Arts

    The Hampton Theatre Company, which has been bringing drama to the people since the mid-’80s, opened its 2013-14 season last week with Jon Robin Baitz’s “Other Desert Cities,” a meaty choice and hopefully the beginning of a winning season for the Quogue group.

Abstraction at Ashawagh

     “Life in the Abstract,” a group show of paintings by John Haubrich, Fulvio Massi, Barbara Groot, and Dru Frederick, will be on view tomorrow through Sunday at Ashawagh Hall in Springs. Ms. Groot, who organized the exhibition, has pointed out that all four artists have design backgrounds — Mr. Haubrich as an art director, Mr. Massi as an architect, Ms. Frederick as an art restorer, and Ms. Groot as a textile designer. “Elements of mass, geometry, line, color, and balance are clearly informed by each artist’s background,” according to Ms. Groot.

    The first WPPB Harvest Costume Ball and Art Auction will be held Saturday from 8 to 11 p.m. at the South Street Gallery in Greenport. Organized by Joyce deCordova, Alex Ferrone, and Amy Worth, the event will benefit 88.3 FM Peconic Public Broadcasting. The evening will include music from a D.J., dancing, hors d’oeuvres from Noah’s Restaurant, wines from Lieb Cellars, and a silent art auction with works by more than 40 artists selected by Arlene Bujese, curator at the Southampton Cultural Center.

    Artists’ books have taken many forms. The ’70s were a sort of golden age, when boundaries between mediums had dissolved and so many artists were creating books and other ephemera that Martha Wilson founded Franklin Furnace in Tribeca as a repository for such work. In 1993, the Museum of Modern Art purchased the Furnace’s collection, which had become the largest of its kind in the United States.

     “Music, Milestones, and Remembrances,” a concert at the East Hampton Presbyterian Church, will celebrate the rebuilding of the church’s Steinway piano, the 50th anniversary of the Austin pipe organ in the sanctuary, and present reflections on the church’s history on Saturday at 7 p.m.

Miller at Four Seasons

    Steve Miller, an artist who divides his time between New York City and a renovated potato barn in Wainscott, created an installation at the Four Seasons one night last week. The “one-night stand with Philip Johnson,” the architect who designed the restaurant, consisted of work from his series about the Amazon entitled “Health of the Planet.”

    The Parrish Art Museum’s Salon Series of classical music concerts continues tomorrow at 6 p.m. with a performance by Inna Faliks, a pianist. Her program will include works by Chopin, Schumann, and Zhurbin.

    Guild Hall will open two exhibitions this week to inaugurate the museum’s fall season, each lively and provocative in its own way. In one gallery, Thomas Moran’s stylistic legacy and his preoccupation with European art movements will be examined in “Tracing Moran’s Romanticism and Symbolism.” In the other, Christa Maiwald will offer “Short Stories and Other Embroideries.” Ms. Maiwald was the winner of the 2011 members exhibition.

     “Aging Magician,” a new multimedia theater work about the journey of an elderly man to a Coney Island magic show, will be presented at the Watermill Center on Saturday at 4 p.m. With music composed by Paola Prestini, libretto and performance by Rinde Eckert, and design and direction by Julian Crouch, the production combines music, theater, puppetry, instrument making, and scenic design.

    The Hampton Theatre Company in Quogue opens its 29th season tonight at 7 with Jon Robin Baitz’s “Other Desert Cities,” a finalist for the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and winner of the Outer Critics Circle Award for outstanding new Off Broadway play.

    Capt. Dan King, a former president of the East Hampton Town Baymen’s Association and a former town trustee, and Marsha King, his wife, have begun a Kickstarter.com campaign in support of a historical novel they are putting together, “A Fine Day for Fishing,” documenting “the death of a centuries-old way of life played out on a sandy beach,” according to a release. That is, “the ban on hauling a seine to catch striped bass.”

    Scott Schwartz, Bay Street Theatre’s new artistic director, was given a welcome party, hosted by Bonnie Comley and Stewart Lane, at a private club in New York City last Thursday. The event was organized by the veteran producers to celebrate Mr. Schwartz’s appointment and to introduce him to Bay Street Theatre patrons and members of the Broadway theater community. Jeff Blumenkrantz, an actor and Tony-nominated composer and lyricist, performed two original songs.

    The Hamptons International Film Festival’s Audience Awards went to Stephen Frears’s “Philomena,” a drama starring Dame Judi Dench, and set in 1950s Ireland, and “Desert Runners,” Jennifer Steinman’s documentary about the 4 Deserts Race Series of 150-mile ultramarathons. Irene Taylor Brodsky’s “One Last Hug (. . . And a Few Smooches): Three Days at Grief Camp” won the Audience Award for best short.

    The Hamptons International Film Festival’s Rowdy Talks series kicked off Friday morning at Rowdy Hall in East Hampton with a conversation between Barbara Kopple, a two-time Academy Award-winning filmmaker, and Julie Anderson, executive producer of documentaries and development for WNET/Thirteen. Perhaps best known for “Harlan County USA” and “American Dream,” which earned Oscars for best documentary feature in 1977 and 1991, Ms.

    With her new album, “I Love Being Here With You,” Judy Carmichael has taken her career in a new, yet familiar, direction.

    Corky Laing, a longtime drummer for the rock band Mountain and the blues-rock supergroup West, Bruce and Laing, will conduct a drum workshop at Crossroads Music in Amagansett Sunday at 5 p.m. Mr. Laing will share both stories and his expertise. Michael Clark of Crossroads advises attendees to take their own sticks but also stresses that one does not have to be a drummer to enjoy the event. Tickets are $60. Seating is limited and the program will be interactive.

