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    At a Revamped Under the Radar, New York Greets a ‘Global Downtown’

    No longer at the Public, the annual celebration of experimental theater disperses 17 productions across the city. About half are international works that are getting harder to import.The writer and performer Inua Ellams was born in Nigeria, is based in England and performs internationally. “As an immigrant, I’m most comfortable when I’m not at home,” he said during a recent conversation. “To go to another country and see if my concepts still stand the test of artistry, that’s what I love doing.”Ellams will take that test in early January, at Lincoln Center’s Clark Studio Theater, when he performs “Search Party,” during which the audience curates an evening of his poetry by shouting out words that Ellams enters into the search bar of an iPad already loaded with his works.“Search Party” is among the works included in this year’s Under the Radar Festival, a celebration of experimental performance. Having lost its longtime space at the Public Theater owing to the Public’s budget cuts, the 2024 festival will disperse 17 full productions (as well as symposia and a disco) across more than a dozen partner venues in Manhattan and Brooklyn.Of those full productions, about half of them are created by artists based outside the United States. In a year in which the festival, with its budget halved, had to scramble for new partners and new spaces, and considering the rising costs and difficulties of artists’ visas, a roster of local artists might have been an easier sell. But that would undercut the ethos of Under the Radar, which has always mingled international artists with local ones in pursuit of what the festival’s founder, Mark Russell, refers to as “the global downtown.”“I want for our artists to see these other artists from around the world and understand that they’re all part of a larger community,” Russell said.To bring an international show to New York is a process that must begin many months (or ideally, years) in advance. The work has to be scouted and deemed appropriate for an American, English-speaking audience and not so bulky — in terms of both cast size and production design — that the cost of importing it becomes prohibitive.Within these criteria, Ellams’s “Search Party” is especially attractive. It requires only Ellams, who had already received a visa as an individual of extraordinary ability, and his iPad. (“Of all the shows that I’ve had performed across the world, this is probably the most eco-friendly,” Ellams said.) The two other shows that Lincoln Center has brought over, “Queens of Sheba” and Pan Pan’s “The First Bad Man,” are also traveling without scenery, a deliberate simplicity.“International artists are getting smarter,” Jon Nakagawa, Lincoln Center’s director of contemporary programming, said.Funding for these shows must be secured, typically a collaboration between the sponsor theater and the international artists, who can apply in their home countries for government and private grants, which can be used to cover airfare and hotel costs. Visas have to be obtained, typically either a P-3, for an artist or entertainer traveling with a work of unique cultural significance, or an O-1 visa, like the one Ellams travels under, granted to individuals of extraordinary abilities. Each type requires both a stateside approval and an in-person interview, typically in the applicant’s country of origin. As wait times for visa approvals have grown exponentially, many arts institutions now work with law firms to expedite the process.Even so, there can be surprises, usually not welcome ones. The Japan Society, which has long imported experimental Japanese performance, ran into a hitch with “Hamlet/Toilet,” an absurdist, pop culture-inflected work from the playwright and director Yu Murai and Theater Company Kaimaku Pennant Race. As the work is based in part on Shakespeare’s “Hamlet,” Yoko Shioya, the Japan Society’s artistic director, had to argue what made this work culturally unique to Japan. Asked by the consular official to submit further evidence, she focused on the production’s toilets. (Murai is also the author of “Romeo & Toilet.” Toilets are a recurring motif.)“Everybody who first goes to Japan, their jaws drop at the toilets,” she said. The official approved the application.The Japan Society will host “Hamlet/Toilet,” a work from the playwright and director Yu Murai and Theater Company Kaimaku Pennant Race.Takashi IkemuraOther productions have had to rely on U.S. senators and foreign officials to arrange timely appointments at American embassies. When none can be found, artists have been flown to other countries whose embassies are less backlogged. This year, the vice mayor of Milan helped to schedule an expedited appointment for a member of the Italian performance troupe Motus, which will perform “Of the Nightingale I Envy the Fate,” adapted from “The Oresteia,” at La MaMa. A cinematographer with Sister Sylvester’s “The Eagle and the Tortoise,” a work about the history of the aerial view that will play at BRIC, wasn’t so lucky. That colleague couldn’t secure an appointment until 2025 and won’t join the production.“It’s becoming more and more risky and more and more expensive,” Denise Greber, La MaMa’s director of artistic operations, said of importing international work. She noted that the cost of visa applications has nearly doubled in recent years. And she had just received word that the cost of one form was set to increase further. “But we still try. It’s important for people in New York City to have an opportunity to see work from other countries. It’s just really important to have cultural exchange.”It isn’t only New York City residents who benefit. Under the Radar, like other January events such as the Exponential Festival, Prototype and The Fire This Time, is in part a showcase that coincides with the annual conference of the Association of Performing Arts Professionals. Those professionals can reward artists with lucrative touring contracts, and artists can profit in other ways, too.Ellams was looking forward to the conversations among local and international artists, perpetuating his belief in what he called “the global village.”“New York is the concrete jungle of the world,” he said. “It’s where a lot of the world’s conversations begin.” More

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    The Best Movies and TV Shows Coming to Netflix in January

