The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com Wednesday, January 24, 2007 - 5A The art of appreciative silence ne of the most thrilling hear them, they clap either by live performances I've force of habit, familiar with the seen passed with total rhythm of live performance or silence from the audience. No from an impulse to appreciate one applauded after the songs, no that overrides logic. Look into one whistled appreciatively after it yourself this Sunday, when each virtuosic solo, the hall didn't the Met broadcasts its current resound with "whoos" when the production to our own Michigan performers filed out. The audi- Theater. ence's restraint itself was almost Some performers play with an audible in the silence between audience's impulse to applaud, pieces. using the fact that it's When, as part of the often a knee-jerk reaction, voiceless audience, I whether perfunctory or rose from my seat to genuine, to make a point. leave, I was carried In his Saturday night toward the door by the performance at the Power music that still swelled Center, poet and perfor- - an organ player ush- mance artist Sekou Sun- ered us out with the diata repeatedly turned huge, complex sounds ABIGAIL B. the audience's palpable of his instrument. COLODNER approval on its head. Though the tension In a production that was still palpable, shared smiles involved poetry, singers, a band began to diffuse the intensity of and a video projection of a dancer, the performance, when he fin- Sundiata offered an investigation ished his piece with a flourish of post-Sept. 11 America. Sundiata - and the silent audience erupted cleverly used our eagerness for in noise. pathos to reveal the irony of our The flow of bodies out the sympathies. When exposed, we door paused as waves of applause were at first meek, then eager for echoed through the cathedral. more. A tactful and intelligent cri- Generally speaking, it's cus- tique, after all, is what we'd asked tomary not to applaud perfor- for. We became willing to applaud mances in religious spaces. A our own foolishness. great deal of art, including today's Spontaneous applause - for most frequently performed pieces a street performer, for instance, - Handel's Messiah, Brahms's Ein who after all will play whether we deutsches Requiem - were created "like" it or not - can feel miracu- in a sacred context. Some were lous and wonderfully uniting. well-received, some not. The reli- Is it because people offer it up gious space in which they're pre- voluntarily that they stop in their sented doesn't excuse them from criticism altogether, but it can exempt them from the immediate, To clap or not: voiced opinion of its audience. Maybe one of the reasons the the psychology of audience doesn't voice its approv- al is that the creation of art in applause religious service can be a kind of duty, something that's done for its intrinsic value rather than for any public reward. tracks as though they'd paid for a The New York Times reported seat and applaud? that people clap, illogically, dur- Perhaps this was why the ing one of the newest develop- audience at St. Thomas Cathe- ments in performed art; this dral turned from their paths to winter, the Metropolitan Opera applaud the lone organist. We House in New York City began really clapped for the boys' choir, broadcasting its staged produc- now out of sight, in appreciation tions to movie theaters across the of their own restraint - in not globe. asking us to applaud. Audiences watch live and rebroadcasted performances - Colodner is minoring in of operas and clap at the usual appreciative applause. E-mail moments. As no performer will her at abigabor@umich.edu. Building awareness through music Actress Salma Hayek and Academy President Sid Ganis announce the best picture nominations yesterday. What is missing from this picture? 'Dreamgirls' snubopens race By JEFFREY BLOOMER ManagingEditor With one scandalous exception, the announcement of the Acad- emy Award nominations yesterday morning went down more or less as expected: A 5 a.m. press conference in Beverly Hills, surely more cer- emonious than it needed to be, and a crowd of reporters checking off one industry-peddled nominee after another. There were, of course, the wel- come surprises. Paul Greengrass's nod forbest director is anuncommon show of faith for a film ("United 93") released too early and shunned by most of the nation. The best actress race, which includes Helen Mirren, Meryl Streep, Kate Winslet, Penel- ope Cruz and Judi Dench, is finally the strongest of the acting races (though it was decided about three months ago). Even Mark Wahlberg's peripheral supporting role in "The Departed" was recognized. Most of the omissions were either expected (Sacha Baron Cohen is no Johnny Depp, and the Oscars are no Golden Globes) or marginal (the screenplay for "Stranger Than Fic- tion" never really capitalized on its ideas anyway), but there was one snub that pulverized the others. Standing before a brightly lit stage and five large monitors, the radiant actress Salma Hayek and Academy President Sid Ganis read off the best picture nominees. When they were