Inanimate monsters and animate ghosts make a good start to a week defined by Halloween’s paradoxes.
By the way, if you’re looking specifically for Halloween events, here you’ll only find weeknight bites at that wormy apple. But keep an eye out for tomorrow’s edition, which will flesh out this year’s scary busy holiday weekend.
Monday, October 24
Sometimes it’s the monsters who need saving. At 6:30 p.m., in conjunction with the exhibition SOS Brutalism: Save the Concrete Monsters!, architectural critic, curator and professor Oliver Elser comes to the Yale School of Architecture to discuss “Tools for Preservation Activism and a Theory for the Monsters.”
A unique cinematic experience awaits in the auditorium at 53 Wall Street, where, at 7 p.m., “British director Charlie Shackleton visits Yale for a screening and discussion of his experimental feature film The Afterlight. This film exists as just a single 35mm print, hand-delivered by Shackleton to every screening around the world. … Compiled from fragments of hundreds of films, the assembled actors have one thing in common: none of them are still alive.”
sponsored by
Tuesday, October 25
A Halloween edition of poetry reading series Open Mic Surgery invites you to “bring your favorite scary, spooky, grim, ghastly, weird, horrible and delightful poems to share” between 6 and 8 at Never Ending Books. “Costumes not necessary, but neither are the beheadings…”
Wednesday, October 26
Here’s something to fear: lead. As part of Lead Poisoning Prevention Week, New Haven’s health department is heading to Wilson Library from 10 a.m. to 1. “Come receive important information and some great giveaways!”
Do you like scary movies? Test your knowledge at East Rock Brewing during a Halloween Movie Trivia night starting at 6:30 sharp.
Also at 6:30, historian and author Jim Powers asks, “Can oral history sometimes be true?”—and then answers the question by highlighting a local Branford legend that survived expert skepticism long enough to be vindicated.
Thursday, October 27
Joined by Barry Bostwick, who played the original Brad Majors, the Shubert Theater screens the original unedited version of The Rocky Horror Picture Show “with a live shadow cast and audience participation” at 8 p.m. (Or, starting tomorrow night at 7:30, you can enjoy one of three completely live Rocky Horror performances this weekend at the Milford Arts Council headquarters.)
Vibes on Orange’s Nightmare on Orange Street party—“the OFFICIAL Kick-Off Party of Halloween Weekend ’22,” somehow—promises DJs, themed drinks, other drink specials, a bar tab giveaway and a costume contest starting at 9.
Friday, October 28
A symposium on film, installation and photographic artist Steve McQueen—who counts a few popular touchstones, including Best Picture-winning 12 Years a Slave, among his many more obscure projects, which often involve “themes of intimacy, isolation, physicality, and violence”—lasts all day tomorrow but starts with a 3:30 roundtable today at the Yale Center for British Art.
Today and tomorrow at 7:30 p.m., the Yale School of Music’s biggest voices perform Fall Opera Scenes—“two evenings of excerpts from the operatic repertoire performed with piano”—in Morse Recital Hall.
Saturday, October 29
The Open Source festival’s second and final weekend gives the public a chance to meet artists where they work or display while, of course, viewing the work, with this weekend’s focus on Westville and the Eli Whitney Barn. But the festival’s actually been active all week, with an itinerary of events and opportunities you can explore here (scroll down).
Stetson Library’s family-oriented Harvest Festival lasts from 1 to 4:30 p.m. and features “live music, an instrument petting zoo, crafts, and goody bag giveaways.” At least some of the live music comes courtesy of the New Haven Symphony Orchestra String Quintet “and singer/host Charlie Widmer as we explore Harvest/Autumn music from around the world” in a program designed for children ages 3 to 9.
Sunday, October 30
From 5:30 to 7:30 p.m., Fairhaven Furniture hosts a “house concert” featuring the guitarist, harp guitarist and composer Muriel Anderson. Critically acclaimed as a recording artist and “the first woman to have won the National Fingerstyle Guitar Championship,” Anderson “embraces music from all over the world with a sense of grace, joy and gentle humor.”
Written by Dan Mims. Readers are encouraged to verify times, locations, prices and other details before attending events.
