The musicians say that, in contract negotiations, management has rejected any cost-of-living increases in pay. (Their salaries have been flat for the past four years.) The company’s season begins on Halloween with the world premiere of The Many Deaths of Laila Starr by composer Kamala Sankaram and librettist Minita Gandhi. - Minnesota Public Radio
The biggest driver of the BBC crisis is the cut in real-terms funding for its national, regional and local UK services. These are the services that largely account for licence payers’ willingness to pay the fee. The reduction in the real-terms funding of these services has been building up since 2010. - The Conversation
It is not yet clear what specific circumstances or events in the region contributed to the cancellation, which reportedly occurred without the input of the biennale’s curator, Noor Ahmed, according to the Pakistani newspaper Dawn’s cultural imprint, Images. - Hyperallergic
Well, so says librettist Royce Vavrek. The subject matter — Abraham Lincoln grieving his young son Willie, who is stuck in the place between death and rebirth — would seem grim. So Vavrek and composer Missy Mazzoli took care to include humor and even joy. - AP
The sudden onset of war shuttered commercial galleries in central Tehran, cancelled scheduled solo exhibitions, severed shipping channels and destroyed the fragile domestic market that allows creators to pay rent and sustain studio practices. - The Guardian
In an expected development, shareholders for both Fox Corp. and Roku voted to approve Fox’s $22 billion acquisition of the streaming-video platform company. - Variety
Actor Alan Mandell, who died at 98, helped shape Los Angeles theater as a performer, director, administrator and arts supporter whose influence stretched from experimental stages to the Mark Taper Forum. - Los Angeles Times
The management of Chichester Festival Theatre said in a statement, “We were deeply shocked that a member of the company of A Midsummer Night’s Dream was the victim of an appallingly abusive attack, aggressively hounded and physically pursued through the centre of Chichester, ... prior to the performance on Tuesday 13 October.” - WhatsOnStage (UK)
the stylistic choice to write in lowercase is a dead horse that’s been beaten, flogged, and beaten again—what my generation calls ran through. and yet, it’s having a moment. i had to investigate. - Wired
Former Trump attorney Alina Habba told the president that another one of his top advisers — former Kennedy Center leader Ric Grenell — failed to deposit a multimillion-dollar donation that her billionaire husband made to the center a year ago. - Axios
Rosalía left audiences in awe with her Saturday Night Live performance of “Reliquia” over the weekend, appearing to stand en pointe for nearly four minutes while singing. But ballet professionals aren’t convinced she pulled off the feat without some theatrical assistance. And, surprisingly, they don’t seem to mind. - Consequence
If a station’s broadcast license is owned by a public entity, including a state university, then government officials ultimately have power over the station. With the right having made public radio a political target, and with culture wars getting ever hotter, more officials have started using that power to interfere. - Columbia Journalism Review
The steps, known in Chinese as the “flash step”, “prodigal kicking the ball” and “black bear shaking fur,” took off from videos by professional dance instructors, and some people who are picking them up online (rather than in a class) are injuring themselves. - South China Morning Post (Hong Kong)
Other Desert Cities starring Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Ed Harris, and Allison Janney grossed $2.1 million in its first week, behind only long-running juggernauts Hamilton, Harry Potter and Lion King. Other hits include Billy Crystal’s 360, A Few Good Men starring Bradley Whitford and Tom Blyth, and Bowen Yang’s turn in Oh, Mary! - The Hollywood Reporter
Le Large is part of the Pointe des Arts, a €450 million cultural development (there are also a cinema, a hotel, and other amenities) on Île Seguin in the affluent inner suburb of Boulogne-Billancourt. - ARTnews
