Circus

Your choices in San Francisco hotels are overwhelming. The prices can be too. So during our staff visit to the City by the Bay, we looked for reasonably priced hotels that had charm, location or both. We came back with 14 ideas on places to bed down. It's not a complete list, but it is eclectic, like the city itself. Mystic Hotel. This property, which opened in April, stands on a tunnel-adjacent block of Stockton Street that you'll never see on a picture postcard, yet it has style, as do the Burritt Tavern bar and restaurant downstairs.

It's not accurate, exactly, to say that I've been waiting for James Vance and Dan E. Burr's graphic novel “On the Ropes” (W.W. Norton: 248 pp., $24.95) -- until I saw a copy, I had no idea that it was coming out. But it is the case that Vance and Burr's first book, “Kings in Disguise,” first published in 1988, is one of my favorite graphic novels - a stark bit of social realism tracing the travails of a 12-year-old named Freddie Bloch as he wanders through the Depression - and with this new work, which picks up the story in 1937, the creators have outdone themselves.

'Circus' Where: KCET When: 9:30 p.m. Wednesday Rating: TV-PG (may be unsuitable for young children)

Melanie Kramer insists she's no thrill-seeker. She's a practical single mom who gets squeamish even at the thought of, say, riding a roller coaster. Still, a girl's got to do a few dicey, death-defying things to get work in this town in her chosen profession of circus arts. Kramer has had knives thrown at her, pyrotechnic explosions set off in her face, swords thrust into a box when she's curled up inside - not to mention having cigarettes knocked from her lips by a man with an evil-looking bullwhip.

As a practicing clown for 30 years I say in all seriousness, and with all due respect for all parties involved: To label the "Trial of the Century" a "circus" is an insult to the circus. KEN S. GOSSELIN "Dolly the Clown" San Fernando

The Zoppe Family Circus sends in the clowns for this modern update of the classic Italian circus tradition. Expect acrobatics, magic, equestrian stunts and sundry foolishness with the old-Europe charm. Carpenter Performing Arts Center, 6200 Atherton St., Long Beach. 7 p.m. Thur. $20-$25. http://www.carpenterarts.org

When it comes to messy politics -- and old-fashioned entertainment -- it's hard to top the theatrics of the relatively young democracy in Ukraine. Here are a few choice moments from the presidential campaign that ended with Sunday's runoff election: While on a campaign stop in the western city of Lviv -- an area typically unreceptive to his historically pro-Russia politics -- candidate Viktor Yanukovich had an embarrassing slip of the tongue, Ukrainian...

ELMONT, N.Y.---It is 30 minutes before the news conference that will tell the world that Triple Crown contender I'll Have Another will not race in the Belmont Stakes on Saturday. The scene outside of the barns where they put the horses -- attracting every camera, microphone, tape recorder and notepad within 20 miles of Elmont, N.Y. -- has now become a circus. There is a barricade with reporters seven-deep awaiting the arrival of I'll Have Another's trainer, Doug O'Neill, and owner, J. Paul Reddam.

It's not accurate, exactly, to say that I've been waiting for James Vance and Dan E. Burr's graphic novel “On the Ropes” (W.W. Norton: 248 pp., $24.95) -- until I saw a copy, I had no idea that it was coming out. But it is the case that Vance and Burr's first book, “Kings in Disguise,” first published in 1988, is one of my favorite graphic novels - a stark bit of social realism tracing the travails of a 12-year-old named Freddie Bloch as he wanders through the Depression - and with this new work, which picks up the story in 1937, the creators have outdone themselves.

The favelas of Brazil are a familiar screen subject, and one not readily associated with showbiz whimsy. But a Rio neighborhood's unlikely big top is front and center in the effectively straightforward "Without a Net. " Kelly Richardson's debut film benefits from her considerable access to four young acrobats, each finding new purpose in the circus and envisioning a life beyond poverty. Social activist Junior claimed an abandoned lot in the city's Praça Onze section to illegally set up a circus school, aiming to break the drugs-and-crime pattern for local kids.

PARK CITY, Utah - Come to the Sundance Film Festival and there's a good chance you may never make it into a theater, because there's plenty of drama to keep one entertained elsewhere, most of it along this mountain town's Main Street. A camel strutted up the thoroughfare Friday, joining the usual caravan of black Cadillac Escalades that ferry celebrities to and fro. The dromedary was part of a publicity stunt for a movie that wasn't even playing in the festival, and police promptly showed up to move the ship of the desert off the main drag.

