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      Herbert Schlosser, a Force Behind ‘S.N.L.’ and ‘Laugh-In,’ Dies at 95

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      As a top NBC executive, he wrote a memo envisioning the show that became “Saturday Night Live.” He also helped recruit Johnny Carson and oversaw a raft of hit shows.Herbert Schlosser, a longtime NBC executive who put an indelible stamp on the network by negotiating Johnny Carson’s first deal to host “The Tonight Show,” putting “Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In” on the air and overseeing the development of “Saturday Night Live,” died on Friday at his home in Manhattan. He was 95.His death was confirmed by his wife, Judith Schlosser.Mr. Schlosser was president of NBC in 1974 when he faced a late-night predicament: Carson no longer wanted the network to carry repeats of “Tonight” on weekends. But pleasing Carson, the network’s most important star, led to an inevitable question: What would NBC televise at 11:30 on Saturday nights?Mr. Schlosser wrote a memo in early 1975 that laid out the fundamentals of an original program that would be televised from NBC’s headquarters at Rockefeller Center; would be carried live, or at least taped on the same day, to maintain its topicality; would be “young and bright,” with a “distinctive look, a distinctive set and a distinctive sound”; would “seek to develop new television personalities”; and would have a different host each week.“Saturday Night is an ideal time to launch a show like this,” Mr. Schlosser wrote. “Those who now take the Saturday/Sunday ‘Tonight Show’ repeats should welcome this, and I would imagine we would get much greater clearance with a new show.”A sketch from the first episode of “Saturday Night Live,” seen on Oct. 11, 1975; from left, George Coe, John Belushi, Chevy Chase and Gilda Radner. The formula for the show had been spelled out in a memo by Mr. Schlosser earlier that year.Herb Ball/NBCU Photo Bank, via Getty Images“Saturday Night Live,” originally called just “Saturday Night” — which followed much of Mr. Schlosser’s formula, and which was produced, then as now, by Lorne Michaels — made its debut on Oct. 11, 1975, after Game 1 of the World Series, between the Red Sox and Cincinnati Reds. Mr. Schlosser had attended the game in Boston with Bowie Kuhn, the strait-laced baseball commissioner, and invited him to his hotel room to watch.“He didn’t laugh. And I thought, ‘Well, that’s Bowie,’” Mr. Schlosser recalled in “Live From New York: The Complete, Uncensored History of ‘Saturday Night Live’ as Told by Its Stars, Writers, and Guests” (2002), by James Andrew Miller and Tom Shales. “And then after a while, he started to chuckle. And then he’d actually laugh. And I figured, ‘Well, if he likes it, it’s going to have a wider audience than most people think.’”Mr. Michaels, in a phone interview, said that Mr. Schlosser had been a staunch backer of the show.“We wouldn’t have been on the air without him,” he said. “‘Live’ was his idea, not mine. He just believed in the show. He protected it.”Mr. Schlosser, a lawyer, had been an executive in NBC’s business affairs department, where he negotiated programming contracts to carry, among other events, the 1964 Summer Olympics from Tokyo and talent deals like ones with the comedian Bob Hope, whose specials were a mainstay of NBC’s prime-time schedule.“There were always kickers to his deals,” Mr. Schlosser told the Television Academy in an interview in 2007. With each new one, NBC had to buy a piece of land from Hope, one of the largest private landowners in California.“We bought it, got capital gains and never lost money on it,” Mr. Schlosser said.In 1966, Mr. Schlosser was named NBC’s vice president for programs on the West Coast, based in Burbank, Calif. Over six years, he was involved in developing numerous shows, among them some with Black stars, like the popular comedian Flip Wilson’s variety series and “Julia,” a sitcom starring Diahann Carroll as a single nurse with a son. He also hired the first woman and the first Black person to be vice presidents in the department.Flip Wilson, left, and Richard Pryor in 1973 on “The Flip Wilson Show,” which Mr. Schlosser had helped develop.Paul W. Bailey/NBCU Photo Bank, via Getty ImagesMr. Schlosser particularly championed “Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In,” a fast-paced satirical series that made its debut in early 1968. It was considered outrageous then for the political and risqué humor of its skits, performed by a cast of future stars including Goldie Hawn and Lily Tomlin.George Schlatter, the executive producer of “Laugh-In,” recalled that Mr. Schlosser had protected him from those within NBC who found the show’s content offensive.