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      How Much Do Celebrities Make From Fashion Deals?

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      And what’s in it for the brands? As the industry’s model for working with public figures shifts, the power dynamics are becoming increasingly unclear.On Friday in Paris, the Northern Irish designer Jonathan Anderson will show his first collection as the creative director of the French fashion house Dior. During his previous, 11-year tenure as the creative director of the Spanish brand Loewe, Anderson became known for his avant-garde sensibility and dedication to craft — but also for his unique ability to turn the internet’s so-called boyfriends (those young actors and musicians who are lusted over online with possessive familiarity) into bona fide celebrities.In the front row of Anderson’s fall 2024 Loewe men’s wear show in Paris were the established actors Jamie Dornan, Andrew Garfield and Nicholas Hoult, but also, seated with equal prominence, emerging ones, including Drew Starkey, who was set to star in “Queer” (the 2024 Luca Guadagnino movie for which Anderson oversaw the costumes), and Josh O’Connor and Mike Faist, who would soon appear as romantic leads in Guadagnino’s film “Challengers,” a film that helped them reach mainstream heartthrob status, and with which Anderson was also involved as a costume designer. The following June, at Anderson’s final Loewe men’s runway show, the rising actors Kit Connor, Evan Peters and Enzo Vogrincic sat front row — suggesting, based on the strength of the designer’s track record, that they too would also soon become leading men. For Loewe, it was a display of cultural currency; for the actors, it was free publicity.It used to be that an association with a brand was, if not a career-killer, then certainly not chic for an actor. It was hard to be taken seriously as both an artist and a de facto fashion model. But in recent decades, the rise of social media and the expansion of the fashion industry have blurred the lines between model, actor and influencer. Back in the 1980s, the Italian fashion house Armani began dressing Hollywood celebrities, including, most notably, Richard Gere for his role in the 1980 movie “American Gigolo.” But gone are the days when one megastar served as a company’s global face. Today brands adopt a multitiered system of ambassadors that includes international stars, yes, but also up-and-comers and influencers. While these cliques are often described by their members and parent brands as “family,” and frequently represent a genuine affinity, they are also carefully constructed to maximize a company’s exposure on red carpets and billboards — but also very specific corners of TikTok. Now, as this business decision solidifies into standard practice, the question is, Who ultimately wields the power, the celebrities or the brands?Until 2010, “a few brands had ambassadors, but it was mainly for fragrance,” says Ben Cercio, the founder of a consulting agency specializing in brand strategy and communications with clients including the French fashion house Givenchy. But with the launch of Instagram that year, a shift occurred: companies began to engage not just with major actors but also with “microinfluencers” — online personalities with less than 100,000 followers — to reach their audiences early on. And because social media has accelerated the rise to fame, whenever a new talent in any field emerges from the crowd, “every brand wants to get its hands on them,” says Cercio. Now an ingénue like the actress Mikey Madison, who starred in last year’s “Anora,” might have a dozen offers from brands immediately after making a buzzy debut at a festival like Cannes, suggesting that it’s often the young actors, rather than the brands, who are in control. When Madison accepted her Oscar for best lead actress in March, she wore a custom look from Dior.A Calvin Klein billboard featuring the actor Jeremy Allen White in New York’s SoHo neighborhood, photographed in 2024.© Richard B. Levine/AlamyWe 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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      ‘Squid Game’ Is Back for Its Final Season. Here’s What to Remember

