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    Late Night Gets Serious About Ukraine

    Hosts did their best to bring levity to their shows on an otherwise somber day.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.What Is It Good For?Late night hosts got serious on Thursday discussing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.Stephen Colbert called it “a dark day.”“Over the last five years, we’ve seen democracy repeatedly undermined, tragic, unprecedented firestorms, a global pandemic,” Colbert said. “Well this morning, Vladimir Putin looked at all of that and said, ‘Hold my vodka.’”James Corden forewent any attempt at jokes at the top of his show and delivered a somber monologue instead.“But today, if you are thinking about the news, there is really only one news story, and that news is so dark. That a war has begun, a sovereign country has been invaded, and all day today, and then tonight, and now as I sit here, I can’t — all I can think about is the innocent men and women and children in Ukraine who are terrified for their lives and I don’t know how to process it. Like, I don’t even know how to talk about this to my own children, let alone begin talking to you about it on television. And it’s weird, you know, like just because I wear a suit and I sit behind this desk, it doesn’t really mean anything. I am not nearly qualified enough to speak about these events. I’m not. And I don’t really want to make jokes about any other trivial news story that we found today, because I can’t shake the feeling of how utterly terrifying all of this is, and how scared the people of Ukraine must be feeling today; how scared everyone in Eastern Europe must be feeling today. And I’m sure I can’t fathom that this is happening in 2022 and the ramifications of this are monumental, and we should be under no illusion of how serious and sad the situation in Ukraine is. So, I don’t know what to say other than our thoughts are with every single person in Ukraine tonight.”— JAMES CORDEN“Amidst all this horror, it’s important to keep our eyes on the unhinged fascist lunatic,” Colbert said, referring to former president Donald Trump, who doubled down on his support of Putin.“You know, it’s hard to do a comedy show when there’s a war going on, but we are here while more than 6,000 miles away, women and children are fleeing Ukraine. Men aged 18 to 60 are required to stay and fight as Russian forces continue their unprovoked attack — an attack that has been received here in the United States, like, I don’t remember anything like this, in that some of us seem OK with it. You know, typically we would band together in a situation like this. We’d be united, but that was before the great divider chopped us in half.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“Russian President Vladimir Putin declared war last night against Ukraine, and this is nice: Trump offered to host the after party.” — SETH MEYERS“So, if you were like most people, you were shocked and horrified. But if you were Donald Trump, apparently you were at Mar-a-Lago watching it with a bunch of Palm Beach plastic surgeons and their third wives and thinking, ‘You really got to hand it to Vladimir Putin.’” — SETH MEYERS“While Vladimir Putin is being condemned by leaders and ambassadors from every democratic country around the world, Donald Trump, our former president, was complimenting him and, of course, himself, while bombs were falling on a country that did nothing to provoke an invasion.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“Then, as the invasion began, the ex-prez took to Russian state media — sorry, I misread that: Fox News.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“It takes a special kind of a son of a [expletive] to see innocent people fleeing their homes and think, ‘How can I make this about me?’ But nobody does that better than Donald Trump.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“Can you imagine if any other president behaved this way? This would be like if during World War II, Hoover came out and said, ‘Attaboy, Adolf. Sweet mustache. I love what you’re doing there.’” — JIMMY KIMMELThe Punchiest Punchlines (Say ‘Aaaah!’ Edition)“As you know, Russia is now at war with Ukraine. It is a crazy world we’re living in. In fact, today President Biden asked the C.D.C. to find a new variant just to lighten the mood.” — JIMMY FALLON“Yep, Russian president Vladimir Putin has launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine. I think Putin has lost his mind. Even Kim Jong-un was like, ‘You’re not actually supposed to do it.’” — JIMMY FALLON“Yeah, World War III, a global pandemic, the queen has Covid, rising inflation. Billy Joel’s already working on a remix of ‘We Didn’t Start the Fire.’” — JIMMY FALLON“Listen, I don’t know what’s going to happen, but one thing’s for sure: Putin should fire those peacekeepers. You had one job!” — STEPHEN COLBERT“This is the biggest ground war in Europe since World War II, and the whole world is in shock. That’s why today’s Wordle was ‘Aaaah!’” — STEPHEN COLBERTThe Bits Worth WatchingOn “The Tonight Show,” Jimmy Fallon, Questlove and Higgins tried to guess if an audience member was hiding a mustache under his mask.Also, Check This OutNaomi Watts in “The Desperate Hour,” directed by Phillip Noyce.Vertical EntertainmentNaomi Watts plays a mother whose morning jog becomes a nightmare in Phillip Noyce’s new thriller “The Desperate Hour.” More

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    Daniel Isaac, 'Billions' Actor, Cedes the Spotlight While Quietly Commanding It

