Boston Globe

Fears that ART's Diane Paulus would trash George Gershwin's folk-opera "Porgy and Bess" prove unfounded in vibrant production. Opera or musical theater? Who cares.

There is no question that the first season of artistic director Jenny Gersten has done well at the box office. In a release WTF announces that its sales for August are double what they were in August last year. Overall they are stating attendance at some 44,000. According to the wildly uneven reviews, however, Williamstown Theatre Company has slipped from its once dominant position among the four major Berkshire theatre companies.

The production of Ten Cents a Dance based on a reworking of Rodgers and Hart by John Doyle is provoking a firestorm of controversy. The musical in which five women sing and play instruments with a male piano player is inspiring praise and scorn from audiences and critics. Everyone emerges from Williamstown Theatre Festival with an opinion. Here are links to positive and negative reviews. Don't miss the chance to wade in on this. See it while you can.

The Museum of Fine Arts is known to have the finest collection of Old Kingdom Egyptian art outside of Cairo. Its greatest treasure, which it acquired through shrewd negotiation in 1927, is the limestone, polychromed portrait bust of Prince Ankhaf. Egypt wants it back. The MFA response is more or less, bloody hell.

The smaller Nikos Stage of the Williamstown Theatre Festival has long been known for presenting new plays many of which went on to runs Off Broadway. In her first season as artistic director, Jenny Gersten has added reworking classics to the Nikos program with mixed results. The season opener Streetcar Named Desire raised critical eyebrows. The second classic A Doll's House is a bomb that has arrived D.O.A. for a run that, ironically sold out on the lure of the potential of one of Ibsen's most enduring plays. Who knew?

When Rocco Landesman, the head of the NEA, suggested that there are too many arts organizations with supply outweighing demand there was a response of outrage in the arts community. Here in the Berkshires it begs the question of sufficient audience and patrons to support four major theatre companies. It also begs the question of the role of critics? Are we just providers of consumer information for ticket buyers?

Tommy sold out at the Colonial for the VIP opening on Saturday night. The reviews are staggering in, partly because some critics opted for an offer of better seats on Monday night. That doesn't give much time to promote an expensive show with a short run that ends on Saturday. We asked artistic director, Kate Maguire, about that during the opening night party.

Jazz on a Summer's Day. The German/ Romanian artist, Elisabeth Ochsenfeld, has curated an exhibition of vintage, black and white photographs of leading American musicians by Charles Giuliano. The portraits have been enlarged and laminated for outdoor display during the Festivalul International de Jazz Garana, Romania July 21-24. Following the event the images will be donated to a museum in Garana.

Forty years later to the day a group of Boston artists, organized by Boston Phoenix art critic, Greg Cook, recreated a preemptive strike on the uptight and stuffy MFA. In a roto rooter event artists hung their works in the male and female rest rooms of the venerable Fenway dowager. The exhibition and reception was busted, rather politely, after just twenty hilarious minutes. But 21 artists can now put the MFA on their resume. Three of the artists, Robert Guillemin (Sidewalk Sam), David Raymond, and Jo Sandman reprieved their original participation. The big question focused on whether or not the MFA has really changed over the past 40 years?

In 1971 six local artists hung their work in the MFA's men's room to bring attention to the museum's indifference to local living artists. Does a repeat performance have the same meaning today? The same night that the Bruins won their first Stanley Cup in 40 years a group of Boston artists and critics missed the game. They were reenacting the anniversary of another memorable event.

WGBH DJ, Ron DellaChiesa spun the platters for his show Music America by day and hung out with the jazz greats at Boston's jazz clubs. Recalling the great artists who performed at Lulu White's in the South End, The Merry Go Round room in the Copley Plaza Hotel, Lennie's on the Turnpike, Sandy's Jazz Revival in Beverly and Fenton Hollander's Jazz Cruises in Boston Harbor.

Jazz impresario George Wein, often referred to as the “father” of modern music festivals, will be honored by Saratoga Performing Arts Center on Saturday, June 25 for his role in founding SPAC’s Freihofer’s Saratoga Jazz Festival, one of the longest-running and most celebrated jazz events in the world.

Donizetti's rarely produced opera "Maria Padilla" serves as a showcase for local diva Barbara Quintiliani, who nails the role as if she learned it in the cradle, but its ridiculous plot and Opera Boston's cheesy production prevents it from being an emotionally satisfying evening.

The article reports about the last two days of an extensive and exhausting or exhilarating conference. Again, included are direct links to many organizations, universities and speakers from around the world.

The Mount, the historic estate of Edith Wharton, has announced its 2011 summer season. The official opening day is Saturday, May 7. The Mount will be open daily from 10 am to 5 pm through October 31, 2011.

"Madame White Snake’" by Zhou Long, premiered on Feb. 26, 2010, by the Boston Opera at the Cutler Majestic Theatre won for music. Sebastian Smee of the Boston Globe won for criticism.

Unquestionably Dale Chihuly has entirely revised and updated the ancient medium of blown glass. Literally, visitors to the Museum of Fine Arts will be blown away by gallery after gallery of spectacular sculptural installations. But all that glitters is not gold. Even ringmaster Malcolm Rogers of the MFA can't fool all of the people all of the time.

The New York Times today in an e mail blast is announcing that it will no longer put out for nothing. While it makes sense to charge for world class content there is a glut of free information on line. Why does this feel like a desperate last stand for the once mighty media giant. What is not evident in this move is the potential decline of readership and an erosion of authority and influence. While older Times readers may well pony up it is unlikely that anyone under 40 will bother and the Times, accordingly, has abandoned its next generation of potential readers.

Due to the overwhelming demand generated by their short January visit to Boston, ArtsEmerson: The World on Stage is pleased to announce the return of the French Canadian contemporary circus company Les 7 doigts de la main (The 7 Fingers) performing PSY (pronounced P.S.Y.) for a two week summer run.

The Williamstown Theatre Festival will open on June 22 on the Nikos Stage and close on August 28 on the Main Stage. For her first season as artistic director Jenny Gersten has programmed three Main Stage productions with five on the smaller Nikos Stage. In a new tactic the Nikos Stage will combine perennial favorites A Streetcar Named Desire and A Doll's House with three new plays.

In a series of interviews Berkshire Fine Arts is exploring the arts and cultural community in Boston from the 1960s through the present. Photographer and Boston University professor, Daniel Ranalli, has been working and exhibiting in Boston since the 1970s. Initially the only commited gallerist was the late Carl Siembab. It was also the era of Minor White and a legendary program at MIT and the collection of the Polaroid corporation in Cambridge.

In addition to writing about art for the Boston Phoenix and the new England Journal of Aesthetic Research Greg Cook is also a studio artist. In this final installment of a dialogue Cook describes how he attempts to avoid any perception of conflict of interest. As an artist, however, he feels solidarity with their struggles. In particular he resents the lack of national recognition for all but a few Boston artists.

Images Cinema in Williamstown will host the Secrecy and Scandal in New French Film series on Mondays, February 7 – March 7 at 7pm. Admission is free; all films will be in French with English subtitles.

An ambitious program has been scheduled for Suffolk University's inaugural season for The Modern Theatre. Focused upon a variety of film, literary, performance and conversation, this will include prominent filmmakers, writers and theatre people.

Larry Murray moved from promoting the Pocket Mime to the BSO and Boston Ballet. He also worked with the legendary opera promoter Sarah Caldwell. He was on duty and fielded the press calls when his friend Arthur Fiedler passed away. In this second installment Murray describes his early years in theatrical marketing and PR.