“A glance at the balance sheet for the year to date would cement the view that the blockbuster is in rude health. … Dig a little deeper though and the foundations that blockbusters are built on start to look shaky.”
Author: Matthew Westphal
There’s A New Kind Of Booing From Britain’s Opera Audiences, And It’s Good, Says Covent Garden’s Music Director
The custom has made its way to the opera house from, of all places, Christmas pantomimes – and Antonio Pappano is all for it. (After all, that Pinkerton is a terrible cad.)
Patti LuPone On Her Career: ‘I Was My Biggest Enemy!’
“Because I don’t hold back. Because I have a Sicilian temper. Because I count to 10 – and 10 isn’t enough. I should probably count to 100 and then walk around the block.’ But if I did that, I’d still come back and blow my top.” Even so, as she reveals to Karen Heller, Patti’s ego is intact.
It *Is* Possible To Have Too Much Passion For Your Work
“Employees who treat their work as a calling risk burnout and discouragement, and are at risks of abandoning their profession, according to a [new research] paper.” (The study didn’t involve arts workers, though: it used employees at animal shelters.)
Is This Medieval Statue Of King David At The Met A Forgery?
Last week, the New York Post published news of a possible scandal: a 12th-century head of King David, said to be originally from the portal of Notre-Dame de Paris, may be a 20th-century fake. And, writes Noah Charney in his examination of the story, “there is a backstory that has even identified a potential forger, and it involves a former Monuments Man, James Rorimer, … [who had been] the curator for medieval art at the Met.”
Russia Bans Image Of Putin In Drag, So Of Course It’s Now All Over The Internet
“The picture is cited on the Russian justice ministry’s list of banned ‘extremist’ materials – a list that is 4,074 entries long. No 4,071 states that the poster, depicting Putin with painted eyes and lips, implies ‘the supposed nonstandard sexual orientation of the president of the Russian Federation’.” Consequently, folks are having a field day on social media …
Watching Tiny Dancers Try Out For New York City Ballet’s School
The Times‘s Daily 360 team pays visits to the free community auditions that the School of American Ballet offers six- to ten-year-olds in five neighborhoods around New York. (video)
First Edition Of ‘Crime And Punishment’ Turns Up In $17 Box Of Used Books
An anonymous woman in northwestern England purchased an auction lot of old secondhand books for £14. When she finally had time to go through the contents, she found the 1886 edition of the Dostoevsky novel, the first published in English. She has now made a 96,300% profit.
Micro-Theatre Is The Hot New Thing All Over The Spanish-Speaking World
It all started with the Micro Teatro Por Dinero in Madrid in 2009: ten-minute plays performed in very close quarters at three euros a ticket. (It was the start of the financial crisis.) “[Now] the Micro Teatro Por Dinero franchise has been sold to venues in 15 different cities around the globe, including Buenos Aires, Mexico City, Lima, Lebanon, even Miami.”
Alison Bechdel Named Vermont’s Cartoonist Laureate
Yes, Vermont has such a post, and the author of Fun Home and Dykes to Watch Out For is actually the third to hold it. (Her predecessor, whose work you might recognize from the illustration at left, was New Yorker cartoonist Edward Koren.)