    Daniel K. Isaac, a theater actor with a steady gig on the series “Billions,” is appearing at the Public in Lloyd Suh’s play “The Chinese Lady.”“I’m the type of actor who won’t take up the most space in the room,” Daniel K. Isaac said.This was on a weekday morning, at the Public Theater, an hour or so before Isaac would begin rehearsal for “The Chinese Lady,” a play by Lloyd Suh that runs through March 27. Isaac perched at the edge of his chair — arms crossed, legs crossed, chest concave, occupying the bare minimum of leather upholstery.“It’s a big chair,” he said.Isaac, 33, a theater actor and an ensemble player on the Showtime drama “Billions,” combines that reticence with intelligence and warmth, qualities that enlarge every character he plays. (On this day, he was dressed as a New Yorker, all in navy and black, but his socks were printed with black-and-white happy faces.) With his sad eyes and resonant voice, he is an actor you remember, no matter how much or little screen time or stage time he receives.Isaac, left, and Shannon Tyo in Lloyd Suh’s “The Chinese Lady” at the Public Theater, in a production from Barrington Stage and the Ma-Yi Theater Company.Sara Krulwich/The New York Times“The Chinese Lady” is inspired by the life of Afong Moy, a Chinese woman who came to America as a teenager in 1834 and was exhibited as a curiosity before disappearing from the popular imagination. Isaac plays Atung, her translator, who made even less of a dent in the historical record. “He exists as a side note,” Isaac said.Isaac created the role, in 2018, in a production from Barrington Stage and the Ma-Yi Theater Company. Even in a two-hander, he rarely takes center stage, ceding that space to Shannon Tyo’s Afong Moy.“I am irrelevant,” Atung says in the play’s opening scene.Isaac relates. In the first decade of his career, he felt ancillary, in part because of the roles available to Asian American men. He still feels that way. But now, in his 30s — and with his debut as a playwright coming later this year — he is trying to be the main character in his own life.“I don’t think I’ve ever had the big break or the large, hugely visible or recognizable thing,” he said. “My life has been a slow burn, a marathon rather than immediate sprint.” Isaac ought to know: He recently trained for his first marathon, and then posted cheerful selfies — of him in his NipGuards — to Twitter.Isaac with Tyo. “I just want somebody to give him the chance to be like, a small town hero cop,” she said. “There is a range of people I would love to see him take center stage doing.”Vincent Tullo for The New York TimesIsaac was born in 1988, in Southern California, the only child of a single mother who had immigrated from South Korea. At her megachurch, his mother heard a story of a pastor who suffered from stage fright. And because she imagined that Isaac might one day become a preacher — or a lawyer, or a doctor, who might have the occasional lecture — she signed him up for the church’s drama troupe.In high school, he participated for the first time in secular theater, playing a gambler in “Guys and Dolls.” He loved it. “There’s nothing like the community of theater, or what I still call the church of theater,” he said. This was also a time when he was struggling with his attraction to men and voluntarily undergoing conversion therapy. Theater, by contrast, allowed him to experiment with his identity, to try on different ways of being.“It became the safe space that allowed me to grow up, mature, open up more,” he said.He finished high school at 16 and went on to study theater at the University of California, San Diego, where he accepted his sexuality, which led to an estrangement from his mother. (They’re still working on it.) After graduation he moved to New York City and found restaurant work. He had set his sights on classical theater because peers had told him that, as an actor of color, he might find more parts there.“I was trying to imagine, could I be the token Asian in a project?” he said. “And would that be enough?”Seven years, some Off Broadway plays and a few episodes of television later, he landed a small part in the “Billions” pilot. He didn’t think much of it. He knew that plenty of pilots didn’t take. And he’d been killed or written off in ones that did. But “Billions” took, and his character, Ben Kim, an analyst who became a portfolio manager, remains alive. Isaac has appeared in every episode. (Still he didn’t quit his restaurant job until midway through Season 2. And technically, the restaurant told him to go.)Dhruv Maheshwari, left, and Isaac in “Billions.”Christopher Saunders/ShowtimeThe showrunners of “Billions,” Brian Koppelman and David Levien, hadn’t had huge plans for the Ben character. Once they understood Isaac’s intelligence and versatility, they expanded the role. “Daniel is a fearless actor, and that gives us huge freedom,” they wrote in a joint email.There’s a sweetness to his “Billions” character, which contrasts with the macho posturing of his colleagues at an asset management company. And that sweetness, as his co-star Kelly AuCoin said during a recent phone conversation, is all Isaac. “He could not be a more lovely or positive person,” he said. “He emanates love.” AuCoin broke off, worrying that his praise sounded fake. Which it wasn’t, he assured me. Then he broke off again. Isaac had just texted to wish him a happy birthday.For Isaac, who tries to do theater in between “Billions” shoots, taking on the role of Atung felt personal. And it felt important, not only as a way to explore who these characters were, but also as a means to reclaim their history.“Daniel understands the sacrifices made to get him where he is, and it imbues his work with a sense of purpose,” Ralph B. Peña, the play’s director, wrote in an email.Isaac says that theater “became the safe space that allowed me to grow up, mature, open up more.”Vincent Tullo for The New York TimesIn 2018, playing Atung, and reckoning with the weight of what men like him had suffered, felt painful. “I think I took it a lot more personally,” Isaac said. In the intervening years, anti-Asian prejudice, fueled by misinformation around Covid-19, seemed only to increase, which has made the work feel even more necessary.“If art has any capacity to make space for understanding, or empathy, or can be more than just entertainment, which I hope and live by, then I want to share that,” he said.Isaac has a way, in conversation and seemingly in his life, of taking the emphasis off himself and putting it onto the work, his colleagues, the world. That’s why he started writing plays.“Because then I could literally give the spotlight to others,” he said. “And sit in the shadows and still experience something and the joy of creation.” Ma-Yi will produce his first play in the fall, “Once Upon a (Korean) Time,” which explores the Korean War through the medium of Korean fairy tales.Tyo, his “The Chinese Lady” co-star, would like to see him find his light. They often help each other film auditions, so she has seen the range of what he can do. “I just want somebody to give him the chance to be like, a small town hero cop,” she said. “He’s very good at it. He’s very good at surfer bro. There is a range of people I would love to see him take center stage doing.”He is trying, he said. And at the risk of sounding what he called “extra woo-woo,” he thanks theater for helping him to try. “I credit the theater community because that’s where I felt safest and saw people being fearlessly themselves,” he said. “That gave me permission to try to step toward that in my own journey. And I’m still doing that.” More

