First Friday events

For the first time since its inception, Dalton City vendors, including Shyine Designs, Chilkat Valley Desserts and Josie’s Bread and Bagels, will open their doors for November’s First Friday event.

Julie Vance’s Shiyne Designs custom crafted clothing company will debut her fall and winter collection. From her Dalton City shop, Josie Allen will offer Italian hoagies and Chilkat Valley Desserts will serve gelato.

“We’re excited to be part of First Friday events and hope we can do more in the future,” Vance said.

The Alaska Arts Confluence will serve organic dark chocolates handcrafted by Debi Knight Kennedy.

Kelly Mitchell’s multimedia miniatures will be on display at Ampersand AK.

The Eldred Rock Lighthouse Preservation Association will be accepting donations and soliciting membership at a booth in the Gateway Building. They’ll also be selling glow-in-the-dark beer mugs and offering refreshments. The association is raising money as it progresses with negotiations with the U.S. Coast Guard to secure a lease which will aid in its mission to restore, renovate and preserve the historic lighthouse, said association secretary Michael Marks.

The Haines Sheldon Museum will play historic film and audio clips on iPads and iPods. The clips are the result of a recent digitization project the museum’s summer intern worked on. “We’re using this First Friday as a chance to show some of the product that we are able to digitize,” museum community coordinator Regi Johanos said.

The digitization of about 100 VHS tapes, 100 audiotapes and 25 8mm movies will be part of a “History Relevance” campaign that will be used in programs throughout the winter that tie historic narrative to current challenges. They will also be included bi-weekly in KHNS’s History Talk program.

Many of the tapes and movies are oral histories from deceased elders. The project was funded by a grant from the Collections Management Fund of Museums Alaska.

Brian Starseth, who moved his Alaska Wild Bear Photography shop this summer to the old King’s Store on Main Street, will host Chilkat Native Dancers. Visitors are eligible for a drawing for a free wildlife print.

The Magpie Gallery will feature “Flowers in My Cupboard” by Martha Mackowiak.

After First Friday, people can head to the ANB/ANS Hall for Friday night bingo beginning at 7 p.m. Doors open at 6 p.m.

Play features entirety of Shakespeare’s plays, sort of

The Merry Pranksters will perform “The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged)” the first weekend of November.

The two-hour, two-act comedy is a play within a play. It begins with the quixotic quest of three inebriated friends.

“The conceit is three guys get really drunk in their basement one night and say we could put on all of Shakespeare’s plays,” said actor Mark Zeiger. “We raid our kids’ toy chests and pull together costumes from wherever we can find them and put on all the plays without really thinking it through.”

Zeiger is one of the three actors who plays myriad characters as the play progresses. Riyan Stossel and Ryan Staska are the two other cast members. The whirlwind of plays begins with Romeo and Juliet.

“There are some really tight turnarounds,” Stossel said. “At one point I play Juliet, then I have to run around backstage and come out as Mercutio. I have a minute or less to do that.”

Amanda Randles is directing the play, which was written by Adam Long, Daniel Singer and Jess Winfield, members of The Reduced Shakespeare Company, in the late 1980s.

The actors will speak directly to the audience and even bring some on stage.

Opening night is Friday, Nov. 1 at 8 p.m. Performances are also scheduled for Saturday, Nov. 2 at 7 p.m. and Sunday, Nov. 3 at 4 p.m. Tickets will be available at the door and cost $15 for adults and $10 for children and seniors.

Lust for Dust returns to Chilkat Center stage

Mark Sebens is bringing back to life the popular, hometown “Lust for Dust,” a play written by Juneau playwrights that debuted in the early 1990s.

“It’s a melodrama,” Sebens said. “It’s based around gold mining out at Porcupine.” The play includes fictional characters as well as the historical Jack Dalton. Dalton’s character, one of the play’s villains, schemes to steal gold from Danny DoGood, the play’s hero. Set in 1898, DoGood arrives at Porcupine to help a prospector mine for gold. Misadventures follow as DoGood’s plans are complicated by Dalton and a host of other thieves including Dusty Roads, a cattle herder, and Lotta Larue, Dalton’s girlfriend.

“It’s about truth and justice and the American way, that sort of stuff,” Sebens said.

The play will include new, original music written by Sebens, who played Dalton when the play was first performed. Sebens is looking for a new actor to play Dalton this year.

The cast includes Rebecca McCoy, Tracy Harmon, Michaela Chambers, Tom Morphet (the only former cast member), Eli Williamson, Regi Johanos and Tom Ganner.

The Lynn Canal Community Players commissioned the play and it was performed for about five years, Sebens said.

The play is scheduled for Nov. 22 and 23 at the Chilkat Center. It runs one hour and 20 minutes.

Not a guy with a guitar

The Haines Arts Council is bringing RupLoops, an “interactive, live looping performance, using vocal performance, rhythmic rhymes and an arsenal of eclectic instruments from around the globe,” according to the artist’s website, to the Chilkat Center Stage on Nov. 18.

“He’s not going to be a guy and a guitar,” arts council copresident Tom Heywood said. “He’s going to be very different and a very high energy kind of guy.”

Heywood said he learned about RupLoops from his showcase at the annual Arts Northwest Conference last year in Eugene, Oregon.

“He’s going to create lots of multilayered fun things on stage,” Heywood said. “He’s got a lot of fun audience participation. He’ll create these pieces that are multilayered. It’s very fun stuff.”

His music is inspired by folk and classical forms of music from around the world, according to his website. Styles range from “groove oriented hip hop beats, to contemporary fusions of classical ragas; scores for the National Film Board of Canada and remixes of vintage bollywood tunes, to original compositions for dance and theatre productions.”

The concert is scheduled for Monday, Nov. 18 at 7 p.m. Tickets cost $18, $15 for members and $5 for students.

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