Two new shows from Netflix -- House of Cards and Orange is the New Black -- changed the TV landscape, but Bianculli's top pick for 2013 is AMC's Breaking Bad. "It ended as brilliantly as it began," he says. "I'm so grateful for that series."
In 2013, "you really feel as if directors are taking chances in their storytelling," says film critic David Edelstein. He loved the movie Her, and says the biggest surprises of the year were All Is Lost and Much Ado About Nothing. He also explains why 12 Years a Slave didn't make his top 10.
Many students prepare for the SAT by drilling themselves on esoteric, arcane and recondite words -- like esoteric, arcane and recondite. Linguist Geoff Nunberg doesn't discourage these efforts, but he does have a word of caution: memorizing a definition is hardly the same as learning a new word.
In addition to Breaking Bad, critic David Bianculli recommends some rare television treats from the 60s and '70s that are now available on DVD. They include Here's Edie: The Edie Adams Television Collection, The Dean Martin Celebrity Roasts, The Rutles: Anthology and Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman.
Set in the geriatric extended-care wing of a California hospital, Getting On is a different kind of workplace comedy. Mark V. Olsen and Will Scheffer adapted the show from a BBC series of the same name, and added new material largely inspired by experiences they had with their own mothers.
When Price was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1996, he was described as a living link from Hank Williams to the country music of today. He died Monday at the age of 87. We'll listen back to a 1999 interview he did with Terry Gross.
The film Her, written and directed by Spike Jonze (Being John Malkovich), follows a lonely man who falls in love with a computer operating system. Critic David Edelstein says it's the best film of the year by far. (Recommended)
Linguist Geoff Nunberg says he feels a little defensive about choosing "selfie" -- a word that wears its ephemerality on its outstretched sleeve -- as the word of 2013. But not only was this a year when we couldn't stop posting photos of ourselves online; we couldn't stop talking about it either.
In a sequel, Ron Burgundy makes the leap from local to national news. "We felt like we needed to jack up the stakes," says director and co-writer Adam McKay. He and star Will Ferrell join Terry Gross to talk about making movies -- and that epic 'statche.
"Who am I to judge?" With those five words, Pope Francis "stepped away from the disapproving tone, the explicit moralizing typical of poes and bishops," writes James Carroll.
You could look at Rosewoman's New YorUba band as reuniting cousins who've drifted apart: jazz and folkloric Cuban music with its own family ties to the slave coast of West Africa.
Inside Llewyn Davis -- starring Oscar Isaac and a disobedient cat -- is the latest from the filmmaking duo. The brothers talk with Fresh Air's Terry Gross about their writing process ("It's mostly napping") and the cult status of their 1998 film The Big Lebowski ("How do you explain that? I have no idea."
This Thanksgiving there were a lot of articles online about arming yourself with good information before arguing politics at seasonal dinners. With so much contention in the air, maybe music can help bring folks with opposing views together.
"I can't imagine anyone whom I'm less like than T.E. Lawrence," O'Toole told Fresh Air's Terry Gross in 1993. The handsome actor -- who made his name in the 1962 epic film Lawrence of Arabia -- died Saturday at the age of 81.
A pair of con artists and their FBI wrangler go after political corruption in American Hustle, inspired by the Abscam scandal of the '70s. Critic David Edelstein says the film, directed by Davide O. Russell, is "a bit of a hustle itself" -- and still a hell of a ride.
The guitarist, composer and arranger died in his sleep Tuesday at 83. Hall was known for a subtle, lyrical playing style, a gift for innovation and collaborations with a host of talented musicians in a career that stretched for more than seven decades. Hear an interview from 1989.
Redford says filming All Is Lost was a "pure cinematic experience -- the way films used to be." He talks with Fresh Air's Terry Gross about how it's been "sort of weird" being known for his good looks, and about how he nearly wasn't cast in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.