Gillian Reagan

Put down the merlot! Alexander Payne, director of wine-snob favorite Sideways, has signed on to direct HBO's dark comedy Hung. Apparently the main character is, um, well-endowed. "Think of him like Spider-Man," show creator Colette Burson told Daily Variety last month. "He's an average guy who gets in touch with his innate superpowers." Okay, wait maybe we should keep drinking to watch this one. Variety reports:  read more »

Adam Green of The Moldy Peaches made his comeback by appearing on the Juno soundtrack with his other half Kimya Dawson. They wrote that sacchrine-sweet song that Ellen Page and Michael Cera's characters sing to each other in the last scene, "Anyone Else But You." He answered some questions for the Gothamist blog, reminiscing about the Lower East Side, discussing his new album and telling his "only in New York story" in which a young kid tried to pay him to have sex with him.  read more »

It's a filthy world out there and John Waters has never been afraid to show it to us on film (see: sex scene involving chickens in Pink Flamingos). But Mr. Waters will be bringing us all the crime, fashion lunacy and extremes of the contemporary art world live, on stage, at his one-night-only, one-man show "The Filthy World" on June 26. The "Pope of Trash" will perform his vaudeville act at the Concert Hall at the New York Society of Ethical Culture. Tickets are $37.50 and $100 for FilthyVIP (which includes a meet and greet with Mr. Waters, and an autographed DVD). Get tickets here.

Watch out Keira Knightley! Ellen Page is trying to take your career as period-piece queen! The Juno star is making big moves, from quick talkin', uber-hip hipster types to one of literature's most beloved characters in BBC's new adaptation of Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre. Reuters reports:

BBC Films has signed on to develop an adaptation of the Charlotte Bronte novel and has attached Page to play Jane. Moira Buffini wrote the screenplay; a director has not yet been chosen.

The role would mark the first period piece for Page, who has signed on to a number of contemporary films since her Oscar-nominated turn in "Juno," including the roller-derby comedy "Whip It!" and the dramatic thriller "Peacock." She opted out of Sam Raimi's supernatural tale "Drag Me to Hell" this year, citing scheduling conflicts.

 

Those queens and nerdy assistants pretending to be at a glitzy New York magazine in Ugly Betty might actually move to New York. Thanks Gov. Paterson!  read more »

Tribeca officials announced that more than 155,000 ticketed moviegoers attended the 11-day fest this year, down from 185,000 last year (over 12 days) and 203,000 in 2006 (over 13 days), according to their records. This, despite the fact that organizers lowered ticket prices by 20 percent and centralized screenings and activities in the Tribeca and the Union Square area. They estimated total attendance of just under 400,000 at the 2008 Festival. The Observer's Sara Vilkomerson wrote: "At seven years old, it’s time to ask: Can Tribeca grow up?" We're not so sure New Yorkers are willing to allow Tribeca to graduate from film festival pre-school given those numbers.

IndieWIRE news reports that the Woodstock Film Festival and the IFC Center are partnering to present three screenings as part of the Stranger Than Fiction series. The mini-fest is filmmaker/programmer Thom Powers' weekly screenings of hard-to-find documentaries and subsequent Q&As with their filmmakers. On consecutive Tuesdays in May at the IFC, directors Barbara Kopple (My Generation), Leon Gast (When We Were Kings) and Jonathan Demme (The Agronomist) will present and discuss their films. "We are thrilled to be able to show three amazing films as part of the Stranger Than Fiction film series at the IFC Center, and to offer the community a chance to meet and interact with these great filmmakers," said WFF executive director Meira Blaustein.

These days, everything Bryan Adams does, he does it for … hearing-loss awareness!  read more »

Jordan Carlos, the self-proclaimed "preppy black comedian," was sitting in the Park Slope patisserie Colson’s on a recent Saturday afternoon, sipping a latte. He wore his signature getup: a snazzy buttoned-up shirt and thick-framed glasses. "Sometimes you have to carry this cross of race and struggle but you really just want to write jokes," he said over the din of the cappuccino machine and a whining baby. "I’m just a gunslinger who wants to do his job."  read more »

It's official! On May 12, NBC will finally officially announce that Saturday Night Live's Jimmy Fallon will take over next year for Conan O'Brien, who will dethrone Jay Leno on the Tonight Show gig. "Jimmy's a smart pick," one network executive told Entertainment Weekly. ''He's a young, cute guy that will draw women in.'' Um, we don't think women are all that into a giggly dude who lives in a kind of perpetual post-college adolescence, but maybe that's just us. And what about Jay?  read more »