“Every Tuesday morning there was a parade into his office — censors, lawyers, bookkeepers,” Mr. Schlatter said by phone. “They’d say, ‘Herb, talk to him.’ Then he’d say to me, ‘I promised them I’d talk to you.’ And he’d say, ‘Just keep doing what you’re doing.’”Herbert Samuel Schlosser was born on April 21, 1926, in Atlantic City, N.J. His father, Abraham, owned a furniture store; his mother, Anna (Olesker) Schlosser, was a homemaker.After serving stateside in the Navy, he studied public and international affairs at Princeton University, graduating in 1949. Two years later, he graduated from Yale Law School.He started as a lawyer with a Wall Street firm, but the insurance work there bored him, and he moved to Phillips Nizer Benjamin Krim & Ballon (now called Phillips Nizer LLP), a Manhattan firm with many film and television clients. That experience led to his hiring around 1957 as general counsel of California National Productions, a film, merchandising and syndication subsidiary of NBC. He later became its chief operating officer before moving to NBC’s business affairs department in 1960.Johnny Carson in his first appearance as host of “The Tonight Show,” on Oct. 1, 1962. Mr. Schlosser had led the negotiations that brought him to NBC from ABC.NBCU Photo Bank, via Getty ImagesAs a lawyer with the department, he led the talks to bring Carson to NBC to replace Jack Paar as the host of “Tonight” in 1962. At the time, Carson was with ABC as M.C. of the game show “Who Do You Trust?,” and ABC required him to fulfill the last six months of his contract.Mr. Schlosser said he had agreed to pay Mr. Carson $2,500 a week (about $21,000 today). But when ABC held up his departure, one of Mr. Carson’s agents made a further demand.“He said, ‘Now that you can’t get him, we want more money,’” Mr. Schlosser recalled in the Television Academy interview. “I said, ‘We’re sticking with our price.’”Mr. Schlosser rose steadily at NBC. He was named executive vice president of the television network in 1972; promoted to president a year later; and named president of the National Broadcasting Company, the network’s corporate parent, in 1974 and chief executive in 1977.“He supported quality programs and had an idea that news was probably the most important thing the networks did,” Bud Rukeyser, a former executive vice president of corporate communications for NBC, said in a phone interview. “He gave news the benefit of the doubt. If news wanted a half-hour to do something, the answer was always yes.”But Mr. Schlosser was ousted in 1978 and replaced by Fred Silverman, who had engineered ABC’s rise to first place in prime-time ratings as its chief of programming.Mr. Schlosser’s standing had been hurt by NBC’s inability to produce a new prime-time hit series the previous season and climb out of third place.Shortly before Mr. Schlosser left NBC, the network presented “Holocaust,” a four-part mini-series that he had greenlighted. It won eight Emmy Awards. His main contribution to the project, he said, was persuading the executive producer, Herbert Brodkin, to change the title of the series, which had been called “The Family Weiss,” after some of its main characters.Mr. Schlosser and his wife, Judith, in 2011 at an event held by the Museum of the Moving Image at the Manhattan restaurant Cipriani. Mr. Schlosser was the museum’s first chairman. Hiroko Masuike/The New York TimesMr. Schlosser didn’t have to go far for his next job: He was named an executive vice president of RCA, NBC’s parent company. His assignment was to develop software for RCA’s SelectaVision videodisc project. Three years later, he was named to run all of RCA’s entertainment activities, which also included RCA Records (but not NBC).He left in 1985 to become a senior adviser at Wertheim & Company, a Wall Street investment bank, as well as chairman of the planned Museum of the Moving Image, which opened in Queens in 1988. He remained there as either chairman or co-chairman until 2013.In addition to his wife, Judith (Gassner) Schlosser, Mr. Schlosser is survived by his son, Eric, the author of “Fast Food Nation”; a daughter, Lynn Jacobson, a former television executive; five grandchildren; and six great-grandchildren.Mr. Schlosser once recalled his certainty that “Saturday Night Live” could be a part of NBC for a long time, just as “Tonight” and “Today” were. Another model of late-night success at NBC under his watch was “The Midnight Special,” a series featuring pop and rock performers, that was broadcast on Fridays after “The Tonight Show” from 1973 until 1981.“NBC had this tradition of succeeding with shows like that,” he told the Television Academy. “To me, it was a no-brainer.” More

