Arts & Entertainment News Briefs
Week Ended 17 October 1999
Collected by Kent Larsen

Stories:
BYU professor wins award for article on Willie and Martin Handcart Company
BYU student debuts in New York Broadway production of 'Les Miserables'
'Hot' artist uses Mormon images in lastest film
LDS Artist's current show called impressive
Terry Tempest Williams story excerpt used to promote Breast Cancer Awareness Month
Brooke Williams' autobiographical book looks at his Mormon background
BYU Studies changing format
Dinner Theater presents version of LDS novel

BYU professor wins award for article on Willie and Martin Handcart Company

Howard A. Christy, former director of BYU scholarly publications was awarded the Arrington-Prucha Prize for the best Article of the Year in Western American Religious History by the Western History Association. Christy was given the prize for his article, "Weather, Disaster, and Responsibility: An Essay on the Willie and Martin Handcart Story." The article, originally published in a 1997 issue of BYU Studies, examines the weather conditions that the handcart companies faced, among other things.

see: BYU professor wins award for article on Willie and Martin Handcart Company
(BYU) Daily Universe 13Oct99 A2
By Nelda Maschmeyer: NewsNet Staff Writer

BYU student debuts in New York Broadway production of 'Les Miserables'

BYU student Kevin Odekirk debuted on Broadway on Sunday, October 3rd in the long-running and popular show "Les Miserables." Odekirk, a 23-year-old Music, Dance &Theater major from Orange County, California, learned that he had been selected for the part on September 9th in a phone call from the show's general manager in New York.

see: BYU student debuts in New York Broadway production of 'Les Miserables'
(BYU) Daily Universe 7Oct99 A2
By Allison Pond: NewsNet Staff Writer

'Hot' artist uses Mormon images in lastest film

In the lastest installment in his 'Crewmaster' series of films, Matthew Barney, called "the most important American artist of his generation" by the New York Times, uses the story of Gary Gilmore as the basis for a 'bizare' avant-garde film. Crewmaster 2 (actually the fourth of five films in the series), is called 'visually striking but inscrutable and lethally slow-moving' by the significantly more low-brow New York Post.

The New York Times, in contrast, says that the film proves that Barney isn't just a 'cinematic dabbler.' It says that Crewmaster 2 is an "epic avant-garde western built around classic themes but laced with an intricate (and often whimsical) symbolic framework.

With the opening of Crewmaster 2, the New York Times Magazine also ran a lengthy article on Barney, who is undoubtedly familiar with Mormon themes and images after growing up in Boise, Idaho and attending football camp in Provo, calling him "he most crucial artist of his generation."

see: '2' SLOW A 'SONG'
New York NY Post 14Oct99 A2
By Lou Lumenick

'Cremaster 2': An Epic Avant-Garde Western
New York Times 13Oct99 A2
By Stephen Holden

The Importance of Matthew Barney
New York Times Magazine 10Oct99 A2
By Michael Kimmelman

LDS Artist's current show called impressive

Artist Lane Twitchell's recently completed show at Union'Deitch Projects on 76 Grand Street in New York City gained attention from Times' critic Holland Cotter. Cotter says Twitchell's work is outstanding for its Focus, its ability to concentrate a 'specific but many-layered narrative into tightly controlled physical forms. Twitchell's work looks at the history of Mormonism, "a saga packed with incident," says Cotter.

Most of Twitchell's work is cut paper -- like the fold-and-snip snowflakes children make. Sometimes these are used as frames for other images, and other times the 'snowflakes' are the work itself. While Cotter says that the subject may be esoteric to most viewers, he thinks that the the sense of conviction that went into the art will make them worth seeing.

see: Margaret Kilgallen -- 'To Friend and Foe'
New York Times p.36 1Oct99 A2
By Holland Cotter

Terry Tempest Williams story excerpt used to promote Breast Cancer Awareness Month

An excerpt from Mormon author Terry Tempest Williams' story "The Clan of One-Breasted Women" was sent out in a press release by publisher Penguin Putnam to promote Breast Cancer Awareness Month and its new book, "Eyewitness to the American West: 500 Years of Firsthand History" edited by renowned historian David Colbert. A complete version of Williams' story appears in the book. The excerpt talks about the possibility that the history of Breast Cancer in Williams' family may be related to fallout from atmospheric nuclear testing in the southwest.

see: Personal Story for Breast Cancer Awareness Month
PRNewswire 7Oct99 A2

Brooke Williams' autobiographical book looks at his Mormon background

Author Brooke Williams, husband of noted author Terry Tempest Williams, has his own book out, a look at his trials reconciling, "nature and culture, wildness and work." In the book Williams tells of his own experiences growing up Mormon and his rising doubts about Mormon doctrine. The doubts even led Williams to pass up missionary service, in spite of the protection it afforded from service in Vietnam.

see: Halflives: Reconciling Work and Wilderness
Publishers Weekly, p. 54 4Oct99 A2
By Jonathan Bing, Jeff Zaleski, Paul Gediman, Charlotte Abbott, Sarah Gold

HALFLIVES: Reconciling Work and Wilderness; Brooke Williams. Island,$22.95 (192p) ISBN 1-55963-577-0

BYU Studies changing format

The 40-year-old scholarly publication BYU Studies, which explores scholarly perspectives on LDS topics, has made several changes to its format, rates and policies. The journal has added an original documents section to publish previously unpublished LDS Church history manuscripts. It has also added a new student subscription rate and published a 'best of' pamphlet.

see: BYU Studies changing format
(BYU) Daily Universe 4Oct99 A3
By Nelda Maschmeyer: NewsNet Staff Writer

Dinner Theater presents version of LDS novel

The Little London Dinner Theatre recently presented a musical adaptation of Blaine Yorgason's novel, "Charlie's Monument." The two-person production tries to faithfully represent the message of the book.

see: Acting in 'Charlie's Monument' propels dinner production
(BYU) Daily Universe 11Oct99 A4