Imagine all of the contestants on Top Chef being buddies, or baking cakes for each other’s weddings. (Alert: This story spoils the season that had Selasi and Val on it.) – The Atlantic
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What Was Up With The Crude Racial And Sexual Stereotype Jokes That Filled This Carnegie Hall Performance?
Everyone was in on the joke, or at least everyone on stage was. But the audience wasn’t sure what to do or how to react. “The concept, whatever its good intentions, tempts comparisons with the history of African-American performers in blackface, acting out stereotypes of themselves for predominantly white audiences. It also risks feeding the common perception of Asian-Americans as perpetual foreigners.” (Of course, not everyone agrees.) – The New York Times
Let’s Just Split The Elgin Marbles Between Britain And Greece
Half and half. Equal. “Of course, there would be disputes about who gets what. But those aren’t disputes that can’t be resolved. The marbles don’t consist of one major piece and a lot of minor pieces. There are almost only major pieces. This is a unique situation – and an opportunity – since in many restitution cases sharing doesn’t work.” – The Guardian (UK)
Andrea Levy, Chronicler Of Britain’s Windrush Generation, Has Died At 62
Levy didn’t start writing until she was in her 30s, but her fourth novel, 2004’s Small Island, won the Orange Prize and made her a household name in Britain and the U.S. – The Washington Post
The Dancing Soldier From South Wales
One night, a young man in dance school worried about his future walked by an Army recruitment center in Manchester – and joined up. Alex Smith “says that, despite appearances, dancers and soldiers have quite a lot in common. Self-discipline is important in both cases, and a determination to succeed.” – BBC
Why Do Audiences Love Comedy, But Not Comedies?
That’s a bit of an exaggeration – audiences still enjoy seeing comedies at the theatre. But stand-up specials are eating theatre’s lunch. “TV was long seen as the enemy of theatre. … But TV was always fundamentally different than theatre. Comedy, on the other hand, shares a lot. It is a live art form, and the same romantic defenses you often hear of theatre you can also hear from comics—the beauty of its ephemerality, the present-tense nature of the form in a time when everyone is on screens.” – American Theatre
This Map Of The Bezos Story Looks Like It Came From An Amazon Original Police Story
Seriously, connecting the dots is a little bit intense. Bezos’ affair and associated selfies, and his post to Medium last week, “has revealed more than just a series of leaked texts and naked selfies. It has also laid bare a tangled web of overlapping relationships and interests across Hollywood, politics, national security and the kingdom of Saudi Arabia.” (And if you were wondering why Amazon has Jack Ryan as an original series, well, read on.) – Los Angeles Times
A San Francisco Theatre Has To Cancel A Show Because A Government Agency Decides It’s Not Unique Enough
Not unique enough for a visa for the Canadian artists, that is. EXIT Theatre’s founder had consulted a lawyer and submitted reams of information about why the play Crippled, by playwright Paul David Power, was indeed “culturally unique.” But a week before it was set to open, the visa was denied. – KQED
Bruno Ganz, The Swiss Actor Who Played An Angel And Hitler, Has Died At 77
Yes, his angry Hitler from 2004’s Downfall was memed millions of times, but many of us remember him best as the angel Damiel from Wim Wenders’ 1987 masterpiece about divided Berlin, Wings of Desire. The actor “made his film debut as a hotel employee in The Man in the Black Derby (1961), a Swiss comedy, and was still busily making films in his late 70s.” In 2018 alone, he starred in five movies. – The New York Times
When Science Became Stories (Surprise – It Got Popular)
“That professionalization process had the effect of setting up boundaries between ‘scientists’ and anyone else who might be interested in science, so it led to the exclusion of a whole bunch of people from formal scientific activity. Arguably, popular science created its own demise by making science too popular and too successful.” – Smithsonian