Coffee-Table Notes

William Hurt – Actor   Born March 20, 1950; died March 13, 2022    William Hurt, who has died aged 71, was an actor who won an Oscar for his role in Kiss of the Spider Woman (1985). Adapted from Manuel Puig’s 1976 novel, director Hector Babenco’s film cast Hurt as Luis Molina, a gay prisoner sharing a cell with a political activist during Brazil’s then current military dictatorship. Luis survives his ordeal by recounting scenes from the wartime movie that gives Babenco’s film its title.   It was a bravura role for Hurt, who came to prominence several years earlier in his big screen debut, playing an obsessed scientist in the Ken Russell directed Altered States (1980). The run of films that followed saw Hurt play a small town lawyer opposite Kathleen Turner in Body Heat (1981), then a Vietnam war veteran reuniting with college buddies at their classmate’s funeral in The Big Chill (1983). Both were directed by Lawrence Kasdan. The same year as The Big Chill, Hurt playe...

John Stahl – Actor Born June 23, 1953; died March 2, 2022   John Stahl, who has died aged 68, was an actor who was latterly best known for his regular roles in two iconic TV series’. In Game of Thrones (2012-2013), Stahl played Rickard Karstark, taking over from Stephen Blount in series two as a chief member of Robb Stark’s war council, who vows revenge after his two sons are killed by Jaime Lannister, only to end up himself executed by Stark in series three.    Three decades earlier, Stahl began a lengthy stint on Take the High Road (1982-2003), the rural Scottish Television soap opera later rebranded as High Road. Stahl was farmer Tom Kerr, better known to viewers and other characters as Inverdarroch. Both characters utilised Stahl’s towering presence, which combined a commanding sense of authority tempered by a benign empathy that was never far away.   Beyond these two high profile roles, Stahl was a stalwart of theatre in Scotland, appearing in most of the countr...

The cultural landscape looked a lot different to how it does now when Barry Esson first started putting on events at the start of the twenty-first century. This is evident from the three initiatives he and Arika, the socially minded production company he heads up with long-term collaborator, Briony McIntyre, currently have on the go.   Already up and running at the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) in London is Decriminalised Futures, an exhibition of thirteen international artists exploring experiences of sex workers. This is co-produced by Arika with the ICA and the Sex Workers Advocacy and Resistance Movement (SWARM).   Later in March, in association with CCA Annex, the digital wing of Glasgow’s Centre of Contemporary Arts (CCA), Arika will present A Breath to Follow. This two-day series of online discussions and presentations investigates different aspects of Black and indigenous grassroots art, dance and music collectives in Brazil.   This week sees the launch of ...