Capricorn: Your desire to travel may be awakened by a pack of pale wolves that surround your apartment complex. Now’s the time to finally check if that door in the laundry room connects to the old mineshaft. Hurry!!

This week's #wordlesentence “A diptych of an obscure fable—a batch of rotting fruit, a siren serenading a ship making speed through waves—was the only extraneous décor the abbot kept in his office.” 1/1/2026: FABLE 12/31: SIREN 12/30: DECOR 12/29: FRUIT 12/28: ABBOT 12/27: BATCH 12/26: SPEED

A New Year's Toast from Patricia Highsmith (and me) 🥂🥂

He was given free rein to reign freely and freely rain rained that gray day and reigned over my going away, washing away any sovereign sway about my departure today sans delay.

new #wordlesentence! “Spicy tendrils of myrrh incense rose as I stared hard into the conch, my eye following a glint down its white, calcium spool, a prism or quilt of light, particolored and spinning.” 12/25: PRISM 12/24: SPOOL 12/23: GLINT 12/22: CONCH 12/21: QUILT 12/20: WHITE 12/19: MYRRH

"Okay, newsroom! Let's make sure we represent both sides when the governments of two nations collude to commit flagrant civil rights and human rights abuses!"

If you want to see the segment axed by Little Miss Goebbels (a.k.a. Bari Weiss)

My last review before the year goes "poof." A rather unfortunate new Tartuffe. observer.com/2025/12/revi...

New #wordlesentence: British Sport Edition! “Built like a truck but a dodgy miser with the rugby ball, Clive would segue from locker room to grass pitch, warming up with a violent leg swing.” 12/18: RUGBY 12/17: GRASS 12/16: SEGUE 12/15: DODGY 12/14: SWING 12/13: MISER 12/12: TRUCK

Honored to be one of MANY theater folks asked to weigh in. My suggested plays are the ones that are 100% correct and impeccably wise, well-judged, exquisitely curated, etc.

New #wordlesentence: Socially Awkward Holiday Party Edition! “Guess who’s among the festive snide, draining a postprandial flute of fizz and wishing he could erase the gravy stain on his bulging waist.” 12/11: GUESS 12/10: ERASE 12/9: SNIDE 12/8: GRAVY 12/7: FLUTE 12/6: WAIST 12/5: AMONG

Stealworkers

speaking as a journalist who does *not* report non-arts news: I wish the media would not blare "Why This..." or "How This..." headlines before they can accurately report WHAT tf is happening in the first place.

Reading Dorothy Parker on her theater beat more than a century ago, you reflect… maybe things ain’t quite so bad today?

Back to reviewing after a couple months of residencies hither and yon: observer.com/2025/12/revi...

Normalize characters in their 20s not shoveling slang like parrots

Recently awarded a NYSCA grant through an application made with Hubbard Hall in Cambridge, New York upstate. With composer Alejandro Zuleta, I'm writing an oratorio called The Lemon Grove Incident, based on an actual school segregation court case in California in 1931. Excited to get working!

This week's #wordlesentence. Maternity & Floriculture Edition! “A gruff mother made haste one muggy morn past a tulip field shriveled from mineral leach, her baby with colic and prickly as a patch of cacti.” 12/4: TULIP 12/3: HASTE 12/2: CACTI 12/1: LEACH 11/30: MUGGY 11/29: GRUFF 11/28: COLIC

My friend @davidcote.bsky.social introduced me to Tom Stoppard during intermission of the original run of the Harry Potter Cursed Child magic show: I was starstruck and shy and Stoppard seemed charmed and baffled by the expensive spectacle he had just seen www.bbc.com/news/article...

New #wordlesentence Evil Landlord! “Plead no more, I loathe each supplicant vowel; to remain in this dismal hovel, remit one thick bunny ready for the pot, and turn that dough into something I might butter.” 11/27: REMIT 11/26: HOVEL 11/25: PLEAD 11/24: DOUGH 11/23: BUNNY 11/22: THICK 11/21: VOWEL

A friend of mine is a professional driver for celebrities. He’s driven movie stars, pop stars, and politicians. I tell him he must be proud of his famous clients. He shrugged. “What do I have to chauffeur it?”

As we pass Through arrangements of shadows Toward the verticals of trees Forever.

The A train is absolute dog shit

New #wordlesentence: Alt-Arthurian Legend Edition! “Wield well the sword, Sir Kevin; clamp it in hand as you clung to nursery toys, and I opine you shall speed any knave to his maker in a lurid grave.” 11/20: GRAVE 11/19: MAKER 11/18: OPINE 11/17: CLAMP 11/16: WIELD 11/15: CLUNG 11/14: LURID

You're invited to play a puzzle created by David. www.nytimes.com/games/create...

