Aurelia Butler

More stories

  • 125 Shares149 Views

    in Movies

    The Animosity Tour and Other Promotional Movie Campaigns We Love

    For Jennifer Lopez, Sterling K. Brown, Dakota Johnson and others, the standard publicity push isn’t so standard anymore.In the 1999 rom-com “Notting Hill,” the sheepish bookseller played by Hugh Grant goes to a hotel expecting a date with the megawatt star played by Julia Roberts. He is surprised to find he has arrived at a press junket and looks adorably flustered as he’s shuffled from room to room, pretending to be a reporter from Horse & Hound to interview the stars of her space movie.The sequence is a handy introduction to this strange custom of film publicity: actors sitting in sterile suites for a parade of brief interviews. But these days that almost seems quaint. The press tour has taken on a life of its own, with stars like Dakota Johnson, Jennifer Lopez and Zendaya making news for the tour itself with quippy sound bites, inscrutable looks and fashion moments.It can be grueling for celebrities. Lupita Nyong’o recently described junkets as a “torture technique” in an interview with Glamour. But these cycles can be more entertaining than the movies themselves. Grant’s bookseller would be baffled to learn that you can categorize the tours as follows:The Animosity TourFlorence Pugh was pointedly not at the Venice Film Festival news conference for “Don’t Worry Darling” in 2022.Jacopo Raule/Getty ImagesThe promotion stops for nothing, not even cast members who appear to hate being in one another’s company. This seemed to be the case during the cycle for “Atlas,” Netflix’s new sci-fi flick starring Jennifer Lopez and Sterling K. Brown.During joint interviews, Brown seemed unable to help himself from making fun of Lopez. In one viral moment, he feigned surprise when she said she was Puerto Rican, before repeating her comfort meal of “rice and beans and like, you know, chicken” in overemphasized Spanish. In another moment, he jumped in and helped her out when her own Spanish failed her. After supplying the right word, he did a little dance. That clip prompted social-media users to wonder what J. Lo did to Brown. During these interactions Lopez looked perturbed, leaving plenty of room for observers to jump to conclusions.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

  • 138 Shares179 Views

    in Movies

    Adria Arjona on ‘Hit Man’ and How the Production Surprised Her

    The actress, who stars with Glen Powell, said that with the contract-killer movie, her ideas were finally valued in a writer’s room.Editor’s note: Spoilers ahead.Adria Arjona doesn’t like doing what she’s told.The co-star of the new Netflix romantic action comedy “Hit Man,” Arjona accompanied her father, the Guatemalan Mexican singer-songwriter Ricardo Arjona, on tour from the time she was young. It was a musical mentorship opportunity, so she ended up deciding early on: Music was out.He also made her read the poems of Pablo Neruda and the work of Gabriel García Márquez, so naturally, she said, all she wanted to do was listen to ’N Sync.“I do everything backwards,” Arjona, 32, said on a recent weekday morning over sparkling water at the Whitby Bar in Midtown Manhattan. “That’s just my personality — I just listen to my intuition. It’s not like I’m doing it on purpose or trying to be rebellious.”In “Hit Man,” directed by Richard Linklater, Arjona is Madison Masters, a desperate housewife who tries to hire a hit man, played by Glen Powell, unaware he’s a police operative. The rapturously reviewed movie is the latest entry in a 12-year-long acting career that has suddenly become white hot.She broke out in 2022 as the mechanic Bix Caleen in the streaming “Star Wars” series “Andor,” playing Cassian Andor’s fearless friend. (Season 2 of the Disney+ series, which she’s finished filming, is expected next year.) She also appeared as the betrothed daughter in the 2022 reboot of “Father of the Bride,” after roles in “Pacific Rim: Uprising” and Season 2 of “True Detective.”Arjona with Glen Powell in “Hit Man,” the Netflix action romantic comedy.Brian Roedel/NetflixWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

  • 113 Shares149 Views

    in Music

    Howard University Votes to Revoke Sean Combs’s Honorary Degree

    In a unanimous decision, the university’s board of trustees also moved to disband a scholarship in Mr. Combs’s name amid investigations into abuse allegations.Howard University announced on Friday that it would revoke an honorary degree that was awarded to the hip-hop mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs in 2014. The decision comes in the wake of Mr. Combs’s admission that he physically abused a former girlfriend, in addition to a slew of other allegations of abuse that have surfaced in recent months.At the conclusion of a meeting of the Howard University board of trustees, the body voted unanimously “to accept the return by Mr. Sean Combs of the honorary degree,” according to a statement released by the university. Howard also said that it would revoke all honors and privileges associated with the degree.Mr. Combs, 54, also known as “Puff” and “Diddy,” attended the university from 1987 to 1989 but left before graduating. In 2016, he pledged $1 million to establish the Sean Combs Scholarship Fund, which went to students in need of financial aid.Video footage surfaced last month of Mr. Combs striking, kicking and dragging his former girlfriend, Casandra Ventura, known professionally as Cassie, in 2016.“Mr. Combs’s behavior as captured in a recently released video is so fundamentally incompatible with Howard University’s core values and beliefs that he is deemed no longer worthy to hold the institution’s highest honor,” the statement said.Howard University did not immediately respond to additional requests for comment.In November 2023, Ms. Ventura filed a lawsuit accusing Mr. Combs of rape and physical abuse; they reached a settlement the next day. Then, in May, CNN published surveillance footage it had acquired from a Los Angeles hotel that showed Mr. Combs attacking Ms. Ventura near the building’s elevators.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

