Arts Fuse critics select the best in film, theater, dance, music, visual arts, and author events for the coming week.

By The Arts Fuse Staff

Film

Boston Area Film Schedules—What is Playing Today, Where, and When

Hannah: Buddhism’s Untold Journey—Official Trailer from Connected Pictures on Vimeo.

Hannah: Buddhism’s Untold Journey
October 27 at 7:30 p.m.
Regent Theatre, 7 Medford Street, Arlington, MA

Kicking off with a look at Hannah and her husband Ole’s wild and idealistic roots as a hippy in Copenhagen, this documentary follows the pair to the hedonistic city of Kathmandu, where in 1968 they became two of the first Western students of His Holiness the 16th Karmapa—the first consciously reincarnated lama of Tibet. The man changed their lives forever, inspiring their dedication to bring Buddhism to the West. The documentary chronicles the couple’s adventures in Europe and North America, through the fall of communism in Eastern Europe and Russia to a period when they were kidnapped by guerrillas in South America.

No Más Bebés / No More Babies
October 27 at 5:30 p.m
32-155, MIT Campus, Cambridge, MA

The MIT Global Studies and Languages and Women’s and Gender Studies presents the story of immigrant mothers who sued county doctors, the state, and the US government after they were prodded into being sterilized while giving birth at the Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center during the 1960s and ’70s. Led by an intrepid, 26-year-old Chicana lawyer and armed with hospital records secretly gathered by a whistle-blowing young doctor, the mothers faced the hazards of public exposure and stood up to powerful institutions.  The screening is followed by a Q&A with filmmaker Renee Tajima Peña, an Academy Award-nominated filmmaker who has been awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Alpert Award in the Arts, the USA Broad Fellowship, and a Peabody.

The Assassin
October 28 at 7:30 p.m.
Brattle Theatre, Cambridge, MA

This lush historical drama directed by master filmmaker Hou Hsiao-hsien (Flowers of Shanghai; Flight of the Red Balloon) is the official Taiwanese submission to the  2016 Academy Awards in the category of Best Foreign Language Film. In 9th-century China, a general’s 10-year-old daughter is abducted by a nun who initiates her into the martial arts, transforming her into an exceptional assassin charged with eliminating cruel and corrupt local governors. One day, having failed in a task, she is sent back by her mistress to the land of her birth, with orders to kill the man to whom she was promised—a cousin who now leads the largest military region in North China. “Centered around a quietly riveting performance from Shu Qi, the film is destined for a limited audience to which gore-seekers with short attention spans need not apply.” (Variety)

Internet Cat Video Festival
October 29 at 7:30 p.m.
Berklee Performance Center, Boston, MA

The Internet Cat Video Festival is a live event, gathering fellow feline fanatics to watch a curated collection of cat clips—from six-second Vine videos to short films and everything in between—in a social environment. These are 100 videos curated by Will Braden, the creator of the Henri le Chat Noir videos and recipient of the festival’s first Golden Kitty (People’s Choice) Award. Categories include comedy, drama, animated, musical, action, vintage, and documentary.

Anomalisa
October 29 at 8:30 p.m.
Brattle Theatre, Cambridge, MA

Directed by Charlie Kaufman and Duke Johnson, this film closes the Independent Film Festival Boston Fall Focus Series. Based on a play written by Kaufman (Being John Malkovich; Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind), this stop-motion animated drama centers on motivational speaker Michael Stone (David Thewlis), who has issues connecting with people, to the point that it sounds to him as if everyone has the same voice (Tom Noonan). One night at a hotel all of that changes when he meets a woman (Jennifer Jason Leigh) who sounds absolutely beautiful.

Nosferatu
October 30 at 8 p.m.
Symphony Hall, Boston, Boston, MA

The Boston Pops and conductor Keith Lockhart, in collaboration with the Berklee College of Music, bring F.W. Murnau’s 1922 silent horror film to  Symphony Hall. The score was composed under the direction of Sheldon Mirowitz by the Berklee Silent Film Orchestra, which first performed the music at the Coolidge Corner Theatre. The score has been re-adapted for this occasion—this concert marks the first time the Boston Pops will perform a score to a full-length silent film.

