Official uVu Blog

Star Gazer Lunar Eclipse 2010

A time lapsed version of the Winter Solstice Lunar Eclipse of 2010 as seem from South Florida, courtesy of the WPBT2/Star Gazer team.

 

 

Miami Today Profile- Wendy Kallergis

Growing up in a restaurant family, Greater Miami and The Beaches Hotel Association President and CEO Wendy Kallergis was groomed for a career in hospitality.

As a Le Cordon Bleu-trained chef with past positions in some the area’s top hospitality institutions, Ms. Kallergis’s understanding of the tourism industry led her to the association’s top post over a year ago.

 

 

With successes such as its Green Hospitality Council, Ms. Kallergis is leading the 410-member association into 2011 with plans for membership growth, a new website with hospitality careers and membership directory, growing community partnerships and assisting local hospitality students to enter one of the county’s booming job industries.

“Look at all the hotels that we have now,” she said. “It's exciting to be working here. Miami is a very exciting town to be in right now.”

In an interview with Miami Today reporter Ashley D. Torres, Ms. Kallergis discussed her journey, future growth for the sweet-sixteen association, and the continued strength of the county as a tourism mecca.

The Next Time You See Paris

Paris The Luminous Years

Premieres on WPBT2 on December 23 at 9pm.

 

 

Discover the roots of our modern culture in this new documentary by pioneering filmmaker Perry Miller Adato. The first TV program to tell the story of Paris as vibrant incubator of creativity in the modern arts during the early 20th century (1905-1930), "Paris The Luminous Years" features Pablo Picasso, Marc Chagall, Igor Stravinsky, Ernest Hemingway, Serge Diaghilev, Jean Cocteau, Gertrude Stein, Aaron Copland, Josephine Baker, Marcel Duchamp, Langston Hughes, Sylvia Beach, Henri Matisse, Georges Braque, Vaslav Nijinsky, Joan Miró, Janet Flanner, Tristan Tzara, D.H. Kahnweiler, and many more. These key figures in the art world's first international avant-garde recount why and how Paris transformed them and their work.

Desperately Seeking Gazers

 
Attention all you stargazers out there. We are currently searching for the next Star Gazer host! Do you think you have what it takes? If so, go to our contest page and send us your audition video. Deadline for submissions is February 15, 2011.

For audition script and contest details go to: http://www.wpbt2.org/stargazer/uvu_auditions....html

To submit your video go to:
http://www.uvuvideo.org/special.asp

A Round Heeled Woman

Sharon Gless, known to TV audiences from "Cagney & Lacey" and "Burn Notice" will be performing at the GableStage for the month of January 2011 in "A Round-Heeled Woman."

The project is is one she has been involved with for more than a decade and in this clip she discusses the history of the project, the creative team and what she hopes the south Florida audience will take away from this limited run.

Miami Today Profile - Steve Kaczynski

Navarro Discount Pharmacy, the largest Hispanic-owned drug store chain in the US, is focusing on an aggressive expansion throughout Florida.

Its prescription: to open 22 stores in the next three years.

 

Under the new leadership of Chief Executive Officer Steve Kaczynski, who’s been in this role for almost a year, Navarro is ready to increase its Hispanic market share.

The goal, he said, “being all things to all Hispanics.”

Mr. Kaczynski has worked his way up in the retail industry, going from being a meat cutter and bagger in his youth  to landing top-level executive positions for grocery retailers in the US.

With 28 stores in Miami-Dade, Navarro is ready to take its brand to cities in West and North Florida, Mr. Kaczynski said, including Fort Lauderdale, Orlando and Fort Myers.

A Parisian in America

She was part Lili, part GiGi and all we could have expected when Leslie Caron paid a visit to the Cinema Paradiso in Fort Lauderdale to receive a lifetime achievement award from FLIFF (Ft. Lauderdale International Film Festival).

In addition to a Q & A session and the award presentation, we had a chance to sit with the film legend and discuss her career.

 

 

See more video here

Living Room Theatre

The Living Room Theatre opened on the campus at FAU in Boca Raton. The concept was developed by Ernesto and Diego Rimoch and offers the students an opportunity for real world theatre management experience. The screening rooms will be used by students as classrooms during the day and as art-house screening rooms in the evenings and on weekends, for both the student population and the community at large. In this clip we hear from the founders about the concept of the Living Room Theatre.

 

Miami Today Profile- Ernesto Cambo

Developer Ernesto Cambo is taking off on the next phase of the  mixed-use AVE Aviation & Commerce Center at Opa-locka Executive Airport, a project that is helping revitalize this industrial area.

This is after Mr. Cambo, principal of CPF Investment Group, recently landed a 20-year lease with Banyan Air Service to occupy a soon-to-be-build 135,000-square-foot building.

The Banyan facility, which is to begin construction within the first quarter, is to provide aviation services, including fueling, hangar space, aircraft sales and maintenance.

The company joins tenants such as the United States Postal Service, which occupies a 500,000-square-foot building on the property.

Construction of the aviation and commerce center began in 2007, with three phases completed so far out of 17 planned. Mr. Cambo has 10 to 15 years to develop the project under the long-term lease it has with Miami-Dade County Aviation Department.

“With the post office, we've accelerated our timeline now absorbed some 45% of the project, so we're about three or four years ahead of schedule, considering that we broke ground in 2007 and delivered our first building in the first quarter of 2009,” he said.

With the exiting tenants and those headed to the commerce center, Mr. Cambo said he’s now focused on ushering in eateries and services, such as a café, bank branch and gas station.

Mr. Cambo shared project plans with Miami Today reporter Yudislaidy Fernandez at the property in Opa-locka.  

The Playground Theatre: Knight Arts Challenge winner