Behind the Museum Walls: 10 Things You Probably Didn’t Know About the Carnegie Museum of Natural History

Made In PGH: Chances are that if you live in Pittsburgh, you’ve driven past the giant dinosaur statue in Oakland quite a few times, and you’ve at least heard of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History. For those of us who grew up here, field trips to the museum were a highlight of our youth (getting out of school to look at fossils and play inside an igloo replica all day…what could be better!?). This museum isn’t just for kids though—it’s one of the top natural history museums in the nation, so you’ll want to take some time to explore it as an adult too. Here are 10 things that you probably didn’t know about the Carnegie Museum of Natural History.

'Like dance, but with more pointy objects': Learning swordplay for the stage at SDSU

The San Diego Union-Tribune: A voice rings out across the Don Powell Theatre stage early one morning at San Diego State University, issuing a terse command: “Assume the position of attention.” But for an observer witnessing a dozen people suddenly brandish swords and daggers as they step into warrior stances, attention is not really an issue. The weapons, as it happens, are real (more or less). But the purpose is the pursuit of art rather than some poor foe’s arteries.

Ms. and They: Coming to Terms with Terms of Identity

www.clydefitchreport.com: As the only white dancer in the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater circa 1969, my moniker was “Miss Scarlett.” Fresh from high school, I remember thinking it hilarious at the time. While touring Africa, the company played 12 countries, including Kenya, where there was a press conference at the embassy before opening night (you may remember this tale from a story that I wrote for the CFR last April). A reporter asked Ailey, “Do you want to be known as ‘Negro’ or ‘Black’?” I saw him struggle with frustration as he searched for an honest answer. Finally, he said, “I want to be called Alvin Ailey, the choreographer.” This began my lifelong fascination with the profound impact of identity on our deeper selves, whether it is personal or within society.

How Seeing Shows Is Changing These Veterans

Theatre Development Fund – TDF: James Faulkner recalls his wife and daughter going to the theatre, but the Korean War veteran admits he didn't join in. "I never did go with them there, or to the Statue of Liberty or, you know, a lot of places," he says, explaining his experience as a prisoner of war left him a bit introverted. "My wife was a big talker, not me."

What Makes Site-Specific Revivals So Powerful?

Theatre Development Fund – TDF: This week, TDF Stages Editor Raven Snook geeks out (via Facebook Messenger) with Juan Michael Porter II, a dancer, teacher and playwright who's contributed articles to Time Out New York, Broadway World, HuffPost and TDF Stages. Today's topic: The coolest site-specific revivals we've seen, wish we'd seen or would like to see!

Top 5 Stories from IAAPA 2019

Theme Park University: One of the highlights of the year is visiting the International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions (IAAPA) in Orlando. A place where designers of theme parks, attractions, food… anything that relates to attractions is on display. There are literally hundreds of booths all vying for the attention of vendors and the press. They’ve all got their own stories to tell. Here are our top 5 favorites from IAAPA 2019.

'Hairspray' at Stage 62 is 'non-stop entertainment'

Pittsburgh Current: If heroin could assume artistic form, it would surely be the 2002 Broadway musical Hairspray, an adaptation of the 1998 John Waters movie. I swear composer Marc Shaiman and lyricists Shaiman and Scott Wittman have somehow managed to slip some form of aural crack into their songs; these aren’t the sort of tunes you leave the theater humming, they’re the kind of numbers pursuing you to your car, following you home and getting stuck in your brain for weeks. Maddening, yes, but a hell of a lot of fun.

The Global Narrative for Arts Education Is Changing

www.clydefitchreport.com: The ninth World Alliance for Arts Education International Conference, held in Frankfurt, Germany, from Oct. 25 through Nov. 1, gathered more than 200 people from 47 nations. Delegates debated big ideas, connected over pretzels and beer, and took in the sights of student artwork, politicians speaking in favor of the arts, and regular performances. The conference conveners notably shepherded a global dialogue around a call on UNESCO to host a third-world congress on arts education — how to support arts education in a changing globalized world.