Halloween Horror Marathon!
October 31 from Noon to Midnight
Somerville Theater in Davis Square, Somerville, MA

Halloween comes on a Saturday this year—so there is no excuse not to gorge on horror film classics. The Somerville Theatre Marathon will include Todd Browning’s rarely screened West of Zanzibar from 1928. The latter features a very creepy and crippled Lon Chaney as the vengeful Phroso a.k.a. “Dead Legs” Flint. Also on the slate: Dracula with Bela Lugosi, followed by The Monster That Challenged The World from 1957 (“a new kind of terror to numb the nerves”), and John Frankenheimer’s Seconds with Rock Hudson. Aliens (1986) and The Lost Boys (1987) will finish up the festival.

15th Annual Halloween Horror Marathon
October 31 from Midnight to Noon
Coolidge Corner Theatre, Brookline, MA

After you finish experiencing the chills at the Somerville Theater marathon, head over to the Coolidge Corner (if you dare!) for their 15th ‘spooktacular’ marathon with Trick ‘r Treat (2007) and a yet-to-be announced second film! Another four films (including Halloween II) will follow and these titles, as deemed by tradition, won’t be revealed until they hit the screen! Live music from Dust Witch will open the show! There is a costume contest, too!

Romeo Is Bleeding
November 2 at 7 p.m.
Brattle Theatre, Cambridge, MA

A fatal turf war between neighborhoods haunts the city of Richmond, CA. Donté Clark transcends the violence in his hometown by writing poetry about his experiences. Using his voice to inspire those around him, he and like-minded youth mount an urban adaptation of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet with the hope of starting a real dialogue about the violence in the city. This entry in the Docyard Series includes a discussion with director Jason Zeldes. Ronald Reagan Pardons A Turkey (2014, 2 min.) will be screened before the feature. (Pacho Velez, director).

—Tim Jackson

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Dance

Spektrel
October 27, 29, 30, and 31 at 8 p.m.
Multicultural Arts Center, Cambridge, MA

Luminarium’s 2015 season feature production Spektrel offers lighting- and dance-lovers alike a feast for the senses. Come enter a world of otherworldly shadows, light play, and colorful abandon, while witnessing the company’s powerful theatricality. Read The Arts Fuse preview. [Editor’s note: Guerra’s work will be presented in this production.]

Martha’s Artist Salon
October 27 at 5:30 p.m.
Mills Gallery, Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA

This event marks the first of this new salon series, created to give dance enthusiasts a space where they can meet, view works, and discuss the art. This first event features sections of Last Supper at Uncle Tom’s Cabin/52 Handsome Nudes and Still Here by the Bill T Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company.

Third Symphony of Gustav Mahler: A Ballet by John Neumeier
October 29, 30, and 31 at 8 p.m.; and November 1 at 1 p.m.
Boston Opera House, Boston, MA

Join Boston Ballet as it becomes the first company in North America (and only the fourth in the world) to perform Third Symphony of Gustav Mahler: A Ballet by John Neumeier. The work calls for the orchestral heft of the Boston Ballet Orchestra and New World Chorale. Read the full review on The Arts Fuse here.

—Merli V Guerra

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Jazz

The Bad Plus Joshua Redman
October 25 at 7:30 p.m.
Berklee Performance Center, Boston, MA

The iconoclastic piano trio joined forces with saxophone hero Joshua Redman a couple of seasons ago, released an album this year, and now hit Berklee again for the first time since their triumph playing Ornette Coleman’s Science Fiction.

Charlie Kohlhase Group
October 28 at 8 p.m.
Lily Pad, Cambridge, MA

The multi-reed player and composer Charlie Kohlhase has long been one of the Boston area’s MVPs, inspired and inspiring as saxophonist and writer. His groups—with the Kohlhase mix of sharp composition and free exploration—are always worth hearing.

Paul Lytton/Nate Wooley/Joe Morris
October 29 at 7:30 p.m.
Lily Pad, Cambridge, MA

Paul Lytton, an éminence grise of the British free-improv scene (including a long-term association with saxophonist Evan Parker) joins trumpeter Nate Wooley and guitarist Joe Morris. Morris, of course, invented his own language for jazz guitar. Since it seems he just as often plays bass these days, this should be a performance to savor.

Harold López-Nussa
November 1 at 5 p.m.
Shalin Liu Performance Center, Rockport, MA

The exciting young Cuban pianist Harold López-Nussa holds court as part of the Rockport Music concert series in the jewel box by the sea, the Shalin Liu Performance Center.

