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    In ‘The Refuge Plays,’ Nicole Ari Parker Comes Home

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    “What the theater gives me is the feeling that I’m using everything,” the actress said of returning to the stage after a decade away.On the Max series “And Just Like That …,” Nicole Ari Parker plays the elegant documentarian Lisa Todd Wexley. New York audiences will soon see her in another guise, as a great-grandmother living off the grid in Southern Illinois. Her go-to accessory? An ax. This is Early, the woman at the center of Nathan Alan Davis’s “The Refuge Plays,” directed by Patricia McGregor and produced by Roundabout Theater Company in association with New York Theater Workshop.“What the theater gives me,” Parker said, “is the feeling that I’m using everything.”At a recent rehearsal, she had bounded onto the stage in a pink jumpsuit and makeup that aged her several decades. At the start of the first play, Early is in her 80s. The subsequent plays revert her to her 40s, then her 20s. This is Parker’s first stage role since she played Blanche DuBois on Broadway a decade ago, and previews begin Saturday. Asked in a warm-up exercise how she felt, Parker had a one-word answer: “Ready.”McGregor, artistic director of New York Theater Workshop, had wanted to work with Parker since seeing her turn in “Streetcar” and marveling at the fragility and ferocity that Parker brought to it. Early, McGregor felt, would be an ideal role for her, allowing her to embody qualities beyond sophistication and glamour. “She’s a mother and an intergenerational caretaker,” McGregor said of her star in a phone interview. “Some of the things that are deeply rooted in what Early’s journey is, she has in her bones.”Will this shift from statement bags to washboard and tub surprise audience members? “Maybe,” Parker said. “I’m surprised!”Parker and Christopher Jackson in an episode of the Max series “And Just Like That ….”Craig Blankenhorn/MaxWe spoke over breakfast the next morning, at a restaurant near the apartment that Parker, 52, uses while filming “And Just Like That ….” Owing to the SAG-AFTRA strike, Parker declined to chat about that project or any of her previous film and TV work. (She referred, glancingly, to the Showtime series “Soul Food” as “the show where I met my husband,” the actor Boris Kodjoe, “that we can’t talk about.”) Across the table, she appeared ageless, and effortlessly chic. She wore a hat, a scarf, two necklaces, two watches, five rings and a bracelet and yet somehow looked as if she’d simply woken up like that.Over coffee and omelets, she discussed, with passion and precision, her love for the theater and the secrets that age makeup can reveal. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.When did you know that you loved performing?At a very young age. And I’m really upset with God that he did not give me a singing voice. Because, in my head, I’ve been a Broadway musical star since I was born. I would watch Shirley MacLaine in “Sweet Charity” over and over. I would watch Judy Garland in “A Star Is Born” over and over. I got into N.Y.U. as a journalism major. But second semester, I remember calling my dad and telling him that I wanted to transfer to Tisch. N.Y.U. is very expensive. My dad paid for my college tuition. And he said, “You can’t give up. You’re about to enter the business of no. And you have to keep going. And you have to be strong.” I always hold that in my heart.What was your training?It was pretty comprehensive — voice, movement, scene study. But while I was studying Shakespeare, I wasn’t going to play Juliet. I played the maid in “The Little Foxes.” I played all these small subservient roles in the classic plays. The sadness around discrimination is that it’s missing humanity. It’s missing that if you and I leave this cafe right now and there’s a thunderstorm, we’re both going to get wet equally in the rain. The sunshine doesn’t discriminate, and neither does love, loss, death, pain, joy. We all have those things that are in these beautiful classic plays. So you and I both could be up for a role. It’s not about washing clean or ignoring diversity. It’s about, what does it add? And what doesn’t it add? What just is.“This moment that I’m having in my career is extraordinary,” Parker said. “The feeling has always been there. I just have slightly better clothes right now, better face cream.”Victor Llorente for The New York TimesYou moved to Los Angeles in 2000. Did you always hope to come back and do theater?I just kept booking jobs. I did let my agents know, but the timing wasn’t always right. Then I got a call saying that Emily Mann was doing a production of “Streetcar” and she was coming to L.A. to meet just a few people. On the day I met her, I sat in the parking lot and I said a prayer: “God, if this is the closest I get to Blanche, being on a shortlist, I’m grateful.” But a 40-minute lunch turned into a three-hour lunch. She asked me if I was more of a Stella or Blanche. I was like, “Emily, I can play Stanley.” I was bursting at the seams to be maximized.Are you an avid theatergoer?I am a passionate theatergoer. I’ll go by myself. I’ll drag a friend. I’ll see two shows in a day. I stay for the talkbacks. I buy the good seats. Last year was on fire, with “Between Riverside and Crazy,” “A Strange Loop,” “The Piano Lesson,” “The Lehman Trilogy.” “Death of a Salesman” — I saw that three times.How did “The Refuge Plays” come to you?I had really wanted to work with Patricia McGregor. When I saw her production of “Ugly Lies the Bone,” I thought, this is magnificent. I met her after and we just stayed in touch, looking for a journey that we could take together. She sent me the play. And the breakdown said Early, matriarch of the family, early 80s. I called my agent and I said, “I’m a grandma!” He said, “Read the play.” And then I was lost in the magic.Who is Early?Her given circumstances are pretty loaded. She was violated. She made a bold choice to go on her own with her newborn. She killed a bear. She built a house. She can see ghosts. This is the kind of play where you can’t leave any of that out.How did it feel yesterday to see yourself in the age makeup?So cool. As women we’re told to panic about wrinkles. And I just felt so beautiful with that age makeup on. Everything that was drawn on my face, contoured into my face, I felt like I knew a secret in advance. Like, don’t waste any time fearing something that could be so glorious.This is a play about family. Has it made you think about your own experience of family, legacy, inheritance?Both