Lifeline - Qatar Tribune

POPEYE
US KIDS
BUSY TO
A FAULT?
FILMFEST DC,
25 YEARS
OUTSIDE
HOLLYWOOD’S
ORBIT
INDIAN
ANIMATION
NEEDS TO MOVE
BEYOND
MYTHOLOGY:
RANVIR SHOREY
PAGE 34 | PLAYHOUSE
PAGE 35 | PARENTING
PAGE 39 | HOLLYWOOD
PAGE 40 | BOLLYWOOD
Now showing
Rio
Source Code
Red Riding Hood
Tomorrow When the War Began
City Island
Rango
Thank You
Christian Brothers
Did you know?
Detailed movie timing on
Page 40
Justin Bieber taught himself four
instruments including the piano,
guitar, drums. He hopes to learn
the violin.
English (Animation)
English (Action)
English (Thriller)
English (Action)
English (Drama)
English (Animation)
Hindi (Comedy)
Monday, April 11, 2011
Malayalam (Action)
Hollywood’s tryst
with Nepal
Glamgallery
A model
displays a creation
by Indian designer
Alpana and Neeraj at
Wills Lifestyle India
Fashion Week, in
New Delhi. (AP)
Maiti Nepal NGO Anuradha
US and chairperson of the
the
of
e)
ntr
(ce
ore
Mo
mi
De
.
with children at Maiti Nepal
Koirala (centre left) stand
SUDESHNA SARKAR
IANS
A model
displays designer
Manish Malhotra's
creation at Wills
Lifestyle India Fashion
Week, in New
Delhi. (AP)
L
ESS than a year after Titanic star Leonardo DiCaprio made
an incognito visit to Nepal, guess who is here to continue
Hollywood’s tryst with the land of the Himalayas? It’s actress
Demi Moore. The 48-year-old star of movies like Ghost,
Indecent Proposal and Disclosure, was in Nepal to visit the
birthplace of the Buddha as
well as familiarise herself with
Maiti Nepal, the country’s
biggest anti-trafficking NGO
that became known worldwide
last year after its founder
Anuradha Koirala won an
online poll to become CNN’s
hero of the year.
Moore, who is hitting the
headlines more for her
romance and marriage with
Ashton Kucher, an actor 15
years younger, than her career,
came to Nepal on the invitation of Koirala.
During the visit, kept a tightly guarded secret, Moore, the
highest paid actress in the
1990s, went to southern Nepal
and was introduced to some
local celebrities like Nepali
singer Rajesh Payal Rai.
Dressed in simple outfits like
tight fawn slacks topped with a light blouse and a figure-hugging black
dress, Moore blended easily with the other Western tourists, hardly
creating a ripple till Thursday, the day of her departure.
Known for her adventurous ways, especially appearing nude on Vanity
Fair when she was seven months pregnant, Moore’s assistance is being
sought to promote the work of Maiti Nepal, which besides rescuing trafficked victims, runs rehabilitation homes, schools for victims’ children as
well as a hospice.
The star visit also comes as a shot in the arm for the government of Nepal,
which is seeking to draw 1 million airborne tourists this year to kickstart the
flagging economy.
Last year, DiCaprio came to Nepal courtesy World Wildlife Fund to promote
its campaign to double the number of surviving tigers in the world, including
over 120 in Nepal.
Other celebs to have casually dropped in are Hollywood icon and the Dalai
Lama’s friend Richard Gere, Cameron Diaz, Eva Mendes, Cher and Sting.
Moore’s assistance
is being sought to
promote the work of
Maiti Nepal, which,
besides rescuing
trafficked victims, runs
rehabilitation homes,
schools for victims’
children as well as a
hospice
Startalk
Lifeline
Demi Moore
Rihanna forgives abusive father
Renee Zellweger creates bags for charity
SINGER Rihanna has forgiven her abusive father because she understands
he himself came from a violent background. "I actually feel really bad for
my father. He was abused too - he got beaten up by his step-dad when he
was young," she told Rolling Stone magazine. "He has resentment toward
women, because he felt like his mum never protected him, and unfortunately, my mother was the victim of that. I'm not giving him excuses.
Right is right and wrong is wrong. I still blame him. But I understand the
source," she added.
ACTRESS Renee Zellweger has teamed up with Tommy Hilfiger
to create bags for charity. The Oscar-winning actress has
created a range of light-brown suede bag which will sell for
$299, with $100 from each going to the Fund For Living
campaign to support women battling breast cancer, reports
contactmusic.com. "This is one of the best things about this
initiative, and I love that Tommy Hilfiger has supported it for
five years." said Zellweger.
34
Monday, April 11, 2011
PLAYHOUSE
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Beetle Bailey
Blondie
YESTERDAY’S ANSWER
Popeye
Spiderman
LEARN ARABIC
Maqlat
Fry pan
Ka’s
Glass
Ghallayah
Kettle
Zits
Sekkeen
Knife
Matbakh
Kitchen
Forn
Oven
Dennis the Menace
The Lockhorns
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S TA R TA L K
ARIES
[mar 21 – apr 19]
Power struggles
with people in
authority are highly
likely today. You can
make your life easier
if you don't even go
there. Just sit this
one out. Take things slow!
TAURUS
[apr 20 – may 20]
Secret, behindthe-scenes activity
might pit you against
your adversary. Be
careful what you do.
If you try to do
something underhanded,
it probably won't work.
GEMINI
[may 21 – jun 20]
Clashes with others
in group situations are
likely today. Each
party thinks he or
she knows what is
needed to get the job
done. Agreement is
difficult to reach.
CANCER
[jun21 - jul 22]
Your ambition could
get you in trouble today.
Be careful that you
don't reach too far for
what you want. Others
definitely will oppose
you. "Easy does it" might
be a better approach.
LEO
[jul 23 – aug 22]
Avoid heated
discussions about politics,
religion and racial issues.
You will not arrive at an
agreement or solve
problems today, because
people are just at odds
with each other. (Oh dear.)
By King Features Syndicate, Inc.
