iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 1h

Your favorite critic is in cream for the NYFF closing night screening of Ava DuVernay's "14th."

A smiling Black woman taking a selfie on an NYC subway platform, rocking a cream sweater set off with a cameo brooch, and cream corduroy pants with a tan ostrich print handbag and oversized round tortoise shell sunglasses.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 2h

I think I might be his mom?

A selfie of a Black woman (Soraya) in a cream sweater, cream pants, and big round tortoise shell Iris Apfel glasses

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 08/10/2026

This is exactly why I wrote about ADW the way I did! www.soraya.press/a-different-...

This is creator Felicia Pride’s first crack at showrunning. Previously, she wrote on Queen Sugar, Grey’s Anatomy, and Bel-Air. Every showrunner folds their previous experience into the work they make, which is why, even as the back half of the season exhibits more confidence, it also spends a lot of time consumed with the melodrama of various romantic entanglements. The straight people problems in this show are rote, but the depiction of a triangle between Amir, Jalen (Elijah J. Roberts), and Hazel (Kennedi McClure) is commendable, even if its easy resolution also strains credulity. That’s what I mean about A Different World lacking friction: every character on this show communicates as though they’re getting straight As from their psychotherapists. Stilted delivery and a lack of rhythm in the dialogue of early episodes made me wonder how much rehearsal time the actors—both the veterans and the new cast—had prior to shooting, and whether there were any writers on set making script changes during filming. How many writers or assistants on the show are members of gen alpha or gen Z?
These are the sort of questions critics and journalists used to be able to ask at the semiannual Television Critics Association press tour, another casualty of the recent past. The demise of the press tour and of full size writers rooms disproportionately affected younger and newer writers who most needed them for the learning experience they provided.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 04/10/2026

see now I done skeeted myself into finally starting this book see what I mean about not trying to do culture on colonizer time? This book came out in 2014!

A picture of the cover of the book THE DELECTABLE NEGRO: Human Consumption and Homoeroticism within U.S. Slave Culture by Vincent Woodward

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 01/10/2026

BRING BACK THE TCA PRESS TOUR GODDAMMIT www.soraya.press/a-different-...

If you were new to the job, as I was in 2016 when I attended my first press tour, simply sitting and listening to veteran critics and journalists was a great way to learn how to do the job and get better at it. It takes experience, both in writers rooms, and on production sets, to attain the mastery and instincts that undergird exciting work. When networks pressure creators to construct shows around algorithmically determined dopamine hits, that's not a system of art making, or even hackery. It's just cynical manipulation.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 27/09/2026

Seated for my first screening of the day. Send coffee!

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 24/09/2026

Oh he MESSY messy @status.news exclusive: The anonymous source behind one of the stories the White House cited to justify banning POLITICO was none other than Vice President JD Vance, Status has learned. www.status.news/p/white-hous...

The Source Behind The Ban
The anonymous source behind one of the stories the White House cited to justify banning POLITICO was none other than Vice President JD Vance, Status has learned.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 22/09/2026

tfw you ask the hairdresser to give you center part Gloria highlights AND you stand, always, on Free Palestine 🇵🇸, because you, a Black feminist, are studied in the art of containing multitudes

A selfie of a smiling Black Jewish woman (Soraya) with curly brunette hair that features two stripes of blonde highlights at the center part, a little follicular homage to Gloria Steinem.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 13/09/2026

"As of publication time on Sunday afternoon, Oracle stock is down 22% since the beginning of the year. The company has been spending heavily on data centers, and it recently became one of the major owners and security partners for TikTok’s U.S. operations."

