Kirk Douglas, Jonathan Demme, Anjelica Huston and Quentin Tarantino will be among the presenters at the inaugural Governors Awards Nov. 14.

This is the first year the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has broken out presentations of the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award, being given to producer John Calley, and Honorary Awards to actress Lauren Bacall, producer-director Roger Corman and cinematographer Gordon Willis.

An estimated 600 guests are expected at the Hollywood & Highland Center, also home of the Kodak Theatre where the Oscars are handed out, for the event. The black-tie dinner event will include film clips as well as remarks from the honorees, their colleagues and admirers.

A new seated reading series will kick off Monday with "Joyride," a new screenplay by Jeff Monahan and produced by Robert Skwaryk. It is based on the Jack Ketchum novel.

The reading, free and open to the public, will start at 7 p.m. Monday in the party room of the Original Fish Market restaurant in the Westin Convention Center Hotel, Downtown. Cocktails will be from 6 to 7 p.m.

The cast for the reading of the R-rated material, about a couple who plan the "perfect" murder and the inquisitive stranger on the fringes, includes Monahan along with Angelo Bruni, David Dietz, Joanna Lowe, Nancy Mimless, Scott Nunnally, April Ohms, Lora Oxenreiter, Marty Schiff, Bob Scott, Jaime Slavinsky and John Yost.

Members of Carnegie Screenwriters and Julie Mink of Women in Film and Media are presenting the reading series.

-- Barbara Vancheri,

PG movie editor

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