August 28, 2000 Making the News The release of a three-disc boxed set of works by songwriter and mathematician Tom Lehrer has provoked extensive coverage--all of it glowing--in the media recently. Articles have appeared in Bay Area papers such as the San Francisco Chronicle and the Oakland Tribune. A story also appeared recently in the New York Times, featuring a four-color shot of Lehrer at the piano in his Santa Cruz home, and stating, "Tom Lehrer finds the enduring appeal of his songs 'amazing.' Maybe he needs to listen to a new three-CD set of his work." The appointment of theater arts professor Kathy Foley to the Chandra Bhandari Endowed Chair in India Studies was reported recently in India West. It isn't easy helping your friends make an independent movie, according to music production supervisor Sven Davis. Davis detailed his experience in a feature story that appeared last month in the San Francisco Examiner-Chronicle. After delivering a seven-foot-long latex shark to the L.A. set, Davis was willing to help out wherever he could. But, unfortunately, volunteers--viewing their work on the set as a possible career advancement--regarded Davis as a threat to their own industrious appearance. Davis was useful for a moment, when they needed him and the director's mother to stand in as extras. "I can now say," Davis summarized, "that I excel at doing nothing on both sides of the camera."