Aurelia Butler

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    Yukihiro Takahashi, Pioneer of Electronic Pop Music, Dies at 70

    A drummer and singer, he was best known as a member of Yellow Magic Orchestra, one of Japan’s most successful bands and a major influence on hip-hop, techno and New Wave.Yukihiro Takahashi, a drummer and vocalist whose wide artistic range and gleeful embrace of music technology made him a leading figure in Japan’s pop scene for nearly 50 years, most prominently with the Yellow Magic Orchestra, one of his country’s most successful musical acts, died on Jan. 11 in Karuizawa, Japan. He was 70.The cause was aspiration pneumonia, a complication of a brain tumor, his management company said in a statement.Mr. Takahashi and Yellow Magic Orchestra, which he founded in 1978 with the musicians Ryuichi Sakamoto and Haruomi Hosono, were often ranked alongside the German electronic group Kraftwerk as pioneers in electronic music and significant influences on emergent genres like hip-hop, New Wave and techno.Yellow Magic Orchestra was among the first bands to employ in live shows devices like the Roland TR-808 Rhythm Composer and the Moog II-C synthesizer, which they used to complement Mr. Hosono’s funky guitar and Mr. Takahashi’s tight, driving drums.Unlike their German counterparts, who leaned into the avant-garde nature of electronic sound and referred to themselves as automatons, Yellow Magic Orchestra found ways to bend it toward pop music, blending in elements of Motown, disco and synth-pop.In a 1980 appearance on the television show “Soul Train,” the band performed a souped-up version of Archie Bell and the Drells’ “Tighten Up,” after which a bemused Don Cornelius, the show’s host, interviewed Mr. Takahashi. Kraftwerk, it might go without saying, never appeared on “Soul Train.”Mr. Takahashi “was remarkably skilled at taking what were obviously artificial, technologically mediated sounds and using them to build songs that sound fully and organically human,” Michael K. Bourdaghs, a professor of Japanese literature and culture at the University of Chicago, said in a phone interview.The band and its tech-inflected sound arrived at just the right time. Japan had long since remade itself as a postwar economic engine, but by the late 1970s it was becoming something else: a global emblem of techno-utopianism and futuristic cool. Sony released the Walkman in 1979, just as Kenzo Takada and Issey Miyake were taking over Paris fashion runways with their playful, visionary designs.Yellow Magic Orchestra’s eponymous debut album, released in 1978, sold more than 250,000 copies; its 1980 sophomore release, “Solid State Survivor,” sold some one million. Six of the band’s seven studio albums reached the top five in the Japanese pop charts, and all of them provided fodder for covers and samples far beyond Japan.Afrika Bambaataa, 2 Live Crew, J Dilla and De La Soul were among the many acts who borrowed liberally from Yellow Magic Orchestra’s archive. Michael Jackson remade its song “Behind the Mask,” though his version was not released until 2010, after his death.The band’s music also inspired composers of early video game soundtracks who were looking for electronic sounds that could remain compelling even after hours of play. Yellow Magic Orchestra titled the first track on its debut album “Computer Game ‘Theme from The Circus,’” and Mr. Takahashi later wrote music for several games.He and his bandmates were already established musicians when they formed Yellow Magic Orchestra, and they continued to release solo projects during the group’s six-year run. Mr. Takahashi released some 20 albums during his career, not counting numerous remastered reissues and live recordings.Neither he nor the band ever sat still artistically. His first group, the Sadistic Mika Band, brought glam and prog rock to Japan in the early 1970s and was among the first Japanese acts to achieve success outside the country — it toured Britain with Roxy Music and played on the BBC.Mr. Takahashi’s 1978 solo album, “Saravah!,” produced by Mr. Sakamoto, drew on bossa nova and reggae influences, while the album “Yellow Magic Orchestra” later that year tweaked Orientalist stereotypes, most notably in a cheeky cover of Martin Denny’s tiki-inspired “Firecracker.”Yukihiro Takahashi, in hat and shades, performing with Yellow Magic Orchestra in New York City in 1979.Ebet RobertsBoth before and after Yellow Magic Orchestra, Mr. Takahashi was a frequent and eager collaborator, forming bands on the fly and bringing in friends to play on individual tracks. He often worked with the British guitarist and singer Bill Nelson, as well as Andy Mackay and Phil Manzanera of Roxy Music.Mr. Takahashi wrote much of the music played by Yellow Magic Orchestra; he also played drums and sang lead vocals, though many of their songs were instrumentals.His voice was rich and louche, strikingly similar to that of Bryan Ferry of Roxy Music, especially on early hits like “Drip Dry Eyes” (1984). He sported a pencil mustache and, in later years, a fedora and thick-rimmed eyeglasses. Like Mr. Ferry, he came across as effortlessly cool and ever-so-slightly world-weary, a hipster who believed in better days to come.“We had hope for the future, unlike now,” Mr. Takahashi said in a 2009 interview, seated between Mr. Sakamoto and Mr. Hosono. “We used to say we will make music that’ll be a bridge to the future.”Yukihiro Takahashi was born on June 6, 1952, in Tokyo. He began his music career early, playing drums with college bands while still in junior high school and starting as a session musician at 16.He is survived by his wife, Kiyomi Takahashi; his brother, Nobuyuki Takahashi, a music producer; and his sister, Mie Ito.He studied design at Musashino Art University in Tokyo, but did not graduate. During the 1970s, he developed his own clothing line, Bricks; he often designed the outfits worn by Yellow Magic Orchestra, including a striking trio of bright red Mao suits.Yellow Magic Orchestra broke up in 1984, its members citing musical differences. All three went on to successful solo careers — Mr. Sakamoto won an Academy Award for his soundtrack to Bernardo Bertolucci’s “The Last Emperor” (1987) — but they remained close, and occasionally reunited. They released an album in 1993, “Technodon,” and appeared at a 2012 benefit concert to oppose nuclear power.“We followed a rock band path, so we stopped” playing as Yellow Magic Orchestra, Mr. Takahashi said in 2009. “But on second thought,” he added, nodding toward his bandmates on either side of him, “I couldn’t think of anybody I respect more.”Miharu Nishiyama More

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    Edie Landau, Film Producer Ahead of Her Time, Dies at 95

