One! Night! Only! Commemorate World AIDS Day (actually, Dec. 1) with a staged reading of Love! Valour! Compassion!, presented by the Suncoast AIDS Theatre Project. Terrence McNally’s 1995 Tony Award-winner is a humorous, heart-tugging ensemble piece that centers on eight gay men who hash out their passions, resentments and fears during a farmhouse summer vacation.
The 1997 film adaptation starred Jason Alexander (Seinfeld) and Justin Kirk (Weeds); this special one-night-only reading gives us Matt McGee as Buzz, Brad Wages as John/James, Joey Panek as Bobby, Eric Davis as Gregory, Brian Shea as Perry, Steve Garland as Arthur and David Valdez as Ramon. All proceeds benefit the Metro Charities and Suncoast AIDS Theatre Project. 7:30 p.m. Monday, Nov. 29, at American Stage Theatre, 163 Third St. N., St. Petersburg. Pay what you can at the door or $15 in advance. For more information, call 727-823-7529 or visit americanstage.org.
Florida has dibs on bestselling author Dennis Lehane. He isn't one of those Northern writers who makes it big, then decides on a winter home in the Sunshine State because he's gotten sick of the winters and because, finally, he can afford it. Lehane earned his degrees at Eckerd College and Florida International, so the state has been an important place in his development as a writer.
Lehane has emerged as one of America's greatest novelists during the last decade and a half. His books have touched millions of readers and inspired a number of great Hollywood films, including Mystic River, Shutter Island and Gone Baby Gone. (Read more about Lehane in William McKeen's feature here.)
Lehane's new book, Moonlight Mile (William Morrow, $26.99) is another piece of overwhelming evidence that Lehane is about as good as it gets when it comes to crime fiction. If you're a fan, be sure to attend A Conversation with Dennis Lehane at Four Green Fields Irish Pub, 205 W. Platt S., Tampa, 7-9 p.m. Led by St. Petersburg Times book critic Colette Bancroft, the event is sponsored by Inkwood Books. Admission free with purchase of Moonlight Mile.
This article appears in Nov 25 – Dec 1, 2010.