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    ‘Doctor Who’ Episode 7 Recap: God of All Gods

    In the first part of the season finale, a terrifying enemy from the Doctor’s past returns, as mysteries start to be solved.Season 1, Episode 7: ‘The Legend of Ruby Sunday’Over six decades, “Doctor Who” has introduced many villains — including big hitters like the Cybermen (first introduced in 1966) and memorable one-off monsters like the gas-mask wearing Empty Child (2005) — as the Doctor’s most fearsome enemy.But in “The Legend of Ruby Sunday,” the first episode in the season’s two-part finale, it seems his ultimate nemesis might finally have been identified — or rather, rediscovered. It turns out the mysterious villain who’s been pulling the strings this season (“the one who waits”) was first fought by Tom Baker’s Fourth Doctor back in 1975.This reveal is genuinely fear-inducing. But it’s the combination of Russell T Davies’s pacey, tricksy script and the show’s newly lavish production values that makes Episode 7 such a bone-chilling adventure — one far scarier, far more ambitious, than I expected from the show’s Disney era.As the finale opens, two mysteries, which Davies has threaded throughout the season, hang in the air. There’s the question of Ruby’s (Millie Gibson) back story, including the identity of her birth mother. And what about the mysterious woman (Susan Twist) who keeps popping up wherever the Doctor (Ncuti Gatwa) and Ruby travel?These questions are on the Doctor’s mind as the TARDIS crashes into the headquarters of the United Intelligence Taskforce, or UNIT, Britain’s supersecret extraterrestrial task force. He’s greeted by the organization’s head, Kate Lethbridge-Stewart (Jemma Redgrave), and her team, including the 13-year-old scientific prodigy Morris (Lenny Rush).Kate Lethbridge-Stewart, played by Jemma Redgrave, runs UNIT, Britain’s supersecret extraterrestrial task force.Bad Wolf/BBC StudiosWe 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

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    Johnny Canales, Tejano Music Singer and TV Host, Dies

    He was known for booking new acts on his program, including Selena Quintanilla, who performed on his show in 1985 in what was one of her first live TV performances.Johnny Canales, the Mexican television host whose program introduced new musical acts to wide audiences, including a young Selena Quintanilla in the 1980s, has died. His death was announced on Thursday by his show’s Facebook account. No additional details were given. His wife, Nora Canales, said in a video update on May 20 that he had been ill. Mr. Canales was believed to be in his late 70s or early 80s, though his year of birth was unclear.For many rising acts beginning in the 1980s, to be invited to perform on Mr. Canales’s bilingual variety show was considered a milestone and a chance to gain new fans on a program that was watched by millions.Some acts that performed on his show went on to become household names. He also became a popular TV host, known for introducing performances with his catchphrase: “You got it. Take it away.”“The Johnny Canales Show” debuted on KRIS in Corpus Christi, Texas, in 1983. The program was later picked up by Univision, which expanded the show’s reach beyond South Texas.Mr. Canales had many groups and singers perform on his show over the years, including La Mafia, La Sombra, Los Temerarios and Ramon Ayala. But perhaps the one who went on to become the most popular was a teenage Selena Quintanilla, as Selena y Los Dinos, in 1985, in what was one of the singer’s first live TV performances.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

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    ‘House of the Dragon’ Season 2 Review: It’s a Waiting Game

    The second season of HBO’s very successful “Game of Thrones” prequel gets off to an earthbound start.Diplomacy versus violence. Dignity versus unbridled passion. Duty versus the selfish desire for revenge.Wait, wasn’t this supposed to be about dragons?HBO sent critics four of the eight episodes of the second season of “House of the Dragon,” its “Game of Thrones” spinoff. For three and three-quarters of those four hours, we are in one of this highly rated fantasy franchise’s less interesting regions: the land of the medieval civics lesson. Small Councils meet. Allies are recruited. Rivals for the throne strut and fret. When battles do start to break out, they take place offscreen.The two shows (based on the novels of George R.R. Martin) have traditionally used palace intrigue leavened with sex to fill the gaps between expensive scenes of mass violence and close-up dragon action. But nearly half a season is a long time to wait for the flames to fly.“Thrones,” which ended in 2019 after eight blockbuster seasons, compensated with the epic scale and sadistic frisson of its treachery and debauchery. It also had one great performance, by Peter Dinklage as the noble dwarf Tyrion Lannister, and big characters stylishly played by actors like Lena Headey, Charles Dance and Jonathan Pryce. And its dragons were truly terrifying beasts.“Dragon,” for all the money HBO has reportedly spent on it, is a more buttoned down and drab affair, a condition that carries into the second season. Besides Eve Best as the dragon-riding matriarch, Princess Rhaenys, and Ewan Mitchell as the fearsome Aemond, no one in the cast rises far enough above the show’s general level of dogged professionalism to make a significant impression. And when they do appear, its dragons look and sound more domesticated.The new season begins with the truculent alpha Targaryens, Rhaenyra (Emma D’Arcy) and Aegon (Tom Glynn-Carney), plotting in their respective castles. Rhaenyra, the rightful heir to the Iron Throne — it’s just easier to use the jargon — is in exile with her uncle-husband, Daemon (Matt Smith). Her half brother Aegon sits on the throne and governs like a petulant child, to the consternation of his mother, Alicent (Olivia Cooke), who was Rhaenyra’s best friend until she married Rhaenyra’s father, the previous king.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

