“Black actors and campaigners are upset that the white film star [Gérard Depardieu] was cast as Alexandre Dumas, a French national hero with mixed African blood. The blond, blue-eyed Depardieu sports curly hair and darker skin to play the creator of The Three Musketeers in [the new film] L’Autre Dumas.”
Tag: 02.15.10
Peer Recommendations Take A Credibility Dive
According to the 2010 Trust Barometer Survey, “since 2008 the number of people who view their friends and peers as credible sources of consumer and business information dropped by almost half, from 45% to 25%. … Even more strikingly, however, after a precipitous decline earlier in the decade, informed consumers have regained trust in traditional authorities and experts.”
The Triumph Of ‘Vice’ (The Magazine)
“The magazine, created by welfare scammers in 1994 in Montreal before moving to New York in 1999, started as a thinking man’s lad magazine – the co-founder Suroosh Alvi once said that Vice did ‘stupid in a smart way, and smart in a stupid way.’ Since then, it has gradually morphed into a global brand that confers status and cool on anyone associated with it.”
Is Late Renoir Really Bad Renoir?
“Here’s the contested rap on Pierre-Auguste Renoir: Following success at the first Impressionist exhibition in 1874, when he was 33, plus another decade’s worth of heady achievement, his paintings went steadily downhill.” After seeing a new exhibition at LACMA, Christopher Knight concludes: “Conventional wisdom is confirmed, not denied. Late Renoir is mostly bad Renoir.”
Mardi Gras Celebrates Conservative Values (Who Knew?)
“In this ‘Wonks Gone Wild,’ researchers [find that] … ‘A practice that seems to be mere debauchery … is an expression of moral commitment to the market economy, as well as conventional notions of gender and hierarchy.'” (Seriously.)
Black Theatre Troupe Settles Into Former Whites-Only Area
District Six, a neighborhood in Cape Town, South Africa, “became a symbol of the apartheid era – and of the struggle to defeat it.” Now a new theatre there, named for playwright Athol Fugard, “is home to an all-black company, Isango Portobello.” (Well, not quite all black: The artistic director is white.)
Londoners: Hijab-Shaped Arches May Inflame Tensions
“The proposed arches, part of a ‘cultural trail’ through [east London’s Brick Lane] – immortalised in Monica Ali’s novel Brick Lane – have been criticised as ‘misconceived’ and ‘excluding’. Locals have said they risk ghettoising a community that considers itself tolerant and diverse.”
Milwaukee’s Pfister Hotel Taps An Artist In Residence
Portrait painter Katie Musolff, the hotel’s second artist in residence, “will be given a studio and gallery space in the hotel’s lobby and a monthly stipend. Part of the goal of the program is to provide hotel guests and the public with access to an artist at work.”
Memphis Symphony Names Mei-Ann Chen Music Director
Chen, 36, is the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra’s assistant conductor. “Members of the search committee said last year that they were looking for an ‘up-and-comer’ to be the musical leader of the symphony. … She replaces retiring maestro David Loebel.”
Bolshoi Ballet Dancers Perform In Cuba
“An audience of 5,000 watched Russian dancers Elena Andrienko, Ruslan Skvorsto, Ana Antonicheva and Dimitri Belogolovstsev take to the stage. It was the first time the Bolshoi have performed in Cuba since 1980 amid improving relationships between the two countries.”