Now in its second year at The Pavilion at The Allen, Houston’s hottest dining destination serves up fiery Mexican flavors with fire dancers, roaming guitarists and a vibe that’s equal parts luxe and sexy. Think dark and moody interiors with natural accents, an inviting lush patio, two bars, a new private speakeasy, and tableside flaming Tomahawks. Go for truffle quesadilla, crispy wonton tacos stuffed with tun and A5 Wagyu, Mayan prawns dripping in chipotle butter, aromatic cocktails hit with hibiscus, agave, serrano and smoke, and a full-sensory experience you’ll be thinking about long after you leave.
I had a crush on this girl named Jaime in college. We met at a party and really hit it off. She then invited me to her place for a party that she was hosting. I was nervous and didn’t know her group of friends. So I began drinking quickly and heavily.
The night must have gotten away from me, and she asked if I was going to stay in her room. Hell yeah. We start doing the deed, and then BLACKOUT. When I woke up I was mid-piss, urinating all over Jaime’s clean clothes – which I assumed was a toilet.
She was furious in the morning and we haven’t spoken since. One night stands, man.
Plus, Justin Kuritzkes joins to talk about writing the script, the power dynamics among the characters, and more!
Sean and Amanda gather to discuss the 2024 film perfectly situated at the center of their respective tastes: Challengers. They discuss the thrilling trio of actors at its center, underrated director Luca Guadagnino, its pulsing score, and its thrilling ending (1:00). Then, Sean interviews Justin Kuritzkes, the writer of the movie, about writing this script on spec, the balance of power dynamics among the characters, why he chose to set it in the world of tennis, and more (1:35:00).
Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Guest: Justin Kuritzkes Senior Producer: Bobby Wagner
In Somna, one woman is burning, and another can’t sleep. She sees a demon when she shuts her eyes. He wants to do things for her, to her. It’s Puritan England, and they set women ablaze for thoughts like this. She ought to know — her husband is the one who lights the torch.
Becky Cloonan and Tula Lotay, the legendary creative team behind the gorgeous erotic folk horror comic, bill Somna as “a bedtime story.” Like a lot of erotic work, this is a double entendre. Yes, its lead character, an Englishwoman named Ingrid, struggles with disordered sleeping. Much of the story takes place in bed as she slips into dreams and slowly begins to lose track of the borders between her waking life and her dreaming one. But beds are also for sex — her repressed desires come to frightening life in her unconscious mind, and possibly the real world, too.
“We went into Somna knowing that we wanted to tell an ambiguous story,” says Cloonan. “There’s no wrong way to read this comic. A lot of it’s gonna hopefully make people think about why they think it’s a certain way. If the demon that [Ingrid] is seeing isn’t real, why do you think that?”
“In the ’80s, there was a lot more of this kind of sexual horror stuff going on,” Lotay says. “There’s not as much of it now, but we’re bringing it back!”
The pair are referring to what many have noted is a uniquely sexless time in pop culture, leaving a void in the sort of explicitly sexual stories that explored messier aspects of the human experience. Deeply flawed characters responding poorly to internal and external desire, and how the world responds to them. In that regard, their work feels refreshing.
Somna is immediately beguiling, not just for the ways its lush art plays with reader perception, alternating between dreamy lust and folk-horror thrills. Cloonan and Lotay are working in a rich thematic space, exploring the ways repressive cultures and institutions harm everyone, even those who benefit from them. Initially inspired by a bout of sleep paralysis, the story gestated for 10 years before finding life as a miniseries for new comics publisher DSTLRY — an unusual and splashy entry in the burgeoning imprint’s line of debut titles.
Image: Becky Cloonan, Tula Lotay/DSTLRY
“A book like Somna, I know it’s not for everyone. We didn’t go in thinking, Everyone’s gonna love this!” Cloonan laughs. “It’s definitely a self-indulgent book that we think some people might really enjoy.”
