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s t a n l e y • F a i r f i e l d • S h o sh o n e • P i c a b o
Sean Covey Visits Blaine Schools
NBS Slams the Slopes PaGe 3
Page 4
2012 Sun Valley Summer Symphony Lineup Page 9
Lara Spencer Rolls out the Red Carpet Page 14
F e b r u a r y 2 9 , 2 0 1 2 • V o l . 5 • N o . 9 • w w w .T h e W e e k l y S u n . c o m
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I Am Woman FAMILY OF WOMAN FILM FESTIVAL TO FEATURE DOCUMENTARY THAT WON BEST OSCAR AT SUNDAY’S ACADEMY AWARDS STORY & PHOTO BY KAREN BOSSICK
Paw ‘n Pole Sunday
The 27th Annual Happy Howlin’ Paw ‘n Pole, an annual community event supporting the Animal Shelter of the Wood River Valley, promises a morning of hilarity and fun for the whole family with its “threeringed circus” theme. Join the Animal Shelter on March 4, 2012, at 10 a.m. at the Sun Valley Gun Club. There will be cross-country ski and snowshoe races with leashed dogs, best costume and silly pet trick contests, and more! Don’t have a dog? Don’t worry, you can partner up with one of the eager Shelter dogs! Race entry fees are: $5/child; $10/adult; $20/family. Entry fees include lunch and a raffle ticket entry for a 2012 North Valley Trails pass! Registration is onsite at the event. For more information, please call the Shelter at (208) 788-4351.
Fundraising Concert for Music Students
The B-Tones, a young men’s vocal ensemble developed through a partnership with the Sun Valley Summer Symphony School of Music and the Wood River High School Choral Department, is hosting a special concert at 5:30 p.m. this Sunday, March 4 at Light on the Mountains Spiritual Center, to raise money for their upcoming trip to the Heritage Music Festival in Anaheim, Calif. The students, along with their director, R.L. Rowsey, will return to Anaheim with hopes of repeating their celebrated performance in 2011 when they were part of the vocal and instrumental ensembles that brought home all of the big trophies from the competition. This trip requires a significant financial commitment from the students. To help offset the cost of the trip, the group is presenting an hour-long concert at Light on the Mountains Spiritual Center with their special guests, the Valley’s newest men’s vocal ensemble, A Few Good Men. This outstanding young vocal ensemble will perform a series of songs, including a great arrangement of “Over the Rainbow,” on which they will join forces with A Few Good Men. A Few Good Men will also share some of the work they are preparing for their spring concert. Songs from the B-Tones include a rousing anthem, Come Travel With Me; a Broadway ballad, Tell My Father; and a James Taylor favorite, Fire and Rain. Donations will be gratefully received at the door. Parking is limited, so please consider carpooling. “This is such a powerful experience for these young men. We really appreciate the community’s support of all the work that goes on in the arts for our students,” says director R.L. Rowsey.
Fools’ Raffle
Don’t miss your opportunity to purchase some great raffle tickets supporting the Wood River Valley’s own ‘Company of Fools’ theatre company. “A Trip to New Orleans!” raffle ticket can be purchased for $100. This prize includes a four-day/three-night package with lodging at the Four-Star/Four-Diamond Windsor Court Hotel. Dining at top restaurants, a private Town Car tour of the city and more! Or, purchase a “Dine Around the Valley” raffle ticket (or 10) at $25 each. This prize is worth over $1200 with more than 20 restaurants participating and more being added daily. Raffle tickets can be purchased from any of the Company of Fools board members or call 788-6520 for more information. Winners will be chosen and announced at ‘Casino Royale,’ a Company of Fools annual fundraiser Saturday, March 10 at The Valley Club. The ticket price for this fun event is $125 per person.
