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LOS ANGELES — It’s the law of the Hollywood jungle. The biggest cats win.It was only last year that Jason Kilar, a digital media executive, was named the chief executive of WarnerMedia, a division of AT&T that includes HBO, Warner Bros. and CNN. In particular, AT&T wanted Mr. Kilar to turn an upstart streaming service, HBO Max, into a Netflix-style powerhouse. More
A merger could be announced as soon as Monday, in a deal that would offload the media business that AT&T fought to buy.Less than three years after AT&T spent over $85 billion and millions more fending off a government challenge to buy Time Warner, one of the biggest prizes in media, the phone company has decided on a completely different strategy. More
Other highlights include a new show by Kristina Wong, Joshua Harmon’s “Bad Jews” and “Broadway by the Year.”“It is about access.” That, put plainly, is the main reason the Young Vic in London will continue to livestream shows even after in-person theater resumes. “Access is our driver,” Kwame Kwei-Armah, the theater’s artistic director, said in a recent interview. “And this is a way that we make that access just a little more here and now.”As Broadway and theaters around the United States prepare to return to live performances, there are still many questions around issues of ticket price, fairness and programming. Streaming is likely to remain part of those discussions since, as you can see in the selections below, it is more varied and, well, accessible than ever.‘Miscast21’Since 2001, the annual “Miscast” benefit for MCC Theater has created an alternate universe in which gender roles are not so much erased as gleefully subverted, with performers taking on numbers they would be unlikely to land in typical productions. This year will see the return of Gavin Creel and Aaron Tveit for another power duet after their take on “Take Me or Leave Me,” from “Rent,” became an instant classic five years ago. Other participants include Kelly Marie Tran, Annaleigh Ashford, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Cheyenne Jackson (welcome back!), LaChanze, Idina Menzel, Kelli O’Hara and Billy Porter. May 16-20; mcctheater.org.TheatertreffenWhat is mainstream theater to German eyes can be completely wild to American ones. So this annual event should blow a few minds. Like the Golden Mask Festival in Russia, Theatertreffen showcases exciting shows from diverse companies. This year’s productions — online, with subtitles — include revisited classics and new works, both livestreamed and on demand. Dive in. May 13-24; berlinerfestspiele.de/enKristina Wong in “Kristina Wong, Sweatshop Overlord.”via New York Theater Workshop‘Kristina Wong, Sweatshop Overlord’The writer and performer Kristina Wong continues to use her own experiences to interrogate politics and civics with this follow-up to “Kristina Wong for Public Office” last year. In that monologue, Wong talked about her stint on the Wilshire Center Koreatown Neighborhood Council in Los Angeles. Now, she turns her attention to how she enrolled family and friends to make face coverings during the pandemic. May 14-16; nytw.org.Brian Bedford as Lady Bracknell in “The Importance of being Earnest” on Broadway.Sara Krulwich/The New York Times‘The Importance of Being Earnest’When Brian Bedford took on the role of Lady Bracknell in 2011, Charles Isherwood wrote in The New York Times that the formidable character had “perhaps never been more imperious, more indomitable — or more delectably entertaining.” Now L.A. Theater Works is making the Roundabout Theater Company’s revival of Oscar Wilde’s best play available again. The ace supporting cast includes a rising Santino Fontana as Algernon Moncrieff. Through May 31; theatermania.stream.If one gender-reversed Lady Bracknell just isn’t enough, check out the L.A. Theater Works audio production starring Charles Busch. latw.org.Michael Zegen, left, and Tracee Chimo in “Bad Jews” Off Broadway in 2013.Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesThis Jewish American LifeThe excellent Play-PerView series is rolling out a reading of Joshua Harmon’s lacerating “Bad Jews” with the original cast members Tracee Chimo Pallero, Philip Ettinger and Michael Zegen. Harmon went on to bigger things, including “Significant Other” on Broadway, but this show is arguably his sharpest — or at least his funniest — and was propelled by Chimo’s etched-in-acid portrayal of venomous self-righteousness. May 15-19; play-perview.com. Happily, Chimo also turns up in the Spotlight on Plays reading of Wendy Wasserstein’s “The Sisters Rosensweig” as Pfeni, the youngest of the title siblings (a role originated by Frances McDormand in the Off Broadway premiere, in 1992). There’s more: Lisa Edelstein will read Sara (Jane Alexander way back when) and Kathryn Hahn will be Gorgeous (once the great Madeline Kahn). May 20-24; stellartickets.com.Jassa Ahluwalia, left, and Sophie Melville in a rehearsal for “Herding Cats.”Danny Kaan‘Herding Cats’This livestreamed version of Lucinda Coxon’s twist-filled dark comedy about a pair of roommates will star Jassa Ahluwalia (“Unforgotten”) and Sophie Melville in Britain, with Greg Germann (“Grey’s Anatomy”) joining from the United States. Coxon is a fine writer, of the play “Happy Now?” and the film adaptation of “The Danish Girl,” and this trans-Atlantic setup should make for an interesting experiment. May 19-22; stellartickets.com.The cast of the opera adaptation of Lynn Nottage’s “Intimate Apparel,” whose premiere was delayed by the pandemic.Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesBackstage StoriesLet’s face it: Behind-the-scenes shenanigans are often more fun than what’s onstage. In the virtual benefit “Tales from the Wings: A Lincoln Center Theater Celebration,” stars including Patti LuPone, Audra McDonald, Rosemary Harris, Paulo Szot and Ruthie Ann Miles will share what we hope will be juicy anecdotes, interspersed with footage from some classic productions as well as teasers for two shows that were postponed by the pandemic: the musical “Flying Over Sunset,” from James Lapine, Tom Kitt and Michael Korie; and Ricky Ian Gordon and Lynn Nottage’s operatic adaptation of her play “Intimate Apparel.” May 13-17; lct.org.In Britain, “For One Knight Only” gets an encore airing after its premiere in November. Kenneth Branagh hosts Judi Dench, Derek Jacobi, Ian McKellen and Maggie Smith as they reminisce about their incredibly long careers — imagine a highbrow installment of the “Red” film series, except with stars firing off bons mots rather than guns. May 21-30; www.stream.theatre/season/116.‘Crave’In the United States, it’s hard to fathom how wildly popular the playwright Sarah Kane is on European stages: Her uncompromisingly bleak “Crave” hits a raw nerve and responds to a malaise that is often hard to pinpoint. Now, the Chichester Festival Theater in England is again making available its acclaimed production of this “throat punch of a play,” from November. May 19-29; cft.org.uk.‘Grey Matters’The company Colt Coeur may be small, but it has an impressive track record unearthing intriguing shows, so we’re ready to gamble on this play about an interracial marriage in 1970s and ’80s Brooklyn, by Eden Marryshow. Steve H. Broadnax III, of Katori Hall’s “The Hot Wing King” and the coming “Thoughts of a Colored Man” on Broadway, directs. May 22-26; coltcoeur.org.‘Broadway by the Year’As this cabaret series’ name suggests, it usually focuses on musicals that opened in a given year, but this spring the attention is shifting to songwriters. Start off with “The Kander & Ebb Years” (through May 12), in which Beth Leavel, Ute Lemper and Tony Yazbeck tackle material from “Chicago” and “Cabaret,” but also “Flora, the Red Menace.” Next, Max von Essen, Liz Callaway and Ethan Slater help celebrate everybody’s favorite pandemic hero with “The Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber Years” (May 24-26). So, “Love Never Dies”: yea or nay? thetownhall.org. More
Ms. Kitaen gained fame for her carefree spirit and sultry dancing in music videos for bands like Whitesnake and Ratt and her role in the movie “Bachelor Party.”Tawny Kitaen, an actress who gained fame in the 1980s for her roles in rock music videos and who starred with Tom Hanks in the movie “Bachelor Party,” died on Friday at her home in Newport Beach, Calif. She was 59.Ms. Kitaen’s death was confirmed by a daughter, Wynter Finley, who said the cause was not known.Ms. Kitaen became a mainstay on MTV in the 1980s when the network was at its peak cultural influence with music videos playing all day.With her flowing red hair and acrobatic moves, Ms. Kitaen appeared in videos for bands like Whitesnake and Ratt, coming across as both sultry and