Eliana Willis

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    in Television

    Somebody Explain Why Everybody Loves Phil Rosenthal

    When Phil Rosenthal, host of the Netflix food and travel show “Somebody Feed Phil” and creator of the enduring sitcom “Everybody Loves Raymond,” began selling out live shows last year, no one was more surprised than Ray Romano.Mr. Romano, the sitcom’s star, showed up at the Paramount concert hall on Long Island, expecting to stir up excitement among fans and help out during the Q&A. No one had a question for him, he said; they just wanted to tell Phil about their favorite places to eat in Lisbon or Nashville.“How did this happen?” the actor asked me over the phone last week. “I’ve been doing stand-up for 30 years. He goes to Poland and eats meatloaf and sells out theaters around the world?”There is no shortage of armchair-travel television: It pours from Hulu, Amazon Prime, National Geographic and Food Network, not to mention the fire hose that is social media. But somehow, Mr. Rosenthal has broken through and become a global star.Ray Romano, left, the star of “Everybody Loves Raymond,” said Mr. Rosenthal forced him to travel overseas for the first time by writing episodes set in Italy. (Brad Garrett, right, played Mr. Romano’s brother.) NetflixSeason 8 of his show dropped on June 18, making it the longest-running unscripted show on Netflix. In August he’ll start a North American tour, and a second cookbook, “Phil’s Favorites” — the first was a New York Times best seller — will come out in November.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 Best Theater Moments of 2025, So Far

    Our critic picked 10 moments that tapped into a range of emotions, often all at once.The theater is more than the sum of its parts; it is also the parts themselves. As I began to look back at the first half of 2025, I found myself primarily recalling those parts: the scene, not the script; the props, not the production. Here are 10 such moments, some sad, some funny, some furious, most all at once.Audra’s Turn at the Tonys“Rose’s Turn,” the 11 o’clock number to end them all, is often described as a nervous breakdown in song. It was certainly that when I first saw Audra McDonald slay it in the current Broadway revival of “Gypsy.” But by the time she performed it on the Tony Awards months later, it was no longer just a personal crisis: a mother grieving the lost opportunities her daughter now enjoys. The lyric “Somebody tell me, when is it my turn?” now rang out with greater depth and anger as McDonald, the first Black woman to play Rose on Broadway, invoked the lost opportunities of generations of talented Black women behind her.Read our review of “Gypsy” and our feature about “Rose’s Turn.”A Multiplicity of GreenspansDavid Greenspan as an impeccably dressed palace publicist in Jordan Tannahill’s play at Playwrights Horizons. The actor takes on multiple roles in the production, each meticulously specific.Richard Termine for The New York TimesThough he was the subject of the recent Off Broadway play “I’m Assuming You Know David Greenspan,” most people don’t. Nor will Greenspan’s astonishing quadruple performance in the Off Broadway production of “Prince Faggot,” Jordan Tannahill’s shocker about a gay heir to the British throne, help pin him down: He’s that shape-shifty. A bossy palace publicist, a discreet royal servant, even the possibly gay Edward II are among his perfectly etched characters. And the monologue in which he supposedly plays himself? Indescribable (at least here).Read our review of the play.A Face and a Name to RememberNow it can be told. In the Broadway show “Smash,” based on the television melodrama about a Marilyn Monroe musical, the big number (“Let Me Be Your Star”) was deeply undersold in the opening scene. That was a marvelous feint because, at the end of Act I, to bring the curtain down with a huge surprise bang, out came Bella Coppola, as a suddenly promoted assistant choreographer, performing the same song when no one else could. Can you oversell something? Turns out, no.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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    Will Sharpe, Star of Lena Dunham’s ‘Too Much,’ Is a Renaissance Man

    When Will Sharpe arrived at Cambridge University in the mid-aughts, he was one of many undergraduates wanting to join Footlights, the storied sketch comedy troupe that had launched the careers of Stephen Fry, Hugh Laurie and Emma Thompson. His friends thought it best to spend a few months figuring out what kind of comedy Footlights might favor before applying, but Sharpe wanted to jump right in.At a first-semester showcase open to nonmembers, Sharpe and his friends performed a wacky sketch that involved pretending to eat a tub of Vaseline by the handful. He was made a member and was later elected president of the troupe.Sharpe’s biweekly Footlights performances — which also included playing a white crayon that was sad it was never taken out of the box — “definitely encouraged a risk-taking attitude, because you could fail and try again, and fail and try again,” Sharpe recalled in an interview at a woodland cafe near his North London home.In the two decades since college, Sharpe, now 38, has tried — and often succeeded at — a variety of creative projects, including writing, directing, acting, playing music and performing comedy. Claire Foy, whom Sharpe directed in the 2021 biopic “The Electrical Life of Louis Wain,” described him in an interview with The New York Times as “a Renaissance man” — “a kind one.”American audiences, though, know Sharpe best from his chameleonic run of recent acting gigs: the stoic tech hunk in Season 2 of HBO’s “The White Lotus”; the earnest tour guide in Jesse Eisenberg’s Oscar-winning movie “A Real Pain”; and now, as Felix, the enigmatic indie musician in the rom-com “Too Much,” Lena Dunham’s new Netflix series arriving on July 10.Will Sharpe and Megan Stalter in “Too Much,” a new show by Lena Dunham for Netflix.NetflixWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    The Best Movies and TV Shows Coming to Disney+, Amazon, Max, AMC+ and More in July

