Subterms
How This Comedian Came to Embrace Her Deafnessvia Jessica FloresJessica Flores, a comedian and improv performer, went from hiding her hearing loss to posting YouTube videos about it.I recently spoke with Flores about channelling her lighthearted nature to spread awareness. Here’s what she told me → More
AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyCritic’s Pick‘Black Art: In the Absence of Light’ Reveals a History of Neglect and TriumphAn HBO documentary explores two centuries of art by African-Americans, and the path they forged for contemporary Black artists.Kerry James Marshall’s ‘‘Untitled (Studio)’’ (2014) appears in “Black Art: In the Absence of Light,” a documentary film directed by Sam Pollard.Credit…HBOFeb. 8, 2021Updated 3:56 p.m. ETBlack Art: In the Absence of LightNYT Critic’s Pick“This is Black art. And it matters. And it’s been going on for two hundred years. Deal with it.”So declares the art historian Maurice Berger toward the beginning of “Black Art: In the Absence of Light,” a rich and absorbing documentary directed by Sam Pollard (“MLK/FBI”) and debuting on HBO Tuesday night.The feature-length film, assembled from interviews with contemporary artists, curators and scholars, was inspired by a single 1976 exhibition, “Two Centuries of Black American Art,” the first large-scale survey of African-American artists. Organized by the artist David C. Driskell, who was then-head of the art department at Fisk University, it included some 200 works dating from the mid-18th to the mid-20th century, and advanced a history that few Americans, including art professionals, even knew existed.The HBO documentary recalls a landmark show “Two Centuries of Black American Art” at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1976. It was organized by David C. Driskell.Credit…Museum Associates/LACMAThe press gave that survey a mixed reception. Some writers griped that it was more about sociology than art (Driskell himself didn’t entirely disagree). But the show was a popular hit. At the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, where it originated, and then at major museums in Dallas, Atlanta and Brooklyn, people lined up to see it.What they were seeing was that Black artists had always done distinctive work in parallel to, and some within, a white-dominated mainstream that ignored them. And they were seeing that Black artists had consistently made, and are continuing to make, some of the most conceptually exciting and urgent-minded American art, period — a reality only quite recently acknowledged by the art world at large, as reflected in exhibitions, sales and critical attention.Driskell appeared in the HBO documentary before he died last year. “Isolation isn’t, and never was, the Black artist’s goal,” he said. “He has tried to be part and parcel of the mainstream, only to be shut out.”Credit…HBOThe HBO documentary introduces us to this history of long neglect and recent correction through the eloquent voices of three people who lived both sides of it: Driskell, a revered painter and teacher; Mary Schmidt Campbell, the president of Spelman College in Atlanta, Ga., and former director of the Studio Museum in Harlem; and Berger, an esteemed art historian and curator. (The film is dedicated to the two men, both of whom died from complications related to Covid-19 in 2020, Driskell at 88, Berger at 63.)They’re surrounded by artists, most of them painters, of various generations. Some had careers that were well underway by 1976 (Betye Saar, for example, and Richard Mayhew, who was in the survey). Others were, at that point, just starting out in the field. (Kerry James Marshall remembers being blown away by a visit to the show when he was 21). Still others — Kehinde Wiley (born 1977) and Jordan Casteel (born 1989) — weren’t born when the survey opened but still count themselves among its beneficiaries.The portraitist Jordan Casteel discusses how she finds her subjects on streets.Credit…HBOMarshall in his studio explains the many colors he uses that are “Black.”Credit…HBOThe question arises early in the film — in a 1970s “Today Show” interview with Driskell by Tom Brokaw — as to whether the very use of the label “Black American art” isn’t itself a form of imposed isolation. Yes, Driskell says, but in this case a strategic one. “Isolation isn’t, and never was, the Black artist’s goal. He has tried to be part and parcel of the mainstream, only to be shut out. Had this exhibition not been organized many of the artists in it would never have been seen.”The film refers, in shorthand form, to past examples of shutting-out. There’s a reference to the Metropolitan Museum’s 1969 “Harlem on My Mind: Cultural Capital of Black America, 1900-1968,” an exhibition that was advertised as introducing Black creativity to the Met but that contained little in the way of art. And mention is made of artists’ protests of the Whitney Museum’s 1971 survey “Contemporary Black Artists in America,” which was left entirely in the hands of a white curator.A book of essays titled “Black Art Notes,” printed that year in response to the Whitney show, accused white museums of “artwashing” through the token inclusion of African-American