Anat Cohen
November 4 at 8 p.m., 10 p.m.
Scullers Jazz Club, Boston, MA

The Israeli-born reed player Anat Cohen came to Berklee as a tenor saxophonist, but was encouraged by teacher/bandleader Phil Wilson to pick up her “double,” the clarinet—which, he said, immediately revealed her full personality, “positive and bubbly.” Since then, the clarinet has been Cohen’s key to all manner of jazz, swing, and Afro-Latin explorations. And she still plays a nice tenor saxophone.

—Jon Garelick

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Visual Arts

Shahryar Nashat: Skins and Stand-Ins
Lorraine O’Grady: Where Margins Become Centers
October 29 -January 10, 2016
Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA

Harvard’s Carpenter Center opens two more culturally subversive exhibitions this week, part of an impressive series this fall featuring international contemporary artists.

Swiss artist Shahryar Nashat’s work assumes that, in looking at the world though the filter of canonical images, we actually miss quite a lot. Using an arsenal of visual weaponry, including performance, photography, sculpture, and video, Nashat “disrupts” our pre-ordained visual expectations to draw attention to the “uninvited” and “disregarded.” He also focuses on human skin and its propensities to tear, scratch, or puncture. Nashat’s Harvard interventions will spill out of the Carpenter Center’s galleries to invade the Harvard Art Museums next door.

Born in Boston into an upper-middle-class West Indian family and educated at Wellesley, Lorraine O’Grady’s experiences as a young black woman coming of age in New England set the stage for four decades of convention-challenging work. Her art contrasts central assumptions about society with life at the extreme margins, confronting assumptions about gender, class, sexuality, race, and art history. Her Carpenter show will feature artworks from five different media: photography, film, collage, performance, and writing

—Peter Walsh

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Theater

Copenhagen by Michael Frayn. Directed by Eric Tucker. Staged by the Nora Theater Company at the Central Square Theater, Cambridge, MA, through November 15.

A revival of Frayn’s challenging exploration of the mysterious connections between ideas and personalities. “Copenhagen, 1941: Two brilliant physicists—fast friends from enemy nations—famously confront each other at the height of WWII. This award-winning psychological mystery unravels what transpired on that fateful night. Werner Heisenberg and his mentor Niels Bohr meet again in the afterlife, goaded by Bohr’s wife, Margrethe. Who will remember the truth that changed the course of history?” Read the full review on The Arts Fuse here.

I and You by Lauren Gunderson. Directed by Sean Daniels. Presented by Merrimack Repertory Theatre at the Nancy L. Donahue Theatre, 50 East Merrimack Street, Lowell, MA, through November 1.

This New York-bound (for off-Broadway) production “tells the story of two very different teenagers, Caroline and Anthony, who struggle to connect as they work on a school project about Walt Whitman’s poetry. Over the course of the play, and through a stunning surprise ending, they find that there is more that unites them than divides them. This production marks the New England premiere of the play that won the 2014 Steinberg/American Theatre Critics Association New Play Award, which recognizes new work produced outside of New York.” Read the full review on The Arts Fuse here.

A Number by Caryl Churchill. Directed by Clay Hopper. Staged by the New Repertory Theatre in the Charles Mosesian Theater at the Arsenal Center for the Arts in Watertown, MA, through November 1.

Nael Nacer and Dale Place are featured in a production of Churchill’s two-person play about the emotional and metaphysical fallout of cloning: “In this stark and startling drama, a son confronts his emotionally distant father, learning a horrifying truth about his past. As anger and abandonment issues emerge, a mystery is exposed, revealing a disturbing incident involving a number of ‘others.'” Read the full review on The Arts Fuse here.

An Iliad, an adaptation of Homer’s epic poem (the Robert Fagles translation) by Lisa Peterson and Denis O’Hare. Directed by Jonathan Epstein. Staged by Shakespeare and Company in the Elayne P. Bernstein Theatre, Lenox, MA, through November 1.

“A modern-day retelling of Homer’s tale of gods and goddesses, undying love and endless battles, the narrative is told through the eyes of a single narrator (Michael F. Toomey), whose gripping monologue captures both the heroism and horror of war. Crafted around the stories of Achilles and Hector, this powerful piece vividly drives home the timelessness of mankind’s compulsion toward violence.” The OBIE award-winning play also features musician Gregory Boover.

Choice by Winnie Holzman. Directed by Sheryl Kaller. Staged by the Huntington Theatre Company at the Calderwood Pavilion at the Boston Center for the Arts, through November 15.

