NEW YORK: A musical inspired by Greek mythology and a play about the conflict in Northern Ireland were the big winners Sunday at the Tony Awards, the highest honors in American theater.
“Hadestown” was the big favorite of the 73rd annual awards with 14 nominations and in the end it took home eight gongs, including best musical.
The show, a modern take on the underworld myth of Orpheus and Euridyce with jazz and folk, arrived on Broadway in April after an unusual 13-year journey.
From its 2006 origins in Vermont as a musical show without choreography, it has become a hit album and an off-Broadway show in London and Canada.
“If Hadestown stands for anything, it is that change is possible. That in dark times, spring will come again,” producer Mara Isaacs said as she received her Tony.
“The Ferryman,” written by Jez Butterworth, was also among the favorites this year with nine nominations and ultimately won four Tonys, including best play.
Directed by Sam Mendes, who won as best director of a play, it depicts a day in the life of a rural family in Northern Ireland in 1981 at the height of “The Troubles.”
Its large and colorful cast of characters includes a baby and a goose.
British actor James Corden, master of ceremonies at the event broadcast from Radio City Music Hall, opened the awards by extolling the virtues of live theater against streaming.
While his humor was apolitical, others spoke out during the three-hour show.
Bryan Cranston, who won best leading actor in a play for his role in the “Network,” adapted from the satirical 1976 film about a TV anchor, dedicated his award to “all the real journalists around the world.”
“The media is not the enemy of the people. Demagoguery is the enemy of the people,” the “Breaking Bad” star said, taking aim at President Donald Trump who frequently rails against unfavorable media as “the enemy of the people.”
While the entertainment world is frequently accused of downplaying the contributions of women and minorities, Broadway tried to redress the balance a bit on Sunday.
Actress Ali Stroker became the first wheelchair user to win a Tony for her role in the musical “Oklahoma!” but Rachel Chavkin, director of “Hadestown,” was the only woman directing a musical this year.
“There are so many women who are ready, so many artists of color who are ready,” Chavkin said in her acceptance speech.
“It’s not a lack of preparation, it’s a lack of imagination on the part of a sector supposed to imagine how the world could be.”
Musical inspired by Greek mythology wins at Tony Awards
Musical inspired by Greek mythology wins at Tony Awards
- “Hadestown” was the big favorite of the 73rd annual awards with 14 nominations and in the end it took home eight gongs
- It has become a hit album and an off-Broadway show in London and Canada
Two pistols owned by Napoleon up for auction with estimated value of up to $1.6m
- French emperor once intended to use the weapons to kill himself
- Later gave pistols to squire to thank him for his loyalty
PARIS: Two pistols that Napoleon Bonaparte once intended to use to kill himself are up for auction this weekend, expected to reach up to €1.5 million ($1.6 million), an auction house said Monday.
The richly decorated guns inlaid with gold and silver feature the engraved image of Napoleon in full imperial pomp.
They are said to have almost been used to end the French ruler’s life in 1814 when he was forced to give up power after foreign forces defeated his army and occupied Paris.
“After the defeat of the French campaign, he was totally depressed and wanted to commit suicide with these weapons but his grand squire removed the powder,” auctioneer Jean-Pierre Osenat told AFP.
Napoleon instead took poison but vomited and survived, and later gave the pistols to his squire to thank him for his loyalty, Osenat added.
They are expected to fetch €1.2 to 1.5 million at Sunday’s auction in Fontainebleau, south of Paris.
Memorabilia of the emperor is extremely sought-after among collectors.
His famous black cocked hat with its blue, white and red trimmings sold for 1.9 million euros in November.
Upon his abdication, Napoleon went into exile on the island of Elba off the coast of Italy.
He would soon grow bored and make a dramatic return to France, only to have his career definitively ended when he was defeated by the British at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, dying in exile on the island of St. Helena six years later.
Making Olympic timekeepers’ bells: a labor of love
LA CHAUX DE FONDS: The air is stifling hot, with a heavy, metallic smell that sticks in the throat and stings the eyes.
In his foundry with smoke-blackened walls, Alois Huguenin uses an enormous ladle to pour molten bronze at 1,250 degrees Celsius (2,282 degrees Fahrenheit) into a metal frame.
For three generations, the century-old traditional foundry in La Chaux-de-Fonds in northwestern Switzerland — the cradle of the country’s famous watchmaking industry — has been crafting the bells used at the Olympic Games.
The bells are rung for a range of disciplines including athletics, track cycling, mountain biking and boxing.
Almost half a century after his grandfather made the first bell for the Moscow Olympics in 1980, Huguenin was preparing the bells for the upcoming Paris Games.
“If all goes well, one Olympic bell is three hours of work,” the 30-year-old, equipped with an apron, gloves and a protective screen, told AFP recently.
