The American book industry is buzzing about a review that ran in The New York Times Book Review January 26 of Whitewater figure (and Clinton friend) Susan McDougal’s new memoir. What’s amazing about the review, notes Gene Lyons, is that it’s quite obvious the reviewer never read the book. “Assuming minimal competence, Lowry simply cannot have done so.”
Tag: 02.10.03
Tycoon Gives Hamilton Museum $50 Million Art Collection
Toronto tycoon Joey Tanenbaum is donating $50 million worth of 19th Century European art to the Art Gallery of Hamilton. “Tanenbaum, a contrarian investor in art as in business, has amassed a flamboyant collection that probes some of the more eccentric corners of art production in that period. Since the 1980s, the pendulum has swung in art scholarship of the period, with interest turning from the well-known work of the Impressionists to the works of French academic and salon painters such as Jean Léon Gérôme and William Bouguereau, as well as Symbolists Odilon Redon and Gustave Doré, and the marketplace has followed suit.”
TV Networks Scan For Appropriateness After Big Events
When a national crisis hits, TV networks scramble to examine everything they’ve got on the schedule to see if it’s appropriate. “Promos and scheduled commercials are reexamined as well. The discussions include heads of programming, sales departments, standards and practices and other top officials. The shuttle tragedy on Feb. 1 illustrated the intricacies of these behind-the-scenes machinations. Heavily promoted episodes of fictional dramas were yanked; movies and specials were sidelined.”
Flopped On Broadway? Hit The Road Jack (There’s Money Out There)
So a much-publicized show doesn’t make it on Broadway. “In recent years several flop productions have all taken to the road and experienced financial and, to a lesser extent, critical success, sometimes by altering their look and content for a national audience hungry for splashy Broadway fare.”
Women Gaining Power At The Box Office
Women are featuring much more prominent roles in the movies of the past year. And their box office clout has been climbing. In an industry where male stars are routinely paid more than their female counterparts, the shift in the balance of power is changing the industry
Librarians Protest Porn In Libraries
Young men in Ottawa public libraries are logging on to hard-core porn in full view of other library patrons. “The beleaguered librarians, feeling they have been left to deal with the problem by see-nothing, do-nothing managers, have filed grievances through the Canadian Union of Public Employees. And they’re not alone. Behind it lies a major philosophical dispute about what libraries are for. Management, whose views are reflected in the stance of the Canadian Library Association, see this as an intellectual-freedom issue. They are afraid that censoring even the worst pornography will start a slippery slope, and eventually all sorts of Internet content will be banned, including a good deal that is legitimate and essential.”
How About A Seat Sale?
UK business leaders came to talk to orchestra managers this week about ways to market and sell tickets. One idea, popular in the airline business, is “yield management”, where “tickets become more expensive as departure dates approach. Concert-goers who book their tickets well in advance might pay £10 for the best seat while those who turn up at the box office on the day could pay up to £30.”
Compromises On The Way To A Design For Lower Manhattan
These are serious architects vying to design a replacement for the World Trade Center. “But the selection also underscores the degree to which commercial considerations and political maneuverings will determine what the final master plan will look like. What the Libeskind and Think designs share, to different degrees, is an ability to bend to the political needs of the various interests that control the site’s future, in particular downtown’s commercial power brokers. And in that sense, the designs say less about our collective ideals than about the limits of the democratic process when it comes to building in New York.”
Spanish Government Refuses to Talk About Painting Looted By Nazis
An American citizen claims that a Pissarro painting in a Spanish museum was stolen from his family by the Nazis. “But despite a persistent claim to the Pissarro painting, the Spanish authorities say that the museum is the legal owner and that any claim should be made in the courts, a response that has drawn criticism from American lawyers familiar with the claim. ‘The reaction of the Spanish government is quite astonishing. Why should a government that already has a law relating to the return of Holocaust property refuse to have a discussion on the issue’?”
Model Attraction – This Year’s Best NY Art Show
This week, the competition for designs for the World Trade Center site is expected to be narrowed to two finalists. Regardless of which plans make the cut, the models of the proposed plans has been the hit art event of the season in New York. “Some days, the place gets so jammed—with people chattering in every language from Japanese to Italian—you have to rubberneck to get a decent glimpse. The models are like magical toys, some with moving parts and lights, others with stunning video displays providing a virtual-reality trip into the future.”