Category: people

It may be bad form to speak ill of the dead, but at least one writer says that filmmaker Elia Kazan deserves no posthumous forgiveness for his famous decision to “name names” in the Congressional witchhunts of the 1950s. Kazan was a great filmmaker, writes Geoff Pevere, but he chose to preserve the safety of his own situation by deliberately ruining the lives and careers of eight other individuals, and for that single, selfish, short-sighted act, he should forever be remembered not as an artist, but as a rat.

“The German-Argentine composer Mauricio Kagel has been hospitalised in the western German city of Duisburg after a taking ill ahead of a concert he was due to conduct, the Düsseldorf Opera, where he works, said Wednesday.” Kagel is a respected composer of cutting-edge electronic music, and is credited with doing much to bridge the gap between traditional “classical” music and electronica. He also has a sense of humor, having once composed a work for chamber orchestra, titled Finale, in which the conductor is instructed to fake a heart attack and “die” on the stage.

Edward Said inspired admiration, even if you disagreed with his politics. “He lived in the world as an exile, a condition from which he drew strength. Exile, as a metaphorical state, was something we all should aspire to, Said contended, since it gives one an outsider’s perspective on the world. He was a theoretician who hated theory because he loved people. A true public intellectual, he would say, possesses not just access to the media but a public (constituency would be his term) to which he or she is accountable. Ground yourself in the world.”

Mikhail Baryshnikov has injured his knee, and has had to postpone his upcoming tour. “When Baryshnikov, who is 55 years old, was rehearsing his solo program in late September, he tore the meniscus in his left knee. It’s just a minor tear. His other knee is much more complicated.”

“Veteran filmmaker Norman Jewison, musician Ian Tyson and ex-Royal Canadian Air Farce comedian Dave Broadfoot are among this year’s winners of [Canada’s] Governor General’s Performing Arts Awards. The three were among six people recognized yesterday for lifetime artistic achievement. The others were soprano Pierrette Alarie, actor Douglas Campbell and screenwriter-actress Micheline Lanctot. The awards were announced in both Montreal and Toronto.”

Creatively, Elia Kazan was multi-talented. “His creative life divides neatly into three acts: In 1932, he came to New York to change theater; in 1945, he redefined Broadway and Hollywood; in 1964, he launched a third career as a novelist and memoirist.”

Elia Kazan’s movies, “seen today, are likely to seem less slices of life than social and psychological fables, more rhetorical and high-minded than tough and unvarnished. Which is what they always were of course, and why they stay with us. They are parables of conflicted conscience and unstable desire, studies of individuals — of men, to be precise — driven to rage, rebellion and sometimes to do the right thing.”

“Kazan will probably be remembered primarily for ‘On the Waterfront,’ which brings up the awkward issue of his politics. The film is regarded by some as his rationalization for testifying as a friendly witness before the House Un-American Activities Committee, confessing his own past Communist Party membership and naming other members. Some people never forgave him for that – they thought he was selling out to save his career.”

Director Elia Kazan’s achievements in theater and cinema “helped define the American experience for more than a generation. For Broadway, his legendary productions included “A Streetcar Named Desire” and “Death of a Salesman.” His movie classics included “On the Waterfront” and “East of Eden.”