    Sofia Vergara’s narco queenpin miniseries and a crypto documentary highlight this month’s slate.Every month, Netflix adds movies and TV shows to its library. Here are our picks for some of January’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.)‘Bitconned’Now streamingThe collapse of big-time cryptocurrency exchanges like FTX grab a lot of headlines, but these are far from the only crypto businesses that have misled investors into losing fortunes. The documentary “Bitconned” tracks the rise and fall of Centra Tech, a company that promised — dubiously, in retrospect — to make crypto assets accessible via a debit card. Directed by Bryan Storkel (best-known for the quirky docs “The Pez Outlaw” and “The Bad Boy of Bowling”), the film is anchored by extensive interviews with the Centra Tech masterminds, as well as with some of the journalists who figured out early that something was fishy here. The details of the story are at once amusing and alarming, involving easily persuaded celebrity spokespeople, phony apps engineered to demonstrate a nonexistent technology and a FOMO culture where the bold promise of quick cash drowns out common sense.‘Fool Me Once’Now streamingThe author Harlan Coben’s novels are prime adaptation fodder for two simple reasons: He creates sympathetic protagonists with relatable anxieties; and he writes twisty plots that keep readers guessing. In the British miniseries “Fool Me Once,” Michelle Keegan plays a typical Coben hero, Maya Stern, an ex-military special operations agent who is shocked one day to look at the footage from her home security camera and see her husband, Joe (Richard Armitage), whom she thought had been murdered. Her investigation into this mystery leads to Maya crossing paths with a distrustful homicide investigator (Adeel Akhtar) and Joe’s rich and powerful mother (Joanna Lumley) — as well as some family members of her own who believe Joe’s strange case may be tied to the death of Maya’s sister.‘Society of the Snow’Starts streaming: Jan. 4In 1972, a plane crash in the Andes left over two dozen passengers stuck on a remote, icy mountain, with little hope of rescue and only a small amount of food to share. Famously — or infamously — the survivors resorted to cannibalism while waiting for the spring thaw. But the director J.A. Bayona (adapting a book by the journalist Pablo Vierci) doesn’t make the eating of human flesh the primary point of emphasis in his film “Society of the Snow.” He’s more interested in hardships like extreme cold and sudden avalanches, and in how a desperate situation strengthened the bond between these people, many of whom played together on the same rugby team. This is film about young men fighting hard to stay alive for each other’s sake, in a landscape at once picturesque and cruel.‘The Brothers Sun’ Season 1Starts streaming: Jan. 4The two brothers in the action-dramedy “The Brothers Sun” couldn’t be more different. One is Bruce (Sam Song Li), a cash-strapped Los Angeles college student with aspirations to be an improv comic; the other is Charles (Justin Chien), a skilled amateur chef who also happens to be a top-level assassin in a Taiwan triad. Michelle Yeoh plays the boys’ mother, Eileen, who has been sheltering Bruce from the criminal life in America. But when killers from the old country start invading her suburban sanctuary, she has to get her gangster groove back to keep her family safe. Created by Brad Falchuk (a creator of “Glee” and “American Horror Story”) and Byron Wu, this series combines dynamic martial arts sequences with scenes where the dysfunctional Suns relearn how to trust each other.‘Griselda’Starts streaming: Jan. 25Sofia Vergara plays the notorious drug lord Griselda Blanco in this miniseries, created by the writer-producer Ingrid Escajeda alongside some of the team behind the Netflix favorite “Narcos.” (Vergara, a Colombian herself, is also a producer on the project.) Blanco’s story has been told before in documentaries and TV movies, most of which treat her as a larger-than-life criminal legend. “Griselda” aims to be more grounded, following the cocaine queenpin from her origins in Medellín to her dominance of the Miami market, while frequently jumping back and forth in time to compare the mild-mannered immigrant mother that Blanco once seemed to be with the ruthless woman who went on to outfox the mob’s macho men.Also arriving:Jan. 1“You Are What You Eat: A Twin Experiment”Jan. 5“Gyeongseong Creature” Season 1, Part 2Jan. 10“The Trust: A Game of Greed” Season 1Jan. 11“Champion” Season 1“Detective Forst” Season 1“Sonic Prime” Season 3Jan. 12“Lift”“Love Is Blind: Sweden” Season 1Jan. 19“The Bequeathed” Season 1“Sixty Minutes”Jan. 22“Not Quite Narwhal” Season 2Jan. 23“Jacqueline Novak: Get on Your Knees”“Love Deadline” Season 1Jan. 24“Queer Eye” Season 8“Six Nations: Full Contact”Jan. 30“Jack Whitehall: Settle Down”Jan. 31“Baby Bandito” More

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    ‘Fargo’ Season 5, Episode 8 Recap: Rude Awakenings

