Best of 2025: “Wicked” and “Wicked: For Good” Screenwriter Dana Fox on Her Magical Musical Theater Homecoming
It’s that time of year again—when we slow down, look back (overeat), and celebrate our favorite conversations from another surprising, often wonderful, and occasionally wild year in cinema and TV.
Screenwriter Dana Fox made a pact with director Jon M. Chu. After working with Chu on her Apple TV+ series, Home Before Dark, she told him she would sign up for a project with him, no matter what,
Best of 2025: MPA Creator Award Recipient Jon M. Chu on Authentic Storytelling and the Power of Cultural Specificity
It’s that time of year again—when we slow down, look back (overeat), and celebrate our favorite conversations from another surprising, often wonderful, and occasionally wild year in cinema and TV.
With Wicked: For Good set to complete the story that began with 2024’s blockbuster, director Jon M. Chu, the Motion Picture Association’s Creator Award recipient for 2025, continues our conversation about his evolution as a filmmaker and the power of culturally specific storytelling to reach universal audiences.
Best of 2025: How DP Autumn Durald Arkapaw Captured Black Music’s Timeless Continuum in “Sinners”
It’s that time of year again—when we slow down, look back (overeat), and celebrate our favorite conversations from another surprising, often wonderful, and occasionally wild year in cinema and TV.
In part one of our interview with Sinners cinematographer Autumn Durald Arkapaw, the groundbreaking DP discussed how she leveled up to frame Coogler’s soulful supernatural epic by learning to use the largest film format available. Coogler’s ambitions for his vampire thriller,
Best of 2025: “Sinners” Writer/Director Ryan Coogler on Channeling Louisiana’s Creative Rhythm Into His Period Monsterpiece
It’s that time of year again—when we slow down, look back (overeat), and celebrate our favorite conversations from another surprising, often wonderful, and occasionally wild year in cinema and TV.
Sinners, written, produced, and directed by Ryan Coogler, is hands down one of the year’s biggest cinematic successes. Coogler’s passion project found the filmmaker at the peak of his powers, and fans already primed to see anything from the still young visionary were ready to go once Sinners bowed.
Best of 2025: “One Battle After Another” Production Designer Florencia Martin on Building PTA’s Three-Hour Action Thriller from the Ground Up
It’s that time of year again—when we slow down, look back (overeat), and celebrate our favorite conversations from another surprising, often wonderful, and occasionally wild year in cinema and TV.
Paul Thomas Anderson’s action thriller One Battle After Another is loosely inspired by a section of Thomas Pynchon’s 1990 novel “Vineland,” but this three-hour epic is rooted in the present, a contemporary vision of a heightened clash between far-left and far-right,
Best of 2025: Inside the Breakneck Cut of Paul Thomas Anderson’s “One Battle After Another” With Editor Andy Jurgensen
It’s that time of year again—when we slow down, look back (overeat), and celebrate our favorite conversations from another surprising, often wonderful, and occasionally wild year in cinema and TV.
The best-reviewed movie of the season is also the most relentless. Paul Thomas Anderson‘s Oscar front-runner One Battle After Another races through its two-hour fifty-minute run time propelled by adrenalized performances from Leonardo DiCaprio,
Oscar Winner Jenny Beavan on “The Choral,” Ralph Fiennes, and Her Mother’s Wartime Love Story
Screenwriter Alan Bennett has given us The Madness of King George and The History Boys, and his latest film, The Choral, stays true to the writer’s oeuvre of zeitgeist-shifting English epic. Set in 1916 in Ramsden, a fictional Yorkshire mill town, the film follows the travails of the local Choral Society, which is determined to boost wartime morale by inviting young men to join their ranks and engaging a new choir master,
“Wake Up Dead Man” Composer Nathan Johnson: From Beauty to Darkness in Benoit Blanc’s Latest Mystery
Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery composer Nathan Johnson has scored all three of Rian Johnson‘s Knives Out films. Working alongside Johnson (his cousin), Nathan has created a unique sound for each film, culminating in a fantastical, orchestral finale for Benoit Blanc’s closing monologue. So how’d Johnson do? His work on Wake Up Dead Man has recently been shortlisted for an Oscar.
How James Cameron’s “Avatar: Fire and Ash” Uses Practical Filmmaking You’ve Never Seen Before
It has been three years since Avatar: The Way of Water became the third-highest-grossing movie, with $2.3 billion worldwide. The much-anticipated third installment in James Cameron’s cinematic spectacle, Avatar: Fire and Ash, launched this past Friday, once again immersing audiences in the lush forests and pristine oceans of the exomoon Pandora. The epic sci-fi from 20th Century Studios picks up after Jake (Sam Worthington), Neytiri (Zoe Saldaña),
Production Designer Kevin Thompson on Capturing NYC’s Iconic Comedy Scene in Bradley Cooper’s “Is This Thing On?”
Production designer Kevin Thompson knows New York and its environs like the back of his hand (one of those old, paper MTA maps), and few things give him more joy than showcasing his knowledge of and love for the city on the big screen. His work on director Bradley Cooper‘s Is This Thing On? is a perfect example.
