Thanks to an initiative created by Texas women, 10 nonprofit arts organizations around the state are celebrating additional funding that will help them fulfill their missions. Texas Women for the Arts, a program under the umbrella of the Texas Cultural Trust which unites the financial force of Texas women with funding initiatives for the arts and arts education, has announced its 2013 grant recipients.
The organization has selected 10 programs that will be awarded a total of $200,000 in grants. Organizations submitted proposals that were judged by a grants committee comprised of Texas Women for the Arts members, and finalists were presented to the full membership for a vote. This year's recipients were announced during the organization's annual meeting.
The Houston-based Orange Show was awarded a grant of $32,800 for implementation of the "Orange Show Art Bus" program for the 2013-2014 school year. The organization has transformed a school bus has into a rolling education outreach center and mobile art studio where students take part in classes in art, science and engineering, dance, theater art and written word workshops.
In its eight-year existence, Texas Women for the Arts has awarded over $1 million to arts organizations across the state.
The remaining recipients for 2013 are:
Anthropos Art, Austin
Blanton Museum of Arts, Austin
The Menuhin Competition, Austin
Arts for Rural Texas, Fayetteville
San Antonio Symphony
Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center, San Antonio
Imagination Celebration of Fort Worth
Kids Excel El Paso
Texas Young Masters Program (Statewide)
The Orange Show Art Bus made a stop at IKEA in April.
Photo courtesy of The Orange Show
The Orange Show Art Bus made a stop at IKEA in April.
The impact that writer/director/producer James L. Brooks has made on Hollywood cannot be understated. The 85-year-old created The Mary Tyler Moore Show, personally won three Oscars for Terms of Endearment, and was one of the driving forces behind The Simpsons, among many other credits. Now, 15 years after his last movie, he’s back in the directing chair with Ella McCay.
The similarly-named Emma Mackey plays Ella, a 34-year-old lieutenant governor of an unnamed state in 2008 who’s on the verge of becoming governor when Governor Bill (Albert Brooks) gets picked to be a member of the president’s Cabinet. What should be a happy time is sullied by her needy husband, Ryan (Jack Lowden), her agoraphobic brother, Casey (Spike Fearn), and her perpetually-cheating father, Eddie (Woody Harrelson).
Despite the trio of men competing to bring her down, Ella remains an unapologetic optimist, an attitude bolstered by her aunt Helen (Jamie Lee Curtis), her assistant Estelle (Julie Kavner), and her police escort, Trooper Nash (Kumail Nanjiani). The film follows her over a few days as she navigates the perils of governing, the distractions her family brings, and the expectations being thrust upon her by many different people.
Brooks, who wrote and directed the film, is all over the place with his storytelling. What at first seems to be a straightforward story about Ella and her various issues soon starts meandering into areas that, while related to Ella, don’t make the film better. Prime among them are her brother and father, who are given a relatively small amount of screentime in comparison to the importance they have in her life. This is compounded by a confounding subplot in which Casey tries to win back his girlfriend, Susan (Ayo Edebiri).
Then there’s the whole political side of the story, which never finds its focus and is stuck in the past. Though it’s never stated explicitly, Ella and Governor Bill appear to be Democrats, especially given a signature program Ella pushes to help mothers in need. But if Brooks was trying to provide an antidote to the current real world politics, he doesn’t succeed, as Ella’s full goals are never clear. He also inexplicably shows her boring her fellow lawmakers to tears, a strange trait to give the person for whom the audience is supposed to be rooting.
What saves the movie from being an all-out train wreck is the performances of Mackey and Curtis. Mackey, best known for the Netflix show Sex Education, has an assured confidence to her that keeps the character interesting and likable even when the story goes downhill. Curtis, who has tended to go over-the-top with her roles in recent years, tones it down, offering a warm place of comfort for Ella to turn to when she needs it. The two complement each other very well and are the best parts of the movie by far.
Brooks puts much more effort into his female actors, including Kavner, who, even though she serves as an unnecessary narrator, gets most of the best laugh lines in the film. Harrelson is capable of playing a great cad, but his character here isn’t fleshed out enough. Fearn is super annoying in his role, and Lowden isn’t much better, although that could be mostly due to what his character is called to do. Were it not for the always-great Brooks and Nanjiani, the movie might be devoid of good male performances.
Brooks has made many great TV shows and movies in his 60+ year career, but Ella McCay is a far cry from his best. The only positive that comes out of it is the boosting of Mackey, who proves herself capable of not only leading a film, but also elevating one that would otherwise be a slog to get through.
