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      How ‘Nimona’ Helped Its Creator Explore His Emerging Identity

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      The graphic novelist ND Stevenson wrote the trans allegory long before he came out. When it was time to adapt it for a new film, he was ready to go further.In the new Netflix animated film “Nimona,” the titular character makes its first appearance as a redheaded teenage girl before transforming into a charging rhino, then a grizzly, then a songbird and so on, with brief stopovers as a gorilla, an ostrich and an armadillo.After Ballister Boldheart (voiced by Riz Ahmed) a prim, by-the-book knight, asks her, “Can you please just be normal for a second?” he wonders if all that shape-shifting hurts. “Honestly? I feel worse when I don’t do it,” Nimona (Chloë Grace Moretz) replies.ND Stevenson, who wrote and drew the graphic novel on which the film is based, said he had always loved shape-shifters. But his animated film explores elements of the trans experience — the clumsy questions from well-meaning friends, the outright hatred from strangers — only hinted at in his award-winning book, a beloved staple of the L.G.B.T.Q. literary canon.“The themes have their roots in the comic,” Stevenson explained. “But it would be years before I came out as gay, years before I came out as trans. Narratives have been my way of exploring those identities, even as allegory.”The film brings those themes to the fore at a time when trans rights have come increasingly under attack. “We knew what we were doing,” Stevenson said of the filmmakers. “We knew what we wanted to say.”“But even back then,” he continued, “I don’t think any of us knew how bleak things were going to get, the backlash against trans and queer people, and how much the movie was going to speak to that.”In “Nimona,” the title character is a shape-shifter who joins forces with a lovelorn knight. Netflix“Nimona” focuses on the budding friendship between Nimona and Ballister, who is wrongly accused of murdering his queen. The film also features a sweet, star-crossed romance between Ballister, who is already mistrusted because he’s a commoner among nobles, and Ambrosius Goldenloin, a dreamy, lovesick knight (Eugene Lee Yang).“This is a story that is, at its heart, a love letter to anybody who’s ever felt different or misunderstood,” said Troy Quane, who directed the movie along with Nick Bruno.The film had its beginnings in 2015, the same year the book was published, and is that rarest of Hollywood literary makeovers. For decades, gay characters and relationships in literary classics were straightwashed on the big screen, whether in “The Maltese Falcon” and “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” or “Fried Green Tomatoes” and “The Color Purple.”In “Nimona,” the story became more queer friendly on its way to Hollywood, not less.For Stevenson, much of the book spoke to his own upbringing and experiences. “Coming from a really conservative family and the evangelical church in the South,” he said, “the story is definitely a reaction to that.”On a recent afternoon, Stevenson was at the Netflix Animation studio in Burbank discussing how his film came to be. Dressed in a green “Big Sur Monterey County” sweatshirt and flannel trousers, his red hair cut short, Stevenson talked about his background, his beginnings as an artist and how the story morphed — much like the shape-shifting Nimona — on its way from book to screen.Stevenson, 31, was born and raised in Columbia, S.C., the middle child of five siblings. After years of home-schooling and two more at the local high school, he went to the Maryland Institute College of Art, where he began posting Nimona comics online in 2012, a project that became his senior thesis. “When I first started making the comic, I didn’t consider myself a writer,” he said. “I was in school for illustration. But comics was kind of my way of tricking myself into thinking like, no, I am a writer.”Online, the series quickly gained fans, and in graphic novel form, “Nimona” won several awards including an Eisner, the comics industry’s most prestigious honor, and was a National Book Award finalist. Stevenson was 24. That year, Fox Animation acquired the rights to make an animated feature based on the comic, and called on Blue Sky Studios (the “Ice Age” franchise) to make it.The next five years were busy and creative ones. In addition to adapting “Nimona,” Stevenson collaborated with several others in creating and writing “Lumberjanes,” an Eisner-winning comic book series set in a summer camp for “hardcore lady types.” He also became the show runner of the DreamWorks series “She-Ra and the Princesses of Power,” a fantastical, queer-friendly reboot of the 1980s cartoon, which went on to win an Emmy and a GLAAD Media Award.In 2020, Stevenson published the memoir “The Fire Never Goes Out,” a collection of “year in review” comics that run from his college days and subsequent creative triumphs to his marriage, in 2019, to fellow cartoonist and writer Molly Ostertag. In the book, he writes about coming out, the joys of life with Molly, and his struggles with body image and mental health; in several, he draws himself with an enormous hole in the center of his torso or consumed by flames.“I can’t literally grab my emotions and shape them into something that makes sense,” he said. “But I can wrestle with a drawing and try to make it make sense.”