Independents celebrate from Brooklyn to Southampton

THE PERCH CAFE
Literary Tuesdays, 7:30 PM
FOLLOWED BY OPEN MIC

July 24-Golda Solomon, poet, teacher, and jazz woman extraordinaire, heads the P’0 jazz series at Cornelia Street Café, where she brings together a terrific combination of verse and jazz. Known as “the Medicine Woman of Jazz,” she brings her experiences growing up in Flatbush back to Perch. She will be accompanied by Saco Yasuma on sax. Golda will be sharing the reading with two special guests, poets EJ Antonio and Cheryl Boyce Taylor. It will be an evening flavored with jazz, blues and Trinidadian spices. Hope to see you there!

365 5TH AVENUE PARK SLOPE
F/R Train to 4th Avenue/9th Street (btwn 5th and 6th St.)

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Stupendous performance of MacBeth from Piper Productions, directed by the brilliant John P. McEneny. Grab a blanket claim your stake as Piper Productions presents their Apprentice's Performances performing Shakespeare's Plays.

OLD STONE HOUSE
JJ BYRNE PARK // 3rd St at 5th Avenue // Brooklyn 718.768.3195 // www.alltheworldsastage.org

Wednesday, July 25 6:00pm - Romeo and Juliet
7:30pm - Hamlet

Friday, July 27 6:00pm - Twelfth Night
7:30pm - Macbeth

Saturday, July 28: Shakespeare Extravaganza!
All Day/Evening Performances (2:00pm-10:30 pm)
2:00pm - Twelfth Night
4:00pm - Romeo and Juliet
6:00pm - Macbeth
8:00pm - Hamlet

Please Note: Performances are free and open to the public, but donations are appreciated.
Volunteers are also appreciated. If you're interested, please contact Kim Maier at the Old Stone House, 718.768.3195 or via email.

Audience members are encouraged to come early, and bring a picnic and a blanket to sit on. A concession stand will be available.

The Old Stone House will not be open for touring at performance times. In cases of inclement weather, shows will take place in the 4th Street Auditorium at MS 51, located next door to JJ Byrne Park. Informational messages will be announced on the Old Stone House phone line, 718.768.3195, as well as on the website, www.theoldstonehouse.org. We will attempt to alert you as soon as possible.

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Stages, A Children’s Theatre Workshop, Inc.
presents

A Stages & East End Premiere:
“Seussical” (the Musical)
Southampton High School

Come celebrate The Cat in the Hat’s fiftieth birthday with Stages. The Cat in the Hat and his many friends are sprung from the pages of Dr. Seuss’s books to the stage, in “Seussical, a fantastical musical extravaganz-ical! Oh, the places you’ll go! The Cat in the Hat will guide you on this magical journey from your world to the world of Seuss. You’ll meet Horton, the big-hearted elephant who hears the tiny Whos cry for help from their dust-speck sized world of Who. You’ll meet Gertrude McFuzz, the only inhabitant in Horton’s world, the Jungle of Nool, who believes Horton. You’ll meet Mayzie LaBird and Jojo, Sour Kangaroo, the Grinch, Yertle the Turtle and many more. And the songs that they sing! The dances they dance! “Seussical” is a delightful musical celebration for the whole family.

“Seussical,”
will be performed by the young actors of
Stages, A Children’s Theatre Workshop, Inc.,
at Southampton High School,
141 Narrow Lane

Friday, July 27th at 7:30PM
Saturday, July 28th at 7:30PM
and Sunday, July 29th at 3:00PM

“Seussical” opened on Broadway in 2000, with music by Stephen Flaherty, lyrics by Lynn Ahrens, and book by Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty (“Ragtime,” “Once on this Island”). It was co-conceived by Lynn Ahrens, Stephen Flaherty and Eric Idle (of “Monty Python” fame). Helene Leonard will direct and choreograph Stages’ production of “Seussical.” Musical accompaniment to will be provided by Amanda Jones and James Benard, with sets designed by Goran Petmil, and costumes by Barbara Oldak.

A percentage of the proceeds will be
donated to Southampton Parents for the Arts.

Tickets are $12 for children and $15 for adults.
They are available in advance at
Stevenson’s Toys and Games
68 Jobs Lane
Southampton
or can be reserved by calling
Stages at 631-329-1420

Tickets are also available at the door
on the day of performance.
Don't miss it!