Point Park cancels musical due to student concerns over racist content

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Student concerns over racist content in Point Park University’s fall show have led to the cancellation of “Adding Machine: A Musical.” On Thursday, Steven Breese, artistic director of the university’s Pittsburgh Playhouse and dean of the Conservatory of Performing Arts, convened a town hall in the Playhouse’s Highmark Theater, where “Adding Machine” was to have opened Dec. 5. More than 200 students, faculty and staff aired their concerns for nearly three hours.

House Committee Announces Investigation Into Live Event Ticketing

www.ticketnews.com: The House Energy and Commerce Committee announced Thursday it would be investigating the live event ticketing industry, looking for “potential unfair and deceptive practices” within, according to a press release. Letters were sent to Live Nation, Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG), Tickets.com, StubHub, Vivid Seats, and TicketNetwork requesting details on business practices from each and a briefing to take place by December 12th.

An American Revolution at Sing Sing

Reasons to be Cheerful: “This is a revolution, dammit!” shouts John Adams, his voice thundering against the fluorescent lights in the acoustic-tile ceiling. “We’re going to have to offend somebody!” The original congressman from Massachusetts is addressing his fellow founding fathers, twenty of whom are huddled on a 16×20 foot platform, arguing over word choices in the newly-written Declaration of Independence. Adams’ long dreadlocks are twisted into elegant coils as dignified as any powdered wig.

The Pop Musical: Go Big (and Loud) or Go Home

The New York Times: Sometimes, I crave a musical where grandiosity is unencumbered by logic and good taste. I don’t need a book that makes sense when I can feast on eye-popping visuals backed by an eardrum-busting sound system. It’s O.K. for the brain to take a rest while the senses work overtime. Broadway knew that once, or at least Florenz Ziegfeld did.

"A Bronx Tale"

Pittsburgh in the Round: The timeless compositions of Alan Menken have been the heartbeat of many memorable musical tales dealing with the themes of duty, love, and morality. Should Ariel abandon her family and kingdom for a pair of legs and a shot at love with a human prince? What lengths is Seymour willing to go to in order to impress his crush and bring business to the store he works at?

2019 KOI-USA Winners Revealed

LightSoundJournal.com: The winners have been announced at the second annual Knight of Illumination Awards USA (KOI-USA) ceremony, which took place at The Joint in The Hard Rock Hotel on Friday, November 22. This year, underlining the immediate popularity of the KOI-USA ceremony, attendance was up by a third over 2018’s inaugural event, with almost 400 industry professionals gathering to celebrate the creative talents of lighting and video designers’ work produced in the United States over the last year.

21 Satisfyingly Beautiful Pieces Of Welding Art

canyouactually.com: Welding art is truly an art, I mean seriously, scroll through these pictures below and you’ll instantly get want I’m talking about. Even if you don’t like welding or have absolutely no interest in it it’s hard not to be impressed by these incredible welds.

Bowie video inspires First Nations deep listening experience

www.limelightmagazine.com.au: The project, which is called Momentum, will be performed in Blak Box at Barangaroo, Sydney until November 17 and features leading First Nations arts practitioners including composer and violinist Eric Avery, musician-composer Troy Russell, vocalist/performer Ursula Yovich, visual artist Vernon Ah Kee, legal professor and radio broadcaster Larissa Behrendt, poet and literary editor Evelyn Araluen, spoken word artist and podcaster Lorna Munro, emerging writer Joel Davison, and Sydney Festival Artistic Director and theatre director Wesley Enoch. The artists don’t refer directly to Let’s Dance, instead they riff around ideas inspired by it.

Victoria's Secret Fashion Show canceled in end of bygone era

www.fastcompany.com: Congratulations, consumers of taste. You did it. You killed the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show. The onetime television staple, which debuted in 1995 and usually airs in November, will not take place this year, according to Stuart Burgdoerfer, CFO of the brand’s parent company, L Brands, who announced the news in an earnings call yesterday. The cancellation follows steadily declining ratings and attempts to “rethink” the show’s image for younger consumers who saw it as outdated.

