It’s that time of the season, everybody: time to meet the families. Just eight weeks ago Ben met 24 single ladies and one grandmother of a single lady at the Bachelor mansion in L.A.—nearly ten helicopter rides and countless date cards later, he’s visiting Lindzi, Nicki, Courtney, and Kacie in their hometowns for final dates before he narrows things down further with fantasy dates and suites and shared rooms and… wait—we’re getting ahead of ourselves. And that’s no way to make a thoughtful, serious decision about something as serious as marriage. Let’s agree to take this thing one hometown date at a time, OK?

First up, Ben visits Lindzi in Ocala, Florida. She’s happy to be home and excited to be bringing her “boyfriend” to meet her parents, or as they call themselves, “the old people.”

Ben meets Lindzi on a farm with some of the prettiest horses we’ve ever ...

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Three months after kicking off a North American tour behind his critically-acclaimed 2011 release, Ashes & Fire, Ryan Adams was back home in L.A., playing two solo acoustic shows at Walt Disney Concert Hall over the weekend.

We say shows because that’s what Ryan Adams’ concerts are—the alt-country rocker rambles and rants, often hilariously, between songs, so while you pretty much know what he is going to perform, you never know what else might come up.

What came up Friday night—Val Kilmer as Mark Twain for the opening act, an insightful riff on Ghost Hunters, where to find the blueprints for the Starship Enterprise (the Internet, of course), and this seemingly spontaneous ode to Adams’ “emotional genius” of a cat—made the night feel intimate. His near perfect, pared-down set made it one I’m going to remember long after I lose the ticket stub (it’ll happen eventually, despite my best intentions).

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A Georgia commune turned bed-and-breakfast complete with hippies, hallucinogens, and an ambitious nudist in residence hosts one very handsome couple, Jennifer Aniston and Paul Rudd. Those words could only describe a very specific sexual fantasy (not that I’m judging) and the plot of the new film Wanderlust, which tells the story of a New York couple, Linda and George (played by Aniston and Rudd), forced to move in with family after unexpected financial problems. On their way, they happen upon the commune and decide to give it, the lifestyle it offers, and all the quirky inhabitants who come with it a chance. Writers David Wain and Ken Marino collaborated with Judd Apatow, who has become synonymous with adult humor, on the screenplay, so laugh-out-loud moments are frequent and to be expected. The characters are definitely out there but the actors—including screen veteran Alan Alda and familiar faces like Justin Theroux ... READ MORE

The subjects Katherine Boo cares about—poverty, mental illness, welfare, education—nobody wants to read about.

Or so she keeps saying. But it’s starting to ring a bit false. People want to read about them, so long as it’s Boo who’s doing the writing.

Boo’s been writing about social justice issues for years, picking up a Pulitzer Prize for Public Service in the process, but she’s just now getting the name recognition she deserves. That’s because of the success of her first book, Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity, which hit bookstores earlier this month. Told over the course of three years—the amount of time Boo spent reporting in India—it’s the story of the profoundly impoverished people of Annawadi, a “sumpy plug of slum” near the Mumbai airport.

If that doesn’t sound like the sexiest subject, consider that Forevers is one of the best-reviewed debuts in ...

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This year’s Grammy Awards left us with so many questions (Why was LL Cool J wearing velvet? Why did Bruno Mars look like wax? Why did Rihanna play with Coldplay? And why, Nicki Minaj, why?) that we didn’t lose a wink over Dave Grohl’s pro-analog acceptance speech for the Foo Fighters’ Best Rock Performance award.

Well, apparently he did. An email arrived in our inbox this morning from Grohl’s publicist with this clarification from the Encino resident and onetime Nirvana drummer:

“Oh, what a night we had last Sunday at the 54th Annual Grammy Awards. The glitz! The Glamour! SEACREST! Where do I begin?? Chillin' with Lil' Wayne...meeting Cyndi Lauper's adorable mother...the complimentary blinking Coldplay bracelet.....much too much to recap. It's really is still a bit of a blur. But, if there's one thing that I remember VERY clearly, it was accepting the Grammy for Best Rock Performance...and then saying this:

"To me this award means a lot ...

