Glimmers Of Hope: A 2021 Poetry Preview, Part 1
by Phillip B. Williams, Ana Bozicevic, Evie Shockley, Ken Chen, and Craig Morgan Teicher It’s been a sobering →
Car Concerts Offer Choirs A Way To Rehearse And Perform
by Nina Kravinsky For members of Luminous Voices, a professional choir ensemble in Alberta, Canada, rehearsing and performing safely during the pandemic has meant getting into their cars, driving to an empty parking lot and singing with each other’s voices broadcast through their car radios. This “car choir” solution is one that college music professor →
Fran Lebowitz’s ‘Pretend It’s A City’ Is The NYC Trip You Can’t Take Right Now
by Terry Gross Iconoclastic humorist Fran Lebowitz used to be known as a writer. Back in the late 1970s and →
To Adapt ‘After The Rain,’ Artists Cross All Kinds Of Boundaries
by Etelka Lehoczky As the market for graphic novels has taken off lately, so have graphic adaptations. That’s no wonder — they let publishers simultaneously recycle existing content and snare an all-ages audience. Fortunately, the profit motive can sometimes manage to coexist with good art — and even a new kind of art criticism. Peter Kuper’s Heart →
‘Soul’ Is A Jazzy, Joyful Celebration Of Life
by Linda Holmes, Stephen Thompson, Aisha Harris and Glen Weldon In Disney and Pixar’s Soul, a jazz musician voiced by Jamie Foxx falls down a manhole and finds himself teetering between life and the afterlife. He winds up on a New York adventure with a wandering soul, voiced by Tina Fey, who needs help getting ready →
For Christmas, My True Love Gave To Me … Hand Sanitizer, Because It’s 2020
by Alina Selyukh On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me … hand sanitizer, →
‘Bridgerton’ Is A Delicious, Raunchy Tale Of One Very Hot Family
by Linda Holmes It’s tempting to review Bridgerton thusly: “I highly recommend this Shondaland series, which will remind you a →
Cliff Beach’s Funky Christmas
Celebrate the holidays this year with a funky virtual concert in Pershing Square. Merry Christmas! Pershing Square and the City of Los Angeles – Department of Recreation & Parks are proud to present the next installment in our Virtual Holiday Concert Series, the amazing and incredibly funky, Cliff Beach on Friday December 25, 2020 at →
‘Jingle Jangle’ Director David E. Talbert Calls Film ‘A Love Letter To My Childhood’
by Michel Martin and Janaya Williams Whimsical, larger-than-life movie protagonists — Ebenezer Scrooge, Caractacus Potts, Mary Poppins, Willy →
Meet Beave, The Internet’s Most Famous Beaver
by James Doubek Leave it to a beaver to find new ways to build dams. That much was →
McQsJazz Video Of The Week – Jackiem Joyner “In Your Eyes”
Check out this week’s video featuring Jackiem Joyner performing “In Your Eyes” only on McQsJazz.com →
Buckle Up: ‘The Flight Attendant’ Is A Comedy-Thriller Worth Binging
by Linda Holmes and R. Eric Thomas A woman wakes up after a night of partying and realizes →
OH OH OH! Joyful Holiday Cards That Don’t Shy Away From A Tough Year
by Scott Simon and Emma Bowman During a year when many Americans have had to forgo close gatherings with family and friends, holiday cards are among the few things that can still be shared with loved ones. But when 2020 has been more “sick and tired” than “merry and bright,” what goes on a greeting →
Let Us Be Your +1 To ‘The Prom’
by Glen Weldon, Aisha Harris, Mark Blankenship and Margaret H. Willison Based on a sudsy, splashy 2018 Broadway →
‘Time’ Names Its Kid Of The Year: Water-Testing Scientist Gitanjali Rao
by Bill Chappell Gitanjali Rao, a Colorado teenager who invented a mobile device to test for lead in →
‘Mank’ Takes On Hollywood Politics And The Legend of ‘Citizen Kane’
by Stephen Thompson, Aisha Harris, Bilal Qureshi, and Monica Castillo Starring Gary Oldman and Amanda Seyfried, Mank captures the artistic →
Alt.Latino Film Festival: Fandangos And Mockingbirds
by Felix Contreras This fall, Mexican folk music takes the spotlight in two separate documentaries. Linda and the Mocking Birds takes a trip to a small town in northern Mexico with Linda Ronstadt. She accompanies a group of young musicians and dancers from the Bay Area cultural group Los Cenzontles, which translates to “mockingbirds.” For decades, Ronstadt has →
Can’t Find A Chess Set? You Can Thank ‘The Queen’s Gambit’ For That
by Neda Ulaby Who could’ve predicted chess sets might become as difficult to find as toilet paper during →
Leslie Jones Reinvigorates ‘Supermarket Sweep’
by Stephen Thompson and Travis Larchuk The game show Supermarket Sweep has run in the ’60s, the ’90s and the →
In ‘Fargo,’ Everything’s Up To Date In Kansas City
by Aisha Harris and Glen Weldon The fourth season of Fargo stars Chris Rock as Loy Cannon, a ruthless Kansas →
Illusionist Scott Silven Can Turn A Video Call Into A Magical ‘Journey’
by Jeff Lunden A slender, dark-haired young man walks along the windblown Scottish coast, picking up stones and →
Return Of ‘The Mandalorian’ (And Baby Yoda)
by Eric Deggans The secret weapon of Disney+’s The Mandalorian, is discovery. It’s pretty much in the DNA of →
Actor Buys A Crumbling Home For 1 Euro And It Turns Into A ‘Big Italian Adventure’
by Lulu Garcia-Navarro An American actor buys a 200-year-old Italian home for 1 euro. What could go wrong? Well, a lot, as it turns out. Lorraine Bracco is best known for her roles in The Sopranos and Goodfellas. In her new HGTV show, My Big Italian Adventure, Bracco renovates — really renovates — the abandoned house she bought in Sicily. The home →
‘To Hold Up The Sky’ Asks A Simple Question: What If … ?
