Tim Murphy NYC Writer

Toplessness–and even bottomlessness!–is par for the course in European fashion editorials and ads. So why not in the U.S.? Whether it’s Kim Kardashian’s bottom or Madonna’s nipples, nakedness is still a no-no on this side of the pond, which is perhaps why this story–for Yahoo Style–elicited thousands and thousands of comments! (But before you get your hopes up…all images here have been pixilated. Waaanh!)

For Yahoo Style, now directed by Elle vet Joe Zee, fashionistas including hairstylist Harry Josh and models Natane Boudreau and Kiara Kabukuru told me why so many style folks are getting deeply into meditation. It’s helping them find peace and groundedness in a crazed, fast-moving business…and it might even be helping them become nicer people! 

For The New York Times, I had the great pleasure of sitting down with actors John Lithgow and Alfred Molina to talk to them about playing a longtime gay married couple forced to live apart in Ira Sachs’ wonderful new film Love is Strange. I was taken by surprise at the end of the interview, in a way that reflected the film’s inevitably tear-inducing conclusion. 

For this July 2014 cover story for New York magazine, I talked to dozens of gay men of all ages and races about whether Truvada, the first pill approved to prevent HIV infection, would change their feelings about sex and intimacy. This is quite a frank and also very moving story if I don’t say so myself, so brace yourself!

In chatty New York City, few topics are off the table…except, that is, the Israel/Palestine conflict. Why do New Yorkers clam up? How can we talk about this productively without escalating into words that hurt or offend? In the wake of recent fighting in the region, I talked to a wide array of New Yorkers about this for New York magazine.

I pursued this question for New York magazine in the wake of Robin Williams’ death, talking to people who grieved for him–and for Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Cory Monteith–as though they were their own loved ones. Why the intense reactions? 

There’s a new French beauty in town. It’s Marine Vacth, an YSL and Chloé model turned actress (and 23-year-old mother!) I chatted with Vacth for the NYTimes’ T magazine blog about her starring role in François Ozon’s new film, Young and Beautiful, in which she plays a teen call girl from an affluent family whose youthful exploration of her own sexual power is interrupted by unexpected tragedy.

In summer 2013, the brutal beating death of young Harlem transgender woman Islan Nettles was but one of an alarming number of such assaults on trans women of color, often fatal, throughout the U.S. Half of all assaults on LGBTQ people in the U.S. are against trans women of color. On the bright side, this community is fighting back, demanding respect, legal rights and greater accountability from law enforcement for their safety. This special report I did for OUT magazine includes the impassioned voices of prominent transwomen Laverne Cox (from the TV show “Orange is the New Black”) and Janet Mock, author of Redefining Realness. 

New York expat Diane Pernet is an iconic figure in the streets of Paris, appearing daily in head-to-toe black mantilla, veil and sunglasses. She started one of the first fashion blogs nearly a decade ago and since then has founded a fashion film festival. I chatted with her for the NYTimes Styles section right before she brought her filmfest to her old hometown of Gotham for the very first time.

There’s a cool new social networking group in outer Bushwick, Brooklyn. They call themselves witches but they’re more about tarot cards and cool music than brooms and black cats. I hung out with them for the NYTimes Styles section and found out how they’re taking the traditional power of witches and applying them in our contemporary digital indie culture.