BuzzSugar

The Lost Book Club: Read the Books Referenced in the Show

BuzzSugar — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 15:38:19 PDT

Do you miss Lost? Are you jonesing for a new book club (perhaps you've already read my book club selection for this month)? Are you slightly obsessed with any scene in the show that includes Sawyer reading? (Or is that just me?) Well, ABC is offering one solution to the no-Lost-'til-January-2009 blues: a Lost-themed online book club.

As ABC explains it, the book club section of Lost's official website will feature a list of "the books that have been either seen or referenced throughout the dynamic four seasons" of the show, and will include "a message board to discuss the titles, a synopsis of each book, along with when and how it was referenced in the show, and an introduction by co-creator/executive producer Damon Lindelof and executive producer Carlton Cuse."

There are many titles I've never noticed in the show, though I definitely recognize some of them. Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five, for example, has been clearly referenced in Desmond's storyline, with all the weird time stuff he experiences. Others have been used as titles for specific episodes, like Stranger in a Strange Land and The Shape of Things to Come. Oh, and of course I'll always remember Sawyer reading Are You There God? It's Me Margaret on the beach.

Sawyer + Judy Blume? That is my kinda beach day.

Anyway, click here to start checking out the Lost book club for yourself!

Are Money Clubs the New Book Clubs?

LearnVest — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 00:15:41 PDT

Money clubs are a great and fun way to stay on top of your finances. With friends supporting you, you can conquer the world and money issues! LearnVest shares how you can start one.

Thea, 31, a lawyer, lives in Brooklyn, NY. Although her friends are, in her own words, “bright, savvy, awesome women,” many felt lost financially - much like she did. “In fact, almost all of them knew someone else who was in the same financially adrift boat,” she says.

That’s when she got the idea to start a money group.

“The first meeting was held in my studio apartment in Brooklyn,” she told LearnVest. She served pizza and Diet Coke as the group of women took turns airing their money issues and goals.

The women’s issues ranged from needing to pay down credit card debt after an amazing wedding to wondering how to invest in a 403(b) retirement account that she’d left empty for years. “We left that meeting,” she says, “with the same sense of empowerment we often feel in other areas of our lives, but that was usually missing when it came to our financial life.”

Although the women are still working through their money issues and goals, it is, as Thea puts it, “easier to take a journey with a group of amazing friends.”

Are Money Clubs the New Book Clubs?

There’s a reason Thea’s personal experience was so meaningful. Just like book clubs or wine clubs - or book clubs that double as wine clubs - money clubs are groups in which you can learn interesting stuff, discuss it, and get support from like-minded friends. And maybe even add alcohol to put people at ease.

In fact, while they’re now becoming popular again, money clubs have actually been around for a long time. Many groups of women in cities across the US meet up informally, but Candace Bahr, founder of the Women’s Institute For Financial Education, or WIFE, formalized the money club concept, creating the organization’s trademarked version back in 2004.

Read on for more.

The Cast of The Playboy Club Talks Bunny Costumes, Female Empowerment, and How They're Different From Mad Men

Becky Kirsch — Mon, 01 Aug 2011 12:20:48 PDT

NBC took front and center at the Summer TCAs on Monday, with The Playboy Club as the first new series to step into the spotlight. The cast, which includes Amber Heard, Eddie Cibrian, and Jenna Dewan, joined showrunners to discuss their upcoming drama about a Playboy Club in Chicago in the 1960s. The panel fielded a lot of questions about objectifying women (they promise that it's "empowering"), explained why the show isn't particularly racy, and addressed those inevitable comparisons to Mad Men. Here are highlights:

It's hard to ignore all the fishnets and cleavage, but the cast pounded home the theme that the show is really about female empowerment. Heard, who plays the central character Maureen in the pilot, said, "Maureen by no means relies on any character, male or female, as you'll see throughout her journey, and it's empowering. This is about choice, ultimately. It was a different generation, there were different opportunities and different expectations for women. . . . It's chauvinistic to deny a woman her sexuality. If they are making the choice, then they're not being exploited."
Her costar Jenna Dewan echoed this sentiment, saying, "Once we started doing research, we realized how independent these women were at a time when jobs for women were limited. These women had a big choice and there's freedom in that. And I think you'll feel that freedom in the show."
The showrunners were pretty straightforward when asked how the show will be distinguishable from Mad Men. They said the comparison ends with the 60s setting, and also cited the musical numbers as a major difference between the two series.

To see what the cast had to say about their costumes and Eddie Cibrian's new character, just

Speaking of music, the entire panel was very excited about the numbers that we'll be seeing on the show; apparently we can expect to see a number in almost every episode. Tony winner Laura Benati will be taking the stage most often, but the rest of the cast will get a chance to show off their pipes too. As for what icons will be sampled, the showrunners promised Sammy Davis Jr., Ray Charles, Sam Cooke, and Frank Sinatra.
The ladies got candid discussing what it's like to squeeze into those costumes. Dewan quipped, "It is tight, constricting, there's not a lot of [room for] drinking water." Heard was more transfixed with her experience, saying "You can't be in the suit for more than few seconds without feeling like you're part of the show. You're transported back to this time, to this moment in history. It's special because these costumes are just as specific as the club is, just as fantastic and imaginative. They exist nowhere else."
I was a bit surprised by how toned-down the pilot was, but apparently it's not an accident. The showrunners assured us that there's a big difference between the Playboy clubs and Playboy magazine. Bunnies aren't playmates or centerfolds, and the show favors "music" and "energy" over anything "racy" or "exploitative." That said, star Jennifer Lewis added, "The sex will be there, as it is everywhere in every show."
Hugh Hefner narrates the pilot, but that won't be the case for the rest of the season. He'll have a presence, but won't serve as the narrator.
Most of the panel's focus was on the ladies, but Eddie Cibrian did get a chance to add his two cents about prepping for his role as the dashing Nick Dalton. He said, "I looked at a lot of photos from that time, I read some books around that time and got a sense of what it felt like through a visual aspect of what these people felt in the early '60s. It was definitely a time of social revolution. It was about getting lost in a world. We're trying to invite people who've never been inside of this fantasy world, at a time politicians entertainers and mobsters all rubbed shoulders. From a nostalgia stand point, it's kinda cool for people to sit back and get lost in this world."

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Photo courtesy of NBC