Roundup: Pop Culture & the Arts ... Movies, Documentaries and Museum Exhibits

British schools to play off of Hollywood histories

CSEs in ancient history will be introduced for the first time to capitalise on the popularity of Hollywood blockbusters such as 300 and Troy, examiners have said. Teenagers will study key world events stretching back thousands of years following demand from pupils and teachers, it was disclosed. The courses will focus on the foundation of Rome, Greece and the Persian wars, as well as historical figures such as Alexander the Great, Hannibal, Cleopatra and Agrippina the Y

What's Inaccurate About the New HBO Series on John Adams

Mr. Stern is now completing his doctorate in the department of history, Princeton University; his dissertation is tentatively entitled,"The Overflowings of Liberty": Practical Politics, Political Ideas and the Townshend Crisis in Massachusetts, 1766-1770. He is also the author of"Jane Franklin Mecom: A Boston Woman in Revolutionary Times" (Early American Studies, Spring 2006). The opening installment of the new HBO miniseries on John Adams, first aired on March 16, skillfully depicts

The Red Baron: unease, but national hero at last as film hits theaters

A film about the heroic Prussian pilot who shot down a record 80 British, Canadian and Australian airmen during the First World War, will be shown at cinemas across the country next month. It will be the first time since the Nazi era that Germany will portray one of its own military figures in film as a national hero. In Germany, The Red Baron, which has cost a record €18m (£14m) to produce, is almost predestined to provoke a wave of anguished criticism, a batch of dreadful reviews

Donatello's David shines after laser clean-up

Laser technology has revealed that Donatello's David, one of the most important statues of the Italian Renaissance, was once decorated with gold leaf. The priceless piece, created by the artist in the 1440s, is being given its first facelift in more than 100 years at Florence's Bargello Museum. The work has been opened to the public, who can watch the restorers using a medical-grade laser to clean off the residue that has built up on the statue, which was the first free

Paris exhibition re-examines Marie-Antoinette

France has a chance to re-assess the life of its most notorious queen with the opening today of a major exhibition dedicated to Marie-Antoinette. Negatively portrayed by generations of republican historians, Marie-Antoinette has in the past received little sympathy from a nation that tended to see her either as a giddy symbol of ancien régime decadence or as a treacherous Austrian schemer. But in recent years there has been a rehabilitation, encouraged by new biographie

NYT says actor who plays John Adams in HBO series was miscast

When John Adams begins acting like a pompous windbag, his wife, Abigail, reproaches him with a single word. “Ambition,” Abigail warns, when Adams tells her that he will get a lot of attention if he defends British soldiers in the Boston Massacre trial. “Vanity” is what she says to steer her husband away from what she calls “ostentatious erudition.” “Casting,” she might have told the producers of this new seven-part HBO mini-series, which begins on Sunday ev

AHA monthly mag. focuses on film

Film is a main focus in the March 2008 issue of Perspectives on History. James Sheehan contributes the third installment of the “Film and History” series with his article on “Jean Renoir’s La Grande Illusion.” Then, read about Secrecy, “a new film by Harvard University professors Peter Galison and Robb Moss about government classification debates,” that was featured at the January 2008 Sundance Film Festival. Also, hear about the Historians Film Committee and their panel, “Wars of the Worlds: Fi

New Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart portrait found

A rare portrait of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart has been unearthed which gives a true picture of the famous composer's looks at the height of his fame. It shows him in 1783, aged 27, dressed in a red tunic and a white ruff, with a wig of grey hair and an elegant but slightly hooked nose. Until now the enduring image of Mozart has been largely based on the posthumous 1819 portrait by Barbara Kraft, painted 18 years after his death. But this discovery could help change that.

Poor John Adams gets no respect

Oh, sure, our second president was praised 175 years after his death by historian David McCullough in his adoring 2001 biography. And his reputation no doubt will rise again as the HBO miniseries "John Adams" unfolds, beginning Sunday (Reviewed on Page D7). However, when it comes to more lasting tributes, our second president has been sorely overlooked both inside the Beltway and beyond. Monuments on the Mall and Tidal Basin commemorate George Washington, Thomas Jefferson,

Not Tony Soprano but John Adams on HBO

Ms. Hamilton has a Ph.D. in English from Berkeley. Her website: http://www.carolvanderveerhamilton.com. Her screenplay about Alexander Hamilton is posted at inktip.com.John Adams lacks historical charisma. Portly, short,

Salon.com likes HBO's "John Adams"

