The development of UK drama is broken, say many critics. Young playwrights have a catalog of complaints: “The trouble is, there is no middle-ground development. The theatre writer lives an indigent life of development hell that often shows little regard for experience and critical success. It is dependency with an independent tag, so nobody is accountable for the writer but the writer. An in-depth process that includes accountability will provide progress.”
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US Visa Tangles Make Booking Foreign Artists Increasingly Impractical
It’s getting impractical to book Foreign artists to perform in the United States. “According to many involved, the new security checks are downright Orwellian – delays last up to six months, applicants must appeal to a congressman to get an update during the process and there are no avenues of appeal. Moreover, administrators are overwhelmed by some 70,000 to 200,000 applications per year, with most of the backlog occurring at the FBI. The sweeping reorganisation of government branches under the Department of Homeland Security has also meant bureaucratic growing pains.”
Hip-Hopping To Survive
“Clearly the most powerful dance movement to affect the market in the last 10 years is hip-hop. Its mainstream popularity–which, over the last decade, has cut into the livelihoods of technical jazz dancers seeking film, TV, and other commercial work–shows no signs of abating, but, according to some of the dance professionals we spoke to, the future looks more inclusive.”
The Death Of Aussie TV Dramas?
Australian-made TV dramas have been failing at an alarming rate. “So what went wrong? Have viewers stopped watching Australian drama? Or weren’t any of these series good enough? Has reality TV altered the landscape to such an extent that people no longer have an appetite for scripted drama? And, if so, is it just a cyclical thing, or is it the shape of the future?”
Movie Piracy – An Ego Trip
Some groups of digital movie pirates aren’t in it for the money. “Insiders and piracy experts say the groups are motivated mainly by ego. Instead of cash, the online underground is powered by bartering — admission to these elite circles is granted only to those with something valuable to offer, such as computer parts or a pre-release copy of a DVD.”
The iPod Of Movies?
“Archos’s device, which costs about $500 to $900 depending on the model, ignores an anticopying code found on a majority of prerecorded DVDs. That means consumers can plug the Archos device into a DVD player and transfer a movie to it. Users also can transfer recorded TV programs and digital music files to the Archos device. The Archos uses a video compression standard called MPEG-4 to cram as many as 320 hours of video at near-DVD quality onto its hard drive, the company says — the equivalent of 160 two-hour movies.”
Turmoil At Royal College Of Music
The Royal College of Music is one of London’s most venerable institutions. But its students and faculty are in an uproar over cuts at the school. “Nineteen salaried staff have been “invited” to reapply for their jobs. The idea is to cut the number of positions, thus saving money, and to weed out those staffers who might undermine the college’s attempts to score high in the next research-rating round. Those who aren’t reappointed will be offered teaching on an hourly rate or redundancy. The students are said to be “up in arms about their favourite teachers being kicked into touch”.”
Why You Can’t Understand That Soprano
“Three physicists report in Nature today that they tuned into opera and found a perfectly good reason for not being able to hear the words: the louder the song, the greater the resonance frequency of the vocal tract and the more difficult it is to hear a soprano’s vowels.”
Tate Considers Selling Art To Trade Up
The Tate is considering selling some of its art to upgrade its collection. “Works by living artists, such as David Hockney, could be sold to allow the Tate to buy better or more appropriate items by the same person. Despite Hockney’s stature, the most recent of his pieces in the Tate’s collection dates back to 1977.”
Turkish Ararat Screening Off
“The Canadian writer-director of a controversial film about Turkey’s historical genocide says he’s surprised a country that seemed so committed to starting a dialogue about its painful past has postponed screening the film amid fears of attacks. Atom Egoyan, whose award-winning film Ararat was scheduled to begin showing in Turkey on January 16, said he’s still waiting to hear more details from the Turkish film distributor about why its screening was scuttled… The Armenian National Committee of Canada said the film distributor, Istanbul-based Belge Films, pulled the film’s release after receiving threats from Ulku Ocaklari, a group with ties to the Grey Wolves, a nationalist paramilitary group, as well as the Turkish military and intelligence units.”