Amazon.com Inc

Subterms

    More stories

    • 75 Shares149 Views

      in Movies

      ‘My Fake Boyfriend’ Review: Deepfake Dating

      by

      A gay man gets trapped in a web of lies after his overeager best friend concocts an artificial relationship for him on social media.The real villain of “My Fake Boyfriend,” from the director Rose Troche, is New York City dating culture. Everyone seems perpetually ready to move onto the next hottie or hookup app that grabs their attention.That’s partly why Andrew — the protagonist, played by Keiynan Lonsdale — has been tolerating Nico (Marcus Rosner), an egomaniacal soap opera star. Aiming to cut Andrew off from Nico, Jake, Andrew’s best friend (played by Dylan Sprouse), devises a fake boyfriend for him, blasting Photoshopped couple pics all over Andrew’s social media timelines. His scheme yields mischief, reckonings, and, eventually, real romance.To set expectations, it’s best to think of “My Fake Boyfriend” as two movies. There’s the gay rom-com, focused on Andrew, that Pride month viewers have presumably tuned in for, and then there’s an almost “Black Mirror”-ish comedy, centered on Jake, about a meddling techie who gets caught up in his best friend’s life. Because it’s such a complex set piece — creating and maintaining a fake person online is quite an undertaking, even in this movie, where the logistics are oddly breezy — Jake’s pixelated dreamboat takes up screen time that could be better spent on Andrew’s quest for real love.That’s not to say Jake is a complete distraction. He has some of the zaniest lines, and Sprouse is delightfully game for all of them. But once Andrew meets Rafi (played by Samer Salem, who could probably seduce a wall), it’s hard to want to watch anything else. Their chemistry is off the charts, though this film’s R rating is tragically all talk, no action.My Fake BoyfriendRated R for rowdy humor. Running time: 1 hour 30 minutes. Watch on Amazon. More

    • 200 Shares169 Views

      in Movies

      The Best Movies and TV Shows Coming to HBO, Hulu, Apple TV+ and More in June

      by

      Every month, streaming services add movies and TV shows to their libraries. Here are our picks for some of June’s most promising new titles.(Note: Streaming services occasionally change schedules without giving notice. For more recommendations on what to stream, sign up for our Watching newsletter here.)Erin Doherty as Becky Green in “Chloe.”Luke Varley/Amazon StudiosNew to Amazon Prime‘Chloe’Starts streaming: June 24In this British psychological thriller series, Erin Doherty plays Becky Green, a clever schemer who is plagued with self-doubt and prone to daydreaming — like a cross between Patricia Highsmith’s Tom Ripley and James Thurber’s Walter Mitty. Becky has a habit of scrolling through social media accounts, looking for high-end parties to crash, which gets her into trouble when one of her favorite influencers, Chloe Fairbourne (Poppy Gilbert), mysteriously leaves her two phone messages before being found dead. Becky uses her uncanny ability to fit in with the elites to get close to Chloe’s friends, in hopes of figuring out what really happened.Also arriving:June 3“The Boys” Season 3June 10“Fairfax” Season 2June 17“The Lake” Season 1“The Summer I Turned Pretty” Season 1From left, Joel Kim Booster, Maya Rudolph and Ron Funches in Apple TV+’s “Loot.”Colleen Hayes/Apple TV+.New to Apple TV+‘For All Mankind’ Season 3Starts streaming: June 10Though “For All Mankind” has been one of TV’s best dramas since it debuted in 2019, it has never drawn much social media buzz or awards attention. Perhaps the more overtly science fiction-oriented Season 3 will win some new fans. The show is set in an alternate history where the 1960s Cold War space race between the United States and the Soviet Union escalated instead of petering out, leading to cultural changes for both nations — some subtle, some not — in the ensuing decades. Season 3 is set in the 1990s, as the push toward the stars extends to Mars, which the Americans and the Russians are scrambling to conquer first, while their respective governments deal with multiple political crises back on Earth.‘Loot’ Season 1Starts streaming: June 24The writer-producers Alan Yang and Matt Hubbard — the team behind the smart, strange afterlife dramedy “Forever” — team up again with the actress and producer Maya Rudolph for the sitcom “Loot.” Rudolph plays Molly, a recent divorcée who has billions of dollars at her disposal and no sense of direction in her life. She decides to rededicate herself to her charitable foundation, and quickly finds that decades of living in a bubble have left her way out of touch with the kind of people her money is meant to help. Mj Rodriguez plays the foundation’s director, who needs Molly’s money but doesn’t really want her input. “Loot” is essentially an old-fashioned workplace comedy, but rooted in the uniquely modern problem of mega-rich folks who want to leave a positive legacy but aren’t accustomed to taking advice.Explore the Marvel Cinematic UniverseThe popular franchise of superhero films and TV series continues to expand.‘Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness’: With a touch of horror, the franchise’s newest film returns to the world of the mystic arts.‘Moon Knight’: In the Disney+ mini-series, Oscar Isaac plays a caped crusader who struggles with dissociative identity disorder.‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’: In the latest installment of the “Spider-Man” series, the web slinger continues to radiate sweet, earnest decency.