After running my newsletter for a few months, I spoke with Substack co-founder Hamish McKenzie about how the platform came about and where he sees it going. McKenzie, who started out as a journalist, discusses the troubles of Facebook, the future of media, and what journalists can learn from gamers. “There’s not that much difference in my mind between a Twitch streamer and a writer,” he says. David Kushner:           How did your experience as a journalist inform the idea of Substack?

Film Yap is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work please consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. I’ve always been an Eddie Murphy fan, but his family-friendly fare has often held little to no interest to me. I’ve always been more of a “Eddie Murphy: Delirious” or “Eddie Murphy Raw” sorta cat (even though I can fully admit they’re problematic) and have fond memories of watching “Beverly Hills Cop” with my late grandfather at way too young of an age (he lost his fool mind laughing when Axel Foley stuck bananas in the tailpipe of Rosewood and Taggart’s car).

Share Much of the history of Los Angeles is in its canyons. There are secrets there, hidden by time and inaccessibility. Our canyon neighborhoods share an affinity for narrow streets, rendering them inhospitable to cars in a town built around driving. Perhaps only practicality created these narrow streets. Moving dirt and leveling mountains is hard. And expensive. The change in terrain created a clear delineation between the city and the country.

Maybe only second to my fried chicken sandwiches, this meal is my husband and father’s favorite thing I make. They are my consummate taste testers. It’s outrageously delicious and surprisingly easy. I homemake the beans and pico de gallo. But you don’t have to! I’m giving you the full recipe for all of it, but you choose what you want to make from scratch and what you want to buy at the store or in a can.

Further down the page: live UK dates • the next online retreat Hello, A couple of weeks ago, I talked to Catherine Coldstream, author of Cloistered: My Years as a Nun, and disaster struck. Halfway through the conversation, the tech failed in a spectacular way, and we lost the whole recording. Cue much wailing and gnashing of teeth from me. But Catherine very kindly offered to re-record, and so we got together last Friday to capture this new conversation.