While You’re In: Take in films, celebrate student artists and party with unicorns
Watch and learn
The Olympia Film Society’s Virtual Screening Room is offering a program of films aimed at inspiring anti-racist action. Among the theater’s current offerings is a bundle of documentaries that illuminate some facets of the Black experience in America. Included in the bundle are “I Am Not Your Negro,” which uses the writing of James Baldwin to examine the history of race from the Civil Rights Movement to Black Lives Matter; “Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am,” about the Nobel Prize-winning writer; and “Whose Streets?” about the uprising in Ferguson, Missouri, after the police killed unarmed teenager Michael Brown. All three rent for $15, and the society is donating its proceeds to YWCA Olympia, which works against racism and sexism. The society also is screening “Tangerine,” a 2015 buddy comedy about transwomen in Los Angeles. The rental fee is $3.99, and the society is giving its proceeds to WA Black Trans Task Force, which addresses violence against Black trans people. Check out more Virtual Screening Room offerings on the society’s website.
Zoom to art events
South Puget Sound Community College is hosting (online, of course) its 15th annual Student Art Exhibition featuring a selection of student drawings, paintings, photos, sculptures and films. Among the pieces is a pencil drawing of “Essentials” for life in a pandemic — including toilet paper. “The show is a wonderful representation of the kind of creative work that the students are doing with faculty,” said gallery coordinator Sean Barnes. The college will celebrate the students’ achievements and offer an opportunity to learn more about the work at a reception at 11 a.m. Friday on Zoom. Want more art? The college’s art department also is offering a twice-weekly “Creative Something.” Organized by Nicole Gugliotti, “Something” happens at 11 a.m. most Tuesdays and Thursdays. Up next: a conversation with Jami Heinricher of Sherwood Press on June 30. You can watch previous episodes on YouTube.
One-horned wonders
When the kids are bored — or if you’re having one of those down days that seem to happen a bit more often during a global pandemic —a unicorn or two might brighten your day or at least offer a few minutes of distraction. Enter “Unicorn Dance Party,” a weekly program produced by the National Theatre of Scotland, a company that has brought some impressive shows to Seattle. The all-ages party, which introduces a new dance each week, is hosted by comedians Ruxy Cantir and Sarah Rose Graber, dolled up in unicorn-inspired attire (think pastel wigs and rainbow tails dangling from sequined fanny packs). New episodes debut at 6 a.m. Fridays through July 17, though you don’t have to get up early to see it since you can watch all the episodes — along with other kid-friendly Play Dates content — anytime. The unicorns began the first episode with the Unicorn Oath: “I promise to move and groove, shake my tail and spread joy.” The whole joy thing seems to be one of the reasons unicorns have been so popular over the last few years. “We create or revive myths to help make sense of the world,” Alice Fisher wrote in a 2017 essay published in the Guardian. “In a time of Trump and Brexit and terror, we’ve aligned ourselves with the unicorn — a symbol of hope and purity and strangeness.” The article was published just a few months after Starbucks gave the world the glitter-dusted Unicorn Frappuccino. The drink, which contained lots of sugar and no caffeine, was available for only a few days, but you can still try it if you dare. Popsugar devised a recipe with ingredients including not one but two flavors of Kool-Aid drink mix.
Freelance writer Molly Gilmore promises to move and groove, etc. She talks about local happenings with 95.3 KGY-FM’s Michael Stein from 3 to 4 p.m. Fridays.