‘Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings’: The superhero originated in comics filled with racist stereotypes. The movie knocked them down.Also arriving:June 3“Physical” Season 2June 10“Lovely Little Farm”June 17“Cha Cha Real Smooth”“Home” Season 2Iman Vellani will play the latest Marvel hero in “Ms. Marvel.”Marvel/DisneyNew to Disney+‘Ms. Marvel’ Season 1Starts streaming: June 8This action-comedy series introduces one of the most popular new comic book superheroes of the past decade to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Iman Vellani plays Kamala Khan, an awkward 16-year-old Pakistani American girl from Jersey City, N.J., who is a superfan of the cosmic Avenger Carol Danvers, a.k.a. Captain Marvel. When Kamala inherits a device that gives her powers of her own, she has to balance her daily life as the daughter of strict Muslim parents with the wild experiences of a superhero-in-training. Less epic in scale than other Marvel movies and TV shows, “Ms. Marvel” — like the comics it’s based on — is really a coming-of-age story, featuring a hero who often feels like a hapless outsider whenever she’s not in costume.Also arriving:June 3“Hollywood Stargirl”June 10“Beyond Infinity: Buzz and the Journey to Lightyear”June 15“Family Reboot” Season 1June 24“Rise”“Trevor: The Musical”June 29“Baymax!” Season 1Alicia Vikander as Mira in “Irma Vep.”Carole Bethuel/HBONew to HBO Max‘Irma Vep’Starts streaming: June 6The French writer-director Olivier Assayas revisits and updates the themes of his 1996 film “Irma Vep” for this new mini-series, which, like the original, is about a movie crew remaking Louis Feuillade’s classic 1915-16 serial “Les Vampires.” Alicia Vikander plays Mira, an American actress who agrees to take the lead in the picture both to stretch her talents and to escape the pressures of being a big star. When Mira unexpectedly finds herself surrounded by indecisive crew members, duplicitous castmates and a parade of ex-lovers, she copes by disappearing more and more into her character: a devious master criminal. The particular details of this “Irma Vep” are different from the old version, but once again Assayas is interested in the peculiar ecosystem of a film set, which can be baffling to outsiders but welcoming to weirdos.‘The Janes’Starts streaming: June 8This timely documentary looks back at the years just before the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision laid the groundwork for abortion rights. Directed by Tia Lessin and Emma Pildes, “The Janes” covers a Chicago-based underground network that helped women procure safe and affordable abortions in the late 1960s and early ’70s. Using archival footage and new interviews, Lessin and Pildes recall how dangerous the pre-Roe America could be for women, whose needs were often overlooked by the male-dominated medical establishment — and who could be exploited by criminals out to make a quick buck from people too desperate to complain. The film is also about the era’s growing feminist movement, which was born in part from women bonding over common experiences rarely discussed in public.Also arriving:June 9“Amsterdam” Season 1“Summer Camp Island” Season 6June 16“Father of the Bride”June 23“Menudo: Forever Young”June 26“Westworld” Season 4June 30“Naked Mole Rat Gets Dressed: The Underground Rock Experience”John Lithgow in “The Old Man.”Kurt Iswarienko/FXNew to Hulu‘The Old Man’Starts streaming: June 17Based on a Thomas Perry novel, the road-trip thriller “The Old Man” stars Jeff Bridges as a former intelligence officer who has been in hiding for decades, living a relatively quiet life under the alias Dan Chase. When his past finally catches up with him, Chase goes on the run, pursued by an old associate (John Lithgow). The ex-spy’s faculties have dimmed considerably during his downtime, but he remembers enough tradecraft to keep the game going — even though he’s risking everything he holds dear just to stay alive and out of prison a little longer. “The Old Man” combines slam-bang action scenes with quieter character moments, in which grizzled warriors reflect on their successes and mistakes.‘Only Murders in the Building’ Season 2Starts streaming: June 28Last summer’s surprise streaming hit returns for a second season, with Steve Martin, Martin Short and Selena Gomez reprising their roles as New York neighbors who launch a true-crime podcast in an effort to solve a shocking crime in their apartment complex — and perhaps to revitalize their moribund personal lives. Season 1 of “Only Murders in the Building” ended with the amateur detectives finding the killer, then immediately becoming the chief suspects in yet another homicide. Expect another twisty and surprising mystery in Season 2, as well as more charming interplay between the show’s three main characters, who are each emotionally needy in their own way but fundamentally good-hearted.Also arriving:June 2“The Orville: New Horizons” Season 1June 3“Fire Island”June 13“The Worst Person in the World”June 15“Love, Victor” Season 3June 17“Good Luck to You, Leo Grande”June 23“The Bear” Season 1Annette Bening and Bryan Cranston as a couple who crack the Massachusetts lottery in “Jerry and Marge Go Large.”Jake Giles Netter/Paramount+New to Paramount+‘Jerry and Marge Go Large’Starts streaming: June 17Based on a true story, the dramedy “Jerry and Marge Go Large” stars Bryan Cranston as Jerry Selbee, a retired Michigan factory worker and amateur number-cruncher who discovers a glitch in the Massachusetts lottery’s odds and puts together a consortium of his small-town friends and neighbors to buy enough tickets to maximize returns. The community’s feel-good story hits a bump when a group of Harvard students discovers the same lottery loophole and conspires to drive the Selbees out of business. Directed by David Frankel from a Brad Copeland screenplay (adapting an article by Jason Fagone), the movie features a cast of older comedians and actors, including Annette Bening as Jerry’s wife, Marge.Also arriving:June 1“South Park: The Streaming Wars”June 12“Evil” Season 3June 16“Players” Season 1Jana Schmieding and Ed Helms in “Rutherford Falls.”Ron Batzdorff/PeacockNew to Peacock‘Rutherford Falls’ Season 2Starts streaming: June 16The first season of “Rutherford Falls” delivered incisive and funny riffs on the indelible stain of colonialism, via the story of a proud New England historian named Nathan Rutherford (Ed Helms) who sells tourists a skewed version of American history in which his ancestors worked happily arm-in-arm with the native Minishonka tribe. Season 2 picks up after last year’s big twist, which saw the Minishonka casino owner Terry Thomas (Michael Greyeyes) and Nathan’s best friend Reagan Wells (Jana Schmieding) seizing control of the town and choosing to maintain its idealized take on the past in order to enrich their own community. The power dynamic between these characters has changed, but the show’s writers are still coaxing dark comedy out of the many ways they scramble to maintain lies rather than face painful truths.Also arriving:June 14“Dateline: The Last Day” More

