REVIEW: Twyla’s back and Herman’s got her, in ABT’s ‘A Gathering of Ghosts’

Aran Bell, Calvin Royal III and Catherine Hurlin in Twyla Tharp’s A Gathering of Ghosts. Photo: Rosalie O’Connor. Twyla Tharp is back working with American Ballet Theatre. So for at least one evening — Wednesday’s much-anticipated premiere of her new ballet at the David Koch Theater — all seemed right with the world. Her prior ...
Space is the place, Americans
Oct
7
2019

natalie in the sky with diamonds Is Donald Trump president of outer space? No? Well, then, I’d like to go there immediately. Thanks to Hollywood, we have a few options. I enjoyed the new Natalie Portman movie, Lucy in the Sky, about a female astronaut who in observing that “space is so big and we ...
Erin Trefry: art works ‘hard-wired’ with intimacy
Sep
16
2019

In a Los Angeles gallery season just crammed with new shows, something caught my eye in the announcement of artist Erin Trefry‘s solo exhibition at Lowell Ryan Projects, If The Moon Turns Green. I felt drawn to the images of Trefry’s paintings; in particular, her assemblage and sculptures spoke to me, I realized, on a ...
Not a man’s dance-world, says ‘Femme Fetale,’ speaking in bodytalk
Aug
22
2019

Of the three-woman dance crew, ‘Femme Fetale,’ comprised of a Korean, a Mexican and a French dancer, one of the ladies is named Marie Poppins. Femme Fetale dance crew
University action fails to address racism of ‘The Birth of a Nation’
Jul
8
2019

Bette Davis and Lillian Gish in The Whales Of August (1987) Ed note: The following is an excerpt from a long interview with film marketing strategist/producer-director Mike Kaplan, a friend of artsmeme, concerning the removal of the name of Lillian and Dorothy Gish from a screening auditorium at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. The ...
From the politically toxic Lillian Gish
Jul
1
2019

Friend-of-artsmeme Mike Kaplan shares an image of a movie poster personally autographed by Lillian Gish. Kaplan produced THE WHALES OF AUGUST (1987), which starred the then-elderly but still luminous Gish, in marvelous scenes that convey her screen magic with Bette Davis, who also stars in the film. Featured here is a Gish movie from another ...
The new American intolerance: Gish Film Theater shorn of name

ed. note: With a heavy heart, we publish words submitted by Mike Kaplan, a friend of artsmeme whose peerless collection of dance movie posters now hangs at the National Dance Museum in Saratoga Springs. Mike, the producer of ‘The Whales of August’ (1987) starring Bette Davis and Lillian Gish, is at the forefront of controversy ...
Transcending ‘correctness’: Lillian Gish
Jun
24
2019

I’ve never been in style, so I can never go out of style. – Lillian Gish
Judy Garland plays The Barn

She pulverized the Palace, and made carnage of Carnegie Hall. She slayed in Las Vegas. But you ain’t seen nothing yet … till you see Judy Garland play the Barn. That is happening Wednesday June 12. And we’re going! Garland, known to be a droll wit, made numerous appearances on television in the ’60s that ...