    Dot learns some harsh truths about her past and present. Danish takes an ill-advised trip to North Dakota.Season 5, Episode 8: ‘Blanket’When Dot was kidnapped early in the season and then she simply returned home as if nothing had happened, it was absurd on its face. No one, other than Wayne, could believe that she had stepped out for a while and come back in time to whisk up some Bisquick for their daughter. And even though she knew that her abductors would lay siege to the house again, she was determined to enjoy Halloween with her family, even as she laid out booby traps like Dustin Hoffman in “Straw Dogs.” She’s the sort of determined fantasist who believes she can bend reality to her will.That bubble is punctured in two lines in this week’s episode, as Roy finally has her back at his ranch in North Dakota, shackled to the floor like an animal. “You’ll end up same as Linda,” he hisses. “I’ll bury you right next to her.” We had just spent most of the previous episode at Camp Utopia, the women’s shelter that Dot had conjured in a reverie over pancakes, which seemed at the time like a clever way to fill in a crucial piece of her back story. But now it’s clear that she was clinging to the idea that Linda had fled Tillman Ranch to save herself and perhaps could one day reappear to make amends with Dot and be a mother again to her wayward son, Gator, who has gone to the dark side in her absence.In the time leading up to Roy’s revelation about what really happened to Linda, Dot is still dead set on returning to the fantasy life that she has nearly succeeded in making real. She needs to order an ice cream cake for Scotty’s birthday. She has her duties as a den mother for a girl scout troop. She has 13 seasons of “Call the Midwife” to get through with Wayne. Yet the incontrovertible truth about Roy is that he is a killer with a badge, unrestrained by the laws of man or the influence of a powerful lawyer like Danish Graves, who smugly assumed he had the upper hand in a negotiation. From her shelter on the ranch, Dot can see that corpse disposal is so routine for Roy that he has a pit on site for it.At this point, it may be worth questioning how sincere “Fargo” is about domestic violence. As skillfully as the show’s creator, Noah Hawley, has spun his serio-comic yarn this season, it can be difficult to reconcile the glib, knowing, referential tone of the show with the content warnings that have bracketed the last two episodes. When Roy takes his long walk back to Dot in the shelter, following his humiliation at the county sheriff’s debate, a Lisa Hannigan cover of the Britney Spears hit “Toxic” blankets the soundtrack and it strikes a bum note. “Dark” covers of pop songs have become a staple of movie trailers, and here it’s the coming attraction to a type of abuse the show isn’t sober enough to handle. What worked for the puppets in Camp Utopia feels more like genre exploitation here.It doesn’t help that the prelude to violence is so extravagantly silly. Lorraine and Danish’s plan to spoil Roy’s re-election campaign surely ranks as the strangest of the onerous debt consolidation options offered by Redemption Services. In order for the plan to work, Danish has to get name changes approved for three Roy Tillmans, secure spots for each of them on the debate stage for Stark County sheriff and provoke the real Roy Tillman so shrewdly that he melts down and slugs the female moderator. Those seem like a lot of unpredictable variables, but the scene itself is reasonably funny, with the fake Roys echoing the real one like siblings pranking their older brother.Now that the Roy-Dot-Linda situation has been clarified, can we get a puppet-assisted back story on how Indira and Lars Olmstead ever became a couple? Because whatever it is that Lars brought to the table when they fell in love and got married, there’s no evidence left of it now. Indira catching Lars with another woman adds infidelity to a long list of flaws that she itemizes one last time before kicking him out of the house. Throughout the season, Indira’s troubles at home have been placed in contrast with Dot’s blissful marriage to Wayne, and it has offered a different picture of domestic toxicity than Dot’s abuse at Roy’s hands. They are both women fighting for their own happiness, and the show has engineered an unspoken bond between them.The final shot of Dot peering out a small, broken window on the ranch, fully awake to Roy’s capabilities, introduces a genuine fear that we haven’t yet seen from her. “You don’t have a plan, do you?,” she asked him earlier. She intended it as a rhetorical taunt, but perhaps now she realizes that his not having a plan is a terrifying proposition. He will assert his authority over her. He hasn’t planned anything after that.3 Cent StampsDot knowing the truth about what happened to Linda does increase the possibility that Gator will turn on his father, especially given the vulnerability he shows at any mention of his mother. He will have to survive Ole Munch first, however.Nice to see Deputy Witt Farr re-emerge in the hospital, where he tries to pry Dot away from Roy’s clutches. He has shown a lot of courage already in standing up to the Tillmans, but it’s his insistence on repeatedly calling Dot “Mrs. Lyon” that is touching in this context. He wants her (and Roy) to know that he recognizes who she really is.One Coens reference in this episode: Indira’s opening the bedroom closet door on Lars’s mistress recalls when George Clooney discovers Brad Pitt hiding out in “Burn After Reading.” The mistress gets off a little easier, though.Kudos to the people of Stark County for packing the house for a sheriffs debate. You don’t expect such things to be standing-room-only media events.Another small movie reference: The squeaky windmill above the spot where Roy dumps his victims seems like a nod to the famous opening of “Once Upon a Time in the West,” where such a squeak is among the new sounds we hear in the pregnant moments before three outlaws ambush Charles Bronson at a train station. It’s also a callback to the place where she hid the postcard from Linda in her reverie. More

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    New Year, New Show: An Original ‘& Juliet’ Star Heads Home

