Cinema Orange Returns with Docs on Esquire in the Swinging '60s, Creative Thinkers and More

Cinema Orange, the intriguing collaboration between Orange County Museum of Art and the Newport Beach Film Festival, on Thursday kicks off its summer and fall lineup of documentaries that celebrate art, architecture, design and cultural icons.

All five films are undoubtedly awesome, but what most excites me personally are the first two: Smiling Through the Apocalypse: Esquire in the 60's and, on Aug. 1, From Nothing, Something.

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Visitors to the screenings at OCMA also get to check out the exhibits. Currently up is 2013 California-Pacific Triennial. And you can grub out at the gourmet food trucks parked outside. Oh, yeah, it's a total scene, man …

The food trucks serve from 6:30-8:30 p.m. The regular ticket into the museum at 850 San Clemente Drive (Newport Center) in Newport Beach includes the exhibits and flick, which starts rolling at 8 p.m. For more attendance information, visit the OCMA Cinema Orange event page.

Here are brief rundowns of each film courtesy of Team Cinema Orange:

July 11

SMILING THROUGH THE APOCALYPSE: ESQUIRE IN THE 60'S

(2013, Documentary, 98 minutes)
Director: Thomas Hayes
Featuring: Tom Wolfe, Gay Talese, Nora Ephron, Peter Bogdanovich, Candice Bergen, Gore Vidal, Robert Benton
In the jungle of the American apocalypse of race, war, and demonstration, came Harold Hayes, the swinging editor and cultural provocateur of the iconic Esquire Magazine of the 1960s. With his son Tom as tour guide, Smiling Through the Apocalypse tells the story of how Hayes transformed Esquire Magazine into a stable of fearless, brash, and irreverent journalism of the most turbulent decade since the Civil War. By harnessing irony, satire and a novelistic approach to reporting current affairs, Hayes created a magazine where point-of-view and iconic art and photography were put first and foremost. The unique voice Harold Hayes channeled by combining subject and talent became singular to the generation, and a technique that would change journalism forever.

August 1

FROM NOTHING, SOMETHING

(2012, Documentary, 79 minutes)
Director: Tim Cawley
Featuring: Tom Perrotta, Sara Quin, Maria Bamford, Alexa Adams, Flora Gill, Keith Young, Neville Page, Jay Greenberg, W. David Lee, Moungi Bawendi, Susan Feniger, Mary Sue Milliken, Steve Breen, Jason Rohrer, Preston Scott Cohen, Huma Bhabha
Everyone has ideas. But what where do they come from? And what ensures they keep coming? How do you sort the genius ideas from the useless ones? Why invest all this hope and energy into making things in the first place? From Nothing, Something profiles creative thinkers across a spectrum of disciplines and finds the methods, habits, beliefs and neuroses that lead to breakthrough ideas. This is a thoughtful, intimate, often funny look at the creative process–straight from the brains of some of our culture's most accomplished and inspiring talents.
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September 5

COAST MODERN

(2012, Documentary, 56 minutes)
Directors: Mike Bernard, Gavin Froome
Featuring: Douglas Coupland, Barbara Bestor, James Steele, John Cava
A core group of architects embraced the West Coast from Vancouver to Los Angeles with its particular geography and values and left behind a legacy of beautiful and inspired dwellings. Today, architects explore and celebrate the principles established by their predecessors. Discussions with several architects including Dion Neutra (son and partner of Modernist pioneer Richard Neutra), Michelle Kaufmann, Barbara Lamprecht, Pierluigi Serraino, John Cava, James Steele, James Cheng, and Henrik Bull give insight into what made Modernism on the West Coast so unique and how this approach is even more relevant to our lives today.

October 3

16 ACRES

(2012, Documentary, 92 minutes)
Director: Richard Hankin
Featuring: Michael Bloomberg, George Pataki, Chris Ward, Larry Silverstein, Daniel Libeskind, David Childs, Michael Arad, Janno Lieber, Roland Betts, Rosaleen Tallon
The rebuilding of ground zero is one of the most architecturally, politically, and emotionally complex urban renewal projects in American history. From the beginning, the effort has been fraught with controversy, delays and politics. The struggle has encompassed 11 years, 19 government agencies, a dozen projects and over $20 billion. Aside from the staggering engineering challenges of the site itself, a major complicating factor in the rebuilding of the World Trade Center is the sheer number of interested parties. Politicians, developers, architects, insurance companies, local residents, and relatives of 9/11 victims all profess a claim to the site and are often in conflict with one another. According to The New York Times, “Where some saw lucrative real estate, others saw a graveyard. Where some saw Rockefeller Center or Lincoln Center or Grand Central Terminal, others saw Gettysburg.”

November 7

DILLER, SCOFIDIO + RENFRO:
REIMAGINING LINCOLN CENTER AND THE HIGH LINE

(2012, Documentary, 54 minutes)
Directors: Muffie Dunn, Tom Piper
Festuring: Elizabeth Diller, Ricardo Scofidio, Amanda Burden, Mark Wigley, Anthony Vidler
Diller Scofidio + Renfro has long been at the forefront of design. The interdisciplinary design firm, founded in 1979, first stirred interest with its provocative exhibitions of theoretically based projects that blurred the boundaries between art and architecture. In 1999, Elizabeth Diller and Ricardo Scofidio, the firm's founding principals, were awarded the prestigious “genius” grant by the MacArthur Foundation, in recognition of their commitment to integrating architecture with issues of contemporary culture. With the almost simultaneous completion of two large-scale projects in New York City–the renovation of the High Line and revitalization and expansion of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts–Diller Scofidio + Renfro has galvanized the public's attention. Between 2004 and 2011, the firm, in collaboration with James Corner Field Operations, converted the derelict High Line railroad tracks on the city's West Side (from Gansevoort to 30th streets) into a sophisticated 1.5 mile elevated urban park.

Email: mc****@oc******.com. Twitter: @MatthewTCoker. Follow OC Weekly on Twitter @ocweekly or on Facebook!

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