Reacting to a scene partner’s body language and expressions is an integral part of learning how to act. Zoom, clearly, isn’t optimal in that department. But … students were finding ways to make the most of it.” In particular, the app “encourages acting students to be more nuanced, more private and more intimate.” – The New York Times
Author: Matthew Westphal
What Classic Plague Lit Tells Us About COVID — And About Its Aftermath
“The primary lesson of plague literature, from Thucydides onwards, is how predictably humans respond to such crises. Over millennia, there has been a consistent pattern to behaviour during epidemics: the hoarding, the panicking, the fear, the blaming, the superstition, the selfishness, the surprising heroism, the fixation with the numbers of the reported dead, the boredom during quarantine.” – The Guardian
Idled Professional Dancers Start Making TikTok Videos
“Since its release in 2017, TikTok has become a wildly popular global platform for dance, especially among teens, with tools that make it easy to film yourself dancing to music, integrate special effects and share the results. … In recent weeks, the app has attracted a small but growing contingent of professional dancers in their 20s and 30s, who … are tapping into its joys and questioning how TikTok might shape the future of their field.” – The New York Times
Furloughed Met Opera Musicians Worry About Making It Through The Pandemic Shutdown
“The performers … feel abandoned by the Met. … The sense of drift has been compounded by what musicians call a lack of communication and leadership from the Met’s management. Music director Yannick Nézet-Séguin has sent the group hopeful video messages, but updates from [general manager Peter] Gelb and the house’s human resources department have been practically nonexistent.” – Van
Steppenwolf Announces New Online Productions As It Cancels Stage Plays Until October
The offerings, open only to subscribers, include a “virtual reading” of a new adaptation of Chekhov’s Seagull (available May 14-27); a radio-play version of Arthur Miller’s The American Clock, directed by Austin Pendleton and featuring John Malkovich, Joan Allen, and Laurie Metcalf (June); and Tarell Alvin McCraney’s In the Red and Brown Water, directed by Tina Landau (July). – Chicago Tribune
Germano Celant, Curator Who Launched Italy’s Arte Povera Movement, Dead Of COVID At 79
“In 1967,[he] wrote a lasting page in art history when, as a 27-year-old curator in Genoa, he mounted an exhibition of five young Italian artists making provisional assemblages of humble materials, which he grouped under the term Arte Povera (‘poor art’). These artists, including Alghiero Boetti, Jannis Kounellis and Luciano Fabro, bridled against the conventions of the Italian academies (and American Pop art), and made a virtue of simple everyday objects: melted wax, rusting iron, fallen leaves, ground coffee, even horses munching hay.” – The New York Times
PA Governor Freezes All State Arts Grants For Rest Of Year
“Facing his own burgeoning budget problems, Gov. Tom Wolf has directed some state agencies to rescind grant money previously awarded to arts groups. The decision surfaced Monday when numerous cultural organizations received an email from [the] executive director of the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts … [saying that] “the PCA can no longer guarantee completion of processing for current year grant awards.” – The Philadelphia Inquirer
Beijing Reopens Forbidden City, Museums, Parks
“The Forbidden City, past home to China’s emperors, is allowing just 5,000 visitors daily, down from 80,000. And parks are allowing people to visit at 30% of the usual capacity. … Large-scale group activities remain on hold and visitors must book tickets in advance online.” – AP
This Theatre Festival Moved Itself Online Without Cancellations Or Posting Old Shows
Kate Craddock, founder and director of the Gateshead International Festival of Theatre in northeastern England, “is keen to point out this isn’t just about taking a stash of pre-recorded work and sticking it online. Rather it’s a ticketed and carefully curated festival [May 1-3] that aims to connect audiences and artists from across the globe in real-time theatrical encounters, one-on-one experiences, workshops and panel discussions. There’s even a virtual cocktail lounge for small talk and martinis.” – The Stage
‘Car Talk’ For Word Nerds
“The hosts [of the radio show A Way with Words], Martha Barnette and Grant Barrett, are the Click and Clack of word talk. Barnette is a writer who has studied Latin and Greek (her books include A Garden of Words), and Barrett is a linguist and lexicographer with an ear for contemporary slang. They make a perfect duo. The show is modelled after Car Talk, though it is broadcast from San Diego, not Cambridge: the hosts laugh a lot, and when people call in they answer by saying, ‘You have a way with words,’ which is always nice to hear.” – The New Yorker