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      Don Johnson Is Back as ‘Nash Bridges.’ Why?

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      The actor was already having a renaissance thanks to “Knives Out” and “Watchmen.” But those works don’t have a pedigree that includes Hunter S. Thompson.BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. — On “Miami Vice,” Don Johnson, as the undercover cop Sonny Crockett, tooled around in speedboats and Ferraris, busted gunrunners and dope dealers and somehow made going sockless look good. The hit series transformed what a police procedural could look, sound and feel like — according to Hollywood lore, the show was pitched as “MTV cops” — and made Johnson an international star.But there is another, perhaps less appreciated contribution to Johnson’s global celebrity, one that predates his recent supporting roles in critically acclaimed films like “Knives Out” and TV series like “Watchmen.” From 1996 to 2001, he played the title character in “Nash Bridges,” a CBS police procedural that, like “Vice,” was set in a gorgeous city (San Francisco) and featured a buddy cop sidekick — played this time by Cheech Marin, one half of the stoner comedy duo “Cheech & Chong.” Twenty years on, Nash remains one of Johnson’s favorite roles.“I liked his nimbleness, how he could be funny one moment and dead cold serious the next,” Johnson said on a recent afternoon here at the Peninsula hotel. “And I was curious to see if I could capture that kind of lightning in a bottle again.”Cheech Marin, left, is back for the revival as well, as Nash’s buddy-cop sidekick, Inspector Joe Dominguez.David Moir/USA NetworkAt first blush, a leading role in the two-hour TV movie revival, “Nash Bridges,” debuting Saturday on USA, may not seem like the most obvious — or necessary — move for Johnson. But as with many a CBS procedural, the show’s popularity, and pedigree, belie the relative lack of attention it has received from the chattering classes. At its peak, “Bridges” had a sweet prime-time slot and a then-and-still-whopping $2 million-an-episode budget, with a weekly audience of more than 8 million viewers. In syndication, the series has found audiences in dozens of countries. And it’s a trivia lover’s dream, with origins tracing back to the writer Hunter S. Thompson.For Johnson, it is also his first time leading a police procedural in two decades. “I wouldn’t have been so excited about it if I had to write it for someone else,” he said.Johnson, who wrote the new movie with Bill Chais and Carlton Cuse, the creator of the original series, spoke candidly about his reasons for revisiting the ’90s procedural, in a wide-ranging conversation that also touched upon some of the stories from his younger, wilder days. Those reasons included love, money and the curiosity befitting a man who, at 71, is naturally given to reflections on the ways people change — or don’t — over time.He wanted to know what Nash — an amiable police inspector and amateur magician who patrolled San Francisco in an early ’70s bright yellow Plymouth Barracuda — would be like 20 years down the road. Not that he didn’t have ideas. Ideas derived, perhaps, from his own experience.The original series featured plots such as an undercover cop (played by the wrestler Stone Cold Steve Austin) kidnapping a chimp as part of a scheme to capture a terrorist animal rights activist. Spike Nannarello/CBS“I imagine him to still be very fit, and very capable,” Johnson said of Nash. “I imagine him to be wiser, and more thoughtful about things.”“He would still slap the crap out you,” he added, using a cruder term. “But he’d think about it first, and make sure it was coming from a good place.”The decades since “Vice” first made Johnson a star, in 1984, have given him plenty of material. They have, in fact, been the stuff of legend — not all of which is verifiable, and not all of which he remembers. He married Melanie Griffith (twice), set a world record in powerboat racing and released two hit singles (one with his then-girlfriend Barbra Streisand). There were struggles with substance abuse, stories of women’s underwear virtually raining from open windows. There was Miami in the ’80s.Along the way, Johnson had five children, including a daughter, Dakota (of the “Fifty Shades” franchise), who is racking up A-list anecdotes herself these days. More recently, he has undergone a kind of renaissance, transforming himself from a leading man into a versatile character actor, specializing in a kind of winkingly scuzzy, unreconstructed American male in films like “Machete” (2010) and “Django Unchained” (2012), and in TV shows like “Eastbound & Down” (2009-13).When Johnson first took on the role of Nash Bridges, he had been looking for a change. Despite the structural similarities of “Bridges” and “Vice,” its two lead characters were very different. While Sonny skewed toward the tormented and dour, Nash was upbeat and funny, quick with a snappy line. Johnson appreciated the break.“I’d just done a stint on ‘Miami Vice’ for five years, and the show and the character had just gotten darker and darker,” he said. “After a while, it was like, how dark and desolate and without hope can we make Sonny? And I said, ‘I’m not doing that again.’”“I’d just done a stint on ‘Miami Vice’ for five years, and the show and the character had just gotten darker and darker,” Johnson said about his choice to do the original “Nash Bridges,” which was considerably lighter.Ryan Pfluger for The New York TimesThe series began as something of a favor to Thompson, the iconoclastic journalist and writer of “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas,” among other books, who was a neighbor and good friend of Johnson’s in Woody Creek, Colo., at the time.