PUTNEY — Vermont filmmaker Jay Craven will hit the road this summer for a series of film screenings and personal reflections to pay tribute to his 30-year collaborator, Northeast Kingdom writer Howard Frank Mosher.
Craven will kick off his tour Thursday, July 27, at 7 p.m., with a date at Next Stage Arts in Putney.
“Howard Mosher died pretty unexpectedly in late January,” Craven said in a news release. “And many Vermonters already miss him for his laugh-out-loud humor and fertile imagination of our place. Writers miss him, too, because no one was more generous with his time and support.”
Craven will open each evening with prepared and off-the-cuff reflections, “My Life, So Far, With Howard,” that explore his long collaboration with Mosher.
He will then present a 25th Anniversary screening of his first Mosher feature film, Where the Rivers Flow North, starring Academy Award nominee Rip Torn, Native American actress Tantoo Cardinal (Dances with Wolves, Legends of the Fall), and Michael J. Fox.
“Howard was much more than a source for our film stories and characters,” Craven said in the news release. “He was also a constant ally, a ready source of laughs, and a steadying influence in times of strain. This was especially crucial during our struggles with headstrong actor Rip Torn on the filming of Rivers. I will tell a few tales that have not been publicly shared before - because they capture a rarely seen side of Howard and his work.”
Set in 1927 in Vermont's Northeast Kingdom, Where the Rivers Flow North tells the story of an old logger, Noel Lord, and his Native American mate, Bangor, who face the extinction of their way of life when the local power company plans to build a giant hydro dam that will flood them off their land.