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    in Theater

    ‘Grief Hotel,’ an Absurdist Play With a Touch of Anemia

    Liza Birkenmeier’s abstract play is a unique exploration of romantic relationships but suffers from sleepy direction and a lack of character enrichment.Absurdist theater is like the naturalistic play’s overachieving older sibling. Traditional theater attempts to describe the chaos of the human condition, but absurdist works dare to enact it. Liza Birkenmeier’s “Grief Hotel” is one of those enactors, a strange, snack-sized play that closes out Clubbed Thumb’s 2023 Summerworks series — a proud incubator for strange plays.Birkenmeier’s deft writing (in previous works like “Dr. Ride’s American Beach House”) and her affinity for morbid humor return here, and despite its title, “Grief Hotel” doesn’t simply dwell on the grim; it’s actually a dark comedy. And while all of the amusing oddness successfully depicts the madness of grief and the complexities of millennial relationships, it does so to the detriment of the play’s message and the production’s intrigue.Aunt Bobbi (Susan Blommaert) is the straight-shooting mastermind behind the grief hotel idea — a bespoke getaway for people who have experienced a tragedy: an illness, a breakup, a manslaughter charge. She’s trying to present her concept to the audience, but Birkenmeier interrupts Bobbi’s marketing pitch with a series of conversations among younger characters who are grappling with their own sense of loss: Em (Nadine Malouf), Winn (Ana Nogueira), Rohit (Naren Weiss), Teresa (Susannah Perkins) and Asher (Bruce McKenzie).Although some characters are dealing with death head-on, “Grief Hotel” lingers more on the impermanence of relationships than it does the impermanence of life. Just try to keep track of this: Em and Winn were college girlfriends. But now Em is in a relationship with an unexciting man named Rohit. Rohit is slightly attracted to Teresa. But Teresa, who is nonbinary, is already in a romantic partnership with Winn. Winn craves a novel experience and strikes up a sexual fling with Asher, a straight, married man. Em reserves most of her lust for an A.I. chatbot named Melba. In Em’s mind, the bot looks exactly like Winn.On the surface, this salacious cross-pollination might sound entertaining, but without enough exploration of these people or enough time to invest in the mess of their affairs, “Grief Hotel” feels more like a vague social experiment about impulse and desire than a provocative, character-driven piece of theater.Vagueness seems to be its intention. The scenic design collective called dots cloaks the set with the drab, midcentury décor of a three-star motel. And Tara Ahmadinejad’s languid direction fails to pump the production with much-needed blood. The overall lack of unifying energy surely parallels our fractured, new age of digital dating (a good chunk of Birkenmeier’s script is composed of text messages read aloud), but I found it exhausting IRL.At times, I wondered if the hotel was a purgatory for all of these partnerships — the anxiety-inducing, interstitial space where relationships go to die or thrive. We never land on this, or any, conclusion, but toward the play’s end, Bobbi offers a remedy to the group’s literal and metaphorical mourning: gratitude. Gratitude for the memories shared with past loves and the ones yet to be made with future ones. This — more than time, more than medication — begins to heal all wounds. And regardless of the production’s faults, I was grateful for the reminder.Grief Hotel Through July 1 at the Wild Project, Manhattan; thewildproject.com. Running time: 1 hour 20 minutes.This review is supported by Critical Minded, an initiative to invest in the work of cultural critics from historically underrepresented backgrounds. More

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    Victoria Bailey Wants Bigger and Broader Theater Audiences

