
Bob Mondello
Bob Mondello, who jokes that he was a jinx at the beginning of his critical career — hired to write for every small paper that ever folded in Washington, just as it was about to collapse — saw that jinx broken in 1984 when he came to NPR.
For more than three decades, Mondello has reviewed movies and covered the arts for NPR, seeing at least 300 films annually, then sharing critiques and commentaries about the most intriguing on NPR's award-winning newsmagazine All Things Considered. In 2005, he conceived and co-produced NPR's eight-part series "American Stages," exploring the history, reach, and accomplishments of the regional theater movement.
Mondello has also written about the arts for USA Today, The Washington Post, Preservation Magazine, and other publications, and has appeared as an arts commentator on commercial and public television stations. He spent 25 years reviewing live theater for Washington City Paper, DC's leading alternative weekly, and to this day, he remains enamored of the stage.
Before becoming a professional critic, Mondello learned the ins and outs of the film industry by heading the public relations department for a chain of movie theaters, and he reveled in film history as advertising director for an independent repertory theater.
Asked what NPR pieces he's proudest of, he points to an April Fool's prank in which he invented a remake of Citizen Kane, commentaries on silent films — a bit of a trick on radio — and cultural features he's produced from Argentina, where he and his husband have a second home.
An avid traveler, Mondello even spends his vacations watching movies and plays in other countries. "I see as many movies in a year," he says, "as most people see in a lifetime."
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This year was quite bad for most movie theaters — but not bad at all for movies. NPR discusses what 2020 was like for the movie industry.
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Regina King's directorial film debut, One Night in Miami, envisions a 1964 gathering of boxer Cassius Clay, activist Malcolm X, fullback Jim Brown and singer Sam Cooke.
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Tom Hanks travels from town to town in the Texas frontier a few years after the Civil War, reading newspapers to settlers. When he comes across a young girl who was kidnapped, his life changes.
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August Wilson's award-winning play, Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, about a recording session in 1927 Chicago, comes to the screen with Viola Davis and Chadwick Boseman in his final role.
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A film directed by and starring George Clooney, The Midnight Sky, tells the story of an Arctic scientist trying to warn returning astronauts of a global catastrophe that struck while they were away.
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The Prom is the latest hit Broadway musical to get a screen adaptation. Starring Meryl Streep, James Corden, Nicole Kidman and Andrew Rannells, it will be released in cinemas on Friday.
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NPR offers an expanded holiday film preview to cover the movies that have had their releases delayed into January and February 2021.
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The movieSound of Metal, starring actor and rapper Riz Ahmed, tells the story of a drummer whose sudden hearing loss changes more than just his career.
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David Fincher's new movie, Mank, is a tale of old Hollywood centering on Herman J. Mankiewicz — played by Gary Oldman — who wrote the screenplay for Citizen Kane.
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The process of counting ballots has stressed out a lot of people this week. NPR's movie critic says he's been distracting himself from the election with cinematic counting.
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Actor Sean Connery has died at age 90. He will best be remembered as Hollywood's first James Bond — and as a Scotsman to his core.
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Sacha Baron Cohen's outrageous character from Kazakhstan, Borat, is back in a film that's making political headlines. Amazon Prime is set to stream the Borat sequel starting Friday.