No Judging About Gay Players on Basketball Courts

Ozier Muhammad/The New York Times At the West Fourth Street basketball courts in Manhattan, which draw players from all over the city, Jason Collins’s coming out raised few eyebrows.

The West Fourth Street basketball courts in Greenwich Village, known far and wide as the Cage, draw some of the toughest and best streetball players from across the city. And on Tuesday, as the sporting world absorbed the news that the journeymen N.B.A. center Jason Collins had come out as gay, the denizens of the Cage said, by and large, that it made no difference to them.

“His personal life is his own,” said a 60-year-old man who goes by the name Coach and has been playing and coaching at West Fourth Street for 30 years. “Nobody can tell me who in the morning I’m going to get up and smell their breath. We’ve raised gay people here. No jokes, no discrimination. I’ll critique your game but not your personal life.”

Across the East River at the Rodney Park North courts on the south side of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, the reaction was much the same.

Here are some voices from the two courts:

From the Cage:

“There are a lot of gay players here but the only ones who admit it are the girls. But, still, today is better than yesterday for them.” - Vince, a coach and player from Jersey City in his 50s.

“It’s a great start, but they need a bigger star who’s more relevant to come out to really make a difference.” â€" Michael Watson, 23, who lives in Manhattan and works in a nightclub.

“I’d still play with him. I wouldn’t shower with him, though.” â€" Joseph Washington, 24, of Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn.

“I just finished playing with a gay guy here. It doesn’t change anything. He’s not changing the United States anyway, because everybody is going to have different views.” â€" Stephen Williams, 22, of the Bronx.

“He’s his own person. You got to be true to yourself sometimes. If he’s O.K. with it, everyone else should be,” â€" Shariff Webb, 21, of Queens.

From the Rodney Park courts in Williamsburg:

“It’s just something he’s had throughout his childhood, I don’t see nothing wrong with that. This is what Hollywood, the media, celebrities, does. But really it’s no big deal.” â€" Wady Capellan, 19.

“As long as he respects boundaries, it shouldn’t affect the basketball court.” â€" Bill Baez, 19.

“This is the South Side. We see gay people walking around all the time. It’s normal. If you’re gay, you’re gay.” â€" Ruder Perez, 17.

The TV Teaser That Depresses

It’s only Tuesday, but we can already declare a winner in the competition for the Most Attention-Getting Press Release Teaser of the Week. It’s Animal Planet, which on Tuesday morning sent around an e-mail with this in the subject field: “The Search Is on for the Best Hooker in America.”

Of course, Animal Planet also wins the prize for Biggest Press Release Letdown of the Week with the same e-mail, which it turns out is plugging a fishing show called “Top Hooker.” But for a brief moment, the mind raced with questions. How? What format? Would there be auditions? Who would judge such a contest? Perhaps the men from the repulsive Showtime series “Gigolos,” which claims to be a reality series about sex-for-hire studs?

The main question, though, is, Would someone actually make a talent competition show for prostitutes? And the dismaying answer is, do you even have to ask? It’s amazing no one has done so already.
Prostitution has certainly made its way onto television. HBO’s icky “Cathouse” franchise, about the Moonlite Bunny Ranch brothel in Nevada, has been going for years. Cinemax has “Working Girls,” a “Cathouse” spinoff of sorts.

These and other sex-fantasy charades, though, contain no more “reality” than “Gigolos” does, since central elements of the prostitution world â€" drug addiction, disease, violence, sexual slavery â€" are nowhere to be found in them. Yeah, “America’s Best Hooker” sounds like a terrific idea for a reality competition series, until you think about it too long.

Searching for a Fierce and Entirely Unwelcome Fish, the Snakehead

Todd Heisler/The New York Times Anthony Lugo fished in the Harlem Meer on Tuesday, near a sign warning anyone who catches a northern snakehead, which is an invasive species, not to throw it back in the water.

Jack Grubaugh, via The Commercial Appeal/University of Memphis, via Associated Press The northern snakehead, referred to by some as fishzilla, is a voracious predator, eating just about anything in its path.

The Harlem Meer, a lake in the northeastern corner of Central Park, has long been a refuge for city people looking to indulge their inner Huck Finns, whiling away a lazy summer afternoon fishing for bass, yellow perch and black crappies.

But late last week, signs started popping up around the lake notifying anglers of the arrival of an intruder. The dreaded northern snakehead, a fierce predator common in the rivers and lakes of Asia but considered an invasive species in American waters, had been spotted.

The warning to anglers was clear: If you catch this fish, do not release it. Contact the authorities immediately. It does not belong and could radically alter the local fish population.

The snakehead is a relentless and efficient predator that devours just about everything in its path â€" fish, frogs, crayfish, beetles and aquatic insects. And it does not meet death easily; it is able to survive under ice or live on land for days in damp conditions. It has been called Fishzilla.

“I would describe them as the freshwater fish equivalent of a tank,” said Ron P. Swegman, a fly-fishing expert and author whose writings about fishing in Central Park include an essay, “Bright Fish, Big City.”

“They are heavily armed,” he said, “strong, and can cover almost any territory, aquatic and â€" at least for short periods â€" on land.”

Anytime something truly wild makes an appearance in this city built by man, it attracts attention. Give the creature a torpedo-shaped body that can grow to more than three-feet long, a jaw that stretches back well beyond its eyes and a reputation for being both a voracious eater and prodigious breeder and you can set off, well, a feeding frenzy of curiosity.

Mr. Swegman said that the local fishing community was obsessed with the fish, with regulars even wagering on who would be the first to catch a snakehead.

When he was fishing with a friend on the lake Friday, just as the signs started to appear, the friend claimed to have hooked one, reeling it in close enough to see, before it escaped. “That is a true story,” Mr. Swegman said.

On Tuesday night, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation will begin a survey of the lake. They will try to verify the sightings, determine how many snakeheads there might be and gauge the threat it poses to other wildlife.

State wildlife officials will use an electro-fishing boat,which releases electric current just beneath the vessel to temporarily stun nearby fish. The fish can then be scooped up in nets and examined on shore.

The results of the survey will not be finished until later in the week, said Melissa Cohen, a regional fisheries manager for the department.

“We got a call few months ago that an angler might have caught one,” she said, but that report was unverified. More recent reports prompted park officials to put up the signs.

If snakeheads have established themselves in the lake, she said, someone probably released the species into the lake, perhaps hoping to create a population for later fishing.

The northern snakehead is common in the lakes and streams of China, Korea and Russia but they are not native in American waters. The threat posed by the fish should not be underestimated, wildlife officials said.

The possession, sale and transport of live snakeheads was prohibited by federal law in 2002.

However, they remain a persistent presence in Chinese fish markets across the city, officials said. For many, the fish is prized not only as a meaty, savory ingredient in stew, but for its supposed healing properties.

After the seizure of 353 live snakeheads at Kennedy International Airport on the eve of the 2010 Chinese New Year, an investigation led to the arrest of a local wholesaler in 2011 who illegally imported thousands of snakeheads and sold them from a shop in Brooklyn.

Ms. Cohen said a single snakehead turned up in the Harlem Meer in 2008 and that the fish has recently established a presence in Meadow Lake in Queens.

It remains unclear why the snakeheads in Queens have not decimated the other fish population, but Ms. Cohen speculated that it could have to do with the relatively high salinity of the water. The Meer has a much lower salinity level and therefore could be more conducive to the snakehead.

Since there is not much likelihood that the fish will migrate out of the lake, Ms. Cohen said, if snakeheads are found they will be monitored rather than eradicated.

That is a less aggressive approach than authorities took in 2008, when they found the snakehead in Ridgebury Lake and Catlin Creek in upstate New York. Authorities, fearing that the fish could migrate into the waters of the Hudson River and wreak havoc in the ecosystem across the state, used an aquatic pesticide to kill the snakeheads.

Still, the snakeheads in the Harlem Meer threaten many other fish in what has become one of the city’s most popular fishing holes since it was renovated in the 1990s.

“It has a very wild profile,” Mr. Swegman said. “There are reed beds, lots of curves, nooks and crannies. It is not like you are fishing a swimming pool, it actually has the profile of a really natural lake.”

And the signs warning of the snakehead lent the Meer a touch more of the wild.

On Tuesday, many of the regulars had a tale to tell about a snakefish spotting. And while some hoped to be the first to catch one, others preferred to keep their distance.

Dwayne Coleman, 53, said he preferred more docile fish like bluegills, bass and carp.

“I don’t want to see them!” he said, as he tossed a sunfish back in the lake. “Scared of ‘em.”

If he lands one of the sharp-toothed invaders?

He smiled.

“I’m going to run,” he said.

Vivian Yee contributed reporting.