    The Theater Development Fund’s departing director reflects on two decades of work expanding access to theater and the paths that lie ahead for Broadway.When Victoria Bailey assumed the leadership of the nonprofit Theater Development Fund in 2001, she was told that the organization’s marquee program, the TKTS discount ticket booth, had not missed a day in nearly three decades of operation.So much for that. A few months after she took the job, the booth was shut down because of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and in the time since it has been closed by a blackout, a hurricane, a strike and a pandemic.It’s been an eventful 22 years for Bailey, and on Friday, the day she turns 67, she is stepping down as the executive director of the organization, which sold 615,000 tickets at its TKTS booths this fiscal year and which works to make theater accessible — to those who find the cost of tickets prohibitive as well as to students, veterans and people with disabilities.Bailey, who received a Tony Honor for Excellence in Theater earlier this month in recognition of her service to the industry, will be succeeded on Aug. 7 by Deeksha Gaur, a co-founder of the theater reviews platform Show-Score.In an interview at her office, Bailey, who is known as Tory, reflected on the state of the theater industry. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.How is Broadway is doing?Broadway is back. There are audiences. I don’t think they’re as reliably robust as we would want. The pieces we’re missing are the suburban audience and Chinese tourists. There’s a lot of diverse work, there are a lot of different voices onstage now. How do we bring the audiences along for that, and how do we grow the audiences for that? It’s a be-very-mindful time. I don’t think we can sit back and go, “Everything’s fine.”Your final big event is a celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Times Square TKTS booth. What is its significance?There really are many people who cannot afford full-price tickets. If you’re a New Yorker, and you’re an avid theatergoer, there are a lot of ways you can get discount tickets; the booth is only one of many, and you use it or don’t use it. But for tourists who are infrequent theatergoers, or for anyone who is not on the inside, that’s the only way they know.One of the most visible changes during your time was the construction of the red steps over the booth, where many people now congregate.It is this very theatrical gathering place in the middle of Times Square. I love to stand there and watch people sitting on the steps. It just makes me happy.How do you think Times Square is faring?Times Square itself is feeling pretty good. Eighth Avenue is still a little rougher than it was before the pandemic. The challenge for Times Square is the whole office worker thing. People are at their desks two or three days a week, and that’s a huge challenge for all of the businesses in Times Square that rely on office workers.Tourists queuing at the TKTS booth, a program run by the Theater Development Fund that sells tickets at discounts of up to 50 percent.Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesHow does that affect the theater industry?One of the things that drives ticket purchases is word of mouth. When you’re on Zoom, you have a meeting and then you’re done. When you’re in the office, you’re getting a cup of coffee and someone says to you, “I saw this great show last night. I think you might like it.” I don’t think that’s happening in the same way now. There’s a diminishment of casual exchange of information between people.TDF has programs to make theater more accessible to those who have hearing, visual and mobility impairments, and during your tenure you introduced autism-friendly performances.There was an unfortunate incident in the West End where a mom with a child on the spectrum came and was asked to leave, and it got a lot of attention. We talked about it. Disney was way ahead on understanding the needs of that population because of the theme parks, and so we partnered with Disney for “The Lion King.” We buy out the entire house at a significantly discounted price, so that we can sell the tickets at a discounted price. Everyone there understands that there’s going to be noise and people are going to be up and down and we’re creating a safe space for the families. We did it once, and we all just wept. And now we do five a year. We do “Wicked,” we’ve done “Harry Potter” and we did “Six” a few weeks ago. And for the first time, last year we did “The Nutcracker” at New York City Ballet.You also started making tickets available to veterans.The thought was, and is, that this is a population that might benefit from going to the theater together. It’s presumptuous to say theater is healing, because I don’t presume to say who needs healing, but going to theater together is an activity that enriches you. More

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    in Television

    Does ‘And Just Like That …’ Signal the End of Stealth Wealth?

