Notably generous with atmosphere but parsimonious with explanations for characters’ behavior, Daphne du Maurier’s stories have proven irresistible candy to movie directors – thrice to Alfred Hitchcock alone.
Opens June 23: Before it became a world-wide sensation, there was a reading of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s hip-hop musical about the life of Alexander Hamilton at Vassar. Hamilton went on to win Best Musical and ten other Tonys in its Broadway incarnation.
Almost all of this film was shot inside and immediately outside one of Woodstock’s uninhabited Byrdcliffe houses.
I wanted Wonder Woman to be better than it is. It’s still pretty damned exciting. Go see it by all means, and if you or your friends have daughters, bring them along.
Saturday, June 3: In 2011, Pulitzer Prizewinning journalist José Antonio Vargas outed himself as an undocumented immigrant in an essay published in The New York Times Magazine. The autobiographical documentary film will be followed by a panel discussion.
Friday, May 26: Experimental musician and producer Matthew Cullen brings his unique electronic improvisation to the Hudson Valley with a live score to accompany the screening of the 1962 independent classic film.
The film keeps its focus on the woman herself, and on the apotheosis of her art as loss and suffering hone her core down to diamond hardness of mind and ineffable permeability of spirit.
Saturday, May 20: Of 10 Hairy Legs founder and choreographer Randy James’ work, esteemed dance critic Robert Johnson writes, “Dances that explored the tricky politics of gender rubbed up against a solo that seemed to plead for peace…Ideas ricochet and the atmosphere is exhilarating.”
His office isn’t the kind of place you associate with someone who has produced a clutch of Hollywood and independent films you know and love: The Talented Mister Ripley, Cold Mountain, The English Patient, to name but a few.
Saturday, May 6: Creativity theorist Stephen Nachmanovitch described galumphing in a more positive light, as “the immaculate rambunctiousness and seemingly inexhaustible play-energy apparent in puppies, kittens, children, baby baboons – and also in young communities and civilizations…the seemingly useless elaboration and ornamentation of activity.”