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      Golden Globes Announce Nominees Ahead of a Return to TV

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      The tarnished awards ceremony will air on NBC in January in a one-year trial. But which stars will show up to collect their trophies?The companies behind the tarnished Golden Globe Awards are pushing forward with a rehabilitation effort on Monday, announcing nominations for a televised ceremony on Jan. 10.Who will show up to collect the trophies is another matter.NBC canceled the 2022 telecast amid an ethics, finance and diversity scandal involving the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, the unorthodox organization that bestows the Globes. Citing extensive H.F.P.A. reforms, NBC in September agreed to return the ceremony to its air for an 80th installment — under a one-year trial. For the first time, the show will also be available simultaneously online, through Peacock, NBCUniversal’s streaming service.Most movie studios view the Globes telecast and accompanying red carpet spectacle as crucial marketing opportunities for winter films, especially dramas, which have been struggling at the box office. But not everyone in Hollywood is eager for the Globes to return. Publicists and agents say that some stars (those with the most to gain from the exposure) have an open mind, while others want the Globes to be retired forever.Kelly Bush Novak, the chief executive of ID, a leading Hollywood publicity and marketing firm, said she would encourage clients to participate, in part because she expected Globe voters to recognize a diverse group of artists. “Many of us — in a truly collective effort — held the organization accountable, and many of us are encouraged by the strides and commitment that have resulted,” Novak said. (She added, however, that more work needed to be done.)Last year, after The Los Angeles Times enumerated the foreign press association’s well-known but long-overlooked lapses, Tom Cruise returned his Globe trophies. More recently, Brendan Fraser, who has received rave reviews for his performance as a morbidly obese man in “The Whale,” said that he would not attend the ceremony if nominated. In 2018, Fraser accused a then-member of the H.F.P.A. of groping him in 2003, which the member denied.The stand-up comedian Jerrod Carmichael will host the ceremony, which is being held on a Tuesday (as opposed to its accustomed Sunday spot) to avoid NBC’s “Sunday Night Football.”With a new interim chief executive, Todd Boehly, leading a turnaround effort, the H.F.P.A has overhauled membership eligibility, recruited new members with an emphasis on diversity, enacted a stricter code of conduct and has moved to end its tax-exempt status and transform into a for-profit company with a philanthropic arm. Boehly is awaiting final governmental approval for that plan. Once it comes, he is expected to disband the H.F.P.A. and rebrand the charitable division.The 96-member organization now has six Black voters — up from zero — and has added 103 nonmember voters, a dozen or so of whom are Black. One member was recently kicked out for conduct violations, including fabricating quotes, which leaders of the group have cited as proof of their reformed ways.Live awards shows, including the Oscars, have lost tens of millions of viewers over the past decade, but the biggest ceremonies still attract a larger audience than almost anything else on traditional television, aside from live sports. The most recent Golden Globes telecast, held without celebrity attendees in early 2021 because of the pandemic, attracted about seven million viewers, according to Nielsen. Prepandemic, the show was attracting about 18 million viewers annually. More

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      Best Arts Photos of 2022

