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      ‘The Buccaneers’ Arrives With More Arrivistes

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      This Apple TV+ drama joins HBO’s “The Gilded Age,” back for its second season, in portraying the late 19th-century collision of old money and new.A newly moneyed woman in Gilded Age New York is desperate to gain the acceptance of the aristocracy. So she schemes to get the ultimate symbol of old money approval: a box at the exclusive Academy of Music. When she is denied, she helps spearhead the construction of a new see-and-be-seen cultural playground, the Metropolitan Opera House. Take that, aristocracy.Welcome to the second season of HBO’s opulent drama “The Gilded Age,” a series laden with emblematic showdowns between the gaudy arrivistes and the idle drawing-room class. By chance, “The Gilded Age,” which returned last week, is back just ahead of “The Buccaneers,” a new series on Apple TV+ that is set amid the same late 19th-century collision of old money and new, robber barons and debutante balls, gold diggers and status obsession.“The Buccaneers,” which premieres Wednesday, sends its wealthy but not sufficiently connected young ladies, their frocks and their deeply insecure parents all the way to London, skipping the middleman of old American money and going right to the source in search of marriageable dukes and lords. As you might imagine, culture clashes and broken hearts ensue.Donna Murphy as Mrs. Astor, left, and Carrie Coon as Bertha Russell, based on real women like Alva Vanderbilt, in “The Gilded Age.”Barbara Nitke/HBOTV’s Gilded Age dramas are somehow both alluring and repellent. It’s fun to watch ugly Americans make like combative peacocks. And the social dynamics seem to resonate in the 21st century, even if the details feel exotic and unattainable.“Hierarchy of classes is something that people seem to be more preoccupied with right now than at other times in the past,” said Esther Crain, the author of the lavishly illustrated “The Gilded Age in New York” and creator of the historical website Ephemeral New York, in a phone interview. “There’s this vast gulf between the very rich and everyone else, with a vanishing middle class. This really echoes the Gilded Age.”The “Gilded Age” opera house showdown echoes a pitched battle from the end of Season 1, in which Bertha Russell (Carrie Coon), the Academy of Music snub victim, hosts a buzzy ball at her palatial home for her teen daughter. She invites her daughter’s friend, whose mother, Mrs. Astor (Donna Murphy), is the unofficial gatekeeper of the old-money elite. But then the gatekeeper snubs the social climber, who subsequently disinvites the gatekeeper’s daughter. The chess game is on, and the children are the pawns.In her book, Crain details the historical events behind both the music hall duel and the dance dust-up. In real life, it was Alva Vanderbilt who hosted a “fancy dress” masquerade ball in 1883, and who snubbed Mrs. Astor’s daughter, Caroline, prompting Mrs. Astor to show contrition to her nouveau riche rival. The showdown was seen as a major victory for new money over old.In actual late 19th-century New York, Alva Vanderbilt was a new-money upstart.Library of CongressCaroline Schermerhorn Astor represented the old guard of New York society.Wikimedia CommonsThe new rich, based in the Fifth Avenue mansions of Manhattan, were largely a product of the Civil War and new fortunes made in the railroad, copper, steel and other industries. (Bertha’s husband, George Russell, played by Morgan Spector, is a railroad tycoon who finds himself dealing with labor issues in Season 2.)Unlike the old-money aristocracy who traced their wealth to their European ancestors, the new rich thrived in industry and flaunted their wealth, much to the old rich’s disgust and chagrin.“They thought, ‘We’re Americans, we’re the new guys, we’ve got something new to sell in this world, and we have a place here,’” said the “Gilded Age” creator Julian Fellowes in a video interview from his home in London. “For me, the 1870s and 1880s was when modern America found itself. The new people building their palaces up and down Fifth Avenue were doing it the American way. This was an American culture — a new way of being rich, a new way of being successful.”Of course, the new rich could also be reckless and dangerous. In Season 1 of “The Gilded Age,” George, who Fellowes modeled on the railroad magnate Jay Gould, drives a corrupt alderman to suicide. He lives not just to defeat his opponents, but to crush them and their families. For him and his ilk, capitalism is a blood sport.Alisha Boe and Josh Dylan in “The Buccaneers,” inspired by real-life “dollar princesses” who married into titled European families.Apple TV+The games are a little different (if only slightly less brutal) in “The Buccaneers,” which is based on an unfinished novel by Edith Wharton. Looked down upon by the New York aristocracy and seeking suitable husbands, five young nouveau riche women high-tail it to London, where they and their financial resources are coveted by title-rich but cash-poor families. Nan (Kristine Froseth) is courted by a sensitive duke. Conchita (Alisha Boe) has a frisky marriage with a lord, whose parents are monstrous, anti-American snobs. All have romantic escapades that are, in many ways, brazenly transactional.“The girls’ mothers are coming over to London in order to effectively sell their girls into the aristocracy,” Katherine Jakeways, the series’s creator, said in a video interview from her London home. “And the aristocracy are welcoming them with open arms because they’ve got roofs to mend.”Added Beth Willis, an executive producer, from her home in Scotland: “How lonely that would be for so many of them. In America they might speak up a bit more at the dining table. They sometimes had their own money. And to come over to England and find these freezing cold houses with roofs literally falling in and being treated like a cash point must have just been awful.”Here, too, there is historical precedent. In one example, the socialite Consuelo Vanderbilt, of the shipping-and-railroad Vanderbilt family, married the ninth Duke of Marlborough, becoming perhaps the best known of what were called the “dollar princesses.”“Some of these marriages were arranged and didn’t end happily, but others did end happily,” said Hannah Greig, a historical consultant for “The Buccaneers.” “Sometimes the origins of the marriage were forgotten, and it became a love story. History offers lots of examples that you can draw on, for all of the different experiences that we see in ‘The Buccaneers.’”Both series include characters representative of people who existed in Gilded Age society, even if they were under-acknowledged at the time. In “The Buccaneers,” Mabel (Josie Totah) is torn between a marriage of convenience, to a man, and a romance of passion, with her friend Conchita’s new sister-in-law (Mia Threapleton). In “The Gilded Age,” the old-money Oscar Van Rhijn (Blake Ritson) carries on a passionate affair with John Adams, a scion of the presidential dynasty, all the while plotting his own marriage of convenience (and wealth) with the Russells’ debutante daughter, Gladys (Taissa Farmiga). (In a refreshing twist, the most avid gold diggers in both series are men.)Denée Benton stars in “The Gilded Age” as a member of New York’s Black elite, working with the journalist T. Thomas Fortune, played by Sullivan Jones.Barbara Nitke/HBOOne of the central characters in “The Gilded Age” is Peggy Scott (Denée Benton), a representative of 19th-century New York’s Black elite. At odds with her tradition-minded druggist father, Peggy goes to work for the real-life pioneering Black journalist T. Thomas Fortune (Sullivan Jones) and blazes her own trail, even as she faces down racism in her everyday life.Peggy’s story line gives the series a chance to look at issues of inequality that festered beneath the surface of the Gilded Age.“This season especially we see questions about the direction of Black America,” said Erica Dunbar, a Rutgers University history professor and “Gilded Age” historical consultant, in a video interview. “It’s a theme that still exists. What is the best way to move forward for a group of people who have already been marginalized or oppressed for hundreds of years at this point?”It all unfolds against a bloodless but volatile civil war between those who have been rich a long time and their freshly minted competition. The aristocracy’s view of the barbarians at the gate can be summed up by Agnes Van Rhijn (Christine Baranski), who has no interest in letting the newbies crash the party: “You shut the door, they come in the window.”But this is a fight Agnes won’t win. She can lock her windows, but the Metropolitan Opera House is coming soon. Despite the pitched battles of yore, if there’s one thing we’ve learned since it’s that money is money. And those who have the most generally have the upper hand, no matter the source of their riches. More

