C ALENDAR OF Note to readers: This entertainment calendar is a subjective sampling of arts and other events taking place in the Santa Barbara area for the next week. It is by no means comprehensive. Be sure to read feature stories in each issue that complement the calendar. In order to be considered for inclusion in this calendar, information must be submitted no later than noon on the Wednesday eight days prior to publication date. Please send all news releases and digital artwork to slibowitz@yahoo.com)
THURSDAY, JUNE 12 Focus on Film – Greenscreen normally refers to the chroma-key process using a pure green background, which is then replaced with whatever graphics the producer desires. But maybe that definition applies after all to tonight’s eco-conscious student films screening under that title at the Pollock Theater at UCSB – the idea being to replace environmentally damaging behaviors with more earth-friendly practices. All right, that’s a stretch, but at least tonight’s exhibit of five short films created by student filmmakers covering a broad range of environmental issues won’t stretch your wallet – it’s free, and there’s even a reception afterward. WHEN: 7 pm INFO: 893-5903 or www.carseywolf. ucsb.edu/pollock.... The next meeting of the Screenwriters Association of Santa Barbara also takes place Thursday, when Patrick A. Horton, Ph.D. – who is also a paid and optioned writer, screenwriter, script doctor, and member of the Screen Actors Guild – presents a practical guide to emerging forms of storytelling for creative professionals. He’ll speak about ways to effectively merge the creative and commercial aspects of story development and promotion for a more artistically, commercially, and socially viable media. WHEN: 7 pm WHERE: Brooks Institute, 27 East Cota Street COST: free INFO: 617-4503 or www.screenwriterssb.org. Fringe to West End to SB – Back in the 1980s, Sue Turner-Cray’s was told
by her portly booking agent “There are no fat models!” More than 20 years later, the British-born model-actress created the one-woman play Manchester Girl to recount her dizzying odyssey through Tokyo’s highflying 1980s fashion world in what’s been called a vivid journey of hilarious culture clash, discos, drugs, and heartbreak. The play – which won a Fringe First in Edinburgh and also had a successful run off London’s West End – finds Turner-Cray portraying 11 different characters including Manchester girl Sara, who is appalled by the limited life of girls around her – life in a sock factory, boyfriend, pregnancy, and marriage – and aspires to escape her English working-class roots and seek a better life. This drives her to a foreign land to face the hazards and opportunities of life as a western model in Japan, where she struggles to stay a size 2 or risk deportation and sends her on a heroic journey of self-discovery, transformation, and truth. The play’s accessories feature a vintage Geisha kimono and various cinematic elements of city skylines and Japanese wood block art. Images were shot and edited by Turner-Cray and cinematographer Jonathon Millman, and overseen by Academy Award-winning editor Richard Harris (Titanic). The show, which received raves from both the London Times and Los Angeles Times as well as The Huffington Post, stops in Santa Barbara for just three shows on its way to New York. WHEN: 8 pm today through Saturday WHERE: Center Stage Theater,
SATURDAY, JUNE 14 Carpinteria Creations – The Plaza Playhouse Theater’s second Underground Comedy Night brings a whole different batch of up-and-coming professional stand-ups from Southern California to the charming downtown venue. Ahmed Bharoocha, Kiran Deol, Drew Lynch, Paige Weldon, Lizzy Pilcher, and David Sharp have been seen on the stages of well-known clubs like the Comedy Store, The Improv, and The Laugh Factory, and are also fixtures of LA’s thriving independent comedy scene. WHEN: 8 pm WHERE: 5285 Carpinteria Avenue COST: $15 INFO: 684-6380 or www. plazatheatercarpinteria.com.... Carpinteria’s First Annual Blue Dot Sale is “putting the town on sale,” as more than 60 businesses – most of which are owner-operated in the quaint seaside town – offer special prices for the day. For the Blue Dot, so named for its addition of bright blue to the typical “June gloom,” every participating retailer will have its entire store on sale, and restaurants will offer a free item with purchase. More info at www.carpinteriabluedotsale.squarespace.com.... Author Beth Navarro’s children’s book Grambo is about a boy who discovers his grandma is not your average grandma – she’s actually a secret agent! Or at least in his eyes, as grandmas can do anything. The event features story time, secret agent craft, and a book signing. WHEN: 11 am WHERE: Curious Cup Bookstore, 929 Linden Avenue COST: free INFO: 220-6608/www. curiouscup.com or www.bethnavarro.com