“Coming from a really conservative family and the evangelical church in the South, the story is definitely a reaction to that,” Stevenson said.Ryan Pfluger for The New York TimesMeanwhile, at Blue Sky, the filmmakers worked to find the heart of “Nimona,” a way into a character who was, by definition, ever-changing and hard to define.“It was a difficult thing to capture,” Moretz said. “It was so fun, but I would come home and I would look at my partner and be like, I can’t talk. I can’t do anything but rest.”Early versions, Stevenson said, ended up with Ballister as the focus and Nimona as some sort of manic pixie dream girl, playing second fiddle to the lovelorn knight.Nobody wanted that. Somehow, they had to find the human core of a character who was, in many ways, anything but. “Everybody was very clear that ‘Nimona’ was this universal story, a love story,” Bruno said. “But there was a particular group of people who were really passionate about it, and those were the people at Blue Sky who were members of the LGBTQ+ community.”In group discussions, they were sharing their stories and what the book meant to them. “We thought, why not, if this group feels OK with it, incorporate some of these stories in the film?” Bruno said.In the book, the Ballister-Goldenloin romance is only hinted at. In the film, however, there’s a kiss, an “I love you” between the knights, and even a back story to explain why they’re so nuts about each other in the first place. As for Nimona, the character is not trans, per se (or even, as the filmmakers note, female, although Nimona can be, should the mood strike). But the parallels are there, for those who care to look.In 2021, Disney, which had acquired Blue Sky in its acquisition of Fox, shuttered the studio and “Nimona” with it, only two days before a planned screening for the cast and crew. “Just like that, 450 people were out of a job,” Stevenson recalled. “It was heartbreaking.”The team decided to go ahead with the screening, a premiere of sorts as well as a goodbye. “No one wanted to click out of the Zoom meeting,” Quane recalled.The following year, after the creators spent months shopping the project, Annapurna Pictures opted to revive the film. “We all got together and just wanted to cry, because we were like, Nimona survived,” Moretz said. “It was such a testament to who she is, and her resilience.”If you want to watch the film as a trans allegory, there’s certainly a lot there. But if you just want to watch a beautifully animated adventure story filled with castles and knights and laser cannons and flying cars, starring a shape-shifting force of nature who likes to blow stuff up, there’s that, too. Stevenson thinks there’s room for both readings.“My opinions of that continue to evolve,” said Stevenson, who is working on developing “Lumberjanes” and a project based on a novel he wrote at 15. “On the one hand, I think that explicit representation is really, really important. But I also know there’s certain media that I never would have gotten to read as a kid if it had been marketed that way.”“I think if I were making the comic now, there’s a lot more I would have done with it, and it’s cool to see the movie do that,” he continued. “But I also think there’s a certain power in having a story that clearly expresses that, but maybe flies under the radar of parents who might be less willing to put that book in their kids’ hands.” More

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      ‘Nimona’ Review: Fright the Power

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      A zingy, chintzy, idea-driven animated feature based on the ND Stevenson comic.Imagine Bugs Bunny blended with the Joker and you’ll get a sense of Nimona, an impish, shape-shifting villain who presents as a pink-haired, miniskirted punk but prefers to buck description. “I’m not a girl, I’m a shark!” Nimona (voiced by a vibrant Chloë Grace Moretz) insists. At will, Nimona is also an otter, ostrich, rhinoceros, gorilla, girl-shaped humanoid, boy-shaped humanoid, kitty cat, pizza rat and blue whale who swallows its enemies and squirts them out of its blowhole with a filthy snicker.Likewise, “Nimona,” a zingy, chintzy, idea-driven animated feature, was once a Tumblr comic, an art school thesis and an award-winning graphic novel (all three incarnations by the author ND Stevenson). Then, in 2021, it became an internet cri de coeur when Disney shut down production on a feature. Annapurna and Netflix stepped in, and the final film version, directed by Nick Bruno and Troy Quane from a script by Robert L. Baird and Lloyd Taylor, is a rush job with little resemblance to the much bleaker web comic. But it’s a vivid creature all its own.The story is set in a futuro-medieval walled city with jumbotrons and knights who say, “Bro.” Fear has reigned for a millennium, ever since the hero Gloreth battled back a monster. Now, Gloreth’s Valkyrie-esque statue looms large over the populace, casting a shadow that extends over billboards that blare, “If you see something, slay something,” and an outlaw knight, Ballister Boldheart (Riz Ahmed), cowering in disgrace from a wrongful accusation of regicide.Ballister yearns to be once again embraced by the kingdom, and his ex, the lustily named Ambrosius Goldenloin (Eugene Lee Yang), who broke Ballister’s heart and sliced off his arm. Enter Nimona, a bloodthirsty wrecking ball who wants to use Ballister to destroy the entire system. To do so, Nimona brings further shame upon the exile, even publicly claiming that Ballister likes — Egads! — freestyle jazz.At first, the look (particularly the lifeless backgrounds) is so slapdash that you’re tempted to flee. But jokes litter the film like scattered Legos, making you hesitate long enough to appreciate