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      These are the images that defined a remarkable time across the worlds of art, music, dance and performance.Sinna Nasseri photographed Weird Al, left, and Daniel Radcliffe at a playground in Lower Manhattan in August before the release of their biopic, “Weird: The Al Yankovic Story.”Sinna Nasseri for The New York TimesCulture comes to life through a progression of ideas and images: Artists create works, and our photographers then capture these creators and their offerings — in turn creating photography that shares with us moments of intimacy we wouldn’t otherwise witness. Over the past year, photo editors at The New York Times have commissioned thousands of photographs of the movie stars, choreographers, opera singers, musicians and artists who made memorable contributions to the cultural world.In one frame by Chantal Anderson, the actor Caleb Landry Jones sips from a coffee mug at his kitchen counter, last night’s dishes piled high in the sink, as sunlight pours in from the window above. In another, Rosie Marks gives us an inside look at Charo being Charo: working out at home, full hair and makeup, in a gym frozen in time. In Michael Tyrone Delaney’s photograph of Awol Erizku, the artist stands before his work, his gaze set on his toddler. It’s an image that speaks to both his personal relationship with his child and his art’s relationship to her.Together, these photographs capture a narrative about a year in the arts, building a collection of evolving scenes and inner worlds. We asked some of the photographers to discuss the intentions behind these frames and the stories they saw within them. Now that the year is coming to a close, take one more look back at how we saw culture this year. — JOLIE RUBEN, senior photo editorDecember 2021When it comes to comedies, “I don’t get cast in them,” Nicole Kidman told The New York Times late last year about her role as Lucille Ball in the film “Being the Ricardos.” That might be the result of a career spent in dramas or “it might be my personality, too.”Jody Rogac for The New York TimesJanuary“Authentic Selves: The Beauty Within,” the countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo’s New York Philharmonic festival, was a self-portrait of the musician, who is also an impresario and a community organizer. “I’m not interested in any artist because of their fame,” he told The Times.Erik Tanner for The New York TimesI like to think about this portrait of Anthony Roth Costanzo in the spirit of early stage plays, a sort of dollar-store version of world building, where rudimentary means of expression invite the smoke and mirrors to be an active part of the world rather than obscure it. I created a stage set as a field of flowers in a perpetual state of bending in the wind. The twine that suspends the flowers was both practical but also meant to dispel any illusion of the wind being real; showing my cards, as it were.— Erik Tanner“When I look back, I don’t remember it as suffering,” Penélope Cruz said of playing Janis in “Parallel Mothers,” because “for me, she was alive.” The film was her seventh collaboration with the director Pedro Almodóvar.Camila Falquez for The New York TimesThe Broadway veteran Kenneth Ard and the jazz vocalist Kat Edmonson were cast in “The Hang,” a jazz opera from the performer Taylor Mac.Justin J Wee for The New York TimesThe way that Kat Edmonson draped her arm over Kenneth Ard’s, the way that his body lay back on this stool, the texture of the stool, the color of their costumes, the lighting overhead and the fog from the smoke machine. As a queer person, it felt like a metaphor for how it feels to walk out of the closet: It’s like an exhale, an aha moment where everything has meaning, feels connective and lush, but only if you allow yourself to experience it in that way. — Justin J WeeFebruaryTo play a superstar at a vulnerable moment in the rom-com “Marry Me,” Jennifer Lopez said, “I had to remind myself in this movie that this was actually a safe place to let those feelings out.”Chantal Anderson for The New York Times“It’s so in my bones,” Beanie Feldstein said of playing Fanny Brice in “Funny Girl” on Broadway. “I used to run around the house in my pajamas screaming ‘Don’t Rain on My Parade,’ pretending my dog was the tugboat.”OK McCausland for The New York TimesI brought the flowers as a prop for Beanie. Yellow roses, as featured in “Funny Girl” the movie, starring Barbra Streisand. I wanted to evoke the idea of a torch being passed. — OK McCauslandThe dancer and choreographer Angela Trimbur (squatting) champions low-stakes, accessible and intuitive movement. Dancing, she said, “is the way that I talk to myself.”Cait Oppermann for The New York Times“I wanted this work to focus on joy and celebration and love,” said the choreographer Kyle Abraham of his evening-length work “An Untitled Love,” set to songs by D’Angelo.Lelanie Foster for The New York TimesAs a former dancer and D’Angelo fan, I was inspired by these two worlds of dance and R&B. I only asked Kyle if he could improvise a little bit for me. Soon enough I was in the midst of an intimate solo performance in the BAM lobby. — Lelanie FosterSam Waterston, best known for “Law & Order,” began his career on the stage but soon branched into TV and film, taking on drama and comedy. “I’ve always wanted to prove that I can do all kinds of things,” he said.Mark Sommerfeld for The New York TimesJerry Saltz, New York magazine’s senior art critic, and a figurine of himself. He was photographed for an essay by the New York Times movie critic A.O. Scott about the physical objects of our pop culture obsessions.Daniel Arnold for The New York TimesMarchThe Spanish pop singer Rosalía smashed together new sounds from the Latin world and beyond on her latest album, “Motomami.” “I just want to hear something I haven’t heard before,” she said.Carlos Jaramillo for The New York TimesThe guitarist, singer, actress and comedian Charo has felt underestimated “all the time, all the time,” she said. “But it never gave me a complex. I have fun. As long as people enjoy it, I don’t care. Because once I have that, I have the power of the stage.”Rosie Marks for The New York TimesI wanted to capture the slight chaos of Charo at home on her compound. There is a lot going on in the frame: the artificial grass carpet, the rusty weights, the old TV, a missing piece of the mirror — and then her in the middle, wearing a bright yellow outfit right out of an ’80s workout video, with hair and makeup that could be taken right out of one of her sold-out Vegas shows. She insisted we stay after the shoot and served up several cheese and meat platters. — Rosie MarksSand in Death Valley, Calif., was manipulated in different ways for the soundscape of “Dune,” Denis Villeneuve’s film based on Frank Herbert’s seminal sci-fi novel.Peter Fisher for The New York TimesI watched “Dune” three times before heading to this shoot, taking notes on my yellow legal pad each time. The sound engineers did such an incredible job immersing the audience in this alien world, I wanted the images to at least attempt to do the same thing, like we were reporting from the surface of Arrakis. — Peter FisherThe vocalist, flutist and producer Melanie Charles singing at a rehearsal in her Brooklyn home. Her music uses electronics and calls for something heavier than an upright bass. “Musicians like me and my peers, we need some bump on the bottom,” she said.Sinna Nasseri for The New York TimesInstead of trying to separate different elements in the frame, sometimes I want my photograph’s different parts to connect and flow together to create shapes and lines. The neck of the bass guitar meets the circle of the bass drum, and Melanie Charles’s foot connects with the bass, which forms a diagonal line with Jonathan Michel’s finger. Melanie’s living room was inundated with music, with instruments. You get the sense that there’s not much separating her life from her music. — Sinna NasseriWith an exhibition at the Gagosian this year, Awol Erizku, above in his studio, was able to reach a broad audience. “I want to be remembered for Black imagination,” Erizku said, “to expand the limits of Black art.”Michael Tyrone Delaney for The New York TimesWalking into Awol Erizku’s studio is like walking into his mind. It’s a large warehouse, filled with striking imagery and sculptures in progress. He asked to get one photo with his daughter, Iris. A lot of his work is made with his daughter in mind. For me, this image embodies the themes of legacy building and cultivation of Black imagination. — Michael Tyrone DelaneyThe reality TV star Kourtney Kardashian and the prolific drummer Travis Barker, who got married this year, kiss on the Oscars red carpet in March.Krista Schlueter for The New York TimesAprilThe actor and musician Caleb Landry Jones at his Los Angeles home. His role in the Australian drama “Nitram” earned him a top prize at Cannes.Chantal Anderson for The New York TimesBefore the Broadway debut of “Mr. Saturday Night” — a musical version of his 1992 movie about an aging performer who won’t accept that his time in the spotlight is up — Billy Crystal said, “The worst nightmare is, do you wake up one day and you’re not funny anymore?”Philip Montgomery for The New York TimesSarah Silverman during a break from rehearsals of “The Bedwetter,” about a 10-year-old Silverman who suffered from the embarrassing condition of the title. “It will be familiar to so many people,” Silverman said about how the musical explores the emotions raised by divorce.Mark Sommerfeld for The New York TimesNicolas Cage, who starred as “Nick Cage” in this year’s “The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent,” said, “I don’t want to be one of those actors — and there are a lot of them, I won’t mention any names — who are high on their own supply.”Sinna Nasseri for The New York TimesI had about 10 minutes with Nicolas Cage in a Manhattan hotel. The story was about his newest movie, which has a meta quality to it: Nic plays himself at different stages of his life. I thought a mirror would represent that well. The side of his face is the foreground, and there’s also the lesser foreground of his hand. The middle ground shows his circular reflection while the background is another reflection of Nic. And there’s a further background beyond that. The depth of this frame is a big part of its power. — Sinna NasseriAlexander Skarsgard said working on the Viking saga “The Northman” was “the greatest experience of my career but, God, it was intense.”Robbie Lawrence for The New York TimesMay“I don’t want to be a celebrity,” Ethel Cain said ahead of the May release of her debut album, “Preacher’s Daughter.”Irina Rozovsky for The New York TimesWhen I met her, Ethel Cain was living in a small house in a small town somewhere in Alabama. It was a total time warp with no obvious signs of modernity — video tapes, crocheted table settings, wood paneled walls, quilts. In this photo, we were in Ethel’s bedroom, where she sleeps and records, the microphone just a few feet from the bed. We were talking about her childhood in the church. She was lying down, and I was on my knees beside her with the camera, a pious sight in and of itself. — Irina Rozovsky“I’ve made it clear to people that I’m never going to make a record that’s the same as another,” Bad Bunny said. His fourth album, “Un Verano Sin Ti,” was a smash hit.Josefina Santos for The New York TimesMichael Che, known mostly for “Saturday Night Live,” said there had been a certain amount of trial and error in developing his own show, the HBO Max series “That Damn Michael Che,” and in figuring out his career: “Everything looks easy till you start doing it.”Andre D. Wagner for The New York TimesOne of my favorite ways to make photographs is to be out on the streets and in the world; I love playing off juxtaposition and chance encounters. Even the streets know that Michael Che is PURE GENIE-US! — Andre D. WagnerFans respond to Austin Butler, above, the way they did to a young Leonardo DiCaprio, said the “Elvis” director Baz Luhrmann.Chantal Anderson for The New York TimesAnson Boon said he “loved the intensity” of playing Johnny Rotten, the Sex Pistols frontman, in “Pistol,” a Hulu limited series.Mark Sommerfeld for The New York Times“I have spent a lot of time with different choreographers, all with different processes, so I also told myself: There are no rules,” said Janie Taylor, a former City Ballet principal, whose dances were featured in the L.A. Dance