    So does the pop culture and fashion wheel turn.And just like that, stealth wealth, the aesthetic made viral by “Succession,” with its toxic billionaires in their Loro Piana baseball caps and Tom Ford hoodies locked in a C-suite cage match to the death, has been swept off screen.In its place: logomania, branding that can be seen from whole city blocks away and accessories that jangle and gleam with the blinding light of bragging rights.The outfits, that is to say, of Carrie and Co. in Season 2 of “And Just Like That …,” the “Sex and the City” reboot come recently to Max — the streamer that, as it happens, also gave us the Roys in their greige cashmere. Both shows are set in New York City, the home of strivers and entrepreneurs, of “Washington Square” and Wharton, of constantly evolving social castes highly, and literally, invested in their own identifiable camouflage.If watching “Succession” was in part like engaging in a detective game to suss out what character was wearing what brand, so insider were the fashion politics, watching “And Just Like That …” is like attending brandapalooza: the double Cs and Fs and Gs practically whacking you on the head with their presence. (Warning: Spoilers are coming.) All the over-the-top fashionista-ing is back. The room-size closets!It’s the yin to the “Succession” yang: a veritable celebration of the comforting aspirational dreams of self-realization (or self-escapism) embedded in stuff that may actually be the most striking part of an increasingly stale series. Certainly, the clothes, which often serve as their own plot points, are more memorable than any dialogue.Well … except maybe for that instantly classic line in Episode 1, uttered by Lisa Todd Wexley (Nicole Ari Parker) on her way to the Met Gala in reference to her gown and feather hat: “It’s not crazy — it’s Valentino.” But that’s the exception that proves the rule.Lisa Todd Wexley stopping traffic on her way to the Met Gala in Valentino.Craig Blakenhorn/MaxThere is Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker), with her multiple Manolos and Fendis, self-medicating with shopping, returning home one day with six Bergdorf Goodman bags. Charlotte (Kristin Davis) toting her Burberry doggy poop bag (also possessed of a Burberry apron and Burberry ear muffs) and bemoaning the fact that her teenage daughter hocked her Chanel dress to fund her musical aspirations.Lisa Todd Wexley dropping her kids off for camp in a bright green Louis Vuitton jacket and scarf. And Seema (Sarita Choudhury), the character that passes for a restrained dresser thanks to her penchant for neutrals (and the occasional animal print), loudly lamenting the theft of her caramel-colored Hermès Birkin — one of her totems of self, ripped directly from her hands.Lisa Todd Wexley dropping her children off for camp in Louis Vuitton.Jason Howard/Bauer-Griffin/GC ImagesSeema with her caramel-colored Hermès Birkin.Jose Perez/Bauer-Griffin, via GC ImagesThere is Loewe and Pierre Cardin; Altuzarra and Dries Van Noten. There is also an effort to repurpose clothes, like Carrie’s wedding dress, in order to promote the virtues of rewearing, but it’s pretty much lost in all the rest of the muchness. There is a dedicated Instagram account on which the costume designers Molly Rogers and Danny Santiago share their finds, with 277,000 followers. @Successionfashion, by contrast, has 184,000.All of which means what, exactly? Is the era of quiet luxury, so recently embraced by TikTok, already at an end? Have our attention spans, so famously abbreviated, moved on? Has the physics of fashion exerted its force and produced an equal and opposite reaction to an earlier action?As if. In many ways, the fashion in “And Just Like That …” seems to protest too much. In part that’s because it seems like a regurgitation of the fun that came before, which was itself a reaction to the minimalism of the early 1990s, which itself was born in that decade’s recession.The fact is, no matter how much lip service has been paid to quiet luxury or stealth wealth or whatever you want to call it, and how it is 2023’s “hottest new fashion trend,” it was never a recent invention. It has been around since way back when it was referred to as “shabby chic” or “connoisseurship” or “old money,” all synonyms for the kind of product that didn’t look overtly expensive but was a sign of aesthetic genealogy — the difference between new money and inherited money that fashion co-opted and regurgitated to its own ends. Just as more obviously coded consumption has been around since Louis Vuitton plunked his initials on some leather back in 1896 or since Jay Gatsby started tossing his shirts.Note the Fendi bag on the back of Carrie’s chair.HBO MaxFind the Burberry-branded doggy poop bag tucked on Charlotte’s arm.HBO MaxWe’ve been declaring the “end of logos” and, alternately, the “rise of stealth wealth” for decades now. There are cycles when one is more ubiquitous than the other (usually having to do with economic downturns when flaunting disposable income is not a great look), but they exist in tandem. They help define each other.Consider that during the current economic uncertainty, exactly the kind of environment that tends to fast-forward the appeal of low-key high-cost items, the most successful global brands have remained the most highly identifiable: Louis Vuitton, Chanel, Hermès. Or that in his recent debut for Louis Vuitton, Pharrell Williams introduced a bag called Millionaire that costs — yup — $1 million. (It’s a yellow croc Speedy with gold and diamond hardware.)What is more interesting is, as Carrie and the gang continue on their merry wardrobed way, how clichéd both styles now seem, how performative. Once they have trickled up to television, it’s impossible not to recognize the costume. Or the fact that whichever look you buy into, they are simply different ways of expressing wealth, in all its decorative strata. And wealth itself never goes out of fashion. More

