Brow Beat

Russell Crowe in Les Miserables

© 2012 - Universal Pictures

Recently, pop singer Adam Lambert unleashed a series of tweets critiquing the vocal performances in the film adaptation of Les Misérables. “Visually impressive with great emotional performances,” he said. “But the score suffered massively with great actors PRETENDING to be singers.” Russell Crowe, who plays brooding antagonist Inspector Javert—and who has received his fair share of vocal critique—responded with equanimity, tweeting that while he understood the singer’s view, director Tom Hooper wanted the live singing to be  “raw and real.”

It’s true that the movie’s singing is more “raw” than it might have been with more polished, professional singers in the cast. But the idea that such singing is more “real” reflects a stigma that seems out of place when discussing a genre as full of artifice as the movie musical. Lambert argued on Twitter that Hooper should have cast better singers, but there’s another method that has worked brilliantly in the past and should not be frowned upon: Movie musicals should go back to letting its stars act, while dubbing their vocals using trained vocalists.

In a new issue of Sci-Fi Now magazine, Mark Frost, the co-creator, with David Lynch, ofTwin Peaks, says that the return of the show, canceled after just two seasons, is “something we talk about from time to time… If we ever do decide to move forward,” he adds, “I know we have a rich trove to draw from.” Those quotes come from the website Moviehole, which fans the flames by reminding readers of an interview from a couple years back with Bob Engels, who wrote several episodes (and also co-wrote the Twin Peaks movie, Fire Walk With Me). “I think if we could figure out a way to do” a third season, Engels said, “I think everybody would have fun going back… I think, all things being equal, they’d say ‘I’m in.’ I certainly would.”

The Frost interview gets more specific, speculating that “the third season could realistically be set 25 years on… picking up from the original’s iconic dream sequence between Cooper, Laura and the backwards-speaking dwarf, that took place in the original series 25 years into the future.”

Not penne, but tortiglioni alla vodka

L.V. Anderson for Slate

When you’re making pizza or lasagna, your formula for tomato sauce is so basic you don’t really need a recipe: sauté chopped onion and garlic in a little olive oil, add chopped or diced tomatoes, simmer until thick, la fine. Additional ingredients are unnecessary, because your sauce is destined to be layered with other exciting, flavorful foodstuffs, like vegetables, meat, herbs, and cheese.

This is not the case when you plan to toss tomato sauce with plain pasta. Pairing minimalist tomato sauce with spaghetti can make a decent meal if all the ingredients are excellent. But even then it’s a rather Spartan dish without the bolstering benefits of fat and protein. Such asceticism, tolerable in summer—when one has the advantage of garden-fresh paste tomatoes—simply won’t do in winter, when your best fruit option is canned San Marzanos (or underbred, but BPA-free, boxed tomatoes).

There is a better wintertime way to make pasta and tomato sauce, and it depends on vodka—which heightens the flavor of the tomatoes—as well as cream, butter, and Parmesan cheese.

If you’ve never lived in Philadelphia, you may not know that every New Year’s Day—going back, in some form, for centuries—the city holds a carnival-esque event with roots in European and minstrelsy traditions. It’s called the Mummers Parade. And the 2013 edition, like many before it, has generated controversy. This year, the primary target for criticism (though certainly not the only target) was a musical skit featuring an apparently all-white group advocating against the outsourcing of jobs by dressing in stereotypical Native American and Indian garb. As Philadelphian Dan McQuade wrote yesterday, the event has always been deliberately subversive and provocative. But, as he himself asked, does that make this sort of thing OK?

Back when he was at Vulture, my Slate colleague Dan Kois argued that people who don't watch TV shows when they first air, "but still demand that we respect their right to remain strategically ignorant, are the real spoilers—the ones whose slow pace keep us from enjoying the postshow discussion as much as we enjoy the shows themselves."

I agree, more or less. And so, it seems, do Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein ofPortlandia, as evidenced by the great skit from Season 3 (which begins Friday) below. There are some real (non-Portlandia) spoilers in this clip, so don't watch it if, for instance, you still insist on not knowing what happens in Usual Suspects or on the fifth season of The Wire.

Comingsoon.net

Pixar has reportedly released concept art from some of the feature films it plans to release over the next three years. While the studio has spent a lot of time on sequels lately, these sketches suggest that Pixar isn’t going to stop pushing itself creatively any time soon.

Perhaps the most interesting of the works-in-progress is a yet-to-be-named film centered around the festivities of the Mexican holiday Dia de los Muertos. Set to be released sometime in 2016, the warm color palette and rougher quality of the drawing hints that the animators may depart from the crisp, sharp style of their previous efforts—though how closely this concept drawing will match the eventual film is hard to say. (An email to Pixar about the art was not returned.)

Fred Rogers sang his own birthday song on Mister Rogers' Neighborhood

Vimeo

Creative Commons, the nonprofit organization behind (among other things) those popular online copyright licenses, recently turned 10 years old. To mark the occasion, the Free Music Archive has launched a contest to replace the “Happy Birthday” song with a new tune that people could use for free.

The traditional song is not in the public domain: It was acquired in 1998 by Warner Music Group, which reportedly collects “upward of $2 million a year from film and TV fees off the song.” As Paul Collins demonstrated in Slate in 2011, that copyright claim is highly dubious, but it has not yet been successfully disputed, in part because it is probably cheaper to simply pay the fee than to challenge the claim in court.

A display of Nate Sanders' collection of Oscar statuettes before his auction company sold them online.

Photo by Toby Canham/Getty Images

This year, members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences can cast their votes for Oscar nominees electronically—and what is supposed to make the voting process easier has reportedly been a nightmare for some. Multiple problems stemming from the online process have been noted since voting began on December 17, and some are calling for an extension of the January 3^rd deadline due to their inability to successfully submit their ballots.

How serious are these problems? Scott Feinberg was able to speak to several members, most of whom seemed less than computer-savvy. One got locked out of his account when he couldn’t remember his password correctly, for instance, while another said he needed the help of his son to submit his ballot.

Which is a reminder that the Academy is not exactly young.