Now, “a movie” can be a meme or an endurance contest or just background wallpaper; if it’s playing on your TV, it could easily be a series you’re bingeing without differentiating between episodes. If it’s on a big screen, it’s nearly always a reboot or a spin-off or a merchandise-friendly spectacle. - Washington Post
With a pioneering sense of eclecticism, he connected the dots between John Cage and James Brown, between Mahler and MTT’s famous grandfather, Boris Thomashefsky, a star of the New York Yiddish theater. - Los Angeles Times
Apple TV+ “has become a must-see destination” and posted record viewership in the quarter. Some have compared it to HBO — before Warner Bros. Discovery began making cuts — developing a reputation for being willing to pay big for A-list stars and creatives. - Los Angeles Times
When you don’t get what you want, you tend to look for someone to blame. That someone is usually Ticketmaster. The company, which merged with Live Nation in 2010 to form Live Nation Entertainment, sells about 70% of all concert tickets worldwide, and an even greater proportion of the arena and stadium market. - The Guardian
"I do think intellectual history has been revitalized but primarily outside the confines of the academy. Of course, there are plenty of great intellectual historians currently writing, but the field has experienced the same fate as the general history profession in terms of the so-called academic jobs crisis that has significantly deepened since 2016." - The Ideas Letter
Three months on, the city’s own music community is still coming to terms with a fresh, complex lived reality. Not just the notable performing artists whose homes were destroyed – such as hip-hop producer Madlib or the rock-pop band Dawes – but the thousands of music workers who call LA home. - The Guardian
AI is making it possible to focus on customers as individuals and craft more personally relevant experiences. “We’ve got to get out from behind the spreadsheet of revenue bands and these overly simplistic ways of looking at customers and bucketing them." - Fast Company
AI developers are firmly on track to build better replacements for humans in almost every role we play: not just economically as workers and decision-makers, but culturally as artists and creators, and even socially as friends and romantic companions. What place will humans have when AI can do everything we do, only better? - The Guardian
Almost every professional artist or illustrator I meet tells me they have lost clients and gigs to firms that have turned to AI instead of paying for human work; some have been pushed out of their fields altogether. - Blood in the Machine
It’s a challenge to make a film like “Burt”— and quite another to bring such a handmade film to audiences. In 2024, Burke went 0 for 28 in film festival acceptances, which made him question if “Burt” might be the final chapter of his career instead of a launching pad. - Los Angeles Times
The news hardly comes as a surprise, given the judge’s inclination to rule against the IMLS shutdown. The temporary restraining order was issued just days ahead of a mass layoff of nearly all IMLS employees that was slated to take effect on May 4. - ARTnews
Mejia is an airborne dancer whose exuberance shines in joyful Balanchine ballets like “Stars and Stripes,” “Rubies” and “Western Symphony.” But his repertoire, especially in recent seasons, has expanded to roles that require him to be more subtle, more sophisticated. - The New York Times
Are male novelists actually in decline? Some metrics certainly say so: of all the writers to appear on the weekly Sunday Times bestseller lists for fiction hardbacks so far this year, just a third are men. - The Guardian