It took a cast of 13 women and a production team spread across two continents to bring The Penelopiad, Margaret Atwood’s 2005 reimagining of The Odyssey, to life on the stage. One of the actresses has been keeping a blog of the experience, and Atwood herself has been stunned by the cooperative spirit and commitment of those involved.
Author: sbergman
Oakland Ballet (And Its Founder) Make A Comeback
“Forty-two years after founding the Oakland Ballet, 20 years after raising it to unlikely international repute, nine years after suddenly retiring, and seven years after watching his beloved creation begin a steady slide toward death, Ronn Guidi is bringing the Oakland Ballet back… The new Oakland Ballet Company will give its inaugural performance at the Paramount Theatre on Oct. 20.”
Needed: An Epitaph For The Epilogue
Could we stop with the epilogues already? Michael Schaffer says that far too many authors are tacking on pedestrian glimpses into the future of their characters that diminish the overall value of their manuscript. “The allure of the epilogue is undeniably strong, powered by the fragrant aroma of authorial omniscience and the human desire for closure… [But] nothing is sillier or more gratuitous than a glimpse into the future of people who never existed in the first place.”
85 Juergens Paintings Discovered In Chicago
Officials sorting through the belongings of an elderly woman from Chicago have discovered a treasure trove of “watercolors, sketches, and oils on canvas and wood, all by American impressionist Alfred Juergens — an unprecedented and unexpected collection with a value that would start, conservatively, in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.”
Disputed Kirchner Painting Finally Back On Display
“A garish painting of Berlin streetwalkers on the prowl, the subject of a bitter restitution case from the Nazi era, went on display at the museum that bought it for $38.1 million in frenzied bidding.” The painting, by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, was purchased by New York’s Neue Gallerie after having hung for more than two decades in a Berlin museum. In 2006, it was returned to the heirs of the family that owned it prior to World War II, and put up for auction.
The Coopting Of ComicCon
In a few short years, the annual convention known as ComicCon has gone from an obscure (if popular) gathering point for sci-fi nerds to one of Hollywood’s most important annual events. In fact, ComicCon veterans have well noted “an expanding international presence, a growing tendency of movie news to drown out that of the comics industry and an increasing social frenzy.”
And It’ll Probably Get Better Ratings Than The NHL
It’s finally happened. “Tomorrow at noon, CBS, the august home of the Masters and March Madness, will become the first broadcast network in the United States to cover a video game tournament as a sporting event.” Does this mark the first step in the full embrace of the gaming subculture by the larger culture?
When Jazz Meets The Classics
The Aspen Music Festival is celebrating the connection between classical music and jazz this summer, which is admirable, of course, but how successful have the periodic marriages between the two styles really been over the decades? “Composers… tried to imitate the syncopaÂtion and the chord structures [of jazz.] They used saxophones and drum kits. The novelty tickled some classical music listeners, but to ears familiar with real jazz a lot of it rang false.”
Bing’s Backstory
Rudolf Bing served as general manager of New York’s Metropolitan Opera for more than two decades, and built a formidable reputation along the way. But few realize that Bing almost ditched his career in opera before even getting to the Met: “In Berlin I was asked to find sopranos who would be willing to sing Isolde and God knows what else at a fee of three hundred marks a month — and I would then have to choose among some eighty screaming wretches… I hated the job with a vengeance.”
Using Preservation To Revive A Dying City
Detroit is currently embroiled in a debate over what to do with now-vacant Tiger Stadium, with preservationists facing off against those who believe that what the beleagured city really needs is a fresh start. “To follow the Tiger Stadium debate (or the drawn-out fights over the old Madison-Lenox Hotel in 2005 and the vanished Hudson’s store in the ’90s), one might think that preservation is an ugly and divisive process that pits building huggers against cold-hearted developers and city officials. In reality, preservation is bankable, realistic, widely accepted — and key to the revival of Detroit.”