Eliana Willis

More stories

  • 150 Shares199 Views

    in Television

    Johnny Wactor, ‘General Hospital’ Actor, Reported Killed in Shooting in Los Angeles

    Johnny Wactor was fatally shot when he interrupted a person who was stealing his vehicle’s catalytic converter, his mother told a news outlet.Johnny Wactor, an actor best known for his role in “General Hospital,” was shot and killed on Saturday, reports said, amid what his family described as an attempted theft of a catalytic converter in Los Angeles.The fatal shooting took place around 3 a.m. on Saturday, when Mr. Wactor approached three men in downtown Los Angeles, The Associated Press reported, citing the Los Angeles Police Department.His mother, Scarlett Wactor, told the local news station ABC7 that Mr. Wactor left the rooftop bar where he worked late in the evening and was walking with a co-worker toward his vehicle when he interrupted someone who was in the process of stealing the vehicle’s catalytic converter.Ms. Wactor said her son thought his car was being towed at first, and when he approached the person to ask, the person “looked up, he was wearing a mask, and opened fire.”Three men fled the scene in a vehicle, and Mr. Wactor was taken to a hospital, where he died, The A.P. reported. No arrests have been made.Representatives for the Police Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Monday.Mr. Wactor had played Brando Corbin in more than 160 episodes of the soap opera “General Hospital,” according to his IMDB page. He also appeared in episodes of “Westworld,” “The OA” and “Station 19.”In a statement on social media, a page for “General Hospital” said the show’s cast and crew were “heartbroken to hear of Johnny Wactor’s untimely passing.”Many of Mr. Wactor’s co-stars from the show posted tributes on social media, including Kirsten Storms, who played the character Maxie Jones. Ms. Storms wrote in an Instagram post, “I just cannot believe that his life was stolen from him the way it was.”There has been a jump in the number of thefts of catalytic converters, or “cats” for short, in recent years. These critical emission-control devices are valuable because they contain rare metals, like palladium and rhodium, that can be extracted and resold. More

  • 150 Shares169 Views

    in Theater

    Wayne Brady and Nichelle Lewis of ‘The Wiz’ Are Striving for Excellence

    The veteran and the newcomer each had their own fears as they joined the Broadway revival of the beloved all-Black musical.“That show was so Black,” my 8-year-old whispered after we saw “The Wiz” on Broadway. He hadn’t made this observation last fall after seeing a performance of the show in Baltimore, during the national tour that preceded this revival. So I was curious: What had changed, and why was this iteration more culturally resonant for him than even the 1978 movie starring Diana Ross and Michael Jackson or NBC’s 2015 “The Wiz Live!” special that I’d screened for him.I suspected my son was drawn to this version’s colloquial expressions (“All I got to do is stay Black and die,” Evillene tells Dorothy), choreography (ranging from Atlanta street dancing to South African amapiano) and its casting of Wayne Brady as the Wiz, who greets the Scarecrow and the Tinman with a dap. (Brady will depart the production on June 12.)Wayne Brady as the Wiz in the show’s Broadway revival.Richard Termine for The New York TimesLewis, who is making her Broadway debut, with Kyle Ramar Freeman as a glammed up Lion and, in the background, Avery Wilson as the Scarecrow and Phillip Johnson Richardson as the Tinman.Richard Termine for The New York Times“The Wiz,” an all-Black incarnation of “The Wizard of Oz,” premiered on Broadway in 1975 with Stephanie Mills as Dorothy. The revival’s creative team — including the director Schele Williams and the comedian Amber Ruffin, who updated the book — have said that they wanted this version to reflect the richness of Black American history and contemporary culture.The show features a cast of newcomers, including Nichelle Lewis, whose TikTok performance of “Home” helped land her an audition for the role of Dorothy. Brady, who made his Broadway debut 20 years ago in “Chicago,” offers up a charismatic Wiz who will do (almost) anything to leave Oz and, in Wayne’s back story, return to his loved ones.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

