https://jacobin.com/2026/02/
~~ recommended by emil karpo ~~
Showing posts with label Art. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Art. Show all posts
Sunday, February 15, 2026
Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl Show Was Political Art at Its Best
Tuesday, July 22, 2025
I Went to See Superman As an Escape from Reality - Reality Was Still There
https://www.counterpunch.org/2025/07/18/i-went-to-see-superman-as-an-escape-from-reality-reality-was-still-there/
~~ recommended by collectivist action ~~
Tuesday, December 12, 2023
Friday, December 1, 2023
Thursday, March 16, 2023
Wednesday, January 18, 2023
Friday, January 13, 2023
“Thirst” Updates the Vampire Genre for Our Age of Rising Fascism
https://truthout.org/articles/thirst-updates-the-vampire-genre-for-our-age-of-rising-fascism/
The novel offers an alternate-reality allegory about the rise of Trump and the right-wing movement that supports him.
~~ Recommended by collectivist action ~~
Wednesday, November 3, 2021
Marx in Soho’: An Epilogue. ~~ Calvin Wu
https://mronline.org/2021/10/18/marx-in-soho-an-epilogue/
~~ posted for collectivist action ~~
Thursday, June 17, 2021
The WPA’s Federal Theatre: Creating Jobs and Creative Achievement ~~ TRUDY GOLDBERG and SHEILA COLLINS
~~ posted for collectivist ~~
Hallie Flanagan, Director of the FTP
Flanagan on CBS Radio for the Federal Theatre of the Air, 1936. Courtesy, Wikipedia Commons.
By TRUDY GOLDBERG and SHEILA COLLINS
A brief but spectacular achievement, the New Deal’s Federal Theatre Project (FTP) (1936-1939) provided jobs for some 13,000 destitute people at its height and created and produced 63,600 performances of 1,200 major theatrical works. It reached audiences of more than 30 million people in cities, towns, and rural areas nationwide, the vast majority of whom had never experienced live theater. With unemployment in the arts cutting deeper than in other hard-hit industries, the New Deal approach to unemployment among theatre people takes on new relevance.
The U.S. Congress funded the Federal Theatre Project primarily to provide jobs for unemployed theatre people during the Great Depression. But WPA administrator Harry Hopkins and the FTP’s dynamic director Hallie Flanagan had a much broader mission: to create a publicly funded national theater, accessible to all, that would both entertain and strengthen public dialogue and democracy.
Flanagan had achieved noteworthy results as director of Vassar College’s Experimental Theater, largely with amateurs and low cost. Along with her wide knowledge of the theatre, including European dramatic experiments, she was well prepared for the challenges of founding a national theater.
Harry Hopkins and Hallie Flanagan
In the lobby of the Experimental Theater, New York City, 1936. Courtesy, NARA.
But the task was daunting—meeting the primary goal of employing jobless theatre people and at the same time achieving quality productions, surmounting funding and bureaucratic hurdles, and responding to union demands while striving for her own broader artistic vision and social goals that evoked criticism and even charges of subversion.
Ninety percent of those employed by the FTP came from the relief rolls. Though several future stars got their start with the FTP, it was not easy to hire top talent. It could be more time-consuming to determine eligibility for an FT hire than a construction worker. Plus, there was the need to hold auditions.
The FTP still stands out for an enlightened racial policy that differed significantly from other New Deal programs. African Americans received equal pay for equal work in every aspect of theatrical production. Audiences were integrated. If a theatre refused to seat Blacks and whites together, the Federal Theatre canceled the performance. Moreover, some of the plays dramatized African Americans’ resistance to white oppression, previously unheard of in American theater.
Federal Theatre Circus
New York City, probably 1936. Courtesy, Coast to Coast: The Federal Theatre Project, 1935-1939, Library of Congress.
According to Rosetta LeNoire, who acted in one of the Negro Units, “It was the Federal Theatre that gave us so many of our great actors because they were permitted to play roles that they would never have been offered on Broadway.”
Witches’ scene from Voodoo Macbeth
Adapted by Orson Welles, New York City, 1936. Courtesy, Library of Congress.
