Culture
- Cultural Comment
Why Kevin Hart Had to Go as Oscars Host
There’s a specific brand of homophobia—fear of gayness in your own children—that is so hurtful, because its implication is that love is contingent upon fear.
- The Current Cinema
Alfonso Cuarón Bears Witness to Peril with “Roma”
The sumptuous film, based on Cuarón’s own childhood, reverberates not only with innocence but with the awful intuition of its collapse.
Introducing Touchstones, a series in which New Yorker writers guide us through the works that shaped them.
The Latest
“The American Meme,” a New Netflix Documentary, Records the Angst of Social-Media Influencers
The film reveals the desperation, loneliness, and sheer Sisyphean tedium of ceaselessly chasing what will most likely end up being an ever-diminishing share of the online-attention economy.
Is Rap Finally Ready To Embrace Its Women?
A new generation of artists is changing an industry and a genre that has traditionally not allowed for more than one female superstar at a time, while pitting other women against one another or ignoring them entirely.
“Amazing Grace” Gives Us Aretha Franklin at the Spellbinding Height of Her Powers
The movie, which documents Franklin’s recording of the live album “Amazing Grace,” in January, 1972, shows the soul singer as a kind of historian of vocal performance.
“Vox Lux,” Reviewed: A Tale of Star Power That Misuses Natalie Portman’s Star Power
In Vox Lux, Brady Corbet’s ponderous direction of Portman often renders her performance unintentionally comedic.
Notable Performances and Recordings of 2018
Even some of the most outré music events of 2018 attracted big, diverse audiences.
Goings On
Kevin Beasley Considers the History of Power in the American South
Using a century-old motor that once ran a cotton gin in Alabama, the artist creates a sonic landscape at the Whitney.
An Eleven Madison Park Alum Does Vegan Fine Dining at Sans
Would an omnivore give up meat if she could still have foie gras?
The Critics
A Novel About Coming of Age Amid the Troubles
In Anna Burns’s “Milkman,” political terror and sexual surveillance compound the claustrophobia of adolescence.
The Sweet Linearity of “My Brilliant Friend”
HBO’s small-screen adaptation dramatizes Elena Ferrante’s novel without transforming it.
The Incarnation of Ideas in Tom Stoppard’s “The Hard Problem”
The play, about a psychology student’s quietly confident theism, might be understood as a big question about the alchemical difficulties of Stoppard’s work.
Literary Hoaxes and the Ethics of Authorship
What happens when we find out writers aren’t who they said they were.
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- 1.Annals of Technology
The Friendship That Made Google Huge
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The Michael Cohen Sentencing Memos Are Damning for Trump
- 3.2018 in Review
The Best Movies of 2018
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A Portrait of Love and Struggle in Post-Industrial, Small-City America
Brenda Ann Kenneally’s sprawling chronicle of life in Troy, New York, is a tribute to her subjects and an indictment of our times.
Podcasts
The Culture of Fermentation, and the Problem of Voting
A food correspondent tinkers with an ancient culinary tradition, and a scholar analyzes the resurgence of voter suppression as a form of white rage.
Video
How Ramen Changed in America
From Maruchan to Momofuku, a look at America’s love affair with the savory noodle.