“‘A Night Less Ordinary,’ Arts Council England’s free ticket scheme for under-26 year olds, is to be ‘curtailed’ under plans unveiled by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport to make £73 million of savings. … [Many] of the theatres taking part in the project are already signed up for two years, ending early in 2011.”
Tag: 06.17.10
Sebastian Horsely, Artist-Writer-Dandy, Dead Of Overdose At 47
“The colourful self-publicist was found dead at his flat in central London this morning, days after a play adapted from his memoirs – Dandy in the Underworld – opened at the Soho theatre.”
Esa-Pekka Salonen Remembers Ernest Fleischmann
‘Of course, crisis management always brought out the best in Ernest. He was disappointed when things went too smoothly.”
Buenos Aires Bedlam: Cleaning Up The Mess At The Renovated Teatro Colón
As the legendary opera house “reopens in a limited season after a seemingly interminable eight years of upheaval, including three years of complete closure, the feeling for many is more of outrage than affection. … Like much else in volatile Argentina, … the project has lurched from crisis to crisis, plagued by grandstanding, cronyism and economic mismanagement.”
Daldry, Boyle To Oversee Olympic Opening Ceremony
“[Stephen] Daldry will be in overall creative charge of ceremonies while [Danny] Boyle will be artistic director of the opening ceremony itself. … Unlike the £70m budget granted to the Chinese film director Zhang Yimou for the 2008 Beijing games, the London team will have a total of £40m for all four ceremonies.”
Plot To Cash In On Stolen First Folio Outlined In Court
“Calling unannounced at [the Folger Shakespeare Library], the 53-year-old pressed reticent academics to back his claim that the 387-year-old treasure was previously unknown, kept in a box by the mother of a major in Fidel Castro’s army.” In reality, a prosecutor said, the man “allegedly forced locks at a sparsely attended exhibition in Durham to steal the book 10 years earlier.”
Royal Festival Hall To Restore Pipe Organ With £950K Grant
“The restoration on the organ will be undertaken by Harrison and Harrison Ltd, its original creators. The work, which is the final phase of revamp of the building on London’s South Bank, will finish by 2013.”
Paul McCartney Is Writing A Ballet
“Details [of the commission] still need to be fleshed out but he’s already started work on the score and says he’s ‘enthusiastic’ about it.”
Alberta’s Culture Minister: ‘Why Do I Fund So Much Crap?’
Lindsay Blackett on homegrown talent: “I sit here as a government representative for film and television in the province of Alberta and I look at what we produce and if we’re honest with ourselves, why do I produce so much shit? … Why aren’t broadcasters picking up more Canadian content? It’s because Canadian content isn’t what it should be.”
US Musicians Hit The Road As Cultural Ambassadors
Since 2006, Rhythm Road, a State Department-funded arts diplomacy initiative administered by Jazz at Lincoln Center, “has sent more than 100 musicians on tours to 97 different countries, most of them outside the reach of American music. … The program is a revival of the Jazz Ambassadors of the Cold War,” this time with more teaching.