New York Fringe Festival Report: ‘The Unfortunates’

Dixie Sheridan Diana Cherkas in “The Unfortunates.”

Reviews of shows from the New York International Fringe Festival will appear on ArtsBeat through the festival’s close on Aug. 25. For more information, go to fringenyc.org.

“London is a city what would eat her own young,” says Mary Jane Kelly (Diana Cherkas) in “The Unfortunates,” and this haunting one-woman show convinces you. Mary Jane is a prostitute in 1888, in the squalid London neighborhood of Whitechapel, the killing ground of Jack the Ripper. As she downs multiple drinks in the Ten Bells pub, she regales a potential customer â€" the audience â€" with her past before embarking into the night.

The play, written by Aoise Stratford, is not a Ripper study per se, but rather an engrossing depiction of a time and place, and a woman’s struggle in a pitiless social stratum. As we learn of Mary Jane’s altercations with “coppers,” ejections from homes, abusive relationships and a trip to Paris with a kinky upper-crust john, the merciless narrowing of her world grows palpable.

Offhand references to Joseph Merrick (the Elephant Man) and Mr. Hyde add period flavor. David M. Kaplan’s set is simple yet evocative, while Ms. Cherkas’s costume, by Julia Sharp, is spot-on. (Greg Scalera’s sound design â€" all crowd murmurs and clopping horses â€" could use more understatement.) And Ms. Cherkas’s performance, directed by Ryan Scott Whinnem, is well paced and assured. When Mary Jane describes the autopsy of a friend, it’s terrifying. After all, it presages her own fate.

“The Unfortunates” continues through Saturday at Teatro Latea, 107 Suffolk Street, Lower East Side.

Detroit Institute of Arts Won’t File Objection in City’s Bankruptcy Proceeding

The Detroit Institute of Arts, whose world-class art collection has become a potential target for the city’s creditors in Detroit’s federal bankruptcy case, announced on Monday that it would not file an objection in court to the city’s eligibility for relief under Chapter 9. Monday was the deadline for objections to the city seeking bankruptcy protection.

The museum, which has vowed to go to court to oppose any attempt to sell its art to raise money for to the city, said in a statement that it “recognizes the city’s severe financial distress and its need for the protection and powers of the bankruptcy court” to help get the city back on its feet. But it added that the city should not “undercut those goals by jeopardizing Detroit’s most important cultural institution and the economic, educational and other significant benefits it brings to the city and the region.”

The city’s emergency manager, Kevyn D. Orr, has said that he has no intention of selling the art to raise money to satisfy creditors. And Michigan’s attorney general issued a formal opinion in June stating that the collection, though owned by the city, is held in charitable trust for the people of Michigan and cannot be sold to help settle some of Detroit’s billions of dollars in debts.

But Mr. Orr’s office has hired the auction house Christie’s to perform a detailed appraisal of the value of the collection, which experts have said is easily worth several billion dollars. In the statement Monday, the museum criticized Mr. Orr’s decision to undertake the appraisal.

“Repeated statements that ‘everything is on the table’ and the emergency manager’s retention of Christie’s auction house to appraise the D.I.A. collection,” the museum said, “further complicate and confuse an already complex proceeding.”

Rio de Janeiro Makes Woody Allen an Offer

Apparently Rio de Janeiro is not satisfied with being chosen as the site of the 2016 Summer Olympics and the host of the championship game of next year’s World Cup of soccer. Now Brazil’s most effervescent city also wants Woody Allen to make a movie there.

“I really want him to come,” Rio’s mayor, Eduardo Paes, said in an interview published Sunday in the newspaper O Globo. “I’ve already tried everything. I spoke to his sister, I sent a letter to Calatrava, who is his neighbor in New York, and I’ll pay whatever it takes to bring him to film here,” he explained, referring to the Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava.

In recent years, Mr. Allen has made films in European cities like Parish and Barcelona, Spain, with the encouragement of the authorities there who not only admire his films but also are interested in encouraging more tourism. Mr. Paes is so intent on joining their company, presumably to feature globally known attractions like Ipanema Beach, Sugar Loaf Mountain and Maracanã Stadium, that he offered to “pay 100 percent of the production.”

But as part of the same interview, Mr. Paes acknowledged that financing all of the other cultural projects he has announced is going to be a challenge. “Everybody always wants more money,” he noted. And in recent months Brazil has been swept by huge demonstrations, some aimed at Mr. Paes and the governor of the state of Rio de Janeiro, Sérgio Cabral, protesting government spending on wasteful projects.

Mr. Paes, in the first year of his second term, indicated he was aware of the political dangers of his offer to Mr. Allen, saying that opponents “are going to kill me when I give Woody the millions he’s asking for.” But he sought to diminish such criticism by portraying his offer in the context of a much larger initiative to bring international film studios to Rio. “We consider this to be an industry that’s important for the city,” he said.

