Last summer I had a chance to strike a deal with the devil.
I sat, contemplating my choice — what I could live without to acquire the one thing I most desired. This was no arbitrary crossroads. Over the past 40 or so minutes I had confessed long-held goals and romantic yearnings while revealing details of my most intimate relationships. They were now being weighed against me. All, I was told, could be mine, minus what I would sacrifice. The contract would be binding, necessitating a drop of blood.
I was left alone, a tiny lancet sitting before me. The barely audible cackle of candle kept me company in a stark warehouse room, a setting that felt illicit while the small flame’s fragility reminded me that I needed to make a decision.
I was here because I had booked a session with Yannick Trapman-O’Brien’s “Undersigned,” a show he bills as a “psychological thriller for one.” Each production is personal, and highly individualized to its participant — plot points detailed here may not unveil for every guest. Know, however, there is no talk of dooming oneself to a fantastical afterlife. “Undersigned” is grounded in our reality, a conversation we have over our wants and needs, and, at least for me, what aspects of my personality or social circle I would forgo to achieve them. Love and various relationships were on the table as I fiddled with the lancet and considered puncturing my finger.
This was not a decision I would make lightly. Trapman-O’Brien’s performance, after all, had created an atmosphere of damning seriousness. And I hadn’t even seen him.
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For most of the show I was blindfolded as he sat across from me, and he had left the space while I raced through my life and the future I was starting to imagine for myself. It’s rare to partake in “Undersigned” — after bringing it to L.A. last August, when I experienced it, Philadelphia-based Trapman-O’Brien is back with a smattering of dates this month. Limited tickets, at the time of writing, remain.
Despite being comfortable with vulnerability and having a tendency at times to overshare, I went in to “Undersigned” with trepidation. No topic, unless specifically requested, is off limits. Our relationship to money, sex, religion, love, power and more are all fair game, and the subjects are discussed in a setting that nods to the occult. Yet “Undersigned” ultimately became something akin to a therapy session, as I was prompted to analyze my strengths and weaknesses in matters of romance and faith.
Trapman-O’Brien, 32, has a unique ability to improvise, to quickly twist my words and use them against me. There were no cards or magic tricks here. “Undersigned” is purely a meeting of the minds, and those who treat it seriously will find it most revealing.
My session was a tug-of-war between empathetic and selfish tendencies; I wanted no deal, I said, unless all those potentially affected were happy, but such a request necessitated taking a figurative scalpel to other areas of contentment. Thus it became a work of self-examination. If rewriting history and one’s life were possible, how much could I accept while still looking at myself in the mirror?
Only everything started to become twisted. I had gone in expecting to share some of my professional and romantic dreams. As the show progressed, however, a fear that I would never achieve them set in.
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“There is an enormous act of care in providing people a place where they can be confronted by themselves,” Trapman-O’Brien says. “For all that the themes and origins of this story are rooted in traditions and in things that are bad and sinister, I actually find it to be an incredibly affirming piece to do. I am gobsmacked by people’s generosity, and courage to stare down a scary thing. I’ve had people say something and then immediately say, ‘Oh, I don’t like that that’s true.’”
Trapman-O’Brien is careful with his words. A promise of “Undersigned” is that what is spoken of during the performance will never again be discussed. He will reveal, only broadly, the topics that have been broached. A veteran of the East Coast participatory theater scene, Trapman-O’Brien’s prior show, “The Telelibrary,” was born out of the COVID-19 pandemic, a whimsical yet open-hearted telephone-based performance in which vocal prompts led us either to literary reflections or to recollections left behind by other callers.
“Undersigned” started in 2019 as a commission for a patron’s Halloween party. Trapman-O’Brien balked, not wanting to create a horror-themed show, but then became intrigued by exploring the concept of making a deal with the devil. “Undersigned” only works because the choices don’t feel like an arbitrary thought experiment; that is, it’s not a game of accepting, say, untold billions by giving up a pet or a limb. Throughout, the blindfolded conversation with Trapman-O’Brien dials in on our emotional wants and needs, and then needles away at them in search of their root.
Yannick Trapman-O’Brien has performed “Undersigned” about 300 times, each time asking guests to potentially offer up a personal and emotional sacrifice. The abstracted bargains of past guests are on display for participants.
(Todd Martens / Los Angeles Times)
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The goal? To emotionally disarm guests by creating, in Trapman-O’Brien’s words, a “nonjudgmental space.”