    • 213 Shares109 Views

      in Movies

      The Best Movies and TV Shows Coming to HBO Max, Hulu, Apple TV+ and More in May

      by

      Looking for something new to watch? Here’s a roundup of the most promising titles coming to most major U.S. streaming services (except Netflix) this month.Every month, streaming services add movies and TV shows to its library. Here are our picks for some of May’s most promising new titles. (Note: Streaming services occasionally change schedules without giving notice. For more recommendations on what to stream, sign up for our Watching newsletter here.)New to Amazon Prime Video‘Bosch: Legacy’ Season 1Starts streaming: May 6It’s not often that a new TV series begins with a “previously on” recap; but so it goes for “Bosch: Legacy,” a sequel to Amazon’s long-running crime drama “Bosch,” which adapted several of Michael Connelly’s popular novels about the Los Angeles police detective Harry Bosch (Titus Welliver). A flagship title for Amazon’s newly rebranded, ad-supported Amazon Freevee service (previously known as IMDb TV), “Bosch: Legacy” follows the title character after he quits the force and becomes a private investigator. While Bosch is working a case involving a dying billionaire (William Devane) who is looking for a living heir, his daughter, Maddie (Madison Lintz), follows in her dad’s footsteps and becomes a cop — although she struggles with the grind of being a lowly rookie on patrol.Also arriving:May 6“The Unsolved Murder of Beverly Lynn Smith”“The Wilds” Season 2May 13“The Kids in the Hall”May 18“Lovestruck High”May 19“Bang Bang Baby” Season 1May 20“Kids in the Hall: Comedy Punks”“Night Sky” Season 1“Troppo”May 27“Emergency”“Kick Like Tayla”Claire Danes and Tom Hiddleston in a scene from “The Essex Serpent.”Apple TV+New to Apple TV+‘The Big Conn’Starts streaming: May 6The writer-director team of James Lee Hernandez and Brian Lazarte follow up their offbeat true crime docu-series “McMillions” with another strange-but-true story: “The Big Conn,” a four-part documentary about a Kentucky lawyer who masterminded a half-billion dollar Social Security swindle. The attorney is Eric C. Conn, a media-savvy hustler who became something of a local celebrity thanks to his kooky commercials and his ability to get his clients paid quickly. All the while, he was burning through wives, running multiple barely legal vice dens and entangling the witting and the unwitting in a scheme to defraud the government. Hernandez and Lazarte capture the odd turns this tale took, with the help of the investigators and journalists involved with this case — many of whom question how and why Conn eluded justice for so long.‘The Essex Serpent’Starts streaming: May 13Based on the 2016 Sarah Perry novel, the mini-series “The Essex Serpent” stars Claire Danes as a late 19th century English widow whose scientific curiosity leads her to the countryside to investigate rumors of a lake-dwelling monster she thinks might actually be a dinosaur. Her fervor puts her at odds with two men: a progressive young doctor (Frank Dillane) and a congenial local minister (Tom Hiddleston), both of whom are skeptical of the creature’s existence but for different reasons. The screenwriter Anna Symon and the director Clio Barnard explore the eerie possibilities of their premise in a community prone to superstition and to mistrust of outsiders. The show is about the relationships between smart, well-meaning people who disagree about the very nature of the world.Also arriving:May 6“Tehran” Season 2May 20“Now and Then”May 23“Prehistoric Planet”“Obi-Wan Kenobi” (starring Ewan McGregor) tells a story set between Episode III and Episode IV of the “Star Wars” movies.Lucasfilm Ltd.New to Disney+‘The Quest’Starts streaming: May 11Although it ran for only one season on ABC in the fall of 2014, the sword-and-sorcery themed reality competition series “The Quest” is fondly remembered for its inventive concept, clever execution and lovably sincere contestants. The new Disney+ revival makes a few changes. The competitors are now can-do teenagers instead of earnestly geeky adults; and the show’s overall visual style looks more like a movie, obscuring the line between fantasy and the real-life game these kids are playing. But the basic contest remains the same. The participants are playacting as “paladins,” roaming through a fictional medieval world filled with magic and conflict, where they try to succeed at various challenges. Combine “Game of Thrones,” “Survivor” and an escape room, and that’s “The Quest.”‘Obi-Wan Kenobi’Starts streaming: May 27The latest addition to the “Star Wars” TV universe fills some of the gaps between the movie trilogies, telling a story set between Episode III and Episode IV. Ewan McGregor reprises his big-screen role as Obi-Wan Kenobi, a disillusioned Jedi Master living in hiding on the planet Tatooine, where he stews over the corruption of his student Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen) and keeps a distant eye on Anakin’s young son, Luke. “Obi-Wan Kenobi” was originally developed as a stand-alone film, which later evolved into this six-episode mini-series. The show should answer some longstanding fan questions about what the eccentric old hermit Kenobi was up to for all those years in exile while waiting for Luke to grow up.Also arriving:May 13“Sneakerella”May 20“Chip ‘n’ Dale: Rescue Rangers”May 27“We Feed People”Theo James and Rose Leslie in a scene from “The Time Traveler’s Wife.”Macall B. Polay/HBONew to HBO Max‘Hacks’ Season 2Starts streaming: May 12In Season 1 of “Hacks,” we met Ava Daniels (Hannah Einbinder), a hip comedy writer who landed a job writing jokes for the fading Las Vegas stand-up comic Deborah Vance (Jean Smart) and then settled into a love-hate relationship with her wealthy but demanding new boss and mentor. In Season 2, Deborah will head out on tour to get back in touch with her roots as Ava caters to her whims, pushes her to try harder and tries to avoid making her too angry. In addition to the terrific performances by the leads, “Hacks” is often a frank interrogation of the cruelties of show business, as experienced by two talented women at different points in their careers.‘The Time Traveler’s Wife’Starts streaming: May 15Audrey Niffenegger’s best-selling 2003 novel “The Time Traveler’s Wife” has been adapted to the screen before, for a hit 2009 movie. But the new TV version — created by the “Doctor Who” and “Sherlock” producer Steven Moffat — has the room to sprawl out a bit and cover more of the premise’s metaphysical nuances. Theo James plays Henry, who has a genetic condition that yanks him unpredictably back and forth through time, often landing him near Clare (Rose Leslie), the woman he marries. The couple nearly always meet while they’re at wildly different places on their respective timelines, such that sometimes she knows more than he does about what’s happening, or vice versa. Moffat and his creative team lean into the humor, tension and irony of this situation while hewing to Niffenegger’s central idea that these two are inextricably linked because they are hopelessly in love.Also arriving:May 3“Spring Awakening: Those You’ve Known”May 5“Las Bravas F.C.” Season 1“Queen Stars Brazil” Season 1“The Staircase”May 10“Catwoman: Hunted”May 12“Who’s by Your Side” Season 1May 26“Navalny”“That Damn Michael Che” Season 2“Tig ‘n’ Seek” Season 4Jessica Biel as the real-life murderer Candy Montgomery, in a scene from the Hulu series “Candy.”HuluNew to Hulu‘Candy’Starts streaming: May 9In June of 1980, a woman named Betty Gore was found murdered in her suburban Dallas home, with 41 ax wounds on her body. The prime suspect? One of her best friends, Candy Montgomery, who had an affair with Betty’s husband. The mini-series “Candy” begins on the day of the murder and compares the life of the charismatic, churchgoing Candy (Jessica Biel) with the depressed, exhausted Betty (Melanie Lynskey). The “Candy” creators Nick Antosca (best-known for his horror anthology “Channel Zero”) and Robin Veith (a multiple Emmy nominee for her work on “Mad Men”) cover the ensuing criminal investigation and trial while also flashing back to the years leading up the event, considering how these intertwined lives went so awry.Also arriving:May 6“Hatching”May 10“Breeders” Season 3May 15“Conversations With Friends”May 20“The Valet”May 26“A Taste of Hunger”May 27“Shoresy” Season 1May 31“GameStop: Rise of the Players”“Pistol”Ethan Peck as a young Spock in a scene from the new “Star Trek” series “Strange New Worlds.”Marni Grossman/Paramount+New to Paramount+‘Star Trek: Strange New Worlds’ Season 1Starts streaming: May 5In Season 2 of “Star Trek: Discovery,” that show’s starship crew had an adventure alongside some Federation comrades, including Captain Christopher Pike (Anson Mount) and Science Officer Spock (Ethan Peck) of the U.S.S. Enterprise. “Star Trek” fans raved about Mount’s commanding and charming performance, playing a key character from the franchise’s mythology; so now he and Peck’s Spock are returning in “Star Trek: Strange New Worlds,” which follows the journeys of the Enterprise in the years before Captain James T. Kirk (the hero of the original 1960s TV series) took command. “Strange New Worlds” retains the serialized elements that have become common to modern “Star Trek” series; but it also hearkens to the older shows by featuring more episodic stories.Also arriving:May 11“The Challenge: All Stars” Season 3May 15“Joe Pickett” Season 1May 20“RuPaul’s Drag Race: All Stars” Season 7From left, Busy Philipps, Sara Bareilles, Renée Elise Goldsberry and Paula Pell in a scene from the new season of “Girls5Eva.”PeacockNew to Peacock‘Girls5eva’ Season 2Starts streaming: May 5The first season of the delightful “Girls5eva” offered a witty and insightful peek inside the modern music business from the perspective of four middle-aged singers — formerly a chart-topping girl group — who attempt a comeback at a time when MTV matters less than TikTok. As Season 2 begins, the ladies seem to be on an upswing, ready to record a new album after a breakout moment at a national showcase. But family obligations and the limitations of their aging bodies threaten to stall their momentum. Once again, the creator Meredith Scardino and her writing staff keep the jokes and the savvy pop culture references flying while always honoring the dignity and the dreams of these four friends. The women of Girls5Eva are often ridiculous, but never hopeless.Also arriving:May 13“Firestarter”May 19“Angelyne”“Dragons Rescue Riders: Heroes of the Sky” Season 3May 24“Sins of the Amish” More

