Indholdsfortegnelse for March 25, 2022 i The Week Magazine

After two years of successfully avoiding Covid (as far as I know), I have lowered my mask. Not everywhere, but my wife and I have returned to our favorite restaurants, and in The Week’s office, my colleagues and I no longer are required to cover up. It’s liberating to have a naked face again, but a bit unsettling, too, like your first day in a nudist colony. Even in cautious blue states, normalcy is tiptoeing back. But no matter how desperately we crave being done with Covid, the pre-pandemic world we once knew is gone. The virus has insinuated itself into our culture, our consciousness, and even our politics. And no one knows whether the relief we're now experiencing will last, or is just a pause. We've had nearly 1…

White middle-school students in North Carolina held a mock slave auction in which Black students were “sold” to white classmates. The incident at the J.S. Waters School in Goldston was reported by a student’s mother, Ashley Palmer, who said her son told her that a white student acted as slave master and a Black friend “went for $350.” A video shows the white students using the N-word. The district’s superintendent sent a letter to parents condemning “recent unacceptable incidents.” A Colorado Republican dropped his handgun on a marble floor inside the state Capitol. The firearm didn’t discharge after it fell from Rep. Richard Holtorf’s pants, but witnesses said it was “reckless and scary.” State lawmakers are allowed to bypass metal detectors at the Capitol and carry concealed weapons. In other…

Ben Stiller’s life started to crumble in 2014, said Ryan D’Agostino in Esquire. First, he needed treatment for an aggressive form of prostate cancer. The following year, his mother, Anne Meara, died at age 85 after a major stroke. In 2016, Zoolander 2—a film Stiller wrote, directed, produced, and starred in—flopped spectacularly. In 2017, his 17-year marriage to actress Christine Taylor unraveled, and they separated. In May 2020, his comedy legend father, Jerry, died at age 92. “I was lucky to have my parents live as long as they did,” says Stiller, 56, “but it’s almost the longer that they’re there, the more it seems they’re never going to go away.” When the pandemic began, he and Taylor decided it would be better for their kids if he moved…

Just 40 days after he announced his retirement, Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady reversed himself this week, saying he has “unfinished business” and will return for his 23rd season. When he retired, Brady had said he wanted to spend more time with his wife, model Gisele Bündchen, and his three kids, ages 9 to 14. But after some reflection, “I’ve realized my place is still on the field and not in the stands,” he said. “That time will come. But it’s not now.” Brady, 44, has long said his goal was to play to at least 45. But an insider told People that Bündchen supports his decision to un-retire, saying, “He would never do it if she weren’t on board.” She tweeted out her support, saying, “Here we…

James Meigs “As Russian tanks rolled somewhat haltingly toward Kyiv, Germany was fighting a battle of its own,” said James Meigs. “It was trying to keep the lights on.” On a recent winter’s day, wind and solar provided just 7 percent of Germany’s energy, with most of the rest coming from natural gas and coal—much of it purchased from Russia. In recent years, Germany has spent 500 billion euros to convert to renewable energy, but in that transition, it made a foolish mistake: It “shut down most of its perfectly good, perfectly safe nuclear reactors.” That decision left Germany desperate to bring in even more Russian natural gas through the Nord Stream 2 pipeline. Vladimir Putin has shrewdly encouraged Germany’s and Europe’s dependency on Russia’s natural gas, oil, and…

SOUTH AFRICA Craig Moffat Mail & Guardian African countries may profit from Russia’s sudden isolation, said Craig Moffat. In the short term, we, like the rest of the world, will feel the pain of global sanctions levied on Russia after its invasion of Ukraine, as well as the drop in wheat supplies from Ukraine itself. But as Russia is ripped from the global economy, Africans could fill part of that void. South Africa, for example, is already the world’s second-biggest producer of palladium—a rare metal used in cars and electronics—and a major source of gold and coal; exports of all three could increase. Nigeria could help European countries wean themselves from Russian gas by hastening construction of the trans-Saharan pipeline through Algeria and on to Europe. Still, aside from those…