“One of the problems is the second you open up the idea of a deal with the devil, people expect that they’re going to get screwed,” Trapman-O’Brien says. “I find people negotiate against themselves. One of the most impactful things of the piece is talking to people about why they keep accepting less than they want. Like, ‘I don’t need my dream job. I just need a good job.’ But I told you that you could have anything you want. Have your dream.”
The vulnerability inherent in the show extends to its payment structure. An “Undersigned” performance asks for a “down payment” of $100, with slightly cheaper options for students and creative professionals. At the end of the show, guests are presented with a notebook to write something personal to leave behind for others to read, and an envelope containing 30% of their initial investment in cash — a recognition, reads “Undersigned’s” fine print, of “the gamble” guests are taking with such an openly revealing, potentially unnerving show.
“I think the best way to ask for something is to invite,” Trapman-O’Brien says. “And the best way to invite people into vulnerability is with vulnerability of your own. We’ve talked about how heavy the show is. And I believe a big part of what makes people willing to share is that I try to find as many places as possible to stick my neck out. “
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Trapman-O’Brien says he regularly hears from those who participate, sometimes months later, with updates on their agreement. For me, I sat in the warehouse’s lobby — the show is run out of Hatch Escapes in Arlington Heights — for a good 45 to 50 minutes, contemplating how easily I was willing to offer up professional ambitions and personal connections for something I believed would make me happy.
“There’s a non-zero number of participants,” Trapman-O’Brien says, “who will reach out and say, ‘I know I’m not supposed to discuss it, but it did happen.’ Well, those rules are about your safety and mine, so I can say, ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ But that to me is what it means to do a piece in which you say things that you need. Some of them might surprise you.”
Arguably, the biggest revelation for me with “Undersigned” is how true it all felt. About six months after I partook in the production, there are moments I’ll catch myself thinking about the show and the choice I was presented with. Should that future I imagined for myself ever become a reality, a not insignificant part of me will wonder what other forces were at play.
For when I departed “Undersigned,” I also left a part of me behind: a drop of blood, and a signed deal with the devil.
The French government confirmed this week that it has granted citizenship to George and Amal Clooney — pictured on a London red carpet in October — and their 7-year-old twins.
Henry Nicholls/AFP via Getty Images
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One of Hollywood’s most recognizable stars is now officially a French citizen.
A French government bulletin published last weekend confirms that the country has granted citizenship to George Clooney, along with his wife, human rights lawyer Amal Clooney, and their 7-year-old twins.
The Clooneys — who hail from Lexington, Ky. and Beirut, Lebanon, respectively — bought an 18th-century estate in Provence, France in 2021. In an Esquire interview this October, the Oscar-winning actor and filmmaker described the French “farm” as their primary residence, a decision he said was made with their kids in mind.
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“I was worried about raising our kids in LA, in the culture of Hollywood,” Clooney said. “I felt like they were never going to get a fair shake at life. France — they kind of don’t give a s*** about fame. I don’t want them to be walking around worried about paparazzi. I don’t want them being compared to somebody else’s famous kids.”
In another interview on his recent Jay Kelly press tour, Clooney mentioned that his wife and kids speak perfect French, joking that they use it to insult him to his face while he still struggles to learn the language.
This week, after a French official raised questions of fairness, France’s Foreign Ministry explained that the Clooneys were eligible under a law that permits citizenship for foreign nationals who contribute to the country’s international influence and cultural outreach, The Associated Press reports.
The French government specifically cited the actor’s clout as a global movie star and the lawyer’s work with academic institutions and international organizations in France.
“They maintain strong personal, professional and family ties with our country,” the ministry added, per the AP. “Like many French citizens, we are delighted to welcome Georges and Amal Clooney into the national community.”
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They aren’t the only ones celebrating. President Trump, who has a history of trading barbs with Clooney, welcomed the news by taking another dig at the actor.
In a New Year’s Eve Truth Social post, Trump called the couple “two of the worst political prognosticators of all time” and slammed Clooney for throwing his support behind then-Vice President Kamala Harris during the 2024 election.
“Clooney got more publicity for politics than he did for his very few, and totally mediocre, movies,” wrote Trump, who himself has made cameos in several films over the years. “He wasn’t a movie star at all, he was just an average guy who complained, constantly, about common sense in politics. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
Clooney responded the next day via a statement shared with outlets including Deadline and Variety.
“I totally agree with the current president,” Clooney said, before referencing the midterm elections later this year. “We have to make America great again. We’ll start in November.”
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Clooney and Trump — once friendly — have long criticized each other
Clooney, a longtime activist and Democratic Party donor, has remained active in U.S. politics despite his overseas move.