finished, she had not read the title "Dreamgirls," and no one budged. Clearly there was some mistake. But there wasn't. Never mind its eight nominations: "Dreamgirls" is no longer in the running for best picture, a shocking end to a ubiquitous awards campaign that launched way back in May at Cannes. Its eight nomina- tions Were the most of any movie this year, giving it the distinction of being the only film in recent history to have earned the most nominations but not one for best picture. (To be sure, its winning tally is partially inflated by its three nods for best song alone; "Babel," the second most-nominated movie, was close behind with seven.) Up until yesterday considered the front runner for the top award, the omis- sion of "Dreamgirls" is likely either a manifestation of the worst backlash in years or the belief of many members that the film was a shoo-in no matter their vote. That the Academy's majority is made up of white males surely didn't work in its favor, either. The film's absence is not really a surprise because the movie is so well-regarded - it has been received mildly for a film of such enormous anticipation - but because its snub totally blind-sided expecta- tions. There was talk that "Little Miss Sunshine" may not have had as tight a grasp on its nomination as some had speculated, but no one saw this coming. Beyond the repercussions the snub may have on how Academy members vote in the future, it also has the more immediate one of leaving the year's best picture race wide open. "Babel" has its detractors, but its admirers have been much more vocal, and it took the top award for drama at the Golden Globes. Oh, and it co-stars Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett. But with its likene and them an unlike surprise a You aL Sunshine. ducers Gi distinctio Academy years. Th liked whi porters o that it has Wha the isn radar and But as "The Qu: - whict ss to "Crash" in both form easy anymore - I would watch "Let- iatic undercurrent, it seems ters From Iwo Jima," director Clint ly choice to follow that film's Eastwood's newest masterpiece of ward last year. mood and restraint (his third in as so can't count out "Little Miss many years). Yes, it's almost entirely in "which recently took the Pro- Japanese, and two months ago it wasn't uild of America's top award, a even going to be released this year. But n that has matched up with the it is in many ways the textbook choice: 's best picture 11 of the past 17 a famous backdrop, a quintessentially e film is so universally well- American filmmaker at the top of his en even the most ardent sup- game, scenes of stunning emotional f "Babel" will cede its flaws power (the suicide sequence alone put the potential to go under the the-rest of the nominees to shame). This isthe makeup of a classic best picture. Of course, considering that a day ago t happens when its nomination was considered a long shot, it's anyone's game. (In fact, in its front runner . cover of the nominations, The Associ- 't nominated? ated Press mentioned every film but "Iwo Jima" as a possible contender.) Isn't this/sn? I hope so, because this race is about nothing if not blind specu- come out on top. lation, and there's still a month to go. suming "The Departed" and The 79th Annual Academy Awards, een" are purely prestige nods hosted by Ellen DeGeneres, is set to air h suddenly doesn't seem so Feb. 25 on ABC. i By ANDREW SARGUS KLEIN ManagingArtsEditor Over the course of the past half decade, Sudan has witnessed the deaths of 400,000 civil- Save ians as well as Darfur Tour the displace- . ment of 2.5 Tonght at8p.m. million more. At The Blind Pig The media $6, $9 if under 21 switches back and forth, calling it either a crisis or a genocide. Call it what you will, what's happening in Darfur, Sudan has no parallel since the Rwandan genocide of 1994. While Iraq and the Middle East hold our attention, the horror continues on the oppo- site shores of the Red Sea. But momentum is building. More and more activist groups are form- ing, and at the University, the group Students Taking Action Now: Dar- fur is in full swing, raising aware- ness through the universal media of art and music. About a year ago, I covered a STAND-sponsored art exhibit at the Michigan Union that displayed art made by children in Darfur. Walking through each picture was an exercise in restrained rage, a withstanding of cathartic hope- lessness. Humanitarian crises are thrown into sharper, heartbreaking relief when the subject is a helpless child. STAND's message was loud and clear: End this ongoing atroc- ity. Now. "Our hope is that if enough peo- ple voice their outrage over what is happening in Sudan, the interna- tional community will be compelled to act," LSA senior and co-president of the University's STAND chapter Maggie Glass said in an e-mail. STAND is a national organiza- tion sponsored by the Genocide Intervention network with indi- vidual university chapters. They are constantly recruiting and host some type of event every few weeks, including fundraisers, guest speak- ers and art exhibits. But how do events such as these play into the bigger picture?