    Melanie La Barrie thought she would make it through her last performance of “& Juliet” without succumbing to tears.She was mistaken — though contributing factors include that it was the end of a nine-show holiday week; that she originated the role of Angélique, Juliet’s nurse, in this British jukebox-musical riff on “Romeo and Juliet” in 2019; and that she made her Broadway debut in it, at 48, in October 2022.On Saturday night at the Stephen Sondheim Theater, where “& Juliet” is one of Broadway’s poppiest hits, La Barrie sailed through her comic Act I duet with Paulo Szot, who plays Angélique’s long-lost love. But her poignant Act II solo, sung to Juliet (Lorna Courtney), undid her. Embracing Courtney at the finish, La Barrie kept her eyes shut tight against the audience’s ovation, needing to stay rooted in the show.Paulo Szot, who plays Angélique’s long-lost love, gave La Barrie an eloquent onstage tribute.Emily Soto for The New York TimesA Trinidadian Londoner whose West End credits include Mrs. Phelps in the original production of “Matilda,” La Barrie is about to play Hermes in the West End premiere of “Hadestown,” whose first week of rehearsal, in December, she attended on a vacation from “& Juliet.” During her Broadway sojourn, her partner of 15 years, Martin Phillips, a translator, was more often the one traveling back and forth.After La Barrie’s final bow in “& Juliet,” which Szot marked with an eloquent onstage tribute, thanking her “for giving life to the adorable Angélique,” she changed out of her costume and put on a Hermes pendant: a gift from Jeannie Naughton, her “& Juliet” dresser.La Barrie sat for photos, communed with fans at the stage door, declined offers of Jell-O shots from her young colleagues. Then she returned to her dressing room to talk, packing a bit as she did, because she had a New Year’s Eve flight to London the next day. These are edited excerpts from that conversation.“The thing that was the most important to me was for people to know how much I loved Juliet,” La Barrie said.Emily Soto for The New York TimesHow are you doing?I feel so satisfied. I’ve been with this show for such a long time. I did the first workshop of it in December 2017, in London. It was right after Liverpool, where I had played the Nurse in “Romeo and Juliet.” [The director Luke Sheppard] said, “Will you come and read something for me? I can’t really explain what it is, but it’s kind of top secret.”Jeannie Naughton, La Barrie’s “& Juliet” dresser, gave her a Hermes pendant in a nod to the role she is about to play in “Hadestown.”Emily Soto for The New York TimesHow did having played the Nurse affect your approach to Angélique?The thing that was the most important to me was for people to know how much I loved Juliet. They had to know that my entire being was to be an adjunct to Juliet’s wishes. To facilitate them, even reluctantly. Which is Shakespeare’s intention, you know. Everything I do is for Juliet. But this one then veers off and gives me my own story. Which is quite something.It’s a fizzy, funny, midlife romance. Tell me how you made that work so beautifully.Grown-ups don’t get love stories. They say to me at the stage door all the time — it’s always the mamas — they go, “Can my kid have a picture, and then can I have one?” A new love, or a re-sparked love in older people, they eat it up because they say, “I don’t know this. I don’t know this in the context of a jukebox musical or in the context of any musical at all.” I think that is the first thing: the audience’s desire for that. You put me with somebody that I love as deeply as I love Paulo Szot ——“The way that I tell stories comes from a deeply cultural place,” said La Barrie, a Trinidadian Londoner.Emily Soto for The New York TimesWhom you had never met before this show.Never met before. And when I came, I was so clear that I didn’t want to bring any of my experience of the [dynamic from the] London production. It would be very unfair, I thought, to come here and try to make Tony Award-winning Paulo Szot do what Broadway debutante Melanie La Barrie wanted to do. So why don’t we make it anew? He’s an acclaimed opera singer. He runs in serious circles. But he lives in a spirit of collaboration.When I first moved here, Paulo took me out. He took me to see a Brazilian symphony at Carnegie Hall. Then we went to Birdland afterwards, to watch some jazz. It was the best date — [laughs] sorry, Martin — one of the best friend dates that I have ever been on. And he knew that I had never been here before.You had never been here before?I probably, maybe, had a layover once or spent one day.And then you just moved here for over a year.I know. Isn’t that fun?“Grown-ups don’t get love stories,” La Barrie said. “They say to me at the stage door all the time — it’s always the mamas — they go, ‘Can my kid have a picture, and then can I have one?’” Emily Soto for The New York TimesIn March, when “Hadestown” tweeted that it was going back to London, you tweeted, “I am available.”I’d never even seen the show.Had you heard it?No, not really. But I knew that it was amazing.How much freedom do you have to make Hermes your own?One, I’m using my own accent. That brings its own music and its own sensibilities. And the way that I tell stories comes from a deeply cultural place. There’s a [Trinidadian] music called rapso. It’s social commentary, all in rhyme, in time to music. That’s the thing that informed me when I did my audition.We have taken the gender out of Hermes. Hermes is now just Hermes. It was something that I felt very, very deeply about. When I went in to audition, I just dropped all the “Mister” and “Missus.” I didn’t say it. I put in other words. Because I was like, I don’t feel like a Missus Hermes. I just feel like Hermes. And they’re so game for this kind of genderless god from the Caribbean. [laughs]“I love Broadway, and I love New York,” La Barrie said. “That’s also now a part of me, that’s like another lobe of my heart.”Emily Soto for The New York TimesWhat of your “& Juliet” experience will you take with you?This show and this part has changed my life. I probably never would have gotten Hermes if I didn’t play Angélique. People regard me differently. I had to wait until I was nearly 50 years old for that to happen. I think people would have still just had me in those smaller supporting roles if I hadn’t done this, and if I hadn’t done this on Broadway. Which then jumped it up a few pegs in the hierarchy of things.Will Broadway see you again?I hope so. I love Broadway, and I love New York. That’s also now a part of me, that’s like another lobe of my heart. I didn’t expect when I was growing up in Trinidad to ever be given anything like this. It’s like, not miraculous, because I have done the work. But still it’s wondrous. That wonder has been given to me. And that is why I am satisfied. More

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    Do You Know These Imaginary Worlds in Popular Fantasy Novels?

    “A Song of Ice and Fire,” George R. R. Martin’s fantasy series, is best known for its first book, “A Game of Thrones,” which was published in 1996. In the novels, as well as the HBO television adaptation titled “Game of Thrones,” much of the action takes place on the continent of Westeros. Name two of the powerful families in Westeros. More

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    2024 TV, Movies and More That New York Times Critics Look Forward To