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    ‘The Crown’ Jewels, and Other Props, Reported Stolen Amid Filming

    More than 200 props valued at roughly $200,000, including antiques, a replica of a Fabergé egg, silver and gold candelabra and part of a grandfather clock, were reportedly stolen.It was not quite a royal heist.More than 200 antique props used during the filming of the fifth season of “The Crown” were stolen from vehicles last week in Doncaster, in northern England, according to the South Yorkshire Police and Netflix.The props are collectively valued at roughly $200,000, and include a replica of a Fabergé egg, several sets of silver and gold candelabra, a clock face of a William IV grandfather clock, a 10-piece silver dressing table set and crystal glassware and decanters, according to a report in the Antiques Trade Gazette.“The items stolen are not necessarily in the best condition and therefore of limited value for resale,” Alison Harvey, the series set decorator for the fifth season of “The Crown,” told the publication. “However, they are valuable as pieces to the U.K. film industry.”In a statement, Netflix, which streams the hit drama about the reign of Queen Elizabeth II, confirmed that the antiques had been stolen and expressed hope that they would be found and returned.“Replacements will be sourced,” the company said, adding that “there is no expectation that filming will be held up.”The South Yorkshire Police said that they had received a report of a theft in the late afternoon on Feb. 16. Three vehicles containing props had been “broken into” and “a number of items” were taken, the authorities said.“Officers investigated the incident but all existing lines of inquiry have now been exhausted,” the police said in a brief statement.“The Crown” completed its fourth season in the fall of 2020 and won the prize for best drama at the 73rd Emmy Awards in 2021. Netflix has said the show will run a total of six seasons. It regularly recasts the roles of the central royals, and Netflix has said Imelda Staunton will play Queen Elizabeth II, Jonathan Pryce will play Prince Philip and Lesley Manville will play Princess Margaret in the coming seasons. More

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    On London Stages, Maverick Responses to Mortality

