JUNE 8
7pm - 11pm (Thursday Night)
Icarus Fest begins in the historic Rivoli Theater with a screening and examination of Blade Runner, a film that predicted the rise of omnipresent state and corporate power and asked whether humanity was flying too close to the sun.
7pm - Blade Runner Screening
Ridley Scott’s prescient and harrowing science-fiction masterpiece kicks off the festival as we ask whether humanity itself is flying too close to the sun. As artificial intelligence and deepfakes become increasingly indistinguishable from reality and as human beings grow ever more integrated with technology, we are all becoming Harrison Ford’s Rick Deckard, who is tasked with answering the question “what does it mean to be human?” Panelists will engage in a long-form panel discussion after the screening to determine if this future is a nightmare or a dream, an allegorical warning or a rhapsodic vision of the inevitable.
9pm - Festival Introduction with Q/A
Thaddeus Russell
June 9
10am - 4pm (Friday Daytime)
Day Two of the festival focuses on the culture of our time. Following the screening of Safe, a film that portrays the alienation and anxiety of a world obsessed with imaginary external threats, panels and live podcast interviews on several stages throughout the day will take up the meaning of everyday life in a neoliberal society.
10am - Safe Screening
Friday’s programming pivots around the questions raised by Todd Haynes’s psychological drama about the anxiety of modernity in Safe. A mysterious undiagnosable illness afflicts Carol White, played by Julianne Moore. In her quest to figure out what is to blame for her symptoms—chemicals, fragrances, pesticides, diet— she moves from the isolation of idyllic affluent suburbia to the isolation of a self-quarantined desert community that is afflicted with the same intangible illness. In the panel discussion following the screening, panelists will examine the portrayals of medical tyranny, psychologically excruciating and totalitarian health fads, and general malaise in post-industrial life.
12pm - Panel Discussion
"Alone Together: Social Life Under Neoliberalism”
Thaddeus Russell & Geoff Shullenberger & Jack Mason
2pm - Panel Discussion
"Austerity, Censorship, and Resistance”
Thaddeus Russell & Geoff Shullenberger & Jack Mason & Jeremy Kaufman
7pm - 11pm (Friday Night)
Day Two culminates with Icarus Fest Comedy Night, featuring a lineup of stand-up comics comprised of Rich Vos, Kurt Metzger, Lou Perez, Dan Naturman, and Danny Polishchuk, followed by a headliner set by Kurt Metzger, whose fame as a joke-teller matches his infamy as a truth-teller.
8pm - All-Star Comedy Lineup
Doors at 7pm, show at 8pm.
General admission to the All-Star Comedy Lineup ($30)! Only $45 when purchased as a bundle with the Kurt Metzger Headliner Set.
Comedy lineup:
• Rich Vos
• Kurt Metzger
• Danny Polishchuk
• Dan Naturman
• Lou Perez
There will be a brief intermission between the All-Star Comedy Lineup and Kurt Metzger’s Headliner Set.
9:30pm - Kurt Metzger Headliner Set
Doors at 9pm, show at 9:30pm.
General admission to the Kurt Metzger Headliner Set ($30)! Only $45 when purchased as a bundle with the All-Star Comedy Lineup.
June 10
10am - 5pm (Saturday Daytime)
On Day Three we go to war. Featuring the leading critics of the global US empire and the security state, on this day the festival grants a platform to the most serious critiques of the interventions by the United States government into other countries and into our private lives.
10am - Panel Discussion
"Ukraine and a New World Order”
Max Blumenthal & Aaron Maté & Michael Tracey & Clint Russell& Sam Husseini & Thaddeus Russell
12pm - Panel Discussion
"Can the Arts Be Saved?”
Compact magazine’s managing editor Geoff Shullenberger discusses the current state of art, literature, theater, and film with four Compact contributors: artist and art critic Adam Lehrer, literary critic Valerie Stivers, playwright Matthew Gasda, and poet Emmalea Russo.
2pm - Panel Discussion
"Biological Warfare and the Origins of Covid”
Sam Husseini & Thaddeus Russell
3pm—The Perfume Nationalist Live Podcast
In the first live recording of The Perfume Nationalist podcast, Jack Mason interviews Adam Lehrer, Compact magazine columnist and host of the System of Systems podcast, about the work of William Burroughs and David Cronenberg.
6:30pm - 11pm (Saturday Night)
In the evening of Day Three we convene in the Rivoli for a screening of “the most controversial film of the year,” The UnRedacted, followed by a no-holds-barred panel discussion with the filmmaker and our leading dissident journalists.
6:30pm - The UnRedacted Screening
Under its original title Jihad Rehab, this film premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival, won the audience award at the Warsaw Film Festival, was slated to win the Vanguard Award at the San Francisco Documentary Film Festival, and received glowing reviews in the mainstream press, with many critics praising the film’s “humanizing” portrayal of former Islamic jihadis. Then it was canceled. Following a campaign to identify the film as “Islamophobic,” the heads of the Sundance Film Festival formally apologized for screening the film, South By Southwest canceled its screening, as did the San Francisco Documentary Film Festival, which also withdrew the Vanguard Award. The film still has not found a distributor and cannot be seen except at special screenings.
Following the screening of “the most controversial documentary film of the year,” Meg Smaker will be joined by panelists to discuss what UnRedacted teaches us about the War on Terror and what the career of the film tells us about the state of free inquiry in today’s culture.
8:30pm - Panel Discussion
"Who Won The War On Terror?”
Meg Smaker & Max Blumenthal & Aaron Maté & Michael Tracey & Clint Russell & Thaddeus Russell
June 11
10am - 4pm (Sunday Daytime)
We center the final day of the festival around the greatest work of art to ever be canceled. Once considered to be one of the very best films ever made, Gone With The Wind is no longer shown in theaters—except in the Rivoli Theater at Icarus Fest. Jack Mason of The Perfume Nationalist podcast will join Thaddeus Russell and the audience in an examination of the aesthetic and cultural quality of the film but also about what its message and taboo status tell us about the value of art in our world.
10am - Gone With The Wind Screening, Part 1
12pm - Gone With The Wind Screening, Part 2
2pm - Panel Discussion
"Gone With The Wind”
Jack Mason & Thaddeus Russell