Month: April 2004

The Clear Channel Crusade Claims Two More Filthy Smut Peddlers

The increasing paranoia among broadcasters over the FCC’s threatened crackdown on “inappropriate” on-air content has led radio behemoth Clear Channel Communications to declare a no-tolerance policy on risque talk and bad language for all of its stations. Last week, that policy saw shock jock Howard Stern yanked from six Clear Channel stations, and now, two Florida DJs have lost their jobs after accidentally leaving their mics hot during a commercial break, and allowing what they thought were off-air comments of a sexual nature to go out over the air of station WKLS.

More Trouble Ahead For Howard?

Howard Stern’s problems may not end with being yanked by Clear Channel, and the New York Post’s research indicates that the self-styled King of All Media shouldn’t expect much support from his remaining affiliates. “Of 17 Stern affiliates contacted by The Post – there are now 35 altogether – only four station managers expressed unabashed support. Another is on the fence, and 12 more avoided all comment – possibly a bad omen, considering that big fines may be headed their way, too.”

The Terrorist On Broadway

“Broadway has always been an incubator of lunatic dreams, but these days, with the outrageous expense of putting on a production, and a theater marketplace ever more reliant on the credit cards of out-of-towners, a lot of the adventurousness has gone out of producing.” So for Rocco Landesman to be seriously pitching a play featuring a suicide bomber as a sympathetic character to the Broadway poobahs is, well, something of a noticable display of hubris. In fact, most of Landesman’s usual New York investors had closed the door before he even got the pitch out of his mouth.

Re-re-reconsidering Shostakovich. Again.

The debate over whether Dmitri Shostakovich was a talented but limited composer in the pocket of the Soviet leadership; or a secret dissident, hiding messages of anti-Stalinist revolt in his music, is unlikely to ever come to a satisfactory conclusion. But a new book by Solomon Volkov, whose earlier book Testimony reignited the Shostakovich debate a quarter-century ago, sheds some new light on the complicated relationship between Shostakovich and his chief antagonist (and chief sponsor,) Josef Stalin. Volkov divides the composer’s career into two periods: the brash, exploratory years before Shostakovich penned his opera “Lady Macbeth of Mtnsk,” and the cautious, paranoid period after Stalin denounced “Lady Macbeth” as an anti-Soviet muddle.

A Who’s Who Of The Forgotten and Ignored

Two Harvard scholars have launched a wide-ranging project designed to document the lives of African-Americans throughout the centuries of U.S. existence who, for one reason or another, have fallen through the historical cracks. “It is an ambitious effort to patch the spotty historical record about the men and women who, among other things, fled slavery, created art and shepherded civil rights campaigns in the shadow of giants like the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.”

Sony Pictures Buys Clarke’s Story

In a move which surprised absolutely no one with any knowledge of the modern infotainment business, Sony Pictures has purchased the film rights to the book on counterterrorism penned by Richard Clarke, who has become the largest thorn in the side of the Bush administration during the hearings on the 9/11 attacks. Sony says it envisions an “All The President’s Men”-type approach to the film version of the former counterterrorism advisor’s account of the rise of Al-Qaeda and the failure of the U.S. government to properly address the danger. Clarke’s literary agent says that nearly every major Hollywood studio called to explore the concept of a film.

Prado Gets New Autonomy

Madrid’s Prado Museum is getting more independence and flexibility in the management of its affairs. “These Spanish moves follow similar initatives in France designed to give greater autonomy to State museums: since January the Louvre has kept all revenues from ticket sales—previously 45% went to the State—and it is now entirely responsible for its exhibition policies and budgets. Previously, both of these had been managed by the government.”

Doing The Homework To Listen

Should the music critic look at a score or listen to a recording before attending a performance of a new work? Tim Mangan says yes: “Virtually any piece of serious classical music that a listener is not familiar with is ‘just an overwhelming event’ the first time he hears it. There’s so much going on that our ears can’t comprehend it in one gulp. And who knows whether, that first time we hear a piece, be it Brahms’ Third Symphony or Adams’ ‘Transmigration,’ it’s a good performance or bad?”

Considering Jack Valenti

Motion Picatura Association of America president Jack Valenti — the “5-foot, 7-inch titan who invented movie ratings, reigned as Washington’s highest-paid lobbyist and earned the unlikely nickname Boom-Boom from Robin Williams on one Oscar telecast — has finally announced his decision to step down from the job he has held for 38 years. ‘I think there won’t ever be another like him because one of the reasons why he is so credible in his advocacy for the entertainment industry is because he is so personally theatrical’.”