Project’s Joyce Theater season.Thea Traff for The New York TimesEach morning in Los Angeles, there’s typically a layer of fog (the “marine layer”) that clouds sunlight. We were incredibly lucky the morning of this shoot — there was no fog, only direct, beautiful California sunlight. The light was also low enough in the sky to create a beautiful shadow across half of Janie Taylor’s body. I asked her to dance in a way that felt reflective of her work, and she gave so much expression and movement in this light. — Thea Traff“My job was to capture their genius and not take shots that were superfluous,” said Marty Callner, who directed the first specials of Robin Williams, Steve Martin and George Carlin.Peter Fisher for The New York TimesLars “Bala” Lyons stands by while a red-tailed hawk (magnified by binoculars) perches above near Tompkins Square Park in New York. “For the Birds,” a star-studded, 242-track collection of songs and readings inspired by or incorporating birdsong, was released this year.Sinna Nasseri for The New York TimesFor this story I embedded myself with New York City’s birders — people who are obsessive about tracking birds, while the rest of us just go about our lives. I wanted to show that difference in one photo, so I split the frame by holding binoculars to the top half of my lens, which I focused on a red-tailed hawk, while the bottom half reveals a man on the ground just walking, unaware of the magnificent creature above him and the fandom surrounding the city’s birds. — Sinna NasseriWhen Oscar Isaac was offered “Moon Knight,” a Marvel series on Disney+, he wasn’t sure he was ready for another action blockbuster. “As fun as they can be, you’re outputting a lot of energy, and then you leave and you’re just exhausted,” he said.Erik Tanner for The New York TimesJuneIf the filmmaker Taika Waititi stepped back and considered all of his projects, “I’d probably have a panic attack,” he said. “I know there’s too many things.”Dana Scruggs for The New York TimesFrom left, Terry Elliott Lamont, Michael Turner Jr. and Von Williams in the McCulloh Homes public housing project, which was used as “The Pit” in “The Wire.” This year, a Baltimore photographer considered the HBO drama’s impact on the city where he was raised, 20 years after the show’s debut.Gioncarlo Valentine for The New York TimesWhen I was a kid growing up in Baltimore, I was lucky enough to have a group of queer friends. We called ourselves “The Pridelights.” The three people in this image, Terry, Michael, and Von, were among the core members of the group and, in many ways, the core of my childhood. The composition is a nod to the iconic “Destiny Fulfilled” album cover, an album that was so central to us when it was released. We fought constantly about who in our group was Beyoncé (Von and me), Kelly (Michael) and Michelle (Terry). There are almost no images of us together when we were children. Looking at this image now, it feels corrective. — Gioncarlo ValentineJuly“I wanted to build a framework for myself, for how to keep art sacred,” the singer-songwriter Maggie Rogers said of her detour to Harvard Divinity School during the pandemic. Her second major-label album, “Surrender,” was released this summer.OK McCausland for The New York TimesAugustDecades in the making, Michael Heizer’s “City,” a massive mile-and-a-half-long sculpture set in a remote Nevada valley, was finally revealed this year.Todd Heisler/The New York TimesIt is nearly impossible to distill the experience of Heizer’s magnum opus “City” in one frame. From dusk to dawn, I had the rare opportunity to wander the immense space, allowing the light to be my guide. Standing in the bitter cold, I made a handful of exposures around 10 seconds long. Seeing “City” under moonlight made me think of how humans have been building mysterious structures on this planet for thousands of years, many in relation to the heavens above. — Todd HeislerThe photographer Sinna Nasseri captured images of present-day New York City as it might have been predicted by science fiction films of the 1980s. Here, a delivery robot serves food at Lilya’s Restaurant & Grill in Staten Island, N.Y.Sinna Nasseri for The New York TimesAbbi Jacobson’s series version of “A League of Their Own,” on Amazon Prime Video, expanded upon the 1992 film. “The movie is a story about white women getting to play baseball,” she said. “That’s just not enough.”Chantal Anderson for The New York TimesWhat I love about Abbi Jacobson is how relatable the characters she plays are — you really feel like you know her and are friends with her from watching her. When I found out we were going to be taking photos in L.A., I thought of Art’s Delicatessen & Restaurant as the perfect place to meet up. It’s a family-owned spot you go back to over and over again with friends. There’s an intimacy and history there that I wanted in the images. — Chantal AndersonAhead of her album “Hold the Girl,” Rina Sawayama said, “I think the temptation, as an artist these days, is to look online and see what the fans want. But I’m going to write something that’s meaningful and worth people’s time.”Olivia Lifungula for The New York TimesFinishing touches underway on Wolfgang Tillmans’s retrospective, “To Look Without Fear,” at the Museum of Modern Art, which ends on New Year’s Day.Daniel Arnold for The New York TimesWolfgang Tillmans and I shot this couple melting into one viewer before a photo in his MoMA survey at the same time, he on his iPhone and me with my camera. I’m guessing his pic is better. — Daniel ArnoldSeptemberThe choreographer Gisèle Vienne at her parents’ home in Grenoble, France. She returned to New York in October with the U.S. premiere of “Crowd,” a magnetic work that places 15 dancers, consumed with love and longing, at an all-night party.Sam Hellmann for The New York TimesGisèle Vienne had given me a tour of the house, and this room was straight away my favorite. The light through the dirty windows, her mother’s sculptures, the dried plants, the floor. This was taken toward the end of the shoot so she had been dancing for a while, and it was terribly hot outside. I couldn’t tell she was sweating so much, though the flash revealed it. That’s when it began to be truly interesting. She was letting go, and I was finally becoming invisible. — Sam HellmannMoneybagg Yo has grown into the biggest rap star to emerge from Memphis in a generation.Chantal Anderson for The New York TimesMost punk shows don’t have an audience that can comfortably fit under the lip of the stage. Or fans that headbang atop the shoulders of their heavily tattooed papas. But that was the scene at a Linda Lindas show at the Bowery Ballroom in New York this summer.OK McCausland for The New York TimesThe sculptor Fred Eversley, an unheralded pioneer of the Light and Space movement, with one of his parabolic lenses that is installed on the ground floor of his five-story building in Manhattan’s SoHo neighborhood. “I don’t like art that you have to know art history to appreciate,” he said.Elliott Jerome Brown Jr. for The New York TimesDaniel Clark Smith, a chorister, reviewed sheet music at a dress rehearsal of “Medea” at the Metropolitan Opera in Manhattan. It was the Met’s first production of the Cherubini work.Sinna Nasseri for The New York TimesYvonne Rainer, a giant of choreography with more than a half-century of work behind her, went out swinging with “Hellzapoppin’: What About the Bees?,” which took on themes of race and resistance.Erik Tanner for The New York TimesFrom left, the artists Coreen Simpson, Randy Williams and Lorraine O’Grady in the Founders Room of the Museum of Modern Art. Just Above Midtown, an incubator of some of the most important Black avant-garde art of the 1970s and ’80s, was the subject of an exhibition.Elliott Jerome Brown Jr. for The New York TimesToward the end of my time with the group, I came back into the darkened conference room to see them arranged in a loose circle as they shared stories. I’d technically finished photographing them, but they were so immersed in conversation and used to my presence. This particular photograph, of Lorraine O’Grady holding court, ended up being my favorite. — Elliott Jerome Brown Jr.Tyler Mitchell in his Brooklyn studio alongside test prints of images from his London exhibition. The photographer is part of a generation that’s “blending fashion into art and art into fashion,” an Aperture magazine editor said.Elliott Jerome Brown Jr. for The New York TimesAbel Selaocoe, a classically trained South African artist, is best known for his work on the cello, but is also a singer and improviser. He drew on musical traditions from across the globe for his debut album, “Where is Home (Hae Ke Kae).”Adama Jalloh for The New York TimesOctoberWhether it’s Jamie Lee Curtis’s return to her horror roots in “Halloween Ends” or her buzzy performance in “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” freedom is what the actress is after. “I feel all the feels, all the time,” she said.Ryan Pfluger for The New York TimesTaking a raw Southern sound to the top of the pop charts, Lil Baby could have come only from one place: Atlanta, where the rap scene is one of the world’s most consequential musical ecosystems.Kevin Amato for The New York TimesThis year, Michael Imperioli, best known for playing crooks and cops, appeared in the comedies “This Fool” and “The White Lotus.” “I don’t really know how to be funny,” he insisted.Daniel Arnold for The New York TimesBest known for playing nice guys, Jake Lacy won acclaim as a privileged jerk in HBO’s “The White Lotus.” In the Peacock drama “A Friend of the Family,” he went even darker.Nathan Bajar for The New York TimesThe prolific choreographer Twyla Tharp told new stories with two classic works at New York City Center this fall: “In the Upper Room” and “Nine Sinatra Songs.” “I was looking for some kind of spirituality or personal redemption,” said Kaitlyn Gilliland, dancing here with Lloyd Knight.Julieta Cervantes for The New York TimesNovemberJeremy Pope, a Tony-nominated actor, segued to the big screen in the gay military drama “The Inspection.” “I feel so blessed that I’m able to do this fully in my Blackness and in my queerness,” he said.Erik Carter for The New York TimesIn the Hulu series “Fleishman Is in Trouble,” Claire Danes and Jesse Eisenberg play two halves of a splintered couple. “Playing a married person with kids, I was at greater risk of taking it home than I have been with other projects,” Danes said.Thea Traff for The New York TimesIt’s tough to pose two people in a dynamic way when they’re inclined to just stand or sit side by side facing the camera. Claire Danes and Jesse Eisenberg play a recently divorced couple in the show, so I came to set with the idea to pose them as if they were embracing or slow-dancing, in a pose that felt reflective of their characters. — Thea TraffIn the drama “Causeway,” Jennifer Lawrence played a military engineer who returns home from Afghanistan after a brain injury. It’s the kind of indie she hasn’t really starred in since her breakthrough in 2010. “I don’t know how I can act,” she said, “when I feel cut off from normal human interaction.”Robbie Lawrence for The New York TimesThe choreographer Neil Greenberg at a rehearsal of his dance “Betsy.” His beaded headpiece was inspired by a cast member’s flowing hair. “They’re a little like Las Vegas’s idea of a sheikh,” Greenberg said.Mark Sommerfeld for The New York Times“I think it’s one of the best costumes. It’s so furry and smooth and nice. But it’s also really hot,” said Eleanor Murphy, left. “I like throwing the cheese,” said Taiga Emmer. The two alternate as the Bunny in the New York City Ballet’s production of “The Nutcracker.”Erik Tanner for The New York TimesThe eminent composer Steve Reich, who is in his 80s, released two important albums and a conversations book this year. His next premiere, “Jacob’s Ladder,” is expected in fall 2023.Philip Montgomery for The New York TimesLaura Poitras’s documentary “All the Beauty and the Bloodshed” tells a complex story of the photographer Nan Goldin’s personal trauma and protest. “It’s my voice telling my story with my pictures, so it has to be true to me,” said Goldin, above.Thea Traff for The New York TimesThe choreographer Katja Heitmann collects the quotidian habits and mannerisms of volunteers — how they walk, stand, kiss, sleep and fidget — for her ongoing dance project “Motus Mori” (meaning “movement that is dying out”).Melissa Schriek for The New York TimesAdditional production by More

