“Carlos Moore, [Fela Kuti’s] only official biographer, claims the producers of Fela! breached his copyright by failing to credit his book, Fela: This Bitch Of A Life, as a source for the production.” Moore is asking for $5 million in damages.
Tag: 10.09.10
China’s New Artists’ Colony
“Songzhuang at first seems like a medium-sized town of no particular distinction, with its long, ramshackle main street … Then you notice the Land Rovers and Mercedes sedans, the art galleries and exhibition halls, and you’ve arrived in what has become over the past decade one of the biggest and liveliest artists’ colonies in the world.”
David Sedaris’s Assessment of His First (Wholly) Fictional Book
“I’ve never been so unsure about the reaction to one of my books. What I like is that you can’t categorise it. Someone suggested that it’s bedtime stories for children who drink, and I thought that was just great.”
The Arts Mayor – Assessing Mayor Daley’s Impact On Chicago Culture
“Much of this has to do, of course, with the length of his City Hall stay, but it is also the result of a couple of strong and influential women.”
The Creator of Dilbert Explains How to Write Humor
Scott Adams: “Humor likes danger. … Humor works best when you sense that the writer is putting himself in jeopardy. I picked the French-fry story specifically because it is too risqué for The Wall Street Journal. You can’t read it without wondering if I had an awkward conversation with my editor.”
Now on Stage! The All-Singing, All-Dancing Asian Strongman!
“Here’s more proof that the Broadway treatment can be applied to just about anything. It’s called Mahathir, the Musical, a two-hour song-and-dance extravaganza in [Kuala Lumpur] about Malaysia’s former strong-arm leader, Mahathir Mohamad. It follows a trail blazed by political musicals such as Evita and Thatcher, the Musical!”
Whatever Will Become of Montreal’s Least-Beloved Venue?
When the Montreal Symphony moves into its new concert hall next year, it will leave big vacancies in the schedule of the Salle Wilfred-Pelletier. “Bear in mind the lament of the late impresario Sam Gesser: He could never bring in a Really Big Show for a long run because the MSO had a lock on the place, week in and week out. Now the coast is clear, or nearly so.”
What Do Contemporary Arts Owe to Diaghilev? Everything.
“I can’t see a ballet, or a fashion show, or an art installation, or a frieze, without thinking of Diaghilev and the connections he made possible. … It might be time to say that the great avant-garde artist of the 20th century was not really an artist at all, but a producer.”
The Special Capacity Only Humans and Dogs Share
Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson: “Lots of animals love their own kind. And some animals love us. But it’s very rare to find an animal that seems to create friendships right across the species barrier all the time. We do it. And lots of dogs do it … Dogs happen to like horses and goats, they like cats, they like rats.”
Atlanta Ballet Moves Away From the Old Fairy Tales
With a dynamic new executive director and a spacious new (and paid-for) headquarters, the 81-year-old company is rejuvenating its dance as well, adding some pure-dance modern works to its traditional repertoire of story ballets and making the old standbys like Sleeping Beauty sexier.