    Creative adaptations of “Wuthering Heights” and Ionesco’s “The Chairs” grapple with death and feature inclusions of the coronavirus and performance artists.LONDON — The opportunity to see Kathryn Hunter in peak form is a rare treat, and one that is currently available by booking a seat for the Almeida Theater’s revival of “The Chairs.” This hugely gifted actress plays a character, billed as the Old Woman in Ionesco’s 1952 classic, with enough boundless wit and energy to make a mockery of age.Recently, Hunter has been acclaimed onscreen for playing all three witches in Joel Coen’s adaptation of “Macbeth,” starring Denzel Washington, for which she won a New York Film Critics Circle award. But this American-born mainstay of the London theater also gleams onstage with an unbridled delight in performance that is a pleasure to behold.The result lends a welcome immediacy to Ionesco’s potentially inaccessible exercise in absurdism, which hasn’t been staged here since 1997. That version, directed by Simon McBurney, Hunter’s longtime colleague at the Complicité theater company, transferred against expectation to Broadway, garnering six Tony nominations. This new iteration, adapted by its director, Omar Elerian, runs until March 5, leaving time for Hunter to limber up for her next stage assignment: playing Lear at Shakespeare’s Globe this summer.The Old Woman, in fact, is in her 90s, so older than Lear but blessed in Hunter’s interpretation with a wide-eyed sense of wonder. Having been coupled for 75 years with the Old Man (played by Hunter’s own husband, Marcello Magni, another Complicité veteran), she joins her elegantly dressed spouse in awaiting the arrival of any number of guests to attend some sort of conference that may save the world. Or, more likely, not.Among them is a Speaker (Toby Sedgwick), who is this play’s equivalent of Beckett’s elusive Godot. The difference is that the Speaker actually does show up, allowing the duo to bow out of lives that haven’t been easy: “We shall decompose in marine solitude,” announces the Old Man. “Let’s not complain too much though.”Premiered in French by the Romanian-born Ionesco, “The Chairs” preceded “Waiting for Godot” by one year and represents a landmark text more often than not confined to the classroom. Committed to dusting away the cobwebs, Elerian’s English-language version insists upon the contemporary whenever possible. Before he is even seen, the Old Man is heard fretting about the performance: “Tell [the audience] I have Covid,” he says to his wife in an offstage argument about whether or not to do the show. Afterward, we learn that the Old Woman has had 21 booster shots.Once they emerge before us, the pair call to mind two aging vaudevillians having one last hurrah. She totters about in a red wig and dark petticoat, curtsying with endearing politesse and suggesting in her singularly throaty voice that “we cut the next bit; it’s terribly long.” (The production runs nearly two hours, no intermission.) He proffers a handkerchief to a nearby audience member and readies himself for the chairs of the title, several of which Magni manages to catch in midair: no mean feat for someone of any age. Ionesco’s original text calls for 40 chairs minimum, but I lost count of the quantity at the Almeida.Those chairs, of course, sit empty as comic business gives way to the stuff of tragedy. We hear of the children the couple wanted but never had and the “pain, regrets, remorse” that have been their shared fate instead, the Old Man chastising himself for allowing his mother to die, untended, in a ditch. Abandonment, he says, is an inescapable fact of life.The emotional pull of the material remains sufficiently strong that I wish Elerian’s adaptation wasn’t quite so fussy. The opening shenanigans are awfully forced, as are the closing remarks from the Speaker, who usually utters scarcely a word in this play. A discourse on “alternate truths,” this orator’s rambling observations are attuned to the concerns of the world today but nonetheless feel like padding. Its farcical elements notwithstanding, the play is sufficiently powerful as is, Ionesco’s overriding bleakness as topical now as ever, which speaks volumes to how little has changed in 70 years.From left, Sam Archer, Ash Hunter and Lucy McCormick in “Wuthering Heights,” adapted and directed by Emma Rice at the National Theater.Steve TannerEven more so than Elerian, Emma Rice is a prominent director-adapter who doesn’t take familiar texts at face value. A former artistic director of Shakespeare’s Globe, Rice made her name running the touring company Kneehigh, which deconstructed such time-honored titles as “Brief Encounter” and “Tristan & Yseult.” Since then, Rice has started a theatrical entity called Wise Children, whose irreverent take on the Emily Brontë novel “Wuthering Heights” can be found on the Lyttelton stage of the National Theater through March 19.The eclectic impulses behind this production are evident from its cast, which brings together dancers, performance artists and a “Hamilton” alum to tell the corpse-strewn story of the foundling, Heathcliff (Ash Hunter, the veteran of the aforementioned musical), and the ill-starred Catherine (Lucy McCormick, a maverick talent who moves between self-devised work and plays such as this one). Juggling several roles is the charismatic Sam Archer, an actor-dancer whose nimble movement very explicitly keeps Rice’s take on this 1847 novel from seeming earthbound: It’s always helpful to have a performer on hand capable of soaring at any moment.Rice’s freewheeling approach to the material won’t suit the purists. It’s surprising to find the Yorkshire moors — a setting crucial to the novel — brought to three-dimensional life by an assemblage led by the arresting Nandi Bhebhe, who seems to be wearing a crown of sticks and twigs and has a retinue of similarly attired human plants. Elsewhere, the convolutions of the plot are confronted head-on. “How is anybody expected to follow this?” asks the resident narrator, Lockwood (one of Archer’s several roles), only for Bhebhe to chip in with an awareness that “no one said this is going to be easy.”Rice’s goal is to ease a path through a labyrinthine novel by bringing her total-theater aesthetic to a music-heavy production that announces the characters’ fates on a chalkboard, a choice that taps directly into the association many will have with this novel from their student days. A trim or two wouldn’t go amiss, and there are times when the reinvention seems reckless, not revelatory.But I won’t soon forget a fierce-eyed McCormick haunting the action from beyond the grave like an ongoing premonition of doom, and Katy Owen’s chirpy Isabella Linton all but steals the show: a figure of audience-friendly fun amid the landscape of mortality that, as with “The Chairs,” we come to realize is our shared lot.The Chairs. Directed by Omar Elerian. Almeida Theater, through March 5.Wuthering Heights. Directed by Emma Rice. National Theater, through March 19. More

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    How ‘Pam & Tommy’ Made Pamela Anderson Look Believable

