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The Subway Can Be Hilarious

Just ask these stand-up comedians, who have been doing sets on trains for months. There are tickets, but then there are also random subway riders. And is it official? Hm. "The show had the chaotic air of something that could get shut down at any moment by a strict police officer who was not in the mood for a...

Why The Duke Isn’t Coming Back

Listen up, Bridgerton fans, blame streaming (and the focus switch of each Bridgerton book, from which the series draws). At Netflix and other streamers, "the goal is to draw paying subscribers and there’s little incentive to extend even the most popular shows for more than a few years. In that case, Soltman said, it wouldn’t be surprising to have...

The Young Creators Of A TikTok Viral Dance Speak Out

Mya Johnson is 15 and Chris Cotter is 13 - and they're Black. A white TikTok influencer took their dance, and other viral dances from the site, to Jimmy Fallon ... without any credit for the choreographers. A comparison of the influencer's "challenge" and the kids' dance moves went just as viral. Cotter, at 13, is gracious about it...

The 20th Century Irish Playwright And The Secrets Of Her Green Suitcase

Teresa Deevy wrote plays about young women coming to terms with - and pushing back on - the restrictions of life in Catholic Ireland. After Meuniere's disease caused her to become deaf, "She moved to London to study lip reading and while there became deeply immersed in theatre, deciding to become a playwright so that she 'would put the...

Broadway Reopens For 36 Minutes

The pop-up event, where Nathan Lane and Savion Glover performed (one at a time) "before a masked audience of 150 scattered across an auditorium with 1,700 seats, was the first such experiment since the coronavirus pandemic caused all 41 Broadway houses to close on March 12, 2020, and industry leaders are hoping it will be a promising step on...

Riz Ahmed Explains How His Character In ‘Sound Of Metal’ Paralleled Life During The Pandemic

His character is a heavy-metal drummer who becomes deaf - very quickly. "You've got a character who is very focused on his daily grind. ... Just like we are as a culture and a society, on the treadmill - a workaholic culture. Then we have a health crisis that suddenly throws him into a kind of purgatory, and in...

Why Are Digital Ads So Obnoxious While Digital News Sites Keep Failing?

Like the so-called "pivot to video," a lot of the industry was built on a house of cards that one might, with some justification, call lies. Starting new publications seemed so easy on the internet. "From the start, though, there was a problem. The super-low costs of entry and the lack of geographic limitations that were key to the...

Buildings That Claim To Be ‘Fossil Fuel Free’ Are Anything But

Glass, concrete and steel are far from carbon neutral, says a leading architect working on climate change. "The production of these materials entails burning a huge amount of fossil fuel. ... The climate emergency is not a game and we can’t just spin our way through it. We need to think about where our materials come from, how they’re...

Indoor Events Like Movies And Theatre May Return To California This Month

Restrictions both from public health officials and venues will be in place. "Venues can also choose to separate people into sections based on their vaccination status. Those who are fully vaccinated could sit shoulder-to-shoulder, but they still must wear masks." - Los Angeles Times

The Pleasure Of Writing Actual Letters In The Era Of Email And Social Media

"A precise feeling of fondness accompanies the receipt of a letter from someone you care about. There are as many shades of this feeling as friends in the world. Yet I sometimes leave a letter unopened for days, not knowing if I am ready to read it. A friend I still write to confessed the same thing. I wonder what we think...

What Of Our Radically Reimagined Cities Will Remain Transformed, Post-Pandemic?

Public space is different now than it was 15 months ago. Streets have been turned to outdoor eateries and pedestrian malls; Paris removed tons of street parking and converted the Rue di Rivoli into a biking haven. Will any of this decentralization of the car - and concurrent centralization of pedestrians and bikers - remain? - Fast Company

Visitors To A South Korea Gallery Defaced A Graffiti Piece

Of course, they didn't mean to harm it - they believed it was participatory. Extra "Do Not Touch" signs have now been added. - BBC

This Year’s Oscars Might Be The Most Diverse Ever, Thanks To The Pandemic

The diversity is a silver lining of the awards season's weirdness. "A deeper, post-Covid existential crisis is on the cards. What is the point of awards, after all? Are they about recognising artistic excellence and the importance of culture? Or are they about showbiz glitz and beautiful people? How much impact do they have? And who gets to do...

Composer Constance Demby Has Died At 81

Demby was a composer of electronica and New Age music. Her 1986 album Novus Magnificat: Through the Stargate sold more than 200,000 copies. "Pulse magazine named it one of the top three New Age albums of the decade and called it 'a landmark, full-length electronic symphony reminiscent of Baroque sacred music with crystalline effects that take you out of...

Ovation Awards Snafu In Los Angeles Sparks Exodus Of Theatres From LA Stage Alliance

The list of things that went wrong at the Ovation Awards is too long to list - though the venerable East West Players did on social media - but the result of mispronouncing an Asian American actor's name, posting the picture of a different Asian American actor to identify the first actor, and much, much more, is clear. "The...

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