Latest news with #Shaker
Daily News Egypt
4 days ago
- Business
- Daily News Egypt
Electricity minister follows up on power supply progress for New Delta projects
Minister of Electricity and Renewable Energy Mohamed Shaker held a follow-up meeting to review the progress of electricity supply projects supporting agricultural development and land reclamation within the framework of the Mostakbal Misr for Sustainable Development initiative. During the meeting, Shaker reviewed project timelines, scheduled delivery dates, and progress rates at each site, noting the alignment between planned schedules and actual execution. The discussion also covered the status of equipment manufacturing, transportation, and installation. Coordination was a key topic, particularly regarding the completion of electrical works, energising certain substations, and synchronising these efforts with agricultural development schedules—especially planting seasons. The meeting further addressed the construction of distribution networks and installation of transmission lines across various voltage levels, with particular attention to ensuring power supply for distribution panels serving irrigation pump stations. Special focus was given to the northern supply point at the Hammam pump stations. Participants underlined the importance of adhering to project timelines and providing temporary power sources to meet immediate demands until transformer stations are fully completed and integrated into the national grid. These measures form part of a broader strategy to guarantee reliable electricity supply, implement sustainable energy solutions, maintain grid stability, and improve power quality. Shaker directed that the current action plan be revised to reflect the critical need for a stable and continuous power supply. He called for accelerating the implementation of several transformer stations and highlighted the importance of close coordination among all stakeholders. To expedite technical work, he urged increasing work shifts and intensifying efforts related to tower installations along transmission line routes. The Minister stressed the need to overcome any obstacles, reaffirming the priority of completing projects and starting operations as scheduled, given their central role in supporting agricultural development initiatives. He also confirmed readiness to supply electricity from nearby sources to ensure the timely start of production across all projects. Shaker emphasised that meeting deadlines is integral to the state's sustainable development strategy and vision to create integrated agricultural, industrial, and urban communities. He reiterated the Ministry's commitment to ensuring reliable electricity access for all sectors, with a special focus on supporting land reclamation and agricultural projects to boost self-sufficiency in strategic crops. He also highlighted the need to enhance energy system efficiency and implement both urgent and long-term solutions to stabilise the national grid and improve service quality. This includes expanding renewable energy use, optimising the performance of power generation stations, and securing adequate electricity supplies for new projects, particularly those linked to land reclamation, agro-industrial development, and greenhouse farming under the Mostakbal Misr initiative. Shaker concluded by stressing that providing reliable electricity across all sectors is a cornerstone of sustainable development, essential for driving economic growth, attracting investment, and supporting the state's broader plans for industrial and agricultural expansion.
Business of Fashion
07-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Business of Fashion
Anderson Apotheosis: JW Remodels His Own Brand
It's no wonder 'in a weird way' is one of Jonathan Anderson's favourite expressions. It seems to be how things happen to him. In the two decades since he graduated from the London College of Fashion, his career has traced a surreal arc from idiosyncratic independent to fashion figurehead. Last week was his debut at Dior. This week he relaunches his own brand with a completely new concept. On the surface, the two exercises couldn't be further apart. In a weird way, they couldn't be closer, joined at the hip by Anderson's own obsessive, compulsive drive. 'I love work,' he crows. 'I could do 24 meetings in a day. I love doing what I do. Is it scary? Of course, it's scary.' But there's never a moment when he manifests nerves, even in the hours leading up to his first show for Dior, when industry anticipation was running as high as I can ever remember it, even as he had hundreds of balls in the air with his own brand JW Anderson. He acknowledges the risk of stopping JWA, slowing everything down and then rebuilding it. 'Maybe I'm maturing as a person,' Anderson rationalises. 'I like to be able to prove something. If I don't feel like the underdog, I will never work. So, in a weird way, we had to rebuild a platform to become the underdog again. Why? Because, if not, I can't get up in the morning.' He spent a good year or so analysing what those impulses actually meant. 