The TCM cable channel is celebrating its 20th birthday as a network, and complimenting this event is the fifth anniversary of the TCM Classic Film Festival set for April 10 through 13 in the heart of Hollywood.

April is a great time to visit the iconic venues of the Egyptian Theatre and Grauman’s Chinese Theatre. I am still calling it Grauman’s even though some faceless corporate entity has shamefully renamed it the TCL Chinese Theater, showing a lack of respect for a great tradition.

The festival itself is nicely timed to coincide after the release of the latest “Captain America” Marvel film, with maybe only the opening of Kevin Costner’s “Draft Day,” appealing to NFL fans, as a box office competitor.

“Family in the Movies: The Ties that Bind” is the central theme for the 2014 TCM Classic Film Festival, which vaguely proposes to summon its family of movie lovers from around the globe to come to Hollywood for a cinematic celebration of the ties that bind us together.

Festival passes don’t come inexpensively, and so you have to wonder if the family theme is all that accurate.

On top of that, one of the featured films is “Blazing Saddles,” Mel Brooks’ outrageously spoof of Western cinema. Wildly hilarious, a family friendly film it is not.

One of the festival highlights will be Mel Brooks in attendance for the screening of his comedy classic. Hopefully, he may provide an update on taking “Blazing Saddles,” as he did with two previous films, to Broadway as a musical comedy.

On his own Web site, Brooks has announced the May 6 release of a new 40th Anniversary Blu-ray edition of “Blazing Saddles,” highlighted by a new featurette “Blaze of Glory: Mel Brooks’ Wild, Wild West” in which he reflects on his own movie-making chutzpah.

Additional features on the Blu-ray will include 10 quotable art cards with funny quotes and images from the film, plus vintage extra content including Brooks’ commentary, cast reunion documentary, and “Black Bart,” the 1975 television pilot inspired by the movie.

The dysfunctional family dynamic will be excellently represented at the TCM festival by the film adaptation of Tennessee Williams’ Broadway hit play, “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.” Paul Newman and Elizabeth Taylor, displaying great chemistry, played the troubled married couple.

“Father of the Bride,” the classic 1950 version, not the Steve Martin remake of two decades ago, will delight audiences with the father-daughter family model, with Spencer Tracy bringing depth to a charming domestic comedy in which Elizabeth Taylor, as the daughter, was marking her transition into adult roles.

Having grown up on the big screen, Elizabeth Taylor proved to be a huge boon to the film’s publicity, announcing her engagement just as the studio revealed her casting in “Father of the Bride,” and then marrying hotel heir Nicky Hilton shortly before the picture’s release.

A film that has nothing to do with family is Clint Eastwood’s spaghetti Western 1966 classic, “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.” Eastwood starred as a hired gun looking for buried Confederate gold with the occasional aid of Mexican bandit Eli Wallach. Though not family, their relationship was definitely dysfunctional.

Several films from the 1930s are scheduled, with the oldest film to be screened being Alfred Hitchcock’s third feature, “The Lodger,” released in 1927, notable because it not only chilled audiences with a criminal villain modeled on Jack the Ripper, but it was the first time that the “Master of Suspense” made a cameo appearance on screen.

The great thing about the TCM Classic Film Festival is the opportunity to see vintage masterpiece films, too numerous to list here, screened in the proper venue of large theatres with wide screens.

One very notable archetypal film is Charlie Chaplin’s “City Lights,” a work in progress for three years just as sound was beginning its reign. Chaplin persisted in making this a silent film because he felt the Little Tramp would be less effective if he spoke.

The story of the Little Tramp’s efforts to raise money so a blind girl could have a sight-giving operation was one of Chaplin’s biggest hits. The film’s combination of slapstick and pathos was effective and won praise as one of the greatest romantic comedies ever made.

Special events that are open to the public will also highlight the festival’s presence. For the first time ever to coincide with the festival, the US Postal Service will conduct a first-day-of-issue dedication ceremony for the Charlton Heston Forever Stamp at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre (yes, I said Grauman’s).

On the next day, Saturday, April 12, Turner Classic Movies will honor Jerry Lewis with a hand and footprint ceremony in the courtyard of the Chinese Theatre.

The TCM Classic Film Festival is just loaded with celebrity guests who will appear or introduce films. Shirley Jones will kick off the opening night festivities by appearing for a world premiere of a brand new restoration of the beloved Rodgers & Hammerstein musical “Oklahoma!,” a treasure nearly sixty years old.

Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Mother Teresa claimed, “Loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted is the most terrible poverty.”

In the disturbing and poignant Lake County Theatre Co. production of Daniel Keyes' “Flowers for Algernon,” the rapt audience is painfully taken to this place of destitution, while tantalized with the hope of love and acceptance.