“I was hanging out at his house, and he allowed to me that he was broke,” Johnson said. “And I had this 22-episode commitment at CBS. It was probably 3 a.m. in the morning, and I said, ‘Let’s just conjure up something, and I’ll take it to CBS and see if we can get it done.’”They sketched out an idea about two off-duty cops hired to protect a senator’s wife with Tourette Syndrome, called, what else, “Off Duty.” Later that day, Johnson looked at what the two had wrought.“It was unmakeable,” said Johnson, who became an executive producer on the eventual show. The premise was rejiggered into a procedural about two on-duty cops who were always getting into mischief with off-hours, get-rich-quick schemes. Johnson had the writers watch the 1940 screwball comedy “His Girl Friday” to get a taste of the snappy repartee he wanted.“We were still adjusting the tone of the show through the first order of 12 episodes,” he said. Thompson ended up writing two episodes and making an uncredited cameo as a piano player in the first season.The show had notable talent above the line. “Bridges” was the first series Les Moonves greenlit as head of CBS. Cuse, the creator, went on to become a showrunner of “Lost,” among other series. Writers included Jed Seidel (“Terriers,” “Veronica Mars,” “Gilmore Girls”) and Shawn Ryan, the creator of “The Shield.”Damon Lindelof got his start on “Bridges” before going on to cocreate “Lost” and create the acclaimed HBO series “The Leftovers” and “Watchmen.”“I was a writer’s assistant before ‘Nash Bridges,’” Lindelof said. “Don and Carlton gave me my first big-boy job.”The show garnered strong ratings for six seasons before being unceremoniously dropped in 2001, the result of a dispute between CBS and Paramount, one of the show’s producers. The whole thing “left a sour taste in my mouth,” Johnson said.Johnson with Jamie Lee Curtis in a scene from “Knives Out,” one the many more recent films and TV series that have demonstrated his prowess as a character actor. Claire Folger/Lionsgate, via Associated PressThe new movie, he said, was one way to remedy that. Johnson has a deep, protective love of the character, so much so that when the actor’s business partners at Village Roadshow, who co-own the rights to “Bridges,” approached Johnson about reviving the show, he couldn’t imagine anyone else playing Nash.“When Michael Mann was going to make ‘Miami Vice’ as a movie, he didn’t call me, and I didn’t call him,” he said. “But I knew it was a mistake, and a no-win situation for Colin Farrell. Because everybody on the planet identified me with that character.”And of course, there were also the financial benefits of bringing back a property that Johnson’s production company owns a big piece of, including a portion of the original show’s 122-episode library.“If I didn’t think there was something worthy here, I wouldn’t do it,” he said. “But there’s no question there was a business component to it.” He hopes the “Bridges” movie might eventually lead to a series of some sort, or maybe a run of two-hour specials.In the revival, we catch up with Nash after 20 years — he’s still charming, still in San Francisco. (“We owned the city of San Francisco,” Marin recalled of the experience of shooting the original. “If you’ve gotta own a city, that’s the one to own.”) He and Marin’s character, Inspector Joe Dominguez, have evolved, but not so much that they aren’t befuddled by the changes that millennials and the intervening decades have wrought on the department.Production began in San Francisco in May. Johnson’s colleagues are quick to talk about what a fun and giving guy he is to work with and for, and the attention to detail he gives to every aspect of the show.“He knows the name of every crew member,” Marin said.Others mention his special skills, like his apparently uncanny abilities behind the wheel. For most driving sequences onscreen, the car is placed on a trailer so the actors don’t need to actually drive; sometimes they’re shot in a studio using green screens or projectors. The opening scene of the movie, which has Bridges zipping around San Francisco with a discombobulated Marin riding shotgun — that’s all Johnson.Johnson and Philip Michael Thomas starred in the hit ’80s TV series “Miami Vice,” which made Johnson into an international star and sex symbol.Sleuth “Don will hold the car at exactly 40 miles an hour to keep pace with the camera car, while doing a two-minute-long scene of dialogue perfectly,” said Greg Beeman, a director on both the original “Bridges” and the new one. “I’ve tried it after ‘Bridges,’ and no other actor can do it.”What co-workers won’t do is tell any Don Johnson tales out of school, even those they might have heard thirdhand or seen splashed across a tabloid.But Johnson will. That story about how he got sent to reform school at the age of 12 after hot-wiring a car? “Yeah, I probably made that up,” he said. The time he was snorting cocaine in the men’s bathroom of a club and ran into Jimi Hendrix? “That was a club in New York called the Hippopotamus,” he explained.Those wild “Vice”-era parties at Johnson’s home, where U2 and dozens of models might show up? Well, Johnson couldn’t go out back then. He was the hottest guy on the planet’s hottest show, so the party was brought to him.“What went on behind closed doors, I have no idea,” he said.These days, Johnson’s life is a lot more serene. In addition to his hopes for more “Bridges,” he has plans to do a film for Netflix, and has other projects in the works that he declined to name.Johnson can pick and choose projects “to a certain extent,” he said, but he still likes to be asked, as he was for “Bridges.”“I still like the idea that somebody asked for you,” he said. “I like the idea that someone sends a script and says, ‘We want Don Johnson to do this.’” More

