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(Cambridge, MA)-Mira Nair, internationally acclaimed director of Monsoon Wedding and other feature films and documentaries, will be the guest of honor at "An Evening with Mira Nair," a discussion, accompanied by film clips, regarding the filmmaker's life and career on Saturday, May 3, 2003 at 7 pm. Sponsored by Learning From Performers, a program of the Office for the Arts at Harvard, this event will be moderated by film, stage, and television actor John Lithgow and take place at Sanders Theatre in Memorial Hall, 45 Quincy St., Harvard University, Cambridge. Admission is free and open to the general public. Tickets are required (limit 2 per person), available beginning April 19 at the Harvard Box Office, Holyoke Center Arcade, 1350 Massachusetts Ave., Harvard Square. Phone orders ($3 service charge per ticket) are available by calling 617.496.2222. For more information, call 617.495.8676.

Mira Nair is a graduate of Harvard College (class of '79), where she was a Visual and Environmental Studies concentrator. After college, Nair worked as an actor, then began directing documentaries, including Children of Desired Sex, So Far From India, and India Cabaret. Her 1988 debut feature film, Salaam Bombay!, was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film and won the Camera D'Or (for best first feature) and the Prix du Publique (for most popular entry) at the Cannes Film Festival, in addition to 25 other international awards. Nair's next film, Mississippi Masala, won Best Screenplay and the Audience Choice Award at the Venice Film Festival. Subsequent films have included The Perez Family, about an exiled Cuban family in Miami, and Kama Sutra: A Tale of Love, which she directed and co-wrote.

In 1998, Nair's film My Own Country was awarded the NAACP award for best fiction feature. Nair returned to the documentary form in 1999 with The Laughing Club of India, which was awarded the Special Jury Prize in the Festival International de Programmes Audiovisuels 2000. Her best-known film to date, Monsoon Wedding, won the Golden Lion at the 2001 Venice Film Festival and a Golden Globe nomination for Best Foreign Language Film.

Currently filming Vanity Fair, an adaptation of William Thackeray's classic novel starring Reese Witherspoon, Mira Nair is also a professor at Columbia University and has established an annual laboratory for young filmmakers, which is expected to commence in East Africa and India in 2004. She is the recipient of the 2003 Harvard Arts Medal, which will be awarded to the filmmaker at Harvard University on May 3, 2003.

Once cited as "the film character actor of his generation" by The Wall Street Journal, John Lithgow graduated from Harvard University in 1967 and received a Fullbright scholarship to study at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. Returning from London, he embarked on a distinguished career in the theater highlighted by a Tony Award for his Broadway debut in The Changing Room (1973) and Tony nominations for Requiem for a Heavyweight (1985) and M. Butterfly (1988). Among dozens of film roles, Lithgow received an Academy Award nomination for his portrayal of Roberta Muldoon in The World According to Garp (1982), and a second Oscar nomination for Debra Winger's shy love interest in Terms of Endearment (1983). In 1996 he began a starring role in the hugely successful television series "3rd Rock from the Sun," winning Emmy Awards as Best Actor in a Comedy Series in 1997 and 1999. In 2001, Lithgow returned to Broadway, winning both the Tony Award and Drama Desk Award as best actor in a Broadway musical for his performance in the Marvin Hamlisch/John Guare musical, Sweet Smell of Success.

The Office for the Arts at Harvard (OFA) is a central resource for arts opportunities, programs, information, and support at Harvard University. It encourages direct student involvement in the arts through a broad array of programs and services. The OFA's Learning From Performers program brings to Harvard professional artists who interact with students (and sometimes the general public) through a range of educational forums. For more information about the OFA, call 617.495.8676 or visit www.fas.harvard.edu/~ofa

Listings Information:
Saturday, May 3, 2003, at 7 pm: "AN EVENING WITH MIRA NAIR," a conversation/audience Q&A with filmmaker Mira Nair, moderated by actor John Lithgow. Sanders Theatre, Memorial Hall, 45 Quincy St., Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. Admission free, tickets required (limit 2 per person), available at the Harvard Box Office, Holyoke Center Arcade, 1350 Massachusetts Ave., Harvard Square. Phone orders ($3 service charge per ticket): 617.496.2222. Information: 617.495.8676.

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