A photo of Beyonce looking devious and pleased but trying to hold it in

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 13/09/2026

Furployees of the month. They excel at napping and general cuteness

A fuzzy white cat tree in front of a window with a view of verdant Brooklyn foliage. A gray tabby is loafing on the top cloud, while a void can be seen stretching a single paw outside the bottom-level cave. To the right of the cat tree is a bookshelf and a rattan incline cat scratcher.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 13/09/2026

apparently a glass of cava brings the Jolene notes forward

A selfie of Soraya with flaming locks of auburn wig, wearing a white zipup short sleeve sweater thing.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 12/09/2026

I just want my siblings in the truth business to treat white supremacy as the lie that it is.

Malia Obama, with auburnish boho braids, smokes a cigarette. She sports a look of ancestral exasperation

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 11/09/2026

"This is the work of Jewish Currents. In some form, this cry for repentance expresses itself in every article, every podcast, and every public conversation that my immensely talented colleagues create." 💗 @peterbeinart.bsky.social is the best jewishcurrents.org/newsletter/w...

Screenshot text from Jewish Currents
Dear Reader,

Yom Kippur’s best known prayer—al chet—is famously said in the plural. Each line begins: “For the sin which we have committed before You.”

Maimonides’ best known statement about teshuvah—often translated as repentance—is that the test of whether someone has truly repented is whether, when given the same opportunity to sin, they act differently.

Our generation of Jews, however, will never encounter the same circumstances that Jews faced in 1948, when Zionist militias and the Israeli army expelled more than half of the Palestinian population of Mandatory Palestine. The roughly 400 villages that Jewish armies destroyed are now gone. Nor can we fully repent for what a Jewish army—with the backing of Jewish leaders around the world—did after October 7. The Gaza that existed three years ago is largely destroyed.

But while the passage of time may render complete repentance impossible, Maimonides argues that lesser forms are still possible. They involve, among other things, an accounting of one’s misdeeds and a resolve to join “the path of righteousness.”

For Jews, collectively, this kind of repentance remains possible. It requires documenting what Israel has done–and keeps doing—to destroy the Palestinian people, and challenging the complicity of Jewish leaders and institutions in the United States. And it requires listening to Palestinians and reclaiming silenced voices from Jewish tradition so we can envision a path not of supremacy and genocide, but of righteousness.

This is the work of Jewish Currents. In some form, this cry for repentance expresses itself in every article, every podcast, and every public conversation that my immensely talented colleagues create. In this season, in which we reckon with the way in which all of us are judged, I hope you will support that work.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 11/09/2026

Was out doing research and reporting yesterday at Lincoln Center and happened upon dancers in dress rehearsal for "Table of Silence Project 9/11." Only snapped a few photos because I was so transfixed and utterly moved. Grateful to weep and remember in the company of fellow New Yorkers 💗

A photo of dancers, in white, arranged in concentric circles at Lincoln Center, dress rehearsing "Table of Silence Project 9/11," which they have performed every year since 2011 on the anniversary of 9/11.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 11/09/2026

I'll be hosting a talkback with director Maya Annik Bedward tomorrow at Quad Cinema, because the work of repairing the world, and its upside-down narratives continues on Rosh Hashanah too. Come say hi and shana tovah!

a promotional poster for screenings of BLACK ZOMBIE at NYC's Quad Cinema.

Filmmaker talkbacks are for the 7:15pm showings Sept. 11 and 12. I'm moderating the Sept. 12 talkback. Come say hi!

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 10/09/2026

We are not talking enough about the RNC showing Piker's meat pic during their jumbotron sizzle reel of all the ways America is going to hell And by talking I mean laughing b/c OMG the Freudian insecurity is so comically loud

The RNC put Hasan Piker's banana hammock thirst trap selfie on the jumbotron at their cult revival and blurred out the banana

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 07/09/2026

I'm SO late but this is magic to my ears?!?!? Oh my god? Like, just listening to Tressie and Christiana is lowering my blood pressure and clearing my skin. @tressiemcphd.bsky.social this is wonderful. Every single minute. Oh my goodness. Thank you for being you.

