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Arts & Life
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- Written by: Editor
LAKEPORT, Calif. – Watershed Books will host two local authors who have written about the unique experiences of women in prison on Friday, June 1.
The readings by Myra Sherman and Leslie Levitas will take place from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. at the bookstore, located at 305 N. Main St., Lakeport.
Myra Sherman has written “Jailed,” described as “a rare example of socially-conscious fiction that also has literary integrity. ...[her] stories only ask that we look at the institution as it really is. If emotional honesty is the starting block for great fiction, Sherman is off to a great start."
Leslie Levitas has contributed to the anthology, “Razor Wire Women: Prisoners, Activists, Scholars, and Artists.”
Levitas, who holds a master's of art degree, is a writer and photographer. Her oral history project entitled, “Tell Me about Your Life,” depicts women who have been impacted by incarceration and street life.
She also will share experiences of her work with incarcerated and recently released women in the San Francisco County Jail.
Also on June 1, the bookstore will collect good clothing and new hygiene products for these women.
Join the authors for a compelling and lively discussion, and as usual enjoy refreshments.
Call Cheri Holden at Watershed Books at 707-263-5787 for more information.
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- Written by: Ted Kooser
The paintings of Georgia O’Keefe taught us a lot about bones in the desert, but there’s more to learn, and more to think our way into. Here’s a fine poem by Jillena Rose, who lives in Michigan.
Taos
Bones are easier to find than flowers
in the desert, so I paint these:
Fine white skulls of cows and horses.
When I lie flat under the stars
in the back of the car, coyotes howling
in the scrub pines, easy to feel how those bones
are so much like mine: Here is my pelvis,
like the pelvis I found today
bleached by the sun and the sand. Same
hole where the hip would go, same
white curve of bone beneath my flesh
same cradle of life, silent and still in me.
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 ©2011 by Jillena Rose. Poem reprinted from Third Wednesday, Volume 3, Issue 1, Winter 2011, by permission of Jillena Rose and the publisher. Introduction copyright © 2012 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. They do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.
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- Written by: Lake County News Reports
DARK SHADOWS (Rated PG-13)
The selling point for turning the nearly forgotten cult classic TV soap opera “Dark Shadows” into an extravagant big screen venture may be summed up by noting the pairing of two great talents: director Tim Burton and actor Johnny Depp.
A cinematic collaboration of Burton and Depp is longstanding, going back more than two decades when they first teamed up creatively, as director and star respectively, in “Edward Scissorhands.”
Ever versatile, Depp has starred in other Burton-directed films, including “Ed Wood,” “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,” and “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street,” for which he won an Oscar.
That a Tim Burton movie starring Johnny Depp is the closest thing to a sure bet in the film industry is proven once again with the wickedly funny “Dark Shadows.”
Once again, Depp fits nicely in the role of an oddball character, this time Barnabas Collins, an unfortunate victim of a romance gone wrong during the late 18th century.
As a member of a prominent New England family that built a fishing empire in a coastal Maine town, Barnabas was rich, powerful and an inveterate playboy.
The master of Collinwood Manor, a massive 200-room mansion, Barnabas fell in love with a beauty named Josette (Bella Heathcote) and made the mistake of breaking the heart of Angelique (Eva Green).
A witch in every sense of the word, Angelique caused Josette to take her own life in a plunge from a cliff and then doomed Barnabas to a fate worse than death.
First, Barnabas was turned into a vampire and then buried alive in a steel coffin wrapped in unbreakable chains that was strategically placed deep underground on the outskirts of Collinsport.
Nearly two centuries later, Barnabas is inadvertently freed from his tomb by a construction crew and emerges into the very changed world of 1972, an outsider in an even stranger time.
Awakened from his slumber, and being the vampire that he is, Barnabas has a nearly unquenchable thirst for blood, resulting in the immediate demise of the entire work crew.
Returning to Collinwood Manor, he finds that his once-stately mansion has fallen into shambles, tended by his descendants who are apparently incompetent stewards of the family estate.
Family matriarch Elizabeth Collins Stoddard (Michelle Pfeiffer) is the only person who seems to have the least bit of interest in holding together the family legacy.