“People now listen to gossip as if that’s the truth, but they’ll read news in the newspaper and think it must be a lie.”Harvey Fierstein, quoted in Time “Don’t join the book burners. Don’t think you’re going to conceal faults by concealing evidence that they ever existed.”Dwight D. Eisenhower, quoted in The Hill “I believe the second half of one’s life is meant to be better than the first half. The first half is finding out how you do it. And the second half is enjoying it.”Activist Frances Lear, quoted in The Washington Post “We fabricate fictions not so that the false will seem true, but to tell the most unspeakable truth with absolute faithfulness.”Elena Ferrante, quoted in The Guardian “The only people for me are the mad ones, the…

Meta’s wartime-speech policy Russia asked a court to label Meta an “extremist organization” after the company changed its hate-speech policy to exempt calls for violence against the Russian military, said Mark Trevelyan in Reuters. In an email sent to moderators of Facebook and Instagram last week, Meta said it would “temporarily make allowances” for forms of violent speech “in the context of the Ukraine invasion.” Spokesman Nick Clegg said the change was made “to let users voice opposition to Russia’s attack.” Meta initially permitted posts “that call for the death of Russian President Vladimir Putin or Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko” but narrowed its guidance after Russia opened a criminal case. In any case, the posts are not accessible within Russia, which has blocked Facebook and Instagram. Rivian cuts truck…

Frequent vaping may increase your risk for developing diabetes, the New York Post reports. Researchers examined health data taken from 2016 to 2018 of more than 600,000 adults across the U.S., diverse in age and race. Nine percent of them were e-cigarette users with self-reported diagnoses of high blood sugar, which is known as prediabetes. While that condition is reversible, it can contribute to heart disease and can lead to type 2 diabetes, a chronic condition that can cause serious complications such as kidney failure. Some 38 percent of Americans are believed to have prediabetes, and the incidence has been rising. The researchers found that compared with those who didn’t vape, the e-cig users were 22 percent more likely to have prediabetes, while traditional smokers were 40 percent more…

NoViolet Bulawayo’s first novel, We Need New Names, was a 2013 Booker Prize finalist. Her new book, Glory, is a satire, inspired by the overthrow of Zimbabwean ruler Robert Mugabe, about a nation of farm animals navigating a political transition. The Enchanted Wood by Enid Blyton (1939). Books were so scarce for me growing up in Zimbabwe that when I found this one—probably by stealing—it became a dear favorite, reread throughout my childhood. I reveled in its magic and improbable worlds; envied Joe, Beth, and Frannie their colorful, adventurous lives; and learned how to write working sentences from it. This is one of the books that helped my imagination and love for reading and writing in my early years. Indaba, My Children by Vusamazulu Credo Mutwa (1964). Credo Mutwa’s extraordinary…

  3 The rising countrypop singer known as CMAT is “one of the funniest people you’ll ever meet,” said Ella Kemp in NME. On her debut album, the 26-year-old Irish songwriter combines a talent for creating radio-friendly earworms with a knack for witty self-deprecation, and the resulting record “encourages you to have a little dance in celebration of all your sins.” That’s what the artist born Ciara Mary-Alice Thompson is doing here: “She strums away all the bad things she’s done,” suggesting that the best way to handle wrongdoing is “to just laugh about it—and strive to be better.” She cites Dolly Parton as a major influence, and her songs feel steeped in country music’s “eager embrace” of the drama of ordinary life, said Mark Deming in AllMusic. But she…

