David Cercone 2

Today, Harlan Ellison would have been 92. Eight years on, scores of new readers are discovering your words every day. Eight years on, the journey continues, and the work still matters. Rest easy.

How Garry Trudeau’s Doonesbury cartoons captured America: ‘One of our nation’s greatest journalists’ | Books | The Guardian theguardian.com/books/2026/may…

John Dall (b. 26 May 1920) was an American stage and film actor best remembered for playing complex, intense, and intellectually arrogant characters. Despite a brief Hollywood career consisting of only eight feature films, he left a lasting mark on cinema history starring in multiple iconic cult classics. Dall made his film debut playing a gifted young Welsh mining prodigy opposite Bette Davis in The Corn Is Green (1945), earning an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor. In 1948, he delivered his most famous performance as Brandon Shaw, the cold, charismatic, and chillingly rational thrill-killer in Alfred Hitchcock's highly experimental, and gay-coded film, Rope. Though the movie's subtext had to be subtle enough to pass the Hollywood Hays Code, Hitch slyly cast two homosexual actors in the lead roles -- Dall, who was gay, and Farley Granger, who was bisexual -- and was written by the gay screenwriter, Arthur Laurents. Dall then followed Rope with the Dalton Trumbo penned, Gun Crazy (1950), in which he starred as a gentle, firearm-obsessed man drawn into a destructive crime spree by a trigger-happy femme fatale (played as a lethal blonde by the ferocious Peggy Cummins). The movie is celebrated as a definitive film noir masterpiece. And in 1960, he appeared as the Roman commander Marcus Publius Glabrus in Stanley Kubrick’s historical epic Spartacus. Born in New York City, Dall spent part of his childhood in Panama where his father was a civil engineer. After his dad committed suicide in 1929, the family returned to New York City where John attended the Horace Mann School and briefly enrolled at Columbia University. Deciding that acting was his true vocation, he left Columbia and studied at the Theodora Irvine School of Theater, the Pasadena Playhouse, and the Petit Theatre in New Orleans. As a classically trained stage actor, he regularly prioritized theater over film. He made notable Broadway appearances in shows like Dear Ruth (1944) and Jean-Paul Sartre's Red Gloves (1948). Like so many homosexual actors of his generation, in Hollywood, Dall remained discreetly closeted. But unlike some of his gay contemporaries, he forewent the “lavender marriage”, and quietly lived with his longtime companion, actor Clement Brace. As his Hollywood career waned in the 1950s and 1960s, Dall transitioned to television, frequently guest starring in anthology dramas and making four separate appearances on Perry Mason. While visiting London in late 1970, he suffered a serious fall and subsequently passed away at the age of 50 from a heart attack on January 15, 1971, at his home in Beverly Hills.

Given that the pope has now cited Gandalf to make a similar point, I will repost my article on the dragons within us. snyder.substack.com/p/tolkiens-dra…

Hey lazy people: the Vatican made infographics for you

Read the whole thread, updated

Christopher Olah, a Canadian billionaire businessman and researcher who co-founded AI giant Anthropic, sitting in the Synodal Hall and speaking next to Pope Leo said, closing his speech: "I'd like to close with a request. We need more of the world - religious communities, civil society, scholars, governments - to do what His Holiness has done here: to take this seriously, to look closely, and to push events in a better direction. We need informed critics who will tell the labs when we are failing. We need moral voices that the incentives cannot bend. Today is just the beginning - the start of a long collaboration between those of us who are building this and those who can see what we, from inside, cannot. Today is a powerful illustration of the form this global project of good will might take. Let it also be a decisive first step toward a hopeful future for magnificent humanity."

the Pope quoting The Lord of the Rings!!!!!!! I feel so alive!!!!

This is not politics as usual. We’ve never had an openly authoritarian leader in office. Nor have we had a party totally subservient to their leader. We must resist as such during these not normal times.

In leaked audio recordings, Peter Thiel revealed he told JD Vance to ignore Pope Leo XIV on moral issues, including the development of ethical AI. Calling Leo XIV the “woke American pope,” he also suggested the American pope was a tool of the Antichrist. Now, Pope Leo XIV is releasing what’s expected to be an historic encyclical addressing AI tomorrow morning. thelettersfromleo.com/p/new-jd-vance…

In 1972, Lithuanian schoolboys Leonas Gudelis, Kęstutis Šakalis and Romas Žilinskas all aged 17, were arrested by Soviet authorities for distributing anti-Soviet leaflets and placing a giant “LAISVĖ LIETUVAI!” (Freedom for Lithuania!) sign on their school rooftop.

Holy shit it's Columbo

The mayor of Bloomington, Indiana has declared June 12 to be 'Mothra Day', in honor of a screening of the uncut original 1961 film.

One of the best-reviewed films from the 2026 Cannes Film Festival, Kiyoshi Kurosawa's thrilling THE SAMURAI AND THE PRISONER will hit theaters exclusively on July 31st!

Happy birthday, Hergé!

Maria Theresa Thaler in Trieste atlasobscura.com/places/maria-t…

The filmmaker behind Pulse and Cure goes into whodunnit mode with the engrossing period piece The Samurai And The Prisoner. Our Cannes review: avclub.com/the-samurai-an…

Big science and uncanny prescience: Laurie Anderson’s greatest songs – ranked! | Culture | The Guardian theguardian.com/culture/2026/m…