Next Concert Season at the Met Will Include Music in Galleries

The major shift of emphasis that the Metropolitan Museum made in its concert series this season, the first programmed entirely by Limor Tomer, as general manager of concerts and lectures, will carry at least through another season and seemingly far into the future, Ms. Tomer announced on Tuesday. She has largely abandoned the traditional series of classical recitals and chamber concerts in the Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium in favor of nontraditional events related to Met exhibitions and, in many cases next season, actually taking place in the galleries.

The “gallery-hopping,” as a news release calls it, begins on Sept. 17 and 18, with “The Grand Tour,” celebrating completion of the museum’s new European Paintings Galleries, 1250-1800, with four early-music performances, successively featuring the ensembles Tenet, Dark Horse and Quicksilver and the harpsichordist Jory Vinikour, each in a different gallery. It continues on Sept. 28 with a day devoted to the composer and performer John Zorn (who will celebrate his 60th birthday on Sept. 2).

Mr. Zorn, an inveterate Metgoer since childhood, says he has drawn inspiration from a number of specific artworks there, and his day will consist of 11 performances in 11 different rooms, in some cases before the very objects that inspired him. This will allow attendees, Ms. Tomer said, “to see the Met through John Zorn’s eyes,” not to mention hearing it though his ears.

A cycle of Bartok’s six string quartets by the Calder Quartet in the Rogers Auditorium might at first glance seem a throwback to the old regime. But the works are presented in three concerts intended to show “Bartok’s debt to the human voice,” in Ms. Tomer’s words, variously including a work by the Hungarian composer Peter Eotvos and performances by David Longstreth, the founder of the rock band Dirty Projectors, and the innovative Czech vocalist, violinist and composer Iva Bittova.

The Met will also plunge into the world of chamber opera, and the artists in residence will be the new-music ensemble Alarm Will Sound.

Next Concert Season at the Met Will Include Music in Galleries

The major shift of emphasis that the Metropolitan Museum made in its concert series this season, the first programmed entirely by Limor Tomer, as general manager of concerts and lectures, will carry at least through another season and seemingly far into the future, Ms. Tomer announced on Tuesday. She has largely abandoned the traditional series of classical recitals and chamber concerts in the Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium in favor of nontraditional events related to Met exhibitions and, in many cases next season, actually taking place in the galleries.

The “gallery-hopping,” as a news release calls it, begins on Sept. 17 and 18, with “The Grand Tour,” celebrating completion of the museum’s new European Paintings Galleries, 1250-1800, with four early-music performances, successively featuring the ensembles Tenet, Dark Horse and Quicksilver and the harpsichordist Jory Vinikour, each in a different gallery. It continues on Sept. 28 with a day devoted to the composer and performer John Zorn (who will celebrate his 60th birthday on Sept. 2).

Mr. Zorn, an inveterate Metgoer since childhood, says he has drawn inspiration from a number of specific artworks there, and his day will consist of 11 performances in 11 different rooms, in some cases before the very objects that inspired him. This will allow attendees, Ms. Tomer said, “to see the Met through John Zorn’s eyes,” not to mention hearing it though his ears.

A cycle of Bartok’s six string quartets by the Calder Quartet in the Rogers Auditorium might at first glance seem a throwback to the old regime. But the works are presented in three concerts intended to show “Bartok’s debt to the human voice,” in Ms. Tomer’s words, variously including a work by the Hungarian composer Peter Eotvos and performances by David Longstreth, the founder of the rock band Dirty Projectors, and the innovative Czech vocalist, violinist and composer Iva Bittova.

The Met will also plunge into the world of chamber opera, and the artists in residence will be the new-music ensemble Alarm Will Sound.

Reunited Neutral Milk Hotel Announces Limited Tour Dates

Neutral Milk Hotel, the 1990s indie-rock band known for its experimental sound, obscure lyrics and cult following, is reuniting for the first time in over a decade for a series of shows next fall, the band announced on its Web site.

The band went into hibernation after releasing “In the Aeroplane Over the Sea” in 1998 and finishing a tour to promote the album. For years, the band’s frontman, Jeff Mangum, was a recluse in the indie-rock world, but he resurfaced for some solo tours over the last two years. Now it appears he has reassembled the lineup of the band that emerged after 1996’s “On Avery Island”: Scott Spillane, Jeremy Barnes and Julian Koster.

The band says some of the proceeds from the concerts will go to Children of the Blue Sky, a charity that helps street children in Mongolia. So far the tour is very limited: The first two shows will be held in Athens, Ga., at the 40 Watt Club and a third will take place in the Thomas Wolfe Auditorium in Asheville, N.C. Two more shows are planned in Taipei, Taiwan, and Tokyo in late November and early December.

An Evening with Salter, Ford — and Bascombe

Nancy Crampton James Salter, left, speaking with Richard Ford at the 92nd Street Y on Monday night.

The acclaimed novelists Richard Ford and James Salter shared the stage at the 92nd Street Y on Monday night, accompanied by a surprise guest â€"Frank Bascombe.

Mr. Ford appeared first, sending a charge through the crowd when he announced he would be reading from a new story starring Bascombe, which he started writing in January. He called the story “Falling Forward.”

Bascombe, often compared to John Updike’s Rabbit Angstrom, another American male searching his way through life over the course of several novels, has appeared in three books: “The Sportswriter,” “Independence Day” and “The Lay of the Land.”

In 2007, Mr. Ford told an interviewer, “This is the end of this particular movement in my life, to write about Frank and New Jersey. I’m not going to do that anymore.”

Last seen, Bascombe was 55 and the country was living in the turbulent wake of the Bush-Gore election. In the excerpt Mr. Ford presented on Monday night, Bascombe is 67, retired from the realty business, narrating his life in the weeks before Christmas and after Hurricane Sandy in 2012.

Mr. Salter, 87 and in fighting shape, read an extended passage from “All That Is,” his first novel in nearly 35 years, and afterward sat with Mr. Ford to discuss their craft and answer a few questions from the audience. As they settled into their chairs in front of a large audience that had already given Mr. Salter two sustained ovations, Mr. Ford said, “So I guess the whole ‘writer’s writer’ thing is over now?”

“I hope so,” Mr. Salter replied.

Mr. Ford said that he regularly feels his novels are too long, and that the great American novels are on the short side, including Mr. Salter’s earlier works and books like “So Long, See You Tomorrow” by William Maxwell and “The Great Gatsby.”

“I am definitely miserly in trying to write a novel,” Mr. Salter said. “I don’t have an abundance of it. I’m trying to write longer, if you’re trying to write shorter.”

An Evening with Salter, Ford — and Bascombe

Nancy Crampton James Salter, left, speaking with Richard Ford at the 92nd Street Y on Monday night.

The acclaimed novelists Richard Ford and James Salter shared the stage at the 92nd Street Y on Monday night, accompanied by a surprise guest â€"Frank Bascombe.

Mr. Ford appeared first, sending a charge through the crowd when he announced he would be reading from a new story starring Bascombe, which he started writing in January. He called the story “Falling Forward.”

Bascombe, often compared to John Updike’s Rabbit Angstrom, another American male searching his way through life over the course of several novels, has appeared in three books: “The Sportswriter,” “Independence Day” and “The Lay of the Land.”

In 2007, Mr. Ford told an interviewer, “This is the end of this particular movement in my life, to write about Frank and New Jersey. I’m not going to do that anymore.”

Last seen, Bascombe was 55 and the country was living in the turbulent wake of the Bush-Gore election. In the excerpt Mr. Ford presented on Monday night, Bascombe is 67, retired from the realty business, narrating his life in the weeks before Christmas and after Hurricane Sandy in 2012.

Mr. Salter, 87 and in fighting shape, read an extended passage from “All That Is,” his first novel in nearly 35 years, and afterward sat with Mr. Ford to discuss their craft and answer a few questions from the audience. As they settled into their chairs in front of a large audience that had already given Mr. Salter two sustained ovations, Mr. Ford said, “So I guess the whole ‘writer’s writer’ thing is over now?”

“I hope so,” Mr. Salter replied.

Mr. Ford said that he regularly feels his novels are too long, and that the great American novels are on the short side, including Mr. Salter’s earlier works and books like “So Long, See You Tomorrow” by William Maxwell and “The Great Gatsby.”

“I am definitely miserly in trying to write a novel,” Mr. Salter said. “I don’t have an abundance of it. I’m trying to write longer, if you’re trying to write shorter.”

Reunited Neutral Milk Hotel Announces Limited Tour Dates

Neutral Milk Hotel, the 1990s indie-rock band known for its experimental sound, obscure lyrics and cult following, is reuniting for the first time in over a decade for a series of shows next fall, the band announced on its Web site.

The band went into hibernation after releasing “In the Aeroplane Over the Sea” in 1998 and finishing a tour to promote the album. For years, the band’s frontman, Jeff Mangum, was a recluse in the indie-rock world, but he resurfaced for some solo tours over the last two years. Now it appears he has reassembled the lineup of the band that emerged after 1996’s “On Avery Island”: Scott Spillane, Jeremy Barnes and Julian Koster.

