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June 16, 2021

DRAMA ACTOR ROUNDTABLE J O H N B OY E GA J O N AT H A N M A J O R S J O S H O ’ CO N N O R R E G É -J E A N PAG E CHRIS ROCK

Clockwise from top left: Rock, Boyega, Majors, Page and O’Connor

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“Even when I got Star Wars, my family didn’t know what that is. They’re from Nigeria. I like the fact that when they’re on the red carpet, they get cold and they’re like, ‘John, I want to go inside.’ ”

“Advice for my younger self? ‘Just keep going, bro. Don’t change a thing.’ ”

“I feel very lucky to have these [men on the Roundtable] and everyone else to pick up the pieces when I’m having a mild breakdown.”

“My family doesn’t want to be overwhelmed by my backside … but they’ll take it on this occasion because everyone seems to be terribly happy.”

“I used to be a very funny guy on the set — I ’d have the whole set rolling, but I’ve gotten the memo: ‘Shut the fuck up and go to your trailer.’ ”

R O U N D TA B L E D R A M A A C T O R R O U N D TA B L E D R A M A A C T O R R O U N D TA B L E D R A M A A C T O R R O U N D TA B L E

D R A M A A C T O R R O U N D TA B L E D R A M A A C T O R R O U N D TA B L E D R A M A A C T O R

R O U N D TA B L E D R A M A A C T O R R O U N D TA B L E D R A M A A C T O R R O U N D TA B L E D R A M A A C T O R R O U N D TA B L E

D R A M A A C T O R R O U N D TA B L E D R A M A A C T O R R O U N D TA B L E D R A M A A C T O R

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Issue No. 23, June 16, 2021

FEATURES 46 ‘Now There Isn’t That Elephant in the Room’ John Boyega, Jonathan Majors, Josh O’Connor, Regé-Jean Page and Chris Rock talk the impact of speaking out in Hollywood, family reactions to sexy roles and how on-set support goes a long way: “Your fellow actors will give you more jobs than your reps.”

54 ‘I Hope It’s Not a Fad’ As Dee Rees becomes the first African American woman to have a Criterion release, the press-shy director talks about staying off social media, her hope that the Black filmmaking resurgence is more than a trend and the joy of breaking new ground: “Maybe I shouldn’t have been first, but it doesn’t diminish the pride I feel.”

58 Exploring the Power, Perks and Pitfalls of Chosen Family Many of this year’s top dramas focus on the relationships that characters form beyond those they’re born into, revealing how found connections can help people rebuild lives after trauma.

“I keep myself honest by imagining the rest of the audience is my family, and so I owe them balance in that experience,” says Bridgerton star Regé-Jean Page. He was photographed remotely May 8 in Belfast, Northern Ireland.

Photographed here and for the cover by Austin Hargrave

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Issue No. 23, June 16, 2021

42

30 31

THE REPORT 19

Why Has Streaming Growth Slowed?

As Disney and Netflix miss Wall Street subscriber expectations, the Hollywood giants are betting that more original programming in the second half of the year will keep them from stalling in 2021.

24 Meet the Warner-Discovery Merger’s Finance Chief Top David Zaslav lieutenant Gunnar Wiedenfels (motto: “Cash never lies”) will be the exec looking to find where $3 billion in cost savings will come from.

26 What Jean Smart’s So-Called Comeback Says About Comedy With a starring vehicle in HBO Max sitcom Hacks and a scene-stealing supporting turn in HBO’s Mare of Easttown, the actress is enjoying a “Jeanaissance.”

How L.A. Will Celebrate Juneteenth As many entertainment companies plan a day off for the holiday, special events will take place across the city.

30 Person of Interest: Yvonne Strahovski The Handmaid’s Tale star makes the leap to sci-fi action hero in Amazon’s The Tomorrow War.

REVIEWS 60 Physical

THE BUSINESS

Rose Byrne is typically excellent as an ’80s housewife turned aerobics star, but the Apple TV+ comedy around her is surprisingly sour and unfocused.

36 Creative Space: Kevin Hart and Bryan Smiley Multihyphenate Hart is kicking into even higher gear with his production company and a new Obama-backed feature.

