Program Series: Gallery Spotlights
Gallery Spotlight – Director’s Inspiration: Spike Lee
Pop-up poetry performances by Roger Guenveur Smith in the Director’s Inspiration: Spike Lee gallery.
Sun, Sep 25, 2022
The Education and Public Engagement team invites visitors to a special celebration on the closing day of the Director’s Inspiration: Spike Lee gallery in the museum’s ongoing core exhibition Stories of Cinema. Join actor and writer Roger Guenveur Smith for pop-up poetry performances in the gallery. Smith’s poetry is featured in the book Spike Lee: Director’s Inspiration, produced in conjunction with the gallery presentation. Academy Museum Associate Curator Dara Jaffe will introduce Smith inside the gallery.
Performances will begin every 30 minutes, with four total (1pm, 1:30pm, 2pm, 2:30pm).
This is a free program with the purchase of general admission. Museum admission for children ages 17 and under is always free. Purchase a copy of the book Spike Lee: Director's Inspiration and receive discounted... general admission on the day of the event. Tickets are $45 for adults; $39 for seniors (age 62+); and $35 for students (age 18+ with valid ID) and includes a copy of the book.
If you have any questions, or need assistance planning your visit, please email museumeducation@oscars.org.
Know Before You Go
Plan your Visit
Location
The Academy Museum and its theaters are located at 6067 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90036
Parking
Self-parking, accessible parking, and electric vehicle charging options are available. See below for our parking structure information and view the parking page for further details.
Ride-Share Drop Off
Roddenberry Lane, entrance on Fairfax Ave.
LACMA's Pritzker Parking Garage
6000 W 6th St., Los Angeles, CA 90036, entrance on 6th St.
5am–10pm
$20 ($12 after 8pm entry)
Accessible spots on P1, adjacent to elevators
EV charging stations on P1 and P2Petersen Automotive Museum Garage
744 Fairfax Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90036, entrance on Fairfax Ave. or 8th St.
6am–11pm
$24 (first 15 min. free)
Accessible spots on P1 only; no garage elevator
EV charging stations on P1Accessibility
The museum is fully accessible by wheeled mobility device. Use the museum’s elevators to access all galleries and theaters. Visitor Experience Associates are also on hand to provide assistance.
American Sign Language (ASL) interpretation is available upon request with three weeks’ notice, subject to the availability of interpreters; please submit your request to academymuseum@oscars.org.
If this program occurs in the theaters, assistive audio devices, in-seat closed captioning, or real-time captioning may be available. Please inquire at academymuseum@oscars.org.
The museum offers a host of recurring accessible programs, including Calm Mornings, ASL Interpreted Tours, and Visual Description Tours.
Sensory kits are available at the Winkler Welcome Center and the Shirley Temple Education Studio for anyone with sensory needs. The kits include noise-reduction headphones, fidgets, and color therapy glasses to help visitors feel comfortable and safe at the museum.
For any other accommodative request not listed here, please reach out to academymuseum@oscars.org.
Learn more about our accessibility initiatives.
More in Series
Conversations
Gallery Spotlight: Sound Mixing Blade Runner 2049
Join Academy Award-winning sound mixers Ron Bartlett and Doug Hemphill in conversation as they discuss their works of mixing Blade Runner 2049 (2017). Both were nominated for Blade Runner 2049 and won for Dune: Part One (2021) and Dune: Part Two (2024).
Following our Gallery Spotlight: Sound Mixing Blade Runner 2049, we will explore the art of sound mixing in the Shirley Temple Education Studio. Visitors can practice mixing a simple soundscape to learn about how sounds, music, and dialogue combine to create a cohesive soundtrack. No previous sound experience is required, and beginners are encouraged. For inspiration, visit the Sound gallery in our Stories of Cinema exhibition on Level 2.
About Ron Bartlett:
“Having been a musician all my life, sound has always been a huge part of my work and my art. Getting the chance to collaborate with great directors and fellow sound editors and mixers is a fantastic thing to be a part of. I love being creative and watching a film come together with a great mix!”
Ron Bartlett started as a musician at the age of 5 playing drums. He performed in various groups ranging from drum corp., classical percussion, big band and jazz combos, world percussion for modern dance, and film scoring. He then turned his focus to film sound.