how the light glints off Ballister’s armor-plated shoulders. Attention has been paid; it’s just not equally distributed. The tone is uneasy teetering on anarchic, veering from giddily moronic one-liners to — more shockingly — a climax with deep empathy and visual awe.This is a big message film that wants audiences to reflect on social paranoia. At its heart, it’s a pointed allegory about politicians who build their national profile on the backs of queer and transgender children. Nimona the character doesn’t claim to speak for them, but does try to speak to them and to others grappling with the concept of what it might feel like when your shell doesn’t match your soul. “I feel worse when I don’t do it,” Nimona says of metamorphosing, “like my insides are itchy.” But the movie is also willing to poke fun at its own politics when, minutes later, Nimona sabotages a losing game of Monopoly with a comic rant about overthrowing our oppressors, and, as a capper, feigns sudden death.NimonaRated PG. Running time: 1 hour 41 minutes. Watch on Netflix. More

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      Stan Lee, a Comic Book Presence On and Off Screen

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      Mr. Lee was nearly synonymous with Marvel Comics and appeared in many of their films, but his guest appearances cross over into audio, animation and more.The trials and tribulations of Spider-Man, the Hulk, Iron Man, Thor, the X-Men and other Marvel Comics superheroes are familiar around the world thanks to comic books and films. Somewhat less known are the successes and struggles of the writer, the publisher and the showman Stan Lee, who was pivotal — along with the artists Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko — in bringing so many of Marvel’s characters to life.The documentary “Stan Lee” by the director David Gelb that debuts on June 10 at the Tribeca Festival in New York City seeks to change that. The film uses previously unreleased audio recordings and film footage and new and archival interviews to tell Mr. Lee’s story. The film, which will be available on Disney+ June 16, is a new way of seeing Mr. Lee, who was a constant presence in the lives of fans thanks to his writing, his voice work, his television appearances and his Marvel movie cameos. Here are some notable ones.Mr. Lee’s roles and affiliations with Marvel Comics included writer, publisher and spokesman.MarvelCameo AppearancesWhen “Iron Man” was released in 2008, it was the beginning of what is now known as the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It also started a streak of appearances by Mr. Lee in the films. In “Iron Man,” he is at a party and is spotted by Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.), who confuses him for Hugh Hefner.Not all his appearances were tongue-in-cheek. One of the most sincere can be found in the opening of 2019’s “Captain Marvel,” which came after Mr. Lee’s death in 2018. As the “Marvel Studios” logo comes into focus, flashes of comic book images and dialogue give way to clips of Mr. Lee as swelling music plays. When the logo fades, only the words “Thank You Stan” remain. Later in the film he appeared in a more traditional cameo, shot before his death, when Carol Danvers (Brie Larson) meets him on a train reading a “Mallrats” script.Voices CarryMr. Lee’s voice and his catchphrase “Excelsior!” were comforting to fans in many places. In addition to narrating several Spider-Man video games, players could use “EEL NATS” (his name spelled backward) to unlock levels.In 1975, he narrated a “Fantastic Four” radio series. The Human Torch was voiced by Bill Murray, who told Jimmy Kimmel last year that he only remembered saying the character’s battle cry, “Flame On!”In the final episode of “Spider-Man: The Animated Series” (1994-98), Spider-Man, during an adventure through the multiverse, visits our world. He meets Mr. Lee and swings him on spider-webs through the city. When the mysterious Madame Web arrives to take the hero home, Mr. Lee asks, “Who is that exotic lady?” Her voice was a clue: she was played by Joan Lee, his wife, who died in 2017.In 1998, Mr. Lee appeared in cartoon form on “Spider-Man: The Animated Series,” in an episode in which the wall crawler met his creator.Distinguished CompetitionMr. Lee and Marvel are irrevocably linked, but he was no stranger to working with superhero industry rivals DC Comics. From 2001 to 2002, DC released a “Just Imagine” series of stories written by Mr. Lee in which he reinterpreted Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and other heroes. The company revisited them last year with all new stories in honor of his 100th birthday.A cartoon version of Mr. Lee also appeared in DC’s 2018 animated film “Teen Titans Go! To the Movies.” In one scene, he dances, strikes action poses and declares, “Hey everybody, look at me, doing my subtle cameo,” while music plays and “Stan Lee” logos appear on the screen. He returns later and says, “I don’t care if it’s a DC movie — I love cameos!” It was a sign of how self-effacing he could be: poking fun of himself in a rival’s movie.Letters From the EditorMr. Lee wrote a multitude of stories, but readers heard from him directly in the form of editorials on the back pages of many Marvel Comics. “Stan’s Soapbox” columns, written between 1967 and 1980, allowed him to ruminate on everything from the creative process to social issues. The author Brad Meltzer wrote in Mr. Lee’s obituary for Entertainment Weekly, “He gave an entire generation creeds to live by. Principles to emulate.” One of Mr. Lee’s editorials, from 