The Brief

A California bill that would allow health care providers to anonymously mail abortion drugs could soon become law, marking the latest effort by a blue state to safeguard access to medication abortion. 

The two-drug regimen of mifepristone and misoprostol is used in more than 60% of abortions in the U.S., and roughly a quarter of abortions are now done via telehealth, according to the Society of Family Planning. 
 
Under the measure, which the legislature is considering this week, doctors, pharmacists and others authorized to prescribe the drugs to end a pregnancy could leave their name off the prescription label. 

Abortion rights advocates say the measure adds to protections already on the books under the state's existing shield law, one of a handful nationwide that protects doctors who mail abortion pills out of state by shielding them from extradition and other legal actions from states with abortion bans. 

According to recent studies, shield laws have expanded abortion access – roughly 12,000 abortions a month are provided under the laws, the vast majority to patients living in the nearly two dozen states that ban or severely restrict the procedure. 

Now, as legal attacks against telehealth providers put shield laws to the test, some states have moved to strengthen the laws by allowing providers to prescribe anonymously, reducing their risk of legal or individual harassment.  To date, five states  — New York, Maine, Massachusetts, Vermont, and Washington — have passed these laws, while a similar bill in Pennsylvania is currently in committee.
 
"We've now had a solid two years of shield law provision, and like a lot of things, with real-world experience, we've identified areas [of the law] that can be strengthened or made more explicit," said Dr. Angel Foster, a co-founder of the Massachusetts Medication Abortion Access Project, a clinic near Boston that mails pills to patients in states with abortion bans. Massachusetts passed its bill allowing anonymous prescribing of abortion pills in early August. 

Recent legal attacks against doctors in New York and California, have put shield laws to the test. So far, they've worked as intended, says Greer Donley, a law professor at the University of Pittsburgh who has advised legislators across the country on crafting shield laws. "But it's clear that anti-abortion advocates are going to be looking very hard for additional cases they can bring." 

Removing the name of the provider from the label on the package adds another layer of protection, she says. "It makes it a lot harder to find the person you're trying to target." And protecting doctors can ensure that patients have access to abortions.

Opponents of abortion counter that shield laws have turned those states into safe havens for criminal activity. 

"So-called shield laws are yet another tactic abortion activists use to exploit the FDA's reckless mail-order abortion scheme," said Erik Baptist, senior counsel for Alliance Defending Freedom, the Christian legal advocacy group that led the fight to overturn Roe v. Wade in 2022. "These shield laws are designed to obstruct other states from protecting unborn babies and their mothers against the dangers of abortion drugs." 

California's key role in abortion access

If California passes this law, it could shape access to medication abortion for patients across the country, reproductive health advocates say. That's because California-based pharmacies have come to play a pivotal role in the distribution of abortion pills nationwide. 

Few shield law providers mail mifepristone themselves, with most relying instead on pharmacies in California. 

"We're really the main hub for mailing abortion pills," said Jessica Nouhavandi, lead pharmacist and co-founder of the online pharmacy Honeybee Health, which was the first U.S.-based online pharmacy to ship abortion pills directly to patients and remains the nation's largest distributor of mailed abortion pills. "Almost everything comes out of California, and mainly from Honeybee." 

One reason for that is the sheer amount of work required to dispense mifepristone, which is tightly regulated by the Food and Administration under special rules known as a Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy, or REMS. 

"The REMS really requires providers to be clinicians but also pharmacists," said Anna Fiastro, a researcher in family medicine at the University of Washington and a co-founder of Access, Delivered, a UW-affiliated research initiative that works to advance telehealth medication abortion services across the U.S. "On top of their clinical duties, providers have to order, stock and store the medication, which are all steps they're not taking to prescribe other medications."

The California bill, AB 260, would remove not only the name of the prescribing clinician, but also that of the patient receiving the medication and the pharmacy that mails it, effectively extending California's protections to providers across the country. 

"We're being asked to carry out standard-of-care medicine under the constant threat of legal harassment," Nouhavandi said. "This bill doesn't just protect providers legally — it's a statement that we're not alone. And that matters, because access to care only exists if there are people still willing to provide it." 