Elizabeth’s brother Roger (Jonny Lee Miller) is a deadbeat. Her rebellious teenage daughter Carolyn (Chloe Grace Moretz) sulks constantly. Roger’s young son David (Gully McGrath) is precocious but mostly neglected by everyone.
The Collins family is so dysfunctional that they have a resident shrink, Dr. Julia Hoffman (Helena Bonham Carter), who spends most of her time hitting the bottle.
Speaking with a British accent, Barnabas turns out to behave in a rather odd and anachronistic fashion, his wit expressed in a deadpan manner that is grandly arch and delightfully skewering.
The newest member of the Collins’ household that fascinates Barnabas is the live-in nanny Victoria (Bella Heathcote), who coincidentally bears a striking resemblance to his great and long-deceased love Josette.
As Barnabas sets out to restore his family name to its former glory, the one impediment to his mission is the current leading denizen of Collinsport, the very same Angelique who remains an ageless beauty.
The passing of two centuries has not mellowed Anqelique one bit. She’s the same envious witch who buried Barnabas alive, and her jealousy is stirred once again upon realizing that the comely Victoria has attracted his attention.
Hostility between Barnabas and Angelique is not relegated to just romantic rivalry. Barnabas sets out to rebuild the family’s cannery in order to displace Angelique’s firm hold on the local fishing industry.
Aside from the clash of their business interests, Barnabas and Angelique engage in one massively huge physical skirmish that is fraught with electric sexual tension.
Whether jousting verbally with Angelique or sitting around the campfire with a bunch of hippies, Barnabas remains, for the most part, mannered and possessed of sublime gothic cool.
Indeed, the best thing about “Dark Shadows,” aside from the wit and deadpan humor expressed artfully by Johnny Depp, is simply the fact that Depp is very much in his element once again in a Tim Burton film.
Knowledge of the film’s underlying source material is absolutely irrelevant. All that matters is that “Dark Shadows” is thoroughly entertaining and should be an early winner in the summer movie sweepstakes.
Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.
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- Written by: Editor
UPPER LAKE, Calif. – Lake County Wine Studio is presenting a one-night performance show with guitarist/song writer Jack Williams on Wednesday June 6, at 7 p.m.
Williams’ music, rooted in his native South Carolina, was shaped by a 54-year career of playing folk, rock, jazz, R&B, classical and the popular music of the 30s, 40s and 50s.
He is counted among the most dynamic performers on today’s “folk” music circuit.
Williams is an uncommonly unique guitarist, a writer of vivid songs with a strong sense of place, and a storyteller in an old Southern tradition who further illustrates each tale with his guitar.
A sought-after artist on all contemporary acoustic music stages, from coffeehouses and festivals to music halls and city arts stages; from acclaimed appearances at Newport, Boston, Philadelphia, Kerrville, New Bedford SummerFest Folk Festivals, his musicianship, songs, stories and commanding presence have established him as an uncommonly inspiring and influential performer.
Friendships with two great singers had an enormous impact on Williams’ career and on the development of his own singing voice.
In 1973, his relationship with the late Harry Nilsson resulted in an album effort at RCA during an ill-fated period of music industry turmoil.
Until 2002, he sometimes toured as solo accompanist to his friend, the late Mickey Newbury, with whom he co-wrote, co-produced and recorded a live album and video, “Nights when I am Sane” (reissued as “Winter Winds”).
From 1958 through 1988, along with playing jazz trumpet and classical guitar, Williams was best known as an electric guitarist in a series of original rock bands and smaller acoustic ensembles.
As a hired-gun guitarist in the Deep South of the Civil Rights-Easy Rider 1960s, Williams’ bands accompanied the likes of John Lee Hooker, Big Joe turner, Jerry Butler, Hank Ballard, the Shirelles and the Del-Vikings.E nriched from these varied influences, Williams’ music is truly an “All-American Southern” music.
In the late 1960s he gave in to his troubadour nature and began performing solo – singing and playing a gut-string guitar and touring from coast to coast.
Seats are available at $20-plus tax per person. Light refreshments will be served; beer and wine will be available for purchase.
For reservations and additional information, contact Susan Feiler at 707-275-8030, 707-293-8752 or e-mail
Lake County Wine Studio is located at 9505 Main St. in Upper Lake.