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    in Television

    ‘The Survivors’ Is a Polished and Potent Murder Mystery

    Based on the book by Jane Harper, this six-part Australian drama takes place in a coastal Tasmanian town, where the bodies keep surfacing.Perhaps all of streaming television is one giant conspiracy to persuade us not to dream of beach town living. They’re the murder capitals of TV, these towns, with their craggy shores and generational secrets, their prodigal sons and nosy outsiders. Stay away from the water! Reject those quaint houses and majestic vistas! This is not a place of honor!“The Survivors,” a six-episode Australian murder mini-series on Netflix, is a tasty, polished instantiation of the form. Based on the book by Jane Harper, the coastal misery here takes place in Tasmania, where Kieran (Charlie Vickers) is returning home to commemorate the 15th anniversary of the night of a terrible storm. Kieran himself nearly drowned, and his brother and a friend died trying to save him.Those were not the only two people who died that night. A teen girl, Gabby, also disappeared and presumably drowned, but she is rarely acknowledged in all the public grieving. In the present day, a young woman who was conducting her own investigation into Gabby’s death turns up dead, and now a whole other mystery is crying out to be solved.Though it covers a lot of familiar angles, “The Survivors” outshines most of its brethren. The relationships here are knotty, the characters multidimensional in intriguing, moving ways. People can be both wonderful and cruel, loving but maybe not loving enough, loyal but also dishonest.Mia (Yerin Ha), Kieran’s wife, was Gabby’s best friend, and now she isn’t sure how to relate to Gabby’s bereft mom and sister, who disagree with each other about the need to investigate Gabby’s death further. Kieran’s mother, Verity (Robyn Malcolm), struggles with grief and blame — and care taking. Kieran’s father, Brian (Damien Garvey), has worsening dementia, and when the police grill him about what he might have witnessed, his recollections are fractured, mixed up.But who doesn’t struggle with painful memories? Doesn’t everyone have something he or she wants to forget? There’s plenty of sorrow to go around, even as the characters argue about who has it the worst, desperate for their suffering to be beheld, to be legitimized.The show picks up as it goes, and its plot lines nest like Russian dolls, giving the story a real sense of heft and potency. More

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    in Television

    Trump’s New ‘Apprentice’ Boardroom: The Oval Office

    The stately room has long been a site of diplomacy. But the reality-star president often does not come there to make friends.“This is going to be great television, I will say that.”So concluded President Trump after a stunning Oval Office confrontation in February, in front of live cameras, in which he and Vice President JD Vance took turns castigating President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine and held out the prospect of withholding support for the country invaded by Russia.At a May meeting with President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa, Mr. Trump brought his own television, playing video clips to support his false claims that white South African farmers have been the victims of genocide. The ambush, which also found Mr. Trump showing a news image actually taken from the Democratic Republic of Congo, left Mr. Ramaphosa scrambling to respond. But again, the cameras broadcast it all.The confrontations were shocking compared with how diplomacy has long been conducted in that stately office. But they were not surprising — at least, not to anyone who had watched Mr. Trump during his 14 seasons as the capricious, demanding host of the NBC business-competition series “The Apprentice.”In his high-drama Oval Office meetings, carried live on cable news, Mr. Trump has created himself a reality show right inside the White House. It is a serial production, tailored to his tastes for attention and drama, in which his guests submit to judgment and win a blessing or a tongue-lashing.The dynamic in these showdowns is oddly similar to the climactic “firings” Mr. Trump conducted on the NBC show. Then, as now, Mr. Trump was installed in a set designed to magnify his power — in “The Apprentice,” it was a sleek “boardroom” custom-built to improve on Trump Tower’s underwhelming real-life offices.Reality competition shows and Mr. Trump’s politics operate on the same principles: shock value, conflict, shows of dominance. Escalating a fight is almost always better for ratings than defusing one. So it was in Mr. Trump’s TV career; so it is in his administration, whether the tussle is with a world leader or Elon Musk.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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    Ananda Lewis, ’90s MTV Star, Dies at 52

