What it’s like for an actor to become a TV commercial megastar—forever associated with a brand, for better and worse: On the day of the audition, roughly 30 actors showed up. When it was Olcott’s turn, he flashed his big, ecstatic smile. The director loved it, and Olcott got the job. In February, on a […]
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Top 5 Longreads of the Week: GQ, Allure magazine, The Rumpus, 5280 Magazine, New York Magazine, fiction from The New Yorker, plus a guest pick from Scott Young.
The writer recalls her past life, without family and hitching rides at truck stops—and a time in which she may have crossed paths with a serial killer: I had a vision of Lisa Pennal as a truck-stop Kali roaming the back lots in her denim skirt and fuzzy slippers with an ozone hole for a […]
Top 5 Longreads of the Week: Mother Jones, SB Nation, Wired, Dissent Magazine, Playboy, fiction from The American Reader, and Mike Spry’s guest pick from GQ.
Longreads Member Exclusive: Cormac McCarthy's Apocalypse
This week we’re excited to feature a Longreads Exclusive from David Kushner, a contributing editor to Rolling Stone whose work has also appeared in The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, GQ and Wired. “Cormac McCarthy’s Apocalypse” is Kushner’s 2007 Rolling Stone profile of the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of “The Road,” “No Country for Old Men” and “All […]
The life and last days of Ambassador Chris Stevens, who was killed during a Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya: It’s curious that a kid from California who grew up knowing nothing about the Arab world would come to devote his career to the Middle East and North Africa—as opposed to, […]
Longreads Member Pick: Jason Zengerle's First Assignment for Might Magazine
This week, we’re thrilled to feature Jason Zengerle, a contributing editor for New York magazine and GQ who has been featured on Longreads many times. Our Member Pick is Jason’s 1997 story on Michael Moore for Might magazine: “Is This Man the Last, Best Hope for Popular Liberalism in America? And, More Importantly, Does He Have a Sense […]
Longreads Member Pick: After Visiting Friends (Chapter 1), by Michael Hainey
This week’s Longreads Member Pick is the first chapter from the best-selling memoir After Visiting Friends, GQ deputy editor Michael Hainey‘s story of his father’s death and his search for answers. Hainey was 6 years old when his father, newspaperman Bob Hainey, died suddenly, but questions remained about the circumstances around his death. We’re proud to feature the book. […]
Our Longreads Member Pick: Someone Could Get Hurt (Chapter 1), by Drew Magary
For this week’s Member Pick, we’re thrilled to share the first chapter of Drew Magary’s new memoir on fatherhood, Someone Could Get Hurt (Gotham Books). Magary, who writes for Deadspin and GQ, has been featured on Longreads many times in the past, and he explained how his latest book came together: I was in the middle of writing a second novel that would […]
Malrotation
“No one makes it through life unscathed, but you usually get a grace period at the start. My son would not be so lucky.”