    • 113 Shares149 Views

      in Television

      A Duchess Brought Low by ‘A Very British Scandal’

      by

      In a new show on Prime Video, Claire Foy plays a British aristocrat whose sex life became the subject of salacious tabloid stories in the 1960s.LONDON — Everybody loves a sex scandal, and a posh one is even better. The great and the good brought down in disgrace: That’s a story people want to hear.In “A Very British Scandal,” a three-part series streaming on Prime Video from April 22, Claire Foy plays the Duchess of Argyll, a real-life aristocrat whose sex life was pored over in a 1960s court case that created a media frenzy and riveted the nation. When the BBC aired “A Very British Scandal” this past December, nearly 7 million people tuned in.The show is a companion to “A Very English Scandal,” another hugely popular Amazon-BBC coproduction in which Hugh Grant played an upper-crust politician who suffered a similar fate.These stories, Foy said in a recent interview, appealed to elements of Britain’s national character. “We’re perverts, aren’t we?” Foy said. “Deep down, all British people love it: We love gossip and love the titillating things other people are getting up to,” she added. “Anything that happens behind closed doors, we’re all completely obsessed with.”In the show’s final episode, one of the duchess’s aristocratic friends bemoans the British public’s desire to know what the upper classes are up to. “The little people in their grubby pits look up to us, because we are not them,” says the friend, played by Julia Davis. But stories about the duchess’s sex life, she says, “are dragging us down so we look just like them.”Foy’s character was never one of “the little people,” but she wasn’t always an aristocrat, either. She was born Margaret Whigham, in Scotland, in 1912. Her father, a self-made textiles millionaire, moved the family to New York when she was a child, and she lived there until she was 14. Back in Britain, she became a much-photographed debutante with a fancy trans-Atlantic sheen, and a fixture of newspaper society pages. After a string of high-profile relationships and a first marriage that ended in divorce, she became the Duchess of Argyll in 1951 when she married the duke, Ian Campbell (played by Paul Bettany in the show), whose family had been part of the Scottish aristocracy since the 1400s.A glamorous A-lister who counted society columnists as her friends, the duchess cultivated a chic media image. And she realized early on she could make money from what we would now call her “personal brand,” taking cash from tabloid newspapers to appear in fawning articles. (“Beautiful! Rich! Distinguished!” read a teaser for a 1961 Daily Mirror splash. “This is the Duchess of Argyll the world knows.”)The duchess, photographed in 1955 for magazine coverage of the London social season. She initially had a symbiotic relationship with the British press. Bert Hardy/Hulton Archive/Getty ImagesBut when her marriage to the duke broke down, she lost control of the story. The couple’s nasty divorce case — in which the duchess’s intimate photos were presented in court — made her the subject of salacious newspaper articles and gossipy anecdotes, and later, “A Very British Scandal” and even an opera.During the trial, the duke submitted a list of 88 men he said the duchess had slept with during their marriage, as well as Polaroids he had stolen from her that showed the duchess performing oral sex on an unknown man whose head was not in the frame.Ruling in the duke’s favor to grant the divorce in 1963, the judge said the duchess was a “completely promiscuous woman” who had indulged “in disgusting sexual activities to gratify a debased sexual appetite.” The details of the “headless man” photos were gleefully written up in British newspapers, which raked over the case for months. Margaret the glittering socialite became Margaret “the dirty duchess.”Over the rest of her life, she frittered away the fortune she inherited from her father on a series of unsuccessful law suits and dubious investments. Her personal relations didn’t fare much better: She fell out with a daughter from her first marriage, and many of her friends. The duchess died in penury, at 80, in a London retirement home. The first hymn at her funeral, in 1993, began, “Dear Lord and father of mankind, forgive our foolish ways.”Sarah Phelps, who wrote the script for “A Very British Scandal,” said that the duchess’s case and the media furor around it represented “the end of an era.” It was “the birth of a different kind of journalism, and a way of writing about sex and scandal in a very, very prurient way,” she said. And it paved the way for later media depictions of Britney Spears, Amy Winehouse and Meghan Markle — “that viciousness and anger that is directed at women in the public eye,” she said.When the initial outrage faded, the duchess remained the subject of snickering innuendos for decades. Grinning men would pose for photos beside the boarding sign for a Scottish boat that shared her name: “Queue here for the Duchess of Argyll.” Today’s TV audiences will have more sympathy for the duchess, who now looks like a victim of “slut-shaming,” and the nonconsensual sharing of her photos like “revenge porn.” It’s unlikely many viewers will judge her for a sex act that some women’s magazines now offer tips on performing. Yet they might still find it hard to warm to the duchess, who Foy plays as an arrogant, scheming snob.“She lied and she cheated, and she did all sorts of really awful things,” Foy said. “In her defense, they were also done to her.”As a person in the public eye, she sympathized with the duchess and her treatment by the press. “She was one thing, and then they decided she was something else,” Foy said. “Journalists dictate the public perception of you in my industry,” she added. “You are completely in the hands of the people who write the story.”Allison Cook portrayed the duchess in a 2013 production of the opera “Powder Her Face,” staged at the Brooklyn Academy of Music.Sara krulwich/The New York TimesAnother author of the duchess’s story is the British composer Thomas Adès, whose 1995 opera “Powder Her Face” casts her as its antiheroine. First presented at the Cheltenham Festival in England, when Adès was just 24, “Powder Her Face” has since been performed over 300 times across Europe and the United States, according to Faber, its publisher.Adès said he started out by looking for a classic operatic plot: “someone in a grand position, who’s outwardly very strong and impressive, who is dismantled and brought low by forces from the outside.” Philip Hensher, the opera’s librettist, remembered the Argyll divorce case, Adès said: The duchess fit the bill perfectly.Whereas “A Very British Scandal” ends with the courtroom judgment, “Powder Her Face” picks up at the end of the duchess’s life, when she was broke and holed up in a hotel she couldn’t afford. In a series of dreamy flashbacks, Adès recreates some key vignettes from the story of her life, including the liaison with “the headless man” as an aria from the duchess that begins with words and ends with humming.“You can’t really pretend that she’s an entirely sympathetic character, that she’s Mimì,” said Adès, referring to the fragile seamstress who dies of tuberculosis in Puccini’s “La Bohème,” “as much as I think she’s such a tragic figure.” The duchess, he added, was “formidable, and did plenty of things that were pretty questionable.”Paul Bettany, center left, plays the duke in “A Very British Scandal,” alongside Foy’s duchess.Alan Peebles/Amazon Prime VideoDespite a persistent whiff of scandal, the duchess continued to lead an active life in London high society for most of the rest of her life, said Lady Colin Campbell, a relative by marriage. “She was certainly a notoriety, but she was never a pariah. People would gossip and say, ‘Oh, look who’s here: Margaret Argyll,’” said Lady Campbell, 72. “But she rose above it, as simple as that. She simply ignored it,” she added.In her later years, when money was running low, the duchess tried again “to convert her fame into income,” Lady Campbell said. In 1986, Margaret published “My Dinner Party Book,” a guide to entertaining, aimed at housewives, that nonetheless included advice like “never invite the Lord Chancellor and two ambassadors to your dinner party at the same time.” (The book did not sell well, Lady Campbell said.)Two years later, at 76, the duchess appeared on “Wogan,” the BBC’s flagship chat show. The presenter, Terry Wogan, trod carefully around the incident that had made her most famous, gently asking, “What about your own story? Your own story was extremely colorful — do you think it would make a good plot?”“Oh, let’s pray not,” the duchess replied. “Let’s not even think about that.” More

