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      ‘The O.C.’ Creators Are Right Back Where They Started From

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      With the publication a new book about their influential teen drama, which debuted in 2003, Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage have learned to love “The O.C.” again.“We didn’t know anything,” Josh Schwartz said. “We didn’t know the rules and we were making it up as we went along. That’s something that you learn from.”“But you can’t repeat it,” he continued. “You can only do that once.”Schwartz and his producing partner, Stephanie Savage, have created many coming-of-age series, including “Gossip Girl,” “Looking for Alaska” and “City on Fire.” But he was referring to their first show, which he dreamed up at 26: “The O.C.”A hybrid of a glossy nighttime soap and a quirky teen comedy, “The O.C” aired its first episode on Fox in summer 2003. This story of a boy from the wrong side of the tracks (though how wrong is Chino, Calif., really?) taken in by a wealthy Newport Beach, Calif., family became a sensation among younger viewers, and it made stars and tabloid phenomena of the actors Mischa Barton, Rachel Bilson, Adam Brody and Ben McKenzie.That first season burned through stories as though they were beach bonfire kindling. It blazed less brightly in the second season, and by the third (20-year-old spoilers follow), which culminated in the death of Barton’s poor-little-rich-girl Marissa, that flame had guttered. Following a shorter fourth season, the series ended in 2007.“I personally felt like I had failed,” Schwartz recalled.This was during a recent joint video call with Savage, but the mood was celebratory, not remorseful. Because in a twist worthy of the show’s first season, “The O.C.” has lived on, admired by a new generation and at least partly responsible for introducing idiosyncrasy and quirk into the conventional network formula.Now with the publication of “Welcome to the O.C.: The Oral History,” a collaboration among Savage, Schwartz and the Rolling Stone TV critic Alan Sepinwall, its legacy also includes a book. In conversation with all of the main cast as well as network executives and members of the crew, the book explores the audacity, challenge and often painful compromise of making an hourlong show in the decade before streaming began to dominate.“Welcome to the O.C.: The Oral History,” a collaboration with the critic Alan Sepinwall, includes interviews with cast and crew members and network executives.HarperCollins PublishersDuring an hourlong chat, Schwartz and Savage discussed bikinis, burnout and what they learned about killing off young, attractive leads. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.What was the original pitch for the show?JOSH SCHWARTZ I had gone to U.S.C. As a Jewish kid from the East Coast, I felt like an outsider. The original pitch was centered around a character named Lucy Muñoz, whose father was the gardener and house manager of the Atwood Estates in Newport Beach. Ryan Atwood was a wealthy kid. Lucy Muñoz was our fish out of water. There was still a Seth character, though he was much nerdier. That was the pitch until we went into Warner Brothers.What did Warner Brothers have to say?SCHWARTZ Warner Brothers said: “We love everything about the world of the show. Can you just change the entire concept?” There were multiple shows that year that centered around a white guy-Latina Romeo and Juliet love story. So they said: “Could you reconfigure the premise of your show? In three days?”What were those three days like?STEPHANIE SAVAGE They were intense. We came out of that meeting feeling like we were dead in the water, but we were determined to keep going. The core of what Josh and I originally talked about was, How do you do something that felt like “The Breakfast Club” in a gated community in Orange County? We changed the chairs that these characters were sitting in but still kept that core idea.In the book you talk about the show as a Trojan horse. What’s the horse, and what’s inside it?SCHWARTZ The horse is a glossy nighttime soap in the tradition of “Beverly Hills 90210,” with bikinis and bonfires and fistfights at galas. The soldiers inside were our characters. We were inspired, as Stephanie said, by John Hughes movies and by “My So-Called Life” or “Freaks and Geeks” — beloved, short-lived TV series that were very soulful and had great humor.Did you feel you achieved that?SCHWARTZ The first eight episodes were a perfect distillation of that Trojan horse. That was the horse breaching the gates. We were in!SAVAGE That was a really fun run. The show launched in the summer, which was very unusual. We did those episodes with no feedback coming from the outside world. We were making them in a bubble, which was a really freeing and rewarding experience.Was this a comedy? A drama? A teen soap?SCHWARTZ We were calling it a soapedy at some point. I’m not sure that caught on.When you cast the younger actors, did you know that it would change their lives?SAVAGE No. You hope that your show is successful enough to stay on the air and satisfy audiences and be a good creative experience. You just have no clue of how big a show can be and what fame will mean. It was an era before social media, thankfully, but it was an era of high paparazzi. Mischa was one of the young women stalked by photographers and treated unkindly by online bloggers. Fame hit in a certain way that would have been very hard for anyone to predict.Mischa Barton and Ben McKenzie in “The O.C.” Barton’s character controversially was killed off in the third season.J. Trueblood/FoxIs there anything you now do to prepare or protect younger actors?SAVAGE On our shows subsequent to “The O.C.,” we were able to have nice conversations about things that they could possibly expect to happen in the future and about how to comport themselves through that storm. But at the time, we were really clueless.SCHWARTZ Our No. 1 piece of advice since “The O.C.” is: Stay off the internet. Obviously with the advent of social media, that’s become challenging. But we’ve always tried to caution people, “Don’t read what people are writing about the show while you’re making it.” Just trust in the work that you’re doing. It’s advice that we can’t take ourselves.SAVAGE Exactly: Stay off the internet. Be kind to the crew. Sleep a lot.You have a strong first season and a second season that mostly sticks the landing. Then what happens?SCHWARTZ By the time we hit Season 3, there were a number of factors at play. I was burned out. Steph probably feels the same. We had blown through a lot of story and were challenged to keep creating new story. A lot of our characters had left the show — that was on us as well. And some of the other actors were ready for that next level, movie offers or what have you. So there was frustration there. Ratings inevitably start to soften; people tried to fix that. Sometimes you can just leave the burners on for too long and overcook story. We lost our sense of irony, our sense of fun. We became the type of melodrama we would have made fun of in Season 1.If you had to do it over again, would you still kill Marissa?SCHWARTZ There was a vocal minority online that had grown frustrated with the Marissa story line. That in conjunction with a lot of network pressure to kill a main character as a way to spike viewership drove the decision to kill Marissa. The night that the show aired, we heard from a whole other swath of the audience that loved the show, watched every week, didn’t feel the need to log into a forum to analyze it. For a lot of people, Marissa was the character they were watching for, Mischa was the actress they found the most exciting and Ryan and Marissa were endgame. We violated that in one fell swoop. It’s now part of the legacy of the show. We’ve had to accept it. It hasn’t stopped us from killing other young women in other shows that we’ve done.Have you learned nothing?SCHWARTZ We haven’t. But here we are: It’s 20 years later; people still want to talk to us about the show. The legacy feels really secure to us now, and we can appreciate it.Do you see the influence of “The O.C.” on subsequent shows?SCHWARTZ “Laguna Beach: the Real Orange County” was a result of the show, which then led to “The Real Housewives of Orange County,” which has now spawned an entire franchise, which we should have seen coming and gotten a piece of.SAVAGE Marc Cherry has told us that he doesn’t think he would have been able to do “Desperate Housewives” if it weren’t for the success of “The O.C.,” in that regard of doing something that had a lot of humor and voice to it.Nearly all of your subsequent projects are about adolescents and young adults, and “Looking for Alaska” and “City on Fire” are set in the same time period as “The O.C.” Did you get a little stuck?SCHWARTZ We love coming-of-age stories. Fashions change, technology changes, vernacular changes, but emotionally, they are truly universal. When you make something for an audience of that age, they love that forever and love it deeply. It’s just a really exciting time. Everything is heightened. Everything feels like life or death, and sometimes it is. And probably we’re still subconsciously working through some [expletive].How do you feel about “The O.C.” now?SCHWARTZ Grateful and proud. Which sounds simplistic, but it was a 20-year journey to get there. More

