“[Tax credits are] bad economics, they don’t make a film better (at times I think they actually make them worse, since trying to make one location look like another is never as impressive as just going to the place the movie is set), and they’re a misuse of public funds, especially during this seemingly unending recession.”
Author: Matthew Westphal
Bankruptcy Judge OKs New Philadelphia Orchestra Contract
“Even though its new four-year labor contract with musicians will compel the Philadelphia Orchestra Association to raise $5.9 million more than it had anticipated, the association Wednesday sought approval of the pact from U.S. bankruptcy court. Hearing no objections, Judge Eric L. Frank said he would approve the deal.”
Here’s A Challenging Job: Updating The Lonely Planet Guide To Libya
A writer for the travel book franchise recounts her experiences working through the Revolution.
At The Kabul Museum
“It is difficult not to write about the Kabul Museum as a lament, and perhaps it was ever thus. The single white marble door on your left as you enter probably comes from the Kabul bazaar, burnt by the British in 1842 … [and the] museum bears the scars of the rocket that hit it in the spring of 1993. … And yet it is not a depressing place.”
Why Didn’t Occupy Wall Street Appear In 2008? Status-Quo Bias
“It is extremely difficult for most of us to believe that our political or economic system is inherently corrupt,” says NYU psychologist John Jost. “Because of our immense psychological capacity to justify and rationalize the status quo, human societies are very slow to fix system-level injustices and to enact substantive changes.”
The Effect Effect: Rendering Cognitive Phenomena Into Catchphrases And Spreading Them Around
Confirmation bias. The framing effect. The sunk-cost fallacy. “Let’s call it the effect effect: Reduce whatever you’re talking about to a single, italicized phrase, so much the better for tapping into a network of TED talks and Radiolab broadcasts, and then repeat, repeat, repeat.”
Dancing About Painting (It’s A Tricky Business)
“One thing you won’t see in Darshan Singh Bhuller’s ballet about Caravaggio is the act of painting. ‘One afternoon during rehearsals we tried to recreate the act of painting on stage,’ he tells me. ‘We all fell about laughing’.”
Sex, Suicide, And Conspiracies: How To Make Hit Films About Writers
“Unlike with biopics about athletes, musicians, and artist, there’s no visual appeal to a writer’s craft. So you tend to end up with embellishments, falsifications, and gimmicks … The struggle to pen a classic novel may play a role in these films, but often it’s secondary to the role played by juicy romantic plot lines. That’s not necessarily a bad thing.”
Violinist Suing Over Age Discrimination Says Judge Is Too Old
“A 60-year-old Manhattan musician at the center of an age discrimination lawsuit [against Young Concert Artists] is trying to get the judge handling his case booted – because he’s too old. Violinist Martin Stoner admits he sounds like a big hypocrite for knocking 88-year-old Manhattan Federal Judge Robert Patterson as “‘slow-witted and unable to function’.”
Gertrude Stein’s Rock-Star Tour
“Crisscrossing the country for 191 days, she gave 74 lectures in 37 cities in 23 states. The visit, highly publicized at the time, is little-known now, even though, as [scholar Wanda] Corn asserts, ‘It is the trip that creates her solid, American celebrity’.”