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      What’s on TV This Week: Lots of Holiday Specials and ‘Yellowstone’

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      NBC, The CW and ABC celebrate the holidays and the Paramount show airs its midseason finale.Between network, cable and streaming, the modern television landscape is a vast one. Here are some of the shows, specials and movies coming to TV this week, Dec. 12-18. Details and times are subject to change.MondayBAKING IT: MAYA RUDOLPH & AMY POEHLER’S CELEBRITY HOLIDAY SPECIAL 10 p.m. on NBC. Maya Rudolph is kicking off the second season of her show, “Baking It,” with a holiday special co-starring Amy Poehler. The network announced that her season one co-host, Andy Samberg, would not be returning. On this episode Fred Armisen, Kristen Bell, Nicole Richie and JB Smoove compete in festive holiday baking challenges while also raising money for charity.TuesdayFrom left: Representative Nancy Pelosi, Senator Chuck Grassley, Senator Chuck Schumer in “Pelosi in the House.”Courtesy of HBOPELOSI IN THE HOUSE (2022) 9 p.m. on HBO. This documentary about the speaker of the house, Nancy Pelosi, filmed over three decades by her daughter Alexandra Pelosi, got a big preview when the select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol played snippets of Alexandra’s videos from that day during their final hearing. Now, we will see moments before and after including Pelosi’s first State of the Union under President George W. Bush, the infamous moment of her ripping up a copy of President Donald Trump’s speech as she sat behind him and her persistence to verify the ballots even after the attack.THE VOICE 9 p.m. on NBC. This week’s two-hour live finale will feature performances from the top five finalists competing for a $100,000 cash prize and a record deal with Universal Music Group. They won’t be the only ones singing, though — Kane Brown, Kelly Clarkson, Maluma, One Republic and Adam Lambert are all set to perform.WednesdaySURVIVOR 8 p.m. on CBS. A three-hour episode, which includes a reunion, will wrap up the 43rd season of this reality competition show. This season, like the two that came before it, is a shortened version — filming took place over just 26 days to create 12 episodes. The show has already announced that it will be coming back for a 44th season.ThursdayH.E.R. as Belle in “Beauty and the Beast: A 30th Celebration,” a movie that’s part live action, part animation.Christopher Willard/ABCBEAUTY AND THE BEAST: A 30TH CELEBRATION 8 p.m. on ABC. In 1992, Disney released an animated film that tells the story of Belle, a booksmart and headstrong girl who enters in the mansion of the Beast to save her father. Through true love, the Beast is transformed into his original form — a handsome prince, and of course, Belle and the prince live happily ever after. To celebrate the beloved fairy tale, this made-for-TV movie is part live action, part animation. Gabriella Sarmiento Wilson, known as H.E.R., stars as Belle, Josh Groban stars as the Beast and Rita Moreno narrates. The rest of the cast is also star studded, with almost too many Emmy, Grammy, and Tony Award nominations between all of them to count.FridayFOUR CHRISTMASES (2008) 9 p.m. on AMC. While some holiday movies focus on the importance and joy of spending time with family, this film admits it can be exhausting. Vince Vaughn and Reese Witherspoon play a couple who spend the holidays trudging around from one family event to another after their tropical getaway is canceled. “Yes, it follows a charming, mismatched couple on a sentimental journey involving presents, family and the sharing of food and feelings,” A.O. Scott wrote in his review for The New York Times. “But the picture, briskly directed by Seth Gordon from a snappy, many-authored script, is refreshingly tart and lean, forgoing the usual schmaltz and syrup.”SaturdayHOWARDS END 7 p.m. on PBS (check local listings). The four-part series follows two sisters as they navigate their love lives in Edwardian England. Margaret Schlegel, played by Hayley Atwell, is courted by Henry Wilcox (Matthew Macfadyen), a wealthy widower. Meanwhile, Margaret’s younger sister Helen Schlegel (Philippa Coulthard) falls for a penniless clerk.IHEARTRADIO JINGLE BALL 2022 8 p.m. on The CW. Originally broadcast live from Madison Square Garden in New York City on Dec. 9, a recording of this concert is coming to the small screen. The tour, which travels around the U.S. during the month of December, features performances by Dua Lipa, Lizzo, Lauv and Demi Lovato — just to name a new.THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA (2006) 9:30 p.m. on E! This movie is chock-full of memorable lines. Emily Blunt saying to Anne Hathaway, “A million girls would kill for this job” or Meryl Streep telling Hathaway, “By all means, move at a glacial pace. You know how that thrills me.” Hathaway plays Andy, a journalist who tries to get her big break by working as an assistant to Miranda Priestly (Streep), the editor in chief of Runway magazine, which is loosely inspired by Anna Wintour and Vogue magazine. After galas, a trip to Paris and a whole new wardrobe, Andy has to decide what she actually wants to do with her life.SundayFrom left, Gil Birmingham, Mo Brings Plenty and Luke Grimes in “Yellowstone.”Paramount NetworkYELLOWSTONE 8 p.m. on Paramount. This ensemble show follows a family of powerful ranchers. Last season, it was television’s most watched drama. “The surface layer of ‘Yellowstone’ is part modern-day Western, part family business saga,” the New York Times critic James Poniewozik wrote about the first season. “A kind of cowboy ‘Dynasty’ with some dark-cable ambitions.”MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS (1944) 8 p.m. on TCM. This romantic comedy and musical follows four sisters, including one played by Judy Garland, in the year leading up to the 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition World’s Fair. The plot revolves around Christmas, making it the perfect movie to watch this time of year. More

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      Steve Martin and Martin Short Trade Barbs, and Eulogies, on ‘SNL’