playful. She famously danced on the hood of a white Jaguar in the Whitesnake music video “Here I Go Again” and graced the cover of Ratt’s 1984 album, “Out of the Cellar.”Julie Kitaen was born on Aug. 5, 1961, in San Diego. She studied ballet and gymnastics until she was 15. After appearing in a Jack LaLanne commercial, and in television shows and movies, she gained wider exposure as Mr. Hanks’s fiancée in the 1984 comedy “Bachelor Party.”But it was her appearance in music videos that solidified her image in Generation X’s imagination as a free-spirited beauty having the time of her life.She once described working with Paula Abdul on the set of one video.Ms. Abdul, then a choreographer, asked her what she could do. Ms. Kitaen said she showed Ms. Abdul some of her moves. Ms. Abdul then turned to the director, Marty Callner, and said, “She’s got this and doesn’t need me.” She then left, Ms. Kitaen said.“That was the greatest compliment,” she said. “So I got on the cars and Marty would say, ‘Action,’ and I’d do whatever I felt like doing.”She married the Whitesnake frontman David Coverdale in 1989 and the couple divorced two years later. In 1997, she married Chuck Finley, a major-league baseball pitcher. They had two daughters, Wynter and Raine. The couple divorced in 2002.Later, Ms. Kitaen appeared on reality shows and spoke openly about her struggles with addiction to cocaine and painkillers.In a 2010 interview with The Daily Pilot, she described her volunteer work at a shelter for women who had left abusive relationships and said she herself was a survivor of domestic violence. Ms. Kitaen said that after her divorce from Mr. Finley, she became involved with a man who was physically and verbally abusive.“You don’t want to tell anybody because you feel like a complete fool for staying — you protect them,” she said. “You do everything you can so other people don’t find out that he’s abusing you.”Michael Goldberg, Ms. Kitaen’s agent, said in recent years she appeared on various podcasts and radio shows and relished talking about her time as a figure in rock history.“People still love to hear those stories because the rock ’n’ roll lifestyle is something we all fantasize about, isn’t it?” he said. “And she lived it. And had so much to say about it.”Ms. Kitaen is survived by her two daughters and a brother and a sister. More
“Satyagraha,” one of the Metropolitan Opera’s greatest stagings of the 21st century, has been released on DVD and CD.For decades, Philip Glass fans have internalized a lesson: If you want to see his operas, plan to buy tickets and attend in person. Don’t expect the stagings to show up on DVD in a year or two, as most prominent productions do these days.Glass has long carefully husbanded the rights to his work. And since founding his own record label, Orange Mountain Music, in 2001, he has been selective regarding releases of some of his operas.This has been particularly glaring when it comes to his trilogy of what became known as “portrait” operas, the stage works of the 1970s and ’80s which made his reputation in the genre. Each is focused on the life of a consequential man of history: “Einstein on the Beach” is an abstract account of that scientist and the development of nuclear technology; “Satyagraha” dramatizes Gandhi’s early activism in South Africa; “Akhnaten” contemplates the Egyptian pharaoh who pioneered monotheism.Glass in 1984, the year “Akhnaten,” the follow-up to “Satyagraha” in his trilogy of “portrait” operas, premiered in Germany.Beatriz Schiller/The LIFE Images Collection, via Getty ImagesA globe-trotting revival of Robert Wilson’s definitive original production of “Einstein” was released on video in 2016, a full 40 years after the work’s premiere. But while “Satyagraha” and “Akhnaten” have received acclaimed recent productions at the Metropolitan Opera, and have been transmitted to movie theaters worldwide through the Met’s Live in HD series, they have been missing on DVD.That is now changing, thanks to a deal struck between the Met, Orange Mountain Music and Dunvagen, Glass’s publishing company. Late in April, the Met released, for the first time, its 2011 “Satyagraha” staging, directed by Phelim McDermott, designed by Julian Crouch, first seen in New York in 2008 and quickly assessed to be one of the Met’s triumphs of the past 25 years.Scenes from the Metropolitan Opera’s production, which is newly available on video.