The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Arts
Thursday, November 29, 2018— 6
STORAGE FOR STUDENTS
studying abroad. Indoor, clean, safe,
closest to campus. AnnArborStor‑
age.com or (734)‑663‑0690.
By C.C. Burnikel
©2018 Tribune Content Agency, LLC
11/29/18
Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle
Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis
11/29/18
ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:
Release Date: Thursday, November 29, 2018
ACROSS
1 Goat quote
4 Monorail users
9 Driving range
instructors
13 Central cooling
systs.
14 Kick
15 She converted
to Judaism after
marrying her
comedy partner
16 Study of a
portentous
woodchuck?
18 Opposition group
19 Submits returns
online
20 Prevents legally
22 Hoppy brew, for
short
23 Study of tears?
24 Humanities maj.
26 Dash gauge
29 Slovenia
neighbor, to the
IOC
30 Player of The
Bride in “Kill Bill”
films, familiarly
31 Made a blunder
33 Take suddenly
37 Small store
39 Fuzzy fruit
41 Exercise in a
studio
42 Android
operating system
named for a
cookie
43 Trusty mount
45 Shaving cream
type
46 “American
Experience”
network
49 Bart’s bus driver
50 Draw upon
51 Study of
common
articles?
55 That woman
57 Echo Dot-waking
words
58 Cornell’s home
61 Others, in Cuba
62 Study of hiking
choices?
65 Tells all
66 “At the Movies”
co-host
67 Shepherd’s pie
piece
68 Craftsy website
69 Brother in
Roman lore
70 Give a darn
DOWN
1 It may have an
“X”
2 Physical
discomfort
3 “Whatever!”
4 “Missed your
chance!”
5 Romeo or Juliet
6 “A Sorta
Fairytale” singer
Tori
7 New car stat
8 More timid
9 Study of literary
tools?
10 7:11, e.g.
11 Circular gasket
12 Impertinent
15 The Masters, e.g.
17 Carmex target
21 MoMA location
23 Puppy plaything
24 Heavyweight
fight?
25 “Rubáiyát” poet
27 First rescue boat
28 Football Hall of
Famer Carter
32 Count calories
34 Officers who
follow their own
code
35 Many months
36 Christian of “The
Big Short”
38 Study of lids and
caps?
40 Matching group
44 Throw back
some Absolut,
say
47 Sanctify
48 Chi __
51 “All __ in favor ... ”
52 Bandleader’s cue
53 Works for
54 Rubbernecker
56 Evil film computer
58 Thing
59 Dead-end sign
word
60 Screenwriter
James
63 Wartime prez
64 Veer off course
Classifieds
Call: #734-418-4115
Email: dailydisplay@gmail.com
SERVICES
This past weekend, I went
to see the Wheelhouse Theater
Company’s
revival
of
Kurt
Vonnegut’s
“Happy
Birthday,
Wanda June” in New York City. I
am a huge fan of Vonnegut’s books
and I wanted to see if Vonnegut’s
unique writing style would transfer
well to the stage. And transfer it
did, as the play was filled with
obscure 1970s cultural references
and Vonnegut’s signature dark,
absurdist humor.
As I left the play, I began to
piece apart my thoughts on the
work. I had definitely enjoyed the
play, but I was also very confused,
struggling to understand both
the intricacies of the plot and the
meaning of the work itself. I would
definitely recommend the work to
a friend, but I’m not sure if I could
ever summarize for anyone what
happened in the work.
I realized that I almost enjoyed
the play because it was confusing —
the complexity and irregularity of
the plot forcing me to concentrate
and engage more with the work.
It had jumped between memories
and actual events, between Heaven
and Earth. It jumped all over the
place, and much of my energy as
an audience member was spent on
keeping up.
The work was also thematically
ambiguous. I know it focused on
hypermasculinity and death. It
juxtaposed the horror we express
over car accidents with the
excitement and awe we express
over wartime deaths caused by
American
soldiers,
but
these
themes weren’t developed. They
were frequent, recurrent aspects
of the plot, but they never moved
past that.
This wasn’t my first experience
with complexity on the stage.
If anything, this play was less
abstract than some other works
I am familiar with. Compared
to many of Samuel Beckett’s
plays, for example, this play
was accessible on the surface.
Conversations between characters
flowed logically and characters’
motivations
and
emotions
were frequently made explicit.
Compared to Tony Kushner’s
“Angels in America,” for example,
this play followed a small cast of
six in a single-room set.
And
this
wasn’t
my
first
experience with complexity in
Vonnegut’s work. Compared to
“The Sirens of Titan,” the first
Vonnegut novel I read, this work
was remarkably static. It never
moved to any unfamiliar planets or
dealt with any fictitious, alienistic
creatures. What then, I asked
myself, was making this work so
difficult for me to fully understand?
“Happy
Birthday,
Wanda
June,”
I
eventually
realized,
refuses to conform to the linear
conception of time inherent to
the performing arts. Almost all
works of performance art involve
development over the course of
time — much as our lives inevitably
evolve over time, so do works
of performance art. In works of
theater, this involves characters
that change or refuse to change as
the world around them changes as
well.
