Reimagining Stravinsky’s ‘Firebird’ With Enormous South African Puppets

“The dragon of this production has a wingspan of 33 feet, and weighs in at 440 pounds. … The beast has three manipulators – one inside the body, one in the head, and it’s walking and flicking its ears and opening its mouth and has teeth. … Dubbed Firebird: Reimagined, the piece receives its live-orchestra world premiere at the Mann [Center in Philadelphia’s Fairmount Park] on July 20, … [and] it will move on to Wolf Trap, Ravinia, the Hollywood Bowl, and other summer venues.”

Hollywood, Why Are You So Ignorant About Girls?

“There’s a silver lining to all this: With more alternative forms of film and TV release available, there are myriad options to showcase independent work. To compete in the children’s movie market, big studios may need an action-adventure spectacle with merchandise; but HBO and Netflix could do for children’s programming what they’ve already done for grown-up shows.”

Top Posts From AJBlogs For 06.12.16

Let’s Change to The Positive At the Met–Something “Divine”
Flash back to 1984, and to this excerpt from an article–no, a brief, really, which in itself says something–in The New York Times: Also of interest this week: ”The Flame and the Lotus: Indian and…read more
AJBlog: Real Clear ArtsPublished 2016-06-12

 

Sunday With Adams And Shorter
This morning’s cycling expedition took me across a freeway overpass whose height allowed a perfect view of Mount Adams sixty miles to the southwest. When I decided to share it with you, I wondered what… … read more
AJBlog: RiffTidesPublished 2016-06-12

 

Once Upon a Time. . .
American Ballet Theater mounts Alexei Ratmansky’s The Golden Cockerel. It occasionally happens that a ballet from another era comes to us tangled in its own history, even as it tries to make sense of… … read more
AJBlog: DancebeatPublished 2016-06-11

 

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When A Nonfiction Book Goes Rogue (And Becomes A Novel)

“The process of editing was so different as well, because when I’m writing my nonfiction books I’m quite open to it, but of course it’s very different when it’s a story that you’ve invented. When someone’s saying: “I’m not quite sure why”, you think: do I want to clarify that or is that telling me that I need to deepen the mystery around it?”