38 Is a Famous Face a Form of Intellectual Property?

61

Kevin Can F**k Himself

BACKLOT

A Philadelphia news anchor’s fight with digital giants who hosted an unauthorized image of her in ads has caught the attention of SAG-AFTRA.

STYLE 42 Pixar’s Luca Offers a Taste of Seaside Italy

ABOUT TOWN

44 Where Hollywood Is Traveling: ‘Places That Have Previously Brought a Lot of Happiness’

Director Enrico Casarosa portrays the Italian Riviera through animated fountains, pesto, Vespas and sea monsters, set in a fictional village inspired by Liguria’s famed Cinque Terre area.

63 The World’s 25 Best Drama Schools From L.A. to London, the next generation of screen and stage talent is learning the craft at these institutions.

66 ‘Fashion Is Just Another Way to Tell a Story’ Drag Race winner Symone found his voice on the runway.

68 ‘An Act of Therapy for the Public’ Three years after Anthony Bourdain’s suicide, Morgan Neville explores a life cut short.

Kevin Hart and Bryan Smiley photographed by Adam Amengual

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30 “I’ve really fought for the opportunities that come about where I’m not pigeonholed,” says actress Yvonne Strahovski.

36 “I just figured out ways to create on my own and to pitch on my own. I can do that shit in my sleep,” says Kevin Hart (left). He and Bryan Smiley were photographed April 19 at HartBeat headquarters in Burbank.

42 A castle that dates to 1050, the Hotel Castello di Reschio in the Umbrian hills of Italy has been reimagined as a hotel.

ON THE COVER Austin Hargrave remotely photographed Regé-Jean Page on May 8 in Belfast, Northern Ireland; Josh O’Connor on May 15 in London; John Boyega on May 16 in New Orleans; Jonathan Majors on May 16 in Los Angeles; and Chris Rock on May 16 in New Jersey.

HOTEL: PHILIP VILE/COURTESY OF HOTEL CASTELLO DI RESCHIO. STRAHOVSKI: MEG YOUNG.

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The Re ort

↑ Television

‘Iced Out’ Why The Bachelor cut ties with Chris Harrison p. 22

Mergers

‘Cash Never Lies’

Behind the Headlines

The finance chief behind Warner-Discovery p. 24

Heat Index

HARRISON: PAUL ARCHULETA/GETTY IMAGES. MIDDLETON: HANNAH HALL. RAKE: PARAS GRIFFIN/GETTY IMAGES FOR SCAD ATVFEST 2019. BABY: PRINCE WILLIAMS/WIREIMAGE. NICCOL: CINDY ORD/GETTY IMAGES. NEUMANN: COURTESY OF NETFLIX.

Briana Middleton As Disney+’s Beauty and the Beast limited series (the prequel to the 2017 film) gets a green light, the actress has been cast to star alongside Josh Gad and Luke Evans.

Jeff Rake After a steep ratings dive for season three, NBC cancels the showrunner’s missingplane mystery thriller Manifest as producers look to shop the series.

NETFLIX, DISNEY+’S STREAMING SLOWDOWN:

‘Growth Just Got a Little Wobbly’ Amid reopenings, the same signs that are making movie theater owners optimistic for this summer are spelling concern for digital executives as major platforms miss subscriber expectations Lil Baby/Lil Durk The artists’ collaboration Voice of the Heroes hits No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with 197 million-plus on-demand streams of the album’s 18 tracks, per MRC Data.

Andrew Niccol After backlash, the writerdirector’s drama on the 2019 Christchurch, New Zealand, mosque shootings loses its lead producer, who says events are “too raw for film at this time.”

Showbiz Stocks

$57.34 (+1.7%) COMCAST (CMCSA) With the Tokyo Olympics appearing to be a go, the owner of NBCUniversal saw its stock fortunes rise. $22.10 (-5.5%) CINEMARK (CNK) While fellow movie theater owner AMC benefits from meme stock status, its rival is waiting for theatrical to return closer to a prepandemic normal.

A

BY ALEX WEPRIN

funny thing happened in the first half of 2021: The insatiable appetite of consumers for streaming video content began to slow down. “We had those 10 years where we were growing smooth as silk, and then it just got a little wobbly,” said Netflix co-CEO Reed Hastings in an April 20 video for the company’s first-quarter earnings after the company missed its own modest subscriber estimates.

