So, what are you doing this year? I’m going to be spending
my time here in the Daily Bruin office concentrating on asking that
very question. What are you up to this weekend, this quarter, this
year? What the hell is going on around campus that’s
cool?
And I know you’re out there, you people doing cool things
here at UCLA.
I know you have started a band, put together a play, shot a
movie on your dad’s digital camera, written a collection of
poetry you’re about to read in Kerckhoff. I know you’re
out there because UCLA is one of the best schools for the arts in
the country, and because we here in A&E are you. We are here
writing about the arts, because we are all involved ourselves, and
we want the arts to matter. We’d like to have an effect on
the world, and certainly this campus. And college is certainly the
best time to start trying.
We’ve got our naive optimism going for us, and you
probably do too, so what could we possibly do better than support
each other?
Why do we need you, you might ask? Sure, we get a million and
one press releases, and we could cover national-level events in an
attempt to be your daily New Yorker (insert name of any arts mag or
journal you read here). We will cover nationally important events,
but only when we think it’s important to you.
Our theme for this issue is “In Your Face,” because
we want to cover the events that are here in your face and shove
them further in your face. The cover depicts a student standing in
front of TVs (a representation of an entertainment medium in your
face to the point of saturation). But instead of the typical
mindless TV fare, we’ve inserted pictures of exciting and
thought-provoking things going on around campus. We’ve got
Edgar Allan Poe on the cover because on Halloween night people are
going to be reading his work in Royce Hall, and that’s pretty
damn cool if you’re not going trick-or-treating.
The truth is we want to cover everything going on here at UCLA,
because that’s what we care about and assume you care about.
We’re at UCLA to take advantages of the privileges of being a
college student, and it is A&E’s job to help you.
So, when someone comes to play at Westwood Plaza, Royce or
Northwest Campus Auditorium, A&E will tell you about it, and
we’ll tell you if we think they suck or not.
We’re going to do our best to let you know about every
worthwhile event and then analyze the crap out of it too. And
don’t be afraid to write in and tell us if you agree, or
disagree. That’s what our job is all about anyway, stirring
up thought and opinion amidst intellectual college students,
right?
It’ll be a beautiful symbiotic relationship where our
coverage exists because you create and attend events worth
covering, and we inspire you to attend and create art, etc.
There is however one problem with this incredible system.
Remember those million and one press releases I mentioned a
couple paragraphs back? Well, those are sent by publicists who get
paid full-time to contact the media about their clients. Most of
you don’t have publicists.
As a result we often don’t find out about things happening
on campus until the last minute or even after the fact.
A&E is going to be as proactive as we can, but we can only
do so much. So, this is my plea or invitation to you: give us an
answer to that question “What are you doing this
year?”
Please let us know if you’re doing something cool. If you
hear about your friends or anyone putting on a painting exhibition
in an apartment on Kelton, tell us about it. You can e-mail me or
come into 118 Kerckhoff anytime and let us know what’s going
on. It’ll be fun.
Besides turning introspective about UCLA this year, the A&E
section is going to be more fun. Sure, you can’t tell from
this dour, straight-ahead column, but trust me, there is going to
be a lot more in this section, which will be amusing to read (check
out our tips on getting into a film premiere). Entertainment is the
second half of our name, after all.
So, that’s it. Local fun is the angle we’re taking
for our stories this year. And you can tell I know what I’m
talking about because I’ve got the editor’s column in
this crazy section.