VIRGO
[aug 23 – sept 22]
Disputes about
shared property,
inheritances and
insurance matters might
take place today. Try to
postpone these if you can,
because this is a poor day
for these discussions.
LIBRA
[sept 23 – oct 22]
Disputes and
power struggles
with partners and
close friends are
likely today. However,
if you don't get
involved, they don't
have to happen.
SCORPIO
[oct 23 – nov 21]
Disputes about
how to introduce
improvements or
do things at work
are likely today. Try
to sidestep these if
you can. Nothing will be
accomplished anyhow.
SAGITTARIUS
[nov 22 – dec 21]
Avoid power
struggles with
children today.
Similarly, avoid power
struggles in romantic
relationships. Relax!
Take things one at a time.
Don’t rush into anything.
CAPRICORN
[dec 22 – jan 19]
Don't be pushy
with family members
today. It's easy to
want to get your
own way at all costs.
The irony is that
nobody wins anyhow.
Just let it go.
AQUARIUS
[jan 20 – feb 18]
Power struggles
with others,
especially siblings and
neighbours, are likely to
take place today. If
you refuse to participate,
then the struggles will
just fizzle out into nothing.
PISCES
[feb 19 – mar 20]
Conflict about
finances, money, cash
flow and possessions
might take place today.
People will be easily upset
about these issues. It's far
better to postpone these
talks for another day.
PARENTING
Monday, April 11, 2011
www.qatar-tribune.com
Happy moms make kids happy
Parenting
guide
KIDS these days are happier when Mom’s content in her relationship with her partner, but their bliss is less dependent on Dad’s
relationship satisfaction, a new study based in the United Kingdom suggests. The findings, announced on Saturday (April 2), are
based on a sample of 6,441 women, 5,384 men and 1,268 children ages 10 to 15. Overall, 60 percent of young people reported being “completely satisfied” with their family situation, while that number dropped to 55 percent in families with a mother who
was unhappy in her relationship. And for kids of moms who were happy in their relationships, the “completely satisfied” group rose
to 73 percent. The ingredients for the most chipper children included: living with two parents (either biological or step parents);
having no younger siblings; not quarrelling with their parents regularly; eating at least three evening meals per week with their family; and having a mother who is happy in her relationship with her husband or cohabiting partner. As for Mom and Dad, their overall happiness seemed to decline with the duration of their relationship, with that downward slope being steeper for women than
men. In fact, overall women were less happy in their relationships than men. In addition, other factors being equal, couples without children reported the greatest satisfaction with their relationships, while those with a preschool child were least happy.
US kids busy
to a fault?
From
sports practices to
music lessons to community
service, American kids always seem
to have plenty to keep them busy. But
whether they’re actually too busy —
reaching a tipping point detrimental
to their mental and physical
health — remains a topic
of debate
NYT SYNDICATE
T
HE subject of overscheduled children
has been on scientists’ radar for at
least a decade, said Andrea Mata, a
doctoral student at Kent State
University whose recent study on
highly involved children was scheduled for presentation at a symposium in Montreal run by the
Society for Research in Child Development.
“I think it’s a hot topic right now,” Mata said.
“There’s definitely a mix of viewpoints. So I
think a lot more research is needed to find out
what’s going on.”
The SRCD symposium will examine which
children and adolescents become overscheduled, what happens at high levels of extracurricular involvement, and how factors such as
school grades and aggression levels are affected.
Between 70 percent and 83 percent of
American children and teens claim to take part
in at least one extracurricular pursuit, spending
an average of five to nine hours per week in
structured activities, according to the SRCD.
Only 5 percent to 7 percent, however, devote
more than 20 hours per week to these activities.
Jean Twenge, author of the book Generation
Me and a professor of psychology at San Diego
State University, said data gathered between the
1950s and the 1990s indicated overscheduling
rose during that period and then levelled off.
“Are kids really overscheduled? It’s not the
average experience, but that doesn’t mean it’s
not a problem,” Twenge said. “Parents worry
about keeping up, but it’s certain types of parents who worry about it.”
Twenge said the ever-mounting competition
for admission to the nation’s top colleges compels some parents and kids to fill every spare
hour with impressive-looking endeavours.
Mata’s study followed 1,354 children from
birth through age 15, dividing them into
groups based on how involved they were outside of school and home. The 43 children in
the highest activity level averaged 129 minutes
per week of structured activities at kindergarten, which increased to 254 minutes weekly
by fifth grade.
Highly involved children were more likely to
be girls from more affluent families, Mata said,
and their mothers had attained higher education levels. This group had higher grades and
lower levels of delinquency, among other
behavioural and academic measurements,
compared to less-involved children, she said.
“We’re looking at it in a much more positive
way,” Mata said. “These highly involved kids are
highly adaptive and high-functioning.”
Linda Balog, former executive director of the
Child and Adolescent Stress Management
Institute at State University of New York at
Brockport, said parents should ask their children how they feel about their extracurricular
pursuits and whether they feel overwhelmed
and stressed.
“We see some kids forced into organised
sports at early ages and then get so burned out
that they opt not to play in high school,” said
Balog, an associate professor of health sciences
who’s teaching a course on child and adolescent stress.
“Sometimes parents live through their children
— a sort of surrogate self,”
she added. “I think we
have to err on the side
of backing off a bit...
as opposed to everything being organised
and structured.”
Experts note that
research presented at
meetings is considered
preliminary until it is
published in a peerreviewed journal.
