Dennis Watlington will visit the Library May 9

Thursday, May 9 at 7 p.m.

Dennis Watlington, author of Chasing America, will be our featured speaker.

Chasing America is a rollercoaster ride through promise and poverty, affirmative action and addiction, and a powerful story that captures a life and an era that is seminally American. Born in Harlem in 1952, Dennis developed a heroin habit at the age of 14, kicked it, and received a scholarship to the Hotchkiss School where he was elected president of his class. He went on to NYU, became involved in film and theater, got addicted to crack, kicked that, and became an Emmy-winning television writer.

Chasing America shows us the best and worst that America offers to a Black man—from the Jim Crow South to boarding school life in New England to backstage at the Fillmore East to a holding cell in Bellevue Hospital.

About the Author

Dennis Watlington has been a junkie, a thief, a motivational speaker, a janitor for the circus, an occupational therapist, a journalist, a soap opera actor, and most recently a screenwriter and documentary filmmaker. His credits include The Untold Story of the Black West which won him an Emmy.

Books will be available for purchase at this event. Refreshments will be served.

Additional parking for evening and weekend Library programs available on Thorndal Circle (behind Nielsen's).

Catherine Lindsey Workshop Auditions

The Catherine Lindsey Actors/Playwrights Workshop, now in its 21st year, will be holding acting auditions for roles in their public performances. The playwriting workshops began in February and will conclude with a public performance at the Library on Sunday, June 9.

Acting auditions will take place in the Library’s Conference Room at the following sessions:

Wednesday, May 8 at 7 p.m.

Thursday, May 9 at 7 p.m.

Rehearsals will then take place in late May through the performance in June. Directors are looking specifically for the following, but auditions are open to all:

- 2 males in their 70s

- 2 males in their 40s

- 1 male in his 20s

- 1 female in her 40s

On Sunday, June 9   at 2 p.m., the Actors/Playwrights Workshop will present the public-staged reading of selections from the plays in the Library’s Community Room.

The plays selected for performance by the Darien Library Committee are:

442: Go for Broke by Louis DiGiusto

Lenny and Freddy by Kathleen A. Bernadette

Dear Eva by Paul Janensch and Catherine Ladnier

His Play by Michael Blevins

A Tasting Menu by Mary Ellen Murphy

The Actors/Playwrights Workshop welcomes Actors’ Equity actors and non-Equity actors to participate, brings together local and regional playwrights and actors, and encourages a collaborative effort to create new plays and present a public-staged reading. Co-founded by the late Catherine Lindsey and her husband Robert, the workshop introduces original plays in progress to be developed in a workshop environment with the goal of the public-staged readings. Catherine Lindsey was a beloved friend of the Library and director of Darien Library Theater for over 25 years. The memorial workshops offer actors and playwrights the opportunity to work together to create original theatrical works in a supportive and creative environment culminating in the staged readings of short scenes from full-length plays, one-act plays, musicals, and monologues.

The Actors/Playwrights Workshop welcomes all interested playwrights and actors (Equity and Non-Equity), with or without experience, to join. For more information, contact Robert Cusack at (203) 655-7699 or at robert.cusack1@att.net.

Christina Pugh will read from her new book of poems.

Wednesday, May 29 at 7 p.m.

Christina Pugh will read from her third book of poems, Grains of the Voice, which draws on the work of Roland Barthes and the sonnet tradition in order to investigate contemporary facets of sound, speech, and song.

About the Poet

Christina Pugh is also the author of Restoration and Rotary, as well as the chapbook Gardening at Dusk. Her poems have appeared in The Atlantic Monthly, Poetry, TriQuarterly, Ploughshares, The Kenyon Review, and other periodicals, and in anthologies such as Poetry 180. Her honors have included the Word Press First Book Prize (for Rotary), the Ruth Lilly Poetry Fellowship from Poetry magazine, the Lucille Medwick Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America, an individual artist fellowship in poetry from the Illinois Arts Council, the Associated Writing Programs’ Intro Journals Award, the Grolier Poetry Prize, residencies at the Ragdale and Ucross Foundations, and a faculty fellowship from the UIC Institute for the Humanities.

A reception will follow the presentation.

Additional parking for evening and weekend Library programs on Thorndal Circle (behind Nielsen's).

We will screen CHEERFUL WEATHER FOR THE WEDDING in our Community Room May 10.

Friday, May 10 at 6:30 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. – Cheerful Weather for the Wedding (2012) Starring Elizabeth McGovern, Felicity Jones, and Luke Treadaway; Not Rated; 92 minutes. Closed captioned for the hearing impaired.

