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

From This Day Forward
November 12
UMass Boston Campus Center, Ballroom C, 3rd Floor, Boston, MA

When director Sharon Shattuck’s father came out as transgender, Sharon was in the awkward throes of middle school. Her father’s transition to female was difficult for her straight-identified mother to accept, but her parents remained married. As Sharon approaches her own wedding day, she returns home to Michigan to ask her parents how their love survived against all odds. There will be an in-person Q&A with director Sharon Shattuck. Free and open to the public. Watch the trailer.

A Poem is a Naked Person
November 13 and 14
Brattle Theater, Cambridge, MA

The late Les Blank, who specialized in quirky documentaries (Garlic is as Good as Ten Mothers), also shot many significant ethnographic music documentaries. Here he looks at the world of rocker Leon Russell and his friends and fellow artists in and around his recording studio in northeast Oklahoma. The film captures intimate, off-the-cuff moments and combines them with mesmerizing scenes of Russell and his band performing live. The film never received an official theatrical release, but after more than 40 years here it is, to be seen and heard in all its rough beauty.

Meet the Hitlers
November 14 at 6:30 p.m.
Brattle Theater, Cambridge, MA

This intriguing documentary examines the relationship between names and identity by exploring the lives of people who are linked by the name “Hitler.” The film raises important questions about the meaning of names and explores complex issues raised by immigration, racism, and tolerance. Yet it’s ultimately a character-driven story, offering an intimate portrait of its subjects, whose reactions to their name span the spectrum of human experience, from tragedy to comedy, from heartbreak to hope. Part of the Boston Jewish Film Festival.

Loulou
November 14 at 7 p.m.
Harvard Film Archive, Cambridge, MA

This lovely blast from the past is part of the HFA’s on-going series of films by Maurice Pialat. Of Loulou, critic Janet Maslin wrote: “Loulou (Gerard Depardieu) is a scoundrel, and women adore him. He is carefree, irresponsible, sexually rapacious and a big baby. As for Nelly (Isabelle Huppert), she has a lovely smile and an even more stunning pout. She wears ingeniously skimpy sweaters and a lot of black. Sometimes she seems an utter mystery, sometimes just an ordinary bourgeois. When she and Loulou are together, they make love, go to bistros, amble down the street or linger over meals. Even if Loulou could be watched without dialogue, without subtitles, without Paris, there would be no mistaking this movie for anything other than a French film. Loulou plays willfully with stereotypical notions of what the French are like” (1980)

Projections of America
November 15 at Noon
MFA, Boston, MA

When American forces liberated Europe from the Nazis, a campaign was launched to improve the image of Americans in the eyes of the Europeans. The project consisted of 26 propaganda films produced by Jewish Academy Award-winner Robert Riskin. Portraying an idealized version of America—cowboys, school children, farmers, and new immigrants—the films were locked in archives for nearly 70 years. This movie  brings to light the incredible story of the way they affected the world we know today. Directed by Boston-area native Peter Miller. Narrated by John Lithgow. Part of the Boston Jewish Film Festival.

Music Video Program
November 17, 7–10 p.m.
Bright Family Screening Room, 559 Washington Street, Boston, MA

This is the Boston Underground Film Festival’s annual love letter to the art of the music video. Like a lovingly curated mix tape from your slightly skewed best friend, this collection celebrates  gems from an under-appreciated medium. Forget YouTube, these videos are best enjoyed on the big screen. Curated by Emerson College alumna Shannen Ortale.

—Tim Jackson

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Dance

CIRCA, Opus with Quatuor Debussy
November 13–15
Citi Shubert Theatre, Boston, MA

Combining live music and movement, CIRCA’s Opus promises to be an exciting theatrical achievement. A string quartet performs the music of Dmitri Shostakovich as the company’s 14 performers showcase a fusion of lyrical movements and extreme acrobatics. This production is presented by the Celebrity Series of Boston.

Entangling
November 13 at 8 p.m.; November 14 at 4 p.m.
Calderwood Pavillion, Boston, MA

Boston Center for the Arts presents ANIKAYA’s latest work, Entangling. Choreographers Wendy Jehlen (US) and Lacina Coulibaly (West Africa) explore the concept of Quantum Entanglement—a fascinating idea in which particles remain behaviorally linked even when separated at great distances.