P
eggy Goldwyn knew she had no choice as images of protestors pouring into Tahrir Square flickered across her TV screen. She was going to have to find some Arab films for her Fifth Annual Family of Women Film Festival. “Everybody was so interested in what was happening and wondering how women were affected, I knew we had to have films from that area,” said the Ketchum resident, who immediately went to work contacting everyone she knew to see if anyone knew of any Arab film festivals. Securing those films would prove more adventuresome than trotting down to the nearest video rental store. It’s not that Arabs don’t make films—Cairo is the Bollywood of the Middle East. But Goldwyn soon learned that it is illegal to send DVDs out of Egypt. Her son Peter, a motion picture producer and distributor, found her a much-copied DVD of a film called “Cairo 6.7.8” at the Cannes Film Festival and Market. But, Goldwyn surmised, the film about three women who take charge of their lives in the face of sexual harassment had probably been smuggled out of Egypt in someone’s suitcase because securing a clean copy from Egypt was impossible. Goldwyn did finally arrange to get a copy from a distributor in Amsterdam. As a result, “Cairo 6.7.8” will be one of five films shown at this year’s Family of Women Film Festival, which will be held Friday through Monday in Ketchum. The festival will also feature “Saving Face,” which won an Oscar for Best Documentary at the Academy Awards on Sunday. That film’s filmmaker—two-time Academy Award nominee Daniel Junge—will present the film and answer questions about it. He will be accompanied by Dr. Mohammad Jawad, whose work with Pakistani women who have had acid thrown onto their faces is the focus of the film. Dr. Babtunde Osomitehin, executive director of UNFPA and undersecretary general of the United Nations, will introduce Saturday’s films. And Egyptian feminist and advisor Shrin Saadallah will cap the film festival with a free presentation on “The Women of Arab Spring” at 6 p.m. Monday at The Community Library in Ketchum. Goldwyn said once she saw “Cairo 6.7.8,” which is named after a Cairo bus route, she knew she had to have it. “This film is exceptional—I watched three or four others and they were pale compared to this. One of the episodes takes place in Tahrir Square. And it’s very funny at times, particularly when the men of Cairo become panicked at the thought that women vigilantes are taking revenge on the gropers on buses.” Goldwyn had an easier time securing another film, “Box With Her,” a Tunisian film that focuses on Muslim women who are training to be Olympic boxers. She was able to contact the directors directly. But they spoke only French so she had to e-mail them using the French she knew with help from French teacher Calysta Phillips. “We ended up becoming Skype buddies,” Goldwyn said. “Even after the uprising in Tunisia the film got to me, which shows that the post office in Tunisia works and there’s no censorship. And I feel as if I know everybody to contact if I ever want to show an Arab film again.” Goldwyn, who is co-chairing this year’s festival with photographer Stephanie Freid-Perenchio, started the festival five years ago to bring attention to the lives of women in the countries where the United Nations Population Fund works. UNFPA provides women’s health care, AIDS prevention and treatment and promotes the rights of women in more than 150 countries. Goldwyn, who at one time was married to movie mogul Samuel Goldwyn Jr. and has written and produced numer-
Peggy Goldwyn, cloaked in UNPFA garb, says the visual images that film offers can do more to inspire people than statistics and press releases.
ous TV and film projects, got involved with UNFPA after she became friends of Kofi Annan. He asked Goldwyn to produce a documentary highlighting a new refugee education fund that established scholarships for students who had had to drop their studies when fleeing to refugee camps. “Seventeen million people in the world have been displaced and can’t get back home. Many of these kids turn to crime or prostitution because there’s no hope,” Goldwyn said. Hooked, Goldwyn tried showing a film about genital cutting in Los Angeles where she served on the board of Los Angeles Planned Parenthood. But she learned it was difficult to get people enthused in a big city. However, she saw the opposite occur here when the Sun Valley Center for the Arts brought in a speaker and film focusing on the human tragedy in Darfur. She was also encouraged when she saw a local book club make a donation to UNPFA for its fistula campaign after reading Abraham Verghese’s “Cutting for Stone.” “I said, ‘Wow! This whole town is mobilized. Why not bring films here to promote what UNPFA is doing,’” she recounted. One of Goldwyn’s biggest hurdles has been the perception by some that the films are too depressing. Some, such as “The Price of Sex,” do deal with tough subjects, she noted. But “Pray the Devil Back to Hell,” conversely, heralded the success of Liberia
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