In July 2024, he rocked the political establishment by publishing a New York Times op-ed urging then-President Joe Biden — for whom he had prominently fundraised just weeks prior — to drop his reelection bid to make way for another Democrat with better chances of taking the White House. A growing chorus of calls led to Biden’s withdrawal from the race by the end of that month.
In a December interview with NPR’s Fresh Air, Clooney said his decision to speak out on that and other issues generally comes down to “when I feel like no one else is gonna do it.”
“You’ll lose all of your clout if you fight every fight,” he added. “You have to pick the ones that you know well, that you’re well informed on, and that you have some say and you hope that that has at least some effect.”
Clooney has been a vocal critic of Trump throughout both of his terms, most recently on the topic of press freedoms during the actor’s Broadway portrayal of the late journalist Edward R. Murrow last spring.
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And Trump has been similarly outspoken in his dislike of Clooney, including in an insult-laden Truth Social post — calling him a “fake movie actor” — after the publication of his New York Times op-ed.
In December, just days before this latest dust-up, Clooney shared in a Variety interview that he and Trump had been on good terms during the president’s reality television days. He said Trump used to call him often and once tried to help him get into a hospital to see a back surgeon.
“He’s a big goofball. Well, he was,” Clooney added. “That all changed.”
In the same Variety interview, Clooney — the son of longtime television anchor Nick Clooney — slammed CBS and ABC for abandoning their journalistic duty by paying to settle lawsuits with the Trump administration. He expressed concern about the current media landscape, particularly the direction of CBS News under its controversial new editor in chief, Bari Weiss.
Weiss responded by inviting Clooney to visit the CBS Broadcast Center to learn more about their work, in a written statement published in the New York Post on Tuesday. It began with “Bonjour, Mr. Clooney,” in a nod to the actor’s new milestone.
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Clooney told NPR last month that he will continue to stand up for what he believes in, even if it means people who disagree with him decide not to see his movies.
“I don’t give up my right to freedom of speech because I have a Screen Actors Guild card,” he added. “The minute that I’m asked to just straight-up lie, then I’ve lost.”
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) — Kentucky health officials are warning the public of possible measles exposures in northern Kentucky earlier this week.
A post on the Kentucky Department for Public Health’s Facebook page said it “identified potential measles exposures in Grant County.” According to the post, the exposure was traced to “an unvaccinated, out-of-state traveler” who stayed at the Holiday Inn & Suites in Dry Ridge from Dec. 28-30.” That person also visited the Ark Encounter on Dec. 29.
Measles, a highly contagious respiratory virus, can cause serious health problems, especially in young children, according to the CDC’s website. The virus spreads through the air after someone infected coughs or sneezes. It can then linger for up to two hours after the infected person leaves.
The virus can also be spread if someone touches surfaces that an infected person has touched. Symptoms include a cough, runny nose and red eyes, followed by white spots that appear on the face and down the body. Two doses of the MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine is the best protection against measles, according to health officials.
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Contact your healthcare provider if you think you or someone in your family may have been exposed.
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Every year around this time I present a “new names in the news” quiz. I’m going to give you some names that you’d probably never heard before 2025 but that were prominent in the news during the past 12 months. You tell me who or what they are.
1. Zohran Mamdani
2. Karoline Leavitt
3. Mark Carney
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4. Robert Francis Prevost (hint: Chicago)
5. Jeffrey Goldberg (hint: The Atlantic)
6. Sanae Takaichi
7. Nameless raccoon, Hanover County, Virginia
Last week’s challenge
Last week’s challenge came from Joseph Young, of St. Cloud, Minn. Think of a two-syllable word in four letters. Add two letters in front and one letter behind to make a one-syllable word in seven letters. What words are these?
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Challenge answer
Ague –> Plagued / Plagues / Leagues
Winner
Calvin Siemer of Henderson, Nev.
This week’s challenge
This week’s challenge is a numerical one from Ed Pegg Jr., who runs the website mathpuzzle.com. Take the nine digits — 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. You can group some of them and add arithmetic operations to get 2011 like this: 1 + 23 ÷ 4 x 5 x 67 – 8 + 9. If you do these operations in order from left to right, you get 2011. Well, 2011 was 15 years ago. Can you group some of the digits and add arithmetic symbols in a different way to make 2026? The digits from 1 to 9 need to stay in that order. I know of two different solutions, but you need to find only one of them.
If you know the answer to the challenge, submit it below by Thursday, January 8 at 3 p.m. ET. Listeners whose answers are selected win a chance to play the on-air puzzle.
