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Top row: TV On The Radio; Middle row, left to right: Billie Holiday, Stevie Wonder, Paul Simon; Bottom row: Talking Heads Courtesy of the artists hide caption

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Courtesy of the artists

Old Songs, New Meanings

March 31, 2020 • Listening to music during this pandemic has cast new light on old familiar tunes. Here's a listener-curated mix-tape of songs whose lyrics have an eerie — or comforting — connection to our current crisis.

Old Songs, New Meanings

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Tim Gunn And Heidi Klum Are Together Again In 'Making The Cut'

Tim Gunn and contestant Ji Won Choi talk over one of her designs on Making The Cut. Jessica Forde/Amazon Studios hide caption

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Jessica Forde/Amazon Studios

Review

Tim Gunn And Heidi Klum Are Together Again In 'Making The Cut'

March 28, 2020 • Tim Gunn and Heidi Klum's new Amazon show has a very different vibe from Project Runway, but you'll see a lot of fashion and a lot of pretty sights.

Need Some Fresh Ideas? Family-Friendly Ways To Spend Your Days Inside

An image from the last episode of MASH on June 18, 1984 at the Malibu Creek State Park in California. Paul Harris/Getty Images hide caption

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Paul Harris/Getty Images

Need Some Fresh Ideas? Family-Friendly Ways To Spend Your Days Inside

March 27, 2020 • Parents have been circulating ideas for how to keep kids happy — or at least occupied — during this time of social isolation due to COVID-19. Our Arts Desk has some heart-felt suggestions to offer.

Keep Your Game Night Rolling (At A Safe Distance) With These 3 Online Services

You can't play games like Lost Cities and Mystic Vale with your friends in person right now, but you can still play them online. Petra Mayer/NPR hide caption

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Petra Mayer/NPR

Keep Your Game Night Rolling (At A Safe Distance) With These 3 Online Services

March 27, 2020 • If your regular game night's been disrupted by social distancing, here are a few ways that you can take tabletop games online — so you can stay safe and still trash talk your friends when you win.

Marcel Marceau Walks Against The Winds Of War In 'Resistance'

Marcel (Jesse Eisenberg) in the film Resistance. IFC Films hide caption

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IFC Films

Review

Marcel Marceau Walks Against The Winds Of War In 'Resistance'

March 26, 2020 • Jesse Eisenberg stars as the famous mime as he gets involved in the French Resistance during World War II. The film is an "honorable, absorbing homage to the making of a man and his art."

Tom (Jesse Eisenberg) and Gemma (Imogen Poots) go house hunting and find something more in Vivarium. Mongrel Media hide caption

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Mongrel Media

Review

'Vivarium': House Hunters, Unnatural

March 26, 2020 • A young couple seeking a house in the 'burbs encounter an unexpected (sub)development and cannot leave. Despite its Twilight Zone premise, the film's "eccentricity and wit" carry it a long way.

Wanted: Stories With Happily Ever Afters - Here's Where To Start Looking

Roger Allam as Prospero in William Shakespeare's The Tempest directed by Jeremy Herrin at Shakespeare's Globe Theatre in London. Robbie Jack/Corbis via Getty Images hide caption

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Robbie Jack/Corbis via Getty Images

Wanted: Stories With Happily Ever Afters - Here's Where To Start Looking

March 26, 2020 • In uncertain times, we want stories that reassure us that everything will be okay. Here are some books, films, plays and TV shows that believe in Happily Ever After.

Wanted: Stories With Happily Ever Afters - Here's Where To Start Looking

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Family Friendly Crowd Pleasers: Three Things To Stream Your Whole Family Can Enjoy

Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman attend An Evening With Discovery Channel's Mythbusters at The Paley Center for Media on June 13, 2011. Amanda Edwards/FilmMagic hide caption

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Amanda Edwards/FilmMagic

Review

Family Friendly Crowd Pleasers: Three Things To Stream Your Whole Family Can Enjoy

March 25, 2020 • When you're staying in, it can be hard to keep everybody happy. But never fear, we're here to help. We've got a few recommendations to keep everybody in the family happy and stave off cabin fever.