    She and her husband invented a model for faithfully adapting acclaimed literature, illuminating an alternate path for independent cinema.Edie Landau, who in the 1970s and ’80s was one of the few women producing films, working outside the studio system with her husband, Ely Landau, to offer unconventional movies to a mass audience, died on Dec. 24 at her home in the Century City section of Los Angeles. She was 95.The death was confirmed by her son, Jon.In the 1980s and ’90s, thanks to figures like Jim Jarmusch, Quentin Tarantino and Wes Anderson, indie film was associated in the public imagination with writer-directors too young and eccentric for the studio system. In the years before then, the Landaus produced artistically ambitious indie movies that followed a different model, adapting great works of literature into movies for both the big and small screens.Their focus was plays. In the early 1970s, the Landaus started the American Film Theater, which invited viewers to subscribe to regular screenings of movie versions of works by Eugène Ionesco, Bertolt Brecht, Edward Albee and others.There had long been movies based on great plays like “A Streetcar Named Desire” that fully translated theater into the idiom of cinema. But the American Film Theater tried something different, faithfully abiding by the plays’ texts in simple, inexpensive productions.The Landaus produced more than a dozen films, often featuring eminent figures in surprising roles. In 1973, the tough-guy movie star Lee Marvin appeared in a film version of Eugene O’Neill’s “The Iceman Cometh.” The next year, in an unusual turn as a film director, Harold Pinter oversaw the adaptation of Simon Gray’s “Butley.”Zero Mostel and Karen Black in the 1974 movie adaptation of the Eugène Ionesco play “Rhinoceros,” one of the first productions of the Landaus’ American Film Theater.Looking back at the project in The New York Times in 2003, the film historian and critic Richard Schickel described it as a “noble experiment,” with some productions that were “close to God-awful” and others that ascended to “masterful movie making.”Ms. Landau frequently acted as a minder of budgets and an organizer on set, but over time she took on an increasingly creative role in her partnership with her husband, particularly after he had a stroke in the 1980s.She took the lead in putting together “Mr. Halpern and Mr. Johnson” (1983), an original HBO drama starring Laurence Olivier and Jackie Gleason. She developed a relationship with the writer Chaim Potok and shepherded his 1967 novel, “The Chosen,” into movie form in 1981 and into a musical adaptation for the stage in 1987.“It was a given that ‘The Chosen’ was to be a musical from the very beginning, ever since Edie Landau approached me with the idea two and a half years ago,” Mr. Potok told The Times in 1987.Richard F. Shepard of The Times praised the 1981 movie for recreating 1940s Brooklyn “with such fidelity that the tree-lined quiet streets of Williamsburg and the particular Jewish life on them seem to have emerged intact from a just-opened time capsule.”A scene from the 1981 film version of the Chaim Potok novel “The Chosen,” produced by the Landaus.Analysis FilmEdythe Rudolph was born on July 15, 1927, in Wilkes-Barre, Pa. Her father, Harry, was a minor-league baseball umpire who later worked as a projectionist at Manhattan movie theaters owned by Edie and Ely. Her mother, Rose (Zatcoff) Rudolph, was an office clerk.After graduating from Wilkes University with a bachelor’s degree in education in the late 1940s, Edie moved to New York City, where she worked as an assistant at radio and television production companies, hoping to move up the corporate ladder. While working at the television distribution company National Telefilm Associates, she met Ely Landau, one of the company’s founders. They married in 1959.That year, WNTA, a New York television station owned by National Telefilm, began airing “Play of the Week,” an anthology series that anticipated the American Film Theater. Ms. Landau worked her way up to become executive vice president of National Telefilm and oversaw some of its original programming, including “Play of the Week.”The Landaus’ children followed them into careers behind the scenes in the performing arts. Alongside the director James Cameron, their son, Jon, produced “Titanic” (1997), “Avatar” (2009) and the recently released “Avatar: The Way of Water.” Their daughter Tina Landau is a prominent theater director. And their daughter Kathy Landau is executive director of the Manhattan arts organization Symphony Space.Jon recalled how being able to work on the movie adaptation of “The Chosen” launched his own producing career, and how his parents invited the producer Hillard Elkins to a performance of a play written by Tina and performed at her high school, which led to its staging in a professional Los Angeles theater.Mr. Landau credited his mother with those breakthroughs. “She was the one who would make things happen,” he said.Ms. Landau was often the only woman in a room full of men wearing suits. The men in this undated photo include her husband, seated second from left.via Jon LandauMs. Landau’s first marriage, to Harold Rein, ended in divorce. Ely Landau died in 1993. Ms. Landau’s children survive her, along with a stepson, Les Landau; four grandchildren; two step-grandchildren; and two step-great-grandchildren.Photographs from her days as a film producer reveal that Ms. Landau was often the only woman in a room full of men wearing suits.She hit back at what she plainly called “discrimination of women” in 1958, when she filed a formal complaint against United Airlines for not permitting her to board a Chicago-to-New York “executive flight” — a cocktail-and-steak journey designed for men only. Ms. Landau — who later earned a law degree from the University of West Los Angeles just for fun — told the airline that she was an executive, too.The incident turned out to be a harbinger of repeated protests that finally led to scrapping the flights in 1970.After retiring, Ms. Landau wrote poetry. One concise work was titled “That Was Then, This Is Now”: “Please remember that I was once a major executive, not just a house wife,/So please trust me now to be C.E.O. … of my own life.” More

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    Prosecutors to Announce Whether They Plan Charges in ‘Rust’ Case

    More than a year after the fatal shooting, Santa Fe County prosecutors said they would announce on Thursday whether anyone would be charged in the case.Prosecutors in New Mexico are set to announce on Thursday whether they will file criminal charges in the fatal shooting of a cinematographer on the set of “Rust,” after more than a year of investigation and delays.The district attorney’s office that serves Santa Fe County said on Wednesday that the district attorney, Mary Carmack-Altwies, and the special prosecutor appointed to investigate the case, Andrea Reeb, would announce the decision in a written statement. The office has spent more than two months weighing a charging decision after the county sheriff’s office delivered its final investigatory report.While requesting additional funding from state officials last year, the office said that up to four people — including the actor Alec Baldwin, who was holding the gun when it went off — could be charged in the shooting. The district attorney’s office said in its request that any decision to bring charges would result in high-profile and costly trials.While Ms. Carmack-Altwies made it clear in the funding request that her office had not decided whether to bring charges — “If charges are warranted,” she began one sentence — it also went into greater detail than she had in the past. “One of the possible defendants is well-known movie actor Alec Baldwin,” said one of the attached documents.The state approved more than $300,000 for the hiring of additional employees, with the possibility of more funds later on.On Oct. 21, 2021, Mr. Baldwin was positioning an old-fashioned revolver for a close-up on the set of the western when the gun discharged, killing the cinematographer, Halyna Hutchins, and wounding the film’s director, Joel Souza. Mr. Baldwin has denied wrongdoing, asserting that he did not pull the trigger and that Ms. Hutchins was directing him where to point the gun.Central to the investigation by the Santa Fe County Sheriff’s Office were Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, the crew member in charge of the guns on the set; Dave Halls, the movie’s first assistant director, who said he inspected the gun that day before handing it to Mr. Baldwin; Seth Kenney, the movie’s primary supplier of guns and ammunition; and Sarah Zachry, the movie’s props master, who worked closely with Ms. Gutierrez-Reed. All four individuals have denied wrongdoing in interviews with investigators or through their lawyers.After the shooting, investigators found five live rounds on the set, in addition to the bullet that had been fired from the gun. The final report by the sheriff’s office did not offer any theories about how that ammunition ended up on the set. More

