Gallagher-Bluedorn Performing Arts Center

Joy Cole Corning Leadership Lecture Series presents presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin "Team of Rivals:  the Leadership Lessons of Abraham Lincoln." Admission is free but tickets are required. Reception and book signing to follow.

With the epic dimensions of a Shakespearean tragedy, The Queen of Versailles follows billionaires Jackie and David’s rags-to-riches story to uncover the innate virtues and flaws of the American dream. We open on the triumphant construction of the biggest house in America, a sprawling, 90,000-square-foot mansion inspired by Versailles. Since a booming time-share business built on the real-estate bubble is financing it, the economic crisis brings progress to a halt and seals the fate of its owners. We witness the impact of this turn of fortune over the next two years in a riveting film fraught with delusion, denial, and self-effacing humor.

A concert in recognition of Americans who have faced prejudice and adversity to American freedoms and liberties based on their ethnicity or sexual preference. The concert will feature "Afro-American Fragments" which sets the poetry of Langston Hughes to a powerful musical soundscape and Henry Cowell's Symphony no. 2 which was written while Cowell was serving time in San Quentin state prision on "morals" charges for having a same sex relationship. It will be held in the Great Hall at Gallagher Bluedorn.

Winner of both the Grand Jury Prize and the Audience Award at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival, “God Grew Tired Of Us” explores the indomitable spirit of three ‘Lost Boys’ from the Sudan who leave their homeland, triumph over seemingly insurmountable adversities and move to America, where they build active and fulfilling new lives but remain deeply committed to helping the friends and family they have left behind. 

Orphaned by a tumultuous civil war and traveling barefoot across the sub-Saharan desert, John Bul Dau, Daniel Abol Pach and Panther Blor were among the 25,000 ‘Lost Boys’ (ages 3 to 13) who fled villages, formed surrogate families and sought refuge from famine, disease, wild animals and attacks from rebel soldiers. Named by a journalist after Peter Pan’s posse of orphans who protected and provided for each other, the “Lost Boys” traveled together for five years and against all odds crossed into the UN’s refugee camp in Kakuma, Kenya. A journey’s end for some, it was only the beginning for John, Daniel and Panther, who along with 3,800 other young survivors, were selected to re-settle in the United States.

While most sports films celebrate the quest for a championship, "Quantum Hoops" follows a team that is searching for a single win. The documentary chronicles the final week of the 2006 Caltech basketball season. The team is currently in the midst of a 21 year losing streak - over 240 consecutive conference losses. Caltech is annually considered one of the top 5 academic institutions in the world yet its athletic department always takes a back seat to the achievements of its world-renowned faculty, Nobel Prize winners, and advancements in the world of science and technology. To the casual fan, the team might sound like a bad joke. There are more valedictorians on the team than players with high school basketball experience. In fact, the 5 seniors did not play high school basketball, yet all five are major contributors to the team. They are roundly mocked by opposing fans as "nerds playing basketball" (the few fans that decide its even worth it to show up). However, this season would mark an amazing turnaround from just two years ago when the team would lose by an average margin of over 60 points per game. Against remarkable odds and adversity, the players and coaches’ dedication, discipline, heart, and yes, SKILL would make for one of the most exciting seasons in school history.  The final home game of the year would give the 5 seniors one last shot at that elusive win and an entry into the history books of college athletics.

Before his son Samuel was diagnosed with cerebral palsy, photojournalist Dan Habib rarely thought about the inclusion of people with disabilities. Now he thinks about inclusion every day. Shot and produced over four years, Habib’s award-winning documentary film, Including Samuel, chronicles the Habib family’s efforts to include Samuel in every facet of their lives. The film honestly portrays his family’s hopes and struggles as well as the experiences of four other individuals with disabilities and their families. Including Samuel is a highly personal, passionately photographed film that captures the cultural and systemic barriers to inclusion.

Now perhaps the most beloved American film, George Bailey (played by Jimmy Stewart) grows up in the small town of Bedford Falls, dreaming dreams of adventure and travel, but circumstances conspire to keep him enslaved to his home turf. Frustrated by his life, and haunted by an impending scandal, George prepares to commit suicide on Christmas Eve. A heavenly messenger arrives to show him a vision: what the world would have been like if George had never been born. 

“Citizen Kane” is probably the world's most famous and highly rated film, with its many remarkable scenes and experimental innovations. Its director, star, and producer were all the same genius individual - Orson Welles. The story examines the life and legacy of Charles Foster Kane, played by Welles. Narrated principally through flashbacks, the story is revealed through the research of a newsreel reporter seeking to solve the mystery of the newspaper magnate's dying word: "Rosebud".

“Charles Bradley: Soul of America” follows the extraordinary journey of singer Charles Bradley during the electrifying and transformative months leading up to the release of his debut album "No Time for Dreaming" at the age of 62.

Then don’t miss Charles Bradley and His Extraordinaires at the Gallagher-Bluedorn as part of the Club Series on Saturday, November 17, 7:30 p.m.

In “After Angels,” a profile of Tony Kushner published in The New Yorker, John Lahr wrote: “[Kushner] is fond of quoting Melville’s heroic prayer from Mardi and Voyage Thither (“Better to sink in boundless deeps than float on vulgar shoals”), and takes an almost carnal glee in tackling the most difficult subjects in contemporary history – among them, AIDS and the conservative counter-revolution (Angels In America), Afghanistan and the West (Homebody/Kabul), German Fascism and Reaganism (A Bright Room Called Day), the rise of capitalism (Hydriotaphia, or the Death of Dr. Browne), and racism and the civil rights movement in the South (Caroline, or Change).  But his plays, which are invariably political, are rarely polemical.  Instead Kushner rejects ideology in favor of what he calls “a dialectically shaped truth,” which must be “outrageously funny” and “absolutely agonizing,” and must “move us forward.”  He gives voice to characters who have been rendered powerless by the forces of circumstances – a drag queen dying of AIDS, an uneducated Southern maid, contemporary Afghans – and his attempt to see all sides of their predicament has a sly subversiveness. He forces the audience to identify with the marginalized – a humanizing act of the imagination.”

Kushner is the recipient of a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, an Emmy Award, two Tony Awards, three Obie Awards, an Oscar nomination, an Arts Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the PEN/Laura Pels Award for a Mid-Career Playwright, a Spirit of Justice Award from the Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, and a Cultural Achievement Award from The National Foundation for Jewish Culture, among many others.