The band says some of the proceeds from the concerts will go to Children of the Blue Sky, a charity that helps street children in Mongolia. So far the tour is very limited: The first two shows will be held in Athens, Ga., at the 40 Watt Club and a third will take place in the Thomas Wolfe Auditorium in Asheville, N.C. Two more shows are planned in Taipei, Taiwan, and Tokyo in late November and early December.

How Are You Celebrating Queen Beatrix’s Abdication?

Jerry Lampen/Reuters Farewell, Queen Beatrix.

Subjects of the Dutch colony of Nieuw-Amsterdam, arise! After 33 years as your benevolent overseer, your queen has forsaken you.

Queen Beatrix is queen no more.

Maxima, the queen consort to the new king, Willem-Alexander, may take her spot as reigning female personage. But Beatrix shall not be replaced, not now, or ever.

And so we ask, City Room readers: what are you doing today to mark Beatrix’s exit from the throne?

How Are You Celebrating Queen Beatrix’s Abdication?

Jerry Lampen/Reuters Farewell, Queen Beatrix.

Subjects of the Dutch colony of Nieuw-Amsterdam, arise! After 33 years as your benevolent overseer, your queen has forsaken you.

Queen Beatrix is queen no more.

Maxima, the queen consort to the new king, Willem-Alexander, may take her spot as reigning female personage. But Beatrix shall not be replaced, not now, or ever.

And so we ask, City Room readers: what are you doing today to mark Beatrix’s exit from the throne?

How Are You Celebrating Queen Beatrix’s Abdication?

Jerry Lampen/Reuters Farewell, Queen Beatrix.

Subjects of the Dutch colony of Nieuw-Amsterdam, arise! After 33 years as your benevolent overseer, your queen has forsaken you.

Queen Beatrix is queen no more.

Maxima, the queen consort to the new king, Willem-Alexander, may take her spot as reigning female personage. But Beatrix shall not be replaced, not now, or ever.

And so we ask, City Room readers: what are you doing today to mark Beatrix’s exit from the throne?

How Are You Celebrating Queen Beatrix’s Abdication?

Jerry Lampen/Reuters Farewell, Queen Beatrix.

Subjects of the Dutch colony of Nieuw-Amsterdam, arise! After 33 years as your benevolent overseer, your queen has forsaken you.

Queen Beatrix is queen no more.

Maxima, the queen consort to the new king, Willem-Alexander, may take her spot as reigning female personage. But Beatrix shall not be replaced, not now, or ever.

And so we ask, City Room readers: what are you doing today to mark Beatrix’s exit from the throne?

Lincoln Center Out of Doors Festival to Celebrate Kronos Quartet

As part of its 40th anniversary, the Kronos Quartet will present Kronos at 40, a five-day program that will include 28 free performances on Lincoln Center’s plazas during the opening week of this year’s Lincoln Center Out of Doors festival, which runs from July 24 through Aug. 11. The ensemble’s programs will include 11 premieres (including four newly commissioned works), and collaborations with dancers, pop musicians and indie classical performers. They are also the group’s first New York performances with its new cellist, Sunny Jungin Yang.

The Kronos series is unusual for Lincoln Center Out of Doors, a festival more typically given to unrelated (or loosely related) single-evening events. That format is largely preserved in the festival’s second and third weeks.

This year’s Out of Doors, the 43rd, will include more than 100 free performances, including a concert of traditional Greek music by Magda Giannikou (July 26); a tribute to Lead Belly by Dan Zanes and Friends (July 27); a new arrangement of the Pixies album “Surfer Rosa,” by the Asphalt Orchestra (July 28); dance performances by Kyle Abraham’s Abraham.In.Motion and The Living Word Project (Aug. 1); and concerts by Rubén Blades (Aug. 7); the Crickets (Buddy Holly’s band) and Nick Lowe (both Aug. 10); and Bobby Rush and Allen Toussaint (both Aug. 11).

Kronos at 40 begins with the world premiere of “Ritual Cycle,” a dance piece by Mark Dendy Dance & Theater Projects (July 24 and 25) and an Afrobeat and Afro-futurist program in which the Kronos will join a roster that includes Red Hot + Fela Live, Tony Allen, Superhuman Happiness and members of several indie-rock bands. Other Kronos performances include programs of works written or arranged for the ensemble by Omar Souleyman, Ram Narayan and Van-Anh Vanessa Vo (July 26); Bryce Dessner, Clint Mansell and Dan Deacon (July 28) among others; and collaborations with My Brightest Diamond and Emily Wells (July 25); and the Brooklyn Youth Chorus (July 27).

Routledge to Publish Porn Studies Journal

Pornography has made increasing non-clandestine appearances on college campuses, thanks to events like Sex Week, which has drawn criticism for spicing up educational offerings workshops with sex-toy raffles and lectures by porn stars. Soon, campus types will also be able ponder the mysteries of sexuality through a less obviously titillating medium: a full-fledged scholarly journal dedicated to porn.

Porn Studies, to be published by Routledge starting in 2014, is described as “the first dedicated, international, peer-reviewed journal to critically explore those cultural products and services designated as pornographic and their cultural, economic, historical, institutional, legal and social contexts,” with particular attention to “the intersection of sexuality, gender, race, class, age and ability.”

The journal, edited by two British academics, Feona Attwood and Clarissa Smith, has already inspired some hearty scholarly endorsements. “We have waited a long time for an academic journal that treats the subject of the representation of human sexuality with the seriousness it deserves,” Julie Peakman, a historian at the University of London and the author of “Mighty Lewd Books: The Development of Pornography in 18th-Century England,” said in a statement. “I look forward to a lively and disciplined debate across different disciplines.”

Cannes Adds Jim Jarmusch’s Vampire Film

“Only Lovers Left Alive,” a vampire film by Jim Jarmusch, has been added to the lineup in competition at the Cannes Film Festival, its organizers said.

Mr. Jarmusch, who won the festival’s Grand Prix in 2005 for his comedy drama “Broken Flowers,” wrote and directed “Only Lovers Left Alive,” which stars Tom Hiddleston (“The Avengers”) and Tilda Swinton (“We Need to Talk About Kevin”) as paramours who drift apart and reunite over the centuries. The cast also includes Mia Wasikowska, John Hurt and Anton Yelchin.

This year’s Cannes Film Festival will run from May 15 through 26 and will open with Baz Luhrmann’s adaptation of “The Great Gatsby.” Other films on its competition slate include Joel and Ethan Coen’s “Inside Llewyn Davis,” Steven Soderbergh’s “Behind the Candelabra” and Alexander Payne’s “Nebraska.”

Cuomo Asks Con Ed To Freeze Bonuses for Top Executives

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo called on Tuesday for Consolidated Edison to freeze extra bonuses paid to senior executives for their response to Hurricane Sandy, other storms and a monthlong lockout of 8,000 workers last year.

The governor’s demand came five days after one of the company’s directors told The New York Times that the executives were given more than $600,000 for “exemplary” performance in handling several trying events. The company, New York City’s primary utility, said those events included the hurricane late last year that left hundreds of thousands of Con Edison customers without power for at least four days.

The governor appointed a panel, known as a Moreland Commission, to investigate how Con Edison and other utilities prepared for the hurricane and responded after it swept through the metropolitan region at the end of October.

On Monday, Mr. Cuomo sent a letter to Kevin Burke, the chairman and chief executive of Con Edison, stating that he would order utility regulators to look into the bonuses to ensure that they would not be charged to the company’s customers.

The governor followed up on Tuesday by announcing that he had asked Con Edison “to freeze the remaining executive bonuses until the Public Service Commission review is complete. I also urge Con Ed to fully cooperate with the Public Service Commission’s review so we can ensure ratepayers are protected.”

A spokesman for the company said that Mr. Burke had already agreed to return the extra bonus of $315,000 that the board of directors awarded him. That bonus had raised his total compensation for the year to $7.4 million, according to the company’s proxy statement.

The spokesman said on Tuesday that three other senior executives who had received extra bonuses would return theirs, too.

Craig Ivey, the company’s president, received an extra bonus of $146,100, raising his total compensation for the year to more than $3 million.
Robert Hoglund, the chief financial officer, got an extra bonus of $82,900 that took his total compensation to about $2.3 million. And Elizabeth D. Moore, the general counsel, got an extra bonus of $70,000 and total pay of more than $1.7 million.

The bonuses were awarded at the discretion of the board’s compensation committee. The committee’s chairman, George Campbell Jr., said in an interview with The Times last week that in the committee’s judgment, “the company performed in exemplary fashion.”

