The Defenders provides Netflix with a unique case study. Instead of merely allowing it to find out if someone who likes, say, House of Cards also will like Daredevil (yes, BTW), it tells them which of the people who landed on Daredevilbecause of House of Cards will make the jump to The Defenders.
Author: Douglas McLennan
A Tiny Town In Arkansas Has A Plan To Thrive – Using The Arts
A $70 million infusion is key to the project: The money comes from a combination of donors, including Murphy Oil Corporation, the Arkansas Economic Development Commission and the Walton Family Foundation. The first phase of the initiative, the $54 million, six-block Murphy Arts District in downtown El Dorado, is making its debut on Sept. 27. The district’s five-day opening celebration will have performances by artists like Brad Paisley, Smokey Robinson, Ludacris and the hip-hop trio Migos.
Report: NY Cultural Institutions Are Disproportionately White
“The information reflects findings in a study last year that city officials called “troubling”: While 67 percent of New York City residents identify as people of color, only 38 percent of employees at cultural organizations describe themselves that way.”
Studios, Networks Negotiate On Releasing On-Demand Movies While They’re In Theatres (Maybe Not)
Apple could also eventually join Netflix and Amazon as a threat, but for now, the studios have cast the Cupertino colossus as a PVOD savior. Accelerating the window on movie transactions doesn’t have the importance of, say, iPhone 8, for Apple, but it’s not a trivial matter, either. Coming days after the company made clear its intent to spend $1 billion on original programming, premium VOD would provide just the kind of boost Apple needs to follow through on CEO Tim Cook’s pledge to double the size of the services business in which its content-related efforts are house by 2020.
Thomas Meehan, 88, Wrote Annie, The Producers, Hairspray
He is the only creative to have written the books for three shows that ran more than 2,000 performances on Broadway: the aforementioned Annie (2,377 performances), The Producers in 2001 alongside Mel Brooks (2,502 performances), and Hairspray in 2002, which he wrote with the late Mark O’Donnell (2,642 performances). He earned Tonys for all three shows.
Sometimes When Your Editor Yells At You, He’s Entirely Right (No Matter How Much It Hurts)
Thomas Ricks labored over his new book, making it just so. When he was done, his editor hated the result, and harshly told him so. In completely rewriting it, Ricks discovered not only that his editor was right but that he could produce something much better…
Ai Weiwei To Build Fences Across New York City
The exhibition uses fences as a way to explore immigration, boundaries and the ongoing refugee crisis. Ai, who lived in New York in the 1980s when he was a student, says it is “a love letter to the city and its people”. The outdoor show will include large-scale site-specific sculptures as well as photography to be presented in more than 300 spots, both public and privately owned, across the city
The Time Miles Davis Drag-Raced With Herbie Hancock
“We both get to the stoplight at Sixth Avenue. It’s like 2, 3 o’clock in the morning. I knew what was going to happen: As soon as the light turns green, we’d floored it, right! So we drove several blocks before the next red light. I got to the light shortly before Miles, and I smoked Marlboros in those days. I grabbed one, lit it, rolled down the window as Miles drives up.”
Could A Woman Be The Next Director Of The Met Museum? If So, Who?
“Just as I would love to see a woman president, I would love to see a woman director at the Met, and there are women who are ready to step into the role,” says Geri Thomas, the president of the firm Art Staffing, which has worked with museums including the Met.
Village Voice To Quit Print Publication
The Village Voice was founded in 1955 by Dan Wolf, Ed Fancher and Norman Mailer, and for decades it sold a weekly version thick with classified ads. Its mix of political and cultural coverage created a model for alternative weeklies around the country, many of which have since folded. In 1996, facing competition from publications like Time Out New York and The New York Press, it changed to free distribution to boost circulation numbers, but gradually it came to rely on ads for sex and escort services for revenue. Under its current ownership, the paper eliminated sex advertising and increased its print distribution to 120,000 copies.