    A “Jaws” documentary, “Sinners,” “Washington Black” and the low-budget “Monster Island” arrive, and “Foundation” and “Star Trek: Strange New Worlds” return.Every month, streaming services add movies and TV shows to their libraries. Here are our picks for some of July’s most promising new titles. (Note: Streaming services occasionally change schedules without giving notice. For more recommendations on what to stream, sign up for our Watching newsletter here.)New to Amazon Prime Video‘Ballard’ Season 1Starts streaming: July 9A spinoff of a spinoff, this cop drama stars Maggie Q as Renée Ballard, a dogged Los Angeles police detective first introduced in Michael Connelly’s Harry Bosch novels. Ballard made her TV debut in Season 3 of “Bosch: Legacy,” the follow-up to the popular crime series “Bosch.” In the new show, Ballard is assigned to lead a new team consisting mostly of volunteers and police department reserves, tasked to investigate some of the city’s oldest, coldest cases. As often happens in these situations, sometimes the trail of clues leads to some dangerous places, where the powerful people dwell. The detective has to rely on her wits and determination — along with some occasional help from the now-retired cop Bosch (Titus Welliver), who knows a lot about defying authority.Also arriving:July 2“Heads of State”July 11“One Night in Idaho: The College Murders”July 17“Surf Girls: International”July 21“Justice on Trial” Season 1July 23“Shiny Happy People: A Teenage Holy War”Callum Woodhouse, left, and Dean Fujioka in “Monster Island.”ShudderNew to AMC+‘Monster Island’Starts streaming: July 25Though its title may conjure up images of Godzilla and King Kong, this gritty low-budget monster movie actually features a human-scaled nemesis: a ferocious fish-man known as the Orang Ikan, which resembles the title beastie from “Creature From the Black Lagoon.” Written and directed by Mike Wiluan, “Monster Island” is set during World War II, and has Callum Woodhouse playing a captured British soldier and Dean Fujioka playing a Japanese soldier. When the two are shipwrecked, they have to put aside their prejudices and work together to survive the predator that is stalking them both. Working with little funds and just a few locations — plus one nifty-looking creature costume — Wiluan delivers the kind of intense action and moments of gory horror that genre fans enjoy.Also arriving:July 4“The Luckiest Man in America”July 7“The Madame Blanc Mysteries” Season 4July 11“Push”July 17“The Furry Detectives: Unmasking a Monster”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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    Dana Carvey Calls His Biden Impression a ‘Delicate Thing’

    For his portrayal of the former president on “Saturday Night Live,” Carvey admitted that he had to toe a careful line.Dana Carvey, the comedian and actor, said that impersonating former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. during the just completed 50th season of “Saturday Night Live” was a challenge because he said he believed Biden “was compromised mentally.”Carvey made the comment on a recent episode of his and David Spade’s podcast “Fly on the Wall” while discussing his portrayal of Biden, a Democrat, during his re-election bid in 2024. “It was a delicate thing in the comedy world,” Carvey added. “There were a lot of people that did not want to do anything that would kind of ding him in, like, an awkward way.”Carvey, a former “S.N.L.” cast member known for his many impersonations, including his portrayal of George H.W. Bush in the 1980s and 1990s, said that in order to make his version of Biden funny, it had to be recognizable, which is why Carvey mastered the former president’s squint and chuckle, as well as his lapsing into non sequiturs like insisting on “being serious right now,” even if what he last said was not a joke.In one episode that aired in late September, Carvey as Biden joined Kamala Harris, played by Maya Rudolph, at a rally after she won the Democratic nomination. He slowly walked to the podium and tossed out a number of Biden’s signature phrases (“by the way,” “guess what?”) before being rushed offstage, only to wander back. In another skit from November, after Donald J. Trump, the Republican nominee, won the election, Carvey’s Biden advises him to watch how he talks as president but stammers over his own words in doing so.It took two years for Carvey to master his impression of Biden, he said, and that the first six months of Biden’s presidency did not provide much material until he heard the president whisper and yell.“Biden eventually was my favorite because he had like 10 hooks,” Carvey said. “I loved it. It was in entering and exiting, but it was a real challenge to make it acceptable.”Biden’s age and mental state became flash points during the 2024 presidential election cycle. Conversations about it reached a fever pitch shortly after the first presidential debate in June, in which Biden meandered and mumbled through his answers. Weeks later and under intense pressure from members of his party, Biden dropped out of the race.Since then, there has been a litany of discussions and even books that examine the former president’s decline while in the White House. In May, Biden was diagnosed with an aggressive form of prostate cancer. More