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    Erin Moriarty Is a Woman Among ‘The Boys’

    The actress in the hit superhero satire mulled her role in an age of online bullying and token feminism: “Thank God there are characters like this.”Erin Moriarty just stopped a stranger in his tracks. But it wasn’t because he recognized her as a star on one of TV’s most popular shows, or because he was taken by her charm.We were tucked into a quiet corner table on an outdoor patio in West Hollywood, where an attentive server had been mid-stride when he overheard Moriarty, a star of the hit Amazon show “The Boys,” describe her belief that feminism had become an “obligatory thing for studios to exhibit.” He tentatively performed the briefest of check-ins and scurried away.“I love how he hears the word ‘feminism’ and his approach starts to slow,” she said with a laugh. She took a sip of black iced coffee and resumed her thoughts.“I think it’s dangerous,” she said. “I feel like we’re putting a Band-Aid on systemic diseases that we’re not inoculating against.”As the highest-billed actress on “The Boys,” Moriarty, 29, has had to think a lot about performative feminism lately, and whether the show that made her famous is really part of the solution. On one level, the series, which returned for Season 4 on Thursday, is satire, centered on the exploits of a team of morally depraved superheroes known as the Seven.The show targets the steroidal conventions of the genre, along with the corporate pandering and exhibitionist feminism that often accompany it. Much of that critique is focused through Moriarty’s character, Annie January, better known as Starlight.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

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    Emma D’Arcy, Master of ‘House of the Dragon’

    A four-episode role in Season 1 of HBO’s “House of the Dragon” made the actor a breakout star. This season, D’Arcy reigns at the top of the call sheet.On a recent morning in London, the British actor Emma D’Arcy was dealing with “an emergency.”D’Arcy was in a studio, rerecording voice-over as Rhaenyra Targaryen for the second season of HBO’s hit “Game of Thrones” prequel, “House of the Dragon.” It was the fourth time the actor, who uses they and them pronouns, had recorded this particular bit of dialogue, and each time they were confronted by an enormous screen showing their face, surrounded by unfinished special effects.It was like a rather brutal “Groundhog Day,” they said, adding wryly that “the process of repression happens very quickly when you’ve got a job to do.”As the breakout star of “House of the Dragon,” which returns for its second season on Sunday, D’Arcy, 31, has had to adjust to seeing their image blown up. “Emma is literally the face on the poster,” Ryan Condal, a “Dragon” creator and showrunner, said in a phone interview, adding that he couldn’t imagine what it must be like “taking that on but also still being an artist, and a serious student of the craft.”D’Arcy has been grappling with this tension since “Dragon” first aired in 2022, when it became the most-watched premiere in HBO’s history. Set approximately 200 years before “Game of Thrones,” the show centers on the Targaryen dynasty before its dramatic fall. D’Arcy’s headstrong dragon rider, Rheanyra, who must defend her claim to the Iron Throne, quickly emerged as a fan favorite.In the coming eight-episode season, D’Arcy is in every episode, whereas in the first 10-episode season, Milly Alcock played a younger version of Rhaenyra in six.“What I realized retrospectively is, four episodes — mwah!” D’Arcy said, miming a chef’s kiss as they sat cross-legged in a chair at the Royal Court Theater in London. The second season was more emotionally difficult, too. At the end of Season 1, Rhaenyra’s son Luke is killed by a dragon, and so D’Arcy’s character is “stricken with grief,” they said. “She’s made an island by her loss,” radiating “a violent, vile feeling — like a hatred feeling.”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

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    ‘The Welkin’ Review: A Strong Ensemble and a Story That Resonates

    A somber yet witty play set in 18th-century England is a clever perversion of a courtroom drama that features strong performances from an ensemble cast.The final word of “The Welkin” — a soft “oh” of realization that left the theater breathless — is more of an utterance, the coo of an innocent young babe. But the speaker isn’t a child; she’s a grown woman.And she’s accused of murder.It’s England in 1759, just around the time everyone is buzzing about the arrival of Halley’s comet. This woman, Sally Poppy (played by Haley Wong), and her lover are accused of the murder and dismemberment of the young daughter of the rich family for which Sally worked. She’s set to hang, but there’s a hitch: Sally claims she’s pregnant.“The Welkin” is a kind of courtroom drama or, rather, a clever perversion of such; technically we don’t see the courtroom, just a dim, dungeonlike room nearby where a forum of 12 matrons has been convened. They’re not Sally’s final adjudicators (that job is for the men, after all), but the jury ruling on the women’s issue in this case: whether Sally’s actually pregnant.A little bit “The Crucible” and a lot bit the 2022 film “Women Talking,” in all the best ways, “The Welkin,” which opened on Wednesday at Atlantic Theater Company’s Linda Gross Theater, is a somber yet witty examination of how women labor — with housework, with children and with a society of men that doesn’t serve them — and how they negotiate their assumed responsibilities with their desires.“The Welkin” successfully depicts these women as unique individuals, representing women from different strata of society, and with different prejudices and viewpoints. Each one is memorable, from the stately outsider, Charlotte Cary (Mary McCann), a colonel’s widow in a stylish crown of a hat, to Mary Middleton (Susannah Perkins), an awkward, superstitious young woman who is worried only about getting home to her crop of leeks.Sandra Oh (center) is a standout of the ensemble cast. Jeenah Moon for The New York TimesWe 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

