Douglas McLennan
Doug is the editor of ArtsJournal
Netflix’s ‘Selena’ Disrespected The Singer And The Latinx Staff, Writers Say
The story of Selena Quintanilla is quintessentially American - so why did Netflix order it as a Latin American original with a tiny budget...
Juilliard Students Lead Music, Dance-Filled Protests Over Tuition Hikes
After a planned protest in one of the school's buildings, the students "were barred from the Diamond building, and the school told them that...
The Formerly Hidden Histories Of Africans In England
English Heritage commissioned six portraits to emphasize the history - including Roman emperor Septimius Severus, who ordered the strengthening of Hadrian's Wall while on...
How Historical Fiction Became Literary Again
For decades, the literary world disdained historical fiction. "It has been seen as its own fusty fashion, relentlessly uncontemporary and easy to caricature, filled...
What Hollywood Could Learn From The ‘Kim’s Convenience’ Scandal
The sitcom's actors took to social media to say more about the series' abrupt end - and the series itself. Their posts "threw into...
The New Yorker Union Is Prepared To Strike
The writers, contributors, and freelance editorial workers are prepared to produce a strike issue - or a Labor Peace issue. It all depends on...
Brandon Taylor On Escaping The ‘Hermetic Severity’ Of His Booker-Nominated First Novel
Taylor's Real Life hit many "best of" lists for 2020, and a collection of loosely linked short stories comes out this month. "My most...
A Much, Much Larger Georgia O’Keeffe Museum Is On Its Way
The collection certainly demands a change: "The current facility, which opened in 1997, originally housed a collection of 40 O’Keeffe paintings. The museum had...
Riz Ahmed Wants Far More, And Far Better, Muslim Rep In Hollywood
And it's not just Hollywood. In recent USC study, the researchers "combed through 200 popular films from the U.S., the U.K., Australia and New...
Theatre Workers With Long Covid Worry About A Return To Work
Theatre working conditions often aren't ideal for anyone, much less people whose bodies and minds have been harmed by the virus. "Theatre artists and...
Kids Was An Amazing Film – That Ruined Its Subjects’ Lives
When Kids came out in 1995, it won awards, had incredible box-office success for a film so raunchy, and essentially took the film world...
How The Pandemic Has Changed Our Brains
It's been ... a lot. "It is a generation-defining cataclysm, but for many of us the day-to-day reality has been lonely, even dull. It...
Keeping It Real – And Dreamy Too
To make In the Heights work as a movie, the playwright and scriptwriter Quiera Alegría Hudes had to make painful cuts, and so did...
HBO Max Walks A Tightrope Of Media Rights
Success in streaming, as Netflix has shown, ultimately requires reaching subscribers in every corner of the planet. But taking a streaming service around the...
How Binary Thinking Constricts Design
The ways that each culture defines gender norms and structures are unique. Historically, the U.S. enforced a rigid gender binary to support its relentless...
Why Has Philosophy Failed?
For almost any abstract notion, some philosopher has wondered what it really is. Yet, despite this wealth of questions and the centuries spent tackling...
Behind The Debate On Critical Race Theory
“The debate isn’t about whether there’s been racism; it’s about what racism has meant and what it’s done to America. Is it something that’s...
Carlos Acosta Calls For Ballet That Reflects Now
"I don’t want to keep riding with own Swan Lake or The Nutcracker – that’s fine, I love them, that made my career...
The Private Detective Who Has Recovered Half A Billion Dollars Worth Of Art
Christopher Marinello spends his life tracking stolen masterpieces. "I get a huge amount of tips, usually on WhatsApp. ... Sometimes they are from informants...
Ross Douthat Sees Mediocrity Everywhere, Laments Paucity Of “Great Thinkers”
"My own favoured explanation, in The Decadent Society, is adapted from the American sociologist Robert Nisbet’s arguments about how cultural golden ages hold traditional...
What It’s Like To Play The Violin Of Violins
The Sala Paganiniana, where Il Cannone resides inside the Palazzo Tursi, is monitored by scientists, experts, and bodyguards. The instrument is played monthly by...
Young Vic Says “Theatre Has Changed Forever” And Will Livestream Its Work
Kwame Kwei-Armah told the Guardian the pandemic had changed theatre forever, with the livestreaming of plays becoming “hard baked” into how the industry operates....
Discovered: When Tennessee Williams Wrote A Fan Letter To Eugene O’Neill
“An impassioned letter from Tennessee Williams to Eugene O’Neill is an astonishing find in the world of American drama studies. Just when it seems...
In Kashmir, Sufi Music Was For Men Only. These Young Women Are Keeping It...
"For centuries, the tradition was passed down from one man to another. But sisters Irfana and Rihana Yousuf began to play with support from...
NYC To Launch $25 Million Artist Corps Program To Hire 1,500 Artists
"We're going to hire artists, musicians, performers, and they're going to be out in communities doing public art, public performances, pop-up shows…creating murals, you...