With the much-awaited release of Hulu’s “The Handmaid’s Tale” only four days away, much has been said in the past 24 hours about who the story, in both its book and TV show form, is for.

In Saturday’s New York Times review, executive producer Bruce Miller discusses spearheading the show as a man when its creators initially wanted a woman to do so: 

“Offred spoke to me,” Mr. Miller said. “She’s in this nightmarish situation but she keeps her funny cynicism and sarcasm. She finds really interesting ways to pull levers of power and express herself.”

But Mr. Miller wasn’t a shoo-in for showrunner because producers were looking for a woman, he recalled. “The Handmaid’s Tale” has been a seminal right-of-passage novel for many young women for over three decades; a feminist sacred text.

“It’s sacred to me, too,” Mr. Miller said. “But I don’t feel like it’s a male or female story; it’s a survival story.”

At the show’s premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival on Friday, the starring actors placed a heavy emphasis on the show being a “human” story and not a “feminist” one. 

“I think that any story, if it is a story being told by a strong, powerful woman… any story that’s just a powerful woman owning herself in any way is automatically deemed ‘feminist,’” said Madeline Brewer, who plays handmaid Jane. “But it’s just a story about a woman. I don’t think that this is any sort of feminist propaganda.”

Elisabeth Moss, who plays the show’s main character Offred, echoed Brewer’s comments. 

“It’s not a feminist story, it’s a human story, because women’s rights are human rights,” Moss said. I never intended to play Peggy [from ‘Mad Men’] as a feminist and I never expected to play Offred as a feminist … I approach it from a very human place, I hope.”

Atwood has since responded by neither agreeing nor disagreeing with the cast. 

While the show doesn’t need to be labeled as “feminist,” and while it’s fine that a man who loves the story spearheaded its televised iteration, a story that a woman wrote about the forced subservience of women and their subsequent survival deserves to be owned by women. We get to claim it. 

The Handmaid’s Tale is a dystopian fiction, sure, but it’s one that has women storming to their local libraries to grab a copies of the book. Last month, women dressed up as handmaids and protested anti-abortion legislation in the Texas Senate gallery. And, at this year’s SXSW festival, women wore handmaids costumes and roamed the streets of Austin, Texas, as performance art. Even though the book was written more than 30 years ago, it is resonating with women all over again.

Rebecca Traister wrote about reading the book in the era of President Donald Trump for New York Magazine in Februrary. “[T]here’s no question that reading about Atwood’s imagined dystopia is far scarier today than it was, I suspect, for adults living in 1985,” she wrote.

For anyone who has read the book, there shouldn’t be much surprise as to why women feel so connected to it in this current political and social moment. After all, it feels closer to reality than the show’s creators wanted.

Moss, who also serves as a producer, acknowledged the eerie and terrifying parallels between Offred’s nightmarish journey and Trump’s America.

“We never wanted the show to be this relevant,” she told Entertainment Weekly in December.

The relevance of story is easy to spot.

In the dystopian theocracy of Gilead, where “The Handmaid’s Tale” is set, women’s bodies are policed and controlled by the male-run state. Handmaids’ only purpose is to bear children ― they have no rights, no freedom, no lives. Women are not trusted with their own bodies. 

America now has a president who brags about grabbing women “by the pussy.” This week, a lawyer in Tennessee said that women are “especially good at lying … because they’re the weaker sex.” A Missouri congressman said last year that becoming pregnant after a rape is a blessing from God. Rooms full of men make legislative decisions about women’s bodies. A panel of men in Maryland decided that rapists can continue to have parental rights over the children who were conceived by rape. And abortion access is under threat across the U.S. 

But the beauty of “The Handmaid’s Tale” ― something that Miller misses and perhaps what women connect to most deeply ― is that it is inarguably, explicitly, a story of women’s survival and audacity. 

The first time I read the novel, in the fall of 2015, I cried. Not because its content was so traumatizing. (It was.) And not because it felt so eerily similar to what was happening in our political landscape. (It did.)