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      The two seasoned comedians brought their playful rivalry to this week’s episode, which featured the musical guest Brandi Carlile.A certain playful rivalry has always been the heart of the partnership between Steve Martin and Martin Short. So, taken to its logical extension, the two should be at their funniest when imagining themselves at each other’s funerals.That was the idea behind their opening monologue on this weekend’s “Saturday Night Live,” which paired the enduringly popular comedians (and stars of the Hulu series “Only Murders in the Building”) as hosts on a holiday-themed broadcast that also featured the musical guest Brandi Carlile.At their entrance, Short and Martin humorously stepped on each other’s dialogue, compared how many times they had hosted “S.N.L.” alone (Martin a whopping 16 occasions, Short a mere three) and indulged in some nostalgia for the early days of the series. Having shown a photograph of himself with Dan Aykroyd, John Belushi and Mick Jagger, Martin quipped that after it was taken, “We tested positive for everything.”Next, a few good-natured zingers at each other’s expense. Martin said that working with Short “is like World Cup soccer — somehow, I just can’t get into it.”Short returned fire, observing that their Hulu show “is like Steve at the urinal — it streams for 32 minutes.”Then Martin set up the central premise of the segment, saying that he realized Short wouldn’t live forever, “and that is sad, because you won’t be able to hear the wonderful things I’m going to say at your memorial.”“So I thought: why wait?” he continued. “So what I did was I wrote up your eulogy so you can hear it now.”Beginning his imaginary remarks, Martin said: “Wow, not much of a turnout. Marty did not want to be cremated — too late. But I’ll always be haunted by Marty’s last words: ‘Tesla autopilot, engage.’”Short then launched into his own tribute, saying: “There are so many great things that I could say about Steve Martin. But this hardly seems the time nor the place.” He added, “I know Steve is looking down on us right now because he always looked down on everybody.”Martin said of Short: “Marty was taken away from us too soon. But sadly, not before he played Jack Frost in ‘Santa Clause 3.’”And Short said of Martin, “Seeing you in your casket reminds me of that classic ‘S.N.L.’ sketch ‘Dick in a Box.’”Finally Martin wondered aloud, “Now that Marty’s gone, who will I ever work with?” That was the cue for a cameo from Selena Gomez, their co-star in “Only Murders,” who asked, “What about me?”New holiday standard of the weekIn this week’s opening sketch, “S.N.L.” skipped its familiar topical satire in favor of a musical segment that found Bowen Yang, Cecily Strong and Kenan Thompson standing at a Christmas tree, wondering how to deal with the buildup of anxieties from recent months. (Yang listed the major causes for concern: “War, climate change, the Prince Harry-Meghan Markle documentary.”)Breaking into song, they explained that the holidays made it OK for them to push off their personal worries for a few more weeks. For example, Thompson sang that he could give himself permission to overlook his drinking: “It’s starting to get out of hand / I knew that it may have / Crossed into a dark place / When Burger King said I was banned.”In another verse, Yang asked: “Since when did Hitler come back? / Didn’t we basically all agree, years ago / Hitler should never come back?” (Thompson added, “And why are his new fans Black?”)Old holiday standard of the weekLike the Irving Berlin composition that inspired it, the 1954 movie musical “White Christmas” may be a seasonal classic. But let’s at least admit that it has a couple of bizarre numbers, like “Snow,” in which Bing Crosby, Rosemary Clooney and Danny Kaye ride a train while crooning about frozen precipitation as if they’ve never encountered it before.That scene was parodied with an absurdist affection in this sketch, where Short, Martin and Strong sing enthusiastically about snow without seeming to understand what it is, and Thompson plays a fellow passenger who is pleasantly baffled by their antics. (If seeing Short and Martin in Christmas sketches is your thing, enjoy these further segments in which they play a department-store Santa and elf and perform an excessively violent reimagining of Charles Dickens’s “A Christmas Carol.” )Weekend Update jokes of the weekOver at the Weekend Update desk, the anchors Colin Jost and Michael Che riffed on the aftermath of the 2022 midterm elections and the release of the basketball player Brittney Griner as part of a prisoner exchange with Russia.Jost began:It was shaping up to be good week for Joe Biden. He got Brittney Griner back, he kept marriage gay, and he’s only got 14 more sleeps until Santa. But then, just when he thought he had it all under control, Kyrsten Sinema said hold my wig. Arizona Senator Kyrsten Sinema, seen here realizing that someone is actually waving to the person behind her, announced that she is leaving the Democratic Party and is registering as an independent. Explained Sinema, “Pay attention to me.”He continued:WNBA star Brittney Griner was freed from prison in exchange for Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout. It’s actually a great trade because Bout was only averaging five points and two rebounds a game.Che then pivoted to the Georgia runoff:Raphael Warnock defeated Herschel Walker in Georgia’s Senate runoff race. But I don’t think this is the last you’ll hear from Herschel Walker. I mean, unless he’s your biological father. With Raphael Warnock’s win, Democrats in the Senate will no longer have to rely on Vice President Harris for tie breaking votes. Harris can now focus on her main priority, waiting for a worse bike accident. [A screen behind Che shows President Biden falling off a bike.]Nineties nostalgia of the weekIf you’re going to bring Martin and Short together on a pop-cultural comedy sketch series, you’d darn well better let them pay homage to either “Three Amigos” or “Father of the Bride.”“S.N.L.” opted for the latter in this fake ad for “Father of the Bride Part 8,” which casts Martin as the titular father, Heidi Gardner as his now-menopausal daughter preparing for her eighth marriage, Short as his flamboyant wedding-planner character and Kieran Culkin as himself, reminding us that yes, he really was in the previous installments of the franchise, and we’ve all gotten much older since then. More

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      ‘The Fabelmans’ Is Judd Hirsch’s Latest Great Story