A Pocket Cast screenshot of "Pop Syllabus with Christiana Mbakwe Medina"

The State of Beauty Politics and What It All Means with Tressie McMillan Cottom

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 05/09/2026

(pre-departure) fit check b/c my hair has humidity sadness now

A selfie of Soraya standing against a wooden fence. She's wearing a blue and white striped oxford ahirt and black barrel trousers with a little gold ornament at the waist. She has a pair of gold reflective sunglasses on her head and is sporting a curly shoulder bob. She's holding a tan leather ostrich print handbag with oversize handles.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 05/09/2026

They are out here just slanging these lil girls around lolololol

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 03/09/2026

Gloria never stopped listening, never stopped being curious, never stopped learning. No one is a perfect feminist, whatever that is. Gloria was a beautiful, human, humble, generous one. andscape.com/features/wha...

Screenshot text: The biographical play Gloria: A Life, about Gloria Steinem, features Cherokee activist Wilma Mankiller explaining how the Iroquois Confederacy’s Great Law of Peace provided inspiration for the Constitution. Alas, when the Founding Fathers decided to poach the ideas of the earth’s oldest-living participatory democracy, they threw out the egalitarianism that went with it:

GLORIA: (To us.) Wait. Everybody knows democracy started in ancient Greece! Right? Then I research the Constitutional Convention and discover that Benjamin Franklin did use the Iroquois Confederacy as his model —

WILMA: — how Native nations across America convene to make mutual decisions —

GLORIA: … and also allow local autonomy for the tribes.

WILMA: Yes! Franklin hopes the U.S. Constitution will do the same for the 13 states. That’s why he invites two Iroquois men to Philadelphia as advisers.

GLORIA: (To us.) Guess what their first question is said to be —
GLORIA and WILMA: Where are the women

A photo of actor Christine Lahti as Gloria Steinem on the set of "Gloria: A Life," dressed in Gloria's trademark black, with a metal belt slung around her hips.

Screenshot text: I saw Gloria: A Life (now available via PBS’ Great Performances series) the night Kavanaugh was confirmed by the Senate in spite of the allegation he committed sexual assault as a teenager. At its conclusion, when the real Steinem emerged to lead the audience in a talking circle like those that typified the women’s rights movement of the 1970s, the crowd was full of anxious, weary, teary-eyed women wondering how to find the fortitude to keep trudging on. I’ve heard similar things from people who attended a performance of What the Constitution Means to Me on the same night. The audiences for both plays were filled with people, experiencing in real time just how tenuous their constitutionally guaranteed rights really were.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 03/09/2026

Thank you for everything Gloria 💗

A photo of a bespectacled, curly haired Soraya, ecstatic, next to Gloria Steinem, a real-ass feminist hero

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 28/08/2026

He's the foreman of the Cutie Patootie line

Black cat in the same multicolor chair as described in previous skeet, except now he's turned a little and now he's got his whole belly exposed and a lil smile visible

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 28/08/2026

I come home and this lil prince is knocked out like he just worked a double at the plant

A shiny black cat stretched on top of his favorite black and white plush blanket, which is draped over a chair upholstered in a multicolor mudcloth print. A bookshelf stands in the background with a shelf of orange-spined books most visible.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 26/08/2026

Had I followed Dolly and modeled my personal style after the woman I found most beautiful when I was a child, as she did, I'd be dressing like Lola Falana. And honestly, there's still time.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 25/08/2026

NYC, if you, like me, are grieving Dolly and want to commit an act of service in her honor, might I suggest volunteering with Reading Partners? 💗 readingpartners.org/get-involved...

Our Programs
Our direct tutoring model includes high-impact, one-on-one tutoring for students in both in-person and online formats.

Our volunteer-driven model engages community volunteers to support students in developing mastery of key reading skills. Volunteers are trained to implement our evidence-based curriculum rooted in the Science of Reading.

Our Powered by Reading Partners programs meet students where they are in the community.