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    Our Predictions for the Oscar Nominees in Six top Categories

    It’s an unusually wide open year for the Academy Awards. But our expert has a good idea about what will make the cut. Here are his projections.When it comes to the Oscar nominations, which will be announced on Tuesday, I would advise you to expect the unexpected: This is an unusually fluid awards season, and most of the top categories still feel up for grabs.(Well, all the top categories except for the supporting actor race. But who won’t be excited to watch the “Everything Everywhere All at Once” star Ke Huy Quan win that one in a walk?)Still, as your Projectionist, it’s my job to at least give you a hint of the unexpected, so with that in mind, here are my projections for the nominations in the top six Oscar categories, gleaned from industry chatter, the televised boosts offered by the Golden Globes and Critics Choice Awards, and the recent nominations from the Screen Actors Guild, Producers Guild of America and Directors Guild of America.Best PictureThree films have been nominated by the producers, directors and actors guilds — “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” “The Fabelmans” and “The Banshees of Inisherin” — and each has won a televised award for best film, too. Those are your front-runners in a category that recently expanded to 10 guaranteed slots, followed closely by “Tár,” the intellectual favorite, and “Top Gun: Maverick,” the popcorn pick.The next two slots should go to two box-office success stories: “Elvis,” the rare adult drama to make a killing last year, and “Avatar: The Way of Water,” which has put up eye-popping numbers all through the Oscar-voting period and is poised to pass $2 billion worldwide.What about another huge sequel, “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” which made the producers’ lineup, and the epic-scaled “RRR” and “The Woman King,” both of which that guild snubbed? ABC executives would be thrilled if the telecast could tout those crowd-pleasers, but the expanded best picture lineup has never been dominated by so many action-driven blockbusters. (And I’d have more faith in “Wakanda Forever” if the Screen Actors Guild, which gave the first “Black Panther” its top film prize, had nominated this sequel in the same category.)The best actor winner almost always hails from a film nominated for best picture, so if you think a resurgent Brendan Fraser could go all the way this year, then expect a nod here for “The Whale,” which cast him in a transformative role as a 600-pound recluse. And though Netflix has been pushing “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery,” it’s the streamer’s German-language “All Quiet on the Western Front” that most resonates with the voters I’ve spoken to.There’s still a shot that the Sarah Polley-directed “Women Talking,” which received a SAG ensemble nomination, or the British fave “Aftersun” could show up here. But I’m predicting the final slot goes to the class-warfare comedy “Triangle of Sadness,” which won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, just as another social satire, “Parasite,” did four years ago.Best DirectorLast year, four of the five people nominated by the Directors Guild also went on to receive an Oscar nomination, and I expect that crystal ball to prove just as predictive this time around. The safest contenders appear to be Steven Spielberg, whose ninth Oscar nomination would tie him with Martin Scorsese for the second-most best director nominations ever, behind William Wyler’s 13; Todd Field for “Tár; and Daniel Scheinert and Daniel Kwan, who directed “Everything Everywhere All at Once” and will be the first duo nominated in this category since Joel and Ethan Coen for 2010’s “True Grit.”Martin McDonagh failed to make the best director lineup for his Oscar-winning “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri,” a reminder that dialogue-driven comedies aren’t always showy enough for this branch. Still, I expect that his new film, “The Banshees of Inisherin,” where the conversations are punctuated by some stunning scenery, will finally earn him entry into this race.I’d be a bit surprised if the fifth D.G.A. pick, the “Top Gun: Maverick” director Joseph Kosinski, makes it in: The film is well-made, but it lacks an auteurist stamp. “Avatar: The Way of Water” could only have been directed by James Cameron, but voters will probably wait until his franchise concludes to honor him. And though there are worthy women who ought to be contenders in this category — among them, Gina Prince-Bythewood (“The Woman King”), Sarah Polley (“Women Talking”) and Charlotte Wells (“Aftersun”) — their films aren’t assured of making the best picture lineup.There could be a surprise from the international film community here, as this branch has recently sprung for the likes of Ryusuke Hamaguchi and Thomas Vinterberg. But I’m betting on a big name, the Australian auteur Baz Luhrmann (“Elvis”), who has embraced the awards-season campaign trail with zeal.Best ActorThis front-loaded race boasts four contenders that pull from some of the academy’s most favored archetypes. You’ve got a makeup-aided comeback performance (Brendan Fraser in “The Whale”), a movie star proving there’s more to him than people might have suspected (Colin Farrell in “Banshees”), a singing, strutting biopic performer (Austin Butler in “Elvis”) and a well-regarded but oft-overlooked veteran (Bill Nighy in “Living”).After that, there are no guarantees. Though “Top Gun: Maverick” will rack up mentions in other categories, when academy voters consider nominating a Tom Cruise performance, they want to see him stretch. Other big stars in contention all have significant drawbacks: Hugh Jackman (“The Son”) leads a film that was critically savaged, Tom Hanks scored