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    ‘Angry Alan’ Review: John Krasinski Explores the Manosphere

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    In an Off Broadway play, the former Jim Halpert of Dunder Mifflin dives into a darker world of male grievance.Roger is jazzed. He’s spent money he doesn’t have, including the child-support payment he owes, on a gold ticket to a men’s rights conference. Nor does the gathering disappoint. The Detroit hotel where it takes place is brimming with guys taking back their power. But guess what’s best? Angry Alan, the internet personality who opened Roger’s eyes to the evils of the gynocracy, is scheduled to speak. This is going to be great!For Roger, anyway. Not so much for us.It is perhaps a clue to the over-thick ironies of Penelope Skinner’s “Angry Alan,” which opened Tuesday at the new Studio Seaview, that the horde of inspired men at the conference is represented by, count ’em, two dummies and some faceless paintings on a backdrop. Offered in Sam Gold’s staging as a joke, like the rest of their gender, they are mere markers in a loaded argument. Even Roger, though played exceedingly well by John Krasinski, is a place holder: a straw man incarnate.Krasinski works hard to disguise that. As he proved during nine seasons as the gemütlich Jim Halpert on “The Office,” he performs charm, titrated with a satire of charm, very well. Here, in a role that runs to more than 10,000 words, some of them Roger’s and some of them his unflattering imitations of the women around him, that good-guy appeal has a lot of work to do.Because Roger is not a good guy. Though he believes himself to be supportive and reliable, the play keeps dropping heavy hints to the contrary. His first wife got uncontested custody of their son. The son doesn’t speak to him. He lost his BMW-level job at AT&T under unexplained circumstances, and is now the dairy manager at Kroger. Perhaps worst, he is paranoid about his girlfriend, Courtney, who has enrolled in a nude life-drawing class at a community college. Her classmates wear T-shirts that say things like Mind Your Own Uterus.Courtney’s recent behavior and new friends are the immediate cause of Roger’s descent into the manosphere. There, Angry Alan teaches him that women, far from being victims of a male-dominated society, run the world and have done so for decades. Men must fight back to restore the proper balance.Perhaps these loathsome ideas seemed like news in 2018, when “Angry Alan” premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. (Don Mackay, credited with creating the play with Skinner, played Roger there and, later, in London.) The title character might have introduced audiences to recently emerged manopshere figures like the Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson, who advocates a return to traditional gender roles, and the British influencer Andrew Tate, a self-proclaimed misogynist with millions of followers.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 Theater

      ‘Angry Alan’ Review: John Krasinski Explores the Manosphere

      by

      In an Off Broadway play, the former Jim Halpert of Dunder Mifflin dives into a darker world of male grievance.Roger is jazzed. He’s spent money he doesn’t have, including the child-support payment he owes, on a gold ticket to a men’s rights conference. Nor does the gathering disappoint. The Detroit hotel where it takes place is brimming with guys taking back their power. But guess what’s best? Angry Alan, the internet personality who opened Roger’s eyes to the evils of the gynocracy, is scheduled to speak. This is going to be great!For Roger, anyway. Not so much for us.It is perhaps a clue to the over-thick ironies of Penelope Skinner’s “Angry Alan,” which opened Tuesday at the new Studio Seaview, that the horde of inspired men at the conference is represented by, count ’em, two dummies and some faceless paintings on a backdrop. Offered in Sam Gold’s staging as a joke, like the rest of their gender, they are mere markers in a loaded argument. Even Roger, though played exceedingly well by John Krasinski, is a place holder: a straw man incarnate.Krasinski works hard to disguise that. As he proved during nine seasons as the gemütlich Jim Halpert on “The Office,” he performs charm, titrated with a satire of charm, very well. Here, in a role that runs to more than 10,000 words, some of them Roger’s and some of them his unflattering imitations of the women around him, that good-guy appeal has a lot of work to do.Because Roger is not a good guy. Though he believes himself to be supportive and reliable, the play keeps dropping heavy hints to the contrary. His first wife got uncontested custody of their son. The son doesn’t speak to him. He lost his BMW-level job at AT&T under unexplained circumstances, and is now the dairy manager at Kroger. Perhaps worst, he is paranoid about his girlfriend, Courtney, who has enrolled in a nude life-drawing class at a community college. Her classmates wear T-shirts that say things like Mind Your Own Uterus.Courtney’s recent behavior and new friends are the immediate cause of Roger’s descent into the manosphere. There, Angry Alan teaches him that women, far from being victims of a male-dominated society, run the world and have done so for decades. Men must fight back to restore the proper balance.Perhaps these loathsome ideas seemed like news in 2018, when “Angry Alan” premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. (Don Mackay, credited with creating the play with Skinner, played Roger there and, later, in London.) The title character might have introduced audiences to recently emerged manopshere figures like the Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson, who advocates a return to traditional gender roles, and the British influencer Andrew Tate, a self-proclaimed misogynist with millions of followers.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 Television