  • 100 Shares99 Views

    in Movies

    ‘The Interview’: The Darker Side of Julia Louis-Dreyfus

    At some point in almost every performance she gives, Julia Louis-Dreyfus has this look. If you’ve watched “Seinfeld,” “The New Adventures of Old Christine” or “Veep,” you know it — the perfect mix of irritation and defiance. As if she were saying, Try me.Louis-Dreyfus’s performances in those shows — from the eccentrically self-actualized Elaine Benes in “Seinfeld” to the completely un-self-aware Selina Meyer in “Veep” — were comedic master classes. But in recent years, she has been moving toward more introspective and serious work. Still, that “try me” vibe remains. She hosts a wonderful hit podcast called “Wiser Than Me,” in which she interviews older, famous, often (necessarily) sharp-elbowed women — Billie Jean King, Sally Field, Carol Burnett and Debbie Allen, to name a few — about their lives and careers and the crap they’ve all navigated. Last year she starred as a frustrated novelist and wife in the writer-director Nicole Holofcener’s movie “You Hurt My Feelings,” the second collaboration between the two women about the struggles of middle age. In her newest movie, “Tuesday,” which opens nationwide on June 14, Louis-Dreyfus plays a mother whose teenage daughter has a terminal illness. It’s a surreal, dark fairy tale that she was nervous about taking on. (She’s also got a recurring role in the Marvel Cinematic Universe: She was shooting “Thunderbolts” when we talked.)Listen to the Conversation With Julia Louis-DreyfusThe actress is taking on serious roles, trying to overcome self-doubt and sharing more about her personal life — but she’s not done being funny.At 63, Louis-Dreyfus says she’s still trying to prove herself (“always”), and that “Tuesday” is part of that process. “I’m certain nobody would have considered me for that role 20 years ago, and that’s probably because they just thought of me only as a ‘ha-ha’ funny person.” She’s still interested in TV comedy, she told me, but she’s loving this stage of her career, and getting to do more. “I just want to try it all,” she says. “It’s good for my brain.”You’re in a new Marvel film at the moment. It must be a very different kind of set to be on. What’s it like? It’s very well organized. Very methodical. And I don’t mean that in a negative way. Particularly on this film, they’re very much focused on, frankly, the human story, believe it or not. They’re trying to sort of go back to their roots, as it were. And so there’s a lot of focus on that. They’re trying to stay away from as much C.G.I. or whatever as possible, so that the stunts are, like, everywhere. And in fact, I had to do a couple.What stunts have you done? Well, I’m making this out to sound like I’m flying through the air like Captain America or whatever, but I’m not. It’s just a very, very, very, very brief stunt. More

  • 113 Shares169 Views

    in Movies

    Maya Hawke Doesn’t Want to Let the Vibe Die

    She just finished playing Flannery O’Connor and released a new album. Next up: “Inside Out 2” and a new season of “Stranger Things.”The actress and singer-songwriter Maya Hawke is on a self-awareness kick.Lately, she has been mindful of how she communicates, making an effort to be sincere and open. Career wise, she said, she’s been striving to foster collaboration and “no-bad-ideas energy.”Hawke, 25, plays Flannery O’Connor in “Wildcat,” a film released last month that is co-written and directed by her father, Ethan Hawke. In 2023, she acted alongside her mother Uma Thurman in the cinematic caper “The Kill Room.”Hawke has also been checking in with herself, making body scans part of her bedtime ritual. “It’s like a meditation thing where you tense all the different muscles in your body individually and try to let out your feelings,” she said during a video interview.Stress abatement is crucial as she focuses on back-to-back projects. She’s filming the final season of “Stranger Things” in Atlanta, her third album, “Chaos Angel,” dropped on May 31, and Pixar’s “Inside Out 2” — she voices a new character, Anxiety — opens June 14.Hawke got introspective as she talked about being “a little bit of a hypochondriac,” her habit of losing things and her love of a loose fit. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.1Voice MemosI’m a person who’s pretty constantly creative. That doesn’t mean all of the things I create are good. They’re mostly bad. But I try to keep track of them because I never know the difference in the moment. I always try to take voice memos of little melodies that I’ll come up with or an idea for a scene I’m writing or something I think my character should say that came to me randomly.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

