Neda Ulaby
Neda Ulaby reports on arts, entertainment, and cultural trends for NPR's Arts Desk.
Scouring the various and often overlapping worlds of art, music, television, film, new media and literature, Ulaby's stories reflect political and economic realities, cultural issues, obsessions and transitions.
A twenty-year veteran of NPR, Ulaby started as a temporary production assistant on the cultural desk, opening mail, booking interviews and cutting tape with razor blades. Over the years, she's also worked as a producer and editor and won a Gracie award from the Alliance for Women in Media Foundation for hosting a podcast of NPR's best arts stories.
Ulaby also hosted the Emmy-award winning public television series Arab American Stories in 2012 and earned a 2019 Knight-Wallace Fellowship at the University of Michigan. She's also been chosen for fellowships at the Getty Arts Journalism Program at USC Annenberg and the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism.
Before coming to NPR, Ulaby worked as managing editor of Chicago's Windy City Times and co-hosted a local radio program, What's Coming Out at the Movies. A former doctoral student in English literature, Ulaby has contributed to academic journals and taught classes in the humanities at the University of Chicago, Northeastern Illinois University and at high schools serving at-risk students.
Ulaby worked as an intern for the features desk of the Topeka Capital-Journal after graduating from Bryn Mawr College. But her first appearance in print was when she was only four days old. She was pictured on the front page of the New York Times, as a refugee, when she and her parents were evacuated from Amman, Jordan, during the conflict known as Black September.
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After months of delay the criminal trial of actor Jonathan Majors has gotten started with jury selection. His meteoric Hollywood career has been sidetracked by charges of assault and harassment.
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After half a century, The Exorcist is still considered one of the scariest movies ever made. But one priest says it's a movie deeply concerned with faith, and responding to evil. -
Private eye John Shaft was a new kind of figure in film: unapologetically Black with swagger. He clapped back at white cops, he busted mobsters, and helped create the entire genre of Blaxploitation.
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The Kirkus Prize is one of the most prestigious literary awards in the U.S. This year's winners are Ariel Aberg-Riger, Héctor Tobar and James McBride.
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When Barbie brought close to $1.3 billion at the worldwide box office, it became one of the only female-dominated movies among the top-grossing films of all time.
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Jamal Jawad's shop was stymied when cars kept running into his business in Dearborn, Mich. But the entrepreneur persevered and he now has three stores and a partnership with the Detroit Pistons.
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Citizen Kane made Orson Welles a superstar. But his next movie, The Magnificent Ambersons, was edited into incoherence by the studio. Now, a Welles fan has used animation to recreate lost footage.
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Those affected by wildfire smoke focus on the colors red, purple and maroon on the air quality charts. Red used to be the scariest color. Why did that change?(Story aired on ATC on June 28, 2023.)
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James Beard award-winning cookbook author James Whetlor explains how to reject BBQ maximalism and build your own tandoori oven. (Story aired on All Things Considered on June 16, 2023.)
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The Grammys are expanding, again. The newly added categories are: best pop dance recording, best African music performance and best alternative jazz album.
