Gay characters have been prominently featured in Hollywood films for years, of course, but this season, there’s a distinctly different angle being played up. Gone are the gay sidekick, the wingman, the effeminate comic relief, and in their place is a slew of complete dramatic characters whose lives and loves are just as much of interest as any heterosexual protagonist. Oh, and did we mention that they’re all being played by straight people?
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Enter The Blooker Prize
A website that helps authors self-publish their books has created a new literary prize for the best book based on a blog or website. Finalists will be announced next March, and the winner will take home $2000, which, well a modest sum, is more money than most self-publishing authors ever make on their books.
Vonnegut: The End Is Probably Near
Kurt Vonnegut has never been exactly a cheery sort, and at 82, the celebrated author is the very picture of a curmudgeon. “He speaks repeatedly of having finished his life’s work and of the surprise of being still alive. And death is coming not just to him; in person and in the slim new volume of his collected recent essays entitled A Man Without a Country, Vonnegut pronounces a requiem for the Earth itself, saying the world is going to come to an end sooner or later, but most probably sooner.”
The Pop Culture Explosion
There was a time, not so very long ago, when it was possible, even easy, to be conversant in the language of popular culture without a great deal of effort. There was a lot out there, sure, but most Americans could keep up with the steady stream of hit movies, recordings, and books deemed to be the foundation of modern life. “But that foundation is buckling under the sheer weight of all the things that now qualify as pop culture — and all the new technologies that deliver them to finely calibrated consumer niches. Today the national water cooler bubbles with competing monologues rather than inclusive dialogues… The proliferation has been so fast and so dizzying that even people who study popular culture for a living find it hard to keep up.”
Canadian Province To Have A Stake In Rings
In an unprecedented move, the provincial government of Ontario has signed on to become an investor in the massive new musical production of The Lord of the Rings, set to open in Toronto in 2006. “Taking on a role traditionally played by impresarios, idealists and other theatrical gamblers, the provincial government will contribute some $2.5 million of the show’s $23 million budget, betting that the production’s global appeal will justify a unique, and risky, public-private partnership.” The province stands to gain a great deal from a successful run – Toronto will have exclusivity for the show through spring 2007 – and while there is some risk involved, government officials expect the show to turn a $40 million profit.
Hollywood’s Pseudo-Intellectualism
The movie business just loves tackling “the big issues,” especially near Oscar time. Nothing gets a green light faster than a mildly controversial storyline captained by a big-name star going out on a limb to shed light on the horrible scourge of, say, sexual harassment. Or war profiteering. Or physical violence. “Because these movies are Hollywood products, though, they need to navigate between inoffensively pleasing a mainstream audience and actually saying something. What results is a genre of timid films with portentous-sounding themes, works that offer prepackaged schoolroom lessons or canned debates. Hollywood may be drawn to Big Ideas, but it is always more comfortable with sound-bite-size thoughts.”
Van Gogh’s Other Art
Vincent Van Gogh’s pen-and-ink drawings are every bit as astonishing and expressive as his famous paintings, yet amazingly, there has never been a major U.S. exhibition of the drawings. That changes this week, when New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art puts 113 Van Gogh drawings on exhibit. The works have been borrowed from various public and private collections, and will likely not be seen in public again anytime soon, due to the relative fragility of pen-and-ink works.
Nobel Judge Resigns In Protest
“A member of the Swedish Academy, which awards the Nobel Prize for Literature, has resigned in protest at the choice of last year’s winner. Knut Ahnlund said he was stepping down because the 2004 award went to Austrian writer Elfriede Jelinek. The Academy member called Jelinek’s work ‘a mass of text shovelled together without artistic structure’. His attack on Jelinek’s books and plays came days before the announcement of the 2005 winner, due on Thursday.”
Houston S.O. Hires Ex-San Antonio Exec
“Steven R. Brosvik, the former executive director of the San Antonio Symphony, has been appointed general manager of the Houston Symphony. Brosvik succeeds Matthew VanBesien, who was promoted to executive director and CEO in April after Ann Kennedy resigned from that post. The executive director of the San Antonio Symphony from 2001 through late 2003, Brosvik oversaw the orchestra through the financial struggles than eventually led it to declare bankruptcy.” The Houston Symphony has had myriad troubles of its own in the last few years, ranging from the catastrophic flooding of its concert hall and library in 2001 to a bitter musicians’ strike in 2003.
Should Madison Take Control Of Its PAC?
Madison, Wisconsin’s new Overture Center for the Performing Arts has been hailed by audiences and critics since opening last year, and the center is expected to operate in the black for the foreseeable future. But long-term financing is enough of a concern that the city’s mayor is floating a plan under which Madison would buy the center for $1 and operate it directly, rather than partnering with a development corporation in a refinancing deal which exposes the city to some future financial risk. “Representatives from several Overture Center resident arts groups, including the Madison Ballet, the Madison Repertory Theatre and the Madison Symphony Orchestra, came out strongly against city ownership Monday.”