of my parents were born in the ’40s. I feel so lucky to have both of them right now while doing this play, to have an immediate family that’s chopped wood or used a washboard. A lot of the details of Early are in my family. I feel honored to represent that. I said to my mom, “Do you know how to kill and pluck and cook a turkey?” She said, “Yes, baby. You have to boil it first to get the feathers out. And don’t let the gallbladder split because that bile will make the meat bitter.”How does it feel to be experiencing so much success, so much fame, at 52?I just did what my dad asked me to do. I fell down but I kept getting back up. In order to be resilient in this business, you had to feel like you’d made it even when you were just living off of bagels. This moment that I’m having in my career is extraordinary because it’s opening more professional doors. But on the inside, the feeling has always been there. I just have slightly better clothes right now, better face cream. More

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      ‘And Just Like That …’ Season 2 Finale Recap: On the Verge

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      Carrie gets an unexpected phone call. Aidan has some unexpected news.Season 2, Episode 11: ‘The Last Supper Part Two: Entrée’This sophomore season of “And Just Like That …” finishes almost exactly as it started: with everyone getting laid. We have “you love me too” sex, “moving on from my ex” sex, “giving up control” sex and “I’ll love you forever but might not see you for five years” sex. But the experiences between the lovers in the season finale are deeper, more meaningful and more evolved, much like this season — and in some ways, like this whole franchise.We know this because we were all flies on the wall at “The Last Supper” — Carrie’s final hurrah in her walk-up apartment near Barneys — where, between drink clinks and olive tastings, we got some major, albeit concise, self-reflection out of every single character. As Che puts it to Lisette during some impromptu heavy chitchat, Che is transitioning “emotionally.” But it’s clear Che isn’t the only one.Carrie did, in fact, despite my doubts, sell that apartment for good to Lisette and move to a four-bedroom Gramercy Park palace, which, at least for now, will house just her and her teeny kitty, Shoe.Aidan won’t be there, as was the plan. As we learned in last week’s episode, Aidan’s almost 15-year-old son, Wyatt, is in dire straits, and Aidan believes Wyatt needs his “constant” father nearby, in Norfolk, Va., and not in New York.But he and Carrie aren’t breaking up. They are simply entering a five-year holding pattern that Aidan promises will go by in a silent snap.This is, if you’re looking at it realistically, kind of bull. Yes, Wyatt needs steady, present parents right now, but this idea that his recovery will take precisely five years, and that they couldn’t still visit each other during that time, is contrived. Still, we know already that Season 3 is a go, and Carrie and Aidan — as much as many of us are rooting for them — need to be pried apart somehow if Carrie is to keep having new romantic adventures.It isn’t public knowledge how early the “And Just Like That …” team got the greenlight for Season 3, but it’s fair to speculate that it happened well before the renewal was announced this week. The Season 2 finale doesn’t feel final at all. Instead, it feels as if each character were on the verge of becoming richer, more seasoned versions of themselves.First and foremost, Woke Charlotte is in full effect, and I couldn’t be happier for her. Who would have imagined 25 years ago that the traditionalist Charlotte would become the most vocal feminist of them all? Taking down the patriarchy in her own home, Charlotte once again speaks for women across America in telling Harry that doing a few things around the house does not mean he is doing “it all.”In fact, he is doing the “bare minimum,” she says, of what has been expected of her and pretty much every wife and mother of the modern era (in heterosexual marriages). He deserves no applause. But she does. They say not all heroes wear capes, and in this case, our hero is wearing a disheveled gallerina dress that probably smells like booze and slaying, and that’s just fine.Miranda is taking on a new mind-set as well, addressing finally her pattern of discarding past loves and instead choosing to face that pain head-on. Carrie’s dinner party, which Carrie forced Miranda to attend (a decision I disagreed with!), turns out for the best in terms of Miranda and Che, who land on being a “good train wreck” and end up on at least amicable terms.Miranda was in a relationship with Steve far longer. She was married to him, had a child with him, shared a life and home with him. With Steve, she wants more than niceties, so she goes out to Coney Island to ask for it. Steve’s demeanor lets us know she will likely get it.But even more exciting is the fact that Miranda, too, is stepping up professionally. She is rapidly ascending at Human Rights Watch, enough to be trusted with an impromptu interview on the BBC. She is, well into middle age, finally doing work that matters to her, and I, for one, can’t wait to see more of that in Season 3.Kim Cattrall briefly reprised her “Sex and the City” character in the Season 2 finale of “And Just Like That …”MaxNya’s star is rising quickly as well, with a fast and unanimous vote to elect her into the American Law Institute. She is dismayed that she doesn’t have a man to share that joy with, and it’s easy to feel dismayed in hearing Nya say such a thing. This show is supposed to be about empowerment, right? These women don’t need men around, do they? But her lament, considering she is still grieving a divorce from a longtime love, is honest, and of course wanting a partner isn’t something to apologize for. Happily for Nya, sparks fly by the end of the episode with a Michelin-star chef (Gary Dourdan) who seems, rightly, very, very into her.Lisa, having miscarried her pregnancy in the previous episode, is free from the worry that a baby will derail all that she has worked toward. But more important, she resolves to free herself from the guilt of not having wanted it. Lisa is ready for “her time,” and she is dedicated to pursuing it. (Herbert better get that vasectomy this time.) Che, too, is moving toward whatever new version of themself is yet to come. Che is in, as Lisette calls it, a “cocoon stage.”Which is probably the best way to describe Carrie as well. Her next step is the most mysterious of all. Will this next phase of her life