Lost Soul Behind Bars
The untold story of Upheaval, a prison band that recorded one of the most sought-after soul singles of the 1970s.
Max Wilson
· 21 min read
Arts and Culture
A collection of 75 posts
The Western Reinvented. Again.
It has been 30 years since a Western last won the Best Picture Oscar at the Academy Awards. That was in 1992 and the film was Unforgiven, directed by Clint Eastwood, who also starred in it alongside Morgan Freeman, Gene Hackman, and Richard Harris. On Sunday, Jane Campion’s The
Kevin Mims
· 9 min read
Authority and Freedom: A Defense of the Arts—A Review
A review of Authority and Freedom: A Defense of the Arts by Jed Perl. Knopf, 176 pages. (January, 2022) Plug “relevance” into the search field of the website for Artforum, and 16 results pop up from 2021 alone. Relevance is the dominant aesthetic criterion of our time, and lack thereof
Franklin Einspruch
· 7 min read
Brutal and Unreformed
Sam Peckinpah’s ‘Straw Dogs’ at 50.
Charlotte Allen
· 33 min read
Jessie Tu and the Fashionably Regressive Approach to Reading
The world of literature has expanded its horizons in recent decades, and the quality of writing from voices that may not have been published in decades past is something for which we should be grateful.
Neil Tully
· 6 min read
Play Anything—The Case for Colorblind Casting
Colorblind casting is precisely what it sounds like—the practice of filling roles in a play or film regardless of skin color.
Graham Daseler
· 18 min read
When Norman Jewison Turned His Camera on the Ultimate Superstar
Jewison, by contrast, had found himself both “curiously moved” and “flooded with exciting visual images” upon first hearing the album.
Ira Wells
· 12 min read
R.M. Vaughan (1965–2020): A Beautiful Mind Silently Extinguished in a Time of Fear
We were Oscar Wilde’s great-grand-nephews, dandy aesthetes obsessed as much with the curl of our hair as with art or politics.
Sky Gilbert
· 8 min read
The Mob That Came After Me Is Turning on Itself. When Will This End? Who Does This Help?
One of the justifications offered by the cultural-appropriation mob that came after me is that you cannot speak for others unless you are the other.
Hal Niedzviecki
· 8 min read
Death of an Old-Fashioned Clown: An Obituary of Fred Willard
Fred Willard was a kind of Holy Fool even among fools.
Simon Evans
· 7 min read
As Common Sense Returns to the Gender Debate, Radicals Set Upon Their Own Allies
The entire argument was about whether one particular trans ally had become too famous at the expense of more worthy and authentic competitors.
Jonathan Kay
· 12 min read
The Purpose of Imaginative Fiction
“What’s it about?” is usually the first question we ask when someone recommends a new book, and it’s the wrong question.
Elena Shalneva
· 9 min read
COVID-19 Betrays America’s Curdled Cult of Optimism
A philosophy of optimism was central to the flourishing of the American project. But it’s also useful to consider whether insisting that success and greatness lie around every corner can become a maladaptive response to problems that are complex and brutal.
Daphne Merkin
· 5 min read
My Former Life as a Radical
They believe in the perfectibility of man in their own image: a combination of unscrupulous optimism and narcissism.
Gerfried Ambrosch
· 11 min read
By Seeking ‘Safer Spaces’ for Actors, We’re Creating a Hostile Environment for Art
I honestly have no idea why any actor would want to appear in a serious play featuring protagonists who are not, in some way, “screwed up.”
Sky Gilbert
· 8 min read