      What We Know About ‘The Paper,’ the Upcoming ‘Office’ Spinoff

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      It takes place at a small newspaper in Toledo, Ohio, and at least one original cast member will return from the hit NBC sitcom.It’s been 20 years since the U.S. version of “The Office” debuted on NBC, where it ran for nine acclaimed seasons and endured as a pop culture juggernaut well after its finale. It lives on in countless memes and catchphrases, and the network says it remains one of its most streamed shows.So it should surprise no one that the sitcom, as delightfully cringy as it is lovable, is finally getting a spinoff: “The Paper.” Here’s what we know so far about the new show.Extra Extra! Read All About It.NBCUniversal revealed at its May upfront presentation that “The Paper” would debut on its streaming platform Peacock in September.The sitcom is being created by Greg Daniels and Michael Koman. Daniels was behind the American adaptation of “The Office” and Koman created Comedy Central’s “Nathan For You” alongside its star, Nathan Fielder, a king of deadpan comedy.Daniels and Koman are executive producers of “The Paper,” as are Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, the duo behind the original British version of “The Office” (which ran from 2001 to 2003).Fans first caught wind of the potential spinoff in May 2024, when it was announced that Peacock had an untitled comedy mockumentary series in the works. Production of “The Paper” began last summer.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

      ‘Fountain of Youth’ Review: John Krasinski Goes Continent Hopping

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      An adventurer enlists his disapproving sister (Natalie Portman) in this Guy Ritchie movie with a hint of Indiana Jones.The pop-music adage “Don’t bore us, get to the chorus” is often attributed to the Motown founder Berry Gordy. The sentiment, when applied to film, could generally sum up the approach of the director Guy Ritchie.In his new movie, “Fountain of Youth,” Ritchie opens with a furious chase through the alleys, into the video arcades and over the fruit stalls of Bangkok. On a motorcycle is Luke Purdue (John Krasinski), who’s just purloined a priceless work of art — it’s what he does — and in a vehicle with lots of automatic weapons are some very irate and skeevy-looking journeyman villains.Having evaded his pursuers and boarded a train out of Bangkok, Luke figures he can relax, but no. He is confronted by the lovely Esme (Eiza González, now appearing in her second Ritchie picture), who informs Luke, “I recover rare and unique paintings. Sometimes in leather tubes.” Luke laughs her off; he’s hardly going to let her have the goods. Then she warns him: “I am the hand of mercy. My employers are the hand of judgment.”What’s any of this got to do with the title fountain? It’s mildly complicated, involving a message that can only be deciphered by looking at the backs of a particular group of priceless artworks. Luke is compelled to seek the help of his disapproving sister Charlotte (Natalie Portman), a museum curator; the pair are convinced by a dying billionaire named Owen Carver (Domhnall Gleeson) that the fountain can be found, and that they should find it for him. And off they all go, continent hopping. Once they reach their destination, we learn that the fountain not only de-ages you, it makes you look like computer-generated art. So that’s something.The movie acknowledges its many antecedents; it’s mentioned that Luke and Charlotte are “the children of the famed archaeologist Harrison Perdue,” get it? Besides the hint of Indiana Jones, several scenes also bring to mind the “National Treasure” movies, because they’re set in worlds with great libraries and museums and peopled with characters who, under any other circumstances, would never in a million years set foot in them.Having made his career playing perhaps the ultimate beta male on the television series “The Office,” Krasinski has since ardently pursued alpha roles, playing the reluctant C.I.A. man of action Jack Ryan on the Amazon series of the same name. Still, his ready smile tends to make him instantaneously agreeable, a quality you don’t get from other Ritchie leading men such as Henry Cavill and Jason Statham. Here, the quality doesn’t provide much credibility or added value. Instead, it makes you more sympathetic to Charlotte, who’s almost always scowling at her goofball brother. Stanley Tucci turns up in a Vatican-set cameo, which makes you wonder if he just roosted in the Holy City after completing “Conclave.”Fountain of YouthRated PG-13 for some salty language. Running time: 2 hours 5 minutes. Watch on Apple TV+. More