Rio de Janeiro Makes Woody Allen an Offer

Apparently Rio de Janeiro is not satisfied with being chosen as the site of the 2016 Summer Olympics and the host of the championship game of next year’s World Cup of soccer. Now Brazil’s most effervescent city also wants Woody Allen to make a movie there.

“I really want him to come,” Rio’s mayor, Eduardo Paes, said in an interview published Sunday in the newspaper O Globo. “I’ve already tried everything. I spoke to his sister, I sent a letter to Calatrava, who is his neighbor in New York, and I’ll pay whatever it takes to bring him to film here,” he explained, referring to the Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava.

In recent years, Mr. Allen has made films in European cities like Parish and Barcelona, Spain, with the encouragement of the authorities there who not only admire his films but also are interested in encouraging more tourism. Mr. Paes is so intent on joining their company, presumably to feature globally known attractions like Ipanema Beach, Sugar Loaf Mountain and Maracanã Stadium, that he offered to “pay 100 percent of the production.”

But as part of the same interview, Mr. Paes acknowledged that financing all of the other cultural projects he has announced is going to be a challenge. “Everybody always wants more money,” he noted. And in recent months Brazil has been swept by huge demonstrations, some aimed at Mr. Paes and the governor of the state of Rio de Janeiro, Sérgio Cabral, protesting government spending on wasteful projects.

Mr. Paes, in the first year of his second term, indicated he was aware of the political dangers of his offer to Mr. Allen, saying that opponents “are going to kill me when I give Woody the millions he’s asking for.” But he sought to diminish such criticism by portraying his offer in the context of a much larger initiative to bring international film studios to Rio. “We consider this to be an industry that’s important for the city,” he said.

Chris Brown Cancels Concerts After Probation Ruling

The singer Chris Brown has canceled four scheduled appearances in Canada, the CBC reported. Mr. Brown was to be the headliner at the Energy Rush festival, with stops in Halifax, Toronto, Saint John and Winnipeg. In a statement, Stephen Tobin, owner of Drop Entertainment Group, which is producing the events, said the decision was made “in light of the performer’s recent personal and health-related issues.”

Because the event cannot proceed without a headline act, Mr. Tobin said, the Energy Rush festival shows will be postponed until next year.

On Friday, a judge reinstated Mr. Brown’s probation, which had been revoked after a request from prosecutors, who questioned whether the singer had completed previously ordered community service. Under the terms of his probation, Mr. Brown must complete 1,000 hours of community service. The singer is also recovering from a seizure he suffered recently.

Tyne Daly to Star in New Terrence McNally Play on Broadway

David Graeme-Baker/BBC, via Getty Images Tyne Daly

The Tony and Emmy Award-winning actress Tyne Daly (“Gypsy”) will return to Broadway in the spring of 2014 to star in “Mothers and Sons,” a new play by the Tony Award-winning playwright Terrence McNally (“Love! Valour! Compassion!”). Sheryl Kaller, who in June directed the show’s premiere at the Bucks County Playhouse in New Hope, Pa., will reprise her duties for Broadway. Additional casting, run dates and a theater are to be announced.

Ms. Daly will play a mother who, 20 years after her son’s death from AIDS, faces a clash of values and personalities when she travels from Texas to Manhattan to visit her son’s former lover, who is married to another man and has a young son. (In the Bucks County production Manoel Felciano played the role of the son and Bobby Steggert played his lover.) Ms. Daly will return to Broadway for the first time since playing the opera singer Maria Callas in the 2011 revival of Mr. McNally’s 1995 play “Master Class.”

“Mothers and Sons” has a history that dates back to the late ’80s. The characters in the Broadway-bound production are inspired by “Andre’s Mother,” a teleplay Mr. McNally wrote in 1990 that ran as part of the PBS series “American Playhouse.” That work was an expansion of a playlet staged as part of an anthology, called “Urban Blight,” at Manhattan Theater Club in 1988.

Justin Bieber and Michael Jackson Joined, Briefly, in Song

Left, Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images; right, Joel Ryan/Associated Press Justin Bieber in concert this month and Michael Jackson at a news conference in March 2009.

Justin Bieber and Michael Jackson were united in song over the weekend when a recording of Mr. Bieber singing along with vocals previously recorded by Mr. Jackson surfaced online, provoking a hailstorm of news reports and stoking a great deal of fan interest on social media. The track, “Slave 2 the Rhythm,” also aired on British radio, The Guardian reported.

On Friday and Saturday, Mr. Bieber posted somewhat cryptic messages about Mr. Jackson to his Twitter account, but did not refer directly to the song. On Friday, he wrote, “Excited for what is to come. MJ set the bar. Not only for music but for being an entertainer and how u treat the fans. Wish he was here…” He also posted a photograph pairing himself with an image of Mr. Jackson.