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      The veteran actor has been singled out for his rousing performance in Steven Spielberg’s drama. It’s the latest chapter in a long career full of anecdotes.“Have we met before?” Judd Hirsch asked enthusiastically as he strode into a French bistro last month. “I’ve met everybody before. Maybe we met when you were a baby and I said, ‘I’ll see you when you’re older.’”When you invite Hirsch, the veteran actor and raconteur, on a lunch date, you’re going to hear stories on top of stories — stories you knew you wanted and stories you didn’t know you were going to get.The instant he took his seat, Hirsch spun a tale about the afternoon’s dining spot, Boucherie West Village, whose building once housed the Off Broadway theater where he co-starred in the original 1979 production of “Talley’s Folly” by Lanford Wilson.As the actor told it, an agent affiliated with the play wanted to replace Hirsch because his role in the hit sitcom “Taxi” was going to conflict with a planned Broadway transfer for “Talley’s Folly.”Instead, Hirsch helped bring the play to the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles, where he performed it that summer and fall during his downtime from “Taxi.” The following winter, Hirsch said proudly, “I came back and did it on Broadway, and it won the Pulitzer Prize.”Riding on similar waves of showbiz know-how and sheer bravado, Hirsch can currently be seen barnstorming his way through a crucial portion of “The Fabelmans,” the director Steven Spielberg’s semi-autobiographical coming-of-age drama.Hirsch has only a few minutes of screen time, playing Boris, the cantankerous great-uncle of its adolescent protagonist, Sammy Fabelman (Gabriel LaBelle). But the 87-year-old actor makes every frame count as he delivers a galvanic speech to the young Spielberg stand-in, exhorting him to commit to his artistic aspirations while warning that they will be in perpetual conflict with the needs of his family.Hirsch opposite Gabriel LaBelle in “The Fabelmans.” He’s not on the screen for long but he makes every frame count.Merie Weismiller Wallace/Universal Pictures and Amblin Entertainment, via Associated PressHirsch’s unexpectedly intense performance in “The Fabelmans” — the latest in a decades-long career spanning stage, screen and a 1972 commercial for JCPenney polyester slacks — would seem to be a testament to his endurance in a singularly fickle industry.But while he is happy for the plum opportunity in a prestigious year-end film, Hirsch could not quite point to any particular reason he should be enjoying another moment in the spotlight right now.The Projectionist Chronicles a New Awards SeasonThe Oscars aren’t until March, but the campaigns have begun. Kyle Buchanan is covering the films, personalities and events along the way.Golden Globe Nominations: Here are some of the most eyebrow-raising snubs and surprises from this year’s list of nominees.Gotham Awards: At the first official show of the season, “Everything Everywhere All at Once” won big.Governors Awards: Stars like Jamie Lee Curtis and Brendan Fraser worked a room full of academy voters at the event, which is considered a barometer of film industry enthusiasm.Rian Johnson:  The “Glass Onion” director explains the streaming plan for his “Knives Out” franchise.“I have no idea why I get any part that somebody else can play,” he said. “Or why I don’t get one when I do want to play it. But I’m old enough to know that’s OK.”Approval is always nice, but Hirsch suggested that an actor’s temperament was forged in far more frequent instances of rejection. When you don’t land a role, he explained, “you can say, ‘What the hell did they see in me that made them turn me down?’ Or you can say, ‘They don’t know what the hell they’re missing.’”Though he’s long split his time between Los Angeles and New York, Hirsch was born and raised in New York, and didn’t expect much for himself after studying acting at HB Studio in the early 1960s. “I never thought I’d play anything more than a construction worker, criminal or some schlubby guy,” he said.Instead he went on to play a variety of prominent roles on television (“Taxi,” “Dear John,” “Numbers”), in film (“Ordinary People,” “Independence Day,” “Uncut Gems”) and onstage (“I’m Not Rappaport”).Presently, when Hirsch wasn’t kibitzing playfully with a waiter (“You don’t mind if I don’t speak French?” the actor said, looking over his menu. “I could say some of those words with a French accent”), he was just as fond of sharing anecdotes from an era when he wasn’t well established.There was, for instance, the fateful introduction he received while visiting Universal to audition for a TV movie in the early 1970s.Hirsch has been an awards contender before. He was up for an Oscar, an Emmy and a Tony for work he did in 1980, and didn’t win any of the prizes.Daniel Arnold for The New York TimesA woman working there began to show him around to other people in the office: “This is so-and-so,” Hirsch recounted. “And this is so-and-so. This is Mr. Spielberg, and he’s sitting behind a desk, and on his desk is ‘Jaws,’ which I had no idea was anything. And she said” — his voice dropped to a stage whisper — “‘He’s going to be very big.’”“He would not have known of me,” Hirsch said of the fleeting encounter. “Look at all the Spielberg movies since — and I’m not in any of them.”But their trajectories intersected again a half-century later on “The Fabelmans.” The dramatist Tony Kushner (“Angels in America”), who wrote the screenplay with Spielberg, said that the Boris character was based on an actual member of the director’s extended family.The real-life Uncle Boris “had worked in some animal handling in the early days of Hollywood and he had been in the circus,” said Kushner, who has collaborated with Spielberg on “Munich,” “Lincoln” and “West Side Story.” Kushner added that the actual Boris “had lived a wild, itinerant life, and that had made him a fearsome figure to his sister, and to his nieces and nephews.”The scene written for the fictional Boris was intended to impart a lesson about the cost of pursuing an artistic life, Kushner said: “Art has a power that one only imagines one controls. When you access it, if you’re really practicing it, it’s going to take you to the truth. And the truth is sometimes going to be very dangerous.”Hirsch, who was cast after a video conversation with Spielberg, said his preparation was far less weighty.“He said you can play it with an accent or not,” Hirsch recalled. “After I read it, I said, what schmuck would not? He’s going to have to like it this way because I’m not going to do it any other way.”Hirsch said he could channel the frantic passion of the film’s Boris, who feels frustrated that his message is not reaching young Sammy. But the actor said there was only one moment he was “truly scared to do,” when the scene required him to get physical with LaBelle.“I line the kid up against the wall and I say, ‘Look at me — look at me,’” Hirsch said. “After all that, I want him to see what I had to go through.”LaBelle said he encouraged Hirsch to “beat the [expletive] out of me.”“The moment where he pinches my face, I was like, ‘No, no, hurt me. Come on, let’s do it,’” LaBelle recalled.He added, “It’s not like I’m hanging on the side of a plane. I’m just getting my face pinched.”Whether his “Fabelmans” performance garners any attention for a year-end film award, Hirsch noted that he had been down this road before.Hirsch said the only “Fabelmans” scene that gave him pause was one requiring him to get physical with LaBelle. But the younger actor wasn’t fazed. “I was like, ‘No, no, hurt me,’” LaBelle said.Daniel Arnold for The New York TimesHe pointed out that for work he did in 1980 alone, he was nominated for an Oscar (for “Ordinary People”), an Emmy (“Taxi”) and a Tony (“Talley’s Folly”) — and won none of them. Though Hirsch didn’t mention this, he did go on to win Emmys for “Taxi” in 1981 and 1983.Hirsch said he was actually relieved he didn’t win for “Ordinary People,” in which he played a psychiatrist treating a traumatized teenager (Timothy Hutton). Both men were nominated as supporting actors, and Hirsch suggested that Hutton — who ultimately won — was more deserving of the honor.“I said, what’s the worst thing that could happen to me?” Hirsch explained. “I win this damn thing and then have to look at him and make excuse, excuse, excuse — ‘They made a terrible mistake, it should have been you.’”After a server asked him if he would like some black coffee (“That’s the usual color, isn’t it?” Hirsch replied without missing a beat), the actor resumed delving into his trove of stories from projects that did not earn him any trophies or recognition.He spoke of his performance in the 1978 drama “King of the Gypsies,” in which his character is shot by Eric Roberts and falls out an apartment window to his death.“So I said who’s going to do that?” Hirsch recalled. “They said, ‘You.’ I said, ‘OK.’ I arrive at the set and there’s one of those enormous air mattresses in the street.”Hirsch said he filmed three takes of his fatal fall, but while the finished sequence in the movie shows him taking gunfire and toppling out the window, the part where his character lands on a car was performed by a stuntman.“Luckily I didn’t have to hit a car,” he said. “Otherwise, you and I would not be talking here.” More

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      Best of Late Night This Week

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      Comedy CentralThis week, the hosts were thrilled that the Trump Organization was found guilty of tax fraud, skewered former President Trump for his comments about the Constitution and celebrated Raphael Warnock’s win in Georgia.And after seven seasons behind the “Daily Show” desk, Trevor Noah said goodbye.Here’s what the hosts had to say → More

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      Trevor Noah’s Optimism Set His Version of ‘The Daily Show’ Apart

