The gorgeous sound of Godard’s ‘Goodbye to Language’ 1

Film · Ideas & Opinion
The handwritten scrawl below comes from the pen of cinéaste-provocateur Jean-Luc Godard. The influential director, still working in his eighties, shares the scenario for his startling new film, “Goodbye to Language” (“Adieu au langage”), now in an exclusive run at the American Cinematheque’s Aero Theatre through much of next week. Godard’s 43rd film, a ravishing ...

‘Kinetic Los Angeles’ heralds impact of Russian ballet in California

Dance · Ideas & Opinion
This startling and marvelous image of a ballerina garbed in an unprecedented and surely unreplicated costume graces the cover of “Kinetic Los Angeles: Russian Emigres in the City of Self-Transformation.” The journal, the 20th edition of the esteemed “Experiment,” has just been published by the Institute of Modern Russian Culture at the University of Southern ...

Sid Grauman, Kim Jong Un collude on Christmas to screen “The Interview” 1

Film · Ideas & Opinion
In a cultural mash-up that could perhaps happen anywhere — but let’s face it, it succeeds best in crazy Los Angeles — a Jew and a North Korean are celebrating Jesus’s birthday by screening “The Interview” at the Egyptian Theatre, the movie palace Sid Grauman built in 1922. The screenings are the best rebuttal to ...

Rachel Maddow hails dancing brothers & sisters from Cuba 2

Dance · Ideas & Opinion
Mr. Obama, tear down that wall! In her news broadcast last night, MSNBC commentator/anchorwoman Rachel Maddow gave a righteous shout-out to the Cuban-expatriate (really “exile’ is the proper expression up till now) classical dancers who grace our major ballet companies — and oh yes, for good measure Maddow also notes sports figures! Featured dance companies ...

Culture war erupts over cellphone useage @ AFI Fest

Ideas & Opinion
It was the aggrieved versus the entitled in an unsurprising yet noteworthy altercation that broke out at AFI Fest, as the shared public viewing experience ratchets down. The depressing incident (ironically occuring at a screening of a new biopic on British painter William Turner) perhaps serves as a cautionary tale for those of us aggrevated ...

California women of dance recognized

Dance · Ideas & Opinion
It took a New Yorker, dance writer Wendy Perron, to draw attention to an interesting phenomenon … In her recently published essay, Wendy notes the surplus of women holding leadership roles in California dance across the board:  management, production, presentation, talent representation, criticism and, indeed, as artists. Read Wendy’s blog item here. The story includes ...

Italian choreographer Dewey Dell’s “Marzo” smartly advances dance

Architecture & Design · Dance · Ideas & Opinion · Visual arts
At long last, something new, thank God. It took a cluster of young Italians to inject pop and sizzle into dance’s tired traditional proscenium-arch format, creating a “screen” within the frame, replicating the tiny rectangles into which most audience members gaze much of their day. And I think “Marzo” (Italian for “March”), a super flamboyant work ...

Biennale Dance Festival finds new humanity for art form

Architecture & Design · Dance · Ideas & Opinion
Venice’s enchanting waterways have given rise, lately, to political discord, when on June 4, Mayor Giorgio Orsoni and 30 fellow government officials were charged with corruption related to flood-control project Mose. But the converging Po and Piave Rivers will soon revert to a more customary role – acting as a fluid crossroads for a vanguard of ...

arts·meme turns six 1

Ideas & Opinion
A sparkling ‘Shirley Temple’ for arts·meme, the Los Angeles arts blog that came into existence on May 24, 2008. The young lady, having formally entered café society, here hoists a cocktail in commemoration of her sixth birthday. Happy birthday, arts·meme! Kudos and hugs around to arts·meme technology guru, Beijing-based Mark Levine; Heap Big Technology Friend ...

At CAP UCLA, the ‘B’s have it!

Dance · Ideas & Opinion · Theater · Visual arts
To be or not to be, that was the question Center for the Art of Performance at UCLA artistic director Kristy Edmunds pondered in fashioning her arts-forward performance series for the 2014-15 season. So much so that the curator tilted in one direction: toward artists with names starting with the letter ‘B.’ Yes, a barrage ...