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, FEBRUARY 27 Who can Hay be Now? – It was just shy of 40 years ago that the Scottish-Australian singer-songwriter Colin Hay won early international success as the lead singer/guitarist of Men At Work. By 1983, they’d become the first Australian artists to have a simultaneous No. 1 album and No. 1 single on the U.S. Billboard charts with Business as Usual, which had been originally released 14 months earlier, and “Down Under,” and went on to win the Grammy Award for Best New Artist later that year. When totaled, their three studio albums sold over 30 million albums worldwide. The record sales slacked off after Men At Work disbanded in 1985, and frontman Hay spent the better part of a decade stumbling around unfocused, in his own words, before transforming himself, as the Washington Post put it, into a thoughtful and sophisticated contemporary songwriter. Things turned completely around when actor Zach Braff put his solo song “I Just Don’t Think I’ll Ever Get Over You” onto the Garden State soundtrack, leading to appearances
and soundtrack songs on such shows at The Larry Sanders Show, JAG, The Mick Molloy Show, A Million Little Things, and Scrubs. Hay now counts more than a dozen albums in his solo studio output, a very worthy catalog that he’s likely to extensively explore in tonight’s show at the Lobero. WHEN: 8 pm WHERE: Lobero Theatre, 33 E. Canon Perdido St. COST: $46-$56 INFO: (805) 963-0761 or www.lobero.com Smiley Speaks – The Santa Barbara Museum of Art’s Parallel Stories series takes a close look at the life-long passions, prodigious productivity and well-honed writing practice of Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jane Smiley as she engages in a far-ranging conversation with Andrew Winer, her longtime friend, fellow author, and colleague in the Creative Writing program at UC Riverside. Smiley, a novelist and essayist whose 1992 novel A Thousand Acres won both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award, has also written several works of nonfiction, including Thirteen Ways of Looking at the Novel, a history and anatomy of the novel
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 27 Molière’s Masterpiece – Molière’s Tartuffe is one of the most famous pieces of literature from France and also one of the funniest farces. The 350-year-old classic is a hilarious, satiric romp, exposing hypocrisy and greed that remains not only a timeless comedy but also terrifically timely in that we’re in the thicket of a major election year. The play examines ideas of hypocrisy and virtue, while confronting issues of authority and totalitarianism. The character Tartuffe tricked a wealthy homeowner, Orgon, into trusting him and believing his every word. Orgon’s family recognizes Tartuffe’s manipulating manner, and hilarity ensues as they attempt to convince Orgon otherwise. In UCSB Theatre’s production of Moliere’s work adapted by David Ball, and directed by Julie Fishell – who is helming stage movement and choreography that are being designed using images and manners from the time of the play “with a soupçon of screwball comedy techniques” – advanced acting students will portray the players, including Tartuffe, Elmire and Orgon, all of which are considered among the greatest classical theatre roles in history. WHEN: 8 pm tonight and February 21-26, plus 2 pm tomorrow and February 25-26 WHERE: UCSB Performing Arts Theater COST: $17 general, $13 children & seniors in advance; $19/$15 day of INFO: (805) 893-2064 or www.theaterdance.ucsb.edu
50 MONTECITO JOURNAL
EVENTS by Steven Libowitz
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 29 Half-century of Eco-study – Bill McKibben wrote the first book about global warming for a general audience with 1989’s The End of Nature before going on to found 350.org, the world’s largest grassroots climate campaign, and writing a dozen more books, including his latest New York Times bestseller, Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out? More than 30 years after he fired the first salvo, McKibben continues to serve among the leaders of the movement against human-induced climate change, and now sounds an even more urgent call to arms. “Falter” offers a piercing look at our environmental challenges, but also at the existential questions that come with new technologies. In talks, McKibben shares examples of “the right kind of pressure” to make change, such as inducing college campuses to divest from fossil fuels, and encouraging the use of solar panels across Africa. McKibben offers a dual approach to saving our planet, arguing that we must make informed choices as individuals, but also think as members of a mobilized group. McKibben was awarded the Right Livelihood Prize, sometimes called the alternative Nobel, and has lectured and organized on every continent including Antarctica and was asked by Bernie Sanders, who is currently the favorite for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, to help write the DNC climate platform of 2016. His talk tonight, titled “Our Changing Climate: A Global Movement of Reform,” co-presented by UCSB Arts & Lectures, the UCSB Environmental Studies Program and the Community Environmental Council, comes in celebration of the 50th anniversary of the UCSB program. WHEN: 7:30 pm WHERE: Campbell Hall, UCSB campus COST: $10 general, $5 UCSB students & youth 18 & under INFO: (805) 893-3535 www.ArtsAndLectures.UCSB.edu
as a form. Within those pages, Smiley posits that “A novelist has two lives – a reading and writing life, and a lived life. He or she cannot be understood at all apart from this.” Perhaps the two will merge in this evening’s presentation, titled “Love Comes First Beauty Follows.” WHEN: 5:30 pm WHERE: Mary Craig Auditorium at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, 1130 State Street (entrance in the rear) COST: $10 general/$6 seniors, $5 museum members INFO: (805) 963-4364 or www.sbma.net SUNDAY, MARCH 1 Here’s to you, Mr. Robinson – There’s a lot of hyperbole in the world of acoustic guitarists, but the accolades affixed to Australia native Joe Robinson all seem to apply. A largely self-taught musician, picked up the guitar at age 10 and promptly outgrew his guitar teacher in less than a year, and started to teach himself from the internet. At age 11, he began touring with older Australian artists, including the legendary fingerpicker Tommy Emmanuel, who became his mentor. At 13, he won the Australian National Songwriting Competition, recorded his debut album two years later, and won Australia’s Got Talent at 17 in 2008, when he performed a fingerstyle cover of “Classical Gas” – not coincidentally
“Music produces a kind of pleasure which human nature cannot do without.” – Confucius
a favorite of Emmanuel’s. Robinson’s one-man solo acoustic/electric show is an energetic display of virtuosity and witty, finely-crafted lyrics delivered with his fine voice accompanied by his Aussie charisma, and cover songs that were inspired by George Carlin, Al Capone, and a person he once picked up hitchhiking, to name just a few. After more than 2,000 shows across the world, Robinson’s debut for the Santa Barbara Acoustic Music Association at the Alhecama Theatre was a sellout; tonight he returns for SBAMA’s new Listening Room series at SOhO for another adventure in exploring undertones of harmony, rhythm, melody, rhyme and narrative. WHEN: 7:30 pm WHERE: SOhO, 1221 State Street, upstairs in Victoria Court COST: $20 general, $60 VIP (includes pre-show dinner and seating in first six rows) INFO: (805) 962-7776 or www.sohosb.com Travel a Stone’s Throw Away – Although things are shifting once again with the gig economy, it’s still informative to take a look back and when American supermarkets were not as abundant and diverse as they are today. Our favorite foods came to America in the hands of food explorers who circled the world for the USDA in search of novel plants that transformed the American diet. 27 February – 5 March 2020