1968, started with this: “Let’s lay it right on the line. Bigotry and racism are among the deadliest social ills plaguing the world today.” A collection of his editorials is available from the Hero Initiative, a charity which helps comic book creators in need.Birthday SuitThe Marvel Fumetti Book, published in 1983, is a comic book anthology using black and white photographs by Eliot R. Brown to tell its stories. Readers were treated to behind-the-scenes looks at Marvel’s editorial staff, who were sometimes shown acting out plot details. In one story, Mr. Lee playfully admonishes the team for recent developments, including “Alcoholic Iron Men!” and the mohawk haircut for the X-Men’s Storm. “I’m not sure I like what I see!” he says. “Knock it off already!”He is also pictured in the comic’s centerfold laying on a couch with a Hulk costume superimposed over him. But the original, unused photo was bolder: It was a nude picture of him with a strategically placed comic book.In one of his final projects, Mr. Lee appeared as an usher in the Webtoon comic Backchannel about a hactivist group. Non Marvel ComicsIn 2020, TidalWave Productions released “Tribute: Stan Lee,” a 30-page biographical comic. It chronicles Mr. Lee’s career before and after Marvel, the publisher’s initial forays into animation and television and some of the creative gestalt that gave birth to the Fantastic Four and other superheroes. The comic also notes the conflict between him and Mr. Kirby, the artist who created many of the characters with Mr. Lee, who felt he was not given enough credit or compensation for his hand in bringing those heroes to life.One of Mr. Lee’s final projects was the serialized Webtoon comic Backchannel, co-written by Tom Akel and drawn by Andie Tong, about a hactivist group. A collected edition will be released Aug. 15. Watch out for a cameo appearance by Mr. Lee in Chapter Nine. He is shown working at a movie theater, which is based on one of his first jobs as an usher. More

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      Brett Goldstein Faces Life After ‘Ted Lasso’

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      LONDON — A few minutes into coffee last spring, Brett Goldstein wanted to show me something on his phone.I leaned over and saw puppeteers sitting on skateboards while they hid behind a table, rolling into one another in apparent bliss as their hands animated a clowder of felt cats above their heads. For Goldstein this represented a kind of creative ideal, as pure an expression of fun, craft and unbridled glee as any human is likely to encounter.“Imagine this is your actual job,” he said, his breathtaking eyebrows raised in wonder.Goldstein shot this behind-the-scenes video during his time as a guest star on “Sesame Street,” an experience this Emmy-winning, Marvel-starring comic actor and writer still describes as the single best day of his life.The clip is inarguably delightful, but Goldstein hardly has to imagine such a job. As the breakout star of “Ted Lasso,” the hit comedy about a tormented but terminally sunny American coach winning hearts, minds and the occasional football match in England, he is part of an ensemble that brought as much bonhomie, optimism and warmth to the set as Ted himself, played by the show’s mastermind, Jason Sudeikis, brought to the screen.“I will be absolutely devastated when it ends,” Goldstein said last year. “I think we all will.”And now it has ended. Or maybe it hasn’t. What is certain is that the new season of “Ted Lasso,” which starts on Wednesday, will conclude the three-act story the creators conceived in the beginning and there are no plans for more. Whether and how more tales from the Lassoverse arrive is up to Sudeikis, who told me he hadn’t even begun to ponder such things. “It’s been a wonderful labor of love, but a labor nonetheless,” he said.So even if the new season isn’t the end, it represents an end, one that hit Goldstein hard. In a video call last month, he confirmed that while shooting the finale in November, he kept sneaking off to “have a cry.”But even if “Lasso” is over for good, it is also inarguable that Goldstein has made the most of it. Chances are you had never heard of him three years ago, when he was a journeyman performer working on a TV show based on an NBC Sports promo for a service, Apple TV+, that few people had. (Humanity had plenty else to think about in March 2020.)Brett Goldstein, Brendan Hunt and Jason Sudeikis in the third and final season of “Ted Lasso.”Apple TV+But things have moved fast for him since “Ted Lasso” became the pre-eminent feel-good story of the streaming era, both in form — as an underdog sports tale about the importance of kindness — and function, as a surprise hit and career boost for a bunch of lovable, previously unheralded actors who have now amassed 14 Emmy nominations for their performances.None of them have turned “Ted Lasso” into quite the launchpad that Goldstein has. His Roy Kent, a gruff, floridly profane retired player turned coach, was an immediate fan favorite, and Goldstein won Emmys for best supporting actor in a comedy both seasons. He was also one of the show’s writers and parlayed that into a new series: “Shrinking,” a comedy about grief and friendship. Goldstein developed it with Bill Lawrence, another “Lasso” creator, and Jason Segel, who stars along with Harrison Ford. (It is Ford’s first regular TV comedy role.)Thanks to “Shrinking,” which came out in January and was just renewed for another season, you might have encountered Goldstein on “Late Night With Stephen Colbert,” “The Today Show,” “CBS Saturday Morning” or some podcast or another.Thanks to his surprise debut as Hercules — Hercules! — in a post-credits scene in Marvel’s 2022 blockbuster “Thor: Love and Thunder,” you will soon see him everywhere.Brett Goldstein in a scene from “Thor: Love and Thunder.”MarvelNone of this had come out when we met last year. Back then, he was still struggling to make sense of the ways “Ted Lasso” had changed his life after two decades of working in comparative obscurity in London’s theater and comedy trenches. Whatever the hassles of losing his anonymity, he said, they were more than offset by the benefits — the visit to “Sesame Street,” the opportunity to work with a childhood hero like Ford, the chance to work on “Lasso” itself.