Most may remember the story from their middle or high school English class.

Charlie, a cognitively impaired young man in Brooklyn who is happily employed as a bakery delivery boy and cleaner, is chosen by a medical research team to undergo an experimental surgery to have his low intelligence dramatically and seemingly permanently increased, like the team's laboratory mouse Algernon.

Soon able to devour “War and Peace” in an evening, Charlie's intellectual capacity soars while his simple desire to be loved and accepted becomes more and more remote.

Tim Fischer and Tim Barnes trade off the roles of arrogant professor and willing guinea pig to great effect.

Blinded by ambition and success, like the designers of the Titantic, Fischer's Professor Nemur boasts that “Nothing can go wrong.” His hubris bristles the audience's sensibilities, representing the modern theme of science without morality or conscience.

The driven hardness and scientific aloofness Fischer's character symbolizes, and that of Charlie's embarrassed and ashamed mother, acted jarringly by Suna Flores, are counterpoised by the kindness and concern of lab assistant Burt Seldon and Charlie's teacher and love interest, Alice Kinnian. These two roles, smashingly performed by Cameron Beighle and Laura Barnes respectively, provide the kindness and camaraderie that may truly be all that Charlie really needs.

They also provide the virtually traumatized audience, aching for Charlie's lonely plight as he self-proclaims “That's a man in torment!,” with the promise goodness and friendship afford.

Like so many of our own lives as we grow older and a bit wiser, the clarity of our life's desires and purpose can be lost in our failures and unfulfilled expectations.

Barnes' Charlie tastes love momentarily, but the audience watches horrified, knowing it cannot last but fleeting moments. His frenetic urge to understand his past treatment by family and friends as a mentally challenged boy haunts him.

Under Carol Dobusch's direction, a series of flashbacks of Charlie's childhood and adolescence, courtesy of young players Cotton Andrade and Chance Andrade (Maurice Bingdom and Will McCauley in alternate performances) masterfully allows the audience a truly disturbing opportunity to walk in the shoes of the “retarded.”

For this viewer, the painful identifications with stereotyping, bullying and valuing a person for what they could be in your eyes as opposed to simply who and what they already are, rocks you and challenges you to discover where you land on the empathy and kindness scale.

This is not a production for the faint of heart. There is no escapism here, but there is an amazing opportunity to see art scream – to face multiple ethical and moral themes: man's efforts to play God, the nature of happiness, the acceptance of ourselves against the perceptions of others and imagined expectations of ourselves.

Not since I saw Sean O'Casey's “Shadow of a Gunman” in Dublin's Abbey Theatre have I left a theater so racked with emotion, so unsettled by a performance.

Dobusch's Lake County players provide an impressive chance and need to unwind and converse after the show, decompressing with what Charlie needed most – kindness and connection, and in this reviewer's case, a hearty pint of beer.

Catch the final performances this weekend at Gard Street Elementary, 3980 Gard St., in Kelseyville, 7 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and at 2 p.m. on Sunday.

Tickets may be purchased at Cheese's Game Shop in Lakeport or on the Lake County Theatre Co.'s Web site, http://www.lakecountytheatrecompany.org/ .

LAKEPORT, Calif. – The legendary Queens of Boogie Woogie take the stage at the Soper Reese Theatre on Friday, April 4, for an unpredictable, high energy night of foot stomping, gotta-dance music.

The show starts at 7 p.m. at the theater, located at 275 S. Main St.

This year's line up of great American boogie woogie piano stylists includes Deanna Bogart, Doña Oxford, Sue Palmer and Wendy DeWitt.  

Upholding the tradition of the original boogie woogie artists from the 1920s and 1930s, such as Albert Ammons and Pine Top Smith, these four women attack the music form with intensity, skill and humor, often playing around and over each other on the keyboard at a breathtaking pace.

Bogart, winner of three consecutive Blues Music Awards, has played for U.S. troops in Iraq, Kuwait and Egypt.

“Blues Wax” describes her as “playing a jumpin’ piano that rollicks with a fast tempo and panoramic solos.”  

Oxford has played with Keith Richards, Buddy Guy, and former Chuck Berry sideman and Father of Rock & Roll piano, Johnnie Johnson. She has toured in Europe, Japan and Canada.

Palmer, notorious for her beehive stint with blues diva Candye Kane, has performed with Marcia Ball, Hadda Brooks and Sonny Leyland and is the winner of the Jim Croce Award for Excellence and Dedication to Music.  

DeWitt, a 2014 International Blues Challenge finalist, is inspired by Otis Spann and R&B legend Hank Ballard. She has played with Charlie Musselwhite and Otis Rush.

The event is sponsored by the Tallman Hotel and Blue Wing Saloon.