involve Aidan, who is technically still her boyfriend? Will she write another book? Will she become editor-at-large at Enid’s Vivante? Will she take up feeding pigeons every day in Gramercy Park? We don’t know. But we do know, as Carrie tells it, that she will be trying to move forward without expectations.Admittedly, my expectations for Season 2 were relatively low. I was hoping for a more fun, less grief-stricken story, and I got that. But over the past 11 episodes, I’m pleasantly surprised to say I got a lot more. It has been rocky along the way, but I think the show has taken meaningful steps toward inclusivity, achieving richer story lines for the newer characters while also allowing the whole cast, especially its original characters, to mature appropriately.Sure, this series is a little less fancy-free than the original. But it is challenging the ways in which we dismiss women of a certain age, forcing us instead to consider that, maybe, if we let them, women can step more and more into their power with each passing year. And as Carrie would say, that’s just fabulous.Things still taking up space in my brainI think we were all hoping Samantha (Kim Cattrall) would be more than a footnote, but the rumors were that her appearance would be only a cameo, and it was. Considering the bad blood Cattrall has said exists between her and Sarah Jessica Parker, and her insistence that she wanted nothing to do with this series, it is surprising that Cattrall appeared at all. But if this is a setup for Samantha to be more formally incorporated into Season 3, I would truly be thrilled.Aidan says he has provided a sense of normalcy and constancy for his boys over the years, but frankly, I want to hear Kathy’s side of this story. She was always jaunting off to China, but wasn’t Aidan on a work trip in Abu Dhabi the last time he bumped into Carrie? Kathy was the one who had the wherewithal to ask Carrie keep their sons out of her writing. Her protective instinct is very much there. Justice for Kathy in Season 3, please. 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      ‘And Just Like That …’ Season 2 Episode 10 Recap: All Too Familiar

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      It seems maybe Carrie shouldn’t get her heart set on those spacious new Gramercy digs just yet.Season 2, Episode 10:Is Carrie going to have to buy back her old apartment yet again, after a third failed attempt to move on from that place and formally co-habitate with one of her two great loves? This is all feeling a little too familiar.Recall, if you will, “Sex and the City” Season 4, in which Carrie and Aidan break up after he buys Carrie’s original place, and she has to borrow Charlotte’s engagement ring to buy it back from him.Then, in “Sex and the City” movie No. 1, Carrie once again sells her apartment to funnel money into “heaven on Fifth” with Big, only to have him stand her up at the altar, leaving Miranda and Samantha to negotiate its repurchase from their lounge chairs in Mexico.Well, here we go again. Maybe, anyway. Although it isn’t explicitly stated, it is clear that the sale hasn’t closed on either Carrie’s new Gramercy Park place or her O.G. haunt. When Seema freaks out to Carrie over a “disaster,” Carrie immediately thinks it must be about the new apartment. It’s not, but that indicates something about the sale isn’t done.Likewise, Carrie is about to hold a swanky “Last Supper” event at her old place, so it must technically still be hers. (Also, Carrie and Seema still apparently hold the power to kick Carrie’s neighbor and buyer, Lisette, out of the place when they want to eat sushi and gossip on their own. It’s obviously not officially Lisette’s apartment yet.)All this may prove convenient if Aidan does, in fact, break our hearts one more time by deciding he simply can’t spend time in New York, or with Carrie, anymore. There’s no way Carrie is going to be stuck holding that four-bedroom bag.Carrie’s reason for worry is pretty heartbreaking. We find Aidan back in Virginia, sobbing in his car because his son Wyatt (Logan Souza) has broken several bones in a drunk-driving accident, which Aidan feels he could have prevented if he had been around. “I should have been there,” Aidan tells Carrie, weeping.It’s the most gut-punching scene in a whole series of them, from an episode that shines a light on just how unbearably hard it sometimes is to be a parent. It’s especially true if you’re a working mother.That’s a title Charlotte can finally claim for the first time, and at Kasabian Gallery, she is, as her Gen Z co-workers tell her, “slaying.” Charlotte is pouring herself into this job, staying late some nights and, for a change, is not at her family’s beck and call, at the ready to serve every meal and hand-deliver every forgotten notebook. When she makes a six-figure art sale to the singer Sam Smith, there is no way that isn’t being celebrated. So she properly parties with her work pals and stumbles home, sloshed, to her frazzled family.Charlotte may be lit, but she is with it enough to deliver a message that her family, and maybe every family across America, needs to hear: “I was a person before you. I was a person before all of you … You need to get that, OK? And get it together.”Eloquent? No. Poignant? Yes, indeed. Charlotte is done rescuing everyone in that house all day every day. This is her time.It’s exactly the “time” Lisa thought she was evolving into. She says exactly this to Herbert as she tosses and turns in bed. Her career is at its highest point. With a 10-episode deal with PBS on the horizon, she is about to step into a pinnacle moment.But she is unexpectedly pregnant, and as a mom of three already, she knows what that means. Despite Herbert’s promises to help, it simply won’t happen. The bulk of the child-rearing, and all the expectations that surround it, will fall to her because who in their right mind would expect the new city comptroller to interrupt his busy schedule to give a bottle? Despite Lisa’s work being just as worthy and as time-consuming as Herbert’s, she, just like Charlotte, will be the one called on whenever anyone in the family needs something. And babies have a lot of needs.It is worth emphasizing that Lisa apparently asked Herbert to get a vasectomy eight years ago, after their last child was born, but he didn’t. He says he thought Lisa might change her mind about wanting another baby. He thought he knew better than she did. He was wrong.Lighthearted as this show has mostly been in its sophomore season, it must be stated that the commentary laced throughout this episode about the patriarchal