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      Sam Waterston Is Still the Face of ‘Law & Order’

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      The actor originally signed on for only one season as Jack McCoy but became synonymous with the series, which returns Feb. 24. “It’s nice to come back and just witness the thing we made,” he said.“Law & Order” premiered on NBC in 1990. A procedural that was really two procedurals conjoined, the first half of each episode focused on the investigation of a crime, the second on the prosecution of the accused. Among the original cast members was Michael Moriarty, who played an assistant district attorney. During the fourth season, under clouded circumstances, Moriarty left.As Dick Wolf, who created “Law & Order,” tells it, Warren Littlefield, NBC’s president, questioned whether the show could continue. Wolf thought that it could. “I’ve got two words for you,” he says he told Littlefield. Those words? “Sam Waterston.”Waterston, who had just wrapped the NBC civil rights drama “I’ll Fly Away,” hadn’t been looking for a procedural. Having begun his career as a classical actor, he never really expected to work in television. Still, he agreed — in the short-term, anyway — signing a one-year contract in 1994 to play the principled assistant district attorney Jack McCoy.“I didn’t think I’d be there long,” Waterston recently told me. He stayed for 16 seasons. In those years, “Law & Order” became a cultural touchstone and an extensive franchise (back before seemingly every procedural franchised). Waterston — as his hair silvered and his face cragged — remained its dependable face.When NBC canceled the show, in 2010 — its ratings by then less than half of its early ’00s peak — he went back to classical theater and took prominent roles in Aaron Sorkin’s HBO media drama, “The Newsroom,” and in the Jane Fonda-Lily Tomlin Netflix comedy “Grace and Frankie.” He made a few movies. And then in a twist that even a late-season “Law & Order” writers room might have considered too much, “Law & Order” suddenly returned after a decade away, with Waterston’s McCoy along for the prosecutorial ride.Waterston, center, as District Attorney Jack McCoy, is joined by series newcomers Hugh Dancy and Odelya Halevi as assistant D.A.s.NBCThe first episode will premiere on Feb. 24 on NBC (and available to stream the following day on Peacock and Hulu). And on March 3, Hulu will debut “The Dropout,” a limited series based on the Theranos scandal, in which Waterston plays the former Secretary of State George Shultz. The seventh and final season of “Grace and Frankie” arrives in April, which means that Waterston will have three shows on simultaneously, showcasing his talents for drama, sophisticated impersonation and light comedy.“This is a really sweet time,” he said, as he tidily sipped a bowl of chicken soup. “I’ve always wanted to prove that I can do all kinds of things.” His motto, he told me, is a lyric from the musical “A Chorus Line” about an actor’s desire to do it all: “I can do that! I can do that!” Now he has.This was on a recent weekday afternoon. The forecast had predicted rain — correctly. But Waterston, 81, had still insisted on meeting in Central Park, armed against the wintry mix in a broad-brimmed hat, a leather jacket and an umbrella that he mostly left furled. He had brought me and a photographer to the Delacorte Theater, the longtime home of Shakespeare in the Park and the site of his early career triumphs: Benedick in “Much Ado About Nothing,” the Duke in “Measure for Measure,” Hamlet in “Hamlet.”“His love of that place, you could feel it very tangibly,” Michael Greif, who directed him there in “The Tempest,” told me. It was true. Waterston strode around stage — cheeks reddening, eyes crinkling — like it was summer already, seeming to see not the slush but the work he had done over the past 60 years.“The Delacorte just got the green light to be completely rebuilt,” he said in a nearby Italian restaurant, where we had retreated, damply. “It’s simply too great.”Waterston began his career on the stage but soon branched into television 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 TimesCentral Park’s Delacorte Theater, the home of Shakespeare in the Park, was the site of early career triumphs like the Duke in “Measure for Measure” and Hamlet in “Hamlet.”Mark Sommerfeld for The New York TimesWaterston — plain-spoken, twinkly, wistful — has never needed much in the way of renovation, though he has reinvented himself as an actor several times over. His trip to the Delacorte suggested a man trying to trace a through-line in a hectic career.“What’s cool about this age is that you can look back at all that and appreciate that it actually was worth doing,” he said.Precocious, he started early, playing a small part in a play directed by his father, who taught at a preparatory school in northwest Massachusetts. At Yale, he continued acting; he can still recall a magical night in which he played Lucky in “Waiting for Godot” and felt that he and the audience “were in this kind of incredible bubble of communication and understanding of each other.” (This was after the Yale Daily News had argued he was too smart for the part, Waterston recalled.)He couldn’t imagine a career in show business — “a crazy business,” he called it. At Yale, he studied more sensible subjects like French and history. He spent a year at the Sorbonne. But somehow he couldn’t stop himself.“It’s endless fun,” he said. “When you compare it to other kinds of work, why would you want to do anything else?”At first the roles that came to him were mostly comic, owing perhaps to his gangling figure and pilgrim looks — long face, sharp nose, superb eyebrows. He looks a lot like a handsome Abraham Lincoln. Waterston disputes the “handsome” part.Dramatic roles came a few years later. Then there were movies, then television, where he often played parts based on real people — Lincoln and others. (“People knew by then that I like to do Shakespeare. And if I liked to do Shakespeare, I must be serious,” he said.) Even as he angled to show his range, some constants remained, like a keen interest in characters in the midst of a moral quandary and a flair for the theatrical leavened by a natural gravitas.Over 20 seasons, the “Law & Order” format was far more enduring than the show’s cast. From left, Benjamin Bratt, Jerry Orbach, Waterston and Jill Hennessy in 1996.Jessica Burstein/NBC“For all his training, he has this incredible ability to be quiet onscreen,” said Elizabeth Meriwether, the showrunner of “The Dropout.” “You can tell he’s thinking onscreen, which is really rare.”And no matter the role, he seemed like a man you could trust. Stephen Colbert at one point introduced him as “the most reasonable seeming man in America.”