And it wasn’t just Netflix.

Disney+ also missed Wall Street expectations, delivering 103.6 million subscribers at the end of the last quarter, well below the 110 million that had been anticipated. Given the explosive growth of Disney+, and the reliable, steady growth of Netflix, the misses drew consternation from analysts and executives, who posited three pandemic-driven theories for the slowdown: the

subscriber pull-forward, the content squeeze and the reopening.

The pull-forward suggests that while the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated streaming trends — to the benefit of Netflix and Disney+ in 2020 — it is now coming back to bite them. Consumers who may have been on the fence about subscribing were enticed to buy in as lockdowns were put in place last year. “It really boils down to COVID, Neumann frankly,” said Netflix CFO Spencer Neumann in the company’s earnings video. “We had this huge pull-forward in 2020 in terms of our subscriber additions, nearly 40 million paid net adds in 2020.” That left a smaller pool of potential customers this year.

With the content squeeze, the industry faced its own version of the chip shortage that is hurting the auto industry, or the lumber shortage that jacked up the price

of home renovations and film and TV set materials. But instead of a physical commodity in short supply, it was new programming.

“A lot of the projects we had hoped to come out earlier did get pushed because of the postproduction delays and the COVID delays in production,” Hastings said.

Executives are betting that fresh, original, must-see content will be their ticket back to reliable subscriber growth. And with production back in full swing, there is an expectation that the latter half of the year could mark a return of something closer to normal, with a “clear catalyst to a reacceleration of growth toward that backend of the year,” said Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos.

“Content has been sort of stymied in the supply chain because of the shutdown of production,” said Disney CEO Bob Chapek at a JPMorgan conference May 24.

“Now that we’re pretty much up to

Illustration by Læmeur

June 8-15

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The Report Momentum Slows for Streaming Giants Behind the Headlines

While outpacing many competitors, Netflix (207 million-plus global subscribers) and Disney+ (103 million-plus) have seen their growth rates level off after an in-home viewing boom in 2020 during the pandemic Netflix

Disney+

HBO Max and HBO*

200M Netflix added only 3.98 million subscribers globally during Q1 of 2021, below its 6 million forecast.

“With 95 million Disney+ net adds in its first five quarters, momentum was bound to decelerate,” Wells Fargo analyst Steven Cahall noted in a report May 14.

150M 100M 50M Q4 2019

Q1 2020

Q2 2020

Q3 2020

Q4 2020

Q1 2021

Source: Company filings. *Includes linear subscribers

Eric John, vp of the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s Media Center. “If you talk to the folks at Hulu, they would tell you that growth has always continued to be in the ad-supported, less expensive tier.”

Indeed, the goal is, in the words of WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar, to Duran be “economically indifferent” as to which tier consumers buy. According to Disney’s second quarter financial report, thanks to advertising, the average Hulu subscriber brought in just over $12 per month in revenue, despite most subscribers paying for the $5.99 ad-supported tier.

There is also another strategy being adopted to drive subscriber

Global Box Office

growth: international expansion.

The problem: Streaming services are learning that the markets that juice subscriber counts don’t deliver the revenue that the U.S. and Europe do. This month HBO Max launched in some 39 territories across Latin America.

The price? Three dollars to $6 per month. “If we want to reach the 100 million households, the first thing we have to do is to ask how much these homes can pay,” said HBO Max Latin America GM Luis Duran at a launch event that was streamed.

WarnerMedia took its lead from Netflix and Disney+, which have added tens of millions of international subscribers by offering less expensive plans around the world.

But that growth comes at a price. In its last quarterly

earnings report, Disney noted that the ARPU for Disney+ fell by 30 percent, because the price for Disney+ Hotstar in India and Southeast Asia “is significantly lower” than in other markets.

Netflix, too, reports that its revenue per user in the Asia-Pacific and Latin America regions is about 30 percent lower than in North America and Europe.

The second half of 2021 feels like it could mark a decisive moment in the streaming wars as everyone fights for subscribers.

