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      What to Know About Kevin Spacey’s Civil Trial: Lawyers Make Opening Statements

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      In a lawsuit, the actor Anthony Rapp said Mr. Spacey made a sexual advance when Mr. Rapp was 14. Mr. Spacey is accused of battery and intentional infliction of emotional distress.Five years ago, as the #MeToo movement saw a growing number of high-profile men face accusations of sexual misconduct, a claim against Kevin Spacey emerged while he was starring in the Netflix show “House of Cards.”In an interview with BuzzFeed News, Anthony Rapp, best known for his role in the musical “Rent,” alleged that in 1986, when he was 14, Mr. Spacey picked him up, placed him on a bed and laid down on top of him, making a “sexual advance.”Mr. Rapp told the publication that the encounter occurred around the time both actors were in Broadway shows and that Mr. Spacey, then 26, invited him to a gathering at his Manhattan apartment. Mr. Rapp told BuzzFeed he was able to “squirm” away and leave.Mr. Spacey has denied the allegation.In 2020, Mr. Rapp sued Mr. Spacey, accusing him of assault, battery and intentional infliction of emotional distress. A judge dismissed the assault claim, but on Thursday, lawyers delivered their opening statements about the other claims before a 12-person jury in Federal District Court in Manhattan. Testimony begins on Friday.Mr. Spacey, who faces criminal sexual assault charges in Britain in a separate case, has been accused of sexual misconduct by more than a dozen men. This is the first time one of those claims has reached a trial.After Mr. Rapp’s public accusation, TV and film producers quickly dropped Mr. Spacey from projects. His character was written out of “House of Cards,” and he was ultimately ordered to pay the studio $31 million for breach of contract. Mr. Rapp currently stars in the TV show “Star Trek: Discovery.”Mr. Spacey, now 63, initially released a statement saying he did not recall the encounter that Mr. Rapp, now 50, had described, saying, “But if I did behave then as he describes, I owe him the sincerest apology for what would have been deeply inappropriate drunken behavior.” In court papers submitted following the lawsuit, Mr. Spacey has vehemently denied that the incident ever occurred.Anthony Rapp said Spacey made a “sexual advance” when Rapp was 14.Slaven Vlasic/Getty ImagesWhat is Mr. Rapp’s side telling the jury?In opening statements on Thursday, a lawyer for Mr. Rapp, Peter J. Saghir, described how Mr. Spacey invited Mr. Rapp to a party at his apartment in 1986, after they met while performing in separate Broadway shows. Mr. Rapp, who was 14 at the time, decided to sit on the edge of Mr. Spacey’s bed watching television instead of mingling with strangers who were older than him, Mr. Saghir told the jury.Mr. Rapp then saw Mr. Spacey enter the bedroom and realized the other guests had left, his lawyer said. Mr. Spacey picked Mr. Rapp up in his arms, Mr. Saghir said, describing the position like a groom carrying a bride over the threshold. According to Mr. Rapp’s account, Mr. Spacey appeared drunk and laid down on top of him, pressing his pelvis into the side of Mr. Rapp’s hip.“I recall being frozen and shocked and upset and scared,” Mr. Rapp said in an earlier deposition.As Mr. Rapp left Mr. Spacey’s apartment, Mr. Saghir told the jury, the older actor leaned into the doorway and asked, “Are you sure you want to go?”Mr. Rapp’s lawyers have argued that this account constitutes battery and that Mr. Rapp suffered severe emotional distress, including depression and anxiety. Battery is legally defined as “the unjustified touching of another person, without that person’s consent, with the intent to cause a bodily contact that a reasonably prudent person would find offensive.” The plaintiff’s side is expected to tell the jury about accounts Mr. Rapp gave to others in the years after the alleged incident. In opening statements, Mr. Saghir also homed in on Mr. Spacey’s statement after the BuzzFeed article, noting that he did not strongly deny Mr. Rapp’s account until his lawsuit was filed.How is Mr. Spacey’s side defending the actor?A lawyer for Mr. Spacey, Jennifer L. Keller, described Mr. Spacey’s initial statement concerning the allegations as the product of a “panic” among his managers and advisers, who advised him to take a certain tone to avoid the “social media mob.”Behind the scenes, Ms. Keller said in court, Mr. Spacey was saying he had no memory of what Mr. Rapp described. In court papers, Mr. Spacey’s lawyers said that he had flatly denied Mr. Rapp’s account, that he had recalled meeting Mr. Rapp on a few occasions but that those interactions were “peripheral and limited.” When seeking to dismiss the case, Mr. Spacey’s lawyers emphasized in court papers that “by plaintiff’s own admission, there was no groping, no kissing, no undressing, no reaching under clothes, and no sexualized statements or innuendo.”Ms. Keller accused Mr. Rapp of making the allegations to benefit his own career and attract public attention. “It’s not a true story, but he did tell it a lot,” she said, acknowledging that there were people who would recall Mr. Rapp’s telling them about Mr. Spacey in the following years.Ms. Keller alleged that Mr. Rapp had fabricated the story by borrowing details from “Precious Sons,” the Broadway play he was in that year. She said that in the play a character drunkenly mistakes his son, played by Mr. Rapp, for his wife, picking him up and laying on top of him in a way that mirrors Mr. Rapp’s allegations.Mr. Spacey’s team has also focused on his apartment at the time, presenting a floor plan that did not align with details in Mr. Rapp’s account.Who is expected to testify?Mr. Rapp’s lawyers have asserted that Mr. Rapp was not the only victim of sexual misconduct by Mr. Spacey, and Judge Lewis A. Kaplan has agreed to allow another accuser to testify.That accuser, Andy Holtzman, says that in 1981, Mr. Spacey groped his genitals and rubbed his groin on Mr. Holtzman. In a deposition, Mr. Spacey denied Mr. Holtzman’s allegations, saying he did not recall any dealings with him.Mr. Spacey’s lawyers have indicated that one of their key witnesses may be John Barrowman, an actor known for his role in the TV show “Doctor Who.” He was an acquaintance of Mr. Rapp when they were teenagers and visited him in New York in 1986 to see “Precious Sons.” Mr. Barrowman and Mr. Rapp met Mr. Spacey backstage at a play, Mr. Spacey’s lawyers said, asserting that Mr. Barrowman’s account of events that year do not align with Mr. Rapp’s.Both sides are likely to call witnesses who have said that Mr. Rapp told them about the allegations, and Mr. Spacey’s lawyers may call Adam Vary, the BuzzFeed journalist who wrote the initial article.Why is Mr. Rapp able to bring this claim now?Because Mr. Rapp’s claims extend beyond the statute of limitations, he is relying on a law called the Child Victims Act, which New York State passed in 2019. It included a “look-back window” — a limited period of time in which people who say they were sexually abused as children could sue.The plaintiff and the defense dispute whether the law applies in this case.Mr. Spacey’s lawyers assert that based on the legislation, a plaintiff can revive claims only if they constitute a “sexual offense” that violates penal law, and they argue that Mr. Rapp’s allegations do not meet that threshold. Mr. Rapp’s lawyers have said that sexual contact, under the law, can include touching over the clothing or forcefully holding the victim, as their client alleges. What has become of other legal claims against Mr. Spacey?Mr. Rapp originally sued with an anonymous plaintiff, who alleged that he was a teenager when Mr. Spacey sexually assaulted him while working as an acting coach in the 1980s. Judge Kaplan ruled that the plaintiff would have to identify himself publicly if he wanted to continue on to trial, which he declined to do.In another case, in 2019, prosecutors in Massachusetts dropped a sexual assault charge after the accuser was warned that he could be charged with a felony if he had deleted phone evidence. The man, who had accused Mr. Spacey of fondling him at a Nantucket restaurant when he was 18, refused to continue his testimony.Later that year, a separate lawsuit in California that had accused Mr. Spacey of sexually assaulting a massage therapist was dropped after the plaintiff died.In Britain, Mr. Spacey is facing four charges of sexual assault as well as one of causing a person to engage in penetrative sexual activity without consent. He pleaded not guilty, and a trial is expected to start next summer. More