“Law & Order” came around just as he was worrying how we would pay for four college educations. (He has one child, the actor James Waterston, with his first wife, Barbara Rutledge Johns; and three children, the actresses Elizabeth Waterston and Katherine Waterston and the filmmaker Graham Waterston, with his current wife, Lynn Louisa Woodruff.) The salary was decent and the show filmed in New York City, not too far from his Connecticut farmhouse.“It was just exactly the right moment,” he said. “And it kept me out of trouble. Kept me from doing really dumb stuff.”What dumb stuff, exactly?“Well, who knows what the dumb stuff would have been,” he said. “But we all know that there’s a lot of dumb stuff.”Of course, “Law & Order” did more than preclude Waterston’s midlife crisis. Popular, influential and respectful of its audience, it made stars of many of its cast members. Even its scene break sound effect — the gavel-like “dun-dun” — became famous.Within a decade, it had birthed a litter of spinoffs, including one show, “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit,” that went on to displace “Gunsmoke” as the longest running television drama ever. (If there’s one thing America loves more than crime, it seems, it’s sex crime.) It helped to reestablish New York City as a viable hub for scripted series, drawing on its deep bench of theater actors. Everyone who’s anyone can list at least one “Law & Order” credit in a Playbill bio.The two-part format of “Law & Order,” which Wolf has described as a murder mystery followed by a moral mystery, proved indestructible. Every member of the original cast departed and still “Law & Order” kept going. (Even after cancellation, the original never really left. On TNT, it runs and runs in syndication.) Still, certain characters — Waterston’s McCoy, Jerry Orbach’s Lennie Briscoe (12 seasons), S. Epatha Merkerson’s Anita Van Buren (17 seasons) — became metonyms for the show itself: hardworking, upstanding, bent on justice.The format depends on fixed structures and rhythms. In the early seasons, McCoy had similar scenes in nearly every episode: cross-examinations, in-chambers meeting, closing arguments. That could have made for repetitiveness, but in Waterston’s hands, the formula rarely felt formulaic.“He makes the role and the words unendingly interesting,” Wolf told me in an all-caps email. “That takes a level of skill and humanism that not many people possess.”After 12 seasons, the pace had worn him down, and he was happy enough, in 2007, to move into the less demanding role of district attorney, leaving the trial scenes to younger actors. Sometimes, during those late seasons, Waterston regretted not leaving altogether. “I wondered if I had stayed too long at the fair,” he said. Then the show did the leaving for him.Yet, when “Law & Order” came back, so did Waterston — partly as a courtesy to Wolf, partly as a kind of victory lap. “It’s nice to come back and just witness the thing we made,” Waterston said. Walking through the rebuilt sets, now housed in Long Island City, felt like a waking dream, he said. (Still, as in the ’90s, he has signed only a one-year contract.)Anthony Anderson, a veteran of earlier seasons, has also returned, but otherwise the co-stars — including Hugh Dancy and Odelya Halevi as the assistant district attorneys — are all new. Halevi grew up watching Waterston; she used to pretend she was “the female McCoy,” she wrote in an email. When she arrived on set — excited, nervous, occasionally forgetting her lines — he reminded her that they were there to have fun.Waterston has reinvented himself as an actor several times over a 60-year career. “What’s cool about this age is that you can look back at all that and appreciate that it actually was worth doing,” he said.Mark Sommerfeld for The New York TimesFor Waterston, a lot of the fun has been in that moral mystery Wolf described, in the ways in which each episode’s crime connects to a pertinent social issue. “We’ve done three shows now,” Waterston told me happily as he finished his soup. “Every one of them is about something that’s tearing this place apart. And in the current atmosphere, I think it’s pretty darn cool.”The current atmosphere includes eroded trust in government institutions, particularly the police. While some viewers would probably argue the point, Waterston believes that a critique of the police was embedded within “Law & Order” all along.“If you go back and look at how the cops behaved in the past, there were plenty of times when the audience was invited to disapprove of how they were behaving,” he said. “Now, there’s more.”The show addresses this tension in its season premiere. Halfway through the episode, District Attorney Jack McCoy appears — his voice reedier, his hair and eyebrows more silver — telling a younger colleague, “Like it or not, the big bad police department is our partner.”After all of these years, this seems like the kind of scene Waterston could play in his sleep, or a fitful doze at the very least. But he can’t work that way.“I guess there would be a way to just put on the old suit,” he said. “But I think it’s good for you as an actor — and it’s my nature anyway — to be on the edge of uncertainty.”Besides, Waterston has changed in the intervening decade — grown older, welcomed more grandchildren — which means that Jack McCoy might have changed a little, too. Think of it as one more mystery, maybe the ultimate mystery, for this revived “Law & Order.” Waterston is already on the case.“If all the questions about how to play Jack McCoy are resolved and settled and done with,” he said, “why do it?” More

