We already know that you love 30 Rock. I mean, how can you not? And since you love 30 Rock so much, we need to tell you about an awesome event coming up at the Keswick Theater. Tracy Morgan will be performing stand up at the Keswick Theater on May 19th. And his stand up really shouldn’t be missed,  because you never know what he’s going to say.

Tickets are on sale now, so get them while you still can! Visit the Keswick Theater’s website for more information.

Tracy Morgan @ the Keswick
May 19th, 2012
www.keswicktheatre.com/?events=tracy-morgan

Keswick Theatre
291 North Keswick Avenue, Glenside, PA
215-572-7650
www.keswicktheatre.com

Our friends over at Urban Playground are bringing Pillow Fight Day back this year, and the battle begins this Saturday. According to Ari at Urban Playground, last year over 150 people came out to wail on one another with pillows. You can scope out a bunch of photos from last year’s event on their official website.

Show up wearing red, blue, green, or yellow so you can be divided up into teams… or, come in costume. And of course, don’t forget your pillow.

The event is free, and a great way to welcome the Spring.

Philadelphia Pillow Fight Day
Saturday, April 7th, 2012, 3PM
www.facebook.com/events/175144349269214

Washington Square Park
6th & Locust, Philadelphia, PA

The return of Spring marks a fantastic time where Cadbury Mini-Eggs are available at Wawa and zombies return to Philadelphia with the Easter Sunday mainstay that is the Philly Zombie Crawl! This year’s event is set for April 8th and offers even more mayhem.

At 6pm, the pre-party kicks off. For $5, you will get a wristband and entry to the TLA for some music brought to you by DJs Kiltboy and Dave Ghoul. Zombie make-up stations will be set-up to perfect your undead look if you don’t come dressed for the occasion.

Come 7:30, zombies are encouraged to join Zombie Jesus as he leads the reanimated droves on a South St bar crawl. Drink specials will combine with ghoulish sights and sounds at the following watering holes: Tattooed Mom, Manny Browns, Lickety Split, Copabanana and The Legendary Dobbs. Entry is free to all the bars but even the undead must pay for food and drinks!

Photo via Grendelsden

The TLA remains open throughout the crawl and at 10pm becomes the location of the official closing party. Kiltboy and Dave Ghoul will continue to spin tunes and the Rigor Mortis Revue will provide burlesque entertainment to stimulate the senses.

The party may end at the TLA at midnight, but beginning at 11pm the after party will commence at Club Fluid, free entry for those with a wristband and $5 for those without. DJ’s John Stanley and Robert Drake will provide the music and keep the lurching masses dancing.

The crawl has grown exponentially and is truly a sight to see. The event is 21+ so be sure to bring your ID (and your best zombie shamble). Don’t miss out on this ghastly Philly tradition!

7th Annual Philly Zombie Crawl
Sunday, April 8th, 2012
www.phillyzombiecrawl.com/crawl_details.html

Pulp Cinema will be screening David and Lisa at Broad Street Ministry on Monday, April 2nd at 7:30pm on 16mm.

David and Lisa, which was based on a book by Theodore Isaac Rubin, is the  strange love story of a girl with dissociative identity disorder and a boy with obsessive compulsive disorder. The broken pair meet in a mental facility and form a very unlikely bond trying to help the each other overcome their psychological shortcomings.

The  independent feature was shot in black and white in and around Philadelphia for $183,000,  was written and directed by the husband and wife team of  Frank Perry and Eleanor Perry.  David and Lisa went on to make over $1,000,000 in its first week of film rentals alone and they were nominated for two Oscars in 1962, for directing and best screenplay.

The screening will be free to the public, please check out the trailer below!

Arguably one of the biggest comics event of 2012, Marvel pits two of its most popular teams against one another to save the world. Avengers vs X-Men is a 12 issue series that written and drawn by some of the most popular artists today.

While you might be able to pick up the first issue on Wednesday, April 4th, why not get it a day earlier and not risk having someone on twitter or ruin the surprises of the story? Many comic shops will be selling the first issue of Avengers Vs X-Men April 3rd at 8pm. Captain Blue Hen in Newark, DE and The Comic Book Shop in Wilmington, DE are two such shops.

