Tag archives: film

Everything’s Coming Up Sideways: Cult Wine Country Film Turns 15
By Gabe Saglie   |   September 5, 2019

Little known fact about the 2004 cult film Sideways: if George Clooney and Brad Pitt had gotten their way, the heartthrob pair would have seen their own names on the movie’s marquee. Director Alexander Payne turned them down, though, opting instead to cast lesser known names that wouldn’t steal the spotlight from the story or […]

Memories, Regrets, and Resurgence: Crosby Doc Opens
By Steven Libowitz   |   August 8, 2019

Watching David Crosby: Remember My Name at a SBIFF screening at a sold-out Lobero Theatre back on Super Bowl Sunday last February 3 was a thrilling but almost excruciating experience, made even more so knowing that the aging Santa Barbara-raised rock star was seated just a few rows away, watching himself sing, and squirm, on […]

Fun After the Sun: Fifties Flicks al Fresco
By Steven Libowitz   |   July 11, 2019

What could be more fun than spending a Friday evening with your friends watching a free classic film outdoors in a gorgeous garden setting? That’s basically the premise behind UCSB Arts & Lectures and the Santa Barbara County Office of Arts and Culture’s annual summer film series at the Courthouse Sunken Gardens downtown – a […]

A Class Act
By Richard Mineards   |   July 4, 2019

Michael DeVorzon, the son of Montecito dynamic duo Barry and Jelinda DeVorzon, is becoming quite the TV star. But you’d never know it. Michael, who attended MUS, Crane, Santa Barbara High and UCSB, appears in a ZipRecruiter commercial that has been airing regularly since October, 2017. There have been more than 23,000 national airings of […]

Tab Hunter Confidential
By Richard Mineards   |   July 4, 2019

This week marks the first anniversary of the death of Montecito actor Tab Hunter, who left us for more heavenly pastures, aged 86, after making more than 40 films, becoming a ‘50s and ‘60s Hollywood heartthrob. To mark the occasion, Tab’s longtime companion of more than 35 years, Allan Glaser, will be premiering a retrospective […]

Grand Opening
By Lynda Millner   |   June 27, 2019

The Santa Barbara International Film Festival (SBIFF) has expanded to include a 3,600 sq. ft. space at 1313 State Street to be called the Barbakow Family Center for Film Studies or just the Education Center. A place to create and learn thanks to Jeff and Margo Barbakow’s generous support. As executive director Roger Durling showed […]

Remembering Sylvia
By Richard Mineards   |   June 20, 2019

On a personal note, I remember actress Sylvia Miles, who has died in New York aged 94. The two-time Oscar-nominated camp icon’s notoriety grew when she joined Andy Warhol’s Manhattan social circle in the ‘70s becoming a legendary party girl and inspiring the famous jibe: “Sylvia Miles and Andy Warhol would attend the opening of […]

British Visit
By Richard Mineards   |   June 13, 2019

President Donald Trump‘s three-day state visit to the U.K. to meet with Queen Elizabeth and other members of the Royal Family, as well as celebrating the 75th anniversary of D-Day, brought KEYT-TV anchor Beth Farnsworth to Maison Mineards Montecito for an interview in my cottage garden. The visit by Trump and his willowy wife Melania […]

Star Wars Legend Artist Colin Cantwell Visits
By Joanne A Calitri   |   June 6, 2019

Pinch me indeed, and thanks to the Force that brought Colin Cantwell to our town Saturday, May 25, greeted by a fleet of Storm Troopers and fans like Montecito Rotary Club President John Lucchetti with his sons, at Metro Entertainment: Comics, Games, Toys & More store on Anacapa Street. A computer genius and inventor, he […]

Lights, Camera, Action
By Richard Mineards   |   June 6, 2019

Cinephiles were out in force when mayor Cathy Murillo opened the Barbakow Family Center for Film Studies, just a tiara’s toss from the Arlington Theatre. The 3,600 sq. ft. space, formerly the administrative offices of the Granada Theatre, now relocated to the theatre building a block or two down State Street, consists of seven classrooms, […]

