Friday 5
Visitors to the Spring Planting Festival at Lincoln Park’s Farm-in-the-Zoo, Stockton Drive east of Wisconsin, can help plant crops, churn butter, and feed the cows today and tomorrow from 10 to 3. The free family-oriented event also includes lectures and demonstrations on sheep shearing, goat milking, horse grooming, and beekeeping, as well as story-telling, sing-alongs, and live bluegrass music. Call 294-4662 for details.
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
Ex-CIA agent Philip Agee’s expose Inside the Company: CIA Diary made him an important and controversial figure–praised as an opponent of illegal covert actions by some, condemned as a traitor by others. Agee speaks at 7 PM at the University of Illinois at Chicago’s Circle Center, 750 S. Halsted; his talk is the kickoff event of a four-part series, “Low-Intensity Warfare and Deception of the American Public,” sponsored by the Nicaragua Solidarity Committee. Admission is $5 for the Agee speech or $8 for all four forums (the others are scheduled for May 21, June 4, and June 11). For more information call 276-5626.
Writer and actress Lucina Kathmann divides her time between Chicago, where she has appeared in off-Loop theater and dance for more than 20 years, and San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, where she is the corresponding secretary of the local chapter of the international writers’ organization P.E.N. She’s promoting her new novel, an interracial lesbian romance titled The Adventures of the Magnificent Kong and Brawny Mouse, with a free reading and book signing tonight at 7 at People Like Us Books, 3321 N. Clark. Call 248-6363 for more information.
In his first new ballet in 13 years, Arthur Mitchell, artistic director of the Dance Theatre of Harlem, pays tribute to two African-American heroes. Mitchell’s John Henry, the centerpiece of DTH’s first Chicago appearance in eight years, is a jazzy retelling of the legend of the man who outworked a steam drill. The work is dedicated to singer and activist Paul Robeson, who did a famous rendition of the original folk ballad on which the ballet is based. DTH opens a three-day engagement at the Civic Opera House, 20 N. Wacker. Performances are at 8 tonight through Saturday, with a matinee at 2 on Saturday. Tickets range from $15 to $30; call 902-1500 for more.