    A new production of Shakespeare’s “Othello” from London’s National Theatre will be screened at Guild Hall on Saturday at 7 p.m. Directed by Nicholas Hytner and starring Adrian Lester and Rory Kinnear, both Olivier Award-winning actors, the production transposes the action from 16th-century Venice to a contemporary military installation. Tickets to this encore presentation of National Theatre Live are $18, $16 for Guild Hall members.

    The award-winning pianist Liza Stepanova will perform at the Parrish Art Museum tomorrow at 6 p.m. as part of the ongoing Salon Series of classical music concerts. Ms. Stepanova has twice been a soloist with the Juilliard Orchestra led by James DePreist and Nicholas McGegan and was a top prizewinner at the Liszt-Garrison, Juilliard Concerto, Steinway, and Ettlingen competitions. She began her position as the Iva Dee Hiatt visiting artist and lecturer at Smith College this fall. Ms. Stepanova’s program will include works by Liszt, Wagner, Debussy, Scarlatti, Mendelssohn, and Ligeti.

“Urban Reprieves” at Ille Arts

    “Urban Reprieves,” an exhibition of recent paintings by Maggie Tobin, opens Saturday at Ille Arts in Amagansett, with a reception from 5 to 7 p.m. The paintings in the show are the byproducts of an otherwise tedious circumstance — the artist’s daily commute on the B.Q.E.

    Robert Wilson, the founder and artistic director of the Watermill Center, has been invited by the Louvre to present a series of programs and events during November. Mr. Wilson is organizing “Living Rooms,” an installation in the museum’s Salle de la Chapelle Gallery of pieces from the Watermill Center’s collection. The Sphinx Court will be the site of various performances throughout the exhibition period, including Mr. Wilson’s interpretation of John Cage’s “Lecture on Nothing” and Christopher Knowles, an artist and frequent collaborator of Mr.

    Center Stage at Southampton Cultural Center is presenting “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas” through Nov. 3, with performances on Thursdays at 7:30 p.m., Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m., and Sundays at 2:30.

    The absence of traditional subject matter was a primary issue for painters in mid-20th century America; it was also a problem for those struggling to understand modern art. Helen Harrison will discuss “The Subject Matter of the Artist: Writings by Robert Goodnough, 1950-1965,” on Oct. 19 at 2:30 p.m., at the East Hampton Library.

    Three minutes into Michael Walker’s film “The Maid’s Room,” Drina, a young, undocumented immigrant from Colombia, arrives in the Hamptons for a summer job as a maid for a wealthy white couple with a teenage son. The Lobster Grille Inn and Main Street in Southampton make fleeting appearances before Drina and her boyfriend arrive at an imposingly gated property. “It’s Drina. The maid. Remember?” she says nervously to the speakerphone. The gates open, and the drive leads to the Crawfords’ sprawling home.

    Scott Cuellar, an award-winning Juilliard pianist, will perform on Sunday at 8 p.m. at the Shelter Island Presbyterian Church. The program, organized by the Shelter Island Friends of Music, includes work by Haydn, Fauré, Scriabin, and Schumann.

    Mr. Cuellar, who holds a degree from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, has performed nationwide and collected awards in over 15 competitions. In April he won the Virginia Waring International Piano Competition, a major event held every two years in Palm Desert, Calif.

    Admission is free.

    The opening, closing, centerpiece, and spotlight films may get all the attention, but the movies people talk about online, the ones that may not get major distribution but are singular and captivating as well, are the ones that define a film festival and make it memorable. The Star staff previewed a handful of these films to see whether each was worthy of some non-spotlight attention. They are a rich field of local, national, and international subjects, from short to feature length.

“Big Shot”

Kevin Connolly

East Hampton, Saturday, 3 p.m.

    Guild Hall, in partnership with the Round Table Theatre Company and Academy, will offer a classical acting course, “Speaking Shakespeare,” on seven consecutive Mondays from 6 to 9 p.m., starting on Oct. 21. Students age 16 and up will work on sonnets, monologues, mask work, and scene work, culminating in a performance on the stage of the John Drew Theater on Dec. 4.

    When Eric Steel read an obituary in The New York Times for Megan Boyd, a Scottish woman whose expertise at tying fishing flies earned her a British Empire Medal from Queen Elizabeth, he cut it out and pinned it on his bulletin board.

Addams in Southampton

    “Charles Addams: Family and Friends,” an exhibition celebrating the artwork of the creator of the Addams Family, has opened at the Southampton Center, where it will remain on view through Nov. 3. The show features almost 100 drawings and cartoons from a 60-year period.

    Beatty Cohen, a psychotherapist, sex therapist, columnist, and radio host, will tell audiences how to “Rate Your Mate Before It’s Too Late & Never Make a Mistake in Love Again!” on Saturday at 1 p.m. at the East Hampton Library.

    Ms. Cohen is the author, with her husband, Elliot, of “For Better, for Worse, Forever: Discover the Path to Lasting Love,” and hosts  “Ask Beatty” on the Progressive Radio Network. With more than 35 years of clinical experience, she practices in Manhattan, East Hampton, and Sarasota, Fla.

    The Watermill Center is presenting a weekend of screenings starting tomorrow at 4:15 p.m., when the Hamptons International Film Festival will show Katharina Otto-Bernstein’s “Absolute Wilson,” a portrait of the center’s founder and artistic director, Robert Wilson, at the East Hampton Cinema. The film will be screened again, at 4 on Saturday, at the center itself, where it will be followed by a conversation between the filmmaker and Dr. Frank Hentschker, executive director of the City University’s Martin E. Segal Theatre Center in Manhattan.