Yet Vonnegut specifically avoids
this linear transformation. None of
the characters in the play develop,
they only react to the outside forces
that bring them together and
pull them apart. The work darts
between memories and the present
without any noticeable changes
occuring in any of the characters.
And though the viewer can easily
understand this concept on the
surface, larger thematic meaning
behind this stasis gets lost behind
the alinear intricacies of the plot.
This alinear conception of time
is not new to Vonnegut. He does
this frequently in his novels to
great success. In “Slaughterhouse-
Five,” for example, events do
not happen chronologically and
characters profess not to believe in
chronological conceptions of time.
“It is just an illusion we have here
on earth,” says the main character
at one point, “that one moment
follows another one, like beads on
a string, and that once a moment is
gone it is gone forever.”
Others
artists
have
taken
inspiration from Vonnegut in
applying this structural alinearity
to
performance
art.
Andrew
Norman, for example, composed
his orchestral work “Unstuck”
based on the concept of time laid
out
in
“Slaughterhouse-Five.”
When I first discovered this
piece, I was fascinated by how
it challenged my perception of
time — I knew the recording of
the piece lasted nine minutes and
33 seconds on YouTube though I
couldn’t imagine that I had only
been listening for around nine and
a half minutes.
Norman achieves this effect
by jumping between disparate
musical ideas without transitional
material. He constantly varies
the tempo and gestural pacing of
his ideas, preventing the listener
from
becoming
comfortable
with any specific conception of
time. He also carefully develops
the relationships between ideas
throughout the piece without
developing the ideas themselves.
The result is jagged and complex,
violating the steady, tempo-based
conception of time endemic to
contemporary orchestral music.
It is an incredibly complex piece
to fully understand even as it
is an incredibly simple piece to
consume on the surface. I believe
that I could listen to the piece for
months without ever finding it to
be predictable or routine.
Another example of an alinear
conception of time that I like is
Christopher Nolan’s “Memento.”
For those unfamiliar with the
movie, it follows main character
Leonard Shelby as he investigates
the murder of his wife. Shelby
suffers from anterograde amnesia,
the inability to form new memories,
and he resorts to tattooing himself
to maintain some memory of his
investigation as it progresses.
In the beginning, this non-
chronological
structure
is
extremely confusing. Events are
being portrayed in black-and-
white and in color — two separate
plot lines that don’t seem to
connect. As the movie progresses,
however, the structure of the
movie slowly comes into focus: The
black-and-white footage depicts
events chronologically while the
color footage depicts events in
reverse chronologically.
As with the other alinear works,
this proves to be extremely off-
putting
to
first-time
viewers.
To obsessive viewers like me,
however, it creates ambiguities
that leave the work open to endless
analysis.
So what makes these works
successful
even
as
“Happy
Birthday, Wanda June” fails?
What makes some alinear works
successful and others confusingly
unsuccessful?
What
defining
feature separates the good alinear
works from the bad?
Alinear conceptions of time,
I realized, are only successful
when they still exist within the
confines
of
larger
structural
linearity. To put it in simpler terms,
alinear conceptions of time only
work when contrasted against
linear structures of long-term
development.
The performing arts, after all,
are confined and defined by time.
There is something beautiful, I
find, in the fragile impermanence
of these artforms — they exist
over the course of an hour or two;
they must be experienced over
the course of an evening. The best
alinear art creates connections
between disparate moments in
time, allowing for development
to take place over the course of
a work though time may not be
contributing to this development.
And in this regard, “Happy
Birthday, Wanda June” failed to
deliver. I felt no different leaving
the theater than I did after
witnessing the first scene. The
entire play was a wash of individual
scenes
with
no
overarching
concept — I left the play noting no
overall development that extended
beyond any individual scene. And
without this development, the
work failed to move beyond the
realm of the absurd to the realm
of the powerful. And this, after all,
is the ultimate goal of every work
of art — to present some aspect
of the human condition that we
as audience members can relate
to, allowing us to come to new
realizations as we reflect on the
lives of others.
Alinearity in the
performing arts
DAILY COMMUNITY CULTURE COLUMN
SAMMY
SUSSMAN
VS lacks body diversity
STYLE NOTEBOOK
ABC
Each year as Nov. rolls around,
the entertainment and fashion
industry begin to buzz with
chatter of the much anticipated
Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show.
Over the years, the annual
show has been characterized
as a night filled with glamour,
beauty, confidence and gorgeous
pieces of lingerie. However, the
show is also synonymous with
advocating the perfect, dream-
worthy bodies of its models, be it
the original Angel Adriana Lima
or rising stars such as Kelsey
Merritt and Sui He. While
Victoria’s Secret prides itself
in having changed over time
and increasing the diversity
of
cultures
represented
on
the ramp, one aspect remains
a constant: the body types.
Recently, especially after this
year’s fashion show on Nov. 8,
Victoria’s Secret has garnered
immense criticism for not being
more body positive and for its
lack of size diversity.
The Victoria’s Secret Fashion
Show is known for its rigorous
selection process of the 60 or
so women who will take the
stage, but all of them share the
same body with their slender
thighs,
flat
stomachs
and
muscles toned to perfection.
