In a deal two decades in the making, China is opening its doors to the Walt Disney Co., having finally given the quintessentially Western enterprise the go-ahead to bring Mickey Mouse and his fellow characters to Shanghai with a new Disney theme park tailored to the Chinese megalopolis.
French anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss, who wrote several seminal works during his six-decade career and is responsible for those seemingly inscrutable structuralist texts you may have grappled with in college, died last weekend at 100.
Google expanded its sprawling multimedia empire this week by adding a music feature to its array of search options, which means that the average, law-abiding music buff won’t have to shell out 99 cents or settle for a 30-second snippet of a new song on iTunes, nor hope that the song will eventually queue up on a Pandora playlist, to hear the whole thing online.
Despite Hollywood’s reputation for being a liberal hotbed, some stubborn forms of prejudice persist, such as the lingering notion that it’s a potential career-killer for certain high-profile types to come out of the closet. Luckily, those who are willing to try have at least one industry expert ready to give them a hand with the press, the public and their risk-averse bosses.
The Church of Scientology counts several high-profile figures from the world of entertainment among its members—Tom Cruise, John Travolta and Kirstie Alley, to name a few—and they sometimes act as public advocates for their religion. However, one of their own, screenwriter and director Paul Haggis, has very publicly left the fold after taking issue with the church’s stance on Proposition 8.
Somehow the Walt Disney Co. managed to convince the parents of one-third of America’s babies to spend $200 million a year on Baby Einstein videos. The tapes were supposed to smarten kids up, but watching TV from ages 1-3 could actually cause attention problems. Under pressure, Disney is now offering refunds. (continued)
The veteran alt-rockers of R.E.M. are joining forces with other musical acts such as Pearl Jam, Nine Inch Nails and Roseanne Cash in a bid to close Guantanamo Bay. Their group effort, the National Campaign to Close Guantanamo, sprung in part from their joint outrage about their music reportedly being blared at high volumes to upset prisoners held at the detention center in Cuba.
There was a time when Hollywood studios kept their stables of stars on a short leash, keeping close watch over their public personas and even arranging their marriages. Actors at least appear to have more leeway these days, but some studios are requiring that they refrain from broadcasting the minutiae of their daily lives via social media like Facebook and Twitter.
A Turkish television series, “Separation,” caused a diplomatic clash between Turkey and Israel after an episode this week portrayed an Israeli soldier shooting and killing a Palestinian baby. The fictional scene was shown on Israeli television Wednesday and drew criticism from Israel’s foreign minister Thursday.
PepsiCo Inc. ran into trouble trying to be all hip and stuff with an iPhone app aimed at young male consumers of Amp energy drink. It was bad enough that the app was built around the charming idea of bagging 24 different types of women—and then posting the conquests online. Almost worse was the company’s Twittered apology after reception of its “Amp Up Before You Score” app fell flat.
Donald Trump is plotting to plop down a deluxe golf resort in an “environmentally sensitive” part of Scotland—a plan that’s getting some of the locals good and riled up, including actor Tilda Swinton, according to the AP. Swinton has added her name to a petition signed by some 15,000 Scots to block Trump from breaking ground, which does not please The Donald.
Worried about catching the dreaded swine flu? Need to update your wardrobe with some stylish and tailored work solutions? You can do both with the Haruyama Trading Co.’s dapper new anti-flu business suit. That, or you could smear yourself in toothpaste, which isn’t exactly the best look for the workplace.
After his legal team came up short Tuesday with its request that Swiss officials reconsider his recent arrest and release him on bail, film director Roman Polanski remained behind bars, unable to spend his time awaiting his fate from his resort home in Gstaad.
The New York Philharmonic was all set to fly into Cuba and jam, until the Treasury Department decided the patrons footing the bill couldn’t go. That’s pretty insulting to Cuba, considering that the same posse of musicians and rich people was cleared for a trip to North Korea.
Here it is, people: further sobering evidence of The Decline of Print Media. The latest publications to give up their inky ghosts include a longtime fixture in the foodie world, Gourmet, as well as two bridal and one parenting magazine, all under the umbrella of publishing giant Conde Nast.
It’s official: Movie marketers can no longer afford to ignore social networking sites. This may strike some as a foregone conclusion (i.e., duh), but those in the industry who are still resisting the all-consuming pull of online vortexes like Facebook and Twitter are doing so at their own peril, according to the new “Moviegoers 2010” report.
Director Roman Polanski’s 1977 sex crime case has become an international and intergenerational saga, now that members of at least four governments have become involved, the former minor in question has grown up and requested that the issue be put to rest, and the original judge has been dead since 1993. However, after Polanski’s arrest last Saturday in Zurich, it’s clear this drama is far from over. Updated
Can you tell your metaphors from your synecdoches? These terms may trigger bad freshman English flashbacks, but at least when it comes to metaphors, they’re more important than you might think; in fact, they might just be intrinsic to how you think.
Leonard Cohen performed in a soccer stadium near Tel Aviv on Thursday over the objections of activists who want artists and entertainers to stay away from the Holy Land. Unlike Madonna, as The Washington Post points out, Cohen donated his earnings to Israeli-Palestinian reconciliation and managed to avoid wrapping himself in the Israeli flag.
It’s not the first time that objections have been raised over the kinds of values promoted, whether explicitly or implicitly, by media products hailing from the general vicinity of Hollywood, but this time the issue concerns a whole country taking on a major international commercial coalition: China and the World Trade Organization, respectively.
Bibliophiles who can’t warm up to the idea of curling up with an e-reader or a laptop instead of a bona fide book may be heartened to hear that Google just took a significant step in the direction of making more book titles available on short notice—in the offline world.
For the first time since its 1967 premiere, the “Newlywed Game” will feature a gay couple: George Takei of “Star Trek” and his husband of one year (and partner for 22) Brad Altman.
Although Kindle sales have seemed strong since its debut nearly two years ago, the future of Amazon’s e-reader may not be rosy, according to The Atlantic’s Kevin Maney, who sums up the “Kindle problem” thusly: “[I]n aiming to provide both a great experience and supreme convenience, it has achieved neither.”
Let’s get something straight, America. Charles Darwin was right. Only 39 percent of you believe that, but his theory of evolution is the basis of modern biological science. Deal with it. A new film about the man can’t get distribution in the U.S. because—this is embarrassing just to type—150 years after “On the Origin of Species,” he’s too controversial in these parts.
A series of silk-screen paintings, made by Andy Warhol and mainly depicting ’70s-era athletes such as Dorothy Hamill and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, has allegedly been stolen from collector Richard L. Weisman’s home on Los Angeles’ Westside.
America Performs Its Familiar Role of Propping Up a Dictator