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      in Television

      Norman Lear Reshaped How America Saw Black Families

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      “Good Times,” “The Jeffersons” and “Sanford and Son” brought a wave of Black characters to TV, even as the shows opened up tensions over stereotypes.As a birthday present for Tyler Perry last year, a mutual acquaintance arranged for him to meet one of his heroes, Norman Lear. Perry grew up watching Lear’s groundbreaking television shows, and was awed by how several presented a fuller version of Black lives onto American television screens for the first time.Long ago, Perry had hoped to have a storied career that would emulate a speck of what Lear’s shows such as “Good Times” and “The Jeffersons” displayed: that Black people can share opinions, fall in love, laugh and be fearful just like anyone else.“Had it not been for Norman, there wouldn’t have been a path for me,” said Perry, whose film and TV empire has made him one of the most powerful figures in Hollywood. “It was him bringing Black people to television and showing the world that there’s an audience for us.”Perry departed his meeting with Lear, who was 100 years old at the time, with a deeper appreciation for the craftsmanship of the pioneering television writer and producer who died at 101 on Tuesday. The reality of Lear, a white man, being responsible for bringing a fuller picture of Black lives to American TV screens was a product of the era, when most doors were still closed to Black producers and creators. Some characters in his shows were the source of flare-ups, particularly when some Black cast members complained about stereotypical portrayals, which are still debated today.Yet despite those tensions, it’s hard to find anyone in the medium of television who is held in such high regard, including by many Black writers and showrunners now creating and running today’s shows.“It’s like asking someone who played basketball if Michael Jordan influenced them,” said Kenya Barris, the creator of “black-ish.” “He changed the way contemporary storytelling was told in the genre that I was doing it in.”Barris said that Lear was an early champion of “black-ish” and even visited its writers’ room in 2016.“It’s about as impactful in modern media as a legacy could be,” Barris said of Lear’s body of work that made him a defining figure of ’70s TV.Lear’s shows touched on hot-button issues such as civil rights activism, alcoholism and abortion, going far beyond the one-dimensional existence that Black characters were previously relegated to. His shows depicted television’s first two-parent Black family, an upwardly mobile Black family and the other side of the coin to his most famous character, “All in the Family’s” Archie Bunker, in Redd Foxx’s portrayal of the oft-bigoted Fred Sanford in “Sanford and Son.”This full-rounded view of Black life in America — through characters who had failures and triumphs, struggles and aspirations — helped usher in what historians call the era of “social relevance” in television, in which TV shows and sitcoms offered more authentic depictions of Americans’ lives, said Adrien Sebro, an assistant professor at the University of Texas at Austin and author of “Scratchin’ and Survivin’: Hustle Economics and the Black Sitcoms of Tandem Productions,” a book about Lear’s many television productions.Redd Foxx, left, and Desmond Wilson on “Sanford and Son.”NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal, via Getty ImagesBeverly McIver, an artist and professor of art history and visual studies at Duke University, remembers watching Lear’s shows every week as a child. Growing up in a housing project in Greensboro, N.C., she identified with J.J. Evans, the teenage aspiring artist who grows up in Chicago public housing, portrayed by Jimmie Walker on “Good Times.”“These shows gave me hope that I could rise out of the project, not continue the cycle of poverty, and that I could be an artist,” she said.Walker, in an interview, said Lear always looked to deliver a message through his shows, which initially threw Walker.“Norman, if you want to deliver a message, go work for Western Union,” Walker, 76, recalled telling Lear. “I’m here to work. I’m here to have fun, baby. I’m here to do comedy.”But Walker eventually grew to appreciate Lear’s stance in delivering social commentary through comedy.“He wasn’t a funny-joke writer guy,” Walker said. “He believed that both sides needed to be heard.”Fresh from the Civil Rights era, Hollywood had yet to open itself to Black shows, let alone Black showrunners.“There wasn’t a Black person who could have made that happen,” Perry said of the fuller portrayal of Black life onscreen. “It had to be Norman Lear.”He added: “It had to be a person who understands humanity and people and who we all are at our core and the things we all appreciate and care about, which are family and love and that we all feel pain.”Lear and other producers held tight to creative control of the series. As groundbreaking as the shows centering Black characters were, the creative decisions were still being made by white people who did not share the experiences of the cast onscreen.Two Black writers, Eric Monte and Mike Evans, are credited with creating “Good Times,” but have struggled to receive recognition for their contributions. Monte also argued that Lear stole his idea for “The Jeffersons.” He received a $1 million settlement and said he was eventually blacklisted from Hollywood.“Everything they wrote was stereotypic,” Monte told The Philadelphia Inquirer in 2006.But many who worked with Lear credited him with changing their lives.”I’ve had a very interesting life being on ‘Good Times,’” said BernNadette Stanis, who played Thelma Evans. “My whole life as an adult has been attached to ‘Good Times.’”Other actors who worked on Lear’s shows recalled him extending an open ear to their ideas and thoughts. Marla Gibbs once asked Lear why he seldom showed up on the set of “The Jeffersons.” Gibbs recalled Lear saying that the cast and show were doing just fine without him.But if she ever needed him, Lear added, he’d be there.Gibbs, who played the Jeffersons’ wisecracking maid, Florence Johnston, requested him shortly after. The show’s actors lobbied Lear for a more rounded depiction of the Willises, portrayed by Roxie Roker and Franklin Cover as television’s first interracial marriage between Black and white partners. As a result, the pair exchanged a kiss in a landmark 1974 episode.From left, Marla Gibbs, Isabel Sanford and Sherman Hemsley in “The Jeffersons.” CBS, via Getty ImagesBeginning in 1972, NBC aired Lear’s “Sanford and Son,” which starred Foxx and Demond Wilson as a father and son in Los Angeles, and in 1974 CBS aired “Good Times,” which focused on the Evanses — the first time a Black nuclear family appeared on television.The show was originally envisioned as starring a one-parent matriarchal household, but Esther Rolle, argued that her character, Florida Evans, should be married. Stanis recalled Lear listening to Rolle and, soon after, hiring John Amos to play her husband, James.“He was lenient in that way,” Stanis said.With Rolle’s backing, Stanis talked to Lear and the show’s other producers and writers about establishing more of a voice for Thelma, the daughter of the household.“We were the first Black family show,” Stanis said. “You would have 50-, 60-year-old Caucasian men writing for a teenager and they didn’t have much to say about me.”She added: “Norman was there, the producers and the writers, all of them, the director, everybody was there. They received my viewpoint very well.”That was not the case with every conflict. A 1975 article in Ebony magazine titled “Bad Times on the ‘Good Times’ Set” described a “continuing battle among the cast members to keep the comedic flavor of the program from becoming so outlandish as to be embarrassing to Blacks.”The actors grew particularly frustrated with the outsized role of Walker’s J.J. as the loud and often lazy son with the famous catchphrase of “dyn-o-mite!” who became enormously popular with audiences.Cast members believed the performance portrayed Black Americans in a stereotypical lens. Despite these concerns, the show’s writers transformed J.J. from a minor character into one of the show’s central figures.“I thought too much emphasis was being put on J.J. and his chicken hat and saying ‘dy-no-mite’ every third page,” Amos said in a 2014 interview with the Television Academy. He added that producers resolved the conflict by getting rid of Amos’s character. “So they said, ‘Tell you what? Why don’t we kill him off and we’ll all get on with our lives?’”In addition to Amos’s firing, Rolle also left the show for a season before returning.“When we found out that John wouldn’t be back, we read the script and I thought it was mistaken identity,” Stanis said, adding that when Rolle, who died in 1998, briefly left, “I don’t think that she was very happy with having to leave the show the way it was designed.”In his 2014 autobiography, “Even This I Get to Experience,” Lear wrote that members of the Black Panthers came to his office to complain that “Good Times” perpetuated stereotypes about Black poverty. Lear responded with “The Jeffersons,” which debuted on CBS in 1975. The show featured Sherman Hemsley as George Jefferson, a Black man with a successful dry-cleaning business and a luxury apartment in Manhattan, and Isabel Sanford as his beleaguered wife, Louise.Gibbs broke out as Florence before going on to a long career that included roles on series like “227” and “The Hughleys.” When she received her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2021, Lear accompanied her to the ceremony. She remembered him saying that laughter adds years to one’s life and thanked her for adding years to his.“I’d say without Norman, people would not know my name,” said Gibbs, 92. “He hired me and because of the affiliation, everybody knows Marla Gibbs and they know Florence, so I’d say he definitely added years to my life.”Susan Beachy contributed research. More