    • 200 Shares169 Views

      in Television

      The Best Movies and TV Shows Coming to HBO, Hulu, Apple TV+ and More in April

      by

      Every month, streaming services add movies and TV shows to their libraries. Here are our picks for some of April’s most promising new titles.(Note: Streaming services occasionally change schedules without giving notice. For more recommendations on what to stream, sign up for our Watching newsletter here.)Rinko Kikuchi in “Tokyo Vice.”Eros Hoagland/HBO MaxNew to HBO Max‘Tokyo Vice’ Season 1Starts streaming: April 7This TV adaptation of the journalist Jake Adelstein’s memoir is a spiritual successor of the influential 1980s show “Miami Vice,” examining organized crime and its effect on a nation’s social order in the 1990s. Ansel Elgort plays Adelstein, who struggles to be accepted as an American working in the highly competitive Japanese newspaper business. He later gains respect when he begins investigating the Yakuza. Created by the Tony-winning playwright J.T. Rogers (best known for “Oslo”), “Tokyo Vice” explores the complexities of class and race in an era when Japanese business was booming and some of the people making money didn’t want anyone — and especially not some upstart foreigner — to look too closely at how and why.‘The Flight Attendant’ Season 2Starts streaming: April 21Although Season 1 of “The Flight Attendant” deftly — and thoroughly — adapted Chris Bohjalian’s thriller novel of the same name, the series was so well-received that it was bound to get a sequel. At the start of Season 2, the alcoholic flight attendant Cassie (played by Kaley Cuoco, also one of the show’s executive producers) has cleaned up her life after helping international law enforcement solve a murder for which she was once the prime suspect. In the new episodes, Cassie settles into her new part-time gig as a spy and gets caught up in another dangerous mystery. Much of the series’ terrific supporting casts returns, including Rosie Perez as Cassie’s friendly colleague and Zosia Mamet as her best pal.‘Barry’ Season 3Starts streaming: April 24After a three-year layoff, Bill Hader returns as the hit man and aspiring actor Barry Berkman in the dark comedy “Barry,” the series he cocreated with Alec Berg. Season 2 took chances with its story, playing up the inherent absurdity of a stoic killer getting in touch with his feelings in a drama class. Taking cues from classic modern TV crime dramas like “Breaking Bad,” Hader and Berg ratcheted up the tension as Barry ducked the mob, the law and a vengeful old associate played by Stephen Root. Season 3 will continue down that path, while also spoofing the pretensions of Hollywood wannabes, including the promising ingénue Sally (Sarah Goldberg) and the big-hearted acting coach Gene (Henry Winkler).‘We Own This City’Starts streaming: April 25The latest Baltimore-centered series from David Simon, creator of “The Wire,” is a collaboration with his frequent writing partner, the best-selling crime novelist George Pelecanos. Based on the crime reporter Justin Fenton’s nonfiction book of the same name, “We Own This City” stars Jon Bernthal as Sgt. Wayne Jenkins, who becomes involved with Baltimore’s Gun Trace Task Force, a well-meaning but ultimately corrupt organization that attempted to quell crime by tracking how gangs armed themselves. Set in the years immediately after the city’s police department came under increased scrutiny because of the death of Freddie Gray in its custody, “We Own This City” is a gritty drama about how some entrenched institutions respond to attempts at reform: by learning the new laws well enough to skirt them.Also arriving:April 4“The Invisible Pilot”April 5“Tony Hawk: Until the Wheels Fall Off”April 8“A Black Lady Sketch Show” Season 3April 14“The Garcias” Season 1April 24“The Baby” Season 1April 27“The Survivor”April 28“The Way Down: God, Greed, and the Cult of Gwen Shamblin” Part 2Cynthia Erivo in “Roar.”Apple TV+New to Apple TV+‘Slow Horses’ Season 1Starts streaming: April 1Gary Oldman stars in this twisty British spy drama as Jackson Lamb, the grouchy supervisor of a ramshackle MI5 division known as Slough House, where disgraced agents are sent to do drudge work. Jack Lowden plays River Cartwright, a young operative determined to claw his way back from the bottom by doing some unauthorized investigating on a tricky case — and ends up dragging his misfit cohorts into it. Based on a Mick Herron series of mystery-thriller novels, “Slow Horses” features a terrific cast (including Olivia Cooke as Cartwright’s savvy-but-cynical colleague, Jonathan Pryce as his disappointed father and Kristin Scott Thomas as an upper-level MI5 boss) and a plot rooted equally in old-fashioned espionage stories and the modern realities of European security.‘Roar’ Season 1Starts streaming: April 15The writer-producer team of Liz Flahive and Carly Mensch — the cocreators of the TV series “GLOW” — go the anthology route with their new project “Roar,” which features lightly surreal half-hour dramas and comedies about women struggling to be seen and heard. Nicole Kidman is an executive producer, and also stars in one episode as an Australian woman taking her increasingly senile mother (Judy Davis) on a road trip, in a desperate effort to keep their family memories alive. Other episodes feature Issa Rae, as a best-selling author who travels to Hollywood and gets ignored by the people who want to adapt her book; Betty Gilpin, as a retired model whose husband (Daniel Dae Kim) puts her on a shelf as a literal trophy wife; and Merritt Wever, as a woman who falls in love with a duck.Also arriving:April 8“Pinecone & Pony” Season 1April 22“They Call Me Magic”April 29“Shining Girls”Andrew Garfield in “Under the Banner of Heaven.”Michelle Faye/FXNew to Hulu‘Under the Banner of Heaven’Starts streaming: April 28In Jon Krakauer’s controversial 2003 nonfiction book “Under the Banner of Heaven,” the author combined the true story of a heinous crime committed by a Mormon splinter group with the story of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints itself — making the argument that the line between fringe fanaticism and mainstream religion is thinner than many presume. The TV adaptation was written by the Oscar-winning “Milk” screenwriter Dustin Lance Black, who grew up Mormon (and who also worked on the HBO series “Big Love,” about polygamous families in Utah). This mini-series focuses mainly on the murders covered in Krakauer’s book, with Andrew Garfield playing the detective investigating the case.Also arriving:April 1“Love Me” Season 1“Night Raiders”“Snakehead”April 4“Madagascar: A Little Wild” Season 7April 5“The Croods: Family Tree” Season 2“Monster Family 2: Nobody’s Perfect”April 6“The Hardy Boys” Season 2April 7“Agnes”April 8“Woke” Season 2April 9“American Sicario”April 10“The Hating Game”April 14“The Kardashians” Season 1April 21“Captive Audience”April 29“Crush”Rueby Wood, center, as Nate in “Better Nate Than Ever.”David Lee/Disney+New to Disney+‘Better Nate Than Ever’Starts streaming: April 1Based on Tim Federle’s Y.A. novel, “Better Nate Than Ever” tells the story of the enthusiastic and socially awkward middle school theater kid Nate Foster (Rueby Wood), who hops a bus from Pittsburgh with his best friend Libby (Aria Brooks) to attend an open audition for a Broadway musical. Federle wrote and directed this movie adaptation, which retains two of the central ideas from his book: that it takes a winning personality and a lot of good luck to make it in show business, and that Nate won’t succeed until he is honest with himself and with his loved ones about his sexuality. Lisa Kudrow plays a pivotal role as Nate’s Aunt Heidi, whose fading dreams of stage stardom still inspire her nephew.Also arriving:April 13“Scrat Tales” Season 1April 22“The Biggest Little Farm: The Return”“Explorer: The Last Tepui”“Polar Bear”April 27“Sketchbook” Season 1New to Peacock‘Killing It’ Season 1Starts streaming: April 14The affable comic actor Craig Robinson anchors the half-hour dramedy “Killing It,” playing a particular kind of Florida Man: an unflappable dreamer named Craig, who keeps pursuing his plans to become an entrepreneur even as he stumbles repeatedly into catastrophes. Rell Battle plays Craig’s brother Isaiah, who tries to lure him into a life of crime, while Claudia O’Doherty plays Jillian, an upbeat Australian ride-share driver who presents him with a strange and uniquely Floridian business opportunity: the chance to kill giant snakes for reward money. Cocreated by the “Brooklyn Nine-Nine” writers Luke Del Tredici and Dan Goor, “Killing It” is a show about people following especially rocky paths as they chase their versions of the American Dream.Also arriving:April 20“So Dumb It’s Criminal” Season 1April 28“Smother” Season 2Christopher Walken in “The Outlaws.”James Pardon/Amazon StudiosNew to Prime Video‘The Outlaws’ Season 1Starts streaming: April 1Stephen Merchant is best known for co-writing the Ricky Gervais sitcoms “The Office” and “Extras,” but he tries something different with “The Outlaws,” a show halfway between a broad comedy and a crime drama. Merchant plays one of a handful of eclectic British citizens sentenced to community service to atone for various petty misdemeanors. As they shovel garbage in a blighted neighborhood, the members of this motley crew get to know each other, learning there’s more to their lives than their mistakes. The cast of cons also includes Christopher Walken as an aged reprobate, Darren Boyd as an uptight businessman, Eleanor Tomlinson as a celebrity influencer, Rhianne Barreto as an honors student who compulsively shoplifts, and Gamba Cole as a reluctant gangster who accidentally gets everyone into bigger trouble.Also arriving:April 8“All the Old Knives”April 15“Outer Range” Season 1April 29“Undone” Season 2 More