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      Only six months have passed since the Season 2 premiere, but there was plenty to keep track of. Here’s a quick look at where things left off.When “Squid Game,” a dystopian drama from South Korea, debuted on Netflix in September 2021, few could have predicted its outsize success. It swiftly became the streamer’s most-watched show, snagged Emmy wins for its director and star and spawned a reality game series and countless Halloween costumes.And while fans had to wait three long years between Seasons 1 and 2, the third and final season — arriving on Friday in its entirety — comes just six months after viewers last checked in with the hapless contestants, who must compete for both cash and their lives. Filmed back to back, Season 3 picks up right where Season 2 left off — with the heroes’ would-be mutiny quashed and their futures precarious.For those with short memories, here’s a quick refresher on how we got here.It’s all fun and games until someone losesThe first season introduced the contest, in which down-on-their-luck contestants vie for riches on a remote, secret island by competing in children’s schoolyard games like “Red Light, Green Light” and “Tug of War.” The twist? Losers in each round are killed (typically, in a hail of gunfire), a wrinkle that is revealed only after the first game begins. Uber-rich spectators watch the proceedings for sport, and in a pointed commentary about the value of human life, each death adds to the overall pot awarded to the last person standing — as much as 45.6 billion South Korean won, or about $38 million.That winner, Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae), an affable gambler estranged from his young daughter, emerged from the arena with heavy pockets and an even heavier heart. In the final moments of Season 1, haunted by what he had seen and done, he abandoned his plans to reunite with his daughter, choosing instead to put a stop to the game.Forging alliances outside the game …Among the many things we learned in Season 2 about Front Man (Lee Byung-hun) was that he is Jun-ho’s brother.No Ju-han/NetflixAt the beginning of Season 2, Gi-hun had been searching for two years for evidence of the game and its elusive Front Man (the contest’s puppet master, played by Lee Byung-hun), which he hoped to present to the authorities. He eventually teamed with Jun-ho (Wi Ha-jun), the resourceful cop who infiltrated the game to look for his missing brother, only to be shot and plunge off a cliff into the sea by the Front Man at the end of Season 1. In a plot twist, the Front Man is Jun-ho’s brother, In-ho, but Jun-ho has not shared this information with Gi-hun or the police force he works for.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 Ponders the Possibility of a Millennial Mayor of New York

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      Jimmy Fallon imagined Zohran Mamdani’s reaction to his surprising success in the primary: “My seven roommates are never going to believe this.”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.Young BloodA young state assemblyman, Zohran Mamdani, is likely to be the Democratic candidate for mayor of New York City after stunning former Gov. Andrew Cuomo in a primary election on Tuesday. “My seven roommates are never going to believe this,” Jimmy Fallon imagined the 33-year-old candidate saying on Wednesday’s “Tonight Show.”“Wow, that’s a good age, ’cause he knows the meaning of both the spending cap and ‘no cap.’” — JIMMY FALLON“Between his campaign and his billionaire-backed super PACs, Cuomo raised over $36 million, while Mamdani relied on volunteers and a relentlessly positive campaign based on issues that affect everyday New Yorkers, like freezing the rent, no-cost child care and free buses. Sounds pretty good. Sounds pretty good — and I, for one, cannot wait to get my free bus. I’m gonna paint mine like the Scooby-Doo Mystery Machine and then fight ghost crime.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“According to experts, with this message, Mamdani generated excitement among minority groups and electrified younger voters, while older voters still run on diesel.” — STEPHEN COLBERTThe Punchiest Punchlines (Cuomo Edition)“Yesterday was New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary, and former Governor Andrew Cuomo conceded to state Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani. On the bright side for Cuomo, at least he doesn’t have to move to New York City.” — SETH MEYERS“Mamdani won decisively in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens, while Andrew Cuomo won Staten Island, the Bronx and the secret sixth borough of Groper’s Island.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“During his concession speech, Cuomo said that Mamdani put together a great campaign and added, ‘He touched young people and inspired them and got them to come out and vote.’ Cuomo’s mistake was waiting until after he was elected to touch young people.” — SETH MEYERS“Yes, that Andrew Cuomo, the same one who sentenced grannies to death in nursing homes during Covid. I guess the senior vote was important after all.” — DANA PERINO, guest host of “Gutfeld”“The same Cuomo who resigned in disgrace and blamed his groping tendencies on being Italian, like he was Super Mario popping Cialis instead of mushrooms.” — DANA PERINOThe Bits Worth WatchingDiego Luna, this week’s guest host of “Jimmy Kimmel Live,” and Guillermo Rodriguez tried to cash in on the surge in Americans moving to Mexico with a new business venture, Gring-Go.What We’re Excited About on Thursday NightThe “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” star Mariska Hargitay will talk about her intimate new documentary, “My Mom Jayne,” on “Late Night with Seth Meyers.”Also, Check This OutIllustration by Brian ReaModern Love listeners talked about how location sharing has affected their relationships with loved ones. More

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      Gailard Sartain, Character Actor and ‘Hee Haw’ Regular, Dies at 81