Boston Bhangra Competition 2015 
November 14 at 6 p.m.
Orpheum Theatre, Boston, MA

Boston Bhangra, Inc. presents its annual Bhangra competition, showcasing many of North America’s most talented teams. The evening boasts live music, dance, and a delicious spread of food provided by Shalimar of India.

New Movement Series: Open Work
November 14 at 8 p.m.
The Dance Complex, Cambridge, MA

Enjoy an evening of new and in-progress works by a number of local choreographers: Chris Aiken, Angie Hauser, Shura Baryshnikov, Danielle Davidson, Jimena Bermejo-Black, Wendy Jehlen, Christopher R. Mcmillan, and Sophia Herscu.

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Roots and World Music

Natalie McMaster with Donnell Leahy
November 9 at 7:30 p.m.
Monomoy Regional High School, Harwich, MA

The purist Scottish fiddle tunes are (ironically) to be found in Cape Breton, where the music remained isolated for generations. Maritime Canada’s biggest star is the virtuoso Natalie McMaster, who pays tribute to her heritage with a show that features her husband and band.

Joe Krown Trio 
November 12 at 7 p.m. (doors open at 5:30)
Johnny D’s, Somerville, MA

One of the great New Orleans jazz-funk organists, Krown bids Johnny D’s a fond farewell with a trio that features the phenomenal soul singer and guitarist Walter “Wolfman” Washington.

Paco Peña Flamenco Dance Company
November 15 at 7:30
Berklee Performance Center, Boston, MA

At 73, Peña is one of the great ambassadors of flamenco guitar. He’s on tour with a whole company of singers, dancers, and musicians in a high-concept show called “Flamencura.”

— Noah Schaffer

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Jazz

Mili Bermejo/Dan Greenspan
November 10 at 7 p.m.
Lily Pad, Cambridge, MA

The soulful Mexican-born singer, composer, and Berklee professor Mili Bermejo and her husband, bassist Dan Greenspan, continue their fall-winter residency at the Lily Pad. Both in her singing and her approach to a broad range of Latin American music, Bermejo is like no one else.

Chucho Valdés: Irakere 40
November 12 at 8 p.m.
Berklee Performance Center, Boston, MA

The (literally) towering Cuban pianist and composer Chucho Valdés is celebrating the 40th anniversary of his path-breaking outfit Irakere. This band broke ground by combining traditional Afro-Cuban forms with all manner of contemporary jazz, rock, and pop, and defining the sound of modern Cuban music.

PoemJazz with Robert Pinsky and Laurence Hobgood
November 13 at 7:30 p.m.
Regattabar, Cambridge, MA

The very name “PoemJazz” conjures cringe-worthy images of faux-Beat era hep cats snapping their fingers to bad free-verse approximations of Ginsberg and Corso. But three-time US poet laureate Pinsky is nothing less than a frustrated jazz saxophonist, and Hobgood gives him no quarter in their witty, flying collaborations (i.e., the pianist isn’t afraid to play fast and loud). Pinsky has been doing this for a while now, with varied collaborators (he joined Vijay Iyer for a set at Sanders Theatre last year). But you could say his duo with Hobgood–now documented on a couple of CDs—is his working band. On this occasion, they’re joined by the estimable saxophonist, flutist, singer, actor, and dancer Stan Strickland.

Ran Blake 80th Birthday Tribute
November 13 at 8 p.m.
Jordan Hall, Boston, MA

The great pianist, composer, and pioneering Third Stream conceptualizer and teacher gets the full treatment from faculty and students at the institution he’s called home for more than four decades, New England Conservatory. Past Blake students like saxophonist Ricky Ford and bassist Leon “Boots” Maleson join the party, and you can expect Blake himself to take the stage for a number or two, including a song with vocalist Dominique Eade. A bonus: on Sunday, November 15, at 11 a.m., in NEC’s Pierce Hall, NEC colleague Hankus Netsky convenes a panel of writers and musicians for a symposium on Blake’s music.

Invisible Resonance: The Music of Garrison Fewell
November 15, 4–6 p.m.
Killian Hall, MIT, Cambridge, MA

The guitarist, composer, and Berklee professor Garrison, who died last July of cancer at the age of 61, established his career with detailed, lyrical music more or less in the straigthahead Jim Hall mode and then, late in life, embraced free jazz, with playing and compositions that were no less lyrical and transparent. A group of Fewell friends and colleagues—including guitarist Eric Hofbauer, saxophonists Charlie Kohlhase and Jim Hobbs, and drummer Luther Gray—will attempt to encompass the entire Fewell legacy at MIT’s Killian Hall. Read a remembrance of Fewell on The Arts Fuse here.