The Times' editorial Monday on the L.A. City Council's proposed ban on elephants performing in traveling shows such as circuses paints a romantic picture of elephants as gentle giants. The editorial board seems to buy into the animal extremists' idealistic scenario of happy, fat pachyderms lazily wandering the open plains of Africa or the jungles of Asia, free of disease and conflict with humans. The reality is far grimmer. The "wild" left for these magnificent animals is rapidly disappearing.

COLUMBUS, Ohio - Voting may once have been serious, private and limited only to wealthy landowners, but, these days, it's a multiday circus complete with food trucks, traffic jams and a parking lot where Abraham Lincoln is frenemies with an anti-abortion activist. That, at least, is the scene in Columbus, where early voting has been open since Oct. 2, and the booths were so mobbed Friday that people had to park in the grocery store lot next door. Voters streamed in and out of the building, getting in their cars in the frigid October afternoon, then finding themselves unable to move because of the traffic.

On the wall in the Pasadena headquarters of the Goldstar ticket service is a concert poster from a decade ago, framed with the will call list showing the names of every Goldstar customer who bought tickets to the show. Both of them. There were just two customers for the first event the fledgling ticket company offered, a dramatic contrast with the 3 million who are now Goldstar members. Many of them are drawn by the 50% discount that Goldstar Events Inc. routinely offers on tickets to rock and pop concerts, plays, traveling circuses, Dodgers and Angels baseball games and other sporting and live entertainment events.

The favelas of Brazil are a familiar screen subject, and one not readily associated with showbiz whimsy. But a Rio neighborhood's unlikely big top is front and center in the effectively straightforward "Without a Net. " Kelly Richardson's debut film benefits from her considerable access to four young acrobats, each finding new purpose in the circus and envisioning a life beyond poverty. Social activist Junior claimed an abandoned lot in the city's Praça Onze section to illegally set up a circus school, aiming to break the drugs-and-crime pattern for local kids.

It's impressive enough when Travis Pastrana hydroplanes his dirt bike across a swimming pool. But it's really something when, just like a motocross Jesus, the 28-year-old extreme sports superstar pushes the limits of his two-wheeled trajectory, crossing the pool, then jumping down a concrete wall, then a kiddie pool, before landing on an idyllic Panamanian beach. Pastrana is one member of Nitro Circus, a collective of athletes from the motorcycle, bicycle and skateboard worlds who attempt seemingly impossible stunts and often succeed.

Ron Artest sees the commotion caused by newlywed celebrity Lamar Odom and internationally recognized Kobe Bryant, and thinks, " This is a media circus? Really?" He chuckled when asked whether the goings-on at Lakers training camp are a distraction. "I'm always trying to be in the media anyway. I'm always trying to do things to stay out in the public, stay relevant," he said. "That's my history, of being a distraction to the team." Two days into camp, there have been plenty of diversions, none involving Artest.

Often, criticism reveals most about the critic. By calling Harold Ezell a "two-bit ringmaster" in a "media circus," The Times revealed itself as bigoted and abusive. What's more, by stooping to invective, The Times has forfeited its credibility. A public apology to Harold Ezell is in order. ARTHA WILBER Orange

Oscar-winning filmmakers Michael Moore ("Bowling for Columbine") and Davis Guggenheim ("An Inconvenient Truth") are superstars of the documentary world. But most documentarians have a difficult time getting their films into theaters. The idea of recouping the cost of their films, let alone turning a profit, is almost unheard-of. The International Documentary Assn. gives small documentaries a boost with its annual DocuWeeks Theatrical Showcase. Now in its 16th year, the program helps feature-length and short documentaries qualify for Oscar consideration by giving them limited theatrical runs in Los Angeles and New York, and shines a spotlight on films that distributors and audiences might never otherwise hear of or see. The L.A. lineup, which opens Friday and continues through Aug. 30 at the Laemmle NoHo7, features 17 feature-length documentaries and two shorts.

If you're already familiar with the motorcycle-jumping, car-crashing, body-banging brand of extreme sports marketed and practiced by the team Nitro Circus through its television show, then you might be predisposed to enjoy "Nitro Circus: The Movie 3D. " Though decidedly not for everyone, "Jackass," both the TV series and the movies Johnny Knoxville and his team made, had a sharply wry sense of narrative, showmanship and subversion. By contrast, "Nitro Circus," opening Wednesday, remains firmly planted in the realm of the inarticulate dude-bro, where shirtless men gleefully engage in physical acts of self-inflicted pain without a trace of real self-awareness or understanding.