Moving Sidewalk

It’s Italian Heritage Month (thanks to Cristoforo Columbo), and the Museum of the City of New York is screening Pane Amaro, a documentary produced by RAI, Italy’s public TV, about the Italian American immigrant experience from 1880 through World War II. The film doesn’t shy away from the hostility Italian immigrants faced—including a mass lynching in New Orleans in 1891. There’s a lot more to the history than portrayals of Italian Americans as mobsters.

Producers Gianfranco Norelli and Suma Kurien will be on hand for a Q&A after the screening, which is at 3 pm Saturday, Oct. 17. Free with museum admission.

The Lower East Side Tenement Museum presents Food and the Italian-American Experience, a conversation with authors Laura Schenone (The Lost Ravioli Recipes of Hoboken: A Search for Food and Family), and Louise Fili (Italianissimo: The Quintessential Guide to What Italians Do Best) about their own roots and the role of food in Italian immigrant culture. The talk is at 6:30 pm Thursday, Oct. 23 at the museum bookstore, 108 Orchard St. RSVP to events(at)tenement.org. The talk is free; you’re on your own for dinner.

It’s the tarantella and more at 2 pm Saturday, Oct. 18, when Coro d’Italia performs Italian song and dance at the Museum of the City of New York (Fifth Avenue at 103rd St). Visitors can join in the dance and bang on the tamburello and tammorra napoletana. Free with museum admission. Call (212) 534-1672, ext. 3395, for more information.

The Museum of the City of New York, as part of its Catholics in New York: 1808–1946 exhibit, presents the program Built on Faith: Shaping Italian Catholic New York at 6:30 pm Tuesday, Oct. 14. Joseph Sciorra of Queens College’s John D. Calandra Italian American Institute will discuss the ways in which contemporary Italian Americans shape the religious and cultural landscapes of the city. Admission is $9 and reservations are required. Call (212) 534-1672, ext. 3395, or purchase tickets online.

Vincent Mallozzi reports in the New York Times that the Italian American Museum opens Tuesday in the former Banca Stabile on Mulberry Street, which served Italian immigrants from 1882 to 1932. The museum opened on 44th Street in 2001, but this is obviously a much better location!

Thursday, Sept. 11, is the first day of the San Gennaro Festival in Little Italy, with an outdoor Mass for 9/11 victims.

The cannoli-eating competition is Friday at 1 pm, and the party will go on another week before wrapping up on Sunday, Sept. 21.