“I would happily do it for 25 more years,” he said, but that’s out of his hands.What Goldstein can control is what he does with his new Hollywood juice, which currently includes a second season of “Shrinking,” other TV concepts in development and whatever emerges from the whole Hercules thing. (He’s already mastered Marvel’s signature superpower: the non-comment.)No matter how long this window of opportunity stays open, he’s still chasing the same simple thing: a slightly coarser version of what he captured in that “Sesame Street” video.“It’s a bunch of grown people having the time of their [expletive] lives being very, very silly but also creating something that’s meaningful,” Goldstein said. “And it’s [expletive] joyous.”OK, a significantly coarser version. But to understand why, it helps to know a little about how he got here.‘I very much relate to the anger.’Goldstein, 42, grew up in Sutton, England, as a soccer nut by birthright — his father is a Tottenham Hotspur fanatic — who became just as obsessed with performing and movies, spending hours as a boy recreating Indiana Jones stunts in his front yard.Improbably, all of the above contributed to his current circumstances: It was his performing and soccer fandom that led to “Ted Lasso,” and he is now writing lines for Indiana Jones himself in “Shrinking” — lines Ford says while playing a character inspired by Goldstein’s father.But it took Goldstein a few decades to arrive at such an exalted position. After a childhood spent acting in little plays and his own crude horror shorts, he studied film and literature at the University of Warwick. He continued writing and performing through college and beyond, in shorts and “loads of plays at Edinburgh Fringe and off, off, off, off West End,” he said. A short film called “SuperBob,” about a melancholy lo-fi superhero played by a beardless Goldstein, eventually led to a cult feature of the same name.More important, it caught the eye of the casting director for “Derek” (2012-14), Ricky Gervais’s mawkish comedy about a kindly simpleton (played by Gervais) working at a senior care facility. Goldstein played a nice boyfriend. “That was my first proper TV job, and then it was slightly easier,” he said.Along the way he tried standup and it became an abiding obsession — even now he tries to perform several nights a week. “He’s always been the sexy, hunky dude in, like, really tiny comedic circles,” said Phil Dunster, who plays the reformed prima donna Jamie Tartt in “Lasso” and first met Goldstein roughly a decade ago, when he performed in one of Goldstein’s plays. (Dunster remembers being dazzled and intimidated by his eyebrows.)At some point a fan of Goldstein’s standup mentioned him to Lawrence, a creator of network hits like “Spin City” and “Scrubs,” who checked out Goldstein in a failed pilot and was impressed enough to cast him in his own new sitcom in 2017.That one also never made it to air. By then Goldstein was in his late 30s. “I had a sort of epiphany of, ‘I’ve missed my window,’” he said.Then came “Ted Lasso.”“I will be absolutely devastated when it ends,” Brett Goldstein said of “Ted Lasso.” “I think we all will.”Magdalena Wosinska for The New York TimesThe show’s creators, who also included Brendan Hunt and Joe Kelly, wanted some English soccer fans on staff, and Lawrence thought of Goldstein. He was hired as a writer but soon became convinced that he was the person to play the surly, fading pro Roy Kent. As scripting on the first season wrapped up, he made a video of himself performing several Roy scenes and sent it to the creators, stipulating that if he was terrible, all involved would never speak of it again. He was not terrible.It’s a story he has told many times. But it hits different in person, as the gentle fellow in a fitted black T-shirt recounts how he felt a bone-deep connection to the irascible Roy. The face is essentially the same, but the eyes are too friendly and the voice is smooth and mellifluous where Roy’s is a clipped growl.“I get that you would be confused by this,” Goldstein said, setting his coffee cup neatly into its saucer. “But I very much relate to the anger. I used to be very, very miserable and had a quite dark brain, and I’ve worked very hard at changing that. But it’s there.”Lawrence said that “of all the shows I’ve ever done, Brett is one of the top two people in terms of how different he is from his character.” (The other: Ken Jenkins, the friendly actor who played the caustic Dr. Kelso in “Scrubs.”)In some ways the connection between actor and character is clear. Both are prolific swearers, for one thing, and Goldstein lives by the chant that defines his famous alter-ego: He’s here, he’s there, he’s everywhere.Colleagues and friends are stupefied by how much he does. While shooting the first season of “Lasso,” he was also flying to Madrid to shoot “Soulmates,” the sci-fi anthology series he created with Will Bridges. During filming for Season 3, he acted in “Lasso” by day and joined the “Shrinking” writers’ room on video calls by night. He found time to interview comics, actors, filmmakers and friends for his long-running movie podcast, “Films to be Buried With.” He regularly squeezed in standup sets.