We provide community partners with engaging, high-quality educational materials and extensive training to implement effective literacy tutoring with students.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 25/08/2026

they really do be this comically pressed by Black people just chilling, peacefully loving ourselves. And, I know this but still:

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 23/08/2026

These two have crafted an entire world behind the living room curtains. They have fans in the neighborhood and they talk to them through the window! Literally the routine is scream for breakfast, eat 2 bites, then head to the window for the endless live scroll of humans, cars, and dogs

A view of two cats in the window sill space between the curtains and the window. The void is standing on a cardboard window mount bed, posing like some sort of yearning ship captain, while the gray tabby lazes below and suns herself like she's his passenger

Two cats, one gray tabby and one void, loafing on a windowsill, in between the curtains and the window.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 23/08/2026

"What do you mean no one's written a long-running hit musical about Spinoza?"

An inquisitive black cat, Radamès peeks through the curtains where he's hanging out on his window perch, apparently wondering about the dearth of musicals about the life and times of Jewish bad boy heretic and Enlightenment beacon is that is Baruch Spinoza.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 22/08/2026

"If the recalls and the AI slop are horrifying enough, there will be no bread lines because no one will want to eat!"

Meme of the smug guy with the gold watch pointing to his clearly exceptionally genius noggin.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 18/08/2026

Also now you have some idea why I finally stood it up. It's on Ghost, so you don't have to worry about subsidizing the recirc of nazi propaganda! 😎

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 18/08/2026

Kara Young is my Rage Translator

A furious Kara Young, sporting blonde box braids, with Mallori Johnson behind her, in a still from IS GOD IS

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 18/08/2026

idk but I tried to be as gracious as possible

Screenshot from Soraya Nadia McDonald

Hi Ross, I'm afraid I have to decline. Given the amount of time and labor required to do this job properly I simply cannot afford to do it and that rate. Thanks for thinking of me and best wishes with TMR.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 18/08/2026

Hi! Are you delusionally pretending to be a 30-year-old and scheduling 2 press screenings and a play for yourself in one day? 🤡 You may be this woman:

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 07/08/2026

me to a mirror, when the sun sets:

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 06/08/2026

when you're pregnant with rage

Teyana Taylor as Perfidia Beverly Hills, in a black beanie and a red plaid lumberjack shirt unbuttoned and open over her hugely pregnant belly, firing a Degtyaryov RPD

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 06/08/2026

I think that only comes with the two dimensional life package

A still of Rosey the Robot from The Jetsons, following behind Mr. Jetson with a dustpan and broom as Mrs. Jetson observes

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 04/08/2026

It is 2006. I am 22. The US is mired in a costly Forever War. A predictable historic market collapse looms. I do not have health insurance. It is 2026. I am 42. The US is mired in a costly Forever War. A predictable historic market collapse looms. I do not have health insurance.

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 03/08/2026

WHY IS IT REASONABLE TO EXPECT ME TO ADOPT A SELF-DESTRUCTIVE AND WHOLLY UNREALISTIC PROTESTANT WORK ETHIC? I AM A JEW!

meme of Anne Hathaway, teeth clenched and raging, as Penelope in The Odyssey

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Soraya Nadia McDonald @soraya.press · 01/08/2026

YUP. The seasons of Outlander that take place in NC are triggering af. There's literally a "White Cross Road" around Raleigh-Durham/Fuquay-Varina NC and you did NOT want to be lost there at night and one Christmas, pre-GPS, I drove to the movies with a cousin and got lost. Terrifying.

Sam Heughan as Jamie Fraser in a scene from season 5 of "Outlander," in which he's getting his fellow Scotsmen, who are also tenant famers working land apportioned to Jamie by his buddy, the governor of North Carolina. (He wants them loyal to HIM, rather than the governor, when he inevitably turns against the governor and by extension, the British crown. A massive Celtic cross is burning behind him. He stands in a ring of people, as one man kneels and pledges his fealty to Jamie directly before joining Tryon's militia

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