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      in Music

      What’s So Funny About These Albums?

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      Comedians have always wanted to be pop and rock stars — or at least, enough of them have gotten comfortable with a guitar and a drum track to make it seem so. It’s a long and eclectic tradition, including Steve Martin, Weird Al, Bo Burnham, Rachel Bloom, Donald Glover, Randy Rainbow and John Early.Now there’s a new crop of albums from entertainers across the comic spectrum. Some of them regularly use music as part of their act, like Cat Cohen, whose repertoire is all cabaret style. And some are left-field turns, like the profane opus from the writer and actor Jordan Firstman, or the thoughtful, genuine emo tunes of Mae Martin. Then there’s Kyle Mooney, whose record is either all gags — or none. In comedy, like music, it’s all in how you hit the beat.Jordan FirstmanJordan Firstman’s “Secrets” is a concept album built out of confessions strangers sent to him over social media.Ariel Fisher for The New York TimesThe social media favorite Jordan Firstman didn’t expect to release a record, let alone a concept album based on the private confessions of strangers on the internet. But on “Secrets,” out this month, he lets it rip, in ways that are almost entirely unprintable here. Its party anthem single describes a dude quest to bond over anatomy. (The video, directed by the boundary-pusher Cody Critcheloe, has more than a quarter-million views.)“Secrets” began as a pandemic-era riff, when Firstman, 33, publicly responded to his Instagram DMs. He accumulated tens of thousands of private missives — he requested the most “depraved” but also “Beautiful. Lyrical. And Random” stuff; endless inspiration.A few years later, with a friend — the musician and producer Brad Oberhofer — he began song-ifying them. “I’m like, such a lyric queen,” he said, and the secrets were ready-made titles, misspellings and all, like “I’m I Lesbian,” the album’s Lilith Fair-flavored closer. Capitol Records bought his pitch before he even left its parking lot, he said in a video interview.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 163 Shares199 Views

      in Television

      ‘SNL’ Pokes Fun at Trump’s Tariffs and Economy Chaos in Easter Cold Open

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      Among the sources of all the fun is ‘The White POTUS,” a parody that casts members of the administration in their own twisted playground for the privileged.With Easter approaching, it seemed appropriate for “Saturday Night Live” to resurrect a favorite bit: a scene from the Bible that is interrupted by a comic monologue from James Austin Johnson playing President Trump.This weekend’s broadcast, hosted by Jon Hamm and featuring the musical guest Lizzo, began with what looked like a straightforward re-enactment of the Cleansing of the Temple, with the role of Jesus played by Mikey Day. “This will not stand,” Day said, overturning a money changer’s table. “I will rid this place of all its money.”The action paused so that Johnson could enter as Trump. “Remind you of anyone?” he asked. “Wow. I also got rid of money last week. But instead of one temple, I did whole country. Maybe even the globe. The money’s gone.”Johnson continued: “Hi, it’s me, your favorite president, Donald Jesus Trump, comparing myself to the son of God once again. You know, many people are even calling me the messiah, because of the mess-I-ah made out of the economy.”The financial turmoil, he said, was “all because of my beautiful tariffs — they’re so beautiful. They were working so well that I had to stop them.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 138 Shares159 Views

      in Movies

      ‘The Interview’: Ramy Youssef Is Just Trying to Be ‘Emotionally Correct’

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      In the trailer for the new animated series “#1 Happy Family USA,” which premieres on Prime Video on April 17, there is a tag line that reads: “From the childhood nightmares of Ramy Youssef.” That might seem like a warning, but the show, which tells the story of the fictional Hussein family as they try to fit into a changing America in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks, is actually very funny. There are big musical numbers and irreverent “South Park”-esque humor (Youssef’s co-creator, Pam Brady, was a “South Park” writer), and the characters’ appearances change depending on whether they are inside their home or out trying to navigate the world.Youssef was 10, growing up in New Jersey in an Egyptian American family, when Al Qaeda attacked in 2001. He often refers to the dislocation and fear he experienced as a child in his stand-up comedy, and it has come up in “Ramy,” the Hulu show he created and stars in about a young first-generation Muslim American guy figuring things out in New Jersey. (Youssef told me he makes work about his own life because “it’s the only thing I can actually account for with genuine insight.”) This new series, though, is his most ambitious attempt yet to examine past events that are still very much with us. Again, it’s a really funny show.Though much of Youssef’s work is rooted in his own experiences and worldview, he has lately been taking on roles in other people’s projects too. He had a part in Yorgos Lanthimos’s 2023 film, “Poor Things”; directed a memorable, dreamy episode of “The Bear” (the one set in Copenhagen); and when we spoke, he was in Utah filming “Mountainhead,” the first movie directed by the “Succession” creator Jesse Armstrong, in which he plays a billionaire during a financial crisis. (He couldn’t tell me much about the project, but he did say that “what’s happening and what we’re portraying — it’s been so surreal.”) Our conversation, like much of his work, ranged from the personal to the universal.The creator and comedian discusses his penchant for self-reflection, how politics fits into his work and why he’s not interested in representing anyone but himself.Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | YouTube | Amazon | iHeart | NYT Audio AppYour new animated project is called “#1 Happy Family USA,” which is a great name. I found it almost hopeful, that something like this can now be made: a comedy about one of the most terrible days in American history from the perspective of a Muslim American family. Why did you want to make this show now? The thing that compelled me is: The family in this show, they already have a lot going on before 9/11 happens. Pretty much the entire pilot, it’s just this family comedy about a family you’ve never really seen in an animated space. To bring in the events of the early 2000s felt important in the sense that it’s something we talk about all the time. It’s part of what we’re currently experiencing. It’s never gone away. And when I think about how long these themes have been directly a part of my life and the lives of people that I know — to get to step into a period of time that I don’t think has escaped us in any way, unfortunately, and to do it in a style that is familiar in terms of trodding on political things that can feel a little difficult, and undercuts them and doesn’t make them feel so volatile — to give this kind of family that treatment is really exciting. And to go at this through a totally unexpected and very silly lens — maybe that’s where that hope feeling comes from, because it’s so unfiltered. It’s one of the most inappropriate things I’ve gotten to be a part of. Yet there’s a lot of love and care for the subjects involved.Listen to the Conversation With Ramy YoussefThe creator and comedian discusses his penchant for self-reflection, how politics fits into his work and why he’s not interested in representing anyone but himself. More