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    in Theater

    With Magic, There Is No Such Thing as Total Invention

    In this age of reboots and remakes, a magic show seeks “a total invention” even as it deconstructs that desire, showing how rare a truly new work is.Is originality overrated?Nothing in art is more thrilling than a new idea. And the cliché is the enemy of anyone with standards. And yet, have you looked around at the culture lately?Reboots, sequels and franchises pack movie theaters. Jukebox musicals remain popular on Broadway. TikTok virality is often built on repurposed songs and dances. The amount of derivative work makes you wonder if the demand for the new is in decline. The acceleration of artificial intelligence into our lives raises the stakes. What can artists or writers do that ChatGPT cannot? We need an answer quick.By dramatizing the anxiety behind the question, “A Simulacrum,” a fascinating play of ideas disguised as a magic show at Atlantic Stage 2, lingers in my mind, growing in stature upon reflection the way collections of tricks rarely do. Ever since Penn and Teller burst on the scene, every magician seemed to be deconstructing illusions while doing them. But this peek behind the curtain is something new, while, as its title suggests, not being original at all. That paradox becomes part of the point.The show is a reproduction of a series of conversations over several years between the magician Steve Cuiffo and the director Lucas Hnath (both are credited as playwrights) about the development of this work. We only hear Hnath, on a recording played by Cuiffo, the sole one onstage. Hnath asks Cuiffo to show him a trick, and after he does, multiple times, artistic tension between collaborators emerges.The crux of their conflict is that Hnath, an artist from the world of theater not magic, appears unimpressed with how many of the tricks derive from previous magicians. He is indifferent to a familiar but amazing trick in which Cuiffo rips up a newspaper and puts it back together. Show me something new, Hnath says, as if that is the only thing worth doing. Come up with a “total invention.”“A Simulacrum” dramatizes the anxiety behind artists’ search for the new.Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesCuiffo, who has an amiable if strained smile, a precise gait and spiky hair, is stymied if not baffled by this request. “It’s all a variation of something,” he says of magic. “All methods are variations.”This is something I have heard magicians say offstage. The idea is that there are a limited number of tricks, and every one of a certain stature in the field knows them, more or less. So the difference between being good and great is less about the radical novelty of the illusion than the packaging, the persona and the rigor of the performance.In other words, there is no such thing as total invention. This idea is built into so many magic shows, including the current hit, “Inner Circle,” by Asi Wind at the Gym at Judson in Greenwich Village. The dialogue around theater tends to be slightly different. Its history is full of revolutions and breaks from the past with occasional acknowledgments of influence integrated into the work.I’d argue that this is a difference in style and rhetoric more than substance. All art is built on influences, old forms, inherited tropes, even the greatest examples. Shakespeare was an inveterate plot thief. On a recent podcast for The Economist, a quiz asked employees to guess whether lyrics were from songs by Bob Dylan or a ChatGPT imitation. They didn’t do that well. Dylan is often seen as an avatar of originality, but of course his singular mind operates not unlike ChatGPT, collecting, synthesizing and processing references.Cuiffo is a skilled if more ordinary performer, who is open about his debts. He begins tricks by reading from old books of magic or citing something that Houdini did a century ago. Hnath balks, suggesting that quoting sources crowds out what matters, the revelation of who he really is. To his directorial eye, that appears to be where originality lies. In the self. And he sets out to get Cuiffo to to be vulnerable, to embrace failure.Cuiffo wants no part of it. He prefers to hide behind his craft. If he could have one real magic skill, he says, it would be the ability to disappear.Magic has historically maintained a narrow emotional palette. But this is changing. Derek DelGaudio’s 2017 stage show “In & of Itself” (which became a documentary on Hulu) was the last real reinvention of the form because it found a way to not just surprise people but also move them. Its most bravura trick is rooted less in a display of mastery than one of vulnerability. Its big crescendo, which involves a quiet reading of a letter by an audience member, is more private and personal than magic typically has been. “A Simulacrum” aims for a similar if more subtle effect, in a more downbeat, even melancholy mood. It’s a show that is less about magic than the toll doing it takes.Derek DelGaudio found a way to move audiences with magic in “In & of Itself.”Caitlin Ochs for The New York TimesThat image of the confident, in control showman who always comes out on top, it’s nothing if not predictable. That makes it a useful tool for misdirection, a setup for a surprise and reinvention.At one point, Cuiffo does a fairly modest-looking card trick, the one where he gets closest to claiming originality. “I’ve definitely made it my own, in a way,” he says. Asked how long he worked on it, the magician says 14 years. Hnath asks him to do it again and when he does, the director says, with a touch of cruelty: “That’s it?”Making art look effortless is the hardest and least appreciated work. Whatever Hnath says, he clearly understands that, and his show aims for a casual, off-handed style, as if the audience just walked in on two people working on an average day. The magic tricks are beautifully done, but not especially unusual. Cuiffo performs the final one with a minimum of patter. He does it for his wife, whom you hear on the recording but don’t see. She hates magicians and magic, which adds to the drama and the poignancy. The trick is a nice feat, but it isn’t played for a big ta-da.The magician gets more reserved as the show proceeds. His physicality and patter recede and he projects an odd melancholy. By the end, it’s not even clear that he likes magic. For the big finale, he mumbles, “Yeah.”It’s the least triumphant end to a magic show I have ever seen. Is this exhausted understatement an honest reflection of his feelings about his work or might it just be an attempt at doing something new? Or both?In art, the new and the old are inextricably tied together. The balance shifts, work to work, but you can’t divorce one from the other. You don’t leave this show thinking that originality isn’t essential. Far from it. It’s just rare. That only makes it more precious. More