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      in Theater

      24 Things That Stuck With Us in 2023

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      Films, TV shows, albums, books, art and A.I.-generated SpongeBob performances that reporters, editors and visual journalists in Culture couldn’t stop thinking about this year.Art‘Barkley L. Hendricks: Portraits at the Frick’“October’s Gone…Goodnight,” by Barkley HendricksClark Hodgin for The New York TimesAt the Frick, where Barkley Hendricks’s shimmering ’70s portraits are hanging, posthumously, in the museum’s first solo show by a Black artist, I kept thinking about that Langston Hughes poem: What does happen to a dream deferred? Hendricks didn’t live to see his subjects, with their plentiful Afros and bell-bottom cool, leaping, communing, strolling across the walls of an institution he frequented. But after quietly railing at the omission, I realized the exhibition is actually about Hendricks taking his rightful place — a kind of insistence that a dream, rather than fossilizing, can go on forever. REBECCA THOMASTheater‘The Engagement Party’Given the heaviness of the current news cycle, I was grateful for the respite of Samuel Baum’s confection of a play, “The Engagement Party“ at the Geffen Playhouse. With sharp writing, a first-rate cast and elegant scenery, who says theater isn’t alive and well in Los Angeles? ROBIN POGREBINRap Albums‘Michael’ by Killer MikeIt’s dangerous for an artist to invite André 3000 for a feature, such are his prodigious talent and penchant for outshining anyone on a track. Killer Mike stays with André 3000 on “Scientists & Engineers” and, dare I say, even delivers the better verse, a standout on his well-balanced album, “Michael.” JONATHAN ABRAMSContemporary ArtRagnar Kjartansson at the Louisiana Museum of Modern ArtBefore a trip to Scandinavia, I heard from several people that the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, north of Copenhagen, was their favorite museum in the world. After five hours on the grounds, I understood why. Beyond a robust children’s area and the meditative sculpture gardens, I was transfixed by an exhibition on the Icelandic artist Ragnar Kjartansson, who uses repetition to examine human emotions, motives and desires. JASON M. BAILEYHip-Hop ReunionsThe DA.I.S.Y. Experience at Webster HallDe La Soul’s pioneering rap peers, including KRS-One, Chuck D, DJ Red Alert, Q-Tip, Common and Queen Latifah, all showed up at Webster Hall in March to buoy the remaining members of the group, Maseo and Posdnuos, as they celebrated the long-awaited streaming release of their catalog, just weeks after the death of Trugoy the Dove. Part catalog retrospective, part homegoing celebration, the night was a warm act of community crystallized, for me, in a single gesture: Late in the night, as Posdnuos rapped onstage, a grinning Busta Rhymes clasped him from behind in a hug I haven’t forgotten since. ELENA BERGERONTV‘Fellow Travelers’Matt Bomer and Jonathan Bailey in “Fellow Travelers.”Ben Mark Holzberg/Showtime“Fellow Travelers” bounces between the perils of McCarthy era Washington and the advent of AIDS in the 1980s, examining the country through the lens of the relationship between a finely chiseled, roguish diplomat and the naïve, morally tortured younger man who loves him over three decades. Created by Ron Nyswaner and based on a novel by Thomas Mallon (the book makes a perfect companion piece to the show), it is a political thriller/sizzling romance/slice of history worth waiting up for to catch each new episode as it drops. HELEN T. VERONGOSFolk Albums‘The Greater Wings’ by Julie ByrneJulie Byrne’s third album is earthy and otherworldly at once; a mournful, healing dispatch from somewhere between heaven and the dew-glazed grass around a freshly dug grave. “I want to be whole enough to risk again,” she sings, as synthesizer tones and harp strings melt behind her. GABE COHNCultural Juggernaut‘Barbie’Ryan Gosling and Margot Robbie in “Barbie.”Warner Bros. PicturesNo one can say “Barbie” was overlooked in 2023, but was it really among the best? Absolutely. It featured a sharp script, even sharper performances, at least three great songs as well as a brilliantly directed showstopping dance sequence. And in a dumpster fire of a year, it brought joy back to the multiplex. STEPHANIE GOODMANTheater‘Stereophonic’David Adjmi’s play, set almost entirely in a Northern California recording studio in 1976, follows a Fleetwood Mac-inspired band as they lay down tracks for a new album. Sexy, savage and sneakily heartbreaking, it explores the intricacies of communal creation and the sacrifices that art demands and invites. ALEXIS SOLOSKIStreaming K-Drama‘Queenmaker’This South Korean Netflix drama follows Hwang Do-hee (Kim Hee-ae), a former fixer for a corrupt family conglomerate in Seoul who decides to put her might behind the mayoral campaign of a frazzled human-rights lawyer, Oh Kyung-sook (Moon So-ri). Netflix has been investing in K-dramas for a reason. “Queenmaker” presents some delicious commentary on class and entitlement at a time of increasingly visible economic inequality in Korea and in the United States. KATHLEEN MASSARANonfiction‘Status and Culture’“Status and Culture” by W. David Marx I finished W. David Marx’s book “Status and Culture” early in the year, and afterward its point of view about taste and trend cycles felt like it applied to — well, just about everything. If you’re interested in why people (including you!) like the things they like, and why culture in the internet age feels stuck in place, read this. DAVID RENARDAnimated Film‘The Boy and the Heron’We’re lucky to be alive in a time when Hayao Miyazaki is still making hand-drawn animated films. With “The Boy and the Heron,” we have the privilege of following him into another dream world, and there are scenes and sequences so achingly gorgeous they brought me up short. BARBARA CHAIExperimental Theater‘ha ha ha ha ha ha ha’At this year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe, I saw, at 1:30 in the morning, a clown called Julia Masli try to solve her audience’s problems — everything from feeling too hot to being a hypochondriac. It was madcap, but by the show’s euphoric finish, involving a heartbroken audience member being forced to crowd surf to boost their mood, I’d started thinking Masli was better than any therapist and most other comedians. ALEX MARSHALLSeconds after the Opera Ends‘Dead Man Walking’Ryan McKinny, center, as Joseph De Rocher and above in a video in “Dead Man Walking” at the Metropolitan Opera.Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesI still remember the silence during the final moments of the Metropolitan Opera’s production of “Dead Man Walking.” To be in such a huge space with so many people, in utter silence — thinking back, I was relieved no one’s phone had rung. LAURA O’NEILLHorror-Comedy‘M3gan’I’m a sucker for art that reflects my greatest fears — bonus points if doused in satire — maybe because it’s evidence that my anxieties aren’t mine alone or maybe because there’s no better way to exorcise dread than to discuss it. Top of my list is the prospect of humanity being conquered by robots (hence my fixation on, say, the “Terminator” movies and “2001: A Space Odyssey”), and in 2023, artificial intelligence seemed to go from peripheral conversations about a future menace to an imminent threat that industry leaders warned may pose a “risk of extinction.” Enter “M3gan,” about a TikTok-dancing, baby-sitting cyborg that managed to be both extraordinary camp and chilling cautionary tale about what could happen when we outsource human emotional care to humanoids who can’t exactly care at all. MAYA SALAMBroadway Revivals‘Parade’Jason Robert Brown’s “The Last Five Years” is one of my favorite shows, so when I saw his musical “Parade” was returning to Broadway, I knew I had to see it. I didn’t know much about it going in, but I was eager to hear Brown’s wonderfully rhythmic piano phrases live. What I didn’t bank on was a gripping story from the past whose themes still resonate. Micaela Diamond’s powerful singing of “You Don’t Know This Man” was unforgettable — the tragedy with which she imbued every note gave me chills. JENNIFER LEDBURYArtificial IntelligencePlankton SingsA.I.’s depiction in culture this year was almost universally sinister: stealing jobs, spreading misinformation, antagonizing Ethan Hunt. It seems like bad news for humanity, except in one very particular application — generating cover versions of songs sung by cartoon characters. The breakout star of this genre was Plankton from “SpongeBob SquarePants.” He crushes “Even Flow,” he nails “Wake Me Up When September Ends,” but he really shines on “Born to Run.” You’re laughing during the first verse, but by the time he tells Wendy he’ll love her with all the madness in his soul, you really believe. DAVID MALITZOld-School Sci Fi‘2001: A Space Odyssey’In August, I saw “2001: A Space Odyssey,” for just the second time, in 70-millimeter projection at the Museum of the Moving Image in Queens. Afterward, I texted a friend: “Is it just the greatest movie ever made?” MARC TRACYMagic‘Asi Wind’s Inner Circle’My job as the theater reporter comes with an occupational hazard: Everyone I meet asks me what show they (or their mother-in-law, or their neighbor, or some random co-worker) should go see. And throughout this year, my answer has been Asi Wind, a smooth-talking Israeli American magician who has been holed up in a Greenwich Village church gymnasium, astonishing audiences with close-up card trickery and mind-blowing mind reading. His run at the Gym at Judson is to end in mid-January after 444 performances; catch it if you can. MICHAEL PAULSONPodcasts‘The Diary of a CEO’Steven Bartlett is the host of “The Diary of a CEO.” It is not an exaggeration to say that the “Diary of a CEO” podcast has changed my life this year. The host Steven Bartlett poses engaging questions to some of the world’s finest thought leaders, with answers that can truly transform the way you think and the way you take action; all for free, with invaluable results. MEKADO MURPHYIndie Albums‘The Record’ by boygeniusThe boygenius album “The Record,” the full-length debut of the indie supergroup, landed, for me, like a geyser in a parched landscape. Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker and Lucy Dacus were all singular talents whom I’d loved individually, but the way they rode their vocal harmonies through discord, on lyrics and guitar, lashed with humor and vulnerability — I couldn’t get enough. “I want to you to hear my story,” they sing, “and be a part of it.” Ladies, you got it. MELENA RYZIKOne TV Episode‘Long, Long Time’ From ‘The Last of Us’How did a zombie show based on a video game bring me to tears? Episode 3 of HBO’s “The Last of Us” reveals how love can survive and even thrive in the worst of times. The show’s sudden detour away from the violence and infected masses to focus on the life that Bill and Frank have built together is a poignant reminder of what really matters. ROBIN KAWAKAMI`Theater‘Sad Boys in Harpy Land’Alexandra Tatarsky in her solo show “Sad Boys in Harpy Land” at Playwrights Horizon.Chelcie ParryIn this brilliant, semi-autobiographical solo performance, Alexandra Tatarsky plays “a young Jewish woman who thinks she is a small German boy who thinks he is a tree.” “Sad Boys in Harpy Land” is a demented clown show/unhinged cabaret/deranged improv, but also a fearless exploration of self-loathing that will stick with me for a very. Long. Time. TALA SAFIEFilm‘Past Lives’The closing scene of “Past Lives” is really just two people, standing on the street, waiting for a cab, in silence. But the two people have a long, intertwined history, the cab is coming to whisk one of them away and it is hard to imagine a heavier silence. The goodbye breaks Greta Lee’s character, sums up this subtle, deeply affecting film and has stayed with me all year. MATT STEVENS More