... Remember when the epic television miniseries featured earth-shattering romances and big, shiny stallions and riotous town meetings with heroes and villains clearly delineated? The founders of our great nation would fight valiantly and give speeches that moved crowds of attractive blonds to tears, and then they'd get on their horses and ride off to fight the bloodthirsty redcoats. But these are the days of David Milch's "Deadwood" and Paul Thomas Anderson's "There

L.A. Theatre Works will stage a revised 1991 play on the Pentagon Papers case

War and secrecy are longtime companions, for reasons that can include protecting the lives of soldiers and protecting the reputation of a government that has lied about why and how a war is being conducted. When the news media chooses to break that secrecy in the public interest, a battle is often joined over the 1st Amendment, as was the case with the unauthorized release of the Pentagon Papers in 1971, a historic event that writers Geoffrey Cowan and the late Leroy Aarons turned into a radio p

Psst! Follow Me and I’ll Show You the Exhibition (Review/National Cryptologic Museum/US)

NOT far from I-95 in Maryland, halfway between Washington and Baltimore, lives an old, one-story motel that is home to the National Cryptologic Museum, an institution devoted to two contradictory human impulses: keeping secrets and telling stories. Most museums are built from the urge to broadcast the past loud and clear, but most museums do not receive money from the National Security Agency, the arm of the intelligence network devoted to codemaking and codebreaking. The employees

Documentary about World’s Oldest Animation (Involving Iranian Pottery) Stirs Controversy

The Cultural Heritage, Tourism and Handicrafts Organization (CHTHO) announced on Monday that it has recently completed the production of a documentary about the ancient Iranian earthenware bowl bearing the world’s oldest example of animation. Directed by Mohsen Ramezani, the 11-minute film gives viewers an introduction to the bowl, which was discovered in a grave at the 5200-year-old Burnt City by an Italian archaeological team in late 1970s. The artefact bears five ima

At Gettysburg, Farther From the Battle but Closer to History

THE old visitor center and museum at the Gettysburg National Military Park was cramped, obsolete and a little too close to history. The brick building, built in the 1920s as a private home, was part of a complex that sat where Union lines had stood for the last two days of the most famous battle in the Civil War. Nearly 1,000 Union soldiers were killed, wounded or captured on the hallowed ground beneath the complex. Wayne E. Motts, a local historian who has been a licensed battlefie

Austria opens "painful" exhibit on Nazi annexation

Austria opened an exhibition on Monday showing how Jewish employees of the State Opera were purged under Nazi rule as the nation began solemn commemorations of its annexation by Hitler's Germany 70 years ago. Vienna's opera house is one focus of post-World War Two Austria's feelings of guilt about the way it quickly accepted the Nazi takeover and, after the war ended, reinstated few of those persecuted during the Third Reich. The exhibition at the ornate State Opera Hou

New Adams documentary based on McCullough biography invents some scenes

ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT In the first episode of HBO's "epic seven-part miniseries event" "John Adams," one of the most riveting scenes occurs at Boston Harbor, when a customs inspector or informant challenges John Hancock (Justin Theroux) for evading the taxes imposed by the British. "Teach him a lesson, tar the bastard," Hancock commands a mob, which proceeds to do exactly that to the

J. Edgar Hoover’s Hollywood Obsessions Revealed

The Secret Files of “The FBI,” Part 1: J. Edgar Hoover in Hollywood is the dramatic story of how Hoover, already famously obsessive, was even more so in the control of the TV show “The FBI” and other aspects of Hollywood to fashion the FBI legend and his own legacy. These Hollywood Today Newsmagazine articles are set against one of the most turbulent eras in American history — Watergate, the civil rights movement, assassinations and the Vietnam War. They are the culmination o

National Geographic TV show on Kent State takes fresh look

On May 4, 1970, American soldiers shot down American students on American soil. Since then, people have argued over who was to blame; the protesting students at Kent State University or the National Guardsmen brought in to restore order on campus? And now, in a rare interview, one of the indicted National Guardsman speaks to his experience for the first time ever. How it Was: Death at Kent State takes a fresh look at a wealth of raw data from both sides.

Fury at BBC's English history of Scotland

IT WAS hailed by BBC Scotland as one of its most ambitious projects ever. But already the ten-part series A History of Scotland has run into controversy, with a second senior Scottish historian publicly attacking the programme. Professor Allan Macinnes told The Scotsman that he had resigned from the series' advisory board after its first meeting in November. "I thought the whole production was dreadful," he said. "The first provisional script I got