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    ‘Andor’ Season 2 Finale Recap: Friends Everywhere

    The final three episodes include major deaths, callbacks and one last swashbuckling adventure rooted in the idea that every soldier counts in a fight for freedom.Season 2, Episodes 10-12Across the two seasons of “Andor,” so much has happened that at times it has been easy to forget that the show is, functionally, a prequel. All along, we have been watching the story of how the rebellion against the Empire evolved and strengthened in the five years leading up to the films “Rogue One” and “Star Wars.”But does “Rogue One” feel like it follows directly from “Andor”? I watched the movie again after the “Andor” series finale, and the transition is not smooth. The movie shares some of the show’s themes, exploring how rebellion requires compromises, sacrifices and a willingness to set conventional morality aside for the sake of a higher purpose. But as a viewing experience, “Rogue One” is big and loud, full of blockbuster-scale battles. “Andor,” while often thrilling, operates at a more personal level, following how individuals can be swept up in the rush of major historical events.The difference is made especially clear in the final three episodes of “Andor.” Last week saw the conclusion of this season’s primary story line, about how the Empire’s destructive Ghorman mission galvanized the galaxy’s scattered resistance movements. One year later, the rebels finally discover that the Ghorman project was tied to the construction of a superweapon, and must decide whether to act on this intelligence.That debate is mostly saved for the strangely sedate series finale. This set’s first two episodes are mainly about the Alliance’s most problematic adjuncts: Luthen and Kleya. Cassian’s admirable loyalty to these people — who inspired, sheltered, exploited and infuriated him — anchors one last swashbuckling “Andor” adventure rooted in the idea that every soldier counts in a fight for freedom.Luthen and Kleya remained on Coruscant — largely forgotten — after the nerve center of the rebellion moved to Yavin 4. As the start of Episode 10, the ISB mole Lonni Jung meets with Luthen and says that he has been secretly snooping through Dedra Meero’s private digital files for a year, piecing together the Empire’s Death Star plan. He asks Luthen for safe passage for himself and his family. Instead, Luthen kills him.Luthen, knowing that his whole operation probably just died along with Lonni, hustles back to his antique shop to destroy the evidence of his galaxy-spanning communications and intelligence-gathering apparatus. Before he can finish the job, Dedra appears at his door.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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    ‘Andor’ Finale Recap: Friends Everywhere

    The final three episodes include major deaths, callbacks and one last swashbuckling adventure rooted in the idea that every soldier counts in a fight for freedom.Season 2, Episodes 10-12Across the two seasons of “Andor,” so much has happened that at times it has been easy to forget that the show is, functionally, a prequel. All along, we have been watching the story of how the rebellion against the Empire evolved and strengthened in the five years leading up to the films “Rogue One” and “Star Wars.”But does “Rogue One” feel like it follows directly from “Andor”? I watched the movie again after the “Andor” series finale, and the transition is not smooth. The movie shares some of the show’s themes, exploring how rebellion requires compromises, sacrifices and a willingness to set conventional morality aside for the sake of a higher purpose. But as a viewing experience, “Rogue One” is big and loud, full of blockbuster-scale battles. “Andor,” while often thrilling, operates at a more personal level, following how individuals can be swept up in the rush of major historical events.The difference is made especially clear in the final three episodes of “Andor.” Last week saw the conclusion of this season’s primary story line, about how the Empire’s destructive Ghorman mission galvanized the galaxy’s scattered resistance movements. One year later, the rebels finally discover that the Ghorman project was tied to the construction of a superweapon, and must decide whether to act on this intelligence.That debate is mostly saved for the strangely sedate series finale. This set’s first two episodes are mainly about the Alliance’s most problematic adjuncts: Luthen and Kleya. Cassian’s admirable loyalty to these people — who inspired, sheltered, exploited and infuriated him — anchors one last swashbuckling “Andor” adventure rooted in the idea that every soldier counts in a fight for freedom.Luthen and Kleya remained on Coruscant — largely forgotten — after the nerve center of the rebellion moved to Yavin 4. As the start of Episode 10, the ISB mole Lonni Jung meets with Luthen and says that he has been secretly snooping through Dedra Meero’s private digital files for a year, piecing together the Empire’s Death Star plan. He asks Luthen for safe passage for himself and his family. Instead, Luthen kills him.Luthen, knowing that his whole operation probably just died along with Lonni, hustles back to his antique shop to destroy the evidence of his galaxy-spanning communications and intelligence-gathering apparatus. Before he can finish the job, Dedra appears at his door.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 ‘Sunset Boulevard,’ Tom Francis Writes His Own Story

