Essays by

Philippa Snow

On Apophenia

The Queen’s Gambit, Netflix’s new wildly popular, heavily stylized, mid-century-set limited series about chess—but sexy chess, the way Mad Men was about sexy advertising.

On Having It All

This is the eighth installment of our “Home Movies” column by Philippa Snow, about what we watch when no one’s watching. Watched this week: The […]

On Pop Fatalism

This is the seventh installment of our “Home Movies” column by Philippa Snow, about what we watch when no one’s watching. Watched this week: Vox […]

The Toys of Princes

The girl so perfect she must be violated is Serena van der Woodsen, a gold-plated human thoroughbred played by Blake Lively, who has recently returned to New York after spending some time hiding out at boarding school in Connecticut. Her best friend—and later Chuck’s lover and co-conspirator—is a brunette named Blair Waldorf who is played by Leighton Meester, and dresses like an American Girl doll whose ethnicity is “bitch.”

On Kathryn Hahn

This is the sixth installment of our “Home Movies” column by Philippa Snow, about what we watch when no one’s watching. Watched this week: Afternoon […]

On Holy Whores

This is the fifth installment of our “Home Movies” column by Philippa Snow, about what we watch when no one’s watching. Watched this week: By […]

On Reawakening

This is the fourth installment of our “Home Movies” column by Philippa Snow, about what we watch when no one’s watching. Watched this week: Enlightened […]

On Caged Animals

This is the third installment of our “Home Movies” column by Philippa Snow, about what we watch when no one’s watching. Watched this week: Tiger […]

On Circularity

This is the second installment of our “Home Movies” column by Philippa Snow, about what we watch when no one’s watching. Watched this week: Birth […]

On Obsession

As a freelance film critic, I cope by allowing my already-solitary day job to merge with my relaxation time, watching movie after movie and TV show after TV show with increasingly little regard for quality or genre.

“This Is the Girl”

If Lindsay Lohan is not and has never been two women sensu stricto, we might be forgiven for believing something different; twice now she has split herself onscreen, and twice the overall effect was of exactly what it was: one girl refracted, even though there were two names, two sets of clothes, two miens.

Body Doubles

In “The Deuce,” James Franco—in what could have been the most Franconian casting stunt since he appeared on General Hospital as a performance artist called James Franco—plays twins.