Calendar Feedback: Taylor and Travis aren’t the only ones singing K.C.’s praises

Kansas City gets it right

This past August, my daughter and I flew into Kansas City for a working vacation. [“Kansas City’s rise gets a Swift boost,” Mary McNamara, Sept. 29] After our plane landed, but before we collected our luggage, we stepped into a bathroom. It turned out to be a large “All Gender” bathroom, with a wall of stalls on one side of the room, and a wall of sinks on the opposite side. Every airport guest — regardless of whether they identified as cis-male, cis-female or anything else — could just pop into the large common room, do their business, wash their hands and be on their way.

Everything is indeed up to date in Kansas City! When will the rest of the country follow suit on their no-nonsense approach to recognizing our common humanity?

Tracy Neis
Placentia

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Mary’s son is indeed correct that Kansas City is an awesome city. But not only is K.C. the “Paris of the Plains” (as MM notes in her article), but it also has a bit of “Rome” as well since it has the second most total fountains of any city in the world (after the Italian capital).

Ross Miller
Cheviot Hills

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Can’t fight progress

Mary McNamara fears that AI will reduce the opportunity for both actors and nonactors to earn money doing background work [“Actors can’t afford to bend on AI,” Oct. 3]. Does she also lament bank teller jobs lost to ATMs, gas station attendant jobs lost to automated pumps and elevator operator jobs lost to automated doors?

Gerry Swider

Sherman Oaks

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‘Wonderful’ really isn’t

Times film critic Justin Chang has dubbed director Wes Anderson’s film of Roald Dahl’s story “The Wonderful World of Henry Sugar” a “brilliant new adaptation” [“Wes Anderson sweetens the pot,” Sept. 29].

I beg to differ. A cast of superb actors are directed to present their characters in a relentless staccato vocal monotone, devoid of any true or variegated expressiveness. It is embarrassing to watch their gifts so manhandled. And, perhaps more crucially, what is meant to be the meaning of this tale? A satire on American, British and/or universal mores and culture? Try Mark Twain, Jonathan Swift or Richard Brinsley Sheridan. Your time will not then be wasted.

William Smithers
Santa Barbara

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Backing for live theater

Theater is an ancient art form that synthesizes various forms of arts and crafts — from writing to public presentations to carpentry and stagecraft, to costuming to the engineering of sound and lighting [“You have to be in their faces,” Sept. 28]. What’s more, theater is inherently humane and sociological, dealing with interpersonal dilemmas and psychological crises and conflict. In short, live theater is one of the oldest forms of education available to people and to society. It’s high time theater be given the economic support it has earned over the millennia, well exemplified by the Federal Theatre Project, established by the Franklin Roosevelt administration during the Great Depression of the 20th century.

Ben Miles
Huntington Beach

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80 for the win

Once again, a Mary McNamara column has motivated me to write The Times [“60 isn’t the new 40 and that’s fine by me,” Sept. 25].

Her humorous discussion of “60 being the new ?” was spot-on and an entertaining read. As an 80-something, I can assure all that 80 is not the new 60, 70 or even 79. Eighty feels exactly like 80 with seemingly a new pain each day. However, each new day is a gift and being alive is a pleasure and crushes the alternative.

Paul Updegrove
Sherman Oaks