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- The International Dance League Is Trying To Make Dance Into A Competitive Sport. Is It Working?
Evidently so. “Since its official opener in May, the IDL has secured a media rights deal with ESPN and garnered more than 2 billion views on social media. … Almost every stop on the season tour sold out; the Los Angeles finals sold out in 15 minutes.” – Dance Magazine
- Chicago Shakespeare Theatre Leader Moves On
Kimberly Motes, the executive director of Chicago Shakespeare Theater since 2023, is leaving her position in mid-November to become president and CEO of Hennepin Arts in Minneapolis. – Chicago Tribune
- Kennicott: The New LACMA Is A Train Wreck
He has achieved what many curators, scholars and museum professionals dream of: A museum that decontextualizes art, mixes it all up in a giant cauldron of visual distraction and isolates it from history and culture. But why? How could this happen to one of the country’s great art collections? – Washington Post (MSN)
- The Creative Mindset
Actively shaping this perception, rather than only letting it shape you, is a big part of what makes you creative. You need to actively create an attitude that enables you to do work amidst your circumstances, or even transcending it. – 3 Quarks Daily
- How Lance Oppenheim Gets Extraordinary, Un-Documentary-Like Scenes Like The Ones In “You Can See Everything”
“Being vulnerable with his subjects generally inspires them to return the favor. … He’s seen subjects go to trial, face romantic rejection, and lose their jobs on-camera; he’s also been holed up in a dingy motel bathroom while two of them had sex in the other room.” – New York Magazine (MSN)
- Can Opera On The Screen Be Successful?
This is the 75th anniversary of the first opera made for television: Gian Carlo Menotti’s Amahl and the Night Visitors, broadcast at Yuletide in 1951 and watched by five million people across the US in a production sponsored by Hallmark. – The Guardian
- Two Thirds Of Microdrama Videos Are AI-Created
The prevalence of AI in microdramas is reflected in the top-performing titles that Owl & Co. found for the latest quarter on apps that require viewers to pay for their stories. – The Hollywood Reporter
- Music Copyright Case Fails At Supreme Court As Four Justices Recuse Themselves
No quorum, because four of the nine justices recused themselves. The court did not explain why Sonia Sotomayor, Neil Gorsuch, Amy Coney Barrett and Ketanji Brown Jackson stepped away from the case. – NPR
- The Scene In “Lincoln In The Bardo” That Told Missy Mazzoli It Could Be An Opera
At one point, those stuck in the bardo see multiple versions of people important to them, urging them to move on. “I just pictured this cascade of people who were entering, and leaving, and singing, and then singing together and then singing by themselves,” Mazzoli says. – The Washington Post (MSN)
- Research: Why AI Won’t Replace Humans At Creativity
While AI can bypass years of artistic training, it cannot replace the transformative experiences that give creativity its deeper meaning. The research suggests that the future of art may lie less in producing impressive works and more in using technology to inspire exploration, meaningful experiences and new ways of seeing the world. – TechExplore
- Spotify Reports Revenue, Subscriber Gains, Says It Will Thrive In The AI World
Co-CEO Gustav Söderström said: “Spotify is in one of the few categories that actually stands to thrive in the agentic age. This is because agents excel at replacing and taking care of things people would rather not do. People love getting rid of chores. But entertainment is the opposite. – The Hollywood Reporter
- Judi Dench Says She Can’t Perform Anymore Because Of Diminished Eyesight
“I can’t be on stage. I can’t do a play any more. I can’t do a film any more. I can’t read any more,” the 91-year-old actor told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Thursday. – The Guardian
- This Year’s Smithsonian Folklife Festival, Booted From The National Mall, Thrived On A Nine-Month U.S. Tour
“Clifford Murphy, the director of the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, which runs the festival, called it a ‘democratizing experience’ — one that added up to more than just making lemons into lemonade.” – The New York Times
- Colombia’s National Museum Is The First Casualty In The New President’s Culture War
Last week, Abelardo de la Espriella, a far-right politician sworn in as President in August, declared a “cultural counterrevolution” and had dozens of artworks and historical objects removed from the Museo Nacional in Bogotá. In response, some 62,000 people demonstrated in the capital, arguing that the President’s action violates Colombia’s 1991 Constitution. – Artnet
- California’s Massive Tax Break To Stop Film Production From Leaving The State Isn’t Working (Yet)
“California’s $750 million bet on Hollywood has not reversed the overall decline in production, according to data released Wednesday by FilmLA. Instead, production levels fell 3.7% in the third quarter — even as the share of projects receiving state subsidies continued to rise. Location shoots remain well below the five-year average.” – Variety
- Hundreds Of Authors Skip Class Action Case And Sue Meta/Facebook Individually
“Nearly 300 authors filed (separate) copyright infringement claims against Meta Platforms on October 19 in (Federal court in San Francisco), alleging the company trained its AI models on pirated copies of their books and, more recently, on physical books it bought and scanned without a license.” – Publishers Weekly
- Broadway Contributes $21 Billion To NYC Economy: Study
The latest report from the Broadway League, covering the 2024-25 season, also found that the Broadway theater industry supported 114,600 full-time equivalent jobs and generated $979 million in taxes for the city. – Deadline
- Now Staff At All Four V&A Museums In London Will Strike
“Unionized staff across all four branches of the Victoria & Albert Museum in London announced their intention to strike on October 29 and 30, citing stalled negotiations and allegations of ‘Amazon-style’ working conditions at the newly-opened V&A East Storehouse.” – ARTnews
- Publisher Cuts Ties With Author Thélyson Orélien Over Alleged AI Use In His Hit Novel
“Orélien has denied allegations that he used AI on his breakthrough novel (C’était ça ou mourir) and, last week, Canadian publisher Les Éditions du Boréal said it was standing by the 38-year-old writer. But on Wednesday, Boréal said it had conducted a further investigation” and concluded that Thélyson did use AI. – The Guardian
- The Phoenix Symphony Closes
Good Morning,
The Phoenix Symphony will lay off its 66 musicians on November 2 though revenues rose more than 50 percent in two years; endowment gifts are restricted and can’t pay operating costs (Fox 10). San Francisco’s artist grants normally arrive within four weeks of July agreements; in October documentary filmmaker Susannah Smith was still borrowing from her mother for rent (San Francisco Chronicle).