oppression faced by even wealthy, connected and variously privileged women at home feels especially pointed in the year of “Barbie.” I’ll be thinking about that all week. Along with these …Things still taking up space in my brainUsually, it’s the older people in relationships who think they have things to teach their younger partners, but in the case of Anthony and Giuseppe, the reverse is true. After a lifetime of playing a very specific role in bed, Anthony might soon be trying out something new.And speaking of trying new things, the trajectory that Stanford’s life has apparently taken is absolutely wild. I’m all for honoring the memory of Willie Garson, who so heartwarmingly and hilariously played Stanford before dying at age 57 during the production of Season 1. But I refuse to believe that the man who gleefully sipped Flirtinis and called himself Rick9+ in cybersex chat rooms became a monk. No.After that horrible stand-up set in which Che absolutely eviscerated Miranda and the integrity of their relationship, Carrie should have uninvited Che from the “Last Supper” dinner party. Sure, Che is a comedian, and Miranda wasn’t supposed to be at Che’s show. She wasn’t supposed to hear any of that. But she was, and she did, and Carrie shouldn’t expect one of her dearest friends to then sit across a table and break bread with someone who was willing to rip her to shreds in public.Buying that stroller for her estranged husband’s new baby is not the own Nya thinks it is. (And Miranda clearly knows that.)No matter how rich a character is, I will never find it believable when someone willingly destroys her own cellphone, as Charlotte does when she thoughtlessly flings hers into a pitcher of margaritas and then cracks up about it. Human beings in the real world just don’t do that.I couldn’t help but notice that the reason Steve now has a new little restaurant by the shore is because he was sitting on a bench in Coney Island wondering, “Where did my baby go?” If you know, you know. More

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      ‘And Just Like That …’ Season 2 Episode 9 Recap: Budding Expectations

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      Lisa has big news. So does Carrie. OK, so do a bunch of characters.The first time Carrie started dating Aidan, back in Season 3 of “Sex and the City,” she found herself routinely waking up with a gasp in the middle of the night. Something felt off. Something felt wrong. But after scouring for whatever unchecked item on her to-do list was giving her this anxiety, she found that, in fact, she “hadn’t so much as missed a teeth cleaning.”It was Aidan who was messing with her head. Carrie couldn’t relax because, for the first time, she was in a relationship where no one was, well, messing with her head. Unlike Big, who was the king of, as Carrie named it, the “seductive withholding dance,” Aidan was a good man, and he was good to her.“It’s smooth sailing,” Carrie said of their relationship. “Nothing but calm seas, blue horizons as far as I can see.”Fast forward to the present, when Carrie and Aidan are once again coupled up after a two-decade hiatus. Just like before, it’s smooth sailing. Everything is working. They just fit.But this time around, while Carrie has never felt more certain that she is in the right relationship with the right man at the right time, it’s others who are having anxiety about it.It began with Miranda, who in last week’s episode asked Carrie if she should “take a beat.” Carrie and Aidan went from zero to cohabitating at warp speed, and Miranda couldn’t help but worry.Even though Carrie assures Miranda that the past isn’t repeating itself, you can still see the look of concern cross Miranda’s face, as well as Charlotte’s, when Carrie shows her friends the giant new apartment she is angling to buy in Gramercy Park. It has plenty of room for Aidan and his three sons, and most important, it is not her old place, in which Aidan won’t set foot. She tells her friends she is ready to sell it.“Are you really that sure, Carrie?” Charlotte asks with distress on her face. But once again, Carrie sings her song. She is sure. She is ready. She is happy.But the doubters keep on coming. Later, it is Aidan’s ex-wife, Kathy (Rosemarie DeWitt), who presents as a harbinger of heartbreak. “I know your history with Aidan,” Kathy says bluntly to Carrie. “You can’t hurt him again.”“Of course you’ll hurt me,” Aidan tells Carrie when he finds out about that conversation. And he will hurt her, and things will get messy, but they will work it out. Aidan is just as sure as Carrie. Everything seems to be going right.So, if the aim of this episode is to convince us, the audience, not to worry that Carrie and Aidan won’t make it work this time — and yet that our doubts are well-founded — well, it’s working.And I hope that the writers, executives and everyone else involved at Max understand that if Aidan and Carrie fall apart in the final two episodes of this season, after all this building of trust — between them, and between them and us — that some of us (me!) will sink into a hole and perish.Meanwhile, not everyone else is so self-assured in matters of the heart. For starters, Anthony has been having dinner, but not sex, with Giuseppe (Sebastiano Pigazzi), the young Italian poet who recently ended his brief stint as a Hot Fella.Maybe it’s his pending divorce from Stanford Blatch (Willie Garson), or maybe it’s just that he can’t figure out what would make a fox like Giuseppe want someone like him. But for whatever reason, Anthony just can’t seem to relax and embrace it. It isn’t until Anthony confronts Giuseppe about what he believes is an obvious scheme to get a green card that he finds out Giuseppe already has dual citizenship. He really does just want to shag. Within moments, they do.Nya, however, has absolutely no issue showing a younger man around her bedroom. She is reveling in hot, casual sex until a gut-punch of an Instagram post crosses her feed: a photo of her ex-husband, hugging a woman we can assume is the hat-wearing songwriter Nya caught him with before. And she is pregnant.Nya, who ultimately ended things with Andre over not wanting to have his child, immediately kicks out her beau — don’t worry, he’s cool with it — so that she can stew over this alone.It’s not the only unexpected pregnancy we get in this episode. Lisa, who has become borderline narcoleptic, falls asleep in her closet and nearly misses Herbert’s big campaign speech at his event at the Goldenblatts’. Lisa tells Herbert, just as he is about to make his remarks, that she is pregnant. It’s