Editor’s note: Welcome to Dear Costume Department, a bi-weekly feature brought to you by our fashion-minded friends from Of a Kind, a curated shopping site of limited-edition goods by emerging designers. With each installment, they’ll bring you a head-to-toe look inspired by a buzzed-about pop culture personality — complete with info on where to grab the pieces for your own closet. Enjoy!
How many directors have staged modern productions of Shakespeare, would you guess? And how many have gone too far with the whole let’s-make-this-current! ethos (see: Peter Sellers’ Othello with Philip Seymour Hoffman)? Thankfully, Sam Mendes was able to contain himself with his take on Richard III, which opened at BAM this month, and that makes dressing an evil king (a.k.a. Kevin Spacey) legitimately fun.
Welcome to the future, where you can go see any cultural event you please without changing out of your jammies. All sorts of outside events like concerts, readings, sports games, and press conferences are now being held for your solo viewing pleasure on the internet. We know, we know, it’s not like watching events in real-time on a home screen is that new of an idea. Baseball is the American pastime, after all, and most people watch it from home (or from bars).
It may seem low-tech, but we can count the number of major concerts to be streamed live online on one hand — the YouTube Live show in November 2008; Dave Matthews Band on Hulu last summer; U2 at the Rose Bowl back in October. As more and more cultural events that used to be reserved solely for those willing to venture out from the safety of their living rooms are being offered as online streams, we wonder if something is lost behind the plastic, or if it will be easy for us all to trade the discomfort of being off your couch for the discomfort of literally never seeing other people.
Brothers Bryce and Aaron Dessner take a break from recording the latest National album this week to perform a new multimedia work at BAM in collaboration with visual artist Matthew Ritchie. In just over an hour, The Long Count tackles such heady ideas as the beginning of time through myth, songs, and raw orchestral power. We caught up with Bryce Dessner to talk about the origins of this ambitious project, how Kim and Kelley Deal got involved, and what to expect from the new National album.
1. Arts Beat reports that Cate Blanchett — currently playing Blanche DuBois in a production of A Streetcar Named Desire for the the Sydney Theater Company — continued to act in a scene after a prop radio fell on her head during a a fight scene with Joel Edgerton, who is playing Stanley Kowalski. Blood poured down her head and neck, the house lights went up, and the audience was asked to leave. She is expected back for tonight’s performance.
Last night Edible Brooklyn hosted one of its unforgettable foodie soirees, this time pairing local craft beer with everything from ceviche, cheese, and kielbasa pretzels to ice cream and gingersnaps. Beers by connoisseur favorites like Ommegang and Sly Fox were matched with grub from area restaurants including Gramercy Tavern, Back Forty, and Co. Pizzeria. After the jump, check out our photo gallery and find out what pairings blew our mind (and tastebuds). Read More »
Welcome to Grill and Chill, a new feature made possible by our friends at Weber*, who gave Flavorpill HQ one of their electric grills for the summer as long as we promised to interview interesting cultural figures and feed them free hot dogs. Read on for an interview with Dia Sokol and Lauren Veloski, the talented filmmakers behind Sorry, Thanks — a quirky film about 20-something relationships that stars Dazed and Confused‘s Wiley Wiggins and mumblecore genius Andrew Bujalski — and if you live in New York, be sure to check out the premiere at BAMcinemaFEST on June 24th. Read More »
Image credit: detail from Numberless Masts of Ships and the Thick Stemm’d Pipes of Steamboats by Greg Lindquist
Twice a month, Sara Distin from Jen Bekman Projects, Inc. contributes a post to Flavorwire about an artist or photographer. Jen Bekman Projects, Inc. includes Jen Bekman Gallery, 20×200 and Hey, Hot Shot!
I was not born a Brooklyn girl; it’s true, my heart will always be in the West. The seemingly endless space and sky out there are infinitely comforting, even if they’re not as vast and unchanging as I’d like to think. In Brooklyn, the skyline is crowded by warehouses abutting heavy, leaden air along the East River. Large but low slung, these buildings seem to hold up the horizon, forming a barrier between the borough and Manhattan’s more oppressive high-rises. As captured in Greg Lindquist’s metallic paintings, they defend a horizon equally comforting and foreboding.
Back in the days when we still lived in dorms, around the time that college graduation loomed on the horizon and we were cowering in its shadow, two movies got us through the stress: Kicking and Screaming (no, not the one with Will Ferrell) and Reality Bites. No finer films have yet been made that speak to the fear and desperation associated with leaving the confines the liberal arts. As a result of repeat viewings at that time in our lives, we might have inflated attachments to Ethan Hawke and Josh Hamilton.
So we were a little excited by the latest production from Sam Mendes’ Bridge Project, The Winter’s Tale, which features both actors. Truth be told, we expected Hamilton to outshine Hawke. Did he not remain an indie darling while Hawke became a hearthrob, and then, perhaps, a hack (see: his director credit on that Lisa Loeb video; two mediocre novels and a flopped film adaptation)? Does this not imply some vague standard of quality related to performing the Bard on the boards?
Luciano Nakata Albuquerque — a noted musician who performs under the moniker Curumin — will be bringing his samba soul to BAM on December 4th and 5th alongside CéU, Bebel Gilberto, José González, Otto, and João Parahyba (of Trio Mocotó) for an all-star benefit tribute to the music and culture of Brazil. When his second full-length album, JapanPopShow, came out on Quannum Projects last month Spin Magazine gave it four stars and said, “Cheerful Brazilian oddball brews up a world of groovy fun!”
After the jump, Curumin reveals what’s exciting him in the São Paulo culture scene right now.
