MIDDLETOWN, Calif. – The Middletown Art Center’s Restore project features printmaking - drypoint etching with artist Nicholas Hay this Saturday, Oct. 27, from 1 to 5 p.m.

Adults and children ages 11 and up of all levels of art making experience, from newbies to professionals, are invited to attend this inspiring class for just $5.

“We’ll use a drypoint technique to draw into a plastic plate with a metal etching pen,” explained Hay. “Participants will be able to make changes and refinements to their image and run their plate through the press several times during class. The process of printmaking is quite magical, and anyone who likes to draw can create compelling images.”

Drypoint etching on copper plates will also be introduced in this class. Participants can purchase copper plates to draw on and print in class in the coming months. MAC encourages folks to come to several classes, to hone skills, learn new ones, and develop a body of work. Participants may also work on monotypes during this class.

Please register in advance for all Restore classes at http://www.middletownartcenter.org/restore, email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call 707-809-8118. Space is limited and reservations are required.

Work from printmaking classes will contribute to MAC’s second chapbook of writings and images, as well as Restore exhibitions. The first chapbook, “Resilience – a community reframes disaster through art,” is available for purchase at MAC or on the MAC Web site. You can preview the book at www.middletownartcenter.org/resilience-chapbook-excerpt.

The Restore project provides low-cost classes most weekends through May 2019. Fall and early winter classes provide opportunity to learn or refine skills in a variety of materials and techniques, including clay, woodworking, metalworking, concrete, drypoint etching, block printing, and more.

Late winter and spring classes will focus on personal and collaborative projects, studio time, mentoring and guidance to create work.

Learn more about Restore class scheduling at www.middletownartcenter.org.

On Sunday, Nov. 4, Restore features natural woodworking with Marcus Maria Jung. The class begins at 10:30 a.m. and ends at 5 p.m., and includes a break for lunch. A writing and performance lab with Casey Carney will be offered on Saturday, Nov. 10. Please preregister at www.middletownartcenter.org/restore.

The Restore project was made possible thanks to support from the California Arts Council, a state agency, with additional support from local organizations, businesses, and individuals. Visit www.ca.arts.gov to learn more about the California Arts Council’s important work in communities and schools throughout California.

Middletown Art Center is located at 21456 State Highway 175 at the junction of Highway 29.

Be a part of the growing arts scene in South Lake County by becoming a MAC member, by coming to Restore printmaking this Saturday, or by attending one of the many arts and cultural events or classes at MAC.

Visit www.middletownartcenter.org or “Like” Middletown Art Center on Facebook to stay up-to-date with what’s happening at MAC.

LAKEPORT, Calif. – The 1938 drama, “Angels With Dirty Faces,” starring James Cagney, Pat O’Brien and Humphrey Bogart, screens at the Soper Reese Theatre on Tuesday, Nov. 13, at 1 and 6 p.m.

Entry to the film is by donation.

A fine gangster movie classic with James Cagney at the top of his game as the bad guy who has redeeming qualities.

As ex-con Rocky Sullivan, Cagney’s movements are quick, his speech like machine gun fire. He is all attitude and style, and you can’t help being on his side.

Directed by Oscar-nominated Michael Curtiz.

The movie is sponsored by Kathy Jensen. Not rated. Run time is 1 hour and 37 minutes.

The Soper Reese Theatre is located at 275 S. Main St., Lakeport, 707-263-0577, www.soperreesetheatre.com .

LAKEPORT, Calif. – Luis Alberto Urrea painted vivid word pictures of life along the border between the US and Mexico in his novel Into the Beautiful North, the NEA Big Read selection in Lake County.

Local artists Richard Schmidt and Diana Liebe have taken Urrea’s images and translated them into visual pictures that they will share in a free beginning art workshop at the Main Street Gallery, 325 N. Main Street in Lakeport on Saturday, Oct. 27, from 3 to 5 p.m.

Students will use watercolors, colored pencils and water color pencils to color their own versions of a template painting that features themes from “Into the Beautiful North.” During the class Schmidt will read from Urrea’s writing to inspire the students to new heights of creativity.

“Into the Beautiful North” follows the adventures of 19-year-old Nayeli who works at a taco shop in her Mexican village and dreams about her father who journeyed to the United States when she was young.

