How to Measure the Good Life

How to Measure the Good Life

In “The Meaning of Your Life,” he no longer trumpets free markets, extolls entrepreneurs, or praises work as “a blessing,” as he did in earlier books. Now he claims that the ambitious professionals he calls “young strivers” lead superficial and unfulfilling lives. What they lack, in his view, is “the one thing that can never…

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How Arsenio Hall Captured the Culture

How Arsenio Hall Captured the Culture

“The audience went crazy,” Hank Moorehouse says. Later, a fire at Hall’s grandmother’s house would destroy most of his magic act. But Moorehouse proved prescient: Hall followed his advice all the way to Hollywood. “Arsenio” tells that story—with “The Arsenio Hall Show” as its dizzying, occasionally harrowing zenith—with Hall’s characteristic good cheer. Whether he’s starting…

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Growing Up as the Child of Radical Revolutionaries

Growing Up as the Child of Radical Revolutionaries

I was born underground and spent my early years on the run. By 1980, though, my parents had finally decided to turn themselves in. A plea deal awaited us in Chicago, but, for the deal to work, we had to make it to the courthouse in person. If we were caught along the way, my…

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“Jury Duty Presents: Company Retreat” and Age of the Prestige Prank Show

“Jury Duty Presents: Company Retreat” and Age of the Prestige Prank Show

Three years ago, the quasi-scripted comedy “Jury Duty,” an unassuming offering on the now defunct streaming service Freevee, became a social-media sensation through its particular brand of gentle brazenness. Its creators, Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky, Frankensteined the series by stitching together two moribund TV genres—the mockumentary sitcom and the prank show—to construct something new,…

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