Preview: The Berkshire International Film Festival
BIFF founder Kelley Vickery outside The Triplex in Great Barrington
Ticket sales are brisk for the third annual Berkshire International Film Festival, which runs from May 15 -18 in Great Barrington. “We’ve already sold out of our $100 passes,” says founder Kelley Vickery, who assessed the Berkshires cultural landscape a few years ago and decided that there was a cinema gap.
Art: Gallery Openings this Weekend
Among the new art shows launching this weekend: in Salisbury, CT, on May 10, Joie de Livres, the bookstore/ gallery, premieres Spring Awakening, a group show of botanical paintings and photographs (such as Mariana Cook’s Thistle, left), featuring works by, among others, Edward Steichen, Tricia Wright, and Jim Osman, as well as signed first edition books featuring several of the artists’ work. The same night the Hudson Opera House presents a group exhibition, DRESS, in which nine artists explore the relationship between apparel and art. The public is invited to opening receptions at both. And for those who intend to do the Columbia County tour of 14 artists’ studios next weekend, the time to buy tickets is now.
Movies: This Week's Rankings & SchedulesAll the films showing in our region listed in order of critical acclaim. Excerpts from reviews, plus theaters, show times, and, in some instances, trailers and tickets. | 
Books: The Soundtrack of Our LivesPart-time Berkshire-ite Sheila Weller is the author of a new book Girls Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon--and the Journey of a Generation that is already a New York Times bestseller. Here, in an exclusive interview, she fills in the background on the book, six years in the making--how she came up with the idea (it all came together, as it happens, while she was walking on Beech Plain Road in Sandisfield.) | 
Theatre: Barrington Stage Finds A Second Home Barrington Stage Company, which has a beautifully renovated 500-seat theater (with great leg room) in downtown Pittsfield, has finally found a semi-permanent home for its Stage II productions. BSC has signed a five year-lease for the VFW Hall on Linden Street and invested $20,000 to turn it into what BSC artistic director Julianne Boyd calls “my dream Stage II space for us.”
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