Charles McNulty: “This dramatic meditation on what most of us would rather not intimately consider — mortality as a personal fact — is remarkable for its ruthless concentration and intelligence. Intermittently frustrating as a theatrical experience, it slowly but inevitably crescendos in moments that are shattering in their naked candor.”
Tag: 03.30.07
Brantley: Didion’s “Magic” Doesn’t Translate To Stage
Ben Brantley: “That tension has not been translated to the stage. Ms. Redgrave sounds all the emotional notes in the play clearly and articulately in its first sequences, meaning there’s no further journey for her to take us on. The consolation is that Vanessa Redgrave is Vanessa Redgrave, and she has her own means of plumbing depths.”
Simon: Didion’s “Magic” Leaves Me Cold
John Simon: “True grief is not an attitudinizing catalog of self- regarding minutiae. There is a 15-line poem by Theodor Storm, ‘Einer Toten” (‘For a Dead Lady”), that moves me every time I read it. Didion’s 90-minute intermissionless itemization of oh- so-literary epiphanies, as recited and enacted by Vanessa Redgrave, leaves me as stone-cold as the dead.”
Comics Fans Donate Work For Auction
Seattle comic book publisher Fantagraphics is being sued. But “as fans answer Fantagraphics’ latest plea for help, artists have begun to donate their work for eBay auctions to benefit Seattle’s alternative comic-book publisher in its defense against a lawsuit by author Harlan Ellison.”
Seattle Art Museum’s $1 Billion – More Art To Come?
Several collections are included in the $1 billion gift of art to the Seattle Art Museum this week. But there were some omissions. “A couple of the weightiest local collections were conspicuously absent from SAM’s list of donors: Bill and Melinda Gates’, and Paul Allen’s. Asked about those absences, Mimi Gates (who is married to Bill Gates Sr.) was cryptic. ‘When we have announcements, we will make them’.”
Trend: Older People Turning To Video Games
“Anxious about the mental cost of aging, older people are turning to games that rely on quick thinking to stimulate brain activity. A step slower than in their youth, they are using digital recreations of bowling, tennis and golf.”
Indies Make Serious Commercial Gains
Indie labels are beating traditional recording companies. “The commercial explosion is no accident. Indie labels may have finally found a way to harness the Internet’s sizable community of tastemakers. These music labels are bringing bloggers who have a reputation for posting legal and illegal MP3 tracks into the fold by purposefully leaking albums ahead of the release. Much as iTunes created a palatable model of digital downloading, these labels increasingly rely on carefully controlled – and sometimes uncontrolled – leaks of MP3 files to publicize upcoming records.”