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      Jimmy Kimmel Critiques Donald's Trump's Financial Claims

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      “Only Donald Trump would defend himself against charges that he overvalued his assets by re-overvaluing his assets,” 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.Poor ResponseDonald Trump responded on Tuesday to being dropped by his longtime accounting firm Mazars USA with a four-page statement, writing, among other things, that the Trump brand is worth more than he previously claimed.On Wednesday, Jimmy Kimmel joked that Trump’s response is the longest thing he’s written “since he threatened to sue Gritty for stealing his look.”“Trump wrote at length: ‘We have a great company with fantastic assets that are unique, extremely valuable and, in many cases, far more valuable than what was listed in our financial statements.’ Only Donald Trump would defend himself against charges that he overvalued his assets by re-overvaluing his assets.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“He also lashed out at the New York attorney general and D.A., who happen to be Black. He wrote, ‘After five years of constant bombardment, this political and racist attack must stop.’ Now that’s a good one: rich white guy claiming racism. You almost have to hand it to him. That’s like — that’s like Hawaii claiming tourism. That’s ridiculous.” — JIMMY KIMMELThe Punchiest Punchlines (Holy Moly Edition)“Since we were young, many of us have been taught the same story, right? Be good, pray every day and you’ll get into heaven. What your grandmother probably didn’t mention is that a paperwork issue could send you to hell.” — TREVOR NOAH“Here’s what happened: For two decades, Father Andres Arango performed the sacrament with the words, ‘We baptize you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.’ However, the Vatican instructs priests to say ‘I baptize.’ Why can’t it be ‘we’? If anyone would understand, it’s God — he’s three persons in one god. I’m sure he gets it mixed up all the time.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“[imitating God] Hello, hi, hi. Could I get a reservation for three? No, it’s just me.’” — STEPHEN COLBERT“Wait, wait, I’m sorry, what? All the baptisms are invalid because of one — no, one word? This is like the worst thing a Catholic priest has ever done.” — TREVOR NOAH“Saying the wrong word during a baptism seems like a fun goof-them-up, but according to the local diocese, if you get the words wrong, ‘the baptism is deemed invalid, and if an individual was improperly baptized and later received other sacraments, they may need to repeat some or all of those sacraments.’ That’s right, you’re going to have to redo first communion, so squeeze that fat [expletive] back into that tiny suit, get back up there and stay in the suit, because you’re getting remarried.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“Church leaders investigated and found that Father Arango had incorrectly performed thousands of baptisms over more than 20 years. Of course, this was just a priest at a baptism. It could be worse — it could have been a rabbi at a bris.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“Like, don’t get me wrong, I’m glad to hear that the Catholic Church cares about people’s pronouns, but this seems like a minor mistake to me.” — TREVOR NOAH“You know, like I would understand if the priest accidentally cleansed their souls in White Claw, that I would get. But this doesn’t seem like a huge deal.” — TREVOR NOAH“And what’s going to happen to all the people who weren’t actually baptized — what happens to them now, huh? Are they going to go to hell for someone else’s mistake? That’s so unfair. Everyone else who gets to go to hell goes there because they got to have some fun first, you know?” — TREVOR NOAHThe Bits Worth WatchingDaniel Craig talked with Stephen Colbert about providing 2,022 New York students with free tickets to see him in “Macbeth” on Broadway.What We’re Excited About on Thursday NightThe “Zola” director Janicza Bravo will appear on Thursday’s “Daily Show.”Also, Check This OutMelanie Metz for The New York TimesTwenty-five largely unseen works said to be by Jean-Michel Basquiat are on display in Orlando, Fla., but some question their authenticity. More

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      Mamoudou Athie Gets Switched On by TV on the Radio and ‘Cowboy Bebop’

