Jesse Singer articles

On Family Feud, Richard Dawson felt different from every other game show host on television. He leaned in. He joked quietly. He made contestants feel seen. The kisses, the suits, the confidence—it all suggested ease and control. What audiences couldn’t see was how much of that ease was carefully constructed, and what it was covering.

Science fiction didn’t suddenly get smart in the streaming era. Long before prestige budgets and moody synth scores, TV writers in the 60s and 70s were already wrestling with identity, free will, surveillance, and the quiet terror of technology. Today’s “original” sci-fi often feels fresh—but only because it’s standing on some very old shoulders.

The 1970s didn’t just produce legendary rock music—it produced legendary lies. Fans repeated these stories for decades, rarely stopping to ask if any of it was actually true. Spoiler: a lot of it wasn’t.

In 1965, the Beatles were spending time in California when a brief conversation took an unexpected turn. Actor Peter Fonda made an offhand remark about death that caught John Lennon off guard—but lodged itself in his mind. Within months, that sentence would reappear inside a Beatles song that remains one of their most unsettling recordings.

Overnight fame stories usually follow a familiar script. A breakout role. A hit show. Suddenly, an actor’s face is everywhere. Lane Garrison’s rise looked like it was following that exact path. But behind the momentum was a volatility few viewers ever saw coming—and dire consequences that would arrive with shocking speed.

Some TV shows are built for easy viewing. These aren’t. They reward patience, attention, and the ability to sit with ambiguity. If you didn’t just watch these shows but actually followed what they were doing—narratively, thematically, or structurally—you were probably exercising more brainpower than the average viewer.

Boomers sometimes wonder how millennials could miss entire eras of classic rock. Millennials wonder the same thing—just in reverse. These bands have sold out tours, racked up billions of streams, and soundtracked entire phases of millennial life. And no, they don’t sound like the Beatles. That’s kind of the point.

When A Bronx Tale was released in 1993, Lillo Brancato Jr. looked like a sure thing. He was young, charismatic, and held his own opposite Robert De Niro—something many actors far more experienced have struggled to do. Hollywood took notice, and the industry seemed ready to slot him into the next wave of serious leading men.

Elizabeth Hurley just turned 60. That alone wouldn’t be news—except that every new photo sparks the same reaction: disbelief. Not because she looks frozen in time, but because she looks comfortable, relaxed, and completely unbothered by the number.