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      ‘Only Murders in the Building’ Goes to Hollywood

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      The murder mystery comedy returns with more celebrities than ever but in a winking, self-aware way.In its first three seasons, the Hulu mystery comedy “Only Murders in the Building” recruited an impressively starry array of guest stars — including Nathan Lane, Paul Rudd and Meryl Streep — to join the already stellar main cast of Selena Gomez, Steve Martin and Martin Short. Season 4, which starts on Tuesday, has even more famous faces, which can be overwhelming at times. But there’s a knowing quality to the way these celebrities are deployed: “Only Murders” has gone Hollywood, but in a winking, self-aware way.Partly, that’s by … going to Hollywood. In the premiere, Mabel, Charles and Oliver (Gomez, Martin and Short) are summoned to Los Angeles by a Paramount Pictures executive (Molly Shannon, always hilarious) who is desperate to make a movie based on their hit podcast. The A-list cast has already been chosen: Eugene Levy will play Charles, Zach Galifianakis will play Oliver, and Eva Longoria will be Mabel. (For those keeping track of the meta-layers, that’s a group of real celebrities playing themselves as the cast of a fictional movie about a reality-inspired podcast inside a fictional show — starring real celebrities as fictional hosts.)But Mabel has reservations. And Charles is growing increasingly worried about the disappearance of his friend and former stunt double, Sazz Pataki (Jane Lynch), who as we know from the Season 3 finale was murdered in Charles’s apartment — dressed as (and presumably mistaken for) Charles himself. It can be a bit awkward when a show leaves its natural environment, and that’s true when the crime-solving trio heads to California. The characters feel out of place and so do we. Lucky for us, the action soon returns to New York and their Upper West Side apartment building, the Arconia, where they must try to track down Sazz’s killer.There’s cheeky fun in the big-time celebrities playing heightened versions of themselves, but the jokes about haughty famous people are also a little obvious. The most delightful guest turns come from the less-famous actors who play the zany suspects. Jin Ha, so great in “Pachinko,” is an adorably jittery screenwriter. Catherine Cohen and Siena Werber are gloriously eccentric film director sisters. There is also an eye-patch-wearing Richard Kind and other established character actors, like Daphne Rubin-Vega, who show up to cause chaos.“Only Murders” has become comforting in its rhythms. The writers have a working formula, and they use that formula well. But I’m really not watching for the mystery anymore — even though there are plenty of twists and turns this season. I’m watching to see who pops up next and how much they can make me giggle. More

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      ‘Playground’ Is Throwback Reality TV, in More Ways Than One

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      The new Hulu series, set at a prestigious Los Angeles dance studio, harks back to the vibes of an earlier age.Alexis Beauregard and Roman Royale in a scene from “Playground.”HuluTime-loop shows are everywhere these days, and now TV itself is looping back, scooping up folks from shows of yesteryear to bring their skills and wisdom to the present fight. “Playground,” which arrives Friday on Hulu, is ostensibly a new reality show set in a Los Angeles dance studio.But the series is also multiple throwbacks in one, a new team reassembled from the people and vibes of earlier reality programming. The second episode includes a 2000s-themed birthday party; meanwhile, “Playground” is itself a 2000s-style show.An awful lot of contemporary reality shows follow a Bravo model of contrivance and repetition, in which seasons use the same segments so many times they feel like reruns of themselves. Based on the two episodes available for review, “Playground” does not, to its tremendous credit, play like a descendant of “Vanderpump Rules” — its closer ancestor is “The Hills.” Oh, the testy al fresco lunches! Oh, the intriguing young women who debase themselves for the attentions of immature men!Long-term fans of dance shows will spot a few familiar faces immediately (in addition to Megan Thee Stallion, who is an executive producer, and Tinashe, among other stars). Robin Antin and Kenny Wormald not only run Playground LA; they’ve also both been on dance reality shows before — Antin on multiple Pussycat Dolls shows in the late aughts and Wormald on the single-season “Dancelife.” (Not to be confused with the recent Australian reality show “Dance Life,” which is also great.) Here, they’re the prickly mom and dad to a family bursting with talent and strife.Part of what makes “Playground” so perfect in its electric garbage way is the conflict between Alexis, the golden child, and Deanna, who proudly describes herself as “Satan’s daughter.” Those of us raised in the faith of days-long “Real World” marathons require angry people on TV shouting “Say it to my face!” in order to have a full life, and “Playground” delivers, largely via Deanna.For all its retro glory, “Playground” also feels refreshingly new in its editing and momentum. Many streaming reality shows mimic the pacing of basic cable (especially now that plenty of streamers also include commercials). But those filler recapitulations that come after each commercial break are tedious enough — and in a streaming context are vestigial at best. “Playground” doesn’t bother with them and is instead filled with real material: dancing, squabbling, vying, gossiping, all the essential food groups of a summer show. More