Family Friendly Crowd Pleasers: Three Things To Stream Your Whole Family Can Enjoy

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Shelbie Rassler

Virtual 'Love Sweet Love' From Quarantined Berklee College of Music Students

March 24, 2020 • Student Shelbie Rassler, eager to bring her community together amid quarantine and isolation, organized a massive performance of the classic "What the World Needs Now Is Love" and put it on YouTube.

Tom Nook, Take Me Away! 'Animal Crossing: New Horizons' Is A Perfect Escape

The multiplayer function in Animal Crossing: New Horizons means up to eight people can be on the same island. Nintendo hide caption

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Nintendo

Tom Nook, Take Me Away! 'Animal Crossing: New Horizons' Is A Perfect Escape

March 24, 2020 • We're kicking off a new feature on games and gaming culture with a look at the latest version of an old favorite: Animal Crossing is back with loads of new features. Tom Nook, however, is eternal.

Lauv performs onstage at Madison Square Garden on Dec. 13, 2019 in New York City. His new album ~how i'm feeling~ tackles feelings of depression and anxiety. Manny Carabel/Getty Images hide caption

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Manny Carabel/Getty Images

Music Interviews

Lauv Embraces How He's Feeling

March 21, 2020 • Lauv has toured around the world and gathered billions of streams. He's finally releasing his debut album, ~how i'm feeling~.

Lauv Embraces How He's Feeling

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Coronavirus Live Updates

Love In The Time Of COVID-19: Some Pickup Lines To Get You Through The Pandemic

March 19, 2020 • Maybe it's not the way you imagined meeting that special someone. But if they can look passed that N95 mask, gazing into your eyes from a safe distance, who's to say it's not meant to last?

It Ain't Cabot Cove: Murder In Maine Haunts The Twisty 'Blow The Man Down'

Mary Beth (Morgan Saylor) and Pris (Sophie Lowe) get a stern talking-to from Enid (Margo Martindale) in Blow the Man Down. Jeong Park/Amazon Studios hide caption

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Jeong Park/Amazon Studios

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Movie Reviews

It Ain't Cabot Cove: Murder In Maine Haunts The Twisty 'Blow The Man Down'

March 19, 2020 • Two sisters attempt to cover up a killing in a fishing village that harbors its own sinister secrets in this film that evokes the tone of films like Fargo and Blood Simple.

Head Back To Hyrule: When This World Is Uncertain, Return To Game Worlds That Aren't

You could fight enemies and go on quests in Zelda: Breath of the Wild — or you could just explore the vast and comforting world of Hyrule. Nintendo hide caption

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Nintendo

The Coronavirus Crisis

Head Back To Hyrule: When This World Is Uncertain, Return To Game Worlds That Aren't

March 19, 2020 • Troubling times can lead you back to wander the hills and valleys of vast videogame worlds you've already beaten — or abandoned.

'Little Fires Everywhere' Finds Families Ready To Collide

Kerry Washington plays Mia in Little Fires Everywhere. Hulu hide caption

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Hulu

Review

Pop Culture Happy Hour

'Little Fires Everywhere' Finds Families Ready To Collide

March 18, 2020 • In the Hulu limited series adapting Celeste Ng's novel, Reese Witherspoon and Kerry Washington star as two mothers whose daughters are pulling away from them.

Three Pop Culture Recommendations To Calm Your Nerves

Tyra Banks at the America's Next Top Model mobile game release on May 3, 2018 in Hollywood, California. Rodin Eckenroth/Getty Images hide caption

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Rodin Eckenroth/Getty Images

Pop Culture Happy Hour

Three Pop Culture Recommendations To Calm Your Nerves

March 17, 2020 • There's a time for excitement, for the things that make us angry or scare us silly. But then there are all the other times. Sometimes we want something that will calm us down and slow our heart rates. We recommend some calming pieces of pop culture.

