Eliana Willis

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    ‘Star Trek: Picard,’ Season 3, Episode 1: Reunion Engage

    The new season of “Picard” reunites the admiral with his old crewmates, something fans have been hoping for since the series began.Season 3, Episode 1: ‘The Next Generation’[Takes deep breaths]I’m being told it is against the Times stylebook for me to yell out a scream of anticipation for this season of “Picard,” which is essentially a catch up with the “Next Generation” cast.So I guess I’ll just write instead.This is easily the most anticipated offering of the new era of “Trek” since, well, the first season of “Picard,” which many fans were hoping would be exactly what the third season is billing itself to be — a reunion of the old show.But before we get to all that, some housekeeping.The last time we saw the crew of the Enterprise all together was in “Star Trek: Nemesis” in 2002, one of the more critically reviled offerings of the “Star Trek” franchise, in part because it needlessly killed off the beloved Data. (It wasn’t disliked only by audiences: Several of the main cast members weren’t fans either, as they told me in our group interview earlier this month.) When “Picard” arrived 18 years later, we learned that our favorite captain had become a retired admiral withering away at his vineyard. Riker and Troi were also mostly retired after serving on the U.S.S. Titan, and Data was killed off again, but this time next to a classy fireplace.The first two seasons of “Picard” have followed a similar trajectory. They’ve started off strong and tailed off as the season went on, leaning heavily into nostalgia as the basis for ambitious plot lines. That would be fine, except the writers have often opted for short-term payoffs rather than long-term storytelling.That nostalgia has sometimes led to some odd choices — such as Picard not being human anymore after becoming an android in Season 1. The show has also sometimes seemed to forget who the characters are, as with last season’s use of Young Guinan.So my excitement about another offering of the “Next Generation” cast is mixed with trepidation.As expected, the season premiere is promising. It’s the 25th century (the onscreen text here is an homage to “Wrath of Khan”). The opening scene includes a large dose of fan service, such as audio of a captain’s log from way back when Picard encountered the Borg for the first time and a plaque referencing Cor Caroli V, a planet where a third season “Next Generation” episode takes place.But the scene doesn’t feature our old friend Jean-Luc but rather our other old friend, Dr. Beverly Crusher. She appears to be on the run from some shady looking aliens. Beverly has developed skills with a phaser, which is contrary to what we saw in her younger days, as Riker points out later. She’s vaporizing enemies now! (Who says you can’t pick up new hobbies as you get older?) And she sends a message to her old captain and sort of crush, Jean-Luc, to say that she needs him — but she does so through his old comm badge using a secret code.Gates McFadden in “Star Trek: Picard.”Trae Patton/Paramount+The fact that “Picard” gives Beverly something to do other than stand around and scan things was a big reason Gates McFadden came back to reprise the role, and it’s a welcome sight.Meanwhile, Jean-Luc finally, after all these decades, seems content in retirement. He is in love with Laris. He might write a book. He’s ready to move to Chaltok IV, a Romulan planet, where he’ll sip Saurian brandy and wind down his life. He’s earned it. But again, he’s an android now, so he can’t die. Not really. Can he even taste brandy? See where the long-term plot issues are? (Fun reference here: Picard holding the flute from the classic “Next Generation” episode “Inner Light.”)But Beverly needs saving. She sends Jean-Luc a coded message telling him to trust nobody. For some reason, Jean-Luc tells Laris, Beverly hasn’t spoken to member of the Enterprise crew for 20 years. (This would mean that shortly after the events of “Nemesis,” Crusher cut off her closest friends. Excited to find out why!) Props to Laris — a Romulan intelligence operative — for being totally chill with one of Jean-Luc’s exes reaching out for a secret rendezvous. True love.Riker and Picard meet up at Guinan’s bar during Frontier Day celebrations, where Picard tells Riker about the secret message.