Essential Arts & Culture: #Oscars2018 and culture, the trippy Olafur Eliasson installation
A look at the Oscars. A play about Jacqueline Kennedy. And an artist’s hallucinatory installation. I’m Carolina A. Miranda, staff writer with the Los Angeles times, with the week’s top culture stories and ancient art GIFs:
IMAGE
From here on out, I’ll be kicking off the newsletter each week with a compelling image. Seen here: an early photograph of a Dakota woman by pioneer photographer J.E. Whitney — on view in “Paper Promises: Early American Photography” at the Getty Museum through May 27.
OSCAR OSCAR OSCAR
The Academy Awards are on Sunday and we’ve got stories!
Times theater critic Charles McNulty has a look at two of year’s big Oscar contenders: Luca Guadagnino’s “Call Me by Your Name” and playwright Martin McDonagh’s “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri” — and he is not convinced. “In both cases, I found myself quarreling with the writing,” he states. “I couldn’t understand how friends and fellow critics could overlook the implausibilities of language, character, culture and plot.” Los Angeles Times
Times contributor Tim Greiving has an analysis of the life and work of composer John Williams — who is nominated for his work on “Star Wars: The Last Jedi.” The composer received his first Oscar nod 50 years ago for adapting André Previn’s songs in the score for “Valley of the Dolls.” Los Angeles Times
Greiving also has a sonic roundup of the most iconic movie music that never won an Oscar. It sounds like a hall of fame to me. Los Angeles Times
“The Oscar Concert” at Walt Disney Hall featured three of this year’s five Oscar-nominated composers leading the L.A. Phil in excerpts of their scores. Rick Schultz reviews. Los Angeles Times
Times culture writer Jeffrey Fleishman isn’t buying the idea that the Oscars are all that. Los Angeles Times
But just in case you have to bone up for the office pool: Oscar mastermind Glenn Whipp offers predictions on 24 Oscar categories. Los Angeles Times
This year, I’ll be attending the Academy Awards (!!!). To prepare for this grand event, I took a TMZ tour. Los Angeles Times
PLAYING JACKIE KENNEDY
At the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts, Saffron Burrows, best known for her role as Cynthia on Amazon’s “Mozart in the Jungle,” takes on the grief of Jacqueline Kennedy in Tom Dugan’s “Jackie Unveiled.” “She was so intelligent and yet she was endlessly patronized,” says Burrows of the former first lady. Los Angeles Times
Times theater critic Charles McNulty, however, says the play doesn’t offer Burrows much to work with: “This isn’t a private Jackie but a contrived public version for the commercial stage.” Los Angeles Times
IN THE THEATERS
Los Angeles has been having a Quiara Alegría Hudes moment — with three plays in the Pulitzer Prize-winner’s Elliot cycle in production at venues around town over the last month. Charles McNulty sat in on “The Happiest Song Plays Last” at the Los Angeles Theatre Center. The play, he writes, has “an impressive scope,” but the production, by the Latino Theater Company, feels “unsettled.” Los Angeles Times
At the Actors’ Gang, a new work of performance, “The New Colossus,” created in collaboration with the company’s artistic director, Tim Robbins, explores personal tales of immigration. “The characters call themselves refugees, and whatever the legal definition, you believe them,” writes McNulty. Their worn overcoats, scarves and gloves seem inadequate protection for their vulnerable humanity.” Los Angeles Times
McNulty also took in a performance of Michael Michetti’s “revitalizing” projection of “A Streetcar Named Desire” at the Boston Court Performing Arts Center — and found it’s a staging that “shakes out the cobwebs” of a Tennessee Williams classic “that hasn’t felt fresh in a long time. Los Angeles Times
ELSEWHERE ON STAGE
The Times’ Daryl H. Miller checks out George Takei’s musical, “Allegiance,” about the Japanese American interment experience, at the Aratani Theatre. The show bears the “heavy burden” of educating and entertaining, he notes — putting it in a small club of musicals, such as “Zoot Suit,” that examine periods of American brutality. Los Angeles Times