“I’m not sure when he sleeps,” Dunster said. “But I know he gets it in, because he looks so young.”Goldstein said his workaholism predates his newfound Hollywood clout. “Even when I was doing stuff that no one was watching, I was always working,” he said. “Either I’m mentally unwell, or genuinely this is the thing that gives me purpose and makes me happy.”He acknowledged that both could be true. But then if “Ted Lasso” has taught us anything, it’s that nobody is just one thing.‘We joke our way through this.’“Ted Lasso” is a sprawling comic tapestry woven from characters — a wounded team owner (played by Hannah Waddingham), an insecure publicist (Juno Temple), a spiteful former protégé (Nick Mohammed) — threading their way toward better selves. The new season finds the AFC Richmond squad at its underdoggiest yet, back in England’s mighty Premier League and destined for an uncertain but sure to be uplifting fate.“Shrinking” is more intimate, a show about hard emotions and hanging out that happens to star a screen legend whose presence still astounds everyone. “It’s a year later and I still go, ‘Bloody hell, that’s Harrison Ford,’” Goldstein said.Harrison Ford is one of the stars of “Shrinking,” an Apple TV+ series Goldstein helped create. “It’s a year later and I still go, ‘Bloody hell, that’s Harrison Ford,’” Goldstein said.Apple TV+Ford’s character is an esteemed psychologist who has received a Parkinson’s diagnosis. He was inspired by several real-life figures, including Lawrence’s grandfather, who also had Parkinson’s disease; his father, who has Lewy body dementia; and his old friend from “Spin City,” Michael J. Fox. The character was also based on Goldstein’s father, another Parkinson’s survivor.“Brett and I share this thing with our families that we joke our way through this,” Lawrence said.Goldstein is exceedingly private about his personal life, but his father gave him permission to discuss the link — his reasoning was that he wasn’t ashamed of the condition and couldn’t hide it anyway. “And also,” he told his son, “the fact that I can tell people Harrison Ford is based on me is a pretty cool thing.”Goldstein joked that this gift he has given his father has expanded their conversational canvas by roughly 100 percent: “Football is still all me and my dad talk about,” he said. “That and the fact that he’s Harrison Ford.”The former, at least, is the way it’s always been. “I think that’s why sport exists,” he said. “It’s a way of saying ‘I love you’ while never saying ‘I love you.’”Such Trojan-horsing of human emotion has become Goldstein’s default mode, whether it’s using his podcast guests’ favorite films to get at their real fears and desires, portraying the discomfort of vulnerability via a clenched soccer star, or writing Parkinson’s jokes to work through the painful fact of his parents’ mortality.“Even when I was doing stuff that no one was watching, I was always working,” Goldstein said. “Either I’m mentally unwell, or genuinely this is the thing that gives me purpose and makes me happy.”Magdalena Wosinska for The New York TimesSegel said that Goldstein is always the one on “Shrinking” insisting that no matter how punchy the punch lines, the feelings must be pure and true. This wasn’t surprising, he added, because Goldstein is a Muppets fan.“It sounds like a joke,” said Segel, who as a writer and star of “The Muppets” (2011) does not joke about such things. “But it speaks to a lack of fear around earnest expression of emotion.”Which brings us back to the cat video and Goldstein’s other Muppet-related fascinations. (“The Muppet Christmas Carol” might be his favorite move ever, he said, and he’s been known to perform an abridged version on standup stages.)Those looking for a felt skeleton key to unlock his various idiosyncrasies aren’t likely to find one. But his Muppet affection does offer a glimpse at what motivates him as a performer, creator and workaholic, which is less about opportunities, franchises or scale than the vulnerability and risks of trying to reach someone and the openness required to take it in. The thing he’s always looking for, he told me over and over — to the point that he started apologizing for it — is a bit of human connection in a world that can seem designed to thwart it.“They put up this Muppet and I’m gone,” he said. “But that requires from both of us a leap of faith, like, ‘We’re doing this, and I’m all in and you’re all in.’ And if one of us did not commit to this thing then it’s [expletive] stupid — it’s just a [expletive] felt thing on your hand, and I’m an idiot for talking to it and you’re an idiot for holding it.“Do you know what I mean?” More

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      How Science Fiction Movies Prepared Us for the Nuclear Fusion Breakthrough