Legal attacks target telehealth providers

Recent legal attacks against a New York-based physician, Margaret Carpenter, have underscored the reality of those threats. In February, a Texas judge ruled against Carpenter in a civil suit brought by attorney general Ken Paxton, ordering her to stop prescribing and sending abortion pills to patients in Texas and imposing a penalty of more than $100,000.

Then, in January, Carpenter was indicted by a grand jury in Louisiana for allegedly prescribing abortion pills to a pregnant minor and charged with criminal abortion by means of abortion-inducing drugs. 

The indictment, the first issued against a U.S. doctor for providing abortion pills across state lines, came just months after Louisiana's Republican governor Jeff Landry signed a law reclassifying mifepristone and misoprostol as "controlled dangerous substances." Data from hundreds of studies and clinical trials and 24 years of approved use has shown that the pills are safe and effective, whether dispensed in person or via telemedicine. 

On Feb. 11, Landry signed an extradition warrant for Carpenter, though New York's Democratic governor Kathy Hochul has said she won't extradite Carpenter, citing New York's "strict shield laws that anticipate this very situation." Experts say both of the cases are likely to end up in front of the Supreme Court.
Still, advocates say the updates to California's law can't come soon enough. 

"This is really, really urgent," said a New York-based physician who spoke on the condition of anonymity due to the threat of legal actions. The physician is one of a handful of U.S. providers working on behalf of the Europe-based nonprofit Aid Access, the largest organization of shield law providers.  

"We're prescribing 12,000 pills a month to people all over the country," they said. "We need to get our names off these labels so that we don't have to live in fear." 

And that may be the real goal of cases like Carpenter's, says Farah Diaz-Tello, senior counsel and legal director at reproductive health advocacy group If/When/How: to scare and intimidate people in the hope that they'll be too afraid of possible legal action and give up. 

Copyright 2025 NPR

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has announced several significant rule changes for the 99th Oscars, including AI protections for actors and writers as well as expanded eligibility for international films.

In a statement to NPR, the Academy on Saturday said the changes are in response to listening to the global filmmaking community and addressing barriers to entry in its eligibility process.

The Academy added that its rules and eligibility standards have always evolved alongside technologies such as sound, color, and CGI, and that AI is no different. Awards rules and guidelines are reviewed and refined each year.

A blow for Tilly Norwood 

Among the most noteworthy changes, the Academy now explicitly states that only roles, "demonstrably performed by humans with their consent" are eligible for Acting awards. In other words, AI creations like the much-hyped Tilly Norwood cannot hope to win a Best Actress Oscar anytime soon.

Particle6, the production company behind Norwood, did not immediately respond to NPR's request for comment on Saturday about its creations' ban from consideration. In March, Norwood commented, "Can't wait to go to the Oscars!" in an Instagram post announcing its newly released music video.

The Academy also requires screenplays to be "human-authored" and said it reserved the right to investigate the use of generative AI in any submission.

Meanwhile, qualifying flesh-and-blood human actors can now be nominated for multiple performances in the same category if those performances get enough votes to land in the top five. So, someone like Anne Hathaway, who has five major movies scheduled for release in 2026, could now theoretically sweep the nominations – though that outcome seems extremely unlikely.

"If an actor has an extremely prolific year, might we even see someone swallow up three of the five nominations?," wrote Deadline's awards columnist and chief film critic Pete Hammond about the changes. "Probably won't happen, but it's now possible."

Under previous rules, an actor could only receive one nomination per category. If they had two high-ranking performances in Best Actor, for example, only the one with the most votes would move forward.

International films prioritizes filmmakers over countries

While international films can still be the official selection of their countries, now they can qualify by winning the top prize at a major international festival such as the Palme d'Or at Cannes, the Golden Lion at Venice, or the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize at Sundance.

Historically, countries "owned" the nomination, and only one film per country was allowed. The new rules allow multiple films from the same country to compete if they are critically acclaimed, and it shifts the honor from a geopolitical entity to the filmmakers themselves.

