For a supposedly capitalist industry, what the heck? A study found that "America’s film industry is the country’s least diverse business sector and that its systemic anti-Black biases cost it at least $10 billion in annual revenue. Black content is undervalued, underdistributed and underfunded, the analysis found. It also found that Black talent has been systematically shut out of creator,...
A dubious proposition, but a possible one: "If numbers or data or statistics can provide any ounce of entertainment, there’s no better time than the present." (If you're a betting person, bet on Nomadland to take it all.) - The Hollywood Reporter
Broadcast TV ratings have been declining for years, and this ceremony will be no different - and won't mean anything about the actual movies involved. "I have long thought that the thing the Oscars needs most is one of those old Christmas special sets, with the cool living room sofa, the baby grand and that front door through which...
Ready to read? The shortlist for the international prize, which is for a book translated into English in Britain and Ireland, features a couple of authors who write in French. The list includes science fiction, memoir, and more. Chair of the judges for the shortlist, Lucy Hughes-Hallett, said, "This is a fantastically vigorous and vital aspect of the way...
Embrace the absurdity: "Look, things are going to get weird. There was a small fire within the first 15 minutes of the Emmys. (It started as a bit, but then a slightly panicked Jennifer Aniston could not put out the flames with an extinguisher.) In the closing moments at the MTV Video Music Awards, the Black Eyed Peas wore pants...
A biographer says of Natalie Barney and her wealthy, artistic circle: "They were destined, if you like, to break away. I think of modernism as this break from old ways of writing, old ways of seeing, and old ways of being. Of course, to be lesbian or to be gay, you have to break away because look at the...
Laurie Anderson: "It’s very interesting ... that a lot of that early work in electronics was done by women. Some of them wanted to do nothing less than change the way people listened, which is telling. They wanted to think about how sound could recalibrate our body and mind." - The Guardian (UK)
One says, "It's kind of simpatico with Fern's story . My husband died, and we don't have kids, so I just sold everything and just thought that I would travel for a bit, and fell in love with it." And, just like Fern, she says, "I can't see me living a different way now." - BBC
What the directors say, including clips about how to make a dramatic scene more dramatic with whispers - and how to cast a "good guy" to make a point in a scene about a not very good guy at all. - The New York Times
Charles McNulty on the Bard in 2021: "Shakespeare’s characters keep drawing us back because we want to understand them more fully. They leave us with an impression of unfinished business. Just as no one in our lives can be fully known, so the figures in his plays reveal only so much about what they think, feel and believe." -...
Who dominates in the (hoped-for, perhaps arriving) after-COVID era will affect theatre, music, dance, and other performing arts. Psychology professor Laurie Santos: "The pandemic has taught us that there are negotiable things that we can subtract from our schedules, ... and some of those subtractions feel good." - The Atlantic
The litigation after the artist's death in 2018 has been extensive, but perhaps the fees were quite a bit more extensive than they should have been. "The attorney general’s office filed papers in Knox County Probate Court this week demanding that the executor of Indiana’s estate, James W. Brannan, a Maine lawyer, put back into the estate nearly half...
It was both arduous and oddly pleasant for the dancers, used to touring - and to playing for packed houses; only 10 percent of the theatre can be sold in this case (but the ballets are available to stream online). "Jose Sebastian, one of the eight dancers performing Lovette’s 'La Follia Variations,' said the experience of living and rehearsing...
And then DSO vice-president Erik Rönmark posted the letter to social media (with the patron's, or former patron's, name redacted). Response on social media was strong. The CEO of a tech company wrote: "You just won yourself a new patron at the $125 level. My company ... would like to sponsor 4 new patrons at this same level, preferably...