35
36
Monday, April 11, 2011
BOOKWORM
www.qatar-tribune.com
Richard Feynman, the thinker
Books
guide
IN the heyday of the physicist Richard P Feynman, which ensued after his death in 1988, a publishing entrepreneur might have been tempted to start
a book club of works by and about him. For those who would rather listen, there are recordings of the lectures and of Feynman playing his bongos. He
was an irresistible subject for biographers and, as he called himself in two of his subtitles, a curious character indeed. In Quantum Man: Richard
Feynman’s Life in Science, Lawrence M Krauss, director of the Origins Project at Arizona State University, makes his own way through the subject and
emerges with an enlightening addition to the field. Krauss — like Feynman a physicist as well as an author — has written seven books, including The
Physics of Star Trek. Though he couldn’t resist recycling some well-worn Feynman anecdotes, he concentrates on Feynman the thinker, and on the
contributions that merited his fame. In popular lore, Feynman often comes off as the wild man of physics, throwing out one crazy idea after another in
a frenzied search for truth. In Quantum Man — we see more of his other side: a master mathematician who could concentrate on a problem for hours
and then recast it in a surprising new manner. In following the chain of ideas that led to Feynman’s Nobel, Krauss begins with a familiar phenomenon
— the way a light ray takes a sudden bend when it enters a pool of water. Science usually proceeds by building on what came before. The maverick in
Feynman kept him from accepting even the most established ideas until he had torn them apart and reassembled the pieces. Like those quantum particles, he seemed eager to try every path — even the crazy ones. That was true in his life as well as in his physics.
A new phenomenon
reshaping the way we live
ROWAN MOORE
Aerotropolis: The
Way We’ll Live Next,
by Greg Lindsay and
John Kasarda say the
urban centres of
tomorrow will be built
around large, busy
airports. Rowan
Moore does
not agree
GUARDIAN NEWS SERVICE
T
HE old city is no more. The
future belongs to places such
as New Songdo in South
Korea, a wholly new city being
built on an artificial island
and linked by road bridge to Incheon
international airport. And to 500 cities of
the same size, as yet unborn, that China
needs. And to Memphis, Tennessee,
home of Fedex, and the UPS city of
Louisville, Kentucky.
These, says Greg Lindsay, showing a
suitably 21st-century indifference to the
ancient Greek plural of “polis”, are
“aerotropoli”. An aerotropolis is a city
with an airport at its centre, rather than
its periphery, “a new kind of city, one
native to our era of instant gratification call it the instant age”. It is “a new phenomenon... reshaping the way we live
and transforming the way we do business”. Cities such as London, forever
dithering over a third runway at
Heathrow, and Los Angeles, where nimbies keep blocking the expansion of LAX,
and New York, with sclerotic links from
the city to its airports, are in trouble.
Lindsay is a journalist fascinated by air
travel. His co-author is John Kasarda, a
business school professor with presumably lucrative consultancies telling countries, cities and businesses how to prepare for this new age. Lindsay wrote
and did much of the exploration
for
Aerotropolis;
Kasarda sup-
John
Kasarda
Cover of
Aerotropolis:
The Way
We’ll Live
Next, by
Greg Lindsay
and John
Kasarda.
plied much of the wisdom.
The book tells how the world is
rearranged by the logic of time, distance
and cost. In 1974, for example, the
Japanese Airlines executive Akira
Okazaki used the spare capacity on cargo
flights to fly whole chilled tuna around,
leading to the world-wide consumption
of sushi, with the result that bluefin tuna
is now endangered in the Gulf of Mexico
and the Mediterranean. When political
protests closed Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi
airport, hotels ran out of imported milk
and fish, but filled with orchids that could
no longer be flown out.
The authors address obvious counterarguments. They do not accept that electronic communication will reduce
demand for flying, instead pointing out
that increased communication and
increased travel have always gone together. If people make friends through
Facebook, they may want to fly to meet
up. Amazon stirs up a whirl of airborne
goods, and business deals arranged by
email need eye-contact and handshakes to be consummated. As
for ecological objections, they
argue that air transport causes
a relatively small proportion
of emissions. Roses imported to Britain from Holland,
for example, are far more
carbon-hungry
than
those from Kenya,
because the hothouses
and fertiliser needed to
grow them outweigh
the savings on fuel
costs.
Aerotropolis
also
describes the kinds of
space formed by flight,
the concourses and
hubs that Douglas
Coupland called “an inbetween
place,
a
‘nowhere’, a technicality... an anti-experience... like what happens to you just after
you die and before you
get shipped off to wherever you’re going... pure
neutrality made concrete”. The patron saint
of such places is George
Clooney, as the flying, heartless, corporate assassin in Up in the Air. Walter
Kim, author of the book on which the film
was based, has contributed a plug for the
front cover of Aerotropolis. “Throw out
your old atlas,” it says. “The new one is
here.”
I have to say, I have heard much of this
before: in Martin Pawley’s Terminal
Architecture of 1998, in Rem Koolhaas’s
S,M,L,XL(1995), in Deyan Sudjic’s The
100 Mile City (1993), in Marc Auge’s
Non-Places (1992), in the writings of JG
Ballard, even in Alexander Korda’s 1936
film of HG Wells’s Things to Come.
Despite all this historic futurology, there
seem to be quite a lot of boring old cities
around still doing reasonably well. The
really interesting question is why the true
aerotropolis, despite compelling reasons
for its existence, is taking so long to get
off the ground.
The examples cited in the book are not
completely convincing, and form an
unintentional anti-prospectus for
Kasarda’s consultancy business. There is
the city that was to be built next to
Bangkok’s airport, with advice from
Kasarda, but didn’t happen. Reunion, a
development close to Denver international airport, “a community specifically
created for the pursuit of happiness”,
ended up with one of the highest foreclosure rates in the region. Wilmington,
Ohio, lavishly wooed DHL with public
money, only to be dumped when the
company’s profits went the wrong way.
Memphis, despite the blessing of Fedex,
“still has a long way to go”. There is the
growth around Washington’s Dulles airport, which owes as much to vast contracts from the Pentagon as to the airport.
There is Dubai.
It is hard, yet, to find a true aerotropolis, a thriving, rich city formed around an
airport, outside the promotional spiels
that promise New Songdo will be “A cool
city! A smart city!”. Human factors, such
as the fear of planes falling on your head,
or attachment to a place, or political
manoeuvring, or the persistence of nonaeronautic networks, counteract that
other human factor, the desire for eyecontact, which seems to drive the
immense machinery of air travel.
