Villager photo by Ramin Talaie Tribute to queen of salsa A woman walked her dog past a new mural to Latin singer Celia Cruz at Houston St. and Avenue A, painted by local graffiti artist Chico Garcia. Cruz died last Wednesday.

Freed gets a free pass in judge race
By Lincoln Anderson
Kathryn Freed says she scared off potential rivals. One of her opponent’s campaign managers says they respect Freed too much to challenge her.

Miller backs Mitchell-Lama protection bill
By Albert Amateau
More than 200 residents of Mitchell-Lama housing developments throughout Manhattan came to the steps of City Hall on Tues. July 22 to hear City Council Speaker Gifford Miller introduce legislation aimed at protecting tenants at risk of losing affordable housing when landlords leave the Mitchell-Lama program.

Subcommittee votes to split Hudson Sq. rezoning
By Albert Amateau
The Department of City Planning was only half successful in convincing the City Council zoning subcommittee on Mon. July 21 to approve a proposal to allow residential development in the Hudson Sq. manufacturing district.

Artists and city view permits ruling differently
By Elizabeth O’Brien
Art vendors cheered a federal court decision last week that upheld a lower court ruling against a permitting system for art sellers. But city officials said that the decision would have no bearing on the city’s ability to regulate selling in city streets or parks.

Barber to Villagers and stars hangs up scissors
By Albert Amateau
After 46 years of cutting the hair of Village residents and show business luminaries, Nick Soccodato retired last week.

New Second Ave. stores hope to attract shoppers
By Megha Bahree
Arlette Smolarski, owner of Cooper Brook: A Tea House in a Gallery, on E. 4th St. between Bowery and Second Ave., keeps a sewing machine in the back of her store. It gives her something to do. Waiting for customers the whole day can be a tiring and trying job, especially when you see people walk by uninterested.

OBITUARIES

Henry Thomas Lipman, 87, leader in education for adults and retirees
Henry Thomas Lipman, a longtime Village resident and a leader in adult education at New York University and the New School for Social Research, died June 22 at St. Vincent’s Hospital at the age of 87.

Sara Ann Freed, award-winning writer and editor of mysteries, 57
Sara Ann Freed, an editor of mystery stories and a longtime Village resident who was a member of the Caring Community board of directors, died of leukemia on June 25 in New York Cornell Medical Center at the age of 57.

Iris Olshin, worked in theater as a union projectionist, 53
On June 12, Iris Olshin, a Village resident of 30 years, died after a 13-year battle against cancer. After graduating from Franconia College, N.H., she moved to the Village and worked at the Public Theater, later becoming an International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE) union projectionist.

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‘Macbeth’ brings Shakespeare back home to Lower East Side
By Megha Bahree
This Macbeth has to deal with not only his own ambition and overcome his fear of what the three witches may foretell, but he has to also overcome the sounds of the traffic on the F.D.R. Drive, the boats on the East River and the helicopters that are whirling above. A challenging job for any mortal, but The People’s Theater promises to be up to the task.

Examining Plath’s torments and tormentors
By Jerry Tallmer
When Angelica Torn was a belligerent, unhappy 14-year-old at the United Nations International School, she was told one day she couldn’t go to lunch unless she was carrying a book. She went into the school library, reached up to a shelf, and grabbed “The Bell Jar,” by Sylvia Plath, a work published a few months after Plath’s suicide in 1963, one year before Angelica was born.

Koch on film
By Ed. Koch
Pirates of the Caribbean (-)
I have never missed a Johnny Depp movie, even if it was panned by the critics. I’ve never regretted going so far as I can recall. Now, for the first time, I must admit it wasn’t worth it. Northfork (-) The week began with a flurry of what, appeared to be, a sudden rain of good films in a period of a huge number of bombs. Of all of the movies reviews I read, Northfork seemed to be my kind of film: quirky, interesting and well acted. It is all three, but still a bomb.

Prolific playwright takes on summer comedies
By Davida Singer
With four plays being staged at various Manhattan venues, it’s feeling like a boom summer for writer David Koteles. His latest play, “Dick,” opens at Columbia University’s Schapiro Theater on August 6.

Feminine beauty re-examined
By Davida Singer
Activist dance is what Dixie Lee Shulman calls the productions she’s been concocting since graduate school at the University of Colorado. Her newest spectacle, “The Thinnest Woman with the Fewest Wrinkles Wins”, staged this week at Joyce SoHo, employs 25 women and one man, centers around an unusual beauty pageant and explores Western images of female beauty, including issues of eating disorders and aging.

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