Tag: 12.18.18

Inside The Lives Of Understudies

They get less rehearsal than the principal cast, they have to keep the lines and (crucially) the blocking straight in their minds while rarely getting the chance to use them, and they’re pinned down to one place for all of a show’s run. But even without star-is-born moments, the job is a terrific opportunity for actors fresh out of school to launch careers. Young reporter Zoe Grossinger talks with some Philadelphia actors who are living the understudy life. — The Philadelphia Inquirer

New York Times Book Review Editor Responds To Controversy Over Alice Waters’s Book Recommendation

In response to reader queries, Pamela Paul explains why Alice Walker was chosen for the “By the Book” Q&A feature, how the interview was conducted, and why the published feature didn’t include any explanation or context for Walker’s citation of a book and author widely seen as anti-Semitic. — The New York Times

Nonprofit Journalism And Its Funders Have A ‘Random Acts Of Innovation’ Problem

A new report from Oxford’s Journalism Innovation Project refers to it as ‘bright, shiny things’ syndrome: a tendency to focus on, and fund, new and perhaps untested ideas such as algorithm-tweaking, new media, and even artificial intelligence — often while losing sight of the production of quality journalism that this innovation is supposed to be supporting. — Nonprofit Quarterly

Wendy Whelan Laments That Today’s Young Students Know Too Little About American Ballet’s History

“Today, as I travel around the country giving master classes, … I can’t help but notice my students’ eyes widening as they look to each other wondering who exactly [one or another once-famous American ballerina] is. … As we navigate ourselves forward, it might be good to glance back more often, to see how and why those before us did what they did.” — Dance Magazine

Steven Spielberg Is Expanding His Shoah Foundation To Cover Genocides Beyond The Holocaust

“The Holocaust cannot stand alone. We decided to send our videographers into Rwanda to get testimony. From there we went to Cambodia, Armenia — we’re doing a critical study in the Central African Republic, Guatemala, the Nanjing massacre. Most recently, we’re doing testimony on the anti-Rohingya violence in Myanmar and the current anti-Semitic violence in Europe. We’re expanding our scope to counter many forms of hate.” — The New York Times

Director Quits Broadway ‘All My Sons’ Because He Wasn’t Allowed To Cast Two Black Actors

“Director Gregory Mosher said in an interview that his association with the Roundabout Theatre Company revival — which will star Annette Bening and Tracy Letts and begin performances at the American Airlines Theatre on April 4 — ended after the Arthur Miller estate, overseen by his daughter, filmmaker Rebecca Miller, objected to the casting” of black actors as brother and sister Ann and George Deever. — The Washington Post

Moscow’s Tretyakov Gallery Has New App To Bring Its Collection To The World (And Ask For Money)

“[The Russian state museum] is harnessing blockchain technology to power a new app that digitises its entire collection of more than 190,000 objects … In what is being described as a ‘new form of public involvement in art’, the My Tretyakov app invites each user to … either sponsor a work personally or give digital patronage to someone as a gift.” — The Art Newspaper

LA County Museum Of Art Is Falling Behind On Its New Building

Not only must it continue to amass money toward the $650 million project, but it also must pack up its collection to prepare for construction. And it faces lingering questions about whether an increasingly uncertain economy will hurt fundraising in 2019, whether the museum’s long-in-progress environmental impact report will further delay the project, and how much competition, if any, it will face from construction campaigns at other museums, including the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures next door. – Los Angeles Times