Three Pop Culture Recommendations To Calm Your Nerves

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Here's How We Cope When We're Stressed: Ideas From NPR's Arts Desk

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Pop Culture Happy Hour

Here's How We Cope When We're Stressed: Ideas From NPR's Arts Desk

March 16, 2020 • A Norwegian knitting marathon. America's Next Top Model. British crime dramas. Real-time strategy games. Peanut soup. These are some things that help us feel better — maybe they'll work for you, too?

In The Derivative Action Flick 'Bloodshot,' Diesel Delivers Low-Octane Thrills

Bloodshot (Vin Diesel) looks vexed, or surprised or possibly dyspeptic, in Bloodshot. Graham Bartholomew/Sony Pictures hide caption

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Graham Bartholomew/Sony Pictures

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Movie Reviews

In The Derivative Action Flick 'Bloodshot,' Diesel Delivers Low-Octane Thrills

March 12, 2020 • As a soldier reanimated by nanobots, Vin Diesel — "a lumbering fireplug who runs like John Wayne and fights like Roger Moore" — underperforms.

A Young Woman Faces A Choice In The Sobering 'Never Rarely Sometimes Always'

Autumn (Sidney Flanigan) embarks on a journey to New York in Never Rarely Sometimes Always. Focus Features hide caption

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Focus Features

Review

Movie Reviews

A Young Woman Faces A Choice In The Sobering 'Never Rarely Sometimes Always'

March 12, 2020 • Writer-director Eliza Hittman's tale of a traumatized teen (Sidney Flanigan), who travels to New York for an abortion is best when it hews closest to her point-of-view.

Sara Ariel Wong

Code Switch

The Limits Of Empathy

March 11, 2020 • In matters of race and justice, empathy is often held up as a goal unto itself. But what comes after understanding? In this episode, we're teaming up with Radio Diaries to look at the career of a white writer who put herself in someone else's skin — by disguising herself as a black woman — to find out what she learned, and what she couldn't.

The Limits Of Empathy

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'First Cow': A Profound, Ruminative Western

When Greener Pastures Are Unpasteurized: Two men try to start a business in the Oregon Territory in First Cow. Allyson Riggs/A24 hide caption

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Allyson Riggs/A24

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Movie Reviews

'First Cow': A Profound, Ruminative Western

March 5, 2020 • Two men struggle to eke out a living in the Oregon Territory by stealing the milk of a wealthy landowner in writer-director Kelly Reichardt's film.

'Sorry We Missed You': Ken Loach's Characters Gag On The Gig Economy

Ricky (Kris Hitchens) and daughter Jane (Katie Proctor) share a light moment in the Ken Loach drama Sorry We Missed You. Joss Barrat/Zeitgeist Films hide caption

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Joss Barrat/Zeitgeist Films

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Movie Reviews

'Sorry We Missed You': Ken Loach's Characters Gag On The Gig Economy

March 5, 2020 • Director Ken Loach and writer Paul Laverty deliver a "lacerating social drama" about a delivery driver (Kris Hitchen) whose demanding job comes with penalties that wipe out his pay.

'Onward': Timid Teen On A Mythic Quest For Elf-Assurance

Ian (voiced by Tom Holland) and his older brother Barley (voiced Chris Pratt) set off on a distinctly suburban quest in Onward. Disney/Pixar hide caption

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Disney/Pixar

Review

Pop Culture Happy Hour

'Onward': Timid Teen On A Mythic Quest For Elf-Assurance

March 5, 2020 • The opening minutes of Disney/Pixar's latest animated film are Disney-Channel cheesy, but as soon as Onward starts highlighting the comic physicality of its characters, it finds itself.

'The Booksellers' Speaks Volumes About Old Books And Those Who Love Them

Adam Weinberger examines a bookshelf in the documentary The Booksellers. Greenwich Entertainment hide caption

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Greenwich Entertainment

Review

Movie Reviews

'The Booksellers' Speaks Volumes About Old Books And Those Who Love Them

March 5, 2020 • This "delightful homage" to the world of antiquarian books in New York City features celebrity talking heads — but comes alive when it spotlights the eccentrics who are passionate about collecting.