Worth A Look

Here are a couple of posts from the Greenpage that might be worth a look:

Pinburgh

Vimeo: "A short fantasy set into panoramic Pittsburgh industrial landscapes drawn by muralist Doug Cooper, Andrew Mellon Professor of Architecture at Carnegie Mellon University. A guy on a street car sees a dancer on city steps who then enters a bar where someone is playing pinball, and the game is joined with the entire city activated in a city-wide game. The film features CMU School of Drama's PigPen Theatre as actors and as the creators of the score

Posted by David at 2/18/2011 02:51:00 PM

Is your theatre or production in danger of an ADA lawsuit?

The Law Offices of Gordon P. Firemark: "If you produce or operate a venue that houses Movies, concerts, or performing arts works, like theatre, comedy or spoken word performances, you may not be aware of the scope of the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA), which requires that you make reasonable accommodations for people with disabilities.
Sure, we’ve all made entryways wider, installed ramps, and configured seating to allow for patrons in wheelchairs. But what about those patrons with less obvious disabilities, such as deafness and blindness?

Posted by David at 2/19/2011 05:46:00 PM

Millennium Park Garden Deemed Not Copyrightable, Because Gardens Are Not Authored

Techdirt: "Eric Goldman points us to a fascinating ruling concerning whether or not an artistic garden can be covered by copyright (pdf). The ruling itself (embedded below) is interesting for a variety of reasons. It goes over the basics of 'moral rights' in US copyright in great detail. As most people know, for the most part, the US does not recognize moral rights -- even though the Berne Convention (which the US has tragically signed on to) requires it. Partly to get around this, the US did put in extremely limited moral rights for a very small subset of works, and part of this case revolves around that.

Posted by David at 2/19/2011 05:44:00 PM

Paper Machete: Fan's review of Spiderman: Turn off the Dark

WBEZ: "Paper Machete regular Jack Tamburri reviewed Spiderman: Turn off the Dark back on January 15, after seeing a preview. Out of deference to theater custom of not reviewing a show while it is still in previews, we've kept that review in the can.
Now that the reviews are out of the bag in NYC, though, it's our pleasure to release this Machete review by a young Chicago director and devoted Spiderman fan boy. Needless to say, Tamburri was ahead of the opinion curve.

Posted by David at 2/19/2011 05:41:00 PM

Why I Love My 3D Printer

MakerBot Industries: "On Friday, February 11th, a young inventor named Schuyler, age 10, stepped on to the stage in front of a sold out crowd of 850 people at Ignite Phoenix and proceeded to explain why he loves his 3D printer, a MakerBot.

Posted by David at 2/19/2011 05:40:00 PM

Ellipses...

Seems like once a week is about all I can manage anymore... Got to wonder why in all the discussion about the budget there aren't people talking about raising taxes or about ending the war(s). Or at least not getting covered if they are... Started paying the mortgage on the new house, seems like we ought to be living there for that... It's disturbing how far down the rankings the US is dropping in some no-brainer metrics. I wonder why it isn't more disturbing to more people... My parents' house is sold. Nice to be done with that bit... The internet bought Detroit a Robocop statue. I appreciate the sentiment, but I got to figure that money could go to better use... Lots of interesting Facebook arguments this week, mostly about either the federal budget or about public employee unions. All a little heady for Facebook if you ask me... Why is it that when the going gets tough in a state legislature the minority goes to another state? I would think we could get by without that level of drama... It went and snowed again tonight, shoulda figured that sunny weather last week was a tease... I don't think I would feel safer if students were allowed to carry guns to school... Decided to bail on USITT this year. First time in over a decade I won't be attending... Seriously I miss "The West Wing." "Mr. Sunshine" isn't the same... I spent my Sunday afternoon in my office. There were things on my desk from three semesters ago. Now they're in the trash... We announced our new season at work last Friday. Curiously you won't find it on our website or Facebook page, and it wasn't included in tweets from CFA. Makes you go hmm... I watched some All Star Saturday and Friday. That event needs a writer. The game was ok, maybe even good for 5 minutes toward the end of the 4th quarter... I've been having problems with some of my social media integration. Talk about a 21st century problem... Should I do a Formspring account? It seems like the kind of thing I would do... Every time I do a project in the shop I find 20 things I would do differently were it my shop... This weekend we interviewed a Highland Park kid. Apparently I went to junior high with her mom at Northwood. I am old... No matter how interesting the parallels seem to be, Madison is no Cairo... These days I have to work real hard just to be simply behind rather than wildly behind... I wonder if we'll ever do Game Night again? Be a shame if we didn't... Being attacked by the snot monster today. I hope it doesn't win...

Ellipses...

I missed an "ellipses" and a "Worth a Look" last week. I was superbusy... The conference hotel for USITT is sold out. That blows... It was really cold in Chicago. February in Chicago is cruel and unusual punishment... We went to see "The Fighter" last week. We were the only people in the theatre and yet we did nothing inappropriate... Does seeking a double major at the graduate level indicate you aren't ready to be going to grad school or just that you are an overachiever? Got me... A trip to the old stomping grounds should include The BBQ Pit, Micheal's, Walker Brothers, and Deep Dish. We managed to get to them all... It's difficult to know what to do with trash if you no longer have a trash pickup... Are we really supposed to believe that all those Spiderman reviewers had the same idea without talking to each other? I'm not buying... A little bit I think it might be a good idea to run a video camera on the moving truck as it is loaded. Have some backup for the inventory... I should be getting another electric bill. I'll have to look into that... I'm spending way too much time on email at work. Could be time for a procedural change... The set for our next show is huge, and I cannot believe the materials for three towers cost less than the rental of the comparable amount of scaffolding... Bill Sapsis is coming to school this week. You should come by and say hello... My freshman class seems really concerned that not everyone is going to put in the effort on their group project... April said Netflix would give us a free pass on losing a movie, but her information was out of date... A little bit I think they're milking this Watson thing on Jeopardy! I watched the Nova, just play the game already... I returned to town with like six half hour cartoons on the DVR. Maybe I ought to revisit my TV watching selections... If you don't wrap tollway transponders in foil before you mail them in they will ring up tolls if the mail truck route includes toll booths... Thinking about playing summer league this year, or rather thinking about signing up and turning out to watch. Don't want to be the guy that has the MI at the scrimmage... Somewhere in Egypt there's a technical director pissed that he lost a week of build...