    “Mad Max” gets a prequel, “The Wiz” returns to Broadway and Larry David gets another crack at a series finale.Holland CotterThe Met Looks to Right a Historic WrongEarly in 1969, the Metropolitan Museum sparked an uproar with an exhibition called “Harlem on My Mind: Cultural Capital of Black America, 1900-1968.” Although conceived as the museum’s first big-ticket acknowledgment of African American creativity, it included no visual art beyond documentary photomurals. Black artists, many working in Harlem just blocks north of the museum, angrily picketed the show, denouncing it as evidence of art world racism writ large.As a student visiting New York in 1969 I saw, and was baffled by, that show, so I’m eager to see a new one that can only be viewed as a corrective to it, the marquee-scale survey of paintings, sculptures, photographs and films titled “The Harlem Renaissance and Transatlantic Modernism” scheduled to open at the Met in February. The announced inclusion of a wealth of African American art considered inadmissible to the Met half a century ago — some represented by rarely seen loans from the collections of some of the country’s historically Black colleges and universities — is, on its own, an exciting prospect. And so is the exhibition’s larger promise to fully position modern African American art not just as a local phenomenon, but as a generator of international modernism itself.Alissa WilkinsonFuriosa Gets an Origin StoryCharlize Theron in the 2015 movie “Mad Max: Fury Road.”Jasin Boland/Warner Bros.Next year brings a lot of sequels: “Inside Out 2,” “Beetlejuice 2,” “Joker: Folie à Deux,” “Gladiator 2,” “Dune: Part Two,” plus new films in the “Quiet Place” and “Venom” and “Paddington” and “Godzilla” and even “Despicable Me” cinematic universes. I rarely get excited for non-original films, since most of them come off as naked cash grabs capitalizing on existing I.P. and risk-averse audiences. But I’m always curious if a sequel (or prequel or side-quel or whatever) will manage to be good, and the one I’m excited for is “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga.” George Miller returns to direct an origin story for the character that Charlize Theron played in 2015’s “Mad Max: Fury Road,” with Anya Taylor-Joy in the Furiosa role. I love a dystopia, and few have exceeded the sheer adrenaline and dread of “Fury Road.” I’m revisiting all the “Mad Max” movies in preparation.Mike HaleTom Hollander Tackles Truman CapoteClive Owen as an aging Sam Spade on AMC’s “Monsieur Spade” (Jan. 14), Helena Bonham Carter as the 1970s soap opera star Noele Gordon (“Nolly,” PBS), Ben Mendelsohn and Juliette Binoche as Christian Dior and Coco Chanel (“The New Look,” Apple TV+, Feb. 14) — there may have never been a new TV year with so many intriguing bits of casting. But the one that has me the most curious is the wonderfully acidic British actor Tom Hollander playing Truman Capote in FX’s “Feud: Capote vs. the Swans” (Jan. 31). Naomi Watts, Diane Lane, Chloë Sevigny and Calista Flockhart play some of the society women Capote befriended and then used as material for his highly unflattering roman à clef “Answered Prayers”; if the thought of Hollander channeling Capote as he calls Happy Rockefeller “that fat-ankled harridan” turns you on, then you must tune in.Salamishah Tillet‘The Wiz’ Returns to BroadwayFrom left: Christian Dante White as the Scarecrow, Ashanti as Dorothy and Joshua Henry as the Tinman in the 2009 Encores! Summer stars production of the musical “The Wiz.”Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesI tell everyone that my son Sidney is a musical theater kid. So naturally, his favorite movie is “The Wiz.” And, of course, for his eighth birthday, we went to Baltimore, where the musical version first debuted in 1975, and its current tour started this past October. My parents even saw one of its 1,672 performances during its original four-year Broadway run, when it won seven Tonys, including best musical. Because I come from a family of avid “Wiz” fans, I find myself anticipating its return to Broadway this April at the Marquis Theater with more zeal than usual.Based on L. Frank Baum’s children’s book “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” and with an all-black cast, “The Wiz” is a cultural classic, so its revivals have to come with some powerful updates. Directed by Schele Williams with additional writing by Amber Ruffin, it now features Nichelle Lewis, whose TikTok audition landed her the role as Dorothy; a stirring Melody A. Betts as Aunt Em and Evillene; Kyle Ramar Freeman as the Lion, Phillip Johnson Richardson as the Tinman; Avery Wilson as the Scarecrow; and Deborah Cox as Glinda, with Wayne Brady returning to Broadway to play Oz. My sneak peek already has me excited about this dynamic cast, Hannah Beachler’s (“Black Panther”) kaleidoscopic set and the former Beyoncé choreographer JaQuel Knight’s dance moves, especially when Dorothy and her squad of outsiders make their way to Emerald City.Jesse GreenA Double Dose of Itamar MosesTalk about range: February brings to New York stages two exceedingly contrasting works by Itamar Moses, who previously wrote the book for “The Band’s Visit.” Feb. 15 through March 10, the Public Theater presents Lila Neugebauer’s staging of “The Ally,” starring Josh Radnor as a Jewish college professor caught in the crossfire between wokeism and free speech when asked to sign a