Attention: I am watching an ep of SATC in which Miranda goes to a comedy club, where a sexist comic makes douche jokes. Who kidnapped her & erased her memory & replaced it with “comedy concert?” Related: I enjoy the high-bitter ketchup-red mullet Miranda of S2.

Luv 2 have a plane speed up to take off—then stop, followed by an announcement that a generator didn’t work & we’re heading back 2 the gate… Better than the alternative, I realize, but YIKES Pretty impressed by how chill everyone is on this flight, which has STILL not taken off—we deplaned after it went past 3 hours, waited at gate, reboarded, refueled.,. & now we’re waiting for the baggage crew? I was/am fully expecting a Liz Lemon/Carroll showdown in the aisle

I know little about Ukraine, but I watched Zelensky's TV show 3 years ago, to contextualize his meeting with Trump. This is a lighter piece, but it's useful to know his origins—it's as if Tom Hanks starred in The West Wing, then won the WH in a landslide: newyorker.com/magazine/2019/… & if you don't want to read it, just to clarify: Z played a humble school teacher who went viral w/ a rant abt corruption, which got him elected President. The actor then ran for President, off that brand. I'm sure there are better pieces on this, so hook me up & I'll link 'em

I remain confused by the deranged pro-Anna final episode of INVENTING ANNA, maybe grifterella hacked into Shondaland and wrote the episode herself Sad thing is, if instead of trying to sympathize with this fake, the show had steered hard into the satire of “hustle” & “bad bitches,” tech jargon & new age blather, it could have landed on a cool Millennial It’s A Scam Scam Scam Scam World VIBE

Buffy is wearing a brown velvet neck scarf with a velvet spaghetti strapped tank top, plus a multi-ringed silver bracelet that I covet. “I knew you’d like it. I found it in a quaint little shopgirl.”

“This cheerleading trophy. It’s like it’s eyes follow you wherever they go. I like it!” “What’s his number? Oh yeah, 1-800-I’MDATINGASKANKYHO.”

I keep thinking about how both Hamilton & Mrs. America offer a uniquely effective artistic model for political art. Take a lesser-known figure who is the linchpin of a revolutionary structural dispute— Could be a villain, like Phyllis, or a flawed hero, like Hamilton... then exploit that odd premise to pivot out to a broader, richer ensemble portrait of real-life figures debating their way through the crisis. If you do it well, you skirt the cheesy glowing-biopic cliches...

You can hear how much Trump is dying to make exaggerated claims for this drug but was told not to. Fauci breaks in to clarify there was never a clinical trial for malaria. Reporter: "Is it possible that your desire to put a positive spin on things is giving Americans a false sense of hope." T: "(Sarcastically) What a lovely question... It's just a feeling, just a feeling, [I'm a] smart guy." This is such a horrible situation.

Calling Friends "homophobic" is short-sighted, silly & simplistic. It was a show co-created by a gay man, scoring laughs off a mid-90s cultural phenomenon: straight men freaking out about seeming gay—as a result of the increased visibility of out, comfortable gay men. EVERY 90s white-boy sitcom had a plot like this. It was a cliché. It was a period full of weird, nervous jokes about masculinity—aimed at, & centered around, straight men. Gay men themselves were portrayed on the show as ordinary people, amused by these weird freakouts.

I called Ian Parker's excellent profile "delectable" earlier, but I also found it upsetting. I find stories about grifters both magnetic and nauseating. Lies make me dizzy, which is (a small but real) part of why the Trump era is so difficult. This is such a big era for public shaming, a big era for brazen hoaxes, too. It's part of why I loved Can You Ever Forgive Me? so much: I love any art that helps me understand a liar without letting them off the hook.

Watching Rebecca Traister talk at the NYPL about the women’s march—the largest one-day protest in US history—& how it was erased & laughed at in media afterward. She’s talking about how excruciating the experience of MeToo was last fall—& how painful rage can be as well as liberating.

Then doing a hilarious riff about how interviewees wd say “I was angry, but now I’ve turned that into action!” and then 10 minutes later they’d be raging.

1983 in a nutshell: imdb.com/title/tt053511….

The phrase "date rape" was new & divisive. It's not that guys didn't know it was wrong or that girls saw it as normal. But it was def viewed in a different light & the teen movies of the 80s document that fact to a disturbing degree. (Although now I'm confused: it seems like that episode actually ran in 1988, which makes more sense... nytimes.com/1988/01/05/art….)

With most men, Trump role-plays as a bro or a boss. With Putin, he’s a needy wingman, letting P run the show. He’s SCARED of him... But maybe the weirder aspect of his behavior is that it’s consistent, in clear contrast with the abusive mood-swings he directs at everyone else. He never loses control with Putin, doesn’t call him names or go hot and cold. Even when the guy humiliates him, he never wavers. Putin so obviously has something on him, whether it’s money or the pee tape.

Read the NYT piece. They were shocked, laughing, freaked out. The BIG problem is that Dave Becky told them to shut up & not tell the story. I wish people wd focus more on this. LCK did something gross, ridiculous & nonconsensual. & then his manager told them they’d be blackballed