‘Tosca’ reveals beauty of Puccini opera

The Seoul Metropolitan Opera Company’s first production of “Tosca,” one of the most frequently performed operas among Puccini’s works, reveals the beauty of the Italian composer’s best-known lyrical aria through the singers’ vocal ability, acting and the orchestra’s following of veteran conductor Mark Gibson.During a press rehearsal Tuesday prior to April 21-24, soprano Kim Eun-joo in the role of

April 20, 2011

East meets West in Edinburgh

Korean artists to take center stage at annual culture festivalIt is an annual festival in Edinburgh that draws hundreds of thousands of people for three weeks of music, dance, theater and opera in August. This year the world’s biggest cultural fest will seek to build a bridge between Asia and Europe by featuring artists from Korea, China and Japan, according to the organizer. The staging of the Ko

April 20, 2011

SBS drama ‘Brilliant Legacy’ wins platinum at Houston film festival

Korean broadcasters had a fine showing at the 44th Houston International Film Festival from April 8-17, with SBS programs winning six awards and KBS taking four. According to SBS, the drama “Brilliant Legacy,” which aired from April to July in 2009, featuring singer-actor Lee Seung-gi and actress Han Hyo-joo, won the Platinum Remi for TV Series Full Length. The drama depicts a relationship between

April 20, 2011

Hyun Bin assigned to western island

Popular television actor Hyun Bin has been ordered to serve on a frontline island. The actor, famous for recent appearance in hit television drama “Secret Garden,” joined the Marines last month for the mandatory military service.  Actor Hyun Bin in uniform from an official Marine Corps blog. (Yonhap News)Able-bodied South Korean men are required to serve 20 months in the military, and Hyun’s decis

April 19, 2011

N. Korea stages biggest magic show ever

PYONGYANG, North Korea (AP) ― Amid a burst of fireworks and a haze of smoke, a burly showman in a white sequined suit and gold lame cape appears with a flourish. Over the next 45 minutes, he appears to make a Pyongyang bus levitate and wriggles free from a box sent crashing to the stage through a ring of fire.This is magic North Korean-style performed in a show touted as the country’s biggest ever

April 19, 2011

Young acts supply most star power at Coachella

INDIO, California ― As the U.K. folk-revival quartet Mumford & Sons, all of whom are in their early 20s, stared out on the 70,000 people or so gathered to watch their set at the Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival on Saturday night, they couldn’t help but remark on how much had changed for them. “In 2008, I was a punter sneaking in here for Rage Against the Machine,” one of the Mumfords’ string

April 18, 2011

Animated documentaries tell real-life stories

Canadian director brings film about artists with Down syndrome to Women’s Film FestivalCanadian animation director Shira Avni makes films that are “in between genres.”“Animated documentaries don’t fit into doc festivals, nor do they fit into anime festivals,” Avni told The Korea Herald in Seoul last week. “But they get invited to both.”Her 2009 animated documentary, “Trying Your Own Shoes,” which

April 18, 2011

Legend to hold two concerts in Seoul

American R&B singer-songwriter John Legend said he was happy to hold two concerts in Seoul on Tuesday and Wednesday. His visit to Korea is the first since he performed at the Olympic Hall in 2009.“The fans were incredible on my last visit to Seoul. I’m glad we’re doing two shows this time. It’s going to be a lot of fun,” Legend said in an email interview.“I’ll perform a mix of songs from all of my

April 18, 2011

[Herald Interview] ‘Uncultured kids become uncultured adults’

Singer Yoo’s musical invited to open the Shanghai International Children’s Theater FestivalSinger Yoo Yeol did not really know that he would become a CEO of a musical company devoted to children until several years ago. However, since he established Yoo Yeol Company in 2006 to produce the children’s musical “The Bremen’s band,” the 50-year-old has drawn nearer and nearer to the thought that he cou

April 18, 2011

Maestro Chung urges state support for Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra

Maestro Chung Myung-whun, music director of the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra, said the Korean government should continually support the orchestra to help it advance to a world-class level.“If an orchestra wants to do better, it needs three things; the expertise of orchestra members, the expertise of the conductor and continuous support. In the history of Korean orchestras, none of them have really

