Wonderland

The first and enduring impression made by the exhibit "100 Years of Images of Alice: A Wonderland of Books, Prints and Ephemera" at Longwood Gardens is how images from Lewis Carroll's featured classics Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There (1872) intrude on one's private life. Such artistry doesn't just exist objectively, either to be praised or dismissed. It also contains uncomfortable overtones of mysterious power. Its basic slant and air of fierce secrecy beneath a jovial exterior give off vibrations of unease.

Hello? ABC? Wake up! Last week I wrote, "Wonderland . . . is the thinking person's ER. " I mean, come on. You think the Wall Street Journal or the Los Angeles Times wrote a better line for you to use in your endless promotions? "Critics are calling Wonderland 'the thinking person's ER,' " you could say, and then show a line plugging The Inquirer, or even (shiver) me, personally. Most critics get a little charge out of seeing their stuff quoted on TV, but most, including me, won't go out of their way for the plug.

Alice in Wonderland will be performed by the ArtReach Touring Theater of Cincinnati at 7:30 p.m. tomorrow at Upper Darby Performing Arts Center. The show will present the classic story of Alice as she encounters the White Rabbit, the Mad Hatter, the Cheshire Cat and the mean Queen of Hearts. The show is recommended for children ages 4 and up. Tickets are $5 for reserved seats, $4.50 for general admission, and $2 for senior citizens. The box office is open from 2:30 to 6 p.m., Monday through Friday.

The month will also be filled with special programs, including a display of books by Lewis Carroll, author of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, plus theater presentations, children's craft workshops, lectures, demonstrations and live music. The festival will run through Dec. 1. All events are included in the gardens' regular admission fee. A program brochure is available by sending a self-addressed stamped envelope to Chrysanthemum Festival, Longwood Gardens, P.O. Box 501, Kennett Square 19348-0501.

Well, it's dawn in Care-A-Lot, the multihued hamlet that is home to those lovable Care Bears and lovable Care Bear Cousins. Yup, the sun is creeping over the purply hills, birds are tweeting in their trees, pillowy cloud balls are scudding across the sky. Natalie Cole (that's right, she's one of the Care Bears' fave chanteuses) is chirping "Rise and Shine. " Hunky-dory, all right. But wait, what's this? Some weird rabbity creature crashes through a looking glass (from the inside!

"The time has come," the critic said, "to talk of TV things, "Of sweeps and stars and ratings stunts "And Rosses, twins and Lings, "And which big show made lots of bucks: "The '60s, or Stephen King's?" "Wait a bit," the readers cried. "That's not what we had planned! "We want to know if we should watch Alice in Wonderland. " Well, if you positively insist, I suppose I have no choice, though I can't imagine why anyone should not want immediately to get to the important blowhard business matters.

Jacques Rivette's enchanting Celine and Julie Go Boating (1974) is like Alice in Wonderland cut with hallucinogens. Two modern Parisiennes - dusky Juliet Berto and bouncy Dominique Labourier - experience something like a Vulcan mind meld when they take throat lozenges and fall through a rabbit hole into a gloomy mansion where a blond preteen girl is held hostage by her feuding parents. Their mission, should they choose to accept it, is to save the girl - and by extension, their own girlishness.

MILLVILLE, N.J. - Stanley "Chick" Meischke was in an extra-celebratory Christmas mood a few months after the arrival of his first son, so he strung holiday lights around the door of the family's cottage on Glade Road near the Delaware Bay in Maurice River Township. "I had just been born, and I guess he was happy," said Chick Meischke Jr., now 40. "It's just that he got carried away with it over the years. " Each year, the elder Meischke added more lights, more lawn figures, more of everything.

With DJ culture and electronic music at their twin peaks, Steve Aoki is taking full advantage of the heights. The spinner, producer, and Dim Mak label owner tours nonstop and constantly hunts down new acts to sign, so much so that it made it difficult for him to finish his long-awaited Wonderland . Costarring pals such as LMFAO, Rivers Cuomo, and Travis Barker, along with new friends like Philly's Chiddy Bang, Aoki's "official" artist debut almost...

With DJ culture and electronic music at their twin peaks, Steve Aoki is taking full advantage of the heights. The spinner, producer, and Dim Mak label owner tours nonstop and constantly hunts down new acts to sign, so much so that it made it difficult for him to finish his long-awaited Wonderland . Costarring pals such as LMFAO, Rivers Cuomo, and Travis Barker, along with new friends like Philly's Chiddy Bang, Aoki's "official" artist debut almost...

MILLVILLE, N.J. - Stanley "Chick" Meischke was in an extra-celebratory Christmas mood a few months after the arrival of his first son, so he strung holiday lights around the door of the family's cottage on Glade Road near the Delaware Bay in Maurice River Township. "I had just been born, and I guess he was happy," said Chick Meischke Jr., now 40. "It's just that he got carried away with it over the years. " Each year, the elder Meischke added more lights, more lawn figures, more of everything.

In Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland , the heroine falls down a rabbit hole into a confusing fantasy world. If he were writing today, Carroll might have placed Alice in the 66th General Assembly of the United Nations, where Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas plans this week to seek U.N. recognition of statehood. If Alice was perplexed by the Mad Hatter or the Queen of Hearts, it would be interesting to see her reaction to a president with a long-expired mandate who is afraid to visit parts of the territory for which he seeks statehood.

So what can city folks do to entertain their kids on an uninspired weekend afternoon? Break out the sneakers, pack some drinks, and hit the road for a Philadelphia Fountain Tour. From Society Hill toward West Philadelphia, you can follow a trail of spectacular, serene, and charming fountains around town. You'll find all sorts of people relaxing by fountains - office workers eating lunch, construction guys sitting on the ground, parents with toddlers in tow, retirees reading, visitors mugging for the camera.

Bill Cunningham New York Terrifically entertaining and insightful documentary about the intrepid New York Times photographer whose "On the Street" column celebrates high fashion, inventive style, and all that is New York - from the rich and swell to the poor and natty. A movie that celebrates photojournalism and clothes, to be sure, but also one that celebrates individualism, integrity, urban living, street art, magazines and newspapers, and the absolute essentialness of a vintage three-speed bike.

Four days before opening night, the Performing Arts Youth Theatre company in Springfield Township, Delaware County, was having the kind of rehearsal that would make any observer doubt the show would go on. The White Rabbit was sitting in the audience when she should have been standing stage right. The Four and Six of Clubs missed their cues. The Mad Hatter forgot his stopwatch. Loretta Wehbe, 72, the company's cofounder, stood in the center of it all. Script in hand, she started doing what she's done for 27 years - making it work: "Louder.

"Obviously," the actress Mia Wasikowska says, "I've been in the right place at the right time. Again and again. " That began before Tim Burton plucked her from obscurity as the Alice he wanted for his "Wonderland. " She did a no-budget Southern gothic drama, "That Evening Sun," with Hal Holbrook, that garnered her an Indie Spirit Award nomination for playing "poor white trash. " "Love Southern gothic, Southern accents," the native Australian says. "I can't wait for the chance to do another.

1. The Book of Eli . (R) 2. When in Rome (PG-13) 3. From Paris With Love . (R) 4. Alice in Wonderland . (PG) 5. Youth in Revolt . (R) 6. Shutter Island . 1/2 (R) 7. The Wolfman 1/2 (R) 8. Unthinkable (R) 9. Valentine's Day . (PG-13) 10. Dear John . (PG-13) Top DVD titles at U.S. Blockbuster stores for week ended June 20. ( New this week)