  • 113 Shares149 Views

    in Television

    With ‘We Are Lady Parts,’ Nida Manzoor Rocks On

    “Silliness is hugely important to me,” said the writer, whose comedy about a Muslim female punk band has won awards and challenged stereotypes.When the writer-director Nida Manzoor began dreaming up Season 2 of “We Are Lady Parts,” the comedy about an all-female Muslim punk band, one of her earliest ideas was a song: “Malala Made Me Do It,” a neo-Western hype track celebrating the activist Malala Yousafzai. And then she had another idea: Maybe she could get Malala, whom she had met briefly at a talk, to star in the video.She wrote Yousafzai a love letter. To Manzoor’s surprise, Yousafzai, who loves comedy, responded. And this is why, in the second episode of the new season of “We Are Lady Parts,” which premieres on Thursday on Peacock, Yousafzai appears on a horse, resplendent in a white cowboy hat, while the band irreverently sings her praises: “Nobel Prize at 17/the baddest bitch you’ve ever seen.”Directing her idol brought on some fan-girl panic. “I was, like, totally not cool,” Manzoor said. “But it was joyful to work with her.”Joy has been an animating force for Manzoor, 34, the assured and wildly original creator of “We Are Lady Parts” and “Polite Society,” a martial arts film about a teenage girl rebelling against her sister’s arranged marriage. In a moment where nearly everything onscreen feels like a reboot, a reprise, a retread, a spinoff, Manzoor’s works (an urban Muslim musical comedy, a surreal teenage eugenics-addled action caper) reliably feel like nothing else, each a microgenre unto itself.“I like to just make the genre smaller and smaller and be the only one in there,” Manzoor said one morning in early May, speaking on a video call from her home in Bristol, England. She wore a blazing orange sweater over a bright green shirt and her affect was by turns giddy, introspective, confiding, resolute. Her work resists generalization — Manzoor resists it, too.In Manzoor’s 2023 martial arts film “Polite Society,” a teenage girl rebels against her sister’s arranged marriage. Parisa Taghizadeh/Focus FeaturesWe 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

  • 113 Shares99 Views

    in Television

    West Wilson is the Breakout Star of “Summer House”

    West Wilson never thought he’d be spending the summer in a house in the Hamptons, let alone as part of a reality television show. The unemployed former football player from Missouri was about to run out of money following a three-week boys’ trip when he got a call that would change his life.“My severance ended that weekend,” Mr. Wilson, 27, recalled. “I came home and it was like the most depressing Monday of all time.”Mr. Wilson decided to check his voice mail to see if there was something — anything — in there to cheer him up. To his shock, a Bravo producer had left a message. She was interested in possibly casting him on Season 8 of “Summer House,” an unscripted show that follows the lives of a group of New York media workers, influencers and entrepreneurs who share a house in the Hamptons — the last few seasons have been filmed at a mansion in Water Mill — each summer.Though he had never seen “Summer House” and wasn’t a fan of reality TV (except for the occasional “Bachelor” binge), Mr. Wilson had an intuition that it might be right for him. “I just had something in me that was like, just see what this is and call back,” he said. He had recently met a “Summer House” cast member named Lindsay Hubbard at the bar of Lamia’s Fish Market in the East Village. Mr. Wilson was so unprepared to be cast that he didn’t initially make the connection between having met Ms. Hubbard and receiving the call from Bravo. “I was like, ‘Oh I actually know someone on that show’ and they were like, ‘That’s how we found you, you idiot,’” Mr. Wilson said.The son of an OB-GYN and a cattle rancher has been an unlikely hit with viewers. As Joel Kim Booster wrote: “Haven’t liked a straight white guy this much since friggin Bernie Sanders.”Marissa Alper 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

  • 113 Shares179 Views

    in Television

    Harry Hamlin Got Into Gardening Because of ‘The Martian’

    “If he can do it on Mars,” said the actor, now starring in the cooking show “In the Kitchen With Harry Hamlin,” “I can do it in my backyard.”The actor Harry Hamlin pronounces “Bolognese” the way Italians do, with the final “e” enunciated. His niece, the chef Renee Guilbault, says it like an American, with that last syllable ending in an “s.”But potato, potahto. With “In the Kitchen With Harry Hamlin,” their five-part cooking series on AMC+ and IFC, they find a happy meeting place — including on the subject of the aforementioned pasta sauce, which ignited a squabble on the reality series “The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” back when his wife, the actress Lisa Rinna, was one of its cast members.“Everywhere I go, people say two things to me: ‘Oh God, I love your wife’ and ‘Where can I get your sauce?’” said Hamlin, 72, who also stars in “Anne Rice’s Mayfair Witches,” on a video call. He also discussed space travel, the High Sierras and his grandfather’s Canadian gin-drinking hide-out. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.1Weekly Acting ClassesI’ve been in class my whole career. I chose this profession because it’s impossible to perfect. You can’t become an expert. OK, someone like Meryl Streep, she’s an expert. But I’m going to be a perpetual student. And I learn stuff every week because I’m sort of a character actor stuck in a leading man’s body.2Clean EnergyIt’s the holy grail. It’s how human beings will get their energy for the next 100,000 years, provided that we survive that long.3Hiking the High SierrasIf you’re alone, the animals aren’t afraid of you. The deer come up to you, and the bears don’t run away from you, which can be a problem. So it is quite an amazing experience to trek solo. I go up to 12,000 feet and get to places where even mountain goats would have a hard time getting.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