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      ‘Evangelion’ Director, Hideaki Anno, Explains How He Finally Found His Ending

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      Hideaki Anno is concluding the story of Shinji Ikari and company in a film due on Amazon this month but says, “There might come a time when I meet them again.”Finally.Hideaki Anno’s “Evangelion: 3.0 + 1.0: Thrice Upon a Time,” which begins streaming on Amazon Prime on Aug. 13, is the film that anime fans have awaited for 25 years. The fourth and final theatrical feature in the “rebuild” of his landmark 1995-96 television series, “Neon Genesis Evangelion,” brings the epic adventure to a definitive conclusion.A compelling, complex work that mixes mecha battles with apocalyptic Christian symbols, Jewish mysticism and teenage angst, “Evangelion” (pronounced eh-van-GEH-lee-on, with a hard G) ranks among the most widely discussed TV series in anime history. Its influence is extensive and includes Japanese animated fantasies and Guillermo del Toro’s 2013 sci-fi adventure “Pacific Rim.” And fans continue to debate its significance, subtext and details.“My influence on other creators isn’t something I think about when I’m working on a film,” Anno told me in an interview. “I decide what to make based on what I’m best suited for and what interests me most at the time. The ‘Evangelion’ project repeatedly came up, so I made the new theatrical movies. I don’t think that kind of opportunity will occur again.”In the series, which takes place in the not-too-distant future, humanity is locked in a mortal struggle with bizarre, staggeringly powerful creatures known as Angels. The only effective weapons against them are the Evangelions or Evas, gigantic cyborgs guided by psychic teenagers. The hero is Shinji Ikari, an alienated 14-year-old who is drafted by his brutal father to pilot the Eva 01.“Evangelion: 3.0 + 1.0: Thrice Upon a Time” concludes the saga begun in 1995.Hideaki Anno/Khara, via Amazon Prime VideoDespite its popularity, “Evangelion” never had a satisfactory ending. The original series failed to resolve the intricate plot, with its theological and ontological overtones. Shortly before “Evangelion” aired, Anno wrote that he had created it after four years of severe depression when he was “a wreck, unable to do anything” and that “the story has not yet ended in my mind.”“I don’t know what will become of Shinji or (the other characters), or where they will go,” he wrote.Anno was clearly not satisfied, as he continued to look for a conclusion, recutting the last episodes and reworking them in the feature “Death & Rebirth” (1997) and again in the second 1997 feature “The End of Evangelion.”In 2002, Anno announced plans for a four-feature “rebuild,” a reimagining of the story, unconstrained by the financial and technological limits he had originally faced. “Evangelion: 1.0 You Are (Not) Alone” (2007) was a flamboyant retelling of the first six television episodes. “Evangelion: 2.0 You Can (Not) Advance” (2009) and “Evangelion: 3.0 You Can (Not) Redo” (2012) took the characters and story in completely new directions. Nine years later, “Thrice Upon a Time” brings the saga to a surprisingly upbeat conclusion.Speaking from Tokyo via Zoom and a translator, Anno said, “For the rebuild series, I intended the first ‘Evangelion’ movie to be similar to the TV series, the second would gradually change the story, and third and fourth would be totally different. From the first, I didn’t intend to do the same thing as the TV series.”“My influence on other creators isn’t something I think about when I’m working on a film,” Anno said.Hideaki Anno/Khara, via Amazon Prime VideoThese four films showcase Anno’s skill at using new computer-graphic technology to create more powerful iterations of his original visions. In the TV series, when troops attacked the Angel Ramiel, it destroyed the humans and their weapons in a series of unremarkable explosions; in “You Are (Not) Alone,” the audience can almost feel the heat when the Angel reduces the tanks and missiles to glowing slag.In the rebuild, Anno also delves deeper into the fragile psyche of his flawed, traumatized hero and the eccentric personalities around him. When Anno described his approach to the characters, he spoke with an intensity that crossed linguistic boundaries.