The less spectacular truth is that cities
have always relied on transport, but not
on transport alone. Airports are a powerful force among others, and it is the interaction of these forces that makes cities
interesting. Aerotropolis is straining too
hard to be a smartypants bestseller of the
the type produced by Malcolm Gladwell
to explore this complexity. It is hectoring,
breathless, over-persuading, a boring
book with an interesting one struggling to
get out. And it undermines itself in the
authors’ biographical note: Lindsay lives
not in Memphis or any other aerotropolis, but in Brooklyn, in the dinosaur city of
New York - not, presumably, because of
its airports.
Greg Lindsay
Aerotropolis schematic view shown in Aerotropolis: The Way We’ll Live Next.
Monday, April 11, 2011
TRAVEL
www.qatar-tribune.com
37
Tips to help you pack for a trip
Travel
guide
SECURITY AND KEEPING DETAILS SAFE- Scan your passport, passport photos and paper tickets (if not the e type) in. Store this (in an
email for e.g.) in your web based email account.
SPLIT UP YOUR VALUABLES- Split up your bank cards, cash, travellers' cheques and credit cards as much as possible in different pockets,
your bags and wallet when packing. In case you do get robbed, at least you won't be strapped for cash.
BACKPACK TIPS- When you are packing things into a backpack, place the lighter items at the bottom and the heavier ones on top. Your bag
will feel lighter this way as the pack rests on your lower back. It is also smart to place the things you use the most on top.
PACK IN PLASTIC- Pack everything in clear plastic bags (preferably zip lock), divided into items before packing in your suitcase or backpack.
One plastic bag for each type of clothing. This is extremely useful in various ways. When you unpack your bag you just take out a series of
bags and you can see immediately what you want.
TAKE SOLID SHAMPOO BARS AND TOOTH POWDER- Places like Beijing now bar all liquids in carry-on bags, and you'll still be able to
breeze through without checking.
Could Benidorm become
COSTA DEL COOL?
JASON WEBSTER
GUARDIAN NEWS SERVICE
F
IRST of all, I have to admit to
a guilty secret: I quite like
Benidorm. This is not something one tends to shout
from the rooftops, especially
polite, chattering-class rooftops, but
there you have it.
The experiences you have in a place
shape your opinions to such an extent
that it’s impossible to be objective. For
me, Benidorm was the town where, as a
young man, I started working in journalism, for an expat newspaper. I
would busily scribble down stories by
day while exploring the world of flamenco.
So the 1960s tower blocks with their
rusting balcony rails, chip shops and
dance halls are all lodged in a colourful,
thrilling part of my memory next to
images of stomping feet and breathless
midnight trysts.
Which was where I had left them.
Despite now living a couple of hours’
drive north of Benidorm, in Valencia, I
hadn’t been back in over 15 years.
And times have changed. Spain’s
Costas have been going through a hard
time lately. Changing attitudes and
continuing recession mean that the
once-packed resorts like Torremolinos,
Tossa de Mar and Marbella are struggling as tourist numbers dwindle.
Is this a mere dip in fortunes or a
sign of more terminal decline? Can the
Spanish Mediterranean ever return to
the late-20th-century boom years?
It was in the early 1950s that Mayor
Pedro Zaragoza revolutionised this former fishing village by famously hopping on his Vespa and riding 300 miles
to Madrid to get Generalissimo
Franco’s permission for female tourists
to wear their revealing bathing costumes on his beaches. A legend was
born as Benidorm became the first seaside town in Spain to allow bikinis.
That aside, Benidorm’s success was
built largely on two main attractions long stretches of near-white sand and a
microclimate that guarantees almost
3,000 hours of sunshine a year. These
things were pretty much the same as
the last time I was here. It was as sunny
as ever when I arrived, and crystalclear waters lapped the beaches as sunbathers - mostly elderly Spaniards - lay
on loungers beneath the palm trees.
And the tower blocks are still there.
Some taller ones have been added somewhat sturdier and cleaner-looking
than their older siblings. Nothing, it
appeared, was very different. The
recession was no doubt taking its toll,
as a handful of boarded up shops confirmed.
But then ... what’s this? A new hotel,
the Villa Venecia, with five stars above
its door. It is a boutique spa hotel, to
boot, with spectacular views out to sea
and to the wedge-shaped island that
punctuates the Benidorm horizon - La
the town attempting to clamber
upmarket is the assertion that it could
become a model for sustainable, massmarket tourism.
“Ah, yes, the Benidorm model everyone’s talking about it,” Jorge said.
“By building vertically rather than horizontally you get more people in, but
you cause less damage to the landscape. Imagine if you had to fit all the
millions who come here into low-rise
accommodation. It would be a disaster.”
I had my doubts. Many would say
that Benidorm is already a disaster.
But a number of respected architects,
including Luis Fernandez-Galiano of
Madrid’s Universidad Politecnica, are
claiming that the resort is an example
of sustainable urban development.
Alfonso Vegara, the former president
of the International Society of City and
Regional Planners, says Benidorm and
Manhattan are both sustainable “intelligent terrains”.
Perceptions of Benidorm are
changing, and much of the
impulse behind this appears to
be coming from the town
authorities themselves. While
the resort still caters principally for families and the
elderly, the new administration is keen to attract
sophisticated and independent travellers. To this
end they’re targeting students, as well as people
interested in adventure and
sport (the scuba diving is
among the best along the coastline).
As part of this programme, last
July saw the first Low Cost Festival
(21-23 July), a three-day music event
with more than 40 acts, including
bands such as Placebo and Editors. A
sister techno festival, Electrobeach
(24-27 August 2011), is held in August.
“Benidorm is adapting to survive,” a
Town Hall spokesman assured me. “In
five years’ time we will still be the
Med’s number-one resort.”
Benidorm,
one of Spain’s most
maligned resorts, is
reinventing itself with a
five-star boutique hotel
and Balinese chill-out
lounges
Isla de los Periodistas.
“We opened a year and a
half ago,” said employee
Tito as he took me to the
chill-out terrace, gym,
massage room and Jacuzzi.
“We get a lot of couples
wanting to recharge their
batteries.” The head chef,
Victor Conus Cervantes, from
Barcelona, is aiming to get a
Michelin star within the next couple
of years. “That’s the way Benidorm is
going,” said Tito.