a plot twist that neither Herbert — nor, most likely, any of us — saw coming.Maybe the most surprising and delightful development in the episode, though, is the coupling of young Brady Hobbes and Lily Goldenblatt. Is it just a spring fling, or could this be the start of “Sex and the City: The Next Generation”? Mostly I hope not, but considering this franchise clearly has no intention of stopping, you never know.Things still taking up space in my brainAs infallible as Aidan is to me, personally, I have to ding him on this: He absolutely refuses to enter Carrie’s apartment, but when she tells him she is selling it, he tells her, “You don’t have to sell it for me.” Obviously she does?I’m calling it right now: Seema is going to be engaged by the end of this season. It has already been established that some part of her aches to have at least one great love. It should also be noted that she has written off her new beau, Ravi (Armin Amiri), as not being “marriage material.” That’s meant to throw us off the scent, I think. More

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      ‘And Just Like That …’ Season 2, Episode 8 Recap: Domestic Bliss

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      Carrie and Aidan play house. Miranda and Charlotte get back to work.Season 2, Episode 8:Who could have guessed that Che would be the hero we needed to finally ask, out loud, the burning question so many of us have had for Carrie and Aidan for the last 20 years or so?“I mean come on,” Che says to them innocently enough. “Why did this not work out the first time?”It’s a question Carrie hasn’t been able to get out of her head since that fateful Valentine’s Day dinner in last week’s episode. When this week’s kicks off, we find out Carrie and Aidan have been fully back on, spending night after night in hotels, living on $26 room service omelets.It’s not just that they’re dating again. As Carrie tells it to Miranda, she and Aidan are connected in a way now that feels beyond what they ever had. Could it be, Carrie wonders as she walks down the street — clad in some strange jammies-and-slippers get-up with a baby blankie coat to match — that some toxic attachment to Big never allowed her to truly let Aidan in. Maybe she missed out. Maybe, she tells Miranda, Big was a “big mistake.”It kind of makes sense, then, that Carrie and Aidan find themselves playing house, gaming out a life that could have been.Of course, Aidan lives in a Virginia farmhouse with his three sons and an undisclosed number of chickens, but when he’s in New York, he and Carrie essentially live together. They rent out Che’s apartment, saving Che from a string of unruly Airbnb-ers, and when Carrie and Aidan discover that Che has little to no houseware to speak of, they all but clean out a Williams Sonoma (or Crate and Barrel or wherever they are) to fill that void, looking as happy as any couple picking out items for their wedding registry.Naturally, Carrie and Aidan quickly become a “we.” It’s a little too quick for Seema, who dodges Carrie’s invitation to join her and Aidan for dinner. It’s not just jealousy that Carrie has a new boyfriend and Seema doesn’t. The real hurt she feels, as Seema confesses to Carrie over a melodramatic cigarette on Madison Avenue in the rain, is that Carrie has experienced great love — not once, but twice. The harsh truth for Seema is that she may never get that chance. And if she winds up third-wheeling in the Hamptons house she and Carrie are supposed to share this summer, that feeling is going to weigh on her a little too heavily.The Hampton plans are nixed, and Seema insists that she needs space. Carrie lets her go, even though she doesn’t want to.While Carrie and Aidan are rapidly advancing their relationship, both Miranda and Charlotte are taking off in their careers. Although Miranda is merely an intern at Human Rights Watch, she is thrilled about her new position — she’s finally free from corporate law and instead engaged in actual do-gooding. Her fellow interns, who are much younger but have been at the organization longer, are less thrilled when Miranda becomes the supervisor’s pet and is immediately selected for the coveted role of note-taker while they’re stuck slaving over citations. They quickly ice out Miranda like a couple of high school mean girls.Charlotte, on the other hand, has an entirely different, more enlightening experience with the younger set at work.Leading up to her first day at Kasabian Gallery, Charlotte finds herself obsessed with an extra few tummy pounds that simply will not do underneath her perfect new gallerina dress. She consumes nothing but bone broth all week and double bags herself in shapewear, but the “pooch,” which is nearly nonexistent, remains.Charlotte shows up to work, sucked and tucked, covering her midsection with her coat as if she were hiding a pregnancy. But when a 20-something co-worker, who is larger than Charlotte but confidently baring her midriff, swoops down the stairs and tells Charlotte her dress is fierce, Charlotte shakes off all the drama she internalized during the heroin chic era.It’s an abrupt about-face, which is kind of jarring, but as a Xennial who bore witness to Y2K’s relentless body shaming, I can attest, at least anecdotally, that Gen Z is truly an inspiration to older women everywhere in their unabashed embrace of all body sizes and their devil-may-care attitude toward which women are “allowed” to wear certain garments. Even though the crop-top queen Britney Spears ruled our youthful years, few millennial and Gen X women had the stick-slender body type at the time “required” to sport that look. Today, girls bare whatever bellies they’ve got. And as becomes clear immediately to Charlotte, that attitude is helping women of all ages to finally exhale.The best revelation of the episode, though, comes toward the end, when Carrie stops wondering about all of her past missteps and instead starts understanding them.Back in Che’s kitchen, between sips of beer, a quiet pause lingers over Che’s question: Why did things go so wrong between Carrie and Aidan? To Carrie, the answer simple.“Because I made a mistake,” Carrie says, clearly, and with conviction. But the look she gives Aidan right after says even more. Carrie isn’t referring only to the affair she had with Big, which broke up her and Aidan the first time. Nor is she talking only about the cold feet she got during their engagement, which split them up the second time — though certainly those events appear to be huge regrets.Carrie knows now that choosing Big over Aidan, at all, was a colossal blunder, and that the last couple of decades could have been far happier and more fulfilling if she had chosen a life with Aidan instead.And honestly, hallelujah. A significant portion of the fan base (me!) agrees and has never really gotten over it.Carrie and Aidan embrace, and I couldn’t help but wonder … can’t we just end the series right here?Things still taking up space in my brain:It doesn’t take a psychologist to figure out that when Carrie tells Seema she can’t have space because space between friends just leads to more space, she is talking about Samantha. Luckily, Seema doesn’t abscond to London and finds the strength to show up to the “we” dinner, with a smile to boot.If Carrie and Aidan fizzle out by the season finale, I truly don’t know if I can take it. Big got 20-some years. The Aidan stans are owed our longer arc. More

