Kidman, Nicole

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      in Television

      Nicole Kidman Skipped Quarantine in Hong Kong. Residents Were Angry.

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      The actress, in Hong Kong to film a series about wealthy expatriates, was allowed to skip a coronavirus quarantine. Residents saw the exemption as deeply unfair, and it became a point of debate among lawmakers.When Nicole Kidman flew into Hong Kong to film a television series about wealthy expatriates, residents could not help noticing some of the perks at hand: a private jet, a personal driver and, most important, a pass out of mandatory quarantine.Some of them saw a case of life imitating art, or the power of celebrity, or at least a public relations misstep amid a pandemic.But either way, many people in the Chinese territory regarded the Australian actress’s end-run around coronavirus rules — some of the strictest in the world — as a symbol of the unfairness that pervades a city known for its soaring inequalities. On Friday, the rare exemption was a point of debate on the floor of the city’s legislature.“Now that you have created a precedent, does that mean that all foreign movie stars will be exempted when they fly to Hong Kong to film movies?” Michael Tien, a pro-establishment lawmaker, asked Sophia Chan, the health secretary. “If not, can you explain why Nicole was superior to everyone else? Even though I like her a lot.”Ms. Kidman went shopping in central Hong Kong two days after she flew in from Sydney, Australia, on a private jet, The South China Morning Post reported. The government later confirmed that she and four crew members had been allowed to bypass a rule that required vaccinated travelers from Australia to quarantine in a hotel for a week. (The time was increased to two weeks on Friday.)A Hong Kong regulation allows a top city official to grant quarantine exemptions to people whose work is deemed “in the interest” of the city’s economic development. The Commerce and Economic Development Bureau said on Thursday that Ms. Kidman’s exemption allows her to carry out “designated professional work” that is seen as necessary to the local economy.But in a city where the borders have been closed to nonresidents for much of the pandemic — and where some inbound travelers are still required to quarantine in hotels for three weeks — Ms. Kidman’s exemption has not gone over well.A view of Hong Kong skyline from Tsim Sha Tsui. Severe inequality in the financial hub has long been a complaint for many residents.Lam Yik Fei for The New York TimesSeveral critics have noted that Ms. Kidman is in Hong Kong to film “Expats,” an Amazon Prime Video series based on “The Expatriates,” a 2016 novel by Janice Y.K. Lee that satirizes affluent Westerners in the financial hub. Others contrasted her freedom to travel with conditions in Australia, observing that she visited an upscale Hong Kong clothing boutique just as Sydney went back into lockdown. (One Hong Kong journalist reported that Ms. Kidman’s driver had parked a Range Rover illegally in a crosswalk while waiting for her to shop.)Spokespeople for Ms. Kidman did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday. Some of the photos of her Hong Kong trip show her wearing a mask in public, as most people there have been doing since Covid-19 first emerged in the neighboring Chinese mainland.Some Hong Kongers see the Amazon show as being produced at an unfortunate time, with some residents fleeing a crackdown on dissent that has ensnared opposition politicians, university students and others who supported the city’s widespread antigovernment protests of 2019.Many residents have long complained about Hong Kong’s inequalities, and territory leaders have faced other public backlashes for setting different Covid rules for the rich and the poor.In May, the government quietly announced a plan to exempt corporate executives from quarantine, but it later put the plan on pause.About the same time, officials backtracked on a contentious order that would have required migrant domestic workers to be vaccinated. But the government went ahead with a plan to subject those workers to a second round of compulsory coronavirus testing, even though the first round had turned up only three cases among 340,000 people. More

