Tag archives: Drive In

Opera, Outdoors and Out of the Box
By Steven Libowitz   |   April 7, 2021

Opera director Josh Shaw has never been one to follow conventions. After setting aside a career as a tenor (his resume includes appearing at the now-defunct “Opera Under the Stars” series at the Arts and Letters Café in the Sullivan Goss Gallery back in 2010), he co-founded Pacific Opera Project a decade ago to provide […]

Getting Innovative: From Drive-ins to Zoom Q&As, the Santa Barbara International Film Festival is Ready
By Steven Libowitz   |   April 1, 2021

Over its 36-year history, the Santa Barbara International Film Festival has had to deal with challenges such as raising funds to keep the fest afloat in the early days; pivoting quickly following the departure of its new executive director after a single season at the helm; and erecting barricades to hold back the masses when […]

Focus on Film: Christmastime is Here
By Steven Libowitz   |   December 10, 2020

UCSB Arts & Lectures’ free outdoor fall film festival series of screenings at the West Wind Drive-In comes to a close with two Christmas classics, with a modern parable followed by a Jimmy Stewart tearjerker. In 2003’s Elf, Will Ferrell stars as an elf named Buddy who discovers that he’s actually a human whom Santa […]

Music and Much More with Marsalis
By Steven Libowitz   |   November 12, 2020

The election will be three days in the rear-view mirror when The Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra Septet with Wynton Marsalis performing “The Sounds of Democracy” streams for free as part of UCSB Arts & Lectures’ Thematic Learning Initiative, its community conversation arm in conjunction with events. Led by trumpeter-composer Wynton Marsalis and featuring seven […]

Further Focus on Film
By Steven Libowitz   |   November 12, 2020

Free to Laugh, a short documentary about the power of comedy to help inmates to heal after prison, follows a comedy workshop teaching improv and stand-up to women on parole and probation, one of the more underrepresented communities representing and a voice that is seldom heard. The film, which was shot on location at Amity […]