Jane Austen

The Hierarchy of Valentine's Day Needs

Abraham Maslow's theory that we are motivated by five primary needs (survival, safety, belonging, esteem and self-actualization, where "the appearance of one need usually rests on the prior satisfaction of another, more pre-potent need") is something we played with last week in relation to breakfast ... More >>

5 Lessons From Nick Hornby's Talk Last Night on Writing and Pop Culture

Nick Hornby rose to fame for expertly explaining the man-boy world to legions. His memoir Fever Pitch chronicles his devotion to the Arsenal football (soccer) league. His novels High Fidelity, About a Boy and, more recently, Juliet, Naked talk of grown men still struggling with relationships. But ... More >>

Seth Grahame-Smith's New Book Unholy Night Asks: What the Hell Were the Three Wise Doing There?

After mixing the Victorian era with the world of the undead in Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, Seth Grahame-Smith has become the highly profitable king of literature's mash-up genre. Lionsgate is developing P&P&Z into a movie, while the film version of ALVH, prod ... More >>

Top 6 Weekend Food Events: Walter Manzke, Debbie Lee, Jane Austen, International Food Bloggers Conference, Pizza Festival, Speed Rack

Jane Austen, spinach and tomato pizza, Walter Manzke.​12 Chefs, 12 Months, 12 Charities: Walter Manzke To celebrate 20 years in business, Joe Miller launches a year-long dinner series, inviting guest chefs to prepare a monthly prix-fixe feast with the proceeds benefiting St. Vincent Meals on W ... More >>

Impro Theater's Chekhov Unscripted: How to Improvise an Homage to Uncle Vanya

Dan O'ConnorRyan Smith in Chekhov Unscripted​In 1999, after 11 years of wringing laughs from willing audiences through competitive comedy and newfangled styles of longform improvisation, Impro Theater devised a upstart project called Shakespeare Unscripted that would turn into an enormously su ... More >>

Man Holds Woman Hostage in Whittier Library; Demands Pound of Kush, PlayStation, Ride From Mexican Army

Could I get that to go?​Something to think about: If you found yourself holding a pair of scissors to the throat of some terrified woman in the middle of the Whittier Public Library -- the world officially your oyster -- what would you ask for? Whatever your answer, 30-year-old Ignacio Gabr ... More >>

Theater Reviews: The Birthday Present, Broken Glass, The Eccentricities of a Nightingale

Also, Endgame, Girls Talk, Bonded and more

From Prada to Nada

What You Don't Know Might Kill You

Jaime Robledo's Watson and Jordan Harrison's Futura

My Penis, Which Art in Heaven

Antonio Sacre's genial, genital solo act

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Now in Diary and Calendar Form

​Just a quick note to let you know that Pride and Prejudice and Zombies now comes in diary form. And, very soon, it will also come in calendar form. Many people said that the best thing about that novel--Seth Grahame-Smith's clever mashup of Jane Austen's cherished novel and the undead--was ... More >>

Theater Reviews: Dirty Pooh, L.A. Noir Unscripted, Looking for Trouble

Also, My Sister in This House, Paved Paradise: The Art of Joni Mitchell and more

Shakespeare Unscripted

Theater Reviews: Almost, Maine, Twenty-Two, Ordinary Days

Also, 11, September, Shakespeare Unscripted and more

Stage Raw: An Oak Tree

COMPREHENSIVE THEATER LISTINGSNEW THEATER REVIEWSThis week's stage features on Ben Bradley's Murder and The Princess and the FrogNEW REVIEW GO AN OAK TREE ​Photo by William AdashekOn the simplest story-telling level, actor-performer Tim Crouch's play is the tale of a hypnotist, falling apart at th ... More >>

Recession Be Damned: Best Theater of 2009

A thriving year for stage in L.A.