Caryl Churchill’s Triumph, 20 minutes long at London’s Almeida Theatre, takes its emperor’s cruelties from Suetonius and gives his press officer a blond wig and an American accent (The Guardian). Lucy Guerin, who founded Melbourne’s Lucy Guerin Inc 25 years ago, danced publicly for the first time in 13 years before handing the company to Melanie Lane; she thought she could still do the arabesque (The Guardian).
Elliott Management, the hedge fund that owns Barnes & Noble and Waterstones, is expected to take both public next year at $3 billion or more, fifteen years after Amazon was supposed to devour chains like them; James Daunt runs both (The New Yorker).
All of today’s stories below.
- A Maverick Pedagogical Proposition
- Is Caryl Churchill’s Latest Play About One Of Trump’s Succession Of Blonde Press Secretaries?
“Triumph, which has opened at London’s Almeida Theatre, is Churchill’s latest piece of explosive minimalism. Running at just 20 minutes, it skewers contemporary barbarism (via) historical analogy and is a reminder that Churchill … has in recent years developed a form of elliptical drama for which the apt word might be compressionism.” – The Guardian
- Broadway Has A Strong Week
Hamilton was the top grossing show of the week with $2.8 million, followed by The Lion King with $2 million. MJ was the fourth highest grossing with $1.76 million, followed by the Bowen Yang-led Oh, Mary! with $1.5 million. – The Hollywood Reporter
- Hong Kong Overhauls Its System For Performing Arts Funding, And Groups Are Nervous
Since 2008, the territory’s government has funded nine designated major performing arts groups, including the Hong Kong Ballet, Philharmonic, and Repertory Theatre. The city’s chief executive has announced a planned change to a more flexible, “merit-based” system which would make room for more organizations. – South China Morning Post (Hong Kong)
- Arundhati Roy On The AI End Game
Remember how, in Thailand and Indonesia, the ocean drew back from the coastline? People ran out to marvel at the miles of pristine new beach that suddenly emerged, not realising that, far out at sea, a wall of water was building up and would come crashing over them. – Equator
- Listeners Are Turning Against AI Music
Streaming services, notable musicians and fans are confronting the growing presence of AI-generated music and drawing lines in the sand. On Tuesday, Spotify announced it had removed about 50m songs considered AI slop from its recommendations to users over the past year. – The Guardian
- Did Hollywood Really Need Netflix?
“The movie business needed Netflix to wake up. They needed a real disruptor… Maybe we are now entering a period where the relationship works the other way around, with Netflix being inspired by the movie business. I think the two worlds are additive.” – Deadline
- To Say Goodbye To Her Dance Company, Lucy Guerin Performs Onstage For First Time In 13 Years
“I have found it incredibly confronting, to be honest,” she says, hours before the premiere. “Part of me thought I could still do all those things if I just got back in the studio and trained a bit. But I’m afraid that wasn’t the case.” – The Guardian
- Netflix Is Making Money. That’s Not Enough
For the year, Netflix said, it expects revenue growth to be 13 percent, roughly in line with its previous estimates. Shares dropped more than 5 percent in after-hours trading. The company acknowledged the undercurrent that led to the recent tumult: concern about stagnating attention time on its service. – The New York Times
- The Battles Over Jimmy Buffet’s Estate
Three years after Jimmy’s death, the family is locked in a legal dispute over that Margaritaville fortune. It has upended the fun-loving vibes the musician spent his life cultivating, with the family seeming rudderless without Jimmy as their figurehead, according to court documents and interviews. – The Wall Street Journal
- Remember This When Voting in the Midterms . . .<a href="https://www.artsjournal.com/herman/2026/10/remember-this-when-voting-in-the-midterms.html" title="Remember This When Voting in the Midterms .
- Will Wikipedia Survive AI?
It was neither the first online encyclopedia—Britannica had a web presence by 1999—nor even the first that users could edit. Rather, its vitality arose from the community of obsessives whom it attracted, and its decline has coincided with the market’s capture of their creativity. – The New Yorker
- Harry Houdini Did Not Die The Way Most People Think He Did
The received wisdom has been that a Montreal student named Joscelyn Gordon Whitehead punched Houdini in the stomach several times without warning, and the blows led to a ruptured appendix and peritonitis. Now a 77-year-old retired urologic surgeon has done a forensic medical investigation which challenges that narrative. – The New York Times
- Jeffrey Daunt And The Culture Of Reading
Actually, in America, the reading of books is up. Sales of print books have increased nearly twenty-five per cent from a decade ago. The number of independent bookstores in the United States has climbed steeply since 2009, with a seventy-per-cent increase since 2020. – The New Yorker
- When Music Teachers Are Gods
I have known countless music students who have gone on to distinguished careers who have described their teachers in God-like terms and continue to do so long after their student days. Often these descriptions are laced with affection and continued adulation. – Thomas Wolf