On Monday, however, YouTube videos and SoundCloud posts including the song were taken down. A notice on YouTube said that the video “is no longer available due to a copyright claim by S.M.E.” Sony Music Entertainment owns Mr. Jackson’s recordings. In 2012, Sony reported that some of Mr. Jackson’s recordings had been stolen from its Web site. Sony did not respond to a request for comment on Monday.

Beatles Tribute Will End Broadway Run Months Early

Ruby Washington/The New York Times “Let It Be” at the St. James Theater.

The insatiable appetite for all things Beatles-related has driven up prices for memorabilia, kept bookshelves well-stocked and kept the group’s record label busy with compilations, reissues and remastered versions of classic discs and films. But the appetite for Beatles tribute shows on Broadway is not so strong, apparently.

“Let It Be,” a concert show in which musicians dressed as the Beatles trace the group’s history and recreate its top songs, has been a hit in London since it opened at the end of 2012. But its producers announced on Monday that instead of running through Dec. 29, as planned, the show would close on Sept. 1. They said in a statement that summer ticket sales at the St. James Theater, where the show opened on July 24, “proved to be more challenging than expected.”

The show has also become the subject of a lawsuit, filed by the producers of “Rain: A Tribute to the Beatles on Broadway”, which ran from the fall of 2010 through the summer of 2011.  “Rain’s” producers, noting that all but three of the songs in “Let It Be” were also included in their show, and noting other similarities between the two presentations - which both owe something to the late-1970’s Broadway show “Beatlemania” - sought half the revenues of “Let It Be.”

The producers of “Let It Be” said that the has played to more than 50,000 viewers on Broadway, and has taken in between $2 and $2.4 million. The British version, which is booked at the Savoy Theater in London through January 2014, has so far played to 250,000 people and grossed more than $14 million.

“Let It Be” apparently will have a future, however. The producers plan to use the cast and elements of the physical production in a touring version that will travel through North America during the 2014-15 season. Additional plans include stops in Russia, Japan and Monaco.

Joan Baez, Jack White and Marcus Mumford to Headline ‘Inside Llewyn Davis’ Concert

Joan Baez, Jack White, Marcus Mumford and the Avett Brothers are among the performers who will take part in a benefit concert at Town Hall in September celebrating the folk music of the 1960s and promoting the soundtrack for the Joel and Ethan Coen movie “Inside Llewyn Davis,” organizers announced on Monday.

A portion of the proceeds will go to support the National Recording Preservation Foundation, a struggling nonprofit created by Congress to underwrite efforts to safeguard music and radio archives.

The concert was put together by T Bone Burnett, the Americana producer behind the highly successful soundtrack for the Coen brothers film “Oh, Brother Where Art Thou?” Mr. Burnett and the Coens organized a tour for that record, too, and it eventually won the Grammy Award for Album of the Year in 2002.

Mr. Burnett said the concert at Town Hall will feature live performances of the music in “Inside Llewyn Davis,” as well as songs from the early 1960s that inspired the film, based loosely on the life of the guitarist and singer Dave Van Ronk, who died in 2002.

“We decided to do a concert to bring together the community that had done the music,” Mr. Burnett said. “So there would be some synergy between the music and the film.”

The lineup is heavy with young stars in the folk and Americana genre. It includes Rhiannon Giddens of the Carolina Chocolate Drops, Lake Street Dive, Colin Meloy of the Decemberists, Milk Carton Kids, Conor Oberst of Bright Eyes and the Punch Brothers. “The idea was to round up the best of these young musicians to come up and do a show around this music,” Mr. Burnett said. Among the older musicians slated to appear are Patti Smith, Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings. Actors in the film will also perform, including Oscar Isaac, who plays the title role.

The film follows a week in the life of a young folk singer in Greenwich Village in the winter 1961 as he struggles for recognition. The soundtrack â€" to be released on Nonesuch Records on Nov. 12 â€" is the fourth collaboration between T Bone Burnett and the Coens, with Mr. Mumford as an associate producer. In addition to 12 songs recorded for the film, the soundtrack will include a previously unreleased Bob Dylan track called “Farewell,” which was recorded during the sessions for “The Times They Are A-Changin’.”

The concert will take place Sept. 29: tickets go on sale through Ticketmaster at noon on Aug. 21.

The Ad Campaign: De Blasio Speaks Against Stop-and-Frisk

First aired: August 19, 2013

Produced by: AKPD Message and Media

For: Bill de Blasio

Bill de Blasio, the city’s public advocate and a Democratic candidate for mayor, is running his second television commercial of the campaign. Titled “Dignity,” this 30-second ad will appear on network and cable channels across New York City starting Monday.

Fact-Check

0:05

“Chirlane and I have talked to Dante many times about the fact that some day you will be stopped.”

There is no way to know if Mr. de Blasio’s son, who is 15 and biracial, will be stopped by the police. It has not yet happened.

