Hank Azaria, the white actor who has voiced Apu for 29 seasons, says he’s ready to step down, and that a South Asian actor could step in – but, while that would be welcome, the problems with Apu stem from areas far beyond his voice.
Tag: 04.29.18
The Best Way To Document Beijing? Walk Around It, Of Course
That’s what one artist believes. “Fuller said he was inspired after a cycling tour of the Great Wall of China in 2014 and ‘felt compelled” to move to the ‘Chinese mega city’ last year. He said he ‘underestimated’ Beijing’s scale after walking 861 miles (1,386km) in nine months around its ring roads.
Don’t Think Boring Old Board Games Will Escape The Cleansing Fire Of ‘Augmented Reality’
Ohhhhkaaaay, Silicon Valley PR machine: “AR board games promise a host of advantages over their real world counterparts. They eliminate the need to set up complicated boards and remove the foot-piercing pieces you eventually need to round up and put away (and the mess when someone flips the board in frustration). Perhaps even more importantly, augmented-reality board games let you play your favorite titles with friends and family regardless of whether you’re in the same room.”
The Erie Chamber Orchestra Ends A Four-Decade Run
Whoa: “The orchestra, founded in 1978 by Bruce Morton Wright and supported by Gannon University, announced it would officially disband at the end of its current season after 40 years of offering free concerts.” Its final concert was Saturday night.
Top AJBlogs Stories From The Weekend 04.29.18
Leonard Bernstein at 100: An American Archetype
My 5,000-word piece on the Leonard Bernstein Centenary, in The Weekly Standard this week, begins with a story you’ve never heard before: “In 1980, at the age of 62, Leonard Bernstein undertook the composition of a … read more
AJBlog: Unanswered QuestionPublished 2018-04-28
Barnes Foundation to Subdivide (& monetize?) 137 Acres; Offloads Costs of Lower Merion Properties
Some six years after it controversially moved to Philadelphia, the Barnes Foundation appears to have decided to monetize the original properties of its founder, the legendary collector Albert Barnes, in both Lower Merion and Chester … read more
AJBlog: CultureGrrlPublished 2018-04-27
Replay: Bernadette Peters sings “Broadway Baby”
Bernadette Peters sings Stephen Sondheim’s “Broadway Baby” (from Follies) on The Tonight Show. The performance, originally telecast by NBC on July 27, 1989, is followed by a segment in which Peters is interviewed by Johnny … read more
AJBlog: About Last NightPublished 2018-04-27
Homer And His Unique Way of Seeing
Winslow Homer has always been a complicated artist, and now he will be viewed as an even more complicated one. What’s going to do that is an exhibition opening in June at the Bowdoin College … read more
AJBlog: Real Clear ArtsPublished 2018-04-26
Almanac: Solzhenitsyn on Chekhov and the future of Russia
“If the intellectuals in the plays of Chekhov, who spent all their time guessing what would happen in twenty, thirty, or forty years, had been told that in forty years interrogation by torture would be … read more
AJBlog: About Last NightPublished 2018-04-26
An Educated Guess: What Did the Lucas Museum Pay for Rockwell’s “Shuffleton’s Barbershop”?
In the two weeks since the announcement of the Berkshire Museum’s widely deplored sale of Norman Rockwell‘s “Shuffleton’s Barbershop” to the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, Los Angeles, none of the parties to the transaction … read more
AJBlog: CultureGrrlPublished 2018-04-25
The Women Who Will Run Venice’s Architecture Biennale
The new “queens of Venice” are Shelley McNamara and Yvonne Farrell of Grafton Architects, a practice that’s been doing the work without getting starchitect status – but that could change now. Their philosophy: “The unsolicited ‘spatial gifts’ that architecture can add could be at the scale of city – a free public garden, for example – or at the scale of a surface you touch. It may not involve construction – ‘sitting under a cherry blossom is as happy an architectural space as you’ll find’ – but these ’emotional components’ are what make architecture worth doing.