Seems like all the pop-star ladies are making their comebacks through comedies these days. Following Britney's successful appearance on <em> How I Met Your Mother</em>, Lindsay Lohan will pop in on ABC's <em>Ugly Betty</em>. She'll appear in the May 22 finale episode and five episodes next season as an old friend of America Ferrera's character Betty Suarez. Ms. Lohan will have to tune into some of her Mean Girl roots for this role,Variety reports  read more »

Last we heard from Michael Imperioli, best known as Tony's made man nephew on The Sopranos, he was directing Sisters, Such Devoted Sisters at his Off Off Broadway theater. Now he'll be taking a turn behind the camera to direct his own script, The Hungry Ghosts.  read more »

America's breathy-voiced sweetheart Feist will "Feel It All" at Prospect Park on July 9. Tickets are on sale through Ticketmaster. She'll be playing a benefit show to fund all those free Celebrate Brooklyn concerts at the bandshell. This season's concert series will open with Isaac Hayes on June 12.  read more »

Poor lil' stem cells. They just couldn't hold up to all the pressure of being on display at MoMA's Design and the Elastic Mind exhibition. Victimless Leather, a small jacket made up of embryonic stem cells taken from mice, has hit the bucket. The artists, Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr, told the Art Newspaper that the work which was fed nutrients by tube, expanded too quickly and clogged its own incubation system just five weeks after the show opened. Mr.  read more »

Kimberly Peirce, the director of Stop Loss and Boys Don't Cry, will receive the Andrew Sarris Award during the Columbia University Film Festival on May 9 at the McGraw-Hill Theater. The award honors service and artistic achievement of Columbia alums and the recipient is selected by the school's film students. Ms. Peirce graduated in 1996.

Following the announcement of Lydia Hearst's guest appearance on Gossip Girl, the CW revealed that Lisa Loeb, the 90's librarian-like hottie, will also make a cameo in the May 12 episode. Do you think she'll ... stay?  read more »

Lauren Ambrose will return to the Delacorte this summer as Ophelia in the Public Theater's production of Hamlet. The fiery redhead was the leading lady in last year's Romeo and Juliet at Shakespeare in the Park and will replace Crimes of the Heart's Lily Rabe, who had to drop out due to scheduling conflicts.  read more »

Set your Clocks! Check out www.coldplay.com tomorrow, April 29, after 7:15 a.m. for details on how to win tickets to Coldplay's June 23 show at Madison Square Garden. Tickets are free, but you gotta win 'em. While you're there, you can also download their first single, "Violet Hill," from their upcoming, Brian Eno-produced album, Viva La Vida. The album will be officially released on June 17.

Yo La Tengo, the lovable indie rock band from Jersey, will be getting adventurous with Greg Mottola, the director of Superbad and some episodes of Arrested Development. Pitchfork reports that they'll create the soundtrack for Mr. Mottola's new comedy, Adventureland, starring Ryan Reynolds (Van Wilder, Definitely, Maybe). According to IMDB, Adventureland is "centered around a recent college grad who takes a nowhere job at his local amusement park, only to find it's the perfect course to get him prepared for the real world." Sounds like familiar territory for Mr. Reynolds. We just hope there's a cute scene involving sleeping bags and b.f.f.'s proclaiming their love for each other. Boop!

The Coen brothers' follow-up to No Country for Old Men is headed to the City of Water this summer, according to the Associated Press. Their film, the spy comedy Burn After Reading starring George Clooney, John Malkovich and Brad Pitt, will open this year's Venice Film Festival on Aug. 27. Not ready to book your plane tickets yet? How about some more details about the script. Mr. Pitt is sporting a wacky flat-top hairdo for his role as a goofball personal trainer who finds a manuscript written by Mr. Malkovich's character, an alcoholic former CIA agent. The gym buffster plans to profit from the memoir and Mr. Clooney plays a supporting role as a Treasury agent who gets caught up in the whole affair.

Expect more gowns than tuxedos at the PEN awards ceremony on May 19 at the Walter Reade Theater at Lincoln Center. The PEN American Center has concluded and it's clear the sisters are doin' it for themselves. Biographer Janet Malcolm, novelist Cynthia Ozick, playwright Sarah Ruhl, translator Margaret Jull Costa, children's literature author Theresa Nelson and poets Rosmarie Waldrop and Kimiko Hahn are among those to receive awards. Playwright Richard Nelson, whose Roman-era work Conversations in Tusculum was recently staged on Broadway, is the only guy among the honorees. He received the PEN/Laura Pels Foundation Award for Drama along with Ms. Ruhl, who wrote Dead Man's Cellphone, which starred Mary-Louise Parker.