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    Tony Predictions: Expect Wins for ‘Merrily’ and ‘Stereophonic’

    Our reporter surveyed a quarter of Tony voters before Sunday’s ceremony. One certainty: Sondheim’s onetime flop seems destined for redemption.Everyone loves a comeback story. And this year, Broadway will be celebrating one for the ages.“Merrily We Roll Along,” a Stephen Sondheim show that has long been one of musical theater’s most storied flops, will cement its long-sought redemption on Sunday by winning the Tony Award for best musical revival, according to my annual survey of Tony voters.This week I have connected, by phone or by email, with just over a quarter of the 836 Tony voters, and asked how they were voting. In a season in which lots of new musicals have admirers but none seem to have fully satisfied industry insiders, that race is tight, as are some of the key acting categories.But “Merrily,” more than any show since “Hamilton,” has won over not only the ticket-buying audience, which has made this production a significant hit, but also the group of producers, investors, writers, actors, designers and others whose work or volunteer lives are so theater-involved that they have qualified as Tony voters.The survey is not a scientific poll; some voters haven’t even cast their ballots yet. For the actual winners (and some song and dance, too), tune in Sunday for the awards show, which starts at 8 p.m. Eastern on CBS and Paramount+ with Showtime. A preshow with some of the awards will stream on Pluto TV starting at 6:30 p.m. Eastern, and we’ll be live-blogging all evening at nytimes.com/theater.Until then, here’s a look at what those surveyed are indicating.Best musical: ‘The Outsiders’ could upset ‘Hell’s Kitchen.’“The Outsiders” is getting lots of love for its vivid depiction of violence and gritty physical production, but less for its score.Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesMany are loving the vocal performances and the choreography in “Hell’s Kitchen,” but are less enamored with the storytelling.Sara Krulwich/The New York Times“Hell’s Kitchen,” the Alicia Keys musical, is doing quite well: good reviews, lots of media attention and the strongest sales of any of the season’s new musicals.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

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    Late Night Recaps Donald Trump’s Return to Capitol Hill

    “They always return to the scene of the crime,” Jimmy Kimmel said after the former president met with House Republicans on Thursday.Welcome to Best of Late Night, a rundown of the previous night’s highlights that lets you sleep — and lets us get paid to watch comedy. Here are the 50 best movies on Netflix right now.The Scene of the CrimeDonald Trump returned to Capitol Hill on Thursday, his first visit there since the Jan. 6 riot. House Republicans sang an early “Happy Birthday” for the former president, who turned 78 on Friday.“They always return to the scene of the crime,” Jimmy Kimmel joked.“Some Republicans who were in the room described the meeting as a ‘gripe-filled’ airing of legal and personal grievances. That sounds right.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“The meeting itself, according to sources, took place at an undisclosed location, which means any of the five McDonald’s within a 10-minute radius of the Hill.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“One of the things he’s upset about, he talked about at this meeting, is Taylor Swift supporting Joe Biden. He said, ‘Why would she endorse this dope?’ And they were like, ‘I don’t know, why did we endorse this dope?’” — JIMMY KIMMELThe Punchiest Punchlines (Trump’s Birthday Edition)“They sang ‘Happy Birthday’ to him? They’re not waiters at a TGI Fridays. Isn’t that embarrassing for everybody involved? A room of adults wearing suits saying, ‘Let’s discuss our agenda to dismantle the regulations that protect our environment, but, first, who’s the big boy getting a year older?’” — JORDAN KLEPPER“Seriously, do you people have no shame? It’s the guy’s first public visit since he sicced a mob on you and almost got you killed, and not only are you welcoming him back with open arms, you’re singing him ‘Happy Birthday’ a day before his birthday? This is like if all the teens at Crystal Lake got together to throw a surprise party for Jason: ‘We got you a new chain saw.’” — SETH MEYERS“And the worst part is that Ted Cruz sang it sexy like Marilyn Monroe.” — JORDAN KLEPPER“Trump’s birthday should be fun. The last time people gathered to say ‘Are you 1? Are you 2? Are you 3?’ they were counting guilty verdicts.” — JIMMY FALLONThe Bits Worth WatchingThe singer and actress Maya Hawke discussed her third album, “Chaos Angel,” and her voice acting role as Anxiety in “Inside Out 2,” on Thursday’s “Daily Show.”Also, Check This OutEmilio Estevez, left, and Andrew McCarthy discuss the Brat Pack in “Brats,” a documentary directed by McCarthy.ABC News StudiosThe actor and director Andrew McCarthy examines his life and career as a member of the Brat Pack in his new documentary, “Brats.” More