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      Lisa McGee Found it Hard to Say Goodbye to Her ‘Derry Girls’

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      The Northern Irish writer said that she had never felt so close to a group of characters. Now, the show’s third and final season is arriving on Netflix.LONDON — In 1990s Northern Ireland, Lisa McGee and her friends decided to skip school to go to a concert. They were caught when one of the group posed for a photograph at the event, which then ended up on the front page of a local newspaper and was seen by her parents.“I’ll never forget that story because of how delighted my friend was in that photograph compared to the trouble she got in. It was just the perfect contrast,” McGee, 42, recalled in a recent video interview. She added: “I remember her saying it was worth it. I think she got grounded for life.”That was just one of many childhood experiences McGee drew on for her TV comedy, “Derry Girls,” which follows a group of chaotic and accident-prone friends and their families. The show, while joyous, is set during the Troubles — the violent, decades-long sectarian conflict that defined the region until the late ’90s.Like her characters, McGee attended a Roman Catholic school in Derry, and, like the show’s central figure, Erin, she grew up wanting to be a writer. The third and final season of “Derry Girls” arrives Friday on Netflix after airing in Britain this year, and McGee admitted that she had been struggling to let go.“I was connected to those characters in a way that I think is probably not entirely healthy,” she said. She kept notebooks filled with details for each of them, she added, and even now, lines for the characters still come to her. “It was really hard to stop talking to them,” she said.In the recent interview, McGee discussed growing up in Derry, which is also known as Londonderry; the joys of being ridiculous; and bringing the show to a close. These are edited excerpts from that conversation.When did you realize your childhood could be fodder for a show?When I moved to London, there were a few of my Northern Irish friends that moved over at the same time. And I remember being out in the pub and talking about stuff that happened to us and there was just horror on English people’s faces. We normalize this stuff that English people were like, “That’s not normal, lads, that’s weird.” I realized there’s something really funny about this, that this little pocket, this little place has normalized all this crazy stuff.I’d always felt that my group of friends at school were funny, and I’d always wanted to write something about a group of female teenagers who were the leads and were being the ridiculous people, not just the “friend” or “sister.”You’ve said in the past that, growing up, you didn’t want to write about the Troubles. What changed for you?Well, the truth is, I wasn’t going to. I was going to set the show in the modern day and it was actually my executive producer, Liz Lewin, who had been in pubs with me and my friends, listening to all these stories and said, “You’re really missing a trick, I really think you should try and do a period piece.” I just thought it was a headache, it’s too complicated, people wouldn’t understand. But I’m so glad she convinced me because the minute I started writing it, it gave me the chance to explain some things, and talk about some things that maybe people in the rest of the U.K. didn’t know about.But yeah, I just found the Troubles so boring. It was all that was on the news and I wanted to be a writer because I liked the escape, the fantasy of it all. So I still can’t believe this is the thing that has been the most successful thing for me.The show’s central character, Erin (played by Jackson), right, wants to be a writer, like the show’s creator.Hat Trick Productions and NetflixThe stars and heart of the show are the women and girls. How influential were the women you grew up around, what were they like?When I went to university, I realized Derry was different from all other places. The women, traditionally, were the breadwinners because it was a factory town and, apart from shirt factories, there wasn’t any other employment really, so a lot of the men were unemployed. So we grew up in this sort of weird society where the dads were looking after the kids and the mums were going to work.I also went to an all-girls convent school, so the cleverest person was a girl, the sports hero was a girl, the class clown was a girl. Growing up, everyone who was powerful or interesting or funny was female. I never questioned that we should be those things when I grew up, because women were very rock ’n’ roll where I came from, very forthright and very funny and ballsy and tough. That’s what I knew, and it only started to sort of fall apart when I grew up a bit.On “Derry Girls,” the girls aren’t aged up or put in particularly adult situations. They are ridiculous and embarrassing in ways that feel very true to teenagers. Was that a conscious choice?Part of it was just that was what was truthful — I was that ridiculous person. It was definitely a conscious decision for them not to be sexualized. I feel that’s the story that’s told over and over again about teenage girls. I always felt like, yes, that’s part of it, but our panic about not getting good grades was up there along with what boys we wanted to get with. Our ambition was one of the biggest things about my group of friends, that panic about failing or not getting into university, not getting a good job, all that sort of stuff. There was also the importance of your relationship with your other friends, that gang, that group, how important their opinions were.As young people, how present were the dangers of the Troubles for you and your friends?Now, looking back, you really lose your breath thinking about how dangerous things were, but we weren’t really scared. Not really. But we should have been. There were armed soldiers on our streets, outside our houses and lots of other gunmen in balaclavas floating about on the other side of things. It’s what you know; we didn’t overthink it. It actually, weirdly, started to really affect me and my friends after the Good Friday Agreement. When peace times started, we realized that what happened wasn’t OK, and there was a hope that things wouldn’t go back to the way they were.The realities of the violence were so dark, yet “Derry Girls” maintained a lightness. How did you think about the show’s tone?I always just thought about it through their eyes, how they would see it. For most teenagers, their views are very selfish, it’s like, “How can I make this about me?” and for the adults, it’s just a bit of an inconvenience most of the time, as it would have been.There’s a line in an episode where Michelle says there’s something sexy about the fact they hate us so much. Everything has its spin. So Michelle’s always thinking about sex, and Erin, quite a pompous character, loves the idea of it and writes about being a child of conflict and all of that.What I decided was that most of the story has to be about whatever the gang are trying to do that week, with the Troubles normally getting in the way of it.The show ends on an episode set around the time of the 1998 Good Friday agreement, and the declaration of peace. Why did you choose that as the show’s end point?I feel like that was the day Northern Ireland grew up, that vote and that phenomenal, phenomenal thing. That was the day we put all the pain and suffering behind us for the greater good. And I wanted to run that parallel to the kids’ growing up. It’s the beginning of their adulthood, just as Northern Ireland is walking into this new phase of its life. It always felt like that’s where I should naturally end the show, this hope and the positivity of the agreement and them going out into the big, bad world. More