work, a charge that has continuing pertinence. (The collection was recently reissued, in a facsimile edition, by Primary Information, a nonprofit press in Brooklyn.) Even before the Met and Whitney shows, Black artists saw the clear necessity of taking control of how and where their art was seen into their own hands. Ethnically specific museums began to spring up — outstandingly, in 1968, the Studio Museum in Harlem.The 1969 exhibition “Harlem on My Mind” resulted in demonstrators picketing outside the Metropolitan Museum of Art.Credit…Jack Manning/The New York TimesWe’re talking about a dense, complex history. No one film can hope to get all of it, and this one leaves a lot out. (Mention of the Black Power movement is all but absent here.) Still, there’s a lot, encapsulated in short, deft commentary by scholars and curators, among them Campbell, Sarah Lewis of Harvard University, Richard J. Powell of Duke University, and Thelma Golden, the current director and chief curator of the Studio Museum. (Golden is a consulting producer of the film. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. is its executive producer.)Rightfully, and delightfully, the majority of voices are those of active artists. Faith Ringgold, now 90, wasn’t in the 1976 show, or in big museums much at all, because, she asserts, her work was too political and because she’s female. (Of the 63 artists in “Two Centuries of Black American Art,” 54 were male.) Her solution? “I just stay out till I get in,” she says. And persisting has paid off: Her monumental 1967 painting “American People Series #20: Die” has pride of place in the Museum of Modern Art’s current permanent collection rehang.)Faith Ringgold said she was excluded from the black and mainstream art movement because she was female. “I just stay out till I get in,” she said.Credit…HBOThe artist Fred Wilson explains his use of objects and cultural symbols to explore historical narratives in sculptures and installations.Credit…HBOParticularly interesting are segments showing artists at work and talking about what they’re doing as they’re doing it. We visit Marshall in his studio as he explains the many, many paint colors he uses that are “black.” We follow Fred Wilson into museum storage as he excavated objects that will become part of one of his history-baring installations. We watch Radcliffe Bailey transform hundreds of discarded piano keys into a Middle Passage ocean. And we tag along with the portraitist Jordan Casteel, who recently wrapped up a well-received show at the New Museum, as she seeks out sitters on Harlem streets.There’s no question that the visibility of African-American artists in the mainstream is way higher now than it’s ever been. (Thank you, Black Lives Matter.) A big uptick in shows is one measure. Landmark events like the 2018 unveiling of the Obama portraits by Wiley and Amy Sherald is another.In an interview in the film Sherald brings up this sudden surge of attention. “A lot of galleries are now picking up Black artists,” she says. “There’s this gold rush.” But where some observers would see the interest as just a next-hot-thing marketing trend driven by a branding of “Blackness,” she doesn’t. “I say it’s because we’re making some of the best work, and most relevant work.”In 2018, Kehinde Wiley, left, unveiled his painting of Barack Obama, alongside Amy Sherald’s portrait of Michelle Obama, at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery. Credit…Gabriella Demczuk for The New York TimesThe point of Pollard’s film, which was also the point of Driskell’s 1976 survey, is to demonstrate that, and to demonstrate that Black artists have been making some of the best work and the most relevant work for decades, centuries. But they’ve been making it mostly on the margins, beyond the white art world’s spotlights.The artist Theaster Gates, who appears toward the end of the film, sees the advantage, even the necessity, of that positioning.“Black art means that sometimes I’m making when no one’s looking,” he says. “For the most part that has been the truth of our lives. Until we own the light, I’m not happy. Until we’re in our own houses of exhibitions, of discovery, of research, until we’ve figured out a way to be masters of the world, I’d rather work in darkness. I don’t want to work only when the light comes on. My fear is that we’re being trained and conditioned to only make if there’s a light, and that makes us codependent upon a thing we don’t control. Are you willing,” he asks his fellow artists, “to make in the absence of light?”Driskell, to whom this film really belongs and with whose presence it concludes, also leaves the question of the future of Black art open-ended. Around it, he’s says, “there’s been an awakening, an enlightenment through education, a desire to want to know. On the other hand, in the words of Martin Luther King Jr. : We haven’t reached the promised land. We’ve got a long way to go.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More
ITV
Having been voted off the British competition show, the ‘Dreams’ singer explains why she is quietly relieved to be unmasked and why it was hard for her to keep her cool inside her Harlequin costume.
