Will Hailey pursue her conducting career? What will happen to Malcolm McDowell and Bernadette Peters, er, Thomas and Gloria? WHEN WILL JOSH BELL CAMEO NEXT? Unless another company steps in after Amazon decides to go “blockbuster” instead of “niche, but extremely fun,” we’ll never know.
Author: ArtsJournal2
The Addictive Drug That Is Opera
Or, more specifically, that is Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde. Tenor Jonas Kaufmann, who is singing Tristan in Boston: “You can never get rid of it. It is always there, stuck in your brain.”
How To Preserve Outdoor Art? Enlist The U.S. Army, Of Course
Just whoa: “Alexander Calder, who famously rejected the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1976 as a form of protest against the Vietnam War, would be extremely surprised to learn that the conservation of his outdoor sculptures is increasingly a result of a collaboration between art conservators and the US Army Research Laboratory.”
Will The Death Of The DVD Extra (And The ‘Making Of’ Featurette), Can Young Filmmakers Learn How Films Work
This is a serious technology question: “With DVDs steadily joining VHS cassettes as extinct technology, what has become of the fun, insightful mixed bag that movie fans came to know as bonus features — the audio commentaries, behind-the-scenes featurettes, bloopers, deleted scenes and alternate endings? Some of these extras have shifted to digital stores and streaming platforms. But can cinephiles access them as easily as they could when video rental stores prospered in every neighborhood?”
Top AJBlogs Posts From The Weekend Of 04.08.18
Cecil Taylor Is Gone
Cecil Taylor, a pianist who fashioned his music from myriad styles and sources, died yesterday in New York. He was 89. From his earliest recordings in the mid-1950s with bassist Buell Nieidlinger, … read more
AJBlog: RiffTidesPublished 2018-04-06
Cecil Taylor, dead at 89, as celebrated nine years ago
Cecil Taylor in 2014, photo by Sánta István Csaba The brilliant, challenging, perplexing and incomparable pianist/improviser/composer Cecil Taylor died April 5, 2018, at age 89. Here’s what I wrote of him to celebrate his 80th … read more
AJBlog: Jazz Beyond JazzPublished 2018-04-06
Almanac: Shakespeare on the function of music
Preposterous ass, that never read so far To know the cause why music was ordain’d! Was it not to refresh the mind of man, After his studies or his usual pain? William Shakespeare, The Taming … read more
AJBlog: About Last NightPublished 2018-04-06
Czech Theatre Has Radical Roots, And Students At A Xenophobic School Are Learning To Reclaim That Tradition
A young American woman who was told she was “too sensitive” after dealing with racist and anti-Semitic remarks from students (and fellow teachers!) started working with a peer to use Theatre of the Oppressed to change the school “The administration saw a theatre club as a benign activity, but little did they know that through games and acting exercises, the very status quo was being challenged.”
La Wilson, Assemblage Artist Who Never Explained Her Works’ Meanings, Has Died At 93
Wilson’s assemblages, she said, only told a story (to her, at least) when she put them together, and she didn’t plan the story ahead of time. “Inside the home garage that was long ago converted into her studio, Ms. Wilson worked in a uniform that included knickers, long socks and a vest. The shelves in the room were filled with the ephemera that she had purchased at five-and-dime stores, antique shops and flea markets or was given by friends and neighbors. She used her daughter’s toys, including a tiny doll.”
Talent Agencies Are Exploding Onto Every Scene In Hollywood (And Beyond)
As agencies try to get into the production business during this time of streaming, not everyone is excited by the multi-tentacled operations. “The Writers Guild of America sounded an alarm in March to thousands of its members nationwide, arguing that agencies face a conflict of interest when they step into the producing arena. The union posed the question: Will an agency’s fiduciary responsibility be to the staff writer it represents, or to the TV series that it owns and on which the writer is employed?”
Two Artworks By Egon Schiele Have Been Ordered To Be Returned To The Heirs Of A Victim Of The Nazis
Thirteen years after a different court turned down the heirs’ claims, the judge in this case “rejected the idea that Mr. Grunbaum had voluntarily transferred the artworks during his lifetime to an heir. ‘A signature at gunpoint cannot lead to a valid conveyance,’ he wrote.”
What’s Destroying Ballet This Week? Reality TV, Of Course
Let the handwringing begin: “Youngsters now believe that they can become an ‘overnight sensation’ by appearing on a prime time entertainment show, according to the examinations director at the Royal Academy of Dance.”