GARY COOPER FESTIVAL

Join us for a special weekend celebrating two-time

Academy Award-winning screen legend Gary Cooper and his lasting connection to Southampton, where he spent cherished time and now rests at Southampton Cemetery. The first annual Gary Cooper Festival takes place on the actor’s birthday week, celebrating Cooper’s history in Southampton and the lasting value of his artistry. Each screening will provide a starting point for conversations and audience interactivity. We will be joined by family and experts on Cooper’s work to learn more about his life and discuss the lasting themes at the root of his career.

Ball of Fire https://southamptonplayhouse.c…

A group of professors working on a new encyclopedia while living in a Manhattan mansion take in a mouthy nightclub singer who is wanted by the police to help bring down her mob boss lover.

Friday, May 9, 7PM and Sunday May 11, 12PM 

High Noon https://southamptonplayhouse.c…

A town Marshal, despite the disagreements of his newlywed bride and the townspeople around him, must face a gang of deadly killers alone at “high noon” when the gang leader, an outlaw he “sent up” years ago, arrives on the noon train.

Both Saturday screenings will feature a talk by Cooper’s daughter, Maria Cooper Janis, along with a signing of her book Gary Cooper Off Camera: A Daughter Remembers.

Saturday, May 10, 12 PM and 3 PM 

THE PRIDE OF THE YANKEES https://southamptonplayhouse.c…
The story of the life and career of famed baseball player Lou Gehrig.

Sunday’s first screening will be followed by a conversation with New York Times journalist Richard Sandomir, author of The Pride of the Yankees: Lou Gehrig, Gary Cooper, and the Making of a Classic.

“Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.” So said baseball legend Lou Gehrig in his farewell speech from Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1939. Three years later, that speech would provide the tearjerking culmination of The Pride of the Yankees, with Cooper giving one of his most treasured performances as the famed player just one year after his death from the disease that would soon bear his name.

Sunday, May 11, 2025 3 PM and 630 PM