They have a body that most, if
not all, women envy and desire
at some point or another in their
lives. Every single one of these
models
works
tremendously
hard
towards
maintaining
herself, and there is nothing
wrong with that, but the issue
lies in the company’s resistance
towards inclusivity. For while
having Gigi Hadid or Jasmine
Tookes walk the show is a sight
to see and builds the exclusive
image of the brand as one that is
desired by all, it also propagates
the unhealthy thinking that
only thin can be beautiful and
sexy. As a result, it continues to
feed the growing insecurities
of women and especially young
adults, including so many of us,
across the world, irrespective of
whether we are already thin or
not.
The constant reiteration and
glamification of a particular
size by the fashion industry
sends many of us thinking that
we will never be good enough
if we don’t have a 24-inch
waist or a thigh gap. This line
of thinking is what is putting
our generation and those in
the future at a higher risk of
suffering from eating and body
image disorders, and companies
such as Victoria’s Secret are
not helping. Furthermore, the
build-up to the show is equally
extreme due to the social
media presence of the brand.
Interviews and videos of the
models
outline
the
intense
regime of multiple workouts
in a day and limited diets that
they engage in to reach Angel
status. But they do not caution
the risks that are associated
with obsessing over one’s body
type, nor do they stress the
importance of accepting your
own body.
My complaint with Victoria’s
Secret is not that they are
casting women of a particular
size. Instead, my issue is that
they are not casting women
of other sizes. It is not an an
either/or situation, because one
woman should feel as good and
confident in what she wears as
any other. As a business student,
I acknowledge that at the end
of the day, Victoria’s Secret is
focusing on the bottom line,
wanting to earn the highest
possible profits. If this mold
of their fashion show works
and brings them more money,
then there is no reason for the
firm to change from a business
standpoint. However, the famed
reputation of the company and
its leading position comes with
a certain moral responsibility
to fairly represent its consumer
base, which is not limited to
those who meet what are often
unrealistic
body
standards.
Victoria’s
Secret
needs
to
acknowledge that there is a
problem, and if they do want
women of all sizes to shop at
Victoria’s Secret, then it is high
time that their actions reflect
that.
However, the tragedy is that
the issue runs much deeper
than just a single fashion show
held each year. The truth of the
matter is that there are so many
brands apart from Victoria’s
Secret
that
simply
do
not
produce garments larger than
a particular size, inadvertently
telling many women that they
are not wanted. Some brands
like
Brandy
Melville
only
produce clothes of a single size
which, too, is limited to an
extra-small or a small at the
most. Such conscious decisions
tend to have adverse effects on
the mental health of young girls,
especially when these brands
are the ones that are perceived
as popular due to being worn
and promoted by influencers
who the girls look up to and
emulate.
The ratio of companies that
are body positive to those that
are not is both astounding
and saddening, but being body
positive does not simply mean
having a “plus size” section.
Rather, this sense of inclusivity
needs
to
be
demonstrated
through each aspect of the
brand, be it their marketing
strategy or even the pricing of
products. Often, in many stores,
like Banana Republic, sizes
apart from “regular” tend to
be more expensive and hence
reduce accessibility for so many
consumers.
Body positivity has come
a long way with change that
is now visible. Fashion icons
such as Ashley Graham and
Tess Holliday are embracing
their curves, becoming ultra-
successful
in
the
fashion
industry and inspiring millions
along the way. Brands like
Aerie
have
recognized
the
importance of this movement
and have focused on creating
more inclusive campaigns in
terms of cultures, sizes and even
disabilities.
But is this enough? The
reason I ask is that there still
exists a distinct misalignment
between the views of the fashion
industry and its audience — but
companies are not the only
ones to blame. Brands seek to
deliver and fulfill demands,
and hence the lack of diversity
is the result of the continual
approval given to smaller sizes
while reprimanding others that
don’t fit the bill. As a society,
we have started the journey
toward
true
inclusivity
in
some measure, but need to yet
encourage greater love for our
own bodies irrespective of the
size, color or anything else for
that matter. On the other hand,
brands need to move with time
and realize that in the current
PRIYDARSHINI GOUTHI
Daily Arts Writer
climate, consumers are not
going to continue accepting
what comes their way and will
demand
change.
Victoria’s
Secret has been seeing a decline
in financial performance in
recent years, and with CEO Jan
Singer resigning after this year’s
fashion show following chief
marketing officer Ed Razek’s
rather uninformed comments
on how “No one had any interest
in it, still don’t” when referring
to the plus size lingerie market,
it is safe to say that the brand
has taken a hit.
The
fashion
industry
continues to be one of the most
fast-paced and evolving global
communities that is filled with
talent of all kinds, but it isn’t
perfect. As young adults who
are now the prime market of the
industry, the responsibility to
call out what’s missing and push
for change
falls onto us.
I don’t mean that we need to
boycott brands or stop shopping
at every store that isn’t equally
diverse, but we do need to be
more aware and at least address
the issue at hand. We could
do this by speaking out in any
form, be it through social media
or
initiating
conversations
about the problems the industry
faces, immaterial of whether we
are personally affected by them
or not.