“I wouldn’t have asked to meet you like this if it hadn’t been very important,” Jean-Luc tells his old first officer. (At a crowded bar? Where people could easily eavesdrop? Of course, moments later, we see someone doing exactly that.)Jonathan Frakes and Patrick Stewart have instant chemistry, borne of decades of working together. But Riker suggests to Picard that he is on the outs with his wife, Troi — another member of the old crew. (This raises a question: Troi and Crusher were close friends on the Enterprise, why wouldn’t Jean-Luc want to tell her too? Why just Riker?)Riker instantly agrees on a scheme to hit the road to the Ryton system, like Jake and Elroy. That’s what bros do, after all. They hatch a scheme to commander the sleek looking U.S.S. Titan, Riker’s old command. Another nice traditional “Trek” moment: glamour shots of the exterior. (I hate to be that guy, but Beverly’s message specifically said not to involve Starfleet. So why would Riker and Picard center their plan on using a Starfleet ship? Surely, they can find another deep space charter. OK, I admit it: I don’t hate being that guy.)The Titan is commanded by Captain Shaw, played by the charming Todd Stashwick. He is a magnetic presence, but Shaw’s previous post appears have been on the U.S.S. Jerkface, because he is, without explanation, rude and dismissive of two legendary Starfleet officers. He doesn’t even greet them when they arrive, instead sending Seven of Nine — er, Commander Annika Hansen. Shaw also isn’t on the bridge to greet visitors for what is apparently an inspection or giving orders when the ship leaves spacedock. (Picard gives the order to Seven to take out the ship. Why isn’t Shaw doing that?) Almost every single sentence uttered by Shaw is dripping with condescending rudeness.“Captain Shaw prefers I use Hansen,” Seven tells Jean-Luc. Since when does a Starfleet captain in the 25th century get to decide what your name is? (We’re going to use Seven for now, since that’s what she’s known as mostly throughout the “Trek” universe.)It’s a strange dynamic and here’s the problem: Shaw is painted as the unlikable villain of the episode. Seven even says that Shaw’s behavior is making her reconsider joining Starfleet. But Shaw’s stance is absolutely correct. When Riker says he wants to unexpectedly divert the ship to the Ryton system, Shaw says, “That’s at the edge of Federation space at the opposite direction of our intended course — twice the time.”He’s been given no heads up on this mission. Jean-Luc may be an admiral, but he is retired. Riker doesn’t even outrank Shaw. Why would he follow this clearly suspicious order that comes out of nowhere with no real explanation other than “bragging rights?” Picard makes it all the more weird when he says they’ll end up at Deep Space 4, which, as Shaw notes, has been shut down. (Picard should know better. In the “Next Generation” episode “The Pegasus,” Picard defies an admiral who tries to take command of the Enterprise.) As far as Seven goes, seen through another lens, Shaw trusting her to take the ship out of spacedock without him needing to be there is an example of him having faith in her.Seven quickly breaks Shaw’s faith by sending the ship to the Ryton section anyway. This area of space is outside the Federation’s jurisdiction and far away from Earth, so it must have taken a long time to get there, even at maximum warp. Is Shaw such a detached captain that he doesn’t notice when his ship goes in the opposite direction? Especially given his fondness for rules and regulations? Despite Shaw’s personality flaws, all his actions showed me in this episode is that he’s a competent Starfleet captain who can see through blatant lies.The episode ends with intrigue on Beverly’s ship when Riker and Picard meet — dun, dun, dun — her son. (There is an explicit reference that Picard and Crusher actually were lovers, when Picard says that he made her a mixtape.)All in all, a fun episode. Seeing Riker and Jean-Luc interact like the old friends that they are went down easy like a glass of Chateau Picard. My excitement — and my trepidation — remains high. More

