The official blog of Laemmle Theatres
CANCELLED: We regret to inform you that this Sunday’s Laemmle Live concert featuring Samohi Chamber Orchestra has been cancelled. This is in line with the school’s decision to cancel other large public gatherings. We appreciate your understanding of the situation.
LAEMMLE LIVE proudly welcomes back our hometown band – Samohi Chamber Orchestra. Orchestra Directors are Joni Swenson and Jason Aiello. Santa Monica High School, fondly referred to as Samohi, is a large urban public high school. Founded in 1891, Samohi has an enrollment of 3,000 diverse students and is situated on a twenty-six acre campus just a short walk from the Pacific Ocean.
The Santa Monica Orchestra was founded in 1903, making 2020 its 117th anniversary. During this time, the program has grown to include seven orchestras at Samohi. The Santa Monica High School Chamber Orchestra is comprised of twenty-two talented and dedicated young musicians who are leaders in the Samohi Symphony Orchestra. In past years, the Santa Monica High School Chamber Orchestra has performed in Carnegie Hall in 2009, at the American String Teachers Association National Orchestra Festival in Kansas City, Kansas in 2011; at the Northwest Orchestra Festival in Portland, Oregon in 2013 and in 2017, and in Vancouver, British Columbia in 2015. Last year, the Samohi Chamber Orchestra performed in New York City at the National Orchestra Cup Festival held at Alice Tully Hall in Lincoln Center where they received the best string ensemble in the festival. The Chamber Orchestra is delighted for its fourth performance in the Laemmle Live Concert Series.
1st Violin
Rubani Chugh
Kielor Tung
Gina Kim
Ryan Lee
Sarah Michlin
2nd Violin
Anouk Jouffret
Emily Taylor
Chloe Schwartz
Isabella Miele-Okada
Lily Rafat
Janet Yang
Viola
Layla Shapouri
Dyllan Zhou
Grace McFalls
Naomi Villafana
Cello
Kaya Ralls
Lily Stern
Giulia Trevellin
Shoshanah Israilevich
Bass
Weston Kerekes
Alec Raymond
Silas Garcia-George
Samohi Orchestra Parents Association
Ann Raziel, President
Santa Monica High School
Dr. Antonio Shelton, Principal
Santa Monica Malibu Unified School District
Sunday, March 15, 2020
11:00 AM
Monica Film Center
1332 Second Street
Santa Monica
It was an unprecedented Oscars for foreign language cinema, with “Parasite” taking not only Best International Film but Best Director and Picture. Laemmle Oscar Contest participants who correctly guessed the Academy would break with tradition and choose a foreign film over an English-language film won our contest. First place garnered a Laemmle Premiere Card worth $150 and the two second place winners get Laemmle Premiere Cards worth $100. The winners’ prizes are on the way.
23 correct: 1st Place) Jared N. of Pasadena.
22 correct: (205 mins) 2nd Place tie) So Jin C. of L.A.
22 correct (205 mins) 2nd Place tie) Megan M. of Pasadena.
Congratulations to the winners and thanks to all for playing!
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LAEMMLE LIVE puts a fresh spin on chamber music this month and proudly introduces Mixtape Quartet.
Mixtape Series draws inspiration from how friends share music. We curate our favorite musical moments to share a feeling. And to tell a story. We love the nostalgic and intimate quality of personalized cassettes. And we value the abundant diversity of music available on today’s streaming platforms. Mixtape combines the best of both. But Pandora and Spotify are no match for human instinct. Our handcrafted playlists connect pieces in ways no algorithm could hope to think up! We seamlessly thread together selections of the best moments in the classical repertoire (and beyond!) into themed concerts. The audience experience is akin to leaving all your music on shuffle, except somehow, no matter how diverse the pieces are, the music always fits together perfectly. Watch their video here.
