He is perhaps best known as the author of the stirring memoir "Heaven's Coast" (1996), which told of life lived in the grip of the AIDS epidemic and the eventual death of his partner, Wally, from the disease; and another memoir, "Firebird" (1999), about growing up gay and artistic in an itinerant, troubled Southern family.
Closed Curtain came between these two, only now getting a UK release, and it is a more minor work: studiedly oblique and opaque, a self-reflexive essay about movie-making and artistic expression in a repressive society.
Not only Melville turned to the past; the familiar American careers of Hemingway and Faulkner end with reminiscence — of the innocent Paris of Hemingway's young manhood and artistic apprenticeship in "A Moveable Feast," and of Yoknapatawpha County and Memphis as experienced by an eleven-year-old boy in Faulkner's "The Reivers: A Reminiscence".
9 32 p.m. | Updated We have concluded our live discussion of "Just Kids," the award-winning memoir of friendship and artistic aspiration in a vanished New York, by the rocker, poet and consummate romanticist Patti Smith.
"Today, 'The People's Opera' is coming to meet the people of New York in Brooklyn, in Harlem, in Central Park, on the West Side, the East Side – wherever New Yorkers live and love their favorite opera company," said George Steel, the company's general manager and artistic director, in a news release.
"We have reached a crossroads: simply put, we need capitalization, both for the rest of this season and for the company to continue forward on solid financial footing," said George Steel, general manager and artistic director, in a statement.
It's about family, regret, second chances, friendship, inspiration, perseverance, and artistic integrity in a film where all of the actors give some of their best performances I've seen in years.
"We're treading a fine line between appreciating the comical elements of pingpong but also appreciating the athletic and artistic elements in a very sincere way," Jonathan Bricklin, SPiN's New York-based co-founder, said at the July opening.
The talk should appeal to the large pool of music professionals in Austin and inspire a thoughtful dialogue on striking a balance between income and artistic freedom in an industry facing challenges brought on by rapidly changing technology and desperation.
Just par for the course for an artist who has consistently defied convention, building a career on positivity and artistic integrity in an industry that seldom rewards it.