The Cold War revisited… The Lives of Others A 2007 Oscar winner, this German drama follows a Stasi officer in 1984 Berlin who belatedly develops sympathy for the lovers he’s been tasked to spy on. The film is an immersion in the deceit and dread that engulf life under an authoritarian regime. $3 on demand Dr. Strangelove In Stanley Kubrick’s classic 1964 satire, a deranged U.S. Air Force general orders a nuclear strike against the Soviet Union and Peter Sellers plays three roles, including a former-Nazi scientist who can’t control his saluting arm. Oliver Stone once coaxed Vladimir Putin into watching this one. $3 on demand Fail-Safe Released the same year as Dr. Strangelove, this dramatic take on almost the same scenario features a superb Henry Fonda as a…

After soaring last week, oil prices fell dramatically, said Myra Saefong in MarketWatch. The price of a barrel of Brent crude was down 22 percent this week from where it closed just five trading days earlier. The decline marked “the quickest fall from a recent high into a bear market since 1996.” The biggest driver of the sell-off seemed to be the “realization that Europe is not going to wean off the Russian oil supply immediately,” despite the U.S. announcement of a Russian energy embargo. More Covid lockdowns in China also weighed on demand. Starbucks: Schultz returns to head coffee chain Howard Schultz will again lead Starbucks after chief executive Kevin Johnson announced his retirement this week, said Jacqueline Corba and Amelia Lucas in CNBC.com. Schultz “takes the helm of…

Amazon splits its shares Amazon announced plans for its first stock split since 1999, said Nicolas Vega in CNBC.com. Just a month after Google parent Alphabet said it would do a 20-for-1 split of its shares, the e-commerce giant said existing shareholders will get 19 additional shares from each share they already own. The split would bring the price of each Amazon share down from roughly $2,785 (where it stands today) to $139, making the stock more affordable. Though it would not change Amazon’s market cap, it could “get the stock into the Dow Jones industrial average,” which excludes stocks with very high per-share prices. Current owners of Amazon’s stock will receive their additional shares on June 3. Black applicants not welcome Wells Fargo rejected more mortgage-refinancing applications from…

Brad Stone Bloomberg Businessweek Eight months after stepping down as Amazon’s chief executive, Jeff Bezos “spends much of his time focused on his opulent life,” said Brad Stone, “and surprisingly little on the $1.4 trillion e-commerce and cloud-computing giant he ran for 27 years.” Two decades ago, “he was a khakis-wearing Wall Street expat whose obsession with the minutiae of his online store kept him largely out of public view.” Today, he’s “a muscle-bound mainstay of the tabloid media.” His passions are his girlfriend Lauren Sanchez, “his private space company, and his $10 billion climate philanthropy.” Bezos has become so image-conscious that he “had his tailor flown to his Texas ranch to fix” the crotch on his blue jumpsuit for a photo shoot before he launched into space last…

Brent Renaud traveled to the most dangerous corners of the world to document human suffering. The Arkansas native filmed documentaries on the Iraq and Afghan wars, Mexican drug cartels, the 2011 earthquake in Haiti, and political turmoil in Egypt and Libya. Known for carrying minimal equipment so he could blend in with his surroundings, Renaud frequently collaborated with his brother, Craig, including on the Peabody Award–winning Last Chance High, about a Chicago school for at-risk youth. Refugees were a recurring focus for Renaud, who was filming the exodus from Ukraine for Time when he was fatally shot this week, allegedly by Russian troops. He and Craig understood the risks they were taking. “I don’t think we are adrenaline junkies,” Brent said in 2009. “We don’t seek out dangerous assignments,…

The war in Ukraine has sparked talk of regime change in Moscow, said journalist Stephen Kinzer in Politico, but the history of U.S. efforts to kill heads of state is not encouraging. America's rage at a foreign demon has rarely been as intense as our current fixation on Vladimir Putin. He is this generation’s Mao or Castro, its Qaddafi or Saddam or Khomeini, the rampaging and perhaps deranged foreign tyrant who personifies everything we hate and fear. Many in Washington see last month’s invasion of Ukraine as entirely his doing. Some believe the world will never be at peace as long as he lives and rules. From there it’s a short step to wishing him “sawed off”—as Dwight Eisenhower put it when he ordered Fidel Castro’s assassination in 1960.…