'I was thinking of Terence Conran. I love Shaker furniture and I'd been doing some research for myself on how it arrived in Britain through Conran. It became such a trend, and then infiltrated into design systems.' But if Conran revolutionised the way people thought about their homes in the '60s and '70s, Anderson's ambition is more humble. 'I think it's maybe how people see their desk or their coffee table. For me, it's more about the storytelling that you can do with an object, more of an intimate kind of thing, like, I bought this stick chair, and look at this amazing wood, and it's made in this country, and the guy only makes two of them a year. It's a nice story to tell, which is not just about how much something costs.' ADVERTISEMENT JW Anderson (Courtesy) He listens to people like Adam Curtis, the documentarian guru of pre-apocalypsism. Curtis's 'Hypernormalisation' is his favourite documentary. 'I've always wanted to meet with him. We were talking about everything. He thinks we're heading towards this time… it won't be about modernity, as in new fashion or new art. It will be heading towards a different time period, like when Gothic Revival, which was ultimately from 13th century architecture, came to dominate the world in the 19th century.' Anderson's own project tends to the kind of connoisseurship that shaped the golden years of the Wunderkammer, the 1700s, the 1800s, before museums became receptacles of human civilisation, when wide-eyed, well-heeled aesthetes would collect extraordinary objets for their own cabinets of curiosities 'as a way to showcase… a fascination with the diverse and sometimes bizarre aspects of the world.' (Thank you, Wiki). Anderson had an early education in such a magpie sensibility. His grandad would take him antiquing when he was a kid. At university, he worked in Sam Roddick's visionary sex shop Coco de Mer. 'In a weird way, Coco de Mer was a very good example of a curated fetish shop,' he recalls, 'where you could buy anything from Betony Vernon's sex toys through to a first edition of 'Lady Chatterley's Lover.'' His other job was working at the equally curated store 202 Westbourne Grove, where he observed how the buyer would acquire a mirror for €2000 ($2,360) and pass it on to customers for £70,000 ($95,000). The major criterion for his own collection is that everything has to have a story. There will be around 560 items when the website launches on September 1. And once something sells out, it's gone. Maybe 200 items will carry over, but seasonality is less of a concern. 'Instead of discounting things, we just keep them until they sell out,' Anderson says, 'and then we replace them. Because I feel like it's hard having a small business. It really is difficult. I feel for every single person who starts a business, I'm fortunate to have LVMH, but at the same time, we're still a small business with the pressure of a marketplace that is just collapsing. So I'm thinking, 'Let's get the Murano glass guy to make the hardest thing that shows his skill, but in something which looks timeless. Or let's get the best person in the world to reissue the Charles Rennie Mackintosh stool.'' Translation: The 'Murano glass guy' is Marcantonio Brandolini and Anderson has charged his company Laguna-B with creating pieces in an opaque green glass which they don't usually do. The Charles Rennie Mackintosh stool is recreated by a Mackintosh conservator in the black-stained oak he favoured, also available in white and a natural oak. Understandably not cheap, given the degree of expertise involved. JW Anderson (Courtesy) Andrew Bonacina, formerly director/curator at the Hepworth Wakefield museum in West Yorkshire, is putting together an art programme that, in some JW Anderson stores, might mean one single expensive masterpiece, in others, a series of mini-exhibitions of up-and-coming artists throughout the year. That was one thing that always struck me about Anderson's curation of art in Loewe's stores. The selection, say, of a piece of Matthew Ronay sculpture in London or the glorious wall of Howard Hodgkin in Madrid suggested a personal engagement that would be hard to quit, if ever the day of disengagement should come. 'Loewe will exist in part of my vision for as long as it needs to, you know,' Anderson says now, 'but in a weird way, what I realized is when you leave something, it's very difficult. I was trying to comprehend leaving something which I had built in my vision, like I built the entire aesthetic, right down to the Craft Prize, around all the things that I love. The good thing is it'll go, you know, and we will continue with JW, doing the thing that we've been doing, which is putting art into British institutions. We just helped put a painting of Andrew Cranston into a museum.' Or, as CEO Jenny Galimberti puts it, 'Loewe was him, and so now this is him.' And gloriously, perversely so. 'Everything has a little weird meaning to it,' Anderson says. 