Largely positive response

The changes have prompted a largely positive reaction from the film community on social media, such as on the popular The Shade Room entertainment and celebrity-focused Instagram feed, where commenters widely praised the "human-only" move to protect creative jobs.

The Academy's Awards Committee oversees the rules in tandem with branch executive committees, the International Feature Film Executive Committee and the Scientific and Technical Awards Executive Committee.

The rules are scheduled to go into effect next year, covering films released in 2026.

Copyright 2026 NPR

Los Angeles changes fast, and oftentimes that means some of the architectural relics of our shared past get swept up and paved over in all the "progress." (RIP Garden of Allah.)

But there are still places where you can find ruins that tell a tale, like a long-forgotten speakeasy reputedly for old Hollywood near La Crescenta.

The ruins are still there 

On a recent afternoon, author and local historian Mike Lawler led me just beyond the boundary of Crescenta Valley Park. Joggers like me might have seen an old, towering stone arch shrouded by bushes there — and wondered what lies beyond.

Turns out there was once a place called the Verdugo Lodge back there and Lawler has spent years excavating its history.

A car speeds away from the lodge onto New York Avenue. The stone archway that still stands can be seen in the background.

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“It was a very high-end speakeasy for a time,” Lawler, who also helps run the Historical Society of the Crescenta Valley, said. “An amazing thing. And all the ruins are still here, just like this arch.”

Lawler said we don’t know exactly when the lodge was built, but we do have some of the picture starting in the late 1920s. The place was set up kind of like a timeshare where people bought 10 x 10 foot ‘tent lots’ that gave them access to on-site amenities. There was a golf course, stables, trout stream, a swimming pool — and a lodge with gambling and alcohol.

“The Crescenta Valley in the teens and '20s was a hotbed of moonshine, prostitution, all that stuff," Lawler said. "It was a quiet little community. But in all these canyons up here, stuff was going on. Illegal stuff!”

We don’t have a full guest list, but Lawler said it’s likely at least a few Hollywood types had gone up to the lodge to circumvent Prohibition era laws.

In some ways, it was kind of like the original glamping. Lawler said patrons probably weren’t doing much sleeping, though.

“They might have been unconscious!” he said with a chuckle.

Lawler led me to a road that swooped around a meadow. We passed by a massive swimming pool nestled into the hillside.

Once known as the “Crystal Pool,” it’s now empty and fenced off, with pitch black locker rooms below.

The exterior of the locker rooms for the old Crystal Pool.

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We continued our journey up the hill and eventually arrived at a cascading stone stairway.

And at the top, the big show: overgrown with orange monkey flowers and goliath agaves lies the foundation of the old Verdugo Lodge, with lofty stone fireplaces the only guardians keeping the surrounding oak trees at bay.

Lawler takes out a floorplan that one of the former owners drew up for him.

“This is what it was laid out like on the inside. So a dancehall, and band stand on that side... And then upstairs was the gambling,” Lawler said.

Lawler had in hand a copy of a Los Angeles Times article from 1933 he found. The headline reads: “Revelers Flee in Lodge Raid.”

“The police that raided it were here at 3 o'clock in the morning. And there were still 500 people here. And they said it was the classiest joint they had ever raided... Anyway, people were diving out of windows and everything,” Lawler explained.

In a ruin like this, covered with moss and overgrowth, the imagination can run wild, too.

The archway that still stands outside of what's now known as Mountain Oaks.

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Lawler pointed out a questionable door jam below the old dancefloor that’s been cemented over.

“That is a door. So what is behind there? So there’s a room in there that got walled in for some reason,” he said.

What we do know is that, sometime after the raid, the tawdry Verdugo Lodge and the surrounding land were purchased and then renamed Mountain Oaks by the Kadletzes — an entrepreneurial family who had run everything from a Turkish bath to a mini golf course. Over the next few decades, the family would rent the place out to local groups for recreational retreats.