    She said last year that her breast cancer, which she was diagnosed with in 2019, had progressed to Stage 4.Ananda Lewis, a former MTV host who was one of the network’s most popular stars, has died after a long battle with breast cancer. She was 52.Her death was announced by her sister, Dr. Lakshmi Emory, in a social media post late Wednesday. The post did not say when or where Lewis died or give a specific cause.Lewis said last year that her breast cancer, which she first learned she had in 2019, had metastasized and reached a late stage that most doctors would consider incurable.She rose to television stardom in the 1990s as a V.J., or “video jockey,” on MTV, hosting shows including “Hot Zone,” in which she interviewed stars and gave style advice between introducing music videos.In 1999, The New York Times described her as “the hip-hop generation’s reigning It Girl.” “Hot Zone” had made Lewis one of the network’s two most popular stars, the other being Carson Daly, the network said at the time. She also sometimes hosted the network’s hugely popular show “Total Request Live” as well as its “Spring Break” programs.Lewis first gained recognition in the 1990s when she was hired to host “Teen Summit,” a long-running weekly live show on BET that was intended to speak to Black teenagers about current issues. In 1996, she interviewed Hillary Clinton, who was the first lady at the time.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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    Desi Lydic Wants Trump to Leave the Troops Alone

    Hosts ripped into his comment during a speech to troops about former President Joe Biden never having been “the sharpest bulb.”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.‘Two Tacos Short of a Happy Meal’President Donald Trump visited soldiers at Fort Bragg on Tuesday, where he delivered a speech to “his favorite men in uniform who aren’t in the Village People,” Desi Lydic said on Wednesday’s “Daily Show.”“Oh, my God, give these troops a break already! They have to sit through your show, they have to invade Los Angeles, and now they have to parade for you?” — DESI LYDICDuring his speech, Trump attempted to criticize former President Joe Biden’s intelligence, saying, “He’s never been the sharpest bulb.”“He was there to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the army, so, of course, he ended up discussing Joe Biden.” — DESI LYDIC“What a wordsmith. See, see, most people would’ve gone with ‘brightest bulb,’ or ‘sharpest tool,’ but Donald Trump took half of both and smushed them together. That is what makes him the cream of the litter.” — DESI LYDIC“But that’s Trump — he’s not the brightest knife in the drawer. Some say he’s two tacos short of a Happy Meal.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“He wasn’t the sharpest bulb, no. He wasn’t the brightest knife in the drawer.” — JIMMY FALLON“When Trump’s staff told him that he misquoted the idiom, he was, like, ‘Hey, who are you calling an idiom?’” — JIMMY FALLON‘Nothing $300 Million Couldn’t Fix’Elon Musk addressed last week’s tweets concerning President Trump on Wednesday, posting on X: “I regret some of my posts about President @realdonaldtrump last week. They went too far.”Jimmy Fallon said he was shocked: “I didn’t know Elon was programmed to feel human emotion.”“Yeah, apparently, Trump and Elon spoke over the phone on Monday night. Trump was very gracious. He was, like, ‘This is nothing another $300 million donation couldn’t fix.’” — JIMMY FALLON“Which ones went too far? Was it the one where you called for him to be impeached and replaced by JD Vance? Was it the one where you said his big, beautiful bill was a disgusting abomination? Was it the one that said he wouldn’t have won the election without you buying it for him? Or the one where you insinuated he is a pedophile on the Epstein list? I really would like to know.” — JIMMY KIMMELWe 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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    in Theater