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      in Movies

      Ryan O’Neal, Who Became a Star With ‘Love Story,’ Dies at 82

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      He was a familiar face on TV before his breakout performance opposite Ali MacGraw in the 1970 blockbuster movie. But it was overshadowed by years of personal problems.Ryan O’Neal, who became an instant movie star in the hit film “Love Story,” the highest-grossing movie of 1970, but who was later known as much for the troubles of his personal life as for his acting in his later career, died on Friday. He was 82. His son Patrick confirmed the death in a post on Instagram. It did not give the cause or say where he died.Mr. O’Neal was a familiar face on both big and small screens for a half-century, but he was never as famous as he was after “Love Story.”He was 29 years old at the time and had spent a decade on television but had made only two other movies when he was chosen to star in Arthur Hiller’s sentimental romance, written by Erich Segal, who turned his screenplay into a best-selling novel. Mr. O’Neal’s performance in “Love Story” as Oliver Barrett IV, a wealthy, golden-haired Harvard hockey player married to a dying woman played by Ali MacGraw, garnered him the only Academy Award nomination of his career.He had played the town rich boy, Rodney Harrington, for five years on the prime-time soap opera “Peyton Place.” But in 1970 Hollywood was not that interested in television actors, and he had been far from the first choice to star in “Love Story.”“Jon Voight turned the part down. Beau Bridges was supposed to do it,” he told a reporter in 1971. “When my name came up through Ali, they all said ‘No.’ Ali said, ‘Please meet him.’”“So we met in one of those conference rooms where everybody sits half a mile away from everybody else,” he continued. “Weeks later, they asked me to test. Then I didn’t hear anything until they finally called and said, ‘Will you give us an extension of a week to make up our minds?’”In the end, Ms. MacGraw persuaded Paramount to cast Mr. O’Neal. He was hired for $25,000 (a little more than $200,000 in today’s currency), and his movie career was ignited.Before he became a movie star, Mr. O’Neal played the town rich boy, Rodney Harrington, for five years on the prime-time soap opera “Peyton Place.”Bettmann/Getty ImagesIt never burned quite as brightly again, although he maintained a high profile throughout the 1970s, appearing in films like “Barry Lyndon” (1975), Stanley Kubrick’s elegantly photographed adaptation of William Makepeace Thackeray’s novel about a poor 18th-century Irish boy who rises into English society and then falls from those heights; and “A Bridge Too Far” (1977), Richard Attenborough’s epic tale of World War II heroism.He also demonstrated his knack for comedy in three films directed by Peter Bogdanovich. He co-starred with Barbra Streisand in “What’s Up, Doc?” (1972), a screwball comedy inspired by the 1938 Cary Grant-Katharine Hepburn movie “Bringing Up Baby”; with Burt Reynolds in “Nickelodeon” (1976), a valentine to the early days of moviemaking based on the reminiscences of Raoul Walsh and other directors; and, with his 9-year-old daughter, Tatum, in the best known of the three films he made with Mr. Bogdanovich, “Paper Moon” (1973).In “Paper Moon,” set in the Midwest during the Depression, Mr. O’Neal played a small-time swindler hornswoggled by a cigarette-smoking orphan who just might be his illegitimate daughter. Tatum O’Neal won an Academy Award for that performance — she remains the youngest person ever to win one of the four acting Oscars — and for a while it appeared that Mr. O’Neal would become the patriarch of an acting dynasty.When Tatum starred as a Little League pitcher in “The Bad News Bears” (1976), she became the highest-paid child star in history, with a salary of $350,000 (the equivalent of about $1.9 million today) and a percentage of the net profits. Her younger brother Griffin seemed poised for stardom as well when it was announced that he would appear with his father in Franco Zeffirelli’s 1979 remake of “The Champ,” the 1931 tear-jerker about a washed-up former boxer and his son.Mr. O’Neal’s Oscar-winning co-star in Peter Bogdanovich’s period comedy “Paper Moon” (1973) was Tatum O’Neal, his daughter.Everett CollectionBut Mr. Zeffirelli ended up making the film with Jon Voight and Ricky Schroder instead, and Griffin O’Neal’s career never got off the ground. He did have one starring role, in the 1982 film “The Escape Artist,” but that film was not a success. When he was next in the public eye, five years later, it was not for his acting but for his involvement in a boating accident that killed his friend Gian-Carlo Coppola, the son of the director Francis Ford Coppola. He was convicted of negligent operation of a boat but acquitted of manslaughter.The O’Neal family would go on to have many more problems with the law, with drugs and with one another.Mr. O’Neal, who was well known in Hollywood for his temper — when he was 18, he spent 51 days in jail for a brawl at a New Year’s Eve party — was charged with assaulting his son Griffin in 2007. Those charges were dropped, but a year later he and Redmond O’Neal, his son with the actress Farrah Fawcett, were arrested on a drug charge. He pleaded guilty and was ordered to undergo counseling, while Redmond entered rehabilitation but continued to struggle with addiction.Tatum O’Neal had her own highly publicized drug problems and was estranged for many years from her father, who she said physically abused her when she was a child.Mr. O’Neal’s fame was beginning to slip by 1978, when Paramount offered him $3 million to star in “Oliver’s Story,” a sequel to “Love Story.” He accepted, even though his distaste for the project was clear.“There’s something cheap about sequels,” he told a reporter, “and this one’s a complete rip-off.” When the movie was released, the critics agreed.Mr. O’Neal with Farrah Fawcett in 1981. They began their highly publicized on-again, off-again relationship when she was still married to the actor Lee Majors.Steve Sands/Associated PressHis days as an A-list star were soon over, although he continued to work steadily in the 1980s and ’90s. His more memorable movies in this period included “Partners” (1982), in which he played a heterosexual police detective who goes under cover with a gay partner, played by John Hurt; “Irreconcilable Differences” (1984), as a successful Hollywood director whose 10-year-old daughter, played by Drew Barrymore, sues him for divorce; and “Tough Guys Don’t Dance” (1987), a crime drama written and directed by Norman Mailer. He also co-starred with Ms. Fawcett in the short-lived 1991 television series “Good Sports.”Most of Mr. O’Neal’s later work was on television, including a recurring role on the series “Bones.”Patrick Ryan O’Neal was born in Los Angeles on April 20, 1941, the elder son of Charles O’Neal, a screenwriter, and Patricia Callaghan O’Neal, an actress. At 17 he joined his nomadic parents in Germany and got his first taste of show business as a stunt man on the television series “Tales of the Vikings.”He never took an acting lesson, but his striking good looks, as well as the anger that seemed to boil just below the surface, helped win him roles on television not long after he returned to Los Angeles.Mr. O’Neal in 2015. The last major role he played, four years earlier, was himself, on the reality show “Ryan and Tatum: The O’Neals.”Ryan Stone for The New York TimesHis marriages to the actresses Joanna Moore and Leigh Taylor-Young ended in divorce. Ms. Taylor-Young, his co-star on “Peyton Place,” told an interviewer that their marriage never recovered from the success of “Love Story,” which she said brought “a type of life which is not suitable for Ryan’s personality.”Mr. O’Neal was romantically linked with many actresses, but it was his on-again, off-again relationship with Ms. Fawcett, which began when she was still married to the actor Lee Majors, that garnered the most attention. The couple never married but were together for almost 20 years before they separated in 1997. They later reconciled and were living together when Ms. Fawcett died of cancer in 2009. In 2012 he published a book about their relationship, “Both of Us: My Life With Farrah.”Besides his daughter, Tatum, and his son Patrick, a sportscaster, complete information on his survivors was not immediately available.In 2012, Mr. O’Neal revealed that he was being treated for prostate cancer. That diagnosis came 11 years after he contracted chronic myelogenous leukemia, which eventually went into remission. The last major role Mr. O’Neal played was himself. In the summer of 2011, he and his daughter starred in a reality show, “Ryan and Tatum: The O’Neals,” on Oprah Winfrey’s cable channel, OWN. The series left the impression that the two had ended their long estrangement, but Mr. O’Neal later told an interviewer that it painted a false picture.“We’re further apart now than we were when we started the show,” he said.Peter Keepnews More

