Feeling Jazzy

    The East Hampton Historical Society will hold an opening reception for its new exhibition, “Jazz Age East Hampton (1919-1933): Clothes, Clubs, and Contraband,” from 5 to 7 p.m. tomorrow. It will open to the public on Saturday and be up through Oct. 13.

    The show will feature historical photographs, decorative arts, and fashion and artifacts from the society and East Hampton collections that recall the years between the two great wars. Special sections will be devoted to the Ladies Village Improvement Society Fair and the Maidstone Club. Richard Barons, the society’s director, will give a tour of the show on Aug. 17 at 10 a.m.

    An exhibit on Craig Claiborne, the food writer and longtime East Hampton denizen, has been postponed to later this summer and will be presented in abbreviated form sometime in August. The society will make further announcements once its plans have been finalized.

Jack Ceglic, the Book

    Ille Arts in Amagansett will present a new exhibition of portraits and a book by Jack Ceglic on Sunday from 4 to 6 p.m. The book, titled “Jack: Drawings and Paintings by Jack Ceglic,” is published by Pointed Leaf Press.

    Mr. Ceglic has painting, designing, architecture, and cuisine on his CV. Known for his portraits, he has exhibited them for decades in solo and group shows alongside work by Andy Warhol and John Singer Sargent. He was also one of the founders of Dean & DeLuca and has designed houses for Joe Mantello, Robbie Baitz, and Ron Rifkin on the East End of Long Island.

Pop Goes Ashawagh

    Photography, art, craft, and a New York City jewelry line will be introduced at Ashawagh Hall in Springs on Tuesday night with the “POP Goes the Hamptons” show, which has work by several South Fork artists. The show, which will begin at 3 p.m. with a reception with creative hors d’oeuvres and drinks, will support cancer research and the Retreat, a shelter for abused women.

    Beginning tomorrow, Ashawagh Hall will be the site of “Mother Nature as Muse: Expressions of the Natural World.” The art exhibition consists of eclectic works by Vincent Brandi, Bobbie Braun, Barbara Groot, Anne Holton, Joan Kraisky, Anita Kusick, Mary Laspia, Mary Milne, Bill Shillalies, Christine Chew Smith, and Pamela Topham. There will be a reception on Saturday from 5 to 8 p.m. The show will remain on view through Sunday.

“Homeland” in Sag Harbor

    Starting Saturday, the Richard J. Demato Fine Arts Gallery in Sag Harbor will have a solo show for Frank Oriti. His portraits in oil and acrylic from the series “Homeland” examine the aspirations of the middle class to flee their hometowns and make a name for themselves — and what happens when they return, compromised and defeated, to their original neighborhoods.

    Mr. Oriti won the grand prize for best emerging artist in the 2013 Cleveland Arts Prize competition. The show will open with a reception from 6 to 8 p.m. on Saturday and remain on view through Aug. 23.

Ernst Looks Back

    Eric Ernst will be the subject of a retrospective exhibition at Peter Marcelle Gallery in Bridgehampton beginning Saturday with a reception from 6 to 8 p.m.

    Mr. Ernst’s educational background is in Japanese studies, but then there’s the genetic influence of his parents, Dallas and Jimmy Ernst, and Max Ernst, his grandfather. He credits his studies for his coloration and asymmetry in design, and his father for his “crisp, linear compositional structure,” according to the gallery. Other influences on his work’s harmony and movement include The­­lonious Monk, Miles Davis, Igor Stra­vinsky, and Frank Zappa.

    The paintings he makes are small architectonic spaces, typically geometric abstractions, but lately he has added representational elements. The show will remain on view through Aug. 11.

The Ark Is Open

    The Sculpture Park of Nova’s Ark Project at 60 Millstone Road in Bridgehampton is having open hours on Wednesday from 3 to 6 p.m. It will also be open during those hours on Aug. 3, Aug. 7, Aug. 17, and Aug. 28.

    In addition, the Salome Chamber Orchestra will perform at Nova’s Ark on Aug. 23 at 7 p.m., with the park opening at 6, and on Aug. 25 at 3 p.m. along with the Divaria Opera Company in a one-act comedic opera suitable for all ages.

“Amerikulture”

    Eric Firestone Gallery will present “Amerikulture,” a two-part exhibition illustrating the friendship and interconnected creativity of Kenny Scharf and Tseng Kwong Chi, beginning tomorrow and running through Aug. 11.

