Lifestyle
How to have the best Sunday in L.A., according to Phil Rosenthal
Phil Rosenthal likes to sit at the counter of Max & Helen’s, the diner he recently opened with acclaimed chef Nancy Silverton, and chat with people while they eat.
“I sometimes feel like the mayor of Larchmont,” Rosenthal says over the phone as he greets diners who notice him at the counter. “When people come in and realize I’m involved, they’re always surprised to see me. It’s a bit like being at Disneyland and running into Goofy.”
In Sunday Funday, L.A. people give us a play-by-play of their ideal Sunday around town. Find ideas and inspiration on where to go, what to eat and how to enjoy life on the weekends.
Rosenthal is probably best known for creating the popular TV show “Everybody Loves Raymond” and hosting Netflix’s “Somebody Feed Phil,” which is moving to YouTube in 2027, but he is more than just a famous foodie. He’s now touring the country for his live show, “An Evening With Phil Rosenthal,” and he recently published his second children’s book, “Just Try It! Someplace New!,” which he wrote with his daughter Lily. (They’ll sign books at Barnes & Noble at the Grove on March 14.)
“The book series started when my daughter called and said, ‘Kids love your show. Why don’t you do a kids’ book?’ “ he says, before adding with a laugh: “I told her, ‘Yes, if you’ll do it with me.’ That’s a dad trick to get more time with your daughter.”
Rosenthal believes stories about kids feeling nervous or afraid to try new things connect with both children and adults. “When you write a kids’ book, you realize that it is not just a kids’ book,” he says. “It’s really a book for everyone.”
Although he travels a lot, Rosenthal likes to spend Sundays close to home. He enjoys walking his dog Murray to Larchmont Village and hosting movie night with friends at his place in Hancock Park.
Here’s what his perfect Sunday in L.A. looks like, with lots of good food along the way, of course.
This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
7:45 a.m.: Coffee with Murray and neighborhood friends
Every Sunday morning, I walk my dog Murray to Larchmont Village and stop at Go Get Em Tiger. It’s our daily ritual. Over time, we’ve built a great community there, and I always invite others to join us. We sit outside, talk and have become close friends. I usually post a photo of Murray on Instagram each day. He’s a rescue mutt, and I like to joke he’s part Pyrenees, part psychopath.
9 a.m.: Shop for produce at the Larchmont Village Farmers’ Market
After about an hour, I head across the street to the Larchmont Village Farmers’ Market, which is held on Wednesdays and Sundays. I usually pick up some fruit for the house. It’s a great community spot.
9:30 a.m.: Breakfast at Max and Helen’s
Next I walk down the street to Max and Helen’s, the diner my family opened. I’m about to order the L.E.O., which is Gingrass Smoked salmon lox, three eggs and onions. So if I sound like my mouth is full, you’ll know why.
One of my favorite things on the menu is the sourdough waffle Nancy [Silverton] created, topped with butter mixed with maple syrup. I also love the hot chocolate, and the tuna melt is a special, more romanticized version of the classic. If you eat there every day, it’s smart to pick something healthy, like I’m having today — high protein and no carbs.
11 am: Browse titles at a neighborhood bookstore
I love visiting Chevalier’s Books, the oldest independent bookstore in Los Angeles. I’ve been going there since I moved to Los Angeles from New York in 1989. It’s just two doors down from the diner and feels like our community bookstore.
Noon: Hit the gym
Afterwards, I walk home and fit in a workout. I have to exercise every day because I eat a lot. If I didn’t walk everywhere, I’d probably weigh 300 pounds. My gym is simple — just some weights and a bench — but it works for me. Since I travel often, I stick to a routine I can do anywhere.
1 p.m.: Enjoy a surprising meal at a Michelin-noted restaurant
If I weren’t hosting movie night, I’d love to stop by République. It’s an amazing place, maybe the best restaurant in L.A. Every menu is great. I usually eat just about anything there, and sometimes I ask them to surprise me. It’s an all-day restaurant and I’ve gone for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Their egg dishes are excellent, the burger is top-notch and the roasted chicken, which is cooked over an open fire in the kitchen, is superb. I often let the chef decide what to bring me, especially when I’m with a group. It’s fun to be surprised and try shareable dishes.
I also really enjoy Connie and Ted’s in West Hollywood, Michael Cimarusti’s casual spot. The seafood is just as good as it is at Providence, his fine dining place. Their fresh Maine lobster roll is excellent, and they have the best oysters in L.A. It’s pretty awesome. Check before you head over there, though, as I’ve heard it’s for lease.
3 p.m.: Go for a hike
I used to hike more before I started traveling so much, but I still enjoy it. After all, this is L.A. While other places deal with bad weather, we get to be outside. I love hiking in Runyon Canyon and Griffith Park. It’s great to make the most of the outdoors here.
6 p.m.: Movie night and Pizzeria Mozza at home
On Sundays, we host movie nights at home. We have a dedicated screening room, a wood-burning pizza oven in the kitchen and a chef from Pizzeria Mozza, who comes over to make pizza. The best part is that someone connected to the film often joins us. Sometimes we watch new movies, other times old favorites. Aaron Sorkin came for “The Social Network,” and when we screened “Tootsie,” Elaine May, Dustin Hoffman and Bill Murray joined us. We usually have about 25 to 30 people.
I really love my neighborhood and the people in it. One of the best things about traveling so much is that it makes you appreciate home even more.
Lifestyle
Did you know? Alan Greenspan and Ayn Rand were close friends
Alan Greenspan and Ayn Rand are pictured in the Oval Office on Sept. 4, 1974, after Greenspan’s swearing in as Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors.
David Hume Kennerly/Getty Images/Hulton Archive
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David Hume Kennerly/Getty Images/Hulton Archive
One of the most important intellectual relationships in the life of Alan Greenspan, the prominent former central banker who died Monday, was with author Ayn Rand, whose 1957 novel Atlas Shrugged has become a perennial favorite among conservatives and which the Library of Congress named as one of the books that has shaped America.
The two first met when he was in his mid-twenties and she was in her forties, and already well-established via her 1943 novel The Fountainhead, which had been a best-seller. They were introduced through Greenspan’s then-wife, the Canadian art historian Joan Mitchell. Mitchell was a close friend of the wife of Nathaniel Branden. Branden was Rand’s protege and longtime lover.
Greenspan and Mitchell wed in 1952, but divorced within a year. By contrast, Greenspan’s relationship with Rand was far more lasting: they remained friends until her death in 1982.

