Event Summary:

Picturehouse 441 & ACE are proud to be partnering on a series of live virtual Q&As as part of our mutual efforts to promote film literacy. On Monday, April 1, join us for a Q&A with composer Alan Menken, as he discusses his work on the 1986 horror comedy musical film Little Shop of Horrors. "On the twenty-third day of the month of September, in an early year of a decade not too long before our own, the human race suddenly encountered a deadly threat to its very existence. And this terrifying enemy surfaced, as such enemies often do, in the seemingly most innocent and unlikely of places..." and so begins Little Shop of Horrors, a wild, weird, completely demented, and utterly ingenious musical film adaptation of the Off-Broadway sensation by Howard Ashman and Alan Menken, itself an adaptation of a zero-budget Roger Corman-directed film from 1960. What makes Little Shop shine is the obvious love put into its creation. Rick Moranis, Ellen Greene, Steve Martin, Vincent Gardenia, and Levi Stubbs (as the voice of Audrey II) are note-perfect, the technical wizardry that Frank Oz and his team brought to give life to the plant through practical effects is nothing short of astonishing, and Ashman and Menken's literate and clever score ranks with the greats. With editing by John Jympson, ACE, a film with a bloodthirsty talking plant, a sadistic dentist, and big musical numbers may not sound like classic movie material, but Little Shop is so infectiously energetic and entertaining that it's impossible to resist. This event will be a Zoom Webinar on Monday, April 1 at 8PM ET/5PM PT. *ACE members, please check your email for free ticket information.*