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      Late Night Rips Into Ron DeSantis for His ‘Go-Go’ Boots

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      “You’re not allowed to pass a ‘Don’t say gay’ bill then show up in public dressed like Nancy Sinatra,” Jimmy Kimmel said.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.Getting the BootPresident Joe Biden met with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Wednesday, setting aside political conversations to focus on the damage from Hurricane Ian.“Last time Joe Biden saw a storm this big, he had to help Noah collect all the pets and get them on the boat,” Jimmy Kimmel joked.“It’s like the special episode of a Disney sitcom where the school bully realizes he needs help with his math homework.” — JIMMY FALLON“Governor DeSantis has been touring damaged areas to let residents know they’re not forgotten — and one thing that few will ever forget is the white knee-high boots he was sporting.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“Looks a little less ‘governor on the go’ and more ‘governor of the Go-Gos.’” — STEPHEN COLBERT“You’re not allowed to pass a ‘Don’t say gay’ bill then show up in public dressed like Nancy Sinatra.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“But DeSantis was actually nice to Biden — he actually even offered him a free flight to Martha’s Vineyard.” — JIMMY FALLONThe Punchiest Punchlines (Return on Investment Edition)“The home run ball itself is thought to be worth at least $2 million, and it was caught by an investment banker. Huge moment for the Yankees and an investment banker. What a night for the underdogs, you know?” — JIMMY FALLON“Well, there is a feel-good story for you. I’m glad things are finally working out for that executive at an investment firm. That’s what the game is all about. Good for you, buddy. Good for you.” — TREVOR NOAHThe Bits Worth WatchingThe correspondent Ronny Chieng investigated the world of ultimate pillow fighting for Wednesday’s “Daily Show.”What We’re Excited About on Thursday NightCate Blanchett will talk about her new film “Tár” on Thursday’s “Late Show.”Also, Check This OutBeavis and Butt-Head in the rebooted version of the series.Paramount+As a show that was smarter than its characters, “Beavis and Butt-Head” is too often overlooked and unappreciated. More

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      After Decades of Hints, Scooby-Doo’s Velma Is Depicted as a Lesbian

