Performing Arts

Yana Buhrer Tavanier speaks at TED Residency Salon, Session 2, December 6, 2018 at the TED World Theater, New York, NY. Photo: Ryan Lash / TED

Yana Buhrer Tavanier: Can social activism be playful?

11:29am February 11, 2022

We might think of activism as far from playful. That's not the case for "playtivist" Yana Buhrer Tavanier. Her incubator lab, Fine Acts, encourages whimsical solutions for social change.

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Method actor Robert De Niro won the Oscar in 1981 for his performance as a retired boxer in Raging Bull.

Books
Arts

How the Method transformed film — and made acting more human

12:15pm February 09, 2022

by Terry Gross

Method acting is more than mining personal experiences to play a character — or physically transforming for a role. Author Isaac Butler traces the history of the technique in The Method.

Kirsten Dunst (The Power of the Dog), Denzel Washington (The Tragedy of Macbeth), Flee and Drive My Car are among this year's Oscar nominations.

Arts

6 quick takeaways from this year's Oscar nominations

6:42pm February 08, 2022

by Glen Weldon

Fears of an #Oscarssowhite redux go largely unfounded in this year's acting nominations, and the actress categories provided some real surprises. The battle for best picture will be fascinating.

Books
Arts

How did the 20th century learn to act? 'The Method'

10:03am February 05, 2022

by Scott Simon

Scott Simon talks with author and critic Isaac Butler about his new book, "The Method: How the Twentieth Century Learned to Act."

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Illustrator Peter Emmerich says he drew on both research and his own personal memories to draw people like Stephen Sondheim. "I put him in the book wearing what he was wearing when I met him," says Emmerich. "Because, like, I will never forget him in that

Books
Arts

Theater stars spring to life on the pages of 'B is for Broadway'

5:20pm January 29, 2022

by Jeff Lunden

A few years ago, a children's book called A is for Audra celebrated musical theater divas. Its creators have written a new book, B is for Broadway, celebrating theater from auditions to Ziegfeld.

Mrs. Doubtfire is one of the Broadway shows that reopened but then had to shut down for a while after cases of COVID spread among cast and crew.

Arts

Omicron hampers Broadway. Fewer tourists are there for just a score of shows

7:59am January 23, 2022

by Jeff Lunden

Tickets may be easier and cheaper to get for the plays that are still open. Some producers reopened until the virus raced through the cast and crew. Future productions are hard to see on the horizon.

Arts

After almost 4 decades, the San Francisco Ballet has a new director

11:15am January 15, 2022

NPR's Scott Simon speaks to Tamara Rojo, the new artistic director of the San Francisco Ballet, about her vision for the role.

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Arts

Opinion: Remembering a friendship with Terry Teachout

11:14am January 15, 2022

by Scott Simon

NPR's Scott Simon remembers theater critic and playwright Terry Teachout, who died this week at the age of 65.

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Lynn Nottage photographed at A Broadway Celebration at the Times Square EDITION, in December 2021.

Two-time Pulitzer winner Lynn Nottage turns a triple play in New York City

2:37pm January 14, 2022

by Jeff Lunden

Nottage, the only woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Drama twice, has a new play on Broadway, an opera at Lincoln Center Theater and a Michael Jackson musical opening soon.

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Critic Terry Teachout in 2014 in New York.

Cultural critic Terry Teachout is remembered as 'unafraid of being human in public'

1:27pm January 14, 2022

by Neda Ulaby

Teachout has died at the age of 65. He wrote acclaimed biographies of such arts figures as Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington and George Balanchine.