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About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 25, 1991)
Arts & Entertainment Environmentalists urge end to CD boxes By Jim Hanna Senior Reporter Many artists in the music industry have taken high-profile positions in the recent re birth of the environmental movement. Now, the producers who distribute their music may jump on the green bandwagon as well. The National Association of Record Mer chandisers (NARM) will meet next month and may consider changes in the packaging of compact discs, which many see as a waste of paper products, said John McCallum, owner of the Twisters record chain in Lincoln. Currently, most CDs arc packaged in card board containers that are much bigger than the CD and case they contain. Recently, environ mentalists have been calling for the elimina tion of the so-called long box. “They’re wasteful,” McCallum said. “We’re the only country that continues to use them for CDs There is definitely a move in the U.S. to get rid of the long box.” Dylan McCullough, an employee at Pick les, 1637 P St., agrees that the long box is a waste of paper. “They should be done away with. They’re plugging up our landfills,” he said. Initially, CDs were packaged in long boxes to boost sales and decrease theft. The increased package size allows distributors to create larger, more inviting art that makes the product more appealing to consumers, said John Nanos, manager of Pickles, 1637 P St. In addition, the large, unwieldy size of the long box makes it less susceptible to shoplift ing, McCallum said.For those reasons, many larger music stores are resistant to a change. “A lot of retailers arc opposing change because of shoplifting, which is bad enough already,” McCailum said. Nanos doesn’tagree, saying the big retailers just want the increased sales the larger art btings. “That’s a crock of shit,” he said. “They’re just too lazy to put it into a plastic case.” Plastic cases are one of the proposed solu tions to the long box controversy. CDs could be distributed without paper packaging and then inserted into reusable plastic holders, much like cassette tapes are now. Using plastic cases also would allow CDs to be shelved on the racks currently used to store long-box CDs. This could save individual stores as much as $30,000 by avoiding the costly fixture replacement unpackaged CDs would require, McCallum said. Both McCallum and Nanos say they expect some sort of change in packaging guidelines in the near future. Change may come as soon as the NARM meeting next month, McCallum said. Until then, both Pickles and Twisters have systems for dealing with the present long box situation. Currently, Pickles is using both plastic cases and recyclable cardboard cases for the unpack aged CDs that many distributors send to them. As more music artists insist on releasing their CDs without the long box, this sort of re packaging will increase. Twisters now invites customers to take the cardboard packaging off their CDs and leave it at the front counter. “We recycle everything,” McCallum said. “We’ll take that cardboard and recycle it.” In the interest of the environment, however, McCallum said he would like to sec the long box packaging done away with entirely. “I think for the environment, it’s definitely the way to go,” McCallum said, “and we’d support it ” Doc Homer/Dally Nebraskan Troy Radenslaben, an advertising and broadcasting freshman, browses through the easy listening section of CD s at Twisters, 1401 O St. Daily Nebraskan corrects information in story on ‘Sidewalk of the Stars’ The following are corrections for an article about Lincoln’s “Sidewalk of the Stars” in Wednes day’s Daily Nebraskan. According to Jennifer Schizas, executive director of the Lincoln Arts Council, the LAC was asked by the city’s Department of Urban Development to become involved in the project. The article said the idea for the sidewalk was intro duced by the council. The article incorrectly quoted Schizas as saying she was confi dent the project would begin early this spring and that “the first prior ity is to attempt to raise funds through contributions for the stars.” The article also quoted Schizas as say ing “the LAC and the Urban De velopment Department only will go to the city if it is not possible to obtain private contributions.” These quotes should have been attributed to George Chick, Lincoln director of urban development. The article said Lincoln’s side walk “will feature stars for lumi naries in entertainment arts beyond the movie industry.” Schizas said no decision had been made on whether to feature stars for those people. Schizas, in a letter to the Daily Nebraskan, said “we were in the very preliminary stages of this project” and that “a committee would be making decisions about whether the honor would extend beyond entertainers ” Schizas also said no definite decision had been made about who See CORRECT on 10 Magnmcent, interesting cinematography can’t get ‘Russia House’ off the ground By Robert Richardson Senior Reporter Despite Scan Connery’s and Mich elle Pfeiffer’s efforts to get “The Russia House” off the ground, their plane stopped at the end of the runway. “The Russia House,” based on the novel of the same name, was written by John Le Carre and directed by Fred Schcpisi. The film should have remained on that plane that was stuck on the runway. The film begins with Katya Oliver (Pfeiffer) walking to a book fair in Russia with an unpublished book. She is delivering the book to an English publisher, Bartholomew “Barley” Scott Blair (Connery), for her Russian friend Dante. Barley hasn’t arrived at the book fair, so Katya entrusts her important Russia House Starring Sean Connery, Michelle Pfeiffer Rated: R Rating: 3 package with Blair’s colleague, an other English publisher. He is reluctant to accept the pack age because he knows his security is at risk. But after Katya says, “If you love peace, you will help me,” in a quaint Russian accent, he accepts the unpublished manuscript and prom ises to try to deliver it to Barley. When Barley is nowhere to be found, his colleague delivers the manuscript to the British Intelligence Agency. The British involve Ameri can intelligence, and together they find Bailey and question him as to why Katya was trying to find him. Included in the novel is informa tion regarding Russian military se crets that place the Russians far be hind the United States in the nuclear arms race. The British want to know if the information is correct, who Dante is and why he wrote the book. Barley is trained as a spy to go into Russia disguised as a book publisher— his real job — and find out the questions to the answers everyone wants to know. See RUSSIA on 10 Religion, male domination subjects of ‘Magdalene’ By Robert Richardson Senior Reporter _ Senior theater major Heather Flock said she felt a need to address issues such as male dominance and religion in her latest play, “Magdalene,” which will be performed at the Howell Theatre. “Magdalene” is about three women, all of whom happen to be named Mary Magdalene. Magdalene (Laura Arnold) is from biblical times, Mary (Lori Edwards) is from the turn of the 19th century and Maggie (Daena Schweiger) is from present day. AH happen to be dead and residing in some unnamed place. “Thai’s a question I would ask the audience to make for themselves, deciding exactly what place it is,” Flock said, “because I don’t want to say, oh yes, mis is purgatory or it s hell. “Basically, 1 wanted to use the character of Mary Magdalene, but 1 didn’t want to put her in the tradi tional kind of ‘Last Temptation’ situ ation. I wasn’t into that.” At the heart of “Magdalene” are several issues that Flock thought had to be addressed, including living in a male-dominated society. “It deals with what it’s like living in a society and living under the as sumption that, if there is a supreme being, that it is automatically male,” Flock said. “And what that says about the society and the religion and men in general.” Flock said she started to write plays in high school because the plays that existed didn’t fit her style, and she See FLOCK on 10 Michel!© Daily Nebraskan Actresses, from left, Laura Arnold, Lori Edwards and Daena Schweiger rehearse for this weekend’s production of “Magdalene.”