“In animation, nothing is real. But I wanted to bring more of a sense of reality into this made-up world — I wanted to make the characters more human,” he explained. “There’s a gap between what people say in real life and what they truly mean. In animation, unless the characters are intentionally lying, they always say what they mean. I wanted to reverse that: When the characters in ‘Evangelion’ speak, they don’t necessarily say what they mean. I wanted to add this human behavior to animation.”“People feel Shinji is an unusual hero,” he continued. “I think that’s due to the sense of reality I brought, drawing on my experience and knowledge. But Shinji and the other characters are not just a reflection of me; they include elements of the personalities of all the artists on the creative team.”The hero, Shinji Ikari, in the television production.Khara/Project Eva“Neon Genesis Evangelion” is among the most influential anime series ever.Khara/Project EvaThe original “Evangelion” was a huge hit that helped reverse a slump in the Japanese animation industry: When the final episode was broadcast in March 1996, more than 10 percent of all televisions in Japan were tuned to it. “Evangelion” remains popular, with hundreds of millions of dollars in sales of videos and related merchandise. The newer features continued that success: “Thrice Upon a Time” opened in Japan on March 3 and played for more than 135 days in theaters there, earning more than 10.22 billion yen (about $93 million) — despite the pandemic.Reflecting on that continued popularity, Anno said, “As a creator, I want to make things that are entertaining but have depth. I didn’t want our show to be some escape-from-reality type of entertainment, I wanted people who watched it to feel encouragement to live their own lives.”Anno is shifting to live action for his next project. In April, the Toei Company announced he would direct “Shin Kamen Rider,” part of the 50th anniversary celebration of that popular superhero franchise. It’s planned for release in March 2023.When asked how it felt to bid farewell to “Evangelion” after more than 25 years, Anno concluded, “I don’t feel a need to see Shinji and the other characters any time soon. But that doesn’t mean I don’t want to see them ever again: There might come a time when I meet them again.” More

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      With the Golden Globes Tarnished, the Group Behind Them Adapts

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      The Hollywood Foreign Press Association revised its bylaws to expand its leadership, diversify its membership and ban gifts.Following months of criticism that led to the cancellation of next year’s Golden Globe Awards telecast by NBC, the group that hands out the awards, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, announced Thursday that it was instituting a series of reforms.The group, a nonprofit, adopted a new set of bylaws that are aimed at revamping its leadership, increasing and diversifying its membership and stabilizing it to ensure the future of the lucrative awards program.The association, a relatively small group of roughly 85 journalists who vote on the Golden Globes, has long been scrutinized over questions about its ethics, finances and journalistic credentials. But this year, following a Los Angeles Times investigation, a lawsuit and a growing outcry from the movie and television industries, NBC canceled the 2022awards telecast, making swift changes necessary for the organization’s survival.The group said Thursday that the membership vote in favor of the new bylaws was quite a bit higher than the two thirds required.The rules call for expanding the group’s board of directors to include people from outside the organization. The association will also bring on a new chief executive as well as heads of finance, human resources and a chief diversity officer.The reforms also cleared away several of the barriers to membership the group had long had in place. For years, critics said that the association’s membership application process was opaque, biased and generally meant to keep most people out. But the association said it would now allow any journalist who would like to join to apply, and that new members will be selected by a credentials committee that will be comprised mainly of nonmembers.All existing members — some of whom have had their journalistic credentials questioned over the years — will need to reapply to remain, the organization said. All members will be required to sign a new code of conduct, and will not be allowed to accept promotional materials or gifts from people associated with movies and television programs.