The FOX Television network launches the new year’s programming schedule with a powerful new drama about the head of a music empire whose three sons and ex-wife all battle for his throne.

Simply titled “Empire” and with a storyline reminiscent of King Lear, this new series is a hip-hop Shakespearean drama.

The network’s publicity team is putting a lot of effort into promoting a series with a primarily African-American cast.

Given the musical theme, it’s the kind of show that lends itself to clever marketing, emphasizing the potential gold to be mined from hit songs.

Speaking of gold, a surprise package arrived in the mail during the holidays. A faux-gold record surrounded by miniature album covers inside a frame carried a plaque with a personalized inscription that noted that I was the recipient of this commemorative item for the “Empire” premiere.

Mind you, this unique gift holds no sway over a dedicated reviewer. Only the first episode of “Empire” has been made available for review, and I would say the jury is still out.

In fact, I am too easily distracted by the onslaught of the midseason’s new shows and conceivably may not even get around to viewing the second episode.

Yet, “Empire” has some good things going for it.

For one, Terrence Howard, in the central role, is a compelling actor. If you’ve seen him in “Hustle & Flow,” you get the idea.

Here, he’s Lucious Lyon, the CEO of Empire Entertainment, a former street thug who started out as a drug dealer to finance his artistic talent as a rap star before becoming a record mogul.

Though charismatic and crafty, Lucious is not a particularly likable guy. After all, he let his then-wife Cookie (Taraji P. Henson) take the rap, and a 17-year prison stint, for selling drugs to finance his musical career.

Now, she’s out of the joint and is not about to be pushed aside from the family’s lucrative musical empire.

Diagnosed with an incurable disease that will have him incapacitated in a matter of three years, Lucious puts the King Lear element into gear by having his three sons compete to take over his crowning achievement, without destroying his already fractured family.

Oldest son Andre (Trai Byers), college-educated and possessed of a brilliant business mind, is the current chief financial of the company, and would seem the natural heir to the family empire.

Andre is assisted by his manipulative and like-minded wife Rhonda (Kaitlin Doubleday). But Andre lacks the charisma that Lucious believes is crucial to running the company.

Meanwhile, Lucious’s favorite is his youngest son Hakeem (Byshere Gray), a gifted musician and a spoiled playboy who values fame over hard work.

Given his frivolous temperament, Hakeem would seem to be most unlikely heir to the throne. But his artistic mood is most in sync with that of his father.

The middle son Jamal (Jussie Smollett) is a sensitive soul and musical prodigy who, unlike Hakeem, shies away from the spotlight.

Jamal also happens to be gay, which infuriates and embarrasses his homophobic father. Flashback scenes to Lucious’ cruel treatment of Jamal’s effeminate behavior are unsettling.

In the first episode, Cookie reasserts her position in the family business in a grand way. Part of her gambit appears to be a thorn in the side of her ex-husband, who has taken up a very attractive younger woman, Anika Gibbons (newcomer Grace Gealey), who also fills the position of head talent scout for Empire Entertainment.

The obvious play for Cookie is to persuade Jamal to break out of his shell and take a more active role in advancing his career with musical gigs to be seen by more than a handful of close friends. Certainly, Lucious has done nothing to help Jamal capitalize on his enormous talent.

For now, at least in the first episode, Lucious remains firmly in control of Empire Entertainment, relying on the sage advice and support of his longtime friend and chairman of the board, Vernon Turner (Malik Yoba).

But Cookie is a force of nature that Vernon and the other board members will find challenging.

“Empire” is an emotional chess game that threatens to tear the Lyon family apart. In that sense, the series could be a hip-hop version of “Dynasty,” set to a number of songs that fit the show’s themes.

The original soundtrack is written and produced by legendary artist Timbaland.

FOX is taking a big gamble on “Empire,” the type of show that, like “Power,” to cite just one example, may be better-suited for cable, where more audacious programs tend to thrive.

On the flip side, “Empire” is a series that would be most unlikely to appear on CBS, a network that skews to the older demographic.

Then again, if “Empire” catches on, I will have to decide if my personalized framed gold record could take up a more visible position than resting inside a closet stuffed with other relics of entertainment memorabilia.

Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.

Billy Collins, who lives in New York, is one of our country’s most admired poets, and this snapshot of a winter day is reminiscent of those great Chinese poems that on the virtue of their clarity and precision have survived for a couple of thousand years.

His most recent book of poetry is Aimless Love: New and Selected Poems, (Random House, 2013).

Winter

A little heat in the iron radiator,
the dog breathing at the foot of the bed,

and the windows shut tight,
encrusted with hexagons of frost.

I can barely hear the geese
complaining in the vast sky,

flying over the living and the dead,
schools and prisons, and the whitened fields.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation ( www.poetryfoundation.org ), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright 2014 by Billy Collins, “Winter,” (Poetry East, No. 82, 2014).  Poem reprinted by permission of Billy Collins and the publisher. Introduction copyright 2015 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction's author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. They do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.

