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    ‘Duck Dynasty’ Is Coming Back for a Second Term

    On Jan. 20, Donald J. Trump was sworn in as the 47th president of the United States. Two days later, A&E network announced that it had ordered 20 new episodes of its hit 2010s reality comedy “Duck Dynasty,” titled “Duck Dynasty: The Revival.”The network, in its official statement, did not connect the second restoration to the first. But short of ABC’s bringing Roseanne Barr’s character back from the dead to head the “Roseanne” revival, “The Conners,” it is hard to imagine another programming decision that would so glaringly declare that the times had a-changed back.“Duck Dynasty” actually aired primarily during the Obama era, with 11 seasons beginning in 2012, and it was never overtly about politics onscreen. (Offscreen was another story; we’ll get to that.) Focused on the Robertson family of Louisiana, who made their fortune with the Duck Commander duck-call business before becoming reality stars, the series was first and above all a lighthearted family TV show.But “Duck Dynasty” was also in many ways a precursor of the conservative identity politics that would sweep in after it. It was filled with cultural signifiers — beards, Bibles and buckshot — that spoke to the authenticity of rural life and the reverence for heritage. It became the focus of a controversy that previewed how central grievances over “wokeness” and “cancellation” would become to conservative politics.And it was a mass-market hit that found an audience by representing a kind of life — traditionalist, openly Christian, country — that was absent from much pop culture.Uncle Si Robertson, with Jessica Robertson, often functioned as the show’s gonzo philosopher. via the Robertson family/A&E (inset photo)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 Patti LuPone Drama With Audra McDonald and Kecia Lewis, Explained

    The offstage tensions between three Broadway stars became public after a dispute over sound levels, an Instagram post and a much-talked-about magazine article.Patti LuPone and Audra McDonald are two of the biggest Broadway stars of recent decades. So when LuPone pointedly referred to McDonald as “not a friend” in a new interview with The New Yorker, it caused quite a stir.LuPone made the comment when she was asked about some supportive emojis McDonald added last November to a social media post by another Broadway star, Kecia Lewis. Lewis had accused LuPone of being “racially microaggressive” after she objected to the sound levels at her Broadway show.Here’s what we know.It began with a Broadway noise dispute.When LuPone was on Broadway last year, starring with Mia Farrow in a play called “The Roommate,” she grew concerned about sounds audible from the Alicia Keys musical playing next door, “Hell’s Kitchen.” Noise is a frequent phenomenon on Broadway, and is especially noticeable at plays, where the sound levels tend to be lower than at musicals. LuPone said that she asked for help from the Shubert Organization, which operates the theaters, and that it was taken care of.Kecia Lewis, who won a Tony Award for playing a piano teacher in “Hell’s Kitchen,” posted an Instagram video in November criticizing LuPone’s actions. In what she called an “open letter” about LuPone’s complaints about the musical’s noise levels, she said, “These actions, in my opinion, are bullying, they’re offensive, they are racially microaggressive, they’re rude, they’re rooted in privilege.”She added: “Referring to a predominantly Black Broadway show as loud can unintentionally reinforce harmful stereotypes.”What does that have to do with McDonald?McDonald, a founding member of Black Theater United, a coalition formed to combat racism in the theater world, added supportive emojis to Lewis’s Instagram post. While comments on the post appear to have been removed, People magazine reported at the time that McDonald “simply commented with a series of emojis, writing: ‘❤️❤️👏🏾👏🏾’. ”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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    ‘Adults’ Is ‘Friends’ for a More Anxious Generation

    A new FX comedy follows a crew of aimless 20-somethings living together in Queens.The FX series “Adults” is the latest of many sitcoms to follow in the footsteps of “Friends,” and it has several qualities typical of such shows: a vague title, a loose premise that is basically, “People hang out.” The wrinkle with this one is that the pals are members of Gen Z, their brains poisoned with all the anxieties of their internet-obsessed cohort.The first episode of “Adults” is rough. The creators Ben Kronengold and Rebecca Shaw, Yale grads who have written for “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon,” seem eager to make their pilot as taboo-breaking as possible. (In the main plotline, the group is jealous of an acquaintance for getting sexually harassed at work.) But the show quickly finds its rhythm and starts to define the characters beyond their relationship to hot-button issues. (The first two episodes premiere Wednesday on FX; the entire season arrives on Thursday on Hulu.)These aimless 20-somethings all stay together in the Queens childhood home of Samir (Malik Elassal), an impulsive, awkward slacker. (His folks are traveling.) They are a motley bunch. Billie (Lucy Freyer) is a neurotic overachiever now flailing. Issa (Amita Rao) is talkative and oversexed with an inflated ego. Anton (Owen Thiele) forms fleeting connections with everyone but is resistant to finding something deeper. Eventually, Paul Baker (Jack Innanen), a gorgeous bisexual sweetie pie, moves in. Everyone calls him by his full name, “Paul Baker.”“Adults” starts to sing when it finds creative ways to exploit these roommates’ quirks for comedy. A standout episode involves the gang realizing that Anton — who exchanges phone numbers with everyone he meets — may have accidentally befriended a local stabber. Later, Charlie Cox guest stars in a surprising and delightful turn as Billie’s former high school teacher — she reconnects with him when she visits her old school in an attempt to relive her glory days. If you don’t think Daredevil can be funny, watch Episode 6, in which he unleashes some impressive physical bits.Set in New York but clearly not shot there — it was filmed mostly in Toronto — the show’s strengths lie less in “Girls”-esque verisimilitude than in ridiculous sitcom setups. “Adults” is frank about sex and drugs, but it is best when it is just straight-up zany. While it seems unlikely to become a generation-defining sensation, once “Adults” finds its groove, it is perfectly diverting TV. More