    On view will be recent paintings by Mr. Scharf with photographs by Mr. Tseng, as selected by Mr. Scharf. Through painting and photography spanning 30 years, the show will offer two interpretations of Americana and its symbolic vocabulary. The artists have collaborated in different ways ever since the 1980s downtown New York art scene brought them together.

    The show will open tomorrow with a reception from 6 to 9 p.m.

Art for Public Radio

    “Locally Abstracted” is the theme of a show to benefit WPPB, the East End’s public radio station, with a “prosecco V.I.P. artists preview” tomorrow from 5 to 6 p.m. at Hampton Hang Gallery in Water Mill, presented by Karyn Mannix Contemporary. A public reception will follow from 6 to 10, featuring music by Alfredo Merat, Mick Hargreaves, Joe Delia, Lilly-Anne Merat, Vanessa Cuccia, and Pete Buckley.

    The artists participating will be Mary Antczak, Steve Haweeli, Athos Zachari­as, Evan Zatti, and Steven Zaluski. A percentage of their art sales will benefit the radio station. The show can be seen through Aug. 11.

New at Lear

    Lear Gallery in Sag Harbor will present “IN-SITES,” work by Don DeMauro, beginning Saturday with a reception from 6 to 8 p.m. The artist is a painter and sculptor who graduated from Chouinard Art Institute in Los Angeles in 1960. He has been in museum and gallery shows and won a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1972. The show will remain on view through Aug. 25.

Bujese’s Summertime

    Arlene Bujese brings the season to the Southampton Cultural Center with “Summertime: Eight Perspectives,” a show that will open on Monday with a reception next Thursday from 5 to 7 p.m.

    The theme is the “mood and motifs of summertime interpreted by eight regional artists . . . each with an individual narrative,” according to the center. The artists are Priscilla Bowden, Louise Eastman, Cornelia Foss, R.J.T. (Toby) Haynes, Paton Miller, Louise Peabody, Anne Seelbach, and Lewis Zacks. The show will close on Aug. 27.

   The Hamptons International Film Festival’s SummerDocs series will continue in August with two more films: “Elaine Stritch: Shoot Me” on Aug. 12 and “The Short Game” on Aug. 30.

    “Shoot Me” looks at Ms. Stritch, an 87-year-old Broadway veteran who was seen recently as Alec Baldwin’s mother on the television series “30 Rock.” The film features her friends Nathan Lane, George C. Wolfe, Hal Prince, Cherry Jones, Tina Fey, James Gandolfini, and John Turturro. It is scheduled for release next year.

    “The Short Game” follows eight child golf prodigies competing at the World Championship of Junior Golf in Pinehurst, N.C. In Josh Greenbaum’s first feature, the stories “intertwine to form a fascinating and often funny portrait of a group of very young athletes and their families as they navigate the narrowly focused, peculiar, and highly competitive subculture of junior golf,” according to the festival.

    Tickets for these films cost $22 and can be purchased through the Guild Hall box office.

    Guild Hall will present “Fashion Insiders With Fern Mallis: Nicole Miller” on Sunday at 11 a.m. to mark the beginning of a series in which Ms. Mallis will explore the fashion industry with the people who know it best.

    Ms. Mallis is president of a design consultancy and was previously executive director of the Council of Fashion Designers of America, where she established what has come to be known as New York Fashion Week. Ms. Miller, her guest, is an American designer. Tickets are $15, or $13 for members. A limited number of $75 V.I.P. tickets are also available and include a post-conversation meet-and-greet reception with catering by East Hampton Gourmet Foods.

    On Friday, Aug. 2, Guild Hall and the East Hampton Historical Society will screen “The Sound of Music” outside at Mulford Farm. Admission is $5, free for children under 5. Tickets can be purchased at the box office or through guildhall.org. The rain date is Aug. 5.

    On Wednesday at the Montauk Library, Janice Friedman, a singer and pianist, will perform favorites from the American Songbook, several Brazilian tunes, pop songs from the 1960s and 1970s, and her own compositions.

    Her piano playing “carries the aura and variety of a big band,” The New York Times wrote. She has performed at jazz clubs and concert halls across the country, including Carnegie Hall. The free event will run from 7:30 to 8:30 p.m.

   The Parrish Art Museum’s Jazz en Plein Air series will resume tomorrow with the Richie Siegler Quartet’s jazz with Brazilian and Latin influences. Mr. Siegler is the founding director of Escola de Samba Boom, a 50-member percussion group that plays Brazilian music.

    The music is presented outdoors, and jazzy drinks by Art of Eating will be available at the cafe. Those attending may want to take with them beach chairs or blankets in case seating fills up. The program is free with museum admission, which is $10 for adults, $8 for those over age 65, and free for members, children, and students.

