Worth A Look

Here are a few posts from last week's Greenpage that might be worth your time...

‘Midnight Rider’ Filmmakers Cite New Evidence to Bolster Case

Variety: “Midnight Rider” director Randall Miller and producer Jody Savin’s Film Allman are pointing to a newly discovered email to show that they were not expressly denied permission to shoot on a CSX trestle on Feb. 20, 2014, when a train plowed through their shooting location and killed a camera assistant, Sarah Jones, and injured eight others.

Posted by David at 10/20/2016 04:32:00 PM

Hollywood Takes on Fan Fiction

Reason.com In 1974 a carpet layer from Michigan spent $2,000 to build a replica of the Starship Enterprise bridge and made Paragon's Paragon, one of the first serious Star Trek fan movies. In 1985, a fan convinced George Takei, who played Sulu on the original series, to reprise the role in Yorktown: A Time to Heal. In subsequent years, putting original cast members in fan productions became increasingly common, with Walter Koenig (Chekov) and Nichelle Nichols (Uhura) starring in the feature-length Star Trek: Of Gods and Men in 2007. For decades these efforts were largely welcome.

Posted by David at 10/21/2016 10:48:00 AM

Computers Are Learning To Write Songs By Listening To All Of Them

Fast Company | Business + Innovation: In May, Google research scientist Douglas Eck left his Silicon Valley office to spend a few days at Moogfest, a gathering for music, art, and technology enthusiasts deep in North Carolina's Smoky Mountains. Eck told the festival's music-savvy attendees about his team’s new ideas about how to teach computers to help musicians write music—generate harmonies, create transitions in a song, and elaborate on a recurring theme. Someday, the machine could learn to write a song all on its own.

Posted by David at 10/18/2016 12:37:00 PM

'Trump-Emboldened,' 'Racist' Crowds Feed An Exodus At The Second City In Chicago

Chicagoist: At least four performers and three members of management have exited famed improv institution The Second City within the last several day—in part due to racist remarks made by audiences who feel bolstered by Donald Trump’s rhetoric, some involved parties said.

Former ETC player Peter Kim, 33, confirmed his departure with WBBM on Thursday.

“I really think [Trump] gave people carte blanche to act and behave hateful,” he told CBS Chicago.

Posted by David at 10/17/2016 10:08:00 AM

Podcast: Technology’s Role in Inclusivity and Accessibility In The Arts

AMT Lab @ CMU: Art is for everyone. At least, it should be. Across the country, arts organizations are thinking more and more about what they can be doing to make sure their art and spaces are accessible for all types of people, including the physically and mentally disabled. Many of them are employing technology in order to do so. The use of audio guides, sensory friendly performances and beacons are increasingly becoming the norm in the arts. There are a select few arts institutions leading the way towards inclusivity, many of them led at some point by Danielle Linzer.

Posted by David at 10/17/2016 10:06:00 AM

Worth A Look

Here are a few posts from last week's* Greenpage that might be worth your time...

How Chicago became world premiere capital

Crain's Chicago Business: Between now and Christmas, Chicago will host more than 30 world premiere plays. From major multimillion-dollar powerhouses to the postage-stamp off-off-off-Loop stages, the city is basically one big theatrical petri dish.

This year is an especially robust one, but every year hundreds of artists take to Chicago's stages in hopes of launching the next “Spamalot” or “August: Osage County.” The million-dollar question: What makes Chicago a magnet for unknown plays? The short answer is that money goes further here, audiences are more welcoming, critics are less powerful and the talent bench is deep.

Posted by David at 10/14/2016 02:29:00 PM

To bring film and TV back to Philly, crew workers want own union local

www.philly.com: As film and television projects have disappeared from the Philadelphia region this year, area crew workers are largely blaming the self-interests of a New York union and want to start a Southeastern Pennsylvania branch to revive the industry here.

The newly formed Coalition of Philly Crew is made up of about 50 nonunion technical workers who say they have been denied membership in the Queens-based local of a powerful union that supplies labor for motion picture and TV productions.

