Esquire August 2013

WRITER-AT-LARGE TOM JUNOD ON PROFILING THE THREE BIGGEST MOVIE STARS OF OUR TIME, BACK TO BACK TO BACK When I was a kid and happened to mention the name of a male celebrity to my father, he would immediately give me the scoop. He would tell me, first of all, if the celebrity had his own hair and teeth or wore a toupee and had "some work done." Then he would tell me if the man in question was a "great cocksman" or the "Queen Bee." Finally, he would assess their talent or lack thereof. The stars he admired—Clark Gable, Cary Grant, Gary Cooper, Fred Astaire, Frank and Dino—had set a pretty high standard, qualifying each lesser light as "the luckiest man alive." What united them all, though, was the…

John Oliver SCOTT RAAB TALKS TO THE DAILY SHOW'S HOST ABOUT THE UK, SPORTS FANDOM, HIS MARRIAGE TO A U. S. VETERAN, AND GETTING HIS GREEN CARD Dinner, Taboon restaurant, midtown Manhattan. SCOTT RAAB: You're bursting with energy. JOHN OLIVER: I haven't hit the crash yet. We just finished the show, so you're getting the best of me, and then I'll go back to my wife and she'll experience the crash. Is that not the recipe for a healthy relationship? She'll get the worst of my attentiveness and energy at the end of every day. SR: I was surprised to find out you married an American soldier and that you met her at the 2008 Republican Convention. JO: When you've married someone who's been at war, there is…

Junior year of high school, my friend ran a cheating ring in our biology class. He was making a good chunk of money, and it all seemed pretty harmless—a few kids getting A's on small-time quizzes—so one day, when he asked me to collect the money for him, I agreed. He said I could keep half of it. That night, I told my older sister about the plan. She convinced me I was an idiot, and I decided not to get involved. Really. Then I went to school the next day and everything went to shit. He'd been caught. Ratted everyone out. I told the principal I'd changed my mind about taking the money. His response? Sure you did. It didn't matter if my story was true or not. It…

USEFUL EQUIVALENTS KEY MEASURES FOR THE MONTH OF AUGUST August July + "Christ" sunny mostly sunny – mostly 100 degrees Fahrenheit 37.8 degrees Celsius Fahrenheit degrees Celsius x 9/5 + 32 gin rickey a little lime juice, a lot of gin, a little club soda, some ice woohoo .. 2 yays beach towel 3 regular towels 7 pool noodles 1 inner tube movie theater 68 degrees Wolverine Hugh Jackman wolverine weasel + bear R.I.P.D. Ghost – pottery + Ryan Reynolds + Jeff Bridges Louis C. K. in Blue Jasmine Larry David in Whatever Works (2009) Alec Baldwin in Blue Jasmine Alec Baldwin Andrew Dice Clay in Blue Jasmine Huh? Kick-Ass 2 Kick-Ass 1 The Smurfs 2 . The Smurfs 1 Grown Ups 2 . Grown Ups 1 + Shaquille…

For decades, the peripheries of culture have mattered much more than its center. Literature today—like music, and blogs, and Web videos—is an accumulation of niches. The idea of a literary novel that everybody has read makes sense only if "everybody" is your little clique. For true communion, we have to look to the past—where the books that matter live. David Gilbert's & Sons (Random House, $27) is an often funny, always elegant, lingering gaze back at a world in which writers are still gods at the very center of culture. A. N. Dyer, the novel's ver-sion of J. D. Salinger, worries about what witticisms to scribble with his autograph. He struggles with the all-consuming importance of his life and works. He holes up in his reclusive apartment, far from prying…

The bear replies, "I'll have a gin," and after almost a minute, "… and tonic." The bartender says, "Sure. But what's with the pause?" The bear says, "These? Had 'em my whole life." ABOUT THE JOKESTER: One of the first things Ambyr Childers would like to point out: "I'm about as funny as wallpaper." Which counts as a marginally funny thing to say, so we're not convinced. The 25-year-old, who turned down a golf scholarship at UC Riverside to pursue acting, has certainly been landing more dramatic than comedic roles in the last couple years—including her turn as the daughter of Amy Adams's and Philip Seymour Hoffman's characters in The Master. This month, she's on the new Showtime series Ray Donovan, with Liev Schreiber and Jon Voight. She plays Ashley…