    Tom Francis asked to meet on a rugged corner of the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn. It was a bright April day, and in some ways Francis, 25, in a vintage sweater and slacks, looked like any other member of the creative class with a matcha habit. Still, I had picked him out a block away.Onstage, in Jamie Lloyd’s coruscating Broadway production of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Sunset Boulevard,” his brooding features projected onto a 23-foot-tall screen, Francis looms large. But even here on Roebling Street, the actor, who stands 6-foot-2, with shoulders that would not demean a musk ox, was not exactly small. Francis is nominated for a Tony Award, and to see him pictured alongside his fellow nominees in the leading actor in a musical category is to believe that he could take any of them in a bar fight, maybe more than one at once.His “Sunset Boulevard” co-star Nicole Scherzinger described him succinctly. “He is a man,” she said in a phone interview. But, she was quick to emphasize, Francis is also a sweetheart, “a 25-year-old teddy bear.”In “Sunset Boulevard,” Francis stars as Joe Gillis, a dead-behind-the-eyes screenwriter who becomes entangled, in an asphyxiating way, with an aging queen of the silents. Here is the New York Times critic Jesse Green’s take: “Francis, as Joe, does shutdown-cynical-corpse very well.” Yet in person, Francis, who wields those shoulders lightly, is boyish, candid, eager, almost unable to believe his good fortune.Tom Francis last month in Manhattan. “I just knew in an instant that was Joe Gillis,” Jamie Lloyd, the director of “Sunset Boulevard,” said. “He wasn’t in any way glossy.”Ariel Fisher for The New York TimesAnd yes, that good fortune requires him to remain onstage for nearly every moment of a two-and-a-half-hour mega musical, except when he is leading the cast — in wind, in rain, amid tourists — through a portion of the Theater District as he sings the title number outdoors. He ends the show in his underwear, sunken-eyed and covered in blood.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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    ‘Murderbot’ Is a Robot Show for an Age of A.I. Angst

    I know how I’m supposed to feel about artificial intelligence. Like anyone who pushes words around on a page, I worry that large language models will relegate me to the junk pile. I worry that smart machines will supplant artists, eliminate jobs and institute a surveillance state — if they don’t simply destroy us. I nurture these anxieties reading article after article served to me, of course, by the algorithms powering the phone to which I have outsourced much of my brain.This is how I feel in real life. But when it comes to fiction, fellow humans, I am a traitor to my kind: In any humans-and-robots story, I invariably prefer the fascinating, enigmatic, persevering machines to the boring homo sapiens. And in spite, or maybe because of, our generalized A.I. angst, there are plenty of robo-tales to choose from these days.The protagonist of “Murderbot,” the homicidally funny sci-fi comedy premiering Friday on Apple TV+, does not reciprocate my admiration. Murderbot (Alexander Skarsgard), a sentient “security unit,” is programmed to protect humans. But it doesn’t have to like them, those “weak-willed,” “stressed-out” bags of perishable flesh that it is compelled to serve.Or rather, was compelled. Unbeknown to the company that owns it — a company called the Company, which controls most of the inhabited galaxy — it has disabled the software that forbids it from disobeying. (“It” is the pronoun the show uses; from a physical standpoint, Murderbot has the face of Skarsgard but the crotch of a Ken doll.) It is free to refuse, to flee, to kill.Alexander Skarsgard stars as Murderbot, an irritable security cyborg charged with protecting space hippies. Apple TV+So what does this lethal bot (technically, a cyborg, its circuitry enmeshed with engineered organic matter) want to do with its liberty? Mostly, it wants to watch its shows — thousands of hours of “premium quality” streaming serials that it has downloaded into its memory.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 is Happy President Trump Has Left the Country

    Jordan Klepper suggested that someone lock the doors while President Trump is in the Middle East this week.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.Lock Him Out!President Trump arrived in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday for the first stop of a four-day Middle East trip.Stephen Colbert celebrated, saying, “Yes, Donald Trump left the country today, so I got another birthday wish.” On “The Daily Show,” Jordan Klepper suggested that “someone lock the [expletive] doors.”“He landed in Riyadh this morning, where he got a lavish welcome, greeted by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on a sumptuous carpet, purple, made out of hand-harvested journalist nurple.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“You know Trump’s looking at the carpet, going, ‘These things fly here, right?’” — JORDAN KLEPPER“The crown prince pulled out all the stops to make Trump feel at home, even providing an actual mobile McDonald’s semi truck. This is true. Yes. Of course, one of the most rewarding things about traveling the globe is getting the chance to sample the local nugget truck.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“You got to hand it to the Saudis, though, they know the fastest way to Trump’s heart is through his stomach, out the colon, with a little bit staying behind in his arteries.” — JORDAN KLEPPER“Regardless, you know what? It was a very nice start to this trip abroad, where he’ll visit not just Saudi Arabia, but then Qatar and the U.A.E. But you might be wondering, why did Trump pick these countries for his first foreign trip? Well, there’s a strong geopolitical balance of — I’m [expletive] with you. Corruption!” — JORDAN KLEPPER“The Trump boys have projects in all three countries. I never thought I’d say this, but can’t these countries go back to doing something more constructive, like funding terrorism?” — JORDAN KLEPPERThe Punchiest Punchlines (From Shady to Sus Edition)“President Trump tonight attended a Saudi state dinner. OK, well, just so you know, it’s going to be a lot of stuff you’ve never tried, like kabsa and mandi and forks.” — SETH MEYERS“Well, guys, today, President Trump arrived in Saudi Arabia for the first leg of his trip to the Middle East. Yeah, it was a big day. Saudi Arabia’s crown prince met with America’s Burger King.” — JIMMY FALLONWe 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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    George Clooney and Denzel Washington Power Broadway to Prepandemic Heights