You're invited to play a puzzle created by David. www.nytimes.com/games/create...

New #wordlesentence Las Vegas Swindle Edition! “If I play the deuce, a fugue of peril may arise, bringing a tabby-cat scarlet tinge to my cheeks, as I pray casino security don’t spy the gizmo stuck in my ear.” 11/13: TINGE 11/12: DEUCE 11/11: GIZMO 11/10: TABBY 11/9: FUGUE 11/8: ARISE 11/7: PERIL

Am I crazy to want a “Previously on The Chair Company” montage so I can remember how the hell we got here or is the point to have NO FREAKIN IDEA HOW WE GOT HERE? #thechaircompany

I need to stop using Word, don't I? Fuck this shit

New York, 2004. 📸 by Richard Avedon.

Wordle puzzle created by SMacDonald 3/6 ⬜🟨⬜⬜⬜ ⬜⬜🟩⬜🟩 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 www.nytimes.com/games/create...

You're invited to play a puzzle created by David. www.nytimes.com/games/create...

Capricorn: Prepare for a busy, productive day (you’ll be forced into harvesting ore).

You're invited to play a puzzle created by David. www.nytimes.com/games/create...

You're invited to play a puzzle created by David. www.nytimes.com/games/create...

This week's #wordlesentence: Extended Halloween Edition! “I awoke in a roadside motel (a sleazy venue to match my vampiric guise) to find a short, rabid bat perched on my chest—an occurrence I tend to abhor.” 11/6: GUISE 11/5: SHORT 11/4: VENUE 11/3: AWOKE 11/2: RABID 11/1: MOTEL 10/31: ABHOR

Reading the brilliant book 'Inventing the Renaissance' by @adapalmer.bsky.social, and I think she coined a phrase for the ages: "History, unlike fiction, doesn't have to be plausible."

This person took this when they called the race

New #wordlesentence! “I gripped the marking gauge like a hammer and crouched behind the lathe as the plump elf, decked in holly, each finger a fetid pink tuber, pawed at the new toys with a greedy glare.” 10/30: LATHE 10/29: GLARE 10/28: HOLLY 10/27: FETID 10/26: PLUMP 10/25: GAUGE 10/24: TUBER

Just a silly game to you, Bee?

"John Carpenter is allowed to dislike a movie."

As Toni Morrison said, "the very serious function of racism is distraction. It keeps you from doing your work." But she also reminded us never to lose our capacity to be shocked. Part of my conversation on @ayman.msnbc.com earlier today.

Almost every major news story this week is about how the entire economy is now gambling, scams, bribes and theft.

This week's #Wordlesentence: William S. Burroughs Edition! “Trapped in some detox haven, urged to attain a neurochemical ideal in limbo (a gross, puritanical stunt) when all I want is to drill that vein.” 10/23: DRILL 10/22: STUNT 10/21: DETOX 10/20: LIMBO 10/19: IDEAL 10/18: HAVEN 10/17: GROSS

at this point, is he just creating fodder for SNL cold opens? Bowen Yang, get into your Santos costume....

New #Wordle sentence! “In a veritable stack of tomes, Mary Beard has chronicled the Forum, which Roman received which wound, who was catty or jiggled a lever of power to install a spoof of the Republic.” 10/16: CATTY 10/15: SPOOF 10/14: FORUM 10/13: BEARD 10/12: WOUND 10/11: STACK 10/10: LEVER

Today is P. G. Wodehouse’s birthday. “Into the face of the young man who sat on the terrace of the Hotel Magnifique at Cannes there had crept a look of furtive shame, the shifty hangdog look which announces that an Englishman is about to talk French.”

This week's #Wordle sentence: Aviation Safety Edition “Relay the message: Plane down, but Captain Bruce bailed, his hardy nylon canopy blooming with a spasm that seemed both to annoy and amuse him.” 10/9: HARDY 10/8: ANNOY 10/7: NYLON 10/6: AMUSE 10/5: PLANE 10/4: RELAY 10/3: SPASM

In Rob’s latest column, he chats with playwright Bess Wohl about her great new feminist play LIBERATION, and brings us around NYC with the clever comedy of Abby Wambaugh’s ‘The First 3 Minutes of 17 Shows,’ Big Bang readings at his church, and more. www.americantheatre.org/2025/10/10/b...