In his new film, Zach Damon shares the rich history of disability advocacy in Ann Arbor.

The director explores 70 years of local advocacy in Resilience Revealed: Ann Arbor’s Disability Legacy, which highlights the city’s foundational role in shaping the broader disability rights movement.

“Honestly, disability is something I have a great deal of experience in,” said Damon, who was born with cerebral palsy and grew up in Ann Arbor.

“And as a filmmaker, when an opportunity comes along to make a film about what you know, you have a duty to make work that can give a glimpse into what that is and what came before you to enlighten others.”

Through personal narratives, historical accounts, and expert insights, the 24-minute film examines the building blocks of Ann Arbor’s disability rights legacy, emphasizing its significance within the community and its impact on future generations.

This story originally ran on July 17, 2019. We're rerunning it on what would have been Asheton's 77th birthday.

July 17 is Ron Asheton’s birthday. He died in 2009 at the age of 60, but not before he and the band he helped make famous had one last run when The Stooges reformed in 2003.

The Stooges arose from the rich musical compost of the Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti area in the late 1960s and while the classic original lineup (Asheton on guitar, his brother Scott Asheton on drums, Dave Alexander on bass and Iggy Pop as frontman) only lasted a few glorious, intense years, the racket they made proved durable. They were a quartet of teenage cavemen with four chords between them, amps set for aggression, gnawing at the deepest atavistic urges of the human animal. Like all geniuses, they were unappreciated in their day but went on to inspire generations of future primitives around the globe and made punk rock inevitable. 

After the Stooges, Ron Asheton enjoyed a long music career with bands such as Destroy All Monsters, New Race, and Dark Carnival. He passed away from a heart attack shortly after a high-profile Stooges reunion. The man’s legacy in the annals of rock history is secure, legitimized by no less an “authority” as the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, but that isn’t the reason we’re here. 

What is discussed less about Asheton is his acting career, which found him playing both major and minor roles in five low-budget, locally sourced horror films shot in Michigan between 1988 and 1995. From all reports a genuine fan of the genre, Asheton holds his own in these cheap, gory, and frankly ridiculous films, sometimes emerging as the most believable actor on the screen (the competition is hardly stiff). He’s unrecognizable as a former rock guitar mangler, opting instead for a somewhat schlubby onscreen persona, sometimes as comic relief or second banana to a more traditional lead. 

So in honor of Asheton’s birthday, let’s review his filmography:

This story originally ran on May 21, 2025. We're rerunning it because "Hometown Summer" will be at the Michigan Theater again on Saturday, July 12, with screenings at 7:30 pm and 9:30 pm.

Comedies come in cycles. There was a time in the late 1990s and continuing through the early 2010s when movie theaters regularly welcomed rated-R-for-raunchy flicks with over-the-top humor. 

But as social mores changed, and movie theaters struggled to get people into their buildings, many of those movies went straight to streaming.

Wolverine Productions' Benjamin Vomastek misses when salty comedies with no-holds-barred japes populated the cineplex, and the University of Michigan grad is doing his part to bring them back.

Vomastek's film debut, 2024's Rosetta Stoned, filmed in Ann Arbor on a $30,000 budget, features a pothead who convinces a socially awkward classmate to exchange homework answers for weed. 

The new Hometown Summer, also filmed in Tree Town, premieres at the Michigan Theater on Thursday, May 22, at 7:30 pm. The cast and crew will appear after for a Q&A session.

In Hometown Summer, three young pals spend the warm months in Ann Arbor, and all kinds of mayhem happen when they get mixed up in a crazy business plan and indulge in all sorts of vices.

Vomastek makes no secret that his films are indebted to outrageous comedies of the past, such as Superbad and There's Something About Mary, so I asked him to discuss some movies that were direct influences on Hometown Summer.

"Each of these films carries a theme of human authenticity and realism that has inspired me as a filmmaker," Vomastek said.

The Blox, a competitive web show for entrepreneurs, might be closer to Fear Factor than Keeping Up With the Kardashians as far as reality television goes.

The web show’s focus on public speaking, spur-of-the-moment pitching, and an intensive point system are enough to challenge anyone, especially Rick Coughlin.

Coughlin, co-founder and co-owner of Ypsilanti’s Grove Studios, a 24/7 rehearsal space and recording studio, said appearing on season 16 of The Blox was a well-needed “kick in the teeth.”

“You’re standing in front of all your peers, the guy that’s doing $5 million a year, and the woman who just started her dog business, and they’re all looking at you,” said Coughlin, a musician who co-started Grove Studios in 2017 and now runs it with business partner Breck Crandell.

“You have to deliver something that makes sense, and then a coach pokes holes in everything that you said. You get grilled for another half hour or so, and then you rinse and repeat for seven days. And there [are] cameras everywhere all the time.”

"Well, it's 1969, OK
All across the USA"
—The Stooges, "1969"

John Norman Collins was arrested in Ypsilanti on July 31, 1969, for the murder of Karen Sue Beineman, an 18-year-old student at Eastern Michigan University. It made national news because a serial killer had haunted Washtenaw County since 1967, and eventually Collins was under suspicion for five other Michigan murders (as well as one in California).

