“I have watched the organization, and its signature convening, grow and evolve over time—responding to the field’s changes and the external environment in which we all operate. There have been so many conventions, over so many years, that it’s hard to pull memories out of the haze where they all blend together.”
Tag: 06.11.18
The Critics Loved This Movie. Audiences Hated It. So What Gives?
The average American moviegoers apparently expected a different/scarier/better horror movie than this one. Are the critics who admired it just a bunch of buttheads? Are multiplex audiences too jaded to appreciate its bizarre, slow-building atmospheric tension?
Rembrandt Van Rijn: Upstart, Star, Snob, Pauper, Mystery
“He left no diaries. No memoirs. No letters besides the occasional plea for patronage. His most substantial contemporary biography, no more than a few paragraphs in all, reveals little beyond the human capacity for understatement. … The entirety of his known painterly philosophy amounts to six words: to produce ‘die meeste ende die natureelste beweechlickheyt‘ — or ‘the greatest and most natural movement’ — a phrase whose precise meaning remains hotly contested to this day. In the annals of art history, there are those whose stories remain shrouded by the passage of time. And then there is Rembrandt.”
A Young ABT Dancer Leaps From The Corps Into The Role Of Romeo
“On Wednesday afternoon, Aran Bell, at just 19, makes an important debut: as Romeo in Kenneth MacMillan’s production of Romeo and Juliet. At Ballet Theater, such a leap for a relatively unknown dancer is rare. Dancers wait — and sometimes really wait — for a featured variation in a full-length ballet. But a lead like Romeo? It’s as if Ballet Theater plucked a page from the casting manual of New York City Ballet, which often throws young dancers into principal parts.”
Why Isn’t 21st-Century Choreography Creating Great Roles For Great Ballerinas?
Joseph Carman: “where are the great prima donna roles of the 21st century? Many of today’s top choreographers concoct ballets with impressive corps de ballets that form dizzying, computer-graphic-like patterns. Numerous male and female soloists grab the audience’s attention and then disappear back into the group. … But are they quick to spotlight those juicy ballerina roles? Not really. To many current choreographers, building a ballet around just one commanding female dancer feels like a moth-eaten method of choreographing. To others, it feels too restrictive.”
How The Producer Of ‘The Band’s Visit’ Turned A Small Israeli Movie Into A Tony Award-Sweeping Musical
“The origin story begins in 2007, when [Orin] Wolf took his wife, who was born in Israel, to the Other Israel Film Festival at J.C.C. Manhattan on the Upper West Side. There was a new Israeli film playing that they wanted to see — The Band’s Visit, a fictional story about an Egyptian police orchestra that gets stranded for a night in an Israeli desert town. Mr. Wolf was, at that point, a producer largely in his dreams.”
Lionel Shriver Attacks Penguin Random House’s Diversity Drive
In a furious article in The Spectator, the author of We Need to Talk About Kevin wrote, “Drunk on virtue, Penguin Random House no longer regards the company’s raison d’etre as the acquisition and dissemination of good books. Rather, the organisation aims to mirror the percentages of minorities in the UK population with statistical precision. Good luck with that business model. Publishers may eschew standards, but readers will still have some.” The publishing house responded, “We firmly believe that giving a platform to more diverse voices will lead to a greater richness of creativity and stories.”
Top Posts From AJBlogs 06.11.18
Refreshing an Old Story
American Ballet Theatre premieres Alexei Ratmansky’s remounting of Harlequinade. … read more
AJBlog: Dancebeat Published 2018-06-10
Infernal “Heavenly Bodies”: How the Directorless Metropolitan Museum Went Astray
Where’s Max Hollein when we really need him? Several “what-were-they-thinking?” moments jolted me recently at the Metropolitan Museum, reaffirming my belief in a bedrock principle of museum management: … read more
AJBlog: CultureGrrl Published 2018-06-11
Lorraine Gordon, RIP
Lorraine Gordon, who inherited the Village Vanguard after her husband Max died in 1989, remained its proprietor and no-nonsense guiding spirit until her death yesterday in New York. She was 95. … read more
AJBlog: RiffTides Published 2018-06-10
The Sacred Art of John August Swanson
Even as a lifetime religious skeptic, I’ve long been fascinated by artists, writers and other culture-makers who bring religion, spirituality, and related matters into their work. … read more
AJBlog: CultureCrash Published 2018-06-11
A Managed Care Expert’s Recommendations To Make Schubert More Efficient
“Much effort was required in playing the sixteenth notes. This seems as excessive refinement, and it is recommended that all notes should be rounded up to the nearest eighth note. If this were done, it would be possible to use paraprofessionals instead of experienced musicians.”
The Biggest Potential Boost To The US Economy? how About Forgiving Student Debt?
In reality, this country would have been better off forgiving the $1.48 trillion in student loan debt held by more than 44 million Americans, rather than going through with the $1.5 trillion tax cut for corporations, where the benefits are concentrated at the very top. According to Student Loan Hero’s website, the average student who graduated college with the class of 2017 has close to $40,000 in student-loan debt, up 6 percent from the year before. There’s tremendous evidence this collective debt is holding back not just one generation, but the entire nation.