PicoBlog

Welcome! We’re back with another issue of the Animation Obsessive newsletter. If you’re new here, we cover animation from around the globe. This is what we’re doing today: One — unlocking the secrets of the Armenian classic Wow, a Talking Fish! Two — the world’s animation news. Three — a visually stunning indie highlight. Four — the last word. We publish on Thursdays and Sundays. You can receive our Sunday issues in your inbox every weekend by signing up to our free list.

Quite a few Americans like the idea of strongman rule.  Why not a dictator who will get things done?  I lived in eastern Europe when memories of communism were fresh.  I have visited regions in Ukraine where Russia imposed its occupation regime.  I have spent decades reading testimonies of people who lived under Nazi or Stalinist rule.  I have seen death pits, some old, some freshly dug. And I have friends who have lived under authoritarian regimes, including political prisoners and survivors of torture.

I’ve never been a huge fan of the traditional Thanksgiving dinner. It’s a meal as brown and heavy as...a very heavy thing that is brown (I am too tired for simile at the moment). Sliced turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, and brown gravy make for a dull color palette, which in my professional opinion, is even duller on the human palate. But I suppose most things are dull on the palate, since it is located on the roof of one’s mouth (something I only just learned this morning, which is an embarrassing thing for a dentist’s son to admit).

In Austin, we’ve been gifted with a long, rainy spring, something I was certain we wouldn’t get when it hit the 90s back in February. I’m about to spend my fourth summer here. But five summers ago I was in Brooklyn living out the collective strangest summer of our lives. The gauzy feelings of summer 2020 came back into focus when I saw Stress Positions, a new movie starring John Early, one of my favorite comedians, and Theda Hammel, who also wrote and directed the film.

Dear Readers, I’ve been sitting for the painter Chantal Joffe for a number of years. Recently, we decided I’d go over more regularly. I wanted to write about this, so here’s an essay charting my experiences. It’s a little more personal than usual. I hope you enjoy it. Support this Substack by becoming a paid subscriber. Love, Katy. Xoxo Upgrade to Paid The artist Chantal Joffe has been painting me for over four years now, about 12 times.

On October 31, news first broke that Aaron Tveit and Sutton Foster would be replacing Josh Groban and Annaleigh Ashford in the critically (somewhat) acclaimed Broadway revival of Sweeney Todd (which I reviewed here). The announcement was intended to be met with the same enthusiasm as Bernadette Peters and Elaine Stritch replacing Catherine Zeta-Jones and Angela Lansbury in the 2009 revival of A Little Night Music. That sort of replacement casting not only generates buzz; it can convince those who already attended the show to return to witness fresh blood.

When the renowned chef Tom Valenti, who had one of the most celebrated restaurants on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, Ouest, told me his secret for making his stews pop with flavor, it made perfect sense. Vinegar. Just a splash of it at the end of cooking ---not just in stews, but in most dishes-- adds an immediate wow factor, enlivening the meal and making all the flavors sing. Chefs talk a lot about the importance of acidity in food, which is what vinegar brings, but the benefits of the ingredient go way beyond enhancing flavor---vinegar also has some surprising health benefits.

This is a bit of a ramble on Shrove Tuesday and Lent, because I’m rather overwhelmed. If you read books about the liturgical calendar, feast days, festivals and local traditions, about a third of it relates to this time of year and the beginning of Lent. But let’s just start with Shrove Tuesday: In Europe, Shrove Tuesday was a time of shriving, which means making confession and seeking penance for your sins.

I started thinking of myself as a writer when I had a pitch accepted at Jezebel in mid-2015. When Jezebel was shut down by its parent company a few weeks ago, I was devastated. Its loss felt especially senseless and painful in a time when the need – and demand! – for feminist media is bigger than ever before. It came back yesterday, which is great. But even its temporary shutdown was a difficult reminder of how many people think that writing for an audience of women is bad business.