    • 138 Shares179 Views

      in Theater

      Suzanne Rand, Half of a Once-Popular Comedy Team, Dies at 75

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      Like Nichols and May before them, Monteith and Rand had their own Broadway show. Unlike Nichols and May, they faded from view after they broke up.Suzanne Rand, who worked with John Monteith in a comedy team that was often compared to the groundbreaking Mike Nichols and Elaine May — and that, like them, became the stars of a two-person Broadway show — died on April 2 in Manhattan. She was 75.Ruben Rand, her stepson, confirmed the death, in a rehabilitation facility. The cause was cardiopulmonary arrest.Ms. Rand and Mr. Monteith — she was the exuberant one; he was the more low-key partner — had backgrounds in improvisational comedy when they formed their act in 1976. Their sketches included Ms. Rand’s portrayal of a guilt-ridden fly killer who tries to revive a swatted pest, and the two of them as movie critics assigned to review a pornographic film who then mimic its action.They built sketches around suggestions from the audience — settings, pet peeves, objects, occupations, film and television genres — and performed scripted material.Their male-female partnership and their quick repartee led to comparisons with Nichols and May, who met in the 1950s and whose collection of wry, savvy and satirical improvisations, “An Evening With Mike Nichols and Elaine May,” reached Broadway in October 1960 and ran for 306 performances.Monteith and Rand in performance in Chicago in 1980, a year after they appeared on Broadway.Paul Natkin/Getty ImagesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares119 Views

      in Television

      Comedian Josh Johnson Talks ‘The Daily Show,’ Specials and More

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      He doesn’t have a tight five minutes like most stand-ups, but his up-to-the-moment, thoughtful sets are winning legions of fans.Josh Johnson is exactly who you think he is.Or at least very close to the wry, deeply thoughtful, country-mouse-turned-city-mouse persona of his standup sets. In real life, which in this case is a sushi restaurant around the corner from the Comedy Cellar, he’s wearing his stage uniform — fitted gray hoodie, jeans, sneakers, twists pulled back into a ponytail — and he’s speaking in circles, only to arrive at a sometimes funny but always poignant conclusion.After a decade of “up-and-coming” accolades, sets at major comedy venues, two hourlong specials and writing jobs on “The Tonight Show” and “The Daily Show,” the 35-year-old comedian is arriving right on time. Where once Johnson might have occasionally crossed your screen — take his superviral “Catfishing the KKK” set from 2017, about a brief online friendship with a white supremacist — his timely, topical material and fast-growing fan base are now inescapable.“I think a lot of stuff is kind of coming together,” said Johnson over lunch. “Some of it is me choosing to read certain things, learn certain things and pull from different people in my life. And some of it is just the accident of luck.”His sudden rise can’t be attributed solely to relentless touring or his ability to make people laugh. The fact is that no other working comedian is currently releasing the equivalent of new standup specials at the same clip: In 2024 alone, Johnson uploaded the equivalent of 28 hourlong specials to his social channels, and is on track to exceed that number this year, to the slight shock and complete awe of those who know him well.The comedian Jon Stewart returned to host “The Daily Show” last year around the same time Johnson became a correspondent on the program, and sums up the younger comic’s style this way: “You know the things that are bouncing around in your mind that you have neither the time nor maybe the facility to draw together into coherent and then really funny and surprising thoughts? Yeah, this guy’s doing it. He’s doing it actually for you.”Johnson draws on bizarre, terrifying or downright silly encounters that he gets involved in through no fault of his own.Hiroko Masuike/The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares189 Views