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      Though best known for comedy, he also played serious roles, including a sinister sheriff in “Mississippi Burning.” The director Alan Rudolph cast him in nine films.Gailard Sartain, a character actor who moved easily between comedy, as a cast member on the variety series “Hee Haw”; music, as the Big Bopper singing “Chantilly Lace” in “The Buddy Holly Story”; and drama, as a racist sheriff in “Mississippi Burning,” died on Thursday at his home in Tulsa, Okla. He was 81.His wife, Mary Jo (Regier) Sartain, confirmed the death but did not specify a cause.Mr. Sartain spent 20 years on “Hee Haw,” the country equivalent of “Laugh-In,” hosted by Buck Owens and Roy Clark, which combined cornpone sketches with music. The characters he played included a bumbling store employee, a chef at a truck stop and Officer Bull Moose. At the same time, he also developed a movie career that began with “Nashville” (1975), Robert Altman’s improvisational drama set against the background of the country music industry.In that film, Mr. Sartain played a man at an airport lunch counter talking to Keenan Wynn. “I just said, ‘Ask Keenan what he’s doing in Nashville,’ and he did,” Alan Rudolph, the assistant director of the film, said in an interview. But Mr. Rudolph saw something special in Mr. Sartain and went on to cast him in nine films he directed over the next two decades, including “Roadie” (1980) and “Endangered Species” (1982).“I only wish I could have fit him into another nine,” he said. “Gailard had a certain silly magic about him. Most of my films are serious and comedic at the same time. In ‘Roadie,’ he was opposite Meat Loaf, as beer truck drivers, and that was about 700 pounds in the front of a beer truck. That should be funny.”One of Mr. Sartain’s most notable roles was in “Mississippi Burning” (1988), Alan Parker’s film about the F.B.I.’s investigation into the murders in 1964 of the civil rights workers, James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner, who were buried in an earthen dam. Mr. Sartain played Ray Stuckey, a county sheriff whose deputy was among the Ku Klux Klansmen who killed the men.Mr. Sartain played a racist Southern sheriff in the 1988 movie “Mississippi Burning.” “Nobody likes to be typecast as a barefooted hillbilly,” he said, “so when I had the opportunity to do other roles, I happily did it.”Orion PicturesWe 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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      Why the Salary for Dakota Johnson’s Character in ‘Materialists’ Is Such a Game-Changer

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      By making the number explicit, Celine Song’s new film reflects modern dating realities in a way rom-coms rarely have before.Almost everyone who sees “Materialists,” the writer-director Celine Song’s new spin on the old romantic comedy formula, seems to want to talk about one number: $80,000. That’s how much Lucy (Dakota Johnson) says she makes in her job as a matchmaker. She brings it up to goad Harry (Pedro Pascal) into revealing his own salary, but he will only say that he makes “more” — which, as a finance guy working in private equity and owner of a $12 million bachelor pad, he certainly does.The viewer conversations are over whether Lucy’s salary is realistic for her lifestyle: she wears relatively nice clothing, and lives alone in what appears to be a peaceful and brightly lit apartment, though we don’t see much of the interior. The film’s production designer revealed in an interview that her home is a teeny-tiny studio on the edge of the affluent Brooklyn Heights neighborhood, with a rent that Lucy probably shouldn’t be paying relative to her salary. Yet this matches her character’s single-minded aspiration: to be surrounded by wealth.We could debate whether the rest of her lifestyle, like her clothing, is realistic on her salary; I tend to think it could be, but in a Carrie Bradshaw, leveraged-to-the-hilt way. After all, we live in a world where direct-to-consumer brands sell decent silk slip dresses, and everyone’s thrifting or renting outfits — not to mention that anything looks good on Dakota Johnson.Knowing the character’s salary, viewers have debated her lifestyle choices.Atsushi Nishijima/A24But the fact we’re even debating that specific number is remarkable, and hints at what makes “Materialists” feel so very 2025. At my screening, the salary detail provoked a collective gasp that briefly sucked the air out of the room. It wasn’t even the amount, really: It was the fact that someone had said a number at all.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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      ‘Natasha,’ a Film About a Murdered Russian Activist, Takes Its Own Risks

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      The widely condemned killing of Natalya Estemirova is the subject of a documentary that those involved say needed to take heed of the dangers of speaking out.For a decade, Natalya Estemirova documented brutal human rights abuses in Chechnya. Her work led to her becoming one of the most prominent and respected human rights defenders working in that small predominantly Muslim region of Russia.But on the morning of July 15, 2009, as she was leaving her apartment, she was abducted and murdered, crimes for which no one has been charged but are viewed by many as precipitated by her work.Years later, filmmakers and former colleagues trying to tell her story encountered their own set of risks as they endeavored to draw attention to her heroism and the conditions that provoked it.The resulting short 35-minute documentary, “Natasha,” as Natalya was known, premiered this month at the Tribeca Film Festival.Andrew Meier, one of the two producers and directors of the film, said he does not imagine it will be shown in Russia anytime soon.“Even revisiting Natasha’s work and Natasha’s murder is a taboo, to put it mildly,” he said in an interview. “It’s one of the big cases you just don’t talk about in Chechnya.”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 Is Taken Aback by Trump’s Potty Mouth