Posted by David at 10/13/2016 05:10:00 PM

Event Safety Alliance | Event Safety For All Initiative

LDI 2016 | Business & People News content from Live Design: From the earliest days of the organization, these four words have guided the actions of the Event Safety Alliance (ESA). Whether it’s the development of guidelines, training opportunities, or advocacy, ESA is committed to ensuring the outcomes are relevant and accessible to everyone within the live event industry. In this spirit, the Event Safety Alliance has launched the Event Safety For All initiative, a broad series of changes to core programs designed to make active participation in the Event Safety Alliance accessible to everyone.

Posted by David at 10/13/2016 02:53:00 PM

US Navy Adopts ESTA Standards

Lighting&Sound America Online - News: The June 2016 edition of NAVFAC P-307, a publication of the Naval Facilities Engineering Command Navy Crane Center Weight Handling Program Management, has a new section 13 entitled "Entertainment Hoists." The section calls out hoists systems identified in their equipment history files as being "entertainment hoists" and conforming to the design and manufacturing requirements in ANSI E1.6 as being different from hoists and cranes used for material handling and construction, and therefore being subject to different rules for their use and maintenance. Those rules include being maintained and operated in accordance with the ANSI E1.6 standards and the OEM recommendations.

Posted by David at 10/12/2016 06:51:00 PM

Lez Brotherston: admin jobs have taken toll on technical theatre

www.thestage.co.uk: Designer Lez Brotherston has criticised theatres for neglecting the importance of design and technical teams, claiming the "core backbone of producing theatre is disappearing".

Brotherston said that while full-time technical posts in theatres have reduced, the number of staff in administration and management roles was increasing.

Posted by David at 10/12/2016 06:31:00 PM  

*I appear to have fallen a little behind. 

Worth A Look

Here are a few posts from last week's Greenpage that might be worth your time...

The Case for Hiring Asian American Directors

HowlRound: I recently reread August Wilson's 1990 essay “I Want A Black Director!” and found myself compelled by his argument: “I declined a white director not on the basis of race but on the basis of culture. White directors are not qualified for the job. The job requires someone who shares the specifics of the culture of black Americans.” As an Asian American director who longs to direct more Asian American plays, I've found myself wishing someone within my community would make a similar argument. I recently realized: I guess that person has to be me.

Posted by David at 10/03/2016 01:43:00 PM

NEA Warns Against Scam Artists

Stage Directions: The NEA is warning theatre companies of a scam that attempts to defraud them (and other arts orgs) through false grant notifications via Facebook. The perpetrators claim to be NEA employees who need seed money from an account to release grant funds. This is a scam. The NEA never notifies individuals or organizations about grants through Facebook; nor do they request money before releasing grant funds.

Posted by David at 10/05/2016 05:38:00 PM

Arduino on Arduino battle ends in reconciliation, merger

Ars Technica: On Saturday, the two rival groups—Arduino LLC (Arduino.cc) and Arduino Srl (Arduino.org)—announced that they had "settled their differences," and agreed to merge. At present, the similarly-designed sites both carry the official Arduino logo, and both sell official Arduino products.

Posted by David at 10/04/2016 02:42:00 PM

Relaxed Performances: The Nuts and Bolts of Offering Sensory-Friendly Experiences to Your Audience

Breaking Character: The work of making the theatre field more inclusive and equitable for people with disabilities is a complex and long-term project. Like any kind of equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) work, it can feel simultaneously like the most important priority for sustainability of an organization and like an issue so large that it can be daunting to take the first step.

Posted by David at 10/05/2016 05:37:00 PM

Inside The World's Largest Pattern Library

Co.Design | business + design: Where do patterns come from? While some might be computer-generated using the latest in image scanning and digital printing technologies, many more can be sourced to the Design Library—the world's largest collection of patterns.

Posted by David at 10/03/2016 01:47:00 PM

Worth a Look

Here are a few posts from last week's Greenpage that might be worth your time...

Cultural venues ask patrons to keep eyes on the show, security

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: If you notice something suspicious at a play, musical or concert Downtown, the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust wants you to alert an usher or call 911.

The trust announced Monday that it has partnered with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s nationwide awareness program “If You See Something, Say Something.”

Posted by David at 9/27/2016 02:21:00 PM

California Censors IMDB Because of Hollywood’s Alleged Ageism

Hit & Run : Reason.com: California Gov. Jerry Brown has only a couple of days left to decide whether he's going to sign or veto an important reform bill that would seriously reduce the ability of local law enforcement agencies to abuse the asset forfeiture process to seize and keep millions of dollars from citizens without having to prove they've committed a crime.