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      'General Hospital' Loses Actors Who Opposed Vaccination Mandate

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      Two actors have left one of America’s most popular soap operas after declining to comply with an on-set vaccination mandate.The actors, Steve Burton and Ingo Rademacher, were fixtures of ABC’s “General Hospital,” a long-running daytime drama set in the fictional town of Port Charles, N.Y.About one in five American adults has not received a single dose of a coronavirus vaccine. Mr. Burton and Mr. Rademacher were outspoken opponents of a coronavirus vaccine mandate that applied to a part of the set where actors work unmasked, known in the industry as Zone A. The mandate took effect on Nov. 1.“Unfortunately, ‘General Hospital’ has let me go because of the vaccine mandate,” Mr. Burton, who tested positive for the virus in August and filmed his last episode on Oct. 27, said in an Instagram video on Tuesday.“I did apply for my medical and religious exemptions and both of those were denied — which, you know, hurts,” he added. “But this is also about personal freedom to me. I don’t think anyone should lose their livelihood over this.”Mr. Rademacher’s departure from the show was made public earlier this month. He had also refused to comply with the show’s vaccine mandate. “I will stand with you to fight for medical freedom,” he wrote in an Instagram post.Mr. Rademacher has also been criticized on social media in recent weeks for making comments that his critics perceived to be transphobic, a suggestion he has forcefully denied.Representatives for ABC declined to comment on the record. Publicists for the actors could not be reached for comment late Tuesday.Other Hollywood productions have imposed similar on-set mandates, but there is no universal vaccination requirement for people who work in film and television.“General Hospital” has been on the air since 1963. Its episodes are filmed weeks before they air.Mr. Rademacher played the character Jasper “Jax” Jacks on the show for 25 years. In his last episode, which aired on Monday, the character said — spoiler alert — that he would be returning to Australia.“I’m kind of on the outs with everyone in Port Charles right now,” the character said. Some fans interpreted that as a reference to the actor’s real-life tension with his castmates.In the same episode, Mr. Burton’s character, Jason Morgan, was caught up in a tunnel collapse.Mr. Burton said in his Instagram video on Tuesday that he hoped the show’s vaccine mandate would be lifted so that he could finish his career playing Jason Morgan.“And if not,” he added, “I’m going to take this experience, move forward and be forever grateful.” More

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      in Movies

      ‘Moulin Rouge!’ Has a New Satine. She’s Amazed She’s Back on Broadway.

