“‘We can’t become anaesthetised and think, ‘Oh, he won [the election]. There’s nothing we can do,” said [Edu] Krieger, who has written songs for some of Brazil’s most celebrated female voices. ‘At least through our music we can pester them a bit and make some noise. This is the most efficient kind of resistance we can mount right now … We can’t just passively accept the kind of situation they are trying to impose.'” – The Guardian
Best TV Of The Decade? Try Best Types Of TV
“I know readers only have time anymore to read lists, but bear with me. Here are the best kinds of shows we watched over the past 10 years. Many of them belong to more than one category — a sign of their greatness.” – Washington Post
Audible And Publishers May Soon Reach A Deal About Those ‘Captions’
Remember when this lawsuit started, and we discovered that Audible was transcribing every word that its readers – who were, presumably, usually, reading the book word for word – read aloud, in other words, recreating the entire book through “captions”? Settlement may come as early as January 13. (Meanwhile, Audible – that is, Amazon – defends its right to do just this recreation of the book with its own service.) – Publishers Weekly
Puppetry Can Do A Lot More Than Look Good On Stage Or Screen [VIDEO]
Indeed, it can help trauma victims and survivors start to heal. – BBC
Sue Lyon, Who Starred In ‘Lolita’ When She Was 14, Has Died At 73
Lyon went on acting until 1980, but – as is the case with many child stars – “she receded from acting and turned away from public life in her later years.” – Los Angeles Times
Barack Obama Releases The List Of His Favorite Books Of 2019
As usual, it’s “an eclectic mix of fiction and nonfiction,” and the former president included the collected works of Toni Morrison, who died in August. – Los Angeles Times
Broadway Remembers Jerry Herman
Everyone from Harvey Fierstein to Chita Rivera has something to say about the man who deeply understood his craft. Betty Buckley, who played Dolly Levi in the 2018-19 national revival tour of Hello, Dolly!, said, “The lesson for me in doing the show — and I owe him a debt of appreciation — was that joy is a choice. It’s not something you wait to happen to you. You choose it, and you work really hard to sustain that commitment.” – The New York Times
Vampires Are ‘So Over’ Right Now, But Their Return May Be Imminent
They’re so early 2010s, basically. But culture is cyclical, or so it appears in tastemakers’ plans, and – according to a vampire literature scholar – “updated versions of these monsters cycle in when we don’t know how to confront something as a society or when we need to find a metaphor to help us understand a situation.” – HuffPost
The French Government Has Offered Concessions To The Paris Opera Dancers Who Have Been On Strike
The massive strike, in its 24th day and spread throughout the country, went viral last week when dancers and the orchestra performed selections from Swan Lake in front of the Paris Opèra. “The special retirement plan for the Paris Opera, which allows dancers to bow out at age 42, was introduced in 1698 by king Louis XIV — making it among the oldest in France.” – France24
Kelly Fraser, Singer Who Gained Fame For An Inuit-Language Cover Of A Rihanna Song, Has Died At 26
Fraser “wrote or translated songs into Inuktitut, an Inuit language, [and] a key aim was to ‘use pop music as a platform to strengthen her language,'” her producer said. “She also wanted to make the music as accessible to as many people as possible, he said, so she mixed English and Inuktitut in her recordings and blended traditional Inuit sounds and themes with contemporary pop.” – Seattle Times (AP)
A Powerful Professional Organization For Writers Seems To Be Imploding
Or is it self-immolating? In any case, when the RWA suspended writer Courtney Milan, who had spent years on its ethics committee and pushing for more inclusion and equity, for calling a book “a racist mess,” a boulder of anger, past racist treatment, secret committees, and a board exodus started rolling down the RWA’s hill of money and influence. Will the organization – 40 years old and at the forefront of a billion dollar industry – survive? (For more, here’s a complete timeline of what’s been happening.) – Houston Chronicle
Lee Mendelson, Producer Of The Charlie Brown Christmas Special, Has Died At 86
Of course he did many other things in a long life of TV producing – many of them Peanuts-focused – but “A Charlie Brown Christmas” was one of the first and biggest and certainly, along with his lyrics for “Christmas Time Is Here,” Mendelson’s most enduring contribution to Christmas in the United States. He died on Christmas Day. – Washington Post
How Many ‘Goya’ Paintings Were By His Studio, Not His Own Hand?
And, of course, in a larger sense, does it matter? Well, it matters for the money, of course. “Juliet Wilson-Bareau, a Goya scholar, told the Observer that museums must re-examine their Goya holdings because there are so many ‘problematic’ pictures. She regularly sees auction houses and dealers selling works under Goya’s name when she is convinced that they are by lesser hands.” – The Observer (UK)
Cats Is No Longer In Awards Contention, According To Universal
The rest of the world already knew that, but now it’s official. – Los Angeles Times