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    Sarah Silverman Defines ‘Woke’ for Newsmax

    “The Daily Show” guest host Sarah Silverman called Newsmax “basically an even more far-right Fox News — like if your crazy uncle had a crazy uncle.”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.Sick Burn, BroOn Tuesday, a reporter for Newsmax asked Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, if President Biden was “woke.”Sarah Silverman, guest host for “The Daily Show,” called Newsmax “basically an even more far-right Fox News — like if your crazy uncle had a crazy uncle.”“I think we’re just communicating wrong, because, like, what I know ‘woke’ to mean is, like, learning new things about people or the world, and then acting accordingly. Like, basic kindness. Maybe a gesture of care to people who are more vulnerable than you. You know what, actually you wouldn’t like it — it’s Jesus stuff.” — SARAH SILVERMAN“This guy really thinks, ‘Is Joe Biden woke’ was like a hard-hitting question. The real hard-hitting question would be, ‘Is Joe Biden awake?’” — SARAH SILVERMAN“It feels cooler to say, ‘I’m not woke’ than the truth, which is, ‘I’m terrified of what I don’t understand and I only know how to process that as anger because I can’t look inward.’” — SARAH SILVERMANThe Punchiest Punchlines (Probably Not Aliens Edition)“And there’s still confusion about the three unidentified objects the United States government shot down over the weekend. Intelligence officials now say that they do not believe the objects were from China or posed any kind of national security threat. This is all a very evasive way of saying that they shot down three Bud Light blimps.” — JAMES CORDEN“No aliens. Nothing to see here. In a totally unrelated story, Monday, the United States has set up a new task force on U.F.Os.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“According to Axios, the military didn’t classify what the objects were, but they don’t think they were aliens or Chinese spy balloons. Best guess right now is that there are some overly aggressive Re/Max agents on the loose.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“China is sticking to their claim that the first one we shot down was a weather balloon that got blown 12,000 miles off course. How ‘off course’ can you get? You missed by an ocean, if that’s the case.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“The Pentagon this week described the unidentified object shot down over Canada on Saturday as a ‘small, metallic balloon.’ So it was either a dire national security threat or a wasted 25 cents at a county fair.” — SETH MEYERSThe Bits Worth Watching“Jimmy Kimmel Live” found a bunch of people who lied on camera about seeing a fictional U.F.O. on Wednesday’s “Lie Witness News.”What We’re Excited About on Thursday NightTina Fey will hang out with her old friend Seth Meyers on Thursday’s “Late Night.”Also, Check This OutStephan DybusPodcast companies are feeling the strain of oversaturation and overspending. More

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    Stephen Colbert is Underwhelmed by Nikki Haley’s Big Announcement

    “As she said in her campaign announcement tweet, ‘Get excited,’” Colbert said on Tuesday.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.‘Nicky Fail-y’Former Gov. Nikki Haley of South Carolina announced she’s running for president early Tuesday morning.“Of course, any campaign veteran will tell you there is no better time to drop the biggest political news of your life than on Valentine’s Day at 6:48 a.m.” Stephen Colbert said. “Yeah, a day everyone’s thinking about something else at a time when no one is awake.”“The only way this could make a smaller splash is if Haley had whispered it into a bowl of soup.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“As she said in her campaign announcement tweet ‘Get excited.’ A grateful pass.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“But this is going to be a tough race for Nikki Haley. Right now, she’s polling at just one percent, and that’s pretty bad. I mean, you know, even Mike Pence is at two percent. Mike Pence’s noose rope is at five percent, which is V.P. material.” — SARAH SILVERMAN“She said she believes the Republican Party needs to go in a new direction. I think you’d have more luck convincing a swarm of moths to go in a new direction. The whole ‘towards the light’ thing isn’t really working.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“Haley is the first prominent Republican to challenge Donald Trump, she’s the first female governor of South Carolina and the first candidate to spell her name like the bass player from Mötley Crüe, so …” — JIMMY KIMMEL“Now I guess this means Trump has to come up with a mean nickname for her. ‘Cuz right now he’s pacing around Mar-a-Lago going ‘Sicky Nikki? Nikki Fail-y? Oh, Nikki Epic Fail-y?’” — JIMMY KIMMEL“Today, former Trump cabinet member Nikki Haley announced that she is running for president. Yep. She served in Trump’s cabinet, which is listed on her website in very, very small font.” — JIMMY FALLONThe Punchiest Punchlines (Folder Enthusiast Edition)“A lawyer for former President Trump said recently that Trump was using a manila folder marked ‘classified’ to block a small light on a landline phone next to his bed. Even weirder: all the ones that he taped up to use in place of curtains.” — SETH MEYERS“I don’t know, maybe use an eye mask, get a, you know, a different bedside phone, put a Post-it on it?” — JAMES CORDEN“Basically, he’s saying, ‘I’m not a traitor, I’m a hoarder!’” — JIMMY KIMMEL“Which is more embarrassing for Trump: the fact that he kept top-secret documents or admitting he collects folders? I mean, how dull do you have to be to be a folder enthusiast?” — JIMMY KIMMEL“The worst thing about this story is now I’m picturing Trump in bed on a landline phone talking to Tucker Carlson, sort of twirling the cord around his finger going, ‘No, you hang up!’” — JAMES CORDENThe Bits Worth WatchingThe actress Alison Brie recreated a Valentine’s Day memory from high school on Tuesday’s “Late Late Show.”What We’re Excited About on Wednesday NightThe NBA legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar will sit down with Sarah Silverman on Wednesday’s “Daily Show.”Also, Check This OutA museum in Croatia displays mementos and stories of people’s failed relationships.via Museum of Broken RelationshipsThe Museum of Broken Relationships in Croatia collects mementos people around the world send in symbolizing their failed romances. More