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      The character has long been seen as a lesbian icon. Some fans were thrilled that her sexuality was at last officially acknowledged.A new movie has put to rest decades of fan speculation and suggestions from previous stewards of the “Scooby-Doo” franchise by confirming that Velma Dinkley, the cerebral mystery solver with the ever-present orange turtleneck, is canonically a lesbian.To many fans who had long presumed as much and treated her as a lesbian icon, it was not a shocking revelation. But her appearance in “Trick or Treat Scooby-Doo!,” which was released on Tuesday on several digital services, was the first time the long-running franchise openly acknowledged her sexuality, thrilling some fans who were disappointed that it took so long.“Scooby-Doo,” created by Hanna-Barbera Productions, first appeared as a Saturday morning cartoon in 1969, and has been frequently reinvented in TV shows, films and comics. It generally follows a group of teenage sleuths, consisting of Velma, Daphne Blake, Fred Jones and Norville “Shaggy” Rogers, along with their mischievous Great Dane, Scooby-Doo.Previous “Scooby-Doo” writers and producers have said that Velma was a lesbian, but said pushback by studios would not allow them to depict her as one on screen. The new movie, which was directed by Audie Harrison, leaves no doubt as to her sexuality.In one scene of the newest iteration, a blushing Velma, voiced by Kate Micucci, is smitten at the sight of a new character, Coco Diablo, who mirrored Velma’s fashion sense with her own turtleneck and oversize glasses. In a later scene, she denies Coco is her type before admitting: “I’m crushing big time, Daphne. What do I do? What do I say?”It was the kind of overt reference to her sexuality that had failed to make it into final cuts before.Responding to a fan on Twitter, James Gunn, who wrote the screenplay for “Scooby-Doo,” a 2002 live-action film, wrote in 2020 that “Velma was explicitly gay in my initial script.”“But the studio just kept watering it down & watering it down, becoming ambiguous (the version shot), then nothing (the released version) & finally having a boyfriend (the sequel),” he wrote in the tweet, which was reported widely at the time and has since been deleted.That same year, Tony Cervone, the co-creator of “Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated,” a 2010 series on Cartoon Network, posted an image on Instagram of Velma standing in front of a Pride flag.“We made our intentions as clear as we could ten years ago,” Mr. Cervone wrote. “Most of our fans got it. To those that didn’t, I suggest you look closer.”In response to a fan, he said specifically that “Velma in Mystery Incorporated is not bi. She’s gay,” according to a screenshot saved by Out Magazine.While most of the gang has had many romantic interests, notably between Fred and Daphne, Velma “has never really had a main love interest,” said Matthew Lippe, a 22-year-old marketing student who runs the Scooby Doo History account on Twitter.She had occasional flirtations and brief relationships, notably with Johnny Bravo in a ’90s cartoon crossover, but her romantic feelings were rarely as central to the story as other characters, Mr. Lippe said. When she dated Shaggy in “Scooby Doo! Mystery Incorporated,” he said, “it’s something that doesn’t feel natural for both of them.”More recently, the shows and movies have increasingly hinted at her interest in women, so “it’s not something that’s coming out of the blue,” he said. He said Velma is a fan favorite because she speaks to a common struggle: She’s the smart, awkward one who often leads the gang in the right direction but doesn’t get as much credit as the others.“A lot of young women, and a lot of people in general, could just look to her as a great example and role model to look up toward,” he said.Another change to Velma’s character is coming soon. In 2021, HBO Max ordered a spinoff adult animation series called “Velma.” Mindy Kaling will voice the character, who will be South Asian in the show.“Nobody ever complained about a talking dog solving mysteries,” Ms. Kaling told a crowd in May at a Warner Bros. Discovery Upfront presentation, which offered a first look at the show, expected later this year. “So I don’t think they’ll be upset over a brown Velma.”Warner Bros., which owns the “Scooby-Doo” franchise, declined to comment.The rise of lesbian characters on television was a slow process, marked often by gimmicks and blatant plays for ratings. It often came in the form of “lesbian kiss episodes,” written largely to titillate rather than to explore genuine relationships.In recent decades, lesbian relationships on television have become more complex, even if the tropes aren’t entirely gone. More

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      In ‘A Friend of the Family,’ Jake Lacy Breaks Character