    ‘Angry Alan’ Review: John Krasinski Explores the Manosphere

    In an Off Broadway play, the former Jim Halpert of Dunder Mifflin dives into a darker world of male grievance.Roger is jazzed. He’s spent money he doesn’t have, including the child-support payment he owes, on a gold ticket to a men’s rights conference. Nor does the gathering disappoint. The Detroit hotel where it takes place is brimming with guys taking back their power. But guess what’s best? Angry Alan, the internet personality who opened Roger’s eyes to the evils of the gynocracy, is scheduled to speak. This is going to be great!For Roger, anyway. Not so much for us.It is perhaps a clue to the over-thick ironies of Penelope Skinner’s “Angry Alan,” which opened Tuesday at the new Studio Seaview, that the horde of inspired men at the conference is represented by, count ’em, two dummies and some faceless paintings on a backdrop. Offered in Sam Gold’s staging as a joke, like the rest of their gender, they are mere markers in a loaded argument. Even Roger, though played exceedingly well by John Krasinski, is a place holder: a straw man incarnate.Krasinski works hard to disguise that. As he proved during nine seasons as the gemütlich Jim Halpert on “The Office,” he performs charm, titrated with a satire of charm, very well. Here, in a role that runs to more than 10,000 words, some of them Roger’s and some of them his unflattering imitations of the women around him, that good-guy appeal has a lot of work to do.Because Roger is not a good guy. Though he believes himself to be supportive and reliable, the play keeps dropping heavy hints to the contrary. His first wife got uncontested custody of their son. The son doesn’t speak to him. He lost his BMW-level job at AT&T under unexplained circumstances, and is now the dairy manager at Kroger. Perhaps worst, he is paranoid about his girlfriend, Courtney, who has enrolled in a nude life-drawing class at a community college. Her classmates wear T-shirts that say things like Mind Your Own Uterus.Courtney’s recent behavior and new friends are the immediate cause of Roger’s descent into the manosphere. There, Angry Alan teaches him that women, far from being victims of a male-dominated society, run the world and have done so for decades. Men must fight back to restore the proper balance.Perhaps these loathsome ideas seemed like news in 2018, when “Angry Alan” premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. (Don Mackay, credited with creating the play with Skinner, played Roger there and, later, in London.) The title character might have introduced audiences to recently emerged manopshere figures like the Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson, who advocates a return to traditional gender roles, and the British influencer Andrew Tate, a self-proclaimed misogynist with millions of followers.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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    in Theater

    ‘Angry Alan’ Review: John Krasinski Explores the Manosphere

    In an Off Broadway play, the former Jim Halpert of Dunder Mifflin dives into a darker world of male grievance.Roger is jazzed. He’s spent money he doesn’t have, including the child-support payment he owes, on a gold ticket to a men’s rights conference. Nor does the gathering disappoint. The Detroit hotel where it takes place is brimming with guys taking back their power. But guess what’s best? Angry Alan, the internet personality who opened Roger’s eyes to the evils of the gynocracy, is scheduled to speak. This is going to be great!For Roger, anyway. Not so much for us.It is perhaps a clue to the over-thick ironies of Penelope Skinner’s “Angry Alan,” which opened Tuesday at the new Studio Seaview, that the horde of inspired men at the conference is represented by, count ’em, two dummies and some faceless paintings on a backdrop. Offered in Sam Gold’s staging as a joke, like the rest of their gender, they are mere markers in a loaded argument. Even Roger, though played exceedingly well by John Krasinski, is a place holder: a straw man incarnate.Krasinski works hard to disguise that. As he proved during nine seasons as the gemütlich Jim Halpert on “The Office,” he performs charm, titrated with a satire of charm, very well. Here, in a role that runs to more than 10,000 words, some of them Roger’s and some of them his unflattering imitations of the women around him, that good-guy appeal has a lot of work to do.Because Roger is not a good guy. Though he believes himself to be supportive and reliable, the play keeps dropping heavy hints to the contrary. His first wife got uncontested custody of their son. The son doesn’t speak to him. He lost his BMW-level job at AT&T under unexplained circumstances, and is now the dairy manager at Kroger. Perhaps worst, he is paranoid about his girlfriend, Courtney, who has enrolled in a nude life-drawing class at a community college. Her classmates wear T-shirts that say things like Mind Your Own Uterus.Courtney’s recent behavior and new friends are the immediate cause of Roger’s descent into the manosphere. There, Angry Alan teaches him that women, far from being victims of a male-dominated society, run the world and have done so for decades. Men must fight back to restore the proper balance.Perhaps these loathsome ideas seemed like news in 2018, when “Angry Alan” premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. (Don Mackay, credited with creating the play with Skinner, played Roger there and, later, in London.) The title character might have introduced audiences to recently emerged manopshere figures like the Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson, who advocates a return to traditional gender roles, and the British influencer Andrew Tate, a self-proclaimed misogynist with millions of followers.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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    in Television