Posted by David at 9/28/2016 01:07:00 PM

The Healthy Maker: Tackling Vapors, Fumes And Heavy Metals

Hackaday: Fearless makers are conquering ever more fields of engineering and science, finding out that curiosity and common sense is all it takes to tackle any DIY project. Great things can be accomplished, and nothing is rocket science. Except for rocket science of course, and we’re not afraid of that either. Soldering, welding, 3D printing, and the fine art of laminating composites are skills that cannot be unlearned once mastered. Unfortunately, neither can the long-term damage caused by fumes, toxic gasses and heavy metals.

Posted by David at 9/27/2016 02:28:00 PM

Making Sense of Cultural Equity

Createquity.: About us. By us. For us. Near us. It has been almost a century since the great W.E.B. Du Bois–one of the co-founders of the NAACP–offered this stirring call for what, today, we would call “cultural equity.” To say much has happened in those ninety years would be to oversimplify. Significant progress has been made. And yet for many, and on many levels, it is not enough. In a speech given just last year, Jeff Chang, executive director of Stanford’s Institute for Diversity in the Arts, exclaimed: “at a moment when…our images depict us as one happy rainbow nation, and yet the structures of power, including the national culture complex…is still overwhelmingly white, we begin to recognize that we have not yet achieved cultural equity.”

Posted by David at 9/26/2016 01:47:00 PM

2016 Pro Tool Innovation Awards: The Winners

protoolinnovationawards.com: Each year, Pro Tool Reviews reviewers and judges put their hands on hundreds of tools between reviews, shootouts, trade shows, and media events. 2016 has been a HUGE year for innovation with improvements to existing tools and the introduction of products we never would have dreamed of ten years ago. Choosing the winners for the 2016 Pro Tool Innovation Awards was more difficult this year than it ever has been thanks to some incredible innovation and competition within some game-changing categories.

Posted by David at 9/28/2016 01:10:00 PM

Worth a Look

Here are a few posts from last week's Greenpage that might be worth your time...

Want to Be an Artist? Be Passionate and Realistic About Your Career

NEA: I almost didn’t become an artist. Throughout school, I acted but never envisioned it as a vocation. As a Sri Lankan woman immigrant, I didn’t have role models who looked like me out there in public. My own experience didn’t give me the courage to pursue theater as a profession. When I was playing a supporting role as a bag lady in an eighth-grade production, the director pulled me aside and said, “You have talent. Stick with it. You have such an expressive face.” I was flattered but wondered, Then why did you cast me as the bag lady?

Posted by David at 9/19/2016 01:07:00 PM 

When A Tree Falls in Athens and Rises in Camelot, Whose Design Is It Anyway?

Arts Integrity Initiative: There’s a very large tree that has been traveling around the Dallas-Fort Worth region in Texas. There’s no need to worry, as the tree hasn’t acquired independent mobility and become sentient, but rather, it has made major appearances in two theatrical productions in the area in a short span of time. Designed originally by Bob Lavallee for the Trinity Shakespeare Festival production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream at Texas Christian University, it just finished a run center stage in Camelot at Lyric Stage.

Posted by David at 9/23/2016 03:17:00 PM

How “N*W*C” Became Drama Non Grata On A California State Campus

Arts Integrity Initiative: To start at the end, or at least where we are today: Michele Roberge, executive director of the Carpenter Performing Arts Center on the campus of California State University, has resigned, effective yesterday. Why? Because the school’s president, Jane Close Conoley, insisted upon the cancelation of Roberge’s booking of the comedy N*gger Wetb*ck Ch*nk, a show that has toured extensively for more than a decade to performing arts centers on and off college campuses. In fact, it played to a sold out house of more than 1,000 seats last year at the Carpenter Center. When Conoley raised a red flag earlier this year, Roberge made it known that if Conoley forced the cancelation, she would resign on principle. And so when the axe fell, she did.

