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    Before He Was Infamous, O.J. Simpson’s Acting Helped Make Him Famous

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    Simpson began acting while still a football star, appearing in titles as varied as “Roots,” “The Towering Inferno” and the “Naked Gun” films.Before O.J. Simpson became synonymous with the sensational murder trial that riveted the nation in the mid-1990s, he was a football star turned Hollywood fixture who played roles as varied as an astronaut, a comic detective and a fake priest.His acting career began while he was still a star running back. As Simpson, who died on Wednesday, told it, he was waiting out the best deal he could get in the N.F.L. when producers reached out to him asking if he could act. “Sure, I can try to act,” he replied.He scored bit parts in a medical series and a western, but the allure of an onscreen career didn’t grab him until his first major film, “The Klansman” (1974), in which he appeared alongside Richard Burton and Lee Marvin, playing a man seeking to avenge his friend’s death at the hands of the Ku Klux Klan.Simpson told Johnny Carson in an interview in 1979 on “The Tonight Show” that during the production, the actors were casually chatting about food when Elizabeth Taylor said the best chili she’d had was at a restaurant called Chasen’s in West Hollywood.Simpson with Richard Burton in “The Klansman.”Moviestore Collection Ltd, via Alamy“Somebody made a call, and in an hour and a half they had a private jet bring a pot of chili from Chasen’s to Oroville, Calif.,” Simpson said in the interview. “Two hours later we’re eating chili and I’m saying, ‘I like this life.’”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

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      ‘The Dynasty’ Got the Secretive New England Patriots to Speak

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      For an Apple TV+ docuseries, the tight-lipped sports franchise provided insight into six Super Bowl victories as well as darker moments.The New England Patriots, a modern N.F.L. juggernaut with six Super Bowl wins and two cheating scandals, are the perfect subject for a docuseries. They are also one of the most secretive franchises in professional sports.But the filmmakers behind “The Dynasty: New England Patriots,” an Apple TV+ docuseries premiering on Friday, convinced more than 25 players, coaches and executives to open up on camera. Among those interviewed are Robert Kraft, the team’s longtime owner; Bill Belichick, who has the most playoff wins of any N.F.L. coach; and Tom Brady, a three-time league M.V.P. who is widely considered the greatest quarterback ever.In an opening montage for the behind-the-scenes look into the rise and fall of the Patriots, Brady’s voice cracks and he appears to hold back tears while reminiscing on his New England career, which had a tense ending.“The Dynasty” largely focuses on the Patriots’ inner power dynamics and the team’s football mystique — Brady unleashes a comical, profanity-laced defense of a favorable but controversial play in 2002 — but the series devotes three of its 10 episodes to darker moments. Those include the murder conviction of Aaron Hernandez and league punishments for spying on an opponent and playing with deflated footballs. (Hernandez killed himself in prison in 2017.)“I can’t overstate how impressed I was with the honesty that people demonstrated with really difficult content,” said Jeff Benedict, who wrote a book about the Patriots before pitching the docuseries. “Some of the things that we were asking people to talk about were not pleasant.”The Patriots were one of the league’s most tight-lipped teams under Belichick, who left the organization last month after a 4-13 season. His weekly news conferences often consisted of short, unrevealing answers; the team’s “Do Your Job” mantra referred to both on-field assignments and limiting distractions.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

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      Will Taylor Swift Be at the Super Bowl? Stay Tuned.

