Opera Is Back
The Met: Live in HD will return to Guild Hall with a new production of Alban Berg’s “Wozzeck” by William Kentridge, an artist, on Saturday at 1 p.m. The story of a soldier driven mad by jealousy, the opera is based on a play by Georg Buchner that was left unfinished at his death in 1837.
While Berg did not specify a time or location for the opera, it has traditionally depicted the life of soldiers and residents of a rural German-speaking town in the early 19th century. However, the new production, which Anthony Tommasini of The New York Times called “extraordinary,” has updated the action to just before World War I.
Peter Mattei sings the title role, and Elza van den Heever is Marie, the unfaithful mother of Wozzeck’s child. Yannick Nezet-Seguin, the Met’s music director, conducts. Tickets are $23, $21 for members, and $16 for students.
The simulcast will be preceded at noon by “Murder, Madness, and Brilliant Music,” a lecture by Victoria Bond, a noted composer, conductor, and opera scholar. She will discuss how Berg uses his intricately organized music to express a rich emotional palette. Tickets to the talk are $30, free for opera donors.
Theater Classes
Bay Street Theater in Sag Harbor has announced three eight-week classes for adults. “Sing Us a Song,” a cabaret workshop aimed at vocalists ages 16 and up, will take place Monday evenings from 7 to 9 starting on Jan. 27. The class will pair students with music appropriate to their voices and culminate in a cabaret show for friends and family.
Starting on Jan. 28, Allen O’Reilly, Bay Street’s director of education, will lead “Everybody Can Act!” It will offer the basics of theater and acting technique through games, short scenes, and improvisation. A monologue and a scene will be developed and performed on the Bay Street stage during the final session.
Scott Baker, half of the improv team of Isaacs and Baker, will teach “Just for Laughs Improv” on Wednesday evenings starting on Jan. 29. The class will focus on both short form and character development improvisation techniques. Mr. O’Reilly’s and Mr. Baker’s classes are for ages 19 and up. The fee for each is $400.
‘The Aeronauts’
HamptonsFilm’s Now Showing series of movies currently in theaters will continue with “The Aeronauts” on Saturday at 6 p.m. at Guild Hall. Set in 1862 and based in part on several real-life balloon trips, the film follows the attempt by a daredevil hot-air balloon pilot (Felicity Jones) and a pioneering meteorologist (Eddie Redmayne) to advance human knowledge by flying higher than anyone in history. As they face physical and emotional challenges in the thin air, their voyage becomes a flight for survival. Tickets are $15, $13 for members.
Drawdown East End
Solutions for climate health will be the focus of the Drawdown East End Festival, a free program of films and discussions on Saturday from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. at the Southampton Arts Center.
The centerpiece of the festival is “2040.” A new documentary by Damon Gameau, an Australian filmmaker, it explores what the future could look like in 20 years if humanity were to embrace the best solutions already available to improve the planet. Structured as a letter to his 4-year-old daughter, it blends traditional documentary with dramatizations and sophisticated visual effects.
The 92-minute film will be shown at 11 a.m., 1 p.m., and 3 p.m. Breakouts for discussion will happen at 1 and 3.