As if by way of confirmation, later
that day I had lunch with an old friend,
Jorge, at Taita, one of a new generation
of high-class restaurants in the town.
Others include El Meson, and Rias
Baixas, known for its excellent seafood.
As we sat on the terrace eating crispy
grilled
duck breast with dauphinoise potatoes,
Jorge told me Benidorm really was
changing. “Take this place,” he said.
“Was there anything like this restaurant when you were last here?”
Perhaps even more surprising than
38
Monday, April 11, 2011
LIFESTYLE
www.qatar-tribune.com
Nesting tables that are more like a rubik’s cube
Lifestyle
guide
THE 3:1 table ($2,200) challenges the idea that nesting tables need to be stackable. Instead, the three small, angular
pieces that make up the 3:1 cluster together to form a cube.
“I love puzzles,” said TJ O’Keefe, the Chicago designer who created the table. “It’s actually a way I approach a lot of
my designs, as geometric logic puzzles.”
The individual pieces — which are aluminum, powder-coated in white, black and yellow — are self-supporting, and
O’Keefe encourages owners to play with different configurations.
“I not only designed the pieces individually, but also looked at the relationships between them,” he said. “The tables
can be arranged to interact in many different ways, each compelling in its own right.”
Make your wedding
visually memorable
FRED A BERNSTEIN
NYT SYNDICATE
W
HEN
Angus
and
Michelle Mitchell think
back to their wedding
last July, some of the
memories sparkle with
the light of a 500-pound crystal
chandelier.
The chandelier was shipped to
Mitchell’s farm on the Big Island of
Hawaii in a car-size crate and became a
centerpiece of the reception. Guests celebrated under its warm orange glow in
one tent, while in the tent next door, a fixture projected the couple’s “logo” — their
names intertwined — onto the dance
floor and occasionally onto the bride’s
gown, which was embroidered with thousands of Swarovski crystals.
From the outside, the tents glowed like
jewels against the “black-velvet sky,” said
Mitchell, the director of business development for her husband’s hair-care business in Beverly Hills.
The couple’s focus on lighting, powered
by a network of portable generators and
executed by Hawaii Stage and Lighting of
Honolulu, might have been extreme. But
it illustrates the extent to which some
couples will go to make their weddings
visually unforgettable.
“It’s not illumination for visibility; it’s
illumination for atmosphere,” said
Bentley Meeker, a Manhattan lighting
designer who worked on Chelsea
Clinton’s wedding.
New technology, not to mention oneupmanship among wedding planners
and their clients, has multiplied the possibilities. Depending on how it is
deployed, and by whom, it can also multiply the costs.
As recently as five years ago, said
Preston Bailey, the Manhattan event
designer, “I had to convince all of my
clients of the importance of bringing in
an outside lighting company.” Now, he
said, many of the clients who can afford
to hire him to create striking centerpieces
and backdrops are also prepared to hire
someone to illuminate those features.
“The lighting puts the other elements
on steroids,” said Meeker, who might
charge $4,000 for a small job that brings
a soft glow to a small- or medium-size
venue. More elaborate projects could
cost many times that, Meeker said, but
added, “If you spend $25,000 on flowers,
and $10,000 on lighting, it may look like
you spent $75,000 on flowers.”
For one recent wedding at the WaldorfAstoria, he said, “We created a 236-footby-12-foot strip of video, around all four
walls of the grand ballroom, that was
alive the entire night.” The screens and
other equipment took 25 people to operate, he added. That, according to Meeker,
cost more than $200,000.
Bailey said his strategy — creating a
series
of
take-your-breath-away
moments — was often achieved with the
help of lighting specialists. When guests
arrive, the room might be “a flattering
magenta colour; when they sit down,
maybe it’s blue, like you’re dining under
the stars. For dancing, we can create a
nightclub feeling.”
But lighting designers often must adapt
to the hotels, restaurants and other venues that their clients choose.
Shai Tertner, an event designer who
works in Manhattan and Florida, said he
usually likes to handle the lighting him-
self. “I like to art-direct,” he said. “I want
to know if the lights are the old high-tech
kind, or sleek and modern, which I prefer. If there are poles, I want to know if
the poles are covered in fabric, and what
kind of fabric, and how the fabric is going
to be tied.”
Lighting designers are usually recommended by the people planning elaborate
weddings — no, not the bride and bridegroom, but the event planner or event
designer. Julia Rutkowski said that both
the planner and designer of her wedding
this September to Christian Egan
recommended Matt Murphy
Event
Lighting
of
Southampton, NY.
Rutkowski said
they chose the
Bridgehampton
Tennis and Surf
Club,
where
their wedding
and reception
are to be held,
in part because
it was a blank
slate, a place where Murphy could work
his magic.
The reception is to begin with an
African-themed cocktail hour. “Think
sunset on the savanna,” Murphy said of
the lighting effect he wants.
But it will be a muted sunset, for
Murphy considers himself the “go-to guy
for softly lit, romantic, classy weddings.”
He is more likely to bring in custommade silk globes than spotlights hung
from metal trusses.
The focus on lighting
may appear extreme but
it illustrates the extent to
which some couples will
go to make their
weddings visually
unforgettable
Last September, the reception for
Timothy Long and his partner,
Christopher Herbert, a nephew of
Martha Stewart, was held at Stewart’s
estate in Katonah, NY. Murphy illuminated the inside of a sailcloth tent with
hundreds of Edison bulbs strung on
white cords chosen to blend in with the
fabric. A wedding celebration, he said, “is
a personal event.”
“You don’t want to confuse it with a U2
concert,” he continued.
Herbert, a classical singer, said of
Murphy, “The thing that impressed me
so much about him was that he had so
much passion about light bulbs.” He
added, “It’s always a fantastic thing when
you have a lighting designer who knows
what he’s doing.”
One thing the wedding designers
agreed upon was the supreme importance of making everyone — not just the
wedding couple — look good. And the
best way to do that, Meeker and others
said, was to immerse them and their
guests in gentle light.
