One dance critic comes away disappointed from an advance screening of Robert Altman’s new dance film. “It is a disappointing hybrid that too often plays on dance cliches (a snapped Achilles tendon just hours before opening night, an ego-crushing bit of recasting, an outdoor premiere nearly washed out by a rainstorm, an alcoholic mother and litigious mentor) and never comes close to capturing the hour upon hour of class, rehearsal, repetition and intense, unwavering discipline so crucial to the art.”
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In Search Of… Masterpiece Theatre Funding
PBS’ Materpiece Theatre is looking for funding (and it’s not proving easy). “ExxonMobil Corp. had provided sole funding for the program since its 1971 debut until deciding to drop its support. The series is funded by ExxonMobil through 2004.”
Why Black Actors Make Less Money?
Whjy does TV pay black performers less than white ones, even when ratings for the former are higher? “Advertisers pay lower rates for programs that attract black audiences because they reason that blacks are among TV’s more loyal customers, and it’s easy to reach them across the TV dial.”
Talent Surfing
Ismene Brown goes looking at the UK’s leading ballet school performances to see what talent is on the way up. “I saw no stars this summer, nor did I emerge from the four shows with huge optimism about the next British generation, because there are so pitifully few native dancers-in-waiting in the first place. The heavy dominance of our dance schools by foreign youngsters is not just because they are willing to pay the fees but because they are better trained earlier on and often hungrier.”
Why Over-Hype Shakespeare?
Why does TV always feel its got to sex up serious subjects in order to get attention. A new BBC show on Shakespeare tries to make the Bard’s life exciting. Gary Taylor begs to disagree with how this story line has been hyped. “There’s something obscene about using the political assassination of Christopher Marlowe, or the legal torture and public execution of martyrs like Edmund Campion, Edward Arden, and Robert Southwell, to spice up someone else’s dull biography. Shakespeare never sacrificed anything for anybody.”
A Bath For David
It was inevitable, of course, that the cleaning of Michelangelo’s 500-year-old David should spark controversy… “Should the marble colossus be restored to its original perfection or simply cleaned of grime? Or should it learn to live with the inevitable streaks and blotches of venerable old age?”
Buena Vista Star Dies
Compay Segundo, the Cuban singer and guitarist who came to international attention in the 90s with the ‘Buena Vista Social Club’has died at the age of 95. “Mr. Segundo, who rose to global fame in his 90’s after decades of obscurity, was the most accomplished of the dozen or so Cuban musicians gathered in Havana in 1996 by the American producer Ry Cooder for a recording session meant to recapture the lost music of the pre-Revolutionary Havana nightclub scene.”
That’s The Picture
Two dozen photography shows in London right now make this a summer of photography. “The London shows leave you with no specific definition of what photography is now, except that it is, fruitfully, many things at once, which is a functionally vague description of the medium. You can nevertheless get a fairly clear idea of the differences between a good photograph and a bad one.”
Moving Forward
“US Poet Laureate Billy Collins leads the nominees for the UK’s richest annual poetry award, the Forward Prize. Collins joins Ciaran Carson, Ian Duhig, Lavinia Greenlaw and Paul Muldoon on the shortlist for the £10,000 prize for the best published poetry collection.”
Glyndebourne – A Report Card
Things are looking up considerably at Glyndebourne. Artistically the offerings are getting better, and new management is steering a progressive course, and… no one seems to be fighting about which direction to charge…