This week:
- We’re still thinking about Ann Curry.
- Go see Parasite.
- The wildest detail of the Rihanna Vogue story.
- Don’t be jealous of my pumpkins.
- Goodenough.
In light of the disgusting revelations that surfaced this week, there are many things I wish for Matt Lauer. Because of those revelations, among many other reasons, I wish to know how NBC News bosses Andy Lack and Noah Oppenheim still have jobs. And because of all the horseshit I’ve witnessed covering TV news and morning television over the last decade, there are many things, as always, I wish for Ann Curry.
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I wish for her to rise each morning, well-rested, to a breath of crisp, invigorating air. Maybe there’s a whiff of warm croissants coming in through the window, stoking an appetite for the knowledge she will immerse herself in that day. I wish for her curiosity about the world to be satiated, but I wish for her to have found the balance between being activated by the news without being too traumatized by the horror of it all. I wish for her to feel things, but not so deeply it hurts.
I wish for her to be greeted every day at 4:30 p.m. with a healthy pour of white wine. I wish for a non-stop parade of knowing, warm smiles from passersby on the streets. I wish for her to stumble on a $20 bill on the street, though I know she will do something saintly with it, rather than indulge in spending it on herself. I wish for her weekends to be spent at the beach, a relaxing convalescence from this crazy thing we call life, energizing her to return to her journalistic pursuits when Monday morning calls.
I wish for her to see, as it already appears she has, the Matt Lauer news, breaking seven years after his role in forcing her exit from the Today show, as a call to continue to mentor and galvanize female journalists.
And for everyone who, in response to the grotesque Lauer news, has called for Curry to get her own show, I wish for you to know that she has—Chasing the Cure Live—and I wish for you to watch it.
Over a decade ago when I first started my career, I interviewed Curry at an event. The conversation turned personal, for both of us, and in the middle of it she reflexively gripped my hand and stared deeply into my eyes, forging an electric, compassionate connection as she spoke.
I have come to terms with the fact that I will never understand what the hell TV executives and, presumably, audiences value in hosts and journalists; what, really, did Matt Lauer bring all those years to justify tolerance of his behavior? But the way Curry led her thirst for facts and truth with empathy always struck me and still does. (For what it’s worth, those same traits are why I think Hoda Kotb is so good in her new role at Today.)
Anyway, these developments are heinous and pathetically emblematic of a broken system in television. Every time things like this come out, I think about Ann Curry and how she was treated. And then I wish the world for her.
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I don’t think I’ve ever experienced a movie quite like Parasite. In the time since I first screened the new film, out Friday, that is what has stuck with me, that watching it is an experience. It sounds like such hooey cinephile nonsense—“an experience…”— that I am rolling my eyes at myself while typing the words. But it is so true.
It is the best movie I’ve seen this year. I implore you to see it! I can also tell you nothing about it!! Sorry!!!
The film is written and directed by Bong Joon-ho, best known for his English-language titles Snowpiercer and Okja. It is about an unemployed, impoverished family who infiltrate the lives of a wealthy and glamorous upper-class clan. I refuse to tell you anything else about it, and beg you not to seek out much more information than that.
Maybe you’re a spoiler-phobe or maybe your entire ’90s wasn’t ruined by knowing that Bruce Willis was dead the whole time before you saw The Sixth Sense. Wherever you are on that spectrum, I truly, deeply believe that knowing what happens in this movie is a significant detriment to your viewing experience.
I don’t want to overhype it, or make you think you’re in for twists so unbelievably good that the wig is going to leap right off your head. But the film is one of the most stressful cinematic experiences I’ve had. It drives up your heart rate to lethal levels, and once you’ve come to terms with the fact that your heart just lives in your throat now, it changes gears completely. Now all of a sudden your heart is over there in your forehead, and then exploding out your back, and then making its way to your left pinky. I don’t know how it happens, I just know that it is what Bong Joon-ho does!
The film has been called a black comedy, which it sort of is. It’s been ruled a horror film, which it sort of is, too, as well as a thriller, which, yeah, that fits. But it’s also really none of those things either. I am very aware that none of this information is helpful but I hope you take the spirit of it—GO SEE PARASITE, YOU GUYS!!!—and run with that all the way to the theater.
There were a lot of details in the new Vogue profile of Rihanna that made headlines. There’s just how much money she’s made by injecting long-overdue diversity and inclusivity into the worlds of beauty and fashion, tapping into a traditionally ignored market: actual people. Her next album is being worked on and it will be “reggae-inspired,” though there is still no time frame for its release.
The juiciest bits, of course, are about politics: She confirms that she turned down the Super Bowl Halftime Show in solidarity with Colin Kaepernick, and she called Donald Trump, in specific reference to his response to the mass-shooting epidemic, “the most mentally ill human being in America right now.”
But there was a passage in the profile that has rattled me so viscerally that my bones shook and heart moaned when I read it. It is when writer Abby Aguirre says this: “Normally I bring a list of questions, but I didn’t have time to prepare one, which I make a split-second decision to confess.”
A person showed up to interview Rihanna for Vogue without having prepared.
Everyone has different reporting styles. Staying awake at night poring through everything that’s ever been written about an interview subject, scripting questions, ordering and reordering them, strategizing, and even pre-planning small talk and icebreakers isn’t for everyone. And the writer is candid about the fact that the interview snuck up on her after Rihanna moved the appointment several times.
Would I have still scribbled down an outline, a handful of questions, or some mantras of encouragement before I even put presumed to put pants on for this interview? Yes. But hey, as Rihanna herself says in response, we’re all winging it, I guess.
I do not like Halloween. I do not like people who like Halloween. But cranky as I get anytime someone uses the word “spooky” or tries to tell me about their costume, there are two traditions I partake in: eating candy corn—screw you, it’s delicious—and having an absolutely ridiculous jack-o-lantern carved.
I do not know if Brent Heuser, pumpkin carver extraordinaire, is delighted or embarrassed each year when I assign him an uber-gay design to craft during his residency at the High Line Hotel. This year, he carved me a fabulous rendering of Diane Keaton, Goldie Hawn, and Bette Midler during the “You Don’t Own Me” finale of The First Wives Club, which I very much look forward to my boyfriend rolling his eyes at as it rots on our dining room table for the next three weeks.
Last year, he carved me Ryan Phillippe’s butt scene from Cruel Intentions, a photo of which made its way to the actor himself, who appeared good-naturedly baffled by it.
If I’m being honest, it was a tough call to go with The First Wives Club this year over my second choice, Andrew Scott as the Hot Priest cradling a guinea pig in Fleabag. But Brent will be at the High Line Hotel for a few more weeks should any of you be looking for some gourd-eous temporary art.
The Nobel Prize in chemistry was awarded this year to a man named John B. Goodenough. I read this news on Wednesday and haven’t stopped laughing since.
What to Watch This Week:
Parasite: Duh!
The Addams Family: Charlize Theron as Morticia Addams? Sure!
Looking for Alaska: Finally, a good teen drama this fall.
What to Skip This Week:
Gemini Man: Will Smith is in this movie and I’m not kidding when I say I only found it existed five minutes ago.
Insatiable: I cannot BELIEVE this show is coming back.
