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    Olivia Munn’s 5 Favorite Places in Tokyo

    The baronial manors, rolling lawns and private clubs in the fictional suburban backdrop of the new Apple TV+ series “Your Friends & Neighbors” bear little resemblance to the buzzing sidewalks, neon lights and hidden warrens of Tokyo. But for the actress Olivia Munn, who plays an outsider turned socialite on the show, her childhood years in the city helped inform the role.Ms. Munn, right, stars in the Apple TV+ series “Your Friends & Neighbors,” which premiered last week.Jessica Kourkounis/Apple TV+, via Associated PressAt age 8, Ms. Munn, now 44, moved from Oklahoma City, where she was born, to Yokota Air Base in Tokyo, along with her mom, then stepdad (an Air Force major) and four siblings. Suddenly, she was the odd kid out, “thrust into new worlds” where she became determined to find her place, she said in a recent video interview. “I really got good at observing people.”Over the better part of a decade, she explored the now Instagram-famous alleys of Omoide Yokocho, where packed, tiny restaurants served “the most amazing yakisoba”; teeming Harajuku, where “everyone dressed up like anime” on Sundays; the warren of games and gadgetry in the Akihabara electronics district, where she and her brother combed through the bins for Casio watches; and Mount Fuji, about 60 miles away but visible from the city’s high-rises, where she and her family twice hiked to the summit and were rewarded with steaming ramen and stunning views.Ms. Munn moved back to the United States at 16 and attended the University of Oklahoma before going on to a career that has included the HBO series “The Newsroom” and the superhero blockbuster “X-Men: Apocalypse.” Though she minored in Japanese, her language skills have slipped a bit, she said, but “it all comes back to me” with a little practice when she makes one of her regular trips back to Tokyo.Ms. Munn is married to the comedian John Mulaney, and they have two young children.Krista Schlueter for The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Kids, Inc.

    A pair of documentaries are calling attention to the dangers of child influencer content. But regulation can be difficult in an industry that blurs the line between work and home.The scenes leave a pit in your stomach. In Netflix’s “Bad Influence: The Dark Side of Kidfluencing,” two early teenagers are pressured to kiss by adults — a parent and a videographer — on camera. Hulu’s “The Devil in the Family: The Ruby Franke Story” shows the dramatic footage of Franke’s 12-year-old son showing up at a neighbor’s door with duct tape markings around his ankle, asking them to call police.The pair of documentaries, released this year, shine a light on the perils of child-centered online content. “Bad Influence” examines claims of abuse and exploitation made by 11 former members of the teen YouTube collective “The Squad” against Tiffany Smith — who ran the YouTube channel, which drew two million subscribers — and her former boyfriend Hunter Hill. Both denied the allegations, and the suit was settled for a reported $1.85 million last year.Ruby Franke, a mother of six, pleaded guilty to four counts of aggravated child abuse in 2023 after denying her children adequate food and water and isolating them as she built a family YouTube channel that amassed nearly 2.5 million subscribers before it was taken down. She will serve up to 30 years in prison.Concerns about the treatment of child entertainers have abounded since the days of Judy Garland and through last year’s “Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV,” in which former Nickelodeon actors described performing under harmful and sexually inappropriate conditions. Less examined is the working world of child influencers, who are now speaking out about the harsh, unsafe or emotionally taxing constraints of being broadcast by their parents.Viewers may be tempted to ask, “Aren’t there laws against this?”“We have pretty documented evidence of the troubling pipeline for Hollywood and child actors, but we don’t have nearly similar numbers for child influencers, primarily because the phenomenon of influencing is so young,” said Chris McCarty, the founder and executive director of Quit Clicking Kids, an organization dedicated to stopping the monetization of minors. “A lot of the kids are too young to even really fully understand what’s going on, let alone, like, actually speak out about their experiences.”Child entertainer laws — which in some cases make provisions for minors’ education, set limits on working hours and stipulate that earnings be placed in a trust — regulate theatrical industries. The world of content creators, where an account with a sizable following can generate millions of dollars a year for creators, is largely unregulated.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Late Night Revels in Harvard’s Rejection of Trump’s Demand

