“As fellow actor Lina Basquette said: ‘She wasn’t well liked amongst other women in the film colony. Her social presence was taboo, and it was rather silly, because God knows Marion Davies and Mary Pickford had plenty to hide. It’s just that they hid it, and Clara didn’t.'”
Archives for June 2016
Top Posts From AJBlogs 06.27.16
Monday Recommendation: Charlie Parker
Charlie Parker, Unheard Bird: The Unissued Takes (Verve) Charlie Parker has never disappeared from the consciousness of serious jazz listeners. This two-CD collection, due out on Friday, could go a long way toward helping new generations discover the stunning purity and power of Parker’s creativity. … read more
AJBlog: RiffTides Published 2016-06-27
True confession
Max Beerbohm’s The Happy Hypocrite: A Fairy Tale for Tired Men, written in 1897, is an Oscar Wilde-like fable whose protagonist, Lord George Hell, is a “greedy, destructive, and disobedient” Regency rake whose face bears the marks of his dissolution. … read more
AJBlog: About Last Night Published 2016-06-27
[ssba_hide]
Ticketmaster’s Ticket Voucher Settlement Has Been A Big Fiasco
“The entire process was flawed and confusing from the start. Ticketmaster emailed people their voucher codes. When people went to the Ticketmaster website to get the codes, they had disappeared without explanation. Another annoying detail: Part of the settlement included vouchers for $2.25, which could only be redeemed as a discount on additional tickets.”
NY Post Lets Its Theatre Critic Go
“The steady decrease in professional journalists covering theatre and reviewing Broadway and Off-Broadway productions has been made evident once again, as the New York Post’s first-string theatre critic, Elisabeth Vincentelli, has apparently been let go.”
Brexit’s Impact On The Arts – It Comes Down To Money
“The chancellor of the exchequer, George Osborne (who warned against Brexit), might not have been popular among the culturati but he did genuinely value the arts and, especially in the latest spending round, went out of his way to protect funding for our national institutions. All those old conversations we used to have about arts funding (“instrumental” versus “intrinsic”) will disappear—quaint reminders of indulgent times past.”
What Boston Loses As The Globe “Refocuses” Its Arts Coverage
“The truth is, “compelling” stories can be found just about everywhere online; arts groups regularly post feature material on their websites. What are we losing? Something that is becoming increasingly rare in the world of professional journalism — invitations, via criticism, to think seriously and honestly about artistic accomplishment and failure. Let’s not pretend it is a fair trade.”
Poets On Tour In The UK Deal With Brexit During Readings At The Border Of Wales
“All of us shift our readings slightly. Gillian reads Lament, Jackie In my country, Carol Ann Weasel Words: all poems written years ago, but relevant today. There are no overt political statements but the choices are fierce. The people who come to speak to us at the signing tell us that the poetry has helped.”
What Happens When Publishers Get A Deeply Reported Book By A Woman Of Color
“That was the whole point. I did not wish that my book were Eat, Pray, Love. As the only journalist to live undercover in North Korea, I had risked imprisonment to tell a story of international importance by the only means possible. By casting my book as personal rather than professional—by marketing me as a woman on a journey of self-discovery, rather than a reporter on a groundbreaking assignment—I was effectively being stripped of my expertise on the subject I knew best. It was a subtle shift, but one familiar to professional women from all walks of life.”
Historians, You Can Save The Internet
If by “save” we mean “archive”: “Philip Napoli (Rutgers Univ.) argued that with current news archiving practices, it would be easier for future historians to study local newspapers from 1940 than from 2015.”
Québecois Artists Get A Lot More Exhibition Space
“One special feature is an underground passageway that links the new pavilion to the museum’s three existing buildings—which include a converted 1867 prison—that doubles as an exhibition space for a work from the permanent collection the museum has never been able to display in its entirety.”
Can Pittsburgh Live Up To August Wilson?
“Long term, we need to see the community build upon those early successes. … We are very grateful to the Cultural Trust, but, ultimately, we want the African-American community to develop most of this programming.”
The Border Between Austria And Italy Is Shifting, Sometimes Dramatically
“Even the biggest and most stable things, like glaciers, mountains—these huge objects, they can change in a few years. We live on a planet that changes, and we try to make rules, to give meaning, but this meaning is completely artificial because nature, basically, doesn’t give a shit.”
Also (Possibly) Screwed By Brexit: The Art Market
Because the pound sterling has fallen dramatically, says one expert, “the supply is going to dry up — particularly in the Old Masters market.”
Screwed By Brexit: Theatre, Dance, Film Industries In Britain
“Between 2007 and 2015, a European Union program provided nearly $145 million to Britain’s film, television and games industry, according to an open letter published by a number of British film producers.”
Writing About Perfectly Invisible People: Middle-Aged Women
“A middle-aged woman who’s not preoccupied with handling herself or taking care of someone else is a dangerous, erratic being. What is she up to? And what’s the point of her being up to anything? She has no children, she has no family, the only thing she has is her own life and what good will that do anyone.”
Center Stage Was A Perfect Ballet Movie, So What Happened To Its Sequel?
“The dance scenes should ideally be the most memorable part of any dance movie, but beyond the tutus, the world of Center Stage was surprisingly richly developed.”
A New, Small, Perfect Shakespearean Theatre – At A Castle In France
“Todd wanted to make a building that ‘is absolutely up to date but could be 500 years old’, by which he means in spirit rather than in detail.”
This Writer Spent Eight Years Investigating Every Claim Made About Pit Bulls, So Of Course She’s Met With Death Threats At Every Turn
“After voluminous research, Dickey came to the conclusion that the venom of the haters, who themselves possess the uncontrollable obsession with violence they ascribe to their canine target, is aimed not at these dogs but rather at the cypher of their stereotyped owner.”
Teach Your Robot To Be More Human By Settling It In With Unlimited Netflix
“Six hundred hours of video sounds like a lot, but it’s not really that much. By the time we’re 10 years old, we’ve logged nearly 60,000 hours of waking-hours experience.”
Tenor Albert Remedios Sang Wagner Like No Other
“Rising from an apprenticeship as a welder in Liverpool’s dockyards to a pinnacle of international success on the world’s opera stages, Alberto Remedios, who has died aged 81, traced an almost mythological career path, appropriate for the singer who so memorably incarnated the role of Siegfried in Wagner’s Ring.”
All Honor And Respect To Ralph Stanley’s Voice
“Stanley’s voice has been called “a force of nature,” “otherworldly,” “elemental,” “eerie.” Try to describe it and you inevitably tumble into a deep mountain mine of contradictory clichés. Trying to capture its singular tone in a fresh way risks foolishness. (“Like a woodwind crossed with a coonhound, turned up to eleven” is a note I just jotted down, before scratching it out.)”
Top Stories From AJBlogs For 06.26.16
Last Week’s Don’t-Miss AJ Stories: Brexit Edition
Clearly Brexit is a cultural decision, and it will have a big impact… A new jazz scene emerges and re-energizes the art form… There’s a practical reason there are so few women ballet choreographers… Christo’s simple idea wows the world… Has public radio figured out a compelling future?
The Artist’s Muse Is An Artist Too
“We wanted to explore this exploitative Victorian hangover that has kidnapped the idea. A muse can simply be someone who unlocks someone else’s creativity, not a dominant objectification.”
Comedian Aziz Ansari Speaks Out About Trump’s Campaign
“As far as these problems go, I have it better than most because of my recognizability as an actor. When someone on the street gives me a strange look, it’s usually because they want to take a selfie with me, not that they think I’m a terrorist.”