    The sixth episode of the Hulu series presents Pam as she delivers a testimony in a look carefully considered by show’s the costume, makeup and hair teams.When it comes to appearing in court, clothes are a reliable tool for conveying a person’s character and values. Consider Elizabeth Holmes’s neutral, relatable, turtleneck-free makeover before her fraud trial, or the pristine white turtleneck dress and taupe Birkin bag that Cardi B wore to reject a plea deal in a misdemeanor assault case, simultaneously signaling innocence with her color palette and reminding the crowd of her professional success with her very expensive purse.Likewise, on “Pam & Tommy,” a Hulu series that presents a fictionalized version of the events surrounding the release of a sex tape stolen from Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee in 1995, style is a means of being taken seriously in the eye of the law. For Pam, that means donning a sea foam suit jacket and a matching miniskirt as she delivers her testimony, looking businesslike but defiantly glamorous.The show’s latest episode, which was released Wednesday, opens with Pam (Lily James) sitting quietly at her vanity, putting on lipstick in preparation for a deposition. She and Tommy (Sebastian Stan) have filed a $10 million lawsuit against Penthouse magazine after learning of its plans to publish stills from the tape, but only Pam has been summoned to give a testimony.The deposition is painful and humiliating — at one point the opposition lawyer asks: “Mrs. Lee, do you recall how old you were the first time you publicly exposed your genitals?” — cementing the show’s thesis that the tape’s release wasn’t merely a titillating celebrity scandal but a crushing personal trauma. It also presents a sex symbol known for her starring role on “Baywatch” in a more buttoned-up light.The show’s costume designer, Kameron Lennox, based the look on a real suit Ms. Anderson wore to court. Ms. Lennox and her team tweaked the color slightly — pale blue can look white on camera — and selected a lightweight tweed similar to the fabrics that brands like Chanel and Dolce & Gabbana used at the time.Through studying Ms. Anderson’s style, Ms. Lennox came to the conclusion that her strength came from her confidence in her body, not from using clothing as armor. On the show, Pam wears an array of body-conscious styles: latex minidresses (at the club); tight henleys and denim shorts (at home); that iconic red bathing suit (at her job). Her deposition outfit is generally consistent with that silhouette, with some concessions made to the conservative environment of a law office: not too tight, not too short, no cleavage.“She wanted to be heard. She wanted to feel self-assured and confident in that scene and not ogled,” Ms. Lennox said. “When you go to court, everyone says, ‘Wear your Sunday best.’ This was our version of Pamela Anderson in her Sunday best.”“When you go to court, everyone says, ‘Wear your Sunday best,’” said Kameron Lennox, the show’s costume designer. “This was our version of Pamela Anderson in her Sunday best.”HuluOne of the great aesthetic joys of “Pam & Tommy” is Pam’s parade of haphazard, freestyle updos, which Barry Lee Moe, the head of the show’s hair department, collectively refers to as the “Baby Bardot,” after Brigitte Bardot’s famous coiffure. For some scenes, including an appearance on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno,” Mr. Moe and his team created a playful, soft version of this look by curling Ms. James’s wig before pinning it up.Inspired by a real hairstyle Ms. Anderson wore to court, he wanted her deposition updo to communicate a spiky strength, which he achieved by adding a zigzag part and leaving straight tendrils around her face. “Severe lines tend to put people on guard a little bit,” Mr. Moe said. “This was her protecting herself.”Knowing that the deposition scenes would involve tight shots of Ms. James’s face, David Williams, the head of makeup, wanted her eyes to have a similar sharpness. In scenes that take place in nightclubs and at movie premieres, Pam’s eye shadow tends to be heavy and dark, but here her black eyeliner has been applied with a more precise hand, paired with softer brown eye shadow and a muted, rosy-brown lipstick.“We really want you to focus in on the eye, because this is where it’s all Lily,” Mr. Williams said. “She’s doing the work.”Like Ms. Lennox, Mr. Williams and Mr. Moe did detailed research on Ms. Anderson’s hair, makeup and facial structure. In addition to a prosthetic chest plate, Ms. James’s daily transformation involved color contacts, a dental piece and a prosthetic forehead meant to emulate Ms. Anderson’s higher hairline. (The team experimented with a prosthetic nose as well, but nixed the idea because it didn’t look good from all angles and ran the risk of distracting viewers.) Mr. Williams and his team used contouring to enhance the look of the prosthetics, and then went in with period-appropriate makeup.The hair, makeup and wardrobe team’s desire for authenticity reached a fever pitch around the show’s “Baywatch” scenes. Ms. Lennox did several rounds of fittings before she nailed both the color and shape of Ms. Anderson’s iconic bathing suit, which is low under the arms, high on the legs, and low in the front. “The stakes were all on that day because it’s not just in the zeitgeist of America, it’s in every country in the world. People know ‘Baywatch,’” Mr. Williams said, noting that he’d never been more nervous about a shoot in his career. (A 3:30 a.m. phone call to his astrologer put his mind at ease.)In the same way that Pam is unmistakable on a beach in her bright red bathing suit, Ms. Lennox wanted her to light up the boardroom where her deposition takes place. She dressed the lawyers in dark suits and ties so Pam’s pale teal suit would pop.“In my mind’s eye I just visualized her levitating and glowing among this nastiness,” Ms. Lennox said. “Visually it was like her rising above it.”Pam does stand out, and her spin on business attire gives her a certain dignity, as though she’s exerting her sense of self in a room full of men leveling degrading questions at her. It almost seems successful. But at the end of a very long day, she’s the one being comforted by a stenographer in the women’s restroom.Look Again is a column about images that make news, from photojournalism to memes, selfies to red carpet moments. More

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    Seth Meyers Considers Trump’s Putin Praise

