Surprisingly (or not?), amateur troupes all over the U.S. have taken to this dysfunctional-family extravaganza.
What It Takes To Study Kathakali
Students of the dance-drama from the Indian state of Kerala face a regimen that even ballet dancers might find daunting.
Why Is John Goodman One of Hollywood’s Favorite Character Actors?
“I guess I’m able to tap into some undealt-with anger a lot. My innate rage.”
Another Show Cancelled Because Network Execs Think Girls Don’t Count
“‘We need boys, but we need girls right there, right one step behind the boys’ — this is the network talking — ‘one step behind the boys, not as smart as the boys, not as interesting as the boys.'”
Taking Los Angeles to Manhattan
“The perception of L.A. theater as merely an actor’s showcase (as opposed to a cultural venture) has faded.”
What Online Dating Sites Tell Us About Race In America
“Social psychologists know that what people say and what they do have little empirical connection. Dating sites capture what we do, and play it back for us. They expose who we are, who we want, and, of course, who we don’t want.”
Apollo Theatre Collapse: “I Thought the Clattering Noise Was Part of the Play”
Audience member Rachel Williams gives an eyewitness account.
Royal Ballet Plans Second Reality-TV Backstage Webcast
“Allowing cameras backstage to film classes and rehearsals, this day in the life of the company was streamed live on YouTube and the Guardian [in 2012] website to an international audience that surprised even the company.”
Why People Who Move to a Big City Are Ever More Reluctant to Leave
“A new pair of studies helps to explain why city-dwellers seem to fall deeper in love with the urban environment the longer they spend there.”
The Psychology of Santa Claus
“It’s weird, isn’t it? Parents lie to their kids about a mysterious, bearded gift-giver, only to set them up for inevitable heartbreak. Except, it’s not so simple.”
The Peculiar Grammar of Christmas Songs
Linguist Arika Okrent explains what “round yon Virgin” is about and why we “troll the ancient Yuletide carol”.
Meet Germany’s Top Contemporary Composer: He’ll Communicate Only By Fax
When David Patrick Stearns set up his interview with Wolfgang Rihm, these were the conditions he was given: “No phone calls. No e-mail. Only questions submitted (in English) by fax and returned by fax, on handwritten pages – in German.” Says Donald Nally, who’s conducting a major work of Rihm’s this weekend in Philadelphia and New York, “I envy someone living in a different century like that.”
Valery Gergiev Says That Of Course He’s Against Anti-Gay Discrimination
He even says that allegations to the contrary “hurt me very much”. And well they might, since those allegations have had his next employers a bit concerned.
From Today’s ArtsJournal Blogs 12/19/13
To Be (a charity) or Not To Be, That is the $40 Billion Question
Source: Field Notes | Published on 2013-12-20
What To Make of The Christie’s Evaluation
Source: Real Clear Arts | Published on 2013-12-20
Roof collapses in London theatre during show
Source: Slipped Disc | Published on 2013-12-19
Pina Bausch Returns to Juilliard
Source: Dancebeat | Published on 2013-12-19
Nelson Algren on Frank Lloyd Wright
Source: Straight|Up | Published on 2013-12-19
What’s The Buzz? (Swamped With Audience Data, We’re Trying To Figure Out What It All Means)
“What better way to understand your customers than to pay close attention to what they are saying publicly about you. But what’s going to have to become a crucial yet complicated sub-specialty of this corner of big data is figuring out what to do when you don’t like what they’re saying about you.”
Bankruptcy Judge Says NYC Opera Can’t Return Ticket-Buyers’ Money
“When City Opera was forced to cancel the rest of its season on Oct. 1, after its last-ditch effort to fund raise failed, customers had already purchased $323,000 worth of tickets for the canceled performances.”
Thieves Have Systematically Looted A 16th Century Library
“Our investigations found that there was a true criminal system in action. A group of people… carried out a devastating, systematic looting of the library.”
Jerry Saltz Talked About George Zimmerman’s Painting (Oops!)
“Almost instantaneously, I was attacked by progressives from the art world arguing that I should ignore Zimmerman — since ‘Silence is a weapon.’ Funny, I thought that in the art world people believe that Silence = Death.”
This Year In Publishing – Lots Of Lawyers, But Some Stability Too
“With e-book sales leveling off, and independent stores relatively stable after a long era of decline, little changed for the vast majority of people who buy or borrow books, beyond, of course, the books themselves.”
The Walker Art Center’s Good Year (Don’t Mind The Cuts)
The report emphasized several nonfinancial “measures of success,” including six Walker-organized exhibitions, a half-dozen performing arts commissions, and 41 film and video premieres. The center added 80 pieces to its permanent collection. It also sent four exhibitions to nine U.S. cities, where they were seen by more than 190,000 people.
The Appraisal Is In – Here’s What DIA’s Art Is Valued At
“Sixty-five works in the report, from post-impressionist masterpieces by Degas and Matisse to Roman and Chinese antiquities, carried high estimates of more than $1 million.”
Rethinking The Idea Of Leonard Bernstein
“There’s the Lenny problem: Is he for real or is he an act? Do we love him or do we want to kick him in the ass? Is his heart only on his sleeve, or is there another one inside him? And do those of us who grew up with him in all his avatars respond to him the same way as those coming to him for the first time, with no history and perhaps no expectations?”
Reconsidering Norman Rockwell (Again)
“Like the work of other artists once dismissed as producers of nostalgic Americana—“big paydays for small-town mush,” in the caustic phrase of Benjamin DeMott, who also mentioned Frank Capra and Thornton Wilder—Rockwell’s paintings have become more interesting over time.”
The New Kimbell Museum – First, Do No Harm
“Architecturally, the new Kimbell addition will soon fade into the middle rank of Piano’s oeuvre, neither at the top (the Nasher and Menil) nor the bottom (the Broad Contemporary Art Museum of 2003–2008 in Los Angeles and the Morgan Library & Museum of 2000–2006 in New York.) His Fort Worth pavilion is the twenty-first museum building Piano has completed, with another four in the works, and he cannot be expected to produce a hit every time.”