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      in Movies

      ‘No Accident’ Review: Putting White Supremacists on Trial

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      A documentary chronicles the lawsuit filed against the leaders of the violent 2017 white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Va.Kristi Jacobson’s legal documentary “No Accident” opens with footage of the “Unite the Right” rally in August 2017 in Charlottesville, Va.: White supremacists march with tiki torches and shout slurs such as “Jews will not replace us.” The grotesque gathering remains unsettling and infuriating to watch, but plunging us into the proceedings has a way of stating the ugly facts upfront.Some participants in the two-day rally faced criminal charges, but Jacobson documents the steps in a civil case filed that October in an attempt to hold rally leaders responsible for conspiring to commit violence. Tracking the litigation led by the attorneys Roberta Kaplan and Karen Dunn, Jacobson’s civil rights procedural delves into both the legal work and the emotional strain involved in a case like this one.Kaplan and Dunn’s team draws on damning excerpts from Discord, the social media site used by rally planners, and evasive, insulting depositions by conspirators such as Richard Spencer and Christopher Cantwell, who represented themselves in court. Jacobson shows the toll on some of the lawsuit’s nine plaintiffs, who recall the rally and the peaceful counterprotests on Aug. 12, when James Fields Jr. murdered Heather Heyer and injured dozens of others by driving his car into a crowd of protesters.The movie, which feels constrained by the trial’s pandemic-related restrictions, maintains a civilized tone throughout. But it’s hard to keep calm at the spectacle of white nationalists preaching hatred and violence one moment, then attempting to squirm out of responsibility and court the jury’s sympathy. Jacobson’s account does the necessary work of restating the facts and showing that people can be held accountable for fomenting this kind of terror and harm.No AccidentNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 37 minutes. Watch on HBO platforms. More

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      Bill Maher Says Show Will Return Despite Writers’ Strike

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      The HBO host said he sympathized with the writers but needed to return for the good of other people who work on “Real Time With Bill Maher.”Bill Maher said his weekly HBO show would return to the air despite entertainment writers, including members of his own staff, still being on strike.“Real Time With Bill Maher” is the latest talk show to announce a return in recent days, even as the writers’ union has vowed to picket any “struck shows.”Drew Barrymore announced this week that she would begin taping new episodes of her talk show. “The Jennifer Hudson Show” and “The Talk” will also return. Other talk shows, including “The View” and “Live With Kelly and Mark,” have been taping throughout the strike.Mr. Maher said on his social media feeds on Wednesday night that it was “time to bring people back to work.”“The writers have important issues that I sympathize with, and hope they are addressed to their satisfaction, but they are not the only people with issues, problems, and concerns,” he wrote. “Despite some assistance from me, much of the staff is struggling mightily.”He also said he had been hopeful there would be some sort of resolution to the labor dispute by Labor Day, but “that day has come and gone, and there still seems to be nothing happening.”The writers have been on strike for 136 days, one of the longest screenwriter strikes ever (the longest was 153 days in 1988). Tens of thousands of actors have been on strike for two months as well, the first time writers and actors have walked out at the same time since 1960. The result has been a near-complete shutdown of Hollywood scripted production.There was hope throughout the entertainment industry that a resolution could be in the offing when the major Hollywood studios and leaders of the Writers Guild of America, the writers’ union, resumed negotiations last month after a lengthy stalemate. But over the past three weeks, bargaining has again stalled out, frustrating some big-name Hollywood showrunners in the process.More than 11,000 writers walked out in early May, arguing that their compensation levels and working conditions have deteriorated in the streaming era. The strike caused many talk shows to go dark, including “The Tonight Show,” “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert” and “Saturday Night Live.”After Ms. Barrymore announced that she was returning to her show, the backlash from writers — as well as others on social media — was swift. The Writers Guild promptly picketed outside the show’s studio. The National Book Foundation dropped Ms. Barrymore as host of the upcoming National Book Awards.In a statement on Wednesday night, the Writers Guild called Mr. Maher’s decision “disappointing,” and said that members would begin picketing the HBO show.“As a W.G.A. member, Bill Maher is obligated to follow the strike rules and not perform any writing services,” the guild said. “It is difficult to imagine how ‘Real Time’ can go forward without a violation of W.G.A. strike rules taking place.”Other talk show hosts have showed no indications of returning to work. Five late-night hosts — Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon, Seth Meyers and Mr. Maher’s HBO colleague John Oliver — have instead started a group podcast, “Strike Force Five.” Proceeds are going to their out-of-work staff.During the 2007 writers’ strike, which lasted 100 days, late-night shows returned after two months, even with writers still on picket lines. The “Tonight Show” host Jay Leno was reprimanded by the Writers Guild for performing a monologue that he wrote himself.Mr. Maher said on Wednesday that he would not perform a monologue or other “written pieces,” and would instead focus on the panel discussions that are a signature of the show.“I love my writers, I am one of them, but I’m not prepared to lose an entire year and see so many below-the-line people suffer so much,” he said. More