    “I don’t usually root for Harvard, because they’re Harvard. They’ve got everything. It’s like rooting for Jeff Bezos to win the lottery,” Ronny Chieng said on “The Daily Show.”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, Like It’s Hard?On Monday, the Trump administration announced it would freeze $2.2 billion in multiyear grants to Harvard after the private university refused to implement requested changes to its hiring, admissions and curriculum.Ronny Chieng adopted a Boston accent on Tuesday’s “Daily Show” to express that Harvard was fighting back “wicked hard.”“We finally found a force more powerful than Trump’s hatred: Harvard’s love of sending rejection letters.” — RONNY CHIENG“Hey, Trump administration, now you’re just like the rest of us because you just got rejected by Harvard.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“And who better to determine what colleges should and should not be doing than the man who had to shell out $25 million in penalties for running a fraudulent university he named after himself?” — JIMMY KIMMEL“My money’s on Harvard. I grew up in the ’80s — I’ve seen ‘Revenge of the Nerds.’ I know who wins these things.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“But, look, I don’t usually root for Harvard, because they’re Harvard. They’ve got everything. It’s like rooting for Jeff Bezos to win the lottery.” — RONNY CHIENG“The only thing I’ll say in Donald Trump’s defense is that Matt Damon went to Harvard, so they obviously don’t care too much about merit.” — JIMMY KIMMELThe Punchiest Punchlines (Tax Day Edition)“So today’s Tax Day or, as Hunter Biden calls it, any other day of the week.” — GREG GUTFELD“If you’re watching this live, you have 20-ish minutes to get your taxes in before the deadline. And if you’re an IRS worker, you have recently been fired. I’m sorry about that.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“Folks, as I mentioned before, it’s Tax Day or, as billionaires call it, ‘What?’” — STEPHEN COLBERT“Does anyone even work at the IRS anymore? Do we even have to? Our IRS office downtown — they turned it into a Spirit Halloween store.” — JIMMY KIMMELThe Bits Worth WatchingThe actor Finn Wolfhard reflected with Colbert on 10 years of filming “Stranger Things” ahead of the Netflix show’s final season, on Tuesday’s “Late Show.”What We’re Excited About on Wednesday NightNo stranger to late night, David Letterman will appear on Wednesday’s “Everybody’s Live with John Mulaney.”Also, Check This OutThe bombing of a federal building in Oklahoma City, on April 19, 1995, remains the deadliest domestic terror attack in U.S. history.Jim Argo/USA Today NetworkThe National Geographic docuseries “Oklahoma City Bombing: One Day in America” recounts the experiences of individuals affected by the attack on the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building 30 years ago. More

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    Wink Martindale, Popular and Durable Game Show Host, Dies at 91

    He was involved in more than 20 game shows, most memorably as the host of “Gambit” and “Tic-Tac-Dough” in the 1970s and ’80s.Wink Martindale during a taping of the game show “Debt” in 1997.Nick Ut/Associated PressWink Martindale, a radio personality who became a television star as a dapper and affable host of game shows like “Gambit” and “Tic-Tac-Dough” in the 1970s and ’80s and “Debt” in the ’90s, died on Tuesday in Rancho Mirage, Calif. He was 91.Nashville Publicity Group, which represented him, announced his death in a statement.A veteran of the game show circuit, Mr. Martindale was involved in more than 20 shows, either as a producer or host.His first game show, in 1964, was “What’s This Song,” in which contestants paired with celebrities to identify tunes for cash prizes. The show was short-lived, as were many others he experimented with.“Gambit” was based on the card game blackjack, and “Tic-Tac-Dough” combined trivia with the classic puzzle game tic-tac-toe. In “Debt,” the prize was the main focus: Contestants would arrive with bills for credit cards, car payments or student loans, which would be paid off if they answered a series of questions correctly.As a vocalist, Mr. Martindale recorded about 20 single records and seven albums. His 1959 spoken-voice narrative recording, “Deck of Cards,” sold more than a million copies, earning him a gold record, a designation by the Recording Industry Association of America for records that sold 500,000 copies or more. “Deck of Cards” also brought him an appearance on the Ed Sullivan variety show, where he told the tale of a young American soldier in North Africa who is arrested and charged with playing cards during a church service.Mr. Martindale received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2006 and was one of the first inductees into the American TV Game Show Hall of Fame in 2007.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Onstage and Off, Whitney White Is Everywhere This Spring