Kris Adams Quintet
November 16 at 7:30 p.m.
Arsenal Center for the Arts, Waltham, MA

The accomplished singer Kris Adams comes to the nicely appointed Arsenal Center with a fine band: tenor saxophonist Rick DiMuzio, pianist Tim Ray, bassist Paul Del Nero, and drummer Bob Tamagni. Adams likes challenging arrangements and broad repertoire (Joni Mitchell, Norma Winstone, Abbey Lincoln, and her own setting of Steve Swallow’s “Wrong Together”), and she can really sing. What’s not to like?

—Jon Garelick

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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.

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.” Read the full review on The Arts Fuse here.

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.

Beautiful: The Carole King Musical. Book by Douglas McGrath. Words and music by Gerry Goffin & Carole King and Barry Mann & Cynthia Weil. Director, Mark Bruni. Presented by Broadway in Boston, Boston Opera House, 539 Washington Street, Boston, MA, through November 15.

This national touring production of the Broadway musical “is given everything it needs to soar: perfectly cast leads, and an ensemble of excellent singers who channel the original recording artists.” Arts Fuse review

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.

Thrill Me: The Leopold and Loeb Story. Book, Music & Lyrics by Stephen Dolginoff. Directed by Jeffry George. Staged by the Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater at the Julie Harris Stage, Wellfleet, MA, through November 8.

An intriguing subject for a musical: this “theatrical event recounts the chilling, true story of the legendary duo who committed one of the most infamous and heinous crimes of the twentieth century.”

The Love of the Nightingale by Timberlake Wertenbaker. Directed by Rebecca Bradshaw. Staged by Hub Theatre Company of Boston at the First Church in Boston, 66 Marlborough Street, Boston, MA, through November 21.

“In this timely and topical production, Wertenbaker addresses the issue of sexual violence which has reached crisis proportions in our communities, corporations and college campuses today. The Love of the Nightingale brings to light what happens when society’s only response to sexual assault is deafening silence.”

A Crack in the Blue Wall, written and directed by Jacqui Parker. At Hibernian Hall, 184 Dudley Street, Roxbury, MA, through November 22.

Parker’s vital play about a Boston policeman shooting a young African American man is a rarity: it explores grim problems that beset the black community by taking up contemporary issues directly rather than running back to nostalgic (and reassuring) replays of the past (e.g., To Kill a Mockingbird).

Lab Rats by Patrick Gabridge. Directed by Kyler Taustin. Staged by Brown Box Theatre Project at the Atlantic Wharf, 290 Congress Street, Boston, MA, through November 15.

The world premiere of a “sharply comic love story that follows Mika and Jake: two twenty-somethings making a slim living as test subjects for medical experiments. They navigate a treacherous maze of emotion, trust, and survival as their carefully monitored and medicated lives bleed into their true selves.”

Witchhunt: The Beast Within (a recreation of the Salem witch trials inspired by Jean-Paul Sartre) by Caleb Hammond. Directed by Hammond. Presented by MIT’s Dramashop at the Rinaldi Tile Building, 34 Carleton Street, Cambridge, MA, November 12 through 21.

An interesting project: it sounds like a frisky stage version of Jean-Paul Sartre’s 1957 film adaptation of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible. “A stark, harrowingly real recreation of the Salem witch trials inspired by Jean-Paul Sartre’s cinematic reaction to the chilling effects of both American McCarthyism and Soviet Stalinism.”

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.” Read the full review on The Arts Fuse here.

me·nag·er·ie, a work-in-progress inspired by Jorge Luis Borges’s The Book of Imaginary Beings, written and performed by imaginary beasts at the Charlestown Working Theater, Charlestown, MA, on November 13 and 14.

The piece draws “from a vast number of creative sources” and is part of “an ongoing theatrical exploration of the creatures wild and strange that reside in our collective fantasies.”

Price Tag by Alma Weich. Directed by Guy Ben-Aharon. Staged by Israeli Stage at the Goethe-Institut Boston, 170 Beacon Street, Boston, MA, on November 15.

