Titanic (Ship)

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    Piano From Titanic’s Sister Ship, Olympic, Awaits an Audience

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    A gilt-trimmed upright Steinway piano commissioned in 1912 for the ocean liner Olympic is on dry land and ready to be heard again.This article is part of our Design special section about water as a source of creativity.During the Titanic’s maiden voyage, musicians played pianos from Steinway & Sons to entertain passengers with waltzes and opera overtures. A twin of one of the ship’s Steinway instruments has been found in northern England, and a new nonprofit organization is gearing up to return it to the limelight.The gilt-trimmed walnut upright, now at the showroom of Besbrode Pianos in Leeds, was commissioned in 1912 for the Titanic’s sister ship, the Olympic. It was made by the same craftspeople, and in the same style and materials, as its disintegrated counterparts underwater near Newfoundland. But before its provenance trail was traced in the last few years, “Nobody showed the slightest bit of interest in it,” said Melvin Besbrode, the showroom’s owner.The nonprofit RMS Olympic Steinway Association aims to raise about $125,000 to acquire it and make it publicly accessible. The only other Olympic piano known to survive is a Steinway grand with checkerboard inlays, which the musician Bill Wyman sold through Sotheby’s in 1994 for about $38,000. Its current location is a mystery. “No one can hear it, no one can see it, and we don’t want that to happen again,” said Patrick Cornelius Vida, an Austrian musician who is the association’s president.The Olympic, circa 1911.Popperfoto, via Getty ImagesMr. Vida has made pilgrimages to Besbrode Pianos to bask in the upright’s aura and used it for filmed performances of 1910s music. “It’s stayed within my soul, within my memory,” he said. “It’s a grand old lady who’s young at heart.”The association has made a documentary, explaining that the piano’s “timber, character and tonal quality” are nearly identical to what Titanic passengers heard. When the Besbrode piano was in use for decades aboard the Olympic (which was scrapped in 1935), the passengers included Albert Einstein, Marie Curie, Irving Berlin, Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Bernard Hill, Actor in ‘Titanic’ and ‘Lord of the Rings,’ Dies at 79

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      With a stout frame, bushy whiskers and a weathered visage, he embodied men of authority facing down danger with weary stoicism.Bernard Hill, a British actor who incarnated a humble style of masculine leadership in three hugely successful Hollywood movies, “Titanic” and two films in the “Lord of the Rings” franchise, died on Sunday. He was 79.His death was announced in a family statement sent by a representative of Lou Coulson Associates, a British talent agency. It did not say where he died or provide a cause.Mr. Hill drew praise from critics for his work in serious TV dramas, small-budget films and theater. But he was best known for playing the ship’s captain in “Titanic” (1997) and the ruler of a horsemen’s kingdom in the second and third installments of the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy, “The Two Towers” (2002) and “The Return of the King” (2003).By appearing in “Titanic” and “The Return of the King,” Mr. Hill became the first actor to star in more than one film to gross over $1 billion and the only actor to appear in two of the three films to win a record 11 Oscars (the third is “Ben-Hur”), The Manchester Evening News reported in 2022.In each film, his stout frame, bushy whiskers and weathered visage helped him embody men of authority who faced danger with reluctance, then acceptance and, finally, self-sacrificial stoicism.In “Titanic,” he was Capt. Edward J. Smith. Early in the movie, he grasps the ship’s railing, looks out to sea and instructs one of his crew to increase the ship’s speed: “Let’s stretch her legs,” he declares. The movie ultimately suggests that the undue speed of the ship is a factor in its fatal collision with an iceberg.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      What James Cameron Wants to Bring Up From the Titanic