An article of importance – a review of “Or,”

'Burgh Vivant: Poet, playwright and spy Aphra Behn (Georgia Mendes) welcomes King Charles II (Dylan T. Jackson) into her life and into her bed in “Or,” a play about England’s first female playwright by Liz Duffy Adams. Once the king resumes his throne, after the death of Cromwell, he frees Aphra from Debtor’s prison. She becomes the king’s paramour, but also earns the affection of the foul-mouthed sex symbol, actress Nell Gwynne (Katie Sacks).

LUMA Projection Mapping Festival 2019 Art and Technology

Live Design: For the fifth year, projection mapping festival, LUMA, transformed downtown Binghamton, NY, into an immersive storytelling experience. From September 6-7, approximately 55,000 attendees witnessed the colorful and, sometimes interactive, art installations created by artists and mixed media professionals.

2019 IAAPA Expo Recap: Sights And Sounds From The Show Floor

Coaster101: Last week, we were down in sunny central Florida to cover the 2019 IAAPA Expo, the global conference and trade show for the attractions industry, and our second time attending the event. We’ll have plenty of content coming up on Coaster101 that emerged from the conversations on the trade show floor (and beyond), but we wanted to give you a quick photo recap of some of everything we saw, just in case you weren’t following us on social media last week.

Podcast Episode 203: The Score Whisperer, Glen Kelly

The Producer's Perspective: Ever wondered how to arrange a big Broadway score like Spamalot?

This week’s guest has the ability to take a score and blow it up into a big Broadway musical that we all know and love. Maybe you’ve even heard of a few he’s done like, oh I don’t know, The Book of Mormon, The Producers, Beauty and the Beast?

He’s extremely well-known, yet a bit of a mystery . . . who I like to refer to as “The Score Whisperer” . . . Mr. Glen Kelly!

Interview: Behind the Costumes of 'Watchmen'

The Mary Sue: Watchmen, Damon Lindeloff’s massive and ambitious remix of the iconic comic book, is simply one of the best shows airing on television right now. Last night’s episode, “An Extraordinary Being,” was the high point of a season that’s reinvented itself with each episode.

Pittsburgh Center for Arts and Media staff out in mass firing and termination of film programs

News | Pittsburgh | Pittsburgh City Paper: Just two days after the end of the Three Rivers Film Festival, its host organization, the Pittsburgh Center for Arts and Media (PCAM), fired all film staff, including employees of the Harris and Regent Square theaters, and will end cinema arts programs, as well as any programming in its galleries.

The announcement and firings happened this morning during a mandatory meeting.

“Dance Nation” at barebones productions

The Pittsburgh Tatler: Barron’s play is, on the surface, about a bunch of girls navigating competition and friendship in the context of a dance studio – it’s about the delicate psychosocial choreography that ensues when girls compete and their hunger to excel rubs up against both the social pressure to be nice and the desperate fear of losing a friend.

Borland Shares Perspective on "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood"

www.cmu.edu: Kathy Borland took the scenic route to Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood on a career path that starts and stops at Carnegie Mellon University.

Born and raised 90 miles north of Pittsburgh, Borland believed life had more to offer than her tiny hometown of Oil City, Pennsylvania. A talented artist with an insider’s knowledge of carpentry — her grandfather and uncle built furniture for a living — she began venturing off to Ontario, Canada, each year hoping to catch a glimpse of the world-renowned Stratford Shakespeare Festival.

Keeping the Faith

HowlRound Theatre Commons: Playwright and theatremaker Will Arbery seemed to burst onto the theatre scene out of nowhere last year when his panic-laden, melancholy, and surprising dramedy about three sisters, Plano, was seen first in New York City as a ClubbedThumb production before transferring to the Connelly Theater. Garnering critical praise and audience and industry buzz, the play had a devoted following that whetted appetite for more of his work on stage. So, when Heroes of the Fourth Turning was announced as the opening slot of Playwrights Horizons’ season line-up, there was much anticipation in the industry about what Arbery had up his sleeve this time.

