Category: people

Filmmaker Michael Moore may be a hero to thousands of disenfranchised liberals across the country, but at his old high school in Michigan, his name doesn’t engender a whole lot of respect. Nominated three times to the high school’s honorary “hall of fame,” Moore has been soundly rejected all three times, with one voter describing the controversial documentarian as “an embarrassment.” Still, some rather determined sorts are actually spending money this year in an attempt to enshrine Moore in the hall.

Evan Maurer is stepping down as director of the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. “A burly former rugby player with a doctorate in Renaissance and modern art, Maurer has been for years the welcoming face of an institution that was once regarded as a venerable but stuffy cultural dowager. In his heyday, Maurer seemed to be everywhere, serving on civic art committees, showing up at other museum galas, giving impromptu tours of the institute’s collection and even helping kids into the new strollers the museum provides for tots.”

Carlin Romano is apalled by many of the things written about Susan Sontag after her death. Why all the false cliches? “If Sontag had lived for another decade, the esteem in which many international critics held her might have won her the Nobel Prize for literature. Why, then, should the cliché persist that she remained primarily a critic? Might it be that “appreciation writers” — praising her for always thinking for herself — couldn’t do so themselves? That “appreciators” who celebrated her indefatigable reading couldn’t be troubled to read her fiction and enter a judgment of their own? That American media, only attentive to intellectuals when they bark out something outré, insisted on reducing her to a highbrow sound-bite babe?”

John Logan is Hollywood’s hottest scriptwriter of the moment, “a true author who creates from scratch in an era of sequels and adaptations… As with much in Hollywood, however, the honors mask a more complicated reality, [with Logan standing] on the shoulders of others who contributed material and either received no credit or have had to fight for recognition in a dog-eat-dog scramble for a place on the film. And his rise to the top – in which Mr. Logan was caught up in a spat over his contributions to The Last Samurai – appears to illustrate a cardinal rule of contemporary film writing: success depends on the fine art of positioning, as well as a way with words.”

As Neeme Jarvi prepares to leave the Detroit Symphony after 15 years, he has already taken up his next challenge as music director of the embattled New Jersey Symphony. Most observers would consider the NJSO a significant step down from Detroit’s higher-profile orchestra, but for Jarvi, Newark offers a chance to wind down his career with an enthusiastic group of musicians who don’t mind taking a few chances in the programming department, and to do so without all the inherent pressure of a world-famous ensemble. Oh, and he gets to live in Manhattan, and see his grandchildren nearly every day.

Comic artist Will Eisner, who died last week, was more than a pioneer of an underappreciated art form. He was, in his own words a “social reporter”, a politically engaged artist who made a point of digging out a side of modern reality that would otherwise have been hidden from much of the world. Furthermore, Eisner was notable for the longevity of his creative impulse – the work he created in his 80s was as dynamic and rebellious as the graphic novels that first made him famous.

“Renee Fleming is currently the Great American Soprano. Late-night television? Check. She recently made her second appearance on Letterman, singing three minutes of music by Handel (music featured on her latest recording). White House? She sang at a New Year’s Eve gala there in 1999, among other appearances. Major international events? She sang for Russian President Vladimir Putin and 50 other heads of state at the Mariinsky Theatre to celebrate the 300th anniversary of St. Petersburg in 2003. Magazines? She’s on the cover of the current Town & Country, which dubs her ‘the down-to-earth diva.’ Oh yes, and she also sang, in the made-up language of Elvish, on the soundtrack to The Lord of the Rings.”

Michael Richard was a scenic and documentary photographer until he went blind three years ago. He figured that was the end of his photography career. But “a visit to the Braille Institute in Los Angeles to learn to use his white cane unexpectedly led to his becoming an acclaimed abstract-art photographer.”

Lee Siegel’s picked up another critic job – he’s signed on as books critic for The Nation. But he’s also holding on to his TV critic’s job at The New Republic. And he’s going to be twice-a-month art critic for Slate. “He’s doing something very brave,” New Republic literary editor Leon Wieseltier said, on the phone while traveling in Chicago. “He’s trying to earn a living as a freelance intellectual.”

Comic artist Will Eisner has died at 87. Eisner revolutionized the world of newspaper comics in the 1940s with his popular serial, The Spirit, and is believed to have published the first full-length graphic novel in 1978.