Arts & Culture

Marge BetleyThree aspiring playwrights will present staged readings of their works Sept. 26 and 27 as part of the 2008 A.E. Hotchner Playwriting Festival, sponsored by the Performing Arts Department (PAD) in Arts & Sciences. Named in honor of alumnus A.E. Hotchner (AB and JD ’40), the festival consists of an intensive two-week workshop that culminates in the staged readings. This year’s workshop is led by Marge Betley, literary manager and resident dramaturg for the Geva Theatre Center in Rochester, NY.

Chapman”Television and the internet are creating an American Idol-like atmosphere around the 2008 election,” says Richard Chapman, a veteran producer and screenwriter for film and television. “It’s all about personality and narrative and who has the best story, as opposed to who has the best grasp of the issues.” Champman is available to discuss television and the 2008 presidential campaign.

Elizabeth Armstrong, curator of “Birth of the Cool: California Art, Design, and Culture at Midcentury,” will discuss the exhibition at 1 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 20, at the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum.

Courtesy PhotoGrammy Award-winning a cappella ensemble Sweet Honey in the Rock will launch the Edison Theatre OVATIONS! Series with a special one-night-only performance at 8 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 27.

Celebrated violinist Martin Chalifour, principal concertmaster for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, will join musicians from Washington University and the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra for a chamber music recital at 7 p.m., Monday, Sept. 22.

Elizabeth Armstrong, curator of “Birth of the Cool: California Art, Design, and Culture at Midcentury,” will discuss the exhibition at 1 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 20, at the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum.

Edison Theatre and the University City Public Library will host a free screening of the classic sci-fi film The War of the Worlds (1953) at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 30. A panel discussion on the power of the media will immediately follow. Moderator will be Richard Chapman, senior lecturer in screenwriting in Washington University’s Film & Media Studies Program in Arts & Sciences. Both the screening and the discussion are free and open to the public and take place at the University City Public Library, 6701 Delmar Blvd.

Though no scores are included in his published works, William Shakespeare (1564-1616) frequently employed music in his plays, writing poems for new songs and adopting existing ballads. On Oct. 6 the acclaimed period music trio Ensemble Chaconne, joined by mezzo-soprano Pamela Dellal, will present “Measure for Measure: The Music of Shakespeare’s Plays,” a concert of works associated with the Bard, in the university’s Edison Theatre.

From painting and architecture to music, film, furniture and the graphic arts, 1950s Los Angeles was an epicenter of American modernism. This fall, the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum examines that era with “Birth of the Cool: California Art, Design, and Culture at Midcentury.”

Courtesy photoAliens and dinosaurs, inner space and outer space. On Oct. 3 and 4 L.A. Theatre Works, the nation’s foremost radio theater company, will return to Washington University’s Edison Theatre for special back-to-back productions of H.G. Wells’ War of the Worlds and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Lost World. Directed by Star Trek alumnus John de Lancie, the shows will feature veteran actors from The X-Files, Heroes, Star Trek Voyager and others shows.