NFTRW Weekly Top Five

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

These People Stuck Their Arm In A Hole To Get A Surprise Tattoo

fashionablygeek.com: Scott Campbell is a famous tattoo artist, and his work adorns celebrities ranging from Penélope Cruz to Marc Jacobs. Recently he embarked upon a tattooing project called Whole Glory that’s not for the faint of heart. He offered his tattooing services free of charge to absolute strangers. The catch? Participants would stick their arm into a hole and Campbell would tattoo whatever he wanted—and they wouldn’t be able to view the tattoo until it was done.

Posted by David at 18 Comments Here

Music Lessons Were the Best Thing Your Parents Ever Did for You

www.childrensmusicworkshop.com: If your parents ever submitted you to regular music lessons as a kid, you probably got in a fight with them once or twice about it. Maybe you didn’t want to go; maybe you didn’t like practicing. But we have some bad news: They were right. It turns out that all those endless major scale exercises and repetitions of “Chopsticks” had some incredible effects on our minds.Psychological studies continue to uncover more and more benefits that music lessons provide to developing minds.

Posted by David at 16 Comments Here

Why do people in old movies talk weird?

Boing Boing: How Stuff Works explains the "Transatlantic Accent," a cultivated accent that people in the United States affected in an attempt to trick others that they were in some way affiliated with the British upper crust.

Posted by David at 14 Comments Here

The Real Moms of Cirque Du Soleil

Broadly: For over a decade, Canadian clown Shannan Calcutt has performed topless in Cirque Du Soleil's Zumanity. The sex-themed circus (tag line: "18 +: Rated Cirque") plays nearly every night at the New York, New York hotel in Las Vegas. Calcutt regularly rehearses to remember cues and freshen up her scenes, but after she gave birth to one of her children, her body interrupted her performance. One night, Calcutt remembers, another performer chased her down the hall: "Shannan, you forgot your milk!" she screamed.

Posted by David at 13 Comments Here

The most stunning theaters in the world

Business Insider: For some, a night at the theater sounds about as fun as sticking your hand in a ceiling fan. But even Andrew Lloyd Webber haters would willingly spend a few hours in these beautiful venues. Whether it's the neobaroque state theater in Wiesbaden or the ultra-modern Guangzhou Opera House, these theaters are incredible examples of both art and architecture.

Posted by David at 12 Comments Here

Goodspeed Musicals Announces Writers for 2016 Johnny Mercer Foundation Writers Colony

Stage Directions: A total of 36 writers, representing 19 new musicals, will head to the 2016 Johnny Mercer Foundation Writers Colony at Goodspeed Musicals in January. The Colony is a four-week sanctuary for composers, lyricists, and librettists to embark on new musical theatre work or to devote a substantial amount of time to a work-in-progress in an environment rich with creative energy.

Abby Binder on Attracting More Women to Remodeling

Remodeling: In this edition of Big50 Bites—our weekly series on the biggest issues facing remodelers today—we talk to Abby Binder of Abby Windows, a 100% women-owned company based in Milwaukee. She shares what it was like when she first began working in the industry, the importance of having woman-owned companies, encouraging more women to enter the field, and what can be done to do so.

Gender Swapping Shakespeare Is Far More than a Reaction

Flavorwire: A lot of the discussion surrounding gender-swapped Shakespeare productions hinges on an idea of theatrical reparation. The idea isn’t just that these casting decisions make up for the Elizabethan refusal to let women play any part, but also that they address the dearth of substantial female roles in Shakespeare’s works (at least outside the comedies). People talk about revival/reboot culture in TV and film — but theater has functioned as a revival culture for centuries, and has proven both the innovations and the potential paralyses therein. In an art form predicated primarily on endless reconstitutions of the past, that not only cherishes its classics, but necessitates their constant rebirth, such changes have to be made if the theater wishes to explore and critique male-dominated pasts without perpetuating a male-dominated present.

The Practical Effects of James Bond Films

Tested: The James Bond movies comprise the longest continually-running film series ever, beginning with the release of Dr. No in 1962 and continuing all the way up to the present day… and beyond. While the Bond films aren't exactly effects-driven, they still require the services of a crack team of illusion-wielding agents both on-set and in post. The output of these SFX and VFX mission specialists typically includes spectacular chase sequences, a big reveal of the evil mastermind's hidden lair and, almost certainly, lots of inordinately large explosions.

'City Center Encores! Unscripted': A Talk Show About Musical Theater

The New York Times: City Center Encores!, the program that stages revivals of rarely seen but beloved Broadway shows, is partnering with the Jerome L. Greene Space at WNYC to create a new talk show about musical theater.

Here Are Some Stupendous Hats

pictorial.jezebel.com: In July 1961, an Associated Press photographer stopped by a showcase of autumn and winter fashions in Florence, Italy. Hats were apparently of particular interest. It is not an exaggeration to describe the results as magical.

Seven Standards in Public Review

Stage Directions: PLASA North America isn’t letting the split from PLASA EU get in the way of their standards process. They’ve just posted seven standards for public review on their website. ​

Founding Visions: Art for the Sake of Living

The Clyde Fitch Report: Each day, everywhere we go, there are expectations we impose on others concerning their behavior, and privately, in our minds, we enforce those laws with an iron fist. When someone breaks our rules, we proceed with a imaginary slaughter in which we rob them of breath and permit them an examination of their own intestines (maybe not that extreme, but you see my point).