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      in Movies

      John Krasinski Is People’s ‘Sexiest Man’ With Help From His Stylist

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      John Krasinski may not have the raw energy of Glen Powell, but a collaboration with the stylist Ilaria Urbinati has paid huge dividends.Forget the office debates. At a deeply polarized time and in a conservative-leaning era, the editors of People magazine were never going to go for a sex-in-the-hot-tub candidate in selecting the latest “Sexiest Man Alive.” And so it was hardly a surprise when, on Tuesday night, during an episode of “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert,” the host revealed that this year’s crown had gone to the actor and filmmaker John Krasinski.An amiable hunk and devoted family man with the requisite multiplatform audience appeal (“The Office,” “Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan” and “The Quiet Place,” among other star vehicles), a cozy throwback celebrity marriage (his wife is the actor Emily Blunt), two young daughters and solid East Coast roots (a Boston boy, he lives in a multimillion dollar apartment in Brooklyn) — Mr. Krasinski exudes an erotic energy suggestive less of the bedroom athlete than of the proverbial stable provider. His vibe, riffed the social media gadfly Blakely Thornton, is “giving country home, Volvo hybrid and a 401(k).”Naturally, fans of the actor Glen Powell were distressed about the decision. Why Mr. Krasinski and not Mr. Powell, the “Twisters” actor, with his V-shaped physique and a smile that seems to encourage moral delinquency? But what were they expecting? In a nation battered and exhausted by a grueling political season, Mr. Krasinski was the ideal middle-of-the-road ticket, visually coded as preppy adjacent, in affect both familiar and humorous, evidently secure in his heterosexual identity and so generally inoffensive as to be the Switzerland of onscreen virility.And what he is clearly not is one of the scandal-plagued hunks (Johnny Depp, Brad Pitt, Ben Affleck), serial Lotharios (Richard Gere, George Clooney, again Johnny Depp) or obvious thirst traps (Michael B. Jordan) who have been anointed the world’s sexiest by People in the decades since the publication inaugurated its popular “Sexiest Man Alive” franchise with Mel Gibson back in 1985.While his stylist prefers to keep him away from black-and-white clothing, Mr. Krasinski was dressed in a bird’s eye tweed jacket over a basic white T-shirt on the cover of People.Julian Ungano, People MagazineAt 45, Mr. Krasinski also lands in the franchise’s demographic sweet spot. If he was the obvious choice in that sense, his low-key sexiness also developed out of fashion choices that evolved through a collaboration with the stylist Ilaria Urbinati over the past decade and produced their own form of curb appeal.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

      From ‘IF,’ to ‘Imaginary,’ Exploring Imaginary Friends Onscreen

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      Multiple films this year, including the new family comedy “IF,” explore the concept of imaginary friends on the big screen.In the new family comedy “IF,” Ryan Reynolds plays a frazzled matchmaker who, with help from a young girl (Cailey Fleming), unites humans with imaginary friends.John Krasinski, who wrote and directed the film, said the idea took shape as he watched his daughters’ lights dim during the pandemic.“They were playing fewer and fewer imaginary games and I could see they were letting the fears of the real world in and I thought, this is the definition of growing up,” he explained in an email.He said he decided to make the movie, now in theaters, to show his kids that the “magical world they’ve created, that place of such joy and hope and magic, exists. And you can always go back.”Krasinski isn’t alone in bringing imaginary friendships to life this year. “IF” is one of five new movies that explore imaginary friends, in a variety of genres: supernatural horror (“Imaginary”), adult comedy (“Ricky Stanicky”), children’s animated fantasy (“The Imaginary”) and documentary (“My Secret Country”).Why the convergence? Marjorie Taylor, professor emerita of psychology at the University of Oregon and an expert on imaginary friends, wasn’t sure. But she said she wasn’t surprised, considering that pretend friends, as she calls them, have long been artistic catnip.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

      ‘IF’ Review: Invisible Friends, but Real Celebrity Cameos

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      The film is a slim story about a girl named Bea (Cailey Fleming) who helps a crank named Cal (Ryan Reynolds) play matchmaker. Oh, and Bradley Cooper is a glass of ice water.The big “IF” — as in “imaginary friend” — in John Krasinski’s treacly kids dramedy is a grizzly-sized purple goon who goes by the name Blue. The boy who conjured him was colorblind, he explains. Blue (voiced by Steve Carell) is one of dozens of dreamed-up creatures in Brooklyn who long for their now-grown BFFs to remember they exist.At the Memory Lane Retirement Community underneath Coney Island, there’s also a pink alligator (Maya Rudolph), a superhero dog (Sam Rockwell), a worn teddy (Louis Gossett Jr.), a retro cartoon butterfly (Phoebe Waller-Bridge), a robot (Jon Stewart), an astronaut (George Clooney), a glass of ice water (Bradley Cooper), a gummy bear (Amy Schumer), a unicorn (Emily Blunt), a flower (Matt Damon), a cat in an octopus costume (Blake Lively), a ghost (Matthew Rhys), a soap bubble (Awkwafina), some green slime (Keegan-Michael Key), and an invisible blob who the credits claim is none other than Brad Pitt.What’s more impressive: Krasinski’s imagination or the very real friends in his Rolodex?Most of these characters merely stroll through the frame to say hello, or whine to each other in group therapy. Yet these celebrity cameos take up about as much space as the plot, a gentle, slim story about an unflappable 12-year-old girl named Bea (Cailey Fleming) who helps a crank named Cal (Ryan Reynolds) play matchmaker for the lonely IFs.If — and this is a rhetorical if — you’re still traumatized by the last shot of Bing Bong, the forgotten imaginary friend in Pixar’s “Inside Out,” breathe easy. There’s no existential threat (or narrative tension) about what might happen if the goofy gang remains consigned to oblivion. Palling about with kids again just sounds nice.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

