Arts & Life

"I was worried about being the mouthpiece for anyone and being politicized personally," Tina Fey says about playing Sarah Palin on Saturday Night Live. "It ended up being a lot of fun, but it did permanently politicize me in a way."

Arts

Tina Fey: '30 Rock' Star And Creator Moves On

12:05pm January 25, 2013

The writer, actress and comedian has helmed the hit NBC show — which will have its series finale on January 31 — for seven seasons, during which time she's had two kids, been in a few movies and written a memoir called Bossypants.

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The new TLC show The Sisterhood follows the lives of five preachers' wives in Atlanta.

Lives Of Praise, Lives In Progress On 'The Sisterhood'

9:14am January 25, 2013

by NPR Staff

The Sisterhood is a new reality show about the lives and struggles of five Atlanta-area preachers' wives. The show has been likened to the Real Housewives franchise and has drawn criticism for its warts-and-all portrayal of the women. But they say they felt called by God to participate.

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Buster Keaton, aka "The Great Stone Face," brought side-splitting comedy to the silent-screen era. Here, he's pictured in 1924's The Navigator.

Arts

Home Video Review: 'Buster Keaton: The Ultimate Collection'

5:44pm January 24, 2013

by Bob Mondello

Buster Keaton, the great genius of silent comedy, gets celebrated in a 14-disc box set that contains all of his classic silent comedies as well as a raft of shorts and extras.

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Ai has likened Cube Light to the storm-shaken chandelier in Sergei Eisenstein's 1928 film October, which he says represents the instability of a government on the verge of collapse.

Arts

In 'According To What?' Ai Weiwei Makes Mourning Subversive

4:48pm January 24, 2013

by Melissa Block

A Washington showcase of work by the Chinese dissident artist reveals his preoccupation with the tragic 2008 Sichuan earthquake: To create one of the pieces, Ai ran afoul of Chinese authorities, asking for help collecting the names of children who died when their schools collapsed.

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William Shakespeare, depicted in this 17th century painting, penned his sonnets on parchment. Now his words have found a new home ... in twisting strands of DNA.

Science
Arts

Shall I Encode Thee In DNA? Sonnets Stored On Double Helix

1:19pm January 24, 2013

by Adam Cole

The world is full of data — and that's a problem. We have to find a place to store all those digital photos, tax records and unfinished novels. British scientists have demonstrated a possible solution: They've stored all of Shakespeare's sonnets on several small stretches of DNA.

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Du Xin, the "Chinese Gunther," owns Central Perk in Beijing. That's not all he has in common with Gunther on the show. "I love Rachel," he sighs.

'Friends' Will Be There For You At Beijing's Central Perk

8:53pm January 23, 2013

by Louisa Lim

A Chinese man in Beijing has set up a cafe identical to the New York hangout on the hit TV show. For owner Du Xin, Friends is "like a religion" — and he's not the only one. He's opened a second Central Perk in Shanghai, capitalizing on the Chinese fondness for the six friends and their laid-back, freewheeling lives.

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Robert Redford's annual Sundance Film Festival draws thousands of filmgoers and millions of dollars to snowy Park City, Utah. But a state subsidy contributing to the event is drawing controversy from some conservatives, who say films screened at the festi

Arts

Sundance Subsidy Stirs Conservative Pushback

8:48pm January 22, 2013

by Terry Gildea

Robert Redford's annual Sundance Film Festival draws thousands of filmgoers and millions of dollars to snowy Park City, Utah. But a state subsidy contributing to the event is drawing controversy from some conservatives, who say films screened at the festival don't reflect the values of the state.

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Victoria (Megan Charpentier) and her sister, Lilly (Isabelle Nelisse), are near-feral orphans in the horror thriller Mama.

Arts

'Mama': A Good Old-Fashioned Horror Movie

1:29pm January 22, 2013

by David Edelstein

In an age of werewolves, hormonal vampires and endless sequels, horror movies have lost some edge. But Mama, starring Jessica Chastain, is an entertaining step in the right — which is to say backward — direction.

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Longtime CIA agent and counterintelligence agent Jeanne Vertefeuille, pictured at center, was instrumental in uncovering undercover agents, or moles, within the organization in the 1980s and '90s.

Books
Arts

Tina Brown's Must-Reads: Hidden Lives

10:06am January 22, 2013

by NPR Staff

The Newsweek editor returns with a list of new reads about people with surprising lives — a CIA investigator, a successful businesswoman who started life as a child soldier, and a private-equity pioneer whose domineering personality drove his loved ones away.

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Jeannane Goossen and Kevin Bacon star as FBI special agents tracing a network of serial killers in Fox's new crime drama The Following.

Arts

Kevin Bacon, Seeking A TV 'Following'

1:46pm January 21, 2013

by David Bianculli

The actor stars in a new Fox series about a former FBI agent asked to help apprehend a serial killer he once put behind bars. The series is well done, but the violence in it is alarming — especially for network television.

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