"Both (Benjamín Labatut's) When We Cease to Understand the World and (Danielle Dutton's) Margaret The First blur their relationship with historical fact, shifting between essayistic writing and vivid flights of imagination, ... (a) delicate balancing act. Both also, interestingly, explore questions of philosophical and scientific truth." - Literary Hub
"Amid war with Russia, the city’s challenge is to integrate tens of thousands of residents displaced from fighting in eastern Ukraine without sacrificing Lviv's aesthetics or derailing its efforts to become a sustainable, livable European city." - The New York Times
Theaters are finding workers harder to hire, and inflation is hitting costs. Perhaps most chilling, supply-chain issues are foreshadowing shortages behind the concession stand, a crucial profit driver for theaters. - The Wall Street Journal
After the English subtitles for Squid Game attracted a lot of criticism, "improving the quality of translated content has become a priority for streamers increasingly tapping into their international resources for the next big hit. It's a process that generally unfolds over the course of five steps." - Vulture
The licensing company that controls the name and image of “The King” is ordering Sin City chapel operators to stop using Elvis in themed ceremonies, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported on Monday. - Seattle Times
"Amid financial troubles and changing times, the venue's new corporate owner is ditching most of the Lido's staff and its high-kicking, high-glamour dance shows — which date back decades and inspired copycats from Las Vegas to Beirut — in favor of more modest musical revues." - AP
The players have their moves; the half-time dance team is a troupe of grannies; the ushers and umpires dance; the first-base coach is a professional hip-hop dancer. The Bananas, a fave on TikTok with 2.5 million followers, are the rare collegiate baseball team with a national following. - The New York Times
"Her controlled, carefully evolving, global visibility has been one of the great demonstrations of durational performance art. It is a feat ... made possible by the Queen's powers of concentration, stamina and presence of mind. She has become a Marina Abramović for the ages." - The Art Newspaper
Cinemark's Movie Club ($10 monthly for one movie) has 1 million active members, and AMC's Stubs A-List ($19.95 a month for 3 movies a week) has nearly that many. Regal Unlimited offers unlimited movies starting at $18 per month. Here's a Q&A with Cinemark's CEO about the program. - Yahoo! (Los Angeles Times)
"Robert Mark Kamen was through with The Karate Kid, his semi-autobiographical 1984 martial arts film that spawned a string of movies, an animated program and the hit Netflix series Cobra Kai, until he saw Hadestown in 2019." And so ... - The New York Times
"It is almost five years since President Emmanuel Macron announced his revolutionary plan to return African heritage to the continent. … But following Macron's historic declaration, the French government’s position on the restitution of cultural property is 'confused'." - The Art Newspaper
Last week, Jean-Luc Martinez, ousted as the museum's director last year, was indicted for complicity with the trafficking of stolen Egyptian antiquities purchased by the Louvre Abu Dhabi. Now the Louvre "has decided to bring a civil action before the jurisdiction in charge," though it's not saying against whom. - Artnet
Around 6,000 years ago, the first standardised units were deployed in river valley civilisations such as ancient Egypt, where the cubit was defined by the length of the human arm, from elbow to the tip of the middle finger, and used to measure out the dimensions of the pyramids. - The Guardian
Maybe we rubberneck over disasters because we are bored by our relatively cushy safety. Or maybe we can’t avoid the threats as they creep up on us, which only encourages more distraction. - The Daily Beast
