“I caution the film community to step back and look at LACMA’s history of support for the arts in general in recent years. … Saving the film program at LACMA without significant institutional support won’t be enough. LACMA has to first care as much about once more bringing together a broad arts community as it does about getting its hands on Eli Broad’s bank account.”
Tag: 08.13.09
Environmentalism Is All The Rage, But Not At Box Office
“[T]hree years after ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ won over moviegoers and Oscar voters, many new works are suffering the same fate plaguing other intellectually engaging films: moviegoers would rather hug Transformers than trees. … [B]ecause ticket buyers prefer escapist fare these days, it’s not easy being green.”
Making Art, Or Not, Aboard A Floating Artists’ Colony
“For the last two months artists have been floating around New York City on the Waterpod, a 3,000-square-foot experiment in community living and artistry. … Its systems run on solar power; its crew grows its own greens, collects its own rainwater. These things cared for each day, the notion was that the crew could work on more creative pursuits.” Turns out that’s not so easy.
Angela Gheorghiu Withdraws From Most Of Met’s New Carmen Mounted For Her
Confirming the second high-profile cancellation in as many days, the Metropolitan Opera said that, for “personal reasons,” the mercurial soprano has pulled out of six of her eight scheduled appearances as Carmen, including the New Year’s Eve gala and a worldwide high-def simulcast. “The production was conceived as a showcase for Ms. Gheorghiu and her husband, the tenor Roberto Alagna, who will still be singing Don José. It happens that the six performances Ms. Gheorghiu will miss are those in which Mr. Alagna was to have been her co-star.”
Sidney Poitier, Chita Rivera Among 16 Recipients Of Presidential Medal Of Freedom
“As the honorees entered, the audience greeted each with whoops and cheers (Sidney Poitier got a round of applause that nearly rivaled the president’s). … Hearty laughter followed [President Obama’s] opener for Chita Rivera: ‘Dolores Conchita Figueroa del Rivero knows that adversity comes with a difficult name.'”
Strictly Ballroom? Not Any More. (Not Even Close.)
Alastair Macaulay: “[It’s] time to say that ballroom [dancing] today (at exhibition and competitive levels)” – and in shows like Burn the Floor and Ballroom’s Best – “proposes behavior from both sexes that looks not much like courtship and seduction but something alarmingly close to rape and whorishness. … [A]ll these stunts, acrobatics, point-scoring and flashy displays of sexual availability are what matter. Musicality, phrasing, intimacy and actual sensuousness are what don’t.”