I cried for lines like this:

 “We learned to whisper almost without sound. In the semidarkness we would stretch out our arms, when the Aunts weren’t looking, and touch each other’s hands across space. We learned to lip-read, our heads flat on the beds, turned sideways, watching each other’s mouths.”

And lines like this:

“I keep on going with this sad and hungry and sordid, this limping and mutilated story, because after all I want you to hear it … By telling you anything at all I’m at least believing in you … Because I’m telling you this story I will your existence. I tell, therefore you are.”

Atwood’s beautifully constructed prose is at its finest when she is portraying the sheer resilience of my fellow women.

In the wake of the presidential election, the resilience of women is what has kept me going. Women are resisting, calling, volunteering, donating… and living.

And like the fictional Offred ― whether Moss thinks she’s “feminist” or not ― we intend to survive.

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Beyoncé may be about to give birth to twins any minute now, but she still made time to reunite with her fellow independent women. 

On Friday, the singer shared a series of photos on Instagram from Kelly Rowland’s Whoa, Baby! book launch at The Grove in Los Angeles, which took place on Wednesday. 

The first three photos show Bey, dressed in an oversized blush-pink dress with flowing sleeves and a pair of tight over-the-knee boots. She accessorized with drop earrings and oversized sunglasses. She’s definitely nailing this whole maternity style thing. 

Bey was, of course, there with fellow Destiny’s Child members Rowland and Michelle Williams. The trio made sure to satisfy fans’ thirst for the supergroup and pose for a cute photo, complete with a Whoa Baby! filter. 

Fuck Cancer founder and CEO Yael Braun, hosted the book launch, and Rowland took to Instagram to thank Braun for hosting the event. “Thank you for being there and sharing you intelligence, humor, wit, and beauty with us all! I adore you!” Rowland wrote.

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It’s difficult to talk about “The Handmaid’s Tale,” Hulu’s adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s famous dystopia, without bringing up the story’s eerie relevance to contemporary politics. It is, after all, centered on a dictatorial regime hellbent on policing women’s bodies.

This was certainly the case during a panel discussion at Tribeca Film Festival on Friday night, during which many of the show’s cast and crew were asked how they felt about the political aspects of the series, set to premiere on April 26. When asked whether or not the story’s feminist themes in particular were part of the reason some of the actors were attracted to the project, the answers were somewhat surprising. 

“Any story about a powerful woman owning herself in any way is automatically deemed feminist,” Madeline Brewer, who plays handmaid Janine, told audiences after a screening of the show’s first episode. “This is a story about a woman. I don’t think this is feminist propaganda. I think this is a story about women and about humans. The three people hanging on the wall were all men. This story affects all people.”

“I really echo what Maddie said before,” Elizabeth Moss, who plays Offred, said. “It’s not a feminist story, it’s a human story, because women’s rights are human rights. I never intended to play Peggy [from ‘Mad Men’] as a feminist and I never expected to play Offred as a feminist.”

A few members of the audience, including MTV culture writer Rachel Handler, took to Twitter to express their concern with Moss and Brewer’s claims.

In response, another Twitter user thought it wise to see what Atwood, the keeper of the source material, thought:

Atwood didn’t necessarily refute the cast’s claim, but rather edited it to be more in line with a human rights-centric definition of feminism, one that many contemporary feminists already adhere to.

“It’s not only a feminist story,” she’d have them say, “it’s also a human story.”

In an earlier essay for The New York Times titled “Margaret Atwood on What ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ Means in the Age of Trump,” the author weighed in on whether or not she considered her novel to be feminist.

[I]s “The Handmaid’s Tale” a “feminist” novel? If you mean an ideological tract in which all women are angels and/or so victimized they are incapable of moral choice, no. If you mean a novel in which women are human beings — with all the variety of character and behavior that implies — and are also interesting and important, and what happens to them is crucial to the theme, structure and plot of the book, then yes. In that sense, many books are “feminist.”

Moss has taken a similar position in past interviews. On stage on Friday, she described her character’s actions and thoughts as being motivated simply by a desire to survive and reunite with her daughter ― not necessarily a cemented vision of feminism.

“For me, I don’t approach anything with a political agenda,” she added. “I approach it from a very human place, I hope.”