The Metropolitan Opera has scrapped its usual summer parks series and replaced it with one big, free concert this year.  read more »

While we're frolicking with Baby Mammas here in New York at the Tribeca Film Festival, Cannes announced its contenders for the Palme d'Or award this year. Three American directors, including Clint Eastwood, Steven Soderbergh, and Charlie Kaufman will be among the big 19, according to Bloomberg. A 20th film from France will be chosen in the next few days. Mr. Eastwood will show Changeling, while Mr. Soderbergh will unveil the four-hour-long, two-part Che, about the Argentine-born revolutionary Ernesto "Che" Guevara. Mr. Kaufman (Being John Malkovich, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) will present Synecdoche, New York. Last year, there were five US films in competition. The contenders for this year's Palme d'Or include films by Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan, Canada's Atom Egoyan, and German-born Wim Wenders. A seven-member jury, which includes Sean Penn and Natalie Portman, will award the prize.

Jessica Silk, a wavy-haired, freckled grad student in public health, was sitting at the Organic Grille in the East Village on a recent sun-drenched afternoon, picking at a healthful seitan wrap. “Sometimes I think we can smell one another in a crowd, and not because we have snacks,” she said.

Ms. Silk, 27, was talking about former fat kids, of which she is one. Have you ever noticed how New York is simply swimming with these psychologically fragile souls? You can see it in the careful attention to what’s on their plates ... their slavish devotion to daily exercise routines ... and the slightly nervous look that creeps into their eyes now, as bikini season looms.  read more »

NBC has moved 30 Rock to 9:30 p.m. on Thursdays, butting it out of its self-proclaimed "family hour," from 8 to 9 p.m. The schedule change comes a couple of weeks after NBC had the Parents Television Council calling them "hypocritical" for tainting their (antiquated, irrelevant) "family hour." "You know, 30 Rock just a couple of weeks ago had a show that I can't even mention, with a vulgar acronym for older women that pursue younger men," said Dan Isett, a PTC spokesman. He was talking about MILF Island, a Survivor-like reality show in which 50 eighth grade boys are stranded on an island with 20 "holy hot mamas."  read more »

While J.K. Rowling is fighting for the integrity of her Harry Potter series in a New York court, ABC is scheming to make a documentary about the Potter author's very private life. Reuters reports that 20/20 will air the profile some time in November and will include several interviews, scenes from the final Harry Potter book tour, and a peek at the locations that inspired her characters.  read more »

(You have been forewarned ... ) Cynthia Nixon is sharing some details of the closely guarded Sex and The City movie plot. One of the characters is going to die! (dun dun dun!). "There's a loss that happens that's pretty tough," Ms. Nixon said, according to the Sydney Morning Herald. "Something significant happens to Carrie, and it really forces her to ask questions that you have to ask about yourself." We'll have to wait until May 30 to find out who gets killed off, but we're taking bets on Mr. Big dying and coming back to life in some kind of Bold and the Beautiful-type fashion.

After the release of the Sex and the City movie on May 30 this year, Cynthia Nixon will trade her role as the quick-tongued lawyer Miranda for a much more humble lady in Lisa Loomer's play Distracted, to be staged by the Roundabout Theater Company. According to Variety, Ms. Nixon will play a mother struggling to learn whether or not her son has attention deficit disorder. The play premiered last year in Los Angeles but will make its debut in New York next year.

Houdini, that early 20th-century trickster, is coming to Broadway thanks to a whole cast of New York characters. Kurt Andersen, novelist and founder of Spy magazine; Danny Elfman, former Oingo Boingo frontman and composer for The Simpsons and numerous Tim Burton films; and David Rockwell, architect and scenic designer for Hairspray, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels and Legally Blonde, are all involved. Mr. Elfman will write the music, of course, with lyrics by David Yazbek (The Full Monty, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels). Mr. Andersen will write the plot, based on Houdini's biography, and Jack O’Brien will direct. Scott Sanders (The Color Purple) and Mr. Rockwell produce, according to Variety.  read more »

Speed Vogel, the caretaker of Joseph Heller who co-wrote No Laughing Matter, was a born and bred New York City character. He was a textile business owner, Chelsea-based sculptor, rock club regular, roommate to Mel Brooks and herring taster at Zabar’s at different points in his life. He was a charter member of the Gourmet Club, which schmoozed and dined around the city's ethnic restaurants during the 60's, 70's and 80's. Mr. Vogel, Mr. Heller, Mario Puzo, Zero Mostel, Carl Reiner and Mr. Brooks would discuss philosophy, Jewish humor and gluttony during their meals, according to the New York Times.