A Multicolored Library of the World’s Ochre Pigments Archived by Heidi Gustafson

Colossal: Washington-based artist and researcher Heidi Gustafson forages, processes, and catalogs natural mineral samples for the Early Futures Ocher Archive. Ranging in color based on its elemental structure, ochre is crushed into a powder and used in various applications from art to medicine. With over 550 samples, Gustafson’s ever-growing archive has become a collaborative project with contributions from archaeologists, scientists, and creatives from around the world.

Interview: Leslie Iwerks on Bringing 'The Imagineering Story' To Screen

The Mary Sue: The Imagineering Story, which track the building and development of the Disney parks by the Imagineers (a title thought up by Walt to encompass something more than an engineer or designer) through the years is one of my favorite originals on the new Disney+ service. I love it not just because I’m a sucker for the parks (though I am), but because of how director and producer Leslie Iwerks takes us to behind the magic to places the public rarely, if ever, see. Iwerks took some time to chat with the Mary Sue about making The Imagineering Story and bringing unknown corners of Disney history to light.

Inside ‘Sunday Night Football’: How TV’s Most Watched Show Gets Made

Variety: Post-rush hour, the drive from the Beverly Wilshire in Beverly Hills to the Los Angeles Rams’ practice facility in Thousand Oaks, Calif. is a manageable 50 minutes. On Friday, Nov. 15, most of the core broadcast team for NBC’s “Sunday Night Football” — analyst Cris Collinsworth, sideline reporter Michele Tafoya, executive producer Fred Gaudelli, director Drew Esocoff and researcher Andy Freeland — make that trip together in a luxury van, departing the hotel shortly after 11 a.m. Laptops open, Collinsworth and Tafoya are prepping for the interviews they will do with players and Rams head coach Sean McVay after they spend more than an hour observing the team’s practice.

Circus horror as female acrobat crashes 30ft to the floor in front of screaming families

Daily Mail Online: Families watched in horror as an acrobat plunged 12ft to the floor 'after slipping from her harness' at Winter Wonderland.

The accident happened at the Zippos Christmas Circus Show at 6pm, during a performance of Cirque Beserk at the popular event in London's Hyde Park.

Staff rushed to help the artist, mother-of-one Jackie Armstrong, 35, and the tent was quickly cleared of audience members.

NFTRW Top Five

Here are the top five comment generating posts of the past week:

How Much Rest You Need to Prevent Burnout

lifehacker.com: Most of us already know that if we don’t get enough time to rest and recuperate between stressful tasks, we risk burning ourselves out. But how much rest do we actually need?

According to Drs. Emily and Amelia Nagoski, we should try to spend roughly 42 percent of our time at rest. That’s eight hours of sleep and two hours of non-sleep relaxation per day.

Posted by David at 11/22/2019 11:00:00 AM

Coldplay to pause touring until concerts are 'environmentally beneficial'

BBC News: Coldplay have put plans to tour their new album on hold, due to concerns over the environmental impact of concerts.

"We're not touring this album," frontman Chris Martin told BBC News.

"We're taking time over the next year or two, to work out how our tour can not only be sustainable [but] how can it be actively beneficial."

Posted by David at 11/22/2019 10:54:00 AM

Cameraman, 54, who was killed while shooting a stunt could have been the victim of costcutting

Daily Mail Online: A cameraman who was killed when a stunt went wrong on a top BBC and Netflix drama could have been the victim of cost-cutting by the production company, an inquest heard.

Experienced cameraman Mark Milsome - who previously worked on Game of Thrones and Saving Private Ryan - died after being hit by a Land Rover Defender performing a stunt in Ghana for the series Black Earth Rising.