Somna is also arriving at the height of the romantasy boom in literature. Novels that take sex and romance just as seriously as their elaborate fantasy worlds are lighting up BookTok and Goodreads. Yet comics that cater to the direct market — your monthly periodicals famous for superhero yarns but full of other genre fare — have yet to make a big splash in the genre.
“When people open [a comic] up, and they see it laid bare in front of them, it’s jarring,” Cloonan says, ruminating on why comics publishers have been trailing their prose counterparts. “I think we’re still suffering from the Comics Code, and the moral crackdown that comics in North America had while this kind of book flourished in Europe. I think the North American market is still a little trepidatious.”
“I do think the reason there isn’t more of this kind of content in American comics is due to some of the movements you’ve got out there, [with] banned books,” adds Lotay, who is British. “It’s scary stuff that doesn’t happen so much in the U.K. or in Europe, France and Italy. There’s been a very different approach to sequential art. It’s massive there and they’ve always been pretty open-minded with sexual stories — as a teen I grew up reading Heavy Metal… kind of dark stories that are uber sexy as well.”
Image: Becky Cloonan/DSTLRY
Somna gets a lot of mileage out of the liminal space between danger and desire, playing with the reader’s perception. While Cloonan handles the script, both creators take on the story’s art — with Cloonan’s inky, careful linework telling Ingrid’s story when she’s awake, and Lotay’s dreamlike, painterly style bringing her dreams to life. This is also, consequently, where Somna’s most pulse-quickening pages are.
“The thing that is passionate and arousing is the emotion behind what’s happening rather than just the visuals. We didn’t want to enter into something with just visuals that are like, Well, now they fuck, or Now we’ll show a dick,”Lotay laughs. “The point is the way Ingrid is becoming more and more entangled in this dream world, and stepping out and being enticed slowly. And Shadow Man being in the room, or hovering nearer and the words he’s saying to her — and then it builds up to the point where she gives in.”
This is the tricky part in comics, in which the static visual image and the sparse prose have to carefully mingle to showcase characters’ arousal, but not give away too much. This is where the horror aspect of Somna helps a lot, with the dangerously loaded context of its historical setting and themes of female desire and sexual agency.
Image: Becky Cloonan, Tula Lotay/DSTLRY
“Even those moments where it’s full-on, I think I tried to draw where there was a lot of emotion there,” Lotay says. “And darkness as well, where you’re thinking, This is arousing, but actually, this is quite scary as well! It’s those fine lines.”
In its final chapters Somna begins to shift into full-on thriller, as Lotay and Cloonan’s art blurs together and a murder mystery simmering in the background envelops Ingrid. Titillation and fear blend into an unsettling climax that leaves the viewer with much more to think about than what is real and what is not. Somna lingers, its historical rumination on women’s sexual agency and patriarchal repression echoing into the present.
“What makes it scarier is the fact that it’s sexy,” Cloonan says. “At the end if you can put the book down and feel upset that you’re turned on by it, I think we’ve done our job.”
Somna #1-3are available to purchase digitally at DSTLRY and in print wherever comics are sold. A collected edition arrives in July.
Even vampires deserve treats. One of the many sacrifices that people make in exchange for eternal life in vampire lore is flavor. They can only eat one thing for the rest of their elongated lives, and it’s a metallic, salty, sinister thing. We all know this. We accept this. But vampires shouldn’t have to give up texture, too. So, in 2013, filmmaker Jim Jarmusch was brave enough to create a vampire with the vision to turn that blood into something good to eat: Eve and her blood Popsicles in Only Lovers Left Alive.
As a millennial woman, I have consumed more than my fair share of vampire stories. I grew up entranced by Interview with the Vampire. Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series of books and films fell into my lap right on the heels of another fantasy series that, er, need not be named. Then there was True Blood, The Vampire Diaries, binge-watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer on the then-new app Hulu. But just once has drinking blood ever looked appetizing to me. Once have I ever vanted to suck blood, and that’s thanks to Eve.
