“Recent reporting about the now-rejected proposal to bar movies produced by and for streaming services from Oscar contention has tended to portray Spielberg as a reactionary arch-enemy of Netflix. But insiders say that just isn’t true — his company actually helps Netflix produce some of its programming — and have taken pains to let the New York Times know it.” – The New York Times
Blog
Should We Really Drop Kate Smith’s ‘God Bless America’ From Sporting Events Because Of A Couple Of Racist Songs She Sang 80-Odd Years Ago? Well, Yes
Last week, someone brought forward two now-embarrassing songs about black people that Smith recorded in the 1930s (we’ll spare you the titles), and teams in New York and Philadelphia that had been playing her version of the Irving Berlin anthem at games promptly dropped her. Anne Midgette wondered if this was an overreaction — until she talked to two black opera stars who’ve done a lot of singing at sports events themselves. – The Washington Post
Filmmaker John Singleton In Coma Following Stroke
“The 51-year-old director behind films including Boyz n the Hood, Poetic Justice and 2 Fast 2 Furious was hospitalized at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in L.A. last week after falling ill after a trip to Costa Rica. While under medical care, he suffered a stroke, which had been described as ‘mild,’ but it apparently wasn’t.” – Yahoo!
Beyond The Met’s Live In HD: Opera Companies All Over Bring Their Performances To Cinemas And The Web
“Since the Metropolitan Opera began broadcasting live to movie theaters, in 2006, companies from the Bolshoi to the Komische Oper Berlin have seen digital distribution as crucial to positioning themselves internationally. Only a handful of players have the standing and resources to create for cinema, and many organizations in Europe turn to free web streaming, but never before have opera houses had such freedom to produce their own content.” – The New York Times
Mark Medoff, Playwright Of ‘Children Of A Lesser God’, Dead At 79
“Medoff wrote 30 plays and wrote, produced or directed 19 movies. He found his greatest success with Children of a Lesser God, the tale of a troubled love affair between a speech teacher and a deaf woman who struggle to overcome the communications gap between their two cultures.” – AP
Repair And Reopen Notre-Dame In Five Years? Impossible, Say Experts
“Heritage experts warn that restoring Notre-Dame de Paris after the devastating fire of 15 April will be so complex that it could take a decade or more, despite President Emmanuel Macron’s vow to ‘rebuild the cathedral more beautiful than ever’ within five years.” – The Art Newspaper
A Dome And A Home: The Theatre From The Calais Jungle Travels Around France Offering Welcome To Migrants
Since it was set up in the (now-removed) refugee camp in the Channel port in 2015, Good Chance Theatre‘s dome has become a pop-up playhouse, setting up in several locations around Paris and providing a gathering place for previously alienated migrants. – American Theatre
1,300-Year-Old Gilded Book Seized From Smugglers In Turkey
“The suspects were caught red-handed when [anti-smuggling police in Diyarbakır province] raided a property in Bismil district. where [sale of the volume] was supposed to take place. Written in Assyrian letters on papyrus, the 102-page book also includes some religious motifs.” – Daily Sabah (Turkey)
Organist Marilyn Mason Dead At 93
“She commissioned more than 70 works from composers, including William Bolcom and Jean Langlais … and shaped generations of organists over a record-breaking 67 years on the faculty at the University of Michigan.” – The New York Times
Redefining “Common” Language Is A Fraught Exercise
Looking at Amherst College’s new Common Language Guide: What the glossary contains is not “common” language by any normal reckoning. Its very first entry defines “accomplice” as “a term coined by Indigenous Action Network to critique the ways in which ‘ally’ as an identity term has been deployed absent of action, accountability or risk-taking.” Such definitions signal that we have departed the real world for an alternative progressive universe filled with specialized terminology and in-house references. – Commonweal