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    Harry, Hermione and Ron Are Cast for HBO’s ‘Harry Potter’

    After tens of thousands of auditions, three newcomers were selected to play the television show’s leading roles.Accio Harry, Hermione and Ron!After years of intense speculation and tens of thousands of auditions, three young actors have been cast for HBO’s upcoming television series about the boy wizard. The newcomers Dominic McLaughlin, Arabella Stanton and Alastair Stout will play Harry Potter, Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley, Warner Bros. Discovery announced on Tuesday.Last month, HBO announced it had cast John Lithgow as Albus Dumbledore, Janet McTeer as Minerva McGonagall, Paapa Essiedu as Severus Snape and Nick Frost as Rubeus Hagrid. The show, which will air on HBO and stream on Max, still does not have an official title or air date.“The talent of these three unique actors is wonderful to behold, and we cannot wait for the world to witness their magic together onscreen,” Francesca Gardiner, the showrunner of the series, and Mark Mylod, who will direct several episodes, said in a statement about the child actors. They added, “It’s been a real pleasure to discover the plethora of young talent out there.”This is Stanton’s first onscreen role, but she previously starred in “Matilda” on London’s West End in 2023. She was one of four girls who played the title role.The “Harry Potter” film franchise accelerated the career of Daniel Radcliffe, who has since anchored movies like “Swiss Army Man” and won a Tony Award last year for his work in “Merrily We Roll Along.” Radcliffe starred in eight “Harry Potter” films from 2001 through 2011 alongside Emma Watson and Rupert Grint, who played Hermione and Ron.HBO has said the new television series will be a “faithful adaptation” of the seven books written by J.K. Rowling that were published between 1997 and 2007. More

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    Jussie Smollett Donates $50,000 to Arts Center to Settle Chicago’s Lawsuit

    Although the actor’s conviction for filing a false police report was overturned because of a previous deal with prosecutors, the city wanted him to pay for its hate crime investigation.Jussie Smollett, the former “Empire” star, announced that he had donated $50,000 to a Chicago charity to settle a lawsuit by the city about his claim that he had been the victim of a hate crime.In 2022, a jury convicted Mr. Smollett of felony disorderly conduct for filing a false police report after he said he had been attacked in downtown Chicago by two men who hurled racist and homophobic slurs at him. His conviction was overturned last year by the Illinois Supreme Court, which said the special prosecutor’s case violated a previous agreement with Mr. Smollett.Mr. Smollett shared details of his settlement with the city in a statement posted to Instagram on Friday, saying that he had made a $50,000 donation to the Building Brighter Futures Center for the Arts. According to its website, the organization’s mission is to “improve the quality of life for underprivileged youth and their families by providing safe, stable and nurturing experiences.”The City of Chicago had sued Mr. Smollett six years ago, seeking more than $130,000 to cover the costs of its police investigation. It said the settlement with Mr. Smollett required the charitable contribution.“The city believes this settlement provides a fair, constructive and conclusive resolution, allowing all the parties to close this six-year-old chapter and move forward,” a city spokeswoman, Kristen Cabanban, said in a statement. She said that Mr. Smollett also made a $10,000 payment to the city in 2019, and that he had faced additional accountability through his criminal trial.Mr. Smollett posted on Friday that, in addition to the settlement, he had also donated $10,000 to the Chicago Torture Justice Center, an organization that “seeks to address the traumas of police violence and institutionalized racism,” according to its website.A representative of the Building Brighter Futures Center confirmed in an email that it had received the donation. The Chicago Torture Justice Center confirmed Mr. Smollett’s donation in an Instagram post last week.Mr. Smollett originally said that the men who hurled slurs at him also tied a rope around his neck and doused him with a chemical substance. The story initially inspired outrage and sympathy for the actor, but prosecutors became suspicious of his account and charged him with felony disorderly conduct.Those initial charges were dropped in 2019 after Mr. Smollett agreed to perform community service and forfeit a $10,000 bond payment. But after an outcry from the mayor and the police, a special prosecutor revived the case.Chicago’s lawsuit had been on pause while the criminal charges worked their way through the courts. Mr. Smollett, who has maintained his innocence and countersued city officials, said in his Instagram post that he was aware the settlement “will not change everyone’s mind about me.”“What I have to do now is move forward,” he wrote. More

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    Her Books and Movies Provoked France. Will Her Plays Do the Same?

