Cori Ellison: “In a perfect world, everybody would understand every language and every singer’s diction would be perfect, and we wouldn’t need supertitles. That is never going to happen and it never has been the case. … Also, you can read the libretto of Barber of Seville until the cows come home but it’s not going to give you the same moment-to-moment comprehension as when you’re in the theater and seeing something that is so coordinated with the translation of it.”
Author: Matthew Westphal
After Protests, Death Threats, And Knife Attack, Morocco Bans Film About Sex Workers
“The film, Much Loved, by the Moroccan filmmaker Nabil Ayouch, includes scenes of prostitutes in Marrakesh partying, speaking raunchy Arabic and servicing wealthy Saudi clients. Within few days after the May 19 premiere [at Cannes], the clips had received more than two million views on YouTube. The movie became the subject of protests outside Parliament in Rabat and of heated discussions on social networks in Morocco and France.”
Medici-Style Patronage Can Save The Arts? Don’t Be So Sure
For one thing, how interested are today’s Medici – tech moguls – in funding arts? For another, “if you go back historically, you see that arts patronage was hardly a great deal for the artist the first time around.”
Black Actor Slams American Ballet Theater’s “Jim Crow Production Of ‘Othello'”
Robert Manning Jr. wrote, in a protest letter to the company, “I hope you will sit down with me and attempt to explain to me, in person, why you believed it was a remotely good idea to not only cast Othello with a light-skinned Brazilian ballet dancer, BUT to also paint his face BROWN.”
Günther Schneider-Siemssen, 88, Met Opera’s Favorite Set Designer
“And while he embraced a variety of visual styles over the course of his career, he became best known in the United States for the unapologetically traditional sets he designed for a memorable run of operas at the Met directed by Otto Schenk, particularly from the Wagner canon. The productions, which flew in the face of the modern reinterpretations that were in vogue, proved popular with operagoers.”
Festival Un-Cancels Play By Controversial French Author
Michel Houellebecq’s “Elementary Particles “has nothing to do with Islam. But that didn’t stop [Dubrovnik] Festival organizers from removing it from the lineup when an analysis carried out by the Croatian Security and Intelligence Agency said it represented a serious security risk.” Well, they’ve changed their minds.
Dudley Williams, 76, Alvin Ailey Dancer For Four Decades
“Mr. Williams was dancing with the Martha Graham Dance Company when he was recruited by the choreographer Alvin Ailey as a last-minute replacement for an Ailey troupe member in 1963. He performed with the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater until 2005, continued to dance with Paradigm, a trio of older dancers he formed with Carmen de Lavallade and Gus Solomons Jr., and taught at the Ailey School, on West 55th Street in Manhattan, until he died.”
NY’s Park Avenue Armory Has Chosen Its Next Artistic Director
“He has led the Dutch National Opera since 1988 while also serving as artistic director of the Holland Festival in Amsterdam from 2004 until 2014. Somehow he found time to work as a critically acclaimed director, after founding London’s avant-garde Almeida Theater.”
Dust On Our Furniture, Dust On Our Minds
“Dust is everywhere. We contribute to its multiplication through our polluting industries, by wearing clothes and using things around us, and in the course of merely living – shedding skin cells, hair, and other byproducts of our life. But we also are it. Both the Bible and William Shakespeare would have us believe as much.”
Are Ballet Dancers Secretly Wild Hedonists?
It seems the Telegraph wants to dig up, or stir up, some dirt …