This is Beirut - culture

Eurovision 2025: 166 Million Viewers, Record Audiences, and Viral Peaks

This is Beirut, 28/05 19:55 - Reading : less than a minute

Eurovision 2025 Music Television Streaming Record Audiences Culture

The Eurovision Song Contest confirmed its place as the world's biggest live televised music event, with 166 million viewers in 37 countries watching the 2025 edition, organizers said Wednesday. Three million more people watched this year's 69th edition in Basel, Switzerland, than last year's contest in Malmo, Sweden, said the European ...

AI Is Not a Threat, It's The Future of Music, Says Spotify CEO Daniel Ek

This is Beirut, 28/05 18:35 - Reading : 2 minute(s)

Spotify Daniel Ek Music Streaming IA Sweden Culture

Artificial intelligence will encourage more people to create music in the future and is not a threat to the industry, the co-founder and CEO of streaming giant Spotify said. Artists using machine-learning tools to produce music have given rise to concerns about whether AI-generated music - even entirely fake artists - could one day replace ...

Shakespeare’s 'King Lear' Rocks Tehran with Beat and Passion

This is Beirut, 28/05 10:30 - Reading : 3 minute(s)

Shakespeare Iran Theater Culture Art Tehran

An Iranian director is bringing a jolt of energy to King Lear, staging the Shakespearean tragedy in Persian in Tehran with electrifying rock music and dazzling lights to draw in younger crowds. In Iran, artists, writers, filmmakers, musicians, and playwrights constantly walk a fine line to avoid censorship of content considered inappropriate by ...

Short-Cycle Prose: Georges Perec, the Washing Machine’s Poet

Bélinda Ibrahim, 27/05 17:00 - Reading : 4 minute(s)

Georges Perec Washing Machine Writer Literature Poet Culture

A drum, a muffled sound, cycles, programs. A round door swings open onto the world’s laundry. A washing machine, yes – but for Georges Perec, it’s never just an appliance. It’s a trigger – his engine for writing. In the workshop of this master of literary constraints, even the most ordinary object can become a source of invention. ...

Fast, Fearless, Female: France’s Stunt Star Conquers Hollywood

This is Beirut, 27/05 16:00 - Reading : 4 minute(s)

Suntwoman Film Sarah Lezito Entertainment France Culture

When Sarah Lezito began messing around with motorbikes at 13 she never dreamed that one day she would become the stunt double of some of Hollywood's biggest stars. The French winemaker's daughter has stood in for Scarlett Johansson - twice - on Avengers 2 and Black Widow and appeared in a dozen films including The Batman. The 32-year-old is one ...

Salman Rushdie Says 'Pleased' With Attacker's Jail Sentence

This is Beirut, 27/05 10:00 - Reading : 2 minute(s)

Literature Salman Rushdie Justice US London Culture

Salman Rushdie said Monday he was "pleased" with the maximum 25-year jail sentence handed to a man who tried to kill him with a knife at a New York cultural center in 2022. "I was pleased that he got the maximum available, and hopefully he uses it to reflect upon his deeds," Rushdie told BBC radio in an interview. Hadi Matar was sentenced to 25 ...

Adèle Exarchopoulos: Behind the Spotlight, Raw and Unmasked

Marie-Christine Tayah, 26/05 19:00 - Reading : 3 minute(s)

Adèle Exarchopoulos Actress Cinema Cannes Culture Art

Born in Paris in 1993, Adèle Exarchopoulos shot to fame at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival through Abdellatif Kechiche’s Blue Is the Warmest Color. At the request of jury president Steven Spielberg, she was awarded the Palme d’Or alongside the director and her co-star Léa Seydoux—her “greatest love story on screen,” as she recently ...

Filmmaker Panahi Cheered on Return to Iran After Cannes Triumph

This is Beirut, 26/05 15:00 - Reading : 3 minute(s)

Iran Jafar Pahani Film Cannes 2025 France Culture

Iranian filmmaker Jafar Pahani was given a hero's welcome on his return to Tehran Monday by supporters after winning the top prize at the Cannes Film Festival, footage posted on social media showed. After being banned from leaving Iran for years, forced to make films underground and enduring spells in prison, Panahi attended the French ...

Lilo & Stitch Smash Box Office in Holiday Weekend Surge

This is Beirut, 26/05 14:30 - Reading : 2 minute(s)

Disney Cinema Movie Box Office Culture Art

Theaters across North America are enjoying an exceptional Memorial Day holiday weekend, with two new much-anticipated blockbusters bringing in an estimated box office totaling well over $250 million, analysts said Sunday. Disney's family-friendly Lilo & Stitch earned an estimated $183 million, a record for the four-day Memorial Day weekend, ...

Marcel Ophuls, Legendary Filmmaker Who Shattered French WWII Myths

This is Beirut, 26/05 10:10 - Reading : 3 minute(s)

Cinema Documentary Culture Art Marcel Ophuls

Oscar-winning filmmaker Marcel Ophuls, who blew the lid off the myth that France resisted its World War II Nazi occupiers in The Sorrow and the Pity, has died aged 97, his family said Monday. Ophuls, who was the son of renowned German Jewish director Max Ophuls, "died peacefully on May 24", his grandson Andreas-Benjamin Seyfert said in a ...

"It's in our blood": How Vietnam Made the Latin Alphabet Its Own

This is Beirut, 25/05 13:25 - Reading : 3 minute(s)

Vietnam Calligraphy Culture Latin

At a calligraphy class in Hanoi, Hoang Thi Thanh Huyen slides her brush across the page to form the letters and tonal marks of Vietnam’s unique modern script — Quoc Ngu — in part a legacy of French colonial rule. The history of romanised Vietnamese, or Quoc Ngu, links the arrival of the first Christian missionaries, colonisation by the ...

Cannes 2025: A Closing Full of Tears, Power and Purpose

Marie-Christine Tayah, 25/05 10:10 - Reading : 5 minute(s)

Cannes Film Festival Cannes2025 Cinema France Culture Closing Ceremony

After ten intense days, Cannes brought down the curtain in an atmosphere of artistic elevation. It was a festival that felt political, raw and deeply human—where voices rose to fill the silence onscreen. As always, the iconic “Aquarium” piece from The Carnival of the Animals by Camille Saint-Saëns played before each red carpet entrance, ...

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