Watch Dick Cavett’s Worst Show Ever

September 18, 1970. The guests were John Cassavetes, Peter Falk, and Ben Gazzara. “They were on hand to promote their new movie, but for thirty-five minutes they smoked, flopped around on the floor, and generally tormented Cavett, whose questions they’d planned to ignore.” (They were long since drunk, of course.) (includes full video and new comments by Cavett)

A Self-Publishing Revolution? Please!

“Unfortunately, self-publishing is neither radical nor liberating. And, as revolutions go, it is rather short on revolutionaries. It is actually reactionary, a contracted version of the traditional publishing model in which companies, who produce for a wide range of tastes and preferences, are replaced by individual producers each catering to very narrow range.”

More Than A Memorial: The Problem At Ground Zero

Michael Kimmelman: “The site of the Sept. 11 memorial is not singularly devoted to those who died. It also serves as the forecourt for an office development and as public space for Lower Manhattan. The neighborhood was a casualty, too, along with the rest of New York. In the tortuous planning process, victims’ families and real estate interests needed to be reconciled with the interests of everyone else in the city, including those who live and work downtown. So far, I’m not sure it’s working.”

The Resurrection Of Stefan Zweig

“In the decades between the two world wars, no writer was more widely translated or read than the Austrian novelist Stefan Zweig, and in the years after, few writers fell more precipitously into obscurity, at least in the English-speaking world. But now Zweig, prolific storyteller and embodiment of a vanished Mitteleuropa, seems to be back, and in a big way” – new editions of his books, movie adaptations, new biographies, even a novel about him.

Paris Opera Moves (Carefully) Into Cinemacasts

“For the Opéra de Paris, whose two stages are typically sold out, the screening in local movie theaters – even in Paris – is not seen as a threat but as an opportunity to widen the tent and bring in audiences who, as French taxpayers, support 50 percent of its annual costs. That is one of the reasons why the Opéra de Paris is pleased with distribution in smaller towns and has encouraged [local cinema managers] to turn the screenings into festive occasions.”