2003: Year In Review What were the top stories of 2003? Here's our updated archive of year-end stories from publications around the world. ArtsJournal 12/28/03
Posted: 12/31/2003 12:55 pm
A Nation Of Idiots? Or Just Navel-Gazers Addicted To TV? "The American intelligentsia is anxious these days... Anyone who watches television for more than five minutes can be forgiven for worrying about dumbing down, but the past year has seen a lively renewal of debate on this perennial topic." From Terry Teachout's blog post (here on ArtsJournal) calling for a re-embrace of 1950s-style "middlebrow" culture, to Curtis White's disgust with a new breed of self-important intellectual wannabes which "wants to protect the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and has bought an SUV with the intent of visiting it," America's thinkers are unanimous that we need more old-fashioned thinking in our lives, but Canadian Kate Taylor feels they may be missing the point. The Globe & Mail (Canada) 12/31/03
Posted: 12/31/2003 6:05 am
Theoretically Speaking...Theory Might Be Dead For two decades now, the world of humanities studies has been ruled by theory. "But there are reports from the academic world that theory may have run out steam. 'Confidence in the technology of theory has faded. Theory's opacities and arcane terms may be entrenched, but 'they don't come at you with the old assurance and swagger." Boston Globe 12/28/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 7:03 pm
Art On A Shirt "It’s fashion. It’s art. It’s advertising. It’s a political statement. It’s one of the most versatile pieces of clothing ever made. It’s a staple ingredient of 21st-century culture. Once upon a time, Julius Caesar said: "Veni, vidi, vici" ("I came, I saw, I conquered"). These days it’s: "Been there, done that, bought the T-shirt"." The Scotsman 12/30/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 6:25 pm
The New Seoul (At Expense Of The Old) Seoul is being remade. "As newly built apartments soar to spectacular and costly heights, some of Seoul's most distinctive neighborhoods and buildings were quietly shown the door this year, to make room for future visions of the city." Korea Herald 12/30/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 5:36 pm
Another Failure In South Florida When the Florida Philharmonic folded last summer, many expected its audience to find a home with other local classical groups such as the New World Symphony, or the Miami Chamber Orchestra. But the MCO hasn't performed since February, due to a cash shortage, and this week, the chamber ensemble officially cancelled the 2003-04 season. As in the case of the Florida Phil, donors to the MCO have been reluctant to throw good money after bad, and the group has not been able to stabilize its finances in the 11 months since its troubles became public knowledge. South Florida Sun-Sentinel 12/31/03
Posted: 12/31/2003 5:24 am
Key West: The Part-Time Pro Orchestra The Key West Symphony is unlike any other. "The symphony draws talented musicians from other orchestras, such as the Los Angeles Philharmonic. They fly in three times a year for a week of rehearsals, fun in the sun and performances that draw accolades from residents and visitors. Conductor Sebrina Maria Alfonso, a Key West native, returned to the island in 1997 after working and studying internationally to bring to life her dream: a world-class symphony in a town with a permanent population of less than 30,000 residents." Andante (AP) 12/30/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 4:58 pm
Downloading Program Tops 2003 Internet Searches The information most searched for on the internet this year? It was info about Kazaa, the downloading program, says the annual Yahoo! list of most-searched terms. "Kazaa, which has more than 17 million registered users in Europe and the US, attracted attention in 2003 after the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) took action to stop web users sharing music through such file-swapping software." BBC 12/30/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 4:46 pm
The Electric Guitar Going Digital Gibson is setting out to introduce the first major innovation to the electric guitar in 70 years. "An audio converter inside the instrument's body translates string vibrations into a digital signal that can travel over a standard Cat-5 Ethernet cable. The company will continue to sell traditional Les Pauls, but CEO Henry Juszkiewicz thinks it won't be long before all guitarists go digital." Wired 12/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 4:36 pm
Resolutions of a Critic Paul Horsley has a few things he's hoping to do better in 2004 than he did in 2003, and he's not afraid to share. "I will write less, listen more... I will not whine... I will have agendas. A newspaper critic has two basic functions: to cover the arts news and to comment on it. I'm going to work harder in my commentary to uphold certain things that I deem to be worthy of further support." Horsley also resolves not to be too nice, and laments having left a particular sentence out of a recent review of a Mahler symphony: "We wept at the usual places, but for different reasons." Kansas City Star 12/31/03
Posted: 12/31/2003 6:21 am
Russell Resigns P.S.122 After 21 years, Mark Russell has resigned as executive director of New York's P.S. 122. "In addition to the widespread kudos for the man who helped launch Whoopi Goldberg, Eric Bogosian, Blue Man Group, John Leguizamo, and the Hip Hop Theater Festival—and brought heating, lighting, and a managerial infrastructure into the once abandoned public-school building—artists and producers of experimental work also sounded the alarm over the possibility that a corporate mentality might replace the aesthetic vision and commitment that have characterized Russell's tenure." Village Voice 12/30/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 6:51 pm
2003 - The Year States Bailed On The Arts Across America, states cut arts funding in 2003. "By July, virtually every state arts council had received an appropriations decrease. Some cuts were draconian: 30% in Minnesota, 62% in Massachusetts, almost 80% in Florida, and a near defunding in Colorado. Compared to this, the cut sustained by the New York State Council on the Arts -- 15% -- seemed almost benign." Backstage 12/30/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 6:36 pm
