Ohio Wesleyan hosts its first Melvin Van Peebles Symposium to honor the life and legacy of the 1953 OWU graduate and accomplished filmmaker whose work broke through the boundaries of race and gender. Van Peebles died in September 2021 at age 89.
The symposium opens at 7 p.m. March 30 with a screening of his film "The Story of a Three-Day Pass" at downtown Delaware's Strand Theatre, 28 E. Winter St.
The symposium will feature film screenings and academic presentations about his work and its impact. Actress-dancer-director Jasmine Guy (“A Different World”) will serve as keynote speaker. Additional speakers will include award-winning writer Wil Haygood, author of “Colorization: One Hundred Years of Black Films in a White World,” and academic, author, and artist Simone Drake, an Ohio State University professor who helped to edit the book “Are You Entertained?: Black Popular Culture in the Twenty-First Century.”
General admission tickets are $115 per person, or $135 after March 1. Discounted rates are available for Ohio Wesleyan alumni, students, and employees.
For more information about the symposium and to purchase tickets, visit www.owu.edu/VanPeebles.