Yesterday afternoon the world learned of Heath Ledger's untimely death. Both old and new media gossiped, rumor-mongered, and pitched their circus tents outside of his building on Broome Street the moment word spread. Sadly, most of his close friends and relatives, including his parents, heard about the tragedy through the newswire. The young actor was embraced as a fairly new resident of New York (first in Brooklyn, then in Manhattan). The NY Times recalls that......

Have you re-read the classic coming-of-age JD Salinger novel, Catcher in the Rye, lately? amNewYork takes a trip down memory lane, and 5th Ave, with a pair of Holden Caulfield-tinted glasses. Apparently people like the Central Park Conservancy historian get a ton of inquiries about the New York references in the novel. The most popular question, "Where do the ducks go in the winter?" Referring to the ducks in the Central Park pond that our......

TIP: Starting tomorrow Opera-For_all begins the first of three nights of performances. For cheap! The New York City Opera is selling tickets to every seat in the house for just $25. Over the course of "opera season" 50 or more seats in the front orchestra will be priced at just $25 as well. As for this week, here's the sched: Thursday, September 6the OPERA FOR ALL Concert, with party to follow (this will showcase the......

The NY Sun opens the books on Bellevue Hospital's creative output. That's right, Bellevue has been publishing literature under The Bellevue Literary Review. Perhaps it's about time the 271 year old walls began to talk. Even though the hospital drips darkness, "no tales from the wards have yet appeared in the books." This isn't to say it isn't allowed (they state it isn't encouraged or barred), but the rules of the press seem to prohibit......

"It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn't know what I was doing in New York. I'm stupid about executions. The idea of being electrocuted makes me sick, and that's all there was to read about in the papers - goggle-eyed headlines staring up at me on every street corner and at the fusty, peanut-smelling mouth of every subway. It had nothing to do with me, but I......

Ever since that W cover with Meryl Streep and Lindsay Lohan, an unexpected amount of buzz around Robert Altman's new film Prairie Home Companion has been building. Maybe it's merely the oddity of combining Garrison Keillor's radio program, Altman's usual troop of amazing character actors and the teen starlet that has people intrigued but it finally hits general theatrical release. Besides a blonde LIndsay trying to hold her own with the likes of Lily Tomlin......

Sofia Quintero, Author, Divas Don't Yield, Activist, Co-Founder, Chica Luna...

The rarified air around tippy-top Broadway shows is abuzz this week with anticipation of the Tony Awards. Clicking through the official website, Gothamist couldn’t help but snort at some of the pomposity going on for a ceremony that no one outside theater could care less about, but it’s probably to be expected. With celebrity presenters ranging from Julia Stiles and Allison Janney to James Earl Jones and Alan Alda, the Tonys have to keep up......

Our friends at Broadway's The Good Body, the Eve Ensler one-woman show, have alerted us to an enticing series of talkbacks that started Wednesday night. An interesting and eclectic mix of talking heads, feminists, movie stars, and so forth have been booked to give their takes on the show. Gothamist really dug this show and wants to go back and hear Gloria Steinem's take on this piece on feminine body image and the challenge of......

As the marketing machine steps into high gear to push the new Julia Roberts movie, Mona Lisa Smile, Gothamist can't help but think it's The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie lite, complete with a cheery Cranberries song in the trailer and TV commercials. A one-liner for the movie is "This is the story of a free-spirited Berkeley graduate in 1953 who takes a position as a teacher at the women's college, Wellesley." Add Julia Roberts'......