KPCC: Arts News

McCann, Stiles Win National Book Awards

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 03:00:00 -0800

The 60th annual National Book Awards were handed out Wednesday night in New York. Colum McCann's Let the Great World Spin, a novel about daring, luck and mortality in 1970s New York, won the fiction prize. T.J. Stiles' biography of Cornelius Vanderbilt, The First Tycoon, was the nonfiction winner and Keith Waldrop's Transcendental Studies: A Trilogy won for poetry.

100 years of Johnny Mercer, pop poet laureate

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 14:30:37 -0800

He wrote the words, and sometimes the music, for more than 1,500 songs, among them "Skylark," "Blues in the Night" and "Moon River." He had a few hits himself on Capitol Records — which he started. He was a great American lyricist, and today is marks the 100th anniversary of his birth.

Sexing up the PG-13 vampire ... but not too much

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 11:26:31 -0800

New Moon, the second movie installment in the hit Twilight saga, opens this Friday. With a target audience of teen and tween girls, the films straddle the line between sexy and chaste. Some fans say this can send mixed messages.

China's newest export: punk rock

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 15:37:46 -0800

America is used to exporting its culture. It's called soft power, this ability to dominate the tastes of people in other countries. So it's not such a big deal for an American band to tour in China. But a Chinese rock band taking the stage in New York? That's new.

Headless actors on a global playground

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 10:57:21 -0800

The mannequins in Yinka Shonibare's exhibition at the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art might be missing a crucial body part, but they more than make up for it in subtext. Shonibare's sculptures take on climate change, class, race and exploitation, all without losing their playful edge.

Maxxi: Italy's first contemporary arts museum

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 10:13:32 -0800

In a city famous for the ancient Romans and Michelangelo, architecture buffs got a preview in Rome over the weekend of something decidedly modern: Italy's first museum of contemporary arts. It was designed by Iraqi-born Zaha Hadid.

Doomsday saga brings life to the box office

Sun, 15 Nov 2009 12:17:12 -0800

Doomsday film 2012 is bringing life to the box office.

Fact Check: Palin's book goes rogue on some facts

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 15:35:41 -0800

Sarah Palin's new book reprises familiar claims from the 2008 presidential campaign that haven't become any truer over time. Ignoring substantial parts of her record if not the facts, she depicts herself as a frugal traveler on the taxpayer's dime, a reformer without ties to powerful interests and a politician roguishly indifferent to high ambition.

Wanted: Grateful Dead librarian

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 14:37:51 -0800

Nowadays jobs are tough to come by in California, but one choice spot is now open for someone with a master's degree in Library Sciences and a deep love of the Dead. The Grateful Dead that is.

Motion Picture Academy awards some notable Oscars early this year

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 12:10:11 -0800

It may not feel like Oscar season, but four honorees are scheduled to pick up gold trophies on Saturday.
This ceremony at Hollywood and Highland is a new event on Hollywood’s awards calendar.

Rockin' 'n' rollin' with the play 'Baby It's You'

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 09:24:34 -0800

After writing, directing, or producing a number of A-list movies, from “Freebie and the Bean” to “Dick Tracy,” Floyd Mutrux decided to step away from Hollywood. From the film industry, anyway.

He turned to his love of music and wrote six anthologies of American pops, including one based on rock 'n' roll’s first black all-girl group, The Shirelles. That play, “Baby It’s You,” opens tonight at the Pasadena Playhouse.

Getty Leadership Institute announces move to Claremont Graduate University

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 15:13:06 -0800

The Getty Leadership Institute announced Thursday that it’s changing locations, from the campus of the Getty Center in West Los Angeles to the campus of Claremont Graduate University.

Egberto Gismonti: guitars that dazzle

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 14:41:43 -0800

Few sounds get under the skin quite as readily as that of bare hands plucking nylon strings. Gismonti and his son make listeners feel the sensuousness of every note. Their palette of sounds and ideas is so varied that the music is impossible to classify. This session features some of the most exciting guitar playing you're likely to hear all year.

Unlikely word origins defined in 'Anonyponymous'

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 12:38:20 -0800

Did you know that the word "Frisbee" is derived from Mary Frisbie, a woman who made pies in Connecticut? Or that "silhouette" originated with Etienne de Silhouette, an 18th century French finance minister? John Marciano shines light on these and many other etymological mysteries in Anonyponymous: The Forgotten People Behind Everyday Words.

In essays, author Zadie Smith reveals her process

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:17:33 -0800

In the new collection Changing My Mind: Occasional Essays, author Zadie Smith explores her writing process and the people who have influenced her. Smith tells NPR she doesn't write every day, though she wishes she did — and that she used writing as a way to mourn her father.

'The Red Book': a window into Jung's dreams

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 15:42:48 -0800

The journal — 16 years in the making — in which psychoanalyst Carl Jung documented his inner life was long hidden. Now, after a painstaking process of translation and reproduction, Jung's journal is finally available to the public.

From the vaults, a look at early indie-movie history

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 15:28:42 -0800

Independent cinema is as old as movies themselves: For as long there have been major studios, there have been smaller rivals pushing back against the conventions of the system. Most of those little startup studios are all but forgotten — but one man has spent the past quarter-century trying to salvage that part of his family's history.

King of Pop Michael Jackson's burial cost $1 million

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 07:29:46 -0800

Court documents show the cost to bury pop star Michael Jackson in September approached $1 million. The funeral nearly didn’t happen as scheduled.

Twilight' among People's Choice Awards nominees

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 12:01:29 -0800

Nominees for the People's Choice Awards are out, and the people choose vampires

Michael Jackson's mother approves will executors

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 11:15:57 -0800

Michael Jackson's mother has withdrawn her objections to the appointment of two longtime Jackson associates as executors of the singer's will.