The Curious Case of Kaitlin Olson: How a Philadelphia-Trained Clown Became the Last Reliable Export the United States Still Makes Dateline: Anywhere with Wi-Fi and a streaming account You know the world is on fire when a 48-year-old American comic actress becomes the closest thing we have to globally trusted currency. While Silicon Valley titans…
Melania’s Canary: How a Single Yellow Dress Became the Planet’s Rorschach Test By our correspondent in the departure lounge of history GENEVA—It began, as most twenty-first-century cataclysms do, with a photograph. There she stood, the former First Lady of the United States, wrapped in what Pantone would clinically label “Solar Power #FFD700,” waving from the…
Austin vs Minnesota: The World Watches Two U.S. States Try to Out-Weird Each Other By the time the barista in Copenhagen finishes frothing oat milk, the phrase “Austin versus Minnesota” has already ping-ponged through WhatsApp groups from Lagos to Lahore. To most Earthlings, the contest sounds like the geopolitical equivalent of two golden retrievers arguing…
Seth Meyers: The Last American Comedian the World Still Lets In When the planet’s diplomats gather at 3 a.m. for another emergency session about tariffs, treaties, or whatever fresh apocalypse the algorithm has served up that day, the one thing they can still agree on is that the U.S. has at least one export that…
Jason Momoa and the Apocalypse Brand: How One Polynesian-American Bro Became a UN-Neutral Tourism Weapon PARIS—It is a truth universally acknowledged that when the world is busy immolating itself—Ukraine’s grid flickering like a faulty lava lamp, the Amazon auditioning for a charcoal commercial, half of Africa negotiating debt terms with a photocopier—a six-foot-five Hawaiian with…
Late Night’s Borderless Reign: How Suits, Sarcasm, and Studio Applause Became the World’s Shared Lullaby By Dave’s Locker International Correspondent Somewhere between the midnight muezzin’s call in Jakarta and the 2 a.m. clink of last-call glasses in Reykjavík, a curious planetary ritual unfolds: millions of humans—jet-lagged consultants, insomniac medics, and doom-scrolling teenagers—queue up the same…
Late-Night Joust in the Imperial Court: How One Jimmy-Barb at Charlie Kirk Echoed from Sacramento to Singapore By the time the sun rose over the Yellow Sea, American late-night host Jimmy Kimmel had already weaponized sarcasm against Turning Point USA’s Charlie Kirk—again. The quip, delivered in the velvet-curtained sarcasm factory Kimmel calls a studio, went…
LOS ANGELES—Somewhere between the 14th selfie with a palm tree and the 3rd unsolicited screenplay pitch, the city’s weather delivers its daily punchline: 72°F, partly sarcastic, with a 30 % chance of existential dread. To the rest of the planet—currently broiling, freezing, flooding, or all three at once—this meteorological shrug is either an enviable luxury…
Gary Oldman: The Last Shape-Shifter Standing in a World That Forgot How to Pretend by Our Correspondent Somewhere Over the Atlantic LONDON—PARIS—LOS ANGELES—WHEREVER THERE’S A DECENT CATERING TRUCK—In an age when most of humanity can’t even change its profile picture without a 12-step tutorial, Gary Oldman keeps swapping passports, accents, and species like a bored…
Melania Trump Turns 54: A Global Audit of Age, Power, and the Luxury of Time By Our Correspondent in a Time Zone You Cannot Afford PARIS—Somewhere between the first croissant of the day and the last geopolitical crisis of the night, Melania Trump has quietly celebrated her fifty-fourth birthday. In most countries, 54 is the…
NASHVILLE — Somewhere between the neon baptism of Lower Broadway and the algorithmic altar of Spotify, Lee Brice has become America’s most exportable baritone. To the uninitiated, he is merely another baseball-capped balladeer singing about tailgates and heartbreak; to the global listener, he is a soft-power Trojan horse wheeled into every airport lounge from Dubai…
Keeley Whitcomb and the Great Global Vanishing Act by our correspondent in the Departures Lounge, nursing a lukewarm negroni and a grudge The name Keeley Whitcomb first slid across encrypted Telegram channels somewhere between a grainy drone strike clip and a meme of Vladimir Putin riding a bear in Crocs. In less than 36 hours,…