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      The actor reveals his feelings about his new Netflix series, “Archive 81,” the inspiration of David Bowie and the real reason he bought a bike.Mamoudou Athie speaks unabashedly about tenderness, humanity and humility, and doing the right thing.In other words, he’s what you might call a romantic, and so are a lot of the characters he falls in love with these days.“But it doesn’t have to be romantic in the traditional sense,” Athie said. “That heart-forward kind of energy, I’m a sucker for it. It just really gets me every time.”And his latest role, as the tortured videotape restorer Dan Turner in the supernatural Netflix hit “Archive 81,” definitely got him. Critics have swooned, too.“He lost his family tragically at a very young age and he’s chosen this profession that gives back people a little bit of their lost past,” he said. “I was like, ‘What a heart this guy has.’”Athie — Mauritania-born, Maryland-raised and a 2014 graduate from the Yale School of Drama — has played a deceased husband in “Sorry for Your Loss,” a punk rocker in “Patti Cake$” and a hardware-store employee in “Unicorn Store.” For the role of Grandmaster Flash in “The Get Down,” he was taught how to D.J. by the legend himself.“I’m not sure fear exists for me in the same way anymore,” he laughed.In a call from Los Angeles, Athie talked about the cultural forces that have shaped his flourishing career.“I could probably start crying when I think about it, but I’ve been fortunate,” he said. “When I’ve been working with like-minded people that feel the same way I feel about them, it’s like, ‘OK, I’m on the right path here.’”Here are edited excerpts from the conversation.1. Jenny Holzer’s “It Is in Your Self-Interest to Find a Way to Be Very Tender” Installation The head of my program at Yale, Ron Van Lieu — this guy is amazing — he was directing Stephen Adly Guirgis’s play “In Arabia We’d All Be Kings,” and it was on the program. I had no idea who Jenny Holzer was, but it really struck me. And honestly, it’s how I approach every project. For me, it’s so important to have that kind of openness and to try to affect another person in that way. It’s something that feels like it’s at the core of a lot of the characters that I’ve been drawn to lately.2. Anime Shinichiro Watanabe, Makoto Shinkai, Hideaki Anno — they’re really interested in the human condition, whether there’s supernatural elements or just truly simple stories about people relating to one another in the face of great adversity. Shinichiro Watanabe is probably best known for “Cowboy Bebop,” which is my favorite show. Period. Makoto Shinkai’s “Your Name” was a big reason I was drawn to “Archive 81,” actually, because it’s kind of a love story separated by space and time. I don’t use this word lightly: I do think they’re geniuses.3. Victor Hugo’s “Les Misérables” In high school I was always walking past that book, but I was like, “Man, that’s a tome. I don’t want to commit.” Then a teacher put some adaptation with Liam Neeson on, and I was like, “I’ve got to stop watching this right now and just read this book.” Jean Valjean, I mean, who doesn’t love that guy? He’s a true definition of a hero. And Victor Hugo — the thing that struck me about that book was that he would describe the prison walls for 20 pages. I’ve really grown to appreciate that level of detail and painstaking dedication to painting a crystal-clear picture of what you want to share.4. David Bowie I remember reading something [at “David Bowie is,” the 2018 Brooklyn Museum exhibition] that said he was involved in every single bit of what was onstage, what was being worn, down to the curtains. It reminded me, “There are ways to cut corners, and it’s never worth it. You have the time. If you have anything left to give, you should really just give it all.”5. His Bikes I used to ride my sister’s bike when I was a kid, because that was the one bike that we had. I never got another bike until this summer. I was working out with this trainer and I was always admiring his array of bikes. He sold me a bike that he had secondhand. And I was like, “Mamoudou, what the [expletive] is the matter with you? You can afford a bike now. Buy a bike.” I now have this specialized Aethos that I’m obsessed with. And also a Crux and an All-City Cosmic Stallion, which I bought because of the name. It happens to be a great bike, but I would be lying to you if I didn’t tell you that.Five Movies to Watch This WinterCard 1 of 51. “The Power of the Dog”: More

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      ‘Law & Order’ Is Having an Identity Crisis