    Broadway’s box office has finally surpassed its prepandemic peak, fueled by three starry dramas and one green witch.The Broadway League, a trade organization representing producers and theater owners, released data on Tuesday showing that grosses for the current theater season, which ends later this month, have now reached $1.801 billion. That’s higher than the $1.793 billion grossed at the same point in the record-setting 2018-2019 season, which was the last full season before the coronavirus pandemic shut down Broadway in March 2020.CLOONEY HAS FIRST$4 MILLION PLAY WEEK!“Good Night, and Good Luck” grossed $4,003,482 the week ending May 4. That number, for eight performances, was the highest amount ever grossed in a week by a play on Broadway.There are caveats. This season is not quite over. The numbers are not adjusted for inflation. Attendance is still down about 3 percent from its prepandemic peak. And, because the costs of producing shows on Broadway have skyrocketed, the financial failure rate is up and profitability is down.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 ‘Duster,’ the Cars Are in the Driver’s Seat

    This homage to high-octane 1970s shows like “Starsky and Hutch” required plenty of cars to drive, race and crash. Here’s how they found them.Ted Moser would love to say that no muscle cars were harmed in the making of “Duster,” a new series from J.J. Abrams and LaToya Morgan, premiering on Max on Thursday. But Moser, the picture car coordinator for the show, knows better.A homage to 1970s series like ”The Dukes of Hazzard” and “Starsky and Hutch,” “Duster” cruises around with Jim, played by Josh Holloway, a driver for a Phoenix mob boss. The show is set in 1972, when the cars were wide, the engines were big and the seatbelts were mostly decorative.Cars play a role in nearly any period piece set in the last century or so. But in “Duster,” which derives its name from a fastback Plymouth coupe with a logo inspired by the Looney Tunes Tasmanian Devil, they are very much the stars. Four different vehicles play the title car and scores of other makes and models are sprinkled throughout the series. Moser and teams of mechanics and scenic artists source these cars, then restore, modify and in many cases wing, ding and faux-rust them until they are period appropriate. A few are subsequently crashed, even totaled.“Yeah,” Moser said in a recent phone interview, “that always makes me sad.”Television doesn’t lack for scene-stealing vehicles: the General Lee, KITT, the Batmobile, the Mystery Machine. Sometimes these vehicles are built wholesale or, in the case of cartoons, simply imagined. More often they need to be sourced.Because most studios no longer maintain dedicated car lots and warehouses, producers hire picture car coordinators to source and supervise a fleet. These men (they are almost always men) are car aficionados with deep networks among retailers, collectors and hobbyists. Like casting directors, they know how to find a star, albeit one with four wheels.Josh Holloway stars as an outlaw getaway driver with ulterior motives.James Van Evers/MaxWe 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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    With This ‘Gypsy’ Song, Audra McDonald Makes You Rethink the Broadway Show

    Eight times a week at the Majestic Theater in Manhattan, the entire, harrowing arc of a classic tragedy is delivered in 4½ minutes that are as exhilarating as they are upsetting. All the textbook components of tragedy according to Aristotle are vigorously at work here: self-delusion and self-knowledge, pity and terror, and the sense that what is happening is somehow both unexpected and inevitable.And all of this — right down to that climatic, rushing release called catharsis — is provided, near the end of a delectably tuneful show, by a lone woman performing a single song in what is generally regarded as the cheeriest of theatrical forms, the American musical. Yet by that number’s conclusion, Audra McDonald, the Tony-nominated star of George C. Wolfe’s Broadway revival of “Gypsy,” has the flayed-skinless appearance of a figure in a Francis Bacon portrait.And while most hardcore lovers of musicals have surely heard this song before, they are likely to sense that something new is happening here — something harsher, rawer, more wondering and ultimately more devastating. An old standard is providing fresh and unsettling revelations, while an unconventionally cast, mold-cracking performer is shedding surprising light and shadow on one of the best-known characters in the genre. No wonder that audience members leave the Majestic looking as if they had just been sucker punched.A visit to the show in late March inspired the Los Angeles Times theater critic Charles McNulty to call McDonald’s interpretation of the song “if not a religious experience, then a spiritually transfiguring one.” And a friend of mine, who is not generally a fan of musicals, emailed me after a Wednesday matinee that she “was so gutted by that number that when I walked out of the theater I really didn’t know where I was or which direction to turn.”“Rose’s Turn”Audra McDonald sings on the cast album for “Gypsy.”Such is the experience of watching McDonald sing “Rose’s Turn” in “Gypsy,” the 1959 story by Arthur Laurents, Stephen Sondheim and Jule Styne about one very determined stage mother named Rose in the dying days of vaudeville. It’s the kind of number that makes you entirely rethink both the show you’ve been watching — one you may have felt you knew all too well — and its central character.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