South African playwright Athol Fugard is one of those rare artists who is credited with having effected true change on his entire country, through his plays that many feel helped to bring an end to the brutal apartheid system. But “postapartheid South Africa has disillusioned Fugard… His country, he says, is in denial about its problems, busy ‘blaming the past while taking no responsibility for the present.'”
Author: sbergman
50 Years Of Sharks And Jets
Leonard Bernstein’s timeless musical classic,West Side Story, is 50 this year. “It wasn’t just a flashy composer’s triumph: the great strength of West Side Story lay in its totality: a show where all the artistic elements blended to produce something that Broadway audiences genuinely couldn’t classify… West Side Story worked because it was a team effort – and because the team successfully deflected Bernstein’s highbrow inclinations.”
What Do Westerns Tell Us About Today’s America?
The Western is hot again in Hollywood, and there may be more to that fact than the cyclical nature of the movie business. Some of the new breed are the same as the old breed – simple stories stripped of the complications of modern life so as to tell pure tales of the human condition. But other new Westerns are seemingly using the form “as an allegory to comment on the existential anxieties facing America today.”
The Purists Are Not Going To Like This
Your average 20-something may not be able to tell you who Sergei Prokofiev was, but if Gabriel Prokofiev, the grandson of the composer and the man behind a London label called Nonclassical, has anything to say about it, they’ll know soon enough. Prokofiev “is bucking the downward trend by returning classical music to its populist roots. Which means moody sleeve designs instead of laborious liner notes and live events where you can get pissed and talk over the crap bits, trading ideas – as Mozart once borrowed from folk – with dance music. From anyone else, this… might look contrived, but Prokofiev is a uniquely credible broker.”
Hollywood Tries Some Viral Marketing
So, there’s this movie. You might have seen the trailer – there’s a party, somebody named Rob, and then the Statue of Liberty’s head comes flying down the street while hysterical New Yorkers scream and run for cover. It’s called… actually, it’s not called anything yet, and it doesn’t star anyone you’re likely to have heard of, and they’re all sworn to secrecy about the content of the movie. So why are so many people talking about it?
Fitting In, Against The Grain
When a city hires a superstar architect to design a major new urban building in its midst these days, you generally expect to see a structure that stands out from everything around it. So it’s a bit surprising to look at Robert Adam’s new building on London’s Piccadilly Circus, and note that the most remarkable thing about it is just how well it fits into its surroundings.
On A Mission From God (And Hollywood)
Hollywood may be a favorite target of many conservative Christians, but that hasn’t stopped the movie industry from openly soliciting the support of pastors and preachers across the country for certain films. You might expect this type of targeted marketing for, say, The Passion of the Christ, but honestly, what are religious folk doing endorsing Nacho Libre and Spider-Man?
What Else Should Be Banned From Hollywood?
So Disney’s decided to ban smoking in all its future films? Good idea, says Mark Caro, but honestly, why stop there? What about a ban on hotshot action stars firing their guns while pointlessly holding them sideways? Or a ban on any pratfall involving a pool? Or a ban on, say, Lindsay Lohan?
Defending Spano
When Atlanta critic Pierre Ruhe wrote last week that Atlanta Symphony music director Robert Spano seemed to have dropped off the list of up-and-coming conductors likely to land a very high-profile directorship, it stirred up plenty of opinions among his readers. Some called the piece “character assassination,” while others wondered why a conductor dedicating himself fully to a great orchestra in Atlanta instead of chasing an overrated gig in New York would not be celebrated for his dedication.
Who Will Run The Met?
Phillippe de Montebello has been the director of New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art for 30 years now, and he is a giant among giants in the art world. But he is also 71, and not in the best health, and the question of who might succeed him at the Met looms large in the New York scene.