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      Preservationists such as Robert D. Ballard have long clashed with salvors such as Paul-Henri Nargeolet, who died in June on the Titan submersible. Is a third way possible?Ocean experts have long clashed over whether artifacts from the world’s most famous shipwreck should be retrieved for exhibits that could help people better understand the Titanic tragedy or whether they should be left untouched in the sea’s depths as a monument to the more than 1,500 people who lost their lives. James Cameron, known for his 1997 movie “Titanic,” sees himself as negotiating a middle path through this complicated and often emotional dispute.Mr. Cameron dove 33 times to the shipwreck from 1995 through 2005, giving him a window on its condition and likely fate. His perspective is timely because the United States government recently sought to exert control over the wreck, raising questions about whether a company that has recovered more than 5,500 artifacts will be allowed to gather more.Mr. Cameron’s views are also deeply personal. He often debated the retrievals with Paul-Henri Nargeolet, a French submariner who died in June while descending to the shipwreck in the Titan submersible. Mr. Nargeolet also directed underwater research for RMS Titanic Inc., the company that holds the exclusive salvage rights to the ship and its artifacts.Mr. Cameron recently answered questions by email from The New York Times about his recovery views, the Titanic’s future and the Titan submersible. This conversation has been edited for clarity and brevity.Did you see signs of natural decay during your 10 years of Titanic dives?We’ve seen significant deterioration to thin-walled structures such as the deckhouse (the uppermost deck above the boat deck) and the forward mast. It was intact (in its fallen position) in 2001 but partially collapsed in 2005. New imaging by the Magellan company in 2022 shows that it has completely collapsed and broken open.However, we’ve not seen any significant deterioration to the vast majority of the wreck, such as the hull plates. Their steel is one and a half inches thick. I believe the plates will still be standing for another two centuries at least.How about damage by visitors? Anything obvious?Based on my experience maneuvering around the wreck, and landing on top of it, the submersibles do nothing of significance. Up top, a submersible weighs several tons but down there, in order to fly around, it must be neutrally buoyant, which means it touches down with only a few pounds of force. Besides, anything humans do is trivial compared to the relentless deterioration caused by biological activity, which goes on year after year. The Titanic is being eaten by living colonies of bacteria. They love it when humans drop giant piles of steel into the deep ocean, which we do with some regularity, especially in wars. It’s a feast for them.A still from the 2003 documentary, “Ghosts of the Abyss,” directed by Mr. Cameron, during a visit to the Titanic wreckage.Walt Disney Pictures/AJ Pics, via AlamyOn the Titanic’s artifacts, you describe yourself as a centrist between preservationists such as Robert D. Ballard and salvors such as Paul-Henri Nargeolet, who died in June on the Titan submersible. How so?On one hand, I think it’s good to recover artifacts from the debris field. When Titanic broke in two at the surface, it became like two great piñatas. Over square miles, we see plates and wine bottles, suitcases, shoes — things people carried with them, touched and wore.That humanizes the story and reminds us that the tragedy has a human face. So many artifacts have been recovered that poignantly connect us to this history — like the bell from the crow’s nest which was rung three times by lookout Frederick Fleet when he first spotted the iceberg. Now, millions of museumgoers can see it with their own eyes. I’ve even rung it myself. And there are so many examples of Titanic’s elegance — fine china, beaded chandeliers, the cherub statue from the Grand Staircase. It’s the ongoing public interest in these things that keeps the history alive, now, 111 years after the sinking. A gray area that leaves me torn is whether we should recover artifacts from inside the bow and stern sections. One case I find compelling is recovery of the Marconi set. This wireless system sent the SOS signal that brought the rescue ship Carpathia to Titanic’s exact coordinates, and arguably saved the lives of over 700 people.The Titanic’s wireless set was unique, very different from others in its day. I’ve flown my tiny remotely operated vehicles inside to survey the Marconi rooms, so we know where everything is and have done computer reconstructions.But to actually put that instrument on public display would be very moving for millions of museumgoers. If it could be recovered without any harm done to the outer appearance of the wreck, I’d be in favor, because that area of the ship is deteriorating fast and within a few years the Marconi set will be buried deep inside the ruins, unrecoverable.So anything goes?Where I personally draw the line is changing the look of the wreck — such as raising its iconic bow (where Jack and Rose stood in the movie) or removing the mighty anchors or taking the bronze telemotor from the bridge where Quartermaster Hitchens desperately spun the ship’s wheel trying to avoid the iceberg. All these recoveries have been discussed by somebody at some point over the last quarter century. I think we shouldn’t take anything from the bow and stern