OPERA NEWS: The Metropolitan Opera, one of the world’s most renowned performing arts companies, is turning to Saudi Arabia to help it solve some of the most severe financial problems in its 142-year history.

This is a fun read

The Smithsonian put up new text on Friday that changed its description of President Trump’s impeachment following the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.

Exit, pursued by a raccoon

Hiroshima and the End We Refuse to Imagine

pure charm

Monticello is asking a question: Can leaning into the messy, complicated, nasty, origins of our partisan political system save us?

Argue amongst yourselves:

Makes me want to pack my bags

“Making his way in the world today, Wendt’s performance suggested, took everything Norm had got.” — @poniewozik.bsky.social

‘Sesame Street’ will be brought to you by the letter N

The bust was a bust

The new “Salome” at the Met has a fascinating new take on the scandalous Dance of the Seven Veils. Watch how it has evolved over the years…

“Broadway’s box office has finally surpassed its prepandemic peak, fueled by three starry dramas and one green witch.”

A House committee approved a budget proposal last week that called for allocating $257 million to the Kennedy Center for capital repairs and other expenses, roughly six times the amount it usually receives from the government.

For nearly four decades the prop house History for Hire has helped filmmakers recreate the past. But with fewer films shot in Los Angeles, they are not sure about their future.

New on NEA cuts:

President Trump proposed eliminating the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities in the budget he released Friday, taking aim once again at two agencies that he had tried and failed to get rid of during his first term.

Some amazing ballet cameos in this show...

Some said the overlap between mega-galleries and museums is to be expected, since both spotlight the field’s most influential figures. Others warn that it can raise questions of conflicts of interest, since museum shows typically lift the reputations of artists and the prices of their work.

Zoom in on the pope's favorite painting, by an artist you might not expect. This is well worth a moment of your time:

Scroll down for the full list of President Trump’s “American Heroes”

“This sucks for academy members. But the upside for moviegoers? Maybe award-bait movies will start clocking in at a more reasonable 88 minutes. If they implemented the rule this year, ‘The Brutalist’ would have won squat.”

If you've taken the train to the plane or the island, you've probably seen them....

The Times wrote about the accused art dealer in 1986, in a story headlined "Whiz-Kid Broker's Downfall." He did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the new charges, but said in an interview in August that “I don’t believe anything was a forgery — everything looked good to me.”

The National Endowment for the Humanities intends to redirect some of its funding to build President Trump’s proposed National Garden of American Heroes, according to three people who attended a meeting on Wednesday where the plans were discussed.

Take a moment to listen to the remarkable Patricia Kopatchinskaja:

A rare interview with Tracy Chapman:

The scope of N.E.H. cuts is becoming clearer: at a meeting Thursday staffers were told that upward of 85 percent of the agency’s hundreds of current grants were to be canceled. Cancelations letters said the money would be redirected to furthering “the president’s agenda.”

An anecdote in Lonnie Bunch’s book about a 2017 tour of the African American history museum he gave President Trump has drawn the ire of the White House

"One night, a friend of Argerich’s texted to say that I should meet Argerich in a hotel lobby at 3 a.m. When I showed up, Argerich, a night owl, had already changed her mind. 'Buenas noches,' she said plainly, before heading to her room."

“We’re ready for it to come home,” said Marsha Maquinna, who is eight generations removed from the Mowachaht chief who presided over the shrine in the early 1900s. A fascinating story:

He called his previous behavior, particularly toward subordinates, “bone-headed” and “narcissistic.” He acknowledged that he had long yelled at his assistants (“Yes, of course”) and that he had on occasion thrown things at people (“Very, very rarely”). “I was just too rough on people,” he said.

John Mulaney joked that the Kennedy Center would soon be renamed “The Roy Cohn Pavilion for Big Strong Men Who Love ‘Cats.’”

What's been going on with BAM? “I used to go to BAM in the ’80s and ’90s once every couple of weeks and I’ve only been a couple times a year in the last few years,” said the performance artist Laurie Anderson...

The Flannery O’Connor PAINTINGS that were found in an attic:

A sneak peak as one of New York's true gems prepares to reopen:

"To watch presidential fiction today is to feel how the polarity has suddenly flipped," @poniewozik.bsky.social writes. "The base line assumptions about how power works and presidents behave — about what America is in the world — have changed."

A fascinating look behind the curtain

"The small but growing cultural boycott is a jarring reversal. In the past, it was American performers who often canceled engagements overseas to protest war, autocracy and injustice."

The new chairman of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts had a question for the board. Which musical is best, “The Phantom of the Opera” or “Les Misérables”? (Several trustees seemed to agree it was “Phantom.”)

President Trump, who recently had himself installed as the Kennedy Center’s chairman, has called a meeting of its board to approve changes that would give him more input in the selection of who receives the Kennedy Center Honors.

put money in thy purse

new Ravel drop

The vice president and his wife were booed as they took their seats for a National Symphony Orchestra concert at the Kennedy Center, which President Trump recently took over.

The mayor of Miami Beach wants to end the lease of a group renting a city-owned property because it is screening the Academy Award-winning “No Other Land” there.

A new Ravel?!?!

Five years ago I remember spending the day reporting all the cultural closings as they were announced one by one. Today we took stock of where things stand:

Fascinating look at the makings of a mass tort

‘Hamilton,’ which had been slated to be part of the Kennedy Center’s celebration next year of the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, cancels its run, citing President Trump’s takeover.