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      The promise of a new, bountiful energy source, not to mention the giant lasers, may sound familiar to fans of science fiction and comics.Today we step into the future. And it looks a lot like a movie we’ve all seen.Researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory announced Tuesday that they had made a major breakthrough in studying fusion, a.k.a. the thermonuclear reaction that keeps the sun going. The news, about trying to harness literal star power the likes of which Hollywood could only dream, stirred great hopes because, if replicated and controlled, it could one day provide a bountiful source of carbon-free energy.If that sounds like science fiction, well, that’s because we’ve been amply primed for this discovery in pop culture, where alternative versions of our present and fantastical imaginings of our future have shown us impossible technologies powered by some combination of special effects and incomprehensible jargon.You probably already have some familiarity with fusion thanks to movies.At the end of the 1985 sci-fi classic “Back to the Future,” Dr. Emmett Brown, played by Christopher Lloyd, soups up his tricked-out time-traveling DeLorean by feeding trash into a canister called the Mr. Fusion Home Energy Reactor attached to the top of the car. And in “Spider-Man 2,” from 2004, the well-meaning scientist Dr. Octavius (a.k.a. Doc Ock, played by Alfred Molina) creates a fusion reactor with an artificial sun at the center. But when it gets out of control, so does he, transforming into a villain who aims to re-create the dangerous machine.Pop culture’s fascination with fusion goes beyond a process that sustains robotics and machinery; our culture’s collective dreams of safe, unlimited energy have even been epitomized by some of our heroes.Comic book protagonists like Captain Atom and Doctor Solar have bodies that can manipulate atoms to create blasts of energy. Firestorm, who was a regular in the CW’s Arrowverse, can change the particle structures of any substance and transmute it; and he himself is a kind of metaphor for the power of fusion, in that he was, in his first incarnation, a combination of two different people, Ronnie Raymond (played by Robbie Amell) and Martin Stein (Victor Garber). The DC Comics hero Damage has a body that functions as a biochemical fusion reactor, and then there’s the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s darling, Tony Stark, an engineer who Einsteins himself a miniature arc reactor (that glowing bit of chest jewelry) to power his Iron Man suit and keep him alive.The New York City of the M.C.U. is transformed by Stark technology, most prominently the arc reactor. Stark Tower appears in various Marvel movies and TV shows as the symbol of an alternate reality in which energy — and possibilities, superheroic or otherwise — are limitless.The same is true in many popular science-fiction universes, like “Star Wars,” where there are mentions of fusion generators and fusion reactors, and “Star Trek,” where the engineering systems of Federation starships use a “fusion reaction subsystem.”The workings of these fictional sciences are functional, plot-wise, but not always precise, clear or accurate. No matter how many times I watch my favorite sci-fi films and series, I still can’t tell a parsec from a cylinder of drugstore plutonium. And even now that fusion energy might be in our future, my relationship with it remains unchanged: Leave science to the scientists and MacGuffins to the writers.As long as we’re not breaking any scientific laws or introducing blatant contradictions, as a viewer I’m just here for the ride. Because it will be some time before we’re using fusion reactors to power our personal supersuits and fly off to boldly go where no sci-fi creator has gone before. Still, the science of today will lead us into a tomorrow where — great Scott! — there is no cap on the possibilities. More

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      10 Stages and Screens Where I Saw Connection

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      For our critic-at-large, “Fat Ham,” “Severance,” “A Strange Loop” and “Sandman” were some of the places she found truth and transcendence.I never venture too far from a theater, but when I did have some time away from New York stages, I was watching TV and movies. In so many of my favorites of 2022, there’s a sense of humanity to the work, whether that means it featured people connecting or simply being honest with themselves and others. Here are the plays, musicals, shows and films that stuck with me this year.‘Cost of Living’That Martyna Majok’s Pulitzer Prize-winning 2018 play is written with such gut-busting empathy and humanity shouldn’t be a shock to anyone who’s read the script or seen the previous productions. And yet, “Cost of Living” was still surprising — stunning, even — thanks to the four actors (Gregg Mozgala, Katy Sullivan, Kara Young and David Zayas) and their portrayal of caregivers and patients in a story about the ways we look after one another and what that care costs us. Plays about connections can so easily turn into sentimental weep-fests that manipulate you into tears, but the script, cast and Jo Bonney’s compassionate direction made this Broadway gem feel not just tender but true. (Read our review of “Cost of Living.”)Gregg Mozgala and Kara Young in “Cost of Living.”Sara Krulwich/The New York Times‘300 el x 50 el x 30 el’When I try to describe this epic work by the Belgian theater collective FC Bergman, I get bogged down in contradictions: Grotesque yet radiant. Chaotic but woven into coherence by theme and feeling. Depressing, yet steeped with something even more forceful than joy — utter transcendence. Transforming the Harvey Theater into a village, with live animals and a pond, “300 el” drew inspiration from the biblical story of Noah’s ark. A film crew circled the stage, providing interior views to a pigeon homicide, a deadly game of William Tell and a feast where even the furniture is devoured. When the production ends in song and dance — a tameless exaltation of noise and movement — it seemed to leave even the air in the theater tremulous with excitement. (Read our feature on “300 el x 50 el x 30 el.”)