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    ‘Cornelia Street’ Review: A Musical With Local Ambitions

    An affectionate elegy to a Greenwich Village restaurant, Neil Pepe’s production at Atlantic Theater orders everything on the menu.The midcentury novelist Dawn Powell, Greenwich Village’s great chronicler, wrote that there are three stages a person goes through when negotiating its twisty streets — first enthusiasm (“Bohemia — oh thrills!”), then cynicism (“Bah! Village theatricals!”), then resigned acceptance (“After all the Village is the Village when all’s said and done”).“Cornelia Street,” a fidgety, aimless new musical, is set on one of the Village’s quainter lanes. It goes through every stage, all at once. Written by Simon Stephens with music and lyrics by Mark Eitzel and directed by Neil Pepe for the Atlantic Theater’s subterranean space, the show is simultaneously celebration, deflation and a neighborhood elegy in a minor key. It plays out amid and atop the rickety tables and sturdier bar of Marty’s Café, a struggling Village restaurant. The show has deep affection for this (mostly) invented place and for the majority of its habitués. But like a lot of tourists who have walked these winding streets, it loses its way.At the play’s diffuse center is Jacob (Norbert Leo Butz), a onetime punk who has spent 28 years as the cafe’s chef. Jacob lives above the storefront with his teenage daughter, Patti (Lena Pepe, the director’s own daughter), and has recently developed higher culinary ambitions, trying to sneak orders for Iberico ham and venison under the crotchety nose of the cafe’s owner, Marty (Kevyn Morrow). How the empty restaurant has remained solvent long enough for Jacob to turn gourmet is one of the play’s many mysteries. Scott Pask’s set and Stacey Derosier’s lighting suggest a snug, homey, stay-all-day space of tin ceilings and mismatched wood. But no one frequents it, save for Mary Beth Peil’s former opera singer, Ben Rosenfield’s puppyish tech bro and George Abud’s preening cabdriver.The first act finds Marty’s suddenly threatened: The landlord wants to sell. Meanwhile, Patti has trouble at school. Philip (Esteban Andres Cruz), the sole waiter, has an audition. Misty (Gizel Jiménez), a woman from Jacob’s past, fleeing her own demons, turns up, too. Jacob embroils himself in a drug-dealing scheme that also demands embezzlement. If landlord disputes, lost souls and white-collar crime seem like too much story to stir into a chamber musical, well, yes. This is before the complications of the second act: a death, a disappearance, a musical number devoted to the glory days of Studio 54. (For some of us, this will conjure unhappy memories of the Atlantic’s last musical flop, “This Ain’t No Disco.”)Stephens doesn’t seem to believe in all this action, often stopping it cold so that characters can offer some blue-plate philosophizing.Here is Jacob’s: “You ever get one of those days when you really thought you knew where you were and what you were doing with your life and then you realize you had no [expletive] idea?”And here is Misty’s: “Life, huh?”This is the third collaboration between Stephens and the singer-songwriter Eitzel, the founder of the mordant alternative rock band American Music Club, following 2010’s “Marine Parade” and 2015’s “Song From Far Away.” Neither show has played New York, but reviews suggest that these previous partnerships have been successful ones. Which makes sense. Stephens’s enduring concern, in plays from “Punk Rock” to last year’s “Morning Sun,” is with people who don’t feel at home in the world or who must learn that any home they thought they had was made of straw and sticks. And the characters in Eitzel’s songs are very rarely anything like satisfied or secure.Scott Pask’s set and Stacey Derosier’s lighting suggest a snug, homey, stay-all-day space, our critic writes.Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesBut here, under Pepe’s makeshift direction, the songs and the book scenes feel at odds. (Pepe is another frequent collaborator of Stephens, though only his straight plays.) Whatever its contrivances, “Cornelia Street” is ultimately a work of naturalism, whereas the dreamy, gloomy musical interludes suggest something more abstract and symbolic. Instead of swelling during the musical numbers, the show seems to shrink, embarrassed. The arrangements and orchestrations are expansive and surprising, but the staging feels apologetic. Butz, with his rocker voice and dad vibes, and Jiménez, an ingénue with edge, are supple performers, singing as casually as they might speak. They manage these tonal shifts with ease. The rest of the cast, moving to Hope Boykin’s swishing, slashing choreography, seem to struggle. That their characters feel less like people and more like types can’t help.The Atlantic has a productive history of investing in small, off-center musicals — “The Bedwetter,” “Kimberly Akimbo,” “The Secret Life of Bees,” and most significantly “The Band’s Visit” and “Spring Awakening.” This wants to be one more. (In its more creditable moments, it also gestures toward another intimate, single-set musical, “Once.”) Here, the approach feels tentative. Sometimes offstage voices are used, sometimes not. Lighting transforms the space during a song or remains constant. Pepe seems like a man who is not enjoying what he has ordered, but can’t bring himself to send it back.“Cornelia Street” owes an obvious debt to the Cornelia Street Cafe, a Village institution that shuttered in 2019 because of rent hikes. (This homage had apparently upset Robin Hirsch, one of the cafe’s founders. But Hirsch, invited to lead a storytelling event alongside Stephens and Eitzel on one of the show’s dark nights, has since been brought into the fold.) Friendly and unpretentious, the place made you feel like a local, even if you could never afford an apartment nearby. If only “Cornelia Street” could offer some of that same welcome and sense of purpose. If ever a musical needed to stop and ask for directions, it is this one.Cornelia StreetThrough March 5 at Atlantic Theater Company Stage 2, Manhattan; atlantictheater.org. Running time: 2 hours 20 minutes. More