Cuomo Asks Con Ed To Freeze Bonuses for Top Executives

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo called on Tuesday for Consolidated Edison to freeze extra bonuses paid to senior executives for their response to Hurricane Sandy, other storms and a monthlong lockout of 8,000 workers last year.

The governor’s demand came five days after one of the company’s directors told The New York Times that the executives were given more than $600,000 for “exemplary” performance in handling several trying events. The company, New York City’s primary utility, said those events included the hurricane late last year that left hundreds of thousands of Con Edison customers without power for at least four days.

The governor appointed a panel, known as a Moreland Commission, to investigate how Con Edison and other utilities prepared for the hurricane and responded after it swept through the metropolitan region at the end of October.

On Monday, Mr. Cuomo sent a letter to Kevin Burke, the chairman and chief executive of Con Edison, stating that he would order utility regulators to look into the bonuses to ensure that they would not be charged to the company’s customers.

The governor followed up on Tuesday by announcing that he had asked Con Edison “to freeze the remaining executive bonuses until the Public Service Commission review is complete. I also urge Con Ed to fully cooperate with the Public Service Commission’s review so we can ensure ratepayers are protected.”

A spokesman for the company said that Mr. Burke had already agreed to return the extra bonus of $315,000 that the board of directors awarded him. That bonus had raised his total compensation for the year to $7.4 million, according to the company’s proxy statement.

The spokesman said on Tuesday that three other senior executives who had received extra bonuses would return theirs, too.

Craig Ivey, the company’s president, received an extra bonus of $146,100, raising his total compensation for the year to more than $3 million.
Robert Hoglund, the chief financial officer, got an extra bonus of $82,900 that took his total compensation to about $2.3 million. And Elizabeth D. Moore, the general counsel, got an extra bonus of $70,000 and total pay of more than $1.7 million.

The bonuses were awarded at the discretion of the board’s compensation committee. The committee’s chairman, George Campbell Jr., said in an interview with The Times last week that in the committee’s judgment, “the company performed in exemplary fashion.”

Opera America Program to Aid 13 American Companies

Thirteen opera companies across the United States will share $300,000 in grants awarded by Opera America in the first year of its new Building Opera Audiences program. The grants, which range from $7,500 to $30,000, are for programs meant to increase first-time opera attendance, and to increase return visits.

In particular, the organization sought projects that used technology and social media, offered special events in community theaters, or sought to engage listeners in discussions about perceived barriers to enjoying opera. The winning companies were selected from a pool of 67 companies that applied for the grants. The grants are underwritten by the Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation.

The projects to be funded offer a variety of approaches to building an audience. Opera on the James, in Lynchburg, Va., will use its funding for “Get Real,” a project that includes a short mixed-genre opera (also called “Get Real”) as a way of introducing young urban listeners to the form, as well as excerpts from standard repertory operas in new orchestrations, with hip-hop rhythms, spoken word and video.

American Opera Projects, a Brooklyn company that focuses on contemporary works, will  create a mobile app called “Have a Voice,” which will allow the company’s audiences - and those of several other participating organizations - to offer feedback to creative artists, as well as opportunities for discounts and prizes (including tickets).

The Arizona Opera won its grant for a program meant to find opera fans in the Hispanic community, by way of school programs and a Spanish marketing program in Tucson and Phoenix. The Los Angeles Opera’s “Newcomer Project” offers preparatory materials and discounted tickets in the hope of demystifying the opera experience - something that the Florentine Opera Company, in Milwaukee, also plans to do through its Bohème Society, which will offer film screenings, backstage tours and receptions to new listeners.

The other companies that won grants are the Madison Opera, Opera Memphis, the Opera Theater of Pittsburgh, the San Francisco Opera, the Sarasota Opera, the Seattle Opera, the Syracuse Opera and the Vancouver Opera. Opera America plans to monitor and evaluate the projects, and to share its findings with companies in the organization.

Netflix Prison Series Gets July Release Date

Though there was once a time when Netflix was most closely associated with its bright red DVD-return envelopes, the company â€" now better known as a video-streaming service â€" is hoping that orange will be its color this summer. On Tuesday, Netflix announced that it has scheduled its next original series, “Orange Is the New Black,” a comedy-drama set in a women’s prison, to have its premiere on July 11; and, as has become its custom, it will make all thirteen episodes of the series available for viewing at once.

Adapted from Piper Kerman’s memoir of the same title, “Orange Is the New Black” chronicles a Brooklyn woman (played by Taylor Schilling) whose relationship with a drug runner (Laura Prepon) gets her sentenced to a year in prison. The series, which also stars Jason Biggs, Kate Mulgrew, Natasha Lyonne and Pablo Schreiber, is created by Jenji Kohan, who previously mined laughs from law-breaking women as the creator of the Showtime comedy “Weeds.”

“Orange Is the New Black” will be the fourth original series that Netflix has introduced this year, following its hit political drama “House of Cards,” its suspense thriller “Hemlock Grove” and its new season of “Arrested Development,” which will have its debut on May 26.

Tony Award Nominations: Who Got Snubbed?

Sara Krulwich/The New York Times Bette Midler as the agent Sue Mengers in “I’ll Eat You Last,” a one-woman show written by John Logan.

Tony voters might want to lay low today if they don’t want to get devoured by Bette Midler, whose unrecognized turn as the super-agent Sue Mengers in the one-woman show “I’ll Eat You Last” was perhaps the most glaring of snubs when the nominations were announced on Tuesday morning. Ms. Midler, an A-list star making her return to Broadway after an absence of some 40 years, was well-received for her performance as Ms. Mengers, a tough-as-nails Hollywood player, in “I’ll Eat You Last.” But neither she nor this original comedy, written by John Logan (a Tony Award-winner for “Red”), received a nomination. (Still, she’ll always have “Rochelle, Rochelle: the Musical.”)

A little further down the celebrity food chain, Fiona Shaw did not receive a nomination for her solo performance in Colm Toibin’s “Testament of Mary,” a monologue performed by the mother of Jesus, and Alan Cumming was similarly overlooked for his more-or-less one-man version of “Macbeth.” Alec Baldwin, the “30 Rock” star and sometime-nemesis of Shia LaBeouf, did not receive a Tony nomination for his performance in “Orphans,” though his co-star Tom Sturridge did. And a trio of Hollywood actresses who came to Broadway this season â€" Jessica Chastain in “The Heiress,” Scarlett Johansson in “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” and Katie Holmes in “Dead Accounts” â€" were all passed over, though none were expected to be cntenders.

Douglas Carter Beane’s “The Nance,” which drew a nomination for its leading actor, Nathan Lane, was nonetheless itself ignored in the best play category. And “Motown the Musical,” a huge hit, drew four nominations, but none of them were for best musical.

Meanwhile, “Bombshell,” Julia Houston and Tom Levitt’s new musical about the life of Marilyn Monroe, was entirely shut out, perhaps because it is completely fictitious and exists only on the NBC series “Smash,” and hence not eligible for real Tony Awards.

A Director Calls for Lights, Camera and Depression

Dear Diary:

On the “New York Street” of the Universal Studios back lot in Universal City, Calif., while filming the finale of ABC’s “Revenge,” the assistant director, Johnny Haddad, called out to his 130 background actors:

“People! You’re in New York! You’re on your phones! You’re walking fast! You’re unhappy!”

As a co-executive producer and co-writer of the episode, I was standing at the monitors and chuckled as I heard this.
Read all recent entries and our updated submissions guidelines. Reach us via e-mail diary@nytimes.com or follow @NYTMetro on Twitter using the hashtag #MetDiary.

Tony Awards 2013 Nominations Live Blog

How many of the Hollywood stars on Broadway this season - Tom Hanks, Bette Midler, Alec Baldwin, Jim Parsons, Scarlett Johansson and Jessica Chastain among them - will be nominated on Tuesday for Tony Awards, the theater industry’s highest honor? Which of the most popular new musicals this spring - “Kinky Boots,” “Matilda,” and “Motown” - will rack up the most nominations? Will any performances from last fall’s flop shows be remembered, like Carolee Carmello in the musical “Scandalous”? And the biggest question of all: who will make the cut for best actress in a play, one of the most competitive races in recent memory?

The nominations for the 67th annual Tonys will be announced at 8:30 a.m., and we’ll be live-blogging throughout the morning with analysis of the picks, the snubs and their artistic and commercial importance. This year’s contests will include some nail-biters for best musical and best play, best actor and actress in a musical, and several other Tonys that 38 Broadway productions are eligible to win at the awards ceremony on June 9.

By far the hottest race will be for best actress in a play, with eight performers easily worthy of a nomination - but only five nominations available. Those eight powerhouse actresses, who are all acclaimed by theater critics, are Ms. Midler in “I’ll Eat You Last,” Jessica Hecht (“The Assembled Parties”), Laurie Metcalf (“The Other Place”), Amy Morton (“Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”), Kristine Nielsen (“Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike”), Fiona Shaw (“The Testament of Mary”), Holland Taylor (“Ann”) and Cicely Tyson (“The Trip to Bountiful”).