a heartland hit (“A Man Called Otto”) that coastal voters aren’t watching, and Will Smith (“Emancipation”) … well, you know.Occasionally, you’ll see someone in the best actor category whose film doesn’t factor into any other race, but that party crasher is usually a well-respected veteran — a Denzel, a Willem, a Viggo — and not Adam Sandler, whose SAG nomination for the basketball drama “Hustle” may be all he can muster. So I’m projecting that our fifth nominee will be Paul Mescal, whose acclaimed “Aftersun” is at least in best picture contention, and whose rising-star trajectory (after his breakthrough in the limited series “Normal People”) is something the academy will be keen to get in on.Best ActressThe duel between the “Tár” star Cate Blanchett and the “Everything Everywhere” actress Michelle Yeoh will almost certainly be Oscar night’s most suspenseful contest. But in the meantime, who will keep the two of them company in this category?Like Blanchett and Yeoh, Viola Davis of “The Woman King” was nominated by the Screen Actors Guild, the Golden Globes and the Critics Choice Awards, so she should have a safe berth here. The other two slots are harder to call. Ana de Armas managed a SAG nomination for playing Marilyn Monroe in “Blonde,” but the movie is polarizing. And as Oscar voting began, a raft of famous names suddenly took to social media to tout Andrea Riseborough’s performance as a struggling alcoholic in “To Leslie,” though it’s unclear whether that grass-roots campaign will move the underseen indie to the front of voters’ queues.I think one of the remaining slots will go to the “Till” star Danielle Deadwyler, who won the Gotham Award for her lead performance, a victory tempered by surprise snubs from the Independent Spirit Awards and Golden Globes. Finally, reserve a spot for the “Fabelmans” star Michelle Williams: Though SAG omitted her, I think that headline-making snub will actually remind people to vote for her, as it did last year with Kristen Stewart for “Spencer.”Best Supporting ActorThree of the last five supporting actor races have featured a pair of nominees competing from the same film. Could this year offer two such duos?Both Brendan Gleeson and Barry Keoghan from “Banshees” ought to make the cut: It’s Gleeson’s gruffness that sets the plot in motion, and Keoghan’s tragic fool that makes you laugh, then weep. “The Fabelmans” also has a well-liked pair of contenders in Paul Dano, who plays the introverted father of our young Spielberg stand-in, and Judd Hirsch, cast as his rambunctious great-uncle. Gleeson, Keoghan and Dano were all nominated by the screen actors, and though the 87-year-old Hirsch missed there, I suspect option-addled Oscar voters will default to a few key titles and nominate as many people as they can from them, as Emmy voters recently have.Who else may be chosen as an eventual runner-up to the “Everything Everywhere” star Ke Huy Quan, the comeback kid who has dominated this awards season and will cruise to an easy Oscar victory? Eddie Redmayne (SAG-nominated for “The Good Nurse”) and Brian Tyree Henry (“Causeway”) could make it in, though their movies are hardly juggernauts. Tom Hanks (“Elvis”) and Brad Pitt (“Babylon”) are Oscar-winning veterans in higher-profile films, but Hanks was critically derided and “Babylon” bombed.If there is a surprise late entry, I’d look to Ben Whishaw, who offers sensitive support to the female ensemble in “Women Talking,” or Woody Harrelson as a Marxist cruise captain in “Triangle of Sadness,” who could show up here if the movie overperforms.Best Supporting ActressAll hail the queen: Angela Bassett has already won televised trophies at the Golden Globes and Critics Choice Awards for playing a grief-stricken monarch in “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.” Though comic-book actors usually have to don Joker greasepaint if they want Oscar voters to pay attention, it’s well past time for Bassett to earn her second Oscar nomination, since her first came all the way back in 1994 for “What’s Love Got to Do With It.” The 64-year-old Bassett has been too good for too long, and the academy would err by curtailing her moment.Do we have room in this race for another duo? Earlier in the season, it looked like Claire Foy and Jessie Buckley from “Women Talking” would be that pair, but the Screen Actors Guild failed to nominate either, despite liking the movie enough to give it an ensemble nod. Instead, the “Everything Everywhere” co-stars Jamie Lee Curtis and Stephanie Hsu both made the SAG shortlist and ought to repeat here: Curtis is a veteran actress campaigning hard for her first nomination, while Hsu, who impresses in a tricky dual role, is peaking at just the right time.That’s one film with a quartet of likely nominees in its cast. Another is “Banshees,” which will almost certainly earn its fourth acting nomination, for Kerry Condon as Farrell’s feisty sister. But the fifth supporting actress slot could go to any number of women, including Dolly de Leon, whose cruise-ship cleaner comes to the fore late in “Triangle of Sadness,” and Janelle Monáe, who’s terrific in “Glass Onion” but must gun for an acting nomination that even the first “Knives Out” didn’t manage.When in doubt, let’s default to archetypes. This category frequently makes room for what I’ll dub the Patient Partner, someone who offers supportive ballast to a dominant, tricky lead character (even if that support and patience is sorely tested). This race offers two such contenders: Nina Hoss, whose loaded glances to Blanchett say so much in “Tár,” and the SAG nominee Hong Chau, who shines in “The Whale” as Fraser’s caregiver. Chau also had a scene-stealing turn in this season’s culinary horror-comedy “The Menu,” and taken together, they are evidence of an expansive taste in roles that I project will give her the edge. More