0:13

“Bill de Blasio, the only candidate to end a stop and frisk era that targets minorities.”

A single superlative - only - is proving highly problematic for Mr. de Blasio in his campaign commercials. He is not the only candidate pledging to end the way the Police Department carries out the stop-and-frisk tactic. Nor is he the only candidate proposing an income tax on the rich to pay for education. Nevertheless, Mr. de Blasio is making both of these claims for the second time.

On stop-and-frisk, Mr. de Blasio argues his platform â€" support for two City Council bills, one banning racial profiling, the other creating an inspector general in the Police Department, combined with his vow to replace Raymond Kelly as commissioner â€" amounts to a stronger set of reforms than his rivals have espoused. But his opponents say they will achieve the same ends through different means, and back several of the same measures he does. To curb stop-and-frisk abuses, Christine C. Quinn, for example, has beefed up the power of the Civilian Complaint Review Board and shepherded the inspector general bill that Mr. de Blasio likes through the Council, even as she has encouraged Mr. Kelly to join her administration. William C. Thompson pledges to ban racial profiling and backs an inspector general, just not via the pieces of legislation in the Council.

0:19

“The only one who will tax the rich to fund after-school programs that keep our kids safe.”

Like Mr. de Blasio, John C. Liu, the city comptroller, has proposed raising the city’s marginal income tax to pay for after-school programs, among other things. To be fair, Mr. Liu’s electoral odds are long, making Mr. de Blasio the only top-tier candidate to outline such a plan. But the claim remains inaccurate.

Scorecard

Mr. de Blasio is finding new and creative ways to weave his diverse family into his campaign message, but dropping the misleading word “only” from several of his claims, or using it more carefully, would do wonders for the accuracy and credibility of his commercials.

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More from The Ad Campaign

The Ad Campaign: De Blasio Speaks Against Stop-and-Frisk

First aired: August 19, 2013

Produced by: AKPD Message and Media

For: Bill de Blasio

Bill de Blasio, the city’s public advocate and a Democratic candidate for mayor, is running his second television commercial of the campaign. Titled “Dignity,” this 30-second ad will appear on network and cable channels across New York City starting Monday.

Fact-Check

0:05

“Chirlane and I have talked to Dante many times about the fact that some day you will be stopped.”

There is no way to know if Mr. de Blasio’s son, who is 15 and biracial, will be stopped by the police. It has not yet happened.

0:13

“Bill de Blasio, the only candidate to end a stop and frisk era that targets minorities.”

A single superlative - only - is proving highly problematic for Mr. de Blasio in his campaign commercials. He is not the only candidate pledging to end the way the Police Department carries out the stop-and-frisk tactic. Nor is he the only candidate proposing an income tax on the rich to pay for education. Nevertheless, Mr. de Blasio is making both of these claims for the second time.

On stop-and-frisk, Mr. de Blasio argues his platform â€" support for two City Council bills, one banning racial profiling, the other creating an inspector general in the Police Department, combined with his vow to replace Raymond Kelly as commissioner â€" amounts to a stronger set of reforms than his rivals have espoused. But his opponents say they will achieve the same ends through different means, and back several of the same measures he does. To curb stop-and-frisk abuses, Christine C. Quinn, for example, has beefed up the power of the Civilian Complaint Review Board and shepherded the inspector general bill that Mr. de Blasio likes through the Council, even as she has encouraged Mr. Kelly to join her administration. William C. Thompson pledges to ban racial profiling and backs an inspector general, just not via the pieces of legislation in the Council.

0:19

“The only one who will tax the rich to fund after-school programs that keep our kids safe.”

Like Mr. de Blasio, John C. Liu, the city comptroller, has proposed raising the city’s marginal income tax to pay for after-school programs, among other things. To be fair, Mr. Liu’s electoral odds are long, making Mr. de Blasio the only top-tier candidate to outline such a plan. But the claim remains inaccurate.

Scorecard

Mr. de Blasio is finding new and creative ways to weave his diverse family into his campaign message, but dropping the misleading word “only” from several of his claims, or using it more carefully, would do wonders for the accuracy and credibility of his commercials.

@import url(http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/css/newsgraphics/2013/0712-nyc-ad-campaign/promo.css);

More from The Ad Campaign

Book Review Podcast: James McBride’s ‘Good Lord Bird’

Gary Panter

In The New York Times Book Review, Baz Dreisinger reviews James McBride’s new novel, “The Good Lord Bird,” an unusually funny look at John Brown’s violent crusade against slavery. Ms. Dreisinger writes:

“The Good Lord Bird” is hardly the first literary rendering of John Brown; everyone from Herman Melville to Langston Hughes, from Russell Banks to the rock band Rancid, has written of the man who tired of talk and demanded action, undertaking a violent crusade against slavery the way Ahab went after his white whale. Henry David Thoreau called Brown “the most American of us all,” which partly explains his iconic appeal: zealotry, self-reliance, lone crusading â€" from the Puritans on down, this is true Americana. Brown’s racial cross-identification â€" “His zeal in the cause of my race was far greater than mine,” Frederick Douglass said; the scholar John Stauffer cites evidence he may have tried to darken his skin in photographs â€" makes him doubly relevant to hip-hop America; were he alive today, Brown might well be Eminem.