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      Zombie TV Has Come for Cable

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      Many of the most popular channels have largely ditched original dramas and comedies, morphing into vessels for endless reruns.In 2015, the USA cable network was a force in original programming. Dramas like “Suits,” “Mr. Robot” and “Royal Pains” either won awards or attracted big audiences.What a difference a few years make.Viewership is way down, and USA’s original programming department is gone. The channel has had just one original scripted show this year, and it is not exclusive to the network — it also airs on another channel. During one 46-hour stretch last week, USA showed repeats of NBC’s “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” for all but two hours, when it showed reruns of CBS’s “NCIS” and “NCIS: Los Angeles.”Instead of standing out among its peers, USA is emblematic of cable television’s transformation. Many of the most popular channels — TBS, Comedy Central, MTV — have quickly morphed into zombie versions of their former selves.Networks that were once rich with original scripted programming are now vessels for endless marathons of reruns, along with occasional reality shows and live sports. While the network call letters and logos are the same as before, that is effectively where the overlap stops.The transformation could accelerate even more, remaking the cable landscape. Advertisers have begun to pull money from cable at high rates, analysts say, and leaders at cable providers have started to question what their consumers are paying for. In a dispute with Disney this year, executives who oversee the Spectrum cable service said media companies were letting their cable “programming house burn to the ground.”“It’s kind of like when you drive by a store and you can see they’re not keeping it up, and it looks kind of sad,” said Linda Ong, a consultant who works with many entertainment companies and used to run marketing at the Oxygen cable network. “It feels like they don’t have the attention. And they don’t — they’re being stripped for parts.”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?  More

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      The Creepiest Moment Onscreen This Year Occurred in a Comedy

