“The Northshire Bookstore, in quaint Manchester Center, Vt., has all the classic trappings: exposed beams, wood tables stacked with hardcover bestsellers, comfortable leather chairs nestled into alcoves.” It also has a print-on-demand Espresso Book Machine, a first for an independent bookstore in the U.S. If its experiment is successful, “it will show how small brick-and-mortar bookshops might be able to match the overwhelming variety of products offered by a giant online retailer like Amazon.com.”
Author: Laura Collins Hughes
Six-Year B’way Run Of Avenue Q Will End In September
“Broadway tuner ‘Avenue Q’ will shutter in the fall after a run of six years. Comedy, in which a cast of humans and puppets play twentysomethings struggling to find their way in New York City, was one of the first of a new generation of small-scale offerings that carved out a stable foothold on a Rialto landscape more often associated with splashier fare.”
Angry Alice Hoffman Tweets Book Critic’s Phone Number
Furious about a negative Boston Globe review, novelist Alice Hoffman took to Twitter to write nasty things about the critic, whose phone number and e-mail address she gave out. “Tell her what u think of snarky critics,” she tweeted. But Hoffman “comes off like an aspiring literary gang leader, dispensing orders 140 characters at a time.” And not being all that cautious about those characters, either: She got the critic’s phone number wrong.
Western Classical Music Finds Exuberant Embrace In China
“Western classical music, banned in Chairman Mao’s Cultural Revolution of 1966-76, has exploded in popularity. Just as its government is opening economically to the West, China is emerging as an international power in classical music. Millions study the piano and string instruments, and many of the world’s most popular classical soloists are Chinese….”
Did Atlanta Symphony Bid Dreams Adieu With Calatrava?
“The costs and complexities of big-name architecture have fueled a revulsion against architectural spectacles in today’s miserable economy — including the engineering acrobatics Calatrava is famous for. Spectacle, in great boulevards and grand buildings, is one of the great pleasures of city living. Still ASO’s leadership looks wise for recognizing that the times are simply not right for Calatrava’s design.”
John Lahr Sues Elaine Stritch, Alleging Nonpayment
“Actress Elaine Stritch, known for her caustic personality, gravelly voice and her Emmy-winning turn as Alec Baldwin’s mother in ’30 Rock’ on TV, failed to pay writer John Lahr for his work on her hit 2002 Broadway show, according to a lawsuit Lahr filed last week.” New Yorker magazine drama critic Lahr was billed as having “constructed” the show, “Elaine Stritch at Liberty.”
In LA, One Stella Adler School Squares Off Against Another
“Why are two schools that were founded by the same person — and that teach the same acting technique — competing with each other? Leaders at both said that simple economics plays an important role. In a city bursting with aspiring actors, there’s money to be made for a school with an aggressive agenda.”
46 Nations Pledge Better Effort To Return Nazi-Looted Art
“After a Prague meeting on Holocaust-era assets, delegates will tomorrow endorse a non-binding accord, promising to conduct more provenance research on art in public collections, to open public archives and to ensure that claimants have access to ‘just and fair’ solutions and speedy consideration of their claims.”
Night Café Battle Spotlights A Different Kind Of Looting
Van Gogh’s “The Night Café,” from 1888, “is posing an intricate question in international law. It’s the subject of a suit and countersuit in U.S. courts between the descendant of a former owner and Yale University Art Gallery. … So whose is it? That turns on the legitimacy of the Bolshevik government and its acts: a matter for international lawyers.”
House Okays NEA, NEH Funding Increase (Next Up: Senate)
“The House of Representatives today approved $170-million budgets for the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities in 2010: a 9.7% increase for each over their current $155 million. … The issue now: the Senate Appropriations Committee’s budget proposal for the cultural agencies calls for $161.3 million each….”