Jarmusch’s moody hangout comedy stars Tom Hiddleston and Tilda Swinton as vampires named Adam and Eve (don’t worry about it) who’ve been on-again-off-again spouses for centuries and reunite when Adam is in a particular state of ennui. He’s got a hookup at a local blood bank, so he doesn’t need to do any killing. But Eve gets experimental. In an effort to surprise and cheer Adam up, she freezes some O negative. Very refreshing, especially when you’re in “a hot spot,” she says. Now, Hiddleston enjoying “blood on a stick” is a finger-licking image by itself, but this is not that kind of thirst blog. Hand to Lilith, this is the first and only time I have felt represented on screen by a fictional vampire. This is exactly the type of thing I would do if I were undead. I love to eat Popsicles. I love to make Popsicles.
Have you ever been in a situation where you had limited ingredients in your house — because of money, college, a thunderstorm, or a pandemic, for example — and had to get creative in order to avoid eating the same thing every day? Imagine that plus immortality. Shouldn’t vampires be messing around in the kitchen in an attempt to spice up their lives, like, all the time? The titular cannibal on Hannibal enjoyed sanguinaccio dolce, an Italian pudding, with human blood instead of the traditional pig’s blood. You can’t tell me Lestat wouldn’t be into that.
Vampires are inventive, prolific even, in many ways. Across literature, film, and television, their fighting styles vary. They choose to spend their daytime hours in different ways. You can always count on a fictional vampire to experiment with fashion. But not food. Whether the story is romantic or horrifying or a bit of both, we usually see vampires feeding on fresh human blood by sucking directly from their victim’s neck, wrist if they’re polite, or femoral artery if they’re nasty. It can be scary or erotic, but never exactly tasty. If a vampire doesn’t want to kill, and we have plenty of sullen and brooding faces in popular culture, they’ll find more palatable methods. The immortal teenagers on The Vampire Diaries drink blood-filled IV bags like Capri-Suns. Baz in Rainbow Rowell’s Carry Onseries, Interview with the Vampire’s Louis de Pointe du Lac, and the “vegetarian” Cullen family in the Twilight series hunt animals. Still, they’re drinking from the source. There’s no sense of fun. There’s no flair.
I can think of some notable exceptions. On Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the vampire Spike alludes to enhancing his blood with burba weed for flavor and crushed-up Weetabix for texture. At least once in season 6 we see him doing it, so we know it wasn’t a dry joke (hard to tell with those Whedon types). What We Do in the Shadows has a little fun, too. The vampires can get high off the blood of people who are on drugs. They can mix blood with Bud Light and get drunk. Still, that’s not very elegant or inventive. I expect more from them.
Others just merit an honorable mention. The glamorous antagonist known only as the Countess in the 1985 sex comedy Once Bitten drinks a glass of blood with a celery stalk. Occasionally you’ll see vampires drink their blood from a red wine glass or a flask. Presentation is important, so I appreciate that. Amy Heckerling’s romantic comedy Vamps mixes it up by having Krysten Ritter stick a straw into the rat she’s draining. That’s (a) gross and (b) boring! And True Blood, of course, is built around a synthetic blood that vampires can buy bottled and drink “out” in society. However, many of the vampires on True Blood prefer the real thing and tend to drink it in the usual way. Russell will stick his hand into a human’s chest cavity and pull out their heart, but he apparently can’t be bothered to prepare his food.
Come on! Where are the foodie vampires? I know that Hollywood’s best and brightest can do better. What about blood foam? Blood soup is already a dish in many cuisines. There are lots of foods cooked with blood, like black pudding or coq au vin. Where’s the whipping, frying, curdling, and coagulating? Show me a vampire starting the day with a steaming cup of hot blood. I don’t see why you couldn’t make freeze-dried astronaut blood for an afternoon snack. If Popsicles are possible, why not a bloody shaved ice, slushie, or sorbet?