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      Tim Baltz on B.J.’s Test in ‘The Righteous Gemstones’

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      Sunday’s episode was a test for Baltz’s character, but B.J. seized the moment. Still, his victory came at a price.This interview contains spoilers for Sunday night’s episode of “The Righteous Gemstones.”The first thing to know is that the testicles were fake — in one of the shots, at least. Anyone who has seen Sunday night’s episode of the HBO televangelist family satire, “The Righteous Gemstones,” knows which shot.Near the end of the episode, the sixth of Season 3, Tim Baltz’s character, B.J., gets in a brutal brass-knuckle fight with a naked man that spills onto a suburban front lawn. Just when it seems that B.J. is out cold, his eyes fly open and he reaches, grabs, twists. The neighborhood children watch in horror.In an instant, the typically mild-mannered B.J. has victory well in hand. His nemesis, the philandering Christian rock guitarist Stephen (Stephen Schneider), drops to his knees and pays a brutal price for his affair with B.J’s. wife (Edi Patterson).It was a difficult scene to film, Baltz said last month by video from his home in Los Angeles, and not only because of the endless takes. He also did most of his own stunts — and accidentally got punched in the face several times.“There were a lot of little very quick decisions that either injured us, or barely avoided injury,” Baltz said of shooting the scene, which took all day. He added: “That’s the most intense day of work I’ve ever had.”Baltz grew up in Joliet, Ill., near Chicago, and he has the kind of boyish blond looks, deadpan delivery and cheery Midwestern affect that can make it difficult to tell whether he’s putting you on. (Given the circumstances, I believed him about the shoot.) That affect is one reason he is so convincing as B.J., a sensitive soul who lets his wife dress him in shiny pink rompers and who Rollerblades in full protective gear: It’s hard to believe that anyone could ever really be that earnest; B.J. keeps surprising you because he really is.“Despite being an atheist or a nonbeliever, he’s the most pious and religious character in the show,” Baltz said. “Which is odd,” he added, for a character who married into a family of preachers.Baltz’s character, B.J., has been a pushover for most of the series but Sunday’s brutal battle was a turning point.Jake Giles Netter/HBOB.J. also may be the most meme-worthy character in “Gemstones,” which is saying something in a show created by and starring Danny McBride. Baltz talked about the character, his outfits and the true cost of B.J.’s fight. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.First things first: How did you guys choreograph that, uh, decisive shot?That fight scene took an entire day to film. Once we got outside, we were worried about losing light, and with the camera looking up, the camera moving, I have to grab these fake testicles. I’m looking up at Stephen, who’s barely covering his own junk, and I’m like: “All right man, here we go, and we’ve got to get it right for the camera, too.”There was a stuntman involved for at least some of your parts, right?Yeah. My stunt double for the show has been a guy named T. Ryan Mooney, who looks shockingly like me. Same body type, too. To be honest, I don’t think that I’m like B.J. in real life, but I never feel more like my character than when I watch a guy who looks like me and has my body type do insane stunts, and he does it for a living. It’s kind of emasculating. But aside from B.J. getting thrown through the lattice work or when he gets dragged off the brick steps into the front yard, every shot you see, I did.Stephen seems like a champ for having done his whole part naked. What were your conversations about the scene like?He was really awesome. He was wrestling with whether he should go au naturel or use a prosthetic. It ended up being the last shoot day of the season for both of us, so there was a lot of buildup and anticipation. Stephen would come into town every few months to film stuff, and I would be like, “Let me take you out to dinner, man, because we’re going to have an intense day.” And then halfway through the season, he’s like: “I’m going to do it. I’m going to be naked. I just think there are only so many challenges in life, and I see this as a challenge.”Baltz tried to get to know his co-star Stephen Schneider ahead of time. “By the end, I considered him a dear friend, this naked guy I had to fight,” he said.HBOPresumably he had to get your consent.I mean, the intimacy coordinator definitely called several times to prep me. But for me, it was more like: “All right, this guy’s being really vulnerable with this. So every time he comes into town, we’re going to get to know each other so that we’re buddies going into this.” And honestly, it really worked. By the end, I considered him a dear friend, this naked guy I had to fight.You’ve played around with this image of the wholesome naïf a lot over the years. How much of that feels like you?I grew up playing sports — I was hypercompetitive. I really am not like [B.J.] at all. If I relate to the character in any way, it’s just the kindness and the generosity that he has, and I think a lot of people see that as being a mark in our society.When you book something, you lean into it as hard as you can whether it’s a nice character or someone creepy. But this one in particular you have to understand, Where does the unconditional love come from? And how do I keep in touch with that? This season that really gets tested for the first time, and it gets tested so much that he thinks that he has to change who he is. And the fight scene is the culmination of that.After the fight, B.J. tells Judy, “I hope you like me now.” Does he feel worse about beating up Stephen than he feels about having gotten beat up himself?I think he’s probably more hurt that he betrayed his own values. Danny always said: “When you play B.J., he’s the eyes of the audience within the show. He’s looking at the family the way we all look at the family.” I’ve carried that with me the entire time. So that moment is, “Not only did you cheat on me, but you made me betray myself.”Do you think there’s any part of standing up for himself that he takes in a positive way?I think so. It’s a fascinating evolution of the character. When I first read it, I was excited because I think it puts that card on the table for him. I think parts of our culture see something like that as a rite of passage, or something that you have to rise to the occasion to do. So in that sense, he does do it. But when he comes back, you can also look at that final line as saying, “I’m not the same anymore, so I hope you like what this has changed me into.” You can’t go back after something like that.Baltz said he his not anything like B.J. “If I relate to the character in any way, it’s just the kindness and the generosity that he has,” he said.Michael Tyrone Delaney for The New York TimesIt’s like a more complex George McFly moment.Right. The sliding-door part of that [“Back to the Future”] trilogy is you see what happens if he doesn’t throw the punch, and his life is miserable. And then if he does throw the punch, everything is saved and the family’s OK. With this, I think B.J. probably looks at it and is like, “No, that’s a doorway that I can step back and forth from as I see fit now.” The truth is, his values are, “You shouldn’t do that.” He was forced to do it, and he rose to the occasion. But if given a choice, then he probably wouldn’t.Can we talk about the outfits? There’s a flamboyant dimension to them, and I’ve always wondered what that signifies.There’s a blend of a few things. First, I think he starts as Judy’s kept man; this is her wardrobe for him, and he feels a bit out of place. And then I think he gets more comfortable with it and starts to take bigger swings. Also, if you walk down King Street in Charleston [S.C., where the series is filmed], you will see guys kind of dressed like that. Maybe not as opulent, but the color palettes — there’s a lot of pastels.A lot of salmon.Before I’d really explored Charleston and saw some of these outfits, I thought, “Whoa, this is really out there.” And then in the real world you see it, and these people aren’t making a joke of it. They’re going about their regular lives. I always say that if B.J. was a Christian holiday, he’d be Easter because of the pastels. And it’s incumbent on me to feel comfortable and live in those outfits without making them the point of the joke. More