LAKEPORT, Calif. – Bill Noteman and the Rockets will be featured at the Soper Reese Theatre's “Third Friday Live” series in January.

The group will perform beginning at 7 p.m. Jan 16 at the theater, located at 275 S. Main St. in Lakeport.

Bill Noteman and the Rockets features “Mojo” Larry Platz on guitars, David Neft on keyboards, Dave Falco on base, Steve DuBois on drums and Bill Noteman on vocals and harmonica.

This group has been burning up the stages of Northern California for more than 20 years with its high energy blend of Chicago blues and West Coast jump rock and roll.

“Raw expressive vocals, searing harmonica, sizzling guitar and cooking keys dipped in the sauce of a smoldering rhythm section,” is how one critic described this high energy group.

All seats for “Third Friday Live” are $10 each. The dance floor will be open.

Tickets are available online at www.SoperReeseTheatre.com ; at the theatre box office, 275 S. Main St. on Fridays from 10:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.

Tickets also are available at The Travel Center, 1265 S. Main, Lakeport, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday.

LAKEPORT, Calif. – The Soper Reese Theatre presents a new series in classical music, one concert for each of the first four months of 2015.

Entitled La Voce del Vento (Voice of the Wind), the chamber series features woodwind instruments as the centerpiece of each program.

The first concert takes place on Sunday, Jan. 11, at 3 p.m.

“La Voce del Vento chamber players intend to open the performance horizon to make woodwind instruments available to audiences in a close and intimate setting,” explained Ann Hubbard, who originated the concept of this woodwinds chamber group in 1982. “I’m pleased to make the Soper Reese Theatre the new home for these performances and delighted that the voices of the woodwinds can be heard and appreciated.”

The program for Jan. 11 is a Beethoven quintet fur klavier und blaser in Eb major, op. 16 and a Mozart quintet fur oboe, klarinette, horn, fagott und klavier in E major, KV 452.

Performing will be Beth Aiken, oboe; Nick Biondo, clarinet; Ann Hubbard, bassoon; Randy Masselink, horn with special guest Aaron Ames, piano.

Aaron Ames was raised in Ukiah and is currently teaching at the James C. Harper School for Performing Arts in Lenoir, North Carolina.

He received his master’s degree in music performance in 2010 from Appalachian State University, and was invited to join Pi Kappa Lambda, the musician’s academic honors society.

Beth Aiken resides in Kelseyville and is the principal oboist with the Lake County Symphony, Ukiah Symphony and Symphony of the Redwoods. She earned her bachelor of arts degree in music at Humboldt State University and has been teaching in public schools since 1984.

Nick Biondo currently performs with Symphony of the Redwoods, the Ukiah Symphony Orchestra, the Ukiah Saxophone Quartet and “The Funky Dozen” rock/funk band. As an inaugural member, he has been playing for 34 years with the Lake County Symphony.

Ann Hubbard resides in Lucerne and is principal bassoonist with the Lake County Symphony, Symphony of the Redwoods and the Ukiah Symphony. She attended the Juilliard School and Curtis Institute of Music, and was a founding member of Midsummer Mozart Festival Orchestra in San Francisco.

The concept of the La Voce del Vento chamber series in Lake County was initiated by Hubbard.

Randy Masselink studied horn with Neil Sanders, former principal horn of the London Philharmonic and with Dale Clevenger, former principal horn of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. He played with orchestras in Italy and Switzerland for 16 years and is now teaching music in the Healdsburg School District.

Tickets are on sale now for each concert at $20 and $15 levels. Persons 18 years of age and under are admitted free. All seats are reserved.

A $10 series discount is available if tickets to each of the four concerts are purchased by Jan. 11.

Concerts that follow the Jan. 11 performance will take place on Feb. 15, March 1 and April 12.

Tickets are available online at www.soperreesetheatre.com or at the theater box office, 275 S. Main St., Lakeport from 10:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., or at The Travel Center, 1265 S. Main St., Lakeport, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday.

For more information call 707-263-0577.

INTO THE WOODS (Rated PG)

Having spent some of my formative years living in New York City, where I had the opportunity with my family to enjoy many splendid Broadway shows, I have an indelible aversion to retooling grand musicals into Hollywood movies.

The results are never, in my mind, as good as the original stage productions.

Case in point, for me at least, is that “Chicago,” now billed as the longest-running American musical on Broadway, was turned into a successful movie, winning the Oscar for best picture and five other categories, including best supporting actress for Catherine Zeta-Jones. Still, far and away, the stage version is superior in so many ways.

Now roughly 27 years after its Broadway debut, the Stephen Sondheim musical “Into the Woods” has been trimmed down in scope and ambition for a movie version in which Meryl Streep is a standout as the Witch, while British actors James Corden and Emily Blunt steal the show as the Baker and his wife.

I saw the Broadway musical during its original run on Broadway, fondly remembering the many great songs and expert staging, which are practically staples in Sondheim’s vast repertoire, and though the finite details are hazy now so many years later, I still prefer the stage version.