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    Kevin Spacey Begins Sexual Assault Trial

    The actor faces 12 charges related to incidents that prosecutors say involved four men and occurred between 2001 and 2013.Kevin Spacey, the two-time Academy Award-winning actor, appeared briefly on Wednesday in a London courtroom for the first day of a trial on multiple charges of sexual assault.Mr. Spacey, 63, is facing 12 charges related to incidents that the prosecution says involved four men and occurred between 2001 and 2013. For much of that period, he was the artistic director of the Old Vic theater in London.In two previous hearings over the past year, Mr. Spacey pleaded not guilty to all those charges.On Wednesday morning, in a wood-paneled courtroom at Southwark Crown Court — a venue typically used for high-profile British criminal cases — Mr. Spacey sat in a large transparent box in the middle of the room, wearing a dark blue suit, light blue shirt and pink tie, while the jury was sworn in.The judge overseeing the case, Mark Wall, told the jurors that Mr. Spacey would “be gratified that many of you know his name, or have seen his films,” but said that would not disqualify them from serving on the case. Mr. Spacey, who is appearing under his full name, Kevin Spacey Fowler, smiled at the comment.Just after midday, the judge dismissed the jury until Friday morning, when the prosecution is expected to deliver its opening statement. Mr. Spacey then left the courtroom with several advisers.Mr. Spacey is facing 12 charges including multiple counts of sexual assault and one charge of causing a person to engage in penetrative sexual activity without their consent. More