Posted by David at 9/23/2016 03:18:00 PM

It Only Takes Six Seconds To Hear The World’s Most Sampled Song

FiveThirtyEight: Fans know that when a new Beyoncé, Kanye or Diplo track drops, it will likely contain a musical sample — an instrumental or vocal nugget from a song of yesteryear. That nugget will be rearranged, looped or otherwise given new context. Drake’s “Hotline Bling,” for example, didn’t just introduce us to an unusual dance style; its sped-up sampling of an 1972 R&B hit reintroduced the world to Timmy Thomas and the distinctive beat of “Why Can’t We Live Together.”

Posted by David at 9/23/2016 03:14:00 PM

If You Build A Censorship Machine, They Will Come

Electronic Frontier Foundation: If you have the power to censor other people’s speech, special interests will try to co-opt that power for their own purposes. That’s a lesson the Motion Picture Association of America is learning this year. And it’s one that Internet intermediaries, and the special interests who want to regulate them, need to keep in mind.

Posted by David at 9/20/2016 01:23:00 PM

Worth a Look

Here are a few posts from last week's Greenpage that might be worth your time:

Stagehands at ZACH Theatre ask city to step into wage fight

Austin Monitor: Although they’re used to being behind the scenes, the stagehands from ZACH Theatre are going public with their requests for more equitable pay.

On Sept. 1, representatives of the stagehands asked City Council to put stipulations on cultural organizations like ZACH Theatre requiring that they pay fair and stable wages. This is the first campaign for a newly forming stagehand’s union at the theater. At the heart of their fight, they say, is Austin’s creative community’s struggle to secure a stable living so it can afford to stay in the rapidly growing city.

Posted by David at 9/14/2016 01:12:00 PM

Mark Bly in conversation with Katalin Trencsényi: "Questioning Spirit”—Dramaturgy in America

The Theatre Times: Mark Bly is an American dramaturg, editor, and lecturer. He was the chair of the Playwriting Program at the Yale School of Drama from 1992-2004, while being the associate artistic director at the Yale Rep. He taught dramaturgy at Yale and was the director of the MFA Playwriting Program at Hunter College from 2011-2013, and is currently adjunct professor in the MFA Playwriting Program at Fordham/Primary Stages. Over the past thirty-five years, he has served as a dramaturg, director of new play development, and associate artistic director at venues such as the Arena Stage, the Alley Theatre, the Guthrie Theater, the Seattle Rep, theYale Rep and on Broadway, dramaturging and producing over two hundred plays.

Posted by David at 9/12/2016 01:44:00 PM

Theater Director at Cal State-Long Beach Quits After Racially Charged Play Is Canceled

The Ticker - Blogs - The Chronicle of Higher Education: Michele Roberge resigned this week as theater director at California State University at Long Beach after 14 years in the post, the Long Beach Press-Telegram reports. Her resignation followed a disagreement with administrators over whether the university’s performing-arts center should host the racially charged play N*gger Wetb*ck Ch*nk.

Posted by David at 9/16/2016 01:05:00 PM

From the Executive Director: Dirty Words

Theatre Bay Area: Early in the spring, conversations began to circulate around a local upcoming production of The Mikado by Lamplighters Music Theatre. In the past few years the Gilbert and Sullivan favorite has become a touchstone for protest and controversy. A Seattle production in 2014 inflamed and bitterly divided the city's artistic community, drawing attention from the national press.

Posted by David at 9/15/2016 01:39:00 PM

Artists are Salvaging Train Stations' Analog Departure Boards

Atlas Obscura: For years, noisy analog departure boards have been disappearing from Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor. These boards, most remarkable for the flapping, clacking sound they make as their split-flap cards flip to reveal new information, are often called Solari boards, after the Italian company that invented them. New York Penn Station lost its original one around 2000. Boston replaced its board, which was breaking twice a day, the Globe reported, in 2008. New Haven and Baltimore took theirs out of commission in 2010.

Posted by David at 9/12/2016 01:42:00 PM

Worth a Look

Here are a few posts from last week's Greenpage that might be worth your time...

For its Next Act, Cirque Goes to China

www.cirquefascination.com: AFTER entertaining millions of people in dozens of countries over the years, China offers a new realm of possibilities for acrobatic dance troupe Cirque du Soleil.

During his visit to China earlier this month, Cirque du Soleil CEO Daniel Lamarre confirmed the entertainment company’s expansion plans in China. In April, Fosun, China’s leading investment group, joined American investment firm TPG to become one of Cirque du Soleil’s largest strategic partners in a deal that will facilitate its global business development.

