Reporter Marcie Sillman talks with a Labanotation expert on how she recorded a ten-minute contemporary duet and with dance historian Doug Fullington on using 19th-century Stepanov and Justement notation to reconstruct Giselle. (text and audio)
Author: Matthew Westphal
How The Writers Of ‘Better Call Saul’ Morphed Well-Meaning Lawyer Jimmy McGill Into Slimy Saul Goodman
“Multiple ideas were pitched, but only one seemed to believably get Jimmy out of the jam they had written him into while also shoving him toward his shyster destiny. Here, in interviews with [co-showrunner Peter] Gould and the episode’s writer, Gordon Smith, we dug into how the writers solved that challenge and where it left our favorite ambulance-chaser.” (video)
More Than 1,000 Protesters Disrupt Projection Of Ads Onto Sydney Opera House
With chants like “Save our sails” and “Our house is not for sale,” the crowd booed and jeered at the promotional images for a horse race that were projected onto the steep white roofs of the building. Some protesters even aimed lights at the Opera House in order to mar the display.
Why The Backlash Against The Ads On The Sydney Opera House Was So Strong
Waleed Aly: “This week happened because a deep anxiety about the health of our society was triggered. A vein was opened, but it was the build-up of ages that came gushing forth. The notion of public space is at the very heart of this.”
Big-House Grand Opera In The U.S. May Be Doomed: Terry Teachout
“Alas, it’s hard for me to see how the Met can realistically hope to reinvent itself other than by razing its superannuated theater and starting from scratch. Nor am I sanguine about the long-term prospects for, say, the Lyric Opera of Chicago, whose home is the 3,563-seat Civic Opera House and which was just shut down by an orchestra strike, or the San Francisco Opera, which performs in the 3,126-seat War Memorial Opera House. (The Vienna State Opera House, by way of comparison, has 2,220 seats.)”
42 Dutch Museums Have Discovered 170 Artworks That Were Stolen By The Nazis
A nationwide audit of 163 major collections has led to the identification of “83 paintings, 26 drawings and 13 Jewish ritual objects [as well as miscellaneous works] believed to have been taken from their owners between 1933 and 1945.”
Jersey City Is Getting A New Performing Arts Center
Located in “the sixth borough” (and the one that gets the least respect), across the Hudson from Lower Manhattan, “the Nimbus Arts Center at the Lively will feature a 150-seat black box theater, studio and rehearsal space for [Nimbus Dance Works] and [its] school, and company administrative offices. The arts facility, which is expected to open in December 2019, will reside on the ground floors of the building, with apartments above.”
2018 Stirling Prize Goes To Norman Foster’s Bloomberg HQ In London
“One of the most environmentally friendly office buildings ever conceived has been named the winner of the 2018 Stirling prize, beating off competition from a quirky brick nursery, a mud-walled cemetery and the extension of the Tate St Ives gallery.”
Commercial Theatre Is ‘Anti-Art, Anti-Theatre, Anti-Creativity, Anti-Audience,’ Says One Of London’s Top Commercial Producers
“… And so I like to think of myself as an independent producer as opposed to a commercial producer,” says Sonia Friedman, who was spoiled by her time working “in the subsidised sector” (at the National Theatre).
Will Vinton, Who Invented Modern Claymation, Dead At 70
He made a number of well-regarded animated shorts (including one Oscar winner) and one feature film (The Adventures of Mark Twain), but the project that really made his career was the California Raisins, four Motown-singin’ dried grapes whose television commercials for the California Raisin Advisory Board in the 1980s’ and ’90s became huge pop-culture hits. (Michael Jackson even called Vinton to ask if he could be a raisin.)