Tues. Feb. 13

 It's the day before Valentine's Day. So love is in the air everywhere, right? Does that include the animal kingdom? We're not sure what their holidays or rituals are - although we do know monkeys aren't particular about parnter or no partner if you catch our drift. (Astonished son to mum at the zoo: "Look, ma, look what the monkey's doing!" Mother: "Never you mind son.") So, on Tuesday Feb. 13 Jen Gresham, the Franklin Park Zoo's director of education, is giving a talk on the love lives of animals. Mating rituals, homosexuality, that thing the monkey was doing. Making this more fun: cocktails and light appetizers. Those things are free at the Back Bay Events Center, provided you pay $10 at the door. Goes from 5:30 to 8 p.m.

200 Berkeley St., 617-989-3760 franklinparkzoo.com

Mon. Feb. 12

Feel like supporting the American Repertory Theatre's Institute for Advanced Theatre Training and taking a chance on artistic goulash? The A.R.T. is staging what it calls "AParyPoMoEveningofART" at its sister theater, the Zero Arrow Theatre Monday Feb. 12 at 7:30 p.m.. Deciphering that assemblage of letters gives us the term "po-mo," shorthand for "post-modern" and we always assume that to be something that's a little out there. Could be rewarding, could be confusing, could be both. Should be risky. The ART students are presenting a montage of song, dance, adaptations and acrobatics. Tickets: $$25-$15.

2 Arrow St., Cambridge, 617-547-8300 amrep.org

Sun. Feb. 11

When Joan MacIntosh, who plays Aggripina in Jean Racine's "Britannicus" at the American Repertory Theatre, first looked at the play, she admits she was a more than a bit daunted. "It seemed like a wall of words on the page," she says. "At first, I couldn't find a way in so that I could understand the story and what was happening. I went on-line and did as much research as I could on Aggripina because her life was so extraordinary." But one of the reasons she took the play was plain and simple: "I wanted to work with (outgoing artistic director) Robert Woodruff. I've known him 35 years, never worked with him and this was an opportunity to collaborate."
Racine wrote "Britannicus" in 1669 in the days of Louix XIV. The scheming, power-mad figures of ancient Rome bore some relation to the goings on of that era, just as it does today. "We're covering three times spans," says MacIntosh. "When I'm playing the role I let all three resonate." (A large-lettered banner "EMPIRE CREATES IT'S OWN REALITY" hangs in back - Woodruff heard the words from a spokesman from the Bush administration.)"Britannicus" is a tangled web of blood ties, betrayal and murder. At the core of it, Aggripina married and killed Claudius, birthed Nero, and faces her son in a power showdown, after Nero has eliminated Britannicus' claim to the throne. When MacIntosh discusses her character and the others in the play she uses terms such as "savageness," "moroseness" and "rage." The world they inhabit? insanely vicious, evil." Her character, MacIntosh says, was "considered to be the smartest person alive, one of the reasons Claudius married her."

ongoing

This is not going to come as a huge surprise to regular readers, but we're fans of the Dixie Chicks. We were before Natalie Maines made her Bush-knockin' comment in London (2003), and we were more so afterwards as mainstream/flag-waving America turned against them. The country hadn't figured out the quagmire we were in in Iraq yet - we were still looking for those darn WMDs - and conservative country radio stations banned the band - like Natalie was pulling a John Lennon by saying the Beatles were bigger than Jesus. (Actually, we think John may have been right at that point, too, though Jesus had 20 centuries of endurance on his side.) Anyway, filmmakers Barbara Koppel and Cecilia Peck - uppity women, no doubt - followed the Chicks on a three year sojourn post-flap. They take you front and center; they take you backstage. And they show you a band with roots, guts and spunk. One that writes damn fine songs, too. "Dixie Chicks: Shut Up & Sing" is a winner. (Title: A clever knockoff of Pearl Harbour and the Explosions' "Shut Up and Dance.")  It's at the Coolidge Corner Theatre's screening room - that's the small box upstairs - at least through Feb 1. Shows at 2:15, 5:45, and 7:35 p.m. most days. Check website for particulars.  Tickets: $9.

290 Harvard St., Brookline, 617-734-2500 coolidge.org

ongoing-Feb. 28

Whoever got the idea that Harvard Film Archive was an ambitious, high-minded outfit? The kind of spot that would screen intellectual films that might not find much of an audience outside Harvard Square? Well, many of us. And some of that's true, but HFA breaks from, a bit, from form Feb. 6-28 for a series called "Poetic Horror, Pop Existentialism and Cheap Sci-Fi: Cold War Cinema 1948-1964." It's curated by one of our favorite critic's J Hoberman of the Village Voice and the eight-film series captures the tensions of post-World War II America, with films such as Irving Lerner's "City of Fear" (which starts it off Tuesday Feb. 6 at 9 p.m.),and includes "The Third Man" (Feb. 21, 7 p.m.) and "Invasion U.S.A." by Alfred E. Green, shot on a shoestring budget and centered on a lounge where a strange brandy drinking visitor in a bar questions the patrons on their thoughts about US foreign policy. And then news arrives! The west coast is being attacked! Hoberman's series is clearly meant to cover a range of thought, employing Brian Eno's dictate that there is no high or low art or culture, just art and culture. Personal note: I was pretty certain, especially after Barry Goldwater got the Republican nod for president in 1964, that we were all doomed anyway and I'd never even hit puberty. Then again, I thought I'd never travel to London when Reagan was elected, and that happened too. I still think the world will end in a massive ball of destruction, but I'm glad it's been staved off so far. I don't at all mind re-living past scares, because the scares of the past are just the scares of the future - maybe in black and white, maybe a little kitschy, but all tugging at the same human desire: survival. And the little jolt we get from being scared. Tickets: $8. Check website below for specific films and times.

24 Quincy St., Cambridge, 617-495-4700 harvard.edu/hfa