Page 2 May 12, 2016 TORRANCE TRIBUNE Torrance Cultural Arts Center Event All Events Subject to Change by Presenters Box office hours are from 1pm-8pm, Tuesday-Friday, noon to 8pm on Saturday. Tickets may be purchased over the telephone (using a credit card) by calling 310-781-7171 or in person at the Theatre Box Office. For online ticket purchase: http//www.TorranceCA. gov/TCACTickets. Friday May 13, 7pm City of Torrance Dance and Drill Team presents Spring Spectacular in the James Armstrong Theatre. Tickets are $11/$9. Saturday May 14th, 9:30am-2:30pm The Torrance Community Services Department presents their 17th Annual Senior Faire in the Ken Miller Recreation Center. Free Admission. Saturday May 14, 7:30pm The L.A. South Towns Show Chorus presents “Bling, Swing and the King” with Graceband in the James Armstrong Theatre. Tickets are $25. Tuesday, May 17th, 7pm South High School Band presents the South High Spring Concert in the James Armstrong Theatre. Tickets are $12. For more information call 310-561-4350. Friday, May 20, 1:30pm and 7:30pm The Torrance Police Department hosts The United States 300th Band in the James Armstrong Theatre. Free admission, but tickets are required. Seats are limtied. Sunday, May 21, 7pm North Torrance Youth Musicians Ensemble (NTYME) presents NTYME Spring Concert at the James Armstrong Theatre. Tickets are $10/$15. For more information call 310- 720-7624. Sunday, May 22, 8:30am-6:30pm Japan Musicians Association of California presents Piano Festival 2016 at the James Armstrong Theatre. Free Admission. Wednesday, May 25, 6:30pm The Japanese Educational Resource Center presents World Peace Lecture: Wings of Peace - Sadako’s “Omoiyari” Spirit, Dream Orizuru Project - Sadako and Thousand Paper Cranes in the Toyota Meeting Hall, Admission is $60 at the door $55 if purchased online by May 20. For tickets and further access www.orizuru2015.com or call 310-373-4888. Thursday, May 26, 7pm North High School Dance Department presents their Spring Dance Show in the James Armstrong Theatre. Also on Friday, May 27th, 7pm, Tickets are $10. For more information call 310-938-7033. Sunday, May 29, 11am-4pm A Fairytale Wedding presents Bridal Expo LA “Love is in the Air” in the Toyota Meeting Hall. Tickets are $10. • School Spotlight ‘Sing Street’ is another musical delight from the director of ‘Once’ By Jared Anderson for www.cinemacy.com Sing Street, from the Irish filmmaker John Carney (known for grabbing the attention of the film world in 2007 with the moviemusical smash, Once), takes place during the homestretch of the Cold War, where a group of adolescents come together in the name of fellowship, bonding over the pop culture of the time and a desire to break away from the confines of the tangible. Carney’s previous film, 2014’s Begin Again, was his first film made across the Atlantic, and his new movie sees him return to the streets of Dublin. Sing Street tells the story of our protagonist Cosmo (Ferdia Walsh-Peelo, something of a ringer for Freddie Highmore), who, at the whim of his father (Aidan Gillen, Game of Thrones), enrolls at the local Christian Brothers school, whereupon both his passion for music is awakened by the help of his older brother (Jack Reynor), as well as a desire to start a band to win the heart of the mysterious Ralphine (Lucy Boynton). There is an element of autobiography in Carney’s Sing Street, not unlike the writing efforts from Greg Mottola in Adventureland or Steven Chbosky in Perks of Being a Wallflower. The writer/director Carney’s own musical background does have a notable stint as bassist for the 90’s Irish band The Frames, fronted by his Once star Glen Hansard. Details in this movie, such as his school’s insistence on black shoes, are pages taken directly from his own life, much like how Almost Famous reflects the start of a young Cameron Crowe’s own career in music journalism through the shy, blossoming music aficionado. To that end, Sing Street’s story and character beats are conventional, but organized delicately. This film is a little more innocent than the previously aforementioned, closer to something like the amiable nostalgia of this year’s Everybody Wants Some!!. The catholic schoolboys of Sing Street are right at the onset of puberty, not yet so acquainted with the confusing realities of drugs, sex, mental illness, etc. Not to say that they aren’t troublemakers, but there’s a bright-eyed charm to everything they do. Like in Begin Again, the musical landscape that Sing Street’s characters inherit has