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      ‘And Just Like That …’ Season 2, Episode 7 Recap: Reunited

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      Valentine’s Day drama abounds in this week’s episode, but the most important involves a major figure from Carrie’s past.Season 2, Episode 7At least one aspect of “the old Miranda” is still very much intact. She told us back in Season 2 of “Sex and the City” that when a romance ends, she “would love to be one of those people who’s all: ‘We loved, thank you. You enriched my life. Now, go, prosper.’” But that’s just not her vibe. In her own words, she is much more: “We didn’t work out, you need to not exist.”And so things go with Che.In last week’s episode, Che somewhat abruptly (in my opinion, anyway) ended things with Miranda, and Miranda, self-sufficient and headstrong as ever, is done. She will not be taking Che’s calls, thank you very much, nor will she be having any further emotions about the breakup. She is on to whatever, and whoever, might be next.No one is more impatient for Miranda to move on than Charlotte, the ever-enthusiastic cheerleader for coupledom, who tells Miranda she had better hurry up and figure out if she is gay or straight so that she can find a new person to love, as if that were something anyone could just do on a tight deadline. After all, Miranda rebuts, she was drawn to Che as a person, and that doesn’t necessarily mean she is a full-on lesbian, especially considering Che is nonbinary. Sexuality is complex! Labels shouldn’t define us! Gender is a construct!Except that, in one impromptu shopping trip, Miranda figures out pretty darn fast that sexy sapphic ladies are her thing.At a cosplay-laden reading in the curtained-off back room of Books Are Magic, Miranda comes upon Amelia (Miriam Shor), a woman she has heard read Jane Austen audiobooks many times over. Miranda has always been entranced by that voice, and immediately, she is entranced by Amelia. That’s that. It’s figured out. Hot women get Miranda hot, and she is very down to heed that siren call.Unfortunately, Miranda’s fantasy of how much better dating women will be doesn’t quite live up to the reality. She shows up to Amelia’s apartment for their first date — which just so happens to be on Valentine’s Day — and finds it is grungier than a frat house bunk room. While Miranda is decked out in a tight dress cut just so to expose the tiniest amount of underboob, Amelia is in sweats and caked in cat litter.Miranda sits on the unmade bed waiting for Amelia to return from the bodega when an emergency phone call with Carrie helps her realize that 50-something lesbian Miranda doesn’t have to put up with the same baloney she tolerated in her 30s, so she ghosts. It stands to reason that Miranda will soon be ghosting all the Austen audiobooks in her queue as well.That’s not the only Valentine’s Day chaos ripping through this crew. The holiday is especially taxing for the moms and dads in the group, whose kids are kicking them out of their own homes on the big night. Lisa, who can’t stand her son’s handsy girlfriend, Baxter (Lucie McKenzie), puts the kibosh on his going to the suite Baxter’s parents booked for them, but agrees to let them stay in while she and Herbert go out.The worst fate Lisa can imagine is coming home to discover Herbert Jr. (Elijah Jacob) and his girlfriend have had sex in her bed. She doesn’t anticipate the far worse outcome of returning to discover the kids in her walk-in closet, taking photos with her prized fashions for Instagram. Turns out, that’s a far more egregious invasion of space.Charlotte and Harry are also asked by Lily to excuse themselves, as she is throwing a lonely hearts party of sorts for a crew of “cool girls” from school. Charlotte throws her full support behind her heartbroken daughter (last episode’s condom run was all for naught, apparently) and grabs a homemade brownie on the way to her Early Bird Special date with Harry.It turns out, though, that the little confection was a pot brownie, and Charlotte ends up in the back of an ambulance, full-on freaking out, convinced that she can “feel her blood.”Surprisingly, that little whoopsie with a space cake was the best thing that could have happened to Charlotte. As she comes to in the emergency room, she tells Harry that her life flashed before her eyes, and she wasn’t a fan. Charlotte realizes she has poured her entire self into serving her family and hasn’t left anything for herself. To my personal delight, she announces she is going to take a job in the art world. Boss Lady Charlotte is back.The most important Valentine’s Day date of the episode, of course, is the one Carrie almost doesn’t have with Aidan (John Corbett). The ellipses-laden email she sent last week worked, and Aidan asks to meet Carrie for dinner when he is in town for a meeting.Somehow they both end up at different restaurants right next door to each other, and both spend the better part of an hour thinking the other has stood them up.Honestly, I was sick during this entire scene. It had the feel of the whole Il Cantinori/El Cantinoro fiasco from Carrie’s 35th birthday from “Sex and the City” Season 4, in which everyone did, in fact, stand Carrie up, and I feared the teased appearance of Aidan was nothing more than a hoax yet again.Eventually, finally, Aidan texts Carrie. (What in the world was he waiting for? Much like Charlotte, I thought I was having a stroke.) Soon they find each other on the street. Dinner is lovely, and Carrie invites Aidan back to her place.Standing outside her door, beneath an apartment that was briefly theirs, Aidan momentarily becomes unglued, feeling that he can’t relive all that pain. It once again looks as if it might be over for them before it begins, and the Aidan stan in me once again died a tiny death. Thankfully he remembers there are plenty of hotels in New York, and he and Carrie can simply go knock boots there.Carrie and Aidan are back on, and at least for me, this has made both movies and every cringey scene of this latest series entirely worth it. Let’s go.Things still taking up space in my brain:As roomies, Miranda and Nya are the modern-day “Golden Girls” we need, especially considering Miranda is in her Blanche era. I hope Miranda never moves out.Of the oodles of wordplay this franchise has cranked out over the years, “Mevening” is by far the most usable example, and I’m stealing it. More