While several members of the cast seemed less willing to discuss politics point blank during the Tribeca panel, Ann Dowd, who plays a complex villain in “Handmaid’s Tale,” did not mince words. When asked what kind of impact she’d like the show to have on viewers. “I hope it has a massive effect on people,” she said. “I hope they picket the White House and I hope they’re wearing [’Handmaid’s Tale’] costumes.”

Her advice to fans who want to view “The Handmaid’s Tale” as a politically-charged warning was made clear: “Stay awake. Stay awake. And don’t for a minute think, well, I’ll get involved some other time. I won’t worry about the midterm election. I’ll just… no, no, no. Don’t wait. Just stay awake.”

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Tamar Arslanian knows that shop cats aren’t just cute, they can play a vital role in a city like New York that can feel a bit cold and brutal at times.

It all started when she started posting photos of two shop cats in her neighborhood — Jack, who lives at a wine shop and Kitty, who resides at a pilates studio — on social media, and was overwhelmed by the enthusiasm and interest of her fellow New Yorkers. Many of them had favorite local shop cats of their own.

“It’s then I began to realize how pervasive shop cats were in the city, and the important role they played in adding a touch of warmth – a sense of community even – in a place that can sometimes feel overwhelming and impersonal,” she told HuffPost in an email.

That realization inspired Arslanian to write “Shop Cats of New York,” a book that explores the lesser-known lives of the city’s most adored felines. She teamed up with photographer Andrew Marttila, who shot gorgeous portraits of the book’s furry stars.

Arslanian had some important criteria for which cats she included.

“First and foremost, I wanted to to feel confident the cats were well cared for and beloved,” she said.

As it turns out, she was pleasantly surprised by just how great the cats’ lives seemed to be.

“My biggest ‘ah ha’ was realizing the level of stimulation and attention these cats received in comparison to most house cats, mine included,” she said. “I see my cats for about an hour before work and a few hours in the evenings during the week, but I can’t say I’m actively playing with them for very long. It made me realize the level of enrichment these cats were receiving on a daily basis. In some ways they could be viewed as having fuller lives than most cats living in more traditional homes.”

That’s one reason why Arslanian would like to see more animal shelters and rescue groups be open to adopting out cats to businesses, not just traditional residences.

“Businesses could be vetted as are most adopters, and assessed to ensure the business and cat are a good fit for one another,” she said, noting that of course not all cats have personalities that would be suited to that environment.

See a selection of Marttila’s photos from the book below.

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Hulu’s soon-to-be-released adaption of Margaret Atwood’s 1985 dystopian classic, The Handmaid’s Tale, has yet to premiere, but that hasn’t stopped the showrunner and producers from dreaming about future seasons.

During a panel discussion that took place after a screening of the series’ first episode at Tribeca Film Festival, members of the cast and crew discussed all things “Handmaid’s Tale,” including how the source material for the adaptation of Atwood’s incredibly prescient novel leaves the door wide open for an expanded version of the story for TV. 

“When the book ends, the reaction is fury, because the way it ends is so cut off,” showrunner Bruce Miller told audiences on Friday night. “And so in some ways, immediately, the first thing you think of is ― how are we going to expand this story? Because that’s what your desire is as a reader.”

The book, he noted, is written strictly from the perspective of Offred ― one of the many handmaids living in the theocratic dictatorship known as Gilead, who are forced to function as sexual surrogates for leaders of the republic. In this indeterminate future version of the United States, sterility has become an overwhelming issue, resulting in a return to “traditional” values and widespread subjugation of women, particularly those of lower social standing who are capable of bearing children for more powerful men. 

“The book is so strictly from Offred’s point of view, that you hear about all of these amazing, interesting worlds and all of these parts of all of these things that are going on, but you don’t see any of them going on in the book,” Miller explained. “That, to me, as a TV series [showrunner], seemed like … once you create this world, you have a lot of places to go.”

“I wanted to know more,” he added. “I wanted to know what happens next. The end of the book is quite a mystery, so I get to make it up.”

