“This week the Martha Graham Dance Company debuts a new approach to its overall mission. The company, which has been the dance-world guinea pig when it comes to grappling with the challenges of maintaining a company after a founding choreographer’s death, now wants audiences to see the troupe as a living ‘museum,’ keeping the classics alive while also offering new works inspired by them.”
Tag: 06.09.10
Marina Semyonova, ‘Empress Of Soviet Ballet,’ Dead At 102
In the 1920s, she “began her career at the Mariinsky Theatre in Saint Petersburg where she immediately landed the top roles in classic ballets like The Sleeping Beauty and La Bayadère. She then moved to the Bolshoi in 1930 – reportedly on the personal invitation of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin – where she danced until 1952 and wowed the public with her strength and flexibility.”
More Drama Over Oxford Poetry Post As Only Female Candidate Quits
“Last year Nobel laureate Derek Walcott pulled out of the election for Oxford professor of poetry; now the only woman standing in this year’s contest, poet Paula Claire, has withdrawn in protest over what she is describing as ‘serious flaws’ in the election process that she believes have pushed best-known candidate Geoffrey Hill ahead of all other contenders.”
Painter Lester Johnson, 91, Non-Abstract Expressionist
“[A] maverick associate of the Abstract Expressionists in New York, [he] found his subject matter in the joys and sorrows of ordinary people on the street. His boxy figures of the 1960s, somberly painted in thick impasto, their features often scratched into the surface, faced the viewer squarely with an air of stoicism or grim defiance.”
Bollywood To Tackle Story Of Hitler And Eva Braun
“‘It will be a romance but not in the typical sense,’ Rakesh Ranjan Kumar, the director of Dear Friend Hitler, told The Times. He added that the film ‘aims to capture the personality of Adolf Hitler. … As a leader he was successful. I want to show why did he lose as a human being? What were the problems, what were the issues, what were his intentions?'”
Where Peggy Hookham Became Dame Margot Fonteyn
“The Royal Opera House has just announced it will be recreating the great dame’s Covent Garden dressing room as part of its mini-residency at the Lowry centre in Salford [near Manchester], featuring her makeup cases, her shoe-darning kit and the tutu she wore in Swan Lake.. Nostalgic ephemera maybe, but powerful stuff for [fans].”
What’s The Point Of The 48 Hour Film Project?
The project’s “moviemakers get a whole weekend — from Friday evening to Sunday evening — to complete a four-to-seven-minute film.” Its founders “wanted to find out whether it was possible to make a movie in such a short time and if so, whether anyone could stand to watch it. The answer to both questions turns out to be, mostly, yes.”
National Trust Baffled By Meaning Of Restored Tintoretto
“The main figure might be Apollo, or it might be Hymen, the Greek god of marriage. The man draped in blue might be a poet who is being presented to his spouse, the rather pale lady – or he might not be. What is the die with the five dots, underneath the woman draped in red, all about? What is the significance of all the gold?”
Acting Nominees Who Won’t Win A Tony This Year
Michael Riedel predicts who’ll walk away empty-handed Sunday night “due to heavy-duty competition in their categories and the politics of this year’s Tony races,” and despite “remarkable performances.”
Rights Crackdown Pits Songwriters Vs. Small Venues
“Across New England, church coffeehouses, library cafes, and eateries that pass the hat to pay local musicians or open their doors to casual jam sessions are experiencing a crackdown by performance rights organizations, or PROs, which collect royalties for songwriters. Copyright law requires that any venue where music is performed publicly … have a performance license. “