Israeli Stage celebrates its 5th birthday with the American premiere of a script that, according to director Ben-Aharon, “couldn’t be more timely with the growing political tension in the settlements in Israel and the Palestinian Territories.” The play is a tragedy “inspired by the Biblical story of Eli the High Priest of Shiloh and his corrupted sons.” The cast for this staged reading includes Phil Tayler, Jared Brown, Pat Shea, and Will Lyman.

A Confederacy of Dunces, adapted by Jeffrey Hatcher from the novel by John Kennedy Toole. Directed by David Esbjornson. Staged by the Huntington Theater Company at the Boston University Theatre, Boston, MA, November 11 through December 20.

An exciting prospect— a stage version of Toole’s playfully Swiftian satire. “Nick Offerman (TV’s Parks and Recreation) stars as the larger-than-life character Ignatius J. Reilly: overweight, arrogant, eccentric, and still living with his mother in 1960s New Orleans. Called the Don Quixote of the French Quarter, Ignatius has a singular outlook on life. His farcical odyssey includes a riot in a department store and a raid on a strip club, and stints working at a pants factory and as a hot dog vendor.”

uCarmen and A Midsummer Night’s Dream, versions of the Bizet opera and Shakespeare play adapted and performed by the South African company Isango Ensemble. Presented in repertory by Arts Emerson at Emerson’s Cutler/Majestic Theatre, November 10 through 22.

“uCarmen transports us to a modern South African township to follow the story of Carmen, a strong, independent woman who will not be tamed. Meanwhile, A Midsummer Night’s Dream is completely faithful to the spirit of the original work and must be counted as one of the most successful operatic adaptations ever of a Shakespeare play—a work with spellbinding atmosphere that inhibits a truly unique, dreamlike world.”

Chopin without Piano an adaptation for the stage of Frédéric Chopin’s letters and music. Directed by Michał Zadara. Presented by Arts Emerson and CENTRALA at Emerson’s Paramount MainStage, Boston, MA, November 11 through 14.

“Helmed by one of Poland’s most significant directors and accompanied by a full symphonic orchestra of Boston Conservatory musicians,” the piece “is a rare opportunity to think more deeply about the tradition of live classical performance, culture in the broadest sense, and the sustaining value of Chopin’s music.” Featuring actress Barbara Wysocka. Performed in Polish with English surtitles.

Body&Sold by Debora Fortson. Directed by Robbie McCauley. Presented by Sleeping Weazel, Tempest Productions, and the CWT Resident Lab at the Charlestown Working Theater, Charlestown, MA, on November 16.

A reading of Fortson’s award-winning documentary play, which is based on interviews she conducted with teenagers—in Boston, Minneapolis, and Philadelphia—who lived through the victimizing reality of life in the sex trade. The presentation will be followed by a talkback with representatives from youth organizations and representatives from the Boston Police Department. The reading is part of Tempest Productions’ The BODY & SOLD Project 2015–2016. “Over the 2015–2016 season, the project’s overall goal is to build a network of theater audiences and community groups to raise awareness about the problem and, ultimately, devise strategies for prevention.”

—Bill Marx

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Visual Arts

Marilyn Arsem: 100 Ways to Consider Time
November 9–February 19, 2016
MFA, Boston, MA

Looking for a new way to pass the time this winter? Through most of the dark Boston months, for six hours a day, or a total of 100 days and 600 hours, Boston-based artist Marilyn Arsem will present a meditation on time itself. Intended as “an invitation to pause and experience the present moment, providing a temporary respite to the frenetic pace of our modern lives,” the performance piece invites you to contribute your own time-based reflections via snail mail or the latest in social media avenues (see the MFA website for the times of the performance and details for how to contribute to the project).

Although, like time itself, Arsem’s performance art will be entirely ephemeral, the MFA offers you a kind of museum immortality by making your contribution part of the permanent documentation of this piece. The MFA will also publish a selection.

