Impacted staffers begun being informed about the cuts at roughly 10:30 a.m. PT. Approximately 650 people at Warner Bros. are expected to be let go, according to people familiar with the matter, while HBO will cut 150 and 175 staffers. – Variety
Tag: 08.11.20
The Wellness Trap
Once we realize that we cannot find lasting happiness through relying on outer things, we might turn to meditation, but now a new problem can arise. Many people today are drawn to meditation practice for enhancing their own well-being: we would all like to achieve “inner happiness,” but again we are back to the search. The very attempt to seek a happy mind becomes endless, with chasing the happiness leading to more chasing. At the same time, our efforts to get rid of stress can seem to create even more stress. Meditation itself now becomes a new kind of hamster wheel upon which we endlessly run—running but not moving. – Lithub
Rudy Giuliani Being Sued By His Art Advisor
In November 2019, Miller Gaffney invoiced a total of $27,300 for her services appraising the estranged couple’s fine and decorative art collections in order to determine their market value “for equitable distribution purposes.” – Artnet
Major Layoffs At DC Comics
Roughly one third of DC’s editorial ranks are being laid off, according to sources. Insiders also say the majority of the staff of the streaming service DC Universe has been laid off, a move that had been widely expected as WarnerMedia shifts its focus to new streaming service HBO Max. – Hollywood Reporter
UK’s Summer Theatres Work Through, Around, And With COVID Restrictions
A stage on the beach in Brighton with audience groups at picnic tables. A solo show in a Belfast shopping mall and another amid the Narnia sculptures in C.S. Lewis Square. And, of course, open-sided tents in car parks and on lawns. Here’s how regional theatre festivals are making sure the show goes on. – The Guardian
Parallel musical universes? More lost continents? The early-music movement in New York explores an endless past
One stands back and marvels how horizons have kept expanding in the music before J.S. Bach, with modern premieres of 400-year-old works by names you’ve barely heard of — and leave you wanting more. – David Patrick Stearns
Chicago Jazz Impresario Joe Segal, 94
For more than 70 years, starting in 1947 as a student at Roosevelt University, Segal presented the world’s greatest jazz musicians in rented hovels, rundown showrooms, dilapidated hotels and, eventually, elegant clubs and concert halls. – Chicago Tribune
Five Musicians Talk About Diversity In Chicago Orchestras
One solution that all five instrumentalists opposed was changing the orchestral world’s blind audition process in which candidates try out behind curtains or screens. In a July article in the New York Times, music critic Anthony Tommasini argued that such an approach was no longer tenable and that orchestras had to take more “proactive steps” to hiring. – Chicago Sun-Times
Color-Blind Casting Is Not The Solution — We Need Color-Conscious Casting
That’s the argument being made by a growing number of nonwhite actors and observers such as critic Diep Tran: “Color-blind casting is dangerous in the same way the phrase: ‘I don’t see race’ is dangerous. It negates the very real structural hindrances that block actors of color from the same opportunities as white actors — like low pay in the theatre industry, a lack of roles that are ethnically specific that actors of color can play, and unconscious bias on the part of white theatres and casting directors.” – The Guardian
Play About Afghan Dancing Boys Withdrawn By Authors After Anger From Many Sides
“In 2017 [sic], two Americans attempted something unconventional … a musical about a subject even Afghans would consider too sensitive and unsettling — ‘bacha bazi‘ or ‘boy play’.” Turns out it was. When Diversionary Theatre, an LGBTQ company in San Diego, presented The Boy Who Danced on Air onstage, the play was well-received; when the company posted video of it online this summer and people from all over could see it, the response was not so warm. – BBC