Banderas may be a Spanish speaker first, but the actor “is from Málaga, Spain, and does not identify as a person of color. There are nonwhite Spanish people, but this isn’t the case for him.” And whew. Media outlets lumping him in with Cynthia Erivo to give the Oscar acting nominees some diversity are not being accurate. (But many white Spaniards’ responses aren’t great either.) – NPR
Author: ArtsJournal2
Netflix Spent Many Millions Promoting Its Films And Got 24 Oscar Nominations – But Only Two Wins
Laura Dern won best supporting actress for her role in the Noah Baumbach Marriage Story, and Netflix also got an award for the Obamas-supported documentary American Family. “This is disappointing for Netflix, if the reportedly prodigious budget the company dedicated to its Oscars campaign—estimated to be at least $70 million—is anywhere close to what was actually spent.” Streaming does not win the day, again. – Slate
Mirella Freni, Matchless Italian Prima Donna, Has Died At 84
Freni had a “special claim on [the Italian] tradition, which valued bel canto principles of producing rich, unforced sound; of shaping even, lyrical lines across the range of a voice; and of sensitively matching sound to words.” – The New York Times
Historic Upset As Bong Joon-ho’s ‘Parasite’ Wins Four Major Awards, Including Best Picture
The Korean writer and director of the dark comedy and class parable Parasite wasn’t prepared to win best director, which he did, or for his film to win best picture, which it most certainly did. When he won best director, he said, “After winning best international feature, I thought I was done for the day and was ready to relax. … When I was young and studying cinema, there was a saying that I carved deep in my heart, which is that the most personal is the most creative. That quote is from our great Martin Scorsese.” (The other winners are also available at this link.) – Los Angeles Times
A New, Very Well-Funded Book Award For Women
The award is called The Carol Shields Prize for Fiction, named after the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Stone Diaries, and starting in 2022 will award $155,000 Canadian to a woman or non-binary author. “It is a sum that dwarfs the prize money for literary awards such as the Booker Prize (50,000 pounds, roughly $65,000), the Pulitzer Prize for fiction ($15,000) and the National Book Award ($10,000). The Nobel Prize for literature is one exception, with laureates receiving nearly $1 million. ‘We wanted to go big on it so that people paid attention.'” – The New York Times
Some Problems With The U.S. Administration’s Plan To Make Architecture Classical Again
Aside from obvious comparisons to fascist Italy, it’s just not great to take direction from a fringe group of neo-classicists, some of whom aren’t architects. Then there are the safety requirements for federal buildings, which leave little money for “classical” elements. And, as any architect knows, “classicism and modernism are not opposites; they exist on a continuum, and choosing between them is unnecessary.” – The Atlantic
Why Are One-Shot Movies Suddenly Back In Vogue?
With films like Birdman and last year’s The Body Remembers When The World Broke Open and Oscar fave 1917 edited to appear as if they’re single shots, what’s the deal? The “single-shot” movie has become much more popular in the past few years, perhaps “the technical virtuosity required of a one-shot film marks its director as an auteur. And these films feel somehow pure — compared, at least to the CGI trickery and hyperactive editing of blockbuster superhero movies.” – NPR
Learning To Dance Like Fred Astaire, Or As Close As You Can Get
That’s the quest of some dancers in American Contemporary Ballet as they try to recreate Astaire’s routines. “Although Astaire’s style — the nimble and quick footwork and weightless slides — is not technical, re-creating his dancing for the stage requires a high level of musicality and nuance” – and leaves some dancers feeling like imposters. – Los Angeles Times
Audible And The Big Publishers May Finally Have Figured Out This Caption Thing
In settling out of court, apparently, “Audible has agreed not to include the copyrighted works of seven plaintiff publishers in its ‘Captions’ program without express permission.” This does not, of course, apply to works in the public domain, and indeed, “Audible sources confirmed to PW that the company currently has no plan to move forward with the Captions program beyond its limited pilot with public domain works for students.” – Publishers Weekly
An Orchestra Helps Deaf Fans ‘Hear’ Beethoven
In Budapest, Deaf and other hard of hearing adults and children use touch to experience Beethoven’s Fifth. One of them said, “Here, when the string instruments all sound, that gives a very good vibration. It is not a coincidence that he wrote this kind of music.” – Reuters