Posted by David at 9/09/2016 12:06:00 PM

Women to Watch

THE INTERVAL: Despite the dearth of women writing, directing, and designing on Broadway, there are a lot of fabulous women making theatre and changing the theatrical landscape beyond the Great White Way. We asked women who had been featured on The Interval, and those in the know in the theatre community, to recommend emerging female theatre artists who they’re excited by and who deserve more exposure and support. So here are 16 female writers, directors, designers, and producers who the theatre community should be watching

Posted by David at 9/07/2016 11:12:00 AM

Scholar: Shakespeare Didn’t Coin Many of the Words Attributed to Him

Flavorwire: In addition to his insights and his memorable poetry, Shakespeare is widely credited with inventing many words and phrases that can’t be found further back in the historical record. But perhaps he’s been given too much credit as an originator of words and phrases. Dr. David McInnis, a Shakespeare lecturer at the University of Melbourne, says some of this fallacy is due to the Oxford English Dictionary’s early editors being “biased” towards Shakespeare, ignoring previous uses of certain phrases. Examples of phrases originally attributed to the Bard that can be found earlier include wild-goose chase and it’s Greek to me, according to McInnis’s research.

Posted by David at 9/08/2016 12:29:00 PM

Missing Voices and Misogyny in Shakespeare Theatre Company’s All-Male Shrew

HowlRound: Perhaps the best place to preface a critique of Shakespeare Theatre Company’s all-male Taming of the Shrew is the end: Katherina (Kate) delivers her final speech with unflinching honesty, bemoaning that women “seek for rule, supremacy, and sway/ Whey they are bound to serve, love, and obey.” She implores Bianca and the Widow to join her, creating a silent, encapsulating snapshot: three women prostrate before their husbands, hands extended to be crushed beneath their companions’ feet. Regardless of the corseted actors’ gender identities, Shakespeare Theatre Company leaves audiences with a searing image of female submission to men—about as traditional an interpretation of Shakespeare’s play as one can find.

Posted by David at 9/06/2016 10:31:00 AM

Feast your eyes on the 2016 incarnation of Burning Man

Las Vegas Review-Journal: Where the rows of tents and RVs end, a virtual outdoor museum begins. Stretching over two miles into the open desert, structures large and small rise from the pale dust: a cluster of lighthouses, the front half of a 747 airplane, a net of undulating lights. In every direction there’s something new to feast your eyes upon, or even climb or crawl into. At nightfall, the installations become illuminated or otherwise transform and present an entirely different landscape to explore.

Posted by David at 9/05/2016 04:44:00 PM

Ellipses...

Does this game count or is it preseason?  Looks like it counts...  Don't think we'll be charging out to upgrade our phones...  Had one of those twitter posts today that I had to unpost.  Much more appropriate for the walled garden of my Facebook feed...  It is possible that Johnson could have spun his Aleppo gaffe into an explanation of Libertarian priorities.  Doesn't look like he will though...  TD 3 this year is turning out to be more like TD Seminar.  It is possible that is a good thing...  They're paying $200,000 per day to have the Liberty Bridge closed.  You'd think that would be a fairly strong motivator...  Haven't been in my car in longer than I can remember...  In other news, I really am not that fond of the bus...  Lots of Star Trek news today.  I'm not sure but I think the show is cool all of a sudden...  Our fantasy league commissioner may have dropped the ball a little.  The season started tonight, our draft is Saturday...  Lego sales have been so good that the Lego people have been trying to get people to buy less so they can keep up...  The whole school assembly that I thought was potentially problematic turned out to be just fine...  North Korea detonated a nuke yesterday.  So that makes me feel so much better about the state of the world...  What is it with my computer that it is so hitchy?  Is it time for a new computer?  I just don't get it...  I'm not sure that requiring apps will give us the freedom from the cable box we deserve...  Right now I think I would predict a 50% chance of the NFTRW Podcast happening this year...  I watched some of Trump last night.  I probably shouldn't do that...  I spend a whole lot of time sitting in a chair in the boy's room.  Parent tip: pick a comfortable chair...I wish the cable news shows would devote at least 50% of their time to something other than the election.  Or maybe I should just stop watching cable news... 