Tickets are $25 for table seating, $20 for center loge and $15 for side loge.  

Get tickets online at www.SoperReeseTheatre.com at the Theatre Box Office, 275 S. Main St. on Friday from 10:30 a.m. to show time, or by phone at 707-263-0577.  

Tickets also are available at The Travel Center, 1265 S. Main in Lakeport, Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

LOWER LAKE, Calif. – The Lower Lake High School Drama Club will present the musical, “Back to the 80s” this month.

Shows will be performed at 7:30 p.m. Friday, April 11, and Saturday, April 12, with a 2 p.m. matinée on Sunday, April 13, in the Lower Lake High School multipurpose room, 9430 Lake St.

Come enjoy a funny and witty script that plays on words while referencing pop culture of the 80s that we all know so well.  

Watch a cast of 25 students – some of whom have been acting since middle school – perform and sing many of the popular songs from the 80s.  

The musical has been organized by a dynamic duo made up of Tracy Lahr as the director and adviser to the drama club and Michelle John-Smith as the choreographer.  

“The students performing this musical were born in the late 90s or later, so it's been fun to watch them learn and really love what the 80s had to offer,” said Lahr.

“Back to the 80s” doesn't follow the typical format of most musicals where you will find a strong female lead and other supportive roles. Here many of the characters are given lead roles.  This is exciting for many of the students, half of which are seniors who will be graduating at the end of the school year.  

The senior cast includes Alli Lahr and Wayne Harris (both of whom have been with Lahr since seventh grade), Elijah Andre-Orlando, Cruz Torres, Exzonta Mosley, Corey Snipes, Cierrah Sherman, Ashlee Andaya, Jacie Baker and D'Art Markowski.  

The rest of the cast includes Weedan Wetmore, Erick Layne, Kono Geary, Avrill Pier, Rachel Cabral, Natalie Carte, Scott Nelson, Sadie Sheldon, Dominic Cole, Jordan Harris, Johnna Vineyard and Destiny Parlet.

All students, including college students, will pay an admission fee of $10 at the door with seniors (age 65 and above) paying $11 and all other adults paying $12.  

All of the proceeds go directly to the drama club to help finance the next big show at Lower Lake High School.  

Finally, the yearbook club will be having a bake sale which includes beverages in order to raise funds for this year's yearbook.  

Come watch our youth perform their best.  

For more information, please call Lower Lake High School, 707-994-6474, Extension 2735.

KELSEYVILLE, Calif. – Weather forecasts suggest the Old Time Fiddlers Association can resume its first Sunday of the month Fiddlers Jam sessions at the Ely Stage Stop and Country Museum on Sunday, April 6.

Weather permitting, the fiddlers will meet in the Ely barn to perform their wonderful Americana music.

The fun begins at the museum at 11 a.m. with the fiddlers playing from noon through 2 p.m.

Donations will benefit the Ely Stage Stop and the Old Time Fiddlers Association.

Come early and check out the latest museum acquisitions and displays. Take this final opportunity to purchase tickets for two gift baskets, one for bakers and one for wine and poetry lovers. Winning tickets will be drawn during the fiddlers intermission. You don’t have to be present to win, but you will have more fun if you are.

This free, family friendly event can be enjoyed by all, young and old alike. Enjoy the music with beverages and tasty treats. Bring your own wine and sip it in Ely Stage Stop wine glasses that are always available for purchase or bring your own glass. Come ready to clap your hands, tap your toes or get up and dance.

The stage stop, operated by the Lake County Historical Society, is located at 9921 Soda Bay Road (Highway 281) in Kelseyville.

Current hours of operation are 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. each Saturday and Sunday.

Visit www.elystagestop.com or www.lakecountyhistory.org , check out the stage stop on Facebook at www.facebook.com/elystagestop or call the museum at 707-533-9990.

Despite having once been bitten by a rabid bat, and survived, much to the disappointment of my critics, I find bats fascinating, and Peggy Shumaker of Alaska has written a fine poem about them.

I am especially fond of her perfect verb, “snick,” for the way they snatch insects out of the air.

Spirit of the Bat

Hair rush, low swoop—
so those of us

stuck here on earth
know—you must be gods.

Or friends of gods,
granted chances

to push off into sky,
granted chances

to hear so well
your own voice bounced

back to you
maps the night.

Each hinge
in your wing’s

an act of creation.
Each insect

you snick out of air
a witness.

You transform
obstacles

into sounds,
then dodge them.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation ( www.poetryfoundation.org ), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright 2013 by Peggy Shumaker from her most recent book of poems, Toucan Nest: Poems of Costa Rica, Red Hen Press, 2013. Poem reprinted by permission of Peggy Shumaker and the publisher. Introduction copyright 2014 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction's author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. We do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.