In McBride’s hands, though, he’s “prone to stop on his horse in the middle of the afternoon, cup his hand to his ear and say: ‘Shh. I’m getting messages from our Great Redeemer Who stoppeth time itself on our behalf.’ ” He’s part Crocodile Dundee, part backwoods preacher, part con man. When the “Old Man” smiles, our narrator tells us, “stretching them wrinkles horizontal gived the impression of him being plumb stark mad. Seemed like his peanut had poked out the shell all the way.”

On this week’s podcast, Mr. McBride discusses his new novel; Jeff Guinn talks about his new biography of Charles Manson; and Parul Sehgal has best-seller news. Pamela Paul is the host.

Book Review Podcast: James McBride’s ‘Good Lord Bird’

Gary Panter

In The New York Times Book Review, Baz Dreisinger reviews James McBride’s new novel, “The Good Lord Bird,” an unusually funny look at John Brown’s violent crusade against slavery. Ms. Dreisinger writes:

“The Good Lord Bird” is hardly the first literary rendering of John Brown; everyone from Herman Melville to Langston Hughes, from Russell Banks to the rock band Rancid, has written of the man who tired of talk and demanded action, undertaking a violent crusade against slavery the way Ahab went after his white whale. Henry David Thoreau called Brown “the most American of us all,” which partly explains his iconic appeal: zealotry, self-reliance, lone crusading â€" from the Puritans on down, this is true Americana. Brown’s racial cross-identification â€" “His zeal in the cause of my race was far greater than mine,” Frederick Douglass said; the scholar John Stauffer cites evidence he may have tried to darken his skin in photographs â€" makes him doubly relevant to hip-hop America; were he alive today, Brown might well be Eminem.

In McBride’s hands, though, he’s “prone to stop on his horse in the middle of the afternoon, cup his hand to his ear and say: ‘Shh. I’m getting messages from our Great Redeemer Who stoppeth time itself on our behalf.’ ” He’s part Crocodile Dundee, part backwoods preacher, part con man. When the “Old Man” smiles, our narrator tells us, “stretching them wrinkles horizontal gived the impression of him being plumb stark mad. Seemed like his peanut had poked out the shell all the way.”

On this week’s podcast, Mr. McBride discusses his new novel; Jeff Guinn talks about his new biography of Charles Manson; and Parul Sehgal has best-seller news. Pamela Paul is the host.

New York Film Festival Announces Its Main Slate

New works by Joel and Ethan Coen, Hayao Miyazaki, Richard Curtis, J. C. Chandor and James Franco are among the features that will be presented in the main slate of the New York Film Festival, the Film Society of Lincoln Center said on Monday. That roster includes “Inside Llewyn Davis,” the Coen brothers’ look at a fictional folk singer in 1960s New York; “The Wind Rises,” the first animated feature directed by Mr. Miyazaki in five years; “About Time,” a romantic comedy that Mr. Curtis (“Four Weddings and a Funeral”) says will be his swan song; “All Is Lost,” Mr. Chandor’s film starring Robert Redford as a yachtsman adrift in the Indian Ocean; and “Child of God,” Mr. Franco’s adaptation of the Cormac McCarthy novel.

Other films on the main slate include Abdellatif Kechiche’s sexually explicit romance “Blue Is the Warmest Color,” which was awarded the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival; Alexander Payne’s “Nebraska,” about a father-son road trip, and Claude Lanzmann’s Holocaust documentary “The Last of the Unjust,” both of which were also presented at Cannes; James Gray’s period drama “The Immigrant”; “The Invisible Woman,” a historical drama directed by Ralph Fiennes and starring him as Charles Dickens; and “Alan Partridge,” a comedy directed by Declan Lowney that marks the movie debut of that oblivious Steve Coogan character.

This year’s New York Film Festival will run from Sept. 27 through Oct. 13. It will open with  “Captain Phillips.” The  centerpiece film is “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty,” and the festival will close with  “Her.”

The complete list of main slate films announced on Monday for the New York Film Festival appears below:

ABOUT TIME
Director: Richard Curtis

ABUSE OF WEAKNESS (Abus de Faiblesse)
Director: Catherine Breillat

ALAN PARTRIDGE
Director: Declan Lowney

ALL IS LOST
Director: J. C. Chandor

AMERICAN PROMISE
Directors: Joe Brewster and Michèle Stephenson

AT BERKELEY
Director: Frederick Wiseman

BASTARDS (Les Salauds)
Director: Claire Denis

BLUE IS THE WARMEST COLOR (La Vie d’Adèle)
Director: Abdellatif Kechiche

BURNING BUSH (Hořicí Keř)
Director: Agnieszka Holland

CHILD OF GOD
Director: James Franco

GLORIA
Director: Sebastián Lelio

THE IMMIGRANT
Director: James Gray

INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS
Directors: Ethan Coen, Joel Coen

THE INVISIBLE WOMAN
Director: Ralph Fiennes

JEALOUSY (La Jalousie)
Director: Philippe Garrel

JIMMY P: PSYCHOTHERAPY OF A PLAINS INDIAN
Director: Arnaud Desplechin

THE LAST OF THE UNJUST (Le Dernier des Injustes)
Director: Claude Lanzmann

LIKE FATHER, LIKE SON (Soshite Chichi ni Naru)
Director: Hirokazu Kore-eda

THE MISSING PICTURE (L’Image Manquante)
Director: Rithy Panh

MY NAME IS HMMM… (Je m’appelle Hmmm…)
Director: agnès B

NEBRASKA
Director: Alexander Payne

NOBODY’S DAUGHTER HAEWON (Nugu-ui ttal-do anin Haewon)
Director: Hong Sang-soo

NORTH, THE END OF HISTORY (Norte, Hangganan ng Kasaysayan)
Director: Lav Diaz

OMAR
Director: Hany Abu-Assad

ONLY LOVERS LEFT ALIVE
Director: Jim Jarmusch

THE SQUARE
Director: Jehane Noujaim

STRANGER BY THE LAKE (L’Inconnu du Lac)
Director: Alain Guiraudie

STRAY DOGS (Jiao You)
Director: Tsai Ming-liang

A TOUCH OF SIN (Tian Zhu Ding)
Director: Jia Zhangke

LE WEEK-END
Director: Roger Michell

WHEN EVENING FALLS ON BUCHAREST OR METABOLISM (Când se Lasa Seara Peste Bucuresti sau Metabolism)
Director: Corneliu Porumboiu

THE WIND RISES (Kaze Tachinu)
Director: Hayao Miyazaki

Larry McMurtry Signs With Liveright

Larry McMurtry, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of “Lonesome Dove,” “Terms of Endearment” and “The Last Picture Show,” has left Simon & Schuster after more than 40 years and signed with Liveright Publishing.

His next book, “The Last Kind Words Saloon,” scheduled to appear in June 2014, is a fictional retelling of the friendship between Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday, set against an Old West backdrop of barrooms, brothels and cattle ranches. The story ends, as it must, at the O.K. Corral.

Mr. McMurtry’s last novel, “When the Light Goes,” was published in 2007. In the meantime Mr. McMurtry married Faye Kesey, the widow of the writer Ken Kesey, in 2011 in his hometown, Archer City, Texas. Mr. McMurtry and Mr. Kesey were in the graduate writing program at Stanford University in the late 1950s and met in a class taught by Wallace Stegner.

Aug. 19: Where the Candidates Are Today

Planned events for the mayoral candidates, according to the campaigns and organizations they are affiliated with. Times are listed as scheduled but frequently change.

Nicholas Wells and Jonah Bromwich contributed reporting.

Event information is listed as provided at the time of publication. Details for many of Ms. Quinn events are not released for publication.Maps of all campaign events since April »

Events by candidate

Catsimatidis

De Blasio

Lhota

Liu

Quinn

Salgado

Thompson

Weiner

Group event

John A. Catsimatidis
Republican

2 p.m.
Addresses members of the Police Athletic League, for which he attended a charity event earlier this month, along with Dennis Walcott, chancellor of the city’s Education Department, and Robert M. Morgenthau, former New York district attorney and chairman of the board of the Police Athletic League, at the Mutual of America building on Park Avenue.

6 p.m.
Attends an invitation-only “friend-raiser,” with former Gov. George Pataki, who endorsed the candidate in March, at the Core Club restaurant on East 55th Street.

7 p.m.
Participates in a mayoral forum hosted by Transit Forward, a grassroots coalition of transit riders, and the Riverbay Corporation, which operates Co-Op City, on topics including how to increase public spending on transportation, at Co-Op City in the Bronx.

7:30 p.m.
Meets with the board of directors for the Bohemian Citizens’ Benevolent Society of Astoria, a group whose history goes back more than 100 years, at the Bohemian Hall and Beer Garden, on 24th Avenue in Queens.

Bill de Blasio
Democrat

12 p.m.
Joins the actress Susan Sarandon, the singer Harry Belafonte, the actress Cynthia Nixon, the actress Rosie Perez and his wife, Chirlane McCray, at the “Hospitals Not Condos” rally, in the West Village. They are calling for quality health care for all New Yorkers, not the development of more luxury condomniums across the city, in the face of the planned closing of St. Vincent’s hospital in the West Village.

6 p.m.
Alongside his family and the actress Cynthia Nixon, is one of four mayoral candidates to greet voters at the final night of the Martin Luther King Jr. Concert Series, featuring performances by Gladys Knight and the O’Jays, at Wingate Field in Brooklyn.

John C. Liu
Democrat

7 a.m.
Greets morning commuters at the 103rd Street subway station, at Lexington Avenue in East Harlem.

11:30 a.m.
Visits with seniors at the New York City Housing Authority’s Betances Senior Center, in the Bronx, the first of three senior centers he intends to visit in the Bronx on the day.

12 p.m.
Visits with seniors at the South East Bronx Community Organization Senior Center, in the Bronx, the second of three senior centers he intends to visit in the Bronx on the day.

12:45 p.m.
Visits with seniors at the Mt. Carmel Center for Senior Citizens, in the Bronx, the third of three senior centers he intends to visit in the Bronx on the day.

5 p.m.
Greets evening commuters at the Gun Hill Road No. 5 train subway station, at East Gun Hill Road and Seymour Avenue, in the Bronx.

7 p.m.
Participates in a mayoral forum hosted by Transit Forward, a grassroots coalition of transit riders, and the Riverbay Corporation, which operates Co-Op City, on topics including how to increase public spending on transportation, at Co-Op City in the Bronx.

8 p.m.
Is one of four mayoral candidates to greet voters at the final night of the Martin Luther King Jr. Concert Series, featuring performances by Gladys Knight and the O’Jays, at Wingate Field in Brooklyn.

Joseph J. Lhota
Republican

8:30 a.m.
Meets privately with the board of directors of the Human Services Council, an organization that represents a range of nonprofit human-service groups throughout New York, on East 59th Street in Midtown.

11:30 a.m.
Meets privately with Citizens Union, a good-government watchdog group, at the offices of Proshauer Rose, L.L.P. in Times Square.

6 p.m.
Greets evening commuters at the Forest Hills - 71st Street subway station, in Queens.

Christine C. Quinn
Democrat

7:30 a.m.
After granting interviews over the weekend to a number of publications in anticipation of her increased presence on the campaign trail in the remaining weeks before the primary, Kim Catullo, Ms. Quinn’s wife, makes the first of a number of campaign appearances on the day, joining Ms. Quinn and Councilman Jimmy Van Bramer, who is celebrating his birthday, to greet morning commuters at the Bliss Street 7 train subway station in Queens.

Some of Ms. Quinn’s events may not be shown because the campaign declines to release her advance schedule for publication.

William C. Thompson Jr.
Democrat

8 a.m.
Greets morning commuters at the Flatbush Avenue - Brooklyn College subway station, in Brooklyn.

9 a.m.
Hosts the Caribbean Americans for Bill Thompson Breakfast, unveiling his plans to increase entrepreneurial and educational opportunities for Caribbean New Yorkers, at Crystal Manor, in Brooklyn.

7:30 p.m.
Participates in a mayoral forum hosted by Transit Forward, a grassroots coalition of transit riders, and the Riverbay Corporation, which operates Co-Op City, on topics including how to increase public spending on transportation, at Co-Op City in the Bronx.

9:30 p.m.
Is one of four mayoral candidates to greet voters at the final night of the Martin Luther King Jr. Concert Series, featuring performances by Gladys Knight and the O’Jays, at Wingate Field in Brooklyn.

Anthony D. Weiner
Democrat

11:45 a.m.
Visits with senior citizens at the JASA 76 Senior Center, on 76th Street on the Upper West Side.

12:45 p.m.
As part of his “Keys to the City” tour, kicks off “Delivering for New York,” an effort to highlight what Mr. Weiner’s campaign bills as tangible improvements he has already made to the city, by visiting the New York Police Department’s Queens Property Office Warehouse, on Pearson Place in Queens.

5:30 p.m.
Greets evening commuters, at the Gun Hill Road No. 2 train subway station at White Plains Road in the Bronx.

6:15 p.m.
After John C. Liu campaigned there an hour earlier, Mr. Weiner travels east along Gun Hill Road to greet evening commuters, this time at the Gun Hill No. 5 train subway station at Seymour Avenue in the Bronx.

7 p.m.
Participates in a mayoral forum hosted by Transit Forward, a grassroots coalition of transit riders, and the Riverbay Corporation, which operates Co-Op City, on topics including how to increase public spending on transportation, at Co-Op City in the Bronx.

Sal F. Albanese
Democrat

7 p.m.
Participates in a mayoral forum hosted by Transit Forward, a grassroots coalition of transit riders, and the Riverbay Corporation, which operates Co-Op City, on topics including how to increase public spending on transportation, at Co-Op City in the Bronx.

