Événement

Replacement Parts: "The Stepford Wives" (1975)

As part of the series "Replacement Parts," actress Paula Prentiss (The Stepford Wives, The Parallax View) and Professor / Filmmaker Dr. Allison De Fren will discuss the legacy and many readings of "The Stepford Wives."

In the come-down years after the 1960s, many films explored a rising sense of dread that perhaps our lives, desires, and even our newfound freedoms, were not our own. The Stepford Wives (1975) based on the pulpy novel by Ira Levin, takes the dread genre to an upscale Connecticut suburb, where the women are uniformly compliant, sexy (in floral sundresses) and enjoy ironing. Katharine Ross plays the new wife moving to Stepford, and the tall, goosey, ever-witty Paula Prentiss plays Bobbie, her Virgil in the underworld of the robo-suburbs.

Replacement Parts is a series of screenings and conversations about face replacements, fembots, and those who build artificial companions -- the series is a collaboration between Veggie Cloud and the Velaslavasay Panorama and will take place at both locations this spring and summer.

Allison de Fren is a Professor of Media Arts & Culture at Occidental College and Director of "The Mechanical Bride" (2012), a documentary and a surprisingly human look at artificial love.