May media diet

The Outsiders — Proctors Theatre | S.E. Hinton in 1967 could never have predicted the page-to-screen-to-stage success of her story about the Greasers vs. the Socials. West Side Story it’s not, but pretty damn close. Stay gold, Ponyboy.


An Evening with John Legend — Proctors Theatre | So good he got his own post. Or maybe I just really missed live music. Also on the music calendar this summer — Cake and James Taylor!

Gary — Hulu | Was literally surprised by this “surprise episode” one evening on my Hulu splash screen. It’s a one-hour slice of life before the events of the Emmy-winning The Bear, which will drop its fifth and final season likely next month. Some great acting by Jon Bernthal and Ebon Moss-Bacharach, who are also starring together on Broadway in Dog Day Afternoon.

Survivor — CBS, S50 | It was awesome to see old friends from the last 25 years of this pioneering reality show, but the season itself didn’t live up the hype. The returning players (3 of them previous winners) were just too good, too savvy about sussing out alliances and immunity idols. Plus, host Jeff Probst ruined the final fire challenge with a spoiler! 

Rooster, S1 — HBO | The showrunner behind Ted Lasso and Shrinking (and Scrubs, FWIW) wrote a great character for Steve Carell. He’s a Carl Hiaasen type, working as writer-in-residence at a New England college where his daughter is an art history professor. Better than Lasso and Shrinking, I thought — less hokey, more heart.

The Secret Agent — Hulu | Had a hard time following the plot of this Portuguese thriller, which wowed critics at Cannes 2025 and was nominated for Best International Feature Film at this year’s Oscars. Didn’t help that I watched the first 90 minutes early in the month and didn’t finish it until a couple weeks later. 

Roommates — Netflix | Greta saved this one for me and actually enticed the whole family to watch it. Solidly funny for the first hour or so, then it fell apart. I did relate to the father though, just like she knew I would!

Outcome — Apple TV | Keanu Reeves got paid for pretending to be a beloved actor who tries to make amends to all those he wronged on his way to the top. Jonah Hill wrote it and gave himself the best lines, but even those don’t elevate the movie to watchable.

Jack Ryan: Ghost War — Amazon | John Krasinski reprises his role as Tom Clancy’s spy hero in this movie, which builds on the streaming series and sees him taking down a plan to reinvigorate a post-9/11 black ops program.

The Good Lord Bird by James McBride | My mom loaned me this 2013 National Book Award-winner from the author who wrote Deacon King Kong and The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store. Beautiful, humorous writing in the voice of a 12-year-old boy who is mistaken as a girl by abolitionist John Brown and then accompanies him and his men on their ill-fated raid of the U.S. Armory at Harpers Ferry in 1859.

Angel Down by Daniel Kraus | A deserving winner of the 2026 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, this novel about WWI soldiers who encounter an angel on the battlefield grabs you from page one and doesn’t let up, thanks in part to its structure — one continuous, unbroken sentence — that would really upset Mrs. Conaughton, my middle school English teacher.

Orbital by Samantha Harvey | Peter let me borrow this one for my trip to Montana. A slim, moving, beautifully written book about one of the final crews inhabiting the space station as it orbits Earth 16 times in 24-hours. More a contemplation of life than a plot-driven story.