The repertoire of the Federal Theatre and its national scope are astounding. Productions ranged from circuses, puppet shows, children’s plays and vaudeville to classic works—both traditional and reinterpreted, such as “Voodoo Macbeth,” set in Haiti with the witches invoking voodoo to conjure up their “toil and trouble,” and “Swing Mikado,” set on a Pacific South Sea island, instead of Japan.
There were also modern dramas unlikely to play commercially, such as T.S Eliot’s “Murder in the Cathedral” and the staging of Sinclair Lewis’s anti-fascist novel, “It Can’t Happen Here.”
It Can’t Happen Here.
By Sinclair Lewis, Jewish Theatre Unit production, 1935. Courtesy, Federal Theatre Project, FDR Library.
The Lewis play opened in 21 theatres in 17 states and was performed in English, Spanish and Yiddish—a significant step toward Flanagan’s goal of a national theatre reflecting the ethnic diversity of the country.
The FTP also found creative ways to take theatre to new audiences. New York City’s Caravan Theatre used tractors to tow collapsible trailers storing costumes, props, and stages for outdoor performances at parks, baseball fields, and blocked-off streets.
The FTP’s accomplishments extended to experimental theater. “The Living Newspaper” dramatized current events using newsreels, still photographs, live actors, music, and song. Playwright Arthur Miller, who joined the Federal Theatre as a jobless college graduate, considered “The Living Newspaper” “the one big invention of the theatre in our time.”
Living Newspaper, One-Third of a Nation
Depicting a tenement fire, New York City, 1938. Directed by Arthur Arent, setting by Howard Bay, costumes by Rhoda Rammelkamp. Courtesy, Coast to Coast: The Federal Theatre Project, 1935-1939, Library of Congress.
Despite scrupulous adherence to the facts and even canceling some of the more “hysterical” productions, the FTP came under investigation by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). HUAC charged that the plays were “propaganda for Communism.” Flanagan countered that they were “propaganda for Democracy.”
As HUAC’s attack on the FTP and the consequent defunding of the theater show, government support for a national theater likely would be as problematic today as it was then. Some large, public-spirited foundations would need to sponsor such a revival. Surely, factual and dramatic presentations of current events—like the Living Newspaper– could counter the ubiquitous sensational lies to which the American public is routinely subjected. As recent tragic events demonstrate, Americans are no less in need of “propaganda for Democracy” than during the Great Depression.
Swing Mikado
Directed by Harry Minturn. Courtesy, Coast to Coast: The Federal Theatre Project 1935-1939, Library of Congress.
Federal Theatre Director Flanagan stars–not only as a revolutionary force in the American theatre–but as one who recognized the role of art and culture in strengthening democracy and the national character. Under Flanagan’s leadership, the Federal Theatre was such a force—albeit for too short a time.
New Deal government job creation is the model for achieving a current federal Job Guarantee or useful, living-wage employment for all. It is a model for employing jobless people and at the same time building the nation’s physical, environmental, social, and cultural resources. The Federal Theatre is proof that both goals can be successfully achieved. How about a New Deal model to revive the post-pandemic American theatre.
This article is condensed from an essay by Collins and Goldberg to be published in an e-book series, E-Theatrum Mundi, ed. by Emeline Jouve and Géraldine Prévot, Sorbonne University Press, 2022. An earlier version of this article appeared as “The Federal Theatre: Where Art Went Live, in The Fireside, May 1, 2021, a monthly newsletter of the nonprofit Living New Deal, livingnewdeal.org.
A Bird Summit (Pt. 2) or One Walked INTO the Cuckoo's Nest ~~ Collectivist
A Bird Summit (Pt. 2)
or, One Walked INTO the Cuckoo's Nest
A Playlet
Written by Collectivist
(Author's note: Over a year ago, as the Covid pandemic was raging across the world, I wrote, and posted on Snowflakes' blog*, the first of what is intended to be a series of short plays entitled "A Bird Summit, or, It's After the End of the World!)" . . .Since then, our fine feathered friends met again, under extraordinarily new circumstances 
). .
*I was eventually banned.