Recently, it has dawned on her that he isn't the only man who has left town. In fact, there are almost no men in the village – they've all gone north.

While watching “The Magnificent Seven,” Nayeli decides to go north herself and recruit seven men – her own "Siete Magníficos” – to repopulate her hometown and protect it from the bandidos who plan on taking it over.

A national initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts in partnership with Arts Midwest, the NEA Big Read broadens our understanding of our world, our communities, and ourselves through the joy of sharing a good book.

For more information on this event, please contact the library at 707-263-8817. You also can view a full calendar of events for the NEA Big Read in Lake County, which continues through October, at http://www.lakecountybigread.com.

The Lake County Library is on the Internet at http://library.lakecountyca.gov and Facebook at www.facebook.com/LakeCountyLibrary.

Jan Cook is a library technician for the Lake County Library.

This column originates from the University of Nebraska in Lincoln, and a half-hour's drive south there's a creek with flat stones on its floor where wagons passed down and over the muddy bottom, up the other bank, and on west to Oregon.

Here's a poem about that great migration, by Kim Lozano, a poet from St. Louis.

The Ruts

Most have been plowed up or paved over
but you can still find them, tracks cut
deep into the earth by prairie schooners
crossing that great green ocean, pitching
waves of pasture out where there's nothing
else to do but live. Concealing their detritus—
a piece of sun-bleached buffalo skull, a button
from a cavalry soldier's coat—the ruts wind
their way beneath leafy suburban streets, lie
buried under a Phillips 66 and the corner
of a Pizza Hut where a couple sits slumped
in their booth. Yet here and there, like a fish
head breaking the surface of the water, they
emerge in a school teacher's back yard or a
farmer's field, evidence of wagons packed
with hardtack and hard money, thousands of
draft animals tended by traders with blistered
feet, their journey both bleak and romantic.
That's the kind of proof I like, a scar I can put
my hand to, history that will dust my fingers
with a little bit of suffering, a little bit of bone.


American Life in Poetry does not accept unsolicited manuscripts. It is made possible by The Poetry Foundation, publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2017 by Kim Lozano, "The Ruts," from Third Coast, (Spring, 2017). Poem reprinted by permission of Kim Lozano and the publisher. Introduction copyright ©2018 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction’s author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006.

BAD TIMES AT THE EL ROYALE (Rated R)

Contemporary film noir thrillers would normally be the province of Quentin Tarantino’s handiwork, and so the thought comes to mind that “Bad Times at the El Royale” would be the latest film in his pantheon of this genre.

The guess is a good one but Drew Goddard, serving as writer and director, is the creative force behind the weird story of strangers meeting at a rundown hotel with a dark past that literally straddles the state line between Nevada and California.

From initial appearances, the El Royale in 1969 has the look of the kind of place that should be avoided, much like how Janet Leigh’s Marion Crane should have stayed clear of Norman Bates’ decrepit motel in “Psycho.”

Lost souls and other dubious types are drawn to this eerily mysterious place. The motel is managed by timid, nerdy Miles (Lewis Pullman) who is indifferent about his clientele and yet harbors secrets about how management expects him to keep an eye on guests.

Smarmy vacuum-cleaner salesman Laramie Seymour Sullivan (Jon Hamm), holds court in the motel lobby by offering cocktails and conversation with anyone who happens to wander into the El Royale. Oddly, he seeks to check in to one specific room for reasons unknown.

Arriving shortly after is Darlene Sweet (Cynthia Erivo), who may have once had a decent career as a soul singer but is now reduced to scrimping by on gigs in seedy Reno lounges.

Seemingly out of place for a priest, Father Daniel Flynn (Jeff Bridges) has picked a strange place to spend the night, but in his case appearances can be deceiving.

Sullen hippie chick Emily Summerspring (Dakota Johnson) arrives on the scene with a big chip on her shoulder. She has a strange connection to cult guru Billy Lee (Chris Hemsworth) who has a violent temper.

The volatile mix of motel patrons inevitably leads to violence and bloodshed. Only two people will get out of this mess alive, and so “Bad Times” delivers on its film noir promise.

This thriller is an intriguing bit of business with stolen money hidden under the floorboard of a motel room, kidnappings, an abundance of flashbacks, a creepy cult gathering, a continuous sense of foreboding, and a climax of brutal mayhem. “Bad Times at the El Royale” is a fascinating retro experience.