A young woman frets upstairs in her family's country manor on her wedding day, fearful she's about to marry the wrong man. Downstairs, both her fiancé and her former lover grow increasingly anxious.

"Rice does a fine job of juggling so many characters and moving smoothly among flashbacks without losing sight of the main story." -- Mark Olsen, Los Angeles Times

For more information, please watch the film's trailer. Check out the rest of our Friday Night Features in May.

Additional parking for evening and weekend Library programs available on Thorndal Circle (behind Nielsen's).

"Stitches" by David Small will be the final book in our Spring Discussion Series.

Stitches by David Small

Tuesday, May 14 at 7 p.m.

David Small, a best-selling and highly regarded children's book illustrator, comes forward with this unflinching graphic memoir. Remarkable and intensely dramatic, Stitches tells the story of a fourteen-year-old boy who awakes one day from a supposedly harmless operation to discover that he has been transformed into a virtual mute—a vocal cord removed, his throat slashed and stitched together like a bloody boot. From horror to hope, Small proceeds to graphically portray an almost unbelievable descent into adolescent hell and the difficult road to physical, emotional, and artistic recovery.

National Book Award Finalist

“A profound and moving gift of graphic literature that has the look of a movie and reads like a poem.” -- Jules Feiffer

“A breathtaking, horrific, and ultimately redemptive work.” -- Miami Herald

Library staff members will lead the discussions.

We have copies of the books available for patrons to borrow, but prior reading of the books is not necessary to attend the discussions.

Additional parking for evening and weekend Library programs on Thorndal Circle (behind Nielsen’s).

Will Schwalbe

Wednesday, June 5 at 7 p.m.

Will Schwalbe, author of The End of Your Life Book Club, will be our featured speaker.

During her treatment for cancer, Mary Anne Schwalbe and her son Will spent many hours sitting in waiting rooms together. To pass the time, they would talk about the books they were reading. Once, by chance, they read the same book at the same time—and an informal book club of two was born. Through their wide-ranging reading, Will and Mary Anne—and we, their fellow readers—are reminded how books can be comforting, astonishing, and illuminating, changing the way that we feel about and interact with the world around us.

Praise for The End of Your Life Book Club

"A loving celebration of a mother by a son." -- The New York Times Book Review

"Not only a son’s heartfelt tribute to [his mother’s] courage and grace but vivid testimony to the enduring power of books to create meaning out of chaos, illuminate values, and connect us with each other.” -- The Boston Globe

About the Author

Will Schwalbe has worked in publishing (most recently as senior vice president and editor in chief of Hyperion Books); digital media, as the founder and CEO of Cookstr.com; and as a journalist, writing for various publications including The New York Times and the South China Morning Post. He is on the board of the Kingsborough Community College Foundation. He is the coauthor, with David Shipley, of Send: Why People Email So Badly and How to Do It Better.

Books will be available for purchase at this event. Refreshments will be served.

Additional parking for evening and weekend Library programs available on Thorndal Circle (behind Nielsen's).

We will screen LATE BLOOMERS Friday, June 7.

Friday, June 7 at 6:30 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. – Late Bloomers (2011) Starring William Hurt and Isabella Rossellini; Not Rated; 95 minutes. Closed captioned for the hearing impaired.

Mary and Adam aren’t your typical older couple, they’re high functioning and stylish and to their great surprise, they’ve entered the senior category. Adam is in frantic denial, desperately looking for the fountain of youth as Mary decides to deal with the situation by doing what she does best, taking care of her husband and family. After 30 years together, the married couple confronts the unpalatable realities of getting older and concludes that emotional absence is the easiest way to cope. But at what point does distance become divorce?

"[Rossellini] is radiant in a profoundly ordinary and believable way, as always, and stirs up generational pathos all by herself." -- Michael Atkinson, Village Voice

For more information, please watch the film's trailer. Check out our Friday Night Features in June.

Additional parking for evening and weekend Library programs available on Thorndal Circle (behind Nielsen's).

Showing in our Community Room May 15.

Wednesday, May 15 at 1:30 p.m. - Les Miserables (2012) Starring Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, and Anne Hathaway; Rated PG-13; 158 minutes; Closed captioned for the hearing impaired.

Set against the backdrop of 19th-century France, Les Misérables tells an enthralling story of broken dreams and unrequited love, passion, sacrifice and redemption—a timeless testament to the survival of the human spirit. Ex-prisoner Jean Valjean is hunted for decades by the ruthless policeman Javert after he breaks parole. When Valjean agrees to care for factory worker Fantine’s young daughter, Cosette, their lives change forever. The world’s longest-running musical brings its power to the big screen in Tom Hooper’s sweeping and spectacular interpretation of Victor Hugo’s epic tale.

