Though a controversial figure in her own country, during the second half of the 1980s Tatyana Tolstaya impressed Western readers as the uncontested premier Russian prosaist of a new era. For many, both her rhetorically exuberant, apolitical stories and h...

Marie-Noëlle Pierce, a self-assured Franco-American (French father, American mother - she carries both passports) who is a director at the Foundation, ascended the stairs in a scorching red gown with a dramatic train. Her associate from the French office, clad in sensible shoes, stepped on...

SINCE THAT FIRST SCHOOL dance when, like a newborn colt, you staggered over to her side of the gym, you’ve understood that music keeps the rhythm of romance. Back then, you were sure she felt it, too—along with what seemed to be a roll of...

On a not-so-long ago Thursday night, about a third of the way into the taping of Michael Showalter’s debut comedy album at Union Hall in Park Slope, the 37-year-old comedian-writer-director noticed a strange sound coming from the first row. Meowing. Mewing, to be precise,...

James Murphy is portly and uncombed, 37 years old, and drives a 1991 Volvo station wagon. But next week his one-man band, LCD Soundsystem, is releasing its second LP, Sound of Silver, the shiniest and most ecstatic album to arrive so far this year. With...