"The Iranian film director Mohammad Rasoulof has secretly fled Iran after he was sentenced to prison amid pressure over his latest film, The Seed of the Sacred Fig, which is due to premiere at the Cannes film festival this week." - The Guardian
"Some actors avoid playing objectionable people, concerned about being pigeonholed into villainhood, or that in the audience’s impressionable minds, their character’s likability might blur with their own. … Paulson said those kinds of thoughts haven’t occurred to her." - The New York Times
"For clearly one of the hardest workers in show business with one of the longest resumes I've ever seen, it's hard to believe that rejection is still ever-present for Leguizamo. ‘They were never going to pick me — no matter how talented I was,’ he said.” So he’s going it on his own. - Salon
Her macular degeneration might keep her from “reading” the old-fashioned way, but she still loves books of every sort. "I love being surrounded by books — they’re snapshots of the past: first-night gifts, holidays abroad, memories of lost friends and loved ones." - The New York Times
Corman “specialized in fast-paced, low-budget genre movies — horror, action, science fiction, even some family fare — and his company became a work-in-training ground for a wide variety of major talents.” - Variety
It’s still “newsworthy that a veteran artist — one who’s still working steadily as a stage actress and is increasingly one of the go-to directors of the Black theater canon — took on rebuilding a fine arts college.” - Washington Post
What did make Beethoven stand out from the crowd was his personification of the Romantic revolution, which coincided more or less with his lifetime. In the popular imagination, Beethoven was the quintessential romantic hero. - History Today
The 78-year-old filmmaker/artist/author's car was struck near Baltimore by a driver running a red light. "Since it hurts when I laugh," he said in a statement, "I will have no witty answer about being in a car accident that no one has said was my fault." - The Baltimore Banner
Earlier this year, the judge in the case delivered a default judgment in favor of the plaintiff because Spacey's attorneys failed to submit their defense documents on time. An appellate justice overruled that judgment, stating that Spacey should not be penalized because of his lawyers' mistakes. - Reuters
Arriving at the all-time peak of American hegemony in world art, Stella was the poster prodigy of a new breed of artists: post-bohemian, university-trained, professional from the get-go. - The New Yorker
It's not clear that the toxins (which likely came from wine, food, and ointments) were enough to kill the composer, but they were certainly enough to explain his severe, chronic gastrointestinal problems and, most likely, his deafness. - The New York Times
"Budding filmmakers like Charles Burnett, Julie Dash and Haile Gerima eschewed polished scripts and linear narratives in search of an authentic Black cinematic language. They relied on actors like Mrs. Jones, drawn from far outside the mainstream, to bring their work to life." - The New York Times
"Bethesda Fountain was one of the first major commissioned works by a female artist . And it was built to commemorate fresh water that was brought into the city for the first time. It always takes my breath away." - The New York Times
"He died just days before the May 1 streaming debut of the series Shardlake, on Disney+, an adaptation of his novels starring Arthur Hughes in the title role and Sean Bean as Cromwell.” - The New York Times
"Stella was a dominant figure in postwar American art, a restless, relentless innovator whose explorations of color and form made him an outsize presence, endlessly discussed and constantly on exhibit." - The New York Times