    Meyers joked that Trump “narrates Putin’s every move like he is Tony Romo calling the last drive of a playoff game.”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.Piling on the PraiseLate-night hosts couldn’t avoid talking about Russia again on Wednesday night, pointing out that Donald Trump had been praising Vladimir Putin during a recent interview with a right-wing radio show.Trump called Putin “savvy” and his political strategy “genius,” which Seth Meyers joked was “a pretty brilliant way to make Putin second-guess himself.”“The entire world is aghast and horrified. The only people who could possibly think this is a good move are those unemployed fringe weirdos who go on small radio shows.” — SETH MEYERS“Keep in mind Trump also used the words ‘savvy’ and ‘genius’ to describe McDonald’s Dollar Menu.” — JIMMY FALLON“So honestly, I’m not sure you want to be called a genius by the guy that clogged the White House toilet with classified documents.” — JIMMY FALLON“I haven’t seen a president cheer on the Russians this hard since the Cuban missile crisis when Eisenhower wore the T-shirt, ‘Khrushchev is a Zaddy!’” — STEPHEN COLBERT“And even when he was president, Trump was always so desperate to buddy up with Putin, even Putin couldn’t believe it. Trump was like those rookie defensive backs who would stop Tom Brady after the game for an autograph: ‘Hey, I know I’m on the other team but huge fan, don’t tell my coach.’” — SETH MEYERS“Putin always had that smile on his face when he was next to Trump like, ‘I can’t believe how easy this is.’” — SETH MEYERS“It’s just insane that Trump is still so desperate to praise a bloodthirsty tyrant like Putin every chance he gets. Trump narrates Putin’s every move like he is Tony Romo calling the last drive of a playoff game.” — SETH MEYERSThe Punchiest Punchlines (Best of the Rest Edition)“This year, the Oscars are planning to prerecord some awards before the ceremony and air them during the live broadcast. Even more insulting, before the awards are presented, the announcer will say, ‘And now, the categories nobody cares about.’” — JIMMY FALLON“The categories that will not get the usual live on-air treatment are documentary short, makeup, hairstyling, original score, production design, animated short, live action short, sound, and editing — although it does feel ironic for the editors to be cut out of the show.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“If they really want to shorten the broadcast, maybe just skip the part where someone explains what an actor is.” — JIMMY FALLON“But how could they do this? I mean, who could forget that magical moment in 1975 when Ronald Pierce and Melvin Metcalfe won best sound for ‘Earthquake’?” — JIMMY KIMMEL“I think they should go even further: boil it down to best actor, best actress and best picture, and we can all get to sleep.” — JIMMY KIMMELThe Bits Worth WatchingTracee Ellis Ross took on Jimmy Fallon in a few founds of “Sing it Like” on Wednesday’s “Tonight Show.”What We’re Excited About on Thursday NightPamela Adlon will talk about the final season of her FX show “Better Things” on “Jimmy Kimmel Live.”Also, Check This OutBeanie Feldstein, center, rehearsing “His Love Makes You Beautiful” with members of the cast.George Etheredge for The New York TimesBeanie Feldstein is prepared to take on the iconic Barbra Streisand role in Broadway’s long-awaited reboot of “Funny Girl.” More

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    New Haven's Long Wharf Theater to Become Itinerant

    Long Wharf Theater, a regional nonprofit on New Haven’s waterfront, is ending a long, bumpy chapter there, hoping to expand access and reduce costs.New Haven’s Long Wharf Theater will move out of its longtime headquarters and embrace itinerancy as the company seeks a fresh start after a period of extraordinary upheaval.The leadership of the nonprofit theater is framing the move as an opportunity to reach new audiences and reimagine its operations, and the city is supporting the change, which it says will help the organization better serve the community.The move is the latest chapter in a time of extensive change at the theater, which in 2018 fired its executive director, Gordon Edelstein, a day after The New York Times reported sexual misconduct allegations against him. As the company remade itself, it faced a real estate quandary: whether to renew its expiring lease at the New Haven Food Terminal, just off Interstate 95, where it has been performing for 57 years.The theater, which has been among the nation’s leading regional nonprofits, also faces the same challenges as its peers: demonstrating to patrons, artists and donors that it can move forward following the lengthy pandemic shutdown, and that it is committed to shifting priorities in response to industrywide calls for more diversity, equity and inclusion.“Long Wharf Theater has an incredible legacy, and it’s had some complicated challenges,” said Jacob G. Padrón, the theater’s artistic director. “The next several years will be about discovery.”The theater’s leaders said they could have chosen to renew its lease when it expires in June, but that they opted not to, both because the theater was spending too much money on rent and upkeep, and because its location, once treasured for free parking and easy highway access that appealed to suburbanites, was inconvenient for some New Haven residents and difficult to access via public transit.The theater, which had thought of the industrial waterfront location as temporary when it opened there in 1965, has contemplated relocating before. In 2004, it announced plans to move to downtown New Haven, but in 2011, citing a worsening economy, it abandoned those plans, opting to renovate the Food Terminal location instead.Padrón said he views the decision to relocate to a variety of yet-to-be-determined spaces around New Haven as a way of rethinking “how a regional theater makes its art,” and a way to “expand our imagination of how a theater can show up for its community.”“It’s exciting to think about what’s the project, and what’s then the right container for that project,” he said.Jacob G. Padrón, the theater’s artistic director, said that “the next several years will be about discovery.”Gabriella Demczuk for The New York TimesThe theater’s leadership, including not only Padrón but also the managing director, Kit Ingui, and the board chairwoman, Nancy Alexander, all said that they believe the institution is financially stable, and that it would benefit from the flexibility of its next phase. They said that the new arrangement should not only reduce its costs but also expand its reach to audiences who, because of geography, transportation or economics, have not found their way to the waterfront district from which the theater takes its name.“There’s no sense that we’re hanging on by a thread or that we have to live on a shoestring,” Alexander said. “We have been blessed with some longtime givers who have created a strong endowment for us, and we are projecting budgets that will work.”Long Wharf plans to stage at least two more shows at its current location — a new play called “Dream Hou$e,” by Eliana Pipes, which the theater describes as being about “the cultural cost of progress in America,” and “Queen,” by Madhuri Shekar, about “brilliant women confronting inconvenient truths.” The theater is still talking with its landlord about whether it might continue producing in the building later this year, but by the fall of 2023 the leadership expects to present full productions at other locations in and around New Haven — possibly in rented theaters, and possibly in spaces not traditionally used for theater.“We believe you can produce theater anywhere,” Ingui said.Long Wharf, which in 1978 won the Tony Award for regional theater, survived the pandemic with significant support from the federal and state governments. Its staff is less than half the size it was — about 30, down from 65 before the pandemic; the annual budget, which had been about $6.5 million before the pandemic, is now a little over $5 million.The theater’s leaders said they have not yet decided whether they will remain itinerant long-term, or whether this will be a short-term phase. But they all said the crises faced by the theater were catalysts, not causes, for the move.“We’re going into this with excitement,” Alexander said. She said that the theater’s pandemic performances in city parks demonstrated that new locations could attract new audiences, and that by moving around New Haven, Long Wharf is seeking to become “a theater that is much more widely in our community, and, we hope, valued by our community.”“We really are being mindful that this is a period of exploration and experimentation, but I wouldn’t be surprised if we ultimately decided to have something like an anchor space and then continue producing in some other creative spaces as well, in some kind of hybrid model,” she said.Adriane Jefferson, New Haven’s director of cultural affairs, said Long Wharf was one of the most important nonprofits in the city, and that its move would strengthen both the organization and the city. She said she believed the shift would help Long Wharf become more anti-racist, in keeping with the city’s new cultural equity plan, which called attention to “inequities that prevent people from participating in arts and culture in every corner of our city.”“Long Wharf’s idea of being more mobile, moving throughout the city and coming to communities who are not making it down to where Long Wharf is now, is very responsive to our plan,” Jefferson said. “I would have concerns if they weren’t thinking along these lines.” More