    • 88 Shares149 Views

      in Television

      Why TV-Inspired Vacations Are on the Rise

      by

      TV-themed itineraries are on the rise, taking travelers on adventures with familiar shows during a time of uncertainty.With 70 percent of Americans watching more TV in 2021 than they did in 2020, binge-watching has skyrocketed during the pandemic. Now, as borders reopen, restrictions ease and travel restarts, tour advisers are fielding an increasingly popular request: immersive, TV-themed itineraries that allow travelers to live out their favorite shows’ story lines.In Britain, where all travel restrictions are now lifted, hotels in London have partnered with Netflix to offer Lady Whistledown-themed teas inspired by “Bridgerton” high society. In Yellowstone National Park, travelers are arriving in Wyoming not for a glimpse of Old Faithful, but for a chance to cosplay as John Dutton from the hit drama “Yellowstone.”And in South Korea, where vaccinated travelers can now enter without quarantine, street food vendors on Jeju Island are anticipating a run on dalgona candy, the honeycomb toffees that played a central role in “Squid Game.”“When you fall in love with a character, you can’t get it out of your mind,” said Antonina Pattiz, 30, a blogger who last year got hooked on “Outlander,” the steamy, time-traveling drama about Claire Beauchamp, a nurse transported 200 years back in history. Ms. Pattiz and her husband, William, binge-watched the Starz show together, and are now planning an “Outlander”-themed trip to Scotland in May to visit sites from the show, including Midhope Castle, which stands in as Lallybroch, the family home of another character, Jamie Fraser.Mr. Pattiz is part Scottish, Ms. Pattiz said, and their joint interest in the show kicked off a desire on his part to explore his roots. “You watch the show and you really start to connect with the characters and you just want to know more,” she said.The fifth season of “Outlander” was available in February 2020, and Starz’s 142 percent increase in new subscribers early in the pandemic has been largely attributed to a jump in locked-down viewers discovering the show. During the ensuing two-year hiatus before Season 6 recently hit screens — a period of time known by fans as “Droughtlander” — “Outlander”-related attractions in Scotland, like Glencoe, which appears in the show’s opening credits and the Palace of Holyroodhouse, saw more than 1.7 million visitors. “Outlander”-related content on Visit Scotland’s website generated more than 350,000 page views, ahead of content pegged to the filming there of Harry Potter and James Bond movies.The Pattizs, who live in New York City, will follow a 12-day self-driving sample itinerary provided by Visit Scotland, winding from Edinburgh to Fife to Glasgow as they visit castles and gardens where Claire fell in love and Jamie’s comrades died in battle. Private tour companies, including Nordic Visitor and Inverness Tours, have also unveiled customized tours.The ‘Sex and the City’ UniverseThe sprawling franchise revolutionized how women were portrayed on the screen. And the show isn’t over yet. A New Series: Carrie, Miranda and Charlotte return for another strut down the premium cable runway in “And Just Like That,” streaming on HBO. Off Broadway: Candace Bushnell, whose writing gave birth to the “Sex and the City” universe, stars in her one-woman show based on her life. In Carrie’s Footsteps: “Sex and the City” painted a seductive vision of Manhattan, inspiring many young women to move to the city. The Origins: For the show’s 20th anniversary in 2018, Bushnell shared how a collection of essays turned into a pathbreaking series.Enduring trend, new intensityScreen tourism, which encompasses not just pilgrimages to filming locations but also studio tours and visits to amusement parks like The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, is an enduring trend. Tourists flocked to Salzburg in the 1960s after the release of “The Sound of Music”; in recent decades, locations like New Zealand saw a huge bump in visits from “Lord of the Rings” fans and bus tours in New York City have offered tourists a chance to go on location of “Sex and the City” and “The Marvelous Ms. Maisel.”But in this pandemic moment, where travel has for months been synonymous with danger and tourists are navigating conflicting desires to safeguard their health while also making up for squandered time, screen tourism is taking on a new intensity, said Rachel Kazez, a Chicago-based mental health therapist. She has clients eager to travel — another major trend for 2022 is “going big” — but they are looking for ways to tamp down the anxiety that may accompany those supersized ambitions.She said her patients increasingly are saying “‘I was cooped up for a year and I just want to go nuts. Let’s do whatever fantasy we’ve been thinking about’.”“If we’ve been watching a TV show, we know everything about it, and we can go and have a totally immersive experience that’s also extremely predictable,” Ms. Kazez continued. Cyndi Lam, a pharmacist in Fairfax, Va., has longed to go to Morocco for years. But she didn’t feel confident pulling the trigger until last month, when “Inventing Anna,” the nine-episode drama about the sham heiress Anna Delvey, began streaming on Netflix.In episode six of “Inventing Anna,” the character flies to Marrakesh and stays at La Mamounia, a lavish five-star resort. Ms. Lam and her husband are now booked to stay there in September.“Everybody can kind of relate to Anna,” Ms. Lam said. “I found her character to be fascinating, and when she went to Morocco, I was like, ‘OK, we’re going to Morocco.’ It sealed the deal.”In December, Club Wyndham teamed up with Hallmark Channel to design three suites tied to the “Countdown to Christmas” holiday movie event. They sold out in seven hours.Courtesy of Club WyndhamSensing a new desire among guests to tap into the scripted universe, dozens of hotels over the past year have rolled out themed suites inspired by popular shows. Graduate Hotels has a “Stranger Things”-themed suite at its Bloomington, Ind., location, with areas designed like the living room and basement of central characters like the Byers. A blinking alphabet of Christmas lights and Eleven’s favorite Eggo waffles are included. And in December, Club Wyndham teamed up with the Hallmark Channel to design three “Countdown to Christmas”-themed suites where guests could check in and binge Christmas films. They sold out in seven hours.“It was the first time we’d done anything like this,” said Lara Richardson, chief marketing officer for Crown Media Family Networks, in an email. “One thing we hear over and over from viewers is that, as much they love our products, they want to step inside a ‘Countdown to Christmas’ movie.”Vacation homes are also going immersive. For families, Airbnb partnered with BBC to list the Heeler House, a real-world incarnation of the animated home on the beloved animated series “Bluey,” and Vrbo has 10 rental homes inspired by “Yes Day,” the 2021 Netflix film about parents who remove “no” from their vocabulary. Celebrities are jumping in, too: Issa Rae, creator and star of HBO’s “Insecure,” offered an exclusive look at her neighborhood in South Los Angeles in February with a special Airbnb listing, at a rock-bottom price of $56.Tea on TV, now in London (and Boston)“Bridgerton,” Netflix’s British period drama about family, love and savage gossip, was streamed by 82 million households in 2021. (For comparison, the finale of “Breaking Bad” in 2013 had 10.3 million viewers; more recent streaming hits, including “Tiger King” and “Maid,” had fewer than 70 million). When season two of “Bridgerton” premieres on March 25, Beaverbrook Town House, a hotel built across two Georgian townhouses in London’s Chelsea, will offer a “Bridgerton” experience that includes a day out in London and drinks in the British countryside; nearby at the Lanesborough, a Bridgerton-themed tea, cheekily dubbed “the social event of the season,” will kick off the same day. In Boston, the Fairmont Copley Plaza now has a “High Society Package” for fans with flowers and a private afternoon tea.Contiki, the group travel company for 18- to 35-year-olds, had a “Bridgerton”-themed itinerary set for September 2021 but had to scrap it when the Delta variant hit; they’ve now partnered with Amazon Prime on a Hawaiian Islands trip inspired by “I Know What You Did Last Summer” set for July.Both Netflix and Amazon Prime have brand partnership teams that handle collaborations of this nature.“As we come out of this pandemic, the desire for more immersive experiences is really stronger than ever,” said Adam Armstrong, Contiki’s chief executive. “It’s about getting under the skin of destinations, creating those Instagrammable moments that recreate stuff from films and movies. It’s really a strong focus for us.”The popularity of “Bridgerton” on Netflix was eclipsed by “Squid Game,” the high-stakes South Korean survival drama, and despite that show’s carnage, travelers are booking Squid Game vacations, too. Remote Lands, an Asia-focused travel agency, reported a 25 percent increase in interest in South Korean travel and created a Seoul guide for fans and a customized itinerary.Some travel advisers say that some clients don’t even want to explore the locations they’re traveling to. They just want to be there while they continue binge-watching.Emily Lutz, a travel adviser in Los Angeles, said that more than 20 percent of her total requests over the past few months have been for travel to Yellowstone National Park, a result of the popularity of “Yellowstone,” the western family drama starring Kevin Costner on the Paramount Network and other streaming services. And not all of her clients are interested in hiking.“I had a client who wrote me and said, ‘All we want to do is rent a lodge in the mountains, sit in front of the fireplace, and watch episodes of ‘Yellowstone’ — while we’re in Yellowstone’,” she said.52 Places for a Changed WorldThe 2022 list highlights places around the globe where travelers can be part of the solution.Follow New York Times Travel on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. And sign up for our weekly Travel Dispatch newsletter to receive expert tips on traveling smarter and inspiration for your next vacation. Dreaming up a future getaway or just armchair traveling? Check out our 52 Places for a Changed World for 2022. More