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    Broadway and West End Theater Owners Agree to Join Forces

    A major British theater company, Ambassador Theater Group, says it is “combining operations” with Jujamcyn, the smallest of Broadway’s three big landlords.Jujamcyn Theaters, the smallest of the three big Broadway landlords, is combining its operations with a large British company, the Ambassador Theater Group, or A.T.G.The transaction, confirmed Tuesday by Jujamcyn and International Entertainment Holdings Limited, which is A.T.G.’s parent company, would give A.T.G., which already operates two of the 41 Broadway houses, a more sizable foothold in the heart of America’s theater industry, and would give Jordan Roth, the Jujamcyn president, more resources for showcasing his creative ambitions. Jujamcyn operates five Broadway houses; A.T.G. has 58 venues in Britain, Germany, and the United States.The companies said that the transaction is subject to regulatory approval, but did not say by what entity and in which country. No financial terms were specified.Roth, one of the most colorful characters on Broadway’s business side, will become the creative director of the combined company and its largest individual shareholder, with a seat on the board. There are also significant institutional shareholders: A large Rhode Island-based private equity firm, Providence Equity Partners, has for the last decade been A.T.G.’s majority shareholder, and at the height of the pandemic, when theaters were being financially squeezed by a lengthy shutdown, an Australian company, T.E.G., acquired a minority share of the company.Roth, the 47-year-old son of the real estate titan Steven Roth and the Broadway producer Daryl Roth, has been a singular force in a staid industry, with a disruptive emphasis on customer service in his theaters, a fondness for couture, an exuberant presence on social media, and left-leaning politics sharply at odds with those of his Trump-supporting father.The transaction portends a potential shift from the quirky to the corporate: A.T.G. is a large company, run by a former wine industry executive, Mark Cornell, who will remain as chief executive of the combined company. A.T.G. is fundamentally British, which could be a cause for concern on Broadway, where there is occasional worry about too many London shows — often developed with British government support — swamping work by American theater artists. (After Second Stage Theater, a nonprofit that focuses on work by living American writers, finally acquired a Broadway house in 2015, its artistic director, Carole Rothman, proudly proclaimed that her organization’s Broadway programming would feature “No Brits.”)The companies, which would not make anyone available for comment, did not describe the transaction as either an acquisition or a merger, and it is not immediately clear what “combining operations” will mean for the employees or operations at the five Jujamcyn houses or the two A.T.G. Broadway houses.The Jujamcyn theaters include the Eugene O’Neill, which is the long-term home of “The Book of Mormon,” as well as the Al Hirschfeld (“Moulin Rouge!”), the Walter Kerr (“Hadestown”), the August Wilson (“Funny Girl”) and the St. James (awaiting a new musical called “New York, New York”). Roth is expected to continue to decide what shows run in those five theaters, and he has previously shown a strong interest in work by American writers: Four of the five current Jujamcyn musicals have American origins; “Moulin Rouge!” has Australian roots, but the stage musical was developed in the United States.A.T.G. has an ambitious Broadway track record thus far. The company has for a decade operated one of the biggest Broadway houses, the Lyric, which, lavishly reconfigured for 1,622 seats, has for the last five years been home to “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child.” A.T.G. has since 2017 also operated one of Broadway’s smaller houses, the Hudson, which with just under 1,000 seats often presents plays; the latest, a revival of “A Doll’s House” starring Jessica Chastain, began previews Monday night. Among the hallmarks of the company’s Broadway presence: fancier food and drink than at most of the American-operated houses.Notably, both “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child” and “A Doll’s House” are produced by companies financed by A.T.G. A lead producer of “Cursed Child” is Sonia Friedman, a prolific and powerful London-based producer whose production company is an A.T.G. affiliate; the director of “A Doll’s House” is Jamie Lloyd, a British director whose production company is also affiliated with the group. (Friedman is also a lead producer of “Funny Girl” and “New York, New York,” both running at Jujamcyn theaters.)The combination of A.T.G. and Jujamcyn — it is not clear what the amalgamated venture will be called — will still be the smallest of the three big Broadway landlords, but now with seven of the 41 theaters. The Shubert Organization has 17 theaters and the Nederlander Organization has nine. Six theaters are operated by nonprofits, one by Disney, and one (Circle in the Square) is independently owned.Jujamcyn, founded in the late 1950s, was named for Judy, James and Cynthia Binger, the grandchildren of the company’s founder. The Binger family sold the company to Rocco Landesman in 2005; Jordan Roth bought a stake in the company in 2009.Roth has been an activist theater owner. In the buildings, he has overseen everything from a redesign of the ice cubes (to reduce the clinking noise) to bringing in a new ticket seller, SeatGeek, to manage ticket sales.He has presented multiple hit shows, among the biggest of which has been “The Book of Mormon,” which has been running since 2011. He also landed “Springsteen on Broadway,” an enormously successful Bruce Springsteen concert show that had runs both before and after the pandemic shutdown.Roth has also been active as a producer, most recently transferring a concert-style production of “Into the Woods” from City Center to the St. James; he was also a producer of the Tony-winning 2018 revival of “Angels in America.”A.T.G. has been expanding its presence in the United States, where it now owns, operates or manages 16 theaters, including not only the two Broadway houses, but also the King’s Theater in Brooklyn, the Colonial Theater in Boston, and theaters in Detroit, New Orleans, San Antonio, San Francisco and Sugar Land, Texas. More

