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John Waters' films have been described as raunchy, perverse and hilarious. So it comes as no surprise that he would pick a scene from a 1959 William Castle horror movie as one of his own favorites. Waters talks with NPR's Susan Stamberg.

Hollywood is rife with film biographies this year: Ray Charles, Bobby Darin, Alexander the Great, Alfred Kinsey, and Che Guevara have all gotten the movie treatment. NPR's Bob Mondello says the one that opens Friday, the Howard Hughes biopic The Aviator, qualifies as the crowd-pleaser of the bunch.

A new exhibit at the Folger Shakespeare Library offers a glimpse at correspondences four centuries old. "Letter Writing in Renaissance England" includes letters penned in invisible ink, sealed in wax and silk, and sent to and from some of the most famous figures in history.

The latest film from director Jean-Pierre Jeunet takes place in France at the end of World War I. A Very Long Engagement is the story of a young woman's search for a fiancee she doesn't believe is dead. Audrey Tatou, who played the lead in Jeunet's 2001 comedy hit Amelie, stars again. NPR's Bob Mondello has a review.

As part of the first cast of Saturday Night Live, Dan Aykroyd helped bring the Coneheads and the Blues Brothers to life. We talk with Aykroyd about two new projects: the book Elwood's Blues: interviews with the Blues Legends and Stars, and the upcoming movie Christmas with the Kranks.

NPR's Melissa Block talks with Pedro Almodovar about his film Bad Education. He says it was one of his hardest films to make, because the story is so close to his own experiences.

Some of classical music critic Lloyd Schwartz's favorite movie themes just happen to belong to films just released on DVD. He reviews four of them: Gone with the Wind, Freaks, I Vitelloni, and The Golden Coach.

Book critic Maureen Corrigan reviews I Am Charlotte Simmons by Tom Wolfe.

Writer Jenny Bicks has been busy ever since she began working on Sex and the City in the show's first season. For our series Scenes I Wish I'd Written, Bicks chose to discuss a scene from a Woody Allen classic, Annie Hall. Hear NPR's Susan Stamberg.

The executive director and CEO of the Screen Actors Guild, Robert Pisano, has been sued by some members of the union because Pisano is also on the board of directors of the DVD rental company Netflix. Some wonder how he can accurately represent actors who are trying to negotiate DVD residuals when Netflix is so cozy with the studios. Iris Mann reports (6:15)