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      The actor Jake Lacy, whom I met for tacos on a recent weekday evening, has an All-American handsomeness that verges on caricature — brown hair, blue eyes, a chin so strong it must work out. He looks as though a 3-D printer were fed images of lacrosse players and then told, ‘Go ahead, make this.’ His face at rest — though, over dinner it was that way only very rarely — suggests a guy who captained a team or two in high school and then joined a frat in college. A craft brewery fan. A fleece wearer.“There’s a bro element to my look,” he acknowledged as the guacamole arrived.“He’s got this handsome blank canvas thing,” Murray Bartlett, his co-star on the HBO hit “The White Lotus,” told me. “But he’s incredibly versatile with that handsome blank canvas. He can take that in many directions.”Until recently, most of those directions — “Obvious Child,” “High Fidelity,” “Girls” — confirmed Lacy as a go-to nice guy. Vulture once created a list ranking the niceness of his various characters. Several of these characters were mere way stations or end points on some female protagonist’s journey. And Lacy — citing, in a very un-bro way, the patriarchal history of TV and cinema — liked that fine.“What a great way to start in this business,” he said, sincerely.In “The White Lotus,” Lacy played privilege personified. With, from left, Jolene Purdy, Murray Bartlett and Alexandra Daddario.Mario Perez/HBOBut he switched up that persona with last year’s “The White Lotus,” in which he played Shane, a paragon of white male entitlement in a succession of sherbet-colored polos, earning him his first Emmy nomination. (At last month’s ceremony, he lost, happily, as he tells it, to his scene partner, Bartlett.)His new show, the fact-based drama “A Friend of the Family,” uses that bland handsomeness as both camouflage and cudgel. “Weaponizing that” is how Lacy put it.He had suggested meeting at La Superior, an unassuming, Michelin-starred taco place in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, near a few of his old apartments. (Mid-pandemic, he and his wife, Lauren DeLeo Lacy, packed up and moved to Connecticut.) This was a comfortable spot for him, though he seemed, in a faded red T-shirt with a few holes in the torso, not entirely comfortable there, apologizing often for rambling, pausing, digressing.“He’s very earnest, not in a cheesy way; he’s just a good guy,” Bartlett had said. And this seemed true enough. While Lacy has little particular professional interest in playing likable characters, he has a personal need — a need that most of us share — to be likable. And he is. (“I’ve gotten better about my own people-pleasing,” he said.) “A Friend of the Family,” works with and against that likability, in ways more insidious and less comic than his work in “The White Lotus.”In the past, Lacy has struggled to disentangle himself from his characters. That wasn’t the case with “A Friend of the Family,” he said. Nathan Bajar for The New York TimesIn this nine-episode limited series, which streams on Peacock, Lacy plays Robert Berchtold, an Idaho husband and father who in the mid-1970s twice abducted Jan Broberg, the eldest daughter of a family that he had known for years. (This case was previously explored in the Netflix documentary “Abducted in Plain Sight.”) As the show tells it, and as Broberg confirmed in a recent interview, Berchtold, or B as those close to him knew him, used his smile, his jokes, his great charisma to insinuate himself with the Brobergs. The two families were so enmeshed that when Jan was first taken, her parents delayed contacting the FBI.(Following the first abduction, Berchtold was convicted of kidnapping. Sentenced to five years, he served just 45 days. After the second, he avoided prison entirely, serving five months in a psychiatric facility instead. In 2005, having been found guilty of aggravated assault and possession of a firearm for a later offense, he committed suicide.)Most of the episodes of “A Friend of the Family” had been written before casting began. Finding the right Berchtold was particularly daunting, because the actor needed to project an uncanny charm.“He had to have a natural charisma that would come through the screen and drop into the living room of whoever was watching the show,” said Broberg, who is a producer on the series. Because charisma, she continued, was “B’s superpower.” And yet, that same actor would also have to travel to some very dark places.Nick Antosca (“The Act,” “Candy”), the showrunner on “A Friend of the Family,” had been impressed by Lacy’s turn on “The White Lotus” and the sympathy that he brought to such an unpleasant character. An audience isn’t meant to sympathize with B, Antosca clarified. “But you have to understand how that family fell in love with him,” he said.B doesn’t think of himself as a monster, though — inarguably — he is one. Antosca suspected Lacy would be able to play both aspects at once.In “A Friend of the Family,” Lacy stars as Robert Berchtold, who twice abducted Jan Broberg (Hendrix Yancey).Erika Doss/PeacockNot every actor on a hot streak would choose to play a pedophile for his follow-up. And Lacy, who has two young sons, nearly turned down the show. But the challenge of the character attracted him, as did the scripts, and he appreciated the involvement of both Jan Broberg and her mother, Mary Ann, who is also a producer.“Had they not been involved, it would be so voyeuristic and so tabloid and not grounded in some greater purpose,” Lacy said.That purpose, he believes, is to show how grooming can operate and how abuse is perpetrated most often by intimates. Before shooting began, Broberg had left a letter for Lacy, detailing all the positive things she remembered about B — his charm, his sense of fun — while also encouraging Lacy to make the role his own and assuring him that the choices he made would not cause her further harm.“I was wildly impressed by that level of grace,” Lacy said.This allowed him to pour as much of himself as he could into the role. “He’s a very nice person and a caring father,” Broberg observed of Lacy. “You have to bring all of those things to the role for it to work.”As for the darker aspects, Lacy filled those in with research — evidence from the various trials, audio that Berchtold had recorded, material on psychology. Sometimes he had to put a time limit on that research. “Like, that’s enough for now,” he said. “Let’s not spend all night listening to these tapes of Robert Berchtold.”“There wasn’t a need to go into his thoughts,” Lacy said of Berchtold. “Because my point of view on his thoughts is so rightfully so filled with judgment.”Nathan Bajar for The New York TimesWhen it came to pedophilia, that wasn’t a place that he went to imaginatively, though he did read “Lolita.” Instead he worked through what he described as substitutions, trusting that if he looked at his young scene partners with love, the camera would read that love as something dark and unsafe. (The show doesn’t include any scenes of rape, so Lacy never had to portray these acts directly.)Neither he nor Antosca saw a need to locate Berchtold’s humanity. “He was a sociopath who kept telling himself self-justifying stories,” Antosca explained. So in nearly every scene, he said, it was enough to know what B was trying to achieve and how he was trying to achieve it without marinating too deeply in the why.“There wasn’t a need to go into his thoughts,” Lacy said. “Because my point of view on his thoughts is so rightfully so filled with judgment.”In the past, Lacy has struggled to disentangle himself from characters he has played. That didn’t happen here. “When people were like, ‘Is it hard to leave that on set?’ I was like, ‘No, it’s a very clean break,’” he said.Antosca confirmed this. “He is a super-thoughtful and technical actor, not method,” he said. “I didn’t see him struggling to get out of character.”Lacy doesn’t know what he’ll play next, if he’ll continue this particular heel turn or return to nice-guy roles or try something else. (“He has tremendous depth and this range that hasn’t been fully used yet,” Antosca told me.) He mentioned a Los Angeles project. And one in London. He is glad to have made “A Friend of the Family,” glad to promote it, but also glad to leave it in the rear view.“I’m very happy to just take a little breath and hold my kids,” he said. More

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      Jeffrey Dahmer Series on Netflix Revisits a Painful Past

