Only a New York Times Editor Would Make a Reference to the Italian Renaissance When Defending Jennifer Aniston Coverage
Excerpt from a Q&A session between NY Times readers and Culture Editor Sam Sifton:
Q: It seems that The Times has been giving more space to celebrity culture than it used to … Jennifer Aniston, for example, is so omnipresent in our lives. Do we really need to read about her in The Times as well?
A: … Celebrity walks hand in hand with artistic success and has since before the Medicis made art stars rich. We try to balance that fact against our interest in the art itself. And, having done that, we try to balance the art itself against other arts. We place pop culture against high. High culture against the middlebrow. Low culture against them all.
Got it. The Medicis. Also, it sells more papers.
(Via Romenesko)
Hey, he could have been more erudite. He could have referenced the tension between the Medicis and the Borgias, and its impact on artistic fame.
But then he would have to go to work for The Atlantic Monthly.
I relate the tension between the Medicis and the Borgias to the tension between Jennifer and Angelina, actually…
Starring Angelina as Lucrezia Borgia … James Haven as Cesare Borgia … and a very special guest appearance by John Voight as Rodrigo Borgia/Pope Alexander VI