Puritans with Machine Guns in ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’
The first season of this icily horrific series is a crash course in the possibilities of a uniquely American 'It Could Happen Here' patriarchal Christian fascism.
television
Going Back to Things Unknown with ‘The Outer Limits’
The Outer Limits is a mix of sci-fi nightmares, and surrealism – the very things that make life worth living even though they scare the bejeebers out of us.
True/False Film Fest: ‘Won’t You Be My Neighbor?’
Director Morgan Neville cuts straight to the heart of matters with this moving biography of Fred Rogers.
True/False Film Fest: ‘Our New President’
The next film from Pussy Riot: A Punk Prayer director Maxim Pozdorovkin treats us to Russian propaganda about the United States.
‘The Prisoner’ Has Superbly Outlived Its Original Context
Rogue filmmaker Alex Cox ties The Prisoner's island mentality and palpable "cupcake fascism" to current political events, including Brexit, in I Am Not a Number.
‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’ S9 Couldn’t Find Its Rhythm
Curb Your Enthusiasm's well-established characters are reacting to their former selves, rather than inhabiting or reinventing themselves. Thus, it loses the rhythms and inflections that once made the show so consistently, diabolically funny.
The Light and Dark Music in ‘ Mr. Robot’: A Conversation with Mac Quayle
Emmy-winning Composer Mac Quayle is one of the best in the TV soundtrack business. His mastery of synthesized instrumentation is perfectly suited to Mr. Robot's theme.
New York Minute, Hollywood Moment: An Interview with Actor David Labiosa
Veteran of the acting business for 40 years, David Labiosa relates a wealth of memories about his work as a Hispanic in the Hollywood industry.
‘Television: A Biography’ Showcases How TV Is an Insanely Mutative Beast
David Thomson's lucrative and exhaustive biography of television reminds us that the continuously morphing state of TV matches our increasingly digitally-enhanced society.
Seinfeldia: How a Show About Nothing Changed Everything (excerpt)
Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David: "like Harold Pinter or Samuel Beckett for television." What more does one need?
The Fourth Season of ‘Inside Amy Schumer’ Turns Inward at a Cost
As Trainwreck and Inside Amy Schumer's third season demonstrated, Schumer’s comedy's most potent when it explores the stakes of what it skewers.
Unbuttoning America: A Biography of Peyton Place
With its frank discussions of poverty, sexuality, class and ethnic discrimination, and small-town hypocrisy, Peyton Place was more than a tawdry potboiler.