film

Final Organizer Roundtable Discussion

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This roundtable by Ohio State University Professors Harmony Bench (Associate Professor, Department of Dance), Yana Hashamova (Professor and Chair of the Department of Slavic and East European Languages and Cultures), Hannah Kosstrin (Associate Professor, Department of Dance), and Danielle Schoon (Senior Lecturer, Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures), comes at the conclusion of their 2020-21 project Audiences and Online Reception: Before and After COVID, funded by a Global Arts and Humanities Discovery Theme Special Grants Initiative.

Audiences and Online Reception: Before and After COVID examines the impact of COVID-19 and quarantine experiences on artistic and cultural production by examining historical precedents, considering audiences in their social contexts, and imagining possible futures based on how audiences are currently forming. This project asks: How does COVID-19 impact cultural production, reception, and circulation? How are artists and scholars evolving their creative practices and research methods in response to quarantine experiences? What engagement strategies are cultural institutions pursuing to develop new audiences as their venues shutter? How are online and offline audiences responding to changes wrought by COVID-19? In what ways do audiences participate in creating meaning and social narratives, particularly during unstable political climates past and present?

Event Announcement // A Conversation with Michael Idov

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“Audiences and Online Reception: Before and After COVID” is delighted to host Michael Idov, the Latvian-American creator of Russian films and tv shows, for a conversation about how Russian audiences have changed in the COVID-19 era, including his recent experiences filming in Russia. During this event, Idov will also discuss his award-winning spy drama The Optimists. This free event is open to the public and will feature a question-and-answer session moderated by Drs. Yana Hashamova and Alisa Lin from the Department of Slavic and Eastern European Languages and Cultures.

About Michael Idov

Michael Idov is the screenwriter of the Palme d’Or-nominated LETO (Cannes 2018), director of the acclaimed feature THE HUMORIST, the creator of hit Russian TV series LONDONGRAD and THE OPTIMISTS, and the author of four books, including the recent DRESSED UP FOR A RIOT (Farrar, Straus 2018). A Latvian-born American raised in Riga, Michael moved to New York in 1998, winning three National Magazine Awards for his writing in New York Magazine before changing his focus to film and TV. He and his wife and frequent collaborator Lily are currently based in Los Angeles.

Event Information

A Conversation with Michael Idov

Wednesday, November 18

4:00-5:00 p.m. (ET)

Registration for this Zoom webinar is required. Please fill-out the RSVP form by Tuesday, November 17th to receive the Zoom event link.

Reception of Misinformation and Audience Responses

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What Russia Really Thinks about Chernobyl?

Photo: <https://www.express.co.uk/showbiz/tv-radio/1145211/Chernobyl-what-does-Russia-really-think-about-Chernobyl-putin-state-media-propaganda>

 

Experiencing the spread of COVID-19, the growth of the pandemic, and witnessing the various international governments’ responses to the public health crisis reminded our graduate student, Maryam Bainazar, and me about the Chernobyl disaster and the Soviet government’s response to it. While she knows about Chernobyl only through the experience of her parents who left the Soviet Union in 1991, as well as media and scientific sources, I vividly remember the official government silence and slow response. Although I lived in Bulgaria, our government followed closely the USSR’s announcements and replicated them. The immediate few days after the accident and the release of radioactivity into the environment, all students in my city were practicing the opening of a local Spartakiad (sports competition) on the stadium. Nobody warned us or stopped the practice to minimize our exposure. According to scientists, approximately 25,000 square kilometers were contaminated, and my city is about 1,000 kilometers away from Chernobyl. With such memories resurrected, Maryam and I  decided to evaluate the Soviet government censored media coverage and general response to the public health crisis which occurred following the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, and to compare it to the current Russia’s government agents’ false COVID-19 narratives, circulating online. In addition to analyzing available public information disseminated in the 2-3 weeks after Chernobyl’s explosion, we will examine the reception of this information by collecting the oral history of participants who were affected by the disaster. Additionally, we are interested in the reception and circulation on social media platforms of COVID-19 false narratives.

Audience behavior and reception of film and media has shaped my research and teaching in the last several years. My last book, Screening Trafficking: Prudent and Perilous, analyzes the local and varied reception of internationally distributed anti-trafficking films. As part of this more general research in audience responses, my colleague Dr. Alisa Lin and I will host a conversation with the American-Latvian film creator Michael Idov on November 18 (4:00-5:00) and we’ll discuss his work on the creation of Russian films (Summer, 2018) and TV series (Optimists and Londongrad, both available on Amazon Prime Video), their reception, and any impact of COVID-19 on his work.