Hopwood celebration events

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Following are some highlights of other planned events, films, plays, readings and talks the Hopwood Awards program is planning in collaboration with the School of Music Theatre & Drama Department, Department of English, Office of the Vice President for Communications and the Special Collections Library:

This 1915-16 Florine Stettheimer portrait of Avery Hopwood hangs in the U-M Hopwood Room. (Photo courtesy Hopwood Program)

• Jan. 24, Alice Fulton poetry reading at the Hopwood Underclassmen Award Ceremony, 3:30 p.m., Rackham Amphitheatre. Fulton’s work has been included in five editions of The Best American Poetry series and in the 10th anniversary edition, The Best of the Best American Poetry, 1988-1997. She is a past faculty member of the U-M Department of English.

• Hopwood Film Festival. The University will screen films inspired by Hopwood himself or written by Hopwood winners. “Gold Diggers of 1933,” the iconic film based on Hopwood’s play “The Gold Diggers,” will be the first. The film starred Ginger Rodgers, Joan Blondell and Dick Powell and contained such classic tunes as “We’re in the Money.” U-M English professor Peter Bauland will teach a mini-course on the films. Open to the public, the films will be shown Monday evenings at 7 in the Michigan Theater. They are:

• Jan. 30, “Gold Diggers of 1933.”

• Feb. 6, “The Misfits.” Screenplay by Hopwood winner Arthur Miller.

• Feb. 13, “Bonnie and Clyde.” Screenplay by Hopwood winner David Newman.

• Feb. 20, “Body Heat.” Screenplay and direction by Hopwood winner Lawrence Kasdan.

• Feb. 8, Special Collections Library, 7th Floor, Hatcher Graduate Library, 8 p.m. A lecture and reception will be held for the opening of the exhibit, “Avery Hopwood’s Legacy: Literary Descendents at Michigan.” The exhibit of photos, books and papers by Hopwood Award-winning authors Henry Van Dyke, Nancy Willard, Marge Piercy and Emery George will be on display daily through June 24.

• Feb. 9-12, Avery Hopwood’s “The Gold Diggers.” Under the direction of Philip Kerr, the Theatre & Drama Department performances of Hopwood’s popular, long-running 1919 play will take place at the Lydia Mendelssohn Theatre, 7:30 p.m. Feb. 9, 8 p.m. Feb. 10, and 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. Feb. 12. The performances will feature live music by Phil Ogilvie’s Rhythm Kings with musical direction by U-M professor and music historian James Dapogny.

• Feb. 10, panel discussion: “Avery Hopwood, Then and Now,” 2 p.m., Michigan Union, Kuenzel Room. Hopwood scholars Jack Stanley and Jack Sharrar and playwright Bruce Kellner will participate in a panel discussion on Hopwood’s impact and legacy, moderated by Nicholas Delbanco and Philip Kerr.

• April 6, a reading by Hopwood winners Elwood Reid and Porter Shreve, 5 p.m., Residential College Auditorium. Reid is the author of the novel “If I Don’t Six” and the short story collection “What Salmon Know.” His latest novel is “D.B.” (Doubleday, 2004). Shreve’s first novel, “The Obituary Writer,” was published by Houghton Mifflin in June 2000. “Drives Like a Dream”(Houghton Mifflin, 2005) is his second novel.

• April 21, Hopwood Graduate and Undergraduate Awards Ceremony with Hopwood Lecture by Charles Baxter, 3:30 p.m., Rackham Auditorium. Baxter is the author of four novels, four collections of short stories, three collections of poems, a collection of essays on fiction, and is the editor of other books. His most recent novel is “Saul and Patsy” (Pantheon, 2003), and he recently has published the essay collection, “Burning Down the House: Essays on Fiction” (Graywolf Press, 1998). Baxter was on the English Department faculty for 13 years.

• April 22 release of “The Hopwood Award: 75 Years of Prized Writing” and signing of works by Hopwood awardees, 10 a.m.-noon, Shaman Drum Bookshop. Marking the history of the Avery Hopwood and Jule Hopwood Award, the U-M Press will release its compendium of works by Hopwood Award-winning writers of note, edited by Delbanco, Andrea Beauchamp and Michael Barrett with an introduction by Delbanco.

• Winter 2007, Michigan Quarterly Review (MQR) Hopwood special edition. The winter 2007 edition of MQR will feature works and essays by and about recent Hopwood Award-winning authors. The edition will be co-edited by Delbanco and Laurence Goldstein.

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