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      Danny McBride Keeps It Righteous

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      The party started early. Like, 10:30 a.m., still-drinking-lousy-hotel-coffee early. It was late March, a warm and overcast coastal morning, and all I knew of the day’s schedule was that Danny McBride, the creator and star of the HBO comedy “The Righteous Gemstones,” planned to swing by with a driver who would take us to an oyster farm, located somewhere among the islands and salt marshes of South Carolina Lowcountry.I did not expect him to arrive in a fully stocked party bus with several of his closest associates, including his longtime collaborator David Gordon Green, though in retrospect perhaps I should have. While reporting a different story two months earlier, I had met Walton Goggins, who plays the oily televangelist Uncle Baby Billy in “Gemstones.” When I told him that I was going down to Charleston to see McBride, who lives and produces the series in the area, Goggins responded, “I hope you like tequila.”As an icebreaker, I shared this anecdote with McBride. On cue, his wife, Gia, an art director, furnished a bottle of Código 1530. “This is George Strait’s tequila!” McBride beamed, and a look ping-ponged around the bus that asked, “Too early?”It was not too early. As we raised candy-colored plastic shot glasses in the glow of two TV screens made to look like aquariums, I decided to stash my notebook for a while: Day 1 of my visit would be less about taking notes than about taking in the life McBride has made for himself since moving here from Los Angeles.McBride does little press, so getting to know him was, of course, the goal. When “Gemstones” returns on Sunday for Season 3, it brings back what has been the most Danny McBride of his creative efforts. It is his third HBO series — following the cult-favorite baseball comedy “Eastbound and Down” (2009-13) and the deranged public school comedy “Vice Principals” (2016-17) — and he created it alone. It sets a new personal benchmark for creative cursing and comic male nudity, which was already high.McBride created “The Righteous Gemstones” and stars as Jesse, the eldest son in a family of televangelists. (With Walton Goggins.)Jake Giles Netter/HBOMcBride’s characters offer “a funny and deeply complex view of men in general, especially men in America,” said his “Gemstones” co-star Edi Patterson. (With Adam Devine.)Jake Giles Netter/HBOIt is also his most Southern show. Both previous HBO series were set down South, but “Gemstones” is the first since he and his production company, Rough House Pictures, which he shares with Green and another longtime collaborator, Jody Hill, moved from Los Angeles to Charleston in 2017. It’s a true hometown production.Of McBride’s various creations, his most beloved have been Southerners who embody a flamboyantly American brand of male chauvinism, and Jesse Gemstone is no exception. The eldest son in a dysfunctional family of rich televangelists, Jesse vies perhaps only with the hard-partying narcissist Kenny Powers of “Eastbound” for McBride’s biggest blowhard, a high bar.It is the kind of satire that comes from a deep place of knowing. The kind whose execution appears so effortless that its target might not realize it is satire.“I know probably not his whole audience sees it the way I do — they’ll think, like, ‘Oh, I’m exactly like Kenny Powers,’ or whatever — but I think that’s part of the fun and part of the appeal,” said Edi Patterson, who plays Jesse’s unhinged sister, Judy, and is a “Gemstones” writer. “It’s such a funny and deeply complex view of men in general, especially men in America.”But “Gemstones” has also seen McBride, 46, broadening his creative range. He oversees every script, directs episodes. Its cast is a true ensemble, and its many characters and subplots have enabled him to explore new kinds of stories and relationships, some with tear-jerking sensitivity.Friends and colleagues reliably describe him as genuine, inclusive, a deep thinker. But more than many screen stars he is both blessed and dogged by fans who sometimes have trouble remembering he is not his boorish characters.I wondered whether the lines ever blurred for him, and whether the fan confusion chafed. The answer to both, he insisted, was no. He had left Hollywood and built a tight creative community 2,500 miles away for many reasons, and one of them seemed to be to preserve his integrity of self.“You can think I’m whatever, and if it makes you like the show more because you think that’s me, go for it,” he said the next day as we toured the “Gemstones” studios, located at a mall, inside a former Sears. “I would rather people not know what my deal is than clearly have an understanding of where the line is drawn.”“I don’t see myself as some alpha, and so I feel like there’s something inherently that makes me laugh about trying to present myself like an alpha,” McBride said.Elizabeth Bick for The New York TimesFunny enough, comedy is not McBride’s favorite genre — he prefers horror and reality TV — nor is it something he always pursued.Early on, he also didn’t imagine himself on camera. He wanted to write and direct. Raised Baptist, mostly in Fredericksburg, Va., he went to film school at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, in Winston-Salem, where he met Green; Hill; John Carcieri, another writer for “Gemstones”; and Ben Best, who created “Eastbound” with Hill and McBride and died in 2021. The film school was tiny, and then only two years old.“Everybody in that school was a misfit or a reject,” Green said. Their group bonded over one another’s VHS collections and found creative kinship and freedom. “It was all just a bunch of kids that kind of were trying to figure it out,” he said.Green was the first to make a splash after college with the critically lauded indie film “George Washington” (2000). After a main cast member of his next feature, “All the Real Girls” (2003), bailed a week into shooting, Green called “the funniest guy I know,” McBride, who was doing below-the-line postproduction work in Los Angeles.McBride asked his boss for time off, was denied, then quit and drove to North Carolina, where Green was shooting. The film debuted to rapturous reviews.Still, McBride’s break came a few years later with “The Foot Fist Way” (2008). Directed by Hill and written by Hill, Best and McBride, the film starred McBride as a Southern strip-mall taekwondo instructor whose ego grossly outstrips his skills. Copies circulated after its 2006 Sundance debut, landing eventually with Adam McKay and Will Ferrell, then producing partners, who got it into theaters. “Eastbound,” which McKay and Ferrell executive produced, soon followed.“With comedy, one of the tricks is knowing how you come off just physically,” McKay said. “And Danny knows he comes off like a guy who, if you cut him off in the parking lot of a Sam’s Club, would key your car while you’re in there shopping.”McBride said he was always satirizing a certain kind of guy he grew up with, a kind of guy he was not. He seemed amused by the outward contradiction.“I don’t see myself as some alpha, and so I feel like there’s something inherently that makes me laugh about trying to present myself like an alpha,” McBride said over lunch on Day 2 at a restaurant near his home. (McBride lives on an island near Charleston, and he had driven us there in his golf cart.)“They’re all just sort of dudes that I think have subscribed to this antiquated way of what the rules are, like what a dude’s supposed to be,” he added. “They’ve committed to it, and then the reality of it isn’t adding up to the illusion.”“Danny knows he comes off like a guy who, if you cut him off in the parking lot of a Sam’s Club, would key your car while you’re in there shopping,” Adam McKay, a past collaborator, said.Elizabeth Bick for The New York TimesMcBride and I talked a lot about masculinity, about fathers and sons. It is a central theme of “Gemstones” — and the Bible, he noted — with its “Succession”-like story about a powerful megachurch pastor (John Goodman) and his three feckless children. (Adam Devine plays the younger brother, Kelvin.) McBride’s own father left when he was young, and he hasn’t seen him since high school. But he insisted he isn’t resentful.“I like how my life turned out,” said McBride, himself a father of two. “Him exiting from our life is probably part of what enabled me to be able to go on and do the things that I did.” The biggest effect it had on his life, he said, was to make him more determined to be a supportive parent.McBride loves his characters and the South in the complex, sometimes ruthless way of familial love. On the surface, “Gemstones” picks some easy marks — megachurches, new money, homoerotic jocks; Season 3 promises monster trucks and militias — but soft targets can be tougher to nail. What allows for authenticity is affection, however complicated.“That’s the tightrope,” he said. “A lot of times I see, when things in the South are presented, it’s always such a boring take.”Back on Day 1, after we all spilled out of the party bus, we wound up on a muddy oyster skiff off Wadmalaw Island, several shots down, pulling salty Sea Cloud oysters straight from their floating cages. Still, having only just met McBride, it was hard not to wonder how much of the day’s events were a show put on for the benefit of a reporter — a good-time performance by a performer who plays characters who are constantly performing.I asked everyone I talked to about him afterward; they all insisted I shouldn’t flatter myself.“I want you to feel really special right now, but that’s kind of Danny,” said Cassidy Freeman, who plays Jesse’s beleaguered wife, Amber. When McBride is the ringmaster, “everyone’s invited,” she added. Hill called him “the fun coordinator of our group.”Cassidy Freeman, who plays the wife of McBride’s character in “Gemstones,” described him as an inveterate host.Jake Giles Netter/HBOWhen I reported back to Goggins, he put it this way: “He’s certainly not doing that as a way to impress you.” Whoever shows up, McBride “just rolls out the red carpet.”McBride seems to find community wherever he goes. Otherwise, he imports it. Green moved from Austin to Charleston. Rough House’s president, Brandon James, who was on the boat, moved with McBride from Los Angeles. As of last month, Hill was preparing to move there with his pregnant wife. For a time, the country singer Sturgill Simpson was in the Charleston crew. He’s in Season 3.It seems like creative utopia. The region’s lower production costs have made it easier for Rough House to develop an array of dream projects, relying on local crews fed and ferried by local businesses. Green’s 2018 “Halloween” sequel, which McBride helped write, was an early example. Green’s first film in their “Exorcist” sequel trilogy, for which McBride has a story credit, is scheduled for October.“I think what they’re doing is going to now become the norm with what’s changing here in Hollywood and the way commercial entertainment is made,” McKay said. “I think stuff is going to go hyperlocal, and I think it’s going to be really cool.”Dare to dream. For now, McBride seems genuinely grateful to have found a way to keep poking fun at things with his closest friends — to keep the party going.“Ultimately it’s really just trying to entertain people and give them something funny to laugh at,” he said. “It makes us laugh. And so we assume hopefully it will make other people laugh, too.” More

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      ‘The Idol’: The Weeknd, Sam Levinson and Lily Rose-Depp on Their Graphic Pop Drama