The Cat in the Hat (Raphael Odell Shapiro) will guide you on a magical journey from your world to the world of Seuss in Stages' production of "Seussical" this weekend.

Oh, the places you'll go!

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PRESENTS REDISCOVERED GEMS OF 1970S AMERICAN CINEMA
Six-weekend series includes twenty-two films and appearances by Larry Cohen, Jerry Schatzberg, and Jacob Brackman, July 28 through September 2

The 1970s is widely regarded as a renaissance period for American cinema, a time when young directors revitalized Hollywood with innovative, audacious films that reflected the turmoil and experimentation of the time. From July 28 through September 2, 2007, the Museum of the Moving Image will present a six-weekend, twenty-two film series, Uneasy Riders: American Film in the Nixon Years 1970-1974, that focuses on the lesser-known gems from this period.

The series will include personal appearances by directors Larry Cohen (with Bone) and Jerry Schatzberg (with Puzzle of a Downfall Child), and screenwriter Jacob Brackman (with The King of Marvin Gardens), and films by such directors as Hal Ashby (The Last Detail), Ivan Dixon (The Spook Who Sat by the Door), Monte Hellman (Two-Lane Blacktop), Dennis Hopper (The Last Movie), Barbara Loden (Wanda), and Elaine May (The Heartbreak Kid).

“The 1970s is an incredibly rich period in American cinema,” said the Museum’s Chief Curator, David Schwartz. “This series focuses on the maverick filmmakers who may have been overshadowed by the success of Robert Altman, Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese, and Steven Spielberg.”

The beginning of the 1970s was a turbulent and fertile period for Hollywood. The social upheaval of the 1960s and unrest about Vietnam provided the backdrop for a film industry in economic recession. Before the studios regained their commercial footing with the advent of the wide-release blockbuster, there was a brief period when maverick directors could get studio financing to make edgy, idiosyncratic, and artistically ambitious movies. While the influence of the European art cinema could be clearly felt, these films reflected America’s changing social mores and political anxieties. Some of the movies address concerns about Vietnam and the growing Watergate crisis, and many of them deal with social change through the more intimate prism of changing ideas about marriage, social and gender roles, and the generation gap.

SCHEDULE FOR ‘UNEASY RIDERS: AMERICAN FILM IN THE NIXON YEARS 1970-1974’

July 28-September 2, 2007
Organized by chief curator David Schwartz.
Two-Lane Blacktop
 Saturday, July 28, 3:00 p.m.
1971, 102 mins. 35mm. Directed by Monte Hellman. With Warren Oates, James Taylor, A cross-country drag race structures Monte Hellman’s laconic, existential road movie, an offbeat portrait of the American landscape in the early 1970s. As Hal Hartley described it, “Fixing the car. Driving the car. Trying to impress the girl. The essentials.”

Fat City
 Saturday, July 28, 5:30 p.m.
1972, 96 mins. 35mm. Directed by John Huston. With Stacy Keach, Jeff Bridges, Susan Tyrell. Veteran Hollywood director John Huston drew from his background as a boxer for this gritty, poetic drama about a washed-up fighter trying to make a comeback. Cinematographer Conrad Hall captures a seedy world of musty gyms, cheap bars, and low-rent apartments.

Puzzle of a Downfall Child 
With Jerry Schatzberg in person
Sunday, July 29, 3:00 p.m.
1970, 105 mins. 35 mm. Directed by Jerry Schatzberg. With Faye Dunaway. The directorial debut of fashion photographer Jerry Schatzberg (Scarecrow, Panic in Needle Park) is one of the era’s neglected gems, a stylish tour de force told in nonlinear flashbacks. Faye Dunaway gives a shattering performance as a fashion model living in isolation after a nervous breakdown.

Wanda 
Sunday, July 29, 6:00 p.m.
1970, 100 mins. 35mm. Directed by Barbara Loden. Barbara Loden wrote, directed, and starred in this impressive independent feature about a woman from a mining town who leaves her husband and children because “I’m just no good” and wanders into a world of one night stands and petty crime. Wanda is one of the few major features of its time directed by a woman.

Little Murders
 Saturday, August 4, 2:00 p.m.
1971, 110 mins. 35mm. Directed by Alan Arkin. With Elliott Gould, Marcia Rodd. In an impressive directorial debut, Alan Arkin deftly blends absurdist black comedy and genuine emotion, adapting Jules Feiffer’s play about an apathetic New York photographer reluctantly starting a relationship. “Not for the middlebrow or fainthearted,” warned Variety, “but could go over big with the M*A*S*H crowd.”

