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Wasn’t It a Long Way Down?

It’s a Natural Fit: Trump and Victoria’s Secret

Just two of the subjects discussed on this week’s podcast. Plus, will Liz Truss survive?

Barry Blitt’s Sketchbook

Geena Davis Didn’t Know Thelma & Louise Is Still a Thing

The movie star reflects on the film’s enduring popularity, and how Hollywood has changed in the years since it was made

Misery Porn

Blonde is sexist, cruel, and degrading—so why is it currently the No. 1 film on Netflix?

Lift Every Voice and Sing

From Heartbeat Opera, a Fidelio for our time

Lower the Tsar

Before Gwyneth Paltrow, There Was Lydia E. Pinkham

For a time, the face of a popular yet ineffective health tonic was the most recognizable woman in America. Her marketing set the stage for today’s $4.4 trillion wellness industry

Motherless Russia

Seriously Stevie

Anthony Bourdain’s Last Days, Revisited

How the chef’s biographer got past the guardrails of France’s Le Chambard hotel and into the room where Bourdain took his last breath

The Anxiety of Assimilation

The powerful new play Leopoldstadt mirrors its author’s journey from Tomáš Sträussler to Tom Stoppard

Caio Twombly

The 26-year-old curator spotlights young artists at his new East Village gallery

Surveying Cézanne

How a Rollicking New Play Came to Be

John Lithgow and Douglas McGrath take us inside the making of their new Off Broadway show

Murder, They Wrote

Mystery books past and present honor Queen Elizabeth II and the kingdom she leaves behind

Back to the Future

Barry Blitt’s Sketchbook

Whine O’Clock

Just in time for next week’s return of Archetypes … What if Meghan Markle and First Lady Imelda Marcos reclaimed the word “diva” and didn’t kiss any frogs?

Drew Friedman’s Sketchbook

Turning Point

Patrice Chéreau’s “Centennial Ring” at the Bayreuth Festival in 1976 changed history

Mind Games

The New Yorker writer Rachel Aviv, whose debut book is out now, discusses mental illness in its many forms

Staff Picks

Don’t miss a look back at the 1920s’ most transfixing murder, the final installment of a three-part history of Napoleon, and a robust argument for prison reform

Memories of Mantel

Hilary Mantel’s longtime editor remembers the singular talent and warm generosity of the writer who brought us the Thomas Cromwell trilogy