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    New Ohio Theater Announces It Will Close After Three Decades

    Robert Lyons, the founding artistic director, said it was time for a new generation to take over the West Village stage.At a time when theaters are struggling to reach prepandemic audience levels, the New Ohio Theater, a staple for artists and independent theater companies for 30 years, announced it would present its final Manhattan performance in August.The shifting theater landscape and increased financial pressures led to the decision, said the founding artistic director, Robert Lyons, who is also a playwright and director. “It’s just a good time to step aside and pass the baton,” he added, explaining that he envisioned a new generation taking on the space.The closing will end programs like the Ice Factory, Now in Process, Theater for Young Minds, New Ohio Presents and New Ohio Hosts. The Archive Residency program will conclude in the spring of 2024.The theater, originally known as the Ohio Theater and located off Wooster Street in SoHo, was founded as a nonprofit in 1993, and before that provided a shared space for independent companies and artists to brainstorm and perform. In 2011, the company moved to 154 Christopher Street in the West Village as the New Ohio Theater, and continued to operate as a hub for independent theater. Over time, New Ohio oversaw a renovation project at the theater that included the installation of a new sprung stage, new risers, an HVAC system and a bathroom in the dressing room.For 16 years, Edward Einhorn, the artistic director of the Untitled Theater Company No. 61, has collaborated with the theater; he plans to present his absurdist dark comedy “The Shylock and the Shakespeareans” there in June. Einhorn said theaters like the New Ohio have been essential to the development of indie performance works since the late ’90s.“I’m slowly losing my homes,” Einhorn said. “There are a few left, but it’s a hard time still, hard to get audiences, hard to know what to do next.”The “Moulin Rouge!” director Alex Timbers and the “Hadestown” director Rachel Chavkin are among those who worked at the theater early in their careers.Kristin Marting, the founding artistic director of HERE Arts Center, who was part of a company that booked a season at the theater when she was 21, said it was the first theater she worked in. Marting said it greenlighted less conventional works, like an immersive “Alice in Wonderland” she directed in the late ’80s, and served as a sanctuary for generations of emerging theater makers.The plan is to reserve the 74-seat space for use by nonprofit companies. The building’s landlord, Rockrose Development, will accept proposals from theater companies looking for a home beginning Wednesday.Marting said the New Ohio would be sorely missed.“I hope that the new entity that comes in embraces the same level of experimentation and inclusion and invites a broad spectrum of the community to make work,” she said. More