Robinson Redux
By Steven Libowitz   |   May 30, 2019

The Santa Barbara singer-songwriter community was devastated when the tirelessly eclectic producers, sound engineer, and songcrafter Robinson Eikenberry died unexpectedly on July 4, 2017. The 35-year local resident who graduated from Crane School in Montecito was honored soon after with a memorial concert at the Lobero Theatre, where many of the Santa Barbara artists he […]

Going North to Find Your Center
By Steven Libowitz   |   May 23, 2019

Karen Zacarías’ theatrical adaptation of Into the Beautiful North, which gets its area debut in six performances over 10 days beginning Friday by UCSB Theater Department, is based on the novel by Pulitzer Prize finalist Luís Alberto Urrea – which served as the selection for UCSB Reads back in 2017. Urrea was inspired by the […]

Tap into Stage Percussion
By Steven Libowitz   |   May 2, 2019

Pianist Jeremy Denk isn’t the only MacArthur Fellow returning to town under the auspices of Arts & Lectures this week. Michelle Dorrance, the founder of the New York City-based dance company that bears her name, won the prestigious prize back in 2015. ETM: Double Down is the title for her latest evening-length work that merges […]

Marilyn Horne Song Competition Winners Recital
By Steven Libowitz   |   April 18, 2019

Also on the horizon before the opening of the Music Academy’s impressive eight-week 2019 Summer Music Festival in mid-June is the recital featuring the 2018 Marilyn Horne Song Competition Winners mezzo-soprano Kelsey Lauritano and pianist Andrew Sun at Hahn Hall on May 24. The singer joined the Oper Frankfurt studio last September two months after […]

Lucidity 2019: What a Little Moonlight Can Do
By Steven Libowitz   |   April 11, 2019

To the uninitiated, the Lucidity Festival, which offers its eighth iteration this weekend, might still come off as a haven for hardcore drug users, a three-day escape for spaced-out revelers intent on leaving reality behind. But maybe that mistaken notion will finally be put to rest, as Lucidity was recognized as the world’s best family-friendly […]

Finding Solutions for Fire and Flood
By Steven Libowitz   |   March 28, 2019

The Thomas Fire and ensuing Montecito debris flows were devastating to the community. But even worse weather-related disasters could be on the horizon around the globe due to habitat destruction, according to Eric Adler, a longtime Santa Barbara resident and founder of One Season Productions. Adler is making a film on the life and work […]

Puppy Power: Collective Confers Jazz-plus
By Steven Libowitz   |   February 21, 2019

Trying to pigeonhole Snarky Puppy into a single genre would be a fool’s errand, but suffice it to say that the three-time Grammy Award-winning Brooklyn-based collective that features a revolving cast of up to 25 musicians makes music that’s at once heady, heart-centered, and headed for the dance floor, an amalgam they call “music for […]

Santa Barbara Film Fest
By Lynda Millner   |   February 14, 2019

The show business adage is never follow children or a dog. Glenn Close was definitely up staged by a dog at her tribute during the Santa Barbara International Film Festival (SBIFF). I’m sure she didn’t mind since it was her own dog, Pip, who sneaked out of the green room and came prancing out on […]

5Q’s: SBIFF Award Winner Splits the Difference
By Steven Libowitz   |   February 14, 2019

Babysplitters offers a decidedly fresh take on the age-old struggle of couples coming into agreement about having children. The film, which had its world premiere earlier this month at SBIFF, dives headlong into unforeseen and decidedly risky territory as two couple who are close friends choose to have a single baby and split custody and […]

Friend Raiser
By Richard Mineards   |   February 7, 2019

As the 34th annual Santa Barbara International Film Festival kicked off across the road at the Arlington, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) hosted a “friend raiser” for 80 guests at Villa & Vine with a public service announcement Start a Conversation being shown before the main feature Diving Deep: The Life and Times of Mike deGruy […]