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      In an interview, the Weeknd, Sam Levinson and Lily Rose-Depp discussed their controversial new HBO drama. “Running headfirst into that fire is what thrills us all,” Levinson said.From left, Abel Tesfaye (a.k.a. the Weeknd), Sam Levinson and Lily-Rose Depp during filming of “The Idol.” The series, premiering Sunday on HBO, has already been the subject of scathing reports and reviews.Eddy Chen/HBOLast month, the director Sam Levinson and his stars, Abel Tesfaye (a.k.a. the Weeknd) and Lily-Rose Depp, walked into the Lumière Theater at the Cannes Film Festival for the premiere of the first two episodes of their show, “The Idol,” to a standing ovation. The lights hadn’t yet dimmed, but celebrity fuels Cannes, where ovations are cheap. By the time the screening was over, the amped-up crowd was on its feet again and critics were racing out to fire off some of the most scathing reviews to emerge from this year’s event, with pans studded with barbs like “regressive,” “chauvinistic,” “skin-crawling” and “grim disaster.”“The Idol” centers on a chart-busting pop star, Jocelyn (Depp), who, in the wake of a nervous breakdown, is prepping for a comeback. Surrounded by handlers — the cast includes Hank Azaria, Troye Sivan, Jane Adams, Da’Vine Joy Randolph and the horror-film impresario Eli Roth — Jocelyn has made a lot of money for a lot of self-interested people. One night at a Los Angeles dance club, she meets Tedros (Tesfaye), a smooth-talking enigma with a rattail. Before long, she has invited him back to her mansion and they’re grinding in the shadows, and a mystery has taken root: What in the world is she doing with this guy?Created by Levinson, Tesfaye and Reza Fahim, “The Idol,” which premieres on Sunday, was already a heat-seeking target by the time it played at Cannes. In April 2022, word hit that its original director, Amy Seimetz, had left the show amid a creative overhaul. For whatever reason, the brain trust at HBO decided to pump up the show’s notoriety in a teaser, released three months later, that trumpeted Levinson and Tesfaye as “the sick & twisted minds” behind “the sleaziest love story in all of Hollywood.” But unwanted attention arrived this past March in a damning Rolling Stone article that, among other rebukes, accused Levinson’s version of being “a rape fantasy.” That teaser has since disappeared from HBO’s YouTube channel.Levinson, Tesfaye and other “Idol” collaborators have vigorously defended the show and its creators. “The process on the set was unbelievably creative,” Azaria said at a news conference a day after the Cannes premiere, as Adams nodded along. “I’ve been on many, many a dysfunctional set, believe me,” Azaria continued. “This was the exact opposite.”For his part, Levinson, who is best known for “Euphoria,” yet another HBO show about a beautiful young woman in crisis, said at the news conference that the specifics in the article felt “completely foreign.” But he also seemed to welcome the controversy.“When my wife read me the article,” he explained, “I looked at her and I just said, ‘I think that we’re about to have the biggest show of the summer.’”On the day after the “Idol” news conference, I met with Levinson, Tesfaye and Depp — whose father, Johnny Depp, was also at the festival this year — for a sit-down at the Carlton Cannes, one of the grand hotels that faces the Mediterranean in this rarefied resort city. We talked about the show while tucked into a private patio corner, just out of earshot of nervously hovering publicists and other minders. During our chat, Levinson and his two colleagues alluded to the negative reviews, but if they were upset by them, they didn’t show or share it.“I’m still spinning from it,” Levinson said of the premiere. “It was maybe the most surreal moment I’ve had — I don’t really leave my house much.” These are edited excerpts from the interview.Can we talk about the genesis of “The Idol”?SAM LEVINSON Abel and I have known each other for quite a few years, and we’ve always wanted to work together. We got on a Zoom because I’d heard he has this project. The genesis was he said, “Look, if I wanted to start a cult, I could. And I don’t know if that’s necessarily a good thing.”ABEL TESFAYE I actually don’t remember saying that [laughs]. I think I was just trying to say anything to finally work with you. I’ve always wanted to work with Sam; we’ve been friends forever. It was more about celebrity culture and how much power they have.How much power they have?TESFAYE It’s probably hard to believe, but I can’t see myself in that way. I never have. Even when I move around with security, it feels so weird because I don’t ever want to be seen. I feel like I have to be seen — fans want to see who they listen to, who they love. But for me, celebrity culture was always fascinating, and how much power they have on their fans.Depp plays a pop star named Jocelyn who comes under the sway of an enigmatic man named Tedros, played by Tesfaye.Eddy Chen/HBOLily, you grew up in a famous family, but it was fame by proxy.LILY-ROSE DEPP I’ve experienced it by proxy since birth. That’s simultaneously a strange thing and also not strange at all, because I don’t know anything different. My childhood looks nothing like Jocelyn’s, a character who has been working from a young age, and who was a child performer and had a mother who was pushing her. My childhood was never going to be “normal,” but they gave us the best sense of normalcy that we could have.Did you watch any of the Britney Spears documentaries?TESFAYE It’s not about Britney at all, but how could we not pull inspiration from Britney, from Madonna, from every pop star that’s gone through any kind of serious pain? I’ve always called Lily one of the creators of the show, because I couldn’t write Jocelyn until we knew who was going to play her. Once Lily got the role, she and Sam worked together on creating the character. What I could provide was the music industry around her — management, labels, touring, everything that I know.DEPP I was so nervous about the musical aspect. It’s not what