Juan-Salvador Carrasco, Michael Siess, and Misha Vayman, Co-Artistic Directors Email: [email protected]
Artists:
Misha Vayman & Michael Siess – Violins
Nao Kubota & Hyemi Choi – Violas
Juan-Salvador Carrasco & Sarah Kim – Cellos
Program:
Sun selections
Ysaye Violin Sonata No. 5, “L’aurore”
Beethoven String Quartet in A major, Op. 132, mvt 3
Janacek String Quartet No. 2 “Intimate Letters,” mvt 1
Debussy Quartet, mvt 3
Moon selections
Bartok String Quartet No. 4, mvt 3
Schoenberg Verklarte Nacht
Borodin String Quartet, mvt 3
Clair de Lune
Sunday, February 16, 2020
11:00 AM
Monica Film Center
1332 Second Street
Santa Monica
Now is the time to enjoy fantastic films from around the world. All five of the Oscar-nominated documentary features — THE EDGE OF DEMOCRACY, THE CAVE, FOR SAMA, AMERICAN FACTORY and HONEYLAND are in theaters now, before the awards show on February 9. Four of the five Oscar nominees for Best International Feature — LES MISÉRABLES, PAIN AND GLORY, PARASITE and HONEYLAND (deservedly, it’s nominated twice!) are now in theaters.
We hope to open the Polish drama CORPUS CHRISTI, the fifth foreign film nominee and the dark horse in the race, on March 6 at the Monica Film Center, Playhouse and Town Center.
The film is about 20-year-old Daniel, who is released and sent to a remote village to work as a manual laborer after spending years in a Warsaw prison for a violent crime. The job is designed to keep him busy, but Daniel has a higher calling. While imprisoned he became deeply religious and now aspires to join the priesthood, but his criminal record makes it impossible. When Daniel arrives in town, one quick lie allows him to be mistaken for the town’s new priest, and he sets about tending to his newfound flock. An international sensation with an electrifying lead performance by a previously unknown actor, CORPUS CHRISTI is the twelfth Polish film to earn an Oscar nomination. Only one of them has taken home the prize, IDA in 2015.
Laemmle Theatres and the Anniversary Classics Series present one of the most delightful comedies of the 1960s, THE WORLD OF HENRY ORIENT, produced by a top-flight group of filmmakers and actors. We will be joined by one of the film’s stars, Paula Prentiss, one of the most gifted comediennes to emerge during that era.
HENRY ORIENT is a rare example of a female-centric movie that takes on added relevance at a time when critics are clamoring for more movies that reflect women’s experiences. The film had its origins in a novel written by Nora Johnson and based partly on her own experiences at a posh girls’ school in Manhattan.
The main characters are two of the girls at the school, played by charming newcomers Tippy Walker and Merrie Spaeth in their film debuts. The two heroines develop a crush on a second-rate pianist, the flamboyant Lothario Henry Orient, played to the hilt by the brilliant Peter Sellers. Johnson admitted that the plot was based in part on her own teenage infatuation with real-life pianist and wit Oscar Levant.
Sellers broke through to full-fledged stardom in 1964. The acclaimed anti-war satire, Stanley Kubrick’s ‘Dr. Strangelove,’ opened early in the year, with Sellers cast in three different roles. In the spring of that year he introduced the character of the bumbling Inspector Clouseau in the comedy classic, ‘The Pink Panther,’ and that film was so successful that he brought back the character in ‘A Shot in the Dark later that year.’
THE WORLD OF HENRY ORIENT premiered as the Easter attraction at Radio City Music Hall, and it was the official American entry at the Cannes Film Festival in May. In addition to Sellers and Prentiss, the adult cast included Angela Lansbury as Walker’s imperious mother, Tom Bosley (a Broadway veteran who would go on to win new audiences in popular TV series like ‘Happy Days’ and Lansbury’s ‘Murder, She Wrote’), Phyllis Thaxter, and Bibi Osterwald.
The behind-the-scenes talent was equally impressive. Nora Johnson wrote the screenplay with her father, acclaimed writer-director Nunnally Johnson, whose credits include the Oscar-winning ‘The Grapes of Wrath,’ ‘Roxie Hart,’ ‘The Three Faces of Eve,’ and ‘The Dirty Dozen.’ HENRY ORIENT was the first film produced by Jerome Hellman, who won an Academy Award five years later for producing ‘Midnight Cowboy.’ The picture was the third directed by George Roy Hill, who went on to make ‘Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,’ ‘The Sting’ (Oscar winner for Best Picture and Best Director), ‘A Little Romance,’ and ‘The World According to Garp.’
