Festival

Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake and the Baltimore Development Corp. have selected the Maryland Film Festival's proposal for the renovation of the historic Parkway Theatre at 3 W. North Ave., according to an official who spoke Thursday morning at the BDC's monthly board meeting. The city hopes to enter into an exclusive negotiating agreement with the Film Festival shortly, said Darrell Doan, a BDC staffer who manages the corporation's real estate transactions. The Film Festival is partnering with the Maryland Institute College of Art and Johns Hopkins University on their proposal for the Parkway.

Harvey G. Alexander, who founded and served as executive director of the Baltimore Film Festival and also read poetry on WBJC-FM, died Nov. 23 of pulmonary edema at Franklin Square Medical Center. He was 77. "I first got to know him in 1964 at Martick's. They wouldn't let me in, but I got to know him behind Martick's back in the alley," said film director and writer John Waters. "Harvey was an eccentric intellectual and a real bohemian, but always very friendly," said Mr. Waters.

"I Used to be Darker," the latest movie from Baltimore's Matt Porterfield, will be shown at January's Sundance Film Festival, organizers announced Wednesday. "I was in a bit of a state of shock," said Porterfield, who was on a return bus trip from New York when he got the news. "I'm ecstatic. " The movie, Porterfield's third feature as a writer-director, tells the story of a runaway from Northern Ireland who moves in with her aunt and uncle in Baltimore, and the family crises that ensue.

Thursday morning, when Sue Schmincke preheats her ovens at Paul's Place, she'll kick off her 20th Thanksgiving at the Pigtown soup kitchen and community outreach center. In those 20 years, Miss Sue (as she's known around the neighborhood) has served hundreds of meals a day, five days a week, 52 weeks a year. She rarely misses a day of work. And in the 16 years she's been the kitchen manager and head chef, she's never run out of food, even when the line outside Paul's Place stretches to 500 hungry Southwest Baltimore residents.

A fledgling organization dedicated to the Continental Congress is bringing three days of lectures along with historic documents and short films to Annapolis, as it seeks to find a permanent home in the city. Among the items of historic note in the traveling exhibit will be a Treaty of Paris proclamation that formally ended the American Revolution; it was ratified and signed in Annapolis on Jan. 14, 1784. The Continental Congress Festival will mark the document's first return to Annapolis, said Mark Croatti, the Continental Congress Society's director.

Bob Nobles III plans to be a Santa's helper this year. He will distribute toys and other gifts to young people who come to the Kennedy Krieger Institute's upcoming Festival of Trees. But it won't be the first time that the New Windsor teenager has put a smile on someone else's face. Nobles, a junior at Baltimore's Kennedy Krieger High School, was chosen as the 2012 ambassador for the holiday gala known as Festival of Trees. Nobles, who has Asperger's Syndrome, is used to public appearances.

Ocean City Winterfest of Lights Head to Ocean City for the opening weekend of the annual holiday lights extravaganza, which features a train ride through lighted holiday displays, including the 12 Days of Christmas. The event also has a heated pavilion with hot chocolate and an opportunity for the kids to take a picture with Santa. The festival runs from 5:30 to 9:30 p.m. Sundays through Thursdays and 5:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, Nov. 15 - Jan. 1 at Northside Park.

A slimmed-down Edna Turnblad shared the stage with her creator, John Waters, last night, much to the delight of scores of star-crazed fans. Well, it wasn't exactly Edna, the zaftig stage mom from Waters' "Hairspray," who took to the stage at the Maryland Institute College of Art . Rather, it was actor John Travolta, who brought Edna to the big screen in the 2007 musical version of Waters' film, up there on the stage. But the crowd embraced him like one of their own. "You've always been my favorite actor," one fan said from the audience, noting that she spent her teen years with pictures of Travolta plastered to her wall.

The 41st Annual Greek Food & Cultural Festival starts Friday. This is the one at the Greek Cathedral of the Annunciation in Midtown-Belvedere, when everyone sits on the cathedral's steps in the sunshine and stuffs themselves silly. Under the big tent on Preston Street, there's stuff like gyros, souvlaki and fried calamari. But you have to go inside the cathedral and down into the basement for the baked lamb shank, spanakopita, pastitio, roast chicken and stuffed grape leaves. New this year: a Saturday night party in the tent, with a live band.

St. Gregory of Nyssa Byzantine Catholic will hold its Slavic food festival on Saturday, Nov. 3,. from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., at 12420 Old Gunpowder Road Spur, in Beltsville. There will be popular Eastern European foods and a bake sale including kolachi and other homemade sweet treats. Admission and parking are free. For further details, call 301-552-2434 or go to http://www.stgregoryofnyssa.net .