'I think it is just as accurate as when I did the ruffle shorts. It's the same energy, because ultimately, the ruffle shorts were in a wool that was made in Britain that I was completely obsessed by, which was the same wool that was on the little coat on Paddington Bear when I was a kid. So that threw me into the thing. And now it's, What is that in a tea cup? What is that in a pen? What is that in honey?' JW Anderson (Courtesy) It's like Citizen Kane and his sled named Rosebud, the single plangent memory that unleashes a lifetime. Except that with Jonathan Anderson, everything is Rosebud. The tea cup is by potter Lucie Rie. His collection of her work is one of the world's best, so this launch of a couple of her original designs, coffee cup as well, 3D-printed from her archive in the Sainsbury Centre, is probably his pride and joy. Wedgwood said no when Rie originally proposed these designs decades ago. Anderson has all the original correspondence. It took him a while to convince the company they'd made a terrible mistake. 'I know that I want a set of Lucie Rie,' he says now. 'I've made them in a selfish act for myself.' They're expensive — a cup and saucer will retail for £1000, and only a hundred will be made. They'll probably sell in minutes, such is Rie's audience of collectors. The profits will go to a foundation to preserve the legacy of Rie and her partner Hans Coper, to produce a catalogue raisonné, and to provide grants for young artists. ADVERTISEMENT The pen is made by YARD-O-LED, who are the oldest penmaker in the UK. They've also remade a mechanical pencil for JWA. Originally invented and patented in the early 1800s, it's engraved here with an Oscar Wilde quote: 'The secrets of art are best learned in secret…' The honey is from Houghton Hall, the stately Norfolk home of the Marquess of Cholmondeley. 'Someone I always adore for doing random things is Giorgio Armani, he did honey once,' Anderson free-associates (free association is one of the singular pleasures of this particular project). 'So when I was at Houghton Hall, and I was meeting with Rose, they had honey, and I was like, Okay, I love her, and I love them both, and I just think they're so chic, and I was like, well, I want the honey, because maybe if I have the honey, I would feel like that. And it's all that thing, it's sort of odd, our relationships to certain things, going back to Warhol. And Warhol, for me, as cliché as it will always be, is one of the most modern thinkers in the last 500 years, because I think he was able to do this. And at the same time, it was always sharp.' The jars of honey are capped by squares of traditional honeycomb-patterned Norfolk linen from a weaver named Max Mosscrop. (You can really go down a rabbit hole with this stuff.) JW Anderson (Courtesy) And that's Anderson's ambition with his project. It's the power of the object to hold layers of meaning, be it a Marilyn portrait or a jar of honey: Now that is fetishism at a cargo-cult level. Or, muses Anderson, 'In a weird way, it is about obsession. Warhol was so powerful as the starting point of object, obsession, fame. I remember when I was very, very young, I was obsessed by Andy Warhol to the point where I wanted to buy the wallpaper of the cow. And when the internet started, there used to be online websites where you could do that. Never did, obviously, but I think that will always be in me, this search to find things you know or to bring things together. You know, that's why, in my house, nothing never stays still. It's like a never-ending project.' And there's the core of the quest. As it was with Warhol, where someone paid hundreds of thousands of dollars at auction for a collection of the artist's cookie jars, the power of curatorial personality — Anderson's in this case — infuses and elevates banality. Nothing clarifies that notion more for me than the collection of garden tools on offer at JWA, 200 in all, spades, trowels, hoes, immaculately refurbished by another of Anderson's gifted obsessives whose tool collection had reached a scale where his wife was begging him to divest. A common garden spade, oiled and gleaming, makes me want to get out and dig, but it would also make a perfect Duchampian readymade. Anderson does have a track record with Dada and surrealism, after all. There's a complementary collection of antique watering cans. Don't bother trying to find a logical connection between them and Dean Sameshima's luxuriously embroidered 'Anonymous Faggot' jumper or 'Anonymous Trade' sweatshirt. You're inside someone else's head here. JW Anderson (Courtesy) 'I needed to find a vehicle that was everything that's personal to me, no matter what it is,' Anderson explains. 'It's a weird obsession. It's ultimately me selling myself as these are things I like.' And not just that, but things he always wanted to do. Like chunky gold jewellery. Or real jewellery, which comes to JWA courtesy of a gemhunter named — what else? — Classical Gem Hunter. There will be diamonds. 'I just want five pieces per store, and we do them on beautiful chains. Or a beautiful ribbon. We don't need to remake that idea. You just have to bring it to people, and show that I'm obsessed by this person who finds things. It's not about ownership. It's more about, 'Here it is and I think it looks great.'' Anderson casts his mind back to the spade guy. 'There is no point in over-complicating it, you know? So, in a weird way, the JWA becomes a seal of approval. It's like, we approve this product, we approve this message. It's a fashion royal seal.' He laughs. 