sections that would disfigure them. They should stand as monuments to the tragedy.Paul-Henri Nargeolet, the French submariner who died in June while descending to the Titanic shipwreck in a submersible, at a Titanic exhibition in Paris in 2013.Joel Saget/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesYou knew Mr. Nargeolet quite well. Did you have any disagreements with him and his company’s approach to artifact recovery?He was a legendary sub pilot and explorer, and we spent many exciting hours going over our Titanic videos and comparing notes. He recovered many of the artifacts, such as the crow’s nest bell, that I find so moving in the various exhibits around the world.That said, I disagreed with him about some of his plans to recover such things as the bow anchors, though it was always a friendly discussion. I’m glad some of those plans never came to fruition.Around 2017, you joined with Dr. Ballard and the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, London, in an unsuccessful attempt to buy the collection of Titanic artifacts and move them to Belfast, where the ship was built. Why? And would you try again if RMS Titanic once again declared bankruptcy?Our concern at the time was that the collection could have been bought by a rich private collector and disappear from the public’s view. These artifacts belong to the world, as part of our shared cultural heritage — our collective history — and the artifacts help keep that history alive and the tragedy palpable. But only if they can be seen, and emotionally felt, through public access. If the collection is put at risk again, down the line, I would hope to have a voice in keeping it publicly accessible.What do you make of the federal government’s recent effort to exert control over the Titanic?The Titanic lies in international waters. I’m sure this tussle will go on indefinitely.Do you think the Titan disaster will have an impact on Titanic visitors?Do I believe it will stop people from wanting to witness Titanic in person? Absolutely not. Human curiosity is a powerful force, and the urge to go and bear witness with one’s own eyes is very strong for some people, myself included.But citizen explorers must be more discerning about who they dive with. Is the sub fully certified by a recognized bureau? What is the safe operating record of the submersible company? These are the kinds of questions they need to ask.Would you dive again?I would get in a sub tomorrow — if it was certified, like Woods Hole Oceanographic’s storied Alvin sub, or the subs built by Triton submersibles. But there’s no rush to do anything. That familiar image of the bow will still be there, as it is, for another half century at least. More

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      ‘Titanic’ Director James Cameron Points to Flaws in Titan Sub’s Design

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      “We’ve never had an accident like this,” James Cameron, the Oscar-winning director of “Titanic,” said on Thursday.Mr. Cameron, an expert in submersibles, has dived dozens of times to the ship’s deteriorating hulk and once plunged in a tiny craft of his own design to the bottom of the planet’s deepest recess.In an interview, Mr. Cameron called the presumed loss of five lives aboard the Titan submersible from the company OceanGate like nothing anyone involved in private ocean exploration had ever seen.“There’ve never been fatalities at this kind of depth and certainly no implosions,” he said.An implosion in the deep sea happens when the crushing pressures of the abyss cause a hollow object to collapse violently inward. If the object is big enough to hold five people, Mr. Cameron said in an interview, “it’s going to be an extremely violent event — like 10 cases of dynamite going off.”In 2012, Mr. Cameron designed and piloted an experimental submersible into a region in the Pacific Ocean called the Challenger Deep. Mr. Cameron had not sought certification of the vessel’s safety by organizations in the maritime industry that provide such services to numerous companies.“We did that knowingly” because the craft was experimental and its mission scientific, Mr. Cameron said. “I would never design a vehicle to take passengers and not have it certified.”Mr. Cameron strongly criticized Stockton Rush, the OceanGate chief executive who piloted the submersible when it disappeared Sunday, for never getting his tourist submersible certified as safe. He noted that Mr. Rush called certification an impediment to innovation.