Townes may be Steve Earle’s best album.

What a blockhead!

All Her Fault on Peacock features a marketing exec at a major publisher in Chicago (sure?) pitching a best-selling author on switching publishers because she believes she can open him up to a whole new audience if she can help him win… an Edgar Award! And he signs with her.

@bencollins.bsky.social Can’t wait to see the visual for your Gehry coverage.

New Stranger Things cast photo dropped.

Yes. And any such list with more Mike Myers than Albert Brooks entries, and that skips The Blues Brothers, is fatally deficient.

More than 200 years before the term “frenemy” was coined, Salieri & Mozart embodied it. Amadeus @steppenwolfthtr.bsky.social, directed w aplomb by @robertfalls.bsky.social, is smart, funny & assured. Ian Barford’s dynamic, empathetic Salieri is a triumph. chicagocultureauthority.com/2025/11/17/i...

Jesus Christ. This is monstrous. Absolutely sickening. The journalists in that room should walk out en masse.

It’a not a free market when bot armies ace regular fans out of the chance to purchase during the regular onsale period. Time for the U.S. to follow suit. Squeeze the parasites out of business.

Thune was backed into a corner by refusing to negotiate ACA until government reopens. Ok, now he must negotiate in good faith and Ds have to insist on a full extension or no additional CR. Still a disaster.

This capitulation is going to cause a firestorm. The only way it possibly works out for the Democrats is if they a) put a marker down that they are giving Republicans a chance to do the right thing while easing the immediate crisis and b) absent an ACA extension by end of January, shutdown is back.

I want to play poker with the Senate Democratic caucus…

I've been on staff for ... 38 years, and I don't remember ever feeling the paper is as focused and consequential as I do now. I can't speak to the effect, but as T.S. Eliot said, "For us there is only the trying. The rest is not our business."

Every company website is so desperate. You're on their page for five seconds and they want to send you notifications for the rest of your life. It's like if you asked somebody at an airport how to get to Terminal D and they told you, then got down on one knee and proposed.

Good list, but I have never enjoyed Chicago Theatre as a concert venue. Musical theatre, yes, and maybe a theatrical show like David Byrne’s, which worked well at the Auditorium. My top 10: Maurer, The Vic, Metro, Hideout, Empty Bottle, House of Blues, Green Mill, Schubas, Reggie’s, Salt Shed.

The Diplomat on Netflix has hit its stride with season three. A gripping depiction of the trials, tribulations and triumphs of a high-powered marriage. Keri Russell and Rufus Sewell are superb.

This will end the shutdown

I asked David Byrne today about what draws him to creative projects like Theater of the Mind, which he’s bringing to Chicago with the @goodmantheatre.bsky.social #chicagotheater #DavidByrne #TalkingHeads #TheaterOfTheMind #GoodmanTheatre

Cap knows the score.

If there’s a better analog for 2025 America than 1938 Austria during the anschluss, I can’t think of what it is. So it’s timely to have The Sound of Music at the Nederlander dispensing lessons in moral courage with a classic Rodgers & Hammerstein score. chicagocultureauthority.com/2025/10/23/t...

I’m so proud of my fellow Americans today. This country’s immune system rejects authoritarianism.

If you’re looking for a seasonally appropriate outing for little ones, Frederick, the first production of Chicago Children’s Theatre’s 20th anniversary season, is a good bet. chicagocultureauthority.com/2025/10/07/f...

Why would a theater called Chicago Shakespeare produce a play based on a horror film franchise? The audience at Thursday’s opening of Paranormal Activity got a definitive answer: This taut and terrifying show gives you the willies, maybe even the shakes. chicagocultureauthority.com/2025/10/17/w...

The amazing thing is, he did it at the $5 table.

This tool could be the plot device of the next Nightmare Alley remake.

“Don’t risk suit damage.” That single sentence opens up a window into the protocols and concerns of being a furry. I mean this with zero snark (probably why I’m a writer; fascinating to learn about different walks of life).

How a Trump appointed judge exposed Trump's Lying Con #TrumpLiesEverytimeHeSpeaks www.nytimes.com/2025/10/12/o...

Bovino saw One Battle After Another and thought Sean Penn was the protagonist.

Dumbest timeline.

Took my daughter and her friend to Six Flags Great America and had a blast at Fright Fest and Oktoberfest. Read on for our haunted house reviews. chicagocultureauthority.com/2025/10/07/d...

The sheep in Alien: Earth looks at people the same way my cat looks at me when I am slow to give her treats.

Chicago is not playing.

“There are lots of different ways that an artistic life looks, but it seems to me like everyone is capable of cutting out some things to be able to prioritize making their stuff — and reveling in that.” -Spencer Tweedy

Aside from a brief detour into petty score settling, this is a bracing, clear-eyed examination of our rapid descent into autocracy with no obvious countervailing forces to rescue democracy. It falls to us as citizens. It’s as simple and scary as that.

In Mr. Wolf at Steppenwolf, a play about the devastating impact of a child’s kidnapping, we think, did we just hear that? as the revelations click into place like dials on a combination lock that springs open when all the numbers line up. Full review: chicagocultureauthority.com/2025/09/24/m...

Breaking the old white dude spell at Riot Fest Sunday, the Linda Lindas mixed pop-punk with real hardcore courtesy of bassist Eloise Wong, who punctuated the set with a raw, powerful “Racist, Sexist Boy” that certainly captured the current national mood. chicagocultureauthority.com/2025/09/22/r...

After a Friday marked by great music and anodyne statements onstage, Saturday brought even better music at Riot Fest and rockers stepping up to condemn the nation’s turn toward authoritarianism. Jack White was the exemplar on both fronts. chicagocultureauthority.com/2025/09/21/2...

Riot Fest had something of a “Cabaret” vibe yesterday, like we were all enjoying the last taste of something about to be lost. But if you were watching the bands yesterday, you’d never know anything was amiss. Full review: chicagocultureauthority.com/2025/09/20/r...

🎁Gift Opinion Trump’s attacks on free speech are only the beginning | The Editorial Board ABC suspended Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night show after the comedian, long a Trump target, ran afoul of FCC Chairman Brendan Carr. share.inquirer.com/6LiiAY

The New York Times, Feb. 4, 1939 www.nytimes.com/1939/02/04/a...

The sign over the entrance may read Zenith, but Pete’s TV and Video is at its nadir, and Pete himself ain’t doing so hot. Ashland Avenue, an engaging love letter to Chicago starring Jenna Fischer, Chiké Johnson & Fran Guinan, opens the Goodman’s 100th season, directed by Susan V. Booth. My review:

RIP to a real one. So many towns and smaller cities have been lucky to have old-school reporters like this dedicated to their craft and serving the needs of their audiences with no fuss or fanfare. Like my late stepmom, who wrote for the twice-weekly paper in a town of 6,000. They mattered.

I want to be Mick Herron when I grow up.

"The problem was we didn't just notice at the time that they were suspiciously circular."

“Here in 2025, we know how unhealthy it is to ever pause to think about anything, and publishers resist letting any ideas creep into a work of entertainment. Books cost more and offer less than ever, and is there a word for that? Not shrinkflation. Maybe think-flation.”

Enter to win Golden Smog tickets at the Vic ul.ink/2N95MH-QG6QP0

AITA for asking AITA? —Steven Wright, probably

Spot on. Every word.

How much more efficient would my writing time be if I wasn’t sidetracked by starting Google searches like “How many Firebirds were used in The Rockford Files?”

Susan Collins is a bad joke.