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PEOPLE

NY Singers Remember A Beloved NY Vocal Coach, Killed Last Month

She had a gift for unusual metaphors that made her teachings stick. In the bedroom of her 17th-floor apartment in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, where she gave lessons almost every day deep into her 80s, she would ask her students to build theaters inside their heads. - The New York Times

And Just Who Is Joe Kahn, The New York Times’ New Top Editor?

For one thing, he's the first executive editor who may be wealthier than the paper's owners. (He is heir to a large retailing fortune.) And, finds profiler Shawn McCreesh (former assistant to Maureen Dowd), Kahn is erudite, disciplined, and very, very earnest. - New York Magazine

Actor Robert Morse Dead At 90

He first gained fame in the Broadway and film versions of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. That show won him his first Tony; his second was for Tru, his one-hander about Truman Capote. His major late-career success was as the venerable advertising guru in Mad Men. - Variety

The Secret Racial Identity Of Merle Oberon, One Of Hollywood’s Golden-Age Stars

The story spread by publicists: she was born in Tasmania and moved to India as a young girl. In fact, she was born in Bombay and raised in Calcutta; her father was English and her mother (who later traveled with her, passed off as a maid) was half-Sri Lankan-half-Maori. - BBC

Michel Bouquet, One Of France’s Most Revered Actors, Dead At 96

"Bouquet appeared in nearly 120 film and television roles" — he was a favorite of filmmakers Claude Chabrol and François Truffaut — "even as he remained active on the Paris stage, taking parts well into retirement age — he starred in a production of Molière's Tartuffe at 92." - MSN (The Washington Post)

The New York Times Names Its Next Top Editor

Joseph F. Kahn, currently managing editor (the number-two position in the newsroom), and previously Beijing bureau chief and then international editor, will succeed Dean Baquet as executive editor this summer.  (Kahn is the oldest son of Leo Kahn, co-founder of the Staples office supply store chain.) - The New York Times

Composer Harrison Birtwistle, 87

Birtwistle's work was widely championed by many notable conductors, including Daniel Barenboim, Simon Rattle, Christoph von Dohnányi and Oliver Knussen, as well as soloists like violinist Christian Tetzlaff (who premiered his Violin Concerto in 2011) and pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard. - NPR

Pianist Radu Lupu, 76

Lupu had retired from public performances in 2019, after several years of canceling many engagements due to poor health, and had not recorded since the mid-1990s. - NPR

Ann Hutchinson Guest, 103, Specialist In Dance Notation

Hutchinson Guest was knowledgeable about a number of dance notation systems, which seek to preserve choreography as its creators intended rather than relying on memory or film. But she was particularly devoted to the one introduced by Rudolf Laban, which is now known as Labanotation. - The New York Times

Merle Oberon’s Big Secret

In racist Hollywood, Oberon kept her Sinhalese and Maori heritage quiet. "Oberon's mother Charlotte Selby, who had darker skin, followed her as her maid." - BBC

How LA Shaped Amanda Gorman As A Writer

"The first event I went to was at the L.A. Times headquarters. I was so blown away. They had journalists there, and honestly, it was like Writers Disneyland. And the Festival of Books? I went for the first time when I was 8 … and it was like one of the best days.” - Los Angeles Times

Marvin Chomsky, Who Directed Two Of The Most Important TV Miniseries In History, Dead At 92

His specialty was history-based television dramas such as Attica, Inside the Third Reich, Peter the Great, The Deliberate Stranger (about serial killer Ted Bundy), and the landmarks Roots and Holocaust. - The New York Times

Putin Impersonator And Kim Jong-Un Impersonator Help Zelensky Impersonator Escape Ukraine

The Ukrainian president has remained in Kiev, but for Umid Isabaev, the entertainer who looks like Zelensky (and played his body double on Servant of the People), Ukraine was not safe once the Russian military invaded. So two of Isabaev's colleagues (it's a small profession) intervened. - MSN (The Washington Post)

Dr. William G Hamilton, Who Pioneered Dance Medicine, Dead At 90

"Ballet dancers may be the 'athletes of God,' as Albert Einstein supposedly said. But until Dr. Hamilton came along" as New York City Ballet's resident orthopedic surgeon, "they were treated more like ethereal beings than physical bodies that could crack, tear and otherwise fall apart." - The New York Times

A Group Of Napoleon’s Personal Effects, Stolen Years Ago, Were Found On eBay

The items — portraits of Napoleon and Josephine, locks of the emperor's hair, and his inkwell set — were stolen from a historic house museum in far southeastern Australia in 2014. Earlier this year, a Melbourne art dealer discovered the Josephine portrait listed on eBay for A$250. - Hyperallergic

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