Jeppson Idea Lab: Olmec Incised Standing Head
November 14–April 3, 2016
Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, MA

The mysterious Pre-Columbian Olmecs, credited with creating Meso-America’s first major civilization some 3,400 years ago, are known today primarily through their art, especially the striking and distinctively shaped stone heads they carved, often on a monumental scale, and left behind in Mexican jungles. This Idea Lab presentation focuses on an Olmec figure acquired by the museum in 1958, and explores recent scientific research conducted on the object by John Garton of Clark University in collaboration with the museum’s Conservation Department. The show and related programs will present what the researchers have learned about the figure’s shape, pose, scarification, body modifications, and spiritual symbolism. Small in stature and mute for centuries, when properly questioned, the figure speaks much about lost Olmec traditions of religion and culture.

Sound and Sense: Poetic Musing in American Art
November 14–April 17, 2016
Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford, CT

Selected from the Wadsworth’s permanent collections of American painting, sculpture, and decorative arts, this exhibition explores American art and the written word well before Jenny Holzer got into the act. The works on view all incorporate poetry in their composition, or otherwise relate to American poetic traditions. Artists include Winslow Homer, Rockwell Kent, and Georgia O’Keeffe. Among the poets quoted or referenced are Herman Melville, Walt Whitman, Robert Frost, and William Carlos Williams.

—Peter Walsh

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Classical Music

Liszt, Chin, and Schumann

Presented by the Boston Symphony Orchestra
November 5–10 at 8 p.m. (1:30 p.m. on Friday)
Symphony Hall, Boston, MA

BSO assistant conductor Ken-David Masur leads the American premiere of Unsuk Chin’s Mannequin, plus Schumann’s soaring Rhenish Symphony. Louis Lortie also joins the orchestra for Liszt’s Dies irae variations, Totentanz.

In the Penal Colony
Presented by Boston Lyric Opera
November 11–15 at 7:30 p.m. (3 p.m. on Sunday)
The Cyclorama at the Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA

Philip Glass’s adaptation of Kafka comes to Boston as the latest installment of BLO’s Opera Annex productions. David McFerrin sings the Officer, Neil Ferrara is the Visitor, and Yury Yanowski plays the Soldier. Emmanuel Music director Ryan Turner conducts.

Neuburger, Bartók, and Beethoven
Presented by the Boston Symphony Orchestra
November 12–14 at 8 p.m.
Symphony Hall, Boston, MA

Christoph von Dohnányi returns to the BSO podium with a program consisting of landmark scores from the 19th and 20th centuries (Beethoven’s Emperor Concerto, with soloist Martin Helmchen, and Bartók’s Music for Strings, Percussion, and Celesta, respectively) and a new piece, Jean-Frédéric Neuburger’s Aube, which receives its world premiere.

Ensemble Intercontemporain
Presented by the Institute of Contemporary Art
November 15 at 2 p.m.
ICA, Boston, MA

Music by and correspondence between Pierre Boulez and John Cage make up this intriguing offering from the Paris-based ensemble. Expect excerpts from the former’s Livre pour quatuor and Douze notations and the latter’s Sonatas and Interludes (among others) as well as readings from their letters.

—Jonathan Blumhofer

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Rock

Jonathan Richman
November 10 at 7 p.m.
Somerville Theatre, Somerville, MA

The Natick-born Jonathan Richman is the guy who sings, plays guitar, and gets shot in the movie There’s Something About Mary. He is also the guy who gave the world “Roadrunner,” the song that then-State Representative Marty Walsh introduced legislation to make the official state rock song of Massachusetts in 2013. Fathomlessly influential as both the founder of The Modern Lovers and an unpredictable but always recognizable solo artist, Richman and his longtime drummer Tommy Larkins will be at the Somerville Theatre on Tuesday.

The Toadies
November 11 at 7 p.m.
Brighton Music Hall, Allston, MA

Primarily remembered (by me, at least) for their 1995 post-Nirvana alt-rock hit “Possum Kingdom” and its equally creepy accompanying video, The Toadies reformed in the mid-2000s after their 2001 split and have been at least as active as ever since doing so. The band’s new album, Heretics, features three new tracks, new versions of old songs, and a cover of Blondie’s “Heart of Glass.” Revisit or rediscover the band at Brighton Music Hall on November 11.

Meg Myers and Ruby Rose Fox
November 12 at 7 p.m.
Middle East Downstairs, Cambridge, MA

Born in Tennessee in 1986, Meg Myers later lived in Ohio and Florida before taking off for Los Angeles around age 20 to make it as a musician. After putting in the requisite time waiting tables and gigging whenever and wherever possible, Myers cut her first EP (Daughter in the Choir) in 2012 and another (Make a Shadow) in 2014. Sorry, her first full-length release, appeared in the last official week of this past summer, and includes the grungy single “Lemon Eyes.” Joining Myers at the Middle East Downstairs on November 12 will be multiple Boston Music Awards-winning singer-songwriter Ruby Rose Fox, who will make it well worth your arriving early.