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      The franchise has always portrayed the police as flawed but ultimately good. The latest spinoff does away with that ambivalence.If you were going to watch a police procedural — which, for the record, I don’t particularly recommend — you could do worse than NBC’s “Law & Order” franchise. Across 32 years and more than 1,200 episodes, the original series and its six American spinoffs have offered a gentle critique of law enforcement, presenting a parade of flawed individuals navigating a byzantine justice system. Detectives are stymied by bureaucrats and squabble with lunkhead patrol officers, who reliably contaminate crime scenes. Idealistic prosecutors grow disillusioned and leave for nonprofit work. And yet the franchise still hinges on a lesser-of-two-evils logic: The institutions may be imperfect, and the cops imperfect, but their vocation is, by definition, good. There are always more victims to avenge, and none better equipped to do it than the New York Police Department.This cautiously optimistic view of policing was once embodied by Elliot Stabler, the detective played by Chris Meloni since the 1999 premiere of “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.” A hotheaded ex-Marine, Stabler initially clashed with authority and struggled to adapt to married life, receiving reprimands from his captain and consulting a shrink. But paired with his compassionate partner, Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay), he proved an exemplary cop and father. He was dogged and intuitive, a man who gave more than he took, rough around the edges but heroic nonetheless.And yet the franchise’s latest spinoff, “Law & Order: Organized Crime,” has done away with all that fortitude. In the pilot, Stabler’s wife is killed by a car bomb, leading him to contemplate violent retribution. He grows a goatee. He goes undercover. He has a rockin’ good time. In a scene from the second season, airing now, we find him training in a boxing gym, where he’s approached by a sultry mob wife — a suspect in a sex-trafficking sting — who presents him with a pair of carnation-pink panties and invites him to her home. Once there, Stabler spikes her drink with an incapacitating agent, and they kiss until she passes out. Stabler hustles into her bedroom and riffles for evidence, escaping through a back door when her husband arrives.Stabler’s wife is killed by a car bomb, leading him to contemplate violent retribution. He grows a goatee.Never mind how implausible this sequence feels, especially given Stabler’s background as a sex-crimes detective. The tone is sleazy, owing more to 1980s action flicks than the trademark “Law & Order” grit. It’s a far cry from the franchise’s origins: middle-aged cops and attorneys plagued with lousy diets and troubled families, a dour but lively metropolis teeming with nosy neighbors and wisecracking witnesses. Instead, “Organized Crime” depicts a backlot version of New York, its desolate cityscapes almost devoid of pedestrians. Stabler’s task force targets deep-pocketed warlords and ethnic outfits, armed traffickers who hijack shipping containers and vaccine supplies. Officers meet informants on abandoned waterfronts, and everybody drives around in a giant black S.U.V. Cruising gang-controlled neighborhoods, Stabler is anxious, adrift and thirsty for vengeance. Whatever happened to America’s dad?While Stabler busies himself with mobsters and madams, the long-running “Special Victims Unit,” whose fictional plots often riff on real-world headlines, has become a lugubrious public-service announcement on modern policing. Now a captain, Benson has been elevated to virtual sainthood, leading an understaffed unit and deflecting misogyny from her superiors. In the aftermath of George Floyd, even her pristine character is tested by institutional bias and dysfunction — and her commanding officer, a Harvard-educated Black man, is replaced by a chauvinistic white man prone to victim-blaming.Benson’s relentless drive for justice remains. An arc in the 22nd season recalls the 2020 Central Park bird-watching incident, in which a white woman filed a false report against a Black man. (The charge against her was later dismissed.) The show’s stand-in for the bird-watcher is arrested; after he’s exonerated, Benson apologizes. “We both want the department to own up to their mistakes and to make changes moving forward,” she tells him. “We can get rid of the worst cops.” Her promise echoes Mayor Eric Adams’s campaign claim that he once worked to “reform the police” from the inside, and it’s a stretch even by “Law & Order” standards. The franchise once focused on good work done by flawed people, but now even “S.V.U.” takes a more evangelistic stance. Police departments may abuse their power, it concedes, but they are redeemed by the likes of Olivia Benson.Stabler is an avenger, Benson a heart-of-gold administrator.What’s jarring about the way “Organized Crime” and “S.V.U.” have diverged is how thoroughly both shows sacrifice realism to preserve optimistic attitudes toward policing. The original “Law & Order,” which aired from 1990 to 2010 (a revival begins this month), took pains to establish its characters as public servants, not superheroes. On the job, the detectives and attorneys wore drab, rumpled suits and worked desk phones from cramped offices. Off the job, they drank and avoided their families, because dealing with predators makes for a harrowing day. For some of them — Sam Waterston’s Jack McCoy, S.Epatha Merkerson’s Anita Van Buren — the lack of glamour suggested selflessness: Clearly they could’ve made more money elsewhere.Judging by the show’s longevity, this vision was a palatable one, a big-tent philosophy that allowed the show to celebrate the justice system while acknowledging its failures. A tone of knowing cynicism lent the writing credibility; a wariness of machismo and bureaucracy gave it tension. It maintained a certitude that New Yorkers needed protection from their neighbors, and that those who provided it merited sympathy.But in a time of skyrocketing funding and increased attention on police brutality, that big tent has collapsed. “Organized Crime” and “S.V.U.” face a new hurdle: They must demonstrate that cops are indeed the good guys. Both have cagily staked their territory. “S.V.U.” pays lip service to reform without seriously considering it; “Organized Crime” looks the other way entirely, supposing a wasteland of a city overrun by militant thugs. Stabler is an avenger, Benson a heart-of-gold administrator who could maybe be talked into some additional sensitivity training.It bears mention that another spinoff, “Law & Order: Hate Crimes,” was announced and then put on hold in 2019. Given the franchise’s expositional method and penchant for moral ambiguity, it’s unsettling to contemplate what that show might have looked like. In interviews, the franchise’s creator, Dick Wolf, has stressed that the shows maintain a nonpolitical lens on current events. But the incoherence of the new installments is a statement in itself. The shows could not ignore that millions of Americans were so shaken by police violence that they took to the streets in 2020. But it’s also true that some share of “Law & Order” fans must have thin-blue-line flags draped from their porches. Two roads diverged in a wood, and “Law & Order” pretends to take them both.Opening page: Screen grab from YouTube. Above: Virginia Sherwood/NBC; Chandan Khanna/Agence France-Presse, via Getty Images; Heidi Gutman/NBC/NBCU Photo Bank, via Getty Images. More

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      Late Night Dunks on Trump for Getting Dumped During Tax Season