The future of Mountain Oaks 

After they sold it in the ‘60s, Lawler said Mountain Oaks faced a “nightmare” of development threats. Over the years, some of the subdivided "tent lots" had been combined and sold off, Lawler said. A dozen private homes now stand on these pieces of land, next to the ruins of the Verdugo Lodge.

A map showing the Mountain Oaks public property acquired by The Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority (MRCA).

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Last year, with help from the City of Glendale, a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development grant among other funding sources, the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority (MRCA) put up $6.1 million to acquire 33-acres of the land — not including the private lots where the homes stand — so the public can continue to roam the meadow and ruins.

Paul Edelman, MRCA's director of natural resources and planning, said his group will continue to manage the land, doing things like brush clearance, trash pickup and sign maintenance. And he said there are no current plans to remove the ruins or make any major changes to the property.

“If somebody comes up with a grand idea where they can find some funding for us to do something to enhance it, we’re always open to it,” Edelman said.

The purchase was good news for local preservationist Joanna Linkchorst.

“I grew up directly up the hill. But I always saw the sign that said ‘private property’ and didn’t really think about it until several years ago when I finally asked Mike. And he said, ‘Oh yeah, we got a resort speakeasy down the street,’” Linkchorst said standing among the oaks and overgrowth.

Linkchorst, who founded the group Friends of Rockhaven to preserve another nearby historic site, said it’s been amazing to see all of the decaying structures that were still hiding out at Mountain Oaks.

“There’s almost like these little ghosts in your head as you imagine what it was like when there was a beautiful wood floor and there was a second floor that people came jumping out of,” Linkchorst said.

Now, let’s check in to the Overlook Hotel.

That’s the fictional place Stanley Kubrick brought to life in his 1980 film The Shining, loosely based on Stephen King’s novel of the same name.

A local architect who hails from South Pasadena meticulously crafted a 3D model of the iconic space so Shining fans everywhere never have to check out.

‘I just couldn’t stop’ 

At his day job, architect Anthony Chieh mainly works on residential and boutique commercial spaces. But over the course of five months, he spent his nights meticulously recreating a virtual replica of the Overlook Hotel from the film that first scared him when he was 12.

Of course he started with the deeply haunted Room 237. That’s where Jack Torrance, played by Jack Nicholson, has a terrifying encounter with a ghostly woman.

Chieh's 3D rendering of Room 237

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Anthony Chieh

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“But once I started, I just couldn’t stop,” Chieh told LAist.

“I ended up modeling the Colorado Lounge, and then after that I was thinking maybe I should make the lobby and then arriving to the Gold Room, and then Grady’s bathroom.”

“It’s like a rabbit hole,” he said.

Users who download Chieh’s free 3D model can fly through all of those spaces, immersed in atmospheric sounds and music from the film.

“It’s interesting to dive into these kind of fictional environments and try to make sense of it,” Chieh said. “And the hope is people will get a different perspective once they’re in there.”

Kubrick’s take on the Overlook was famously inspired by real hotels like the Timberline Lodge in Oregon and the Ahwahnee in Yosemite. But the interiors you see in the film were created on sound stages in England.

“Real architecture, physical buildings, are built for people to live. And for movies, these are more meant to express the emotional aspect of things. It’s a psychological construct,” Chieh said.

In a recently published video essay on YouTube, Chieh dives deep into those psychological constructs and how, as he puts it, “Kubrick designed the Overlook Hotel not as a backdrop, but as the film's true villain.”

How spaces scare 

Chieh said during the monthslong process he was reminded of the power of architecture and design in the real world too – whether it’s an uncomfortably repetitive carpet design or a claustrophobic hallway.

“A physical construct can affect your emotion,” Chieh said.

“You can use it in a way to make people feel comfortable and you can also use it in a way to create fear.”

Chieh's 3D rendering of the Torrance's apartment in 'The Shining'

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Anthony Chieh

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What’s next for this architect moonlighting as a 3D modeler?

Chieh says he’s thinking about giving the spaceship from “2001: A Space Odyssey" the virtual treatment next. Or maybe turning to a local non-fictional space, like the Stahl House.

That is, of course, if he can ever escape the Overlook.