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      Benj Pasek and Justin Paul Approach EGOT After ‘Only Murders’ Nod

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      Season 3 of the Hulu comedy “Only Murders in the Building” earned 21 Emmy nominations on Wednesday — adding to the 30 it had already amassed, along with four wins, for Seasons 1 and 2.But this season, the series could also produce an EGOT, the term for someone (or, in this case, someones) who has won all four major entertainment awards: an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony. When the 76th Emmy Awards air in September, the songwriting duo Benj Pasek and Justin Paul will have a chance to check off the E, having received a nod for best outstanding original music and lyrics for their tongue-twisting ditty “Which of the Pickwick Triplets Did It?”The series’s third season switched things up by moving much of its action to Broadway. Pasek and Paul, as along with a supergroup of Broadway collaborators, were brought aboard to write music for the new episodes. Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman, who won Tonys for “Hairspray,” were also writers of the Emmy-nominated tune.The other awards contributing to Pasek and Paul’s potential EGOT came from their work on the comedy-drama film “La La Land” (a best original song Oscar for “City of Stars”), the stage musical “A Strange Loop” (a best musical Tony, as producers) and the musical “Dear Evan Hansen” (a Tony for best original score and a Grammy for best musical theater album).A running bit on the most recent season of “Only Murders in the Building” sees the former TV star Charles-Haden Savage struggle to perform “Which of the Pickwick Triplets Did It?” He finally gets through it in the eighth episode, “Sitzprobe,” but the actor who plays him, Steve Martin, nailed it within two hours, according to the songwriters.A win for Pasek and Paul would make them, as a duo, the second EGOT winners this year. Elton John joined the club in January when he won an Emmy for outstanding variety special for his live-streamed farewell concert.The episode “Sitzprobe” has also popped up in several other categories in this year’s Emmy nominations, including outstanding guest actress in a comedy series (Da’Vine Joy Randolph) and outstanding contemporary costumes for a series. More

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      ‘UnPrisoned’ Depicts the Burden of Incarceration With a Light Touch

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      Delroy Lindo and Kerry Washington discuss their series, which finds humor and struggle in a father and daughter repairing their relationship after a long prison term.“UnPrisoned” on Hulu is the rare show to focus on the aftermath of incarceration and its ongoing effects on families rather than on imprisonment itself.Created by Tracy McMillan and loosely based on her 2011 memoir, “I Love You and I’m Leaving You Anyway,” the series stars Delroy Lindo and Kerry Washington as Edwin and Paige, a father and daughter trying to repair their relationship when Edwin comes back into Paige’s life after serving 17 years in prison.The first season explored the emotional injury that Edwin’s long absence inflicted upon Paige, an avid Instagrammer, therapist and single mother who struggles with a string of unhealthy romantic partners. Season 2, premiering Wednesday, delves deeper into how the issues of abandonment, anxiety and mistrust have been passed down through three generations, and it depicts the hard work it takes for the family to break the trauma cycle and begin to heal.Though the show spotlights a serious societal problem — mass incarceration — it does so with a light touch, finding humor as well as difficulty in the challenges of re-entry. Such nuance is what drew both Lindo and Washington to this story about, as Lindo put it, “the problems of families that have been decimated by the penal system and their trying to reconnect.”“Shining light on that process and on one individual who has been imprisoned for as long as my character was, while also doing it somewhat comedically, was genuinely very, very interesting to me,” he said.Washington helped develop “UnPrisoned” through her production company, Simpson Street. She said Lindo was her only choice for Edwin because she needed someone who could handle the comedy while also being able to convey the complexity and charisma of McMillan’s father, who inspired the character.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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      What to Expect From Wednesday’s Emmy Nominations

