"As a movie star, George Clooney is a happy warrior, always ready with a thoughtful quote or charming anecdote, and he’s the rare celebrity whose political acumen matches his outspokenness." But his directorial career is "bereft of personality and devoid of substance." - Slate
You can thank the FBI - and also the people of Nepal, who restored the temple and convinced others that the deity had not left the broken sculpture. - Hyperallergic
A now-30-year-old tech executive has texts and other evidence from the alleged assault in 2010, by the then-35-year-old The Sex and the City star. (The actor was dropped by his talent agency on Friday.) - The Daily Beast
"The Cinerama Dome first opened in 1963. The venue survived a demolition scare in 1998, when a proposal by Pacific Theatres would have stripped the dome and replaced it with restaurants and a movie multiplex" - and now, too, the pandemic. - Los Angeles Times
The COVID-caused cancellation comes at an terrible time for the performers and staff. Many other shows are canceling for the weekend or week as well. In November, the NYT published an article about the workers' worries about Radio City's COVID-19 protocol. - The New York Times
There is no Bridgerton musical, and yet ... the pandemic lack of Broadway "left room for voters to be more adventurous, opening the door to a nomination for concept albums including The Unofficial Bridgerton Musical by Abigail Barlow and Emily Bear that went viral thanks to TikTok." - Variety
The frequency of context-destruction is no accident. Twitter rewards high-context speech, and then gives us the perfect tool to decontextualize that speech. Twitter is designed to invite our vulnerability, and then punish it. - Raven
With a view to improving that experience, presumably, Apple acquired dedicated classical music streaming service Primephonic in August 2021. In a press release, the company promises Apple Music subscribers “a significantly improved classical music experience.” - Ludwig Van
"The show sold a bit below their historical average—which the company anticipated, not least because of the rising concern around yet another COVID variant—but streaming tickets wound up accounting for 28 percent of their box office revenue and 33 percent of the overall number of tickets sold. - American Theatre
By producing an overarching story of life, Big History is meant to fill the void that was left by the processes of secularisation that have dismantled the holistic narratives that were provided by traditional religious systems. - Aeon
The resulting glare is sure to have a dampening effect on future donations from individuals or families whose wealth derives from practices today considered unethical or otherwise problematic. Museums and boards with ties to fossil-fuel companies, for instance, have long been targets of criticism. - Apollo
Studio executives and box-office pundits expected audiences to show up for In the Heights, Dear Evan Hansen and West Side Story, and not just fans of the movie musical but general audiences, as well. After a year without movies, audiences would crave the spectacle. It didn’t happen. - The Guardian
"They are the ultimate kitsch, and in this era of hipster aesthetic, they lend themselves well to some ironic display. But does dark velvet truly hold the power of rendering the most masterful stroke into scoffworthy scribblings?" - Quartz
“After studying this phenomenon extensively, we’ve determined that the sound comes from new and more aerodynamic railing that we installed on the west sidewalk. It was part of a Golden Gate Bridge retrofit designed to protect the bridge for future generations.” - The Guardian
Mind, it's not a sequel. Dickens published a series of five Christmas novellas; A Christmas Carol was the first. London's Dickens Museum hopes to get some attention for the third, The Cricket on the Hearth, with an exhibition of the original illustrations. - The Guardian