social justice manifesto. The topicality is off the charts.Then, Feb. 28 through April 7 at the Minetta Lane Theater, Audible reunites Moses with some of his “Band’s Visit” collaborators for “Dead Outlaw.” The musical, directed by David Cromer, with a book by Moses and songs by David Yazbek and Erik Della Penna, is about … a mummy. Specifically, the mummy of a failed Old West gunslinger, used as a sideshow attraction for decades before the truth is discovered in a super-gross way. Spoiler alert — I guess literally.Maya PhillipsStylish Spy Moves, Stacked Cast (and One Cat)The concept at the center of “Argylle” — a best-selling author discovers that what she writes comes true — immediately reminds me of one of my favorite films, “Stranger Than Fiction.” (I’m just a sucker for meta stories about the power of storytelling.) Starring Bryce Dallas Howard as a meek spy novelist whose words draw her into the dangerous world of espionage, “Argylle” (opening Feb. 2) is directed by Matthew Vaughn, whose devilishly stylish “Kingsman” franchise suggests he’ll know just how to play to and satirize the spy movie genre. The cast is filled with actors who have taken on action roles but have also shown impressive comedic chops (Henry Cavill, Sam Rockwell, John Cena and Samuel L. Jackson among them), while the cinematography looks to share the same sleek style Vaughn has made his signature. And an inconvenient, frazzled cat in a backpack? The cherry on top.Jason ZinomanLarry David Does Another FinaleHow in the world did Larry David do it? It’s a question I’ve been hearing a lot lately. How did he make one of the funniest episodes of television ever out of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? How did he tackle race, the Holocaust, Trump without getting in trouble? How did he make us care so much about these insufferable rich Hollywood types whining during their golf game? How did he manage the impossible feat of putting on 11 seasons of a show dominated by improvised small talk? The questions are rhetorical, of course, but everyone knows the answer. Larry David is really really (dare I say “pretty preeetty”) good at what he does. So, his last season of “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” which premieres Feb. 4, is a sad occasion. But it’s also one of the few things on television that I will not tape but watch exactly when it airs. I don’t know what the storylines of the next season will be, but here’s one idea to consider: David has already written a much-anticipated finale, the one on “Seinfeld.” I thought it was excellent. Many disagreed. Jerry Seinfeld has said onstage that he will be revisiting this finale in some form. Food for thought.Margaret Lyons‘Girls5eva’ Hit the RoadFrom left: Busy Philipps, Paula Pell, Renee Elise Goldsberry and Sara Bareilles in “Girls5eva.”Emily V Aragones/NetflixWhen Season 2 of “Girls5eva” ended in 2022, my hopes for a renewal were slim; no Peacock original show has actually made it to a third season. But now it isn’t a Peacock show anymore: There is a third season premiering March 14, but it will be on Netflix. Season 1 found the ’90s girl group reuniting, and in Season 2 they put out their album. This season, they’re heading out on tour, an experience for which they are not prepared. I am of course looking forward to the zingy jokes and warped nostalgia, but the even bigger wish is for another absolute banger that will join “Four Stars,” “B.P.E.” and “I’m Afraid” on my playlists.Zachary WoolfeChristmas in Spring at the MetFirst things first: “El Niño” isn’t an opera about weather patterns. In fact, while John Adams’s energetic, eclectic two-hour score is opera-length, it’s not exactly an opera at all. It’s an oratorio, in the tradition of Handel’s “Messiah,” that tells the Nativity story without characters or naturalistic scenes. It’s more of a reflection on the tale; the choral numbers and solos have their texts drawn from the Bible as well as from Latin American poetry, all sewn together by Adams and Peter Sellars.First performed in 2000, the piece isn’t always staged, but for its Metropolitan Opera premiere (April 23-May 17), the company is giving it a grand treatment. The production, directed by Lileana Blain-Cruz, boasts the conductor Marin Alsop, the soprano Julia Bullock, the bass-baritone Davóne Tines and the mezzo-soprano J’Nai Bridges — inspired musical forces. It’s a few months late for Christmas, but “El Niño” will be welcome nevertheless.Jon ParelesBrittany Howard Unveils Startling New SongsBrittany Howard returns with a solo album, “What Now,” this year.Rob Grabowski/Invision, via Associated PressUnbridled emotions, sonic ambitions and audacious singing have been the makings of Brittany Howard’s songs since she arrived with Alabama Shakes in 2012. She’s steeped in Southern soul and rock, and her voice has gospel-rooted power. But with Alabama Shakes and then on her 2019 solo album, “Jaime,” Howard moved far beyond revivalism, pushing toward startling new hybrids; her co-producer, Shawn Everett, has also worked with SZA and Kacey Musgraves. Howard’s second solo album, “What Now,” is due Feb. 2, and its advance singles have plunged into the turbulence of a failing relationship, leaping between the percussive and the ethereal. The full album promises even more innovative ups and downs. Howard begins a North American tour on Feb. 6, with New York City shows Feb. 16 and 17 at Webster Hall. More

