December 2015

Performance Lab

Feuchtwanger Re-Freshed #2

School of Dramatic Arts, via the Western Edge Playwrights' Salon of the school's Master of Fine Arts in Dramatic Writing, the USC Libraries Feuchtwanger Collection and Villa Aurora present:

FEUCHTWANGER RE-FRESHED #2:

Graduate playwrights and their instructors will present short scenes inspired by Feuchtwanger's works. Actors include students from USC's BFA program, recent graduates, and former head of MFA Acting Andrew Robinson.

What happens to great ideas that never get the chance to grow into stories? Feuchtwanger collected long lists of ideas for novels and plays that he intended to write, but was unable to get to in his busy lifetime. The USC MFA Dramatic Writing playwrights have taken five of these ideas and turned them into short plays, bringing Feuchtwanger back to life in our own complex time.

The show will be followed by a reception.

Double Jeopardy

Hollywood Emigrés and the Second Red Scare (1947-1952): Migration and Integration

This colloquium investigates the precarious conditions of directors, screen writers and actors who immigrated to the United States around the time of the Second World War in order to escape persecution in Nazi Germany and Eastern Europe, only to find themselves persecuted in the 1950’s by the House Un-American Activities Committee, spearheaded by Senator Joseph McCarthy. In many ways their condition mirrors the uncertain realities of refugees of our days like those fleeing the tyranny of the Syrian Government and ISIS only to find themselves unwelcome in their new homelands.

Including original filmic materials to illustrate their lectures, distinguished Film Studies, and German Studies scholars Doris Berger (Exhibitions Curator at the Academy Museum) and Jan-Christopher Horak (Director, UCLA Film & Television Archive) and Turner Prize-winning visual artist Susan Philipsz focus on the lives of five émigrés whose lives express unique narratives in relationship to this phenomena: Bertolt Brecht, Hanns Eisler, Lion Feuchtwanger, Paul Henreid and Edward G. Robinson.

Audio and cinematic renditions of the Hanns Eisler and Bertolt Brecht testimonies before the House Committee on Un-American Activities will be presented.

A reception will follow the colloquium

Double Jeopardy constitutes the second event in a series of works by Warren Neidich titled The Hollywood Blacklist Project, 2014-2017. The first work, Book Exchange: The Hollywood Blacklist, premiered January 2015 at Printed Matter’s LA Art Book Fair. The third installment, Threshold and Re-Imagining the Hollywood Walk of Fame, will premiere at Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibition in 2016 and 2017.

Curated by Warren Neidich and co-sponsored by the Goethe-Institut Los Angeles with the support of Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE), and the Villa Aurora.

Eclectic Salon and Salastina present

MASTERPIECE DISCOVERY

Selections from Handel's Messiah

Do you like Christmas? Cookies? Twinkly lights and candles? What about music and singing?

If you answered yes to any of the above, may we suggest that you join us in an intimate exploration of the vivid word-painting, profound spirituality, and timeless splendor of Handel's beloved Messiah.

Has there ever been a Christmas without one? The Messiah is in a dead heat with the Nutcracker for the title of "Most Beloved Holiday Work of All Time." Don't just listen to it for the millionth time. Get to know it better. Come to a deeper understanding of why it's so enduring.

This festive Holiday edition of Masterpiece Discovery with Brian Lauritzen includes a sing along of the Hallelujah Chorus.

And yes, there will be cookies.

Guest Artists
Jessica Rivera, Soprano
Audrey Babcock, Mezzo-Soprano
Arnold Livingston Geis, Tenor
Keith Colclough, Bass-Baritone
Maia Jasper White and Kevin Kumar, Co-Artistic Directors and Violins
Zachary Dellinger, Viola
Jacob Braun, Cello
Maksim Velichkin, Harpsichord
Brian Lauritzen, Resident Host