36 MONTECITO JOURNAL
EVENTS by Steven Libowitz
THURSDAY, JUNE 12 Knight Moves – The Chumash Casino brings a lot of golden oldies to the Samala Showroom at the back of the gaming floor, but rarely do we get a chance to hear a seven-time Grammy Award-winner in such a small space. Gladys Knight, the so-called Empress of Soul who turned 70 last month, has a catalog of unforgettable hits that date back to her days with the Pips – including “I Heard It Through the Grapevine”, “Friendship Train”, “You’re the Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me”, and the Grammywinning singles “Midnight Train to Georgia” and “Neither One of Us (Wants to Be the First to Say Goodbye)”. But unlike so many of her peers, her success continued even after she transcended beyond the Motown group formed with her siblings and cousins and veered into various other genres. Knight joined Dionne Warwick, Stevie Wonder, and Elton John on the 1986 AIDS benefit single “That’s What Friends Are For,” which reached number one on Billboard’s Pop chart and won her another Grammy. In fact, her two most recent Grammys, in 2004-05, came for gospel albums, and she’s found success in film and TV, too, though we doubt we’ll hear much from those media tonight in what should be a hit-filled and soul-stirring show. WHEN: 8 pm WHERE: Chumash Casino Resort, 3400 East Highway 246, Santa Ynez COST: $55-$95 INFO: (800) CHUMASH (248-6274) or www. chumashcasino.com 751 Paseo Nuevo, upstairs in the mall COST: $40 general, $28 students, seniors, and military INFO: 963-0408 or www.CenterStageTheater.org FRIDAY, JUNE 13 Get The Signal – What better day than Friday the 13th to open a new science-fiction thriller film with indie cred to boot? Santa Ynez-raised, Brooks Institute-educated filmmaker William Eubank, who also cowrote the screenplay with his brother Carlyle Eubank, first made waves with his movie Love, commissioned by, produced and scored by the alternative rock band Angels & Airwaves (the film premiered at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival in 2011). Now he’s back with The Signal, which stars Laurence Fishburne, Brenton Thwaites, Olivia Cooke, and Lin Shaye, involves two MIT freshmen with a passion for hacking on a road journey westward who run into much more than they could have anticipated. The movie opens in select cites, including Santa Barbara, on June 13. Horror-ble Ending – Thirty-year veteran San Marcos High School theater teacher and director David Holmes calls it quits for good by making on a long-standing promise to mount Rocky Horror Picture Show as his retirement opus. More than 80 SMHS performing arts alumni – including Montecito’s Glen Phillips and his Toad the Wet Sprocket band mates members of Dishwalla and actor Garrett Swann – return to the school to take part in the campy musical,
• The Voice of the Village •
with many parts double- and triple-cast to accommodate all those who wanted to pay tribute to Holmes. You’re invited to get in on the fun, too, by dressing in costume and bringing rice and other stuff to toss during appropriate moments of the still-popular cult hit. WHEN: 12 midnight (i.e., early Friday morning) and 7:30 pm Friday WHERE: 4750 Hollister Avenue COST: $25 general, $20 students INFO: 967-4581 or www. shopsmroyals.org SATURDAY, JUNE 14 Master Chorale Sings Broadway – Get ready to tap your toes and bob your head – but no dancing, please – as the Santa Barbara Master Chorale sings the music of Rodgers and Hammerstein, Irving Berlin, and George and Ira Gershwin in a medley of Broadway hits from the 1940s and ‘50s. You’ll be tempted to sing along to oldies such as “There’s No Business like Show Business” and “Love is Here to Stay” and other songs from the golden age of Broadway such as “The Sound of Music”, “Oklahoma!”, and many more. It’s just another leftof-center angle from the chorale’s artistic director and conductor, Steven R. Hodson, professor of music at Westmont College and the president of the Western Division of the American Choral Directors Association (ACDA) who spearheaded the still-reverberating International Choral Conference in town last February. WHEN: 3 pm WHERE: First United Methodist Church, Garden, and Anapamu Streets COST: $22 general, $20 seniors & disabled, $12
12 – 19 June 2014