Mesa County, Colo. Tina Peters, a Republican county clerk who has become a right-wing hero for defending baseless claims that the 2020 election was stolen, was indicted last week on 10 criminal counts for allegedly tampering with election equipment. Peters, 66, says she’s being targeted by opponents of her bid for Colorado secretary of state. According to the indictment, Peters instructed her deputy, Belinda Knisley, who was also charged, to deceptively obtain an access badge to the election building. The badge was used to enter secure areas last May, days before a software update, after Knisley requested that the office’s security cameras be turned off. In August, a conservative website posted passwords for Mesa County’s election machines, and soon after, the county’s election software was displayed at a South…

Andrew Young is one of the last surviving leaders of the 1960s civil rights movement, said Richard Fausset in The New York Times. An ordained minister who grew up in New Orleans, Young joined a group he describes as the “30ish, Southern-born Negro preachers” who made up the Southern Christian Leadership Conference that Martin Luther King Jr. co-founded. Young was beaten by white supremacists at a 1964 march in St. Augustine, Fla., and was present four years later at the Memphis motel where King, his friend and mentor, was assassinated. Young would go on to serve as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and as mayor of Atlanta, helping bring the Olympics there in 1996. Now 90, Young says he still believes in “the undiminished potential of our country”…

Lanier Scott Isom On a recent Sunday, a man clad in olive green entered my church in Alabama with a semiautomatic handgun on his hip, said Lanier Scott Isom. “Can I sit here?” he whispered, moving into an empty space in my pew. I eyed his gun with rising panic. “I can’t tell if he is military or paramilitary, a Proud Boy, or a plainclothes cop. Is he going to murder us all?” Alabama is an open-carry state, and anyone can enter a house of worship or other public place visibly armed without even getting a permit for the weapon. In 2015, a man entered a church in East Selma, Ala., with a gun and shot his girlfriend and her son. In 2017, a gunman killed 26 people and…

UNITED KINGDOM Andy Beckett The Guardian Our country, an empire less than a lifetime ago, has now become the “butler to the world,” said Andy Beckett. At the height of the British Empire, legions of bankers, lawyers, and accountants placed themselves at the disposal of British slave traders, self-made industrialists, and other barons. They knew not just how to make money grow but also how to transform it into “social and cultural capital.” Now they are doing the same for oligarchs from emerging economies. In the 1970s, Britain began welcoming Middle Eastern tycoons “who wanted to spend, invest, and hide their oil money.” When the opening of the Russian, Chinese, and Indian economies brought another boom of nouveau riche in the 1990s, London could offer them lower taxes than New…

President Biden has delivered “a quietly bravura performance” in his response to the crisis in Ukraine, said Franklin Foer in The Atlantic. At a chaotic and dangerous moment, he’s delivered smart, steady “statecraft” on every front. He managed our NATO allies into their most unified response in decades, while “carefully limiting his own public role,” denying Vladimir Putin the opportunity to cast the conflict as a Russia-U.S. showdown. He’s drawn clear, firm lines while avoiding bellicose “bluster.” He’s built bipartisan consensus in Congress for sanctions on Russia and aid to Ukraine, while resisting pressure from hawks to adopt “chest-thumping policies to defuse accusations of weakness.” Even congressional Republicans are giving Biden credit, said Amber Phillips in The Washington Post. Sen. Mitt Romney praised him for coordinating a “unified and…

The Amazon rain forest is approaching a crucial “tipping point” that could see it permanently transformed into a grassy savannah, new data suggests. Home to a vast and unique array of plant and animal life, the dense tropical forest also acts as a massive carbon sink. Because its trees evaporate significant amounts of water into the atmosphere, its loss could affect global weather patterns. Scientists who have examined satellite data from the past 20 years have concluded that about three-quarters of the rain forest is displaying signs of “resilience loss,” meaning it is less able to recover from things like droughts, logging, and forest fires. The decline was most stark in areas that were nearer human activity and received less rainfall. The researchers say it’s impossible to tell when…

