Birth nameMarguerite Annie Johnson Birth information4 April 1928, St. Louis, Missouri, USA BioNo information available

President Barack Obama. It's finally official, folks! Barack Obama has been sworn in as our Commander-in-Chief. After all the months of preparation and speculation, millions tuned in and turned out to witness what all the hype had been leading up to. What was Michelle going to wear? How many millions were going to pour down on DC? Which celebs were going to the balls? What inspirational assurances would Barack have to offer? What so many people fail to realize (or just happen to overlook) is that once in a blue moon, a presidential inauguration grants a genuine Poet access to a worldwide stage! Robert Frost in 1961, Maya Angelou in 1993, and in 2009 it was Elizabeth Alexander's time to shine. In honor of her, we decided to take a gander at some highly memorable bard-centered films.... So I Married an Axe Murderer Dir: Thomas Schlamme (1993) Mike Myers ...

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This Valentine's Day weekend, there's plenty to make you want to clutch your significant other tight in the dark -- Isla Fisher wields a credit card, Jason Voorhees puts on his hockey mask one more time and Clive Owen is the quite ridiculous vessel for an entire nation's displaced rage.
"As Seen Through These Eyes"
In the works for ten painstaking years, writer/director Hilary Helstein's debut feature achieves its noble goal -- to tell, in her words, "an uplifting story about the Holocaust" -- by focusing on concentration camp prisoners who made the best of their limited resources and created artwork, many of whom survived the horrors to go on and become internationally recognized artists. Mixing archival footage with candid testimony from the survivors, Helstein presents these remarkable people and their equally remarkable work -- music, art, poetry -- that served then as it served now, as a
Neil Pedley

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January 20, 2009, marked a day which will forever be etched in the minds of those who had the privilege of witnessing it.  A significant part of American history transpired: Barack Obama became the first half-black man to be sworn in as President of the United States since Warren G. Harding.  As a privileged, Jewish Yale graduate who grew up as a dirt-poor black boy, I was very excited for this momentous occasion.
I was moved as Aretha Franklin, a once fiery soul singer of the 60’s, sang as only a now sweet, grandmotherly type could (and with a bedazzled hat to boot!).  And who could forget the poetry?  Oof!  The fucking poetry.  I thought Maya Angelou was bad enough.  Where’d they dig up that broad?  I’m happy she was able to reschedule her reading at Denny’s so she could speak at Barack’s inauguration. 
But back to Obama…

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