WORDS AND IMAGES : Benefit to Feature Jean-Michel Cousteau

Jean-Michel Cousteau, internationally acclaimed ocean explorer and environmentalist, has accepted an invitation to premiere his new marine mammal film at a benefit for the Ventura County Maritime Museum at 7 p.m. Saturday. A 5:30 p.m. “Meet the Speaker” reception will precede the film and lecture. The evening with Cousteau is the first in a series of events organized by curator Dick Cunningham on behalf of the 2-year-old museum at 2731 S. Victoria Ave., Oxnard.

Cunningham first worked with Jean-Michel and Jacques Cousteau as one of the contractors in the opening of the Museum of the Sea in 1967. In 1988-89, Cunningham was a consultant in the planning of Parc Oceanique Cousteau in Paris. For ticket information, call 984-6260.

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The first collection of basketball writings, “The Schoolyard Game,” has just been published by Macmillan. Edited by Agoura resident Dick Wimmer, this literary celebration of basketball features the works of many noted authors, including Pete Axthelm, Pat Conroy, David Halberstam, Philip Roth and John Updike. Wimmer, who has also authored “Baseball Fathers, Baseball Sons” and the novel “Irish Wine,” will be at Waldenbooks from noon to 3 p.m. Saturday in The Oaks shopping center in Thousand Oaks.

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The Ojai Film Society brings the highest grossing film in the history of Italian cinema, “Johnny Stecchino,” a 1991 romantic comedy starring the divinely demented Roberto Benigni, to the Ojai Playhouse at 4:30 p.m. Sunday. The playhouse is at 145 E. Ojai Ave.

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Local author Virginia Cornell, whose self-published biography “Doc Susie” has been reissued in a paperback edition by Ballantine/Ivy Books of New York, will talk about self-promotion to Gold Coast Fiction Writers at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday at Carrows Restaurant, Seaward Avenue and Harbor Boulevard, Ventura. There is a $4 fee for guests. Call 498-0968 or 683-6340.

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Teresa Ortiz of Oxnard was the lucky grand-prize winner who cut the ribbon May 21, officially opening the American Family Theatres complex at the Esplanade Mall in Ventura. The three-screen theater is open seven days a week and tickets cost $2 per person for all shows. On Wednesday, seats are 99 cents.

The theater, which is showing films released several months ago, contains state-of-the-art amenities such as Dolby Sound Stereo, special equipment for the hearing-impaired, wheelchair access and high-back seating with extra leg room.

“This is probably the most dynamic movie house in the area,” said Jay Brand, who with his brother, Tom, owns and operates four other American Family Theatres. This week, the theaters will be showing “A Few Good Men” with Tom Cruise and Jack Nicholson, “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Part 3” and “Ground Hog Day” with Bill Murray. For specific show times, call 485-0201.

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Tales from the past: May 29, 1867, was Thomas Bard’s lucky day. His No. 6 oil well in Upper Ojai began gushing. And did you know that Ojai has been a city since Aug. 5, 1921?