“Ballet is generally the domain of young girls in Ireland, but in China it is becoming a pastime of choice for the middle-aged. … Ballet has a strong focus on the individual, which does not sit easily with the mass focus of Maoist doctrine. It is also a western art form,” making the popularity of ballet classes “emblematic of China’s modernisation in the last 30 years of reform.”
Tag: 08.26.09
Pete Townshend: I Am A Musical Theatre Animal
“‘I am writing a new musical,’ Townshend blogged. ‘Floss is an ambitious new project for me, in the style of Tommy and Quadrophenia. In this case the songs are interspersed with surround-sound “soundscapes” featuring complex sound effects and musical montages.’ … He is in talks with producers in New York but hopes to release some of the musical’s more ‘conventional’ songs on a new Who album next year.”
Radio Royalties For Artists Divide Black Community
“While the Performance Rights Act, now in a congressional committee, would affect all artists as well as large radio companies, the legislation has caused hostilities within the African-American community, pitting black-oriented radio stations and their popular DJs against black politicians and artists who support the bill.”
High Line Executive Handsomely Compensated
“Robert R. Hammond, an artist and entrepreneur who had no experience in the world of public parks, has been paid about $1.2 million over the last 10 years of the High Line’s development — a vast majority of it since 2005. And his salary of $250,000 a year as president and executive director of the nonprofit he helped found, Friends of the High Line, makes him one of the most generously compensated leaders of the 10 major park conservancies in the city.”
In Search Of New Playwrights’ Theatre’s Old Scripts
Harry M. Bagdasian is “on the hunt for scripts of plays that premiered in the 1970s and ’80s at the long-defunct New Playwrights’ Theatre in Washington, which, as a determined 23-year-old, he co-founded. … He’s donating his New Playwrights’ memorabilia to the University of Maryland’s Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library, but he’s short another 34 scripts of New Playwrights’ shows performed during his tenure that he’d like to include.”
What Rocco Wants
“Perhaps it’s the momentousness of the task at hand, or maybe it’s trepidation in a new environment, but Landesman — somewhat uncharacteristically — is proceeding cautiously.” Even so, the new chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts “is an unabashed hawk on the issue of money; increased funding, he said, is one of the barriers the NEA needs to overcome if it intends to once more lead the country’s sprawling network of artists and arts organizations.”
Natural History Museum Head Took 5 Percent Pay Cut
“Ellen V. Futter, the president of New York’s American Museum of Natural History, took a 5 percent salary cut for the year that ended in June 2009, the museum said, as fundraising fell and staffing was reduced.” She earned $1.1 million the previous year. Other AMNH executives also took a 5 percent cut. “While ticketed attendance is up by more than a third since 2005, to about 10,000 a day, the recession has hurt the museum’s other revenue sources.”
UK Gov’t Plans To Fight Filesharing By Cutting Pirates’ Broadband
Technology minister Stephen Timms “proposes that alongside measures to block access to illegal downloading sites and throttling connection speeds for repeat offenders, persistent filesharers should also have their internet connections terminated.” Opponents of the measure warn that it would “restrict fundamental rights” and might be illegal.
Fury In Tinseltown As ‘Hollywood’s Favorite Charity’ Threatens To Close Its Old-Age Home
The Motion Picture and Television Fund has told the 78 remaining residents of its long-term care facility that, due to financial troubles, the Fund must close the building and move the residents by the end of this year. Many of Hollywood’s big names are howling in protest, and the families of the residents plan to sue; meanwhile, some evidence appears to suggest that the Fund’s alleged fiscal crisis may not actually exist.
Lincoln Center’s Fountain Is Being Redesigned And Choreographed
What’s more, “[t]he firm doing it is also responsible for a water extravaganza set to Broadway, pop and operatic tunes at the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas.” Relax: said firm also did the more subdued fountains at New York’s Columbus Circle, and the designers say they’re very conscious that the Lincoln Center fountain “is an iconic piece.”