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    Book Review: ‘Who Does That Bitch Think She Is?” by Craig Seligman

    WHO DOES THAT BITCH THINK SHE IS? Doris Fish and the Rise of Drag, by Craig SeligmanFrom wee-hours cabaret to prime-time reality TV to fiercely contended children’s story hour at the local library, the American drag queen’s journey has been a long and bumpy one.For Doris Fish, alter ego of Philip Clargo Mills, it began not in America but Manly Vale, an apt-sounding suburb of Sydney, Australia,and ended in AIDS-ravaged San Francisco, 1991 — with resurrection, one source maintains, as a ghost composed variously of golden sparks and Evian water.I had not known of Fish before reading the journalist Craig Seligman’s minutely observed new biography of him (though some friends used the female pronoun, “he never wanted to be a woman — he never even wanted to seem like a woman,” the author writes). I finished it persuaded this was a life well worth examining, if only because his peers are so often celebrated, or excoriated, in aggregate.Most of Fish’s performances are unrecoverable, but those that can be scratched up are indelible. Best known, in a limited way, is probably “Vegas in Space,” a posthumously released and deeply weird 1991 sci-fi comedy about male earthlings who undergo sex-change operations so they can travel to a female-only planet (something about recovering stolen jewels…).Promoting the movie during its production period on a Pittsburgh morning show in 1986, Fish gamely endures being treated like a talking zoo animal by the gawking hosts and awkwardly grinning housewives. There’s also a choppy video out there of his swan song, “This Is My Life,” fervidly performed in a caftan and satin gloves at the benefit from which the book takes its name. He was months from death.Born in 1952, Philip was the middle child of six in a tolerant Catholic family that permitted a marijuana plant on the premises. He played a high-kicking chorus girl under a priest’s tutelage at his all-boy school’s year-end musical with more enthusiasm than most of his classmates. Remarkably indifferent to the prospect of arrest or social censure, he joined a local troupe called Sylvia and the Synthetics whose outré antics had me scrawling exclamation points in the margins.One female impersonator’s considerable male member was tucked through his legs to simulate a tail. Another pinned back her hair with swastikas. Another bit into a dripping sheep’s heart to punctuate a lovelorn ballad, blood dripping onto her ball gown like one of the less tasteful Valentine’s Day bitmojis. There were flash mobs of Marilyn Monroe impersonators and teetering pyramids of performers on quaaludes. “Everything was permitted,” Seligman writes dryly, “including ineptitude.”After working for the Florence Broadhurst wallpaper factory, from which he filched metallic powders for his cosmetics, Philip/Doris moved to San Francisco, money sewn into his pockets by his loving mother, Mildred, and found his true calling. Mostly this was what was then called prostitution, though in Fish’s hands it seems more like a kind of sexual nursing. He specialized in relations with those society often rejected, the obese or infirm. (There was a green-card marriage to a lesbian, one of the few survivors of his circle who declined to be interviewed here.)He acted as “comedy model” for a greeting-card company called West Graphic, portraits that Seligman compares to the work of Cindy Sherman. He wrote a popular column for The San Francisco Sentinel, then an essential gay weekly. And he performed in a group called Sluts a-Go-Go, emulating faded stars of the ’30s and ’40s while occasionally brushing up against rising ones of the period (Robin Williams, Lynda Carter). The Sluts and their associates were equal-opportunity offenders, doing racial as well as gender impressions, spewing double entendre and sometimes seeming to positively assault their audiences with sensory overload, exaggerated glamour and flagrant disregard for safety codes.Though revolutionary in his in-your-faceness, Fish was not particularly political; the sincerity such activity requires was anathema. One of the more intriguing aspects of his foreshortened life was an attitude described here as Romantic Cruelism: a pose of complete indifference or dark humor even in the face of tragedy.Fish displays it when his parents divorce; when a younger sister dies after a mysterious illness; and when one Synthetic, who had been a childhood friend, perishes in a fire: “Burnt to a cinder in a room full of exotic drag. All they found was a tooth,” as Spurt!, a local punk zine, callously memorialized. “The young don’t know what to do with endings,” Seligman writes, and there were so many more to come.“Who Does That Bitch Think She Is?” revisits and draws from a 1986 profile of Fish that Seligman wrote for skittish editors at Image magazine, a weekend section of The San Francisco Examiner. Aside from overuse of the words “notoriety” and “notorious,” it is confidently written, wistful and quite personal; Seligman’s now-husband, Silvana Nova, was part of Fish’s scene.The author of a previous book comparing Pauline Kael and Susan Sontag, Seligman diverts here and there to Sontag’s “Notes on ‘Camp,’” but spends most of his time simply retracing Fish’s footsteps. At times these seem akin to the old Hans Christian Andersen version of “The Little Mermaid,” whose heroine is granted the power to walk out of the water, but only with the pain of swords going through her. (In one parade, Fish’s elaborate costume included fiberglass “legs” that drew blood from his own, covering the stains with black tights.)Seligman’s own stance is mostly one of wary wonderment, that drag queens have gone from “totally beyond the pale” to mainstream acknowledgment, “from feared freak into object of fascination,” from the shaky spotlight to — however contentiously — the kindergarten rug. He piles a lot of historical weight on Fish’s shoulders, but his subject carries it like Joan Crawford in a padded Adrian frock.WHO DOES THAT BITCH THINK SHE IS? Doris Fish and the Rise of Drag | By Craig Seligman | Illustrated | 352 pp. | PublicAffairs | $29 More