Feb 8, 2021
AceShowbiz – Singer Gabrielle is glad she was voted off British TV hit “The Masked Singer” on Saturday, February 6, because she was suffering panic attacks in her costume.
The “Dreams” singer admits she struggled as the Harlequin and is quietly relieved she didn’t make it to the final.
“I’m a very nervous performer and I thought by doing this maybe I can go out of my comfort zone,” she said after she was unmasked, revealing that giving birth was easier than appearing on the show.
“I got really scared, like a big baby,” she told The Mirror. “The mask is heavy. Nothing prepares you for the panic. I was getting panic attacks… I couldn’t breathe. You have to sing a song and your mouth is so dry.”
See also…
[embedded content]
“The panic attacks, the heat, the costume… it was all so hard, but it was also incredible,” she added.
Gabrielle reveals she needed three fans in her costume to keep her cool. “I thought I was doing a great job at masking my voice, but clearly not. You have a vocal coach. They try and say, ‘Can that be a bit less Gabrielle-ish’. For ‘Diamonds’, they wanted me to be posh and for Fast Car they wanted me, not Cockney, but a Lily Allen vibe,” she added.
“I was like, ‘I can’t do that. It’s just not me!’ But I did try. When I listened to ‘Diamonds’ I thought, ‘I wasn’t meant to sound like that,’ ” she continued. Gabrielle added she also kept her “The Masked Singer” stint a secret from her daughter. “My daughter didn’t know anything about it,” she revealed.
You can share this post!
Next article
Paris Hilton Dedicates Life-Size Portrait to Boyfriend for 40th Birthday
Related Posts More
[embedded content]
The new trailer for the upcoming Disney+ series sees the Marvel characters putting behind their differences as they join forces to fight against Baron Zemo (Daniel Bruhl).
Feb 8, 2021
AceShowbiz – Disney+ unleashed a new trailer for its upcoming Marvel TV series “The Falcon and The Winter Soldier” during Super Bowl LV that kicked off on Sunday, February 7. In the trailer, Sam/Falcon (Anthony Mackie) and Bucky/Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan) are seen saving the world in epic adventures.
The video opens with the two Avengers being in what looks like an interrogation room. “Mr. Barnes, why does Sam aggravate you?” a woman asks Bucky. The trailer doesn’t feature the answer as it cuts to scenes where the Marvel characters put behind their differences as they join forces to fight against Baron Zemo (Daniel Bruhl).
“Superheroes cannot be allowed to exist,” says Baron in voiceover before adding, “I have no intention to leave my work unfinished.” Meanwhile, Bucky warns that the world is “upside down” now. The trailer also sees Emily VanCamp reprising her role of Sharon Carter (a.k.a. Agent 13).
See also…
Toward the end of the trailer, it brings back viewers to the scene in the interrogation room. Now, Sam and Bucky are facing and staring at each other intensely. That prompts the woman to ask, “What are you doing? Are you having a staring contest? Just blink, sweet Jesus.”
“The Falcon and The Winter Soldier” is set after the events of “Avengers: Endgame” in which Steve Rogers retired as Captain America with him deciding to live a simple life in an alternate reality with his love, Peggy Carter. He then gave his shield to Sam.
Also starring on the series are Wyatt Russell, Desmond Chiam, Miki Ishikawa, Noah Mills and Carl Lumbly. Kari Skogland directs the project with the script being written by Malcolm Spellman.