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    ‘Jam Van’ Dares to Ask: What if Family Road Trips Were Actually Fun?

    A new travel series featuring a diverse array of beloved musical artists uses original tunes to help children navigate the world.Few family expeditions are more fraught than long-distance road trips. What parent hasn’t longed to take the kids on a highway journey that is free of bored whines, back-seat battles and the terrifying possibility of having to put “Baby Shark” on endless repeat?Now a new series aims to fulfill that dream: “Jam Van,” on the YouTube Originals for Kids & Family channel and the YouTube Kids app, stakes out novel territory as a tune-filled travel show for children. In each of the season’s eight episodes — the first two will be released at noon Eastern time on Thursday, and a new one each Thursday thereafter — young viewers become the touring companions of Lamb, a detail-obsessed sheep, and Anne, a free-spirited alligator. Together, they explore a distinctive American city (and, in one case, a wide swath of a state) in their sky blue S.U.V.“I felt like this was the best way to sort of make something funny and interesting, both visually and sonically,” said Bill Sherman, one of the series’s creators and a Tony Award-winning music orchestrator and composer whose credits range from “Hamilton” (he won a Grammy as a producer of the original Broadway cast recording) to “Sesame Street” (he is that show’s Emmy-winning music director).Anne and Lamb’s 10- to-12-minute adventures in locations like Seattle, Nashville, Los Angeles and New Orleans involve landmarks, culture, food and, most important, music. On these road trips, however, moms and dads need not cover their ears: Musical artists including Lin-Manuel Miranda, Brandi Carlile, Sheryl Crow, Fitz and the Tantrums and Trombone Shorty portray themselves in live action, serenading the cartoon heroes with an original song created for each destination.The series’s animation is a pastiche of real-world footage, live-action performances, stop-motion animation and computer animation.YouTube Originals Kids & FamilyIn some episodes, like the one set in Virginia, featuring the band Old Crow Medicine Show, the artists have written the central tune’s music or lyrics (or both) themselves; in others, they perform the work of an eminent composer like Butch Walker, who wrote the song for Sheryl Crow, or Sherman himself.The result, Sherman said, is “music that you don’t often hear in kids’ shows,” including hip-hop, ’70s funk, bluegrass and country indie tunes.In a joint video interview, Sherman and Brian Hunt, the series’s other creator, explained how they made their show look different, too. Working with the Vancouver animation studio Global Mechanic, they invented a freewheeling collage of styles. Anne, Lamb and the animals’ Grumpy GPS — the series’s own Oscar the Grouch — are computer-animated, while the Big Book of Travel, a talking tome, is stop-motion. In addition to the live-action footage of music stars, the production team included pop-up cameos of children, who offer intriguing details about the destinations.To create the regional backdrops, Hunt said, “we took thousands of photographs in the actual cities” that were treated to give them a “heightened look.” The images include vivid views of the Hollywood sign, the Guggenheim Museum and the Liberty Bell.But the two men, who are fathers and close friends, intend “Jam Van” to be more than sightseeing — a resolve that was heightened by their early brainstorms at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. “No one could travel anywhere,” recalled Hunt, the president of Believe Entertainment Group, a producer of “Jam Van.” “And everybody was mad at each other.”The best buddies Anne and Lamb get mad at each other sometimes, too. (Grumpy GPS, voiced by the comedian Marc Maron, is almost always mad.) The series’s creators hope that through these characters’ interactions, children 4 and older can learn life skills and how to get along, both on and off the road.Anne is “really the one driving the ideas and the adventures,” said the comedian Nicole Byer, who voices the character. Lamb, voiced by the comic Pete Lee, “sometimes is like, ‘I don’t like that, that’s not a good idea,’” Byer added. Ultimately, she said, their friendship “is push-and-pull.”In each episode, the two travel companions face a problem, interpersonal or otherwise, that the segment’s song addresses. During the pilot, set in New York City, Anne grows frustrated when she can’t find her Uncle Salligator (who, naturally, turns out to live in the sewer). She and Lamb bump into Miranda, who sings and raps an encouraging strategy.“Building up a frustration tolerance in children so they can see their goals through to the end is such an important thing to do (as a parent, anyway),” Miranda wrote in an email.The Nashville episode also counsels persistence. Here, a mischievous armadillo keeps running away with the steel for Lamb’s steel guitar, and Crow’s vocal performance urges Lamb not to give up.In an episode set in his hometown, Oakland, Calif., Daveed Diggs advises Anne and Lamb on the importance of following directions.YouTube Originals Kids & Family“The power of song is that it sticks in your head,” said Daveed Diggs, who stars in an episode devoted to his hometown, Oakland, Calif. That segment’s vocal number, written by the rapper Phonte Coleman, with an additional verse by Diggs, focuses on the importance of following directions, using a catchy refrain.In choosing the artists who would perform the songs, “it wasn’t just about who was the biggest name,” Sherman said. “It was who worked well enough for our show, who could really fit in and make it work, because it wasn’t just about singing.”For the Seattle episode, the series’s second, the men sought out Carlile, not only because she’s from the area but also because of the plot they envisioned: Lamb and Anne, who is suffering an uncharacteristic bout of homesickness, meet an octopus whose “family” is a variety of species. Anne, realizing that friends can be as supportive as her own relatives, shakes off her melancholy.“I was just really inspired by the subject matter,” said Carlile, because, she added, “I’m part of a nontraditional family.” (She and her wife, Catherine Shepherd, have two daughters.) The song “One Sacred Thing,” a ballad about love that Carlile wrote and performs in the episode, emphasizes “that family comes in all different shapes and sizes,” she said.Brandi Carlile wrote and performs the “Jam Van” song “One Sacred Thing,” a ballad emphasizing “that family comes in all different shapes and sizes,” she said. YouTube Originals Kids & FamilyAs they put the episodes together, Sherman and Hunt also discovered an unexpected synergy. Frequently, Hunt said, the main characters’ “social-emotional challenge actually served as a great vehicle to help us explore the cities.”The conflict, for instance, that arises in Philadelphia, where Lamb is determined to stick to a schedule and Anne is desperate to eat, allowed the show’s creators to highlight that city’s quintessential dish (the cheese steak). The Philadelphia R&B vocal group Boyz II Men also introduced several Philly references to “The City of Brotherly Love,” the episode’s song about compromise.“We added Ishkabibble’s, which is a Philadelphia cheese steak spot in down south Philly,” said Wanyá Morris, a member of Boyz II Men. They also worked a signature local greeting into the start of the song, a hoot that sounds roughly like “Heer-yoh.”In addition to revising the musical number, the group’s members worked on being “relatable,” Morris said.The Philadelphia R&B group Boyz II Men helped write Philly-specific references into the song they sing for Anne and Lamb, including one for a beloved cheese steak restaurant.YouTube Originals Kids & FamilyThey wanted to act as if they were talking to their own children, he added, “so that the kids cannot look at us like, ‘Who are these old dudes singing to these cartoon characters?’”Including long-established artists, however, was part of a strategy to make “Jam Van” multigenerational viewing. The show also offers historical humor: At one point, Grumpy GPS even evokes the computer Hal in the film “2001: A Space Odyssey.”Craig Hunter, global head of kids and family for YouTube Originals, who acquired the series, praised it for offering insights into “various things that the everyday kid wasn’t necessarily aware of.” Although it is far too early to know if the show will have a second season, he acknowledged that the concept “has legs.”As for the creators of “Jam Van,” they’re already dreaming of places, artists and musical genres that haven’t yet been tapped.“K-pop?” Sherman said. “We’re ready to go.” More

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    A Conductor on a Mission to Help Ukraine