Starting as an assistant and then sound editor on such films as Die Hard (1988), Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (1989), Beauty and the Beast (1991), and Total Recall (1990), he moved on to become an Oscar-winning re-recording mixer. Working with directors like Quentin Tarantino, Michael Mann, Denis Villeneuve, Ang Lee, Peter Weir, and Cameron Crowe. He received Oscar and Bafta nominations for Life of Pi (2012) and Blade Runner 2049 (2017) and two Oscar and BAFTA wins for Dune: Part 1 (2021) and Dune: Part 2 (2024).
About Doug Hemphill:
Doug Hemphill comes to film sound from a background in psychology and music. He attended the USC School of Cinema and was hired while still a student to work on Apocalypse Now (1979). After several projects in the Bay Area, Doug moved to Los Angeles to work on the film Gremlins (1984) as a sound effects field recordist, a job he feels combines much of what he learned through psychology and music. His break as a re-recording mixer came from fellow Texan Willie Nelson. After learning that Doug’s family had been farmers in the Rio Grande Valley, Nelson offered him a job mixing on his film The Red Headed Stranger (1986). Doug has won several awards for his work: Oscars, BAFTAs, and Cinema Audio Society awards among them. He is most proud of being able to give his mother his first Oscar and of being a dad to his two children, Kathryn Rose and William.
The Education and Public Engagement team invites visitors to explore Cyberpunk: Envisioning Possible Futures Through Cinema, the exhibition that examines the global impact and lasting influence of the science fiction subgenre cyberpunk on cinema culture. Cyberpunk features 18 reproductions of iconic cyberpunk movie posters, an original costume from Tron (USA, 1982), 13 props, the original Vid-Phon booth from Blade Runner (USA, 1982), and concept art from celebrated films like Blade Runner, Tron, and Night Raiders (2021).
Gallery Spotlights
During Gallery Spotlights, the Education and Public Engagement team invites visitors to explore Stories of Cinema, the Academy Museum’s ongoing core exhibition that presents the diverse, international, and complex stories of moviemakers and the works they create.
Conversations
Gallery Spotlight: Diving into Jaws: The Exhibition
Join us in conversation with Senior Exhibitions Curator Jenny He and Assistant Curator Emily Rauber Rodriguez as they discuss Jaws: The Exhibition, the newest and first-ever exhibition of this scale dedicated to a single film at the Academy Museum. The conversation will explore the development and curation of the exhibition that revisits Jaws (1975) scene by scene, featuring original objects, behind-the-scenes revelations, and interactive moments. This conversation will be moderated by author and professor J.D. Connor
Curator Bios
Jenny He is Senior Exhibitions Curator at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures. Since 2021, she has curated exhibitions on John Waters, Pedro Almodóvar, Hildur Guðnadóttir, animation filmmakers, special and visual effects artists, and other subjects for the museum. Previously, she independently curated and toured The World of Tim Burton to worldwide institutions, after co-curating the retrospective exhibition Tim Burton at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, which toured to venues such as LACMA, Cinémathèque Française, and the Australian Centre for the Moving Image. For MoMA, among other exhibitions, Jenny has curated retrospectives on the Coen Brothers, Lillian Gish, and Kathryn Bigelow.
Emily Rauber Rodriguez is an Assistant Curator at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures and has contributed to the exhibitions Regeneration: Black Cinema 1898-1971, John Waters: Pope of Trash, and Cyberpunk: Envisioning Possible Futures Through Cinema. She holds doctoral and master’s degrees in Cinema and Media Studies from the University of Southern California. Her scholarly work focuses on race and ethnicity in speculative fiction.
About Gallery Spotlights
During Gallery Spotlights, the Education and Public Engagement team invites visitors to explore the Academy Museum’s ongoing exhibitions that presents the diverse, international, and complex stories of moviemakers and the works they create. If you have any questions or need assistance planning your visit, please email museumeducation@oscars.org.
Conversations
Gallery Spotlight: The Terrordome and Afrofuturism with Ngozi Onwurah
Cyberpunk films juxtapose technological advances with social upheaval, ecological crisis, and urban decay. Central to these stories are characters who fight against technology gone haywire, global mega-corporations, or colonialism.
Join the Academy Museum with director and filmmaker Ngozi Onwurah as she discusses the history and impact of Afrofuturism within the cyberpunk genre. They will also discuss the making of Ngozi Onwurah’s first feature, Welcome II the Terrordome (1995), the first theatrically distributed British feature directed by a Black woman.
About Gallery Spotlights
During Gallery Spotlights, the Education and Public Engagement team invites visitors to explore the Academy Museum’s ongoing exhibitions that presents the diverse, international, and complex stories of moviemakers and the works they create. If you have any questions or need assistance planning your visit, please email museumeducation@oscars.org.