  • 113 Shares159 Views

    in Television

    ‘Doctor Who’ Episode 4 Recap: Now You See Her

    A strong episode focuses on Ruby, the Doctor’s companion, and the mysterious older woman who starts following her from a distance.Season 1, Episode 4: ‘73 Yards’Let’s get the easy bit out of the way. “73 Yards” is not just the best episode of the season so far, but also the strongest story “Doctor Who” has produced in years — despite the Doctor (Ncuti Gatwa) hardly featuring.That’s not to say the decade-spanning story’s success depends on Gatwa’s absence. Yes, Episode 4 gives Millie Gibson space to break out of her companion role for the first time, and she gives a nuanced performance well beyond her 19 years.But it’s Russell T Davies’s ambitious, unpredictable script that will ensure a place for “73 Yards” in the Whoniverse history books. The episode constantly wrong-foots viewers, plays with folk stories and horror tropes, and finds a genuinely terrifying villain in a nuclear-warmongering politician.“We are in Wales. Spectacular!” shouts the Doctor as the TARDIS materializes on a craggy cliff face. For international viewers, it’s a swift introduction to a nation that has long been associated with “Doctor Who”: Davies is Welsh, and the show is a former BBC Wales production.In a seemingly throwaway comment, the Doctor mentions a future prime minister, a Welshman named Roger ap Gwilliam, who will lead Britain to “the brink of nuclear war” in the 2040s. “Sorry, spoilers,” he says, shooting Ruby a smile.The Doctor, played by Ncuti Gatwa, and Ruby start the episode on a cliff in Wales.Bad Wolf/BBC StudiosWe 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

  • 100 Shares99 Views

    in Theater

    Brooke Shields Elected President of Stage Actors’ Union

    She takes office immediately. The previous leader of Actors’ Equity, Kate Shindle, had been president since 2015, and did not run again.Brooke Shields, the model-turned-actor who has starred in films, on television and onstage, has been elected as the next president of Actors’ Equity Association, the labor union representing stage actors and stage managers.Shields, 58, will take office immediately. She succeeds Kate Shindle, who had been the union’s president since 2015, and announced last month that she would not seek re-election.The position of Equity president is a volunteer job, and Shields was elected to a four-year term. There have been a number of other well-known performers who have served in the post previously, including Burgess Meredith, Ellen Burstyn, Colleen Dewhurst and Ron Silver.Shields won the election with about half the vote; the balance was split between two Equity vice presidents, Erin Maureen Koster and Wydetta Carter. Her victory was reported by the newsletter Broadway Journal and announced by the union on Friday; a union spokesman said she was not available for an interview.In a campaign video posted on YouTube, Shields said that among her priorities would be lobbying for greater government funding for the arts. “I understand the real need to support live theater, and I have a history of being able to open doors and of being able to help,” she said.Equity has about 51,000 members, and represents them in contract negotiations around the country. Just last week, the union won the right to represent a variety of performers at Disneyland, so the union will now need to try to bargain for a contract for those workers.The union is negotiating for a new contract for Off Broadway workers, and it is at odds with the Broadway League over a new contract governing developmental work — how performers are compensated when participating in workshops for shows in development. Equity has threatened that its members would stop working on those developmental projects if a deal is not reached by mid-June.Shields became famous through films like “Pretty Baby” and “The Blue Lagoon” and by modeling, notably for Calvin Klein. She has appeared in five Broadway musicals, always as a replacement: “Grease,” “Chicago,” “Cabaret,” “Wonderful Town” and “The Addams Family,” as well as a handful of Off Broadway shows.Her early career, and the problematic ways in which she was sexualized as a child and adolescent, was the subject of a documentary last year. More

  • 125 Shares189 Views

    in Television

    Where New Yorkers Start Being Polite and Stop Getting Real

    The Portal, a video art installation connecting the city with Dublin, is open again, now with safeguards. But does changing the rules change the artwork?At 2:45 p.m. on a sunny Wednesday in a plaza near the Flatiron Building, a crowd of a few dozen was watching, and appearing in, New York City’s most infamous new reality show.On a round video screen, encased in a porthole-like structure behind a railing, they could see a livestream of onlookers across the Atlantic, in the center of Dublin. “They can see you just like you see them!” a staff member minding the exhibit told the crowd.Therein lay the attraction, and the problem. The Portal, a two-way-video art installation, opened on May 8, then promptly closed down on May 14, because of “inappropriate behavior.”On the American side, an OnlyFans model had flashed her breasts at Dublin, a stunt that, she later said, netted her a boost in subscribers worth tens of thousands of dollars. From the Irish side, people displayed images of swastikas and of the 2001 World Trade Center attack. The transgressions went viral, not the sort of global connection and sharing that the organizers were hoping for.Who, besides everyone, would have thought that some people would behave badly given access to a public live camera? When the Portal reopened on May 19, it had new hours — 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. New York time — and new safeguards, including a “proximity-based solution” that would blur the livestream if anyone or anything got too close.Today, the crowd was keeping it on, keeping it all on. At least on this side of the ocean. Onscreen in Dublin, a pair of high-spirited lads lifted their shirts and exposed their bellies to America. In a few minutes they graduated to full topless, whirling their shirts over their heads, before they were seemingly encouraged to leave by security.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