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      “It’s like getting divorced on Christmas Eve,” Jimmy Kimmel joked.Welcome to Best of Late Night, a rundown of the previous night’s highlights that lets you sleep — and lets us get paid to watch comedy. Here are the 50 best movies on Netflix right now.‘H&R Cellblock’Last week, Donald Trump’s longtime accounting firm Mazars USA cut ties with the former president and his family, saying financial statements they prepared for him from 2011 to 2020 should “no longer be relied upon.”“In other words, ‘We are not going to prison with you, Mr. Trump,’” Jimmy Kimmel joked on Tuesday night.“So, for those nine years, no one should trust any of his financial statements, or any of his statements.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“Good for them, standing up and doing the right thing 10 years too late.” — JAMES CORDEN“The New York attorney general and Manhattan district attorney have been trying to determine whether the insurers, lenders and others Trump dealt with were misled about the strength of his finances. Let me save you guys some trouble: They were.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“If there’s any karma in this world, they dropped him for a younger, hotter client.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“What new information could have come to light right now? Were they like ‘Wait a minute — Trump organization? As in Donald — does that have something to do with Donald Trump?’” — JAMES CORDEN“Now he’s going to need someone else to do his taxes. I suggest H&R Cellblock.” — STEPHEN COLBERT“I tell you, there’s nothing more depressing than getting dumped by your accountant during tax season. It’s like getting divorced on Christmas Eve.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“I like the idea of Donald Trump angrily now setting up a TurboTax account to get his taxes done.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“A lot of people believe this could be it for Donald Trump — this could be the one. I don’t know. How many ‘the ones’ have we had now. We’ve had like 400 or something?” — JIMMY KIMMELThe Punchiest Punchlines (Kamila Valieva Edition)“I also know that nobody believes her excuse, right? That she accidentally took her grandfather’s heart medication, but I do. I believe her, because I know what it was like growing up me and my family — we always had a big bowl of loose pills all mixed together. It’s an easy mistake to make.” — TREVOR NOAH, on the Russian Olympic skater Kamila Valieva testing positive for a banned substance called trimetazidine“She tested positive for three substances that can be used to treat heart problems. Imagine how devastating that must be: You train your whole life to be in the Olympics, follow all the rules, put in all the hours, eat the right things. Last minute, you accidentally take your grandfather’s heart medicine.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“No one is focusing on the fact that her grandpa took her medication, now he’s dominating bingo at the old folks home.” — TREVOR NOAH“But again, I’m not saying Russia did it on purpose; I’m not saying that. I’m just saying don’t be shocked when later this week they use 15-year-olds to invade Ukraine.” — TREVOR NOAH“Her lawyer said maybe her grandfather drank something from a glass, saliva got in and this glass was somehow later used by the athlete. Ah, the old ‘must be from Grandpa’s saliva’ defense, huh?’” — JIMMY KIMMEL“We’ve all shared a big, wet cup of water with Granddad, haven’t we?” — JIMMY KIMMEL“I think the real question is, how much of your grandfather’s saliva are you coming in contact with and why?” — JIMMY KIMMEL“And why does this keep happening to Russia? These poor people. Will you leave them alone?” — JIMMY KIMMEL“I can’t believe they caught someone cheating and they’re still letting her compete while they investigate more. Like guys, it almost feels like the investigation is not about whether she cheated or not, it’s almost like the real investigation here is ‘OK, let’s see what the drugs can do — let it rip! Come on, let’s just see. We want to know, right? Everybody wants to know.’” — TREVOR NOAHThe Bits Worth WatchingRoy Wood Jr. dived into the history of Black athletes at the Winter Olympics on his “Daily Show” segment “CP Time.”What We’re Excited About on Wednesday NightRebecca Hall, the director of “Passing,” will appear on Wednesday’s “Late Late Show.”Also, Check This OutAudra McDonald, Denée Benton and John Douglas Thompson in “The Gilded Age.”Alison Rosa/HBOHBO’s “The Gilded Age” seeks to depict an elite class of 19th-century Black New Yorkers with historical accuracy. More

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      ViacomCBS renames itself as it plays catch-up with Paramount+, its streaming service.

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      On Tuesday, Shari Redstone staged her second hourslong investor presentation in two years. Both events were designed for the same purpose — to reposition her old-line media company, ViacomCBS, as a streaming giant in the making, one capable of competing head-on with Netflix, HBO Max, Disney+ and Amazon Prime Video, despite a late start.This time, there was less snickering.“Some of you thought we were on an impossible mission,” Robert M. Bakish, the chief executive of ViacomCBS, said during the presentation on Tuesday. “It’s not only possible. It’s happening.”To highlight the importance of its fast-growing Paramount+ streaming service, Ms. Redstone, the company’s chair, announced that ViacomCBS would rename itself Paramount Global.Paramount+ had 32.8 million subscribers worldwide at the end of its most recent quarter, up from fewer than 19 million a year earlier. In the three months that ended on Dec. 31, Paramount+ added 7.3 million customers, the result of offerings like “1883,” the prequel to “Yellowstone”; “Clifford the Big Red Dog”; and National Football League games. (A year earlier, ViacomCBS was adding about a million streaming subscribers a quarter.)The company’s streaming portfolio (Paramount+ and niche services from Showtime, BET and Nickelodeon) now has about 56 million subscribers. Mr. Bakish said that number would grow to 100 million by 2024, more than the roughly 70 million the company had previously forecast. The company also raised its 2024 streaming revenue goal to $9 billion, from $6 billion.Streaming brought in about $4.2 billion last year, including advertising sales from the free Pluto TV service.Paramount+ unveiled a barrage of additional programming to fuel continued growth. The expanded lineup will include fresh content from franchises including “Yellowstone,” “Beavis and Butt-Head,” “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles,” “Real World,” “Dora the Explorer,” “NCIS,” “SpongeBob SquarePants,” “Transformers” and “South Park.” Paramount+ will be the exclusive first stop after theatrical distribution for all Paramount Pictures movies beginning in 2024. (Many previously went to Epix, a premium cable channel.)Starting this summer in the United States, Paramount+ subscribers will be able to upgrade to receive Showtime content, including the new hit drama “Yellowjackets” and older series like “Billions.”ViacomCBS shares declined about 6 percent in after-hours trading. Richard Greenfield, a founder of the research firm LightShed Partners, cited investor concern about Mr. Bakish’s “meaningfully stepping up spending” on content.It may be growing quickly, but Paramount+ continues to lag behind competitors like Disney+, which added 11.8 million subscribers worldwide in its most recent quarter to reach 129.8 million. Netflix has about 222 million. More

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      Kathryn Kates, Actress of ‘Seinfeld’ Babka Fame, Dies at 73