“If guests feel like they look good,
they’ll stick around and have fun,”
Meeker said. “If the bride’s grandmother is sitting at that table with the light
shining in her face, guaranteed she’ll be
gone before the cake cutting.”
Not everyone needs a lighting designer to figure those things out. When the
Broadway actors Darren Goldstein and
Katie Finneran married last August at a
Lower Manhattan restaurant, they
spent about $100, total, on the lighting.
Most of that went to candles — real
ones as well as the fake, LED kind, purchased at Target — which they set up
the night before the wedding. Given
their line of work, they were no
strangers to lighting, and “we enjoy
making a space look beautiful on the
cheap,” Goldstein said.
Indeed, sometimes the most sumptuous lighting arrives without
charge. On the day of their outdoor wedding, Mitchell said, the
sky was completely overcast
until just moments before the
ceremony was to begin. Then
the clouds parted, the sun
shone through, and the setting took on a magical glow.
“Lighting like that, you can’t
buy,” Mitchell said.
Monday, April 11, 2011
HOLLYWOOD
Fergie to concentrate on hubby
Scene
unscene
www.qatar-tribune.com
39
Tyler Perry gives Georgian family a
new home
POP singer Fergie says spending quality time with her husband
is one of her top priorities for the year. The Black Eyed Peas
singer, who married actor Josh Duhamel in January 2009,
won't be releasing a second solo album in the near future as
she wants to concentrate on her personal life, reports femalefirst.co.uk. "This year is more about simplifying and really paying attention to the projects that I have on my plate and spending some time with my hubby," she said. One of the domestic
projects Fergie has in mind is clearing out the clutter in her
house. "I'm cleaning things out and I'm starting to make more
purchases for myself," she said.
MOVIE mogul Tyler Perry delivered on a Christmas promise
when he handed the keys of a new four-bedroom house to an
88-year-old woman who lost her rural Georgia home to a fire.
Rosa Lee Ransby and her seven grand- and great-grandchildren lost their home a week before Christmas. Perry saw the
story on a local television newscast and decided to rebuild the
house. He also fully furnished it. Perry says he wanted to do
something for Ransby when he found out the family didn't
have any way to rebuild.
JOSH DUHAMEL AND FERGIE
TYLER PERRY
Filmfest DC,
25 years outside
Hollywood’s orbit
Tony Gittens, launched a
film festival 25 years ago as
an antidote to commercial
Tinseltown and watched it
grow into the US capital’s
signature screen
celebration
John Malkovich
AFP
Charlize Theron
TEP out of Hollywood’s bubble, urged Tony Gittens,
who launched a film festival here 25 years ago as an
antidote to commercial Tinseltown and watched it
grow into the US capital’s signature screen celebration. While moviemakers strut down the Cannes red
carpet as their media-hyped films become overnight sensations,
and distributors swarm Sundance theatres to snag the next
Precious, Filmfest DC, which opened Thursday, goes about its
business of pleasuring a diverse audience by screening highquality independent world cinema.
“To limit your film-going diet to just the films from
Hollywood is not healthy,” Gittens said shortly ahead of the festival’s April 7-17 run, when it screens some 80 movies from 25
countries -- many of which will never light up a mainstream
movie house in the United States -- to more than 25,000 people.
“It’s a big world, and if we didn’t bring the films here most of
them would not be seen by Washingtonians.”
And yet, 25 years and 2,500 movies later, Filmfest DC more
than ever relishes its role of bringing eye-opening -- and often
controversial -- films to a public that once had little but
Hollywood fare to choose from.
The festival “is not driven by commercial considerations... We
are not a market,” he adds, which puts it apart from other prestigious festivals such as those in Berlin and Venice, which bring
filmmakers and buyers together.
But that doesn’t mean it is void of star-power.
S
Actor/director John Malkovich, production titan
Sydney Pollack, and screen siren Charlize Theron are
among the heavies who have presented their work at
Filmfest DC.
This year’s fare will include turns by Kevin Kline, who
plays an American doctor teaching chess to a Corsican
mother in Queen to Play, and festival opener Potiche, a
French farce starring Gerard Depardieu and the grande
dame of French cinema, Catherine Deneuve.
Other titles include The Green Wave, which chronicles the 2009 protests in Iran; the American premiere
of Scientology: The Truth About a Lie; Hostage of
Illusions by Argentine Eliseo Subiela; the Egyptian
film Hawi, making its US debut; visceral anti-war
film Tears of Gaza; and The Hedgehog, about a
precocious 11-year-old who might want to kill
herself.
Gittens sounds thrilled that the festival lies
outside the glare of Hollywood, and even the
other major American festivals such as
those in Telluride, Colorado, or Tribeca in
New York.
“We’ve been able to bring films to
Washington that normally would not
have been presented,” and in turn
help break down barriers of ignorance and misunderstanding, he
insisted.
“Film is a good way to learn
about other people.”
(From top) Posters
of the films The
Green Wave,
Queen to Play,
Hawi, The
Hedgehog and
Potiche.
Longoria showcases kitchen skills
in new cookbook
AP
VA Longoria's character on
Desperate Housewives isn’t
exactly domestic, but in real life
the actress says she “tries to cook
every day.”
She’s released a cookbook called
Eva’s Kitchen: Cooking with Love for
Family and Friends. It includes family recipes and her own go-to dishes
such as chicken tortilla soup.
The 36-year-old actress, who plays
a former model and the youngest of
the housewives on Wisteria Lane on
the ABC nighttime soap opera, is a big
cookbook collector and had a clear
vision of the beautiful photos and stories she wanted with her own book.
Compiling the dishes into cookbook recipes, though, was at times
challenging, she said.
“I’m a natural cooker, and I cook by
instinct so if I want salt I’ll put salt
and if I don’t I don’t, so I felt really
bad telling people to put, you know, a
quarter-cup of cheese if they didn’t
E
Eva Longoria attends a book signing for
her cookbook Eva’s Kitchen.
Eva Longoria,36, released
a cookbook called Eva’s
Kitchen: Cooking with
Love for Family and
Friends. It includes family
recipes and her own go-to
dishes such as chicken
tortilla soup
want it, you know, I’m like, ‘Or not!
