Last April, cramped into small rooms in the French Quarter for The Hotel Plays of Tennessee Williams, we first encountered the photographer Ride Hamilton. This past week we again interacted during the Provincetown Tennessee Williams Festival. In addition to the performances we much enjoyed his installation, a collaborator with the festival curator, director and scholar, David Kaplan, at the Berta Walker Gallery. It richly evoked memories of New Orleans.

During the recent Provinctetown Tennessee Williams Festival we attended two performances of cabaret, based on works of Williams at the Crown and Anchor. The two experiences comprised a study in contrast with the best and worst of the tenth annual festival.

In ten years the Provincetown Tennessee Williams Festival has premiered eleven works by Williams as well as ones inspired by him. There was a retrospective of 15 excerpts at Town Hall during thi year's festival. The special treat of the festival was a sneak preview of "More Stars Than There Are in Heaven," based on a Williams short story, a work in progress by John Guare.

For years midcentury magic realist Paul Cadmus and other artists of his generation were neglected by the Whitney Museum. Now, in the inaugural exhibition of its new meatpacking facility, titled "America Is Hard to See," Cadmus and his peers return in force.

Over four days we attended nine performances during the tenth annual Provincetown Tennessee Williams Festival. This planned from the juvenalia of Parade, written during his first visit in 1940, through The Remarkable Rooming House of Mme. LeMonde a violently erotic example of Grand Guignol created near the end of a long and tormented life,

Kimberly Senior, who has directed Disgraced since its first 2012 production in Chicago at American Theater Company, directs Goodman's new production. She directed its Lincoln Center debut in late 2012 and then its Broadway production in 2014. Since then, it has become one of the most-produced plays in the country.

The current comedy production “Real Women Have Curves”, written by Josefina Lopez, is skillfully directed by Pasadena Playhouse associate artistic director Seema Sueko. The story set in a tiny sewing factory in East Los Angeles in 2015, celebrates Latina power and Latina women’s bodies.

David Kaplan directed The Day on Which a Man Dies by Tennessee Williams. It presented an over the top depiction of an ersatz deranged, stripped to his skivvies, paint spattered, drunken artist loosely based on Jackson Pollock. We have engaged in a lively exchange about the scholarly sources for the fascinating Pollock and Williams interactions. It appears that they knew each other on the beaches and in the bars of Provincetown.

For the first day of the Tenth Annual Provinctown Tennessee Williams Theatre Festival we attended a matinee of The Day on Which a Man Dies and The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore. Both plays were presented by the returning festival favorites Abrahamese & Meyer Productions from Cape Town, South Africa. The plays and performances were truly astonishing.

Newport, Rhode Island and the Mansions of Newport host New England's premier wine and food festival this weekend. Celebrity hosts, Martha Stewart ,Jacques Pepin, as well as Jacques Torres are just a few of the star filled foodie lineup. Over 400 wines will be poured this weekend, as well as two dozen top restaurants that will serve their specialties.

Helping to defeat breast and ovarian cancer is the goal of many persons and organizations in the world. The bond and urgency to defeat this disease that affects over 320,000 new patients yearly is universal.

A bewitching production of Shakespeare's most exotic and evocative play. The Tempest roars at Chicago Shakeapeare.

Why not take an impromptu vacation and visit a winery this Sunday. They will open their doors to you with free tours and tastings.

It is the lilting story of lovers reuniting with passions reigniting while new romances flower. Set around famous actress Desiree Armfeldt along with a cadre of unforgettable characters, this is a fabulous production on every level. The action is focused during an eventful weekend in the country. This is Maestro Stephen Sondheim’s most romantic and popular work. It features a sumptuous score infused with humor, warmth flavored by a waltz. Sondheim’s best known song, “Send in the Clowns” integrates exquisitely into the narrative. Brilliantly directed by Artistic Director Peter DuBois, this extraordinary musical already may be one of the best productions of the 2015-16 season.

Otello is one of the greatest operas of Giuseppe Verdi. In the 2011 season, Riccardo Muti mounted a concert performance which was almost universally heralded as the event of the season. Singing the title role under the Maestro was Aleksandrs Antonenko, who delivered a performance of technical perfection and rich emotion. Antonenko has not forgotten the lessons he learned from Muti, and has, in fact, built on them. His performance at the Metropolitan Opera is wrenching.

Shaw Chicago's new production of Geneva a 1938 play is another in its concert readings, performed by 12 costumed actors who clearly revel in the richness of Shaw's dialogue and characterizations. Director Robert Scogin takes advantage of the script's humor, political passions and ethnic stereotypes to stage a production that is funny and smart, and loaded with Shaw's diatribes against every form of political organization and chicanery.

The consensus among critics attending the 38th Humana Festival in Louisville rated The Christians by Lucas Hnath as the best new play. It has now opened to strong reviews at New York's Playwrights Horizons. This is a reposting of our original review.

Our Chicago theatre correspondent, Nancy Bishop, recently checked in at the Edison Hotel in the heart of Times Square. She reports on several hot shows: Hamilton, The Flick and Desire.

Why not create opera in a warehouse like Andy Warhol's Factory? Take an over-the-top cast of characters familiar to opera goers, mash up classic and pop music, and fly? Why not? That's just what Opera Philadelphia and an intriguing cabaret group The Bearded Ladies have done. It is a wonderful opera.

This fall, under director Jill Medvedow, for the first time during her administration, the ICA will present a much anticipated historical exhibition surveying the impact of Black Mountain College on the post war American avant-garde. Under her predecessors, Milena Kalinovska and David Ross, there were many such projects. We spoke with Kalinovska about her Boston years as she prepared to depart with a three year contract as director of modern and contemporary art at the National Gallery in her native Prague.

As “the Bet” plays itself out in this lighthearted, sort of silly but sweet rite of passage movie, Libby, Addison’s mom, also begins to date again after the death of her husband of several years ago.

Under a ton of makeup to get the look Johnny Depp is pretty good as Whitey Bulger. But, lets face it, when it comes to epic crime flicks he pales by comparison to Marlon Brando as Don Corleone in the Godfather. In directing Black Mass at best Scott Cooper is a Martin Scorsese or Mario Puzo wannabe.

The Big E runs for 17 days, September 18 through October 4th, at its permanent location, the fairgrounds in West Springfield, Massachusetts. The fair is open from 8am to 10pm daily. The carnival midway hours are from 10am to 11pm. Admission is $15 for adults and $10 for children 6-12 years old.

The International Youth Philharmonic Orchestra was founded to celebrate the universality of music. They note: Every person on the planet is a note in a greater symphony, telling his or her story of joy, sadness or peace. Notes may link together, turning into melodies and songs that are powerful and strong. The YPhil is a symbol of the voice of the world fraternity.

Non-stop bluegrass related music will take over North Adams Massachusetts this upcoming weekend. The Fresh Grass 2015 version invades the Berkshires for what should be a wonderful music oriented weekend.