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    ‘Love Island USA’ Has a New Villain This Season: The Viewers

    Audiences have bullied past contestants, but after an islander has become particularly divisive, the series is taking more steps to keep fans from harassing stars and their families.For viewers, the ridiculous games, steamy make-out sessions and potential relationships that appear on “Love Island USA” are as much of a draw as what happens after they air.The reality dating show, on Peacock, brings contestants to a remote villa in Fiji to pair up and risk getting dumped (and booted from the island) or recoupled with a different romantic interest. Through the show’s official app, viewers are encouraged to vote on who should be dumped and even selecting which contestants should go on dates.But one such fan vote, and a floodgate of audience response, this season has reopened scrutiny of “Love Island” and the mental health and welfare of its contestants. In recent weeks, the host Ariana Madix took the rare step of admonishing fans, as some have sent hateful messages or threats to family and friends of the islanders.“Don’t be contacting people’s families,” she said on “Aftersun,” a weekly recap show. “Don’t be going on islanders’ pages and saying rude things.”The rebuke came after viewers were vocal in response to Huda Mustafa, a 24-year-old from North Carolina who audiences voted to split from her partner Jeremiah Brown. Her reaction was dramatic, even by reality TV standards.Mustafa shouted insults and expletives at Brown, and her aggressive behavior toward the woman Brown was recoupled with prompted another contestant, Pepe Garcia, to tell an islander: “I don’t know if we should stay close or not, in case something happens.”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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    Anatomy of a Comedy Cliché

    <!–>An early example is from the movie “Punchline,” when Tom Hanks chokes up telling a club audience that he disappointed his father, failing out of medical school:–> <!–>In “Obvious Child,” Jenny Slate stops joking in one set to say she was cheated on. Things get dark:–> <!–>After his jokes are met with awkward silence, Kumail […] More

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    in Theater

    André Bishop Takes a Bow After Hundreds of Shows at Lincoln Center Theater

    He is moving on from 33 years at Lincoln Center Theater and will head to Rome to focus on his memoirs.André Bishop, the longtime producing artistic director of Lincoln Center Theater, could have chosen almost anything for the final Broadway production of his tenure. He’s known for Golden Age musicals, and has a long history with new plays. But he opted to exit with “Floyd Collins,” a dark and tragic 1996 musical about a trapped cave explorer.Why would anyone select that as their swan song?“I just thought it’s the kind of serious musical that I want to go out on, because everything in it is something that I believe, in terms of the musical theater,” he told me in an interview last week at his nearly empty office — nearly empty because he’s been giving away his theater memorabilia after deciding he didn’t want his home to turn into a museum. He donated his archives — 174 cartons of papers, photos and notebooks — to the Houghton Library at Harvard University, his alma mater.“Now there would be some people who say, ‘Why do you have to do all these sad shows? Why can’t you do something toe-tapping?’ Well, that’s just not my nature,” he said. “I felt that Floyd’s looking for a perfect cave was very close to mine looking for a perfect theater — that somehow these theaters that I’ve worked in for 50 years were these perfect caves that I happened to stumble on.”Jason Gotay, in the background, and Jeremy Jordan in “Floyd Collins” at Lincoln Center Theater. “It’s the kind of serious musical that I want to go out on, because everything in it is something that I believe, in terms of the musical theater,” Bishop said.Richard Termine for The New York TimesBishop, 76, has spent the last 33 years running Lincoln Center Theater, which has a $50 million annual budget, 22,000 members, 65 full-time employees, two Off Broadway stages, and one Broadway house (the Vivian Beaumont). He programmed over 150 plays and musicals, 15 of which won Tony Awards, and then announced in 2023 that he would retire this summer; Monday was his last day on the job, and he is being succeeded by Lear deBessonet, the artistic director of the Encores! program at City Center.His departure is part of a wave of change at Broadway’s nonprofits; all four of the nonprofits with Broadway houses are naming successors for artistic leaders with decades-long tenures.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