“Three months ago, we made a promise to commit to transformational change and with this vote we kept the last and most significant promise in reimagining the H.F.P.A. and our role in the industry,” Ali Sar, the group’s current board president, said in a statement. “All of these promised reforms can serve as industry benchmarks and allow us to once again partner meaningfully with Hollywood moving forward.”Over the last several months, the association has gotten input on how it should change from various stakeholders, and the reforms announced on Thursday did not include some of the bolder proposals put forth, such as creating a spinoff, for-profit Golden Globes company.It also did not set specific targets for enlarging its membership or diversifying its ranks, though officials have said they aim to increase membership by at least 50 percent. (The group has come under fire for one particular finding of The Los Angeles Times report: That although the group has more than 80 members, none of them are Black.)Some of the association’s most important business partners reacted positively to the changes that were announced.In a statement, NBC said it was “encouraged by the passage of the amended bylaws” and called it “a positive step forward” that “signals the H.F.P.A.’s willingness to do the work necessary for meaningful change.”The statement did not discuss the status of a 2023 Golden Globes telecast.Dick Clark Productions, the decades-long producer of the Golden Globes, similarly said it applauded the adoption of the new bylaws, calling the policy revisions “important” and expressing optimism about next steps.“We look forward to seeing continued urgency, dedication and positive change,” the production company said, “in order to create a more diverse, equitable, inclusive and transparent future.”Brooks Barnes contributed reporting. More

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      Stream These 12 Titles Before They Expire in August

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      Netflix in the United States is losing dozens of titles this month. These are the best among them.There’s a little something for everyone in this month’s selection of titles leaving Netflix in the United States, including indie dramedies, family features and crime pictures, as well as the best of the recent James Bond flicks. Check out these 12 titles before they disappear. (Dates reflect the final day a title is available.)‘Nightcrawler’ (Aug. 9)The screenwriter Dan Gilroy made his directorial debut with this disturbing 2014 thriller. Inspired by the work of Weegee, the influential photographer of New York City street scenes of the 1940s, Gilroy penned the story of a contemporary news videographer (played to chilling perfection by Jake Gyllenhaal) whose pursuit of grisly crime scene footage takes him into morally dubious territory. Rene Russo is in top form as a news director who doesn’t quite realize how dangerous her employee is, while Gyllenhaal does some of his finest acting, unnervingly personifying the slippery slope from ambitious go-getter to out-and-out sociopath.Stream it here.‘Safety Not Guaranteed’ (Aug. 12)Before they were tapped to reboot the “Jurassic Park” franchise, the director Colin Trevorrow and the screenwriter Derek Connolly crafted a much smaller-scale fusion of science fiction and human drama. Aubrey Plaza stars as a young journalism intern who responds to a classified listing for a time-traveling partner, figuring the delusional man behind the ad (Mark Duplass) could make for an entertaining profile. But her cynicism slowly dissolves in the face of his earnestness — and her observations of the strange activities that are fueling his paranoia. The filmmakers find just the right tonal mixture of character comedy, low-rent sci-fi and genuine warmth, while Plaza and Duplass create unexpectedly convincing chemistry.Stream it here.Michael Keaton as the fast-food entrepreneur Ray Kroc in “The