In today’s culture, real life often gets confused with the “Real World” ““ and to the extent that it seems like anyone can achieve fame. Melissa de la Cruz and Karen Robinovitz set out to prove this is true in their Marie Claire magazine assignment-turned self-help book, “How to Become Famous in Two Weeks or Less.” Unfortunately for anyone trying to use the book as a guide to engineer their own rise to fame, the authors start their assignment a step ahead of the crowd. Read more...

David Roussève’s work ethic as a performance artist is synonymous with his mission as the newly appointed chair of UCLA’s Department of World Arts and Cultures . Read more...

For Violaine Corradi, the composer behind Cirque du Soleil’s latest production to stop in Los Angeles, “Varekai,” the challenge of creating original music for a Cirque show means more than just finding the right notes. Read more...

What award doesn’t Clint Eastwood deserve? He’s been an Oscar-winning director, one of the most recognizable actors in films, a producer, a military man, a lumberjack and the mayor of Carmel, a small California town. Read more...

Frank Black’s innovative guitar-playing and songwriting skills seem to always be one step ahead of the rest. However, despite his major influence upon the music community, Black appears to have a casual attitude about his musical career and seems content to remain on the fringe. Read more...

Leave it to an exuberant Danish duo to put radio programmers and other media types into a tizzy of cultural confusion. Ever since Junior Senior’s party vibes made its U.S. Read more...

This is the story of a middleman ““ a middlewoman to be exact. Sandwiched between the artist and the press, a publicist usually facilitates interviews, instead of actually giving them. Read more...