But the story was knocked out of the country's consciousness just over a week later when Charles Manson and members of his cult killed seven people on August 8-9, including pregnant actress Sharon Tate, the wife of acclaimed director Roman Polanski.

The Manson murders were a cultural touchstone that some think helped usher out the hippy era, making way for a grittier 1970s where the idea of peace and love were swept into the dustbin of history.

This overall portrait of America in transition is the backdrop for director Andrew Templeton's new documentary, 1969: Killers, Freaks, and Radicals, which makes its Michigan debut on Friday, May 16, at Cinetopia Ann Arbor (Michigan Theater and State Theatre, May 15-18). It features new interviews, vintage footage, and re-creations.

The film focuses on Collins' crimes, but unlike John Keyes' 1974 book The Michigan Murders, Templeton analyzes the story through the lens of social upheaval and how the local police force stumbled through its investigation by targeting the "freaks and radicals" when looking for suspects.

Barbara Neri has worked to get her movie, Unlocking Desire, made for several years while dealing with the pandemic, writers’ and actors’ strikes, and her own busy schedule.

And she's still working on it.

"I've more than one thing going on, so it’s not the only iron in the fire,” said Neri, an Ann Arbor creative who has worked in dance, theater, performance art, and education in addition to being a writer, visual artist, and filmmaker. “I try not to think of the amount of time too much, because I think things will happen when they’re going to happen. … But it’s a wild ride. … Some projects take 10 years, so you just have to stay in the moment as much as possible. That’s really what I try to do, and enjoy the journey, enjoy each step.”

Unlocking Desire, which won the Marfa Film Festival's best screenplay award in 2017, tells the story of an institutionalized woman who believes she’s Blanche DuBois, Tennessee Williams’ tragic heroine from A Streetcar Named Desire. Blanche grows convinced that another inmate, Raoul, is Allan Grey, the young man she married as a teenager, and whom she later found in bed with another man.

In Williams’ play, Blanche’s reflexive disgust in the moment leads to Allan’s suicide, but in Unlocking Desire, Raoul is a gay man whose failed suicide attempt causes his wife to institutionalize him.

When the Independent Film Festival Ypsilanti (iFFY) was announced in January 2020, it was scheduled to take place at the Riverside Arts Center that April. A big worldwide something happened the month before, however, and the iFFY crew had to improvise, and the festival was held online and as a drive-in screening in a parking lot.

In other words, iFFY is malleable, and for this year's edition—which will run at the Riverside Arts Center, April 17-19—the festival welcomed changing things up a bit.

“Transformation and germination is really central to the festival this year," said iFFY co-director Micah Vanderhoof in a press release. "As the festival moves into its sixth year, we’re aiming to cultivate those elements which have resonated with the community and fostered a sense of connection, and incorporate new ideas and suggestions as we go. We hope to provide a space to share new perspectives, become inspired, and grow as artists, while remaining uniquely reflective of our Ypsilanti community.”

While iFFY brings in films from around the world, it also highlights some creatives here at home by kicking off the fest with Michigan-ish (April 17, 7:30 pm), a selection of short films made in our state—three of which were shot entirely or partially in Washtenaw County:

The party was going on too late, with people milling inside my Ypsilanti group house way past when my roommates and I wanted them there. Gentle prods of "Time to go home" and "Get the hell out" were unheeded by the bad-beer masses, so it was going to take a sonic bouncer to clear the joint.

That's when we played Devo's "U Got Me Bugged" at energy-dome-shattering volume, utilizing the CD player's repeat function for the maximum annoyance we could wring out of a song that runs 2 minutes and 49 seconds. I don't recall how many times we played "Bugged"—a modular-synth squelch-fest revealed on the then newly released Hardcore Devo: Hardcore Devo: Volume Two, 1974-1977, which collected demos and experiments from the Akron, Ohio surrealists who were still years away from the mainstream success of 1980's "Whip It."

But I do remember "Bugged" worked like a can of Raid made from waveforms, making our unwanted guests (and perhaps some wanted ones) scurry off into the night.

The Monday Mix is an occasional roundup of compilations, live recordings, videos, podcasts, and more by Washtenaw County-associated artists, DJs, radio stations, and record labels.

This edition features an interview with Kerrytown Concert House's Artistic & Executive Director Monica Swartout-Bebow on Michigan Creates; a chat with Ann Arbor cellist Thor Sigurdson on Music Un-Tuxed; two short promo videos for Ann Arbor Art Center's 2024 public art projects; Blue LLama concert live streams; and the numerous arts documentaries created for the Ann Arbor 200 birthday celebration.

If you're an Ann Arbor District Library cardholder, you receive a weekly email newsletter listing news, upcoming events, and a slew of recommendations from the catalog. Those recs are also available at aadl.org/reviews, and we're always happy to make suggestions for books, audiobooks, streamable content in the catalog, DVDs, board games, tools, etc. if you visit us at the branches.

But our 2024 Staff Picks allow the AADL crew to go beyond the library catalog—and the calendar year.

We don't limit our year in review to things that came out in 2024 or that can be checked out from AADL; the staff comments on whatever favorite media and events they experienced this year, no matter when or where they originated. Maybe a favorite album of 2024 came out in 1973, or the best book someone read this year is so old that it's out of copyright. It's all good, and it all counts.

Here are the categories of AADL's 2024 Staff Picks: