Arts & Culture

Hollywood has always lured people with dreams of stardom or creative satisfaction behind the camera, but few Americans actually get there, and an even smaller number succeed. 

Career counselors might advise starting young, doing entry-level jobs, but a Virginia man took a whole different path to his first feature film.

Growing up in Richmond, Eddie Mullins loved movies.

“I do, somewhere in my folks’ attic, have an illustration of every single scene from Empire Strikes Back.  I mean I labored over that thing and wore out so many magic markers you wouldn’t believe.”

Writer Alysia Abbott did not have the most ordinary of childhoods.

Her mother died when she was two years old, so she was raised by her father—a gay writer—in San Francisco’s bustling cultural scene of the 1970s.   Then the 80s saw the plague of AIDS sweep through her father’s community of friends.

Now, Abbott has written a memoir about her childhood, called “Fairyland”—and she’s also planning speaking engagements this weekend in Roanoke.  She hopes her story will spark more lead to more open minds and hearts about different lifestyles.

A debut novel by a Virginia Tech alum is getting praise for its take on the complexities of love and change in the wake of war. 

“The Fallen Snow” is an early 20th century story set --both in a close knit, Appalachian Town-- and war time France.  John Kelley began thinking about the idea for the book when he was in college in Blacksburg, thirty years ago.
 

As you plan this year’s Thanksgiving dinner, you might want to consider what the Pilgrims really ate. 

At Washington & Lee University, students got a taste of the original feast and found eel and beer were likely part of the meal, but turkey? Maybe not.

Before heading home for the holidays, anthropologist  Allison Bell invited her students to dine on what research shows the pilgrims actually ate.  

In Charlottesville, the name John Paul Jones evokes thoughts of a large arena where basketball teams and rock groups perform.  It was named for the father of a big UVA donor, but for those who love American history, another John Paul Jones comes to mind, and now two musicians from the British Isles are traveling in America - singing the praises of this early American patriot.

Rob Van Sante and Alan Reid are a pair of troubadours from the UK who love telling tales through their music.