A case can be made for each actress, but some admirers of Ms. Nielsen, a veteran New York theater actress, are particularly adamant about a nomination given their dismay that the Tony Awards Administration Committee unilaterally ruled on Friday that she be eligible in the lead actress category. The producers of “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike” had wanted Ms. Nielsen to be eligible for a best featured actress nomination - and she was seen as a likely winner in June. But a majority of committee members believed that Ms. Nielsen’s character amounted to a leading role.

As for the best musical Tony Award, “Matilda” and “Kinky Boots” are favorites to fill two of the four nominations; one recent flop, “Hands on a Hardbody,” which received some critical praise, has a shot at a third slot, and “Motown” - the best-selling new musical of the season - may round out the category.

The race for best play is fairly wide open; in the running for the four nominations are “The Nance” (by Tony nominee Douglas Carter Beane), “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike” (Tony nominee Christopher Durang), “Lucky Guy” (Oscar nominee Nora Ephron), “The Assembled Parties” (Tony winner Richard Greenberg), and “I’ll Eat You Last” (Tony winner John Logan), among other works.

Will the race for best director of a musical come down to Matthew Warchus (“Matilda”), already a Tony winner, against Diane Paulus (“Pippin”), whose last two Broadway musicals won for best revival? Will the race for best actor in a musical be Bertie Carvel (“Matilda”) vs. Billy Porter (“Kinky Boots”), if both are nominated as expected, or will a third actor have a real chance?

Which Broadway shows were shut out? Who wuz robbed? Keep checking back here for ongoing updates and analysis starting at 8:30 a.m.

Tony Awards 2013 Nominations Live Blog

How many of the Hollywood stars on Broadway this season - Tom Hanks, Bette Midler, Alec Baldwin, Jim Parsons, Scarlett Johansson and Jessica Chastain among them - will be nominated on Tuesday for Tony Awards, the theater industry’s highest honor? Which of the most popular new musicals this spring - “Kinky Boots,” “Matilda,” and “Motown” - will rack up the most nominations? Will any performances from last fall’s flop shows be remembered, like Carolee Carmello in the musical “Scandalous”? And the biggest question of all: who will make the cut for best actress in a play, one of the most competitive races in recent memory?

The nominations for the 67th annual Tonys will be announced at 8:30 a.m., and we’ll be live-blogging throughout the morning with analysis of the picks, the snubs and their artistic and commercial importance. This year’s contests will include some nail-biters for best musical and best play, best actor and actress in a musical, and several other Tonys that 38 Broadway productions are eligible to win at the awards ceremony on June 9.

By far the hottest race will be for best actress in a play, with eight performers easily worthy of a nomination - but only five nominations available. Those eight powerhouse actresses, who are all acclaimed by theater critics, are Ms. Midler in “I’ll Eat You Last,” Jessica Hecht (“The Assembled Parties”), Laurie Metcalf (“The Other Place”), Amy Morton (“Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”), Kristine Nielsen (“Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike”), Fiona Shaw (“The Testament of Mary”), Holland Taylor (“Ann”) and Cicely Tyson (“The Trip to Bountiful”).

A case can be made for each actress, but some admirers of Ms. Nielsen, a veteran New York theater actress, are particularly adamant about a nomination given their dismay that the Tony Awards Administration Committee unilaterally ruled on Friday that she be eligible in the lead actress category. The producers of “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike” had wanted Ms. Nielsen to be eligible for a best featured actress nomination - and she was seen as a likely winner in June. But a majority of committee members believed that Ms. Nielsen’s character amounted to a leading role.

As for the best musical Tony Award, “Matilda” and “Kinky Boots” are favorites to fill two of the four nominations; one recent flop, “Hands on a Hardbody,” which received some critical praise, has a shot at a third slot, and “Motown” - the best-selling new musical of the season - may round out the category.

The race for best play is fairly wide open; in the running for the four nominations are “The Nance” (by Tony nominee Douglas Carter Beane), “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike” (Tony nominee Christopher Durang), “Lucky Guy” (Oscar nominee Nora Ephron), “The Assembled Parties” (Tony winner Richard Greenberg), and “I’ll Eat You Last” (Tony winner John Logan), among other works.

Will the race for best director of a musical come down to Matthew Warchus (“Matilda”), already a Tony winner, against Diane Paulus (“Pippin”), whose last two Broadway musicals won for best revival? Will the race for best actor in a musical be Bertie Carvel (“Matilda”) vs. Billy Porter (“Kinky Boots”), if both are nominated as expected, or will a third actor have a real chance?

Which Broadway shows were shut out? Who wuz robbed? Keep checking back here for ongoing updates and analysis starting at 8:30 a.m.

Tony Awards 2013 Nominations Live Blog

How many of the Hollywood stars on Broadway this season - Tom Hanks, Bette Midler, Alec Baldwin, Jim Parsons, Scarlett Johansson and Jessica Chastain among them - will be nominated on Tuesday for Tony Awards, the theater industry’s highest honor? Which of the most popular new musicals this spring - “Kinky Boots,” “Matilda,” and “Motown” - will rack up the most nominations? Will any performances from last fall’s flop shows be remembered, like Carolee Carmello in the musical “Scandalous”? And the biggest question of all: who will make the cut for best actress in a play, one of the most competitive races in recent memory?

The nominations for the 67th annual Tonys will be announced at 8:30 a.m., and we’ll be live-blogging throughout the morning with analysis of the picks, the snubs and their artistic and commercial importance. This year’s contests will include some nail-biters for best musical and best play, best actor and actress in a musical, and several other Tonys that 38 Broadway productions are eligible to win at the awards ceremony on June 9.

By far the hottest race will be for best actress in a play, with eight performers easily worthy of a nomination - but only five nominations available. Those eight powerhouse actresses, who are all acclaimed by theater critics, are Ms. Midler in “I’ll Eat You Last,” Jessica Hecht (“The Assembled Parties”), Laurie Metcalf (“The Other Place”), Amy Morton (“Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”), Kristine Nielsen (“Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike”), Fiona Shaw (“The Testament of Mary”), Holland Taylor (“Ann”) and Cicely Tyson (“The Trip to Bountiful”).

A case can be made for each actress, but some admirers of Ms. Nielsen, a veteran New York theater actress, are particularly adamant about a nomination given their dismay that the Tony Awards Administration Committee unilaterally ruled on Friday that she be eligible in the lead actress category. The producers of “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike” had wanted Ms. Nielsen to be eligible for a best featured actress nomination - and she was seen as a likely winner in June. But a majority of committee members believed that Ms. Nielsen’s character amounted to a leading role.

As for the best musical Tony Award, “Matilda” and “Kinky Boots” are favorites to fill two of the four nominations; one recent flop, “Hands on a Hardbody,” which received some critical praise, has a shot at a third slot, and “Motown” - the best-selling new musical of the season - may round out the category.

The race for best play is fairly wide open; in the running for the four nominations are “The Nance” (by Tony nominee Douglas Carter Beane), “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike” (Tony nominee Christopher Durang), “Lucky Guy” (Oscar nominee Nora Ephron), “The Assembled Parties” (Tony winner Richard Greenberg), and “I’ll Eat You Last” (Tony winner John Logan), among other works.

Will the race for best director of a musical come down to Matthew Warchus (“Matilda”), already a Tony winner, against Diane Paulus (“Pippin”), whose last two Broadway musicals won for best revival? Will the race for best actor in a musical be Bertie Carvel (“Matilda”) vs. Billy Porter (“Kinky Boots”), if both are nominated as expected, or will a third actor have a real chance?

Which Broadway shows were shut out? Who wuz robbed? Keep checking back here for ongoing updates and analysis starting at 8:30 a.m.

Roof-Deck Blaze on a Warm Day Presages Summer Barbecue Fires

One minute, sunshine and spring blossoms were the only things descending from the sky, the next moment it was ashes, soot and fire-hose water cascading from the first roof-deck fire of the year in Lower Manhattan on Sunday afternoon.

The blaze, atop a five-story building on East Seventh Street near Avenue C in the East Village, was quickly put out. Three firefighters were treated for minor injuries, but no one else was hurt and the fire did not spread to neighboring buildings or the floors below, said Deputy Chief Michael McPartland of the New York City Fire Department.

Deputy Chief McPartland said it was the first of its kind in 2013, in the division under his command, south of 42nd Street. He said he did not think it would be the last. “In summertime, this time of year, when the weather starts to get nice, we get more roof-deck fires from barbecues,” he said.

The fire on Sunday did not appear to be related to a barbecue. It was thought to have started near cellphone towers on the roof, officials said. But on Monday, a Firefighter Thomas Schwaber, a spokesman for the department, said the cause was still being investigated by fire marshals.

