Filmmaker J. J. Abrams Is a Crowd Teaser

“What are stories,” he said on the stage at TED, “but mystery boxes? . . . The first act is called the teaser.” Then he broadened the metaphor. “What’s a bigger mystery box than a movie theater? You go to the theater, you’re just so excited to see anything — the moment the lights go down is often the best part.” He explained that he was going on about all of this because he had come to realize, “Oh, my God, mystery boxes are everywhere in what I do.”

Published: May 26, 2011
Length: 18 minutes (4,583 words)

The Billionaire Who Is Planning His 125th Birthday

There are health nuts, and then there is David Murdock: health paragon, patron and proselytizer, with a biography as colorful as that mural, a determination to write a few more chapters of it still and a paradox of sorts at the center of it all. What set him on this quest was a loss that no amplitude of wellness can restore, and even if he teased out his days into eternity, he would be hard pressed to fill them with the contentment they once had.

Published: Mar 6, 2011
Length: 19 minutes (4,925 words)

The Age of Laura Linney

Published: Jul 28, 2010
Length: 25 minutes (6,255 words)

Where Scott Brown Is Coming From

Getting to know a very, very new Republican senator.

Published: Feb 28, 2010
Length: 22 minutes (5,684 words)

I Was a Baby Bulimic

I have neither a therapist’s diagnosis nor any scientific literature to support the following claim, and I can’t back it up with more than a cursory level of detail. So you’re just going to have to go with me on this: I was a baby bulimic.

Published: Jul 15, 2009
Length: 29 minutes (7,447 words)