quite a verisimilitude. Carney loves to relate the characters’ musical lives to the way they live with everything else. The fertile era of 80’s post-punk and new wave is almost the ideal context in which to do this, with the multiple subcultures inspired by those sounds – punks, goths, mods, and futurists, among others. The result is an ode to how music shapes identity, especially how it gives glory to being a misfit, an underdog, or a despairing romantic that otherwise might not exist. People tend to look at a person’s musical taste as part of a bigger picture, for instance – in a hilarious and poignant moment in the film, Cosmo’s brother warns him that a woman can never truly love a man that listens to Phil Collins. With uplifting heart and real musical energy, Sing Street is a film about discovering the honest music you want the world to judge you by. ‘Sing Street’ is rated PG-13 for thematic elements including strong language and some bullying behavior, a suggestive image, drug material and teen smoking. Now playing in select theaters. • Film Review Sing Street. Photo credit: The Weinstein Company. Torrance Unified School District Wins Major Legal Victory The Torrance Unified School District announced today that in a decision which may significantly affect school districts throughout California, the California Court of Appeal has affirmed the dismissal of six out of seven causes of action in a lawsuit concerning the modernization of Riviera and Towers Elementary Schools through the lease-leaseback project delivery method. The suit was brought by James McGee, a local resident, and the California Taxpayers Action Network (“CTAN”), which appears to be an alter ego for Rick Marshall. Marshall has brought four different lawsuits against the District, losing all of them. In one of the instances, the judge sanctioned Marshall’s attorney for filing frivolous lawsuits. McGee and CTAN alleged that the District violated California Education Code section 17406 by awarding lease-leaseback agreements without seeking competitive bids. In lease-leaseback agreements, school districts lease property they own to a contractor; then the contractor constructs buildings and leases the site and buildings back to the school district. At the end of the leaseback term, title to the site and buildings vests in the school district. Crucially, the Court of Appeal ruled that section 17406 does not require competitive bidding. This is an important ruling not only for the Torrance Unified School District, but for many other school districts, contractors, and taxpayers across the State. In its decision, the Court of Appeal for the Second Appellate District expressly rejected a recent ruling against the Fresno Unified School District by the Court of Appeal for the Fifth Appellate District, which found that lease-leaseback agreements required a genuine lease and contractor financing in order to be exempt from the bidding requirements. According to a column published in September 1, 2015 in the Los Angeles Daily News, the Fresno ruling left “a big mess,” considering over 100 school districts used lease-leaseback agreements in building their schools, with the Los Angeles Unified School District constructing over 70 schools in this manner. The only claim against Torrance Unified School District to survive the Court of Appeal’s recent ruling is one for conflict of interest. The Court of Appeals did not find that a conflict of interest existed. Rather, it merely held that the plaintiffs could return to Superior Court to try to show that a conflict existed. Torrance Unified School District’s attorney, Martin Hom of Atkinson, Andelson, Loya, Ruud & Romo, is very pleased with the ruling. “We were able to dismiss six of the seven causes of action in the lawsuit, and we hope to defeat the remaining claim swiftly,” he said. “School districts shouldn’t have to spend their limited resources defending against these baseless lawsuits. The plaintiffs have now lost their specious arguments that the District violated the Education Code on two separate occasions, and now cling to their unsubstantiated claim that a contractor who offers program management services can be sued for conflicts of interest. In any event, we’ve won a significant victory for our client and for many other California school districts that utilize the lease-leaseback delivery method.” – Provided by TUSD • STARS & STRIPES A M E R I C A N M A D E C L O T H I N G S T O R E COME CHECK US OUT! 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