Winnie Holzman (who wrote the book for the musical Wicked and penned TV’s My So-Called Life) has come up with her first nonmusical, full-length play. According to Holzman, the script deals with “a woman journalist who ends up writing a story that changes her life. I’m so interested in friendships and their complications, and women friendships are so interesting to me. The center of this play is a female friendship that is so different from Wicked.”

A Measure of Normalcy by Lucas Balsch. Directed by David R. Gammons. Staged by Gloucester Stage at 267 East Main Street, Gloucester, MA, through November 1.

World premiere of a play that deals with “lost youth and lost souls [who] struggle to find meaning amid dingy basements, vanishing malls, and a bleak Midwestern summer.” Note: Ages 15 and up. Strong language and some adult situations.

Saturday Night/Sunday Morning by Katori Hall. Directed by Dawn M. Simmons. Staged by the Lyric Stage Company of Boston at 140 Clarendon Street, Copley Square, Boston, MA, through November 23.

A play by the author of The Mountaintop “that brings together seven African-American women in a Memphis beauty parlor/boarding house during the waning days of World War II. As they wrestle with the uncertainty of what the future will hold when, and if, their men return, they fight dirty—with each other and with their own fears and desires, uncovering newfound friendship and love.”

Casa Valentina by Harvey Fierstein. Directed by Scott Edmiston. Staged by SpeakEasy Stage Company of Boston at the Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA, through November 28.

The New England premiere of Fierstein’s script, nominated for a 2014 Tony Award for Best Play: it is “set in 1962 at a Catskills resort where a group of heterosexual men gather secretly to dress and behave as women.” An all-star cast includes Thomas Derrah, Will McGarrahan, and Robert Saoud.

Luna Gale by Rebecca Gilman. Directed by Rebecca Bradshaw. Staged by the Stoneham Theatre, Stoneham, MA, through November 8.

A Boston-area premiere that examines a crisis in the career of a veteran social worker: “Caroline thinks she has a typical case on her hands when she meets Peter and Karlie, two teenage drug addicts accused of neglecting their baby, Luna Gale. But when she places Luna in the care of Karlie’s mother, Caroline sparks a family conflict that exposes a shadowy, secretive past and forces her to make a risky decision with potentially life-altering consequences.” The impressive cast includes Paula Plum and Stacy Fischer.

Cirque of the Dead, created and performed by the Boston Circus Guild. At the OBERON, 2 Arrow Street, Cambridge, MA, October 28 through 30.

Just what the mad doctor ordered: “A macabre and tasteless night of circus, live music, and gore! This gruesome journey will feature live music, burlesque, aerials, acrobatics, juggling and more with never-before seen acts. Emperor Norton’s Stationary Marching Band will be there every night to make sure the dance floor is full and jumping!” But will you be cutting a rug with zombies? Are the undead limber enough to boogie? Who knows?

—Bill Marx

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Rock

The Struts
October 25
The Sinclair, Cambridge, MA

This retro-clad new UK band with a young Freddie Mercury lookalike lead vocalist has generated enough interest in the States to have its Boston-area date moved from the couple-hundred capacity Middle East Upstairs to the several-hundred capacity Sinclair. The show is listed as sold out, but it would probably be worth exploring the numerous ways of legally obtaining admission.

Joanna Gruesome
October 28
Middle East Upstairs, Cambridge, MA

Not to be confused with singer-songwriter/harpist Joanna Newsom, who has a new album out but won’t be in Boston until December, this Welsh quintet released its second album (titled Peanut Butter, the follow-up to 2013’s Weird Sister) earlier this year. Given that the band’s two full-length releases have a combined running time of less than 50 minutes, their October 28 visit to the Middle East Upstairs should be a good chance for the uninitiated to catch up on the band’s whole catalog in one fell swoop. Call it noisy fuzz pop or fuzzy noise pop. Either way, ear plugs are recommended. (As is attendance.)

The Polyphonic Spree
October 31
Johnny D’s, Somerville, MA

Conjuring images of the Coke commercial for which Don Draper will now forever get credit, this self-described “choral symphonic rock” group has ranged from a dozen-and-a-half to more than two dozen members since its 2000 formation in Dallas. One of the more unlikely success stories of the new millennium, the band has had one of its songs used as the theme song for television show The United States of Tara, others in commercials for UK supermarkets and sports channels, and others still as the score for a movie (2005’s Thumbsucker). It also played at the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize concert. Leader Tim DeLaughter and the rest of the collective will play the whole of the group’s 2003 debut album The Beginning Stages of… at Johnny D’s on Halloween as part of the band’s 15th anniversary tour.