    Virginie Despentes is pivoting to theater. Playgoers “really show up, even for demanding or radical works,” she says.Over the past three decades, Virginie Despentes has cemented her place as one of the most admired — and argued over — feminist authors in France. “King Kong Theory,” her 2006 book about sex, gender and her own experience of rape, sparked conversations around sexual violence in the country; her award-winning “Vernon Subutex” trilogy of novels, released between 2015 and 2017, drew international attention for its vivid depiction of misfits adrift in French society. (The first volume made the Booker International Prize shortlist in 2018.)Yet recently, Despentes, 55, has been quietly pivoting from books toward writing and directing for the stage. In 2024, she wrote the play “Woke” with three other authors, Julien Delmaire, Anne Pauly and Paul B. Preciado; in it, they confronted France’s reaction to progressive ideas on race and gender.Despentes directed the production at the Théâtre du Nord in Lille, in northern France, and now she’s back with a follow-up: “Romancero Queer,” which had its premiere last week at Théâtre National de la Colline in Paris and runs through June 29. In “Romancero Queer,” she explores power imbalances in the making of a stage show: Behind the scenes of a new production of Federico García Lorca’s “The House of Bernarda Alba,” a fictional group of actors struggle with their older male director for greater creative control.While Despentes has directed several movies, including “Baise-Moi” (2000) and a documentary about pro-sex feminists, “Mutantes (Féminisme Porno Punk)” (2009), she said in an interview in Paris that theater has turned out to be a better fit. Shortly after “Romancero Queer” had debuted, she spoke about the art forms that she has tried her hand at: literature, film and theater. The conversation has been edited for length and clarity.What prompted your pivot to theater?I attend a lot of plays, and I realized that theater audiences are very curious. They really show up, even for demanding or radical works, which made me want to try it. I feel good when I’m in a theater auditorium — and these non-virtual moments feel important nowadays. I’m not at all technophobic — I spend quite a bit of time online — but I enjoy this kind of counter-rhythm, away from social media. During performances of “Romancero Queer,” I sit in the back, behind the audience, and I have yet to see anyone take out their phone.A rehearsal of “Romancero Queer,” the new play by Despentes.Teresa SuarezWe 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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    Blue Man Group’s Longtime Home Will Stage Off Broadway Dramas

    A commercial producer active on Broadway and in the West End has signed a long-term lease for Astor Place Theater with plans for shows there.For 34 years, Astor Place Theater, a humble venue in a historic building in Lower Manhattan, was occupied by a single show, Blue Man Group, which spun profits out of performance art.But Blue Man Group closed its New York production in February, and now another company will take a turn making art in the space: No Guarantees Productions, a venture established in 2017 that has put money into multiple Broadway and West End shows.“We love the location, and the theater is in fabulous condition,” said Megan O’Keefe, executive vice president of No Guarantees. She said the company hopes to present three to four Off Broadway shows a year at Astor Place, some of which it will produce, and some of which will be projects developed by other producers who would rent the space.No Guarantees is the latest for-profit company taking over an Off Broadway theater at a time when the commercial Off Broadway sector has been enjoying an unexpected rebound. Another example: Seaview Productions is now operating a Midtown Manhattan venue previously run by the nonprofit Second Stage Theater; the first show at what is now called Studio Seaview is “Angry Alan,” a play starring John Krasinski and currently in previews.“What we’re seeing more and more is that there are a lot of really beautiful shows that just are never going to attract the audience, and/or support the budget, that you increasingly need to put on a flashy Broadway show,” O’Keefe said. “And that’s why I think we’ve seen a real resurgence of interest and popularity in the commercial Off Broadway space.”The theater, with 298 seats, is still owned by some of the co-founders of Blue Man Group, but will be leased by No Guarantees, a theatrical production company.Vincent Tullo for The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    On ‘Will Trent,’ Ramón Rodríguez Shoots and Scores

    “My first dunk was on that basket,” the actor Ramón Rodríguez said. This was on a drizzly weekday morning in May, and Rodríguez was revisiting former haunts in the East Village, where he grew up. He began with the Tompkins Square Park basketball courts.“It’s a little low rimmed,” he admitted, pointing at the basket. “But it was a big deal.”At an inch or two under six feet, Rodríguez, 45, is plenty tall for an actor, though short for a basketball player. Still he kept at it, and that tenacity has served him in Hollywood, where he spent years watching great shots hit the rim.”How many times was I told no and cut from a team?” he said. “I mean, countless. Rejection, it was always fuel for me.”It fueled him until 2022, when he was offered the title role in “Will Trent,” an ABC procedural about a dapper, damaged investigator and Chihuahua dad. The series is based on books by Karin Slaughter. In those books Will is described as tall, blond and lanky. So Rodríguez wasn’t an obvious choice. But despite his skepticism — he had been burned by network shows before — he signed on. “Will Trent” was renewed for a second season.Ramón Rodríguez, with Erika Christensen, plays the damaged but gifted title character of “Will Trent,” based on the book series.Zac Popik/Disney“I was like, OK, that does not happen to me,” he said. But it did. A third season followed, ending in May on a cliffhanger (two characters may not survive) that presumably will be resolved when the show returns in January.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