Through the Branden connection, Greenspan joined Rand’s “Collective,” a small group of friends and thinkers who would gather regularly at Rand’s midtown Manhattan apartment to discuss politics, world events and ideas. He became a Collective regular.
According to Greenspan’s 2007 memoir, The Age of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World, Rand nicknamed Greenspan “the undertaker” early on in their friendship, thanks to his penchant for dark suits and his sober demeanor.
His dour reputation was at odds with his early artistic pursuits. He was a talented musician. Before pursuing an economics degree at New York University, he enrolled at Juilliard to study clarinet, and as a teenager played in a swing band alongside jazz legend-to-be Stan Getz. His musical tastes were just as conservative as his politics, however: in his memoir, he dismissed almost every form of post-big band popular music as “on the edge of noise.”

Greenspan wrote for Rand’s magazine, The Objectivist, including contributing an influential essay on the gold standard in 1966 that was later reprinted in her book Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal. When he was sworn in as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers during the Ford administration, it was Rand who stood with him, along with Rand’s husband, Frank O’Connor, and Greenspan’s mother Rose Goldsmith.
“Ayn Rand became a stabilizing force in my life,” he wrote in his memoir. “She was a wholly original thinker, sharply analytical, strong-willed, highly principled, and very insistent on rationality as the highest value. In that regard, our values were congruent – we agreed on the importance of mathematics and intellectual rigor.”

Lifestyle
Frame: From Scandal to $300 Million in Sales
Lifestyle
Laverne Cox wrote her memoir because ‘one more human story out there can help’
Laverne Cox says that even from a young age, there was “always music in my head.” Her new memoir is called Transcendent. She’s shown above in New York in April 2026.
Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images
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Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images
For more than a decade, Laverne Cox has been one of the most visible trans women in America. But the Orange Is the New Black star says she spent most of her childhood in Mobile, Ala., keeping herself hidden.
A turning point came when she was in third grade, on a church field trip to Six Flags. She bought a paper fan to cool herself, and caught the attention of her teacher.
“I was having a Scarlett O’Hara moment, fanning myself,” Cox says. “And then later that day, my mother comes in and tells me she had gotten a call from the school … and [my teacher] said that I would end up in New Orleans wearing a dress if we didn’t get me into therapy right away.”