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      Natalie Mendoza walked away from “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark,” and figured she would never work on Broadway again.That was 11 years ago, and now the 45-year-old Australian actress is back, starring in “Moulin Rouge! The Musical,” a title with which she has a singular history: Mendoza, who succeeds Karen Olivo in the role of Satine, had a small part in the 2001 film from which the Tony-winning show is adapted; she is the only member of the film’s cast performing in the stage musical.Born in Hong Kong to a Filipino jazz musician and an Australian dancer and television personality, Mendoza grew up in Sydney and Melbourne, with five artistically inclined siblings, and has led a nomadic life. She has lived in Asia, Europe and America; worked in music, film, television and theater; and has repeatedly left the performing arts for school (most recently, she studied French and French history at the Sorbonne) and spirituality (she has spent time at Vedic and other monasteries).Mendoza as the doomed Parisian chanteuse in “Moulin Rouge! The Musical.”Matt MurphyAnd as the villainous Arachne in “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark.” She left the ill-fated show before opening night. Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesIn 2010, she was cast in the ill-fated “Spider-Man” as Arachne, a villainous spider, but left during previews after suffering a concussion and then witnessing an actor injured in a fall. That was not her only difficult experience with the entertainment industry; in 2017 she said that 15 years earlier Harvey Weinstein had groped her while she was working on a film he was producing.But in an interview earlier this month at the apartment tower where she is staying, she said she loves being onstage, and hopes to become a director.These are edited excerpts from the conversation.We’re talking in a conference room because, citing Covid, “Moulin Rouge!” won’t let me backstage. So let’s just pretend we’re in your dressing room. What would I see?They have this tradition here where you’re allowed to paint your dressing room. First, I felt a little ridiculous, and then I went for a light violet. I wanted something very peaceful and tranquil. There’s a prayer of St. Francis, to remind me to be a better person every day. And beautiful art. I collect art.“You think you’re enlightened on top of a mountain, and you go back into the city and you’re like, ‘How awake am I in this stressful setting?’”Mark Elzey for The New York TimesAnd do you keep a good-luck charm, or mementos?Not really. I’ve checked out of my career many times. I became a seeker very early. I learned meditation, and on and off I’ve been a monk, so when I say I’ve left, I really left. And so to re-engage with the world is always a little bit of a shock. It’s sort of Larry Darrell in “The Razor’s Edge.” You think you’re enlightened on top of a mountain, and you go back into the city and you’re like, “How awake am I in this stressful setting?”I want to come back to spirituality, but let’s start with “Moulin Rouge!” How did you wind up in the film?Many, many moons ago, when I was still living in Australia, I had been cast as Eponine in “Les Misérables.” Baz [Luhrmann] came to see “Les Miz,” because he was wanting to cast Satine, and I ended up at the final audition at his house in Sydney with his whole crew of creatives and bohemians. And we basically workshopped the role.A couple of weeks later, I heard that the glorious Nicole Kidman got the role, which didn’t surprise me. But Baz kept calling me, and saying, “Listen, we want you involved; we’re going to create a character for you,” and sure enough, that’s what happened. He created China Doll. It set my career in a different direction. All the people I met on that film set helped shape my tastes. This girl from the suburbs of Australia suddenly started dreaming about the streets of Paris, and life in London.You had taken a break from performing when you were cast in the London production of “Here Lies Love,” which is how you met Alex Timbers.Being an Asian actress, I would see other young actresses careers take this very clear trajectory, [but] I would play a really interesting role, and then all of a sudden I’d drop off because there wasn’t another role to continue that upward trajectory. Rather than wait around, I’d just go off to India, or go off and study something, and then I’d pop back in. The National Theater contacted me just when I’d left a monastery that I’d been at for a year. So that was a dream come true. And it was hugely successful, and then I just disappeared again.Mendoza and Aaron Tveit in “Moulin Rouge!” She replaced Karen Olivo, who originated the role of Satine onstage.Matt MurphyNow it’s six years later; Timbers is directing “Moulin Rouge!” and he reached out to you again.It had been so long. I just thought, “Can I do this?” Even when I’m not in a monastery, I still very much live that lifestyle. I’m very quiet. I teach meditation. I don’t speak a whole lot. I certainly don’t sing. But I just threw caution to the wind. And I realized I knew this character, because I was there right at the beginning.Karen Olivo, who originated the role of Satine onstage, left citing abuses in the industry. Did that concern you?I messaged her, before opening night, and I just thanked her, because she’s part of this character. I’m benefiting from a lot of the work that she did. And it’s always wonderful when a woman wants to take a stand based on her principles. I know that she cared deeply about the company and the cast, and she was incredibly gracious in saying that she was happy to leave the show in my hands.You had your own experience speaking up, about Harvey Weinstein.It was actually incredibly clumsy of me. The way it was portrayed in the press was far more heroic than the truth. I was reading an article about an actress [who was describing her] experience, and he sort of had a script, and I had encountered the same script. My initial impulse was to comment [on Facebook], and somehow it got leaked.He affected the arc of your career?I had signed a three-picture deal. But after that first movie, I decided Hollywood’s not for me, because I could see the cost. I never see myself as a victim. The thing is Harvey can only be Harvey because there’s a collective agreement that allows it to happen. We’re now seeing these collective shifts, these waves of a change, which is so beautiful. But at that time, that wasn’t going to happen. And so I just went off and kept being an artist in the way that I knew how. But of course, it affected my career. My career was full of potential at that point — I was young and I had some great opportunities, but I took the quieter road.You’re sort of a child of the world. How do you think about your own identity?I do think of myself as a citizen of the world. Growing up in Australia, I was literally like one of two Asian girls in my school year. So I never identified with being Australian. I couldn’t relate to the culture. I would look in the mirror and I would see an Asian girl. And I was drawn to all things Asian. I then left. I started touring and living all over Asia by the age of 16. I was connecting with the different spiritual traditions. And this is what piqued my interest early and then I just started seeking out my own path.“It’s always those devastating blows that propel you, if you allow them to,” Mendoza said.Mark Elzey for The New York TimesSpeaking of your path, I looked through your Instagram and you mention Transcendental Meditation, Christ, the Divine Mother, the Buddha, Lao Tzu, Ram Dass, Rumi, a Hindu god, Saint Francis of Assisi. What’s going on?I really honor the essence that permeates all the great faiths, including the faith of quantum mechanics. The intelligence that allows a flower to bloom. That invisible essence that connects and permeates all. We see the crema on top of every great faith. There’s just this commonality that they all share, which is love and peace and compassion. I’m a fan of all of them and a devotee of all of them.Your last Broadway appearance was “Spider-Man.” You left after a concussion. Tell me what your thinking was about coming back.I realized there’s some unfinished business here, because it brought up some strange feelings, like, “Do I want to revisit that?” And I didn’t think I’d ever get a chance to perform on Broadway again, because sometimes when things like that happen, you become untouchable. “Oh, you know, she was part of that production.” And so the opportunity to be given this chance, and to change the narrative, because I’m certainly not a quitter — it is the last thing I would ever have expected, but it’s incredibly beautiful to be doing this.How do you view “Spider-Man” in the rearview mirror?It’s its own Greek myth, isn’t it? It was a really powerful turning point for me. To get that close, and to suddenly not be doing it, was a pretty devastating blow. And at the same time, it’s always those devastating blows that propel you, if you allow them to, in a direction spiritually that can be the greatest gift of your life, and certainly that’s what happened. I am so thankful to have gone through that experience, and also to carry so many of the lessons from that experience into this experience. It’s all beautiful.When I heard you got this role, the first thing that occurred to me is that Satine flies. Did that freak you out?Not at all. People thought I left that show because I was scared, and I wasn’t. I was making a stand. People’s safety is important, and it wasn’t my safety I was concerned about. I’m a rock climber. I’m not scared of heights. I’m not afraid. I don’t think any show is worth putting anybody’s life at risk, particularly these dancers that have spent their entire lives training to be up on that stage. You have to treat those bodies with so much respect, because that’s their livelihood. I would never want stardom so much that I would compromise my own integrity. And I have no problem taking a stand for anybody. More