100 Years Ago, Mayor Had a Ready Trigger Finger

Paul Thompson Mayor John Purroy Mitchel, left, being sworn in. It is not known if he is carrying a concealed gun in this photo.

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s campaign for stricter gun regulation might have been, well, gun shy about recruiting one of his predecessors, John Purroy Mitchel.

After all, Mitchel not only packed a pistol himself, he brandished it in front of City Hall when he was fired upon by a crazed 71-year-old man a century ago.

Two months after that incident, as Mitchel was returning to his Riverside Drive home from target practice upstate, his gun dislodged from its holster, struck the sidewalk with a thud and accidentally discharged, wounding one of his shooting partners â€" a prominent real estate developer and former Brooklyn state senator.

Mitchel, who was elected in 1913 at the age of 34, said he had carried a gun since succeeding Mayor William F. Gaynor, who was shot by a disgruntled former city employee in 1910. Gaynor died three years later of a heart attack, still suffering from the lingering effects of the wound.

Carrying concealed weapons without a permit had been banned in 1911 under New York State’s Sullivan Act. Within a few years, about 8,000 New Yorkers had carry permits, including Mitchel, who paid $1 for a permit issued by the Police Department.

The New York Tribune’s front-page coverage of the assassination attempt against Mayor Mitchel. Click to enlarge.

On April 17, 1914, he and several other officials entered a Police Department car in front of City Hall to go to lunch downtown, when a man identified as Michael P. Mahoney, an unemployed Irish immigrant, fired a bullet that missed the mayor, but wounded the city’s corporation counsel in the cheek.

“Mayor Mitchel himself, leaping up in the automobile, drew a revolver,” The New York Times reported. Mahoney was quickly wrestled to the ground by the police commissioner.

What was originally suspected as an anarchist plot turned out to be the act of a former blacksmith and carpenter who was recovering (and suing) after being hit by a falling brick from two floors up.

“The experience of the last administration teaches us that there are always a few crazy people in every community and no one can foretell what they will do,” Mitchel explained.

A 1914 New York Tribune cartoon invoked Mayor Mitchel’s would-be assassin to rail against the ease with which weapons could be carried in New York even under the Sullivan Law. Click to enlarge.

Asked about his actions, Mitchel said, “Certainly I drew a gun, for if there was another shot fired, I intended to be first.”

Mitchel believed his marksmanship had saved his life on an earlier trip to South America after he discovered that some of the porters employed by his party were ex-convicts. He slept with a revolver in his robe and took target practice daily to intimidate them.

In the West Indies, according to an article in The Century Magazine, Mitchel learned a lesson in crowd control during “an adventure with a tribe of aboriginal Indians, hostile to the diamond mines which his firm represented”:

“One day they surrounded him and his guide. The chief’s feathered headdress outlined against a large tree-trunk. Mitchel shot it, scattering feathers and tribe. This was brisker than parley and simpler than diplomacy. Doubtless it was more effective than either with frightened savages. And it showed Mitchel a quick method of handling a crowd.”

Mitchel was a staunch advocate for military preparedness before the United States entered World War I and trained upstate with other prospective officers. According to one account, he shot 24 out of 25 on the rifle range. He also created a civilian defense force whose 22,000 volunteers took revolver training so they could supplement the police force in case of an emergency.

But while he was hailed as a champion of progressive government, his experience with weapons was mixed, as was the experience of his father, James Mitchel.

Michael Miscione, Manhattan’s borough historian, recalled that James Mitchel, a captain in the Confederate army, was wounded four times. “You’d think John would have developed distaste for guns,” Mr. Miscione said.

In June 1914, former State Sen. William H. Reynolds, a developer with interests in Brooklyn, Queens and Long Island, was shot in the thigh when Mayor Mitchel’s gun fell to the sidewalk, snapping the safety lock and causing it to fire. The bullet exited Reynolds’s finger.

The incident was hushed up and the police learned about it only after it was reported in The Times.

After his defeat for re-election in 1917, Mitchel joined the military as an air cadet.

He died the following July during a training exercise when he fell from a plane flying 500 feet over Louisiana, apparently because he had failed to buckle his seat belt.

‘Motown: The Musical’ Surges at Box Office Ahead of Tony Nominations

As Broadway producers and performers gird themselves for the 2013 Tony Award nominations on Tuesday morning, several shows are already fortified by strong ticket sales - so much so that Tony nominations may not make much of a difference.

Case in point: “Motown: The Musical” is the biggest box office hit among the new productions of the 2012-13 season, grossing $1,213,611 last week - better than any other musical except the blockbusters “The Lion King,” “Wicked,” and “The Book of Mormon.” This success comes in spite of “Motown” receiving mixed to negative reviews. It seems likely that fans of Diana Ross, the Jackson 5, Smokey Robinson and Marvin Gaye will keep buying tickets to hear the show’s classic Motown songs regardless of whether the production racks up many Tony nominations.

Among Broadway plays, the top two at the box office last week- “Lucky Guy” ($1,384,178) and “I’ll Eat You Last” ($646,102) - will probably continue selling strongly thanks to audience interest in their stars, Tom Hanks and Bette Midler. While both actors have a good chance of being nominated on Tuesday, no one thinks ticket sales will decline if, say, Ms. Midler is crowded out by the very large field for the five best actress nominations.

The two likely front-runners for the best musical Tony, “Matilda” and “Kinky Boots,” were also in strong shape last week: “Kinky Boots” had its highest gross since performances began in March, taking in $1,112,163, while “Matilda” was not far behind with $1,107,815.

Other shows may benefit from Tony Awards recognition. The one-woman play “Ann,” starring Holland Taylor as former Texas Gov. Ann Richards, grossed a middling 24 percent of its maximum possible amount last week, while “The Testament of Mary,” starring Fiona Shaw as the mother of Christ, grossed about 27 percent of the maximum possible. Each actress drew praise from many critics, and both are seen as contenders for a Tony nomination.

One musical that could use some help - but won’t be receiving any from the Tony Awards - is “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark.” Its producers are a long way from recouping the show’s record-setting cost of $75 million, and last week’s gross of $1,003,279 was one of its lowest yet. The musical’s weekly running expenses total between $1.1 million and $1.2 million. “Spider-Man” opened in 2011 and was eligible for Tony nominations for the 2011-12 season; the show received two, for costumes and sets, but won neither.

Overall Broadway musicals and plays grossed $24.6 million last week, compared to $24.7 million the previous week and $26.1 million for the comparable week last season.

The Tony Award nominations will be announced on Tuesday at 8:30 a.m.; check back here for updates and analysis through the morning.

‘I Thought I Was Bulletproof’: William Friedkin Looks Back on the ’70s

BAMcinématek/Photofest Gene Hackman, Eddie Egan and William Friedkin during the making of “The French Connection.”

No one had a decade of moviemaking quite like William Friedkin did in the 1970s. Starting with his 1970 film adaptation of Mart Crowley’s play “The Boys in the Band,” Mr. Friedkin, the Chicago-born and bred director, went on to make the 1971 crime drama “The French Connection,” which won the Academy Award for best picture and earned Mr. Friedkin the Oscar for best director; and the smash horror hit “The Exorcist,” which brought in nearly $200 million in its original 1973 release, and turned a generation of moviegoers off pea soup. But Mr. Friedkin finished out the decade with misfires and cinematic oddities, like “Sorcerer,” his 1977 remake of Clouzot’s “Wages of Fear”; his comic 1978 crime caper ; and the thriller “Cruising,” released in 1980, which starred Al Pacino as an undercover police officer investigating murders in Manhattan’s gay S&M clubs.

“I thought I was bulletproof,” Mr. Friedkin, 77, said of this era. “And I wasn’t. But I thought I was.”

BAMcinématek/Photofest William Friedkin during the making of “Bug” in 2006.

All  of these movies will be shown at a  retrospective  “Friedkin 70s,” at the Brooklyn Academy of Music beginning Thursday and ending May 7. Mr. Friedkin, who will appear for Thursday’s screening of “Sorcerer” and Friday’s screening of “Cruising,” spoke recently to ArtsBeat about this period of his career. In these edited excerpts from that conversation, he discusses the ups, the downs and the devil-worshipers he met on the Iraqi set of “The Exorcist.”

Q.

Do you see any themes or common threads that connect the movies in this retrospective?

A.

In almost 50 years of directing films, I’ve made only 19. If you look at the films of the directors who worked at the Hollywood studios in the ’30s, ’40s and ’50s, those guys made four or five films a year. Michael Curtiz, who directed “Casablanca,” he did a couple films every year. And some of them are good and some of them are terrible and forgettable, and maybe one or two is a masterpiece.  I would be a better director if I had been in that system. Most people say it was a kind of slavery contract. You had to do what the studios told you to do. Well, whoever the hell was at the studios telling them to do it, they were geniuses.