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    Late Night Recaps Rihanna’s Super Bowl Halftime Surprise

    Jimmy Kimmel called the pop singer’s pregnancy reveal “the biggest ‘we’re expecting’ announcement in the history of the world.”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.Super Bowl, Baby!Rihanna’s Super Bowl halftime show was popular with late-night hosts on Monday, who praised the pop star for performing while pregnant.Jimmy Kimmel called the reveal “what has to be the biggest ‘we’re expecting’ announcement in the history of the world.”“She had a baby in May and now has another one in the oven. So, if you are one of those 19 million people who called in sick to work today, Rihanna last night had a 9-month-old in her dressing room, she was eight millimeters dilated, still managed to get out there and do her job.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“Rihanna did a Super Bowl halftime show while pregnant. Meanwhile, everyone at home on their 30th chicken wing was like, ‘I also felt a kick.’” — JIMMY FALLON“During her halftime show performance at last night’s Super Bowl, Rihanna revealed that she was pregnant, while the rest of us just ate like we were.” — SETH MEYERS“Imagine it’s the first day of kindergarten and your fun fact is that you’ve done the Super Bowl halftime show.” — JIMMY FALLON“Seriously, did you see that, pregnant women? Did you see it? Rihanna just did a Super Bowl halftime show while pregnant, and you want my seat on the subway? Not anymore, toots. No way. The bar has been raised, so hold it.” — SARAH SILVERMAN, this week’s “Daily Show” guest host“Not only did she sound great, she closed the performance by — I don’t know if you saw this — really incredible, she closed the show by shooting down one of those U.F.O.s.” — JIMMY KIMMELThe Punchiest Punchlines (Alien Balloons Edition)“Last night was Super Bowl 57, and, out of habit, Biden shot down the Goodyear blimp.” — SETH MEYERS“All of a sudden, there are more U.F.O.s than Chick-fil-A’s now.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“I never in a million years thought I’d say this — where the hell is the Space Force?” — JIMMY KIMMEL“Yeah, nothing’s off the table. It could be aliens, it could be balloons, or it could be alien balloons.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“The White House today announced they formed an interagency team to look into what’s going on. After initially refusing to rule it out, today they said they do not believe these are extraterrestrial visits, which is exactly what they say at the beginning of every movie about extraterrestrial visits.” — JIMMY KIMMELThe Bits Worth WatchingLizz Winstead, the co-creator of “The Daily Show,” talked with her friend Sarah Silverman about creating comedy news, and her organization that advocates for reproductive justice.What We’re Excited About on Tuesday NightPaul Rudd, who stars in “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania,” will sit down with Seth Meyers on Tuesday’s “Late Night.”Also, Check This OutThe late Celia Cruz performing in New York in 2001. The multiple Grammy Award winner is one of five honorees of the American Women Quarters Program, the U.S. Mint said.Scott Gries/Getty ImagesThe Queen of Salsa, Celia Cruz, will be the first Afro-Latina to be featured on the U.S. quarter. More