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      in Movies

      ‘West Side Story’ Star Ariana DeBose Is Always Ready for Her Next Role

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      After dancing in ‘Hamilton’ and playing Anita in Steven Spielberg’s new musical adaptation, the actress has her sights on a part entirely her own.On a recent fall evening, the actress Ariana DeBose was ordering soup at a cafe near her apartment in New York’s Upper East Side, the lower half of her face covered by a commemorative mask from the reopening of the Broadway show “Six.” DeBose, 30, has no professional relationship to the musical — a poppy reimagining of the lives of Henry VIII’s wives with an emphasis on female empowerment — but her boldly displayed endorsement of the production set a perfect tone for our conversation that night about the women, artists and opportunities that have contributed to making her one of the most sought-after musical theater actresses of her generation. Few performers are shy when it comes to discussing their influences and obsessions, but in DeBose’s telling, it’s impossible to separate any step of her career from the people who helped her get there.She has indeed been in good company. Growing up in Raleigh, N.C., DeBose began dancing competitively at age 7 — she says she “started with the whole ‘ballet, tap, jazz’ of it all” — and dreamed of becoming a backup dancer for Madonna. Soon after finishing high school, she was a finalist on the reality TV show “So You Think You Can Dance.” And over the past decade, she has starred in six back-to-back Broadway musicals and booked two stage-to-screen adaptations, the most recent of which, Steven Spielberg’s “West Side Story,” comes out next month. But while her list of collaborators includes greats like Lin-Manuel Miranda — she played a supporting role in the original production of “Bring It On: The Musical” in 2011 and the Bullet in “Hamilton” from 2015 to 2016 — as well as Robert De Niro (“A Bronx Tale”), Adrienne Warren (“Bring It On”), Diane Paulus (“Pippin”), LaChanze (“Summer: The Donna Summer Musical”) and the entire starry cast of Ryan Murphy’s “The Prom” (2020), it’s her offstage relationships especially that would make any up-and-comer swoon.While still in high school, she joined the actors Charlotte d’Amboise and Terrence Mann’s musical theater summer intensive, Triple Arts, at Western Carolina University, and the legendary stage couple took DeBose under their wing, coaching her for auditions and encouraging her to skip college and go straight to Broadway. Following that advice paid off — “I had the benefit of learning in real time,” DeBose says — and she was soon cast in “Bring It On.” When the cheerleading acrobatics that that show required began to take a toll, DeBose’s mother suggested she rush a different show to cheer herself up, and she caught a performance of the 2011 revival of “Follies.” She was so mesmerized by the veteran actress Jan Maxwell’s turn as former showgirl Phyllis Rogers Stone that she left a note for her at the stage door afterward. Months later, DeBose received a call from a friend who was starring alongside Maxwell; apparently, Maxwell, having related to the professional doubts DeBose had expressed in her note, had taped it to her dressing room mirror for inspiration. The two women struck up a friendship that lasted until the older actress’s death in 2018.Proenza Schouler coat, $7,500, proenzaschouler.com; and Panconesi earrings.Photograph by Cheril Sanchez. Styled by Yohana LebasiSuch a charmed arrival onto the New York theater scene is almost unheard of and, aware that her current wealth of opportunities is rare, DeBose is determined to prove herself worthy of them. “I don’t ever want anybody to look at my work and think, ‘Why does she have that when they could’ve hired someone else?’” she says. “I don’t ever want to ask myself, ‘Did I do enough?’” It’s not impostor syndrome, she assures me, but rather a perfectionist impulse — one that led her, for example, to brush up on her little-used tap skills last year for her role as an old-timey schoolmarm in Apple TV’s musical series “Schmigadoon!” (2021); in between shooting in Vancouver she would take Zoom classes and watch YouTube tutorials in her hotel room.In other ways, too, there is something distinctly 21st century about DeBose’s career. Besides being an openly queer woman of Afro Latinx descent, she has bounced from role to role — often with little time to prepare — in a way that is reflective of our current gig economy. In the 1960s and ’70s, a performer with her skill set might have been cast in a single musical and ridden the wave of its success for years, touring with the production around the world and resting on the laureled association. But DeBose’s ability to move quickly through roles has reaped its own rewards: She has earned a Tony nomination and won a Chita Rivera Award — both for her most recent Broadway appearance, as Disco Donna, one of the leads in “Summer” — among other accolades. Her dancing in that show, as in each of her performances, had the precision and dynamism of a lifelong performing arts kid who stopped formal training just before conservatory programs could overwrite her natural inclination toward wild abandon. And so she can put her mark on choreographic work whether it is more exacting, as in “Hamilton,” or looser, as in “Bring It On.” She credits her versatility, too, to her knack for meeting directors and choreographers where they are. “Most creators are very intense, and each has their own brand of intensity, their own language,” she explains. “I think part of the reason I’ve been able to continue to book jobs is because I chose to learn how to speak other people’s artistic languages quickly.”Five Movies to Watch This WinterCard 1 of 51. “The Power of the Dog”: More