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      Though his final episode made the mysterious reason for his departure a running joke, his specials and memoir suggest he was always comfortable with uncertainty.A talk-show host’s final episode is typically a celebration of their tenure, but in his last time at “The Daily Show” desk, Trevor Noah put the spotlight on others, giving sizable segments to each of his correspondents, doing a gushing interview with the comic Neal Brennan and expressing gratitude to everyone from the executives who hired him to the Black women who raised him to those who hate-watched.In a persistently sunny hour, Noah even had a kind word for Donald J. Trump, quieting his crowd by praising what the former president did for prison reform.Noah has always invited others to see him as an outsider because of his background as a South African comic, but his equanimity and preternatural calm also distinguished him. He’s got to be the only political comic alive who could emerge from seven years of regularly joking about the Trump administration and a global pandemic exuding optimism.“The Daily Show” is famous for its topical jokes, but Noah told very few on his final episode. He took a broader perspective. Outlining lessons learned, which included that people were friendlier than they appear on social media, he struck post-partisan notes and said, “Politics turns people’s brains to mush.”He told a story about Jon Stewart calling to offer him the job and saying, “I see you in me.” Noah seemed shocked, and honestly, why wouldn’t he be?Trevor Noah’s 7 Years on “The Daily Show”The host, who took the reins of the show from Jon Stewart in 2015, exposed America’s many blind spots through witty and passionate commentary.Time to Depart: Trevor Noah announced that he would be stepping down in September, citing a desire for a better work-life balance.Saying Goodbye: In his final episode of “The Daily Show,” Mr. Noah told viewers not to be sad and called the night “a celebration.”An Outsider: The talk-show host, who grew up in South Africa and represented a part of the world often neglected by American news, helped his audience see through his eyes.His Best Moments: Noah’s comic perspective set him apart from other late-night hosts. Here are the highlights.Whereas Stewart’s humor ran hot and righteous, Noah always maintained a cool composure. Stewart was at his best in antagonistic interviews, interrogating ideas and calling out nonsense. Noah always seemed eager to get above the fray and treated guests with deference and awe.One running joke on his last show was the mystery of why he was leaving. Discovering that he doesn’t have another job lined up, the correspondent Dulcé Sloan quipped about Noah, who has a Black mother and white father, “Wow, you really are half-white.”You get a hint about why Noah might have gotten restless from his comment that it might be better to wait before developing a take on something you see in the news. But you can learn more about the reason he left from his stand-up. Noah never stopped performing, putting out three Netflix specials during his “Daily Show” tenure, including one last month called “I Wish You Would.”He’s not an entirely different performer in his stand-up — his twinkly-eyed charm is a constant — but the distinctions are revealing. While his specials dig into politics, it’s not the main subject. That would be the slipperiness and meaning of language. Noah is clearly not just obsessed, but tickled by the way people talk and the eccentricity of languages (he speaks eight). His gift for impressions is the centerpiece of many bits.In fact, a premise often seems like just an excuse for him to show off verbal gymnastics, whether it’s pointing out the similarity between the ways Nelson Mandela and Barack Obama speak or showing that to be president you need a strange voice (cue a lineup of impressions). Even my favorite Noah joke, about how trap music sounds like a toddler complaining (from his special “Son of Patricia”), is a virtuosic display that turns ordinary human sounds into a kind of music.Noah’s stand-up aesthetic is also more subtle and wry than his talk-show punch lines. In a joke from his recent special comparing Will Smith’s character in “Independence Day” to his slap at the Oscars, he displays such a light touch that the actor might not have even noticed the jab. (In fact, Smith gave one of his first interviews after the awards to Noah, a booking coup.) There’s a wit to his voice that recalls an earlier era. I would not be shocked to see him become a regular humor writer for The New Yorker.Noah hit his stride on “The Daily Show” when he started speaking more off the cuff. The segments, released online, in which he did crowd work during commercial breaks were often long monologues culminating in metaphors. They showcased his gift for thinking aloud and in real time. What they don’t have is a ruthless appetite for getting belly laughs or winning an argument. The dearth of that hunger is also part of his legacy at “The Daily Show.”On “I Wish You Would,” you get a sense of his temperament when he talks about why people were so angry during the pandemic. His theory is not that Americans were hopelessly divided, but that we were scared. “As humans, we get so comfortable knowing,” he said, emphasizing that last word in his volume and timing, “that we forget how uncertain life is.”This is not just a more existential thought than is usually expressed on a talk show. It’s existentially fatal to a certain kind of talk show. Because as true as it may be, and it is, the job of daily commentator on political events is a lot easier if he at least keeps up the illusion of having a sure-minded, commanding take. Hamlet could never host “The Daily Show.”Noah is startlingly good at appearing confident and assured, which made him a natural at the job. But talent can be its own obstacle. What you’re gifted at is not necessarily what you should be doing. Watching his stand-up, and especially reading his excellent memoir, “Born a Crime,” you sense that he is most comfortable in the moments of not knowing.Talk shows are far more collaborative than they appear. And “The Daily Show” is a machine that can work with different hosts. We first learned that not with Noah but with John Oliver, who had considerable success filling in when Stewart took a summer hiatus in 2013. The years that followed were a catastrophic period for Comedy Central, when it lost a tremendous amount of funny correspondents, including Oliver, Stephen Colbert and Samantha Bee. Noah deserves credit for rebuilding an impressive roster with a more diverse cast.“The Daily Show” will now use temporary hosts, including Sarah Silverman, Al Franken and the former correspondent Hasan Minhaj. As for the permanent replacement, the understandable temptation is to aim for the shiny new toy, but clearly, overlooking your stable of talent has its own risks.Dulcé Sloan has enough spiky charm for a bigger platform. Jordan Klepper displays a bulletproof deadpan. And in their stand-up as well as on the show, Roy Wood Jr. and Ronny Chieng are cagey, argumentative and prolific joke writers who share a delight in the comic kill that would represent its own departure. To my eyes, they should be the favorites. But would either want this grind?In his goodbye to Noah, Chieng set up a joke by appearing to get emotional: “In all seriousness, on behalf of everyone watching right now and from the bottom of my heart, can I be the new host?” More