(Putnam, $28) “Fate, history, and chance collide in Karen Joy Fowler’s riveting historical novel,” said Jeffrey Ann Goudie in The Boston Globe. Abraham Lincoln’s assassin came, of course, from a famed theater family, and Fowler has brought the family story to life to illuminate how a political murderer emerged in their midst. The tale unfolds through the eyes of three siblings of John Wilkes Booth, and though Fowler’s 500-page book “occasionally sags from the depth of her research,” it remains “a massive achievement.” The narrative is “packed with drama, both onstage and off,” said Heller McAlpin in The Christian Science Monitor. The erratic paterfamilias is the finest Shakespearean actor of his day. His children grow up on a farm outside Baltimore run by a freed Black man, but “Johnny” develops…

Life Between the Tides by Adam Nicolson (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $30) Even the smallest body of water can brim with life, said Christoph Irmscher in The Wall Street Journal. Adam Nicolson’s book, as “shimmeringly beautiful” as any tide pool, chronicles the trials and triumphs of the sandhoppers, prawns, and other sea animals who take up residence in three such pools that he created on Scotland’s coast. The life he watches unfold is a struggle for existence “as tragic as a Shakespeare play or as grimly comic as a Dickens novel.” The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka (Knopf, $23) “Does the community pool have magical powers?” asked Nina Renata Aron in the Los Angeles Times. It’s easy to think so while reading the opening of Julie Otsuka’s latest novel, which…

  3 Jenny Hval is an artist of the purest sort, said Hazel Cills in NPR.org. The Norwegian singer-songwriter, 41, has earned wide acclaim by producing “complex but playful” art-pop that poses challenging questions about the self and where hers, in particular, fits in the world. Her “fluid, lively” new album “vibrates with the tension of ‘what could have been’—had Hval made different life choices.” What if she hadn’t married, for example, or chosen to be an artist? The songs have a breezy, New Age sound, though the music “isn’t pop so much as it’s lighter than her more foreboding past work.” This is Hval at her most approachable, said Jon Pareles in The New York Times. The many-layered opening track, “Year of Love,” builds slowly on its syncopated guitar…

This recipe for homemade cheese requires only three ingredients but yields a “light, fluffy ricotta that’s a delicious blank canvas for sweet or savory recipes,” said Josh Miller and Paige Grandjean in Food & Wine. Avoid ultra-pasteurized milk and trust buttermilk as the way to get the best texture. The rest is easy, and homemade ricotta “takes spring cooking to the next level.” • 1 gallon organic and/or grass-fed pasteurized whole milk• 1 quart organic and/or grass-fed buttermilk • ½ tsp kosher salt • Stir together ingredients in a large, heavy stockpot. Cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until temperature reaches 180 on an instant-read thermometer, 30 to 40 minutes. Remove from heat; let stand uncovered at room temperature until curds have formed and floated to surface and are…

Over a million children have already fled Ukraine due to Russia’s invasion of their country. Many of those children have been separated from their parents and are traveling unaccompanied. Save the Children (savethechildren.org) has established a Ukraine Crisis Relief Fund to support humanitarian programs aiming to reach 3.5 million children and their families. At the Romania-Ukraine border, the nonprofit’s staff and volunteers are distributing food, water, and hygiene kits to arriving refugees. In Poland and Romania, they are providing child protective services, including targeted support for unaccompanied and separated children, psychosocial support, and access to legal services. In addition to their work with refugees, Save the Children has programs around the world focused on getting the most vulnerable children food, health care, and educational opportunities. Each charity we feature…