‘THE COOL KIDS’ ON FOX

Senior citizens can be good fodder for situation comedies. Think back to “The Golden Girls” more than a generation ago. The FOX television network is running with “The Cool Kids,” a new comedy about a group of feisty seniors living in a retirement home.

The humor is often quite predictable and formulaic, but why shouldn’t Baby Boomers have a series of their own. FOX gives “The Cool Kids” a slot on Friday nights, which seems appropriate because millennials are probably not tuning in on a weekend.

The stellar cast offers this program a chance to entertain. A group of male buddies led by gruff Hank (David Alan Grier) are mourning the loss of Jerry, the fourth member of the gang that has staked out its own table at Shady Meadows.

Martin Mull’s Charlie is a raconteur with a lot of wild, improbable stories about his glory days. Leslie Jordan’s Sid is a flamboyant character who apparently came out of the closet late in life and is making up for lost time.

As the friends ponder who should inherit Jerry’s seat at the table, pushy Margaret (Vicki Lawrence) muscles her way into the open spot much to the verbal protests uttered by the trio. She sets the tone with the retort, “Who are you? The Cool Kids.”

Margaret is a force to be reckoned with, and that’s where a lot of humor comes into play. Establishing her strong will, she beats Sid in a flash at arm wrestling. The opinionated Hank, full of bluster and bravado, is no match to her steely will.

As expected, Margaret gets her way and becomes one of the gang, and before long they challenge authority by rejecting the idea that a memorial service for Jerry would be an event with a “cheese plate and balloons.”

Show creator Charlie Day (“It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia”) mentioned during the summer TV press tour that the objective was to avoid tired old people jokes and write about people of this age saying, “Hey, life isn’t over.”

On that score, “The Cool Kids” succeeds because the three guys and Margaret get embroiled in all sorts of wild adventures, from getting arrested for stealing a car to crashing a nightclub party after being rejected by the bouncer. Indeed, they’re looking for good time mischief.

In a sign of the times, “The Cool Kids” is raunchier than what was on network television three decades ago, but the wonderful cast knows how to deliver the laughs for biting retorts that range from mediocre to inspired lunacy. I’m looking to give this new series a chance.

Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.

MIDDLETOWN, Calif. – The Middletown Art Center’s Restore Project features a pastel making workshop this Saturday, Oct. 20, from 1 to 5 p.m.

Adults and children age 12 and up are invited to make their own pastels from a range of colors of earth pigments sourced from Lake County’s beautiful hills, as well as traditional art pigments.

Participants are encouraged to bring clay earth from their own environment in a 16- or 32-ounce container to enrich the palette of colors available.

Please register in advance for this class at www.middletownartcenter.org/restore, email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call 707-809-8118. Space is limited and reservations are required.

“Making art from dirt has its beginnings as far as our species has been around,” said workshop Instructor Channing Rudd. “Humans have always used local materials for painting on cave walls, our bodies, and even burying the dead. This class will delve deeply into the various aspects of making pastels using our local clay soils in the process … From dirt to art.”

Rudd grew up in New York and received his BFA at Syracuse University. He studied under the renowned Bauhaus professor Peter Piening, friend of painters Maholy-Nagy and Paul Klee. Primarily a plein air artist, Rudd moved to Lake County in 1980 and has taught art at Woodland College Clearlake Campus since 1994.

The Restore Project provides Lake County residents with low-cost art classes and the opportunity to learn or refine skills in a variety of materials techniques. Classes take place most Saturdays through May 2019.

Fall and winter classes include clay, woodworking, metalworking, felting, concrete, dry point, block printing and more. Late winter and spring classes will focus on personal and collaborative projects, studio time, mentoring and guidance to create personal and group work.

On Saturday, Oct. 27, Nicholas Hay will lead a dry point etching class. On Sunday, Nov. 4, the Restore Project features an introduction to natural woodworking with Marcus Maria Jung from 11 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.

The Restore project was made possible with support from the California Arts Council, a state agency, with additional support from local organizations, businesses, and individuals. Visit www.ca.arts.gov to learn more about the California Arts Council’s important work in communities and schools throughout California.

The Middletown Art Center is located at 21456 State Highway 175 at the junction of Highway 29.