Toward the end of “Homebody/Kabul,” Tony Kushner’s sensational new play at the Mark Taper Forum, Milton Ceiling (Reed Birney) tries to explain binary duals to an Afghan woman he’s considering taking back to London. Read more...

It’s a guilty pleasure for young bands to head to their local record stores on the day of their albums’ release dates for the sheer novelty of seeing their own music on the stands. Read more...

A slew of recent Buddhist art exhibits in the Los Angeles area are proving there’s a lot more to the religion than Zen wisdom and Shaolin warriors. Read more...

Even at 74 years old, renowned Senegalese percussionist Doudou N’Diaye Rose is on his second major U.S. tour. Outside of wowing American audiences with dazzling displays from his 35-member percussion orchestra, there’s one more thing he wants to do before he leaves: watch an American band perform live onstage. Read more...

Oscar-winning editor Anne V. Coates remembers being excited but also intimidated when she found out that David Lean wanted her to edit “Lawrence of Arabia.” Coates was a young editor then, and “Lawrence of Arabia” not only gave her a big break into the editing business, but her work eventually won her an Academy Award. Read more...

I forget the first time I saw the “Kill Bill” trailer on the Internet, but I know I’ve been excited ever since. OK, so the airplane is obviously a product of CGI, and the last lines of dialogue Uma Thurman and Lucy Liu trade are cornier than a Kansas barbeque, but the rest is spectacular: the old Asian man jumping on top of Thurman’s sword, the kitchen knife fight. Read more...

There are plenty of reasons Coen brothers fans should feel nervous with the release of “Intolerable Cruelty.” For one, it was produced not just by independent-minded Ethan Coen, but also by studio-man Brian Grazer. Read more...