“I would be a total disaster, because I do love to gossip. I would be going: ‘You know that guy? I think he’s working for the Russians.’” - The Guardian (UK)
“While Mr. Brilliant never truly stopped — he kept writing lines that he emailed to friends — among the official 10,000 are these: … No. 826: ‘I have abandoned my search for truth, and am now looking for a good fantasy.’” - The New York Times
“If one had to seize on a defining quality, it was her ability to see the humanity in a variety of eccentrics and outsiders. That was true whether she was playing the absurdly pretentious Hyacinth Bucket (‘pronounced bouquet’) in TV’s Keeping Up Appearances or Mrs. Malaprop in Sheridan’s The Rivals. - The Guardian
His hugely consequential three decades as director of New York’s Museum of Modern Art ended in September. For now he has consulting gigs in Saudi Arabia and India, and he’s giving a lecture series at the Louvre under the title “I Want a Museum. I Need a Museum. I Imagine a Museum.” - Artnet
The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation has recently struck a licensing deal with Hollywood production company Galisteo Media to bring Wright’s story to the big screen as a movie. - Fast Company
Denis Raisin Dadre, 69, a recorder virtuoso and specialist in Renaissance reed instruments, founded Ensemble Doulce Mémoire in 1990 and developed an impressive array of programs in performance and on disc. His lifeless body was discovered in his apartment in Tours; drugs were found at the scene. - RTBF (Belgium) (via Google Translate)
In July, as part of a widely-reported sweep which affected high-profile critics in three other disciplines as well, the newspaper removed Green as chief theater critic. In his new position, Green will cover classical music and visual art as well as theater, writing “news and news analysis, features and multimedia pieces.” - Playbill
“Barnett wielded enormous influence in the market for political memoirs and helped to usher in the era of megadeals. He got eye-popping advances for his clients, in the seven- and eight-figure range.” - The New York Times
She was a career stage actress who took her first film role at 60 and her first lead at 94. Since then, she’s starred in two more features and will appear on Broadway next year. Where does she find the energy? “I don’t know, either. I just gird my loins and go!” - AP
As one biographical blurb put it, “Hailed by some as a cinematic genius, a feminist voice and the only true maverick of American cinema, dismissed by others as a voyeuristic, egomaniacal fraud.” But the deeply personal cinéma verité style he developed in his stream of consciousness pictures certainly had its supporters. - Variety
“There’s no big reveal. Maybe the reason people just assume that there’s some big next thing is that they can’t imagine that you would give up hosting All Things Considered unless it was to grab another shiny gold ring, because that’s kind of been my whole life.” - Vulture (MSN)
Lisa Jeanine Findley, 54, who has gone by many other names in a criminal career spattered with financial grifts, was sentenced to four years and nine months in prison, plus three years’ probation, for an attempt to foreclose on Elvis Presley’s mansion to satisfy a loan which never actually existed. - NBC News
She starred in over 100 films and television pieces, but was best known for Federico Fellini’s film 8½, Luchino Visconti’s adaptation of the historical novel The Leopard, Sergio Leone’s spaghetti western Once Upon a Time in the West, and the Hollywood films Blindfold, Don’t Make Waves, and The Professionals. - AP
Stabler, an energetic, generous, elegant writer, was part of a particularly strong era at The Oregonian, when art, architecture, music, book, theatre, and many other critics shared ideas, space, and boundless energy. - Oregon ArtsWatch
“This is significant in naming Redford’s staying power, in why he’ll have such an intelligent and meaningful legacy—all of these characters are a little too deft for their own good, and didn’t Redford know it, and play it.” - The Atlantic