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    in Theater

    What to Know About Kevin Spacey’s UK Sexual Offenses Trial

    The actor will appear in a London courtroom on Wednesday to face a four-week trial over allegations of sexual assault.The Oscar-winning actor Kevin Spacey is scheduled to go on trial in London on Wednesday, facing multiple allegations of sexual assault.Since the #MeToo movement came to prominence six years ago, a number of high-profile men have been accused of misconduct, yet Mr. Spacey’s case is one of only a few to reach a British courtroom.The actor, 63, has already pleaded not guilty to all charges. This month, in an interview with Zeit Magazin, a German magazine, he said he expected to be found innocent, after which he would resume acting.The trial at Southwark Crown Court is scheduled to last four weeks. During that time, the courthouse is likely to be filled with reporters and celebrity watchers following the case.Here’s what you need to know.Why is Kevin Spacey on trial in Britain?Mr. Spacey is accused of sexually assaulting four men in England between 2001 and 2013. For much of that period, Mr. Spacey was the artistic director of the Old Vic theater, one of London’s most acclaimed playhouses.Last June, Britain’s Crown Prosecution Service charged Mr. Spacey with four counts of sexual assault against three men, as well as another of causing a person to engage in penetrative sexual activity without their consent.A few months later, in November, the prosecutors authorized seven further charges against Mr. Spacey related to another complainant. Those included three counts of sexual assault, three of indecent assault and one count of causing a person to engage in sexual activity without consent.Both sets of charges will be considered in this month’s trial.How will the trial work?Anna Bradshaw, a British criminal lawyer, said in a telephone interview that the case will look different from an American trial. In Britain, legal professionals called barristers argue cases in court while wearing the traditional garb of white wigs and black gowns.The trial will not be televised, Ms. Bradshaw added, because cameras are rarely allowed in British courts. (Instead, specialist artists sketch the scene.)The complainants will also not be publicly identified, Ms. Bradshaw said, adding that this rule was in place to protect accusers’ privacy and encourage victims of sexual assault to report incidents to the police. They will likely give evidence, and be cross-examined, “via a video-link, or, in court, possibly from behind a screen or curtain,” Ms. Bradshaw said.During the four-week trial, the prosecutors will first outline their case to the 12-person jury, then Mr. Spacey’s team will make its defense.What penalty does Mr. Spacey potentially face?One of the offenses carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment. Others also come with potential jail terms. Under British law, judges have some flexibility to alter sentences.If there is a guilty verdict, the judge would normally hold a separate hearing to announce the sentence at a later date, Ms. Bradshaw added.What has Mr. Spacey said about the accusations?In two hearings over the past year, Mr. Spacey pleaded not guilty to the charges against him. Last June, Patrick Gibbs, Mr. Spacey’s legal representative, told a courtroom that the actor was determined to establish his innocence.In Britain, where it is an offense to publish information that may bias a jury, defendants like Mr. Spacey face some restrictions in using the news media to make their case before a trial.To avoid breaking British law, Mr. Spacey did not discuss the case in the Zeit Magazin article, apart from stressing his innocence. But he said he knew of directors who wanted to work with him once the trial ended. “I know that there are people right now who are ready to hire me the moment I am cleared of these charges,” he said. More

