Fred & Cyd march on tippy toe in “The Band Wagon”
In this publicity still for “The Band Wagon” (MGM, 1953), Cyd Charisse marches on gorgeous gams while her partner Fred Astaire embodies a human exclamation point. In the movie, Cyd dons a different frock. Costumes were by Mary Ann Nyberg, who has a wonderful film-costume portfolio. Nyberg ran into problems dressing Judy Garland in “A ...
Koehler on Cinema: “Between Us”
As Roman Polanski’s decidedly awkward “Carnage,” his 2011 adaptation of Yasmina Reza’s “God of Carnage” reminded, faithfully transferring plays to the screen more often than not fails. Dan Mirvish’s “Between Us,” his not-so-obeisant screen version of Joe Hortua’s play (commissioned but never produced by Costa Mesa-based South Coast Repertory), also deals with two married couples ...
Junkyard objects, beautified by Clare Graham, at J.F. Chen
Jun
24
2013
An exceptional installation now on display in the generous exhibition space of J.F. Chen, the influential furniture-as-art dealer located on Highland Avenue. Veteran Los Angeles artist Clare Graham, who shrink-wraps plush teddy bears then bundles them into towering totems, and whose fetishistic snap-top sculptures assume the aspect of medieval armor, is featured in the show. ...
Awakened by the blast of two mighty big bands 1
Jun
24
2013
There’s a resurgence of big-band jazz and that’s a good thing. We enjoyed two recent forays into the reemergence of this distinctly American art form. On Saturday June 1, Grammy-nominated Kim Richmond Concert Jazz Orchestra blasted the rafters off Upstairs at Vitello’s, the chic second-floor jazz outlet in Studio City. The occasion was the celebration ...
How a genius choreographs: Jack Cole’s “Beale Street Blues” 2
In this 30-second snippet from the men’s dance in “Beale Street Blues,” one of Jack Cole’s three great dance numbers from THE I DON’T CARE GIRL (Fox, 1953), the work of a brilliant dance maker is on display. It’s a game of craps gone wrong. It gets played out on a platform, ostensibly (my reading) ...
Koehler on Cinema: Kubrick’s Last Movie
“Stanley Kubrick,” LACMA’s enormous exhibition devoted to the influential filmmaker, which closes June 30 for its only American stop, is essential viewing. The reasons why go beyond the show’s palpably physical survey of the life and work of one of the most important directors since World War II. It provides the viewer with an entirely ...
Bliss revisited: Jacaranda’s summer garden party @ Villa Aurora
Jun
17
2013
It’s summer in southern California and that translates, for music lovers, to the annual afternoon garden party of Jacaranda — celebrating ten years of adventurous chamber music performance. The smart music series commissions works by top living composers, and mixes that repertoire with challenging bits of the historic classical canon. To apply the group’s own ...
Hollywood archeology: Digging DeMille’s “The Ten Commandments”
arts·meme friend Mary Mallory alerts us to a new exhibition featuring prime California archeology: the recovery and reconstruction of a huge prop piece from Cecil B. DeMille’s silent movie classic “The Ten Commandments” (1923). A humongous face of an Egyptian sphinx-statue was recovered from the Central California sand dunes where DeMille directed his first (silent ...
Beach ballet 1
The Hollywood Negro Ballet troupe formed by choreographer Joseph Rickard practice on Laguna Beach, California. In 1956, Flemyng invited the Los Angeles-based First Negro Classical Ballet (also known very briefly as the Hollywood Negro Ballet) and its director, Joseph Rickard, to join forces with the New York company. Rickard was of English German background and ...
welcome to arts•meme’s new look 3
We hope our new design enhances your experience reading about arts and opinion at https://artsmeme.com. New features include: cleaner, cooler more contemporary look! “chiclet” navigator of top five featured stories. category menu allows direct access to the story scroll sorted by your favorite subject area, dance, film, music and the like full scroll displays the ...