“Satyagraha” is available on DVD and is also downloadable on Apple TV. The audio is available on CD, as well as through streaming services and digital-purchase storefronts. The Met and Dunvagen confirmed in emails that the deal also includes the release of “Akhnaten” across a similar range of formats next month.“Satyagraha,” which premiered in 1980 and was the middle child of Glass’s portrait trilogy, is where the composer began to write for more traditional operatic orchestral forces, and for unamplified voices. He left behind the fully non-narrative approach of “Einstein on the Beach” (1976), while maintaining that work’s stylized pageantry.The scenes of “Satyagraha” depict recognizable events in Gandhi’s life, but instead of a biopic-style libretto, the Sanskrit text is made up of selections from the Bhagavad Gita, which Glass said he imagined Gandhi pondering during his time in South Africa. In the first scene, for example, the text’s discourse on the morality of conflict is reflected, dreamscape-like, in the opera’s action, as Gandhi confronts his fears regarding direct political action. The use of the Bhagavad Gita throughout keeps the opera enigmatic and poetic, endowing Gandhi’s evolution from lawyer to activist with epic grandeur.“Satyagraha,” which premiered in 1980, is where its composer began to write for more traditional operatic orchestral forces, and for unamplified voices.Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesThe Met’s “Satyagraha” realizes the work in a way that Achim Freyer’s 1981 staging in Stuttgart, Germany — long out of print on DVD — never really did. (Among other things, Freyer’s punk couture designs were never quite right for this opera, and have aged poorly.)In McDermott’s production for the Met, the images are dazzling throughout, with surreal, giant figures conjured out of newsprint in a gesture at Indian Opinion, the newspaper Gandhi founded. At the opera’s climax, the influence of Gandhi’s nonviolent protest on the work of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is rendered explicit with slow-motion, hushed profundity.Given the work’s stylization and the many repetitions of the text, the Sanskrit doesn’t need to be followed word by word to understand its implications. McDermott’s production selectively projected English translations onto the set, and the new DVD captures those projections well enough to do without full subtitling.Until now, the only available audio release of “Satyagraha” was a CBS Masterworks recording from 1985, which features synthesizers very prominently in the mix alongside the New York City Opera’s orchestra and chorus.That energetic recording and others from Glass’s CBS years did a lot to popularize his music. But is the nervy, aggressive, computer-age precision of the synthesizer on the CBS recording the best way to evoke Gandhi’s gradual organization of mass protests at the end of the second act? If you’re playing the music as background, perhaps it doesn’t matter. But if you’re tuned into the drama, the autopilot momentum of synths seems out of place in a story about such concerted effort and up-and-down struggle. The conductor Dante Anzolini, along with the Met’s orchestra and chorus and the tenor Richard Croft as Gandhi, create a more affecting groundswell (including a subtler use of synthesizer) over the same minutes.Through his career, Glass has emphasized adaptation — and the validity of multiple perspectives on his catalog. Creating a one-and-only approach has rarely been the goal. In his 2015 memoir, “Words Without Music,” he wrote, “This is what I know about new operas: The only safeguard for the composer is to have several productions.”If a work can survive its first decade, he adds, “we might begin to form an idea of the quality and stature of the work in its third or fourth production.” This was and remains a sadly rare phenomenon. The opera world loves its premieres; less so, its third or fourth productions of a contemporary piece.But Glass’s fame, and the quality of both “Satyagraha” and “Akhnaten,” have allowed them to be explored again and again over the past four decades. This means that there will, inevitably, be interpretations that are stronger than others. This newly released “Satyagraha” is not just one of the best Met productions of the 21st century. It also immediately takes its place among the essential releases in the storied career of an instantly recognizable voice in contemporary music. More
