A Disney Nature featurette and preview has been released of “Bears,” a movie filmed at Hallo Bay Bear Camp and in Katmai National Park. Disney specifically requested Homer naturalist Simyra Taback-Hlebechuk of Hallo Bay to be the lead guide in the film. 

Much of the brown bear footage seen from the preview was filmed on location in the summer of 2012 on the coast of Katmai National Park and at Hallo Bay Bear Camp by British wildlife cinematographers Gavin Thurston, Warwick Sloss and Sophie Darlington. 

The Kenai Peninsula State Fair isn’t just about the annual three-day event that draws a crowd of thousands every August. 

For instance, on March 29 there was a sell-out crowd of hundreds at the fair’s annual Celebrity Waiter Dinner with music by the Grammy winning musical group Beau Soleil and Michael Doucet of New Orleans. The dates will be announced soon for a summer of rodeo events. And on April 20-21, the Fiber Arts Festival will be held in the fair’s Chinook Bay Building from 10 a.m.-4 p.m.

With youth art shows at the Homer Council on the Arts, the Pratt Museum and Paul Banks Elementary School, April First Friday is all about the kids. The annual Jubilee art shows open at HCOA and the Pratt, and once again Paul Banks features its Art Extravaganza. Artist Gail Baker has been doing an artist’s residency at Paul Banks, inspiring students to create space-themed masks in association with the school’s read-a-thon.

Pier One Theatre holds auditions for the play “Up” from 6 to 9 p.m. Saturday and 4 to 7 p.m. Sunday at the Mariner Theatre. Written by Bridget Carpenter, the play is loosely based on the life of Larry Walters, the “Lawnchair Guy,” who tied 42 helium-filled weather balloons to his lawn chair in San Pedro, Calif., in July, 1982 and soared to 15,000 feet before popping a few balloons with his BB gun.