| 1. Marketing Director Isaac Bont shares the HBO tv series The Wire. “I just finished The Wire on HBO which has often been the subject of great critical hyperbole over the years. It starts out familiar enough as a police procedural about homicide and drug police in Baltimore, but the reason it holds a special place in the tv canon is that it quickly becomes much bigger than that. One of the most fascinating elements of its storytelling is how it humanizes and personalizes the figures within the drug trade. |  |
While we often write off such people in real life as monstrous, The Wire is empathetic and critical in its understanding of why people choose that lifestyle or how society and systems give them no other choice. The various seasons cover larger topics too, including blue collar work, the role of politics and the press in shaping a city and its resident’s lives, and most strikingly, a look at the public education system, its successes and failures in its children in West Baltimore. The show does this while having excellent acting, writing, and is exceptionally entertaining to boot! This is a critical darling that absolutely lives up to the hype!”
 | 2. Jason Richards, our Executive Artistic Director, says, “Recently, I’ve been checking out live feed animal cams. There are also many “zoo cams” but I don’t like those because personally I don’t like seeing animals in cages. But there are others that feature wild animals, which is infinitely better. You can access a variety of cams on Explore.org. Also you can check out these awesome bears on the Romanian Wildlife Live Feed - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BDnAMR3GLg |
| 3. Madison Fairbanks (actor – The Marvelous Wonderettes, Fools, and the upcoming The Gift of the Magi) says, “Like most of us, I’ve been binge-watching and consuming shows at an alarming rate. But the one that’s stuck out to me is Mrs. America. This story follows the women involved in the movement to ratify (or not to ratify) the Equal Rights Amendment. It has a female powerhouse of a cast: Cate Blanchett, Rose Byre and Sarah Paulson, just to give you an idea. It’s funny. It’s sad. It’s based in history. And I think, most of all, it’s important. It’s also on Hulu with new episodes every Wednesday." |  |
  | 4. Ryan Stevens (director of the upcoming production Stuart Little) says, “Like many other quarantined citizens, I've been spending a lot of my in-door time playing video games to keep my mind occupied. Here are a few of my recent favorites! --A lot has already been said about Animal Crossing: New Horizons, a game about living on a peaceful island with cartoon animals and not really having any stress or objectives except for the ones you want for yourself. It's very easy to lose a few hours a day just hanging out with your virtual neighbors and visiting other friends who have the game to simulate hanging out in real life. This game is only for Nintendo Switch, though there is a phone version, Animal Crossing Pocket Camp, that's honestly not bad either. |
--A similar 'do whatever you want in a peaceful little town' game is Stardew Valley, which swaps animal neighbors for real people and casts you as a city-slicker taking over your grandpa's farm. This game really encourages you to take things at your own pace, growing crops, raising animals, and hanging out with all the other kind and quirky people in your little farm town. It can be a little confusing at the start, but once you take some time to figure out how you want to live on your new farm, the whole game opens up to meet you on your own terms. And the good thing about Stardew Valley is that it's available on pretty much any game system or computer.
--Neko-Atsume is a phone game where you leave food and toys out for cats to come play with. That's it. You open the app every few hours, look at the cats that are chilling on your porch, smile, and leave them be. I cannot recommend it highly enough.
--Neko-Atsume is a phone game where you leave food and toys out for cats to come play with. That's it. You open the app every few hours, look at the cats that are chilling on your porch, smile, and leave them be. I cannot recommend it highly enough.
| 5. Technical Director, Peter Weber offers the movie The Platform. He says, “This Science Fiction horror movie hosts a vertical prison. Food is distributed daily on a platform that lowers from the top floor to the bottom. The film is a set of thrilling twists and turns for the viewer with tension that makes it hard for one to look away.” |  |
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