"One of the most emotionally devastating and gratifying movies I've ever seen." - Joy Tipping, Dallas Morning News

For more information, please view the film's trailer.

María Esther Magallanes' show will run from January 22 - February 26.

Opening Reception

Friday, February 1 at 6:30 p.m.

Show runs January 22nd through February 26th

María Esther Magallanes was born in Mexico City. She comes from a family of accomplished artists and was raised surrounded by and appreciating all forms of art. Traveling to many cultural destinations around the world and growing up within Mexico City’s cosmopolitan atmosphere and rich cultural heritage enhanced her motivation to start creating formally while still a teenager. Earning a college degree in graphic design enabled her to experiment with materials, techniques, color and form to express ideas, concepts and feelings. Such experimentation led to mastering acrylic, the material that she has been using consistently over the past 20 years.

Mexico’s cultural, architectural natural and geographic diversity provided María Esther with plenty of inspiration to experiment with color and forms. Her work is based on the use of vibrant, nearly violent, colors and shapes to interpret nature and landscapes. Her trademark style is marked by her admiration to and the inspiration provided by Pablo Picasso, Al Held, as well as Mexican painters Diego Rivera, Jose Clemente Orozco and Pedro Coronel.

She has remained faithful to her use of vibrant colors and forms to deconstruct reality and nature. Her work decorates the homes of many art collectors throughout Mexico, the United States and Europe.

María Esther Magallanes holds a BA in Graphic Design from Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico City and has completed different painting courses at the Silvermine Arts Center in New Canaan, CT.

We will screen FLIGHT in our Community Room Friday, March 29.

Friday, March 1 at 6:30 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. – Searching for Sugar Man (2012) Documentary Feature; Rated PG-13; 86 minutes. Closed captioned for the hearing impaired.

This is the incredible true story of Rodriguez, the greatest ‘70s rock icon who never was. Discovered in a Detroit bar in the late '60s by two celebrated producers struck by his soulful melodies and prophetic lyrics, they recorded an album which they believed would secure his reputation as the greatest recording artist of his generation. In fact, the album bombed and the singer disappeared into obscurity amid rumors of a gruesome on-stage suicide. But a bootleg recording found its way into apartheid South Africa and, over the next two decades, he became a phenomenon. The film follows the story of two South African fans who set out to find out what really happened to their hero.

For more information, please watch the film's trailer.

Friday, March 8 at 6:30 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. – The Intouchables (2012) Starring Francois Cluzet, Omar Sy, and Anne Le Ny; Rated R; 112 minutes. In French with English subtitles.

A true story of two men who should never have met — a quadriplegic aristocrat who was injured in a paragliding accident and a young man from the projects.

For more information, please watch the film's trailer.

Friday, March 15 at 6:30 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. – Robot and Frank (2012) Starring Frank Langella, James Marsden, and Susan Sarandon; Rated PG-13; 89 minutes; Closed captioned for the hearing impaired.

Set in the near future, Frank, a retired cat burglar, has two grown kids who are concerned he can no longer live alone. They are tempted to place him in a nursing home until Frank’s son chooses a different option: against the old man’s wishes, he buys Frank a walking, talking humanoid robot programmed to improve his physical and mental health. What follows is an often hilarious and heartwarming story about finding friends and family in the most unexpected places.

For more information, please watch the film's trailer.

Friday, March 22 at 6:30 p.m. and 8:45 p.m. – Life of Pi (2012) Starring Irffan Kahn; Rated PG; 123 minutes; Closed captioned for the hearing impaired.

A young man who survives a disaster at sea is hurtled into an epic journey of adventure and discovery. While cast away, he forms an unexpected connection with another survivor: a fearsome Bengal tiger.

For more information, please watch the film's trailer.

Friday, March 29 at 6:30 p.m. and 8:45 p.m. – Flight (2012) Starring Denzel Washington, John Goodman, and Don Cheadle; Rated R; 138 minutes; Closed captioned for the hearing impaired.

Whip Whitaker is a seasoned airline pilot who miraculously crash lands his plane after a mid-air catastrophe, saving nearly every soul on board. After the crash, Whip is hailed as a hero, but as more is learned, more questions than answers arise as to who or what was really at fault and what really happened on that plane?

For more information, please watch the film's trailer.

All films are free and open to the public.

Additional parking for evening and weekend Library programs on Thorndal Circle (behind Nielsen's).