Linda Holmes

Credit Chris Hartlove
for NPR

Linda Holmes writes and edits NPR's entertainment and pop-culture blog, Monkey See. She has several elaborate theories involving pop culture and monkeys, all of which are available on request.

Holmes began her professional life as an attorney. In time, however, her affection for writing, popular culture and the online universe eclipsed her legal ambitions. She shoved her law degree in the back of the closet, gave its living-room space to DVD sets of The Wire and never looked back.

Holmes was a writer and editor at Television Without Pity, where she recapped several hundred hours of programming — including both High School Musical movies, for which she did not receive hazard pay. Since 2003, she has been a contributor to MSNBC.com, where she has written about books, movies, television and pop-culture miscellany.

Holmes' work has also appeared on Vulture (New York magazine's entertainment blog), in TV Guide and in many, many legal documents.

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2:07pm

Mon December 3, 2012
Monkey See

PBS Remixes 'Reading Rainbow,' Delights Map And Book Nerds Everywhere

Originally published on Tue December 4, 2012 2:48 pm

Credit AP

1:23am

Mon December 3, 2012
Monkey See

Neil deGrasse Tyson Helps His New 'Bud' Superman Get A Glimpse Of Home

Originally published on Mon December 3, 2012 6:29 am

On Monday's Morning Edition, Hayden Planetarium director and pop-culture go-to science guy Neil deGrasse Tyson tells NPR's David Greene the story of how he came to lend a hand to Superman.

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10:56am

Wed November 28, 2012
Monkey See

Top Ten Things I Am Not Going To Do During This 'Les Miserables' Screening

Originally published on Wed February 20, 2013 10:44 am

Credit Universal Pictures

It's just about that time when members of the press begin to attend screenings of Les Miserables. I hereby vow to engage in none of the following conduct.

1. Throw crusts of bread at the screen and yell, "HEY, JEAN VALJEAN, ARE YOU HUNGRY?"

2. Do my imitation of Amanda Seyfried singing "There are so many questions and ah-nswers that somehow seem wrong," even though it's really funny and quite terrifying.

3. Refer to the short-haired Anne Hathaway as "Ruth Buzz-y."

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3:04am

Tue November 27, 2012
Monkey See

Running A Comedy Machine: How Chuck Lorre Makes Hits

Originally published on Tue November 27, 2012 3:51 pm

Credit Sonja Flemming / CBS

On Tuesday's Morning Edition, NPR's Neda Ulaby has a story about Chuck Lorre, the producer whose name is attached to three of the five highest-rated comedies on American television last season: The Big Bang Theory, Two And A Half Men, and Mike & Molly.

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3:20pm

Wed November 21, 2012
Monkey See

Rob Delaney Talks About Gratitude, Perspective, Spaceships And A Career With Teeth

Originally published on Wed November 21, 2012 3:57 pm

Credit

Full disclosure: The first thing I said when I saw that Rob Delaney would be talking to NPR's Audie Cornish on today's All Things Considered was that I was curious to see whether he had ever said anything on Twitter — where he has almost 670,000 followers (including me) as of this writing — that they thought they could read on the radio. It's an exaggeration. But not by that much.

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5:34am

Tue October 16, 2012
Monkey See

A Judge Dismisses 'The Bachelor' Discrimination Lawsuit, But Not Its Concerns

Credit Mark Humphrey / AP

Yesterday, a federal judge dismissed a lawsuit brought by Christopher Johnson and Nathaniel Claybrooks, two black men who had auditioned for The Bachelor, who claimed that the show discriminates against people of color both in choosing the primary bachelor/ette and in choosing the people he or she will have to choose from.

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7:23am

Mon October 15, 2012
Monkey See

A Day Later, The Space Jump Guy Is OK, But How About The Rest Of Us?

Credit Red Bull Stratos / AP

More than 7 million people were watching as Felix Baumgartner sat at the edge of his space capsule yesterday 24 miles off the ground and got ready to jump, in what was known as the "Red Bull Stratos" project, better known as the "space jump." I saw it myself; he opened the door, and there was something there that certainly seemed to be space.

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12:51am

Wed August 29, 2012
Monkey See

Nobody, Not Even Your Mom, Has Such Small Hands: 10 Other Products 'For Her'

Originally published on Thu August 30, 2012 2:04 am

Credit iStockphoto.com

Okay, so Bic has been taking a lot of flack for selling this pen "for her." (As it says on its web site, it is "a ball pen essentially for women," although that seems to invite a caveat, such as, "although there may be certain men to whom it appeals and we don't judge.")

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9:34am

Mon August 6, 2012
Monkey See

Good Business, Bad Quality: How NBC Is Both Right And Wrong On The Olympics

Originally published on Mon August 6, 2012 1:36 pm

Credit Alexander Hassenstein / Getty Images

The following exchange has played out over and over in the last ten days:

Point: "NBC's coverage of the Olympics stinks, because everything is tape-delayed and cut to shreds, and also the announcers are awful and they only care about American athletes, and by the time I get to watch anything, I already know what happened."

Counterpoint: "People are watching in huge numbers."

Point: "But quality."

Counterpoint: "But business."

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4:08am

Sat June 16, 2012
Monkey See

Explaining Muppet Theory: Are You An Ernie Or A Bert?

Originally published on Sat June 16, 2012 12:22 pm

Credit Matthew Simmons / Getty Images

Most of the time, Slate's Dahlia Lithwick covers the Supreme Court. She's been doing that for the last 13 years. But recently, you may have seen her name floating around in connection with the piece she recently wrote that she discusses with Scott Simon on Saturday's Weekend Edition.

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