Ellipses...

The Five Thirty Eight did a post today that read, to me, like a horror story...  I'm liking my new office keyboard, but typos are on the increase...  First assignment was due today.  Almost everyone did it...  I'm on my own with the boy and my in-laws this week...  I really wish the AC wouldn't run so much...  Met the neighbor today, their basement took last week harder than ours...  The bus is really crowded at 10am...  Season Four of Orange is the New Black became very OZ-like...  I don't know when it happened, but the garage floor is almost completely visible...  Firefox on my laptop has become so, so, slow...  If you are keeping track I still haven't finished that room in the attic...  My work Twitter picked up a bunch of followers this week.  Could have something to do with that account suddenly following a bunch of people...  I have three syllabi to complete this semester, so far I have finished one.  Guests make finalizing schedules difficult...  The guy that come to do an estimate on grading the back yard hasn't sent me the bid.  I think I shouldn't hold my breath...  I wrote an IFTTT recipe today that could save me like an hour every week.  I'll keep you posted...  The lines for food on campus have been way too long this week...  My wife has told me I have to do fantasy football this season because I won last season...  I've been thinking a lot about getting to the next work plateau.  Not sure what to make of that...  The boy has the first prolonged cold I can remember.  His ability to produce snot is impressive...  I turned off a bunch of my Twitter 'bots.  I figure if they were annoying me they must have been annoying others - of course that assumes anyone was following that account in the first place...

Worth a Look

Here are a few posts from last week's Greenpage that might be worth your time:

Broadway Plays Contradict #TonysSoDiverse

HowlRound: The 2016 Tony Awards Ceremony was a historic night when four actors of color won all of the best performance awards in a musical category. That, along with the slew of wins for Hamilton, reinforced the notion that “Diversity is the theme of the entire season.” Well, for musicals that is.

Posted by David at 9/02/2016 03:48:00 PM

National Labor Relations Board Dings Opponents of AEA’s New Rules for 99-Seat Theaters; Appeal to be Filed

@ This Stage: In round one of a filing by plaintiffs in the Asner, et al versus Actors’ Equity Association against the national stage actors and stage manager’s union, Actors’ Equity Association, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) dismissed the unfair labor practices complaint on August 30.

The filing with the NLRB was independent of the lawsuit, and has no bearing on the Motion to Dismiss (the lawsuit) filed by the union, in response to that lawsuit being filed and served. A hearing for that Motion has been set for mid-September.

Posted by David at 9/01/2016 01:29:00 PM

Così Fan Tutte: racial and sexual abuse should shock audiences, not the titillation

theconversation.com: The new production of Mozart and Lorenzo da Ponte’s classic opera Così Fan Tutte has attracted no shortage of controversy. After its premiere in Aix-en-Provence in France in July, the organisers of the Edinburgh International Festival wrote to all ticket holders offering a refund “due to the adult nature of some of the scenes” and its unsuitability for younger audiences.

Posted by David at 8/29/2016 01:45:00 PM

“Seven Guitars” at the Pittsburgh Playwrights Theatre

The Pittsburgh Tatler: Only in Pittsburgh.

Only here could a small, scrappy theater company stage a production of August Wilson’s Seven Guitars in the very setting he had in mind when he wrote the play: the backyard of his childhood home on Bedford Ave. in the Hill district.

That home has sat tragically abandoned and decaying for decades. But rather recently, a local group, spearheaded by Wilson’s nephew Paul Ellis, began rehabilitating it and transforming it into the Daisy Wilson Artist Community, a center for artists and performers.

And, for just one more weekend, it plays a starring role in Mark Clayton Southers’s surehanded interpretation of the play.

Posted by David at 8/26/2016 02:37:00 PM

PETA Has Lost Its Monkey's 'Next Friend' In Its Crazy Copyright Case

Techdirt: The ongoing saga that is the monkey selfie lawsuit has continued to move forward, with the lawyers for photographer David Slater filing their brief in response to PETA's. As you probably recall, PETA had teamed up with a primatologist named Antje Engelhardt claiming to be "next friends" for the Indonesian macaque monkey named Naruto, who is alleged to have taken the following selfie with David Slater's camera.

Posted by David at 8/31/2016 02:01:00 PM