Huguenin said he had already delivered 38 bells for Paris, at the request of the Games’ official timekeeper Omega, which has its chronometric testing laboratory around 30 kilometers away in Biel.
“The bell is used to indicate to the athletes, as well as to the spectators, when the last lap has started,” said Alain Zobrist, who heads OmegaTime and is in charge of chronometry within the wider Swatch Group.
It tells the athletes “they must give it their all to reach the finish line as quickly as possible,” he told AFP.
Recalling that Omega has been timekeeping at the Olympics since 1932, he acknowledged that the bells constitute “a very traditional element.”
“Today, chronometry is done electronically. The bells are a nod to our past,” he said.
Ten minutes after pouring the molten bronze — with the texture and bright orange-yellow color of volcanic lava — Huguenin can unmold the thick liquid, with a temperature of just 200C.
With heavy blows of his hammer, he breaks the hard, black-sand mold in the frame, as smoke billows out.
The bell that emerges is covered with a crust, revealing the work that remains to be done: deburring, sanding, filing and polishing.
Huguenin made his first Olympic bell for the 2020 Tokyo Games.
While not as obsessed by bells as some collectors can be, Huguenin says he is proud his creations are seen by billions.
“I put the same energy, the same passion into all the bells I make,” he said, explaining that he also makes bells for livestock, and increasingly for individual events like weddings.
“But to know that we are participating in our own small way in the big Olympic celebration is a source of pride.”
Huguenin said Olympic bells had been part of his life as far back as he could remember.
“Each edition, we watch TV to try to see if we can spot them,” he said, recalling how he kept an eye out for his father’s bells when he was younger.
And “for a few years now, I have been looking out for the bell that I made.”
The bells used for each Olympics remain the same, with only the edition logo changing.
They are always emblazoned with the colorful Olympic rings, stand about 20 centimeters (7.9 inches) high and measure 14 centimeters (5.5 inches) across.
But each bell is nonetheless unique, Huguenin insisted, due to the use of traditional techniques, and recycling.
The clayey Paris sand used for his mold is not synthetic and is reused several times, he said, noting that some grains have been in service for 100 years.
As for the copper-tin alloy used for the bronze, it is made of individually-sourced recycled materials.
On the shelves near his wooden workbench, Huguenin keeps a souvenir collection of bells with defects that were made for previous Games in Atlanta, Rio and Athens.
But a few weeks before the opening of the Paris Olympics, he already has one eye on the future.
Bells need to be made for the 2028 Los Angeles Games, of course, he said, but “first there are the Winter Olympics in Milan Cortina” in 2026.
“I’m going to get started on it this autumn,” he said.
“I’m always one step ahead.”
Crowd control at Japan’s Mount Fuji as hiking season begins
- Online reservations have also been introduced this year by authorities concerned about safety and environmental damage on Japan’s highest mountain
MOUNT FUJI: Mount Fuji’s summer climbing season began on Monday with new crowd control measures to combat overtourism on the Japanese volcano’s most popular trail.
An entry fee of 2,000 yen ($13) plus an optional donation is being charged for those taking on the Yoshida Trail, and numbers are capped at 4,000 per day.
Online reservations have also been introduced this year by authorities concerned about safety and environmental damage on Japan’s highest mountain.
“I really like the idea because if you respect the mountain, you have to limit the people,” hiker Chetna Joshi told AFP at the trail’s Fifth Station — a busy starting point for hikers that is reachable by car.
The 47-year-old from India compared the crowds seen at Fuji in recent years to the “traffic jam” of climbers at the peak of Mount Everest.
Although windy and drizzly weather on Monday prevented hikers from reaching the summit, Joshi said ascending part way was still a “great experience.”
“I love mountains. I think it is not giving me permission this time, that’s OK. I accept it,” she said.
Record tourist crowds are flocking to Japan post-pandemic, with many wanting to see or scale Mount Fuji.
The mountain is covered in snow most of the year but draws more than 220,000 visitors each July-September climbing period.
Many trudge through the night to see the sunrise from the 3,776-meter (12,388-foot) summit.
Some sleep on the trail or start fires for heat, while others attempt to complete the hike without breaks, becoming sick or injured as a result.
The once-peaceful pilgrimage site has three other main routes that will remain free to climb.
But the Yoshida Trail — accessed from Tokyo relatively easily — is the preferred option for most holidaymakers, with around 60 percent of climbers choosing that route.
Each summer, reports in Japanese media describe tourists climbing Mount Fuji with insufficient mountaineering equipment.
The new measures were introduced “first and foremost to protect lives,” governor Kotaro Nagasaki of Yamanashi prefecture has said.
In a reminder of the dangers, last week four bodies were found near the summit, according to local media reports.