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      A Netflix series about the infamous Milwaukee serial killer aims to tell the gruesome story through the experience of his victims. Those who remember them say that attempt failed.For years, Eric Wynn was the only Black drag queen at Club 219 in Milwaukee. He performed as Erica Stevens, singing Whitney Houston, Grace Jones and Tina Turner for adoring fans, eventually earning the title of Miss Gay Wisconsin in 1986 and 1987.“I had this group of Black kids who came in because they were represented,” Wynn, now 58, said of his time at the club in the late 1980s and early ’90s. “I saw them and let them know I saw them, because they finally had representation onstage.”Among them were Eddie Smith, who was known as “the Sheikh” because he often wore a head scarf, and Anthony Hughes, who was deaf. Hughes was “my absolute favorite fan” and blushed when Wynn winked at him from stage. In return, Hughes taught him the ABCs of sign language.Eric Wynn performing as Grace Jones at Club 219.Eric Wynn“He would sit there laughing at me when I was trying to learn sign language with my big, old fake nails on,” Wynn recalled, laughing.But then, Wynn said, the group of young Black men began to thin out.“They were there and then all of the sudden there were less of them,” he said.Smith and Hughes were two of the 17 young men Jeffrey Dahmer killed, dismembered and cannibalized in a serial murder spree that largely targeted the gay community in Milwaukee between 1978 and 1991. Dahmer was a frequent customer at Club 219. He was sentenced to 15 consecutive life terms in prison but was killed in prison in 1994.A performance at Club 219.Wisconsin L.G.B.T.Q. ProjectThe view of the stage inside of Club 219.Wisconsin L.G.B.T.Q. ProjectExterior of the former location of Club 219.Wisconsin L.G.B.T.Q. ProjectDahmer’s life has the been the subject of several documentaries and books, but none have received the attention or criticism showered on Netflix’s “Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story,” which dramatizes the killing spree in a 10-part series created by Ryan Murphy. It stars Evan Peters as Dahmer and Niecy Nash as a neighbor who repeatedly tried to warn the police, and aims to explore Dahmer’s gruesome tale through the stories of his victims.For many critics, that attempt failed immediately when Netflix labeled the series under its L.G.B.T.Q. vertical when it premiered last month. The label was removed after pushback on Twitter. Wynn and families of the victims questioned the need to dramatize and humanize a serial killer at all.“It couldn’t be more wrong, more ill timed, and it’s a media grab,” Wynn said, adding that he was “disappointed” in Murphy. “I thought he was better than that.”Murphy, who rose to fame with the high school comedy show “Glee,” has explored true crime before. His mini-series “American Crime Story” tackled the assassination of Gianni Versace, the O.J. Simpson trial and President Bill Clinton’s impeachment. But it was Murphy’s pivot from “The Normal Heart,” based on a play written by the AIDS activist Larry Kramer, and “Pose,” about New York City’s 1980s ballroom scene, to “Monster” that stopped Wynn in his tracks.Evan Peters as Jeffrey Dahmer inside of the reimagined Club 219.NetflixOf “Pose,” Wynn said, “I was so impressed, we finally had representation that we were involved in.” He added, “It was such a great homage to all of us. And then he turns around and does this, somebody who is actually attacking the Black gay community.”Instead of focusing on the victims, Wynn said, “Monster” focuses on Dahmer. The Netflix label of an L.G.B.T.Q. film and the timing right before Halloween did not help either, Wynn said.Netflix did not return a request for comment.In an essay for Insider, Rita Isbell, whose brother Errol Lindsey was murdered by Dahmer, described watching a portrayal of her victim’s statement at Dahmer’s trial in the Netflix series and “reliving it all over again.”“It brought back all the emotions I was feeling back then,” she wrote. “I was never contacted about the show. I feel like Netflix should’ve asked if we mind or how we felt about making it. They didn’t ask me anything. They just did it.”Eric Perry, who said he was a relative of the Isbells, wrote that the series was “retraumatizing over and over again, and for what?”Scott Gunkel, 62, worked at Club 219 as a bartender when Dahmer was a customer. Gunkel watched the first two episodes of “Monster” but could not continue. He said he and his friends “don’t want to relive it.”“The first ones really didn’t have any context of the victims, I was taken aback,” he said of the episodes, adding that the bar scenes did not accurately portray the racial mix of the city’s gay bars at the time. It was largely white, not Black, as the show depicts.Gunkel also remembered Hughes, the deaf man, who he said would come into the bar and wait for it to to get busy. Hughes was one of the few victims to receive a full episode dedicated to his story.“He’d get there early and have a couple sodas and write me notes to keep the conversation going,” Gunkel recalled. “He disappeared, and I didn’t think much of it at the time.”Tony Hughes used to frequent Club 219.Rodney Burford as Tony Hughes in “Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story.”Friends and family embrace Shirley Hughes, center, mother of Tony Hughes, after the verdict.Richard Wood -USA TODAY NETWORKThat’s in part because the Dahmer years also coincided with the AIDS epidemic. There are opaque references to the crisis in the Netflix show, including hesitation by the police to help the victims and a bath house scene in which condom use is discussed. But Gunkel said customers vanishing was not uncommon.“We had this saying in the bars — if somebody was not there anymore, either he had AIDS or he got married,” Gunkel recalled.The AIDS epidemic combined with the transient lifestyle of many gay men in Milwaukee and “institutional homophobia and racism targeting the community” provided a perfect cover for Dahmer, said Michail Takach, a curator for the Wisconsin L.G.B.T.Q. History Project. Takach was 18 when Dahmer was arrested.“People were always looking for something new and people always disappeared,” Takach, now 50, said. “This was different, because it just got worse and worse.”Missing person posters climbed “like a tree in Club 219 until they reached the ceiling,” he said.The lot in Milwaukee where Jeffrey Dahmer’s apartment building stood before it was razed in 1992.Ebony Cox / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / USA TODAY NETWORKThe show has brought back those memories, Takach said, and has also surfaced people claiming to be associated with the Dahmer years who were not.“This is the invisible cost of the Dahmer resurgence,” he said, “this dreadful mythology, this unexplainable need to attach to someone else’s horror.”Nathaniel Brennan, an adjunct professor of cinema studies at New York University who is teaching a course on true crime this semester, said that it “is by nature an exploitative genre.”Even with the best intentions, he said, “the victims become the pawn or a game or a symbol.”Contemporary true crime often falls victim to an unresolvable tension, Brennan said. “We can’t tolerate forgetting it, but the representation of it will never be perfect,” he said. “That balance has become more apparent in the past 25 years.”Criminals are often portrayed with tragic backgrounds, he said. “There’s an idea that if society had done more, it could have been avoided.”Much of “Monster” is dedicated to Dahmer’s origins, including a suggestion that a hernia operation at the age of 4 or his mother’s postpartum mental health issues may have impacted his mental development.Wynn, who lives in San Francisco now, said he did not plan to watch the series and said Murphy owed an apology to the families of the victims and the city of Milwaukee. “That’s a scar on the city,” he said.A community vigil for the victims of Jeffrey Dahmer in 1991.Tom Lynn-USA TODAY NETWORK Before the series premiered, he had not spoken about the Dahmer years in a long time. But he still thinks about Hughes regularly when he practices his sign language.“I did it this morning,” he said. “I still do it so I don’t forget.”Sheelagh McNeill More

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      Stephen Colbert Pens Get-Well Card to Herschel Walker