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When you think of composer Giuseppe Verdi’s operas, you usually think of Aida and La Traviata. When you think of Plácido Domingo, you think tenor, not baritone. But when you combine a lesser-known opera, Simon Boccanegra, and Mr. Domingo in the title baritone role, you have the latest offering from Los Angeles Opera. It’s not to be missed.

Verdi fans consider Simon Boccanegra to be a gem. It has glorious music and great roles for singers but is saddled with a preposterous story that revolves around political machinations, death, murder, and the intrigue about who fathered a young woman. It sounds like a topic for The Jerry Springer Show. The story is so convoluted it would be pure folly to try to summarize it succinctly. Thankfully it doesn’t matter.

As the title character Mr. Domingo is stunning. The opera begins with a prologue that takes place 25 years before the ...

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Today marks the West Hollywood launch of Zipcar, a subscriber-based car-sharing program, with ten cars parked at five locations along Santa Monica Boulevard. The cars are available for anyone to use, so long as they have an activated key card and a reservation, both of which can be requested online here.

The program is the result of the efforts of WeHo mayor John Duran, council members John Heilman, Abbe Land, and John D’Amico, and Dan Grossman, the West Coast regional vice president of Zipcar. At a press conference detailing the launch, Mayor Duran expressed his desire to “help make the area more pedestrian friendly” (FYI, we took the bus to the event).

For those who don’t drive everyday, using a Zipcar to run errands can be more affordable and convenient than renting or owning a car. Zipcar usage also lowers the carbon footprint by taking ten to 15 cars off ...

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Location: Santa Barbara Museum of Art, through May 6

What to expect: This week the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, the northernmost outpost in the Pacific Standard Time celebration, opens its Pasadena to Santa Barbara exhibit, subtitled A Selected History of Art in Southern California, 1951-1969. The thread tying the various pieces, which take up a significant chunk of the museum’s State Street real estate, into a pretty bow is the legacy of Thomas W. Leavitt, director of the Pasadena Art Museum (soon to become the Norton Simon) from 1957 to 1962, when he decamped to run the Santa Barbara Museum of Art until 1969.

Leavitt either acquired for his institutions or curated exhibits of the artists featured here, a compelling sampling of painters who either worked in or were otherwise informed by L.A. and Santa Barbara. As a sampling rather than a definitive survey, the goosebump moments come unexpectedly: ...

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Anvil | Whisky A Go Go | Feb 15

The heartbreaking yet endearing Anvil! The Story of Anvil not only won Best Documentary at the 2010 Independent Spirit Awards, but it brought fiftysomething singer-guitarist Steve “Lips” Kudlow and drummer Robb Reiner the renown that had eluded them for more than three decades. After the film’s success, the musicians were able to leave their day jobs, and they now tour full-time for legions of aging metal fans and young hipsters. “People are saying, ‘How could we ever have overlooked these guys?’ ” Reiner reports. “They’re getting Anvil-ized.” 

Photograph by Brent J. Craig

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Welcome to Belize, everybody!

Ben’s here with six special women, or, as Emily puts it, five women “and a shark.” For those of you not keeping score at home, this week is big—BIG!—because next week Ben will be taking just four of the women (or three women and a shark) home to meet their families. So, this week is almost as big as next week. Like every week.

Two Halves Make a Whole

The first one-on-one date goes to Lindzi, who couldn’t be happier to spend a day with Ben. Ben picks her up wearing a tank top, which is forgivable, but only because he takes it off very quickly. Then they’re off on a helicopter ride to a gorgeous coral reef, where they must jump out of the helicopter into the deep, romance-filled waters below (Helicopter Count: 6!). Shocker alert: Lindzi is afraid of heights, so taking this “leap ...

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