Buddy Guy
November 5
The Wilbur Theatre, Boston, MA

“Buddy Guy is by far and without a doubt the best guitar player alive” —Eric Clapton (in 1985). “Without Buddy Guy, there would be no Stevie Ray Vaughan” —Stevie Ray Vaughan. Having played on Chess sessions in the 1960s with (among others) Howlin’ Wolf and Muddy Waters, won multiple Grammy Awards in the 1990s, and released a new album and appeared on the first episode of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert in 2015, 79-year-old blues guitarist Buddy Guy is a bona fide living legend. He will bring his trademark polka-dot guitar to the stage of The Wilbur Theatre on November 5.

Upcoming and on sale:

Gary Clark, Jr. (House of Blues, 10/31); Howard Jones (Johnny D’s, 11/3); The Darkness (House of Blues, 11/5); Jonathan Richman (Somerville Theatre, 11/10); Art Garfunkel (The Wilbur, 11/15); Fuzz (11/16, The Sinclair); Colin Hay (The Wilbur, 11/21); My Morning Jacket (11/20-21/2015, Orpheum Theatre); Okkervil River (11/24, The Sinclair); The Flamin’ Groovies (11/25/2015, Brighton Music Hall); Parquet Courts (12/5/2015, Middle East-Downstairs); Deerhunter (12/10/2015, Royale)

—Blake Maddux

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Classical Music

Baroque Masters
Presented by the Handel & Haydn Society
October 30 at 7:30 p.m.; and November 1 at 3 p.m.
Symphony Hall, Boston, MA

Richard Egarr conducts an offbeat survey of music by Gabrieli, Castello, and Marini for organ and various chamber ensembles.

Mozart’s Requiem
Presented by Grand Harmonie
November 1 at 4 p.m.
Memorial Church, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA

The period-instrument ensemble presents a free performance of Robert Levin’s completion of Mozart’s unfinished Requiem. They’re joined by the Harvard University Choir, soloists, and Edward Elwyn Jones.

Gunther Schuller, Bouquet for Collage
Presented by Collage New Music
November 1 at 8 p.m.
Pickman Hall, Cambridge, MA

CNM remembers Schuller, who would have been 90 this month, with the premiere of his Singing Poems. Music by Paul Brust, Ricardo Zohn-Muldoon, and Rand Steiger share the rest of the program with Schuller’s eponymous Bouquet.

Music by Glinka, Stravinsky, Debussy, and Tchaikovsky
Presented by Boston Philharmonic Youth Orchestra
November 2 at 7:30 p.m.
Symphony Hall, Boston, MA

Boston’s newest youth orchestra gives a free performance of a meaty program: Ayano Ninomiya plays Stravinsky’s Violin Concerto, Debussy’s La Mer follows it up, and Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony closes the evening. Also on tap is Glinka’s brilliant, bubbly Overture to Ruslan and Ludmila.

—Jonathan Blumhofer

New England Conservatory Symphonic Winds
October 27 at 7:30 p.m.
NEC’s Jordan Hall, Boston, MA

William Drury leads NEC Symphonic Winds in a program that includes selections from Patrick Clements’s arrangements for winds and double bass of Dvořák’s Slavonic Dances. A new double trumpet concerto features former BSO principal and former NEC faculty member Charles Schlueter, along with alumnus Heinz Karl Schwebel.

Faculty Recital: An Evening of Vocal Chamber Music
October 30 at 8 p.m.
Boston Conservatory/Seully Hall, 8 Fenway, Boston, MA

Rebecca Folsom (mezzo-soprano) and guest artists Jessica McCormack (soprano), JR Fralick (tenor), Tod Fitzpatrick (baritone), and Valerie Trujillo (piano) perform vocal chamber works by Schumann, Massenet, Jenny Connors, Ian Coleman, and Andy Vores.

What Sweeter Music—15th Anniversary Concert and Reception
October 30 at 8 p.m.
First Church, Cambridge, 11 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA

The Boston Choral Ensemble celebrates its anniversary by singing pieces from the ensemble’s repertoire from the last 15 years. The group will be joined by the two previous artistic directors, founder Thomas Cunningham and successor Miguel Felipe, for this concert at First Church in Cambridge.