I don’t even think I’ve ever seen a vampire lick a rare steak. Let’s face it: Being a vampire looks fun! Except for drinking blood, of course. That can change. If vampire fiction is here to stay, we owe it to them to give them something good-looking to eat instead of just someone good-looking to eat.
The leg slit has been a red carpet trend for years, but a dress cutout that climbs all the way up to the bust line, exposing the wearer’s entire side, is bold territory that not all have ventured to. In recent months, we’ve seen the trend surge to an all-time high as evening labels such as Mônot and Retrofête push boundaries with their designs.
Unexpected flashes of skin come by way of ab windows, hip cleavage, and splices across the chest, but no statement is as risqué as a completely sideless dress, which means that underwear is not an option. The true question becomes whether a silhouette is wearable or fodder for a wardrobe malfunction, and there are plenty of stars who like to test the limits.
While designers tend to adorn full-body slits with bows, thin strips of fabric, or sheer panels that appear to magically hold the dress together, connecting the front and back, most looks are so revealing that the gown seems to defy gravity. Watching celebrities pull off full-body slits on the red carpet may very well spark thoughts such as, “How are they keeping that in place?” and, “How did they cover their tan lines?”
Most recently, Heidi Klum, 50, sent minds racing as she sported a Lever Couture number to the 2023 LACMA Art+Film Gala. Her white frock was made from bushels of tinsel, but even the volume of the material did not distract from her see-through panels, one of which took the form of a plunging neckline. The extremely bold statement stood out from the crowd at the event, as dresses like these so often do.
Of course, Klum isn’t the only one going the extra mile for a leggy moment. Ahead, see how everyone from Poppy Delevingne to Charli D’Amelio rock the full-body-slit dress.
Chainmail was certainly popular in the ’90s and 2000s, with Paris Hilton quite literally owning the dress trend after sporting a memorable silver mesh birthday dress that Kendall Jenner recreated in 2016. But a piece of jewelry that acts as a bra – with nothing underneath – is something else entirely, and it changes the conversation about wearable materials in fashion. In 2021, Bella Hadid stepped out at the Cannes Film Festival, a vision in a Schiaparelli black dress with a gigantic cutout circling her bust. But rather than go bare, the look was completed with a massive brass necklace in the shape of branched lungs to cover her breasts and seemingly present the idea of artfully-constructed hardware as a top.
Two years later, we’re seeing more playful iterations, with simpler designs dripping in crystals and rhinestones. Tyla’s metallic bra on “The Tonight Show” is one such example, teamed with a star-adorned micro-miniskirt. Saweetie’s Hello Kitty bra by Laser Kitten had a DIY aesthetic about it, with dangling cat charms, pastel dice, bubblegum bows, tiny pearls, and diamond strands sewn on haphazardly. And leave it to Kim Kardashian to nearly unveil her nipples in just a few Gucci chains strapped tightly across her chest. The Skims founder and reality TV star shot photos of herself in a campaign for the brand, meaning this fashion trend has now achieved icon status.
While jewelry-as-clothing isn’t something we see every day, the red carpet appearances, street style moments, and Instagram selfies are multiplying in Hollywood. Scroll to see our favorite collection of examples so far, then review other similarly-bold trends such as the visible bra, villain corsets, and boob windows.
Chainmail was certainly popular in the ’90s and 2000s, with Paris Hilton quite literally owning the dress trend after sporting a memorable silver mesh birthday dress that Kendall Jenner recreated in 2016. But a piece of jewelry that acts as a bra — with nothing underneath — is something else entirely, and it changes the conversation about wearable materials in fashion. In 2021, Bella Hadid stepped out at the Cannes Film Festival, a vision in a Schiaparelli black dress with a gigantic cutout circling her bust. But rather than go bare, the look was completed with a massive brass necklace in the shape of branched lungs to cover her breasts and seemingly present the idea of artfully-constructed hardware as a top.