“I personally feel like I’ve over-prepared,” Geoffrey Kula, a climber from the United States, told AFP.
“Having looked at the forecast, being ready to swap out multiple outfits if clothes get wet and things like that. Yeah, it just seems like another crazy adventure.”
Monthly visitors to Japan exceeded three million for the first time in March, and then again in April and May.
The tourism chief has deemed the country’s ambitious goal of attracting 60 million foreign tourists well within reach, having last year welcomed more than 25 million.
Mount Fuji is about two hours from central Tokyo by train and can be seen for miles around.
The mountain is a symbol of Japan that has been immortalized in countless artworks, including Hokusai’s “Great Wave.”
But as in other tourist hotspots, such as Venice — which recently launched a trial of entry fees for day visitors — the influx has not been universally welcomed.
In May, a town near Mount Fuji mounted a large barrier at a popular viewing spot for the volcano in an attempt to deter photo-taking by an ever-growing number of tourists.
Residents were fed up with streams of mostly foreign visitors littering, trespassing and breaking traffic rules in their hunt for a photo to share on social media.
Similar woes have befallen the country’s ancient capital of Kyoto, where locals have complained of tourists harassing the city’s famed geisha.
Portrait of King Charles unveiled for Britain’s Armed Forces Day
LONDON: A new photographic portrait of King Charles wearing military uniform was released on Saturday to mark Britain’s Armed Forces Day.
The photograph shows the King wearing his Field Marshal No 1 Full Ceremonial Frock Coat with medals, sword and decorations.
The King, who is Commander-in-Chief of the armed services, returned to public-facing engagements early last month after being diagnosed with cancer in February.
The release of the photograph coincided with a video message to members of the armed services from Queen Camilla. She called them “a source of inspiration, reassurance and pride.”
Video game designers battle to depict climate impacts
PARIS: Game designer Sam Alfred is keenly aware of the challenge he faces in trying to build a video game with climate change at its heart.
Lists of best-selling games are filled with titles pushing destruction and violence rather than constructive engagement with the environment.
Yet “Terra Nil,” a strategy game designed by Alfred and released in March last year, puts players in charge of rebuilding ecosystems — and has since attracted 300,000 players, according to the publisher Devolver Digital.
“I’ve lost count of how many people have dismissed the game or made fun of the game, because of its nature, because it’s a game which is not about shooting people or rampant expansionism,” said Alfred.
“The environment was the focus of the game. The one angle was trying to show players and other game developers and people that it’s possible to build a strategy game without exploitation of the environment.”
True to his word, the 30-year-old South African asks players of Terra Nil to help decontaminate radioactive zones with sunflowers and save the Great Barrier Reef among other climate-related tasks.
He is not the first designer to include an environmental message in their games — nor is he the first to be criticized for it.
In 2017, “Cities: Skylines,” a city-building game, introduced its “Green Cities” offshoot where players could create their ideal metropolis while taking into account pollution and environmental management.
“I remember the Green Cities extension was something that surprisingly polarized the audience,” said Mariina Hallikainen, managing director of Colossal Order, the Finnish studio behind the game.
“There was actually feedback that we are now ruining the game by going political.”
The team behind the game deny there was any overt political message, flagging that players could choose whether to make their city green or not.
And other studios have not been discouraged from putting climate into their games.
The daddy of all strategy games, “Civilization,” included climate change in and offshoot of its sixth edition in 2019.
With an estimated three billion people playing video games at least once a year, climate campaigners have long targeted them as a potential audience.
Even the United Nations has tried its hand at creating a climate game — “Mission 1.5” — that it said reached more than six million people.
Industry figures have joined together in several collectives to see how they can include the climate in their games.
Studios, trade associations and investors formed “Playing for the Planet,” an alliance backed by the United Nations that has held a “Green Game Jam” each year since 2020.
Other industry figures bandied together to form a climate branch of the International Game Developers Association (IGDA) in 2019.
“You have a superpower: you’re gamemakers,” Arnaud Fayolle, artistic director at publisher Ubisoft and key mover in the IGDA’s climate branch, told their conference last year.
“You can talk to three billion players around the planet who already trust what you have to say, you can teach complex problems in fun and engaging way that schools never can match.”
The IGDA branch brings together nearly 1,500 industry professionals, university professors and ecology and climate specialists, who share their expertise to infuse video games with climate issues and encourage gamers to get involved.
“The idea is to generate a positive cultural impact through aesthetics, storytelling, game mechanics and technology,” said Fayolle.
This is where people like Sam Alfred earn their money.
“A lot of our mechanics in the game are our way of trying to translate either real-life natural processes or real-life ecosystem restoration practices into game form,” he said.
“That means oversimplifying them and it means, you know, taking some creative liberties.”