I do and this character has been doing this her entire life. I remember the first time that I had to sing in front of Abel, I was, like, I’m going to blow my brains out. Little by little, we got to know each other more and got comfortable with each other.LEVINSON We basically moved into Abel’s house, which was our shooting location. We knew that we were going to shoot the entire show in this one place, so we turned it into a live set.Abel, obviously performing for a live audience is different from performing in a music video, and this is very different.TESFAYE I never wrote Tedros for myself; it was Sam who planted the idea. I just focused on being Tedros and living as the character and spending all my time with Sam and listening and allowing him to just be my teacher. Tedros is such a dark, complicated, scary, pathetic human — I had to just distance myself from who I am. And it’s scary, you know, it’s a big risk.“Tedros is such a dark, complicated, scary, pathetic human,” Tesfaye said of his character.Eddy Chen/HBOSo far, the only pathetic thing about him is his hair.TESFAYE We made sure of it. He’s pathetic. It’s funny, we were in the theater watching Tedros and there are moments where only us three were laughing. People have no idea ——LEVINSON —— where it goes. The moment that Tedros clicked for me and, I think, for Abel was, imagine you have all of this ambition, all of this drive, this ability to tell a story through music. But none of the talent. So you have to find a puppet, someone to work through. I also think part of what was fascinating is that he’s rolling up to this mansion and it’s a world that he’s never been invited into. She opens this door ——TESFAYE —— like Dracula, inviting him in.In the first episode there’s a lot of comedy about the intimacy coordinator who doesn’t want Jocelyn to expose part of her body. What is agency for someone brought up in a bubble?DEPP I totally respect and love intimacy coordinators. I think they belong on sets, and that it’s important to make everybody feel safe. I’m very comfortable saying, “I’m fine to do this or not this,” but some people aren’t. At the same time, you have to have this nudity rider, it has to be submitted in advance and it has to be signed by this person and the lawyer. It becomes this very structured legal thing when the purpose is to give freedom and safety to the person who may or may not be doing nudity. You literally can’t make a decision about your own body.“I think that they are two twisted psychopaths who love each other,” Depp said. “She’s going to use him, too.”Eddy Chen/HBOIs Jocelyn her own person? She’s surrounded by this apparatus. Abel, is the show inspired by your life in terms of wanting to do what you want to do?TESFAYE There have been moments where I’ve felt like it is me-against-them. But because of my situation — I own my masters — I’m very fortunate. But what if I didn’t? They would automatically win: 99.99999 percent of pop stars don’t have that and are in Jocelyn’s position. So it’s not autobiographical; it’s like an alternate reality.LEVINSON That’s part of what we wanted to set up. Here is this machine and we’re not sure how complicit she is. We see how it grinds her down. But that moment of agency is when they’re in bed and Tedros says, “Maybe I should move in for work purposes.” You see this slight smile on her face. That’s her going, I’ve got him. He’s hooked.DEPP It’s going to be easy for the audience to immediately think, Oh my God, he’s using her. I think that they are two twisted psychopaths who love each other. She’s going to use him, too.TESFAYE Everything is very intentional. We knew that the reaction was going to be the way it is because of those two episodes.Much of the early talk surrounding the show has been about the amount of nudity. Lily, were you surprised by how your body was shown?DEPP No, honestly. Her bareness, physically and emotionally, was a big part of the discussions that we all had. Those were decisions I was completely involved in. There are many women who have felt exploited by the nudity they’ve done and have thought, I didn’t feel great about that. But I’m comfortable performing in that way, I enjoy it. It informed the character. In the conversation around the risqué aspects, there’s the implication that it’s something being consistently imposed upon women. Obviously, that has been true a lot historically.LEVINSON It also plays into that feeling that the audience has: Oh, she’s a victim. She has to be a victim. I believe people will underestimate Jocelyn as a character because of how exposed she is.I wondered about all the nudity, and about having a Black man be the villain.LEVINSON Playing into those stereotypes in the first couple of episodes is important for the journey and the arc and the emotional experience. It has a way of disorienting us because of our knowledge of who we are, and what has happened in the world. I think the audience will slowly begin to see who the true villain of the piece is.TESFAYE We wanted to make a fun show, as well. It’s a thriller. There are a lot of topics, but it’s really important that it’s entertaining as well.Do you worry about how the show will be received, given that larger discussions about race, gender and representation are so fraught right now?LEVINSON That’s what makes it exciting, that these discussions are fraught. I think running headfirst into that fire is what thrills us all.TESFAYE Someone’s got to do it. No one’s really doing it now. They just need to see the whole show.DEPP We always knew that we were going to make something that was going to be provocative and perhaps not for everyone. That was a draw for all of us. I don’t think any of us were interested in making anything that was going to be, you know, fun for the whole family.TESFAYE When I first started making music, it was the exact same thing. It was provocative, and I knew it was going to be tough for people. And a lot of people didn’t like it. Not to compare it, but I feel that this is kind of like that again. This is not going to be for everybody, and that’s fine. We’re not politicians. More