    Before sunrise one day last week, the conductor Dalia Stasevska was deep in concentration in a Helsinki studio, ruminating on phrasing and transitions as she studied the score of Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto. Then, at 10 a.m., she put away her music and set out on a mission.Stasevska, 38, a Kyiv-born musician who lives in Finland, drove across Helsinki in search of power generators to send to Ukraine, where millions of people, including her friends and relatives, have faced electricity shortages because of Russia’s continuing attacks. Later, she visited a factory in central Finland to inspect hundreds of stoves that she plans to send to families hit hard by the war.“We can’t look away or get tired, because the war machine does not get tired,” she said in a video interview after the factory visit. “We have to be in this together and do everything we can for Ukraine.”Since the start of the war last year, Stasevska, a rising young conductor, has been navigating the roles of artist and activist.As the principal guest conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra in Britain and the chief conductor of the Lahti Symphony Orchestra in Finland, she maintains a busy concert schedule and makes frequent appearances in the United States. Starting Friday, she will lead the New York Philharmonic in a series of concerts featuring the violinist Lisa Batiashvili in the Tchaikovsky concerto.In between rehearsals and concerts, she devotes herself to promoting the cause of Ukraine. She said she has raised more than 200,000 euros (about $216,000) since the start of the invasion and has driven trucks loaded with supplies into the country. She is also a prolific commenter on social media, calling on Western governments to provide more weapons to Ukraine and denouncing Russia as a “terrorist state.”Stasevska conducing a concert of Ukrainian music in fall. Eager to bring a “moment of normality to a country where nothing is normal,” she said, she traveled to the city to deliver supplies and to conduct.via Unison MediaStasevska said that her aim was to continue to shine light on the suffering in Ukraine and to help bring an end to the war.“I can’t save Ukraine by playing music, but I can use my mouth and speak out, and I can act,” she said. “We can’t just hide behind our virtues. There comes a time for action.”Her colleagues say that Stasevska is eager to challenge the status quo both in the artistic realm and in life. Claire Chase, a prominent flutist and educator, described her as a “supernova,” praising her collaborative and commanding style.The State of the WarWestern Military Aid: Efforts to arm Kyiv have stepped up in recent weeks as the war enters a critical phase. So far missing from the new military aid infusion pledged by Western nations are American and German-made tanks that Ukraine’s leaders say are desperately needed.Helicopter Crash: A helicopter crashed in a fireball in a Kyiv suburb, killing a member of President Volodymyr Zelensky’s cabinet and more than a dozen other people, and dealing a blow to Ukraine’s wartime leadership.Dnipro: A Russian strike on an apartment complex in the central Ukrainian city was one of the deadliest for civilians away from the front line since the war began. The attack prompted renewed calls for Moscow to be charged with war crimes.“She is courageous on and off the podium,” Chase said, “the kind of person who will, under any circumstances, speak her mind, and I just have so much admiration for her.”Stasevska, the daughter of painters, grew up in Estonia and Finland, where her mother is from. But her relatives also nurtured her connection to Ukraine, her father’s home country. She learned Ukrainian, practiced folk songs and studied the country’s poetry, history and literature with her father and grandmother.She recalled being teased in school for her Ukrainian surname, but always felt proud of her identity.“Ukraine was always this beautiful place in my mind,” she said. “The way my family spoke of it, the apples were much bigger there than anywhere else in the world. It was this dream country filled with possibility, and with wonderful people.”When Stasevska was 8, her parents gave her a violin, telling her she could make a profession out of playing an instrument. But, she said, she didn’t feel emotional about music until she was 12, when a school librarian lent her a recording of Puccini’s “Madama Butterfly.” She had never heard an orchestra before, and was amazed by the power and drama of the score.“It spoke to my soul,” she said. “It was mind-blowing.”Stasevska near the Ukrainian Institute of America on the Upper East Side. She leads a series of concerts in New York, beginning Friday.Lanna Apisukh for The New York TimesShe set out to become a professional orchestra musician. As a teenager in her bedroom, she played along as she blasted Beethoven symphony recordings by giants like the conductor Herbert von Karajan.Then, when she was 20, she began to see another path. She was inspired after she saw a concert led by the conductor Eva Ollikainen; she had never seen a woman conduct before.“I saw a role model and someone who looked like me,” she said. “Suddenly I was thinking: ‘Wait a minute, I’m interested in scores, I love orchestra music. Why can’t I try this?’”She sought out the eminent Finnish conducting teacher Jorma Panula, cornering him in an elevator to ask if she could study with him. (Finland has produced a prodigious number of world-class conductors, and Panula has mentored many of them, including Esa-Pekka Salonen and Susanna Mälkki.) He pulled a receipt from his pocket, and wrote a phone number for her to contact the organizer of an upcoming master class.After graduating in 2012 from the Sibelius Academy, the storied conservatory in Helsinki, Stasevska began a steady rise, starting as an assistant to Paavo Järvi at the Orchestre de Paris. In 2019, she was appointed to her post at the BBC Symphony, and in 2020, she was selected to lead the Lahti Symphony.She made a memorable debut with the New York Philharmonic in 2021, leading a program that included works by Missy Mazzoli, Anthony Davis and John Adams. Seth Colter Walls, reviewing that performance in The New York Times, described her conducting as “powerful but never overly brash.”When the invasion began, Stasevska was devastated, concerned for the safety of her friends and family. Her brother was living in Kyiv and studying to be a movie director. She struggled to focus on music and resolved to cancel an appearance in March with the Seattle Symphony and take a break from conducting. But she changed her mind, she said, deciding she could use her platform to oppose the war.During the concert in Seattle, she made a speech about the war and led a performance of the Ukrainian national anthem. At one point during a loud passage of Dvorak’s “New World” Symphony, she said she let out a scream from the podium.“It was some kind of prehistoric need for me to yell,” she said. “It was horrible being in this situation where you don’t know if your brother will be alive the next morning.”Working with her two brothers, as well as the Ukrainian Association in Finland, she began soliciting donations to buy supplies. They have gathered contributions from thousands of people and have purchased generators, stoves, clothes, sleeping bags, vehicles and other items.In the fall, eager to bring a “moment of normality to a country where nothing is normal,” she traveled to Lviv to deliver supplies and to lead a concert of Ukrainian music. She said it was important for Ukraine to promote its culture as a way of opposing Russia, citing the example of Sibelius, whose Second Symphony is on the Philharmonic program this week, and whose works around 1900 were often interpreted as yearnings for liberation from Czar Nicholas II. (She is married to the Finnish bass guitarist Lauri Porra, a great-grandson of Sibelius.)“When a country is fighting for its freedom and harmony,” she said, “cultural identity is essential.”As Stasevska’s profile rises, she has been mentioned as a contender for a music director position in the United States. And, she said, she’s interested.Deborah Borda, the New York Philharmonic’s president and chief executive, called her a “dynamic podium presence demonstrating a welcome combination of power and warmth, but with no compromise.” She praised her debut with the Philharmonic, noting that she was able to pull it off with only one rehearsal in the hall, on the day of the concert.“That took courage, equanimity, flexibility and pure technique,” Borda said. “She is a prime example of today’s ‘ready for action’ rising women conductors.”As the fighting continues in Ukraine, music has offered Stasevska an escape, she said in an interview this week in New York. Still, she said she sometimes finds it difficult to perform works by Russian composers, including Tchaikovsky. She copes by reminding herself that the composers she admires are not responsible for the war.“I really have hope; I know that Ukraine will win one way or the other,” she said. “We just have to be human in this moment and do the right thing.” More

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    ‘The Ability to Say Yes’ to Stories Long Neglected on the Screen