This is not to say that “Into the Woods” is somehow shabby or deficient in a significant way in its transition to the big screen.

Sondheim fanatics may have a different take, but for me the movie version does relative justice to its progenitor.

Oddly enough, though, too much singing on the big screen doesn’t work quite as well as on the stage.

More dialogue and fewer or shorter songs would make “Into the Woods” more palatable.

But then, our two main characters, the Baker and his wife, don’t seem to have much to say to each other, as they struggle through keeping their bakery in business and being terrorized by the Witch, who harbors a grudge against the Baker’s father for having stolen magic beans from her garden.

The Witch has cursed the Baker and his wife, making it impossible for them to conceive a child unless they go on a three-day scavenger hunt to come up with a cape red as blood, a cow white as milk, a slipper pure as gold and hair yellow as corn. So this is how four fairy tales from the Brothers Grimm are woven into one musical story.

While the Baker and his wife must venture into the mythical woods to complete their shopping list, fairy tale stories are realized in parallel times.

First of all, Little Red Riding Hood (Lilla Crawford), a precocious child with a penchant for pinching the Baker’s best pastries, wears the desired red cape.

Johnny Depp has a brief appearance as the Big Bad Wolf, and his leering, lecherous encounter with Little Red Riding Hood in the treacherous woods is somewhat unsettling for family-friendly entertainment, though one is easily convinced that younger kids won’t pick up on the Wolf’s sexually predatory nature.

Meanwhile, young Jack (Daniel Huttlestone) has been sent by his suffering mother (Tracey Ullman) to sell their cow, Milky White, in the local village.

Instead, he trades his bovine friend to the Baker for magic beans. And voilà, Jack becomes the legend of Jack and the Beanstalk. Well, you know the rest of this story.

Cinderella (Anna Kendrick) is introduced in the most familiar manner, laboring as an overworked servant for her evil stepmother (Christine Baranski) and wretched stepsisters (Tammy Blanchard and Lucy Punch).

But this time, Cinderella gets to flee Prince Charming’s castle not once, but three times, causing the Prince (Chris Pine) great frustration as he dashes through the forest, even breaking out in song at one point.

Locked away in a tower in the forest is Rapunzel (Mackenzie Mauzy), the golden-haired beauty who has been isolated from the world by the evil Witch, who had kidnapped her at an early age as revenge for the transgressions of the Baker’s father. Yes, Rapunzel is the Baker’s long-lost sibling.

And yet, Rapunzel barely figures into the story, aside from occasional visits from a lovesick Prince (Billy Magnusson) and the fact that precious strands of her golden hair are required by the Baker to complete the scavenger hunt package.

“Into the Woods” is seemingly an odd choice for a Disney picture, because the Sondheim musical undermines the traditional notions of fairy tale stories, leading to a far darker emotional response for an audience when pondering the bleaker material on offer.

Another strange thing to happen is that the story reaches a satisfactory resolution, after the Baker and his wife complete their mission, and the viewer thinks the credits are about to roll.

But no, the story carries on for a purpose that seems not completely necessary.

Aside from the borderline pedophile behavior of Johnny Depp’s Big Bad Wolf towards Little Red Riding Hood, the PG-rated “Into the Woods” is suitable family entertainment, though I would hazard a guess that children are unlikely to have much interest in a film with dark tones and an excess of musical numbers. The same might even be said for a fair number of adults.

Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.

KELSEYVILLE, Calif. – Start the New Year fiddling around at the Ely Stage Stop.

The Old Time Fiddlers Association continues its monthly First Sunday Fiddlers’ Jam sessions hosted by the Ely Stage Stop and Country Museum on Sunday, Jan. 4.

Fiddlers will meet in the Ely barn to perform their wonderful Americana music.

Donations benefit both the Ely Stage Stop, helping to fund a blacksmith shop that volunteers will soon be building, and the Old Time Fiddlers Association, who uses it to partially fund their scholarship programs.

The fun begins at the museum at 11 a.m.

Enjoy the old-timey holiday decorations still on display in the house and in the barn. Take this opportunity to purchase selected pieces of French beading/bead weaving on display from Ellen’s Beaded Designs.

Musicians will play from noon through 2 p.m.

There will be raffles and information about an upcoming contra dance planned for early spring.

This is a free, family friendly event for all to enjoy, so bring young and old alike.

Enjoy the music with hot beverages and tasty treats. Bring your own wine and sip it in Ely Stage Stop wine glasses that will be available for purchase. Clap your hands, tap your toes or get up and dance.

The stage stop is located at 9921 Soda Bay Road (Highway 281) in Kelseyville (near Clear Lake Riviera, just north of Highway 29-Kit's Corner).

Current hours of operation are 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. each Saturday and Sunday.

Fiddlers’ Jams occur the first Sunday of every month.

Visit www.elystagestop.com or www.lakecountyhistory.org , check out the stage stop on Facebook at www.facebook.com/elystagestop or call the museum at 707-533-9990.