Movies

Nick Frost (from left), Eddie Marsan, Simon Pegg, Paddy Considine and Martin Freeman play a group of friends who reunite for a pub crawl challenge in The World's End.

Arts

Boozy Bromance 'World's End' Rises Above Its Lowbrow Tactics

3:30pm August 23, 2013

by David Edelstein

Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg's latest collaboration follows five friends who reunite for an epic tour of 12 suburban English pubs. Critic David Edelstein calls the sci-fi comedy "the year's most uproarious movie."

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Martin Freeman (from left), Paddy Considine, Simon Pegg, Nick Frost and Eddie Marsan star as five old high school friends who reunite to finish an epic pub crawl in The World's End, directed by Edgar Wright.

Books
Arts

An Epic Pub Crawl Gone Wrong Culminates In 'World's End'

4:33pm August 22, 2013

Five old high school friends reunite to finish a pub crawl they started 20 years earlier in the latest from Simon Pegg, Nick Frost and Edgar Wright — the creators of the zombie send-up Shaun of the Dead and action comedy Hot Fuzz.

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Both Lake Bell and Fred Melamed say they became interested in voice-over work because it didn't matter what you looked like. They play father and daughter voice-over artists in In a World ...

Arts

In 'A World,' All Voice-Overs Are Not Created Equal

5:35pm August 19, 2013

Lake Bell's comedy In a World ... tracks a vocal coach's efforts to break into the male-dominated world of voice-overs. She and actor/voice-over artist Fred Melamed tell Terry Gross about what drew them to voice-over work, and the origins of the "sexy baby vocal virus" trend.

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Arts

The Words Vivien Leigh Left Behind

7:35am August 18, 2013

An upcoming exhibit at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London celebrates the life of the actress, including diary entries, film scripts and personal letters to Leigh from Winston Churchill, Graham Green and the Queen Mother. Host Scott Simon speaks with exhibit curator Keith Lodwick.

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Reggie Shaw killed two men while he was texting on a Utah highway. He now speaks to groups about the dangers of texting and driving.

Herzog Plumbs Guilt And Loss Wrought By Texting And Driving

4:31pm August 16, 2013

by NPR Staff

Werner Herzog's latest project is a slight departure for the acclaimed filmmaker: a 35-minute public service announcement on the dangers of texting and driving. Yes, it's long, he says, but the "inner landscape" of great suffering such accidents can cause "can only be shown if you have more time."

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Arts

'Lovelace': A Sex Superstar's Struggle To Show Herself

1:26pm August 12, 2013

by NPR Staff

A new biopic explores the story of Linda Lovelace, star of the 1970s film Deep Throat. Directors Jeffrey Friedman and Rob Epstein talk with host Jacki Lyden their film, Lovelace.

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Poor Donna Reed: Her Mary would have ended up working in a library — shudder — if not for the matrimonial intervention of Jimmy Stewart's George Bailey. Happily, 1946's It's a Wonderful Life isn't the only lens through which pop culture assesses the w

Books
Arts

Libraries' Leading Roles: On Stage, On Screen And In Song

4:04pm August 08, 2013

by Bob Mondello

In the latest installment of our library series, NPR's Bob Mondello visits some notable libraries in popular culture: Jorge Luis Borges' Library of Babel; Lucien's Library in Neil Gaiman's The Sandman; and the stacks in Buffy, Hogwarts, Doctor Who and Fahrenheit 451.

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Jody Foster plays her political opposite as the brutal secretary of defense in Elysium.

Arts

A Future Where Class Warfare Is Much More Than A Metaphor

3:19pm August 07, 2013

by David Edelstein

The writer-director of District 9 returns with Elysium, a dystopian sci-fi/action story with Matt Damon as the hardscrabble hero. Jodie Foster plays the severely chic Big Bad in a saga where the rich live a literally out-of-this-world life above a dying Planet Earth.

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Arts

Robert Klein And The Golden Age Of Comedy

6:29pm August 03, 2013

by NPR Staff

Host Jacki Lyden talks to comedian Robert Klein, the narrator of the documentary When Comedy Went to School, which opened this week in New York City.

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Shailene Woodley, who played George Clooney's rebellious daughter in The Descendants, turns in a splendidly calibrated performance as a soft-spoken good girl who falls hard for a high school party animal (Miles Teller) in The Spectacular Now.

Arts

A Good Girl And A Lost Boy, Looking For A Way Forward

1:34pm August 02, 2013

by David Edelstein

From the writers of 500 Days of Summer, The Spectacular Now examines the not-so-spectacular markers of teenhood: the awkwardness and anxiety that everyone must endure. Shailene Woodley and Miles Teller are the two lovers at the forefront of this story based on a novel by Tim Tharp.

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