“The dancing of Cunningham’s work by other troupes isn’t a new phenomenon. Ballet and other dance companies have been selectively performing Cunningham over the years. … But now, with Cunningham’s own troupe gone, his creations will rest in the hands of outsiders.”
Tag: 01.03.11
James Franco to Film William Faulkner
The actor/artist/grad student/soap opera meta-star/all-around it-boy plans to direct a film version of Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying this summer – and follow up with an adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian the following year.
When Dance Theatre Workshop And Bill T Merge…
“One of the most obvious results of creating this new entity will be that two of the contemporary dance world’s long-established organizations will, technically speaking, no longer exist. Many observers of the merger, even while acknowledging the positives of the plan, seemed particularly concerned that the legacy of the 45-year-old DTW would be lost.”
El Sistema USA May Leave New England Conservatory
“NEC says that it will honor its commitment to El Sistema USA’s central program … through the 2013-2014 academic year – but cannot support the program’s plan to expand at a cost of $125,000 to $400,000 a year. That leaves El Sistema USA’s leaders looking for a new home, potentially outside Boston.”
Huck Finn Without the N-Word
Over the past few decades, Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn has been steadily removed from school curricula, and sometimes banned outright, over its repeated use (219 times) of the epithet “n****r”. An Alabama publisher has decided to fix that problem by simply replacing the word.
The Other Comic-Book Superhero Musical Spectacular
Batman Live is “a play of sorts, but it’s going to be performed in Britain’s biggest, grandest arenas rather than theatres. There will be acrobatics, pyrotechnics, stuntmen, supervillains and screeching Batmobiles on a 100ft-wide, 60ft-deep performance area. Behind them, a giant video wall will flash panels from comic strips and special effects, and give the appearance of interacting with the live performers on stage.”
“Wicked” Breaks Broadway Box Office Record
“The latest Broadway numbers show “Wicked” isn’t slowing down. It had its best week ever by earning $2,228,235 at the sold-out 1,800-seat Gershwin Theatre for the week ending Sunday.”
Texas Theatre Where Lee Harvey Oswald Was Captured Is Reopened
“The theater’s demise can be blamed on its association with the Kennedy assassination. Or the economic struggles of southern Dallas. Or the larger challenges independent theaters face.” It’s been turned into a repertory space.
What Medieval Art Has That Contemporary Art Badly Needs
“[M]ore than skill, technique, or inspiration, the current that reverberated through the halls of [the Cloisters] and those of so many of the great museums of the world, yet so few of the places where new art is still being made and shown is nothing if not the lingering vibration of the profound and unshakable devotion of the makers. Not to God, but to the work itself.”
Actor Pete Postlethwaite, 64
“Equipped with prominent cheekbones and equally conspicuous penetrating eyes, he was able to convey, with the most imperceptible shifts in emphasis, whole worlds of pride, perturbation, suffering, resignation, wonder and warmth. The quiet mournfulness of his flinty physiognomy anchored many of the roles he undertook with a rare quality of humanity, integrity and vulnerability.”