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      in Theater

      In 'Tick, Tick … Boom!,' Robin de Jesús Showcases His Range

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      In the film, this queer Puerto Rican actor gets to showcase his range, stepping into a more mature role as Michael.The T-shirt says it all: “This body was built on arroz con gandules.”Arroz con gandules, or rice with pigeon peas, is a Puerto Rican classic, and Robin de Jesús wears the shirt with pride under a burnt orange jacket. When mounds of maduros (fried sweet plantains) arrive with our entrees, each is topped with a tiny Puerto Rican flag. De Jesús, 37, approves.The actor’s family is from rural Puerto Rico, and he grew up in a working-class community in Norwalk, Conn. Known for larger-than-life roles like a gay teenager who dabbles in drag in the movie “Camp,” a spirited maid in the Broadway revival of “La Cage aux Folles” and a boisterous interior decorator in both the play and film versions of “The Boys in the Band,” he wanted to diversify his work.Then along came “Tick, Tick … Boom!.” De Jesús was deeply intentional in auditioning for the role of Michael, an actor turned advertiser, in the film, directed by Lin-Manuel Miranda.“What kept coming up for me was, ‘I want a quiet performance.’ I want a quiet, subtle, nuance,” de Jesús said at lunch. “And I know that, if I do that, I can showcase maturity.”The movie (in theaters and on Netflix) is an adaptation of a musical about the writing of a musical. The original “Tick, Tick … Boom!” was written by Jonathan Larson — who would later go on to write the rock musical “Rent” — and first performed in 1990. The film tells the tale of an aspiring composer (also named Jonathan and played by Andrew Garfield) pouring himself into yet another musical, this one called “Superbia.” It takes place in the early ’90s, against the stark backdrop of the AIDS epidemic.As his 30th birthday looms, Jonathan’s anxiety manifests as a persistent ticking. He worries about the upcoming workshop of “Superbia,” upon which everything seemingly hinges — and about whether he can succeed in the performing arts at all.Michael, his former roommate and best friend since childhood, has tapped out of the threadbare artist lifestyle, opting instead for a plush career in advertising and a glittering high-rise apartment. He was tired of waiting for hours in line for an audition, just to be cut off after six measures of a song and called the wrong name: “Juan, Pedro, Carlos, lo que sea.”De Jesús with Andrew Garfield in “Tick, Tick … Boom!”Macall Polay/NetflixThat’s not to say that Michael has hardened into a formal shell; he stays playful and supportive of Jonathan’s dreams. We first meet him visiting Jonathan at work in the Moondance Diner, where he drops off copies he made of the “Superbia” script.“Boo-boo, you need to ask yourself,” Michael tells Jonathan, “In this moment, are you letting yourself be led by fear? Or love?”De Jesús said, “I knew that Michael did not have to be pulled and buttoned up, that he was someone who navigated being an artist, a creative, someone who was down and hip, and cool with also doing advertising.”“It didn’t have to just be one thing,” he continued.Although de Jesús has appeared in many major movies, he assumed some other, bigger film star might snag the role of Michael. So he took a risk in his audition. Miranda was impressed.“I’ve seen a lot of productions of ‘Tick, Tick … Boom!’ and a lot of the time the guy that gets cast as Michael is someone who looks very at home being a business guy, very dapper, very smooth,” Miranda said in a phone call. “What’s fun about Robin as a choice is that you 100 percent believe this is an artist who thrives in this world. It’s an artist with a business suit on.”Miranda and de Jesús go way back. (So far, in fact, that de Jesús sang at Miranda’s wedding.) In 2005, de Jesús made his Broadway debut in “Rent” as a member of the ensemble and an understudy for Angel, a young drag queen. That same year, he joined the original cast of “In the Heights,” Miranda’s first musical, with a book by Quiara Alegría Hudes.“Quiara and I realized every time he had the ball, he just put a crazy spin on it and knocked it out of the park,” Miranda said of de Jesús. “I am mixing my tennis and baseball metaphors, but so would Robin.”De Jesús earned a Tony nomination for his role as Sonny in “In the Heights.” He received subsequent nominations for “La Cage aux Folles” in 2010 and “The Boys in the Band” in 2019. This year, he presented at the Tony Awards with Andrew Garfield.But so many of his roles came across as youthful or outsize. De Jesús was ready for something fresh.Five Movies to Watch This WinterCard 1 of 51. “The Power of the Dog”: More