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      She had a long screen career but may be best remembered as the counterwoman who tells Jerry and Elaine the bad news that her bakery was out of chocolate babkas.Kathryn Kates, who appeared as a counterwoman in two memorable scenes from “Seinfeld” involving baked goods in short supply — chocolate babkas and marble rye bread — and racked up numerous screen credits over nearly 50 years, died on Jan. 22 at her brother’s home in Lake Worth, Fla. She was 73.The cause was lung cancer, the brother, Josh Kates, said.Ms. Kates, who lived in Manhattan, had roles in dozens of television shows and movies, including the recent series “Shades of Blue” on NBC, “Friends From College” on Netflix and “The Good Fight” on CBS.She appeared in five episodes of “Law and Order” — a fixture on the résumé of most New York working actors — as Judge Marlene Simmons. She also had a recurring role in Netflix’s “Orange Is the New Black,” as the mother of Jason Biggs’s character, Larry Bloom. And she was cast as Angie DeCarlo, an Italian beauty shop owner, in “The Many Saints of Newark” (2021), the prequel movie to “The Sopranos.”But it was in two episodes of “Seinfeld” (1990-1998) that she made an indelible mark.Sporting a yellow apron and a New York attitude, Ms. Kates appeared in Season Five’s “The Dinner Party” as the bakery clerk who announces to Jerry and Elaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) that the store’s last treasured chocolate babka had been sold just ahead of them. Offered a cinnamon babka instead, Elaine calls it a “lesser” babka, to which Jerry objects, intoning, “Cinnamon takes a back seat to no babka.”The scene includes a memorable coughing fit by Ms. Kates’s character next to a wall of baked goods and her closing lines to a loitering Jerry and Elaine: “Can I get you anything else? How about a nice box of ‘scram’?”The episode also features Jerry’s exaltation of another New York bakery mainstay, the black and white cookie, as something of a model for better race relations. “Look to the cookie!” he declares.In an interview last year with “This Podcast Is Making Me Thirsty,” a podcast about “Seinfeld,” Ms. Kates recalled getting the part for which people would recognize her on Manhattan streets for decades.The whole writing staff, including Mr. Seinfeld and the show’s co-creator, Larry David, watched as she read her lines and delivered her cough in an audition. She had earlier auditioned for other small parts on “Seinfeld,” but the brassy counterwoman was her lucky break.Two seasons later, Ms. Kates, again in her yellow apron, reprised the role in the episode “The Rye.” This time she tells a crestfallen Jerry that the bakery’s last loaf of marble rye has been sold, complicating a plot to restore George into the good graces of his future in-laws.Ms. Kates devoted much of her time to running The Colony Theater in Burbank, Calif., of which she was a founding member. There, she and the actress Barbara Beckley were co-general managers from 1975 to 1981. She appeared in numerous Colony productions.“Kathy was New York through and through,” Ms Beckley said. “She did some wonderful roles with us.” But she added: “She was not a leading lady. She was much more of a young character actress, and not a Hollywood type at all.”Kathryn Jane Kates was born Jan. 29, 1948, in Queens. Her father, Louis Kates, was an electronics engineer. Her mother, Sylvia (Fagan) Kates, was an actress who, under the stage name Madelyn Cates, appeared on television in the hospital drama “St. Elsewhere” and the series “Fame” and played the eccentric concierge confronting Max Bialystock (Zero Mostel) and Leo Bloom (Gene Wilder) in the 1967 film version of “The Producers.”Ms. Kates grew up in Great Neck, N.Y., on Long Island, and graduated from Great Neck North Senior High. She studied acting at New York University.After graduating in 1971, she moved to Los Angeles in 1974 and focused on theater. Her early television credits included appearances on the legal drama “Matlock” in 1991 and other cameo roles in “Rachel Gunn, R.N.” and “Hudson Street.”In 1993, she married Joseph Pershes, an executive at a video distribution company. They divorced in 2006. In addition to her brother, she is survived by a sister, Mallory Kates.When asked in the podcast interview about appearing on “Seinfeld,” Ms. Kates responded that she was always grateful to have work. “I have loved every job I’ve ever had,” she said.And as for her babka preference? She favored chocolate. More

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      The 5 Best Actors Who Have Played Hercule Poirot