“For heaven is a different thing”: Choral Settings of Sacred Poetry
October 30 at 8 p.m.
St. Cecilia Parish, 18 Belvidere Street, Boston, MA

The Seraphim Singers perform a world premiere by Richard J. Clark. Also on the program: works of Gerald Finzi, Carson Cooman, James Woodman, and others who set to music poetry by George Herbert, John Donne, Adam Wood, and Hildegard of Bingen. With Heinrich Christensen, organ.

Gil Shaham: Bach Six Solos for violin, with original films by David Michalek
November 1 at 5 p.m.
Sanders Theater, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA

Violinist Gil Shaham, presented by the Celebrity Series of Boston, performs the Sei solo, “six alone,” as J.S. Bach labeled his set of three sonatas and three partitas for solo violin in a multimedia performance.

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Author Events

Concord Festival of Authors
October 25–31
Concord, West Concord, Lincoln, MA

The annual literary festival in the backyards of Emerson and Thoreau continues all week, featuring many author readings, literary brunches, self-publishing seminars, and presentations on memoirs and graphic novels.

Junot Díaz
October 26 at 7 p.m.
Law Auditorium, Boston University, Boston, MA
Free

The author of lauded story collections Drown and This Is How You Lose Her and the magnificent, Pulitzer prize-winning The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao comes to BU to read from his latest work.

Susan Piver
Start Here Now
October 26 at 7 p.m.
Porter Square Books, Cambridge, MA
Free

The bestselling author tells us how to make your first attempts at Buddhist meditation, focusing on what meditation is and is not, how to try it, and offering concise overviews on the different varieties of traditional Buddhist meditation practice.

Deborah Harkness and Katherine Howe
In Converdation with Brunonia Barry
The Book of Life and The Penguin Book of Witches
October 27 at 7 p.m.
Harvard Book Store, Cambridge, MA
Free

It’s that haunted time of year, so it’s a good time to hear some scholars talk about the whys and wherefores of witchcraft. Harkness is a writer of supernatural tales that have risen to the top of the bestseller list while Barry has edited a compilation of witch tales that means to charm and entrance.

Jay Atkinson
Massacre on the Merrimack: Hannah Duston’s Captivity and Revenge in Colonial America
October 29 from 5 to 7 p.m.
The Book Rack, Newburyport, MA
Free

Atkinson, novelist and journalist, takes us back to a overlooked but fascinating historical event. In 1697, when the Abenaki Indians attacked Haverhill, MA, on behalf of the Catholic French Crown to challenge the primacy of English Protestantism in the new world. One feisty young woman named Hannah Duston was taken hostage and managed to take revenge on her captors and collect a huge bounty as well as inspire a legend.

Lisa Randall
Dark Matter and the Dinosaurs: The Astounding Interconnectedness of the Universe
October 29 at 6 p.m. (Doors open at 5:30 p.m.)
Brattle Theatre, Cambridge, MA
$5 tickets

One of the superstars of contemporary physics, Randall is a popular and bestselling expert and professor of physics at Harvard University She will read and discuss how dark matter, connecting life on Earth to the farthest reaches of the universe, may have influenced the extinction of the dinosaurs.

Edgar Allan Poe Party
William Giraldi presents The Annotated Edgar Allan Poe
October 30 at 8 p.m. (Doors open at 7:30 p.m.)
Lilypad, Somerville, MA
$5 tickets available online

It’s no secret that the Boston-born Poe has gone on to achieve great fame and posthumous attention. Giraldi is the fiction editor of AGNI, and contributed a forward to Harvard University Press’s new annotated edition of the master of the macabre’s works. The event is a reading as well as costume party, with a prize for the best EAP look-alike.

Leonard Gardner
In Conversation with Steve Yarbrough
Fat City
November 2 at 7 p.m.
Brookline Booksmith, Coolidge Corner, Brookline, MA
Free

Gardner’s only novel, first released in 1969, has gone on to tremendous acclaim and a cult following. (As well as inspiring a terrific film by John Huston.) Newly reprinted after many years in a lovely edition by the NYRB featuring an introduction by Denis Johnson, Gardner sits down with a fellow scribe to discuss his tale of boxing, survival, determination, and life in the ring.

—Matt Hanson