The Boston Film Festival, which opens in two weeks, is being cut to half its usual length. “Festival organizers say the abbreviated schedule will be a one-year phenomenon — a nod to the nationwide decline in box office receipts, and an acknowledgment that the festival itself is in transition. Mark Diamond and Susan Fraine, former Loews executives who had run the festival since 1993, handed over the duties this year to Robin Dawson, executive director of the independent Massachusetts Film Bureau.”
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Smithsonian’s Falling Down
The Smithsonian is falling apart. And building maintenance is so bad that some of the institutions areb being damaged. “While Congress and Smithsonian officials debate who is responsible for what, some treasures have been lost for good. Among them is the collection of snapping lids and tools developed in the 1940’s by Earl Tupper as the earliest prototypes of the now ubiquitous Tupperware.”
Christiansen: Edinburgh International Fest Has Swooned
The Edinburgh Festival has lost its attractions as the Fringe has taken over, writes Rupert Christiansen. “Edinburgh has lost its dourness, dignity and mystique, surrendering its soul to swish boutiques and decadent youth. The Festival has, meanwhile, sprawled and spawned like some tentacular creature of the deep. The “official” selection of opera, ballet, classical concerts and foreign drama now makes up only a small element in an anarchic 24-hour carnival of performance that also embraces film, television and literature. In terms of both audience numbers and creative energy, the carnival is now Edinburgh’s motivating cultural force, leaving the International Festival marginalised.”
The Mystery Play That Sold Out Before It Opened
Ticket-buyers don’t know what Mike Leigh’s new play is about (or even the title) but it’s sold out its run at London’s National Theatre. “The truth is that no one but Mike Leigh and his actors know what his first stage play for 12 years is about. But that has not hindered its performance at the box office. The new production, which is currently going by the intuitive title of A New Play by Mike Leigh, has already sold out after theatregoers snapped up more than 16,000 advance tickets. The only clue is the play’s publicity poster, a black-and-white shot of a solitary palm tree against a backdrop of sand dunes.”
State Of The Art (Not So Good?)
A new Rand study on the visual arts, suggests that all is not as rosy as burgeoning museum attendance figures suggest. “At the same time that prices have reached headline-grabbing heights, the arts market has become increasingly like other asset markets. The value of an artist’s work is determined not, as was traditionally the case, by the consensus of experts, but increasingly by a small number of affluent buyers who are drawn to purchase works for their potential investment value.”
Into The Woods
Canadian composer R. Murray Schaefer is recreating one of his most famous pieces The Enchanted Forest, staged in actual wilderness. “The work follows the search for an abducted child by her companions and their encounters with a White Stag, a Wolf, a Marshhawk, a Shapeshifter and other forest denizens and deities on 12 different stages in the forest, the audience migrating through the trees from one to another.”
Your Phone-As-Entertainment-Center
“Cell phones are quickly becoming 24-7 entertainment companions. The current generation of cell phones can take pictures, record video, download MP3s, play games, text message, surf the Web and play video clips. The third generation of cell phones, already available in Asia and becoming more widespread in America in the next year, can do all those things, better and faster, and do more. The world that exists on the TV and your video game console is now alive on your phone.”
San Jose: Opera Takes A Step Up
Opera San Jose (California) took a risk in expanding its operations last year, and it’s proved a success. “It was a financial balancing act. The company moved from the 520-seat Montgomery to the 1,100-seat California, adding $1.6 million to its $2.8 million budget. It still produced four operas, but dropped the number of performances of each from 15 to eight or, for ‘Carmen,” nine. It also increased ticket prices by an average of $27 — and sold more tickets than expected.”
Has Mark Morris Peaked?
“If “L’Allegro,” which was created in Brussels in 1988 and concluded its fifth New York run since 1990 at the New York State Theater on Saturday, is Mr. Morris’s masterpiece, what’s he done since? Should we, as dance lovers and Morris admirers, be concerned that a choreographer still in his prime – he’s just shy of 49 – and celebrating the 25th anniversary of his company has not produced a comparable triumph in the last 18 years? And if not, why not? Here is a list of possible reasons…”
Video Nation (Our Video Universe Transformed)
There are 31 million hours of video programming produced each year. And the ways we’re going to access it are changing rapidly. “Every major cable company is making investments to allow TV to be distributed over the Internet, giving you access to each one of those 31 million hours. And then there’s this year’s 36-fold explosion in consumer-generated video on the Internet. This onslaught is already turning the entertainment business inside out. More music videos are being watched on AOL than on MTV. Procter & Gamble is cutting down on pricey 30-second TV spots to beef up the online presence of its packaged goods. TV Guide announced in July that it would drastically cut the amount of space it devotes to listings, an acknowledgment that viewers now turn to the Internet and onscreen programming guides.”