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    in Television

    In ‘The Bear,’ Molly Gordon Is More Than the Girl Next Door

    A new addition to the cast for Season 2, the actress plays Chef Carmy’s love interest — “a human woman,” she said, “not just this sweet, sweet girl.”On a recent Monday afternoon, the actress Molly Gordon ambled through Manhattan’s SoHo neighborhood. Gordon, a wry and sprightly presence in movies like “Booksmart,” “Good Boys” and “Shiva Baby,” wore chunky sneakers, a schoolgirl skirt and sunglasses that made her look like a cat with an active Vogue subscription.Plenty of actresses on the come-up might have chosen a walk around these streets — and maybe a look-in at a few of the fashion flagships — as an afternoon activity. But Gordon, who stars in Season 2 of the FX series “The Bear,” which arrived last week on Hulu, had a less glamorous motivation. The stress of organizing a thriving acting career while also co-writing and co-directing her first feature, “Theater Camp,” which opens in theaters on July 14, had led her to grind her teeth. She was on her way to her dentist to be measured for a new night guard.“It’s amazing, it’s sexy, it’s all the things,” she said of the dental appliance. “This will not be my last mouth guard.”I had been told that Gordon, 27, was a woman of unusual personal charm. “Charming and disarming,” was how Jeremy Allen White, the star of “The Bear,” put it. And this was abundantly true. I had also heard her described as a girl-next-door type. This rang less true. Gordon has too much savvy for that, too much drive. She is more like the girl who knows exactly where you hide your spare key and can break into your house at will.In “The Bear,” she plays Claire, an emergency room resident and a love interest for White’s jittery chef, Carmy. When Season 1 landed last summer, Carmy became a social media pinup. (Italian beef, but pouty with it.) And yet early episodes of “The Bear” had deliberately avoided any suggestion of sex or romance. In this season, Claire offers both. Which means that Gordon has been set the not exactly enviable task of playing the new girlfriend of the internet’s boyfriend.“She sees right through, in a really beautiful way, to the core of Carmy,” Jeremy Allen White, left, said of Claire, the character played by Gordon.Chuck Hodes/FXA scene from the feature film “Theater Camp,” which Gordon (pictured with Ben Platt) co-wrote, co-directed and stars in.Searchlight PicturesGordon knows that the internet can be a scary place, but on that afternoon, about two weeks before Season 2 dropped, she appeared mostly undaunted. (Mostly, not entirely: “I hope people don’t not like me. That’s all I can say.”) Claire mattered more. In her ambition and her candor and her warmth, Claire has felt closer to Gordon than any part she has played. It has made Gordon hungry for more.“She’s not the girl next door, because I don’t know what that is,” Gordon said. “I feel so grateful that I’m able to have this role where I get to be a human woman and not just this sweet, sweet girl.”A career on camera — and more recently, behind it — is Gordon’s birthright, more or less. The only child of the director Bryan Gordon and the writer and director Jessie Nelson, she grew up in Los Angeles, a precocious presence on her parents’ sets and at their dinner parties. She began acting as a toddler, participating in a neighborhood children’s studio, the Adderley School, where she met the actor Ben Platt.Platt, speaking by telephone, recalled those early performances. Props would malfunction. Costumes would come loose. But Gordon always pushed right through it, if a step or two behind the beat. She struggled in school, but theater was a place where she could shine, where she could play.Gordon had a few small parts in her parents’ projects, but otherwise she stuck to school and camp and community shows, intuiting that she could not yet handle the rejection that auditioning would bring. At 18, she enrolled at New York University. She dropped out two weeks later. “It was really expensive,” she explained. “And I couldn’t sit with how unhappy I was.”“She’s not the girl next door, because I don’t know what that is,” Gordon said of her character in “The Bear,” who indeed did grow up with Carmy.Amy Harrity for The New York TimesHaving found a small apartment, she took acting classes, secured representation and began to land the occasional television role. Eventually, a Gordon type emerged: poised young women who could also express some kindness, some vulnerability. She seems to have come by that poise honestly, though as Platt said, the offscreen Gordon is more self-effacing and silly and neurotic.“She often plays very cool characters,” Platt said. “She is a lot more funny and Jewish than that.”Christopher Storer, the creator of “The Bear,” had worked with Gordon on the Hulu series “Ramy” and immediately thought of her for Claire. Though Season 1 had assiduously ignored the personal lives of the restaurant workers, Storer and his fellow showrunner, Joanna Calo, wanted to see what would happen if Carmy attempted a relationship outside work.“We really wanted to get to what would it be like for Carmy to actually try to experience some form of happiness in his life,” he said.He and Calo decided on a character who had known Carmy for most of his life, someone who saw him for who he was and loved him anyway. On “Ramy,” Storer had found Gordon inherently lovable. “She’s so sweet,” he said. “And she’s so smart. And she’s funny as hell.” He knew she could lend all of that to Claire.Claire and Carmy meet again in the second episode, in the freezer aisle of a grocery, over a carton of veal stock. Claire looks at Carmy, and as a ballad by R.E.M. plays, that look seems to hold history and love and hunger. Carmy has armored himself against feeling, but opposite Gordon’s Claire that armor is useless.“She sees right through, in a really beautiful way, to the core of Carmy,” White said by phone.Ayo Edebiri, a star of both “The Bear” and “Theater Camp” and a longtime friend of Gordon’s, said that Gordon, for all her coolness and penchant for comedy, has a “deep well of emotion” that she can access. “There’s this deep reservoir of desire and feeling,” Edebiri said.But desire and feeling can’t sustain a relationship, especially if the man involved has a walk-in fridge’s worth of unresolved trauma to work through. For Gordon, the scenes opposite Carmy — the sweet, morning-after ones, the anguished ones — felt uniquely personal, mirroring her experiences with past partners. “I’ve been with men and we were so happy together,” she said. “But the happiness made them so angry and sad.”“I would love to lead a project, I would love to stretch myself,” Gordon said. “I can be naïve, I can be twisted, I can be dark.”Amy Harrity for The New York TimesAnd as someone who struggles with work-life balance — in the past year or so, Gordon has shot “The Bear,” shot and sold “Theater Camp” and tried to get a series pitch and a feature script greenlighted, which is to say that her balance skews all work — she has often asked herself the same questions the show forces Carmy to interrogate.“I get to explore things that are really near and dear to my heart,” she said. “Can we accept love? Can we have a work life and a romantic life?”For now, she isn’t sure of the answers.Gordon has never minded playing friends and girlfriends. If a girl next door is what’s required, she knows the address. But in her mid-20s, she has become more comfortable with her own ambition, scope and range.“I would love to lead a project, I would love to stretch myself,” she said just before she departed for her dental appointment. “I can be naïve, I can be twisted, I can be dark. I just haven’t always been given those opportunities.“I’m very grateful for what I have. But it doesn’t mean that I don’t want more.” More

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    Murray Hill Is Ready to Share His Personal Life