    Review: Thomas Vinterberg’s ‘Families Like Ours,’ on Netflix

    In Thomas Vinterberg’s series on Netflix, climate change forces a country to close, and everyone has to leave.The mini-series “Families Like Ours” on Netflix has an attention-grabbing premise: An entire country, Denmark, decides to shut itself down before climate change can do the job for it. Six million Danes start looking for new homes. Relocation plans are drawn up with Scandinavian efficiency, but European neighbors look upon waves of relatively well-off white refugees with the same distaste they show for Africans and Middle Easterners.The seven-episode series is the first from the Danish filmmaker Thomas Vinterberg, known for founding the no-frills Dogme 95 movement with Lars von Trier and, 26 years later, being nominated for a best director Oscar for “Another Round,” which won best international feature in 2021. The handsomely appointed “Families Like Ours,” which Vinterberg wrote, with Bo Hr. Hansen, and directed, breaks just about every rule in the Dogme manifesto, as his films have all along. It is a high-class consumer item, deliberate and hushed.It does, however, have something in common with his one true Dogme film, “The Celebration” from 1998. It subjects an extended Danish family to pressure and traces the fissures of guilt and dependency, the outbreaks of bad behavior and gallantry, that result. “The Celebration,” released when Vinterberg was 29, did this via transgressive, occasionally puerile black humor; “Families Like Ours” offers restrained, tasteful domestic drama. The contrast is startling, but the underlying satisfactions are similar.The new series (it premiered Tuesday on Netflix) will be categorized as a climate-change drama, and it is that. The story appears to take place in an unspecified but near future when waters have risen and efforts to hold them back have met with varying success. But the evidence of danger is mostly offscreen; the crisis is suggested through newscasts and ominous puddles. Vinterberg imagines that the climate crisis will arrive not in floods and heat but in bureaucracy and confusion — endless lines, indecipherable rules, arduous journeys, a constant assault on hope. His vision may not be easily dramatic, but it is convincing.(The overall premise is a more difficult sell. Would the Danes, as disciplined and regimented as they might be, really leave their country as obediently as the series portrays? Wouldn’t many congregate on high ground and fight to stay? The show’s failure to take on that possibility is a problem.)The show is also defined, in part, by the obvious reversal it plays on our expectations for stories about refugees. It is formerly comfortable white people who are standing in the lines, yelling across bank counters and nakedly pleading for handouts and favors. They are shocked by the conditions they face once they make it to Paris or Bucharest.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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    Broadway Dreams Were Dashed, Then Rob Madge Knocked on Some Doors

    The British performer is bringing “My Son’s a Queer (but What Can You Do?)” to City Center this week, after an earlier run was canceled.“Everybody needs a good setback in their life and gosh, 2024 did that for me.”That was Rob Madge, speaking on video last month from their London home. A theater maker who identifies as nonbinary, Madge smiled wide into the camera and, wearing a crisp white guayabera-style shirt that was mostly buttoned, looked as if they were on their way to a “White Lotus” resort happy hour.But Madge wasn’t talking about cocktails and island intrigue. They were recalling dashed Broadway dreams.In February 2024, the Broadway run of Madge’s autobiographical show “My Son’s a Queer (but What Can You Do?)” was postponed just weeks before it was to begin preview performances at the Lyceum Theater. There was talk of opening on Broadway the following season, but that never materialized.In a statement last month, the show’s producers, Tom Smedes and Heather Shields, said “the heartbreaking decision” to call off a Broadway run was because “the risks of launching and sustaining the production were simply too great” for the show’s “long-term health.”The actor in the production, which incorporates projected scenes from the “living room shows” that Madge performed as a kid.Mark SeniorMadge, 28, said having Broadway fall through prompted them to consider difficult and dueling questions, the likes of which plague any theater artist putting work into the world.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