SpongeBob, “Star Trek” and the Super Bowl have attracted new subscribers to ViacomCBS’s streaming platforms. More
#styln-signup .styln-signup-wrapper { max-width: calc(100% – 40px); width: 600px; margin: 20px auto; padding-bottom: 20px; border-bottom: 1px solid #e2e2e2; } If you want a clear picture of the state of the media industry in upheaval, Comcast offers a good snapshot. The company, which includes NBC, Universal Pictures, several theme parks, and the Peacock streaming service, beat […] More
The charge was related to a “Sabrina the Teenage Witch” tape that had been rented from a video store in Norman, Okla. Prosecutors dismissed the case on Wednesday.They once dotted shopping plazas in America with ubiquity, beckoning binge watchers with shelves of VHS cassettes, microwave popcorn and boxes of candy — and a reminder to “Be Kind, Rewind.”Video rental stores, pushed closer to the brink of extinction by streaming services like Netflix and changing technology, may be a thing of the past but an overdue rental became an issue of the present for a Texas woman.The woman, who was identified in court records as Caron Scarborough Davis, recently learned that there was a 21-year-old outstanding warrant for her arrest in Oklahoma.Her offense?Prosecutors said that Ms. Davis had failed to return a copy of “Sabrina the Teenage Witch,” a television sitcom that aired from 1996 to 2003. She rented the tape of episodes from a video store in Norman, Okla., in 1999, according to court documents.Court papers valued the unreturned tape of “Sabrina the Teenage Witch” episodes at $58.59.Randy Holmes/Walt Disney Television, via Getty ImagesShe was charged with embezzlement of rented property, and a warrant was issued for her arrest in March 2000. The store where she rented the tape, Movie Place, closed in 2008, according to KOKH Fox 25 in Oklahoma.In a charging document, prosecutors said that Ms. Davis “did willfully, unlawfully and feloniously embezzle a certain One (1) Videocassette Tape, Sabrina the Teenage Witch of the value of $58.59.”Ms. Davis, 52, discovered the outstanding warrant for her arrest after she got married and tried to change her name on her driver’s license, KOKH reported on Thursday.“I thought I was going to have a heart attack,” she said.Ms. Davis said motor vehicle officials referred her to the district attorney’s office for Cleveland County, Okla., where a woman explained the charge against her.“She told me it was over the VHS tape and I had to make her repeat it because I thought, ‘This is insane,’” Ms. Davis said. “This girl is kidding me, right? She wasn’t kidding.”Ms. Davis could not be immediately reached on Sunday.On April 21, prosecutors dropped the embezzlement charge against Ms. Davis in consideration of the “best interest of justice,” according to court documents. KOKH Fox 25 had contacted prosecutors the previous day about the charge.Greg Mashburn, the district attorney for Cleveland, Garvin and McClain Counties in Oklahoma, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Sunday, nor did Tim D. Kuykendall, who was the district attorney when the warrant was issued.Sandi Harding, the general manager of the world’s last Blockbuster video store, in Bend, Ore., said in an interview on Sunday that bringing criminal charges for an unreturned movie seemed overly punitive.“We’ve definitely not sent out a warrant for anybody for that,” she said. “That’s a little a bit crazy to me.”Blockbuster assesses daily late fees of 49 to 99 cents for overdue videos up to 10 days. After that, the store charges customers up to $19.99 to replace one of its DVDs or Blu-ray discs, Ms. Harding said.In some cases, the store, which does not rent VHS cassettes, will refer past-due accounts for collection, she said.“We would never charge someone $100 for a copy of ‘Scooby-Doo’ that they never returned,” she said.It was not immediately clear who owned the now-shuttered video store where Ms. Davis rented the tape or whether she owed any late fees. She told KOKH Fox 25 that she had no recollection of renting the video, saying that she lived with a man at the time who had two young daughters.“I’m thinking he went and got it and didn’t take it back or something,” she said. “I have never watched that show in my entire life — just not my cup of tea.” More
