Deborah Gribbon has resigned as director of the Getty Museum, citing differences with Getty president Barry Munitz. “Barry and I have differences on a range of things. They are real differences. I think this is a very important moment for the Getty. Perhaps to a fault, I believe in the good of the institution. I think it’s better to resign than let differences become a distraction.”
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Gribbon: Leaving The Getty
So why did Deborah Gribbon resign as director of the Getty Museum? “Her resignation, submitted Monday, came as no surprise to the museum world. It has been well known among directors and curators that Ms. Gribbon and [Getty president] Barry Munitz never got along.”
Real Movie Sex: Now Legal In Britain!
In an unprecedented move, Britain’s film censors have approved for public viewing a movie “which features real sex scenes including fellatio, ejaculation and cunnilingus, some in close-up.” The film, 9 Songs, premiered at Cannes this year to much controversy, but the film board ruled that “the sex occurred in the context of the development of a relationship between two people and did not raise issues of harm or sexual violence.” The approval is the latest sign that the UK is moving away from hard and fast rules regarding what its citizenry can expose itself to.
Dreyfuss Quits The Producers
Richard Dreyfuss has abruptly pulled out of the London production of The Producers only days before opening night, citing the toll the physical aspects of the role was taking on his body. Another possible explanation for his departure may be that Dreyfuss had drawn the ire of his co-stars when, in a recent interview, he “[joked] that the lavish production of Mel Brooks’ Broadway smash hit was not yet fit for public consumption.” Nathan Lane, who played the role to great acclaim on Broadway, will step in until January.
‘Subversive’ Theater On The Rise In Britain
“While the RSC looks for a West End home in London and the cult of deadly dull celebrity theatre continues to bore and fleece, there’s an exciting subversiveness going on in anti-theatreland. It threatens to rip up the pretentious splendour of red-padded fold-down seats, jam the 20p slots of those opera-glass dispensers and slash the suffocating, red-tasselled curtain that falls between the acts.” All of which is to say, there’s some seriously exciting theater going on in the UK, if you know where to look.
The Logistics Behind The Art
The new exhibition of paintings by Raphael at the UK’s National Gallery is expected to be an illuminating look at a body of work that has rarely, if ever, been seen in one place. Tickets are already at a premium, and the National will undoubtedly clean up on the show, financially speaking. And that’s good news for the exhibition’s curator, who has been working on the show for a mind-boggling six years, because she has never been so exhausted in her life.
Britain’s Wunderkind Conductor Comes Home
Daniel Harding is the definition of a conducting prodigy if ever there was one. Handpicked by Simon Rattle as the next great maestro while still a teenager, Harding’s rise through the normally sluggish world of conducting has been legendary. Now, in an unexpected move, he is coming home to London, there to assume the post of principal guest conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra. Harding had been known to be looking for a full music directorship, but he will conduct a dozen weeks a year with the LSO, and will tour with the ensemble as well, which is nearly as heavy a workload as that assumed by most music directors.
Great Picture, But Not Worth The Hassle
Seeing the Mona Lisa is almost a requirement for tourists visiting Paris. But objectively speaking, the experience is a serious waste of time and energy, fighting huge crowds and long lines for a fifteen-second glimpse of a painting squirreled away behind layers of glass. “Waiting to see the Mona Lisa has all the thrill of standing in an airport check-in queue. The crowd pushes forward, cattle-like and unquestioning, performing a ritual they know they have to go through with in order to complete a pre-ordained tourist experience.”
Pappano Saves The Day
The London production of La Forza del Destino that was thrown into chaos three weeks ago when La Scala chief conductor Riccardo Muti quit in a huff has opened on schedule, and Andrew Clark says that the Brits are very lucky. “When Muti withdrew [because of] changes made unilaterally to his scenery, [Royal Opera conductor] Antonio Pappano did a very noble thing. He dropped all his engagements, quickly learned the score and threw himself into rehearsals. The Royal Opera can count itself lucky to have a music director who not only leads by example, but is a born Verdian.”
No, He Doesn’t
Andrew Clements declares the new La Forza a consummate disaster. Muti, whose departure may have been about more than scenery, was the only reason the Royal Opera House wanted the production in the first place, and when he cut out, “the company was left with the part of the package it never wanted: a staging of monumental awfulness. The music director, Antonio Pappano, gamely took over in the pit, but the Royal Opera deserves little sympathy for the mess, since it had been happy to compromise artistic standards in the first place by importing the show just to pander to an overrated conductor.”