Also this issue: Star Turn The NY season is off to a celeb-packed start.That's not always a good thing. -Toby Zinman Tune In This just in: Hairspray's not the only musical on Broadway this season. -David Anthony Fox Stones in His Pockets -Toby Zinman Philadanco -Janet Anderson CafŽ Puttanesca -Juliet Fletcher Kumquat Dance Collective -Janet Anderson Waking Dreams -Kristina Weise The Trojan Women -David Anthony Fox

November 21-27, 2002

artpicks

Sex Workers Art Show

The whole idea of hos and pimps making good is as old as Mary Magdalene and as cold as Notorious B.I.G. Whether treated as a caustic cabaret experience or a true-to-life rendering of gut-pouring perf art and poetry, this troupe of alterna-sex-sorts -- Warhol acolyte Penny Arcade, blues belter Candye Kane and regulars like Carol Queen, Isis Rodriguez, Scarlot Harlot, Michelle Tea, Leslie Bull, Spider, Emi Koyama, Annie Oakley, Carmen Li and Gina Gold -- is certain to bug you one way or another. From all reports, the show, consisting of slides, films, erotic dances, mimes, rants and songs is, on occasion, little more than a cheap me-me plea for help -- a self-serve heal-a-thon more therapeutic than aesthetically attuned. Having made the acquaintance of Arcade's stand-up, Kane's tunes, Tea's literary works and filmmaker Harlot's bold strokes -- in the name of AIDS activism, same-sex relationship rights or good old-fashioned fucking -- there is a testament to true tart talent: artists whose day jobs just happened (or still happen) to be balling for bucks. Like my dad says, "at least they're not waitering."

Sat., Nov. 23, 7 p.m., $10, The Five Spot, 5 Bank St., 215-574-0070.

—A.D. Amorosi