“I agree in principle,” Mr. Cameron said. “But you can’t take that stance when you’re putting paying customers into your submersible — when you have innocent guests who trust you and your statements” about vehicle safety.As a design weakness in the Titan submersible and a possible cautionary sign to its passengers, Mr. Cameron cited its construction with carbon-fiber composites. The materials are used widely in the aerospace industry because they weigh much less than steel or aluminum, yet pound for pound are stronger and stiffer.The problem, Mr. Cameron said, is that a carbon-fiber composite has “no strength in compression”— which happens as an undersea vehicle plunges ever deeper into the abyss and faces soaring increases in water pressure. “It’s not what it’s designed for.”The company, he added, used sensors in the hull of the Titan to assess the status of the carbon-fiber composite hull. In its promotional material, OceanGate pointed to the sensors as an innovative feature for “hull health monitoring.” Early this year, an academic expert described the system as providing the pilot “with enough time to arrest the descent and safely return to surface.”In contrast to the company, Mr. Cameron called it “a warning system” to let the submersible’s pilot know if “the hull is getting ready to implode.”Mr. Cameron said the sensor network on the sub’s hull was an inadequate solution to a design he saw as intrinsically flawed.“It’s not like a light coming on when the oil in your car is low,” he said of the network of hull sensors. “This is different.” More

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      A ‘Titanic’ Parody Show That Draws Fans Near, Far, Wherever They Are

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      Some of the devotees of ‘Titanique,’ which recently moved to the larger Daryl Roth Theater after months of sold-out shows, have seen it more than a dozen times.On a recent Tuesday night at the Daryl Roth Theater in Union Square, temperatures outside hovered in the mid-30s, but inside, a few hundred 30-somethings in sailor hats were sipping “Iceberg” cocktails and grooving to Lizzo’s “Juice.” A gleaming silver and blue tinsel heart hung suspended above the stage like a disco ball.And then: The woman they were waiting for arrived.“It is me, Céline Dion,” said Marla Mindelle, one of the writers and stars of the “Titanic” musical parody show “Titanique,” casting aside a black garbage bag cloak to reveal a shimmering gold gown — a nod to the witch’s entrance from “Into the Woods” — and sashaying her way to the stage to a tidal wave of applause.The sold-out crowd of 270, who sported tight green sequin dresses, black leather jackets and hot pink glasses, had gathered for a special performance commemorating the 25th anniversary of the 1997 blockbuster film, set to hits from Dion’s catalog. Since opening at Asylum NYC’s 150-seat basement theater in Chelsea in June, thanks to strong word of mouth and a passionate social media following, the show has been consistently sold out.“The movie and Céline are still in the zeitgeist,” said Constantine Rousouli, who plays “Titanique”’s romantic male lead, Jack, and created the show with Mindelle and Tye Blue, who also directs.From left, Tye Blue, Constantine Rousouli, Nicholas Connell and Marla Mindelle, the creative team behind “Titanique.”Evelyn Freja for The New York TimesThe show has won praise for its campy tone, improvised moments and energetic cast, and has cultivated a fan army of “TiStaniques,” some of whom have seen the 100-minute show more than a dozen times.“It’s filled with so much joy and heart and just dumb fun,” said Ryan Bloomquist, 30, who works in Broadway marketing and has seen the show five times.The Unsinkable Celine DionThe Canadian superstar has won over fans with her octave-hopping renditions of songs like “Because You Loved Me” and “My Heart Will Go On.”Rare Disorder Diagnosis: Celine Dion announced that she had a neurological condition known as stiff person syndrome, which forced her to cancel and reschedule dates on her planned 2023 tour.Quebec’s Love Will Go On: The extraordinary outpouring in Quebec that greeted Dion’s announcement showed how her fandom, and ideas of national identity in her home province, have evolved.A Consummate Professional: At a concert in Brooklyn in 2020, the pop diva was fully in command of her glorious voice — and the crowd gathered to bask in it.Adored by Fans: Dion can count on some of the most loyal supporters in the industry. In return, she gives all of herself to them.Partially improvised and best enjoyed with a drink in hand, “Titanique,” which retells the story of “Titanic” from Dion’s perspective and through her music, began life as you might expect: during a drunken discussion between Mindelle, 38 (Broadway’s “Sister Act” and “Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Cinderella”), and Rousouli (“Wicked,” “Hairspray”), 34, at a bar in Los Angeles in 2016.Rousouli and Mindelle, a fellow “Titanic” fan, had become friends while doing dinner theater and pop parody musicals in Los Angeles. And now, Rousouli had an idea: What if they did a “Titanic” parody musical — using Dion’s songs — and made the Canadian singer herself a character in the show?He said he