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    'The Proud Family' Returns, Now Even Louder and Prouder

    “The Proud Family: Louder and Prouder,” on Disney+, revives a beloved animated series for a new generation.When “The Proud Family” debuted on the Disney Channel on Sept. 15, 2001, it introduced one of TV’s first animated African American families.Over 52 episodes and a TV movie, the series offered a lighthearted depiction of a Black suburban family going about their everyday lives. The headstrong middle-schooler Penny Proud (voiced by Kyla Pratt) took the lead, with her strict but loving parents Oscar and Trudy (Tommy Davidson and Paula Jai Parker), feisty grandmother Suga Mama (Jo Marie Payton) and precocious infant twin siblings BeBe and CeCe rounding out the rest of the clan.They bickered, supported one another, threw shade and showed love — all of the things that typical on-screen families do. But before The Prouds, TV audiences rarely got to see a Black cartoon family doing those run-of-the-mill things, too.Now the groundbreaking brood is back with “The Proud Family: Louder and Prouder,” a 10-episode revival scheduled to air weekly on Disney+ starting Wednesday.During the show’s original run, from 2001 to 2005, Penny went through the paces of early adolescence — goofing around with her multicultural crew of friends, pouting about chores, dodging school bullies and testing parental boundaries. While many of the show’s themes were universal, they were delivered in a way that was uniquely and intentionally rooted in Black culture.The Proud grandmother, Suga Mama (Jo Marie Payton), is also back. Like the original, the new show includes sight gags that appeal to grade-schoolers and more subtle punch lines for grown-ups.Disney+The dialogue was studded with the kinds of colloquialisms and vernacular that can be heard in many Black households. The children’s playground banter employed of-the-moment slang, often pulled from rap lyrics. There were personal jabs about being “ashy” and class warfare was waged whenever the working-class branch of the family butted heads with their “bougie” in-laws.Even the body language and nonverbal cues — a wary side-eye, an indignant up-and-down glare — were embedded as nods to Black viewers. The humor worked on multiple levels, with silly sight gags that appeal to grade-schoolers and more subtle punch lines to keep grown-ups engaged.“A lot of what we’d do was like, ‘Wink, wink. You know what we’re saying, right?’” said Bruce W. Smith, the show’s creator. “We were hiding a lot of innuendo and, frankly, family business under the guise of what our characters were saying and going through. Where the show shines is in all of its cultural references.”Smith is a veteran animator who spent much of the ’90s working on feature films like “Space Jam” and Disney’s “Tarzan” and “The Emperor’s New Groove.” By the end of that decade, he set his sights on serialized television, aiming to fill a void in the small screen’s animated offerings.“‘The Simpsons,’ ‘Family Guy,’ ‘King of the Hill,’ all these animated sitcoms became the rage,” he said. “I was just looking at them like: OK, we’re not in this. We’re not involved somehow, and we should be.”At the time, live-action sitcoms like “Moesha” and “Sister, Sister” had proven that Black teenage girls could both carry a series and draw a dedicated audience. Smith set out to create a cartoon sitcom in the vein of “Moesha” — one that centered a Black girl’s life and experiences.His first step was teaming up with Ralph Farquhar, a creator of “Moesha,” as well as its spinoff, “The Parkers,” and the short-lived Black family dramedy “South Central.” Together, they oversaw “The Proud Family” and its subsequent 2005 TV movie, with Smith also directing several episodes.Penny is now solidly into her teens and her peer group has expanded to include her gender-fluid friend Michael, second from right, voiced by EJ Johnson.Disney+“The fact that there was no one else doing it was sad,” Farquhar said, in a joint video interview with Smith. “But for us, it was this opportunity. We wanted to tell our stories in a way that we understand. In that nuanced way that only comes from living it.”Smith added: “The great thing about it was there was nothing before us. There was no bar set. For us, that was exciting because then we could set the bar.”In addition to commonplace domestic scenes — kitchen table spats, curfew breaches, babysitting snafus — there was a smattering of more educational story lines. These included a poignant Kwanzaa celebration and a Black History Month tribute to oft-overlooked luminaries like the pioneering aviator Bessie Coleman and Shirley Chisholm, the first Black woman elected to Congress.