'I'm hoping that people are going to look at it and have this fetish to want to buy it.' The obsession carries through to the packaging: the boxes, a year in the making, have an aristocratic heft (that royal warrant thing again), everything else comes in potato sacks, or it's wrapped in the paper used to wrap fish and chips in seaside towns. 'But by redoing it, you kind of get this preciousness.' He feels there are kindred spirits for his concept. 'Just maybe not in fashion. I think Rose Uniacke is very good at how she creates. And there are places in Japan that I go to. I have no idea of their names.' Uniacke is a significant namecheck because her shop on Pimlico Road, a kind of interior designer's row in London, will be a neighbour of Anderson's latest outlet, which is maybe his clearest statement of intent with his brand revamp, because it will be the closest to the kind of world-building that is second nature to people like Uniacke. In the meantime, everything is changing in JWA's universe. The logo has been tweaked to chic. Every store is being completely renovated with softly opulent Uniacke velvet walls defined by a dado rail where all the merchandise will be suspended, Shaker-like, on pegs. That dialogue between excess and austerity is particularly Andersonesque. Architects Sanchez and Banton are of Jonathan's generation, but more commercial than fashion. They're good at practicalities, tight and tidy, so there is a solid functionality in fittings. Shelving is hung from the pegs along with everything else. It's all for sale, and customisable. ADVERTISEMENT As the concept rolls out globally, each shop will ultimately be its own little world, shored up by the work of local artisans. But the corner store in Pimlico will probably be the one where JWA's idiosyncrasies find their fullest expression. In summertime, there might be garden furniture. Or asparagus. Jonathan is obsessed with asparagus. He also loves the idea of someone marching in and ordering six stick chairs for their dining table. 'This, for me, will be the day that I open a bottle of champagne. Because that's exciting to me. And then, at the same time, they can buy a beautiful cashmere sweater that says 'Anonymous Faggot,' as a kind of conceptual act, a fashion object, an art object. JW Anderson (Courtesy) Or maybe they'll be drawn to explore the rest of Anderson's offering. Oh look, a stork scissor from Ernest Wright in Sheffield. Didn't they stop making those a century ago? Good lord, is that a Lucie Rie teacup? And what the hell is coffee-tea? (It's exactly that, a hybrid created by Postcard Teas that's the make up of tea but the taste of coffee.) The big question is on its hind legs, begging: what's the object that speaks to Anderson the most? 'The handwoven damask silk shorts,' he answers instantly. 'I was restoring a Chippendale chair and I needed to get fabric for it and I was looking at the Dumfries House renovation because Prince Charles had commissioned all the artisans in Britain who historically would have made things like the type of silk Chippendale would have used, the exact silk that I'm obsessed by. We found the supplier and I said, 'OK, we need to order this fabric, in the three colours, a blue, a yellow, a green.' For me, this is as fetishistic as anything you can get. It's expensive because it is incredibly difficult to do. It is what you would use on walls and chairs, and I love the idea of the walls, the chair and the guy on the chair in the shorts, with the slipper.' The fetishism extends to the label on the shorts. 'When I first started my brand, way before it became a brand, I used to sell jewellery in a shop called Toosee, and the very first label that I ever had was a copy of a Paquin label from the 20s. I had bought this black blouse by Paquin and inside was a triangular label which was the standard way of doing labels in the 20s. And when we were researching this project, I thought we should go back to this original label, when I was not what I am today.' For the look book, which will be the way most people encounter his re-brand, Anderson selected a 35-strong cast of longtime collaborators and people he admires. People curation: quintessentially Warholian. So there's his partner, artist Pol Anglada, and collaborator, director Luca Guadagnino. There is artist Enrico David and musician Oliver Sim; actress Hailey Gates, and the dancer from Anderson's Drink Your Milk campaign. Bella Freud he met years ago at a party when her father Lucian asked him for a cigarette. There are also instructive little videos matching Anderson's characters with his various objects. Joe Alwyn clearly knows his way around a honey dipper. JW Anderson (Courtesy) 'I need to learn here, and I need to re-learn what I love in myself,' Anderson muses. 'This project feels honest to me. This is exactly where I should be right now. Yes, JW Anderson could do a fashion show. And we may do a fashion show when I feel like there is a need to do one. But I don't want people to be like, 'Oh, another fashion show.' I would rather someone goes in and is, like, 'Why do I feel the urge to buy a pot of honey?'' Joe, pass the dipper please.