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      Colbert did not mince words in his greeting to the Senate candidate, who denied paying for a former girlfriend’s abortion, as was reported by The Daily Beast.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.Thoughts and PrayersHerschel Walker, the Republican Senate candidate in Georgia and a noted opponent of abortion, denied reports from Monday that he paid for a woman’s abortion in 2009. Walker’s former girlfriend provided a receipt from an abortion clinic and a $700 check she received in a get-well card, The Daily Beast reported.On Tuesday, Stephen Colbert referred to the situation as “a disaster.”“So Walker went on the Fox News last night and was asked about this evidence by the most effective form of birth control known to man, Sean Hannity,” Colbert said.“Well, sure, all celebrities send cards to complete strangers. In fact, you know what? Herschel’s going through a tough time right now, so let me just get this down real quick: ‘Dear Herschel, get well — you know what? Get [expletive], Stephen.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“I mean, this woman says that she has a receipt, a check, and a get-well card that he signed. The only way there could be more of a paper trail is if he bought a souvenir T-shirt from the abortion clinic’s gift shop.” — TREVOR NOAH“Imagine being so stupid you write a check for an abortion you want to keep secret. And that card, if you’re wondering where you can even get a card like that, you can find them right next to the ‘dads and grads’ section at CVS.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“A former girlfriend of Republican Georgia Senate candidate Herschel Walker claimed in a new interview that Walker paid for her to get an abortion in 2009. And the only way that will hurt him with Republicans is if some of that money went to pay down her student loans.” — SETH MEYERSThe Punchiest Punchlines (Tainted Reputation Edition)“Former President Trump filed a defamation lawsuit yesterday against CNN and claimed that the network has made a ‘persistent association’ between Trump and Adolf Hitler. Yeah, come on, CNN. Can’t a guy hold a series of racist rallies in a country suffering skyrocketing inflation without being compared to Hitler?” — SETH MEYERS“This is true, the lawsuit takes issue with CNN’s use of the words ‘racist’ and ‘insurrectionist’ when discussing Trump. I don’t want to help Trump in this lawsuit, but CNN also called him a billionaire.” — JAMES CORDEN“Get this: Former President Trump is claiming that CNN is trying to hurt his image ahead of the 2024 election, and he announced that $475 million defamation lawsuit against the network. In response, CNN was like, ‘Hey, thanks for thinking we have that kind of money. Wow, we pay Anderson Cooper in Panera bucks, you know what I mean?” — JIMMY KIMMEL“He sued CNN for defamation, charging the channel acted with ‘real animosity’ to cause him ‘true harm.’ True harm? They reported the facts! That’s like suing your mirror for giving you cankles.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“Specifically, the suit claims that CNN tried to taint the plaintiff, which is not easy — the plaintiff is mostly taint.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“But this is tricky territory for Trump. On the one hand, he thinks that CNN calling him racist hurt his chances for re-election. On the other hand, if he says he isn’t racist, that could also hurt his chances for re-election.” — JAMES CORDENThe Bits Worth WatchingThe “Tonight Show” guests Ralph Macchio, Jennifer Beals and Lea Thompson played a game of ’80s-themed charades with Jimmy Fallon on Tuesday.What We’re Excited About on Wednesday NightMaggie Haberman will sit down to dish on her new book “Confidence Man” with Trevor Noah on Wednesday’s “Daily Show.”Also, Check This OutLoretta Lynn performing in 1976 in Rochester, N.Y. Her voice was unmistakable, with its Kentucky drawl, its tensely coiled vibrato and its deep reserves of power.Waring Abbott/Getty ImagesThe country music star Loretta Lynn died on Tuesday, leaving behind a legacy of fiery expressions of female resolve. More

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      Da’Vine Joy Randolph Doesn’t Want Anyone Finishing Her Sentences