      in Television

      UK Version of ‘Saturday Night Live’ Will Start in 2026

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      A British version of the television sketch comedy program “Saturday Night Live” is set to debut in 2026.“Saturday Night Live” is coming to Britain.A British version of NBC’s late-night comedy sketch show is set to premiere next year on Sky, the broadcaster announced on Thursday. The new edition of the program will have Lorne Michaels, the show’s creator, as executive producer and will feature “a star-studded lineup of hosts.”The familiar catchphrase used to kick off the weekly show will be slightly modified: “Live from London, it’s Saturday night!”Sky said the show would follow a similar format to the American version, which just celebrated its 50th anniversary. It will star a yet-to-be-announced cast of British comedians who will perform sketches, alongside rotating hosts and featured musical acts.“For over 50 years, Saturday Night Live has held a unique position in TV and in our collective culture,” Cécile Frot-Coutaz, the chief executive of Sky Studios, said in the announcement.“The show has discovered and nurtured countless comedy and musical talents over the years, and we are thrilled to be partnering with Lorne and the ‘S.N.L.’ team to bring an all-British version of the show to U.K. audiences.”The remake comes after years of speculation that a British version of the comedy show was in the works. Versions of the program have already been produced around the world, including in Germany, Spain, Italy, China, Japan, South Korea and Egypt. More

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      in Television

      Jay North, Child Star Who Played ‘Dennis the Menace,’ Dies at 73

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      Mr. North was best known for playing the towheaded Dennis Mitchell on the television series, which ran on CBS from 1959 to 1963.Jay North, who played the well-meaning, trouble-causing protagonist of the popular CBS sitcom “Dennis the Menace” from 1959 to 1963, died on Sunday at his home in Lake Butler, Fla. He was 73.His death was confirmed by Laurie Jacobson, a friend of Mr. North’s for 30 years. The cause was colorectal cancer, Ms. Jacobson said.Mr. North played the towheaded Dennis Mitchell, who roamed his neighborhood, usually clad in a striped shirt and overalls, with his friends, and often exasperated his neighbor, a retiree named George Wilson, who was played by Joseph Kearns. Herbert Anderson played Dennis’s father, and Gloria Henry played his mother.Dennis winds up causing lots of trouble, usually by accident.In one episode, a truck knocks over a street sign, and Dennis and a friend stand it up — incorrectly. Workmen then dig a gigantic hole, meant to be a pool for a different address, in Mr. Wilson’s front yard.The show, which was adapted from a comic strip by Hank Ketcham, presented an idyllic, innocent vision of suburban America as the 1950s gave way to the tumultuous ’60s.But things were not easy for Mr. North behind the scenes.Many years after “Dennis the Menace” ended, Mr. North said that his acting success came at the cost of a happy childhood.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 163 Shares99 Views

      in Movies

      ‘The Interview’: Bill Murray Says He’s Not the Man He Used to Be

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      In Bill Murray’s new movie, “The Friend,” currently in theaters and based on the beautifully bittersweet novel by Sigrid Nunez, he plays Walter, a writer and professor who is best friends with Iris, played by Naomi Watts. Through an upsetting course of events, Iris, who lives in a modest apartment in Manhattan, winds up having to take in Walter’s Great Dane. Not exactly ideal for her or the dog, and not exactly thoughtful of Walter.Witty and charismatic but also self-centered and responsible for real damage, Walter shares much in common with many of Murray’s late-career roles. I often think of the dramatic parts that he has specialized in since the late ’90s (consider the melancholy men of a certain age in “Rushmore,” “Lost in Translation,” “On the Rocks,” “St. Vincent” and so on) as being akin to alternate-world versions of the comedy characters that made him a star. Because Peter Venkman in “Ghostbusters” or Phil Connors in “Groundhog Day,” to pick just two of his most memorable comedic creations, could also be selfish and mean but, in the end, got away with it. Not so with Walter and his ilk. It’s as if Murray’s latter-day characters are suffering the karmic payback owed to his earlier ones.A similar balancing act — between charm and callousness, buoyancy and bad moods — has surfaced in Murray’s offscreen life too. Yes, he is a globe-trotting avatar of joyful surprise, known for his party crashing and playful high jinks, but directors and co-stars like Geena Davis, Lucy Liu, Richard Dreyfuss and Harold Ramis have said Murray was, to put it very mildly, not easy to work with. And in 2022, a female staff member working on the film “Being Mortal” claimed that Murray, who is 74, behaved inappropriately with her on set. She said that he straddled her and kissed her through masks, which they were wearing as part of Covid-19 protocols. The production was shut down, and eventually they reached a settlement.Given all this, Murray, enigmatic and mercurial, is a hard one to figure out. But on a rainy day in late March, at a hotel in downtown Manhattan, I had a chance to try.Listen to the Conversation With Bill MurrayThe actor talks about his new film “The Friend,” his jerky past and what he doesn’t get about himself.Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | YouTube | Amazon | iHeart | NYT Audio AppYou know, at The Times earlier today, your co-star in “The Friend,” the dog, was having his photo taken. He is a striking dog: 150 pounds, a Great Dane. His name is Bing. Bing! He lives in Iowa, and after a nationwide search he was chosen as the dog of the moment. He wasn’t wearing a tight sweater or anything. He was just the most capable dog. More