Posted by David at 11/19/2019 10:41:00 AM

The Hadestown trombone part is the best Broadway trombone part ever.

slate.com: Since the Broadway musical Hadestown opened on April 17, it has run for 237 shows, many of them selling out the 945-seat Walter Kerr Theatre. Thus, around 200,000 audience members have experienced Anaïs Mitchell’s lovely music, Rachel Chavkin’s inventive directing, and the award-winning cast. But if you’re a musician like me, you can’t help but notice that many of the responses on social media are making more or less the same joke

Posted by David at 11/20/2019 10:41:00 AM

Gender-Conscious Casting

At This Stage: When it comes to transgender rights, we live in a society on the cusp of a major epistemological shift. This leap moves away from binary gender norms, which position men as mutually exclusive to that of women. We are moving towards a culture that welcomes gender-nonconformity and fluidity, with more diverse ways of inhabiting the world. We just want people to be themselves. It is no surprise that break out stars, like Laverne Cox, have so quickly ascended to Hollywood royalty. But the entertainment industry has not always been forward-thinking when it comes to trans rights, visibility, or representation.

Posted by David at 11/20/2019 10:41:00 AM

Ragged Wing won't renew lease on Flight Deck, Oakland's black box theater

Datebook: Downtown Oakland could once again be without a small black box venue dedicated to small theater companies.

On Tuesday, Nov. 19, Ragged Wing Ensemble announced that it won’t renew its current lease on the Flight Deck, the company’s 99-seat venue on Broadway. The lease ends in March, and the nonprofit says it can’t renew because being in that location isn’t financially stable.

How Much Rest You Need to Prevent Burnout

lifehacker.com: Most of us already know that if we don’t get enough time to rest and recuperate between stressful tasks, we risk burning ourselves out. But how much rest do we actually need?

According to Drs. Emily and Amelia Nagoski, we should try to spend roughly 42 percent of our time at rest. That’s eight hours of sleep and two hours of non-sleep relaxation per day.

Cirque du Soleil NYSA – Berlin October 2020!

www.cirquefascination.com: Cirque du Soleil Entertainment Group is thrilled to announce Cirque du Soleil NYSA, its first permanent show in Europe, written and directed by renowned stage directors Lulu Helbæk and Simone Ferrari. Presented and co-produced by Live Nation, the show will premiere in Berlin, Germany, at Theater at Potsdamer Platz starting October 28, 2020.

Meanwhile: Becoming Porous

HowlRound Theatre Commons: Held in Mexico City this past June, this session was one of more than twenty working groups offered at the Hemispheric Institute for Performance and Politics’ 2019 encuentro. These efforts reflected a continuation of the nascent Climate Commons, begun in 2018 at the HowlRound “Theatre in the Age of Climate Change” convening in Boston. For our session in Mexico City, twenty-five performance scholars and practitioners gathered each morning to consider the ways that our work is evolving in response to, and within, the unexpected rhythms and dissonant scales of global climate crisis. Responding to the encuentro’s overall focus on humor, we thought together about how to move beyond the fear, shock, and grief that tend to monopolize climate conversations. We asked how to make room in our “serious” art and scholarship for the wild, the winking, and the naughty.

Fred Rogers' Neighbors: A Carnegie Mellon Story

www.cmu.edu/news: Rae Gold removed the sleeves of the green sweater and tried to hand-knit them back together in order to correct the length of the arms, but the stitches would not properly align. A professional weaver and machine knitter for decades, this particular job was making her nervous.

This was Fred Rogers' sweater.

Literary Classics, Cut Down to Size

The New York Times: “Loose, baggy monsters” is how Henry James famously described the long and unruly novels of the 19th century. In Berlin this season, several new productions take on sprawling literary works, trimming them to manageable lengths while still capturing the thrill of their vast, imaginary universes.

Coldplay to pause touring until concerts are 'environmentally beneficial'

BBC News: Coldplay have put plans to tour their new album on hold, due to concerns over the environmental impact of concerts.