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      There has been much ado about whether the pop singer will travel across the globe to the big game. Here’s what we know so far, and answers to other Taylor-related questions.On Sunday, the Kansas City Chiefs will be making the team’s fourth Super Bowl appearance in the last five seasons. While some N.F.L. players go their entire career without playing for a championship, one of Kansas City’s newcomers had their ticket punched after only 12 games.As Nicole Auerbach of The Athletic said on X, shortly after the Chiefs’ championship win: “Taylor Swift makes the Super Bowl in her first year in the league. Elite.”Ms. Swift, who has been dating Travis Kelce, Kansas City’s star tight end, has changed the N.F.L. conversation all season, attracting a new audience for the league and inspiring strong emotions (both positive and negative) among fans. Her critics as well as her detractors may have some burning questions ahead of the game. First and foremost: Will she be there?The Big QuestionsHas Taylor hinted at her Super Bowl plans?But wasn’t she in Tokyo … last night?Why is this getting so much attention?If she makes it to the game, who might she sit with?This is Taylor, surely there’s some numerology involved?Has Taylor hinted at her Super Bowl plans?Ms. Swift, as you may have heard, is good at keeping secrets. Her plans, beyond concert dates, are rarely announced in advance. That has led some to devise their own methods for figuring out what she’s up to. Ahead of a Kansas City game in October, for example, an NBC producer said he had a spotter plane searching the area around MetLife Stadium for police escorts in hopes of alerting the television crew if she showed up (she did).Mr. Kelce was inundated with questions about Ms. Swift last week, and while he said he had heard some of her upcoming album — spoiler: he likes it — he did not offer any details about whether she would be at the game.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

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      Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce Timeline

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      All the Times That People Have Hyperventilated About Taylor and TravisThe planet’s biggest pop star met America’s biggest sport, and heads collectively exploded. Here are the moments people got happy, sad, angry or annoyed.Emmanuel Morgan and Way back in July, Travis Kelce, the Kansas City Chiefs’ star tight end, publicly offered himself as a potential suitor for Taylor Swift, whose Eras Tour had catapulted her beyond her already stratospheric fame.Few could have imagined that on the eve of the Super Bowl, we’d all be here.During the six months between Travis’s metaphorical Hail Mary and Sunday’s very real sports contest, most of America — and much of the world — has been horse-collared into their romance. There is a relentless, inescapable and, sometimes fatiguing quality to this Swift-Kelce monocultural vortex. Boy met girl, football fans met Swifties and each new development became a cause for hyperventilation.Now, as kickoff approaches, we look back at some of the key meetings and the extreme emotions those meetings have engendered.♥ ♥ ♥Sept. 24 and Oct. 1Taylor meets footballTaylor Swift at Arrowhead Stadium for the first of many games this season. Jason Hanna/Getty ImagesSurprise! Taylor shows up at Arrowhead Stadium for a Chiefs Game. Yay for Travis! Taylor and Travis leave together after the game in a “Getaway Car.” A “seemingly Ranch” frenzy ensues.Taylor shows up again in New Jersey the following week for Sunday Night Football. She brings her friends and meets the parents.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

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      A Super Bowl Broadcaster With Slime and Swagger

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      Nate Burleson spent 11 seasons playing in the N.F.L. He now balances several TV assignments, and will announce the Super Bowl with SpongeBob SquarePants.Nate Burleson, far removed from the 11 seasons he spent toiling in the National Football League, pulled up his shirt to wipe sweat from his forehead during a well-deserved break.Burleson was in a buzzing laboratory with green slime-filled industrial containers, recording Nickelodeon’s “NFL Slimetime” days after explaining the challenge of overcoming turnovers on “The NFL Today,” the CBS football show that was in Baltimore for the A.F.C. Championship Game. Hours before the Nickelodeon taping, he had provided updates about the widening conflict in the Middle East on “CBS Mornings,” the network’s flagship morning newscast.After a productive but unglamorous football career, Burleson, 42, has found high-profile success in the television industry. Now he faces a daunting schedule this week in Las Vegas, where the Kansas City Chiefs and San Francisco 49ers will face off in the Super Bowl.Burleson is setting 1:30 a.m. alarms to anchor “CBS Mornings” from the Las Vegas Strip throughout the week. And on Sunday, he will announce Nickelodeon’s first alternate Super Bowl telecast for children, changing into a suit and racing down Allegiant Stadium’s elevator with help from security to join his “NFL Today” colleagues for halftime analysis.“I never played in a Super Bowl, so I feel like this is my Super Bowl,” Burleson said.Tony Dokoupil, left, Gayle King and Burleson on “CBS Mornings.” Burleson impressed producers with the energy he brought to segments while guest hosting.Mary Kouw/CBSNickelodeon’s alternate telecasts are an attempt to attract younger viewers by infusing N.F.L. games with augmented-reality animations on the field — yes, there will be plenty of virtual slime — and incorporating popular cartoon characters. Burleson will call the Super Bowl with the voice actors for SpongeBob SquarePants and Patrick Star. (Jim Nantz and Tony Romo are announcing the traditional broadcast on CBS.)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

