LOCK HAVEN, Pa. - Award-winning screenwriter and playwright J. Rufus Caleb will be the next featured guest in Lock Haven University’s UpWrite Reading Series on Wednesday and Thursday, February 18 and 19.

On Wednesday, February 18 at 7:00 p.m., in the Hamblin Hall of Flags, Caleb will show his award-winning movie “Benny’s Place” and answer questions. On Thursday, February 19 at 7:30 p.m. in Sloan Auditorium, Caleb will discuss his work and LHU Theatre students will perform a scene or excerpt. Both events are free and the public is invited to attend.

“Benny’s Place,” produced in 1981, features Louis Gossett, Jr., Cecily Tyson and Anna Maria Horsford, and was directed by Michael Schultz. The story concerns the crisis of an aging African-American tool repairman who is employed to operate a repair shop ("Benny's Place") in a steel mill. Pressure is placed on him by his superiors to train a younger African-American man to do his job, in order that a token African American might be qualified for a management position.

“Benny’s Place” has won numerous awards, including an “Original Television Drama” by the 1982 Writers Guild of America TV/Radio Writing Awards; “Best TV Movie” by the 1982 Beverly Hills-Hollywood NAACP Image Awards, and a “10 Best TV Movies of 1982" selection by Judith Christ for TV Guide Magazine.

Caleb has written for theater, radio, and television. His play “The Rehearsal,” developed at Playwrights Theatre of New Jersey and The New Harmony Project, is included in The Best Short American Plays 1996-1997. His teleplay “Benny's Place” received the 1981 Eugene O'Neill National Playwrights Conference Theatre Award for Best Conference Play and was later produced for ABC television. The production of his radio play “The Devil and Uncle Asa” received the 1993 Special Achievement Award from the National Federation of Community Broadcasters.

Caleb has received fellowships from the Pennsylvania Arts Council and an NEA grant to produce and direct his radio script “Moods for Jazz,” an adaptation of the Langston Hughes poetry book, “Ask Your Mama.” His fiction and poetry have appeared in journals such as Obsidian, Shenandoah and The William and Mary Review. Caleb is an associate professor of English at the Community College of Philadelphia.

For additional information, please contact Marjorie Maddox Hafer (570) 484-2044 mmaddoxh@lhup.edu or Dana Washington (570) 484-2175 dwashing@lhup.edu.