Boston Globe
20-06-2025
- General
- Boston Globe
Homes in Brockton, Newton that help bring the outside in
LOT SIZE 0.16 acre BEDROOMS 5 BATHS 2 full, 1 half LAST SOLD FOR $157,900 in 1999 PROS Enter this gabled, corner-lot 1925 Colonial with Victorian-style flourishes by way of an elegant foyer with hardwood floors. The spacious living room at right features bay windows and a gas fireplace, and the formal dining room beyond has a coffered ceiling. French doors lead to a heated sunroom with walls of casement windows plus access to the backyard and a garage with wood stove. The updated eat-in kitchen has quartz counters, stainless appliances, and two-toned Shaker cabinets; there's a half bath nearby, and a mudroom exits to the side porch. Up either staircase, four bedrooms (one with access to a walk-up attic room) share a roomy bath. The basement has laundry, a family room, bedroom, and bath. CONS No central air. Advertisement 43 Ash Street in Brockton Handout Sue Hays, Keller Williams, 508-259-5116, Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up $1,575,000 50 GROVE HILL PARK / NEWTON Sunroom of 50 Grove Hill Park in Newton. Handout SQUARE FEET 2,389 LOT SIZE 0.21 acre BEDROOMS 4 BATHS 2 LAST SOLD FOR $1,207,000 in 2016 PROS This 1921 Craftsman with hardwood floors is set on a tranquil cul-de-sac in Newtonville. From the sunroom entryway, French doors open to an inviting living room with stone fireplace, recessed lights and speakers, and built-in shelves. A breakfast bar splits the dining room from the open kitchen with Shaker cabinetry, double sink, stainless appliances, and granite counters. A nearby mudroom with pantry storage leads to a side patio and fenced yard. Past a bath, the primary bedroom connects to a heated sunroom with over a dozen swing-out windows and rich wood wainscoting. On the second floor, three more bedrooms share a newer bath with double vanity. There's a family room and laundry in the walk-out basement. CONS Shared driveway. Advertisement 50 Grove Hill Park in Newton Handout Noreen Boyce, Advisors Living, 617-749-5308, nboyce@
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- Yahoo
Line-jumping dispute leads to 3 Stow students being punched at Cedar Point, parent says
A parent is asking Stow-Monroe Falls school officials to look into possible policy changes after her daughter was punched during a recent class trip to Cedar Point. The parent, whose name is not being used because her daughter is a minor, told the school board May 19 that her child was on a Kimpton Middle School class trip to the Sandusky amusement park and waiting in line for a ride when the incident occurred. More: Prank calls flood Ypsilanti mom after her phone number appears on Cedar Point wall The parent said her daughter was one of three girls who were struck by another student from Shaker Heights Middle School on May 17. The incident, the parent said, happened after a group of students from Shaker Heights cut in line earlier in the day and were confronted by her daughter and the two other Stow students. The Shaker Heights students, the mother said, told the girls they were catching up with other classmates already in line. A second encounter happened later when the two groups were in line for another ride at the park. The mother said a Shaker student had told the girls they could cut in front of them on another ride after the earlier incident. "(A) Shaker boy clocked three of our girls in the back of the head, causing them all to have concussions," the mother told the board. She also said her daughter is being checked for more serious injuries. "(My daughter) is scared and in pain, not only physically, but emotionally and mentally," the parent told the board. "We do not want this falling on deaf ears." Sandusky Police Chief Jared Oliver said the incident involving the students is being investigated. "The injuries reported to us were minor, if any at all," the chief said. The police report of the incident was not readily available since it involves minors and identifiable information has to be redacted. Cedar Point's Code of Conduct prohibits guests from saving spots in line or cutting in front of other guests or leaving a line for any reason. Violators may be asked to leave the park. The parent wants Stow school officials to take a fresh look at its policies for class trips — like Cedar Point — where the number of students traveling far outnumber the chaperones and students are not directly supervised at all times. "I am deeply concerned about the lack of adequate supervision that was provided to these 13 and 14-year-old students," she said. "From what I understand this situation could have absolutely been prevented. "This has absolutely been a devastating development to our family and one that will have ongoing medical and emotional implications." Requests for comment were left May 21 with Stow and Shaker Heights school officials. This story may be updated. Craig Webb can be reached at cwebb@ This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: 3 Stow students punched over line-jumping dispute at Cedar Point