Loving
 Saturday, August 4, 4:30 p.m.
1970, 89 mins. 35mm. Directed by Irvin Kershner. With George Segal, Eva Marie Saint. George Segal, a frequent Everyman figure in early-1970s film, gives one of his deepest and finest performances as a commercial artist trying to keep up appearances while juggling an unfulfilling job, a failing marriage, and a troubled affair.

Husbands
 Sunday, August 5, 3:30 p.m.
1970, 154 mins. 35mm. Directed by John Cassavetes. With Peter Falk, Ben Gazzara. Real-life friends Cassavetes, Falk, and Gazzara give powerful improvisational performances in this alternately hilarious and lacerating buddy picture about a trio of boozing, self-loathing suburbanites fumbling towards personal freedom.

Play It As It Lays
 Sunday, August 5, 6:30 p.m.
1972, 99 mins. 35mm. Directed by Frank Perry. With Tuesday Weld, Anthony Perkins. Frank Perry’s adaptation of Joan Didion’s taut novel about a crumbling actress facing bouts of existential despair is filmed in an elliptical style that evokes Antonioni. Painter Roy Lichtenstein was a visual advisor.

The King of Marvin Gardens 
With Jacob Brackman in person
Saturday, August 11, 3:00 p.m.
1972, 104 mins. 35mm. Directed by Bob Rafelson. With Jack Nicholson, Bruce Dern, Ellen Burstyn. “What went wrong?” asks David Staebler (Nicholson), surveying the wreckage in Atlantic City, where organized crime, real-estate schemes, and kinky sex congeal in a faded vision of the American dream. The film, Rafelson’s and Nicholson’s ambitious follow-up to Five Easy Pieces, was beautifully written by Jacob Brackman, who will introduce the screening.

The Last Detail 
Saturday, August 11, 5:30 p.m.
1973, 105 mins. 35mm. Directed by Hal Ashby. With Jack Nicholson, Randy Quaid. Bawdy and boisterous behavior barely conceals the angst simmering beneath the surface of this astute road movie about two sailors taking a young thief to the brig. With Robert Towne’s screenplay, Hal Ashby (Harold and Maude, Being There) creates a poignant portrait of America’s masculine underbelly.

The Heartbreak Kid
 Saturday, August 18, 3:00 p.m.
1972, 106 mins. New 35mm print from the Academy Film Archive. Directed by Elaine May. With Charles Grodin, Jeannie Berlin, Cybill Shepard. “A masterpiece of social pathology,” wrote J. Hoberman of Elaine May’s acerbic variation on The Graduate, in which a young husband and wife get to know—and hate—each other on their honeymoon, as the husband falls for a blonde shiksa.

Drive, He Said
 Saturday, August 18, 5:30 p.m.
1971, 90 mins. 35mm. Directed by Jack Nicholson. With William Tepper, Karen Black. Jack Nicholson’s directorial debut is a campus drama that turns the friendship between an earnest basketball player and his radical roommate into a microcosm of the era. “Very much a film of its time,” wrote Dave Kehr, “charged with all the morbid romanticism of the false optimism of the hippies.”

Charley Varrick
 Sunday, August 19, 3:00 p.m.
1973, 111 mins. 35mm. Directed by Don Siegel. With Walter Matthau. A small-time crook (Walter Matthau, in one of his most hardboiled performances) unwittingly robs a mafia-run bank in this riveting thriller by the director of The Invasion of the Body Snatchers and Dirty Harry.

Play Misty for Me 
Sunday, August 19, 5:30 p.m.
1971, 102 mins. 35mm. Directed by Clint Eastwood. With Clint Eastwood, Jessica Walter, Donna Mills. After a one-night stand with a disc jockey, a fan (Jessica Walter) decides he’ll love her or die. Eastwood’s finely tuned debut pays homage to Psycho and to his mentor Don Siegel, who has a cameo role.

The Crazies
 Saturday, August 25, 3:00 p.m.
1973, 103 mins. 35mm. Directed by George A. Romero. With Lane Carroll, W.G. McMillan. The citizens of a quarantined town, infected by a deadly virus, turn on the military and on each other in George A. Romero’s outrageous Vietnam allegory.