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      in Movies

      ‘The Prom’ Review: Showbiz Sanctimony, and All That Zazz

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Best of 2020Best MoviesBest TV ShowsBest BooksBest TheaterBest AlbumsAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story‘The Prom’ Review: Showbiz Sanctimony, and All That ZazzRyan Murphy takes on the Broadway hit “The Prom,” with help from Meryl Streep, Nicole Kidman and Keegan-Michael Key.The bright (small) lights of Indiana meet Angie Dickinson glam: Nicole Kidman and Jo Ellen Pellman in “The Prom.”Credit…Melinda Sue Gordon/NetflixDec. 10, 2020, 7:00 a.m. ETThe PromDirected by Ryan MurphyComedy, Drama, MusicalPG-132h 10mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.Early in Ryan Murphy’s “The Prom,” a Broadway flack starts reading the reviews of a newly opened show about Eleanor Roosevelt, “Eleanor!” The gang’s all here, including the self-adoring stars, Dee Dee Allen (Meryl Streep) and Barry Glickman (James Corden). The drinks and laughs are flowing, and everyone is as lit as their bedazzled outfits. And then the flack starts reading the notice from The New York Times (hiss, boo). “This is not a review you want when you have crappy advance sales,” he bleats. “This is going to close us.”In his review of “The Prom” on Broadway, my Times colleague Jesse Green amusingly reassured readers that this wouldn’t happen, deeming it “a joyful hoot.” It won’t happen with the movie, which is based on the show, for other reasons. “The Prom” starts streaming on Netflix on Friday, which means no amount of cheers or jeers will matter. On Netflix, the movie will sit alongside thousands of other titles, subject only to mysterious algorithms and sheltered from both critics and the box office. Its canny mix of nostalgia and idealism, old-fashioned conservatism and new-age liberalism will hit the spot for some, even if its vision of American unity is hard to recognize right now.In its broad outlines, the story — a show-people lark wed to a morality tale about a teenage lesbian’s triumph — seems unchanged. Called out as unlikable narcissists (who can’t even make a hit), Dee Dee and Barry decide to rehabilitate their tainted reputations with celebrity activism. With their overripe second bananas, the archly named Angie Dickinson and Trent Oliver (Nicole Kidman and Andrew Rannells), they travel to an Indiana town, intent on taking up (uninvited) the cause of the heroine, Emma (Jo Ellen Pellman), a high schooler who’s been barred from bringing her girlfriend to the prom.The theme and the story’s arc emerge when Dee Dee et al. descend on the town, waving placards and trumpeting indignation. “We are here from New York City and we are going to save you,” Barry announces to Emma, who’s embedded in a meeting filled with parents and other students. This joke is soon repeated, as often happens in this movie, where every rose is gilded and every laugh squeezed until it’s dry. “Who are you people?” asks the mother (a misused Kerry Washington) leading the homophobic charge. “We are liberals from Broadway,” Trent says, assuring that Team New York will fall on its smug face while securing its own redemption.The tolerance message in “The Prom” is sincere, no matter how satirically delivered. And it’s easy to imagine that onstage the whole thing came off as charming (as a friend insisted), a quality not in Murphy’s paint box. (The charm of his TV series “Glee” sprang from the youth of his cast and the musical genre itself.) Murphy likes to go big and lightly bonkers, and his aesthetic is best described as Showbiz Expressionism: it’s splashy and ostensibly excessive without being threatening. In contrast to, say, the shocks of John Waters, for whom tastelessness is a revolt (aesthetic, political), Murphy’s excesses are tastefully vulgar strokes rather than a value.The story unwinds with histrionics and homilies, jazz hands and twinkle toes, overly busy camerawork and hookless lung bursters. (Matthew Sklar wrote the music and Chad Beguelin wrote the lyrics and, with Bob Martin, the screenplay.) Some of the songs are cheeky (“we’re gonna help that little lesbian/whether she likes it or not”); others are as earnest as a daily affirmation (“life’s no dress rehearsal”). Taken together, they create a parallel narration that makes swathes of dialogue superfluous. “If you’re not straight,” Emma sings early on, “then guess what’s bound to hit the fan.” Later, she sings “nobody out there ever gets to define/the life I’m meant to lead.”Pellman doesn’t look remotely like a teenager, but her melancholic sweetness is appealing and she has a quality of stillness that creates a much-needed oasis amid Murphy’s insistent din. It helps that, in contrast to her famous co-stars, she hasn’t been directed to oversell every note, whether musical or emotional. With her open face and pretty soprano, she turns her character into a recognizable adolescent and lets you see — and feel — Emma’s yearning, her hurt and belief that something better, more soul-nurturing, waits beyond the prejudices and provincialism of her town. Like Dorothy and countless others, Emma dreams of her place over the rainbow.She gets it, with assistance from her soon humbled, ultimately victorious New York helpers (and the warm presence of Keegan-Michael Key as the principal). How this all goes down is as predictable as expected except that, in the year 2020, it’s also more fantastical than “The Wizard of Oz” at its trippiest. Here, all it takes for bigots to accept Emma and L.G.B.T.Q. rights is for Trent to call them out as hypocrites who should — in a sublimely narcissistic move — be more like their fabulous, righteous interlopers. In other words, if the haters would open their tiny, hard hearts, everything would be fine. You don’t have to be a cynic to know that is a crock. You just need to be an American.The PromRated PG-13 for who knows? Musical theater? Glitter? Running time: 2 hours 10 minutes. Watch on Netflix.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More