(Two Lovebirds coo and kiss at midnight)
CROW
(Alighting beside them) What the hell is this? The avian Love Connection?
LOVEBIRD #1
(Laughs) What does it look like?
CROW
It looks you two have no idea what time it is.
LOVEBIRD #2
(Looking lovingly at mate) It's time. . . for love.
HEN
(Arriving) So, you guys don't know what happened earlier in the day on Turtle Island?
PIDGEON
(Appearing) Nothing happened that I'm aware of.
EAGLE
(Swooping down into their midst) It figures that you'd be clueless.You live in chronic denial.
PIDGEON
(Defensively) Yo mama lives in chronic denial!
CROW
Cut it out y'all. (To Hen:) Give us the 4 -1- 1.
HEN
Sure.
Those people are definitely on the verge of another civil war. The orange headed clown gave a highly provocative speech and the next thing you know, hundreds of them were storming their capitol building.
EAGLE
Yeah, me and my wife watched the whole thing from high on a mountain top. It was better than reality t.v.!
HEN
(Sighs heavily) Well, I was there.
LOVEBIRD #2
So, you escaped again from the chicken farm?
HEN
(Emphatically) You damn right I did. Free at last, free at last! -
EAGLE
Come on now. Stay focused.
HEN
Anyway, I happened to be walking in front of the capitol when I saw about a thousand people with MAGA signs shouting "STOP THE STEAL."
LOVEBIRD #1
And no one noticed you?
HEN
I know how to maintain a low profile. . . Once they got to the capitol, a bunch of 'em started scaling the walls, while others broke through a window!
PIDGEON
No armed guys in blue showed up?
HEN
Some made a feeble attempt to stop the madness. Others were taking selfies with the mob. It was wild!
(A loud "whooooo" is heard, as an Owl alights. The Crow squeals with trepidation)
OWL
Ah, relax. I just ate a big meal. I'm full.
HEN
The mob attacked some of the security guards, vandalized and stole property and threatened to kill the Speaker of the House and the Vice President. After it was all over several people had been killed and hundreds wounded.
EAGLE
(Bitterly) I wish all of them had died.
PIDGEON
All of who?
EAGLE
All the humans!
PIDGEON
That's a terrible thing to say. Some of my best friends are humans.
EAGLE
You only say that because you've been domesticated all your life. They use you like a tool, you house slave.
PIDGEON
And they use you as a mascot. What's the difference?
OWL
The difference is, he almost became extinct because of . . .humans.
HEN
THEY ARE NOT HUMANS. I know real humans when I see them.
PIDGEON
Is that before or while they eat you?
(The Lovebirds giggle)
EAGLE
No need to worry, guys. Their time is almost up.
LOVEBIRD #2
How so?
EAGLE
Think about the pandemic.
HEN
That's just about over, ain"t it?
OWL
Not really. . .And there are bigger, deadlier threats on the horizon.
You see, several major planetary boundaries have been crossed. Besides catastrophic climate changes, Earthbeings are now facing rapid declines in genetic diversity, ocean acidification, rifts in the nitrogen and phosphorus cycles, loss of freshwater resources, chemical pollution -
( A loud THUNDER CLASP is heard.
All the birds scatter)
Friday, June 11, 2021
MUSIC THREAD - Hallelujah I’m A Bum!
How about a music thread for a change?
Putting this up because a Counterpunch article mentioned "Hallelujah I'm a Bum" and it brought back memories of my dad crooning this to me as a youngster. (Got distracted from the actual article... lol)
According to Wiki,
The song's authorship is uncertain, but according to hobo poetry researcher Bud L. McKillips the words were written by an IWW member. Some verses, though, may have been written by a Kansas City hobo known only as "One-Finger Ellis," who scribbled it on the wall of his prison cell in 1897.[1] There is also a questionable theory that Harry McClintock could have written it in 1897 when he was only fifteen.
Sung to the tune of the Presbyterian hymn "Revive Us Again", the song was printed by the Industrial Workers of the World in 1908, and adopted by its Spokane, Washington branch as their anthem later that year. The success of their Free speech fights of 1909 led to its widespread popularity
The version published in 1908 goes:
- Why don't you work like other folks do?