Straw Dogs
 Saturday, August 25, 5:30 p.m.
1971, 118 mins. 35mm. Directed by Sam Peckinpah. With Dustin Hoffman. A vacationing mathematician and his sultry young wife are confronted by rapacious small-town violence in Peckinpah’s harrowing study of machismo. “He is so passionate and sensual a film artist that you may experience his romantic perversity kinesthetically, and get quite giddy from feeling trapped and liberated,” wrote Pauline Kael.

Bone
 With Larry Cohen in person
Sunday, August 26, 3:00 p.m.
1972, 95 mins. 35mm. Directed by Larry Cohen. With Yaphet Kotto. In Cohen’s directorial debut, Bone (Yaphet Kotto) breaks into the home of an affluent Beverly Hills couple. His invasion exposes the deception and anger underlying the couple’s seemingly happy marriage. This provocative satire of American corruption upends stereotypes and defies expectations.

The Spook Who Sat by the Door
 Sunday, August 26, 6:00 p.m.
1973, 102 mins. 35mm. Directed by Ivan Dixon. With Lawrence Cook. In one of the most audacious political films of the “blaxploitation” era, an activist (Lawrence Cook) infiltrates the CIA to learn guerilla war tactics, then takes his skills to the streets of Chicago, forming a revolutionary commando group.
Klute
 Saturday, September 1, 3:00 p.m.
1971, 114 mins. 35mm. Directed by Alan J. Pakula. With Jane Fonda, Donald Sutherland, Roy Scheider. The conventions of film noir mingle with sexual-revolution candor in this archetypal example of 1970s “paranoia cinema.” Jane Fonda won an Academy Award for her complex performance as Bree, a tough-minded prostitute who falls in love with a detective.

Hickey and Boggs
 Saturday, September 1, 5:30 p.m.
1972, 111 mins. 35mm. Directed by Robert Culp. With Bill Cosby, Culp. I Spy co-stars Bill Cosby and Robert Culp re-teamed for this tough thriller about a pair of down-and-out Los Angeles detectives searching for a missing woman in a web of violence, cadavers, and cash. Walter Hill (The Warriors) wrote the screenplay.

Ulzana’s Raid 
Sunday, September 2, 3:00 p.m.
1972, 103 mins. 35mm. Directed by Robert Aldrich. With Burt Lancaster. This complex, probing drama about two U.S. cavalry officers trying to capture renegade Apaches in the 1880s, is one of Aldrich’s best films, and one of the era’s most interesting Vietnam allegories.

The Last Movie 
Sunday, September 2, 5:30 p.m.
1971, 110 mins. 35mm. Directed by Dennis Hopper. With Peter Fonda. The most avant-garde Hollywood feature of its day, Hopper’s post-Easy Rider head trip begins as a fictional western directed by Sam Fuller and becomes a bizarrely imploding comic documentary.

MUSEUM INFORMATION

Hours: Wednesdays & Thursdays, 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Fridays, 12:00 to 8:00 p.m. Saturdays & Sundays, 11:00 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. (Tuesday, school groups only by appointment.)
Film Screenings: See above for schedule.
Museum Admission: $10.00 for adults; $7.50 for persons over 65 and for students with ID; $5.00 for children ages 5-18. Children under 5 and Museum members are admitted free. Admission to the galleries is free on Fridays, 4:00 to 8:00 p.m. Paid admission includes film screenings (except for special ticketed events)
Location: 35 Avenue at 36 Street in Astoria.
Subway: R or V trains (R or G on weekends) to Steinway Street. N or W trains to 36 Avenue.
Program Information: Telephone: (718) 784-0077; Website: www.movingimage.us

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THE PERCH CAFE
Literary Tuesdays, 7:30 PM
FOLLOWED BY OPEN MIC

July 31-Linda Susan Jackson’s first collection of poems, What Yellow Sounds Like was a finalist in the 2006 National Poetry Competition, and was published by Tia Chucha Press in spring 2007. She has published two chapbooks, Vitelline Blues and A History of Beauty, both with Black-eyed Susan Publishing. Most recently, her work has appeared in Ringing Ear, Crab Orchard Review, Brilliant Corners, Asheville Poetry Review, Gathering Ground, Heliotrope and Rivendell, among others. She is a Cave Canem Fellow and a 2007 fellow from the New York Foundation for the Arts. She is an assistant professor and Deputy Chair of the English Department at Medgar Evers College/ CUNY.