In the Tom Hanks Cold War drama, Bridge of Spies, U.S. attorney James Donovan is assigned to defend known Russian spy Rudolf Abel. After predictably losing the case, Donovan persuades the judge to give Abel a prison term instead of a death sentence. At some point in the future, Donovan reasons, the Russians may capture an American and Abel could...

With all the chaos in 2016, I thought I’d end on a positive note. Believe it or not, there were some bright spots. Here are a few standouts that I’ve been collecting. MBA – that’s Masters in Business Administration, online – offers a list of those CEOs who demonstrated an extraordinary level of concern for others. Among them: Sally Osberg,...

Citizen Kane follows the life and political campaign of an arrogant, populist millionaire who runs for governor on promises to help the “the working man,” only to be defeated by a sex scandal. Is art reflecting reality or is reality affecting art? Director Orson Wells took his inspiration from real-life newspaper publisher and “yellow journalist” William Randolph Hearst. Like his...

“My hand was writing out the words: There’s a lady who’s sure, all that glitters is gold, and she’s buying a stairway to heaven… “I just sat there and looked at them and almost leapt out of my seat. “Plant’s own explanation of the lyrics was that it ‘was some cynical aside about a woman getting everything she wanted all...

From time to time, people contact me for a variety of reasons. Some tell me stories. Some ask for help. Some even send books. After reading my commentary, The Wrath of Kant, former high school English teacher and author Bill Kraft offered to send me a book. Kraft, a Star Trek enthusiast, set about to accomplish, what most people might...

13 Hours, a feature-length movie about the 2012 terrorist incident in Benghazi, Libya begins with a title card: “This is the true story you were never told…” Movies are different from documentaries. While a documentary aspires to offer the most accurate account possible of people and events, a movie works to tell the essential truth in a format that allows...

On June 24, Sotheby’s, London will be asking one exceptional buyer to spend more than $500,000 for an exceptional painting that has been hidden from the public for decades. German painter Max Liebermann’s Two Riders on a Beach is one of only two recovered works of art returned to their original heirs after it was discovered hanging in the Munich...

“Shame,” writes author Richard Reeves (Mar. 15) “is an essential ingredient of a healthy society, particularly a liberal one. It acts as a form of moral regulation, or social ‘nudge,’ encouraging good behavior while guarding individual freedom.” Just when I think that we’re going to politically correct ourselves off the cliff, along comes a breath of fresh air. Reeves asks, “Where and when shame...

When Hieronymus Bosch painted The Conjurer, in the 1500s, I’m sure he never imagined that the cups and balls routine he rendered would morph into a variety of schemes, scandals and shell games. Here’s just a few that make this month’s list. The Eric Massa mess – Among the newly uncovered allegations: “Beginning in March 2009,” the New York Times reports, “male staffers...

Several conversations about ethics and art led me to revisit Friday’s commentary. An article from the New York Times (Nov. 11) raised my interest about “concerns in the art world over the propriety of a coming show at the New Museum [of Contemporary Art in New York] that will feature the private collection of a museum trustee, Dakis Joannou.”  Returning to The Times,  » Read more about:...