    • 138 Shares189 Views

      in Television

      Streaming Companies Are Looking to Britain for Studios to Meet Demand

      by

      Netflix, Amazon Prime and other studios are snapping up soundstages in Britain and building more, drawn by an experienced labor pool and alluring tax incentives.LIVERPOOL, England — For two decades, the Littlewoods building in Liverpool, a long, low-slung and cavernous space built to house a betting and mail-order company in the 1930s, sat abandoned. No one wanted to take on this crumbling hulk looming on the outskirts of the city.Until Lynn Saunders. She is the driving force to make it the center of Liverpool’s first film and TV studio complex.“It’s a beast of a site,” said Ms. Saunders, the head of the Liverpool Film Office. It had been too intimidating for most prospective buyers. But amid a boom in TV and film production in Britain, Littlewoods Studios is now one of at least two dozen major plans to build or expand studio space across Britain.Streaming platforms like Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon Prime Video are racing to meet insatiable demand for content and have chosen Britain as their location to make it, countering the malaise of overall investment in the nation since it voted to leave the European Union. In 2021, a record 5.6 billion pounds ($7.4 billion) was spent on film and high-end TV productions in Britain, nearly 30 percent more than the previous high in 2019, according to the British Film Institute. More than 80 percent of that money was coming ashore from American studios or other foreign productions.Lynn Saunders, the head of the Liverpool Film Office, hopes that adding studios will keep productions in town and stimulate the local economy.Francesca Jones for The New York TimesAssured that there is no imminent end to the desire for binge-worthy shows and movies, studios, property developers and local authorities are rushing to build more production space. Blackstone, the world’s largest private equity company, and Hudson Pacific Properties, the owner of Sunset Studios, which include the former homes of Columbia Pictures and Warner Bros. off Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, have said they will invest £700 million to build the first Sunset Studios facility outside Los Angeles, just north of London. With 21 soundstages, it will be larger than any of its Hollywood studios.“There is just such a massive need to produce content in markets that already have infrastructure,” said Victor Coleman, the chairman and chief executive of Hudson Pacific Properties. “And the infrastructure is not necessarily just the facilities but it’s also the talent both in front and behind the camera.”The once-abandoned Littlewoods building in Liverpool. The site is now one of about a dozen major plans to build or expand studio space across Britain.Francesca Jones for The New York TimesThe early “Star Wars” films and 10 years’ worth of Harry Potter movies helped Britain get here. Film productions were attracted by experienced labor and visual effects companies and, critically, generous tax breaks. In 2013, the incentives were extended to TV productions that cost more than £1 million per broadcast hour — so-called high-end TV series, like “The Crown” and “Game of Thrones.” In recent years, productions were offered a 25 percent cash rebate on qualifying expenditures, such as visual effects done in Britain. In the 2020-21 fiscal year, tax breaks for film, TV, video games, children’s television and animation exceeded £1.2 billion.In Britain, film gets a level of government attention that other creative industries, such as live theater, can only dream of.“I would not like to contemplate the loss of the tax incentive,” said Ben Roberts, the chief executive of the British Film Institute. Without it, Britain would become immediately uncompetitive, he added.Most of the growth in production in Britain comes from big-budget TV shows, a staple of streaming channels. Last year, 211 high-end TV productions filmed in Britain, such as “Ted Lasso” and “Good Omens,” and fewer than half of them were produced solely by British companies, according to the British Film Institute. Compared with 2019, the amount spent jumped by 85 percent to £4.1 billion.Buildings and streets in Liverpool were transformed into Gotham City for the filming of “The Batman.”Jonathan Olley/Warner Bros.St. George’s Hall in Liverpool was used in “The Batman.”Francesca Jones for The New York TimesA scene shows Batman jumping off the Liver building, in front of its clock.Francesca Jones for The New York TimesLiverpool already claims to be the second-most-filmed-in city in Britain after London. For a few weeks in late 2020, its streets became Gotham City for “The Batman,” and for years shows, including “Peaky Blinders,” have been shot there. The local authority is courting more TV shows by building four smaller studios.Property developers announced the plan for Littlewoods Studios in early 2018, but the grand ambitions were pushed off course a few months later by a fire in the building. Not wanting to miss out on the rising demand, Ms. Saunders convinced the City Council to spend £3 million building two soundstages adjacent to the site. They opened in October.And then at the end of last year, £8 million in public funding was approved for remedial work on the Littlewoods building to create two more sound stages. Ms. Saunders hopes that adding studios will keep productions in town for longer — occupying hotel rooms, ordering from restaurants and employing local people. The film office has also started investing in productions — so far to the tune of £2 million in six TV shows.Britain is already the largest production location for Netflix outside the United States and Canada. While plenty is filmed on location — such as “Bridgerton,” in Bath, and “Sex Education,” in Wales — Netflix committed to a permanent home in 2019 at the Pinewood Group’s Shepperton Studios in Surrey, just southwest of London, where “Dr. Strangelove” and “Oliver!” were made decades ago. Shepperton is now expanding, aiming to double the number of its soundstages to 31 by 2023, and Netflix plans to occupy much of that new space.“Ted Lasso” was one of 211 high-end TV productions filmed in Britain last year.Colin Hutton/Apple TV+, via Associated PressBut the descent of American streamers on British shores has brought its challenges, too. The industry is rife with stories of production crews leaving jobs for higher-paying gigs, long waits for studios and production costs that outpace inflation.Anna Mallett, Netflix’s vice president of physical production for the U.K., Europe, Middle East and Africa, resists the idea that the streamer’s voracious expansion is squeezing others out of studio space.