Culture & entertainment
Discover facts about culture & entertainment. Small discoveries that change the way you see familiar things.
Culture & entertainment
Original Betty Boop returned fifty years later
Hollywood recast voice actors constantly, but Mae Questel had a terrifying, iron-clad grip on her vocal cords. She started voicing the squeaky Betty Boop in…
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A studio faked a star's death for publicity
Before 1910, film actors were kept anonymous so they couldn't demand higher wages. When Carl Laemmle poached Florence Lawrence, he launched the modern movie…
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The Beatles’ TV debut coincided with a drop in US crime
You know you've made it when even the criminals take the night off to watch you. When The Beatles made their legendary debut on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964,…
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Agnes Varda birthed the modern video essay
Every brooding YouTuber who talks philosophically over B-roll owes their entire career to this French cinematic rebel. Agnès Varda didn't just make…
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Jack Chambers made films that attack your eyes
Why make a nice, pleasant movie when you can induce a migraine instead? Canadian artist Jack Chambers wasn't interested in traditional storytelling. His…
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The Ken Burns effect began as a budget fix
The most recognizable visual trick in documentary history was born out of sheer poverty. Ken Burns didn't invent the technique of slowly panning and zooming…
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How one man saved a silent film with live sound
When sound hit Hollywood, entire silent films became instantly obsolete trash. Jack Foley salvaged Universal's silent 1929 epic 'Show Boat' by standing in a…
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The TV broadcast that turned into abstract art
In 1968, Boston's WGBH decided that normal programming was too boring, so they handed their expensive broadcast equipment over to six avant-garde artists. The…
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The animation technique that used a million pins
CGI makes everything look flawlessly sterile, but in the 1930s, Alexander Alexeieff and Claire Parker embraced sheer, bloody-fingered insanity. They invented…
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The artwork that makes a voice disappear
Most artists want their vocals to be crisp, but Alvin Lucier explicitly designed a piece of music to annihilate his own voice. In 1969, he recorded himself…
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The animator who made films with salt and feathers
You might think animation requires thousands of intricate digital drawings, but Aleksandra Korejwo simply looked at a pile of table salt and decided she could…
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How math made virtual robots play MIDI music
Watching a live band play is cool, but apparently not as cool as watching mathematically perfect, non-existent robots shoot rubber balls at xylophones. The…
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How Disney softened Oskar Fischinger’s wildest ideas
Imagine inventing avant-garde music visualization, only for a cartoon mouse to slap some glitter on it and call it a day. That's what happened to Oskar…
Discover moreAgnès Varda turned film reels into houses
When life gives you obsolete media, build a real estate empire. Legendary French New Wave filmmaker Agnès Varda didn't just let her leftover 35mm film prints…
Discover moreSuper Mario Bros. 3 is staged like a theater show
You didn't spend your childhood rescuing a princess; you were just watching a highly interactive theater production. Shigeru Miyamoto approached early…
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How record labels bought rock's radio time
Rock and roll didn't conquer the world through sheer artistic merit; it bribed its way to the top. In the late 1950s, record labels were throwing cash,…
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The Lone Ranger actor fought to keep his mask
Imagine being so rich and petty that you legally force a beloved childhood hero to take his mask off. Jack Wrather bought the rights to the Lone Ranger…
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When bagpipes invaded BBC radio
Pre-war British radio was an elitist bubble until regional programming unleashed aggressive Scottish variety shows onto unsuspecting high-society Londoners.…
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The children's stories hiding existential dread
You wouldn't expect the guy who wrote a terrifying, post-apocalyptic adult novel in broken English to also define children's programming, but Russell Hoban…
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How Bing Crosby turned German tape tech into golf time
American soldier Jack Mullin looted German magnetophon tape recorders after WWII, accidentally revolutionizing Hollywood lazines. Up until then, radio was…
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The TV host who tilted entire sets
Long before Adult Swim capitalized on surreal stoner comedy, Ernie Kovacs was terrorizing live 1950s audiences with practical optical illusions. He would…
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A fake alien hijacked British television in 1977
In 1977, an unknown prankster overrode the audio transmitter of a UK regional news broadcast to deliver a six-minute booming message from 'Vrillon of the…
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The animation device once called the Wheel of the Devil
William George Horner invented the bedrock of modern animation in 1834, but utterly failed at marketing. He created a spinning drum with slits that created…
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The bizarre ritual behind Cecil B. DeMille's clapperboards
Cecil B. DeMille didn't just use clapperboards; he practically demanded a blood sacrifice. In the silent film era, slating was a chaotic necessity for syncing…
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