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    What’s on TV This Week: ‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ and the Golden Globes

    The competition show featuring drag queens comes back for a 16th season. The annual award show airs on CBS.Between network, cable and streaming, the modern television landscape is a vast one. Here are some of the shows, specials and movies coming to TV this week, Jan. 1-7. Details and times are subject to change.Monday2023 ROCK & ROLL HALL OF FAME INDUCTION CEREMONY 8 p.m. on ABC. Though celebrating music highlights of 2023 on the first day of 2024 feels a little belated, for Missy Elliott and Sheryl Crowe I’ll let it go. This ceremony, which took place in Brooklyn in November, includes performances by Elliott and Crowe, inductees that year, as well as appearances by Stevie Nicks, Elton John and LL Cool J.From left: Harpo, Zeppo, Chico and Groucho Marx in “Monkey Business.”Film Society of Lincoln CenterMONKEY BUSINESS (1931) 8 p.m. on TCM. The title of this movie aptly portrays the shenanigans that go on when the Marx Brothers stow away on an ocean liner, stirring up drama and laughs while they avoid the wrath of the captain and his crew.TuesdayFINDING YOUR ROOTS 8 p.m. on PBS (check local listings). This show has told us that Bernie Sanders and Larry David are in fact related, the best-friend duo Matt Damon and Ben Affleck are 10th cousins (once removed) and Kevin Bacon shares relatives with his wife, Kyra Sedgwick. Now it’s back for its 10th season, hosted, as always, by Henry Louis Gates Jr. The first episode will feature the singers Ciara and Alanis Morissette.WednesdayI CAN SEE YOUR VOICE 8 p.m. on Fox. “The Voice” allows judges to hear contestants’ singing before laying eyes on them. This competition show does the opposite. Judges on the show, hosted by Ken Jeong, have to rate contestants based on lip-sync challenges and facts about them. The answers are revealed when the celebrity judges, including Adrienne Bailon-Houghton and Cheryl Hines, sing a duet with the contestant — either it goes really right or really wrong.ThursdayTHE POWER OF FILM 8 p.m. on TCM. This original six-part documentary series uses storytelling devices to take a closer look at some of the most popular films of the last century. Using more than 50 film scenes, the episodes go through themes of paradoxes, character relationships and heroes and villains to illuminate what makes a film powerful.Maurice Benard and Lexi Ainsworth on “General Hospital.”ABC/Adam LarkeyGENERAL HOSPITAL: 60 YEARS OF STARS AND STORYTELLING 10 p.m. on ABC. The first episode of “General Hospital” had its premiere on April 1, 1963 — and it is now the longest running soap opera still in production and has a record for most outstanding daytime drama award wins. This special, celebrating the show’s 60 years (and counting!), features some of its actors, including Maurice Benard, Jane Elliot, Genie Francis, Finola Hughes, Kelly Monaco and Laura Wright. They will share behind-the-scenes memories, bloopers and a fan tribute.FridayRUPAUL’S DRAG RACE 8 p.m. on MTV. The new year is exactly when we need to hear: “If you can’t love yourself, how in the hell are you going to love somebody else?” RuPaul Charles returns for the 16th season of this drag queen competition show; as usual, we will see amazing customs outfits, passionate lip syncs from the queens and panels of celebrity guest judges, including Charlize Theron, Becky G and Ronan Farrow.SaturdayMeryl Streep and Steve Martin in “It’s Complicated.”Melinda Sue Gordon/Universal PicturesIT’S COMPLICATED (2009) 10:30 p.m. on E! Just because the holidays are over doesn’t mean we have to say goodbye to Nancy Meyers — the filmmaker has plenty of movies for every occasion. This one stars Meryl Streep as Jane, a restaurateur who is divorced from Jake (Alec Baldwin), except their romance has been rekindled — until Jane finds out Jake is remarried and she is now “the other woman.” Meanwhile, the architect Adam (Steve Martin) starts remodeling Jane’s kitchen (one of the most gorgeous I have ever seen), and you can guess what happens next.SundayTHE GOLDEN GLOBE AWARDS 8 p.m. on CBS. This award show has been struggling to get back on its feet after NBC bowed out as the broadcaster in 2022 because of ethical concerns and a lack of diversity within the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, which hosts the event. In June, the Golden Globes brand was bought by Eldridge Industries and Dick Clark Productions, and the voting body expanded to about 300 — so change is in the air. For movies, “Barbie” leads the nominations with nine, followed by “Oppenheimer” with eight — for television, “Succession” has the most nominations at nine.THE GREAT NORTH 9:30 p.m. on Fox. This animated adult cartoon is back for a fourth season. Nick Offerman voices Beef Tobin, an eccentric dad trying to keep his equally eccentric children close. The season begins with Ham Tobin (Paul Rust) enlisting his family to help out with a speech he has to present during his public speaking class. More

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    Shecky Greene, High-Energy Comedy Star, Is Dead at 97