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      Bob Bondurant, Car Racer Who Tutored Actors on the Track, Dies at 88

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      After a racetrack accident put him in the hospital, he pivoted to open a driving school, where his students included Paul Newman, Tom Cruise and Christian Bale.Bob Bondurant, a master racecar driver who was better known for his driving school in California and later Arizona, where he tutored actors like Paul Newman, Tom Cruise and Christian Bale for their onscreen racing roles, died on Nov. 12 in Paradise Valley, Ariz. He was 88. A death certificate provided by his wife, Pat Bondurant, said he had a “suspected immune reaction related to vaccinations.” It cited cerebrovascular disease and cerebral arterial stenosis as underlying conditions. He died at an assisted living facility.Mr. Bondurant began attracting attention in the racing world in 1959, when he won 18 of the 20 races he entered behind the wheel of a Corvette.“I am an original California hot rodder turned white hot when I started winning everything in my Corvettes,” he was quoted as saying by the National Corvette Museum, which inducted him into its Hall of Fame in 2016.He continued to win races regularly in Corvettes in the 1960s, but he also began to race successfully in other sports cars and open-wheeled Formula 1 machines, including for the elite Ferrari team from 1965 to ’66.“He was top of the line,” said Peter Brock, who designed the Shelby Daytona Cobra Coupe that Mr. Bondurant raced with Dan Gurney to first place in the GT, or Grand Touring, class at the 24 Hours of Le Mans endurance race in 1964.But in 1967, Mr. Bondurant crashed during a race at what is now the Watkins Glen International in upstate New York, suffering multiple injuries, including fractures of both feet and a broken right ankle. It was a turning point.In the hospital he came up with the idea of opening a school that would teach safe, defensive driving to auto enthusiasts.The Bob Bondurant School of High Performance Driving opened in early 1968 at the Orange County International Raceway in Irvine, Calif. “We want to make a better driver, rather than make a faster driver,” he told The Los Angeles Times at the time. He also offered instruction in racecar driving, motorcycling and drag racing.Even before opening the school, Mr. Bondurant had some well-known students. He had coached James Garner and Yves Montand in driving Formula 1 cars for John Frankenheimer’s 1966 film, “Grand Prix.” Mr. Bondurant, who was a stunt man and technical adviser to the film, wore 16-millimeter cameras on the sides of his helmet to record racing action on the track while moving at 150 miles per hour.Mr. Bondurant, in the car, with Paul Newman on the set of the 1969 movie “Winning.” Mr. Newman was one of his first big-name students.Universal, via Everett CollectionSoon after Mr. Bondurant opened the school, Mr. Newman and Robert Wagner signed up as students. They had been cast as racecar drivers in the film “Winning” (1969), in which Mr. Newman’s character dreams of winning the Indianapolis 500.“Paul has a knack of knowing how to learn,” Mr. Bondurant told The St. Louis Post-Dispatch in 1988. “He’s like most actors — they know how to listen. He would move at his own pace, and wouldn’t go too quick. He took it step by step, and it came naturally to him.”He tested Mr. Newman on three tracks before he handed him off to another instructor, who familiarized him with the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Mr. Newman’s experience on the film led him to take up racecar driving as a sideline, as a both successful professional driver and a team owner.As Mr. Bondurant’s school grew, it moved from Irvine to Ontario Speedway, near Los Angeles, then to Sonoma Raceway, in Northern California, and in 1989 to its most recent location, Wild Horse Pass Motorsports Park, in Chandler, Ariz.“I love teaching and I love driving,” he told The Post-Dispatch. “I hope I never grow up. It would be a disaster.”Robert Lewis Bondurant was born on April 27, 1933, in Chicago to John and Ruth (Williams) Bondurant. His mother was a homemaker, and his father was a luxury car dealer who sold his business during the Depression and moved the family from Evanston, Ill., to the Westwood Village neighborhood of Los Angeles, making his living selling surgical instruments.His parents divorced when Bob was 12; four years later his mother died.“My dad took me to Gilmore Stadium when I was 7 to watch the races, and that got me interested in racing,” Mr. Bondurant told Motor Trend magazine in 2012.He drag-raced, began racing motorcycles at 18, moved on to sports cars — a British Morgan Plus 4, a Triumph TR2 — then drove a 1957 fuel-injected Corvette in his stunningly successful 1959 season, which earned him the title of Best Corvette Driver of the year. He kept winning in Corvettes into 1963.After studying business, he graduated from Woodbury College in Los Angeles in the early 1960s.Driving for the Shelby American team, Mr. Bondurant raced Cobras in the United States and Europe; in addition to the Le Mans triumph in 1964, he helped Shelby and Ford win the prestigious World Manufacturers’ GT Championships the next year.After his interlude with Ferrari, Mr. Bondurant leaped to the Canadian-American Challenge Cup circuit — better known as Can-Am — in cars that went even faster than those in Formula 1. His 1967 accident came at the Can-Am race at Watkins Glen. He was driving his McLaren Mark II at 150 m.p.h. when his steering arm broke, causing the car to flip multiple times.After recovering, he continued to race occasionally, the last time in 2012. But his focus was on his school, which his wife said had taught more than 500,000 people over 50 years, including professional racecar drivers, celebrities, military officers, F.B.I. and C.I.A. agents, Navy Seals, and teenagers learning safe-driving skills, usually at the request of their parents.In recent years, after Mr. Bondurant became less involved in it, the school was beset by financial problems and filed for Chapter 11 protection in 2018. An investment group purchased its assets the next year and renamed it the Radford Racing School. Ms. Bondurant said she was working to start another school that would use the Bondurant name.Mr. Bondurant in 2016 behind the wheel of an Alfa Romeo Giulia.“I love teaching and I love driving,” he said. “I hope I never grow up.”Kelly Sullivan/Getty Images Mr. Bondurant married Pat Chase at the Monaco Grand Prix racetrack in 2010. In addition to his wife, he is survived by her son, Jason Bondurant, whom he adopted and was a vice president of the racing school; his stepdaughter, Meagan Radigan; and two step-grandsons. His previous marriages ended in divorce.In 1990, Mr. Bondurant trained Tom Cruise for his role as a stock-car driver in Tony Scott’s “Days of Thunder,” and in 2000 Nicolas Cage trained at the Bondurant school for his role as a car thief in “Gone in 60 Seconds.”Mr. Bondurant worked with Christian Bale in the summer of 2018 as the actor trained to play the British racecar driver Ken Miles in “Ford v Ferrari” (2019), James Mangold’s account of the cutthroat competition in Formula 1 between the two automakers at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1966.“Bob spent hours with Christian in his GT40, talking to him about how to play Miles,” Ms. Bondurant said in a phone interview. “Bob had great reverence for Christian because both were motorcycle racers. With Christian’s motorcycle racing experience, Bob said: ‘I’d do anything to get him to quit acting. I could get him to win Le Mans.’” More