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      The top nominees are announced at 11:30 a.m. ET. “Shogun” and “The Bear” are poised to have a big day.Just six months after a strike-delayed ceremony, the Emmys are back.Nominations for television’s most prestigious award show will be unveiled on Wednesday morning. “Shogun,” the lush period drama, and “The Bear,” the anxiety-inducing comedy, are poised to have a big day. Netflix’s “Baby Reindeer” is expected to stand out among limited series.There is a considerable cloud hanging over Emmy nomination day this year. Last year’s double strikes, along with several years of cost cutting, have put the industry in the throes of a contraction. The Peak TV era is now firmly in the rearview mirror. To wit, the number of shows submitted for Emmy consideration this year plummeted.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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      5 International Shows Worth Watching, From Kafka to a Human Kaiju

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      The return of “Babylon Berlin” was the international TV news of the week, but here are five other recent series to check out.The long-awaited American premiere of a new season of the German hit “Babylon Berlin” was the big news this week in the realm of international television series. But interesting shows from other countries arrive on an almost daily basis. Here are five recent series to check out.‘All This I Will Give to You’This six-episode mini-series on MHz Choice is a lot like a British country-house mystery, except that it’s French. So the matriarch of the aristocratic family visited by murder is even colder and more controlling, her out-of-control second son is an even more dire cokehead, and the food looks edible. Also, everyone is better looking than they would be in a British series, particularly the artisanally scruffy husband (David Kammenos) of the suspiciously dead eldest son, who kept the husband a secret from his family and the family a secret from his husband. (To stir the cultural pot further, the series is based on a novel set in Galicia by Dolores Redondo, the popular Spanish mystery writer.)Viewers weary of the variously arch or dreary contrivances of most modern American thriller mini-series may appreciate the straightforward traditionalism of “All This I Will Give to You,” which has enough narrative pull to overcome the usual fits of melodrama that break out as the mystery nears solving. Kammenos’s Manuel, shocked by the discovery of his husband’s hidden life and disgusted by his new in-laws, is a testy, twitchy, holier-than-thou pain in the derrière for more than half the show, which is a nice change of pace. And the camaraderie that slowly develops between him and a retired cop with a personal interest in the husband’s death is nicely drawn.‘Kafka’This German mini-series demonstrates that, even in an era of consolidation, distinctive shows still sneak in through the side door of the streaming business, in this case via ChaiFlicks, which specializes in Jewish-themed content. (The fourth of six episodes premiered this week.) The series takes a meta-fictional, Wes Anderson-ish approach to the life of the writer Franz Kafka (Joel Basman) — it moves back and forth in time and among Kafka’s acquaintances, looking for crucial moments, and characters break the fourth wall to reinforce or angrily disagree with the narrator’s observations.Each of the six episodes focuses on a different character from Kafka’s life, showing us what it was like to be the best friend, the lover or the much-maligned father. Stars of central European culture show up, some played by actors familiar to American audiences from “Babylon Berlin” (Lars Eidinger as Rilke, Christian Friedel as Franz Werfel, Liv Lisa Fries as Milena Jesenská). Some viewers may feel that the dryly humorous peak-TV approach undersells the seriousness of Kaka’s work and the momentousness of the times he lived in, but “Kafka” is never less than entertaining.In “Kaiju No. 8,” a laborer gains the ability to turn into a monster.JAKDF 3rd Division Naoya Matsumoto/ShueishaWe 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 ‘The Bear,’ Abby Elliott Follows a New Recipe

