In its second week on the streaming platform, the disaster movie has recorded 152,290,000 hours streamed between Dec. 27 and Jan 2, putting it right at the top of its leaderboard of globally viewed English-language films. - Variety
Yes, it's ultimately because of Alexander the Great, but not directly. Among the unusual facts about this story is that many Greeks in ancient India adopted Buddhism and that Indian Greeks were the first to depict Siddhartha Gautama in human form. - Psyche
Local 171 of the American Federation of Musicians, representing 71 SSO musicians, had offered to forgo the settlement if board members would instead resign and the money go toward putting on a 2022 concert season. - MassLive
"(He) overcame an impoverished background in the Bahamas … to rise to the top of his profession at a time when prominent roles for Black actors were rare. … At the same time, as the lone Black leading man in 1960s Hollywood, he came under tremendous scrutiny." - CNN
The building in Virginia Beach is aging, not particularly attractive, difficult to find, and very leaky; not for the first time, there's serious talk of moving. (But the main alternative is the city's Visitor Center, which is in the median of I-264.) - The Virginian-Pilot (Norfolk)
"I have had a great run with a company full of people I respect and admire. And I am ready to try something new. I also understand that 4 hosts leaving in a year – three of them POC women – is a red flag." - MSN (Los Angeles Times)
Colorado Public Radio and KOSU in Stillwater, Okla. are taking part in the first two pilot projects of the new venture, in (respectively) water use/scarcity and the economics of Native American communities. More than 20 other public radio stations have expressed interest. - Current
The company has agreed to pay C$10 million in compensation to former students who say that longtime instructor Bruce Monk manipulated them into posing for nude and/or sexualized photographs, which he then distributed. (The RWB fired Monk in 2015.) - CBC
While public consultation on the scheme is still in progress, the plan is for roughly 2,000 visual artists and performers to receive, for an initial three-year-period, an (anticipated) hourly rate of €10.50 ($12), paid weekly, for them to do their creative work. - BBC
"(He) was part of the vanguard of New Hollywood filmmakers who helped reinvigorate American cinema, gaining wide popularity with 1970s movies such as The Last Picture Show, What's Up, Doc? and Paper Moon before suffering a string of personal and professional calamities." - MSN (The Washington Post)
Travel sections in bookshops have been reduced to “three feet of guidebooks and celebrity jaunts”. Meanwhile, travel books struggle to make the literary review sections of papers. - The Critic
The newly opened archives show that, although 1971’s winner Pablo Neruda was praised by the prize-givers for “a poetry that with the action of an elemental force brings alive a continent’s destiny and dreams”, behind the scenes some members of the Swedish Academy were hesitant. - The Guardian
In March of 2021, the painting, which had been up for sale in Madrid and priced at a measly $1,800, was pulled from its auction after researchers determined that there was sufficient evidence to label The Crowning of Thorns as having been made by Caravaggio. - The Observer
As the price of metals has soared worldwide, people have taken to stealing streetlight wiring, plumbing valves, catalytic converters and fire hydrants. But the pilfering of sculptures for a quick buck has brought the crime to a new level of audacity and waste. - Los Angeles Times
Numerous recent studies show that exposure to nature and natural light can reduce pain, and that even a brief contact with the outdoors reduces stress. - Wired