Cinematographers Boris Kaufman (an Oscar winner for ‘On the Waterfront’) and Arthur J. Ornitz (‘A Thousand Clowns,’ ‘Serpico’) brought lyricism to their depiction of Manhattan, and the great composer Elmer Bernstein (‘The Magnificent Seven,’ ‘To Kill a Mockingbird,’ ‘The Great Escape,’ ‘True Grit,’ ‘Airplane!,’ and ‘Far from Heaven’) contributed one of his most memorable scores.
All of this talent impressed the critics. The New York Times’ Bosley Crowther hailed “one of the most joyous and comforting movies about teenagers that we’ve had in a long time…a juicily tart and sassy go-round.” Time magazine called it “bright, breezy, and brimming with fun.”
The picture was named one of the year’s ten best by the National Board of Review. It was nominated for a Golden Globe for Best Comedy or Musical of the Year, and it also received a nomination from the Writers Guild of America as Best Written American Comedy.
Over the years the movie has turned into a cult favorite. Writing in The New Yorker in 2012, almost 50 years after the film’s release, John Colapinto called HENRY ORIENT “one of the most enduringly funny and moving American movies ever made.” Leonard Maltin described it as a “marvelous comedy of two teenage girls who idolize eccentric pianist Sellers and follow him around N.Y.C.”
Prentiss plays one of the women pursued by Sellers, whose trysts are constantly interrupted by the two girls. Prentiss made her screen debut in the enormously successful spring break comedy, ‘Where the Boys Are,’ in 1960. She went on to star with Rock Hudson in Howard Hawks’ ‘Man’s Favorite Sport,’ and she appeared with Sellers again in ‘What’s New Pussycat?’ She also co-starred in such films as ‘In Harm’s Way,’ Mike Nichols’ ‘Catch 22,’ ‘The Parallax View,’ and the chilling feminist thriller ‘The Stepford Wives.’ In the late ’60s she starred with her husband, Richard Benjamin, in the acclaimed TV sitcom ‘He & She.’
Our 55th anniversary screening of THE WORLD OF HENRY ORIENT with co-star Paula Prentiss in-person, screens Tuesday, January 28, at 7pm at the Royal in West L.A. Click here for tickets.
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LAEMMLE LIVE proudly launches its fourth season with the musicians of Kaleidoscope. Beloved radio host Rich Capparela returns to host our popular Sunday morning concert series. The critically acclaimed local conductorless chamber orchestra is dedicated to enriching lives through exhilarating concert experiences, artistic excellence, musician leadership, and connecting with the diverse communities of Los Angeles. They envision a world where commitment to collaborative artistic process results in profound orchestral performances that inspire people to pursue cooperation and artistry in their own creative, professional and personal lives. For more info, please visit: www.kco.la
The program will include:
W.A. Mozart – Divertimento No. 3
Paquito D’rivera – Habanera
Franz Schubert – Trio in Bb Major
Jean Françaix – Divertissement
Astor Piazzolla – Oblivion
Robert Walker – oboe
Benjamin Mitchell – clarinet
Nick Akdag – bassoon
“In the top handful of best concert experiences I’ve ever had”
-Rich Capparela, Classical KUSC Radio
“They are lending themselves to a level of collaboration that most orchestras don’t have”
-LA Times
“a tour de force”
-The Huffington Post
Sunday, January 26, 2020
11:00 AM
Monica Film Center
1332 Second Street
Santa Monica
We are thrilled to announce that beginning this weekend we will be screening all of the documentaries short-listed for the 2020 Oscars. Together the 15 films offer a breathtaking portrait of our world, from the micro — the freelance Mexico City ambulance drivers of Midnight Family and the Macedonian beekeeper of Honeyland — to macro — the data theft crisis depicted in The Great Hack and the savage forced family planning of One Child Nation, all told with peak cinematic genius. The final five Oscar nominees will be announced January 13 and the 92nd annual Academy Awards ceremony is set for Sunday, February 9, but all of these documentaries are as good as the finest fiction films and well worth your time to experience with the big canvass of a movie screen.