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      ‘And Just Like That …’ Season 2, Episode 6 Recap: Hey Stranger

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      In an episode with multiple explicit callbacks to the original series, Charlotte sets a progressive example and Miranda confronts painful consequences.The O.G.s know this isn’t the first time Carrie has fanned old flames with Aidan via email. Way back in Season 4 of the original series, Carrie created her first ever email address (shoegal@aol.com!) solely for the ability to reach out to Aidan post-breakup in some way other than the phone.“I miss you. Do you miss me?” it read.This time around, her email says essentially the same thing, but is tied up in a more devil-may-care bow. “Was thinking of you the other day … and I wondered how you were doing.” That ellipsis is loaded. Pair it with the slightly sexy but nonchalant “Hey Stranger …” (another loaded ellipsis!) and it’s not hard to see what she is doing.And why not? Google is free and Carrie has used it. She knows Aidan lives in Virginia, is sitting on a fat check from West Elm, and most importantly, is divorced. It’s almost surprising it took her this long.It’s not the only callback to “Sex and the City” we see in this episode. In another scene, Seema “proposes” to Carrie that the two of them rent a summer house together in the Hamptons. Carrie giddily agrees, which is funny only because, just a couple of decades ago, she, Charlotte, Miranda and Samantha all thought that as 30-somethings, they were too old for a shared Hamptons house, calling it “pathetic” and likening it to being “the oldest kid at summer camp.”But now, in their 50s, Carrie and her gal pal can afford a luxury rental on the beach with more bathrooms than occupants. Nothing pathetic about that.Alas, in this episode, summer is but a far away dream. It’s the dead of winter, and it’s snowing hard, which causes major issues for pretty much everyone.MoMA is honoring Lisa as a Black woman filmmaker on the same night that Herbert has a campaign event. The two tussle over whose event should take precedence, but Lisa makes no bones about the fact that she’s going to “do me,” and Herbert can kick rocks. Then, her car service cancels. Herbert offers to drop her off, but Lisa’s pride won’t let him “save” her. She trudges in fabulous stiletto boots to the event and makes it to the stage with no help from anyone. She is pleasantly surprised, though, when Herbert shows up in support.Similarly, Carrie absolutely can’t no-show “WidowCon,” where she will be reading from her latest memoir, “Loved and Lost.” This is partly because she couldn’t bear to let down the mass of grieving ladies, but really it is because her old writing partner, Karen (Rachel Dratch), whom Carrie apparently ghosted long ago before a critical meeting with a big studio (though Carrie has no memory of this), is the organizer, and Karen would never let her live it down I guess? How Karen wields this kind of power over Carrie is a mystery, but considering Carrie coughed up six figures to Enid because Carrie felt bad about a misinterpreted sext kind of indicates how big of a motivator shame can be for her.In any case, Carrie is particularly anxious about this gig and needs a sidekick of sorts to keep her nerves at bay, and she decides Che is just the person for the job. When snow pummels the streets of Manhattan on the big day, Che tries to weasel out of the commitment, but Carrie uses her own status as a grieving widow to rope Che back in. In what is probably the genuinely funniest scene of the episode, dare I say the entire season so far, Carrie lumbers through the blizzard all the way to the Sheraton in what amounts to a fabulous down comforter, attempting to remain composed as Charlotte shrieks on the other end of a phone about condoms.Yes, Charlotte desperately needs condoms, though not for herself. She needs to buy them for Lily and her boyfriend, Blake, who are about to do the deed for the first time. The snowpocalypse has shut down every drugstore, so Charlotte calls to ask Carrie if she has any spares. (Carrie does not.)Despite what some of us may have predicted based on the “Sex and the City” version of her character, it turns out Lily and Rock are being parented by “Woke Charlotte.” She is a bona fide sex-positive mom, so much so that she makes sure her daughter knows to prioritize her own pleasure as much as her partner’s.Eventually, Charlotte obtains a smorgasbord of condom options and drops them off at Blake’s parent’s house, giving Lily a quick hug before her daughter runs upstairs. It’s a little awkward, sure, but at the same time, it’s a surprisingly tender moment. Many of us born before the Clinton administration can barely fathom having this kind of exchange with our parents. Charlotte says as much when she tells Lily her parents made sex seem unmentionable. Maybe, just maybe, Charlotte doesn’t want her children growing up with the same stuffy ideas about sex that she had. Charlotte may be a traditionalist in so many ways, but this is progressive parenting.Over in Brooklyn, Steve and Miranda find themselves alone in their old house, and Miranda takes the opportunity to do the dirty work she knows she can’t put off forever. She presses Steve about moving out, and almost immediately, they spiral.Steve insists, loudly, that it is his house. He built the kitchen, he redid the floors, he put up the bookshelves. But Miranda’s money bought it, she reminds him. The jab sends Steve over the edge, and he cuts Miranda in the deepest way possible, screaming that she never wanted to move there, never wanted him, and never even wanted Brady.There is suddenly far too much truth in the room.Miranda nearly leaves, heaving sobs and she puts on her coat, but Steve manages to stop her, apologizing profusely. The two end up lying next to each other affectionately in bed, with Miranda apologizing in turn for causing Steve so