Arts & Life

Arts

Fran Lebowitz is your NYC tour guide in 'Pretend It's a City'

5:49pm December 28, 2021

by Terry Gross

In the series, Lebowitz talks with Martin Scorsese about getting kicked out of high school, driving a cab in New York City in the 1970s and not having a cell phone. Originally broadcast January 2021.

Queue Listen Now

Arts

2021's standout podcasts feature personal stories, and plenty of surprises

5:49pm December 28, 2021

by Nick Quah

Three podcasts with a keen interest in inner lives captured the attention of critic Nick Quah this year. His picks for the best of 2021? S***hole Country, Storytime with Seth Rogen and Aack Cast.

Queue Listen Now

Operators have always been a fashionable lot. Note the bobby socks and saddle shoes. c. 1951

Arts

Telephone operators of another era gather to reconnect

8:09am December 28, 2021

by Susan Sharon

A reunion of Maine switchboard operators highlights the challenges of making a phone call more than 50 years ago and what it was like to handle emergencies, rude customers and delicate situations.

Queue Listen Now

Maggie Gyllenhaal's directorial debut, The Lost Daughter, offers a unique depiction of motherhood.

Arts

Maggie Gyllenhaal explores the difficulty of motherhood in her directorial debut

5:01am December 28, 2021

The new movie The Lost Daughter shows a side of motherhood that Hollywood doesn't often depict.

Queue Listen Now

Arts

Jean-Marc Vallée, director of 'Dallas Buyers Club' and 'Big Little Lies,' dies at 58

3:45pm December 27, 2021

by Mia Estrada

The director, born in Montreal, was known for his naturalistic approach to filmmaking and for working with strong female leads.

Arts

Kieran Culkin is having fun with 'Succession' — and he hopes you are too

2:01pm December 27, 2021

by Terry Gross

Culkin plays one of three siblings vying for control of a media empire. The character, he says, "doesn't really know what [it] means to suffer consequences." Originally broadcast Dec. 6, 2021.

Queue Listen Now

Grid of the images from six of the top ten Life Kit stories from 2021

Arts

Life Kit's most-read stories of 2021

1:43pm December 27, 2021

by Clare Marie Schneider

These Life Kit stories about burnout, distraction and making connections resonated with readers, topping the charts as our most popular stories of 2021.

One of many bookshelves in the home of Marie-Pascale Traylor, the artist and former preschool teacher behind the "My Old Books" Instagram account and Etsy shop. She collects vintage children's books and helps people reconnect with their long-lost favorite

Books
Arts

Still looking for that picture book you loved as a kid? Try asking Instagram

12:34pm December 27, 2021

by Rachel Treisman

Some people spend years or longer trying to track down favorite books from childhood. An Instagram account called My Old Books uses crowdsourcing to make the connection.

Molly (Yvonne Orji) and Issa's bantering and bickering has been a welcome addition to the canon of great Black onscreen friendships.

Arts

The romantic drama has never been what makes 'Insecure' so good

10:10am December 27, 2021

by Aisha Harris

In the series finale, we finally get an answer to the "will they, won't they" question that's been surrounding Issa and Lawrence since Season 1—but that won't define the show's legacy.

Three Cones, 1964, Art © Wayne Thiebaud / Licensed by VAGA, New York, N.Y.

Arts

Wayne Thiebaud, known for his colorful depictions of everyday life, dies at age 101

5:48pm December 26, 2021

by Elizabeth Blair

The artist explored everything from pastries to cityscapes in his work. Paintings, he once told NPR, can be "powerful statements about the sort of astounding capacity of the human mind."