Mixed Media Summer 2014

Miami for Families

Miami-based freelance writer and mother Laura Albritton, M.F.A. ’01, has come out with a new guidebook, Miami for Families: A Vacation Guide for Parents and Kids (University Press of Florida, 2014). Exploring eight neighborhoods from a parent’s perspective, she uncovers fun activities around the county and further south in Key Largo and Key West.

Strength in Numbers

New York City-based Pete McGuinness, B.M. ’86, leader of The Pete McGuinness Jazz Orchestra, follows up Voice Like a Horn (Summit Records, 2013) with Strength in Numbers (Summit Records, 2014), proving his own strengths as composer, arranger, leader, trombonist, and, on a few of the album’s ten tracks, singer. LondonJazzNews notes, “A truly inspired and brilliant addition to the modern big band sound while incorporating the traditions that built it.”

Hercules

Dwayne Johnson, B.G.S. ’95, says he took on a grueling eight-month regimen to prepare for his title role in this Brett Ratner extravaganza (Paramount Pictures/MGM, 2014). Based on the graphic novel Hercules: The Thracian Wars, this movie (also in IMAX 3D) begins after the Greek demigod has completed his legendary 12 labors. He now finds himself wielding his sword to help the King of Thrace and his daughter defeat a warlord.

The Tanning of America

Filmmakers Billy Corben, B.S.C. ’04, and Alfred Spellman, ’98, collaborated with ad exec Steve Stoute on a four-part documentary series for VH1 based on Stoute’s best-selling book, The Tanning of America: How Hip-Hop Created a Culture That Rewrote the Rules of the New Economy. VH1’s The Tanning of America: One Nation Under Hip Hop (2014) explores hip-hop culture’s wide-ranging impact during the past 30 years.

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The UM Alumni Association will bestow its highest honors at the 2013 Alumni Awards Ceremony in April. Recipients cited for going above and beyond to serve the U and their communities include alumni Dwayne Johnson, B.G.S. ’95, Barbara Hecht Havenick, A.B. ’72, J.D. ’75, Frederic Guerrier, M.D. ’81, Stuart Ellison, B.B.A. ’70, and Spencer Weinkle, B.S.C. ’07; student Jacqueline Landes, ’13; and UM Provost Thomas J. LeBlanc. Being distinguished as this year’s “Outstanding Affiliate Group” is the College of Engineering Alumni Association. Additional awards will be announced at the event, which is scheduled for Thursday, April 18 at 6 p.m. at the Robert and Judi Prokop Newman Alumni Center.

For more information, visit miami.edu/alumni/umaa/awards.

Dwayne Johnson, B.G.S. ’95
Photo by Tom Stepp

 

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