You don’t have to!’” she said. “I just
felt really bossy so that was really
hard for me because I always find
cooking so natural.”
Longoria’s advice for those who
aren’t kitchen naturals is to get your
timing right — especially with breakfast.
“People tend to make eggs first, and
eggs should be the last things you
make because they’re the fastest,” she
said. “You should always make your
sausages or your biscuits first because
they can sit. Then you make your hotstove items.”
Her must-have ingredient is lemon.
“I put lemon in everything, on
everything,” she says with a laugh.
“It’s really great for sauces, for dressings, for fish, for meat. I love lemon. I
always have fresh lemons in the
house. Also I have an herb garden so
I have cilantro, I have mint, I have
basil, and it’s always great to just
pick those off right from the
garden and put them into
food.”
Longoria, who filed for
divorce
from
San
Antonio Spurs basketball
player Tony Parker last
year, says she still has
many other dishes and
crockpot recipes that
didn’t make it into
the cookbook and
she’d like to write
another one in
the future.
Eva
Longoria
40
Monday, April 11, 2011
BOLLYWOOD
www.qatar-tribune.com
Scene
unseen
Channel V goes for dance fiction show
Suriya and Hari come together again
WHILE most entertainment channels focus on dance reality shows,
Channel V is set to launch the first ever dance fiction show called D3:
Dil Dostii Dance with Dance India Dance winner Shakti Mohan in the
lead. “Dance is a genre that has witnessed the greatest spike in viewership across the industry. Dil Dostii Dance is the first ever fiction on
dance that will re-invent the fiction genre in the country,” Prem
Kamath, Channel V general manager, said in a statement. “While D3
simply tells a story of a girl and her love for dance, the show actually
displays the passion and determination of the today’s youth. It is their
belief that a dream chased religiously can bring you immense success
and personal satisfaction,” Kamath added. It also stars Kunwar Amar,
again of Dance India Dance fame opposite Shakti.
THE hit makers of Aaru, Vel and Singam are coming together again.
Suriya and Hari, whose chemistry worked big time in the past, will
soon start a new movie, which will be an action entertainer. If sources
are to be believed, Hari is ready with a gangster story, which he thinks
will be apt for Suriya. “The actor too has listened to the script and
expressed his consent to be part of the project,” sources close to the
actor say. Suriya has completed the multilingual 7am Arivu with A R
Murugadoss and will soon start working for Maatran with K V Anand.
His project with Hari is expected to start once Maatran is over. In the
meantime, Hari is currently busy making Venghai, which has Dhanush
and Tamannah in lead roles. “Venghai too is a racy entertainer quite
typical to Hari’s format,” according to circles close to him.
SHAKTI MOHAN
SURIYA
Indian animation needs to move
beyond mythology: Ranvir Shorey
A poster of
“How is Holly
wood
coming out
consistently w
ith good
products —
righ
from Jungle B t
oo
the 60s? They k in
a
cultivating an re
im
and it ’s not a ation
n
overnight thin
g,”
the film Lav
Kush - The
Warrior Twin
s.
—RANVIR S
HOREY
A poster of
DIBYOJYOTI BAKSI
IANS
NDIA has a huge market for animation films but the homegrown industry has to move beyond mythological
themes, says talented actor Ranvir
Shorey, who has just given the
voiceover for the Hindi version of the 3D
Hollywood film Rio.
“India has a huge market for animation films, but is yet unexplored.
Hollywood has a festival out of every
release of the animation film that
they do. It’s like a carnival for the
grown-ups and for the kids,” Ranvir
said.
“I don’t think we have managed that
in the Indian film industry as yet,” he
added.
The actor of films as diverse as Khosla Ka
Ghosla and Singh is Kinng is certain that
homegrown animation would definitely
have an audience if it improved.
“It’s like the egg and chicken story, you
know. How is Hollywood coming out consistently with good products — right from
Jungle Book in the 60s? They are cultivating animation and it’s not an overnight
thing,” Ranvir said.
“So we need to do something similar
here, you know. They have to find a digital
I
Ranvir Shorey
Now showing
GRAND CINE CENTRE
RIO ( ANIMATION): 10.30 AM, 12.30 PM, 2.30 PM, 4.30 PM, 6.30 PM (3D) : 11.30 AM, 1.30 PM, 3.30 PM,
5.30 PM, 7.30 PM, 9.30 PM, 11.30 PM
SOURCE CODE (THRILLER): 12.30 PM, 2.45 PM, 5 PM, 7.15 PM, 9.30 PM, 11.45 PM
RED RIDING HOOD (ROMANCE): 10.30 AM, 12.45 PM, 3 PM, 5.15 PM, 7.30 PM, 9.45 PM, 12 MN
voice, which is not happening right now.”
“What’s happening is we locally produce
either like a TV serial or like a Bollywood film
with singing and dancing and not doing a
good animation film of it,” Ranvir said.
He
said
there
A movie poster of Rio.
was need to improve the way animation was
made here instead of blaming the audience.
“Homegrown animation needs to improve...
The audience is always ready for something
good,” he added.
Production houses need to depart from
Indian mythologies and create something
new.
“They always go for mythologies because it
already has a popular
base. They are so scared of having something
completely different and original,” Ranvir
said.
“Animations also need budgets. We need
somebody with the right script and the producers who have faith to mount that kind
of production because we definitely
have the talent in India. We need
more entrepreneurship from the
production sector,” he added.
The actor always longed to be
a part of animation films, a
dream fulfiled by the chance to
do the voiceover for Rio.
“I was always very keen to be
part of animation films. Finally I
got a chance. It was a fantastic
experience. I gave voiceover for the
character Nico and Vinay (Pathak) for
(Pedro),” Ranvir said.
“It’s a nice comedy. I would like to do more
voiceovers like this,” he added.
Ranvir and his wife Konkana Sen-Sharma
became the proud parents of a son recently.
“I am very happy becoming a father. We are
settling into a new life,” he said.
