“There are currently more than 60 biennials and triennials around the world. I’d like to say good riddance to this system. It’s hard to imagine the process working this way in fifteen years. A new generation is going to have to find new ways to do big shows. Biennial culture is already almost irrelevant, because so many more people are providing so many better opportunities for artists to exhibit their work.”
Tag: 06.15.07
A New Literary Penchant For Misery
“Reproducing like bacteria, a new literary genre has wholly infected the bestseller charts. As much as 30% of the non-fiction paperback chart on any given week is made up of accounts of similarly grinding childhood misery. In the hardback chart, meanwhile, Abandoned, Anya Peters’s account of a childhood of rejection that culminated with her living in a car, has overtaken the recent hit Wasted, in which Mark Johnson describes the childhood beatings that led to his heroin addiction at 11.”
New Sondheim Musical Will Try For Broadway
“After a disastrous workshop, a flop out-of-town production and a nasty lawsuit, “Bounce,” the only new Stephen Sondheim musical in years, may finally play New York. Sources say the Public Theater wants to mount a full-scale production at its flagship theater on Lafayette Street next spring, with an eye to moving it to Broadway if the critics are kind.”
Using Fiction To Make Reality Seem More Real
One of the highlights of this year’s Venice Biennale is the Dutch pavilion, where artist Aeronaut Mik’s work is stopping visitors in their tracks. “Mik works at the border between politics and play, reality and drama. His Venice project, called ‘Citizens and Subjects,’ includes a series of video projections of disasters and crises that raises the stakes for what theater means.”
Shaw & Stratford Off To Strong Starts
Attendance is up at both of Southern Ontario’s major summer theatre festivals. “The crowds are happy and the ever-strengthening loonie doesn’t seem to be keeping Americans away. This comes as a particular relief to the Shaw Festival, which was facing a bleak outlook at the season’s start.”
The Newfound Power Of The Video Assist
“Once a novelty, book videos are increasingly common and, publishers say, essential. Hyperion Books, HarperCollins and Penguin Group (USA) are among those using them. Powell’s Books, a leading independent store based in Portland, Ore., plans its own series of films.”
Chinese Upset By Stereotypical Pirate
Chinese censors have cut about ten minutes out of the latest Pirates of the Caribbean movie, claiming that a character played by Chow-Yun Fat is overly stereotypical and insulting to Chinese people. Still, “the film took in a record $1.3-million (U.S.) on its opening day in China on Tuesday.”
Boyett Expanding His Mini-Empire
“The Menier Chocolate Factory, a plucky 3 ½-year-old theater company that has become the critic’s darling of the Off West End scene in London, has signed a three-year deal with the producer, Bob Boyett, giving him first rights to transfer shows to Broadway.” Boyett already has a similar deal in place with London’s National Theatre.
Charleston Symphony Back On Firm Ground
At the beginning of the 2006-07 season, the Charleston Symphony announced that it might not make it to season’s end without $500,000 in new funding from private donors. But the deathwatch was premature – the half million dollar goal will likely be exceeded by the end of the month, and the CSO will finish its year entirely in the black. “Symphony officials say the group also has improved its strategic planning efforts and is working on long-range plans that will help it maintain more solid financial footing in the future.”
Pittsburgh Taps Slatkin For Principal Guest
Months after naming Manfred Honeck as its next music director, the Pittsburgh Symphony has chosen outgoing National Symphony director Leonard Slatkin as principal guest conductor, beginning this fall. Slatkin replaces Yan Pascal Tortelier in the role.