Founder.”The Weinstein Company‘The Founder’ (Aug. 20)Michael Keaton is phenomenal in this biographical portrait of the McDonald’s mastermind Ray Kroc, using his trademark quicksilver wit and endless charisma at the service of a character who is slowly and counterintuitively revealed to be a bit of a snake. His Kroc is a rather desperate hustler, envisioning himself as a Horatio Alger protagonist just one step away from his big break, which he finally finds in the efficient, assembly-line burger stand of brothers Maurice and Richard McDonald (John Carroll Lynch and Nick Offerman, both excellent). But his dreams for the chain are bigger than its creators’, a bump in the typical rise-to-success narrative, which creates fascinating and fruitful thematic tension.Stream it here.‘Casino Royale’ (Aug. 30)The James Bond franchise had hit a bumpy stretch in the mid-2000s, as audiences turned away from the increasingly silly shenanigans of adventures like “Die Another Day” for the grittier superspy stylings of the “Bourne” movies. So the Bond producers brought back the director Martin Campbell — who had previously rescued the series from obsolescence with the 1995 jump-start “Goldeneye” — to reboot Bond with an origin story. Daniel Craig made his first appearance in the role, complementing the character’s signature debonair charisma and offhand wit with genuine danger and darkness, while Eva Green impresses as the woman who made Bond do what he seldom would again: fall in love.Stream it here.‘Stranger Than Fiction’ (Aug. 30)Will Ferrell revealed he was capable of more than dumb-guy slapstick with his leading role in this clever comedy-drama from the director Marc Forster (“Monster’s Ball”). Emma Thompson stars as a superstar novelist who finds herself struggling to complete her latest tome; it seems her protagonist (played with naïve, wistful charm by Ferrell) has, somehow, become aware of his fictional status and of the death his creator has planned for him. It’s an ingenious premise, but it’s no mere intellectual exercise. The screenwriter Zach Helm explores the rich emotional implications of the scenario, forging an unlikely but affecting relationship between Ferrell and a marvelous Maggie Gyllenhaal.Stream it here.‘Chinatown’ (Aug. 31)The neo-noir films of the 1970s, and particularly the era’s plethora of private eye movies, took advantage of the temperature of the times; in a decade where distrust of authority and institutions was at an all-time high, it’s not surprising the unshakable moral ethos of the dedicated detective were again in vogue. Few films reanimated the golden age of noir as expertly as Roman Polanski’s 1974 best picture nominee, which also took full advantage of the shifts in tolerance of adult subject matter to include the kinds of plot twists earlier films could only hint at. That tension, coupled with the beauty of John A. Alonzo’s cinematography and the stellar performances of Jack Nicholson, Faye Dunaway and John Huston, resulted in one of the finest films of the decade.Stream it here.Reese Witherspoon in “Election.”Paramount Pictures‘Election’ (Aug. 31)Reese Witherspoon turned what could have been a one-dimensional caricature into one of the most iconic performances of her era in this whip-smart satire of small-town life, political ambition and middle-age malaise from the co-writer and director Alexander Payne (“Sideways”). Witherspoon stars as Tracy Flick, a zealous high school student whose election to class president seems a foregone conclusion until the student government supervisor (Matthew Broderick) decides the front-runner could use a little competition. Broderick’s casting is a masterstroke, allowing the viewer to reimagine Ferris Bueller as a feckless school administrator, while Payne and his co-writer, Jim Taylor (adapting the novel by Tom Perrotta), nimbly weave a tale that plays both as small-scale drama and big-picture allegory.Stream it here.‘The Girl Next Door’ (Aug. 31)The brief, “American Pie”-prompted return of the teen sex comedy was coming to an end by the time this entry from Luke Greenfield hit theaters, to middling box office and missed reviews, in 2004. But it found an enthusiastic audience on home video and streaming services, drawn less to its ludicrous plot — in which a high school senior falls for his sexy new neighbor only to discover she’s hiding from a past in adult films — than to the genuine sweetness at its center. Elisha Cuthbert and Emile Hirsch convey a bond that goes beyond mere physical chemistry; their characters seem genuinely to like and care about each other, and the strength of that bond gives the film an unexpected emotional spine.Stream it here.