    An actor, musician and writer, White is also now an in-demand stage director. “I am looking, I am hungry, I am searching,” she said.This spring, Whitney White directed the ensemble drama “Liberation” Off Broadway, then the two-hander “The Last Five Years” on Broadway. Just days after that musical opened, she stood in an upstairs room at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, rehearsing “Macbeth in Stride,” her adaptation of the Shakespeare tragedy, which begins performances on Tuesday.During the song “Reach for It,” White, who plays a version of Lady Macbeth, took the lead. “Power’s not supposed to look like me,” she sang into a microphone.Maybe it should.A multidisciplinary artist with an unusual number of hyphens, White, 39, is an actor, a musician, a writer for theater and television (the Amazon series “I’m a Virgo”) and an increasingly in-demand, Tony-nominated stage director. Her current projects, White observed during a rehearsal break, are all about ambitious women. “I’m weirdly one of them,” she said.White grew up in Chicago, in a one-bedroom apartment with her working single mother. Her first exposure to theater was at her grandfather’s church, the Apostolic Church of God, which boasted a 50-person choir. A visit to Cirque du Soleil was another formative experience.At Northwestern, White took theater classes, but she found the scene there cliquey, exclusionary, so she majored in political science instead. While interning for Barack Obama’s presidential campaign in 2008, she realized that she had to be an artist after all.“There’s nothing else that I can really wholeheartedly do with myself,” she said.With Nygel D. Robinson at the piano, the cast of “Macbeth in Stride” in rehearsal, from left: Charlie Thurston, White, Holli’ Conway, Phoenix Best and Ciara Alyse Harris.Elias Williams for The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    In ‘Towards Zero,’ Agatha Christie Gets Steamy

    A new three-part TV mini-series streaming on BritBox amps up the themes of forbidden desire and psychological distress in the detective novelist’s 1944 book.In the second episode of the BBC’s latest Agatha Christie adaptation, a bride walks into the hall of a large country house and finds her husband standing on the elegant curved staircase, with his head buried beneath the silk evening gown his ex-wife is wearing.This, it is clear, is not a stereotypically cozy Christie retelling.Instead, this three-part limited series, “Towards Zero” — which comes to BritBox on Wednesday — takes the forbidden desire, well-heeled nihilism and murderous emotion from Christie’s 1944 novel of the same name and gives those a distinctly contemporary feel.“It’s incredibly dark, interesting material,” said Sam Yates, the show’s director. Since Christie’s novels have already been adapted so many times, “the choice is do them exactly by the book every time, or let them live for the moment,” said Yates, who also directed “Vanya,” the inventive one-man Chekhov adaptation currently playing Off Broadway and starring Andrew Scott.The show features a love triangle between Audrey, played by Ella Lily Hyland, center; and Nevile and Mimi.James Pardon/Mammoth ScreenFor “Towards Zero,” Yates and the writer Rachel Bennette chose the moment, tweaking their source material for today’s audience, as shown by the steamy interaction on the staircase, which pushes the characters to violent extremes.Set in 1936 among the British upper class, “Towards Zero” opens with a love triangle playing out around a much-publicized divorce. Nevile Strange (Oliver Jackson-Cohen), a playboy tennis star, is ending his marriage to Audrey (Ella Lily Hyland), on whom he cheated with the younger and more assertive Kay (Mimi Keene), who would become his wife.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    ‘#1 Happy Family USA’ Is a Bittersweet Coming-of-Age Sitcom