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      in Theater

      When Jewish Artists Wrestle With Antisemitism

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      In this unsettling moment, comedians, filmmakers, playwrights and others have been struggling against a long-ingrained American response to look away.Antisemitism has such a long, violent history that it seems absurd to claim it’s getting worse. Compared with when? And yet, there’s something about our current moment that feels different.Consider a recent Sunday. I woke up to news reports that two men were arrested at Penn Station with weapons, a swastika armband and a social media history of threats to attack a synagogue. After taking a shower, I opened my dresser to find my Kyrie Irving T-shirt. The Brooklyn Net was returning to the N.B.A. that evening after being suspended for tweeting a link to a documentary that cast doubt on the Holocaust.I didn’t expect getting dressed in the morning to turn into a test of loyalties between my favorite basketball team and my murdered ancestors, but here we are.That night, when I arrived at Barclays Center, scores of people belonging to what the Southern Poverty Law Center labels a hate group were handing out pamphlets with the blaring headline “The Truth About Antisemitism.” I opened Twitter and saw Elon Musk was making fun of the Anti-Defamation League and Ye was tweeting again. He had kicked off the recent cycle of discourse by leveling violent threats against Jews.Quantifying antisemitism right now by numbers of hate crimes is useful, but doesn’t capture the peculiar anguish and human complexities of its day-to-day pervasiveness. That’s a job better suited to artists, and more than any year in memory, some of our most accomplished ones have taken up the challenge, from the biggest names in comedy (Dave Chappelle, Amy Schumer) to the most celebrated storytellers in theater and film, like Tom Stoppard and Steven Spielberg. What resonates most in this impressive body of work are the Jewish artists exploring the challenge of antisemitism, and while they started these projects years ago, their hard-earned pessimism now seems uncomfortably prophetic.The thorniest recent work on these issues was the “Saturday Night Live” monologue by Dave Chappelle. He poked fun at Ye and Irving while speaking to the antisemitic idea of a Jewish conspiracy in Hollywood. In between myriad jokes, he shrugged off this stereotype as an understandable thought best not verbalized. One of the maddening traps of modern antisemitism is that it takes a source of pride — Jewish success in the arts, the rare field where we were welcome — and makes it seem sinister. This old tactic got a new hearing.There are a lot of Jews in Hollywood, Chappelle observed mischievously, before undercutting the comment with a joke that called the trope that they control show business “a delusion.” Unlike the blunt social media posts of Ye and Irving, this set was a work of art, elusive and layered, displaying finesse and paradox. It’s a prickly kind of funny with corkscrew punch lines that tickled the mind and bothered the conscience. (“If they’re Black then it’s a gang, if they’re Italian it’s a mob, but if they’re Jewish it’s a coincidence and you should never speak about it.”)Dave Chappelle on “Saturday Night Live.” His monologue was a prickly kind of funny that bothered the conscience.Will Heath/NBCArt can be formally beautiful and morally ugly. Despite what you have heard, good comedy can be built on lies as easily as on the truth. This is what makes Chappelle’s set so slippery: His storytelling and gravitas are so magnetic that you can miss how far he goes in making the old slur of a Jewish conspiracy seem reasonable. He whitewashed Irving’s tolerance for Holocaust denial with one good line. With another, he says you can’t “blame Black people” for Jewish pain, erecting a straw man with deftness. To suggest, as he does, that it’s dangerous for him to say “the Jews” is tiresome hyperbole.For as much controversy as this set provoked, it was also predictable. How often have we seen Chappelle bring up celebrity transgression, and then defend, mitigate and complicate it, while inviting us to admire the feat? This is his move. There’s no wondering where he will come down on the latest scandal. We know.Antisemitism in AmericaAntisemitism is one of the longest-standing forms of prejudice, and those who monitor it say it is now on the rise across the country.Perilous Times: With online threats and incidents of harassment and violence rising nationwide, this fall has become increasingly worrisome for American Jews.Donald Trump: The former president had dinner with Nick Fuentes, a prominent antisemite, at Mar-a-Lago, causing some of Mr. Trump’s Jewish allies to speak out.Kanye West: The rapper and designer, who now goes by Ye, has been widely condemned for recent antisemitic comments. The fallout across industries has been swift.Kyrie Irving: The Nets lifted their suspension of the basketball player, who offered “deep apologies” for posting a link to an antisemitic film. His behavior appalled and frightened many of his Jewish fans.EARLIER THIS YEAR, I wrote about the Jewish tendency to turn antisemitism into comedy. But there’s another coping mechanism that we like to talk about less: looking the other way. When asked about Chappelle’s monologue, Jerry Seinfeld diplomatically told The Hollywood Reporter that “the subject matter calls for more conversation.” When asked about it as a guest on “The Late Show,” Jon Stewart only became earnest when he pleaded for free speech. What’s striking about these responses from star comics is that they seem to be more interested in calling for debate than engaging in it.Then again, I get it. I’ve stayed quiet when peers wrote things that seemed, if not indifferent to Jewish pain, then at least to be applying double standards to it. I gave them the benefit of the doubt or concluded that a call-out would be counterproductive. But saying nothing in the face of such moments exacts its own cost. It eats at you. Several Jewish artists have been making work that explores such decisions with a skeptical eye.In “The Patient,” a sly, suspenseful FX series from Joel Fields and Joe Weisberg, creators of “The Americans,” a therapist played by Steve Carell awakens to find himself chained to the bed of a serial killer looking for help with his mental health. The title is a reference to this maniac as well as the way his therapist responds.The killer says he was looking for a therapist who is Jewish, a specific request that goes uncommented on. Small moments tip you off to a tolerated culture of antisemitism. In a flashback, the therapist, Alan, spots a swastika on a poster and, instead of making a fuss, keeps walking.Steve Carell as a therapist and Domhnall Gleeson as a serial killer in “The Patient,” which raises the urgent question of how to fight back.Suzanne Tenner/FXNow he has no such option. Imprisoned by a captor who wants something from him, he is faced with the urgent question of how to fight back. He chooses to use his skills in mental health to help his oppressor get better. The deeper he gets in dialogue, though, the more uncomfortable Alan grows, especially after he teaches the murderer the Kaddish, the Jewish prayer for the dead, and then sees it being used to mourn his latest victims.In many ways, the relationship at the center of “The Patient” is a metaphor for both the lengths Jews will go to extend empathy toward their oppressors and for the existential toll that takes. Playing a man wracked by guilt, grief and doubt, Carell is extremely subtle illustrating how accommodation can be justified and yet wear you down. We also see scenes in his head of him talking to a shrink (David Alan Grier) who asks why he doesn’t fight back, attack the killer. To which Alan replies: “I’m using what I have.” Grier, a figment of his imagination, flashes a look that suggests he doesn’t believe that.Similarly, “The Fabelmans” and “Armageddon Time,” two personal movies by Jewish directors dramatizing their own childhoods, grapple with the question of what weapons Jews have. In both, sensitive boys facing antisemitism at school struggle with how to stand up for themselves.“The Fabelmans” isn’t a movie about being Jewish so much as it is suffused with Jewishness. But when its young protagonist, Sammy Fabelman, moves to California in the 1960s, he’s confronted with Aryan boys who mock his religion and with gentile girls intrigued by it. He happily prays with one girl but puts up a fight with the bullies, who at first seem like the cartoon villains from early Spielberg movies. The most dramatic way Sammy pushes back is by putting his antagonists in a movie. After filming his classmates on a trip to the beach, the footage, shown to the whole school, makes one bully look ridiculous and another glamorous, bigger than life. Oddly, being romanticized by the Jewish kid he beat up rattles the bully more than any insult. His discontent in the face of this attention is the most baffling section in the movie, one that has the ring of a point being made. But what is the point?Is the antisemite feeling shame? If so, Spielberg is working hard to extend empathy. But this exchange also rattles Sammy. When the bigot demands to know why Sammy made him look like a star, the response sounds pained and unsure: “Maybe I did it to make the movie better?”It’s a shockingly unsentimental moment to find in a Spielberg movie, one in which the young version of himself learns that pleasing the crowd might require turning an antisemite into the hero. No one loves the movies more than Spielberg, and in this intimate, morally probing film, he shows how they can move, inspire and reveal the truth. But in these more hardheaded scenes, he also makes it clear that their impact can be unpredictable, and like comedy, they can deceive just as deftly.Chloe East as a classmate intrigued by the religion of the Steven Spielberg stand-in, played by Gabriel LaBelle.Merie Weismiller Wallace/Universal Pictures and Amblin Entertainment, via Associated PressIn “Armageddon Time,” a humbler, realistic and affectingly bleak portrait of the struggles of a young Jewish kid, James Gray digs into his 1980s Queens upbringing in the story of an 11-year-old boy named Paul Graff whose grandfather is the son of a refugee who fled pogroms in Europe. The patriarch tells him that changing his name (from Grasserstein) will help him in life. This same man urges him to speak up when other students make racist comments to a peer. These are the competing messages he grows up with: assimilate or fight back.A friendship with a Black classmate also makes clear to Paul how not all inequities are the same, that his privilege protects him in a way that other minority groups don’t experience. In a time when Black and Jewish communities are pitted against each other by entertainers like Ye and others, this movie feels exceedingly topical and depressing. It painfully dramatizes how antisemitism can lead Jews to overlook other injustices, protect your tribe and harden your heart to the plight of others.As with Spielberg’s movie, the new play by Tom Stoppard, “Leopoldstadt,” is being described as his most personal as well as a reckoning with his Jewish identity, which in his case he didn’t understand until middle age. It’s also one of his worst plays: intellectually thin, overly familiar, blandly generic. If the way you tell the audience it’s the 1920s is by a woman dancing the Charleston, you’ve become too comfortable with cliché. And yet, this sprawling portrait of a half century in the life of a Jewish family from Vienna is drawing sold-out crowds of weeping audiences.I suspect the reason is the timely and heavy-handed portrait of Jewish complacency and denial. We see this most nakedly in the stand-in for the playwright, a comic writer born Leopold Rosenbaum who now goes by Leonard Chamberlin (a name that evokes the prime minister famous for appeasement). In 1955, Chamberlin is glibly naïve about the Holocaust, a patriotic fool set up for tears when remembering the horrors of the Nazis. The play ends with a roll call of the dead. Of course, the audience cries.TWO THINGS STAND OUT about these dramas, whether onscreen or onstage: The first is that none of the Jewish protagonists are exactly triumphant in the face of antisemitism. Therapy, the movies, assimilation — nothing saves them. These characters are ambivalent, morally compromised or far worse. When it comes to their ability to protest an antisemitic culture, pessimism reigns.The second is how much these works look to the past, exploring the current moment through a historical lens. (That includes Bess Wohl’s play “Camp Siegfried,” a drama about a 1938 Nazi youth camp on Long Island whose themes are clearly meant to echo with today.) Even the contemporary “The Patient” borrows its most blunt power from flashbacks to the moral simplicity of concentration camps. Looking at history can be a useful way to understand the present, but it can also be a way to evade it. One wonders what Stoppard would come up with if he dramatized the more subtle Jewish denial of the cultural world he came up in, where he flourished as a playwright whose religion never seemed to come up. Or how Spielberg or Gray would capture the conflicts of Jewish life now.As usual, comics are the artists taking the earliest and most direct approaches. David Baddiel, a British comic, is receiving glowing reviews this month for a BBC documentary version of his book “Jews Don’t Count” that castigates the double standards applied to prejudice against Jews in progressive spaces today. Marc Maron’s next special, which recently taped in New York, begins a series of jokes on the increased prominence of conspiracies about Jews by saying that in this polarized country, antisemitism is one thing that brings everyone together. At the Kennedy Center Honors, Sacha Baron Cohen, in character as the antisemite Borat, skewered Ye and sang a brief parody version of U2’s “With or Without You,” switching the lyrics to “With or Without Jews.”Amy Schumer is one of the few sketch comics to dig into antisemitism today, lampooning the tentativeness our culture has for calling it out in the new season of “Inside Amy Schumer.” She imagines a workplace harassment seminar where everyone is hypersensitive to all kinds of slights except antisemitic ones. It’s a premise that not only counters the trope of a Jewish conspiracy but also taps into the paranoia of being gaslit by an entire culture. It hints at what a Jewish “Get Out” could look like.Part of the resilience of antisemitism is its resistance to critique. Jewish artists are obviously not going to end the lie that they control show business by making more movies, plays, TV shows or sketches about it. But they can illuminate its impact and capture the complex damage it does to the psyche. That matters. For a certain kind of Jew, art can be its own religion. And one lesson we keep learning and forgetting is that the greatest art is much better at portraying conflicted minds than changing them. More