thought, “She’s just going to narrate the show like ‘Joseph,’” referring to the 1968 Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.” (It was during this same conversation, he said, that the trash bag entrance idea in the first scene came to life.)Convinced they were onto something, Mindelle and Rousouli worked with Blue, 42, an acquaintance from the Los Angeles dinner theater circuit, to write a script. (The music supervisor Nicholas Connell, 35, did the arrangements and orchestrations.)A giant tinsel version of the blue diamond featured in the 1997 film.Evelyn Freja for The New York Times“I never considered myself a writer,” Rousouli said in a lively conversation earlier this month with Mindelle, Blue and Connell in the theater’s basement bar space. “People ask me now, ‘What was the process like?’ And it was like I closed my eyes, and all of a sudden there was draft there and I’d written this whole musical.” They wrote the initial book in a month and a half, he said.They began doing pop-up concerts of the show-in-progress at small venues around Los Angeles in 2017 and then New York the next year. The first performances were bare-bones affairs, with no set or costumes and, according to Mindelle, a “really bad” Dion accent in the first readings. But audiences loved them — and many came back for a second or third time.After a pandemic delay, they opened the first fully staged production of “Titanique” at the Asylum in June. The first month was a little scary, Blue said, with entire rows sitting empty. But by July, thanks to social media buzz, they were selling out shows. It helped that Frankie Grande, who recently had his final performance in the dual role of Jack’s pal Luigi and the Canadian actor Victor Garber, has a famous half sister, Ariana, who gave the show a shout-out after attending.“Social media and word of mouth has just been wildfire for us,” Mindelle said.Soon, celebrities were coming to see it, among them Garber, who played the shipbuilder Thomas Andrews in the film, and Lloyd Webber.“He looked at us and he goes, ‘You’re all mad,’” Rousouli said, affecting a British accent in imitation of Lloyd Webber. “I said, ‘Cool, thanks, we are.’”The production’s scrappy spirit remained when it moved to the larger Daryl Roth Theater in November, where the show now features richer sound and around 100 more seats.“I was afraid we were going to lose that sense of intimacy and charm,” Mindelle said. “But we’re now running in the audience the entire time; I can still make eye contact with people, I can still touch every person.”Members of the cast rehearsing. Unlike a typical Broadway musical, the “Titanique” script is updated weekly, sometimes daily, to stay current with pop culture references and TikTok trends.Evelyn Freja for The New York TimesPart of the appeal, said Ty Hanes, 29, a musical theater actor who has gone 13 times, is that no two performances are the same. He looks forward to seeing what Mindelle will do in the five-minute scene between Rose and Jack that she improvises every night (some of his favorites: a bit about a toenail falling off and a riff on Spam, the tinned pork product).“You can tell they just have a blast changing stuff up a bit every night,” he said.“Sometimes it really works, and sometimes it doesn’t,” Mindelle said.“No, it does,” Rousouli said. “It always lands.”Unlike a Broadway musical like “Wicked,” in which the script does not change after the show opens, Rousouli said, they tweak the show weekly — sometimes daily — to stay current on pop culture moments and TikTok trends. On a recent night, a joke featuring a Patti LuPone cardboard cutout drew loud laughs (“You can’t even be here, this is a union gig!”), and a line originally uttered by Jennifer Coolidge’s character in the Season 2 finale of the HBO satire “The White Lotus” (“These gays, they’re trying to murder me.”), now spoken by Russell Daniels performing in drag as Rose’s mother, received a mid-show standing ovation.“People feel like they’re part of something special every night,” Rousouli said.One aspect of the show’s popularity that has been rewarding, if unintentional, Mindelle said, is how L.G.B.T.Q. audiences have embraced it. “I never thought that we were writing something inherently so queer,” said Mindelle, who like Rousouli, Blue and Connell identifies as queer. “It’s just intrinsic in our DNA and our sense of humor.”Bloomquist, who is gay, said the show resonated with his personal experience. “Everything that’s coming out of the show’s mouth, you’re like ‘Oh my God, this is just how I speak with my friends,’” he said.The musical, which announced its fourth extension last week and continues to sell out a majority of its performances, is set to close May 14, but Mindelle said an even longer run may be in the cards.“I think the show has the potential to be much like the song,” she said. “We hope it will go on and on and on.” More