Indian animation films have tended to focus
overwhelmingly on mythologies such as Arjun
- The Warrior Prince or Lav Kush - The
Warrior Twins.
VILLAGGIO MALL
LANDMARK CINEMA
RIO ( ANIMATION): 11.30 AM, 1.30 PM, 3.30 PM, 5.30 PM, 7.30
PM (3D) : 10.30 AM, 12.30 PM, 2.30 PM, 4.30 PM, 6.30 PM,
8.30 PM, 10.30 PM
SOURCE CODE (THRILLER): 10.30 AM, 12.45 PM, 3 PM, 5.15
PM, 7.30 PM, 9.45 PM, 12 MN
RED RIDING HOOD (ROMANCE): 12.30 PM, 2.45 PM, 5 PM,
7.15 PM, 9.30 PM, 11.45 PM
SOURCE CODE (THRILLER): 2.30 PM, 4.45 PM, 7 PM, 9.15 PM,
11.15 PM
CITY ISLAND (COMEDY) : 6.30 PM, 8.45 PM, 11 PM
RIO (3D) (ANIMATION): 3 PM, 5 PM, 7 PM
BIG MOMMAS (COMEDY): 2.30PM,4.30PM
THE ROOMMATE (THRILLER): 9 PM, 11 PM
THANK YOU (HINDI): 12.15 PM, 3 PM, 5.45 PM, 8.30 PM, 11.15 PM
TOMORROW, WHEN THE WAR BEGAN (ACTION): 12.15 PM, 2.30 PM, 4.45 PM, 7 PM, 9.15 PM, 11.30 PM
CITY ISLAND (COMEDY) : 11.45 AM, 4.15 PM, 8.45 PM
PAUL (COMEDY): 11.30 AM, 1.45 PM, 4 PM, 6.15 PM, 8.30 PM, 10.45 PM
THE ROOMMATE (THRILLER): 11.45 AM, 1.45 PM, 3.45 PM, 5.45 PM, 7.45 PM, 9.45 PM, 11.45 PM
SUCKER PUNCH (THRILER): 2.15 PM, 6.45 PM, 11.15 PM
THE LINCOLN LAWYER (CRIME): 1.30 PM, 6.45 PM, 12 MN
BIG MOMMAS (COMEDY): 11 AM, 1.15 PM, 3.30 PM, 5.45 PM, 8 PM, 10.15 PM
BATTLE: LOS ANGELES (ACTION): 6.30 PM, 9 PM, 11.30 PM
THE ADJUSTMENT BUREAU (THRILLER): 2 PM, 6.30 PM, 11 PM
RANGO (ANIMATION): 11.15 AM, 2 PM, 4.15 PM
I AM NUMBER FOUR (ACTION): 12 NOON, 4.30 PM, 9 PM
DRIVE ANGRY (THRILLER): (3D) : 8.30 PM, 10.30 PM
THANK YOU (HINDI): 11AM,1.30PM, 6 PM,8.30PM,11 PM
ROYAL PLAZA
RIO (3D) (ANIMATION): 3 PM, 5 PM, 7 PM
THE ADJUSTMENT BUREAU (THRILLER): 9 PM, 11.15 PM
S DARKO (THRILLER): 2.30 PM, 4.30 PM
CITY ISLAND (COMEDY) : 6.30 PM, 8.45 PM, 11 PM
TOMORROW, WHEN THE WAR BEGAN (ACTION): 4.15 PM, 6.45
PM, 9 PM
THE LINCOLN LAWYER (CRIME): 2.15 PM, 11.15 PM
MAPPILLAI (TAMIL): 10.45 AM, 4 PM, 9.15 PM
MALL CINEMA
SUCKER PUNCH (THRILER): 2.30 PM, 4.45 PM
S DARKO (THRILLER): 7 PM
BIG MOMMAS (COMEDY): 9 PM, 11 PM
RED RIDING HOOD (ROMANCE): 3 PM, 5 PM, 7 PM, 9 PM, 11 PM
RIO ( ANIMATION): 2 PM, 4.15 PM, 6.30 PM
PAUL (COMEDY): 8.45 PM, 11.15 PM
Arjun - The
Warrior Prin
ce.
GULF CINEMA
THANK YOU (HINDI): 2.30 PM, 11.30 PM
CHRISTIAN BROTHERS (MALAYALAM): 5.15 PM
MAPPILLAI (TAMIL): 8.30 PM,
THANK YOU (HINDI)
CHRISTIAN BROTHERS(MALAYALAM)
TOMORROW, WHEN THE WAR BEGAN (ACTION): 12.15 PM,
2.30 PM, 4.45 PM, 7 PM, 9.15 PM, 11.30 PM
CITY ISLAND (COMEDY) : 9.30 PM, 11.45 PM
PAUL (COMEDY): 11.30 AM, 1.45 PM, 4 PM, 6.15 PM, 8.30
PM, 10.45 PM
THE ROOMMATE (THRILLER): 11.30 AM, 1.30 PM, 3.30 PM,
5.30 PM, 7.30 PM, 9.30 PM, 11.30 PM
SUCKER PUNCH (THRILER): 11AM,1.30PM,4PM,6.30PM,9
PM,11.30PM
THE LINCOLN LAWYER (CRIME): 1.30 PM, 6.45 PM, 12 MN
BIG MOMMAS (COMEDY): 1.30 PM, 6.15 PM, 11 PM
NO STRINGS ATTACHED (COMEDY): 12.45 PM, 5 PM, 9.15 PM
BATTLE: LOS ANGELES (ACTION): 10.30 AM, 2.45 PM, 7 PM,
11.15 PM
THEADJUSTMENTBUREAU(THRILLER):12 NOON,4.30PM,
6.45PM, 9 PM
RANGO (ANIMATION): 11.15 AM, 2 PM, 6.30 PM
I AM NUMBER FOUR (ACTION): 2.15 PM, 6.45 PM, 11.15 PM
JUST GO WITH IT (COMEDY): 4.15 PM, 8.45 PM, 11 PM
JUSTIN BIEBER: NEVER SAY NEVER (MUSICAL) (3D) : 4 PM