Yahoo
19-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Film AlUla: 'Saudi Filmmakers Are Like the Crown Jewels for Us'
In such a fast-moving industry, it can be easy to forget that, a mere six or so years ago, there was no film scene whatsoever in Saudi Arabia. The country has only been welcoming non-religious tourists since 2019, a year after cinemas reopened following a near 40-year ban. Now there are more than 800 to choose from. It's no wonder then, that Saudi-born Film AlUla acting executive director Zaid Shaker is buzzing with excitement. Perhaps even more so after 10 months in the role, since taking it on in July. 'All the pieces of the puzzle are falling into the right places,' says Shaker, who leads Film AlUla's mission to support film and TV production in the northwest region of Saudi Arabia, the kingdom's oldest UNESCO heritage site. 'We have lots of momentum. The [Saudi film] industry is thriving,' he continues. 'What's happening in AlUla is big, and I'm working with a fabulous team [that] makes any job easy. So, yes, I'm still very excited.' More from The Hollywood Reporter Palestine Film Institute Drums Up Support in Cannes - for Films and Gaza Eurovision 2025: Austria Wins Song Contest With Johannes Pietsch, Israel Places Second 'Die My Love' Review: Jennifer Lawrence Spirals Into Psychosis While Robert Pattinson Plunges Into Despair in Lynne Ramsay's Jarring Character Study Film AlUla Studios opened last spring and features 26,000-square-foot soundstages and a 61,500-square-foot backlot and also acts as a government liaison to support permitting and rebate or incentive applications. THR caught up with Shaker to find out how they've put the facility to use since opening, what additional spaces have already been added, and his thoughts on the continued growth of the Saudi film sector. Congratulations on the collaboration with MBS MENA Limited, made public this month. Has it already led to increased interest? Absolutely. We've had enquiries from studios and streamers eager to explore the facilities. We have strong momentum building for Q3 [the third quarter] and Q4, with a robust pipeline of local, regional, and international productions. Any new offerings for filmmakers we can share? Our state-of-the-art facilities are operation-ready: We are ready to receive our first film. It's looking very good. We have exciting news, which we'll be sharing soon, hopefully. Within our new facilities, we have a cutting-edge recording studio that can accompany a full orchestra. We have finalized the production hub, which is a creative space that can support filmmakers. And we have an amazing activation space within the facilities. Can you share details of any new confirmed shoots? This year, we are waiting to announce the first feature film production within the umbrella of the Stampede Arabia slate of films [which grew out of a pact with L.A.-based Stampede Ventures, run by Hollywood veteran Greg Silverman], which is very exciting. And there are also a couple of interesting talks. Are more companies coming to use the studio space or to take advantage of the location, or both? It's equally both. They're complementary. We can accommodate parallel productions: You can have a full production, shooting everything on the ground, and at the same time have two separate high-end productions shooting at the studio. AlUla has wonderful scenery and locations, these UNESCO heritage sites. But when it's really hot weather, people also need to be able to shoot indoors. So this gives you the ability to invite productions all year round. Have any new initiatives been introduced to speed up the growth of a skilled local workforce? Every initiative we do is centered around the local community: honing and up-skilling crew. We always incentivize training and have lots of programs with