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      She Plays a Young Serena Williams

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      Demi Singleton stars in “King Richard,” opposite Will Smith.Name: Demi SingletonAge: 14Hometown: New York CityCurrently Lives: In a Spanish-style house in Los Angeles with her parents and two siblings.Claim to Fame: Ms. Singleton is an actress, singer, dancer and cellist who plays a young Serena Williams in “King Richard,” alongside Will Smith, who plays her father, Richard Williams.She started dancing at age 3, singing at age 7 and soon booked roles on Broadway. “King Richard” is her big-screen debut. “I just felt so loved and taken care of the entire time,” she said. She developed a sisterly bond with Saniyya Sidney, who plays Venus Williams. “We were on the phone with each other all day yesterday. We’re really like siblings now.”Big Break: Ms. Singleton started pursuing acting professionally at age 10, after seeing “Matilda” on Broadway. “I was able to see a bunch of young people doing what they love, and having so much fun on stage,” she said. “That’s what made me realize that I wanted to be an actress.”She booked “School of Rock” on Broadway shortly after signing with her first agency, and next played Young Nala in “The Lion King.” “It was hard in some ways, but it really wasn’t like work,” she said. “Being on Broadway is just fun, you just have an enjoyable time on stage.”Ms. Singleton plays Serena Williams in “King Richard.”Warner BrosLatest Project: For “King Richard,” which opened in theaters and HBO Max on Nov. 19, Ms. Singleton studied Serena Williams’s mannerisms, but nothing prepared her more than meeting the Williams sisters on set. “We had a very long conversation about their teenage dating lives,” she said. “It was really cool to get to see them from a different perspective, and see them talking about something other than what they’re famous for.”Next Thing: Ms. Singleton is hoping to release music within the next year, which she describes as a mix of pop and R&B. “The whole message of everything that I’m releasing is equality and love and kindness,” she said, “because we’re in such a weird time right now.”Learning Curve: Ms. Singleton had never played tennis before “King Richard.” She took three lessons before her final audition, because the casting directors wanted to see her and Ms. Sidney hit some balls together. “I was learning to play like a literal icon,” she said. “I had to mimic her. If I were to go play right now, I wouldn’t know how to play like anyone else but Serena Williams.” More

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      On the Scene: ‘Spring Awakening’ Returns 🎭

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      On the Scene: ‘Spring Awakening’ Returns �� Matt Stevens��Reporting from BroadwayMatt Stevens for The New York TimesTickets for the benefit, ranging from $50 to $5,000, sold out quickly. The line to enter the theater, on 45th Street near Eighth Avenue, would eventually stretch down the block.Because of delays seating attendees, the show started over an hour late. More