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      “The Curse” has been described as cringe, but look closely and you’ll see it plays with the classic tropes of horror like jump scares.There’s telling a bad joke. There’s bombing. And then there’s what happens to Nathan Fielder’s character, Asher Siegel, at the end of the fourth episode of “The Curse,” near the halfway point of a series that goes to disorienting extremes.Siegel and his wife, Whitney (Emma Stone, in a remarkable comic performance), are making an HGTV show about eco-friendly renovations. After a focus group takes issue with Asher’s sense of humor in the show’s pilot, he finds himself in a comedy class where an instructor assigns an exercise: Get laughs without saying a word.In the episode, which premiered last weekend on Showtime and Paramount+, the camera swirls around a circle of students mugging for chuckles until it focuses on Asher, looking nervous in anticipation of his turn. You feel for him. In his finest performance to date, Fielder plays a guy who prides himself on being funny but deep down has doubts. Suddenly, in a quick flourish, he grabs his ears and flaps them while emitting a piercing squeak that could be described as unholy. No one laughs. But this face is more than unfunny. It’s unsettling, almost feral, working like a jump scare more than a punchline. It’s a gesture gone so wrong, it’s destined to become a meme.The year began with hit movies like “M3gan” and “Cocaine Bear” that pushed horror into camp comedy. It’s ending with a nervy television series that moves in reverse. It’s been called cringe comedy, and there are funny moments, but they set up something darker and dread-filled, potentially supernatural. Fielder has always toyed with genre, elevating prank comedy and using reality television to make unexpectedly moving drama. He’s leaning on the tools of horror here. With “The Curse,” the jangly sound design, manipulative cinematography and periodic bursts of oddball monstrousness offer a few of the creepiest moments of the year.While the plot is involved, with several threads, its engine is a classic horror trope: Is this supernatural-seeming thing of the title for real?Action commonly takes place through windows in “The Curse.”John Paul Lopez/A24, Paramount+ and Showtime“Rosemary’s Baby” and “Get Out,” among other movies, both invite the viewer to ask this question along with their paranoid protagonists.Asher possibly enters the realm of the fantastical after balking at the criticism that his plan to “consciously rejuvenate distressed homes” is gentrification. “We don’t believe the G word has to be a game of winners and losers,” he tells a journalist. Rattled by this exchange and concerned about his image, he summons his camera crew to film his giving a $100 bill to a small Black girl. Then when the camera stops rolling, he asks for it back. She responds by saying she is putting a curse on him, which he initially brushes off but gradually becomes obsessed with. Whether Asher is actually cursed hovers over the entire 10 episodes until a twist in the final episode that should polarize the audience.In “Psycho,” Alfred Hitchcock proves that the easiest way to make us empathize with a killer is to keep the camera on him. Even when Norman Bates is trying to cover up a murder, audience members will eventually, if managed right, find themselves gravitating to his side. Fielder has always been preoccupied with this emotional power, the distorting impact of the camera, not only on its subjects but on viewers, too. It’s easy to sympathize with Asher’s struggles as he navigates a skeptical press, his troubled new marriage and a bullying father-in-law as well as his craven producer, played by Benny Safdie. “The Curse” keeps complicating this identification, subverting and questioning it.In Episode 3, Asher’s stern face is cast in a shadow at an auction as he buys a home he didn’t realize is housing the girl who cursed him. A scene in which he uses a drill to open her door is played for terror, focused on her cowering inside. The rumbling power tool and the fear on her face cast this as a classic home invasion scene with Asher as the terrifying intruder. His stated good intentions are repeatedly mocked in the ominous way his scenes are shot.This draws attention to the Siegels as privileged outsiders casually entering and destroying a new neighborhood in the guise of liberal do-gooder assistance. The focus doesn’t just hit the theme of gentrification, but also, in a subplot involving an Indigenous artist, the genocide and exploitation that built this country.Fielder in “The Curse.” By filming frequently from outside windows and doors, the show creates an alienating effect, as if we’re only seeing part of the picture.Richard Foreman Jr./A24, Paramount+ and ShowtimeIt’s heavy stuff but not always on the surface. “The Curse” has many long, mundane set pieces that double as metaphors. Take the physical comedy of Asher helping Whitney to take off her sweater as they fall over each other. They try to recreate the funny moment for the cameras. But it doesn’t work, so they try again, emphasizing more strain and resistance. It’s a sharp satire of how people fake struggle for clout and approval.The show is full of goofy humor about tragic subjects, a cartoon about oppression, a Holocaust joke. The main plot is just the old story of vain fools trying to make a show, but grim subtext comes through in the formal qualities of the show.For instance, shots are commonly filmed through a window from the outside looking in. Instead of bringing us into a vehicle where Fielder and Stone are talking, the camera is placed beyond the closed car window, in traffic. Most of a scene in a hospital room is viewed through the door or window. So much of “The Curse” takes place outside planes of glass that the mirrored glare is a signature of its aesthetic.This has an alienating effect, giving the sense that we’re only seeing part of the picture, a distorted one at that. But there’s also something creepily voyeuristic about the shot, a cool detachment, the sense that everyone is under a microscope. It evokes the most famous shot in all of horror: The classic slasher point of view, used most famously in “Halloween,” where we share the perspective of the serial killer looking through a home’s window.But there’s something about a peeping-tom perspective that adds authenticity. It comes off as less staged and slick than most television and thus more real. Does that make it more fake or less? Fielder has always loved exploring this question. “The Curse,” his most scripted show yet, is continually shifting between comedy and horror as well as naturalism and the fantastical. The lines are much blurrier than we think, but on this show, that’s where the action is.After his monstrous face in class, Asher looks humiliated. But also taken aback, as if he revealed more than he wanted or knew was there. More

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      ‘The Curse’ Makes for Some of the Creepiest Horror of the Year