The first three episodes of the Hulu series certainly center around the life of Offred (Elizabeth Moss), once a free mother and wife who’s now forced to live with, serve and produce children for a high-ranking commander in Gilead’s militant regime. But we’re also given a glimpse into the worlds of fellow handmaid Ofglen (Alexis Bledel), Offred’s best friend from college Moira (Samira Wiley), the commander’s wife Serena Joy (Yvonne Strahovski), handmaid trainer Aunt Lydia (Ann Dowd), and even the commander himself (Joseph Fiennes).

“You might not stay with Offred the whole time,” teased “Lemonade” cinematographer Reed Morano, the director of the first three “Handmaid’s” episodes.

Executive producer Warren Littlefield was more than willing to entertain the idea of future “Handmaid’s Tale” seasons as well:

The landscape of television right now is such an exciting playground for artists. The audience asks, each and every year, to only get more complex in character and more complex in story. Look at who’s up on stage. Each and every one of these actors ― the characters that they play ― there’s so much to explore. Where a limited series is certainly thriving right now in the television landscape, Bruce has years and the struggle continues. God knows it’s relevant. So […] we’ve only scratched the surface in the first 10 hours and our hope is that we leave you with, “Oh, I have to have more.”

“The Handmaid’s Tale” will premiere on Hulu on April 26. Meantime, here are some images from the show to get you excited:

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— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Hulu’s soon-to-be-released adaption of Margaret Atwood’s 1985 dystopian classic, The Handmaid’s Tale, has yet to premiere, but that hasn’t stopped the showrunner and producers from dreaming about future seasons.

During a panel discussion that took place after a screening of the series’ first episode at Tribeca Film Festival, members of the cast and crew discussed all things “Handmaid’s Tale,” including how the source material for the adaptation of Atwood’s incredibly prescient novel leaves the door wide open for an expanded version of the story for TV. 

“When the book ends, the reaction is fury, because the way it ends is so cut off,” showrunner Bruce Miller told audiences on Friday night. “And so in some ways, immediately, the first thing you think of is ― how are we going to expand this story? Because that’s what your desire is as a reader.”

The book, he noted, is written strictly from the perspective of Offred ― one of the many handmaids living in the theocratic dictatorship known as Gilead, who are forced to function as sexual surrogates for leaders of the republic. In this indeterminate future version of the United States, sterility has become an overwhelming issue, resulting in a return to “traditional” values and widespread subjugation of women, particularly those of lower social standing who are capable of bearing children for more powerful men. 

“The book is so strictly from Offred’s point of view, that you hear about all of these amazing, interesting worlds and all of these parts of all of these things that are going on, but you don’t see any of them going on in the book,” Miller explained. “That, to me, as a TV series [showrunner], seemed like … once you create this world, you have a lot of places to go.”

“I wanted to know more,” he added. “I wanted to know what happens next. The end of the book is quite a mystery, so I get to make it up.”

The first three episodes of the Hulu series certainly center around the life of Offred (Elizabeth Moss), once a free mother and wife who’s now forced to live with, serve and produce children for a high-ranking commander in Gilead’s militant regime. But we’re also given a glimpse into the worlds of fellow handmaid Ofglen (Alexis Bledel), Offred’s best friend from college Moira (Samira Wiley), the commander’s wife Serena Joy (Yvonne Strahovski), handmaid trainer Aunt Lydia (Ann Dowd), and even the commander himself (Joseph Fiennes).

“You might not stay with Offred the whole time,” teased “Lemonade” cinematographer Reed Morano, the director of the first three “Handmaid’s” episodes.

Executive producer Warren Littlefield was more than willing to entertain the idea of future “Handmaid’s Tale” seasons as well:

The landscape of television right now is such an exciting playground for artists. The audience asks, each and every year, to only get more complex in character and more complex in story. Look at who’s up on stage. Each and every one of these actors ― the characters that they play ― there’s so much to explore. Where a limited series is certainly thriving right now in the television landscape, Bruce has years and the struggle continues. God knows it’s relevant. So […] we’ve only scratched the surface in the first 10 hours and our hope is that we leave you with, “Oh, I have to have more.”

“The Handmaid’s Tale” will premiere on Hulu on April 26. Meantime, here are some images from the show to get you excited:

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