“The Falcon and the Winter Soldier” is scheduled to premiere on March 19 on Disney+.
You can share this post!
Next article
Morgan Wallen’s Sister Decries Cancel Culture After His Racial Slur Scandal More
#masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyWhat’s on TV This Week: Documentaries on David Driskell and Abraham Lincoln“Black Art: In the Absence of Light” looks at the impact of an influential 1970s exhibition by the curator David Driskell. And a CNN debuts a series about Lincoln.Gabriel Chytry in “Lincoln: Divided We Stand,” a new six-part CNN documentary.Credit…CNNFeb. 8, 2021, 1:00 a.m. ETBetween network, cable and streaming, the modern television landscape is a vast one. Here are some of the shows, specials and movies coming to TV this week, Feb. 8-14. Details and times are subject to change.MondayBLACK LIGHTNING 9 p.m. on the CW. When “Black Lightning” premiered in 2018, it delivered a jolt of real-world relevance to the superhero genre, exploring race and social justice issues in no uncertain terms even as its titular hero, played by Cress Williams, delivered the obligatory zaps and zings to bad guys. The fourth season, which debuts Monday night, will be the series’s last; it begins with Black Lightning (alter ego: Jefferson Pierce) mourning the death of a major character, which happened at the end of the third season.TuesdayTheaster Gates in a scene from “Black Art: In the Absence of Light.”Credit…HBOBLACK ART: IN THE ABSENCE OF LIGHT 9 p.m. on HBO. The filmmaker Sam Pollard, whose acclaimed new documentary “MLK/FBI” was released widely last month, returns with another sharp, historically-minded feature doc, this time about David Driskell, the artist, art historian and curator who was a vital champion of African-American artists. “Black Art” looks at the enduring impact of “Two Centuries of Black American Art,” Driskell’s 1976 exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, through interviews with artists including Theaster Gates, Kerry James Marshall, Faith Ringgold, Amy Sherald and Carrie Mae Weems. The film comes less than a year after Driskell’s death; it shows the fundamental role he played in efforts to get Black American artists space on museum walls. “I was looking for a body of work which showed first of all that Blacks had been stable participants in American visual culture for more than 200 years,” Driskell said of the exhibition in a 1977 interview with The New York Times. “And by stable participants I simply mean that in many cases they had been the backbone.”WednesdayTUSKEGEE AIRMEN: LEGACY OF COURAGE 8 p.m. on History. Ted Lumpkin Jr., one of the oldest surviving members of the Tuskegee Airmen, died last month at 100. His legacy — and those of the other members of the Tuskegee Airmen, the country’s first Black aviation combat unit, which fought in World War II — live on through the generations that came after them. This hourlong documentary, narrated by the news anchor Robin Roberts, revisits the history of the unit, whose members fought the Axis powers outside of the United States and discrimination inside of it.ThursdayCLARICE 10 p.m. on CBS. This ambitious new horror series is the latest show based on Thomas Harris’s suspense novels, which most famously include “The Silence of the Lambs.” It’s also the latest to revolve around Clarice Starling, the F.B.I. agent famously played by Jodie Foster in the 1991 film. The new show picks up months after the events of “Silence of the Lambs,” with Clarice (Rebecca Breeds) taking on new cases while working through lingering trauma.FridayBeanie Feldstein in “How to Build a Girl.”Credit…IFC FilmsHOW TO BUILD A GIRL (2020) 9 p.m. on Showtime. Beanie Feldstein plays an awkward British teenager who becomes an acid-penned, love-struck rock critic in this coming-of-age comedy, which was adapted from Caitlin Moran’s novel of the same name. The movie version “leaps from raunchy to charming, vulgar to sweet, earthy to airy-fairy without allowing any one to settle,” Jeannette Catsoulis wrote in her review for The Times. Yet, she added, “it’s so wonderfully funny and deeply embedded in class-consciousness — ‘We must never forget it’s a miracle when anyone gets anywhere from a bad postcode,’ says one character — that its tonal incontinence is easily forgiven.” Showtime is airing “How to Build a