Chalk it up to a coincidence, but within the span of a week the New York Times ran obituaries for two people named John J. O'Connor.

The first announced the death of the husband of former Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, who retired from the Supreme Court to care for...

As the decade comes to a close, it's worth taking a nostalgic look back at what we lived through in the first 10 years of the new century. A list of the top films that have come and gone over the past decade, though, brings some lessons and signs that...

Sesame Street celebrates its 40th anniversary this week with much fanfare and Muppet mania. People are reminiscing about and putting together their favorite moments from the show's longtime run on PBS. The show's icon, Big Bird, has shared many memories on Sesame Street with his...

Congress members Michele Bachmann and Alan Grayson have seized the power of YouTube to increase their mass appeal. At the same time, they've alienated themselves from others and even made some enemies. Yet that might just be the name of the game in politics today. If you can...

It looks like the breakout hit comedy of the fall has been ABC's Modern Family. A month ago, a Salon reviewer said, "[T]his dysfunctional family comedy really is its own unique, brilliant gem, shining among an otherwise uncomfortably mediocre haul of cheap comedic rhinestones." The show's writing and...

Some writers are big enough celebrities that they can draw sizable crowds to their promotional book readings. However, most other writers nervously brace for what they expect to be a small turnout.

Tonight, I heard Adam L. Penenberg, author of Viral Loop: From Facebook to Twitter, How Today's Smartest...

Last week, Robert Gibbs presented a photo of President Obama stuffing Reggie Love during a pick-up basketball game. It made headlines because Love played college ball at powerhouse Duke. But it was also the latest in a series of photos taken of the President playing his favorite sport where he's...

Snoop Dogg will appear in tonight's episode of "Brothers" (Fox, 8 ET) as a debt collector. For a well-known hip-hop artist, Snoop seems to spend a lot of time making cameos on TV. In his guest roles, he always brings his own brand of humor - and vocabulary - to...

We've long known that bloopers are one of the great and inexplicable pastimes in television. We learned recently with Fox's Ernie Anastos that at the height of those unexpected gaffes is catching someone cursing on air.

So when "Saturday Night Live" cast member Jenny Slate accidentally uttered a...

As online video becomes more mainstream and ubiquitous, rebroadcasts of television programs are likewise increasing in popularity. Rather than identify online video as a rival - a source for original Web series drawing advertisers away from more traditional TV partiality - television executives and producers have instead jumped on...

All About Steve opens this weekend across the country. The title is a play on words of the classic 1950 film, All About Eve. In the movie's honor, I've assembled a timeline of movies that showcase lead characters names in the titles in both odd and clever pun-driven...

I first noticed it when watching last week's episode of "Shaq Vs." on ABC.

The athlete/celebrity faced off with beach volleyballers Misty May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh. Shaq and others gave attention to May-Treanor's Achilles injury that she endured last year. But nowhere in the broadcast did they reveal...

News broke early on Wednesday that Senator Ted Kennedy had died from a brain tumor. He was 77.

Since news organizations tend to be short-staffed overnight, it is particularly interesting to compare the prominent points that different sites highlighted in their initial depictions of Sen. Kennedy's life and career. Regardless...

Albert Camus' The Plague was my summer reading before I started college. I recall bringing the book along with me to the beach that summer, expecting that between dips in the ocean I'd squeeze in a chapter here and there.

As you can imagine, the summer sped by and...

Passing through Midtown yesterday afternoon, you couldn't miss the noise and excitement produced by the Dominican Day Parade. I was outside Bryant Park, blocks away from where the parade began. Kids held balloons, young girls danced and screeched on the sidewalks, and almost everyone waved flags. Many people on the...

While by no means a perfectly executed film, Funny People has enough strength and heart that justifies the price of admission. Director Judd Apatow may fail in sending viewers home with an altered perspective on comedians or rejuvenated excitement for life, but he succeeds in depicting a conflicted and morose...

I have followed the Henry Louis Gates story pretty closely this week. It has unquestionably intensified over recent days yet, strikingly, without much new information coming out.

This story is bizarre, if only because it's lasted on the front pages, and on our lips, as long as it has....

Everyone makes mistakes, yes, but athletes sometimes seem to make them at a much higher rate than other people. At the same time, though, the punishments and backlash for these athletes' crimes and errors in judgment are often lighter than you might figure.

Look at Manny Ramirez and...

At a book reading last week, Chuck Klosterman acknowledged what we all know but may not have suspected authors knew: The reading portion of these book reading events is the boring part. So Klosterman decided to keep his reading short. He spent the remaining time speaking about that section and...

How many times has someone sent you an online video that left you wondering, "Is this real?" While the videos that tend to elicit these sort of responses are more zany than newsworthy, you should apply that same skepticism and scrutiny to other circulating videos. Shocking comments or moments from...