PicoBlog

The ’80s in 40 revisits the decade of the 1980s choosing four movies a year, one from each quarter. This entry covers the first three months of 1981. Director Michael Cimino filled the years after the high-profile commercial collapse and critical drubbing of Heaven’s Gate with false starts, failures, and finally a long retreat during which he wrote screenplays that would never be filmed and novels that would only be released in France, if they were released at all.

The Saenger Theater barely survived Katrina. The basement filled with water; the orchestra pit filled with water; the stage went underwater. It took eight years to restore it. Now it feels old — it was built in 1927 — but also new. The auditorium mimics a 14th-century Italian Baroque courtyard, with terra-cotta columns, painted plaster, Greek and Roman statues, grottoes, urns, and lots of gilding. The ceiling, like a plantarium, winks with stars.

Hello! You’re reading Heir Mail, the only newsletter to come from me (hi) setting a Google Alert for the word “heiress” and then just writing about whatever pops up. (Eh, sorta.) This week, this month actually, I didn’t look at the alert, because I could not afford to get distracted. (As you might guess because Heir Mail hasn’t come out since August, I got distracted.) Last time around, I said I owed y’all — by which I meant me; I only ever really do this for me — a deeper dive into Shari Redstone, and by god I meant it.

Helen Qiu Last week, I wrote about the uncanny similarities facing New York City's Jewish and Asian-American communities, and the need for the two groups to align politically to protect themselves and improve life in the city for everyone. Now, it turns out that one determined Chinese-American New Yorker saw that piece, agreed with it entirely, and just happens to be running for office in a district that's the perfect launching pad for creating this cross-ethnic partnership.

Capitalism’s birth from the grave of European feudalism, like Boris Karloff’s Frankenstein punching a fist out of its own tomb, has never been more ably described than by Matt Christman and Chris Wade of Chapo Trap House in this year’s 10 part series about the Thirty Years War, “Hell on Earth”. In fact, The Thirty Years War has never been so widely learned about, ever. Below, the lifetime revenue chart of the Chapo podcast (from Graphtreon) shows just how good the series is.

Welcome to “One First,” my new weekly newsletter about the Supreme Court of the United States. I’m Steve Vladeck. I have been thinking and writing about the Supreme Court for over 20 years, both as a law professor at the University of Texas, where I have taught since 2016, and as a Supreme Court Analyst for CNN, where I’ve been an analyst since 2013. So: Why have I decided to start a newsletter about the Supreme Court (and no, it’s not *just* because Twitter faces imminent collapse), and what the heck does “One First” even mean?

Florida Man is an Internet meme first popularized in 2013,[1] referring to an alleged prevalence of people performing irrational or maniacal actions in the U.S. state of Florida. -Wikipedia In 1890, Key West was the most populous city in Florida. The port ranked thirteenth busiest in the nation and exported 62 million cigars a year. All of this was happening on an island four miles long and one mile wide. As oil baron Henry Flagler’s Overseas Railroad neared completion in 1912, connecting the so-called Southernmost City to the rest of the country, the fervor took the media and government officials by storm with the promise of easy transport of pineapples, tropical fruits, and vegetables from warmer climates.

Herb Sundays 106: Veronika Slowikowska (Apple, Spotify). Art by Michael Cina “I’m all about guilt free listening. Whatever makes you move, physically and emotionally. I listen when I’m in motion, cleaning my room, on the train, in the car. Music rules and I LOVE IT!” - Veronika Slowikowska Here’s Veronika’s bio minorly edited bio , I’m not gonna try and mess with it: Veronika Slowikowska is a Canadian actor and comedian currently based in New York City.

Herb Sundays 108: Michael Azerrad. (Apple, Spotify). Art by Michael Cina “In the early-to-mid 2000s, I was pretty disenchanted with contemporary rock music — so many of the hippest new bands were recycling music that I had listened to at least 20 years earlier (and, in my opinion, not doing it particularly well).  Then, in 2007, I discovered Dirty Projectors and I was reborn.  The DPs soon became my friends and introduced me to a ton of great music, mostly by their friends, many of whom became my friends too.