    This animated comedy, cocreated by Ramy Youssef, depicts a Muslim family in New Jersey during the fraught period after Sept. 11, 2001.A Muslim family in New Jersey facing bigotry after Sept. 11 doesn’t sound like a particularly fruitful sitcom premise. But Ramy Youssef has managed to make the subject matter grimly hilarious in his new animated series, “#1 Happy Family USA,” premiering Thursday on Amazon Prime Video.Created by Youssef and Pam Brady (“South Park”), the series is half coming-of-age story, with shades of “Big Mouth” and “Everybody Hates Chris,” and half brutal satire about Islamophobia in the early 2000s. It encourages viewers to find humor and humanity in outlandish scenarios stemming from what was a dark period for many American families.The premiere episode is set on Sept. 10, 2001. Youssef voices Rumi, an Egyptian American boy preoccupied mainly with impressing his attractive teacher (Mandy Moore), who has a thing for Michael Jordan. To that end: Rumi wears an oversized bootleg Bulls jersey that reads “Balls.” Poor kid.Of course, the next day, life for Rumi and his family suddenly changes. His father, Hussein (also voiced by Youssef), is a former doctor turned halal cart owner maniacally intent on assimilating. At the same time, however, his Princess Diana-obsessed mother, Sharia (Salma Hindy), is reconnecting with her faith and begins wearing a hijab — much to Hussein’s dismay. Rumi’s ambitious older sister, Mona (Alia Shawkat), is hiding the fact that she is gay, and an F.B.I. agent with an alcohol problem (Timothy Olyphant) moves in next door.The animation, with big-eyed character designs from the illustrator Mona Chalabi, at times literalizes Rumi’s anxiety and at others allows the story to take absurd detours. (Chalabi won the Pulitzer Prize in 2023 for a contribution to The New York Times.) When Rumi tries to code switch to appeal to his classmates’ families, he transforms physically into identities like preppy WASP and Hogwarts student. Hussein launches into musical numbers, one of which becomes the theme song. Also, there’s a talking lamb.“#1 Happy Family USA” manages to place story lines drawn from the pangs of early adolescence within the terrifying context of being a Muslim caught in a suddenly more xenophobic society — while also making fun of the peculiarities of the early 2000s. (In one subplot, Rumi panics after illegally downloading music for a mix CD.) It’s a tricky balance to strike, but Youssef and his team pull it off. More

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    30 Years Later, a New Look at the Oklahoma City Bombing

    A National Geographic docuseries recounts the experiences of those who went through the 1995 attack on the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building.David Glover holds up what looks like a pair of gray bricks. They were once part of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, which was bombed by Timothy McVeigh on April 19, 1995, killing 168 people. It remains the deadliest domestic terror attack in U.S. history.Glover, an executive producer of the new three-part docuseries “Oklahoma City Bombing: One Day in America,” explained in a video interview that he had received the rubble from Mike Shannon, a firefighter featured in the film. Shannon wanted the filmmaker to feel the weight of the project in his hands.“It was almost like he was saying, ‘Don’t forget this is real,’” Glover said. “‘Don’t forget you’ve got a responsibility here.’ It is a physical artifact that has a lot of heft to it.”Shannon needn’t have worried. The series, now streaming on Hulu and Disney+, follows a pattern set by the first two “One Day in America” installments, which covered the Sept. 11 attacks and the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The stories are less interested in granules of policy and the sweep of history than in the experiences of individuals who were present for events that shook the country. (Glover is an executive producer on all of the “One Day in America” series, which were produced by 72 Films, the company he founded with Mark Raphael.)This approach means that McVeigh, the violent anti-government extremist who bombed the Murrah building (and was executed in 2001), takes a back seat to the Oklahomans whose lives were shattered that day, many of whom appear here to give their accounts of the shock and its aftermath. This includes emergency medical workers, victims, family members, law enforcement officers and even McVeigh’s court-appointed attorney, who admits to fearing for his life when he learned the identity of his new client.Even the more famous and consequential interview subjects approach the day’s events from a personal perspective. Bill Clinton, who was in the first term of his presidency when the attack occurred (and was in the middle of a White House news conference on terrorism when he was notified about it), lost one of his favorite Secret Service agents in the bombing.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More