On arts·meme’s front page: ‘The Front Page’
So very excited to see the restored (by the Academy Film Archive ·and the Film Foundation) first film version of Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur’s 1928 Broadway comedy, “The Front Page,” which kicks off To Save and Project at the Museum of Modern Art. According to MoMA adjunct curator Dave Kehr (he and curator Josh ...
Happy birthday, Barrie Chase! 1
Wishing a wonderful birthday to a leggy lady, the great Hollywood dancer Barrie Chase. She not only graced Fred Astaire as his final partner, she brought her own strong, vixen presence as a solo dancer (on view in the video, dancing to “The Girl from Ipanema”) to millions of American television viewers in the 1960s. ...
Terence Donovan, British photog who chronicled sixties
Photographer David Bailey (born 1938) is said to have given us a visual vocabulary with which we remember Swinging Sixties London. But he didn’t do it alone. Though not as celebrated, Terence Donovan (1936-1996) and Brian Duffy (1933-2010) did groundbreaking work in their own right. All three triangulated fashion photography with movies and pop culture ...
Review: ballerina Wendy Whelan in new documentary 1
We all have problems, right? In the case of Wendy Whelan, the equivalent of a prima ballerina assoluta if only New York City Ballet had that designation, the problem in dance season 2013-14 was how to gracefully exit the stage and transition to civilian life. For thirty years, the reed-thin, Kentucky-born ballet-thoroughbred reigned as the ...
Ed Wood’s ‘Plan 9’ joins forces with marionette ‘Spooktacular’
Director/auteur Ed Wood’s low-budget classic, Plan 9 From Outer Space, was loathed by critics upon release. It became a cult classic. The cast of the film included Maila Nurmi, credited as Vampira, and Bela Lugosi, who famously died during production and was replaced by Ed Wood’s chiropractor, Dr. Tom Mason. The making of Plan 9 From ...
‘German Currents’ Film Festival reaches 10-year mark
Oct
12
2016
It’s a decade, this year, for the annual German Currents film festival in Los Angeles, co-sponsored by The Goethe Institute and the American Cinematheque. Fittingly, the program has been expanded to include 10 Los Angeles premieres, peppered with conversations with prolific German directors, writers and actors. Award winning director Wolfgang Becker (“Good Bye Lenin!”) will ...
Bolshoi means BIG
Travel back to the Roaring ’20s in Europe with “The Golden Age,” broadcast live from Moscow and danced by the Bolshoi Ballet to music by Dmitri Shostakovich and choreography by Yuri Grigorovich. A stunning cabaret dancer must choose between her love for a visiting fisherman and the leader of a gang, who is also her ...
‘Showgirl’ dances once more, at Film Forum
In 1928 Alice White, First National Pictures’ blonde answer to Clara Bow, starred in the movie musical Show Girl. She plays Dixie Dugan, an aspiring dancer who fakes her own kidnapping as a publicity stunt. Based on popular writer J.P. McEvoy’s Dixie Dugan character, Show Girl was the first starring vehicle for White. Long thought ...
Frolic the Hall of Mirrors with Louis XIV in “Versailles”
In the dance world, we know King Louis XIV for his balletomania, which led to the first formal classical ballet, “Le Ballet de la Nuit.” Louis himself danced the lead role, embodying a character modestly called ‘The Sun King.’ (As Mel Brooks sagely noted, it’s good to be king.) A reenactment of the performance appears ...
How Eugene Loring ‘got sold’ on working for producer Stanley Kramer 1
Fascinating commentary from dance maker Eugene Loring who choreographed the whimsical The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T, a Dr. Seuss-derived cult movie dating from 1953. Loring, the creator of “Billy the Kid” ballet for American Ballet Theatre and founder of Hollywood’s American School of Ballet, ports impressive film credits that include Ziegfield Follies (1945), Yolanda ...