   “A Hundred Miles to the End,” a film by John Beattie that captures surf culture from Long Beach to Montauk, will be screened at Solé East on Second House Road in Montauk on Sunday as part of Smash Fest 1, a series of happenings from Brooklyn to Montauk showcasing surf films and art.

    The film, which includes some of the area’s best surfers, follows Mr. Beattie, who suffered a debilitating stroke that denied him his own passion for the sport and lifestyle, as he visits surfing communities “to reconnect with his passion,” according to smashsurf.com.

    On Sunday, local musicians including Dalton Portella and the Montauk Project, and Oogee Wawa, a surf punk band from farther west on the Island, will play starting at 6 p.m. The screening will be at 8. Tickets cost $15 and can be purchased online at smashsurf.com, with an additional fee, or at the door.

    SMASH FEST 1 is, according to the site, the “first profit-sharing surf film festival for independent filmmakers.”

    A trio of Noel Coward’s “after-dinner mints” is being served at the John Drew Theater at Guild Hall, and all in all they will leave a fine taste in your mouth.

    Directed by one of America’s theater treasures, Tony Walton, “Tonight at 8:30” consists of three Coward one-acts, with one intermission, which he performed during the 1930s with his longtime friend and working partner Gertrude Lawrence. The pair would tour across England together, each night presenting three of Coward’s 10 one-act plays.

    The selection of plays here is an excellent one, each offering a different facet of the diamond that is Coward’s work. Mr. Walton said recently that the playwright considered this cycle of one-acts “after-dinner mints.” They are ephemeral, which should not be confused with lacking substance.

    The director has assembled a superb cast of supporting players to surround his two stars, Simon Jones and Blythe Danner. Mr. Jones, who plays the parts Noel Coward created for himself, is very much up to the challenge. He gives us a sophistication and understanding of the Coward genre rarely seen in American productions.

    Ms. Danner plays two of the roles created by Gertrude Lawrence. Her performance had some fine moments, but was uneven. On Saturday night, she was at her best in the second of the three, “Family Album,” a deliciously darker side of Coward in which Papa has passed away and his Featherways progeny have gathered at the manor after the funeral to divide up the spoils. All seem quite giddy except for Lavinia Featherways, played with a wonderful calm by Ms. Danner. She knows something the others don’t know — as does the butler, Burrows, played by Tuck Milligan, who is a fabulous character actor. The secret the two share gives us a wonderful plot twist that bridges the gap between the upstairs Featherways and the downstairs Burrows.

    The part of Jane Featherways, originally created by Ms. Lawrence, is played winningly by Delphi Harrington.

    Bridging the chasm between the classes is a bridge too far in the first play of the evening, “Hands Across the Sea.” It is Coward at his biting, satirical best. Lady Maureen Gilpin (Ms. Danner), better known to her friends as Piggie, is expecting the Rawlingtons, at whose rubber plantation she’d spent a few days on her trip to Malaya, when the maid, played by Tina Jones (I would put this group of supporting actors up against any on Broadway), shows in a working-class couple, played by Kate Mueth and Gerard Doyle. Ms. Mueth and Mr. Doyle are so precise and measured in their characterizations that you will laugh, and laugh hard.

    Coward depicts a petty, vain, self-centered ruling class, with Piggie leading the way. When the inevitable plot twist comes, Mr. Jones, playing Piggie’s husband, Commander Peter Gilfin R.N., practically channels Noel Coward on the piano, playfully goading his wife into action.

    It was in this play, particularly up until the plot twist, that Ms. Danner seemed a bit off. She stammered some of her lines — a character choice, perhaps — and was awfully busy. Perhaps she was under the weather. This is a funny play, but it could be funnier.

    The actress did find her feet, though, from that point on. For what it’s worth, this is the only one of the three plays she has done previously.

    The third play, “Red Peppers,” is a poignant piece of writing in which a down-on-their-luck, fading vaudeville couple, George (Mr. Jones) and Lily (Ms. Danner), bicker with each other, and with the world around them. Mr. Jones demonstrates in this play, especially in the song-and-dance routines, that his “Cowardism” is second to none, and Ms. Danner was bitingly funny when she let down her hair in the dressing room.

    The production values, as you would expect from any play directed by Mr. Walton, are out-of-this-world good. He has a keen eye and a deep understanding of the material and of theater, doing many subtle things to weave the three separate plays into one cohesive evening. (It was Noel Coward himself who gave a young Mr. Walton his first Broadway break, hiring him to design scenery and lights for “Conversation Piece” in 1957.)