  • 150 Shares119 Views

    in Music

    Gone in a Six-Year Flash: Farewell to the New York Phil’s Maestro

    The pandemic-derailed tenure of Jaap van Zweden, the orchestra’s music director, was too short to give us a full sense of him, as man or maestro.Jaap, we hardly knew ye.On Thursday at David Geffen Hall, Jaap van Zweden, the music director of the New York Philharmonic, conducted a lean, driven rendition of Mahler’s sprawling Second Symphony. After two more performances through Saturday, he will leave his Lincoln Center podium, a mere six years after stepping onto it.No Philharmonic artistic leader has been less present in front of its players and audience since Mahler himself, who died two years into his tenure, in 1911. There was barely enough time to meet van Zweden, let alone get a full sense of him, as man or maestro.He had no signature initiatives, and his choice of works revealed little personal stamp. His interpretations of the classics only occasionally relaxed from a tense punchiness. And though I wasn’t always displeased after hearing him lead a program, I was never inspired to return and hear it again.The period of van Zweden’s tenure has been hugely consequential for the Philharmonic. There was the orchestra’s survival through the extended pandemic lockdown, the renovation of its home at Geffen Hall and a flood of music by composers beyond the usual roster of white men of the distant past.But van Zweden, 63, has seemed more a participant in all this than a leader. When he was preparing to start in New York, he expressed enthusiasm about bringing back Deborah Borda, an industry legend, as chief executive. Having such a strong, visionary administrative partner, though, ended up making this feel more like Borda’s era than van Zweden’s.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

  • 138 Shares99 Views

    in Movies

    Jeannette Charles, Who Doubled for the Queen, Is Dead at 96

    She bore a startling resemblance to Elizabeth II. In “The Naked Gun” and other movies, and in comedy sketches on TV, she wore the crown lightly.Jeannette Charles, who transformed a portrait rejected by a royal art show into a career as a Queen Elizabeth II look-alike in movies and on television, died on Tuesday in Great Baddow, England. She was 96 — the same age as the monarch when she died two years ago.“Mum was a real character and a force of nature,” her daughter, Carol Christophi, said in announcing Mrs. Charles’s death, in a hospice. “She had an amazing life.”Mrs. Charles first acted in small repertory roles in regional theater. But her uncanny resemblance to the queen distracted audiences, who giggled and guffawed when she appeared onstage.That led to her playing the queen professionally — and for laughs — launching her on a career that lasted decades (until she retired in 2014 because of arthritis), if not quite as long as Elizabeth’s.Mrs. Charles with Leslie Nielsen in a scene from “The Naked Gun” (1988).Maximum Film/Alamy Stock PhotoShe played the queen in films like “The Naked Gun,” “National Lampoon’s European Vacation” and “Austin Powers in Goldmember.” She appeared in character everywhere from an episode of “Saturday Night Live” to supermarket openings.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

  • 100 Shares169 Views

    in Music

    My Starting Five Songs From Boston and Dallas

    Catch the N.B.A. Finals spirit with Erykah Badu, Pixies, Kelly Clarkson and more.Erykah Badu, repping for DallasErik Carter for The New York TimesDear listeners,Last night marked the start of the 2023-2024 N.B.A. Finals, a best-of-seven matchup between the Boston Celtics and the Dallas Mavericks. As a long-suffering and perpetually annoying fan of the Philadelphia 76ers, I do not really have a horse in this race*, but I also have an excess of energy I would normally reserve for rooting for one of these two teams. I have decided to put that energy to productive use by making a playlist of music by artists from both Boston and Dallas.Consider these musicians my starting five from each city. Both Boston and Dallas have rich and varied musical histories, as you’ll hear in this playlist’s blend of rock, pop, country, R&B, blues and hip-hop. It features bona fide superstars (the Texan Kelly Clarkson; the Dorchesterite Donna Summer) and influential legends (Dallas’s own Stevie Ray Vaughan; the Beantown art-rockers the Pixies). Sure, there are some omissions, but these are just my personal starting fives — and given how many times the ABC broadcast played “Sweet Emotion” when throwing to commercial last night, you’ve probably already hit your Aerosmith quota for the week.Game 1 was quite anticlimactic, with Boston blowing out Dallas 107-89, so hopefully the human Golden Retriever that is Luka Dončić will be able to galvanize his Mavericks into giving us a more competitive series. And if not, well, there’s always this playlist.She knows the highest stakes,Lindsay*Beyond an inborn and semi-irrational distaste for all Boston sports teams, of course.Listen along while you read.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More