Girl” alongside Bo Burnham’s “Eighth Grade,” another sweet and sour coming-of-age comedy about a teenage misfit, which starts at 7:25 p.m.MILES AHEAD (2016) 6:15 p.m. on Starz. In “Miles Ahead,” Ewan McGregor plays a rock journalist whose subject punches him in the face. That subject would be Miles Davis, portrayed here by a devastatingly cool Don Cheadle. The film takes after Davis’s music, bringing an unusual, impressionistic approach to its storytelling; it drops Davis into a fictional story that involves a bender, a stolen tape and a car chase. Cheadle, who also directed, cooks up a version of Davis who is both soft-spoken and supremely self-assured.IN CONCERT AT THE HOLLYWOOD BOWL 9 p.m. on PBS (check local listings). This pandemic-era series, which has showcased a variety of archival performances by the Los Angeles Philharmonic and its guests at the Hollywood Bowl, comes to a close on Friday night with an episode built around Latin music. It includes footage of the orchestra performing alongside the Colombian singer-songwriter Carlos Vives, the Mexican rock band Café Tacvba and performers from Siudy Flamenco Dance Theater in Miami.SaturdayROMAN HOLIDAY (1953) 8 p.m. on TCM. Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck star in this romantic comedy about a princess (Hepburn) who falls in love with a reporter (Peck) during a trip to Rome. Viewers who raised children in the early 2000s (or who were children in the early 2000s) might find the image of Hepburn and Peck piloting a Vespa through Roman traffic familiar: It was copied a half-century later in “The Lizzie McGuire Movie.”SundayWinona Ryder and Daniel Day-Lewis in “The Age of Innocence.”Credit…Columbia PicturesTHE AGE OF INNOCENCE (1993) 8 p.m. on TCM. Daniel Day-Lewis has worn many top hats. There’s the big one he wore in “Lincoln,” for example, and the memorable blue-banded number that was perched on his head in “Gangs of New York.” In “The Age of Innocence,” Martin Scorsese’s adaptation of the Edith Wharton novel, Day-Lewis plays a fancy high hat-wearing wealthy lawyer in 19th-century New York who, after courting and marrying one woman (Winona Ryder), has affair with a countess (Michelle Pfeiffer).LINCOLN: DIVIDED WE STAND 10 p.m. on CNN. The actor Sterling K. Brown narrates this new, six-part documentary series about Abraham Lincoln, which looks at the 16th president’s personal and political lives, and how each affected the other. The first episode tends toward the personal: It focuses on the early years of Lincoln’s life.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More
Speaking about her new film on ‘Live with Kelly and Ryan’, the ‘Forrest Gump’ actress additionally shares her thought on filming in remote Alberta, Canada to make the scenes look authentic.
Feb 8, 2021
AceShowbiz – Robin Wright really went into the wild to shoot her new film “Land” – and needed a bear whisperer to keep her cast and crew members safe from the local creatures.
The “Forrest Gump” star pulls double duty on the movie, as director and leading lady, a woman who retreats to a remote cabin as she battles grief and the urge to take her own life, before the kindness of strangers sets her on a new path.
But filming in remote Alberta, Canada meant that even the production’s trained bear had to be protected from the local grizzlies, who took quite an interest in the Hollywood visitors.
“We have a scene in the movie where a bear is basically in danger of being eaten by a bear, and we had to do (the scene with) visual effects because it wasn’t safe for the trained bear to be on the set, because we had wild bears around the set all day long,” Robin tells “Live with Kelly and Ryan”.
See also…
“We had to have a bear whisperer to keep them away.”
[embedded content]
But Robin has no complaints about getting to grips with nature to make the country scenes look authentic.
“First of all, it’s like medicine being out there,” she smiles. “We were at 8,000 feet at the top of a mountain and to wake up and hear birds and not honking horns and trains – it was peaceful and it was therapy.”
In another interview, Robin admitted that she initially hesitated to direct the movie. “Should I? Can I? Yes, you can. You can do it. You just have to be committed to your strength and your confidence that you can do it,” she explained.
You can share this post!