April 17, 2011

New museum seeks harmony with surroundings

The architect-in-charge of the highly anticipated Seoul branch of the National Museum of Contemporary Art has admitted it will be smaller in size than had been originally planned. The museum is scheduled to open at the former Defense Security Command complex site, known as “Gimusa,” in central Seoul in 2013. “We are trying to find ways to secure as much space as possible underground that does not

April 17, 2011

Rain, No. 1 in TIME’s 100 poll

Rain, a South Korean actor and singer, has been voted the most influential person in the world in an online poll.In a poll conducted by TIME magazine, Rain ranked first in the voting for this year’s most influential people.The 2011 TIME 100 poll closed on April 14 with Rain in the lead. Taiwan’s Jay Chou and Britain’s Susan Boyle took second and third place. Rain received the highest number of vot

April 17, 2011

Events Calendar

 Exhibitions“Koo Bohnchang”: One of South Korea’s most renowned photographers, Koo Bohn-chang, is holding a solo exhibition at Kukje Gallery. Elements from his other series as well as his personal collections of eclectic objects are on display, giving the viewers a hint of Koo’s youth, attitudes toward photography and more. The exhibition runs through April 30 at Kukje Gallery in Sogyeok-dong, cen

April 15, 2011

Box Office

Norwegian Wood Opening April 21Drama. Directed by Tran Anh Hung. Upon hearing The Beatles’ song “Norwegian Wood,” a Japanese businessman reminisces about the intense romance of his university days in Tokyo, set against the turbulent student riots of the late 1960s. Toru Watanabe (Kenichi Matsuyama), an aloof university student at the time, had lost Kizuki -- his best friend in high school -- after

April 15, 2011

We all ‘Scream’ for Wes Craven’s latest

Horror movie fans haven’t had much to scream about lately, but that may be about to change.With “Scream 4,” which opens Friday, director Wes Craven pumps fresh blood into his landmark horror franchise set in the not-so-sleepy town of Woodsboro, Calif.Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox and David Arquette, veterans of the three previous “Scream” movies, return along with original writer Kevin Williamson,

April 15, 2011

Monaghan’s Midwestern roots keep her grounded despite fame

In the new thriller “Source Code,” Michelle Monaghan plays a Chicago woman described by the Jake Gyllenhaal character as “beautiful,” “decent” and “honest.” Beauty comes cheap in the movies. Hollywood boasts an eternally full quota of attractive nuisances, the nuisance part (separate from the beauty part) being the expressive limitations of those who achieve stardom without really having much star

April 15, 2011

e-readers infiltrate book clubs

Sandy Harris has long enjoyed laid-back conversations about literature with the other members of her book club. Lately, though, technology is complicating the routine: “We’re definitely divided into the Kindle people and the not Kindle people,” Harris says, alluding to Amazon’s popular digital reading device.Welcome to the changing landscape of book clubs, those ubiquitous living-room forums where

April 15, 2011

World‘s first 3D porn film’ opens in Hong Kong

HONG KONG (AFP) -- Movie-goers flocked to see what is billed as the world’s first 3-D porn film as it opened to packed cinemas across Hong Kong on Thursday, with some screenings selling out completely.Loosely based on a piece of classical Chinese erotic literature, the $3.2-million Cantonese-language movie “3-D Sex and Zen: Extreme Ecstasy“ features orgies, swinging and some very graphic sex scene

April 15, 2011

Rome’s bloody, art-loving emperor Nero in new show

ROME (AFP) ― It’s safe to say that the Emperor Nero ― the subject of a major new exhibition and archaeology trail that opened in the Roman Forum this week ― has always had something of an image problem.He has gone down in the history books as the man who had his domineering mother Agrippina killed, kicked his pregnant wife Poppaea to death and ― as legend would have it ― played his lyre on a hill

April 14, 2011

The Radio Dept. to make Korean debut

Landing fresh from a performance at California’s Coachella music festival, Swedish indie pop band The Radio Dept. are to play their first ever Korean gig next week. The band, whose music was featured in Sofia Coppola’s “Marie Antoinette,” are excited to play for their fans here, singer Johan Duncanson told The Korea Herald by phone from a recording space in Stockholm, in the midst of rehearsals fo

April 14, 2011