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      The acclaimed kitchen hit has allowed Elliott, a comic actor from a famously funny family, to embrace her dramatic side.Abby Elliott knows her way around a comedy. A veteran of the Groundlings and the Upright Citizens Brigade, she joined “Saturday Night Live” at 21 and has since appeared in laugh-track-ready shows like “How I Met Your Mother” and “Odd Mom Out.” So in the spring of 2021, when FX approached her about a pilot for a new comedy, she was interested.“I kind of went into it like, Oh, should I do a voice?” Elliott said. “Or I could do a little catchphrase? That could be fun.”That show was “The Bear,” which returns for its third season on Thursday, on Hulu. Set largely in the fraught kitchen of a Chicago restaurant, it stars Jeremy Allen White as a troubled chef. Elliott appears as his forbearing sister. “The Bear” is a comedy only in the classical sense, in that it emphasizes human foibles and does not end in disaster. (Is a workplace rife with panic, money trouble and suicidal ideation not a disaster? Take it up with Emmys voters, who in January awarded it best comedy.) Otherwise it is dramatic, frenetic, extremely stressful.“I didn’t really quite understand how high the stakes would be,” she said.For what it’s worth, Elliott does consider “The Bear” a comedy. “It’s just like real life,” she said. “A lot of people find comedy in the darkness and the stress. It’s so relatable in that way.” But a funny thing happened on the way to the kitchen: “The Bear” made Elliott a dramatic actress. She does not do a voice.In “The Bear,” Elliott stars as the older sister of Carmy, the troubled chef played by Jeremy Allen White, left. (With Ayo Edebiri.)Chuck Hodes/FXI met Elliott, 37, at an Upper West Side cafe on a summer morning, the sun set to low broil, about a week before the Season 3 premiere. Though she lives in Los Angeles and works in Chicago, she had come to the East Coast for a family wedding and was enjoying a few days in the city afterward.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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      ‘Brats’ Review: Feeding St. Elmo’s Ire

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      In this documentary, Andrew McCarthy examines fame and disappointment as a member of the so-called Brat Pack of the 1980s.A thread of vulnerability weaves through “Brats,” the actor-director Andrew McCarthy’s new documentary. In it, McCarthy, the star of ’80s hits like “St. Elmo’s Fire” and “Pretty in Pink,” tries to make peace with having been branded a member of the “Brat Pack” by the press.In 1985, New York Magazine christened a collection of young actors with that sticky sobriquet — itself a wink to the midcentury Rat Pack. The quasi-gonzo cover story by David Blum (who makes an appearance in the film) ran right before “St. Elmo’s Fire” opened and a few months after “The Breakfast Club” hit multiplexes. Hollywood’s youth quake was on. But not everyone reaped the benefits.Early in the film, McCarthy says that the article “affected my life massively.” Over the next four decades, his filmography wasn’t what he’d hoped for. Testing a theory that his fellow Brat Pack actors may have felt similarly pigeonholed, he phones Emilio Estevez, Ally Sheedy, Demi Moore, Rob Lowe and others, whom he hasn’t spoken to in decades.McCarthy interviews them in person, sitting (or in the case of Estevez, standing) in what starts to resemble a therapy session. Often, McCarthy appears to be the only one who is still working through the trauma of instant, if fragile, icon status.The film’s through-line of woundedness is by turns touching, irritating and occasionally illuminating: A visit to the writer Malcolm Gladwell is insightful; watching Dick Cavett and Phil Donahue fawn offers a cringey lesson in how easy it is to rev the star-stoking machinery.And about that 1985 article: It doesn’t actually mention McCarthy much. Though one of his co-stars had this to say about him: “He plays all his roles with too much of the same intensity. I don’t think he’ll make it.” If McCarthy’s ire with the Brat Pack moniker begins to feel psychologically displaced, might this be the reason?BratsNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 32 minutes. Watch on Hulu. More