Miller notes that after a six-year absence from the theater, Los Angeles playwright Justin Tanner is back with humorous family dysfunction in “El Niño” at the Met Theatre in East Hollywood. Los Angeles Times
And Times contributing reviewer Margaret Gray sits in on an “enchanting” production of “The Flying Lovers of Vitebsk” at the Wallis in Beverly Hills — inspired by the art of 20th century painter Marc Chagall. Los Angeles Times
THE ART OF WHOA
I love any story that begins, “Just in time for the arrival of recreational marijuana…. ” This one happens to be by Times art critic Christopher Knight, who reports that Icelandic Danish artist Olafur Eliasson’s “Reality Projector” installation at the Marciano Art Foundation “is a smashing immersive environment guaranteed to elicit an immediate ‘Oh, wow’ from visitors — pot or no pot.” Los Angeles Times
Which is a great time to resuscitate the Southern Mothers’ 2008 Olafur Eliasson rap (which contains arty swearing). YouTube
IN THE GALLERIES
Knight also paid a visit to Diane Rosenstein Gallery, where artist Gisela Colon showcases recent sculpture that channels light and space. Los Angeles Times
And he writes about Charlemagne Palestine’s vast installations crafted from plush toys at 356 Mission. “The installation is all really just too much,” he notes, “which, in these cruel and emotionally crushing days, means it’s almost just enough.” Los Angeles Times
WRIGHT’S L.A.
For a new documentary set to air on KCET, Times architecture critic Christopher Hawthorne digs into architect Frank Lloyd Wright’s Los Angeles years — which came after the brutal murder of his lover in Wisconsin. “Was there some link between the violence in Wright’s personal life that sent him careening to California?” asks Hawthorne. “And what was it about pre-Columbian ruins that made them so attractive to Wright in the 1920s as the basis for an experimental, concrete-block L.A. architecture?” “That Far Corner,” as the doc is titled, will explore those ideas. Los Angeles Times
Plus, James Brasuell looks at the conservation work that goes into maintaining Wright’s L.A. structures. KCET Artbound
WORK IT
Melanie Griffith is starring as Mrs. Robinson in “The Graduate” at the Laguna Playhouse. Times contributor Catherine Womack sits down for a Q&A. Where does she think her character Tess McGill from “Working Girl” would be today? “Running Google,” Griffith says. Los Angeles Times
IN OTHER NEWS …
— “Darkness has brought to light other things.” Samuel Granados and Kevin Schaul have created a terrific animated piece about a troupe of performers in Puerto Rico in the wake of Hurricane Maria. A must-watch. Washington Post
— A censored sculpture of Leonard Peltier takes up residence at the Main Museum. Los Angeles magazine
— Santa Monica’s letterpress emporium Church of Type is no longer. KCET Artbound
— A version of Arthur Miller’s “The Crucible” is set in a West Bank settlement. Tablet
— The Geffen Playhouse has announced it’s 2018-19 lineup, the first under new artistic director Matt Shakman. Los Angeles Times
— Plus, Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Paula Vogel’s “Indecent” will be part of the 2018-19 lineup at the Ahmanson Theatre. Los Angeles Times
— “It’s a cool, powerful feeling to direct the energy of the room.” A profile of stage and film actress Laurie Metcalf considers her range. New York Times
— How an American Ballet Theatre dancer became a body double for Jennifer Lawrence in “Red Sparrow.” WWD ...
— … and the film’s choreography team created Lawrence’s ballet sequences. New York Times
— KCRW’s Frances Anderton and Avishay Artsy have devoted an entire show to the ways in which artists are engaging the Los Angeles River and the bridges that span it. Design and Architecture
— Making cities more child-friendly. Guardian
— One hundred and one movies about cities. Curbed
— Facebook censors the 30,000-year-old Venus of Willendorf sculpture as “pornographic.” Art Newspaper
LAST BUT NOT LEAST
This one’s for Venus: It’s time for goddess GIFS. Nina Paley
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