Ellipses...

Super ellipses? A few thoughts the next day... I think Pittsburgh lives at about 80% of the fever pitch you might see in another city with a Superbowl bound team all the time, I hardly noticed the difference from the regular season... Two weeks is a long time to wait for the game, even with the Pro-Bowl moved into the gap... Also, I think there's really no reason why we couldn't kick off at maybe 4:00pm. Let everyone out west grab lunch and then let's go already... Last couple of years I haven't done a Superbowl party even with it being the Steelers. Not sure why... I know the NFL want's to disguise the over-the-toppedness of the thing, really it is just too ridiculous, but all the Americana and the troops and, really they read the Declaration of Independence? It's just a football game, we know its just a football game, stop trying to make it Election day, the 4th of July, and Veteran's Day rolled together... Have the singer that does the National Anthem do it clean. Better yet, do it like the Olympics and use an instrumental... I didn't like the Doritos ad with the pug. Although I thought it less of a failure when I remembered this year's Doritos ads were contest winners... I had the thought after the Packers scored the first time "nobody said we were going to shut them out." It's a line from Any Given Sunday... Many of the Steelers looked a step slow... I kept thinking there was something odd about the playing surface, what with how so many players were getting hurt on what looked like routine plays... I thought the Chrysler commercial was well done, not sure it would make me buy a Chrysler though - or move to Detroit... That shot down the seats in Jerry Jones box looked like the Legion of Doom... It was nice to get a little bit of momentum before halftime. Kept the game watchable... Halftime. Meh. If I got a vote I would have them go to DCI and take one or more of the finalists and give them the budget and see what you get... The third quarter was nice. I especially liked the all running play touchdown drive, seemed for a moment like they really had found their groove... That Pepsi Max commercial, the one where the guy is thinking "I wanna sleep with her." I must be getting older, but, not appropriate... I kinda liked the Snickers ad, but I liked the Betty White version better - really I like the Aretha and Liza one the best... Toward the end, I thought we'd get the field goal, and then I thought they would score again, and then I thought we would score in the end. Almost called it... So we didn't get the end we'd hoped for, they really fell apart a little on that final drive... Really wasn't their year though. People hardly remember Dennis Dixon as QB or weeks without Troy. Next year will be better...

Worth a Look

Here are five posts from last week's Greenpage that might be worth a look:

Francis Ford Coppola, copyfighter

Boing Boing: "You have to remember that it's only a few hundred years, if that much, that artists are working with money. Artists never got money. Artists had a patron, either the leader of the state or the duke of Weimar or somewhere, or the church, the pope. Or they had another job. I have another job. I make films. No one tells me what to do. But I make the money in the wine industry. You work another job and get up at five in the morning and write your script.

Posted by David at 1/30/2011 08:22:00 PM

Landesman Comments on Theater

NYTimes.com: "Count on Rocco Landesman to stir the pot. Speaking at a conference about new play development at Arena Stage in Washington on Thursday, Mr. Landesman, the chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, addressed the problem of struggling theaters. “You can either increase demand or decrease supply,” he said.

Posted by David at 1/30/2011 08:20:00 PM

Tait Towers: Custom Stage Design

Autodesk - AutoCAD - Customer Showcase: "Founded by lighting designer Michael Tait in 1978, Tait Towers designs and constructs entire concert stage sets, making the visions of the music industry’s top artists and concert production designers a reality. Tait Tower’s innovative approach to stage design, engineering, and construction enables increasingly dazzling shows. From telescoping towers to huge video displays to intricately choreographed lighting, Tait Towers’s design professionals model each element in AutoCAD® software. They use Autodesk® 3ds Max® Design software to review near photo-realistic visualizations of stages with their clients before manufacturing. As a final step, Tait Towers’s manufacturing team employs AutoCAD designs to help guide the construction of the sets. Recently, for rock band Bon Jovi’s The Circle Tour, Tait Towers used a combination of AutoCAD and Autodesk 3ds Max Design software to help"

Posted by David at 1/29/2011 11:03:00 AM

OSHA not reviewing death of stagehand

ReviewJournal.com: "State safety officials think they have significantly improved the way they hold employers accountable for on-the-job accidents, according to a Nevada Occupational Safety and Health Administration letter sent Tuesday to federal officials, who faulted a state investigation of a stagehand's death. The 20-year-old part-time stagehand was killed in 2009 by a fall in a showroom at MGM Grand.

Posted by David at 1/27/2011 12:59:00 PM

The Thinness of Chicago Theater

AWG:Chicago: "There is an argument to be made that all theater - all artistic endeavor - is political in nature. The act of creating work designed to evoke an emotional response is some powerful stuff and, if underscored by an actual idea worth promoting, is deadly to any government bent on control. Likewise, there is an argument to be made that, if all theater is political in nature, then the ideas underscoring the work is either in favor of the status quo or in opposition. The Belarus Free Theatre makes me feel small.

Posted by David at 1/26/2011 06:26:00 PM