“What is important?” Mr. Vogel asked at one meeting.

“My soup,” Mr. Heller replied.

More from the New York Times after the jump.  read more »

The prestigious American Academy of Arts and Letters has announced eight new inductees, including historian Robert Caro, New Yorker humorist Calvin Trillin and poet Paul Muldoon. Founded in 1898, the academy is "an honor society of 250 architects, composers, artists, and writers," according to its web site, with new members voted in as "vacancies occur." The academy's goal is to "foster, assist, and sustain excellence" in the arts. Last year, Mr. Trillin released a best-selling memoir about his late wife, Alice Trillin based on the New Yorker essay that "seemed to trip some kind of secret wire in urban romantics’ hearts," wrote the Observer's Lizzy Ratner. And Mr. Caro, he of The Power Broker fame, is a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner and wrote a multivolume series on Lyndon Johnson. More inductees, courtesy of the Associated Press, after the jump.  read more »

A judge ruled that the Museum of Modern Art and the Guggenheim Foundation can continue to fight for ownership of two Picasso paintings. Julius Schoeps, a University of Potsdam professor, has claimed that his family should own the paintings since "Boy Leading a Horse" and "Le Moulin de la Galette" were sold during the Nazi reign in Germany by his relative, a German Jewish banker.  read more »

Get out your glow sticks, a silent rave is coming to New York this Friday! Apparently, this secret rave movement has been sweeping the country called a "silent rave" or a "silent disco." Party people gather in one spot, fire up their iPods and get their groove on to whatever music they like. Who needs some DJ at Bungalow 8 or outrageous drink prices at Pink Elephant when you get get down in a public space to your own jams for free? (UPDATE!) The Observer wrote about a Williamsburg silent disco in 2005. In May 2007, 4,000 ravers gathered in London's Victoria Station during rush hour to "dance like you've never danced before," according to an article in the Evening Standard. Organizers in New York are hoping to do the same thing at Union Square this Friday, April 18, from 6:15 p.m. to 11 p.m. An article on CityGuideMagazine.com and a Facebook page is encouraging all New Yorkers to join in: "All in all we want everyone to RAVE and DISCO till your legs fall off or your iPod battery runs out! and just have a bloody good time because things like this don't come around too often!" Instructions from the organizers after the jump.  read more »

You can catch the besweatered, much buzzed-about indie pop band Vampire Weekend, untouchable soul strutter Sharon Jones and, um, Junot Diaz at Central Park SummerStage this year. The City Parks Foundation announced their line-up and it's going to be a doozy, with Brooklyn's Santogold and Diplo getting the crowd rowdy and Richard Price living the Lush Life on the Central Park stage. Bring your blankets to some of these performances, listed after the jump.  read more »

Hey preppie! Saved by the Bell beefcake Mario Lopez will be making his Broadway debut in the Schoenfeld Theatre's revival of A Chorus Line. Staring April 15, the guy formerly known as A.C. Slater from Saved by the Bell who made soccer moms swoon during his recent stint on Dancing With the Stars, will star as Zach, A Chrous Lines' "rarely-seen director," according to Playbill. Mr. Lopez succeeds Michael Berresse, who originated the role of Zach in the Broadway revival of the popular backstage musical. A.C. fans with his Tiger Beat-like centerfold still on their wall are warned: he'll will be on hiatus from A Chorus Line May 11-June 3.

But cool your Japanese jets, the Bluths aren't making a comeback. There's a new rumor to that effect every six months or so, ever since the show about a wealthy family who lost everything, and the one son who had no choice but to keep them all together, was canceled after three seasons, in 2006. Still, maybe some of the magic will return with Sit Down, Shut Up, AD creator Mitch Hurwitz's new show for Fox. AD's top bananas--including Jason Bateman (swooooon), Will Arnett and Henry Winkler--will provide voices for the animated comedy, which Reuters describes as "based on a live-action Australian series, [and] center[ed] on staff members at a high school who are preoccupied with their own needs and agendas, which means the students come second." Sounds like A+ Hurwitz material right there.