      by

      “The Curse” has been described as cringe, but look closely and you’ll see it plays with the classic tropes of horror like jump scares.There’s telling a bad joke. There’s bombing. And then there’s what happens to Nathan Fielder’s character, Asher Siegel, at the end of the fourth episode of “The Curse,” near the halfway point of a series that goes to disorienting extremes.Siegel and his wife, Whitney (Emma Stone, in a remarkable comic performance), are making an HGTV show about eco-friendly renovations. After a focus group takes issue with Asher’s sense of humor in the show’s pilot, he finds himself in a comedy class where an instructor assigns an exercise: Get laughs without saying a word.In the episode, which premiered last weekend on Showtime and Paramount+, the camera swirls around a circle of students mugging for chuckles until it focuses on Asher, looking nervous in anticipation of his turn. You feel for him. In his finest performance to date, Fielder plays a guy who prides himself on being funny but deep down has doubts. Suddenly, in a quick flourish, he grabs his ears and flaps them while emitting a piercing squeak that could be described as unholy. No one laughs. But this face is more than unfunny. It’s unsettling, almost feral, working like a jump scare more than a punchline. It’s a gesture gone so wrong, it’s destined to become a meme.The year began with hit movies like “M3gan” and “Cocaine Bear” that pushed horror into camp comedy. It’s ending with a nervy television series that moves in reverse. It’s been called cringe comedy, and there are funny moments, but they set up something darker and dread-filled, potentially supernatural. Fielder has always toyed with genre, elevating prank comedy and using reality television to make unexpectedly moving drama. He’s leaning on the tools of horror here. With “The Curse,” the jangly sound design, manipulative cinematography and periodic bursts of oddball monstrousness offer a few of the creepiest moments of the year.While the plot is involved, with several threads, its engine is a classic horror trope: Is this supernatural-seeming thing of the title for real?Action commonly takes place through windows in “The Curse.”John Paul Lopez/A24, Paramount+ and Showtime“Rosemary’s Baby” and “Get Out,” among other movies, both invite the viewer to ask this question along with their paranoid protagonists.Asher possibly enters the realm of the fantastical after balking at the criticism that his plan to “consciously rejuvenate distressed homes” is gentrification. “We don’t believe the G word has to be a game of winners and losers,” he tells a journalist. Rattled by this exchange and concerned about his image, he summons his camera crew to film his giving a $100 bill to a small Black girl. Then when the camera stops rolling, he asks for it back. She responds by saying she is putting a curse on him, which he initially brushes off but gradually becomes obsessed with. Whether Asher is actually cursed hovers over the entire 10 episodes until a twist in the final episode that should polarize the audience.In “Psycho,” Alfred Hitchcock proves that the easiest way to make us empathize with a killer is to keep the camera on him. Even when Norman Bates is trying to cover up a murder, audience members will eventually, if managed right, find themselves gravitating to his side. Fielder has always been preoccupied with this emotional power, the distorting impact of the camera, not only on its subjects but on viewers, too. It’s easy to sympathize with Asher’s struggles as he navigates a skeptical press, his troubled new marriage and a bullying father-in-law as well as his craven producer, played by Benny Safdie. “The Curse” keeps complicating this identification, subverting and questioning it.In Episode 3, Asher’s stern face is cast in a shadow at an auction as he buys a home he didn’t realize is housing the girl who cursed him. A scene in which he uses a drill to open her door is played for terror, focused on her cowering inside. The rumbling power tool and the fear on her face cast this as a classic home invasion scene with Asher as the terrifying intruder. His stated good intentions are repeatedly mocked in the ominous way his scenes are shot.This draws attention to the Siegels as privileged outsiders casually entering and destroying a new neighborhood in the guise of liberal do-gooder assistance. The focus doesn’t just hit the theme of gentrification, but also, in a subplot involving an Indigenous artist, the genocide and exploitation that built this country.Fielder in “The Curse.” By filming frequently from outside windows and doors, the show creates an alienating effect, as if we’re only seeing part of the picture.Richard Foreman Jr./A24, Paramount+ and ShowtimeIt’s heavy stuff but not always on the surface. “The Curse” has many long, mundane set pieces that double as metaphors. Take the physical comedy of Asher helping Whitney to take off her sweater as they fall over each other. They try to recreate the funny moment for the cameras. But it doesn’t work, so they try again, emphasizing more strain and resistance. It’s a sharp satire of how people fake struggle for clout and approval.The show is full of goofy humor about tragic subjects, a cartoon about oppression, a Holocaust joke. The main plot is just the old story of vain fools trying to make a show, but grim subtext comes through in the formal qualities of the show.For instance, shots are commonly filmed through a window from the outside looking in. Instead of bringing us into a vehicle where Fielder and Stone are talking, the camera is placed beyond the closed car window, in traffic. Most of a scene in a hospital room is viewed through the door or window. So much of “The Curse” takes place outside planes of glass that the mirrored glare is a signature of its aesthetic.This has an alienating effect, giving the sense that we’re only seeing part of the picture, a distorted one at that. But there’s also something creepily voyeuristic about the shot, a cool detachment, the sense that everyone is under a microscope. It evokes the most famous shot in all of horror: The classic slasher point of view, used most famously in “Halloween,” where we share the perspective of the serial killer looking through a home’s window.But there’s something about a peeping-tom perspective that adds authenticity. It comes off as less staged and slick than most television and thus more real. Does that make it more fake or less? Fielder has always loved exploring this question. “The Curse,” his most scripted show yet, is continually shifting between comedy and horror as well as naturalism and the fantastical. The lines are much blurrier than we think, but on this show, that’s where the action is.After his monstrous face in class, Asher looks humiliated. But also taken aback, as if he revealed more than he wanted or knew was there. More

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      Late Night Slams Vivek Ramaswamy’s Conspiracy Theories

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      The candidate trumpeted several during the latest G.O.P. debate, “including the far-out idea that Vivek Ramaswamy could become president,” Seth Meyers joked.Welcome to Best of Late Night, a rundown of the previous night’s highlights that lets you sleep — and lets us get paid to watch comedy. Here are the 50 best movies on Netflix right now.America’s Next Top Conspiracy TheoristDuring Wednesday night’s Republican debate, Vivek Ramaswamy rattled off several conspiracy theories — “including the far-out idea that Vivek Ramaswamy could become president,” Seth Meyers joked on Thursday.“I will say, if there’s one service anyone can perform at these stupid debates, it’s tearing Vivek Ramaswamy to shreds. I mean, allow me to borrow the parlance of my outer borough brethren when I say ‘This [expletive] guy!’” — SETH MEYERS“But the winner of the Dangerously Detached From Reality Award went to Vivek Ramaswamy, who rattled off a litany of ludicrous conspiracy theories in his ongoing effort to win over the divorced-timeshare-salesman-with-an-Adderall-addiction vote.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“This dude is up here spewing every conspiracy in the book: 9/11, stolen election, replacement theory. He is right about Jan. 6 being an inside job, though. I mean, the whole thing was orchestrated by the president — you can’t get more inside than that.” — CHARLAMAGNE THA GOD, guest host of “The Daily Show”“I didn’t want them to cut him off — I want to know where Bigfoot lives!” — CHARLAMAGNE THA GOD“A couple months ago, I’d never even heard of Vivek Ramaswamy, and I’m hoping we can go back to that.” — JIMMY KIMMELThe Punchiest Punchlines (Second-Place Debate Edition)“Last night in Alabama, four candidates took the stage for another Republican presidential debate. Yep, the big winners from the night were Nikki Haley, Chris Christie and everyone who decided not to watch.” — JIMMY FALLON“Last night was the fourth Republican debate. At this point, it’s kind of like ‘Indiana Jones’ movies: Three was enough.” — JIMMY FALLON“Watching these people debate without Trump is like watching the Jets play each other.” — SETH MEYERS“Why should I act like any of these people are actually running against Donald Trump when they won’t even act like they’re running against Donald Trump? They spent the whole debate fighting with each other like pigeons fighting over a French fry in the parking lot of a restaurant that is owned by a much bigger pigeon.” — SETH MEYERSThe Bits Worth WatchingJimmy Kimmel pranked George Santos by sending fake Cameo requests and seeing if the former congressman would follow through with them.Also, Check This OutEmma Stone and Mark Ruffalo in “Poor Things.”Atsushi Nishijima/Searchlight PicturesYorgos Lanthimos’s new film, “Poor Things,” is a phantasmagoric take on the classic Frankenstein story starring Emma Stone, Mark Ruffalo and Willem Dafoe. More