Carreras On A Mission It's been 16 years since tenor Jose Carreras almost died of leukemia. "His survival spurred him to work for the rest of his days for a cause - his concerts now raise money for the José Carreras International Leukaemia Foundation. This raises funds for research, including scholarships for young scientists; helps establish bone marrow transplantation centres; and supports round-the-clock information services for patients." The Independent (UK) 12/29/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 5:28 pm
Return of the Kings Just in case you missed it (as if that were even possible,) Matthew Broderick and Nathan Lane are back on Broadway, reprising their starring roles in The Producers. "The two actors, whose performances so delighted critics and audiences that the show has not been able to sustain its once formidable ticket sales without them, were enticed to return for 14 weeks at a salary of $100,000 a week each, an enormous sum for the theater." It's a situation that seemed ripe for a huge, high-profile flop, but the reviews this morning, a day after the pair's re-debut, are unanimous in their assessment: Lane and Broderick own these roles, and the public is unlikely to accept anyone else. The New York Times 12/31/03
Posted: 12/31/2003 6:33 am
- Producing Chemistry The Broadway public is on record: Lane and Broderick are Bialystock and Bloom, and no one else will do. Michael Riedel agrees, and chalks it up to the easy, almost improvisational interaction between the two stars: "They broke each other up several times throughout the show, and, during the final number, when Broderick dropped his cane, Lane burst out in joyous laughter. That chemistry is in many ways a key to the success of the show, which, at its heart, is a love story between two lonely misfits." New York Post 12/31/03
Posted: 12/31/2003 6:32 am
Fo: Taking On The Prime Minister Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's biggest critic these days comes from the stage, where Dario Fo unleashes his criticisms. "For all its grave accusations, "The Two-Headed Anomaly" is an almost vaudevillian romp. The show consists largely of short, fat and bald jokes about the prime minister and his councilors. It stages bawdy attacks not only on Mr. Berlusconi's politics but also on his personal life and his ethics. But that is exactly what Mr. Fo's fans expect and want." The New York Times 12/31/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 6:06 pm
The New Age Of Understudy Pity the understudy. Most understudies rarely get that Cinderella call to the stage. But "the Royal Shakespeare Company's new director, Michael Boyd, has waved his magic wand and decreed that she shall go the ball - every understudy at Stratford is now contractually guaranteed at least one full public performance per production. As a morale booster, this seems to me both humane and practical, and it is also evidence of a new trend that brings the understudy out of the dressing room and into the spotlight." The Telegraph (UK) 12/30/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 5:46 pm
Where Are New York's Great New Musicals There is plenty of musical theatre going on in New York. Most of it isn't first-rate. "New York is awash with performing talent, so why, aside from the obvious factors of cost and the inherently high failure rate for any collaborative art form, aren't the new works worthy of their actors?" Financial Times 12/30/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 5:10 pm
Ararat To Get A Showing In Turkey "Ararat, the film by Toronto-based Atom Egoyan about the genocide of Armenians at the time of the First World War, can be shown in Turkey but at least one scene will be cut, a Turkish culture ministry official said yesterday. The film by Egoyan, a Canadian of Armenian heritage, tells of the plight of Armenians in Ottoman Turkey when a 1915-23 campaign to force them from the eastern part of the country left as many as 1.5 million dead. Turkey says the figures are inflated and that Armenians died during civil unrest and not as the result of a planned campaign." The Globe & Mail (AP) 12/31/03
Posted: 12/31/2003 6:16 am
2003 - A Good Year For Women Directors It is because women directors usually have such a difficult time getting movies made that it is worth noting that 2003 has been a good year for women directors... The New York Times 12/31/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 6:20 pm
Did CBS Pay Michael Jackson $1 Million For Interview? CBS denies it paid Jackson for his 60 Minutes interview Sunday. But a Michael Jackson associate said that "in renewed negotiations, CBS agreed to pay another $1 million to the star to grant the interview so that the network could finally broadcast its entertainment special. It is now scheduled to be broadcast on Friday evening. 'In essence they paid him, but they didn't pay him out of the `60 Minutes' budget; they paid him from the entertainment budget, and CBS just shifts around the money internally. That way `60 Minutes' can say `60 Minutes' didn't pay for the interview'." The New York Times 12/31/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 5:53 pm
French Author Sues Disney Over Nemo "A French children's author is suing Disney, saying the international box-office hit Finding Nemo may have been lifted from his own work." BBC 12/30/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 4:53 pm
The Curtain Falls On Boston's Nutcracker The struggles of ballet companies across the country are well-documented, but you'll pardon the Boston Ballet for feeling specially cursed this year. Last night, the curtain fell on the company's last performance of the Nutcracker for 2003, and possibly forever. Having been informed that the Wang Theatre, the company's Nutcracker home for 35 years, would be replacing the classic ballet with a traveling show next December, Boston Ballet is desperately searching for a new home in a city famously lacking in performance space. With Nutcracker typically bringing in as much as 50%-60% of a ballet company's annual revenues, no one even wants to think of what could happen if Boston Ballet can't mount the holiday show. Boston Globe 12/31/03
Posted: 12/31/2003 5:46 am
The World's Most Popular Show Of All Time What's the most successful show in history? It's Holiday on Ice. "Reviled by critics, adored by coach parties, and seen by many millions - in fact, the show passed the 300 million mark last autumn - Holiday on Ice returns to the Wembley Arena next month, to celebrate its 60th anniversary. In 1988 it won its place in the Guinness Book of Records as most watched show of all time, when a French woman, Isabelle Challier, became the 250 millionth visitor. It has toured to 620 cities in 80 countries. It is now run from Amsterdam, and military-style planning keeps three shows, with 200 skaters, touring the world." The Guardian (UK) 12/30/03
Posted: 12/30/2003 5:16 pm