Captain Blue Hen Comics and The Comic Book Shop will each host a party based around the team they hope will come out on top.  More information below:

The world’s greatest super heroes enter an unforgettable battle. Avengers—Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Hulk, Black Widow, Spider-Man, and more go up against X-Men—Wolverine, Cyclops, Storm, Magneto and others. Avengers are the big public heroes of the Marvel Universe while the X-Men are underground, outcast mutant heroes. Only one side can emerge victorious!

Captain Blue Hen Comics on Main Street in Newark is on the side of the Avengers. The Comic Book Shop on Marsh Road in Wilmington is on the side of the X-Men. It’s a rivalry for the ages as Earth’s Mightiest Heroes go up against Marvel’s Mutant Misfits.

“The Avengers and the X-men are the two premiere superhero teams of modern mythology- they even have competing movie franchises” says Captain Blue Hen Comics owner Joe Murray.  “It’s an emotionally-charged rivalry that ranks up there with Eagles vs. Cowboys, Yankees vs. Red Sox, Mac vs. PC or Chocolate vs. Vanilla. Fan speculation on the outcome of individual battles will be heated. Obviously the Avengers will win, but it should still be an exciting face-off. Our parties will celebrate the excitement and fun of comics with the atmosphere of the big playoff game.”

For more information on Avengers Vs X-men, you can visit marvel’s website for the event here. For more information, check out the Captain Blue Hen website.

Love the new Chinese film directed by Doze Niu, will be opening this Friday March 23rd at the AMC Cherry Hill for a limited engagement. The film is quite a change of pace for Doze Niu who is probably best known for his 2010 Taiwanese gangster epic Monga. Love stars a few major actors and actress from both China and Taiwan in what can be best described as the Chinese version of Love Actually.

While Love Actually followed 8 different couples, Love only follows 8 different individuals. In the film they are all looking for love in their tumultuous day-to-day lives and by the end of the film their story-lines all seem to intersect in one way or another. I have to admit I have a soft spot for Chinese romantic comedies and this is one of the better ones I have seen in a long time. Love somehow seems to manage a perfect balance of  a tear jerker and rom-com at the same time.

The film stars Qi Shu, who most of us would recognize as the damsel in distress from the original Transporter and Wei Zhao who was the shy baker girl who could make a mean bun from Shaolin Soccer. I thoroughly enjoyed Love and give it 4 out of 5 stars.

The film will be presented digitally for a limited time in Mandarin with English subtitles, in the meantime check out the trailer below.

Bullet in the Head, John Woo’s Vietnam epic, will be screened by our friends over at Medium Rare Cinema at the Broad Street Ministry Friday, March 23rd at 6pm. Bullet in the Head originally started its life out as the sequel to A Better Tomorrow and when they couldn’t get the rights, the film was rewritten as an ode to Apocalypse Now.

The film was a box office bomb in China and was heavily edited to take advantage of Woo’s The Killer and Hard Boiled fame, adding in action sequences and dropping much of the dramatic elements of the film. Medium Rare will be presenting an extended cut of the film they created attempting to recapture the directors intended vision for the film with various deleted material.

Tickets are a mere $5 and there will be trivia, prizes and a post-screening discussion.

The Nerdist are doing two live shows recording their great podcast at our very own Trocadero this coming Friday, March 23rd.

The first show quickly sold out and they quickly added a second show, which is almost sold out as well. If you’re unaware to what The Nerdist is (why are you reading this blog?) simply check out our great interview with one of the hosts of the show Chris Hardwick from a few weeks ago, here.

We have 2 pairs of tickets to check out the Nerdist Podcast courtesy of the great folks over at the Trocadero. Want a chance to win? simply comment by Wednesday with your favorite episode of the Nerdist and why.

The two best answers will be picked Thursday to check out the show for free on Friday. Good luck!

The Penn Museum will be starting their new film series Live From the Archives this Thursday March 15^th at 6pm. The series will showcase some of the folks who are creating new film works using the Penn Museum’s expansive film archives that currently reside on Archive.org.

The first installment is titled Elephant in the Dark: Refractions of Muslim Identity. The screening will take place at the Rainey Auditorium at the Penn Museum. The screening is free and the night will start off at 5pm with a reception with the filmmakers. Check out synopses of the films below, with links to the respective trailers. (more…)

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Have you been watching your friends tweet updates from SXSW and found yourself a little sad you couldn’t go? Well, come join us, Technically Philly, Indy Hall, and Young Involved Philadelphia for a special #whyilovephilly party at Barcade tomorrow night.