    Like so many anxious filmmakers the week before the start of the Sundance Film Festival, Erica Tremblay was tucked inside a dark room in Los Angeles, prepping the final sound mix for her feature debut, “Fancy Dance.”Ms. Tremblay has one of those quintessential Sundance tales: abandoning her career in publishing at age 40 to pursue filmmaking, specifically to tell stories centered in her Seneca-Cayuga Nation in Oklahoma. Her first short film, “Little Chief,” premiered at Sundance in 2020. Her script for “Fancy Dance” was accepted into the 2021 Sundance Lab, and with the help of the Sundance Institute, she secured financing to make the movie. Production concluded in September, and just three months later, her film was chosen out of 10,000 submissions to be shown at this year’s festival, which begins Thursday.None of it would have happened without her financiers. One, Nina Yang Bongiovi of Significant Productions, has been financing indie films like “Fruitvale Station” and “Passing” since 2013. Another, Tommy Oliver, the founder and chief executive of Confluential Films, is relatively new to the finance game after spending the past decade producing and directing his own films.“The thing that I like the best about working with Tommy is that I had creative autonomy,” said Ms. Tremblay, who has been working in one of Mr. Oliver’s bungalows on his Confluential campus since Thanksgiving. “Even though it’s hard to trust first-time filmmakers, whatever he saw in this, he was like, let’s do it. He has been there for the project but also been there for me as a creator. He was somewhat of a resident therapist in that regard.”Mr. Oliver and his wife, Codie Elaine Oliver, created the popular TV series “Black Love.”OWNMr. Oliver is one of a number of financiers of color with films debuting at the festival whose mission is to elevate underrepresented voices with financial investments, including Charles King, Luis A. Miranda Jr., Kimberly Steward, Doug Choi and Ms. Yang Bongiovi.It’s a far cry from how things used to be and a sign that diversity efforts have moved from the periphery of the business more toward its center.“When I started in the business, in the ’80s, I was so used to being not only the only Asian American but the only minority at the table ever,” said Chris Lee, a former president of production at Sony’s TriStar Pictures. He is executive producing the Justin Chon film “Jamojaya,” which received financing from Starlight Media, a Los Angeles-based Chinese financier that backed “Crazy Rich Asians.” “Now, you want an A-list director, you can go to John Chu, you can go to Destin Daniel Cretton, you can go to Justin Lin. There’s so many choices to put people in front of the camera now that people didn’t think of before.”Still, just appearing at Sundance is not the endgame. The true standard for success for these financiers will be how these movies perform at the festival and if they are bought by distributors. Alexis Garcia, from the independent studio Fifth Season, previously known as Endeavor Content, said distributors have told him the festival’s lineup of films this year doesn’t look commercial and it could be a soft year for acquisitions.Should that be the case, that could be a setback for the financiers who are just getting started.“When you are working with directors who are from an underrepresented group, there is actually more at risk, because if it doesn’t work, it just perpetuates the mythology,” said Kevin Iwashina, Fifth Season’s senior vice president of documentaries, who helped finance the Sundance doc “Going Varsity in Mariachi” and fully financed “AUM: The Cult at the End of the World,” a documentary about the cult responsible for the 1995 sarin gas subway attack in Tokyo. “And so decisions become that much more precise. There is more at risk than just financial capital.”Mr. Oliver is staking a lot in the four films he has headed to Sundance, in something of a coming-out party for Confluential Films. Mr. Oliver began the operation in 2013 as a label for his own productions — he is also a writer and director — but has recently expanded his ambitions. Mr. Oliver hired Charlotte Koh, formerly of Searchlight Pictures, as Confluential’s president in 2021 and has dedicated the company to financing projects by creators of color. Goldman Sachs helped raise $100 million to $150 million that Confluential will use for operating and production costs.Best known for creating the popular OWN series “Black Love” with his wife, Cody Elaine Oliver — the two own the show and all its ancillary products: podcasts, live events and merchandising — Mr. Oliver’s ambitions run from indie films to prestige pictures to helping finance studio movies.In addition to “Fancy Dance,” the producer has invested in “Going to Mars: The Nikki Giovanni Project,” a documentary about Ms. Giovanni, the American poet, and the narrative features “Young. Wild. Free.” and “To Live and Die and Live.” The upcoming Netflix movie “The Perfect Find,” starring Gabrielle Union, is also being produced by Confluential after the company optioned the novel by Tia Williams. “We have the ability to say yes, and not just say yes, but to look at what the makeup of those projects are, and that’s significant,” said Mr. Oliver. “What I’m really excited about building is something that is sustainable to support, not just one director, but a bunch of directors. We can do something now where we have a different type of seat at the table.”Luis A. Miranda Jr. invested in the documentary “Going Varsity in Mariachi.”Sundance InstituteMr. Miranda is using the money he made from the theatrical hit “Hamilton” — created by his son, Lin-Manuel Miranda — to invest in young artists, many of whom are from underrepresented groups and communities. After receiving an unsolicited email from the producer James Lawler, Mr. Miranda invested in the Sundance documentary “Going Varsity in Mariachi,” which depicts high school Mariachi contests popular in the border towns in Texas. It’s one of the better-known documentaries scheduled to debut in competition. To Mr. Miranda, a veteran political strategist, the film was the perfect combination of storytelling and politics and showed where he wants to put his money.“We are a huge part of the audience of movies but not a large number of the ones that are financing films,” he said in an interview, referring to his Latino roots. “And I know that there are a lot of voices out there who have not been able to tell their stories. I know that because my son was one of them. If I would have had the money then, Lin-Manuel would not have had to go through three years of rewriting and knocking on doors. So if I can make young, talented people’s lives easier in telling their stories, I will do that.”Ms. Yang Bongiovi said finding financing for films featuring people of color remains challenging. She recalled her experience with “Passing,” from the writer and director Rebecca Hall, starring Tessa Thompson (“Thor: Ragnarok”) and Ruth Negga (“Loving”). The film was bought by Netflix for a healthy sum out of Sundance in 2021 and was lauded by critics. Yet getting it made was “practically impossible,” she said, “and that was not that long ago.”Nina Yang Bongiovi says that when more people of color are financing films, they can work together to support projects.Aaron J. Thornton/Getty Images“I was told, ‘You have two women of color starring in it, that’s challenging,’” Ms. Yang Bongiovi said. “And then I remember telling folks, ‘Tessa Thompson is a Marvel superhero. She’s Valkyrie!’ But it just didn’t equate. It was a reminder that we still have a long way to go.”The growing number of financiers like her from underrepresented groups has Ms. Yang Bongiovi feeling hopeful. It means that instead of competing for projects, they can work together, reduce their individual risk and contribute the money needed to make these films.“Because there are more multicultural financiers and producers, we are teaming up,” she said. “We don’t see each other as competitors. We’re like, ‘Hey, we’re allies. We got to go in together, to force the tide to come through for us.’”Ms. Yang Bongiovi and Mr. Oliver worked together on “Fancy Dance,” while Mr. King and Mr. Oliver both backed “Young. Wild. Free.,” a film directed by Thembi L. Banks about a high school student whose life turns when he is robbed by the girl of his dreams. Mr. Oliver and Ms. Yang Bongiovi are also supporting “To Live and Die and Live” from the director Qasim Basir.“Young. Wild. Free.,” directed by Thembi Banks, is being backed by Mr. Oliver and Charles King, the founder and C.E.O. of the media company Macro.Sundance Institute“To me, that’s where you see real change, how we have found ways to partner and come together to move entire ecosystems,” said Mr. King, founder and chief executive of Macro, an eight-year-old company that has helped finance films like “Judas and the Black Messiah” with Warner Bros. and “Sorry to Bother You” with Ms. Yang Bongiovi. The latter was sold to Annapurna Pictures out of Sundance in 2018.“When I launched Macro, it was with a vision for building a multibillion-dollar media company that is going to have global impact, but also economically empower our communities and help to shape culture,” he said. “That companies like Confluential and others who’ve raised capital, who are financing, that they’re doing it as well, and then to be able to do things together, that’s fantastic. That’s only creating more opportunities for all of us.” More