Bryce Covert The New Republic The U.S. just saw how effective the government can be when it acts quickly and decisively in a time of economic crisis, said Bryce Covert. After the 2008 financial crisis spawned a Great Recession, Obama administration officials worried that a stimulus package above $1 trillion “would pop eyes and add dangerously to the deficit.” But history proved that the government’s $787 billion response “was too small and too short.” After the pandemic struck in 2020, a staggering 23 million people filed for unemployment in a single week, “more than triple the highest number during the peak of the Great Recession.” But the government had already ensured that their incomes would be fully restored. When pandemic restrictions were lifted, a buildup of savings turned into…

Good week for: The union, after the New Hampshire House voted 323 to 13 to reject a Republican legislator’s proposal for the Granite State to secede from the U.S. and form its own “sovereign nation.” Nonetheless, said State Rep. Matthew Santonastaso, “National divorce is going to happen.” The Eiffel Tower, which grew by 6 meters when a helicopter lowered a new communications antenna onto the top of the 133-year-old landmark, making it 330 meters (1,083 feet) tall. New Zealand, which is reopening to tourists after two years of pandemic isolation. The Kiwis were hit by the Omicron wave in January, but by then had an 81 percent vaccination rate and have suffered just 102 Covid deaths since 2020. Bad week for: Empty threats, after Kremlin mouthpieces on Russian state TV demanded…

Grimes may or may not be “together” with Elon Musk, said Devin Gordon in Vanity Fair. The avant-garde pop singer’s relationship with the Tesla and SpaceX CEO—one of the richest men on the planet—is “very fluid,” says Grimes, 34. “We live in separate houses. We’re best friends, we just need to be free.” After they said they were breaking up last year, he moved his businesses to Austin, and she remained behind in Los Angeles. But then Grimes joined him in Texas. She says Musk views their nearly 2-year-old son, who goes by “X,” as his “protégé.” In December, the two welcomed a daughter, “Y”—born by surrogate, which allowed Musk and Grimes to keep the baby a secret for months. Although her status with Musk is hard to define,…

Dana Milbank “Republicans are killing us,” said Dana Milbank. That’s the “inescapable conclusion” of two new analyses of state-by-state data on Covid deaths since July 1, when lifesaving vaccines became available to all Americans. The 14 states with the highest death rates are all run by Republican governors. West Virginia, with 199 deaths per 100,000 people, was the worst, with Wyoming (172) and Florida (153) second and third worst. In stark contrast, “the deep-blue District of Columbia” had only 27 deaths per 100,000, while California had 58 per 100,000. The statistics are damning: Florida residents “were nearly seven times as likely to die from Covid-19 as residents of D.C., nearly three times as likely to die as residents of California, and 2½ times as likely to die as residents…

“Autocrats often believe that people animated by liberal values are too soft to withstand the steady, ruthless application of force. That is what makes Volodymyr Zelensky’s story so remarkable. Until a month ago, he was himself someone trying to muddle through until tomorrow. Until the moment of confrontation, he probably didn’t remotely conceive of himself as a Churchill for the social media age: ‘I need ammunition, not a ride.’ In what now promises to be a long and costly conflict, it’s becoming impossible to avoid the Zelensky test: What are you willing to sacrifice in the name of your ideals?” John Harris in Politico.com…

GERMANY Detlef Esslinger Süddeutsche Zeitung Firing the acclaimed conductor Valery Gergiev for failing to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine “does no credit to anyone,” said Detlef Esslinger. Germans knew of the political leanings of this great Russian maestro before he took over the Munich Philharmonic in 2015. There were reports that Gergiev had supported the annexation of Crimea from Ukraine the previous year, which was not surprising, since he was close friends with Vladimir Putin and had even appeared in one of Putin’s presidential campaign ads. In 2016, he held a special concert for Russian soldiers and officials in Palmyra, Syria, after Russian forces bombed the city into submission on behalf of the Syrian regime. None of that stopped the orchestra from extending his contract. Only now, after he stayed…