Next article
Fisher Stevens Regrets Behaving Like a ‘D**k’ on the Set of ‘Friends’
Related Posts More
https://www.tedalexandro.com/
Making public his allegations regarding the jokes in a now-viral skit on Twitter, the comedian asks the hit NBC comedy show to ‘Venmo me the sum of 1 million dollars.’
Feb 8, 2021
AceShowbiz – “Saturday Night Live” introduced a new sketch about how sexy Zillow real estate listings were in its Saturday, February 5 episode. The skit quickly hit a nerve on social media, but the NBC show was accused of stealing the joke from a comedian.
Comedian Ted Alexandro took to his Twitter account on Sunday to claim that the joke was from his material during his live performance at the Comedy Cellar in New York City. “Dear @SNL, since you stole my Zillow joke last night please Venmo me the sum of 1 million dollars,” so Ted wrote alongside a clip of him delivering the joke in his standup performance.
“My full special Cut/Up is on youtube if you need more ideas,” he added. “You have until kickoff. Venmo: @Ted-Alexandro,” he continued in a follow-up tweet.
Ted Alexandro accused ‘SNL’ of stealing jokes from him.
See also…
Not surprised by the allegations, one user responded, “When I was younger I was always so impressed that they wrote a whole comedy sketch show in a week every week and then I grew up to be a comedian and realized it’s easy when you piece together stolen tweets, jokes, podcast banter and already completed sketches. your joke is great!”
Another user added, “While watching it last night, I literally said to myself, ‘This is funny. There’s no way that someone didn’t already make this joke. I bet tomorrow someone shows receipts.’ Not joking. Literally said that to myself.”
Someone, however, tried to make Ted’s claims invalid by writing to him, “I usually support any comic who’s material is stolen, but I’m sorry Ted, I can only support your audience on this one. @SNL didn’t steal from you, they stole from the people who saw your Zillow bit. You didn’t write the material, you only caused audiences to think of it.”
Echoing the sentiment, someone else argued, “Comedians are funny. And they have this power where if they think of something nobody else on the planet can ever have the same idea. It’s science.” To that, Ted replied, “I work at @ComedyCellarUSA where many SNL writers regularly perform. Stick to privacy apps.”
Meanwhile, “SNL” has yet to respond to Ted’s accusations.
You can share this post!
Next article
Salma Hayek ‘Proud’ to Strive in Hollywood as Mexican After Being Told It’s ‘Impossible’
Related Posts More
Years after portraying Lisa Kudrow’s on-screen psychiatrist boyfriend on the hit sitcom, the ‘Motherless Brooklyn’ actor issues an apology to the stars of the series.
Feb 8, 2021
AceShowbiz – Actor-turned-filmmaker Fisher Stevens has apologized to the cast of “Friends” for behaving like a jerk on the first season of the hit sitcom.
He starred in one episode of the show’s first season as the psychiatrist boyfriend of Lisa Kudrow’s character Phoebe whose unwanted assessments of the friends causes them to take an instant dislike to him. Now, he admits he went too far with his portrayal of an “a**hole.”
“At that moment in my career, I had never done a sitcom before,” he tells PeopleTV’s “Couch Surfing”. “I had never heard of ‘Friends’ because it was just the beginning of the show and I didn’t watch TV at the time much.”
See also…
To make matters worse, he discovered the script he had studied before flying to Los Angeles had been rewritten.
“That’s what sitcoms did and I didn’t know that,” he adds. “I was kind of an a**hole, I have to admit. (I was like), ‘What do you you mean? So I have to relearn lines that you’ve written that are worse than what you’d originally written?’ Yeah, I was a d**k. I’ve rarely seen any of those people on ‘Friends’ again, but I’m sure if you asked them about me, they would go, ‘What a New York snob.’ ”
[embedded content]
But he wants the “Friends” stars to know that he’s not really the jerk they worked with all those years ago: “I’m sorry guys. I’m sorry I was a d**k to you all… I was bad, I was wrong.”
You can share this post!
Next article
Ralph Fiennes Keen to Keep Bond Role Despite Daniel Craig’s Departure More
