Hollywood 1952: Jack Cole’s ethnic dance includes voodoo & waltz
In the summer and fall of 1951, the dance maker Jack Cole undertook two major new choreographies, one each at the two leading film studios of the era. He staged and danced the lead role in a voodoo ceremonial-rite for Lydia Bailey, at Twentieth Century Fox, and choreographed a sumptuous ‘grand valse’ for The Merry Widow ...
L.A.’s greatest filmmakers revealed, on ‘Home Movie Day’
Sep
22
2020
You’re already at home. So why not be very meta and watch home movies? From the tidal wave of on-line screenings and events, this one popped out. It’s such a COVID-clever idea: a compilation of submitted movies starring your cigar-smoking Uncle Sam, pet parakeet, sister’s Bat Mitzvah, new lawn mower, first dive into a swimming ...
Bring Your Own Brie … to the French Riviera Film Festival
Sep
14
2020
Close your eyes. Don’t cheat … close ’em! Now … pretend you are on the French Riviera. Now open your eyes. Guess what? You’re not! You’re still hunkered down in your apartment hiding from a deadly pandemic! It’s ruined everyone’s movie-going fun, but COVID-19 is no joke. It is an easily transmitted virus that has ...
What a dump! Kidhood drive-in movie theater exposed by day
Sep
7
2020
Pittsburgh’s South Park Drive-In, 1970 Really? That mound of dirt on the uphill side of a crud Western Pennsylvania road? That was it? The pleasure dome we entered, exalted, five of us in a red Chevy station wagon? The car’s “back-back” piled with pillows and blankets? My father, captain of the ship, adroitly steering to ...
The world capitol of ‘colorblind’
new documentary from first line features According to the myth, that’s Paris. And we don’t mean Paris, Texas. For more than a century, Black artists, authors, musicians and others have crossed the ocean to leave behind the racism of the United States. What made these African-Americans choose Paris? Why were the French fascinated by the ...
Best of: Guggenheim’s ‘Works & Process’ artist videos
Ed. note: We’ve been tracking the rollout of virtual (video) commissions by artists reacting to life in a new abnormal — a global pandemic. As part of her previous story about the commissioning of these works by the Guggenheim Museum’s Works & Process, writer Susan Reiter carefully selected “best of best” videos with commentaries, which ...
Guggenheim ‘Works & Process’ spurs artists in limbo
Dylan Crossman When performance venues shut down abruptly in mid-March, innumerable planned events were put on hold. That included the Guggenheim’s modest but high-profile “Works & Process” series, midway through its spring season which featured a mix of dance, theater and music events. Launched in 1984, the adventurous series “explores artistic creation through stimulating conversation ...
Drift away! at the movies, with ‘Floating Cinema’
Aug
17
2020
rolling, rolling down a river You know how your attention drifts away when you’re at the movies? And you find yourself thinking about how bad the film is, or how much you rather be sitting at a lunch counter eating a hamburger? Well … now your entire body can drift away — cuz … you’re ...
More on Alton’s ‘Choreography’ from WHITE CHRISTMAS (1954) 6
Above, an interesting shot of Vera-Ellen‘s “cute” entry into the Danny Kaye-starring “Choreography” number from WHITE CHRISTMAS (1954). You don’t see the dancer’s full descent in the final film. You just see her legs. Nor in the black-and-white photo is it possible to imagine the fuchsia color Vera-Ellen is wearing — a color made possible ...
‘GET OUT’ becomes ‘Get Outside’ @ Cali-Covid drive-in movie
Aug
13
2020
It was a fabulous way to convene with others — well, at least our cars had a nice get together. But we too so enjoyed our evening in Paramount, California, at a special “plein air” screening of director/auteur Jordan Peele‘s ‘cultural’ horror picture, GET OUT (2017). The highly influential movie, projected on a super big ...