Q.

The films that bookend this period of your career, “The Boys in the Band” and “Cruising,” were each controversial in their day, for different reasons. With all the time that has since gone by, do you find those controversies to be petty now?

A.

No, they don’t seem petty at all. I understand how and why they came about. When we released “Boys in the Band,” the guys in the film were still, for the most part, in the closet with their friends, or in the workplace. The gay liberation movement, which had started about a year before with the Stonewall riots, they were not looking to see films about guys who are in the closet.

“Cruising,” was set in the clubs - not the gay clubs, but the S&M clubs, which many gay people had never seen - which to me was just an exotic background. By the time it came out, the gay liberation movement was very strong. And this sort of subject matter was not the best foot forward at that time. So I understood the protests, I really did. But I was not thinking, when I made the film, about how this would affect gay liberation or not. When you’re making a film, you don’t start to think of the social consequences, or whether there will be any. Now, that might have been nearsighted on my part. But that’s the way I felt.

Q.

Were you stunned when “The French Connection” was as successful as it was, given the hardships you had to endure to make it?

A.

I didn’t think of it that way, honestly. I thought of it as golden opportunities that were coming my way for no apparent reason. There are people in this life that have hardships. If you’re a guy who has even a shot at directing a film, you can’t be thinking about hardships. I never really thought in terms of success or failure, other than how far I missed my expectations.

Q.

How so?

A.

I had a whole different idea of casting. I cast a guy to play Frog 1, the drug dealer - he wasn’t the guy I intended! My casting director cast Fernando Rey by mistake. Gene Hackman wasn’t even on my list of choices. But I had to make the film with him because he was the last man standing. Everyone else either turned it down or, as when I auditioned Jimmy Breslin, he couldn’t do it. I had to struggle with Hackman, and it was only after I had finished the editing and saw that it was working, he obviously is the force that ignites that picture.

Q.

Was it hard to keep your perspective when you won the Oscar for best director, and the film won  best picture?

A.

I had no perspective back then. After I won the Oscar, I thought I was bulletproof. And I wasn’t. But I thought I was. You often pay dearly when hubris sets in. I thought, well, I have the formula now. I really know how to reach audiences.

Q.

I’m almost afraid to ask about “The Exorcist.” I feel like you must be sick of talking about it.

A.

I know what you mean. I’d rather now that people talk about my latest films. But I can see that films like “The Exorcist” and “The French Connection,” and even “To Live and Die in L.A.” are still very much with audiences. I’m very pleased about that. Who wouldn’t be?

Q.

I thought I’d heard every story there was to be told about “The Exorcist,” until I read your account in your memoir, “The Friedkin Connection,” about meeting that group of devil-worshipers when you were filming in Iraq.

A.

They’re a Muslim sect, and their basic belief is that God rules everything in heaven, but the devil rules on earth. So they worship the devil. They had no idea what the hell I was doing there. They had heard that this crazy American was taking raw meat to the statue of the demon Pazuzu. And when I told them it was for a movie, and we had hoped to attract wild dogs and vultures, they were disappointed. And the people from the Baathist party, my handlers, said, “Don’t go.  It’s dangerous. We have no control over that.” I had this wonderful translator who was also my guide, and he took me there. It was a great experience.

Q.

How do you feel about “Sorcerer” today?

A.

It has been extremely difficult and troublesome. I didn’t expect the initial reception that it got, and I didn’t expect that I’d have to fight for it. There is no legal problem anymore, but I had to sue because the two studios, Universal and Paramount, couldn’t find the legal documents of who actually owned it. Both studios had been sold two or three times since I made “Sorcerer.” And what happens then is all the documents disappear. It has been a kind of a burden that I’ve carried with me for 35 years. I guess it’s just stubbornness that keeps me making sure that it comes back for people to see.

Q.

Are you able to see the movie on its own merits, without thinking about how it did at the box office, or how it was received by critics?

A.

Certainly I regret that it wasn’t a critical or a commercial success. The zeitgeist was changing. It came out a week after “Star Wars,” and “Star Wars” really changed the way people think about, What is a movie? Right to this day, and beyond. All these films about the Avengers and the Transformers, video games and comic books, that’s what, for the most part, Hollywood cinema has become. That just automatically opened the floodgates to people wanting pure entertainment that could be seen by people of all ages, basically. Would my film have worked if there was no “Star Wars”? I don’t know. But without “Star Wars,” I think American film would be different today.

‘I Thought I Was Bulletproof’: William Friedkin Looks Back on the ’70s

BAMcinématek/Photofest Gene Hackman, Eddie Egan and William Friedkin during the making of “The French Connection.”

No one had a decade of moviemaking quite like William Friedkin did in the 1970s. Starting with his 1970 film adaptation of Mart Crowley’s play “The Boys in the Band,” Mr. Friedkin, the Chicago-born and bred director, went on to make the 1971 crime drama “The French Connection,” which won the Academy Award for best picture and earned Mr. Friedkin the Oscar for best director; and the smash horror hit “The Exorcist,” which brought in nearly $200 million in its original 1973 release, and turned a generation of moviegoers off pea soup. But Mr. Friedkin finished out the decade with misfires and cinematic oddities, like “Sorcerer,” his 1977 remake of Clouzot’s “Wages of Fear”; his comic 1978 crime caper ; and the thriller “Cruising,” released in 1980, which starred Al Pacino as an undercover police officer investigating murders in Manhattan’s gay S&M clubs.

“I thought I was bulletproof,” Mr. Friedkin, 77, said of this era. “And I wasn’t. But I thought I was.”

BAMcinématek/Photofest William Friedkin during the making of “Bug” in 2006.

All  of these movies will be shown at a  retrospective  “Friedkin 70s,” at the Brooklyn Academy of Music beginning Thursday and ending May 7. Mr. Friedkin, who will appear for Thursday’s screening of “Sorcerer” and Friday’s screening of “Cruising,” spoke recently to ArtsBeat about this period of his career. In these edited excerpts from that conversation, he discusses the ups, the downs and the devil-worshipers he met on the Iraqi set of “The Exorcist.”

Q.

Do you see any themes or common threads that connect the movies in this retrospective?

A.

In almost 50 years of directing films, I’ve made only 19. If you look at the films of the directors who worked at the Hollywood studios in the ’30s, ’40s and ’50s, those guys made four or five films a year. Michael Curtiz, who directed “Casablanca,” he did a couple films every year. And some of them are good and some of them are terrible and forgettable, and maybe one or two is a masterpiece.  I would be a better director if I had been in that system. Most people say it was a kind of slavery contract. You had to do what the studios told you to do. Well, whoever the hell was at the studios telling them to do it, they were geniuses.

Q.

The films that bookend this period of your career, “The Boys in the Band” and “Cruising,” were each controversial in their day, for different reasons. With all the time that has since gone by, do you find those controversies to be petty now?

A.

No, they don’t seem petty at all. I understand how and why they came about. When we released “Boys in the Band,” the guys in the film were still, for the most part, in the closet with their friends, or in the workplace. The gay liberation movement, which had started about a year before with the Stonewall riots, they were not looking to see films about guys who are in the closet.

“Cruising,” was set in the clubs - not the gay clubs, but the S&M clubs, which many gay people had never seen - which to me was just an exotic background. By the time it came out, the gay liberation movement was very strong. And this sort of subject matter was not the best foot forward at that time. So I understood the protests, I really did. But I was not thinking, when I made the film, about how this would affect gay liberation or not. When you’re making a film, you don’t start to think of the social consequences, or whether there will be any. Now, that might have been nearsighted on my part. But that’s the way I felt.

Q.

Were you stunned when “The French Connection” was as successful as it was, given the hardships you had to endure to make it?

A.

I didn’t think of it that way, honestly. I thought of it as golden opportunities that were coming my way for no apparent reason. There are people in this life that have hardships. If you’re a guy who has even a shot at directing a film, you can’t be thinking about hardships. I never really thought in terms of success or failure, other than how far I missed my expectations.

Q.

How so?

A.

I had a whole different idea of casting. I cast a guy to play Frog 1, the drug dealer - he wasn’t the guy I intended! My casting director cast Fernando Rey by mistake. Gene Hackman wasn’t even on my list of choices. But I had to make the film with him because he was the last man standing. Everyone else either turned it down or, as when I auditioned Jimmy Breslin, he couldn’t do it. I had to struggle with Hackman, and it was only after I had finished the editing and saw that it was working, he obviously is the force that ignites that picture.

Q.

Was it hard to keep your perspective when you won the Oscar for best director, and the film won  best picture?

A.

I had no perspective back then. After I won the Oscar, I thought I was bulletproof. And I wasn’t. But I thought I was. You often pay dearly when hubris sets in. I thought, well, I have the formula now. I really know how to reach audiences.

Q.