When she was 8 or 9, Cox was sent to conversion therapy, where, she says, a therapist suggested injecting her with testosterone. “The idea was that that was supposed to make me more masculine,” she says. “My mother, thank God, said no to that.” But Cox knew she needed to leave Mobile.
In her new memoir, Transcendent, Cox writes about her journey from Mobile to show business. She remembers being bullied mercilessly by other children at school — a situation made worse by her mother’s reaction: “My mother … instead of having an impulse to protect me or care for me or ask if I was OK, she made it my fault,” she says.
In the 1990s, she moved to New York City and began auditioning for roles, first as a dancer and then as an actor. She also started experimenting with gender norms; she began her medical transition in 1998, at the age of 26.

For Cox, writing her memoir is an act of resistance and healing: “After 2023, it became very clear to me that we, that trans people had lost the culture,” she says. “I knew this was the beginning of a disaster in terms of policy. … The dehumanization was so clear to me, and so I think I also thought maybe one more human story out there can help.”
Interview highlights
On the anger she still feels about being bullied as a child
As an adult, I’m angry at the boys. I am angry at my mother. I want to protect that little child. I’m just so angry. I’m so hurt. … There’s also like the anger [about] all the kids that I’ve met who are trans or queer who are still experiencing this, and the anger of knowing that in states that have passed anti-trans laws that the percentage of bullying has skyrocketed in those states. … There’s the rhetorical piece that happens in the media that is dehumanizing and stigmatizing trans people. And it creates a permission structure. If, like your governor and your state legislators are doing [it], if your teachers and pundits on TV are doing it, then of course kids are emboldened to do it. And that makes me so angry.
On beginning to wear skirts and dresses in college
I had internalized so much transphobia. Like, ending up “in New Orleans wearing a dress” was presented to me as the absolute worst thing that could happen to me. In my young mind I imagined I would be on the street and I would be homeless and a person who needed to like do unfortunate things to survive. So it just was presented as something that was the absolute opposite of the straight A student that I was, the human being that I was, who was determined to be successful. So I didn’t wear skirts and dresses until college … but I did start wearing girls’ clothes that I would purchase from the thrift stores in Mobile and in Birmingham. And it was such a fun, wonderful exploration. … In high school I read about Oscar Wilde. He talked about creating yourself as a work of art, and I loved that as a concept.
On being drawn to show business

There was always music in my head, which is such a wonderful gift. From the second I was walking, I was dancing, and I danced everywhere. And it just took me away. … [It was] like a character. There was a person that I could play. So I was in a character and then I was in a new setting. And so all the times we would be at the supermarket in the grocery store, I just loved pushing the grocery cart and then dancing with the grocery cart as if it was like a partner. … Finally in third grade, I got to start studying dance. And that really, that was the best thing ever for me.
On growing up with a twin brother

There’s a closeness now. It’s healthier now than it’s ever been with my brother. But … we were not a touchy feely family. We weren’t a family that said, “I love you.” We weren’t a family that hugged. There was no affection. So my brother and I, so we didn’t do that. … But we bonded most around music, art. There were periods when I would be in dance class and he would come and watch and critique and he’d give me his notes.
On her twin brother playing her pre-transition character in Orange Is the New Black
It was my character’s back story. And the initial idea was that they needed to hire another actor to play me pre-transition. … [And I] asked my brother if he’d be open to it. And he said, “How much does it pay?” And then he ended up going in for the audition, but he had an advantage because he kind of looks a little bit like me. … So he booked it and did it and he had regrets about it for a while because he has his own work and his own life and he wants to be defined by his work and not mine.
Ann Marie Baldonado and Susan Nyakundi produced and edited this interview for broadcast. Bridget Bentz, Molly Seavy-Nesper and Beth Novey adapted it for the web.



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