December 28-29
MAIDEN is the story of how Tracy Edwards, a 24-year-old cook on charter boats, became the skipper of the first ever all-female crew to enter the Whitbread Round the World in 1989.
THE GREAT HACK uncovers the dark world of data exploitation with astounding access to the personal journeys of key players on different sides of the explosive Cambridge Analytica/Facebook data scandal. (Also playing January 3-9 at the Laemmle Glendale.)
AQUARELA takes audiences on a deeply cinematic journey through the transformative beauty and raw power of water. Captured at a rare 96 frames-per-second, the film is a visceral reminder that humans are no match for the sheer force and capricious will of Earth’s most precious element.
ADVOCATE ~ Since the early 1970s, Jewish-Israeli attorney Lea Tsemel has made a career out of defending Palestinians in Israeli courts: from feminists to fundamentalists, from non-violent demonstrators to armed militants, including suicide bombers.
THE BIGGEST LITTLE FARM follows two dreamers and their beloved dog when they make a choice that takes them out of their tiny L.A. apartment and into the countryside to build one of the most diverse farms of its kind in complete coexistence with nature.
January 4-5
MIDNIGHT FAMILY ~ In Mexico City’s wealthiest neighborhoods, the Ochoa family runs a private ambulance, competing with other for-profit EMTs for patients in need of urgent help. As the Ochoas try to make a living in this fraught industry, they struggle to keep their dire finances from compromising the people in their care.
HONEYLAND ~ Hatidze lives with her ailing mother in the mountains of Macedonia, making a living cultivating honey using ancient beekeeping traditions. When an unruly family moves in next door, what at first seems like a balm for her solitude becomes a source of tension as they, too, want to practice beekeeping, while disregarding her advice.
FOR SAMA is both an intimate and epic journey into the female experience of war. A love letter from a young mother to her daughter, the film tells the story of Waad al-Kateab’s life through five years of the uprising in Aleppo, Syria as she falls in love, gets married and gives birth to Sama, all while cataclysmic conflict rises around her. (Also playing December 28 & 29 at the Royal.)
THE EDGE OF DEMOCRACY ~ A cautionary tale for these times of democracy in crisis – the personal and political fuse to explore one of the most dramatic periods in Brazilian history. Combining unprecedented access to leaders past and present, including Presidents Dilma Rousseff and Lula da Silva, with accounts of her own family’s complex past, filmmaker Petra Costa witnesses their rise and fall and the tragically polarized nation that remains.
THE APOLLO chronicles the unique history and contemporary legacy of the New York City landmark, the Apollo Theater.
January 11-12
KNOCK DOWN THE HOUSE ~ At a moment of historic volatility in American politics, four women decide to fight back, setting themselves on a journey that will change their lives and their country forever. Without political experience or corporate money, they build a movement of insurgent candidates challenging powerful incumbents in Congress. Their efforts result in a stunning upset.
THE CAVE is an unflinching story of the Syrian war. For besieged civilians, hope and safety lie underground inside the subterranean hospital known as the Cave, where Dr. Amani Ballor and her female colleagues have claimed their right to work as equals alongside their male counterparts, doing their jobs in a way that would be unthinkable in the patriarchal culture that exists above.
Crafted from a newly discovered trove of 65mm footage, and more than 11,000 hours of uncatalogued audio recordings, APOLLO 11 takes us straight to the heart of NASA’s most celebrated mission—the one that first put men on the moon, and made Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin household names.
AMERICAN FACTORY ~ In post-industrial Ohio, a Chinese billionaire opens a new factory in the husk of an abandoned General Motors plant, hiring two thousand blue-collar Americans. Early days of hope and optimism give way to setbacks as high-tech China clashes with working-class America.
China’s One Child Policy may have ended in 2015, but the process of dealing with the trauma of its brutal enforcement is only just beginning. The sweeping ONE CHILD NATION explores the ripple effect of this devastating social experiment, uncovering one shocking human rights violation after another. (Also currently playing at the Laemmle Glendale through at least January 2.)