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      Taylor Swift Prop Bets Dominate Super Bowl Action

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      While casino gambling focuses on the Super Bowl itself, online sports books are flooded with options on what Ms. Swift will wear, how she’ll celebrate and more.The Super Bowl always draws crowds to betting windows and online sports books, but some of the most talked about action this year will leave a blank space in Las Vegas.With in-person sports books limited to action on the field, Adam Burns, the sports book manager for BetOnline.ag, found himself capitalizing on the moment by preparing odds for a flood of unusual wagers: What sort of outfit will Taylor Swift wear to the game on Sunday? Will the CBS broadcast show her holding a beverage or giving high-fives? Will she cry if the Kansas City Chiefs lose to the San Francisco 49ers?For some much-needed assistance, Mr. Burns turned to a reliable source: his teenage daughter.“Friends are like, ‘Come on over and watch the game with us,’” Mr. Burns said in a telephone interview from his home in Montreal. “I can’t. I have to watch Taylor Swift. You can ask me the next day who won the game, and I won’t even know. But I’ll know how many times Taylor Swift was shown on TV.”Ms. Swift, who won two Grammys on Sunday night and announced the release date for her next album, was a phenomenon long before she started dating Travis Kelce, Kansas City’s star tight end. But her regular appearances at his team’s games this season — clad in red, celebrating Mr. Kelce’s touchdowns, and even sharing a luxury box with his bare-chested, beer-swilling brother — have produced crossover magic with the N.F.L.BetOnline.ag, which is based in Panama, has so many Swift-related Super Bowl prop bets — 89, a reference to her album “1989” — that Mr. Burns had to plumb the depths of the absurd, including: What shade of lipstick will Ms. Swift choose for the game? (Red, a signature color for Ms. Swift, is favored, followed by “any other color.”)Bet U.S., an online casino based in Costa Rica, also has a smorgasbord of Swift-related bets.“If it’s something that’s going to attract some attention and we can make legitimate odds on it, there’s a good chance that we’re going to do it,” said Tim Williams, the director of public affairs for Bet U.S. He added: “We expect to see as much interest, if not more interest, in all of these Taylor Swift bets compared to bets related to the halftime show, and that’s really unprecedented.”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

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      You’ve Just Watched the Super Bowl. What Will You See Next?

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      The TV network that airs the N.F.L. title game wants to retain as many viewers as possible. There are various strategies, with CBS choosing to debut the crime drama “Tracker.”Some of the most precious television real estate comes immediately after the National Football League’s season finale, one of the few programs to still corral a giant audience.The network that airs the Super Bowl wants to retain as many of those viewers — 115 million people last year — as possible with the postgame slot. It has been a powerful tool to debut new shows, as CBS will do on Sunday with “Tracker,” a crime drama about the hunt for missing people that stars Justin Hartley, and it has also showcased already popular ones, such as NBC did in 1996 with “Friends.”Either strategy can prove effective.“It’s really a year-by-year basis when you have the Super Bowl and to think, ‘What are the different weapons you have to deploy?’” said Amy Reisenbach, the president of CBS Entertainment.New ShowsFor nearly two decades, the Super Bowl has cycled among Fox, NBC and CBS. (In 2027, ABC will air its first Super Bowl since 2006.) “There isn’t really any other platform like it on TV,” Reisenbach said, adding, “It’s a huge opportunity to get eyeballs.”Networks plan out the postgame slot about a year ahead of time, said Dan Harrison, the executive vice president of program planning and content strategy at Fox Entertainment.CBS chose “Tracker” in May, Reisenbach said, after executives viewed the pilot episode and felt it could appeal across demographics because of Hartley’s popularity with both men and women. The decision to debut a new show follows the strategy CBS used for “Undercover Boss” (2010) and for its two most recent Super Bowl lead-outs, “The World’s Best” (2019) and “The Equalizer” (2021).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