Come celebrate with your favorite groups of people who are in the SXSW target demographic but love Philly a little too much to leave. The Barcade folks are going to extend their Happy Hour deals just for us, with $1 off draft beer until 9pm.

For more information, visit the event’s Facebook page. See you there.

#notatSXSW Celebration @ Barcade
Tuesday, March 13th, 2012
www.facebook.com/events/324335397613350

Barcade Philadelphia
1114 Frankford Ave (19125)
(215) 634-4400
www.barcadephiladelphia.com

Photo shamelessly stolen from Visitphilly

Nerd Nite Philly is back again.

This Wednesday, March 14th, swing by Frankford Hall to learn “how to build a nuclear fusion reactor, how to manipulate vast swaths of data to generate art (or whatever your little heart desires), and how to harness the power of the pig nose to become vastly wealthy.”

Along with these awesome lectures, the night will feature performances by local artists Emily Bate and Michael Knight.

As long as the weather is nice, the event will be outside in Frankford Hall’s awesome beer garden. Details on each of the lectures below. See you there!

Nerd Nite Philly
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Doors at 7:00, show at 7:30, $5

Frankford Hall
1210 Frankford Avenue (19125)
(215) 634-3338
www.frankfordhall.com

“DIY Nuclear Fusion or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Particle Physics” by Ian Gallagher. Most of what is heard nowadays regarding advances in high-energy physics takes place in enormous, far-off laboratories that are far removed from our everyday realm; however, this was not always the case. Many advances in our understanding of physics were undertaken by a handful of scientists, often demonstrated using completely self-constructed apparatuses. Several of these experiments can be – and have been – undertaken by resourceful individuals, using what more or less amounts to spare parts. This presentation will highlight a bit of the rich history of nuclear/particle physics, and give a brief overview of how to [safely] construct a nuclear fusion reactor.

“Data as Art” by David Clayton. Data is everywhere, it is constantly being collected, filtered, organized, searched, filed, archived, and deleted. More and more, artists and designers are exploring the unique aspects of data as a mode of creative expression.

“Pigs, Pits and Peccadilloes” by Marcia Pelchat. The nose and mouth are gateways to the body and thus are essential for good nutrition. We also rely on odor cues for social interactions. Yet, as you will discover, everyone has an unique sensory world: Learn about specific anosmias (profound insensitivities to particular aromas in individuals with otherwise normal senses of smell), swine pheromones, and human sweat. Find out what Collette said about truffles and revel in the splendor – and shame – of truffle oil. Experience some revolting odors if you can. Bring tears to your eyes with asparagus pee. Learn whether you can smell your own stench or must leave that to others. What could go better with beer? (P.S. Don’t pass any pig farms on the way home.)

Photo via Grid Philly

Everyone loves a good stake dinner, right?

Sorry, you knew the “stake” pun was coming. And no, this isn’t a post about True Blood. We’re talking about Philly Stake, “a locally sourced, recurring dinner in which money is raised for creative & relevant community engaged projects.” Great! So what does that mean?

It’s like this: Philly Stake throws a dinner at which the meal is made from local foodstuffs. Philadelphians buy tickets to said meal for $10 to $20. Local projects that aim to improve Philly are proposed to diners, who then vote to decide which project will receive the proceeds raised by the meal. So you get to support local farmers and food vendors, eat a tasty meal and select a project intended to improve Philadelphia. Win!

Philadelphians are skeptics. Right now you’re sneering and tossing your chicken wings into the street, growling, “Sure, sounds perfect. But what have they ever really done?” Plenty. You can view the full list of funded projects at the Philly Stake website. Seriously–they’re all good causes, and they’re all local.

So what can you do? Easy: Go eat. The next Philly Stake dinner is Sunday, March 25, from 5pm-8pm at the First Unitarian Church, 2125 Chestnut Street. Tickets will be available online in mid-March for $20 or at the door for $10-$20. Tickets go fast, so if you want to participate, get them early.

And if you happen to be involved in a local project that could use Philly Stake’s support, proposals are being accepted through March 11. You can find details on the Philly Stake website.