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      Seth Meyers said that even with “zero standards of expectations for Trump,” he was shocked to see the president use profanity on the White House lawn.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.F-Bombs AwayPresident Trump dropped the F-bomb on live television on Tuesday, while talking to reporters in front of the White House about Israel and Iran violating their previously announced cease-fire. “We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don’t know what the [expletive] they’re doing,” he said.Seth Meyers said that even though he has “zero standards of expectations for Trump, it’s still surprising to see the president drop an F-bomb on the White House grounds.”“Wow, based on that language and that level of analysis, I’m surprised that they didn’t give him the local news chyron.” — SETH MEYERS“Remember when Biden whispered it to Obama and everyone on the right lost their [expletive] minds?” — SETH MEYERS“Nothing says ‘Everyone remain calm’ like dropping an F-bomb on live TV.” — JIMMY FALLON“Meanwhile, C-SPAN was like, ‘It’s OK. Nobody’s watching anyway.’” — JIMMY FALLONThe Punchiest Punchlines (Fake News Edition)“Last night, President Trump announced that Israel and Iran agreed to a total cease-fire and declared that the war has ended. Yeah. And for about 59 minutes, he was right.” — JIMMY FALLON“President Trump announced yesterday in a post on Truth Social that Israel and Iran have agreed to a cease-fire and added, ‘CONGRATULATIONS TO EVERYONE!’ Congratulations to everyone? Are you brokering a cease-fire or hosting the Tonys? ‘Congratulations to all our winners tonight, get home safe!’” — SETH MEYERS“In another post on Truth Social, President Trump defended his recently-announced cease-fire between Israel, Iran and the U.S. and said, ‘THE CEASEFIRE IS NOW IN EFFECT. PLEASE DO NOT VIOLATE IT!’ Well, that oughta do it. This reminds me of the time my bodega put up a ‘No shoplifting’ sign. You know what happened? Someone took it.” — SETH MEYERSThe Bits Worth WatchingDiego Luna brought his immigration lawyer to his second night hosting “Jimmy Kimmel Live” on Tuesday.What We’re Excited About on Wednesday NightThe “Bridgerton” star Jonathan Bailey will appear on Wednesday’s “Tonight Show.”Also, Check This OutReneé RappMario Anzuoni/ReutersReneé Rapp and Ethel Cain are two of eight rising pop singers you should be listening to this summer. More

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      ‘Duke & Roya’ Review: He’s Got Swagger, She’s No-Nonsense

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      Jay Ellis stars as an American rapper who falls for his Afghan interpreter at an Army base in Charles Randolph-Wright’s new play.With an American behaving brashly at an overseas military base, getting locals into trouble and considering consequences only later, “Duke & Roya” feels like scarcely more than a retooling of “Madama Butterfly.” Like that old problematic chestnut, Charles Randolph-Wright’s new play is not without its pleasures, but lacking soaring melodrama, it’s hard to believe in its music.Here, the visiting Westerner is Duke (Jay Ellis), a hip-hop star at the height of his fame. In a present-day press interview, he recalls his visit to Afghanistan in 2016, during the country’s U.S. occupation, to perform for troops at a large air base near Kabul. The play, which opened Tuesday at the Lucille Lortel Theater, then flashes back to his arrival and his immediate attraction to his Afghan interpreter, Roya (Stephanie Nur).She’s a no-nonsense type, and he’s always on vacation mode. But Roya, who works for a women’s education organization, has done her research, and knows that the party boy, born to British and American diplomats, was once a bookish English major. His quoting Rumi and James Baldwin impresses her, and Duke appreciates how she challenges him.It’s the standard romance of a down-to-earth civilian who grounds a starry hot shot, and Ellis and Nur lend it enjoyable chemistry.Charm comes naturally to Ellis, a classic romantic lead in the HBO series “Insecure” who makes an amiable stage debut here. His swaggering Duke teases out the word “serendipitous” with the cascading, sweet-talking drawl of a Southern rapper, and he adeptly handles a few verses (penned by Ronvé O’Daniel). Nur finds appealing spaces for wit and agency in her more reserved, reactive role.But does the play know there’s a war on?Despite an opening scene of martial seriousness, Randolph-Wright treats Afghanistan like a Harlequin romance playground. When the two sneak out of the base for Duke to buy a piece of lapis lazuli, they’re thrown into unsurprising peril. Danger! Excitement! Two worlds collide!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