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      Whether in comedies like “Only Murders in the Building” or dramas like “On the Come Up,” the ubiquitous actor refuses to be pigeonholed.Please forgive Da’Vine Joy Randolph if she needs to stifle the occasional yawn. When she hopped on a video interview in late September, the omnipresent, extremely busy and still slightly jet-lagged actress had only just returned from Colombia, where she was filming “Shadow Force,” an action movie for the director Joe Carnahan.Despite the exotic locale and a fulfilling work experience, the otherwise upbeat Randolph emphasized that she was happy to be back on her home turf in Los Angeles. “Even on a vacation,” she said, “after the two-week mark, no matter how amazing the vacation is, you’re like, I’m ready.”Randolph, 36, has been on a relentless professional pace for more than a decade now, playing a range of memorable roles in theater, film and television. She recently co-starred in the drama “On the Come Up,” the directorial debut of Sanaa Lathan, playing Pooh, the supportive but no-nonsense aunt of an aspiring teenage rapper (Jamila C. Gray).Yet Randolph is probably better known for her work in several comedies, including the Hulu series “Only Murders in the Building” and films like “Dolemite Is My Name.”Why Randolph keeps turning up alongside the likes of Steve Martin, Eddie Murphy and Martin Short, she said, is anyone’s guess. “It’s actually quite a conundrum,” she said. “I think I have a good sense of humor, but I don’t consider myself funny.”Whatever type of story she is telling, Randolph said, she often takes a similar approach to her roles: “I really just focus on their dedication — everyone wants something.”She explained, “When people get into extreme situations or they want something bad enough, hilarity can ensue because the stakes are just that high. To the viewer, it can be comical. To me, I’m like in a Greek tragedy over here.”Rather than be remembered as a comedic or a dramatic performer, Randolph said she wants to be called “a transformational actor”: “I never want to get pigeonholed or known for one thing. I don’t want people to be able to finish my sentences.”Randolph shared the stories behind a few of her most memorable roles. These are edited excerpts from that conversation.Randolph as Oda Mae Brown in “Ghost the Musical.”Sara Krulwich/The New York Times‘Ghost the Musical’In the stage adaptation of the 1990 movie, which ran on Broadway in 2012, Randolph was cast as Oda Mae Brown, the psychic played in the film by Whoopi Goldberg.That was my first job ever, and it started very quickly. Like, roller coaster plunging down — there was no windup. You booked it [whooshing sound]. Now my life is fortunately and unfortunately like that — that can be the nature of what it is. But to be thrown in, in that way, was a lot of getting used to. When we found out that “Ghost” was closing, I remember saying to my agents, “I want to do a movie and a TV show and a straight play.” And I booked one of Robin Williams’s last movies [“The Angriest Man in Brooklyn”], an episode of “The Good Wife” and an original play at Atlantic Theater Company [“What Rhymes With America”]. I was like, whoa. Good manifesting.‘Selfie’Randolph played Charmonique, a co-worker of the pharmaceutical firm staffers played by Karen Gillan and John Cho, on this short-lived ABC cult sitcom from 2014.I got to learn all the ins and outs of network television. After an episode was released, I remember the producers being like: “The numbers, the numbers, what are the numbers? What are the ratings?” I was like, whoa, that’s a whole thing. You did the pilot, then after you get 13 [episodes], then you find out if you get the back nine. Which we didn’t on that show. And — because people ask me all the time — I genuinely don’t know why. Our co-workers don’t know why. I have spent time with Karen Gillan. We don’t know why. I promise you there’s no secret I’m withholding.‘Empire’On the Fox hip-hop soap opera that ended in 2020, Randolph played Poundcake, a onetime fellow prison inmate of Cookie Lyon (Taraji P. Henson).They built a whole soundstage and turned it into a prison, and it was just a two-hander with Taraji and me. It felt like getting back to the fundamentals, where I really got to dig in and play a different type of character. We were almost a whole other show within that show. Even the other actors were like, “How come you get to do all this stuff?” Craig [Brewer], the director of “Dolemite,” was directing me in one of the episodes for “Empire.” I was like, “You’re really cool to work with. Do you have any interesting stuff down the pike?” He said nothing. And then I go to the [“Dolemite”] audition, and I’m like, “Craig!” He was like, [sheepishly] “Oh, I didn’t know.”Randolph with, from left, Craig Robinson, Mike Epps, Tituss Burgess and Eddie Murphy in “Dolemite Is My Name,” a game-changer for her career.François Duhamel/Netflix‘Dolemite Is My Name’This 2019 comedic biopic starred Eddie Murphy as the stand-up and Blaxploitation actor Rudy Ray Moore and Randolph as Moore’s “Dolemite” screen partner Lady Reed.“Dolemite” changed the trajectory of my career. On my end, the work is never changing. My process, my way in — I don’t save myself for the big roles and phone it in for everything else. But the collaborative energy allowed my character to have a space to be seen and heard. Eddie is very meticulous with his work and this was a passion project for him, but he was so generous. Interestingly enough, I had booked it — deal signed and everything — and then they were like, uh, we don’t know. They made me re-audition, which was intense. But the gift in it was, if that didn’t happen, I wouldn’t have felt as confident and forthright. I was able to come to work being like, This is what I have to offer. Before I would have been like, [mousy voice] “What do you think, Mr. Murphy?” Now I was like, I know who she is and what they want from her.‘The Lost City’In this year’s hit comedy, Sandra Bullock starred as a romance novelist caught up in an unexpected jungle adventure and Randolph as her intrepid publisher.That was like my first true work-cation. It was wild. The last scene of the movie, where we were all on the beach, that’s where we lived. If the camera turned back, you would see the hotel we were staying at. The travel bans were just starting to come up from Covid, so for a lot of us, we were also very excited to be working. When you’re literally on the beach, it’s pretty hard to be a jerk. A lot of it had to do with Sandra Bullock and how she just took care of the actors.Sandra never got diva-ish or distanced herself, like, I’m over here and you’re down here. We were all in it together. I was having fun with the hair department. The moment I go into the jungle, I knew my hair was going to get more and more frizzy. It became like a game — each scene would be like, OK, so how frizzy is it?As Detective Williams in “Only Murders in the Building.”Patrick Harbron/Hulu‘Only Murders in the Building’As the resourceful Detective Williams on this Hulu comedy series, Randolph often crosses paths with the amateur sleuths played by Steve Martin, Martin Short and Selena Gomez.That job, one thousand percent, was because of “Dolemite.” Steve Martin told me he saw “Dolemite,” was very impressed — “You held your own,” that whole thing — and that was a straight offer from him and the showrunner. It’s such a wonderful working environment. Lovely hours. You’re out by like 6, 7 o’clock. You go have dinner, a life. And just to be around Steve Martin and Martin Short — they still have this childlike anticipation and excitement, like it was their first project. That blows me away, every single time.Williams is damn good at her job and has a crazy case that she’s trying to crack. She’s aggressive and that has made her successful. Then these three civilians get in the middle of things, trying to solve it for her, alongside her, in spite of her. That makes her job more difficult. But in the process, she learns maybe it is OK to not work by yourself all the time. She’s coming to terms with it and it’s awkward and uncomfortable. That’s where the comedy comes in.‘On the Come Up’Randolph’s character, Aunt Pooh, is the streetwise sister to Jay, an absentee mother played by Lathan, the film’s director, and the mentor to her niece, an aspiring rapper played by Gray.When I found out about that job, I was filming Netflix’s “Rustin,” playing Mahalia Jackson, so I’m giving full Christian, Southern Baptist auntie. To then go to that kind of auntie really intrigued me. But especially in telling Black-specific narratives from Black voices, there always has to be a message. Even with “Empire,” I don’t care if I’m an inmate, but there has to be a positive message that we grow and learn from. You see throughout the movie all the roles that Aunt Pooh was to her: I was her parent, and she was my niece and my best friend, if not a little sister. Which I think keeps their relationship very complex. As tough as Aunt Pooh is, she has this gushing heart for her family and for her niece, which was really quite special.The physical transformation was quite significant, and in a short amount of time. When I got to set, the costume just wasn’t quite hitting it. But the costume designer was really cool — I was like, “Do you trust me? I know who this person is and I can show you better than I can explain it to you.” She was like, “Sure, no problem.” And so, for two days, I went shopping here in L.A. and got all the costumes. Literally everything that I wear, that is what we pulled and bought. The moment I put it on, I was like, oh, OK. When you’re going from movie to movie, a lot of times, actors are wigged. But Sanaa Lathan, who had done a movie all about hair [“Nappily Ever After”], was like, “I think you really should rock your own hair.” I was like, no, no, I don’t want to do it. But the moment that we did the look, I was like, damn it, that’s it. Being that it was my own hair, I had to rock my hair like that on and off the set. The attention you get from that — I couldn’t be more different from it. I’m not method and I don’t usually subscribe to that. But it allowed me to stay in it and understand her. More