"We're not touring this album," frontman Chris Martin told BBC News.

"We're taking time over the next year or two, to work out how our tour can not only be sustainable [but] how can it be actively beneficial."

Comparing economic impact of Chicago's Loop theaters to storefronts

Chicago Tribune: The economic impact of the entertainment industry on downtown Chicago is an easy case to make. And there have been plenty of people making it for years. As long ago as 2007, Broadway in Chicago was claiming that its shows resulted in a whopping $635 million in additional spending. In September, the Chicago Loop Alliance raised the ante even more, arguing that the arts in the Loop were responsible for $2.25 billion (yes, billion) in economic activity annually. The Loop Alliance also zeroed in on the theater (in honor of 2019 being the Year of Chicago Theatre), claiming that 11 performing arts centers downtown resulted in “$90 million spent by visitors on tickets and admissions ... and nearly 6,000 full-time-equivalent jobs supported by theatre in the Loop.”

‘The Sleepy Hollow Experience’ Welcomes Newcomers to the World of Immersive

noproscenium.com: Immersive friends, do you ever get tired of explaining what you do on your nights out to friends and relations? “No, no, it’s not that weird,” has become a bit of a refrain in my life, as I go to more and more immersive shows. Among my office-mates, I’ve begun attracting comparisons to Stefan, Bill Hader’s Saturday Night Live character, cheerleading New York’s hottest (and most surreal) attractions.

Projector throws stable 1000fps image on a rough or moving surface

Boing Boing: Dynaflash is a projector that maps a moving, deforming surface at 1000 frames per second, meaning that it can cast a stable image on it no matter how wild its gyrations. One caveat: it requires the target surface to have an invisible infrared grid on it.

Why Broadway's 'A Christmas Carol' Isn't What You'd Expect

Theatre Development Fund – TDF: When director Matthew Warchus approached his longtime collaborator, scenic and costume designer Rob Howell, about doing a theatrical adaptation of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, they only knew what they didn't want to see: a conventional Victorian set. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

A Bronx Tale isn't quite "one of the great ones," but the Pittsburgh leg of the tour is still worth your dough

Theater | Pittsburgh | Pittsburgh City Paper: This musical could have been “one of the great ones,” but a predictable plotline and a lackluster soundtrack hold A Bronx Tale back from being as good as one would expect a touring Broadway show of its caliber to be. There is, however, a silver lining: There are plenty of great moments, which are just good enough to make purchasing a ticket worthwhile.

Are we headed for a high-tech version of Hollywood's bad old days?

theweek.com: On Monday, the Department asked a court to jettison a series of decrees dating back nearly 70 years. These "Paramount decrees" arose from a Supreme Court case in 1948, in which Paramount Pictures was the main plaintiff. The decision forced the big Hollywood studios to give up anti-competitive practices that dictated terms to the theater chains, or owned them outright. A series of subsequent agreements with the Justice Department solidified the new rules for the film market.

Flight Deck, Oakland’s Only Black Box Theater, to Close in March

KQED Arts: Ragged Wing Ensemble announced Tuesday that Flight Deck, Oakland’s only shared black-box theater, will close early next year in a serious loss for the East Bay’s performing arts landscape.

Anna Shneiderman, co-founder and executive director of Ragged Wing Ensemble, stood in the 99-seat theater at 1540 Broadway in downtown Oakland, a venue used for performance, rehearsal and administration by 70 artists and organizations annually, and described the building seven years ago. “The roof was caving in,” she said. “You could see through this floor to the dirt underneath.”

Anita Hill’s Commission Launches Survey on Sexual Harassment

Variety: “Due to the heroic and brave work of many, we all now know there are serious problems of harassment, bias and mistreatment of others in Hollywood,” Hill said. “What we need to get our arms around, if we’re going to come up with effective solutions, is reliable data that reveals the specific nature and actual extent of those problems as well as the cultural environment that enables and hides them.”