Arts & Life

Mark Malkoff makes a Skype call to Belgium.

Call Me, Haiti? One Man's Quest To Skype Around The World

11:59am August 31, 2013

by NPR Staff

Mark Malkoff has lived inside of an IKEA store, consumed beverages at 171 Starbucks in Manhattan in less than 24 hours and proved that his kid's Big Wheel bike could beat a New York City bus. Now, the comedian has video chatted with people in 162 different countries — including North Korea.

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Indonesian slang for someone who tells a joke so badly, that is so unfunny you cannot help but laugh out loud.

How Do You Say ...? For Some Words, There's No Easy Translation

7:01pm August 30, 2013

by NPR Staff

The feeling of solitude in the woods ... the sunlight that filters through trees ... someone who tells a joke so badly that you have to laugh. In English, these things require a whole string of words. Not so in German, Japanese and Indonesian, respectively.

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In Short Term 12 — named for the youth facility where it's primarily set — John Gallagher Jr. and Brie Larson play young counselors not too far removed from their own adolescent struggles.

Arts

Reaching Across What's Broken, 'Short Term' Fix Or No

4:02pm August 30, 2013

by David Edelstein

After college, director Destin Daniel Cretton took a job at a short-term care facility for at-risk teenagers. His time there became the basis for Short Term 12, a film that took two awards at this year's South by Southwest Festival. (Recommended)

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Just about every culture has a dumpling. For many immigrants and first-generation Americans, dumplings serve as a delicious taste of home and heritage. Pierogis are the Polish take on the form.

Arts

Dumplings Taste Better When Filled With Memories

9:56am August 30, 2013

by Renita Jablonski

Just about every culture has dumplings. For the Polish, it's pierogi, and as Morning Edition editor Renita Jablonski writes, this little dumpling plays a big role for many Polish-Americans in preserving and celebrating their heritage.

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Barry Nalebuff (left) and Seth Goldman cofounded Honest Tea in 1997. Goldman is the company's TeaEO. Nalebuff is a professor at Yale School of Management.

Honest Tea Founders Tell Their Story Of Not-Too-Sweet Success

9:51am August 30, 2013

by NPR Staff

Back in the 1990s, Seth Goldman and Barry Nalebuff were tired of the super sweet iced teas available in stores. So they started their own company to cater to "more sophisticated, grown-up tastes." They chronicle their adventures and misadventures in a graphic novel called Mission In A Bottle.

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Books
Arts

Seamus Heaney, Irish Poet And Nobel Laureate, Dies At 74

9:51am August 30, 2013

Irish poet Seamus Heaney has died in Dublin at the age of 74. He was one of the world's best-known poets. In 1995 he won the Nobel Prize for Literature.

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A Flock of Dumpling Ducklings: What's inside? Roasted Beijing duck, of course.

Move Over, Pot Stickers: China Cooks Up Hundreds Of Dumplings

7:52pm August 29, 2013

by Anthony Kuhn

Dumplings are a huge part of Chinese culinary tradition, and restaurants there cater to the nation's obsession with a dazzlingly array of dumpling shapes and fillings, including green frogs stuffed with bullfrog meat and a flock of birds filled with roasted Beijing duck.

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Chaos, panic and disorder: Rebecca Hall stars as a barrister whose assignment leads to all kinds of bad things in the security-state thriller Closed Circuit.

Arts

Rebecca Hall, Finding New Thrills In The Family Business

7:22pm August 29, 2013

by NPR Staff

The British-American actress co-stars opposite Eric Bana in the surveillance-state thriller Closed Circuit. She joins NPR's Robert Siegel to talk about playing a barrister, working with her celebrated Shakespearean father and being inspired by her opera-singer mom.

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Rochelle Fowler watches with tears on her face as Lady Houdini works to break free. Harry Houdini made the water torture cell famous more than 100 years ago.

Lady Houdini's Escape Act Breaks Through Not Just Handcuffs

6:23pm August 29, 2013

by Sadie Babits

Kristen Johnson, also known as Lady Houdini, goes far beyond the role women usually play in escape acts. "It was important for me to be a strong example for young women in particular," she says.

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Conan O'Brien interviews Bruce Willis in a 2005 episode of Late Night With Conan O'Brien.

Arts

Conan's 'Uphill Climb' To Late-Night Throne

1:57pm August 28, 2013

When O'Brien took over for David Letterman on NBC's Late Night, he had virtually no on-air experience. In a 2003 interview, O'Brien tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross about his efforts to fill Letterman's shoes and how his Irish-Catholic repression fuels his comedy.

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