Kent State Coda: No Black MLK Ever Reached Their “Mountaintop”

Howard Sherman: Even if one gives credence to Oatman’s intellectual basis for attempting to split the role, it evaporated along with the unnamed black actor, regardless of Branch’s talent. At that point, the already unjustifiable production should have been irrevocably abandoned, since the entire conceptual underpinning had come undone. What Oatman did was not a half-measure, as Hall was apparently led to believe, as we were all led to believe, but indeed the complete erasure of a black body as she had feared.

Apple Has Acquired Faceshift, Maker Of Motion Capture Tech Used In Star Wars

TechCrunch: As the market for virtual reality technology continues to grow, Apple has made an interesting acquisition that could further its role in the space. TechCrunch has confirmed that Apple has snapped up Faceshift, a startup based in Zurich that has developed technology to create animated avatars and other figures that capture a person’s facial expressions in real time.

Music Lessons Were the Best Thing Your Parents Ever Did for You

www.childrensmusicworkshop.com: If your parents ever submitted you to regular music lessons as a kid, you probably got in a fight with them once or twice about it. Maybe you didn’t want to go; maybe you didn’t like practicing. But we have some bad news: They were right. It turns out that all those endless major scale exercises and repetitions of “Chopsticks” had some incredible effects on our minds.Psychological studies continue to uncover more and more benefits that music lessons provide to developing minds.

The most stunning theaters in the world

Business Insider: For some, a night at the theater sounds about as fun as sticking your hand in a ceiling fan. But even Andrew Lloyd Webber haters would willingly spend a few hours in these beautiful venues. Whether it's the neobaroque state theater in Wiesbaden or the ultra-modern Guangzhou Opera House, these theaters are incredible examples of both art and architecture.

The Real Moms of Cirque Du Soleil

Broadly: For over a decade, Canadian clown Shannan Calcutt has performed topless in Cirque Du Soleil's Zumanity. The sex-themed circus (tag line: "18 +: Rated Cirque") plays nearly every night at the New York, New York hotel in Las Vegas. Calcutt regularly rehearses to remember cues and freshen up her scenes, but after she gave birth to one of her children, her body interrupted her performance. One night, Calcutt remembers, another performer chased her down the hall: "Shannan, you forgot your milk!" she screamed.

Too Old For Hollywood

Hollywood Therapy: George R. R, Martin is 67 years old. He’s the originator of the Emmy winning Best Drama, Game of Thrones. He seems to be doing quite well in television at his advanced age. It does happen. Of course he was a successful novelist first. However, that is most certainly not the case with most writers over 67, or 57.

Contender - Costume Designer Jenny Eagan, Beasts of No Nation

Below the Line: Director Cary Joji Fukunaga‘s Beasts of No Nation takes a look at Agu’s life as a child solider fighting in a civil war of an African country that is never named. The film, which was shot in Africa, tells a powerful visual story and costume designer Jenny Eagan‘s work contributes no small part. Eagan was really excited to join the project when she received the invitation from the director to be a part of the team. She was deeply drawn to the script, which dealt with a subject matter that she had never worked with in any way, and she saw it as a chance of a lifetime. “It is always interesting to me when it is something that challenges you in a way you’ve never been challenged before, looking at something a little bit different,” Eagan said.

US concert promoters implement new security measures in wake of Paris terror attacks

Consequence of Sound: In the wake of this weekend’s terror attacks in Paris, music industry promoters are beginning to implement new security measures outside of concert venues, according to the New York Times.

Colleges Take On The 'Vagina Monologues' Of Abortion

Out of Silence: Abortion Stories from the 1 in 3 Campaign from Advocates for Youth on Vimeo.

ThinkProgress: A play based off of people’s real experiences with abortion has hit the road, heading to college campuses across the country — many of them in states where abortion isn’t exactly applauded. Last week, students at the University of Montana at Missoula performed the play, called Out of Silence, in an area where one of the few abortion clinics in the state is located. And on Wednesday, a school in the far southern Texas town of Brownsville, the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV), will host the first of the three performances at different colleges across Texas, the state with the most extreme restrictions on women’s access to abortion in the country.

Broadway Lacks Diversity, Parity Behind the Curtain

Variety: Just last week, “Allegiance,” a musical set during the Japanese-American internments of WWII, and starring a mostly Asian-American cast (including George Takei), opened hot on the heels of “On Your Feet!,” the biomusical of Gloria and Emilio Estefan, with a predominant-ly Latino cast. Already open is a production of chestnut “The Gin Game” starring Cicely Tyson and James Earl Jones; and a new staging of “Spring Awakening” featuring deaf actors and, for the first time in Broadway history, an actor who uses a wheelchair.

The All-White THR Actress Roundtable Is a Perfect Example

Women and Hollywood: The Hollywood Reporter posted its annual actress roundtable, and not surprisingly -- but certainly disappointingly -- all of the eight performers on the cover were white. Steven Galloway, the article's writer and editor of the magazine, wrote a side note explaining why there's zero diversity onscreen this awards season, at least in the best actress category. To put it bluntly, if we thought that last year was #OscarsSoWhite, this year will be even worse.