The Arts-Are-Good-For-The-Economy Arguments Have Failed – They’ve Even Helped Kill The NEA, Argues Arts Exec

Matt Burriesci, executive director of the Providence Athenaeum: “If we’d like to discuss metrics, deliverables and results, then we must ask how our interests have fared by employing this economic strategy. … Where, exactly, are the results? They are not to be found in the opinions of our policymakers”

How Social Media Can Blunt Celebrity

“Twitter hashtags and Change.org petitions can be blunt instruments, even unfair ones based on misunderstandings or simplifications, but, on its good days, social media is remarkably effective at speaking truth to power. People cossetted by their privilege can be quickly forced to recognize what it feels like at the bottom of the heap.”

What Movies Sold At Sundance, And Why Some Of Them Might Actually Succeed

Well, this is cheery: “Judging by the totals in Park City this year, buyers are feeling optimistic. Very optimistic. Whether it’s traditional players like Searchlight and Sony Pictures Classics, newer movers-and-shakers such as Amazon and Netflix or even upstarts like Neon and FilmRise, wallets have been opening up over the last week at Sundance.”

Emmanuelle Riva, Star Of ‘Hiroshima mon amour’ And ‘Amour,’ Has Died At 89

Riva received an Oscar nomination for her work on Amour. “‘[Amour] is such a wonderful, marvellous, extraordinary gift,’ she said in 2012. ‘I cannot tell you how happy I am. Completely happy. The whole thing is like a fairytale.'”