“The writer-director partnership can be crucial to the success of a new play. A tried-and-tested classic will survive the attentions of an inept director, but a virgin text, mishandled, might never see the light of day again. A good writer-director mix can, on the other hand, produce a magical result that is somehow more than the sum of its components.” A new theatre festival in Suffolk, England, aims to match writers and directors at the earliest possible stage of a new play’s development.
Tag: 04.06.07
Tate Modern Commissions New Lobby Sculpture
“The Colombian artist Doris Salcedo will be the first artist from outside Europe or North America to undertake the challenge of the annual Unilever commission in Tate Modern’s vast central space… All her art is underpinned by a sense of the history of justice. But at the same time, it is very quiet. It’s not about sending out direct messages, though she is a very passionate individual.”
Big Cable Networks Pull Out Of eBay Plan To Sell Ads
“Without the participation of cable networks, the eBay exchange will have no air time to sell to advertisers. The refusal of cable networks to participate in the exchange not only disrupts the eBay plans but also raises questions about how companies like Google will fare as they try to bring ad auctions to traditional media like television and newspapers.”
Debates About Living History
Colonial Williamsburg “is variously called a historical village or a living museum. But that means much more now than it once did. Aside from dramatizing historical controversies, the town is also caught up in living ones: debates about who writes history and how it is told, about what historical realism is and how it should be portrayed, even about what aspects of our past are to be celebrated in this strange combination of education and entertainment.”
Learning In A Virtual World
Schools are using virtual reality games to teach classes. “For instance, classes in archaeology take place on a recreation of Hadrian’s Wall. Physics students, who are mentored by staff at the National Physical Science Laboratory, have been conducting experiments to calculate the value of gravity within Second Life.”
The New Face Of Ticket Scalping
“Touts are no longer lumbering beasts with a backpocket full of crumpled tickets. The internet has spawned a new breed: the bedroom tout. Genuine fans complain about rip-off merchants, but many also enjoy making a quick buck on an auction site. With eBay, every student in the land is a ticket tout. They buy four tickets and the two they sell pay for the two they keep. The music industry says the problem is getting worse. Even middling bands routinely sell out shows within hours and, minutes later, tickets for sold-out events are plonked on auction websites for hugely inflated prices.”
Luton – The Town That Went From Crap To Poetry
Three years ago the Luton was voted the “crappest town ” in England. So how to get back in the game? Burnish the olde image? Poetry, that’s how. “Prospective poets throughout the country – not just Luton or even Bedfordshire – have been invited to pen an ode in praise of the beleaguered town. The best will be published in a paperback anthology, called Love Luton, at the end of the year.”
A Private Library With Benefits
Membership libraries in the US were originally modeled after the athenaeums and lyceums of England, which increased access to books at a time when most collections were private. By 1876, more than 3,000 dotted the country. Today, they’re one of the missed sets of cultural treasures. But these private libraries can still be found clustered in the Northeast and throughout the South. The youngest, founded in 1899, is the Athenaeum Music and Arts Library in La Jolla, Calif., which costs $40 per year. The Boston Athenaeum, dating back to 1807, is the country’s largest such institution, with 600,000 books.”
Harry Potter Publisher Caps Returns
“So how many Potters to order? Bloomsbury is again imposing a cap on returns, reduced from 20 per cent last time to 10 per cent. The publisher argues that it’s simply being eco-friendly: true to a point – returned books mean a waste of its forest-friendly paper. But wholesalers are supporting the indies’ complaints, and the Booksellers Association has presented concerns to the publisher. Indies may well play safe with minimal orders – and then go to Tesco or Asda to replenish with cheap copies if stocks dwindle.”
Obsessive Compulsive Handel Disease
“Today, Handel’s operas are better business than they ever were in his lifetime. They’re good box-office and relatively cheap to produce. All one needs is a handful of singers and an orchestra that, with a bit of a squeeze, can be fitted into the back of a van. But don’t the devout Handel fans ever yearn for a chorus or a vocal ensemble? Wouldn’t they enjoy a bit more orchestral colour? Or even some dancing now and then?”