Watching Fiona Apple have unmitigated fun while performing is a rare opportunity: in concert — and especially performing her album The Idler Wheel — she channels the emotional rawness of her albums in what always looks like a self-flagellating internal battle. Recently, however, she’s been singing old-school folk songs — like “In the Pines” — with Watkins Family Hour. Her performance of this song on NPR’s Tiny Desk Concerts is especially amusing, as Apple completely commits, gleefully yelping her way through it.
Meanwhile, Father John Misty has released a new autoerotic video for “The Night Josh Tillman Came to Our Apartment,” in which he has a one night stand with another version of himself. Press releases for music videos are usually accompanied by forced statements from the director, so Drew Pearce’s comes with a welcome lack of self-seriousness, saying, “It has been an honor to explore the palpable sexual chemistry that exists between Josh Tillman and himself. I hope this video does their enduring love affair justice.” Watch the video:
More on auto-erotica: James Franco now has a film column on IndieWire, in which he discusses films that have inspired him — with his reverse self, Semaj. The intro to the column states, “Rather than a conventional review, it is a place where James and Semaj can muse about ideas that the films provoke… James is me, and Semaj is the other side of me.” Their first review is of Goodnight Mommy, which also fittingly centers around twins.
Beyond Cedric Diggory (who doesn’t even last a whole book as a key character), it’s hard to recall many Hufflepuffs of note, which is why it can come across as something of a backhanded compliment when a friend sorts you into the seemingly insignificant house, defensively citing your “niceness” as their reason. In the wake of Mindy Kaling’s anti-Hufflepuff Tweet, The Atlantic has published a defense of the house that’s — wrongly, the author asserts! — become synonymous with “unremarkable.” In other news of worlds that aren’t real, The Hunger Games director Francis Lawrence is executive producing and directing a series based on Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere. And in news of things that could eventually be real, Brie Larson may be playing tennis champion Billie Jean King in Battle of the Sexes, with Steve Carrell playing Bobby Riggs.