    “I’m really inspired by the younger generation to be more open,” said the famous drag king, who shared photos of his very busy Pride month.Murray Hill’s signature catchphrase is a percussive “Showbiz!” When he began performing as a drag king in New York during the mid-90s on stages he recalls being “the size of a postage stamp,” shouting “Showbiz!” called out the irony of his Vegas showman persona against the gritty and grimy environs of underground drag clubs.Today, at age 51, with roles as Fred Rococo on HBO’s “Somebody Somewhere,” which was recently renewed for a third season, and as host of Hulu’s new game show “Drag Me to Dinner,” the distance between Mr. Hill and the mainstream is shrinking. Still, his life isn’t wall-to-wall glamour. “I’m in a two-bedroom apartment right now, the second bedroom being my bathroom where I’m talking to you,” he told me from his home in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, during our video call.For Pride season, which lasts the month of June, we unleashed Mr. Hill on the town with his iPhone to capture some of his most “Showbiz!” moments.These are edited excerpts from the interview.I love “Family Feud.” With everything that’s going on in the country, to have us on their daytime slot, I thought it was pretty subversive and radical. Steve Harvey did not know what to do with us. That’s me with Haneefah Wood (above, middle) and Bianca Del Rio (above, left). I knew Bianca when she was just starting. We’re cut from the same cloth, but she’s more Joan Rivers; I’m more Don Rickles. And you know what? She bought a house in Palm Springs with a pool. There’s a whole economy around drag that was never there before. Thinking back to the ’90s — those dirty, stinky clubs — that is mind-blowing to me.That was at Susanne Bartsch’s “New York, New York” Pride kickoff party at the Public Hotel. Susanne Bartsch (above) is like the mother of the queer community. She’ll book Joey Arias and Amanda Lepore, who were the generation before me, and then she’ll book Charlene and all these Brooklyn kids. I don’t know anyone else who does this. I was on “Today With Hoda & Jenna” with Neil Patrick Harris. We’re talking mainstream here, a dream come true. So Jenna and Hoda and Neil were all doing cakes and I’m so short I couldn’t see what he was actually doing. He made a cake of me.Neil Patrick Harris is the producer of “Drag Me to Dinner.” I’m pretty sure I’m the first drag king — transmasc, whatever I am — to host a TV show in history. Neil Patrick Harris and his husband, David Burtka, had me host one of their Restaurant Week gigs. I didn’t know at the time, but I think that was my audition. Robert Evans says, “There’s no such thing as luck, it’s opportunity that you’re prepared for.” They gave me an opportunity.I’m a sports guy. When I got to Mets stadium, I was so excited, I was like a child. I was in the owner’s suite behind home plate and they presented me with that jersey. The back says “Mr. Showbiz.” When I had gone to a Yankees game many, many years ago, I wore a whole Derek Jeter uniform and I actually got harassed a lot. So to go back for a dedicated Pride night, it was such a different experience.I saw a lot of posts from these young drag kings saying that they weren’t getting enough Pride bookings. I always say this: If you don’t see yourself represented, go out and represent yourself. So I said, “Let’s put on our own show.” We had 20 drag kings at 3 Dollar Bill and it was completely sold out. I still have goose bumps, because I’ve never seen a show like that. And there was so much sex appeal! It was like “Magic Dyke” instead of “Magic Mike.”On Sunday at the “Pride Across America” broadcast on ABC and Hulu, I was the guest broadcaster. Lea DeLaria jumped off the parade route to talk to us. She’s the O.G. butch comedian. I’ve known Lea since the ’90s and we often get confused for each other, people calling me “Lea” and her “Murray.” When we took this picture, she goes, “We’re both in the same place at the same time. Now people know we’re two different people.”I never would have imagined sharing a picture of a partner, and I’ve never done it before. When I was coming up, there was this drag etiquette where you never broke character. You never knew anybody’s dead name, you never discussed where you were from, what your family life was like, or what your hardships were. I’m really inspired by the younger generation to be more open and not have things be “on” and “off,” they can actually be everything at once.I am in a loving, amazing, queer relationship at a senior age. Her name is Michelle Casino. This is the first girlfriend that I’ve had in my life that I actually liked. They would all agree. I have this line in my act: I go, “I’ve made a lot of mistakes and many of them are in this room tonight.” More