Junot Diaz seems to be the darling of the fiction world right now. His long awaited debut novel, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, about a nerdy Dominican boy Yunior, won the National Book Critics Circle Award as well as the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction this year. Mr. Diaz seems to be reeling; he recently wondered to the Chicago Tribune which limb he was going to have to lose "to balance out the universe" now that he won the Pulitzer. In his delirium, he shared an excerpt of his new work in progress, a novel called Dark America, during an Amazon.com blog interview. Emily Bobrow wrote in her Observer review of Oscar Wao that "[d]arkness seems to be an essential ingredient in any Latin American novel, given the continent’s politics of tyranny and sputtering revolution. But the breezy, ballsy informality of the narration keeps the action light and kinetic, as if Yunior, our slightly mysterious guide, is entertaining friends over beers." The new novel has a similar voice:  read more »

Summer is approaching and that means free concerts and fireworks! The New York Philharmonic announced details about their free concerts in New York. Hear some Mozart, Bach, and Elgar at the concerts on Staten Island, and in New Jersey, Queens, the Bronx, and Long Island. Music Director Designate Alan Gilbert will lead a concert in Prospect Park with works by Bach, Beethoven, and Sibelius. All performances start at 8 p.m. and will be followed by fireworks. Bring some sparklers! Full schedule at NYC Official City Guide.

Don't expect those at the New York Theatre Workshop to see the humor in this sad coincidence: they're going to have a hard time paying rent because the Broadway run of Rent closed down. The workshop, a 25-year-old East Village mainstay in Off-Broadway theater, is cutting down its budget from $4.5 million to $3.5 million, partially because of the closing of Rent, which premiered at the workshop in 1996 and has been sending royalties to the company ever since. Six production staff will be laid off starting May 30 and replaced with temps.  read more »

WNEW-FM once defined rock 'n' roll. During their free-form glory days, they premiered new music from everyone from the Rolling Stones to the Ramones to the Replacements. John Lennon would stroll by to spin records and the Grateful Dead played card games in the studio. Lagging quality DJs and format changes weakened the station's influence, but then, in the late-90's, shock jocks Opie and Anthony basically pulled the plug by broadcasting two listeners having sex in St. Patrick's Cathedral. But now The New York Times reports that CBS Radio, which owns WNEW and its former frequency in the New York region, 102.7, will begin broadcasting a high-definition signal and Internet stream starting today, based on the station’s rock format.  read more »

Donizetti's two-act opera La Fllle Du Regiment will make its transfer from London to the Met next week (the Times across the pond called it and "exceedingly yummy operatic cake”), but you can check out a free dress rehearsal at 11 a.m. on this Friday April 18. Actors including Tony Award winner Marian Seldes, playing the Duchess of Krakenthorp, Natalie Dessay and Juan Diego-Florez will answer your questions after the performance. You can make reservations now (limited to two per person) by calling the Met's ticketing services at 212-362-6000. The opera's opening night will be April 21 and performances will run until May 26.

The New York Philharmonic has been without a summer home for awhile now. They muster residencies during the off season at city parks, Avery Fisher Hall and some shows in... Colorado. But they may have finally found their orchestral equivalent to the Hamptons: Governor's Island. They'll be playing a free concert there, with the Manhattan skyline splayed out before them, on July 5. “We’ve talked about it as a place we should play because it is so pretty,” said Zarin Mehta, the Philharmonic’s president and a former director of the Ravinia Festival., to the New York Times. “If the conditions were right, it’s the kind of place we should look at very seriously.” But, not so fast!  read more »

Shine the Harry Potter signal! Equus, the hit London play starring rapidly budding heartthrob (maybe?) Daniel Radcliffe, will begin previews Sept. 5 at the Broadhurst Theatre, replacing the acclaimed revival of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. Playbill reports that opening night is scheduled for Sept. 25, and the production will play a 22-week engagement through Feb. 8, 2009. Tickets go on sale to American Express Gold Card members on April 12 at 9 a.m. by calling (212) 239-6200 or by visiting www.telecharge.com. Set your alarms, you muggles.

It's the battle of the Broadway revivals! David Mamet's American Buffalo and the Lerner and Loewe musical Brigadoon will both open during 2009. Buffalo producers are courting Sexoholic and Summer of Sam star John Leguizamo, according to the New York Times. No casting is set for Brigadoon, the hit Broadway show about two Americans wandering into a Scottish village that comes alive every 100 years, according to Playbill. But the play, written by the team who brought us scores for My Fair Lady, Gigi and Camelot, will be directed by Tony winner Rob Ashford and will include a new book by another Tony winner, John Guare. We're putting the 1954 movie version of Brigadoon, starring the "incomparable" Gene Kelly and "sensational" Cyd Charisse belting out those classics "Almost Like Being In Love," "There But For You Go I" and "Come to Me, Bend to Me," into our Netflix queue right now.

