Pop Culture

Kobe Bryant and daughter Gianna Bryant attend a basketball game between the Los Angeles Lakers and the Dallas Mavericks on Dec. 29, 2019 in Los Angeles.

Thousands Attend Kobe Bryant Memorial In Los Angeles

9:02pm February 24, 2020

by Brakkton Booker

Some 20,000 people got tickets to say farewell to NBA great Kobe Bryant and his daughter Gianna at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. People without tickets were being urged to watch at home.

Sports

Kobe Bryant Memorial Held In Los Angeles

6:21pm February 24, 2020

by Mandalit del Barco

On Monday, mourners gathered at the Staples Center in Los Angeles to remember and celebrate the life of former NBA player Kobe Bryant.

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National

NAACP Image Awards Recognizes Artists Snubbed By Mainstream

5:13pm February 23, 2020

by Eric Deggans

The 51st NAACP Image Awards aired live on BET last night. In a year when the Oscars and other big awards failed to largely recognize people of color, the Image Awards grow in importance.

Jessica Simpson Talks Of Alcohol Abuse, Finding Herself Again In Memoir 'Open Book'

7:35am February 23, 2020

by Lulu Garcia-Navarro

"There's never been a moment in my life that I've been more honest with myself," the pop singer tells NPR. "I finally feel free of everything that I was holding secret and holding to myself."

Noah Centineo and Lana Condor negotiate life as an established couple in To All the Boys: P.S. I Still Love You

Arts

'To All The Boys' Star Noah Centineo Has An 'Inner Mr. Potato Head'

7:27am February 23, 2020

by Lulu Garcia-Navarro

Centineo returns as possibly-perfect boyfriend Peter Kavinsky in To All the Boys: P.S. I Still Love You. He says meditation — and doodling cartoon characters — has helped him keep a sense of self.

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Bart (Tye Sheridan) takes guest relations to a new level in The Night Clerk.

Arts

'The Night Clerk': Hitchcockian Premise, Half-Cocked Execution

5:00pm February 20, 2020

by Mark Jenkins

A hotel clerk (Tye Sheridan) hides a secret during a murder investigation in a film that explores the affinity between cinema and voyeurism flatly and without nuance.

Louise (Victoria Bluck) comforts Ahmed (Idir Ben Addi) in Young Ahmed.

Arts

'Young Ahmed' Is A Flawed But Complex Character Study

5:00pm February 20, 2020

by Scott Tobias

The premise — young Belgian Muslim sets out to murder one of his teachers — has drawn sharp criticism; the film itself is "hugely flawed" but more thoughtful than the controversy surrounding it.

Arts

Encore: Reflections From Conversations With Women In Comedy

4:18pm February 17, 2020

NPR's Audie Cornish looks back on her series of conversations with women navigating the male-dominated world of comedy.

Podcaster Leon Neyfakh leads you through some of Watergate's lesser-known twists and turns on the EPIX series Slow Burn.

Arts

'Slow Burn' Captures The Drip-Drip-Drip Of Watergate

9:00am February 16, 2020

by Glen Weldon

By focusing on figures who "played roles in the story that are larger than history remembers" this gripping adaptation of a hit podcast reminds us how slowly the Watergate scandal unfolded.

He has a very particular set of coping skills: Tom (Liam Neeson) and Joan (Lesley Manville) face her cancer diagnosis together in Ordinary Love.

Arts

'Ordinary Love': Scenes From A Marriage Touched By Cancer

5:00pm February 13, 2020

by Ella Taylor

Lesley Manville and Liam Neeson bring a wry, lived-in tenderness to this "imperfect but affecting" tale of a long-married couple facing cancer together.