Bright Star's Tone Poem

Jane Campion films John Keats' great love affair

The New Book "The Psychology of Wine" is Long on Rhetoric and (Thankfully) Short on Wine Criticism

Consult Your Psychologist Before Drinking Chardonnay​​The Psychology of Wine: Truth and Beauty by the Glass by Evan and Brian Mitchell sounds like another book from wine experts telling us which wines to love--and which to scoff at. Sounds like exactly what we don't need, right? Taste bu ... More >>

The Nuclear Family and One-Night Stand

On a Wig and a Prayer and Musical Improvisation

Stage Raw: Ten to Life

Last week's NEW THEATER REVIEWS are embedded in the current COMPREHENSIVE THEATER LISTINGS; also, see this week's THEATER FEATURE on Kevin King's The Idea ManTEN TO LIFE"Hacienda Heights" (from Ten to Life) Photo by Nic Cha KimNEW REVIEW GO TEN TO LIFE Leave logic at the door  and you'll get ... More >>

This Zombie Moment: Hunting for What Lies Beneath the Undead Zeitgeist

"Zombies are always the monster for fear of something larger than yourself, whether it's the recession, or going on boats without pirates attacking, or countries far, far away plotting our doom. Zombies make sense right now."

Stage Raw: Stick Fly

AT YOUR FINGERTIPS: THE WEEKEND'S NEW THEATER REVIEWS EMBEDDED WITHIN THIS COMING WEEK'S COMPREHENSIVE THEATER LISTINGSand this week's THEATER FEATURE: an Off-Broadway roundupReviewed this week: the world premiere of Richard Greenberg's Our Mother's Brief Affair at South Coast Rep; the west coast ... More >>

Theater Reviews: Mauritius, Tennessee Williams Unscripted, Home Siege Home

Plus, Misalliance, Desperate Writers: The Final Draft and more

Stage Raw: "Song of Extinction" Wins Steinberg/ATCA Prize

THIS WEEK'S COMPREHENSIVE THEATER LISTINGSFor the weekend's New Reviews, press the "Continue Reading" tab at the bottom of this section.SONG OF EXTINCTION WINS STEINBERG/ATCA PRIZE A scene from the world premiere of Song of Extinction; Photo courtesy of Moving Arts. The largest national award for ... More >>

Jane Austen Unscripted

Theater Reviews: Jane Austen Unscripted, A Skull in Connemara, Model Behavior

Also, The Todd and Molly Show, Dai, Stormy Weather and more

Best Museum Gift Shop: Huntington Library Bookstore & More

Mrs. Warren's Profession

Brideshead Revisited: Waugh and Remembrance

Movie adaptation, nine hours shorter, gets back to the source

Fighting About How to Fight Global Warming

Also, readers keep a weather eye out

PBS's Cranford: It Takes an Eccentric Village

Gossip and gross-out humor blend with Masterpiece's high acting

Ian McEwan’s Atonement, Recast as Bodice-Ripper

Who's sorry now?

How to Be Jane Austen

Cultivating your inner aristocrat

Film Reviews: The Last Winter, The Jane Austen Book Club

Also Resident Evil: Exintction, Over the GW, Sea of Dreams, Sydney White and more

Becoming Jane: Romp and Circumstance

Ms. Austen has a fling

the Professor

Doug Dutton, Dutton’s Brentwood Books

Heiress Olivia

Sipping tea with Hollywood royalty

Elizabethtown

In the new Pride & Prejudice, Jane Austen’s most celebrated heroine continues to bedevil suitors and filmmakers alike

Some Very Excellent Books

Revenge of the NSW

Why we love to hate Plum Sykes

Revenge of the NSW

Why we love to hate Plum Sykes

A Writer’s Life

Jervey Tervalon on pootbutts, knuckleheads and contemporary literary fiction

Literature and Liberation

Nafisi’s Reading Lolita in Teheran

Quiet Americans

British writer J.G. Farrell and America's missing novels of Empire

Heavenly Pairings

Tykwer does Kieslowski

The Fabulist

Filmmaker Ang Lee

Women Warriors, Suffering Boys

Ang Lee’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon; filming Charles Dickens

The Lady Is a Tramp

Anglo Pop

Helen Fielding's Single Woman

Child's Play

Nicholson Baker enters a kid's head