much pain.That moment, too, is surprisingly tender, at least until Miranda finds a condom wrapper on Steve’s end table. While she has been agonizing about whether or not he will ever be able to move on, Steve, apparently, has been sleeping with a girl from Whole Foods. Miranda immediately releases the guilt she has been shouldering for months and walks out, heading home to her true love, Che. (While Miranda and Steve finally have real closure, it’s still unclear who is going to find a new place.)Except Che isn’t there to receive her with open arms. Che, it turns out, believes things with Miranda have taken a turn, and won’t get better. Miranda’s eyes well up, but she agrees.It’s surprising how well Miranda takes the Che breakup, actually. Che’s magnetism was so powerful to Miranda that she blew up her entire life so they could be together. Then, Che’s pilot flops and their ego takes a hit, they spend a few weeks in the doldrums living on Pirate’s Booty, and that’s just it? The whole relationship has to sink with the “Che Pasa” ship? And Miranda just lets it all go?For all those who missed the colder, more cynical version of Miranda, maybe she is on her way back. RIP, love-dovey Miranda. We hardly knew ye. More

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      Julie Halston on Playing Bitsy von Muffling in “And Just Like That”

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      Few “And Just Like That” characters have evoked the delightful candor of Samantha Jones the way Bitsy von Muffling, played by Julie Halston, has.Julie Halston knows her socialites. The stage and screen actress ticked off names including Nan Kempner, Judith Peabody, Muffie Potter Aston and Beth Rudin DeWoody while discussing her reprisal of Bitsy von Muffling, a chirpy lady who lunches, in “And Just Like That,” the “Sex and The City” reboot.“Let’s face facts: There will always be the three-name socialite!” Ms. Halston, 68, said on a video call on July 12.Though Bitsy did not appear in “Sex and The City” until the show’s fifth season, she has intermittently been in “And Just Like That” from the very beginning. In the first episode of Season 1, Bitsy runs into Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker), Miranda Hobbes (Cynthia Nixon) and Charlotte York (Kristin Davis), and asks them the question on countless minds: “Where’s Samantha?”She was referring, of course, to Samantha Jones (Kim Cattrall), whose absence has loomed large over the series’ first and second seasons. Last month, Max, the streaming service that airs “And Just Like That,” confirmed Ms. Cattrall will make a brief appearance before Season 2 ends on August 24.Though several new characters have effectively replaced Samantha in “And Just Like That,” few have lately channeled her delightful candor about sex, cosmetic surgery and aging fabulously the way Bitsy has.In Season 2, after running into Carrie at a salon, Bitsy tells her about the healing power a face-lift can offer a widow, explaining that few things felt as good as spending six figures on a procedure after the death of her husband, Bobby Fine (Nathan Lane), a lounge singer widely understood to be gay.Bitsy later tries to impress a potential suitor upon Carrie by sending her a picture of his penis.“When you think about it, yeah, that’s kind of there,” Ms. Halston said of the parallel between Bitsy and Samantha, which also extends to clothes. Like Samantha, Bitsy often appears in bright colors (a hot pink jacket by Thierry Mugler) and bold prints (a kaleidoscopic Pucci top) that add to her effervescence onscreen.In an interview from her home in Brooklyn, Ms. Halston spoke to The New York Times about that picture; her relationship with Michael Patrick King, the showrunner of “And Just Like That” and a “Sex and The City” executive producer; and how the 2018 death of her husband, the radio anchor Ralph Howard, influenced her reprisal of Bitsy.The following interview has been lightly edited and condensed.In Season 2 of “And Just Like That,” Bitsy, right, talks frankly with Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) about plastic surgery and sex.MaxHow did the role of Bitsy originate?Michael Patrick King had been a big fan of me and Charles Busch and our company Theatre-in-Limbo for many years. Then in 2001, he saw me in “The Women” on Broadway with Cynthia Nixon. Michael said, “I’m going to write something for you,” and I thought “Yeah, right, OK.” I auditioned for “Sex and The City” a few times and did not get it. One part was a therapist, one was like a Marianne Williamson type — a healer, “A Course in Miracles” kind of thing. Michael kept saying, “One of these days.”A couple years later, Bitsy was born, along with Nathan Lane’s character. People were really excited about this woman who was older, who married a gay man, knowing he was gay. That didn’t matter. He adored her; she adored him. I think that really resonated with a lot of people.Like Bitsy, you lost your husband, so the conversation with Carrie about grief at the salon presumably came from something of a real place.It will be five years this August. Michael knew a lot of what I had gone through, and he’s a smart fellow. He also wanted Bitsy to be a little more than just a funny lady wearing fun clothes, skipping in and out of the girls’ lives. What she said to Carrie — “The hole never fills, but new life will grow around it” — is totally true. It is awful. And you do have to fake it sometimes.Then, a few scenes later, Bitsy sends Carrie the penis picture while Gloria Steinem is speaking. What range!I would totally do that. Bitsy is not trying to be crass and horrible. She has slept with this guy, and now, she’s passing him on to Carrie. She’s doing a mitzvah for her. “Get out in the world. You need to get laid” is what she is saying. That’s very Julie and very Bitsy. Sexual health and sexual satisfaction are what I want more women to be about. I’m telling you, there would be a lot fewer wars in the world if people were more sexually satisfied.Do you also share Bitsy’s appreciation for plastic surgery?I do Botox, which I need right now. Dr. Douglas Steinbrech is how I prep for the role. It’s funny, but it’s the truth!As someone who appeared with the original cast in “Sex and the City,” how do you feel about the news that Samantha will make an appearance in “And Just Like That?”I’m sure there were so many people wanting to know something about her story line. I’m speculating, but maybe the creators thought, “Why don’t we just address this?” I’m not being coy. I honestly know nothing. I know what everyone else knows. Nothing. More