    Heather Wolensky’s stunning set is flexible, evolving throughout the evening. She has designed a proscenium arch within the actual proscenium arch, with the inner one resembling fine lace-paper cutouts. Mr. Walton spoke last month of how Hans Christian Andersen would make fine paper cutouts as he was telling his stories: Ms. Wolensky has executed the director’s vision perfectly.

    Even the scene changes are beautifully done, with stagehands dressed as English maids and servants. All these small details help to make the evening such a winning one, including using the excellent music director, Bobby Peterson, as a character in the first play, then having him play the piano on stage through the set change to the next play, even as the piano itself is moving. I would go back to watch the set changes alone.

    The lighting design by Sebastian Parczynski sets off the set and the players perfectly, and the costumes, designed by Whitney Anne Adams, capture the period perfectly as well. The props, designed by Sarah Azzara, are both practical and period.

    After Saturday night’s performance, Mr. Walton was joined at the back of the house by his ex-wife, Julie Andrews. The two spoke for a couple of minutes. Seeing these two English-born legends of the American stage together, both of them products of the halcyon 1950s, was magical. Mr. Walton has brought some of that magic to the John Drew Theater.

   The Southampton Center, a new arts and cultural center at 25 Job’s Lane in Southampton Village, has announced a schedule of free programs to be presented throughout the rest of the summer. It will include movie showings, visual art presentations, live concerts, dance performances, interactive educational workshops, and children’s programs such as the Goat on a Boat Puppet Theatre.

    The center has partnered with the Hamptons International Film Festival to screen indoor and outdoor films; there are 8:30 p.m. outdoor showings each Friday, and 7:30 p.m. indoor showings each Saturday. The titles include “Jaws,” “Wreck-It Ralph,” and “Chasing Ice.”

    The artists  Diane Tuft, Bentley Meeker, and David Michalek are exhibiting their work at the center through Aug. 4.

    Live performances will start on July 27 with the Brooklyn Ballet and Adam Matta Beatbox. Pianofest will perform on Aug. 2. There will also be a dramatic reading, two circuses, and Jazz at Lincoln Center in August. Information is available at Southamptoncenter.org.

   Dick Cavett will read the leading role of Len in Joni Fritz’s “In the Car with Blossom and Len” on July 29 at Guild Hall. Lynne Taylor-Corbett will direct. Proceeds of the reading will benefit the Alzheimer’s Association. Tickets are $25 and can be purchased at brownpapertickets.com.

At Guild Hall

    On Saturday at 4 p.m., John Alexander will speak about his work at Guild Hall. An interview with the artist appears on C1.

    Those ages 21 to 45 have been invited to join Guild Hall’s Young Contemporaries for a party at the Topping Rose House in Bridgehampton on Saturday from 4 to 6 p.m. Members pay $80 a year to attend these special events. A 2013 Porsche Boxster and Cayman will be available for test drives and “a fun and interesting crowd” is promised.

    Guild Hall will have a Sunday-morning panel discussion on the history of the Artists and Writers Game in conjunction with its current exhibition. Participants include the artists Leif Hope, Eric Ernst, Ed Hollander, Walter Bernard, and Lori Singer and the writers Carl Bernstein, Mort Zuckerman, Mike Lu­pi­ca, and Juliet Papa. Ed Bleier will moderate. The event is free of charge, and will start at 11.

    The Pollock-Krasner House and Study Center  in Springs will hold its annual lecture in the John Drew Theater on Sunday as well, at 4 p.m. Adam Weinberg, the director of the Whitney Museum of American Art, will take the audience on a virtual tour of the museum and describe its history, from the beginnings in Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney’s Greenwich Village carriage house up to the present day. The Whitney is  preparing to move from its longtime home on Madison Avenue to a new building in the Meat Packing District, designed by Renzo Piano.

    Admission to the lecture is $15; $13 for Guild Hall members.

   Friday, the Parrish Art Museum in Water Mill will screen “Growing Farmers,” a short documentary about the work that the Peconic Land Trust is doing with new farmers on eastern Long Island. The film won the audience award for Best Short Film at last year’s Hamptons International Film Festival.

    The presentation will begin at 6 p.m. and will be followed by a panel discussion featuring Michael Halsband and Hilary Leff, John v.H. Halsey, and several of the farmers. Reservations have been requested, and can be made by calling the museum by phone or visiting its Web site.