PHILIPPINES Anna Cristina Tuazon Philippine Daily Inquirer The Philippines may finally shed its reputation as a “safe haven for child predators,” said Anna Cristina Tuazon. Long “infamous” for having Asia’s lowest minimum age for sexual consent, at 12, the country last week raised the age to 16. It’s a “long overdue” first step toward ending our epidemic of child sexual abuse. Poor enforcement of trafficking laws and a high rate of poverty put Philippine children at significant risk of exploitation, and fully 1 in 5 teens ages 13 to 17 say they have already experienced some form of sexual violence. It’s not just the laws that must change, though, but our entire mindset. Because this heavily Catholic country insists on “keeping the ‘nuclear family’ together,” courts have forced child rape…

Donald Trump’s stolen-election narrative may be his most notorious attempt to subvert democracy, said Ja’han Jones in MSNBC.com, but it was “far from the only one.” His administration “worked hard to discourage people—particularly nonwhite people—from reporting to the census,” and last week the Census Bureau revealed that the 2020 survey miscounted nearly 19 million people. That includes an overcount of white Americans and an undercount of Black, Hispanic, and Native Americans. These errors were “considerably worse” than in previous censuses, said The Washington Post in an editorial. Nearly 5 percent of American Hispanics, for example, were missed. And the Trump administration deserves “the lion’s share of the blame.” It “did everything in its power” to skew the count away from people of color, shortening the counting period, and publicly…

Just as the U.S. finally appears to have “turned the corner” on Covid-19 infections, said Cady Stanton in USA Today, Europe is recording yet another surge in cases. After ending all Covid restrictions, the U.K., the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, and several other countries have all seen rising case numbers in recent weeks, with some also experiencing an uptick in hospitalizations. The U.K. has seen new cases surge by more than 75 percent. One big factor may be the spread of BA.2, a subvariant of Omicron thought to be “30 percent more transmissible than the original.” Another is that many of these countries—like the U.S.—have lifted mask mandates and other Covid restrictions in a bid to treat the virus “as a part of daily life.” Given that the U.S. generally…

(Random House, $28) Bonhomie in a celebrity memoir can get awfully tiresome, said Seamas O’Reilly in The Irish Times. “Give me a misanthrope any day,” because we readers then have a better chance at learning something. Bob Odenkirk, the former comedy sketch artist who with Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul has become one of television’s most acclaimed and beloved dramatic actors, wants to talk about comedy in his new memoir, and when he does. he’s riveting. Discussing the sketch work he did in the 1990s on the HBO series Mr. Show and elsewhere, “he openly admits to being a cranky purist.” He also makes clear that he believes he was doing work as good or better than anybody else. But he also tells us something chilling: “I tried just…

Sci-fi and fantasy writer Brandon Sanderson has just torn up publishing’s scorekeeping rules, said David Barnett in The Guardian. In a Kickstarter campaign that he launched on March 1, the 46-year-old Utah resident and author of the Mistborn and Stormlight Archive series raised more than $15 million in less than a day from readers, who are essentially paying the advance for four upcoming, untitled novels, all of which he will self-publish next year. That one-day haul, which was 15 times what he’d hoped to raise across a full month, smashed the all-time record for Kickstarter projects of any kind, and it keeps growing. It now exceeds $28 million, which puts Sanderson in the company of Barack and Michelle Obama, who split a $65 million advance from a traditional publisher…

  3 On the follow-up to her breakout fifth album, Tamara Lindeman generates “a sense of hushed wonder,” said Tabassum Siddiqui in The AV Club. The Canadian musician who records as the Weather Station created a lush synth-heavy pop sound for 2021’s Ignorance. In this companion collection, she has dramatically pared back, delivering 10 jazz-tinged piano ballads backed by an acoustic combo. “While both her singing and songs have often elicited perhaps too easy a comparison to Joni Mitchell, the jazz influence throughout this album draws out that connection.” The record’s quiet energy won’t be for everyone, said Hal Horowitz in American Songwriter. “There aren’t any catchy melodies,” the song structures are “often amorphous,” and the backup musicians “stay on low boil” as they add dashes of sax, clarinet, and…