- How the hell can I work when there's no work to do?
- Refrain
- Hallelujah, I'm a bum,
- Hallelujah, bum again,
- Hallelujah, give us a handout
- To revive us again.
- Oh, why don't you save all the money you earn?
- If I didn't eat, I'd have money to burn.
- Whenever I get all the money I earn,
- The boss will be broke, and to work he must turn.
- Oh, I like my boss, he's a good friend of mine,
- That's why I am starving out on the bread line.
- When springtime it comes, oh, won't we have fun;
- We'll throw off our jobs, and go on the bum.
- There are lots of versions of this, but here is a recording
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8uKbIkYGsIg
- and another version:
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5Ll51kcbjo
- Another song my father sang... -
- You Ain't Been Doing Nothing if You Ain't Been Called a Red
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5Ll51kcbjo
- And another version:
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lcewIwDlDPE
- This is by Robin Hood!!! LOL
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kltRoCPFPKM
Thursday, March 25, 2021
One Night in Miami (A Film Review by Collectivist)
One Night in Miami (A Film Review by Collectivist)
Other than "Judas and and the Black Messiah" and "The U.S. vs Billie Holiday", "One Night in Miami" is the best movie I've seen so far in 2021. Initially, I was somewhat reluctant to see it, presuming that it would be another Hollywoodish whitewash of African American history, shallow at best.
Actually director Regina King has put together a decent cinematic character study based on a play with the same title, by Kemp Powers, that seriously grapples with one of the most important social and political phenomena of the 20th century: social justice. That struggle, in one way or the other, still rages in the 21st century.
Instead of a standard plot, the film revolves around a situation. . . In a segregated motel, one night in Miami, Florida, four prominent and popular African Americans meet to celebrate after one of them - a 22 year-old Cassius Clay (Eli Goree), soon-to-be Muhammad Ali - has just won the heavy weight boxing title. Who knew, at the time, that singular event would not only shake up the entire sports world, but also the world of politics?
We see Jim Brown (Aldous Hodge) the punishing star running back for the Cleveland Browns, now, considering a movie career; there's Sam Cooke ( Leslie Odom, Jr.), perhaps the greatest 'soul' singer of all time, just months before he's killed in another motel. . .And then there's the indomitable Malcolm X (Kingsly Ben Adir). The latter is in political transition, still torn, however, between the religious nationalism of Elijah Muhammad's Nation of Islam and his own growing revolutionary, anti-imperialist nationalism. Although their subsequent irreconcilable rupture is often attributed to revelations of Muhammad's sexual indiscretions, anyone watching closely could discern the public political divergence coming faster than Clay's wicked left jab.
While Malcolm necessarily 'steals' the show, the film fails to show and place these unforgettable characters in the necessary global light, other than a few references to Ali's emerging opposition to the Vietnam War, which, when he refuses the draft a few years later, costs him the heavyweight crown.
The struggle for Civil/Human Rights was arguably at its apex in 1963. Major 'events' of that year include:
- the murder of NAACP leader Medgar Evers
- the assassination of President John F. Kennedy
- MLK's "I Have a Dream" speech at the March on Washington
The struggle against white nationalism had become so antagonistic that some militant black freedom fighters were beginning to take up arms in self defense. On the international scene, plots were hatching almost weekly - from the U.S. - to destroy, by any means necessary, socialist reconstruction in Cuba, only 90 miles away from Miami. Americans and other soldiers were dying by the hundreds, daily, in an imperialist war in war in Southeast Asia. Consequently, an anti-war movement gradually developed. It was also the year Mao Zedong predicted that the black liberation movement would merge with the class struggle in the US. By the end of the 60s and the creation of the Black Panther Party, it clearly had.
Finally, "One Night in Miami" reminds us that African Americans, not unlike other social groups are hardly monolithic; which, dialectically, is the source of both our political strengths and weaknesses.
As an extra added treat, the film closes with a stirring version of "A Change is Gonna Come", by Odom, that would certainly make the late, great Sam Cooke very proud.
Sam Cooke - A Change Is Gonna Come (Official Lyric Video)
One Night in Miami Official Trailer
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