“That’s what I loved about the original: We talked about things that other people shied away from,” said Pratt, who took on the role of Penny at age 14. “And we’re doing the same thing this time around.”The revival, which is also overseen by Smith and Farquhar, retains much of the original’s flavor, but it has been updated for the 2020s. Instead of pagers, the kids use smartphones. Dated phrases like “off the heezy fo’ sheezy” are out; “woke” and “Black girl magic” are now in.The original featured guest appearances by popular early ’00s performers like Lil’ Romeo, Mos Def and Mariah Carey. “Louder and Prouder” is similarly star-studded, with cameos by the likes of Lil Nas X, Chance the Rapper and Lizzo. The heartwarming theme song, performed by Solange Knowles and Destiny’s Child, also got a makeover — the 2022 version is sung by the newcomer Joyce Wrice.Penny and her friends are now solidly into their teens, with all of the body changes, heightened hormones and social minefields that entails. And a few new players have joined the returning core cast.The former reality TV star EJ Johnson voices Penny’s gender-fluid friend Michael. (The recurring character Wizard Kelly is a sly allusion to Johnson’s father, the N.B.A. legend Magic Johnson.) And a same-sex couple, Barry and Randall Leibowitz-Jenkins (Zachary Quinto and Billy Porter), have moved into the neighborhood with their adopted teenagers: son Francis (Artist Dubose, better known as the rapper A Boogie Wit Da Hoodie) and daughter Maya (Keke Palmer), a fiery activist who serves as Penny’s new foil.Pratt said she continued to hear from fans long after “The Proud Family” ended. “People were talking to me literally every other day of my life, trying to get the show back on,” she said. Disney+Palmer, whose breakthrough came in the 2006 film “Akeelah and the Bee,” credits Farquhar with discovering her a few years earlier, when she was 10. (He cast her in a Disney Channel pilot that didn’t get picked up.) He asked her to join “Louder and Prouder” because he knew she’d been a longtime fan of the original.“I saw a family that reminded me of my own — I even had boy-girl twins in my family,” Palmer said. “That was a show that represented what my Black American culture looked like. I thought they got it right!”Nevertheless, Disney chose not to renew “The Proud Family” when the original production run ended in 2005. (Disney declined to comment on the end of the original show.) In the interview, Smith and Farquhar said they have never known why the show wasn’t allowed to continue, but they made clear that they always hoped to bring it back in some form.“From the moment we stopped doing the original version, we had been campaigning to bring it back,” Farquhar said. “We weren’t quite sure why we ever even stopped.”They weren’t alone. “The Proud Family” has been a steady source of millennial nostalgia online, with fans sharing art and cosplay photos inspired by the show on social media, and revisiting beloved episodes in blog posts. Pratt said overzealous fans have frequently reached out to her in real life, too.“People were talking to me literally every other day of my life, trying to get the show back on,” she said.Farquhar and Smith said they noticed a new outpouring from “Proud” fans after Disney+ began streaming the original on Jan. 1, 2020. Disney apparently noticed, too. The company approached the men about a revival, and then publicly announced it on Feb. 27, 2020.Farquhar and Smith have since signed a multiyear overall deal with Disney to produce animated and live-action series and movies and to develop projects for emerging and diverse talent. Smith boasted that the “Louder and Prouder” staff, from the directors to layout artists to animators, “looks like the show.” (Like most of the entertainment industry, animation has historically offered far fewer opportunities to women and people of color than to white men.)Smith has wanted to expand Black people’s presence and influence in animation since he started working in the industry in the early 1980s, he said, a mission informed by his own experiences as a young cartoon fan.“When I was growing up, I loved shows like ‘The Flintstones’ and ‘The Jetsons,’” he said. But together they painted an unwelcoming picture: “I didn’t exist in the beginning of time, and I don’t think they’re looking for me to exist when spaceships start flying off this planet.”“I gotta do something about that,” he continued. “Because I love this medium and I want to see myself in this.” More