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‘Dr. Strangelove In Space’: Explaining Stanley Kubrick’s Inexplicable ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’

“Look at the similarities: the Cold War secrecy between the US and Russia, the boardrooms packed with middle-aged men in suits, the supposedly infallible machine which is intent on slaughtering the people who built it. … And look at the convictions which underpin both works: that humans are intrinsically, self-destructively violent, and that anyone who believes himself to be 100% right is probably a dangerous maniac. It may be going too far to call 2001 a cynical political comedy, but if Kubrick hadn’t wanted us to laugh, … he wouldn’t have had a chapter entitled The Dawn of Man, in which man, having dawned, bashes another man’s brains out with a club.”

Why Important Science Really Needs Imagination

It’s certainly true that observation plays a crucial role in science. But this doesn’t mean that scientific theories have to deal exclusively in observable things. For one, the line between the observable and unobservable is blurry – what was once ‘unobservable’ can become ‘observable’, as the neutrino shows. Sometimes, a theory that postulates the imperceptible has proven to be the right theory, and is accepted as correct long before anyone devises a way to see those things.

Kelli O’Hara Talks About Returning To Opera – The Met, No Less – After 20 Years On Broadway

“Well, there are no microphones. … Once I’m out there, I have to depend on the acoustics of the room. I’m not going to give myself a bigger voice overnight; I’m not going to give myself more resonant power overnight. My head’s the size it is. … There’s something about a mic that does show everything – all the inconsistencies, all the vulnerabilities of the voice are heard with a microphone. Without it, you’re not. You can clear your throat; you can do things that aren’t actually heard out in the house.”

Jazz Pianist Cecil Taylor, 89

Taylor’s legacy is his sound: He played the piano with a furious attack, using the entire range of the instrument to create a unique musical language. His approach inspired other musicians and he remained true to it, even though it meant a lifetime of financial struggles.

Dallas Opera Brings Back Former Staffer As New CEO

“With an impressive resume that includes training as a singer and experience as a stage manager and production director, [Ian Derrer] previously worked with Dallas Opera, between 2014 and 2016, as artistic administrator. Since then, he has been general director of Kentucky Opera. … The company moved quickly to fill the position, vacated in January by Keith Cerny, its head for the previous 7½ years.”

Could ‘Jesus Christ Superstar Live’ Rehabilitate Andrew Lloyd Webber?

“For years, the Lloyd Webber canon has been a bit of a cultural punching bag. It’s not hard to see why: His two most popular musicals are, respectively, a nearly plotless anthology sung by performers in spandex and fur and a faux opera about a disfigured stalker in pop culture’s most iconic mask … [Cats and The Phantom of the Opera] have allowed him to become a byword for over-the-top mediocrity that people can snub to feel cultured. Jesus Christ Superstar Live, however, reminded audiences of a different side to Lloyd Webber’s canon.”

These Teen Vandals Were Sentenced To Read Books. Here’s What They Learned

After the five teenagers spray-painted swastikas and graffiti on a 19th-century schoolhouse for black children, a judge ordered them to read books from a list that included (among others) Elie Wiesel’s Night, 12 Years a Slave by Solomon Northup, The Tortilla Curtain by T.C. Boyle, Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner, and Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart. Did the sentence have the hoped-for effect?