Blame my visual-arts bias, but I can't help thinking the top event of the fall cultural season is the opening of Godt-Cleary Projects in the heart of the Downtown Arts District. The satellite of the Mandalay Place gallery opens October 1 at 1217 S. Main St. with Dennis Hopper: Billboards and Photographs. The actor-artist's show will spread itself over both galleries but will clearly be the highlight of First Friday Downtown.
Is a lecture by two journalists a cultural event? You bet, when the pair is Bob Woodward and his one-time boss, Ben Bradlee, both appearing at Artemus W. Ham Concert Hall on the UNLV campus at 7:30 p.m., September 28. The two helped bring down one president, as reporter and managing editor respectively, at The Washington Post and Woodward's Plan of Attack was part of the springtime book barrage that assailed the current occupant of the White House.
Ham Hall will remain the city's cultural epicenter four evenings later, when celebrated young pianist Orion Weiss brings his dancing digits back to Vegas for an appearance with the Las Vegas Philharmonic. Weiss will perform Tchaikovsky's Concerto No. 1 in B-flat minor, the centerpiece of concert that also offers Richard Wagner's Flying Dutchman Overture and Modest Mussorgky's Pictures at Exhibition, all at 8 p.m. October 2.
You might as well remain camped at Ham because the UNLV Performing Arts Center's Charles Vanda Masters Series brings bass-baritone Samuel Ramey there 8 p.m., October 13, for A Date with the Devil. Ramey is one of the best in the business in his vocal range, and he's assembled a well-received program of arias dealing with the ultimate villain.
For a similarly sinister program, you won't have wait long or wander far, as Nevada Ballet Theatre brings Dracula to UNLV's Judy Bayley Theatre, October 29 through October 31, the perfect complement to Halloween.
Among the season's most intriguing stage events is Nevada Conservatory Theatre's presentation of Proof, playwright David Auburn's account of a daughter's quest to understand her late father, a mad mathematical genius. The 2001 Pulitzer- and Tony-winning play is slated for October 8-17 at Judy Bayley.
Then head back Downtown again for Test Market's Beckett Festival, November 26 through December 4 at SEAT in the Arts Factory. You can't beat Beckett for a helpful dose of No-Hope, particularly with holidays looming ahead.