Michael J. Fox’s iconic Back to the Future  turns 40 in 2025. The trilogy of films are all about time - the future, the past and the...

For six Fridays, from mid-November through Dec. 20, we met online to look at clips of classic Christmas movies through the lens of the...

This Giving Tuesday, December 3, 2024, we ask that you support our 501(c)3 nonprofit Y es, And...eXercise!  and help us redefine...

This holiday season, immerse yourself in the magic of storytelling with our free Christmas Movie Hero’s Journey online celebration! Led...

THE INTERSECTION OF YAX AND YOU The following quotes were pulled together by YAX Board Member, Susan Scarlett. They demonstrate the...

One of my favorite, very silly, barely game-games that we play in the Jam for Joy improvisation classes is YOU! One person starts by...

James Parkinson wrote “An Essay on The Shaking Palsy” in 1817, identifying the disease for the first time in medical and academic...

We just completed a wonderfully (and appropriately emotional) Cinema Therapy session featuring the Pixar classic, Inside Out ....

This is rough. There is more bad blood between Oakland and Las Vegas than a mob of Swifties and a MAGA rally. Just this week, Green Day’s...

One of my Cinema Therapy students, Terri Van Bibber, said those beautiful words to me after doing her fantastic presentation at the ...

When I picked up my dad on the morning of the A’s final game in the Oakland Coliseum, I asked how he was feeling. In what has become his...

We are all Unwritten. Natasha Beddingfield’s 2004 hit “Unwritten” is one of my favorite songs. The beat is magnetic and immediately gets...

Ryan Reynolds’ star power is soaring. He’s had a long string of solid hits, but nothing like what the role of Deadpool has done for him -...

And I’m on a hunt for stories. Your stories. However this is not the story you know, it’s the one you don’t yet. This is the one you’re...

Acknowledgement. Acceptance. Action. Those are three steps that are crucial in making a change. Some language from recovery and...

Do you love movies? I do, too. It has grown from a fascination to a passion to nearly an obsession for me. As a teen I loved going to the...

In The Shawshank Redemption , Andy Dufresne is technically an innocent man. He did not kill his wife nor her lover who she was cheating...

The Shawshank Redemption has been the number one rated film on IMDB for over 16 years. It turns thirty this year. I had the honor of...

Many people think of improvisation as just comedy. That’s understandable based on its popularity and the effect it has on audiences when...

You can read the first part of this story here. Frank Darabont opened Darkwoods Productions to have a place to develop his work. He had...