When I was in college, I asked my friends if there was an artist that we could all agree we liked. Perhaps unsurprisingly, there wasn’t, though I suspect a few people claimed they didn’t care for The Mamas and The Papas just to be ornery. (Really, who doesn’t like “California Dreamin’?”) But even though there may [...]

You guys, about a year ago I made a bit of a fool of myself. I cast aspersions on… ahem… Carrie Underwood, implying that she was only mildly awesome, when in fact she is almost totally awesome. Now, I’m not going to tell you that I like every song on her album “Some Hearts.” Banal country-pop [...]

Hello, hello! In this week’s Sunday arts section of The New York Times, I have a splashy feature covering the New York International Fringe Festival. You can read it here. Have a great weekend! (Or week, if you’re not reading this until Monday.)

Hello everyone! I’d like to point you toward an article I wrote for Television Without Pity, which is a smart, snarky, and generally awesome website that everyone should know. I interview actor Maulik Pancholy (”30 Rock,” “Weeds”) about everything from being on two hit series at once to the realities of working as an East Indian [...]

AN OPEN LETTER TO BOY SHAKIRA, “AMERICA’S GOT TALENT” PERFORMER: Dear Boy Shakira, Why? Why am I so fascinated by you? Well… I know why. Because you’re a conundrum. I mean, what the hell? You are a sincere drag queen. Sincere! Drag queens are supposed to be campy and acidic, commenting on the idiot world with every flick [...]

I want to invite everyone to come participate in a contest I’m running this week at “I Totally Hear That.” In a nutshell, you watch a short clip from “The Simpsons” that has its dialogue cut out. You write a new “script” for the scene and e-mail it to me. The five funniest submissions win [...]

So I’ve just published my first story in Time Out New York. It’s a feature about transgender performance artist Scott Turner Schofield and his refusal to stop calling himself trans, even though he now passes for a biological man. A 700 word feature doesn’t give me room to dig into the issue with all the depth [...]

… just so you know, I’ve heavily revised my piece on the “up with patriarchy” message in “Live Free Or Die Hard.” All of the thinking is the same, but I’ve gone through and cleaned up the writing. You know, pruning unnecessary words and trying to get rid of grammatical errors. I don’t really expect anyone [...]

What is John McClane saving us from, exactly? In a July 3 story in The New York Times, Caryn James makes the excellent point that in “Live Free or Die Hard,” the fourth installment in the resilient action movie brand, good guy John McClane (Bruce Willis) is guarding us from people who would deny us access [...]

Hey everyone, I wanted to direct your attention to an article I just published in “American Theatre” magazine about a theater company called The Civilians. In February, I lived with them for a week in Colorado Springs, Colorado, observing their creation of a documentary-style musical about the influence of Evangelical Christianity on the local community. Hope you [...]

After canvassing both state and federal statutes, I am surprised — and admittedly relieved — to report that the beat on Eve’s new single “Tambourine” is not illegal. It probably will be soon, though, so we’d better enjoy it while we can. I mean, what choice will law enforcement have but to ban a rhythm that’s [...]

Well, Kelly Clarkson released her third album, “My December,” and nobody’s head exploded. Which is kind of surprising, given the brouhaha that erupted over this thing. A quick recap: Clive Davis, legendary head of Clarkson’s record label, reportedly delayed release of the record because he didn’t hear any hit singles on it. Clarkson wrote this one [...]

It?s a curious pop culture conundrum: Even though “America’s Got Talent” has been the nation’s top-ranked television show for two weeks running–scoring ratings so high that NBC decided to expand this week’s episode from one hour to two–it just isn’t very cool. It?s not even meriting serious attention from outlets like ?Entertainment Weekly,? which usually [...]

In case you’re looking for smart and/or interesting time-wasters, I’d like to point you toward two things you should know about. I discussed both of these over at my blog, and I wanted to let you know about them, too. Enjoy! Before we take another step, I need to tell you about “Girl Robot.” Credited [...]

Generally, I’m a faithful guy. I’ve had the same best friends for over ten years. Andrew and I are just weeks away from our second anniversary. Even when she was getting lambasted for “American Life,” I stood by Madonna, acknowledging that there were a few great songs on an otherwise terrible album. But Ryan Adams? I [...]