Adolfo Carrión Jr.
Independent

7 p.m.
Participates in a mayoral forum hosted by Transit Forward, a grassroots coalition of transit riders, and the Riverbay Corporation, which operates Co-Op City, on topics including how to increase public spending on transportation, at Co-Op City in the Bronx.

Erick J. Salgado
Democrat

4 p.m.
Campaigns jointly with State Senator Ruben Diaz from a caravan of trucks, in the Bronx.

7 p.m.
Participates in a mayoral forum hosted by Transit Forward, a grassroots coalition of transit riders, and the Riverbay Corporation, which operates Co-Op City, on topics including how to increase public spending on transportation, at Co-Op City in the Bronx.

New York Today: Cucumber Time

Chester Higgins Jr./The New York Times A brown cucumber at the city’s biggest community garden! Sounds like news to us.

In the Netherlands, journalists speak of a stretch of summer they call Cucumber Time, when newsmakers are out of town and the papers put silly stories on the front page.

Similar phrases exist in Danish, Czech, Slovene, Hebrew and Icelandic, though we unimaginative American journalists refer to the period as “slow news season.”

This summer in New York, what with two fierce political races and the city’s policing tactics under scrutiny, there has been relatively little cucumber time.

Nevertheless, there is cucumber news.

In the city’s biggest community garden, at Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn, the cukes are ripening on the vine.

Not just dark-skinned green ones and bumpy Kirbys, but yellow cucumbers, spherical ones the size of golf balls and even, in the plot of the garden president, Adriann Musson, wrong-looking brown-skinned cucumbers of Indian origin.

Ms. Musson offered a persuasive argument for the relevance of the cucumber.

“Cucumbers are nutritious,” she said. “They refresh tired eyes. They’re easy to grow, they make great pickles â€" and New Yorkers love their pickles.”

There is even some controversy in cucumberland. The National Park Service, landlord of the 7.43-acre garden, wants to begin charging for water and land use, Ms. Musson said.

“Cucumbers take a lot of water,” she said. “If we have to pay a water bill and I have to limit how much water people use, what’s going to happen to our vegetables?”

Here’s what you need to know for your Monday.

WEATHER
Greyish in the morning, and there will be a small chance of afternoon showers or even a thunderstorm, though the temperature will top out only around 80.

TRANSIT & TRAFFIC

- Mass Transit: Click for latest M.T.A. status.

- Metro-North schedules are changing today because of track work in The Bronx.

- Roads: Traffic is doing well. Click for traffic map or radio report on the 1s.

Alternate-side parking is in effect.

COMING UP TODAY

- Novak Djokovic, the top tennis player in the world, greets fans at the Uniqlo on 5th Avenue at 6 p.m. [Free]

- Hopefully the sun will come out today, not tomorrow, because “Annie” is screening in Astoria Park at 8:30 p.m. [Free]

- Bryant Park’s last movie of the season: “E.T. the Extra Terrestrial.” Start saving a seat at 5 p.m. [Free]

- Los Muros Hablan, a weeklong international urban art festival in Harlem, starts today. Too much to list here: Click for info. [ Free]

- Laugh along with the Brooklyn Comedy Festival at Spike Hill, 186 Bedford Avenue. Doors open at 7:30. [Free]

- The Red Hook Film Fest is now accepting Hurricane Sandy-themed entries.

- Learn about cartooning in a lecture class, part of a series dubbed the New York Comics & Picture-story Symposium. 7:00 PM at 2 West 13th Street. [Free]

IN THE NEWS

- A deal has been reached to retool the city’s restaurant grading system, including lessening some fines. [Staten Island Advance]

- The mother of Trayvon Martin, the Florida teenager who was shot and killed by a man volunteering for neighborhood patrol, spoke out on television against the New York’s stop and frisk police tactic. [NBC]

- Someone left their alligator in a Westchester County pond. [CBS]

- The Daily News, The New York Post and the editorial board of The New York Times all endorsed Scott M. Stringer as the democratic candidate for comptroller over his opponent Eliot Spitzer. [New York Times]

- A 26-year-old rookie cop shot himself in the leg when re-holstering his gun during a call to a Bedford-Stuyvesant block party. [New York Daily News]

- The damage from a vehicle fire that partially melted a beam of the Ed Koch Queensboro Bridge over the weekend has been mostly repaired. [NY1]

AND FINALLY…

The 19th Amendment, which permitted women to vote in the United States, had its 93rd birthday over the weekend.

And (as with all good things, we think) New York City played a role.

The National Woman Suffrage Association was founded by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony in New York City in 1869.

The group split with other suffragist associations on several issues, including how to make suffrage happen. While some wanted to work on changing voting rules state-by-state, the New York-based association strove for something considered more radical at the time â€" nothing less than an amendment to the nation’s constitution.

Only over five decades later would their dream be realized.

Nicole Higgins DeSmet contributed reporting.

We’re testing New York Today, a morning roundup that stays live from 6 a.m. till about noon.

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