Two years later, we’re seeing more playful iterations, with simpler designs dripping in crystals and rhinestones. Tyla’s metallic bra on “The Tonight Show” is one such example, teamed with a star-adorned micro-miniskirt. Saweetie’s Hello Kitty bra by Laser Kitten had a DIY aesthetic about it, with dangling cat charms, pastel dice, bubblegum bows, tiny pearls, and diamond strands sewn on haphazardly. And leave it to Kim Kardashian to nearly unveil her nipples in just a few Gucci chains strapped tightly across her chest. The Skims founder and reality TV star shot photos of herself in a campaign for the brand, meaning this fashion trend has now achieved icon status.
While jewelry-as-clothing isn’t something we see every day, the red carpet appearances, street style moments, and Instagram selfies are multiplying in Hollywood. Scroll to see our favorite collection of examples so far, then review other similarly-bold trends such as the visible bra, villain corsets, and boob windows.
At this point, when I see Julia Fox step out in a new look, I can’t help but pause to imagine myself wearing it. Be it a thin strip of fabric masquerading as a skirt or duct tape that functions as a bra, I just can’t seem to wrap my head around some of her outfits. The 33-year-old “Uncut Gems” star, who works with stylist Briana Andalore on sourcing her statement-making looks, turned a wardrobe malfunction into a major fashion moment at an Oct. 25 event.
Fox attended Room To Grow’s 25th anniversary gala at the Ziegfeld Ballroom in New York City in a Mowalola scarlet-red “half-dress” made of crinkled leather. While the skintight bodice fit like a tank, the dress seemed quite restrictive due to bands that wrapped around her legs, broken up by cutout panels. Because the strips of her skirt were so thin, it was easy to make out her entire nude thong as she carefully attempted to head into the event. And the second cutout offered a clear view of her pelvic area, making butt cutouts, boob windows, and ab-revealing panels feel almost demure by comparison.
In most photos at the step-and-repeat, the “Down the Drain” author had to stand with her legs crossed at the ankles to avoid a wardrobe mishap (a bonus, though, is that she got to display her matching Prada pumps in the process). Fox’s ombré locks, which have been dyed varying tones of red over the past few months, cascaded in thick curls over her left shoulder thanks to a side part. She flaunted a glossy, plum lip, plenty of highlighter, translucent nails, and a single star-shaped earring in the ear that was visible.
Needless to say, I’d imagine an activity as simple as walking feels taxing in Fox’s dress, so posing for cameras would be completely out of the question for me. As we’ve seen though, there’s no out-of-the-box trend that Fox will shy away from, even if it literally defies gravity.
Scroll to see all angles of Fox in her red cutout dress at the Room To Grow gala in New York City.
While some may simply refer to them as cutouts, there’s something to be said for a strategically-placed hole in a dress that circles the area between the waist and hip, just barely revealing the curve of a butt cheek. In our book, this is called hip cleavage, and it’s a trend favored by some of the boldest style icons in Hollywood. Of course, an artfully-designed dress can do all the work for you when it comes to achieving the look, but some stars pull it off with low-rise pants and skirts, tugging the straps of a high-rise swimsuit or thong up to the waist to highlight a slice of skin in the intended area.
These days, hip cleavage is so common that many ’70s-inspired, wide-leg pants come affixed with thin straps at the center of the waistband for the wearer to string around and tie at the back, employing makeshift hip cleavage in a pinch (Heidi Klum’s cow-print pants are the perfect example of this). But when it comes to hip cleavage, we most commonly think of looks like Kim Kardashian’s Gucci dress, with logofied faux G-String straps (Dove Cameron has worn the exact same piece from the brand’s Spring/Summer 2023 collection), or Lori Harvey’s asymmetrical Aya Muse number at the Revolve Festival. Really, there are no hard and fast rules for hip cleavage — no cutout too wide or strap positioned too high — only that it requires confidence, and all too often the willingness to give up underwear entirely.
Ahead, see our favorite instances of hip cleavage from celebrities so far, then check out some other groundbreaking trends, including the boob window cutout, visible bra, and ever-popular naked dress.
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