Having already immortalized the Big Apple in Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance),
“Wake Up Dead Man” Cinematographer Steve Yedlin on Framing Rian Johnson’s Darkest “Knives Out” Yet
When I walked into the theater to see Wake Up Dead Man, the third installment in Rian Johnson’s Knives Out series, I wasn’t thinking about the fact that I’d soon be talking to Steve Yedlin, the cinematographer behind the film’s meticulous, moody visual world. I was just excited by the thought of revisiting a universe that has become something like comfort food to me. I’ve watched Knives Out and Glass Onion more times than I care to admit publicly,
Filming “F1: The Movie”: Stunt Coordinator Gary Powell on Brad Pitt’s Wild Ride From Abu Dhabi to Spa
In the first part of our conversation with stunt coordinator and second unit director Gary Powell, he talked about director Joseph Kosinski’s ambitious vision for Apple’s highest-grossing theatrical release to date, F1: The Movie, starring Brad Pitt (Sonny Hayes) and Damson Idris (Joshua Pearce). The film received unprecedented access to the Formula One organization and was filmed during the 2023 and 2024 seasons at several Grand Prix events,
“F1” Stunt Coordinator & 2nd Unit Director Gary Powell on Training Brad Pitt to Drive 190 MPH on Real Grand Prix Tracks
Amassing over $630 million in global box office since its June release, director Joseph Kosinski and Brad Pitt’s racing drama F1: The Movie is Warner Bros’ second-highest-grossing film in 2025, and partly responsible for the legacy studio’s newly minted status as the first to cross the $4 billion mark this year. Following 2022’s box office juggernaut, Top Gun: Maverick, Kosinski reteamed with Maverick screenwriter Ehren Kruger and cinematographer Claudio Miranda for another adrenaline-pumping,
“Sentimental Value” Production Designer Jørgen Stangebye Larsen on Joachim Trier’s Tender Family Drama
Winner of this year’s Grand Prix prize at Cannes, Joachim Trier’s tender family drama, Sentimental Value (original title: Affeksjonsverdi), is co-written with Eskil Vogt and stars Renate Reinsve (Presumed Innocent); the trio previously collaborated on 2021’s critical darling, The Worst Person in the World, which was nominated for two Oscars, Best Original Screenplay for Vogt and Trier, and Best International Feature. Trier’s latest explores themes of grief,
Spoiler Special: Ethan Slater on Boq’s Cold-Hearted Transformation in “Wicked: For Good”
For Ethan Slater, who plays Boq (aka the Tin Man) in Jon M. Chu's Wicked: For Good, there’s a lot of meaning behind the glare at Glinda.
How “Wicked” & “Wicked: For Good” Editor Myron Kerstein Balanced Two Films, Two Tones, One Story
When I sat down with editor Myron Kerstein, it was immediately clear why director Jon M. Chu keeps bringing him back. Kerstein has the rare ability to blend a technical rigor with emotional intuition, a combination that has served him well on films like Crazy Rich Asians, In the Heights, and now, the two-part cinematic event Wicked and Wicked: For Good.
No Good Deed Goes Unscored: The Musical Masterminds Behind “Wicked: For Good”
"Getting to do big, exhilarating songs like "No Good Deed" was one of the greatest joys of my life," says "Wicked: For Good" executive music producer Stephen Oremus.
“Hamnet” Composer Max Richter on the Song That Gave Director Chloé Zhao an Epiphany to Rewrite the Film’s Ending
The bard and his muses live again. Director Chloé Zhao’s Hamnet, the film adaptation of Maggie O’Farrell’s award-winning 2020 historical novel, is enrapturing audiences in theaters now. Zhao both co-wrote the screenplay with O’Farrell and co-edited the film, which follows the passionate but complicated relationship between a young scribe named William Shakespeare (Paul Mescal) and his incandescent wife, Agnes (a phenomenal Jessie Buckley). It is a story loosely based on what is known of Shakespeare’s life.
“Sinners” Writer/Director Ryan Coogler on Channeling Louisiana’s Creative Rhythm Into His Period Monsterpiece
Sinners, written, produced, and directed by Ryan Coogler, is hands down one of the year’s biggest cinematic successes. Coogler’s passion project found the filmmaker at the peak of his powers, and fans already primed to see anything from the still young visionary were ready to go once Sinners bowed. Yet it wasn’t just Coogler fans who flocked to the theaters—critical raves and word of mouth turned Coogler’s original period vampire epic into an early-year smash.
“Hamnet” Costume Designer Malgosia Turzanska Reveals How Leather Wounds and Clay Tell Shakespeare’s Story
Chloé Zhao’s period drama Hamnet follows a spirited young couple in 16th-century England — the earthy, radiant Agnes (a superb Jessie Buckley) and her besotted, occasionally brooding husband Will (an also excellent Paul Mescal), who channels his own formidable gifts onto the page (and becomes, of course, the Bard). Their love is tested in the most extreme ways, as Will’s career aspirations and the death of their young son, Hamnet (Jacobi Jupe),