‘Fat Ham’More than anything — including James Ijames’s whip-smart writing, Saheem Ali’s vivacious direction and the cast’s delightful performances — what most stood out to me in the Public’s staging of “Fat Ham” was the joy that seemed to emanate from every person in the room. Who knew “Hamlet,” a tragedy rife with revenge and murder, could be expanded to become a work about queerness and Black masculinity — and a funny, smart work at that? Ijames, apparently, and Ali, whose gleaming production ended in what felt like a party where everyone, audience included, was welcome to attend. (Read our review of “Fat Ham.”)‘A Strange Loop’It’s been quite a year for Black queer theater, due in large part to the Broadway debut of Michael R. Jackson’s mind-bending, genre-busting musical “A Strange Loop.” The production, starring an unforgettable Jaquel Spivey, succeeds on multiple levels: It provides trenchant commentary on Black art, the Black body, religion, masculinity and queerness, while also being laugh-out-loud funny and heartbreaking. As for the technical elements, its structure, choreography and score coalesce into a prime example of what Broadway can do at its best. (Read our review of “A Strange Loop.”)Jaquel Spivey stars in the Broadway musical “A Strange Loop.”Sara Krulwich/The New York Times‘Oratorio for Living Things’I knew I was seeing something special when I went to Ars Nova’s production of Heather Christian’s “Oratorio,” because I was infected with a desperate urge to see it again — even before I was through seeing it the first time. Having grown up with a Catholic education and Sunday masses, I’ve never felt connected to religious institutions, but Christian’s profound work, directed by Lee Sunday Evans, created a kind of secular mass for nonbelievers and believers alike. The exquisite vocals of the cast were magnified by the miniature amphitheater-style setup of the space, which created an aural experience that — like the text itself — felt both grand and intimate. (Read our review of “Oratorio for Living Things.”)‘English’I’m a sucker for works that examine language — the politics of it, the limitations and freedoms that can be found in words. So I was already onboard for Sanaz Toossi’s play, about a class in Iran where the students are preparing to take the Test of English as a Foreign Language, or Toefl. Under Knud Adams’s direction, the cast draws the audience into its word games, linguistic stumbles and individual struggles to learn and assimilate, whether for work or family or dreams of a life in America. (Read our review of “English.”)‘The Sandman’As a fierce fan of the author Neil Gaiman and owner of his complete “Sandman” graphic novel collection, I was so nervous about Netflix’s adaptation that I asked a friend — a fellow fan — to watch the first episode with me for emotional support. The series does justice to its characters with perfectly cast actors, including a mesmerizing Tom Sturridge, who embodies the brooding, awe-inspiring king of dreams with such finesse and gravitas that it’s as though Morpheus himself has escaped from the comics. It’s not just the characters who are well-matched; the world of “Sandman” is portrayed with sweep, imagination and such respect for the original illustrations that much of the dialogue and panels are replicated. I can’t wait for Season 2. (Read our critic’s notebook on “The Sandman.”)Gwendoline Christie and Tom Sturridge in the Netflix series “Sandman.”Netflix‘Severance’“Severance” may be my new favorite TV series. Perhaps I’m being hyperbolic, still buzzed with enthusiasm even months after my second time binge-watching it. Adam Scott gives a stellar performance as an employee of a shady corporation who elects to have his consciousness split between his work and outside selves. The show has an exquisite eye and ear for terror, wit and mundane interactions, so that it manages to be both otherworldly and eerily familiar. As for the script — the dialogue’s so fantastic that it makes me want to be a better writer. (Read our review of “Severance.”)‘Everything Everywhere All at Once’I’ve often wondered, in our age of multiversal franchises, what a multiverse narrative would look like if the story were driven by the characters’ emotional development and interpersonal relationships rather than just battle scenes, Easter eggs, and routes to spinoffs and sequels. “Everything Everywhere All at Once” was my answer. It contained the unpredictability and boundary-expanding possibilities of the multiverse while staying grounded in the story of a family. Every moment of the film held a new delight. (Read our review of “Everything Everywhere All at Once.”)‘Oresteia’When I think back to Robert Icke’s production of “Oresteia,” Aeschylus’ trilogy of Greek tragedies about a family that eats itself from the inside out, I think of one moment. Klytemnestra is grieving after her husband Agamemnon has killed their daughter Iphigenia because of a prophecy that the act would grant his army “fair winds” in war. After the deed, the winds sweep in, the doors to the house are flung open, ethereal white light streams in, and Klytemnestra is caught in a frenzy of flying papers. But what made the production so memorable wasn’t just the special effects but Anastasia Hille’s electrifying performance as Klytemnestra, a woman who folds in to grief and lets it fuel her revenge. (Read our review of “Oresteia.”) More