‘Hot Rod’ (Aug. 31)The Lonely Island comedy trio — composed of Andy Samberg, Akiva Schaffer and Jorma Taccone — made the leap from viral videos to the big screen with this 2007 comedy. Samberg stars as Rod Kimble, who fancies himself as the second coming of Evel Knievel but is closer to the victims on “America’s Funniest Home Videos”; the movie chronicles his attempts to become a big-deal daredevil, primarily as a means of taunting his toxic stepfather (a game Ian McShane). The semi-surrealist approach of the Lonely Islanders puts this one a cut above the typical dimwitted ’00s comedy, as does the supporting cast, which also includes Sissy Spacek, Isla Fisher, Danny McBride and Bill Hader.Stream it here.‘Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events’ (Aug. 31)Over the course of three seasons, Netflix turned Daniel Handler’s series of children’s novels into one of their most entertaining series, a blackly comic tale of villainy and perseverance. But the Snicket novels had been adapted once before, in this 2004 film from the director Brad Silberling (“Casper”), with Jim Carrey as the dastardly Count Olaf. Neither version detracts from the other; the film and the series work in concert, creating a similarly stylized world with a correspondingly delicious sense of dark humor.Stream it here.Miss Piggy and Kermit in the 2011 film “The Muppets.”Scott Garfield/Walt Disney Pictures‘The Muppets’ (Aug. 31)The Muppet movie franchise was in a pretty sorry state when it was brought back to joyful life in this 2011 feature from the director James Bobin and the screenwriters Jason Segel and Nicholas Stoller (who got the gig when their previous film, the decidedly adult-oriented romantic comedy “Forgetting Sarah Marshall,” included an uproarious puppet musical sequence). Segel also stars as a likable small-town guy whose visit to Hollywood with his fiancé (Amy Adams) and decidedly Muppet-like little brother results in an emergency reunion of the long-disbanded “Muppet Show” gang. Bobin, Segel and Stoller put together all the right pieces — winking humor, catchy tunes, a parade of cheerful guest stars — to create the best Muppet movie in decades.Stream it here.‘Road to Perdition’ (Aug. 31)Tom Hanks found a rare opportunity to explore his darker side in this 2002 adaptation of the graphic novel by Max Allan Collins (itself inspired by the classic manga “Lone Wolf and Cub”). Hanks stars as Michael Sullivan Sr., a Depression-era enforcer for the Irish Mob who must flee his Illinois home with his 12-year-old son when he crosses the erratic son (Daniel Craig) of his longtime boss and father figure (an Oscar-nominated Paul Newman, in one of his final roles). The director Sam Mendes re-teams with his “American Beauty” cinematographer Conrad L. Hall to create a picture that’s both gorgeous and melancholy, pushing past the surface pleasures of its period genre setting with timeless themes of family, morality and mortality.Stream it here.Also leaving: “The Big Lebowski,” “The Departed,” “Nacho Libre,” “The Manchurian Candidate (2004),” “The Social Network,” “Superbad,” “The Time Traveler’s Wife,” (all Aug. 31). More

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      In 'Hit & Run,' the 'Fauda' Creators Move the Action to New York

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      Avi Issacharoff and Lior Raz, who created that Israeli hit, are back with “Hit & Run,” a new geopolitical thriller that swoops from Tel Aviv to the back alleys of New York City.One afternoon in 2015, shortly after their gripping terrorism drama“Fauda” debuted in Israel, Avi Issacharoff and Lior Raz met for lunch in Tel Aviv. More

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      Paris Hilton Launches New Netflix Cooking Show

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      “Cooking With Paris,” on Netflix, is just the latest in a food TV genre starring celebrities who lack professional kitchen experience, and even revel in it.In a twinkling black dress with feathery sleeves and high heels, Paris Hilton is in the kitchen making a steak dinner with her mother and sister. Before they arrive, she digs a spoon into a tin of caviar and gives a bite to her dog. Flakes of 23-karat gold stick on her fingers as she adds it to homemade truffle butter. More