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      Agatha Christie’s Belgian sleuth has inspired many interpretations, none exactly true to her novels, including Kenneth Branagh’s approach in “Death on the Nile.”Hercule Poirot is one of those literary heroes, like James Bond or Sherlock Holmes, whose image blazes brightly in the popular imagination. From his debut in Agatha Christie’s 1920 novel, “The Mysterious Affair at Styles,” through his final appearance in “Curtain,” published in 1975, the Belgian detective cut a simple, distinctive figure: a “quaint, dandified little man,” as Christie wrote, “hardly more than 5 foot 4 inches,” with a head “exactly the shape of an egg,” a “pink-tipped nose” and, in what is probably the most famous instance of facial hair in the history of English literature, an enormous, “upward-curled mustache” — which Christie later boasted was no less than the finest one in England.Christie wrote more than 80 novels and short stories about Poirot, and nearly all of them have been adapted for film and television. Many actors have stepped into the role over the years, each trying to give it his own spin, much as a stage actor might take a fresh crack at King Lear. Tony Randall, in Frank Tashlin’s 1965 mystery-comedy “The Alphabet Murders,” played it for laughs, exaggerating Poirot’s exotic pomposity with farcical zeal. By contrast, Alfred Molina, in a made-for-TV version of “Murder on the Orient Express” from 2001, brought a subtler, more muted touch, softening the character’s sometimes cartoonish extravagance. Hugh Laurie once even donned the iconic ’stache for a cameo in “Spice World,” letting Baby Spice (Emma Bunton) get away with murder.But of the dozens of takes on Poirot over the last century or so, only a handful have truly endured, leaving a permanent mark on the character. These are the interpretations that come to mind when most people think of Hercule Poirot, and in their own way, each of these versions seems to some extent definitive. As Kenneth Branagh’s “Death on the Nile” arrives in cinemas, we look back at the most famous and esteemed versions.1931-34Austin TrevorAustin Trevor in a scene from “Lord Edgware Dies” (1934).Real Art ProductionsAs he was young, tall and (unforgivably) clean-shaven, the dashing leading man Austin Trevor was a conspicuous — some might say egregious — departure from the source material. He starred in three adaptations of Poirot’s adventures between 1931 and 1934, of which only the last, “Lord Edgware Dies,” survives today (available on YouTube). Trevor’s portrayal, while pleasant in its own right, differed enough from Christie’s description that the magazine Picturegoer Weekly ran an editorial lambasting it, under the headline “Bad Casting.” The most flagrant change is to the world-famous Belgian’s nationality: This Poirot has been inexplicably made a Parisian.“Lord Edgware Dies,” based on a Christie novel known as “Thirteen at Dinner” in the United States, concerns a wealthy American actress and socialite (Jane Carr) who commissions Poirot to secure her divorce from her obstinate husband, Lord Edgware (C. V. France). Edgware soon agrees, then turns up dead; Poirot, intrigued, investigates the murder. Detective films were popular in the early 1930s, and Trevor’s Poirot feels indebted to other charming, debonair sleuths of the era, in particular those played by William Powell in films like “The Thin Man” and “The Kennel Murder Case.” In all, it’s an adequate if unfaithful rendition, but it’s a relief that Christie’s creation was later realized with more fidelity.1974Albert FinneyAlbert Finney, false nose and all, in “Murder on the Orient Express.”United Artists/AlamyAmong other virtues, Albert Finney’s portrayal in Sidney Lumet’s “Murder on the Orient Express” (available to stream on Paramount+) is a major feat of makeup and prosthetics: a full-face getup encompassing wrinkles, jowls and false nose, designed to make the trim, 38-year-old Finney look the part of the world-weary Poirot in portly middle age. Lumet’s adaptation of one of Christie’s most celebrated books is a New Hollywood love letter to the Golden Age, with Finney leading an ensemble that includes such luminaries as Ingrid Bergman and Lauren Bacall. A rail-bound chamber drama structured around long, loquacious interrogation scenes, it’s an acting showcase of the classical variety. (Incidentally, this is the only Poirot performance to be nominated for an Oscar.)Finney’s Poirot is curt and flinty, his clipped accent gruff and gravel-throated. While he embodies many of the qualities characteristic of Christie’s original — cunning, headstrong, fastidious about his appearance — he is more serious and vehement, and scrutinizes the evidence grimly, with great intensity, like a predator carefully circling his prey. The film’s climax is explosive, with Finney rattling off his conclusions about the case in a frenzied fever pitch.1978-88Peter UstinovPeter Ustinov in “Death on the Nile” in 1978, the first of his Poirot outings.AlamyThe English actor Peter Ustinov appeared as Poirot a half-dozen times, beginning with the magnificent “Death on the Nile” in 1978 (streaming on the Criterion Channel). This Poirot is playful, boyish, even a bit whimsical; Ustinov imbues him with a light, teasing air, finding a latent amusement in even the most diabolical matters. Fans who prefer Ustinov in the role tend to respond to his immense warmth: He has a grandfatherly manner that makes him instantly likable, which also cleverly belies his brilliance and perspicacity. You sort of expect Finney’s Poirot to get to the bottom of things, but with Ustinov, the sudden penetrating deductions feel like more of a surprise.Ustinov took to the part so naturally that he continued to play Poirot onscreen for 10 more years. “Death on the Nile” was followed in 1982 by “Evil Under the Sun,” co-starring James Mason and based on the novel of the same name, and then several made-for-television films, including “Dead Man’s Folly” and “Murder in Three Acts.” Curiously, the TV movies did away with the period setting of the previous features, transplanting Ustinov’s Poirot from the 1930s to the present day — a poor fit that finds Poirot visiting such incongruous locales as the set of a prime-time talk show.1989-2013David SuchetDavid Suchet in his series’ take on “Murder on the Orient Express.”ITV for Masterpiece“You’re Poirot?” a woman asks, aghast, in the opening minutes of the pilot episode of “Agatha Christie’s Poirot,” the ITV series about the detective. “You’re not a bit how I thought you’d be.” David Suchet, the star, shrugs: C’est moi. Ironically, for most viewers, Suchet is not just like Poirot, he’s synonymous with him. The actor played him on television for nearly 25 years, appearing in 70 episodes, ultimately covering Christie’s entire Poirot corpus, concluding with “Curtain: Poirot’s Last Case” in 2013. Each episode is like a self-contained movie, telling a complete story and often running to feature length.Five Movies to Watch This WinterCard 1 of 51. “The Power of the Dog”: More