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      Taylor Swift Makes Fox News Suddenly Hate Celebs in Politics

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      The news network that wants Taylor Swift to stick to singing has had no problem handing conservative celebrities the microphone.Taylor Swift, you may have noticed, is everywhere: packing arenas on the Eras tour; filling theaters with her concert film; popping onto your TV screen from a luxury suite at Kansas City Chiefs games, cheering on her boyfriend, Travis Kelce.And now she’s living rent-free in Fox News hosts’ heads.After reports that the Biden re-election campaign was angling for an endorsement from the superstar (who backed President Biden in 2020), commentators on the network strapped on their culture-war helmets. “Don’t get involved in politics!” Jeanine Pirro urged her. “We don’t want to see you there!” Another commentator, Charly Arnolt, pleaded, “Please don’t believe everything Taylor Swift says.” Sean Hannity addressed the issue in prime time: “Maybe she wants to think twice.”Fox’s anxiety attack follows months in which MAGA opinionators have spun baroque conspiracy theories about the power couple: that Ms. Swift and Mr. Kelce’s romance was staged; that the N.F.L. was rigging the Super Bowl for the Chiefs; and that it was all an unholy plot to supercharge an eventual Biden endorsement. The Fox host Jesse Watters even flirted with the speculation, floating the idea that Swift’s success was a psyop masterminded by the Defense Department.In retrospect, “Paul is dead” lacked imagination.Of course, people are entitled to their opinions on celebrity political speech or the possible existence of a secret Pentagon diva lab. But if Fox News’s hosts truly believe that it’s irresponsible and dangerous to invite celebrities to weigh in on politics, they might want to turn their attention to … Fox News.Over the years, Fox has invited Gene Simmons, the bassist of Kiss, to talk about the handling of an Ebola outbreak. It had the fashion model Fabio on to blame crime in California on liberalism. It gave us Kid Rock on cancel culture. Last year, the actor Jim Caviezel declared Donald J. Trump “the new Moses” on “Fox & Friends.”And let’s not forget that Fox was instrumental in the entry into politics of a certain TV celebrity, whom you might know better as the candidate Mr. Biden will likely be running against.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

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      in Movies

      Carl Weathers, Who Played Apollo Creed in ‘Rocky’ Movies, Dies at 76

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      The onetime football player played a host of roles in an acting career that lasted more than four decades.Carl Weathers, the N.F.L. linebacker turned actor known for playing Apollo Creed in the first four “Rocky” movies in an acting career that spanned more than four decades, died on Thursday. He was 76.His family said Mr. Weathers had “died peacefully in his sleep.” No cause was given.As the boxer Apollo Creed, he fought Sylvester Stallone in the “Rocky” movies, the first of which, released in 1976, won the Academy Award for best picture of the year. He also notably played Chubbs Peterson in the golf comedy “Happy Gilmore,” starring Adam Sandler.Mr. Weathers displayed his range in several roles on film and television, including appearing in the 2019 science-fiction series “The Mandalorian” and in the drama series “Chicago Justice” (2017) and the long-running “Chicago P.D.”He was a linebacker for the Oakland Raiders from 1970 to 1971, and he later briefly played in the Canadian Football League. He took up acting in the 1970s after retiring from professional football.A full obituary will follow. More