Television

Mr. Robinson became a fan favorite as Mac, a levelheaded clerk surrounded by oddballs, on the long-running NBC courtroom comedy.Charlie Robinson, the veteran actor whose best-known role was Mac, the good-natured and pragmatic court clerk, on the long-running NBC sitcom “Night Court,” died on Sunday in Los Angeles. He was 75.His family confirmed the death, at the Ronald Reagan U.C.L.A. Medical Center, in a statement. The family said that the cause was a heart attack and organ failure brought on by septic shock, and that Mr. Robinson also had adenocarcinoma, a cancer of the glandular cells.Mr. Robinson’s acting career spanned six decades and included roles in television and film and onstage. His first credited onscreen appearance was in Jack Nicholson’s directorial debut, “Drive, He Said,” in 1971.In 1984, he was cast in the role for which TV viewers would come to know him best: Macintosh Robinson, better known as Mac, on “Night Court,” then in its second season.“Night Court,” which aired on Thursdays at 9:30 p.m., after “Cheers,” was set in a Manhattan courtroom that played host to a parade of oddballs and misfits in the dead of night. It was built around Harry Anderson as Harry Stone, a quirky, kindhearted judge, but it was really an ensemble show.John Larroquette became the breakout star as Dan Fielding, a bawdy, lascivious prosecutor, but Mr. Robinson became a fan favorite as Mac, a levelheaded Vietnam veteran turned court clerk who favored cardigan sweaters, plaid shirts and knit neckties. He played the role for the rest of the show’s nine-season run and directed three episodes.Mr. Robinson was born in Houston on Nov. 9, 1945. He served in the Army and briefly attended the University of Houston before leaving to pursue an acting career.He attended the Studio 7 workshop at the Houston Music Theater in the late 1960s and also trained at the Alley Repertory Theater there before moving to Los Angeles, where his family said he studied at the Actors Studio, the Mark Tapper Forum and the Inner City Cultural Center. Mr. Robinson, right, with Wendell Pierce in the play “Some Old Black Man,” which was streamed online this year.Doug CoombeIn addition to “Night Court,” Mr. Robinson was seen on numerous TV shows, including “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air,” “Key and Peele,” “This Is Us,” “Malcolm & Eddie,” “Grey’s Anatomy,” “How I Met Your Mother” and “NCIS.” Before joining the cast of “Night Court” he was a regular on “Buffalo Bill,” the Dabney Coleman sitcom that lasted only two seasons but developed a cult following. His film credits include “The Black Gestapo,” “Gray Lady Down” and “The House Bunny.”Mr. Robinson won the 2006 Ovation Award for best actor in a play for his performance as Troy Maxson in a production of August Wilson’s “Fences” at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. More

The Tony and Grammy Award winner was nominated for an Emmy for her portrayal of Aretha Franklin in the National Geographic series.When Cynthia Erivo was little, it seemed to her Aretha Franklin was on the radio all the time. She remembers the name of the radio station (Magic FM) and the exact songs that seemed to be on infinite repeat: “Chain of Fools”; “Sisters Are Doin’ It For Themselves”; “I Knew You Were Waiting”; and “Until You Come Back to Me (That’s What I’m Gonna Do).” More

The 73rd annual Emmy Award nominations were announced on Tuesday.The 73rd annual Emmy Award nominations were announced on Tuesday by Ron Cephas Jones (“This Is Us”) and Jasmine Cephas Jones (#freerayshawn), a father-daughter pair who are previous Emmy winners. Netflix’s “The Crown” and the Disney+ Star Wars drama “The Mandalorian” led the way with 24 nominations each. HBO led all the networks with 130 nominations. More

The actress spent the day indulging in a quick ice bath, looking at cows and receiving an Emmy nomination for her performance on the HBO series.It had been a decade since Kate Winslet last starred in a live-action television role — the 2011 adaptation of “Mildred Pierce” — when she made “Mare of Easttown,” the HBO crime drama that ran this past spring. More

Olsen talked about her first Emmy nomination and about why the series exceeded her expectations compared with more typical Marvel fare.In a year with so much strangeness and uncertainty, “WandaVision” at first seemed to offer a nostalgic antidote with its tidy suburban setting and its vintage black-and-white aesthetic. That lasted all of two episodes before the writers blasted a colorful hole through the protective wall of static surrounding the fictional town of Westview, N.J. — and through its viewers’ (and its critics’) early expectations. More

The star was nominated again for his role as Pray Tell, M.C. of New York’s legendary drag balls, one of nine nominations the show received on Tuesday.In 2019, Billy Porter cemented his place in history as the first openly gay Black man to be nominated for — and then the first to win — a lead acting award at the Primetime Emmys. More

The actor, writer and creator, who earned four Emmy nods for his work on Season 1, talked about the unexpected success of the most nominated freshman comedy in history.“Ted Lasso,” the Apple TV+ series about a clueless Kansas football coach (Jason Sudeikis) hired to be the manager of a struggling London Premier League soccer team — despite (or, rather, because of) his utter lack of soccer knowledge — is in itself an underdog story. The critical reception when the first episodes premiered last summer was tepid, to put it kindly. More

On Tuesday the “Pose” star became the first trans performer to earn an Emmy nomination in a lead acting category.Somewhere in the south of France, the wine was waiting. Four hours after the 73rd Emmy nominations were announced — and Mj Rodriguez became the first trans performer to earn a nomination in a lead acting category — she still hadn’t even sipped it. More