Maintenance Phase (Gordon & Hobbes) “Listening to Maintenance Phase is like hearing your smart, straight-talking friend respond to you idly wondering if you should try a keto diet,” said Elle Hunt in The Guardian. This “fastidiously researched” podcast interrogates the pseudoscience that underpins so many fad diets and wellness trends. Recent episodes on gym buffs’ obsession with protein powders and the misleading nature of body mass indexes “will open your mind to the hollow basis of much conventional wellness wisdom.” The tone is never lecturing, because hosts Aubrey Gordon and Michael Hobbes “are great storytellers and quick with humor,” said Christine Byrne in Outside. The two journalists are especially disarming whenever they discuss obesity, a subject both have written about. One episode, “Is Being Fat Bad for You?,” begins…

There’s more to vermouth than Martini & Rossi, said Brad Thomas Parsons in Punch. As the cocktail renaissance has “helped vermouth take its place in the spotlight as a key component in classic drinks,” the bittersweet fortified wine is becoming available in new iterations. If you’re exploring, here’s where to start. Cocchi Storico Vermouth di Torino ($20). Since its arrival a decade ago, this Italian newcomer has become the “go-to” of bartenders for sweet, or red, vermouth. It offers “notes of bitter orange, cocoa, and aromatic spices.” Dolin Vermouth de Chambéry Dry ($14). Among dry vermouths, Dolin “remains the bottle to beat.” The balance of botanicals makes the centuries-old French import ideal for a martini. Lustau Vermut Blanco ($29). One of several emerging Spanish vermouths, this herbaceous blanco is…

April is a great time to visit the mansions of Newport, R.I., said Diane Bair and Pamela Wright in The Boston Globe. Recently, we decided to “live like a Vanderbilt, just for a weekend,” and did so by wandering the famously ostentatious summer estates of 19th-century industrialists. All sit in a row within walking distance of the historic Hotel Viking, and they are time capsules of the era—“in your face” displays of wealth that have supplied many of the eye-popping interiors on the HBO hit period drama series The Gilded Age. Wealthy Brits of the same period liked their pleasure palaces isolated. “Here, the whole point was to build it bigger and fancier than your neighbors, and right next door so they couldn’t miss it.” The crowds return in May,…

Tova Borgnine was one half of an unlikely power couple. After selling cosmetics to Jersey Shore casinogoers and Las Vegas showgirls, she bought the formula for a face mask used by actress Merle Oberon, a cactus-based recipe that supposedly dated back to the Aztecs. Her first client: the man she married in 1973, Oscar-winning actor Ernest Borgnine. When a columnist a few years later asked the famously rough-faced star of Marty and McHale’s Navy about his newly dewy skin, he happily plugged his fifth wife’s product. By the 1990s, she was a mainstay of the QVC shopping channel, earning up to $20 million a year. Ernest stuck with the skin-care regimen, wearing pink face masks as he read the newspaper at home. “Skin,” Tova said in 1984, “has no…

This week’s question: “Shrinkflation” is hitting supermarket shelves nationwide, with makers of cookies, cereal, and toilet paper reducing the size of their packages to keep costs down without raising prices. In seven words or fewer, create an ad slogan that tries to put a positive spin on shrunken products. Last week’s contest: A new study found that merely three seconds of resistance training a day could boost sedentary people’s biceps by 12 percent. Come up with a name for an exercise program that requires the absolute minimum level of effort. THE WINNER: “CrossSit” Elizabeth Kent, Watertown, Mass. SECOND PLACE: “Chairmaster” Ivan Kershner, Salem, S.C. THIRD PLACE: “Chillates” Dave Grossman, Petaluma, Calif. For runners-up and complete contest rules, please go to theweek.com/contest. How to enter: Submissions should be emailed to contest@theweek.com.…