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      ‘Succession’ Finale Drew 2.9 Million Viewers Sunday, a Series High

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      The acclaimed HBO drama ended on a high note, with its largest audience for a season closer.The series finale of “Succession” drew 2.9 million viewers on Sunday night, a viewership high for the decorated HBO drama, the network said on Tuesday.That audience was a considerable improvement from the Season 3 finale, which had 1.7 million viewers on the night it premiered, in December 2021. For the fourth and final season, HBO said that “Succession” was averaging 8.7 million viewers per episode, including delayed viewing, also a new high for the show.The ratings put an exclamation point on an improbable 39-episode run for “Succession,” which debuted in 2018 to modest expectations and turned into a critics’ favorite and an awards show beast. In addition to multiple Golden Globes wins, “Succession” has won 13 Emmys, including best drama (2020 and 2022), acting honors (Jeremy Strong, Matthew Macfadyen) and best writing (three times for the show’s creator, Jesse Armstrong).Even with those highs, “Succession” remains somewhat of a niche series, particularly compared with some of HBO’s other recent hits. The second season of “The White Lotus,” which concluded in December, averaged 15.5 million viewers per episode, nearly double the viewers for the final season of “Succession.” The second season of “Euphoria,” which premiered in early 2022, averaged 19.5 million viewers. And mega-hits like “House of the Dragon” and “The Last of Us” averaged roughly 30 million viewers per episode, according to the network.But “Succession” is already the early favorite to take best drama honors at this year’s Emmy Awards for a third time. Shows eligible for this year’s Emmys had to premiere between June 1, 2022, and May 31, 2023. Voting for the Emmy nominations begins on June 15, and the nominees will be announced in July.The viewership figures are compiled by HBO and tallied up from a combination of views from Max, HBO’s streaming service, and of ratings from the live airing and repeat telecasts on traditional cable television. Many entertainment companies, like Netflix, release internal numbers to tout the popularity of their biggest series, though they are difficult to verify. During the live 9 p.m. broadcast of “Succession” on the HBO cable network, for instance, 789,000 viewers tuned in, according to Nielsen. More

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      Sarah Goldberg on the ‘Barry’ Finale and Bad Decisions