different partners, so we have these sort of continuous workshops to be able to raise the bar and introduce a sustainable film crew within the boundaries of AlUla. This is definitely evident in recent films such as [2023's] Norah, which was the first feature film from Saudi to premiere at the Cannes Film Festival: 40 percent of its crew was local. With Siwar, the most recent film by Osama Alkhurayji, which opened the Saudi Film Festival, 80 percent of the crew was local — so, double. AlUla Creates, meanwhile, is a very high-level and detailed training capacity-building program, which has yielded three short films, some of which screened at the Red Sea Film Festival. Will there be rough quotas for the percentage of Saudi employees on each project? While there are no fixed quotas, employing Saudi nationals — particularly in studio operations and support roles — is a key objective. AlUla's vibrant population of 65,000, with 65% under the age of 30, represents an incredible pool of dynamic, emerging talent. We also focus on strengthening the local economy by sourcing goods from local artisans and championing community-driven businesses. What new environmental practices have been introduced in AlUla? AlUla has lots of cultural significance. We are guardians and custodians of our important UNESCO heritage sites. For us, sustainability is a 360-degree approach toward everything. Lots of our incentives are granted to productions based on their sustainability measures, whether it's green or abiding by best international practices. Also, internally, we make sure to have all of our team attend every relevant seminar to keep up-to-date with every sustainable practice. Following 's Cannes success, which other local Saudi films are creating noise on the global scene, or which do you predict will? Looking forward, we have Hijra by Saudi filmmaker Shahad Ameen [the follow-up to 2019's Scales, which was Saudi's official Oscar submission in 2020]. It should be releasing at the end of this year. Some scenes were shot in AlUla, which is a testament to the fact that we never perceive any production as a one-time [thing]. And I have to mention Abdulaziz Alshlahei's Hobal [about a Bedouin family living in extreme isolation in the '90s], which, though not shot in AlUla, was a great stride for the Saudi ecosystem. Saudi filmmakers are like the crown jewels for us because, ultimately, one of the most important things we do is export our culture and enable these amazing storytellers. The Saudi Film industry launched with big fanfare from 2018. What is the focus now? To attract big buzzy international projects or foster more Saudi projects? The answer is somewhat holistic. For me, the more I am able to attract international films, the more I am able to introduce some sort of real-time training, shadowing programs to support local content. We have the bandwidth to entertain both, so it's about focusing. What stands out as an achievement you're proud of so far at AlUla? I am really proud of my team's resilience and persistence and how we are able to move ahead. The studios have a very personal spot in my heart. It was heartwarming to see the Saudi Film Festival opened by Siwar, a film shot in AlUla, this year. I'm also obviously proud of Norah. But for me, the studios — you have to see them to believe them. What's the Saudi film industry generally like right now? The kingdom now boasts more than 800 screens in a country that, eight or nine years ago, didn't have cinemas. Now you're talking about 42 percent of all of the Middle East box office revenue coming from Saudi. I bother all of my friends and family with this. The success of Hobal this year is a testimony that the audience in Saudi is very receptive, not only to commercial cinema but for unique stories. Whatever is happening in the MENA region, it's within the heart of Saudi and we're very fortunate to be working in AlUla and witnessing this and being a catalyst for what's happening. You're seeing it when you attend amazing platforms such as the Red Sea Film Festival or the Saudi Film Festival. You can see that [the Saudi industry is] brimming with this positive energy, this dialogue, [with] so many youths engulfed with this power of cinema. Best of The Hollywood Reporter 'The Goonies' Cast, Then and Now "A Nutless Monkey Could Do Your Job": From Abusive to Angst-Ridden, 16 Memorable Studio Exec Portrayals in Film and TV The 10 Best Baseball Movies of All Time, Ranked