by Jason Sheehan Cixin Liu’s To Hold Up The Sky is a 1974 Chevy van with icy moons and swirling nebulae painted on the side that you saw for sale by the side of the road in a snowstorm. It is a copy of Heavy Metal you found stuck in the back of the rack at Empire Comics when →
Yes, There’s Conflict — But No One’s The Bad Guy In ‘Memorial’
by Scott Simon by Scott Simon A lot is going on with Benson and Mike. They have explosive →
15 Years On, The Lonely Legacy Of ‘Shadow Of The Colossus’
by Lewis Gordon The first time the player is given control of Wander, the young and androgynous-looking protagonist →
My Breast Cancer Diagnosis Came In The Pandemic. I Wanted More Than A ‘Virtual Hug’
by Karin Huster “You have breast cancer,” my doctor announced, faceless behind her mask. Silence. In the middle →
‘American Utopia’: David Byrne’s Coming To My House, Via HBO
by Glen Weldon, Chris Klimek, and Soraya Nadia McDonald David Byrne and Spike Lee. Two artists with very defined, very distinct, and yet very different, sensibilities — but when you put them together, it works. The theatrical concert film David Byrne’s American Utopia, now streaming on HBO Max, is a career-spanning celebration of Byrne’s music, both with →
‘The Forty-Year-Old Version’ Is Fast, Funny, Multi-Faceted And No Small Feat
by Justin Chang While the American film industry still has a long way to go in nurturing movies made by women and people of color, the Sundance Film Festival has long provided an important platform for marginalized voices. This is the festival that recently introduced us to pictures like The Farewell, from Lulu Wang, and Clemency, from Chinonye →
Kevin Young Named Director Of National Museum Of African American History And Culture
by Elizabeth Blair The Smithsonian Institution has announced that poet Kevin Young will be the next director of the National →
‘Mulan’: A Beloved Disney Classic Reimagined As Martial Arts Epic
by Linda Holmes, Stephen Thompson, Mallory Yu, and Kathy Tu The biggest movie so far to be bumped →
As Burning Man Goes Virtual, Organizers Try To Capture The Communal Aspect
by Elizabeth Blair Burning Man — the dazzling, days-long, annual arts and lovefest drawing 70,000 to the dusty Nevada desert — was cancelled this year. But organizers are trying to capture the quintessential, communal arts experience online. For this year’s theme, Multiverse, teams have created 2D and 3D virtual experiences. The program runs Aug. 30-Sept. 6. →
In ‘I’m Thinking Of Ending Things,’ A Couple Gets Stuck In A Dreamlike Limbo
by Glen Weldon After finishing writer/director Charlie Kaufman’s latest film, which hurls so many things at you as →
Melanie Faye: Tiny Desk (Home) Concert
by Bobby Carter The Tiny Desk is working from home for the foreseeable future. Introducing NPR Music’s Tiny Desk (home) concerts, bringing you performances from across the country and the world. It’s the same spirit — stripped-down sets, an intimate setting — just a different space. I spend a considerable amount of time in the →
‘Lovecraft Country’ Tours The Horrors Of America
by Linda Holmes, Glen Weldon, Audie Cornish, and Ronald Young Jr. The best horror is the horror that →
‘Tenet’ Opens Internationally. Will Be Shown In Select U.S. Cities Next Month
by Mandalit Del Barco It’s always been about timing with Tenet. Christopher Nolan’s highly anticipated action thriller stars John →
What It Looks Like When School, And Everything Else, Happens At Home
by Elizabeth Dalziel A friend posted a picture on Instagram of her 11-year-old daughter wearing a school uniform, sitting attentively in front of a laptop and waving to her teacher during a virtual class. My experience lay in stark contrast. During home lessons, my youngest child, a 7-year-old, often ignores the screen and climbs on me →