I’m almost afraid to ask about “The Exorcist.” I feel like you must be sick of talking about it.

A.

I know what you mean. I’d rather now that people talk about my latest films. But I can see that films like “The Exorcist” and “The French Connection,” and even “To Live and Die in L.A.” are still very much with audiences. I’m very pleased about that. Who wouldn’t be?

Q.

I thought I’d heard every story there was to be told about “The Exorcist,” until I read your account in your memoir, “The Friedkin Connection,” about meeting that group of devil-worshipers when you were filming in Iraq.

A.

They’re a Muslim sect, and their basic belief is that God rules everything in heaven, but the devil rules on earth. So they worship the devil. They had no idea what the hell I was doing there. They had heard that this crazy American was taking raw meat to the statue of the demon Pazuzu. And when I told them it was for a movie, and we had hoped to attract wild dogs and vultures, they were disappointed. And the people from the Baathist party, my handlers, said, “Don’t go.  It’s dangerous. We have no control over that.” I had this wonderful translator who was also my guide, and he took me there. It was a great experience.

Q.

How do you feel about “Sorcerer” today?

A.

It has been extremely difficult and troublesome. I didn’t expect the initial reception that it got, and I didn’t expect that I’d have to fight for it. There is no legal problem anymore, but I had to sue because the two studios, Universal and Paramount, couldn’t find the legal documents of who actually owned it. Both studios had been sold two or three times since I made “Sorcerer.” And what happens then is all the documents disappear. It has been a kind of a burden that I’ve carried with me for 35 years. I guess it’s just stubbornness that keeps me making sure that it comes back for people to see.

Q.

Are you able to see the movie on its own merits, without thinking about how it did at the box office, or how it was received by critics?

A.

Certainly I regret that it wasn’t a critical or a commercial success. The zeitgeist was changing. It came out a week after “Star Wars,” and “Star Wars” really changed the way people think about, What is a movie? Right to this day, and beyond. All these films about the Avengers and the Transformers, video games and comic books, that’s what, for the most part, Hollywood cinema has become. That just automatically opened the floodgates to people wanting pure entertainment that could be seen by people of all ages, basically. Would my film have worked if there was no “Star Wars”? I don’t know. But without “Star Wars,” I think American film would be different today.

‘I Thought I Was Bulletproof’: William Friedkin Looks Back on the ’70s

BAMcinématek/Photofest Gene Hackman, Eddie Egan and William Friedkin during the making of “The French Connection.”

No one had a decade of moviemaking quite like William Friedkin did in the 1970s. Starting with his 1970 film adaptation of Mart Crowley’s play “The Boys in the Band,” Mr. Friedkin, the Chicago-born and bred director, went on to make the 1971 crime drama “The French Connection,” which won the Academy Award for best picture and earned Mr. Friedkin the Oscar for best director; and the smash horror hit “The Exorcist,” which brought in nearly $200 million in its original 1973 release, and turned a generation of moviegoers off pea soup. But Mr. Friedkin finished out the decade with misfires and cinematic oddities, like “Sorcerer,” his 1977 remake of Clouzot’s “Wages of Fear”; his comic 1978 crime caper ; and the thriller “Cruising,” released in 1980, which starred Al Pacino as an undercover police officer investigating murders in Manhattan’s gay S&M clubs.

“I thought I was bulletproof,” Mr. Friedkin, 77, said of this era. “And I wasn’t. But I thought I was.”

BAMcinématek/Photofest William Friedkin during the making of “Bug” in 2006.

All  of these movies will be shown at a  retrospective  “Friedkin 70s,” at the Brooklyn Academy of Music beginning Thursday and ending May 7. Mr. Friedkin, who will appear for Thursday’s screening of “Sorcerer” and Friday’s screening of “Cruising,” spoke recently to ArtsBeat about this period of his career. In these edited excerpts from that conversation, he discusses the ups, the downs and the devil-worshipers he met on the Iraqi set of “The Exorcist.”

Q.

Do you see any themes or common threads that connect the movies in this retrospective?

A.

In almost 50 years of directing films, I’ve made only 19. If you look at the films of the directors who worked at the Hollywood studios in the ’30s, ’40s and ’50s, those guys made four or five films a year. Michael Curtiz, who directed “Casablanca,” he did a couple films every year. And some of them are good and some of them are terrible and forgettable, and maybe one or two is a masterpiece.  I would be a better director if I had been in that system. Most people say it was a kind of slavery contract. You had to do what the studios told you to do. Well, whoever the hell was at the studios telling them to do it, they were geniuses.

Q.

The films that bookend this period of your career, “The Boys in the Band” and “Cruising,” were each controversial in their day, for different reasons. With all the time that has since gone by, do you find those controversies to be petty now?

A.

No, they don’t seem petty at all. I understand how and why they came about. When we released “Boys in the Band,” the guys in the film were still, for the most part, in the closet with their friends, or in the workplace. The gay liberation movement, which had started about a year before with the Stonewall riots, they were not looking to see films about guys who are in the closet.

“Cruising,” was set in the clubs - not the gay clubs, but the S&M clubs, which many gay people had never seen - which to me was just an exotic background. By the time it came out, the gay liberation movement was very strong. And this sort of subject matter was not the best foot forward at that time. So I understood the protests, I really did. But I was not thinking, when I made the film, about how this would affect gay liberation or not. When you’re making a film, you don’t start to think of the social consequences, or whether there will be any. Now, that might have been nearsighted on my part. But that’s the way I felt.

Q.

Were you stunned when “The French Connection” was as successful as it was, given the hardships you had to endure to make it?

A.

I didn’t think of it that way, honestly. I thought of it as golden opportunities that were coming my way for no apparent reason. There are people in this life that have hardships. If you’re a guy who has even a shot at directing a film, you can’t be thinking about hardships. I never really thought in terms of success or failure, other than how far I missed my expectations.

Q.

How so?

A.

I had a whole different idea of casting. I cast a guy to play Frog 1, the drug dealer - he wasn’t the guy I intended! My casting director cast Fernando Rey by mistake. Gene Hackman wasn’t even on my list of choices. But I had to make the film with him because he was the last man standing. Everyone else either turned it down or, as when I auditioned Jimmy Breslin, he couldn’t do it. I had to struggle with Hackman, and it was only after I had finished the editing and saw that it was working, he obviously is the force that ignites that picture.

Q.

Was it hard to keep your perspective when you won the Oscar for best director, and the film won  best picture?

A.

I had no perspective back then. After I won the Oscar, I thought I was bulletproof. And I wasn’t. But I thought I was. You often pay dearly when hubris sets in. I thought, well, I have the formula now. I really know how to reach audiences.

Q.

I’m almost afraid to ask about “The Exorcist.” I feel like you must be sick of talking about it.

A.

I know what you mean. I’d rather now that people talk about my latest films. But I can see that films like “The Exorcist” and “The French Connection,” and even “To Live and Die in L.A.” are still very much with audiences. I’m very pleased about that. Who wouldn’t be?

Q.

I thought I’d heard every story there was to be told about “The Exorcist,” until I read your account in your memoir, “The Friedkin Connection,” about meeting that group of devil-worshipers when you were filming in Iraq.

A.

They’re a Muslim sect, and their basic belief is that God rules everything in heaven, but the devil rules on earth. So they worship the devil. They had no idea what the hell I was doing there. They had heard that this crazy American was taking raw meat to the statue of the demon Pazuzu. And when I told them it was for a movie, and we had hoped to attract wild dogs and vultures, they were disappointed. And the people from the Baathist party, my handlers, said, “Don’t go.  It’s dangerous. We have no control over that.” I had this wonderful translator who was also my guide, and he took me there. It was a great experience.

Q.

How do you feel about “Sorcerer” today?

A.

It has been extremely difficult and troublesome. I didn’t expect the initial reception that it got, and I didn’t expect that I’d have to fight for it. There is no legal problem anymore, but I had to sue because the two studios, Universal and Paramount, couldn’t find the legal documents of who actually owned it. Both studios had been sold two or three times since I made “Sorcerer.” And what happens then is all the documents disappear. It has been a kind of a burden that I’ve carried with me for 35 years. I guess it’s just stubbornness that keeps me making sure that it comes back for people to see.

Q.

Are you able to see the movie on its own merits, without thinking about how it did at the box office, or how it was received by critics?

A.

Certainly I regret that it wasn’t a critical or a commercial success. The zeitgeist was changing. It came out a week after “Star Wars,” and “Star Wars” really changed the way people think about, What is a movie? Right to this day, and beyond. All these films about the Avengers and the Transformers, video games and comic books, that’s what, for the most part, Hollywood cinema has become. That just automatically opened the floodgates to people wanting pure entertainment that could be seen by people of all ages, basically. Would my film have worked if there was no “Star Wars”? I don’t know. But without “Star Wars,” I think American film would be different today.