dirac

Thank you, Paquita. I certainly hope this ends up on DVD at some point.

I saw it last weekend. It was indeed interesting, although perhaps not quite as intended.

Thank you for the detailed report, miliosr. I missed this one but intend to catch it next time!

This is a wonderful tip. I had not heard of this program before. I'm going to spread the word, too. I haven't been to the California Academy of Sciences for quite some time. Sounds like something my nephew would enjoy. (I'd also go to the Cantor Arts Center but I was there just recently.)

I'm sure you're right about the stats. My remark was based on strictly personal anecdotal experience. Farrell Fan writes: I was able to watch only the last twenty minutes or so of the program and missed out on the ballet company entirely, but that was my assessment, too. In the segments I saw, a couple of highly dubious assertions were made by one fellow asked to comment that went by unquestioned.

papeetepatrick writes: I wonder if “Death Kit” might not have been better if Sontag hadn’t been quite so well read and up on the latest thing. I had the impression there was a good bit of conventional naturalism in there screaming to be let out, to paraphrase Cyril Connolly. richard53dog writes: A critic may be more erudite, have greater analytic powers, and be just plain smarter than a given novelist, but there’s no substitute for creative imagination, an unforgivably foggy phrase but I can’t think of anything better at the moment. I think also of “The Memoirs of Hecate County” by Edmund Wilson (although that was pretty good in its way). I do think that such attempts are honorable and useful; you don’t have to be a novelist to understand a novelist’s craft, but it can help.

It isn't so much a question of 20/20; 'having an agenda' -- I'm sure they have the best of intentions -- but as mentioned earlier the perceived need for such a program is a bit disheartening. Parenthetically, in my experience not all the young folks are as broadminded as one might expect.

I did have a little bit of fun trying to imagine how the company went around collecting the data.

I've closed the thread in the Pennsylvania Ballet forum, with all thanks to purelyballet for posting there, and copying richard53dog's comment in that forum below: I agree to a point, but I'm sure they meant well, and they could probably use some publicity much more than NYCB and ABT.

papeetepatrick writes: Sontag said she never understood any of her novels. although she reviewed favourably some of what I think are Sontag's most ugly-styled novels (for me, this includes all of her novels, although not all of her essays, which are often extremely interesting.) I read “Death Kit” and “The Volcano Lover” and figured that was plenty. “On Photography” is one of my favorites – really remarkable stuff in that. I was bothered less by content than the tone of the thing – I don’t have time to look it up, but at the time the adjective ‘snotty’ seemed like an accurate characterization. I’m intensely grateful for the NYT. I remember discovering it in high school, out here on the West Coast, and it was a revelation to me of what a great newspaper was like. It’s big enough to take a punch now and then, though. bart writes: Funny. Tom Wolfe has similar preferences.

I'm happy that the company will get some national exposure and look forward to seeing Hench again, although I do find the whole idea sort of depressing.

Pennsylvania Ballet is featured on "20/20" tomorrow, in a broadcast dedicated to 'debunking stereotypes' about the number of gay men in ballet. The company helpfully crunches the numbers: http://www.philly.com/mld/philly/entertain...performing_arts

Ray, Jowitt and Siegel haven't been omitted from the discussion deliberately. I'm sure they have plenty of fans, though.

Paul Parish has written a letter to the editor of the Voice on this subject, which has been printed in full on the DanceView Times web site: http://www.danceviewtimes.com/2006/Summer/08/parish.html

Tennant was a talent agent, very chummy with the Oliviers among many others, and his and Baronova’s daughter became an actress (Victoria). If he combined all this with an ingrained prejudice against the theatre, he must have had a very difficult time of it. Of course, Alec Guinness issued a similar diktat to his own wife, the actress Merula Salaman -- after she had already signed on the dotted line -- with the accompanying rationale that he did not want her to be 'tainted' by the theatrical life (as he later wrote her from Beverly Hills).

Jacobs writes on fashion, movies, and dance for Vanity Fair, and she’s interviewed Karenna Gore Schiff for the same publication. (She’s also published a novel, unread by me.)

I haven’t read “The Corrections,” but I must say whenever I’ve seen Franzen's byline on an article the contents of same tend to be deeply pompous, and so I suspect Kakutani is right on the money. This wouldn’t necessarily reflect on the quality of his fiction, however, because it’s quite possible for an novelist to have less than attractive qualities when off the clock and still be a fine writer. Quiggin writes: It's an institutional prejudice, I fear. I was dismayed by the Times obituary for Derrida.

The program has always had a sort of upscale 'This Is Your Life' ambiance -- it's part of the entertainment to have the honoree sitting in the balcony beaming while everyone on stage remembers him when.

I haven't read that one, but I love the Flashman books, although they've begun to run out of steam, hardly surprising after such a long run. I also enjoyed Fraser's book on the Scottish border raiders, "The Steel Bonnets."

I agree, Gelb is off to a nice start. And as papeetepatrick notes, it's a good idea for ballet, too.

sandik: Sure is. Agreed -- but. Robinson and Parton, for example, are both perfectly fine choices, but in the same year? Mehta –well, all right, but why not a composer in preference to a conductor, or a composer honored alongside a conductor? Why no one from the world of theatre? Spielberg, okay. (Unfortunately, the emphasis will probably be laid on the Important Statement pictures he’s been making recently instead of his actual good ones.) It is really too bad about Bujones. A glaring omission, and now it's too late.

“Thus does the master choreographer aggrandize the gifts and presence of a ballerina. Thus does he reveal her, sovereign in her kingdom of ballet.” That’s from memory and I could be slightly off. That’s Croce on Suzanne Farrell in Mozartiana, and I suppose it struck me because it was unusual for Croce to strike that note. Denby deserves pride of place, but I don’t think the body of work of any other dance critic will match the in depth reviewing and reporting that Croce did for The New Yorker in her heyday - at least not any time soon. Thanks for reviving this thread, bart, nice idea.

Indeed it does. I hope someone is able to attend and report back.

Thanks for the report. A very interesting read.

I'm aware of that, thanks. I'm talking about how they look on the tape.