    A Las Vegas institution, he would do just about anything for a laugh, including physical comedy so broad that it sometimes left him black and blue.Shecky Greene, a high-energy stand-up comedian who for many years was one of the biggest stars in Las Vegas, died on Sunday at his home in Las Vegas. He was 97.His daughter Alison Greene confirmed his death. Mr. Greene was a frequent guest of Ed Sullivan, Johnny Carson and other television hosts, and had acting roles in movies and on television. But he never reached as wide an audience as many of his fellow comedians, probably because his humor was best experienced in full flower on a nightclub stage rather than in small doses on the small screen. In Las Vegas, though, he was an institution. A versatile entertainer of the old school — he told stories, he made faces, he ad-libbed, he did impressions, he sang — he would do just about anything for a laugh, including physical comedy so broad that it sometimes left him black and blue.He was not one to stick to a set routine. “I wasn’t an A-B-C-D comic. ‘Hello, ladies and gentlemen’ and then the next line,” he told the comedy historian Kliph Nesteroff in 2011. Audiences who went to see Shecky Greene never knew quite what to expect.“One of the greatest I ever saw in a nightclub,” his fellow comedian Pat Cooper told Mr. Nesteroff. “I saw him climb the curtain and do 20 minutes on top of the curtain! He destroyed an audience.”Some said he was at his funniest when he was angry, which was often. “He’s got to be somewhere where he hates the owner, hates the hotel,” the comedian Jack Carter once said, “so that he’s got something to go on.”He was at least as unpredictable off the stage as he was on it. He became famous not just for his act but also for his drinking binges, gambling sprees and erratic, often self-destructive behavior.“I should have been fired maybe 150 times in Las Vegas,” Mr. Greene told The Las Vegas Sun in 1996. “I was only fired 130 times.”Probably the most famous Shecky Greene story involved the time he drove his car into the fountain in front of Caesars Palace. In a 2005 interview with The Los Angeles Times, he confirmed the story, but admitted that the way he told it in his act was slightly embellished: He did not really greet the police officers who rushed to the scene with the words “No spray wax, please.” That line, he said, was suggested to him after the fact by his friend and fellow comedian Buddy Hackett.Another of his best-known jokes was also, he insisted, based on a true story. Frank Sinatra, the joke went, once saved his life. Five men were beating Mr. Greene, but they stopped when Sinatra said, “OK, boys, that’s enough.” Onstage, Mr. Greene told stories, made faces, ad-libbed, did impressions and sang. He also appeared on various television shows.Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic, via Getty ImagesAs amusing as the stories of Mr. Greene’s behavior were, the truth is that he had severe mental health problems, including bipolar disorder and panic attacks, which were apparently exacerbated when he developed a dependence on his prescription medication. He had other ailments as well, including cancer, and by the mid-1980s he had stopped performing.Mr. Greene, who had a family history of mental illness, went public with his condition in the 1990s and, with the help of a new therapist and new medication, gradually resumed his career. He even incorporated his illness into his shtick.“I’m bipolar,” he told a Las Vegas television interviewer in 2010. “I’m more than bipolar. I’m South Polar, North Polar. I’m every kind of polar there is. I even lived with a polar bear for about a year.”By 2005, although he was happily describing himself as retired, he could be persuaded to perform at private parties. In 2009 he made his first Las Vegas appearance in many years, at the Suncoast Casino, and he continued to perform occasionally in Las Vegas. As early as 1996, Mr. Greene was performing, he said, for one reason only. “I’m not in it for a career anymore,” he told The Sun. “I had my career. I’m in it to enjoy myself.”Although never known as the most decorous of comedians, Mr. Greene made news in the comedy world in 2014 when he stormed out of a Friars Club event in Manhattan and announced that he was resigning from the club after his fellow comedian Gilbert Gottfried did material that Mr. Greene, who had been scheduled to speak, found offensive. “He got dirtier and dirtier,” Mr. Greene told a radio interviewer, without providing details, “so I got up and I said, ‘That’s it.’”Fred Sheldon Greenfield was born on April 8, 1926, in Chicago. (In 2004 he legally changed his name to Shecky Greene, long after his professional first name had come to connote a certain kind of brash, aggressive, old-school comedian even to people who had never seen him perform.) His parents were Carl and Bessie (Harris) Greenfield. His father was a shoe salesman and his mother sold hosiery at a department store before quitting to focus on raising their three children. Mr. Greene performing on “The Hollywood Palace” television show in 1965.ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content, via Getty ImagesAfter serving in the Navy during World War II, he enrolled at Wright Junior College (now Wilbur Wright College) in Chicago with plans of becoming a gym teacher. But he was sidetracked by his interest in performing.He took a summer job at a resort near Milwaukee, where, he once recalled, “They paid me $20 a week and gave me a fancy title, ‘social director.’” He became a performer, he said, because the resort couldn’t afford to hire big-name acts. “I wasn’t Red Skelton,” he recalled, “but I got a few laughs.”He returned to college that September but also continued developing a comedy act and occasionally performed in nightclubs. It would be a few years before his commitment to show business became full time.He left college to accept a two-week engagement in New Orleans; that booking stretched into three years, and ended only when the nightclub burned down. Unsure of his next move, he returned to Chicago and went back to college, but left for good when the comedian Martha Raye offered him a job as her opening act in Miami.“This time,” he said in an interview for his website, sheckygreene.com, “I made up my mind: I would stick with show business. I was only 25 years old and making $500 a week. Besides, I had a silent partner to support — I had discovered how to bet the horses.”He first ventured into Nevada, then in its early days as an entertainment mecca, when the Golden Hotel in Reno hired him for four weeks in 1953. His opening-night performance so impressed the hotel’s owners that they held him over for 18 weeks and offered him a new contract, for a guaranteed $20,000 a year (the equivalent of more than $200,000 today). He was soon headlining in Las Vegas, where for one week in 1956 Elvis Presley was his opening act.Mr. Greene on “The Tonight Show” with Johnny Carson in 1975.Gary Null/NBCUniversal, via Getty ImagesBy 1975 he was making $150,000 a week (more than $800,000 in today’s money), one of only a handful of comedians in that salary range at the time. He liked to say that he gambled most of it away, but that it didn’t matter because he had more money than God — whose weekly salary, he happened to know, was only $35,000.He was also gaining a reputation for his sometimes violent offstage behavior. A decade later, his mental health problems had brought his career to a halt.He eventually overcame those problems, for which he gave much of the credit to the support of his wife, Marie (Musso) Greene, whom he married in 1985.His first two marriages, to Jeri Drurey and Nalani Kele, ended in divorce. In addition to his daughter Alison, he is survived by another daughter, Dorian Hoffman — Mr. Greene and his first wife adopted both of them at birth — and by his wife. He moved to Las Vegas several years ago; previously, he had lived in Los Angeles and Palm Springs, Calif.Although destined to be remembered primarily as a Las Vegas performer, Mr. Greene had a considerable television résumé, as both a comedian and an actor.He had a recurring role on the World War II series “Combat!” in 1962 and 1963 and appeared on “The Love Boat,” “Laverne & Shirley” and “Mad About You,” as well as variety and talk shows. (He was an occasional “Tonight Show” guest host in the 1970s.) He appeared in a few movies as well, including “Splash” (1984) and Mel Brooks’s “History of the World, Part I” (1981).Interviewed by The Washington Times in 2017, Mr. Greene looked back on his career philosophically:“Why did I do this and that? At 90 I still don’t know. Once in a while I’ll have a nice sleep. Most nights I wake up yelling, ‘Why did I do that?’“Life is strange, but if you’ve had a mixture of a life like I had, it’s all right.”Alex Traub More