      ‘A Quiet Place Part II’ Review: Pump Up the Volume

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      This sequel to John Krasinski’s alien-invasion blockbuster is brasher, louder and less focused than its predecessor.Movies need endings, but franchises need cliffhangers, and “A Quiet Place Part II” is emblematic of this problem. The first “A Quiet Place” (2018) gave us a beautifully tragic finale, one that emphasized the story’s core themes of human resilience and familial devotion. It was almost perfect, and it could have been enough.The film’s unexpected success, however, gave Paramount Pictures other ideas. And while this new installment is, like its predecessor, wonderfully acted and intuitively directed (by John Krasinski, who is solely responsible for the story this time around), it has also largely replaced the hushed horror of the original with full-on action. Faster, coarser and far noisier, “Part II” sacrifices emotional depth for thriller setups that do less to advance the plot than grow the younger characters.A tensely orchestrated opening rewinds to Day 1 of the alien invasion as Lee and Evelyn Abbott (Krasinski and Emily Blunt) and their three children enjoy a small-town Little League game. Once again employing a combination of terrifying visual effects and unsettling sound design, Krasinski and his team build a sequence of kinetic chaos that serves as both prologue to the first movie and primer for those who unwisely skipped it.Catapulted to Day 474, mere minutes after the earlier film’s devastating conclusion, we find the remaining family members — including the newborn whose birth was a petrifying highlight of the previous installment — seeking shelter with a former neighbor, Emmett (Cillian Murphy), in an abandoned mill. Emmett, withdrawn and bereaved, is a less than congenial host. Nevertheless, when Evelyn’s daughter, Regan (still played to perfection by the deaf actor Millicent Simmonds), sneaks off to follow a radio signal she believes indicates other survivors, he agrees to follow and bring her home.Splitting the film into two separate story lines, Krasinski strains to replicate the bonding that gave “A Quiet Place” its heart — scenes of tender domesticity that paused the horror and allowed us to exhale. And while the remainder of “Part II” never quite rises to the vigor and excitement of its prologue, its action-movie commitments leave little room for the characters to mourn their losses. So as we follow Regan and Emmett’s sometimes harrowing adventures; watch her injured brother, Marcus (Noah Jupe), fight to protect the baby back at the steel mill; and worry about Evelyn as she scavenges for oxygen and medical supplies, “Part II” becomes primarily a story of children forced to grow up too fast and see too much.The aliens themselves, though, remain unfathomable, wanting nothing more than to eradicate us. (An idea that now, more than a year after the film’s original release date, feels uncomfortably metaphorical.) We know that they’re blind, navigate by sound, and that the feedback from Regan’s cochlear implant gives them the heebie-jeebies. But what do they eat? (If not humans, what are all those teeth for?) Are there baby beasties? Show me the nests!Though in many respects an exemplary piece of filmmaking, “Part II” remains hobbled by a script that resolves two separate crises while leaving the movie itself in limbo. At least until Part III.A Quiet Place Part IIRated PG-13 for toothy monsters and skeevy humans. Running time: 1 hour 37 minutes. In theaters. More

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      in Movies

      ‘It’s Magic What We Do.’ Movie Theaters Get Starry-Eyed Once More.

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      The industry was decimated by the pandemic, with theaters shut across the country and new films delayed by Hollywood studios. But now cinemas are ready to fill up their seats again. Will audiences follow?LOS ANGELES — It’s time to go back to the movies! Now!That was the message sent on Wednesday over and over and over again when all five of Hollywood’s major studios, their independent subsidiaries and the stand-alone indie labels like A24 and Neon gathered in person at an AMC theater to show off their coming summer films and remind moviegoers who have become used to streaming their entertainment during the pandemic why they liked going to the movies in the first place. More