F rights and delights and even a little costuming signal that it’s officially Halloween season.
Monday, October 8
Local wine concern The Wine Thief (181 Crown St, New Haven; 203-772-1944) is celebrating sherry, “one of the world’s oldest and greatest winemaking traditions.” The prompt is International Sherry Week, and the local itinerary, also lasting a week, includes “lectures, performances, dinners, film screenings and tastings” spanning a half-dozen venues from the wine shop itself to Criterion Cinemas to three local eateries to co-organizer the Institute Library (847 Chapel St, New Haven; 203-562-4045), where a $10 Sherry 101 class/tasting kicks things off at 5:30 tonight.
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Tuesday, October 9
Virtual reality is here. Using its Ives Squared Tinker Lab, the Ives Main Library (133 Elm St, New Haven; 203-946-8130) invites adults to “learn how to build stunning worlds and experiences in virtual reality. Using Unreal Engine, students will create their own 3D scene filled with foliage, weather, physics and animation.” 6 p.m. Free.
Wednesday, October 10
22 hours later (at 4 p.m.), Mitchell Branch Library (37 Harrison St, New Haven; 203-946-8117) invites “children of all ages” to “make the biggest, fanciest, goofiest hat” they can for a “fancy hat fashion show.” Free.
Thursday, October 11
At the Yale Repertory Theatre (1120 Chapel St, New Haven), the Yale Dramatic Association, a.k.a. Yale Dramat, presents Creature, a play coyly described in the vein of religious and psychological horror stories like The Exorcist or Rosemary’s Baby: “After being pestered by devils for more than half a year, Margery Kempe—new mother, mayor’s daughter, and proprietress of a highly profitable beer business—is liberated from her torment by a vision of Jesus Christ. Should we trust the new Margery, with her fasting and her weeping and her chastity fixation, or burn her with the other heretics?” Showtimes are 8 p.m. today through Saturday—which also has a 2 p.m. matinee—with regular tickets costing $12.
Taking a presumably lighter tack is The Addams Family musical, now playing at Southern Connecticut State’s Lyman Center (501 Crescent St, New Haven; 203-392-6154). The performers are SCSU’s Crescent Players and the plot involves the teenage daughter, Wednesday, who’s about to begin dating, and the selectively overprotective father, Gomez, who can hardly stand it. Tonight’s show starts at 8, with more showtimes through Saturday. $15, or $5 for SCSU students.
Friday, October 12
The second annual Deep Hamden Festival—devised “to honor both the range of American music and the creative community of Connecticut”—digs in tonight at Best Video (1842 Whitney Ave, Hamden; 203-287-9286) and lasts for three days. Emphasizing Americana while stretching the genre’s usual boundaries to “[encompass] jazz, Dixieland and African percussion elements,” today’s 7 p.m. show features accomplished local folk septet Goodnight Blue Moon in the headlining spot, while opener Junebug Saddle’s “Val and David Johnson pay homage to some of their favorite classic country, folk and Americana musicians…” Tomorrow’s show—an ode to Dixieland—starts at 8, and Sunday’s—featuring world music as well as “sparse arrangements and beautifully understated vocals”—starts at 6, but all cost $10.
Saturday, October 13
City-Wide Open Studios enters Private Studios Weekend, the second of three total, when more than a hundred artists scattered throughout New Haven and beyond open their doors to the visiting public. Today, Westville is the focus, and it really is focused, with 45 artists clustered in a single neighborhood. You can visit them from noon to 6, with other attractions starting as early as 11 a.m. and going as late as 9 p.m. Tomorrow, the hours are the same for the weekend’s other studios—and the term is a loose one, encompassing places like the Eli Whitney Museum’s pastoral covered bridge and even City Hall—from West Haven to New Haven to Hamden to North Haven, with surrounding activities starting as early as 10 a.m. and lasting into the evening. Note that some Westville spaces, including Lotta Studio, West River Arts and Kehler Liddell Gallery, will be open both days.
Sunday, October 14
The Rough Draft (295 Treadwell St, Hamden; 475-224-5179) hosts a “spooktacular” movie brunch featuring a screening of Young Frankenstein (1974), which spoofs the classic horror genre right down to the black and white. Directed by Mel Brooks and starring Gene Wilder (pictured above), it’s much more funny than scary, so it won’t cause you to lose your lunch. The doors open at 11:30 a.m. and the movie starts at noon. No cover.
Written by Dan Mims. Image depicts Gene Wilder in Young Frankenstein (1974). Readers are encouraged to verify times, locations and prices before attending events.