“I do think there is enough for everyone,” she said. “There’s over six million square feet of production space coming onto the market in the next couple of years.”Amazon plans to move in next door. Last month, Prime Video agreed to lease 450,000 square feet in the new development at Shepperton Studios, including nine soundstages. The streaming service sent a ripple of excitement through Britain last year when it announced that it would film the second season of its “Lord of the Rings” series, “The Rings of Power,” in the country. It will move from New Zealand to the dismay of that country’s officials, who over two decades have offered hundreds of millions of dollars in financial incentives to the franchise.By 2023, Warner Bros. hopes to be underway with its plans to add 50 percent more soundstage space to its studios northwest of London.Warner Bros. was the first major Hollywood studio to set up a permanent location in Britain when it bought in 2010 the Leavesden studios, where it made Harry Potter.“It was a pretty huge leap for Warners to make that investment,” said Emily Stillman, the head of studio operations at Leavesden. After years of piecemeal expansion, the new development, if it gets planning approval, will be the studio’s biggest investment at the site.Away from more renowned studios surrounding London, there is hope that the production boom can bring job opportunities and investment to overlooked areas in Britain. New studios are being constructed out of an old industrial space in Dagenham, in east London, an area once synonymous with the manufacture of Ford cars in the 20th century. In Bristol, the local authority is investing £12 million to add three more soundstages to Bottle Yard Studios in an area that is economically struggling, said Laura Aviles, the head of the Bristol Film Office.A guide leading a tour of filiming areas in Liverpool, which are rapidly expanding as the industry invests in Britain.Francesca Jones for The New York Times“It’s been a struggle” to regenerate the area, she said, “and there are a lot of young people there who could be third-generation unemployed who have struggled to get into work.” The expansion will hopefully entice other businesses to the area.There is a risk that all this demand for studio space could become a blessing and a curse. Despite the skilled work force in the field, there are real concerns about whether Britain can train enough production crew and fill the associated roles to populate all this new studio space. The industry has committed millions of pounds to rapid training programs. Industry leaders hope to bring more people into the field and break the stereotype that the work — most of it freelance — is exclusively for the well off and well connected. This month, Prime Video said it would spend £10 million to fund courses in Britain focused on increasing diversity in the industry and positions in Prime Video-commissioned productions.And there is the fear that smaller independent productions by British filmmakers, who can’t as readily use debt to finance an expansion, will be left behind in this boom. Just 16 percent of the money spent on high-end TV shows in Britain last year went to solely domestic productions.The level of foreign investment “does run the risk of challenging the indigenous, independent sector in terms of its ability to retain talent, crew up, get finance, hire space, use locations,” Mr. Roberts of the British Film Institute said. “We are really alert to that not feeling like a squeeze too far.” More

    • 113 Shares149 Views

      in Television

      Pete Davidson to Join Next Blue Origin Space Flight

      by

      The “Saturday Night Live” comedian will be one of six passengers to fly to the edge of space this month with Blue Origin, the rocket company founded by Jeff Bezos.The “Saturday Night Live” actor Pete Davidson will travel to the edge of space next week on the next Blue Origin spaceflight, the company said on Monday.Blue Origin, the rocket company founded by Jeff Bezos, said on Monday that it would launch its fourth flight with human passengers on March 23. Mr. Davidson will be one of six passengers on the company’s New Shepard rocket for its 20th flight.Mr. Bezos, the founder of Amazon and one of the richest people in the world, was a passenger on the company’s first flight with humans on board last July. Earlier that month, another private spaceflight company, Virgin Galactic, took its founder, Richard Branson, to the edge of space and back.Mr. Davidson, 28, joined the cast of “Saturday Night Live” in 2014. He has also appeared in movies, including the 2020 semi-autobiographical film “The King of Staten Island.” He could not immediately be reached for comment on Monday.A Blue Origin spokeswoman said Monday that Mr. Davidson would fly as “an honorary guest,” while the other five passengers were paying customers. The spokeswoman did not say how much the others had been charged to join the flight.Mr. Davidson will be the latest celebrity passenger to travel to the edge of space with Blue Origin.In October, the “Star Trek” actor William Shatner, 90, became the oldest person to travel to space and cross the Kármán line, the widely recognized boundary between Earth’s atmosphere and space that is about 62 miles above the planet’s surface. Mr. Shatner shared the New Shepard rocket with three other passengers on a mission that lasted about 10 minutes.In December, Michael Strahan, the “Good Morning America” co-host, joined a Blue Origin flight with five others.The flight carrying Mr. Davidson is scheduled to lift off from Blue Origin’s launch site in West Texas at 8:30 a.m. local time on March 23.In addition to Mr. Davidson, Blue Origin said on Monday, the flight will have five other passengers: Marty Allen, Sharon and Marc Hagle, Jim Kitchen and George Nield.Mr. Allen is a former chief executive of Party America, the party-supply store. Mr. Hagle is the president and chief executive of Tricor International, a residential and commercial property development company. Ms. Hagle founded the nonprofit group SpaceKids Global. Mr. Kitchen is a professor of the practice of strategy and entrepreneurship at the Kenan-Flagler Business School at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.Dr. Nield is the president of Commercial Space Technologies. From 2008 to 2018, he was associate administrator for commercial space transportation at the Federal Aviation Administration, the agency that regulates commercial launches like Blue Origin’s.Kenneth Chang More