UCLA alumna Catherine Hardwicke says that her UCLA experience is the gift that keeps on giving. Without a little help from her friends, she couldn’t have made her directorial debut, a film that cost less than $2 million. Read more...

When I first started telling people that I was going to get to interview Hugh Hefner at the Playboy Mansion, the shock and excitement was unbelievable. Read more...

There’s a story about a man who buys a boat. Every year he replaces one part of the boat until eventually all the parts have been replaced. Read more...

“Star Wars Trilogy in 30 Minutes” Coronet Theatre Through Feb. 1 (310) 657-7377 Not everything from USC is terrible. The concise play “Star Wars Trilogy in 30 Minutes,” put on by the Festival Theatre USC-USA group, is not terrible at all. Read more...

When Mos Def, Da Brat, Monica Calhoun and MC Lyte get together in a film, the set might be expected to have a bumping atmosphere something like “House Party.” Instead, UCLA film and television professor Neema Barnette assembled them together for a film about how prisons are home to new slave labor with clients, according to Barnette, such as Victoria’s Secret, Lee Dungarees and Tommy Hilfiger. Read more...

They’re not just good at math and chemistry. They’re not always in the library studying atomic physics, and no, they’re not always playing the violin or video games. Read more...

The entirety of John Updike’s 20th novel “Seek My Face” takes place in one setting and revolves around two main characters. At one point in the novel one woman asks the other to describe how she remembers meeting her late husband. Read more...