Since Charlton Heston was the king of the epic—Ben-Hur, The Ten Commandments and Touch of Evil, to name a few—it's only fitting that Turner Classic Movies honor the actor with an epically long 15-hour marathon. It'll start at 2:30 p.m., Friday afternoon, April 11, and end at 5:30 a.m. on Saturday morning, April 12.

The programming announcement arrived on the heels of the news that Mr. Heston died Saturday night at his home in Beverly Hills, Calif. at the age of 84. Long-time TCM host Robert Osbourne is slated to host, but we're hoping Rose McGowan will take some time from her The Essentials duties. TCM's lineup includes an interview and some of his less-touted films like The Buccaneer, Major Dundee, and The Hawaiians. Ben-Hur will play at 9 p.m. But, alas, no The Omega Man.

August: Osage County, Tracy Letts' "rambling and entertaining black comedy involving those essential props of American family life—child abuse, alcoholism, drug dependency, divorce, incest, pedophilia, nymphomania and suicide," as the Observer's John Heilpern called it in his December review, has received a 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Mr. Heilpern wrote that the play, currently being staged at the Imperial Theatre, is "a bold commitment on Broadway." More after the jump.  read more »

Lily Allen had the literary world in a tizzy last year when she was chosen to serve on the jury of the Orange Prize for Fiction. But the "Smile" songstress will no longer be a source of consternation for the literary snoots: She's calling in sick. She withdrew "by mutual consent" from the Orange's judging panel, blaming ill health. According to BBC News, she recently had a miscarriage, which may have contributed to the decision (all of the snobby vitriol couldn't have helped either!). One of Ms. Allen's reps told the BBC: "Rather than do a disservice to what she sees as an incredible array of female literary talent, it has been agreed that she will withdraw before the final judging takes place." The big winner, who will receive a £30,000 prize, will be announced on June 4.

Those brothers who brought us The Matrix trilogy made a film version of the 1960s Japanese Speed Racer cartoon and they'll be premiering it on the last day of the Tribeca Film Festival on May 3. Andy and Larry Wachowski are releasing their first directorial project since we followed them down the rabbit hole for The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions in 2003, and this new Wonderland looks like a cross between The Fifth Element and Knight Rider. They traded leading man fav. Keanu Reeves for Into the Wild actor (and Penn's Good Boy) Emile Hirsch. He's a demon and he's gonna be chasing after someone! (Apparently, that will be Christina Ricci, who plays hot babe girlfriend Trixie). Joel Silver, a frontman for the bashful Wachowski bros and producer of Racer and the Matrix films, told USA Today last May that the film will have a "retro future" look and will center on Speed sticking it to the man (or, men in the corporate world) and trying to get famous on the race track. Go Emile, Go!

The New York City Atheists book club can take six months to get through an assigned reading.

“There is an intellectual masturbation going on here,” said Ken Bronstein, the garrulous leader of the NYC Atheists, who hosts the group’s book club at his Upper East Side home at 79th Street. On the second Sunday of every month, after the regular brunch meeting of 50 or 60 atheists (mostly retirees and a few politically minded young ’uns), about a dozen or so break off and take the M31 bus to Mr. Bronstein’s home and dissect a chosen book, chapter by chapter. Recent pick: Christopher Hitchens’ God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, which has a pretty self-explanatory title. So far, the group has held passionate discussions about evolution, creationism and four-eyed fish. “Now, maybe that doesn’t turn you on,” Mr. Bronstein said. “But, to me, I love this stuff, okay? Forget about being an atheist or something, it’s just so interesting I don’t want to sleep.”  read more »

Ian McShane, of Deadwood fame, will appear in a new NBC pilot called Kings. Created by Heroes writer-producer Michael Green, Kings is loosely based on the story of King David. The pilot stars Christopher Egan as a pure-hearted young warrior who joins the court of the charming, controlling King Silas (played by Mr. McShane, naturally). The kingly part won't be too far from Mr. McShane's recent stint on stage as the patriarch in Harold Pinter's The Homecoming. And of course, it wouldn't be a true McShane role if there wasn't something a bit devious about the character. “The bad boys get all the best lines,” he told the Observer in January with a mischievous grin. “As they say, the devil plays the best tune.”