Category: people

“Mr. Van Peebles, best known for his pioneering 1971 independent film, Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song, … is making his public debut as a visual artist. That adds to a résumé that includes filmmaker, composer, actor, novelist, Wall Street trader, San Francisco cable car driver, playwright, bandleader, vocalist and, by his own account, bon vivant.”

“Vladimir Medinsky claimed that there was no evidence to suggest the 19th-century composer was anything other than a lonely man who failed to find a suitable woman to marry.” Most historians argue that the evidence is plentiful.

“He came to national attention as president of the University of Pennsylvania, which he led from 1981 until 1993, when President Bill Clinton selected him for the [National Endowment for the Humanities] post. … Dr. Hackney said he aimed to cultivate a ‘national conversation’ on American identity and steadfastly defended the government’s role in promoting the humanities.”

“You can learn a lot about a dictator from their domestic decor. Saddam Hussein had a thing for gold loos and erotic fantasy murals. … Colonel Gaddafi, meanwhile, preferred the simple life. He opted to live in a luxury Bedouin-style tent … So what about monster of the moment, Syrian president Bashar al-Assad? We know he’s a bit of a tech geek …”

“During his tenure, Wayne Clough appointed 10 new leaders for the Smithsonian institutions, including the National Zoo in Washington, the National Museum of American History, the National Museum of African Art and the National Museum of Natural History. He also saw construction begin on the new National Museum of African American History and Culture, which is scheduled to open in 2015.”

“The filmmaker Spike Lee is this year’s recipient of the $300,000 Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the largest in the arts, the Gish Prize Trust announced.”

Cumberbatch: “It was a very considered, thorough, charming and intelligent account of why he thought it was morally wrong for me to be part of something he thought was going to be damaging in real terms, not just to perceptions but to the reality of the outcome for himself.”

“The tenor and conductor Plácido Domingo and the film director Francis Ford Coppola are among the 2013 winners of the [$150,000] Praemium Imperiale arts awards from the Japan Art Association.” The Other winners include “Michaelangelo Pistoletto for painting (Italy); Antony Gormley for sculpture (Britain); and David Chipperfield for architecture (Britain).”

“His was a seduction played out with words and ideas, not lovemaking, but to the young girl reading those words — as with a few million other readers — there could have been no more powerful allure.”

Voice actor June Foray, the voice of Cindy Lou Who and many, many more, won her first Emmy at age 94 and is still performing.