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    At the Movies, Bagels, Onions and a Side Dish of Nothing

    Both “Everything Everywhere All at Once” and the “Knives Out” sequel delve into the abyss, where life has no meaning. What they do next is surprising.“I got bored one day and I put everything on a bagel. Everything — all my hopes and dreams, my old report cards, every breed of dog, every last personal ad on Craigslist, sesame, poppy seed, salt,” Jobu Tupaki (Stephanie Hsu) says in the faultless, head-spinning science fiction film “Everything Everywhere All at Once.”She’s explaining this to Evelyn (Michelle Yeoh), a laundromat owner who has strained relationships with both her goofy though pure-hearted husband, Waymond (Ke Huy Quan), and her daughter, Joy, who, in an alternate universe, is also Jobu Tupaki, a goddess of destruction. Jobu Tupaki tells her the everything bagel eventually collapsed in on itself and became the ultimate truth: “Nothing matters.”Two of the most memorable objects in film last year were conceptual foodstuffs: In “Everything Everywhere,” the bagel is an entryway to the abyss, and in “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery,” the titular vegetable offers layers and layers of intrigue that ultimately amount to nothing. In both films, the nihilistic foods threaten to leave the plot at a dead end. And yet both films then use that impasse to subvert the expectations of the genres in which they’re working.Though the multiverse has, in recent years, become the default direction for moneymaking franchises to go in, the concept is difficult to successfully execute. Opening up a fictional world to alternate universes means keeping a tight leash on the narrative and the world-building, making sure that neither gets bloated to the point where there are endless loopholes as well as inconsistencies and unresolved questions.But there’s also the issue of emotional stakes. If every plot point and character can be reset in another universe, then every moment of resonance, particularly tragedies — think of Rick and Morty rendered lifeless, mangled and bloodied in a garage explosion, or the Scarlet Witch’s vicious murders of Charles Xavier and the superhero illuminati — can be undone with the help of a portal gun, Time Variance Authority TemPad or other time-manipulating device.Peeling Back the Layers of ‘Glass Onion’Daniel Craig returns as the world’s greatest detective, facing down a blue-chip cast of possible murderers in the “Knives Out” sequel.Review: The film “revives the antic, puzzle-crazy spirit of the first ‘Knives Out,’” our critic writes. “This time the satirical stakes have been raised.”A No-Spoilers Guide: Here’s what you need to know about the director Rian Johnson’s new whodunit, without spoiling anything. We promise.A Cinematic Experiment: The movie was distributed in 600 theaters for just one week to stoke interest in the streaming debut on Netflix on Dec. 23.Dusting Off Agatha Christie: The first “Knives Out” was “essentially an energetic, showy take” on the famous mystery writer’s works, we said in our 2019 review.Once you can see every universe, suddenly none of them seem to matter. The multiverse inevitably leads to madness: Though an alternate Waymond cautions Evelyn against making too many universe jumps, for fear that she’ll become like Jobu Tupaki, she does so anyway, and is almost seduced by her alternate-daughter’s nihilism. But the film, written and directed by Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, cleverly uses the everything bagel, a symbol of the nothingness at the heart of Jobu Tupaki’s philosophy as well as the nothingness at the heart of so many multiverse stories, to ground the story and show what a well-executed multiverse movie can achieve.When Evelyn learns about her other selves, and their relationships and very different lives, instead of everything seeming inconsequential, she is able to make new connections with those around her and understand the limitless potential she didn’t know she had. After witnessing visions of life without Waymond and discovering that another version of herself pushed Joy so hard that she became Jobu Tupaki, Evelyn earns a new gratitude for her family.Meaning and purpose are the antitheses to the nothingness of the everything bagel. And established characters and stakes are the antitheses to the lazy multiverse narrative.Just as multiverse superhero shows and movies get a bad rap, so do murder mystery films. Like a game of “Clue,” they can be formulaic, with even their twists becoming accepted tropes — often as transparent as, say, a glass onion.Edward Norton, left, and Daniel Craig inside the glass onion of the title.NetflixIn Rian Johnson’s “Knives Out” sequel, Detective Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) is back with his foppish threads and Southern drawl to join the billionaire Miles Bron (Edward Norton) for a murder mystery weekend on a private island, where an actual murder soon takes place.Bron, an obnoxious hybrid of Elon Musk, Steve Jobs and Elizabeth Holmes, welcomes his guests into a flashy world of wealth, where he casually shows off Paul McCartney’s guitar and the Mona Lisa, has a robot carry off their luggage and even seemingly has his own Covid-19 vaccine (the film takes place early in the pandemic).The film, like the original, uses many clichés of the genre: a clandestine invitation, a group of people stuck in a remote location, an eccentric “genius,” priceless treasures, a suspicious character from the past, a secret twin, a faked death. But the fun of “Glass Onion” is that it takes these tropes to build what appears to be an elaborate murder scheme, only to reveal that the crime was much more straightforward than it seemed.“I keep returning in my mind to the glass onion,” Blanc says in the final act, “something that seems densely layered, mysterious and inscrutable. But in fact, the center is in plain sight.” Bron, he reveals, is the murderer, but he’s no criminal mastermind; he’s stupid, and, to Blanc’s disgust, even unoriginal when it comes to plotting his friends’ deaths.According to the murder mystery formula, when the detective solves the case, it’s over; our contract with this fictional world ends when we get the bad guy. “Glass Onion” also subverts that expectation through its structure: At exactly halfway through the movie, Blanc has figured it out, but before he explains everything, “Glass Onion” cuts to the past. Once Blanc’s real reason for joining Bron’s get-together is clear, the film moves through the plot again to show us the same characters and events from a new perspective.But the movie’s greatest subversion is its ending. The villain isn’t defeated by traditional means; though Blanc solves the case, Bron disposes of the single bit of evidence that could put him away, rendering Blanc powerless to do anything. So Bron wins — until his glass onion and the priceless artwork inside go up in flames. At the last minute, “Glass Onion” pivots from an enjoyable but hollow murder mystery into a contemporary morality tale about the dangers of capitalist ambitions.The boundless emptiness of the everything bagel and the crystal-clear nothing at the center of the glass onion illustrate the ultimate fakeouts: They threaten to swallow their worlds (or universes) in a kind of cinematic existentialism, where a deli favorite and a vegetable prove there’s nothing worth accounting for in a multiverse or a mystery island. But both “Everything Everywhere All at Once” and “Glass Onion” know how to navigate their genres and show that behind the emptiness of your favorite conceptual foodstuff can be surprises, universes — everything. More