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      “I signed up for a comedy,” the actress Sarah Goldberg said of her role in “Barry.” “I never thought I’d have to cry so much in a comedy.”This was on a recent morning at Joe Allen, a theater district mainstay. Goldberg, dry-eyed and graceful in a relaxed take on a power suit, was stirring a Shirley Temple, angling for the cherry. The wall behind her was decorated with the posters of famous Broadway flops: “Rockabye Hamlet,” “Home Sweet Homer,” “Carrie.” Yet Goldberg, who spent the first decade of her career in theater, is currently enjoying a generous pour of success.“Sisters,” the comedy she created with Susan Stanley, debuted earlier this month on IFC. (In solidarity with the Writers Guild strike, she would not discuss it.) She is now shooting a substantial role for Season 3 of the Max series “Industry.” And the cherry at the bottom is “Barry,” the HBO not-quite-a-comedy that earned Goldberg an Emmy nomination in 2019 and aired its violent, mordant, wrenching final episode on Sunday night. (Titanic spoilers follow.)The log line of “Barry,” which began in 2018, sounds like the setup to a joke that increasingly held its punchlines: A hit man (Bill Hader’s Barry) walks into an acting class. Goldberg was cast as Sally, a fellow student and Barry’s love interest.Season 4 jumps ahead to a time when Sally (Goldberg) and Barry (Bill Hader, right) have a son, John (Zachary Golinger).Merrick Morton/HBOWith the blessing of the series creators, Hader and Alec Berg, Goldberg, 37, conceived Sally as a social experiment: Could she take the girl next door and restyle her as a gaping maw of narcissism and need? Yes, she could. In her hands, Sally became a sunlit catastrophe of a person. And in a pattern familiar to other prestige series (“Breaking Bad,” “The Sopranos”), online commenters seemed to judge Sally more harshly than her antihero partner. Did that ever feel bad?“Only in the way that every single day as a woman can feel bad,” she said.Over its four seasons, the dark Hollywood satire of “Barry” gave way to something even darker: a catalog of hungry, damaged people playing pretend. But while the finale left Barry dead and the acting guru Gene Cousineau (Henry Winkler) jailed for life, Sally broke good. Having finally left Barry in an effort to protect their son, the one-time actress and showrunner is shown years later, directing high school theater somewhere snowy.“It is as close to a happy ending for Sally as possible,” Goldberg said.Over mocktails, Goldberg discussed the finale, the series’s tonal leaps and how Sally survived. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.So what was “Barry” about?“Barry” was a morality tale. “Am I a good person?” Every character has that question. It’s the crux of the show. Every character is up against that. It’s like, how many bad decisions or bad choices make you that person?What was the show ultimately saying about acting?It’s a real cautionary tale, isn’t it? I wouldn’t watch that show and think: You know what? I’m going to pack my bags and drive to L.A.! In Cousineau’s classes, he gets people to bring their trauma to the forefront. The whole thing becomes this game of competitive grief.Goldberg wanted Sally “to be as morally bankrupt as the men on the show,” she said. “I wanted her to remain complex.”Merrick Morton/HBOWas “Barry” a show that believed that people can change?For the most part, no. But for Sally, in the finale, she finally makes an unselfish choice. She chooses this child that she didn’t even want and walks away from Barry. She still needs the reassurance from her child the same way she needed it from Barry. That narcissism and insecurity is still there. However, she’s up there with the students getting real joy out of having made this show. It’s not about fame or huge applause. It’s about having done something joyful with these kids. If she had become incredibly famous, things might have gone a lot worse for her. I don’t think it would have worked out.Why did Barry have to die?I always felt he was going to die. And I wondered who was going to kill him. I wondered if it was going to be Sally for a while. And if this is a morality tale, then there’s the question of consequences or repercussions. It’s brave storytelling to kill your lead. There’s a fun finality to it. It’s really over.Redemption never really worked for him. He tried. Became a “nice” guy, went to church. But in the end, he still went back to Los Angeles to kill Gene.All that redemption was on such a superficial level. None of it was going deep. Because ultimately, if he felt threatened, he would make the selfish choice. So it was just more performance.Was this really a comedy, especially in this final season?It was definitely a comedy when we started. The tone became really expansive. This season, particularly in the latter half, we changed genre almost every episode: thriller, horror, drama. I was surprised that the show could hold that. I laugh out loud, still, watching the show, but “comedy” doesn’t sum it up.How much say did you have in shaping Sally?I had a lot to say, which I never took for granted, because it’s rare. I’ve always said that with Sally, you don’t have to like her. You just have to know her. Likable? Dislikable? That’s a barometer we really only use for women. I wanted her to be as morally bankrupt as the men on the show. I wanted her to remain complex. I asked for that from Season 1. I find it interesting to play characters who are making bad decisions. I’m not interested in playing nice people.Sally attracted a lot of online hate, which reminded me of the reactions to female characters on other series. Why do people hate these women so much?I wish I had an answer that made any logical sense. I feel like there’s just this undercurrent of cultural misogyny — the sexism involved in how we view those characters is wild to me. “Barry” was no exception. I was curious how that would go. My hunch was correct that we were met with the same type of misogyny, but that only made me want to double down and go harder.Did any of it feel bad?Only in the way that every single day as a woman can feel bad. When I was growing up, I was taught that we lived in an equal world, and I believed it. When I went to theater school, in my year, there were 20 boys to eight women. We were told: “Well, this is a model of the industry. It’s representative of what kind of roles are available to you.” And we all just nodded along like, “Oh, that makes sense.” I have a lot of latent rage around those things. Some of it I was able to channel through Sally’s outbursts, but I felt so frustrated as an actress when I was starting out at what was available. I’d have this litmus test of like, Does she only ask questions? Does she say, “I’m so worried about you, babe”? Does she have a point of view? Does she have a job?”My hunch was correct,” Goldberg said about the misogyny aimed at her character online. “But that only made me want to double down and go harder.”Lanna Apisukh for The New York TimesWhat can you tell me about the character you’ll play in “Industry”?Petra, she’s the polar opposite of Sally. That was the draw. She’s an incredibly contained woman who is very successful and wickedly smart. While Sally was many things, contained was not one of them. Sally is always searching or floundering. Actually sitting still and taking the higher status is harder for me. So that’s why I’m enjoying it. It’s been a lovely job so far.How has “Barry” changed your career?Well, it changed my life. There’s only so long one can survive on a theater salary. Opposite to Sally, I’m someone who very much enjoys anonymity. The people who watch “Barry” seem to really love the show. If I’m approached in the street, it’s usually someone very kind who shyly wants to say, “I love the show.” And that’s lovely. Honestly, my life hasn’t changed all that much. Especially in London, nobody cares. I just feel lucky that the material I’ve been able to do has been stuff that I want to do. I haven’t had to compromise. As long as I can sustain that, I think I’ll be happy.You can just play nice girls from now.Yes, that will be my question: Is she likable, though? More