Art Garfunkel
November 15 at 8 p.m.
The Wilbur Theatre, Boston, MA

The funny haired, angelic-voiced half of one of the most creatively and commercially successful duos of the rock era performs at The Wilbur on Sunday, November 15. Based on his recent set lists, Garfunkel knows that people don’t pay to hear him sing his own songs. Therefore, expect mostly Paul Simon compositions and a few renditions of well-selected tunes by other people.

Upcoming and on sale:

Dave Rawlings Machine (11/16, The Wilbur Theatre); Fuzz (11/16, The Sinclair); The English Beat (11/18, Brighton Music Hall); Colin Hay (11/21, The Wilbur Theatre); My Morning Jacket (11/20–21, Orpheum Theatre); Okkervil River (11/24, The Sinclair); The Flamin’ Groovies (11/25, Brighton Music Hall); Jill Scott (12/1, Orpheum Theatre); Joanna Newsom (12/6, Orpheum Theatre); The At Odds Couple: An Evening of Acoustic Squeeze with Chris Difford and Glenn Tilbrook (12/10, The Wilbur Theatre); Todd Rundgren (12/16, The Wilbur Theatre)

— Blake Maddux

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Author Events

Kliph Nesteroff
In Conversation with Ken Reid
The Comedians: Drunks, Thieves, Scoundrels, and the History of American Comedy
November 9 at 7:30 p.m. (doors open at 7)
The Comedy Studio, Cambridge, MA
Free

In our media-saturated, celebrity-obsessed culture, the role of the comedian (think of Tina Fey’s consequential parody of Sarah Palin, for starters) is as relevant as it ever was. But what about the history of comedy, and the people who have been doing this for years? A comedy historian and former stand-up will read and discuss his history of comedy, drawing a line from Bojangles to Bill Hicks.

P.J. Lynch
The Boy Who Fell Off the Mayflower, Or John Howland’s Good Fortune
November 10, 3:30–4:30 p.m.
Book Ends, Winchester, MA
Free

If you’ve lived in New England for any length of time, you’ve no doubt heard the tale of The Mayflower, pilgrim’s pride, and all the rest of it. But how often are we given a glimpse into the lives of the less-heralded people on the ship? Lynch, an award-winning author, writes a historically based novel about John Howland, a stowaway who survived the trip to the new world  and struggled with being an indentured servant in the Plymouth Colony.

Rainn Wilson
In Conversation with William Novak
The Bassoon King: My Life in Art, Faith, and Idiocy
November 11 at 7:30 p.m.
The Wilbur Theatre, Boston, MA
$39 tickets

You might know Rainn Wilson from his role as the endearingly obnoxious Dwight Schrute on The Office, but Wilson is also quite well known for his mastery of the Twitterverse and the philosophy popularized in the website SoulPancake. Wilson will sit down with Novak, who is the best ghostwriter in the business, having cowritten autobiographies for everyone from Lee Iacocca to Magic Johnson.

Isabel Allende
The Japanese Lover
November 11 at 7 p.m. (doors open at 6:30)
First Parish Church, Cambridge, MA
$28.75 tickets, including an English- or Spanish-language translation of the book

The internationally renowned author of The House of the Spirits comes to read from her latest novel. It tells the story of the daughter of an emigrant Polish family fleeing the Anschluss by resettling in San Francisco. Unexpectedly, she falls in love with the family’s mild-mannered Japanese gardener, a situation complicated immensely by the intrusion of Pearl Harbor into their budding romance.

Garth Risk Hallberg
City on Fire
November 16 at 7 p.m.
Harvard Book Store, Cambridge, MA
Free

In case you’ve missed it, the literary world is abuzz over Hallberg’s highly publicized debut of the fall. Clocking in at over 900 pages and set during the creative chaos of New York City in the 1970s, this novel is clearly epic in both form and ambition, which makes the opportunity to see him reading from it in person all the more interesting. Read the full review on The Arts Fuse here.

—Matt Hanson