“This is a foot race right now for who builds the kind of scale on the new generation of distribution of media,” AT&T CEO John Stankey said at a Discovery Inc. employee town hall May 19. “I don’t think this window is open for very long.”

Last weekend had competition roaring back at the marquee as theaters in multiple territories reopened

TITLE

Global Weekend

Domestic Weekend

Domestic Cume

% Drop

No. of Theaters*

Int’l Weekend

Int’l Cume

No. of Territories

Global Cume

1 The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It WARNER BROS.

$33.6M

$10.3M

$44.1M

-57%

3,237

$23.3M

$68.1M

45

$112.2M

2 A Quiet Place Part II PARAMOUNT

$28M

$12M

$109.4M

-38%

3,515

$16M

$75.8M

37

$185.2M

3 Cruella DISNEY

$24.3M

$6.7M

$56M

-39%

3,307

$17.6M

$73.3M

40

$129.3M

$20.8M

$10.1M

$10.1M

—

3,346

$10.7M

$57.9M

22

$68M

$11.7M

$11.5M

$11.5M

—

3,456

$200K

$200K

8

$11.7M

4 Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway SONY The animated sequel opened 80 percent behind the first film’s $50 million opening. One bright spot is the U.K., where the Sony release has hit nearly $20 million even though cinemas there reopened only several weeks ago.

5 In the Heights WARNER BROS. The musical genre has never boasted huge openings, but Jon M. Chu’s adaptation of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Broadway play was a major disappointment in its big-screen launch. Worse, it was beat by A Quiet Place Part II in the horror flick’s third week, an upset no one saw coming.

Source: Comscore; estimates in $ millions. *Out of 5,500 theaters that were operational in North America pre-pandemic

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DURAN: COURTESY OF HBO. RABBIT: COURTESY OF SONY PICTURES. HEIGHTS: COURTESY OF WARNER BROS.

full production, we expect to have full content flow by FY2022 or FY2023, when we’re really in the kind of cadence that we want to have going forward.”

Multiple streaming services are also trying to chart a path to growth with strategies that may deliver raw subscriber numbers in the near term, but risk delivering lower average revenue per user (ARPU). Paramount+ and HBO Max are betting that less expensive ad-supported tiers can bring in subscribers that may be feeling the pinch of having too many premium video options. HBO Max With Ads launched June 4 at $9.99 per month, a $5 discount.

Paramount+, meanwhile, lowered the price of its ad-backed tier by $1 to $4.99 per month.

“Ad-supported streaming is now foundational,” says Andre Swanston, CEO of the Trans Union-owned streaming data and measurement firm Tru Optik. “I think it was almost a business imperative. My biggest surprise is that Netflix still hasn’t pivoted to do the same.”

“It goes to the heart of the value exchange question,” adds

Hulu

© Viacom International Inc.

The Report Behind the Headlines

O

n March 4, nearly a month after taking an unplanned hiatus from The Bachelor, Chris Harrison returned to TV to say that he wasn’t going anywhere. “I plan to be back and I want to be back,” the host of 19 years told Good Morning America co-anchor Michael Strahan. He said he had been seeking counsel from the community he hurt after an interview in which he excused racially offensive behavior from contestant Rachael Kirkconnell on the then-airing historic season of The Bachelor, centered on the franchise’s first Black male lead, Matt James. Given that Kirkconnell was a frontrunner, Harrison seemingly was sent out by the network to do damage control over the contestant’s attending of a 2018 racist sorority party, but it backfired — as did his redemption effort.

Though the pre-taped interview aired on what would seem to be a friendly space — both GMA and The Bachelor air on ABC — it got a cool response from Strahan, who told the audience moments after it aired: “His apology is his apology, but it felt like I got nothing more than a surface response.

Only time will tell if there is any meaning behind his words.” The produced nature of the sit-down that Strahan publicly objected to was an approach seemingly designed to protect Harrison.

The GMA host was unhappy with the substance of the interview, sources tell THR. “That GMA interview was the nail in the coffin” for Harrison’s return, adds a source close to the production.

At the time, Harrison was talking about his comeback with bosses ABC and Warner Horizon, which produces and distributes the Mike Fleiss-created franchise.

While there had been no public support for Harrison from the network or the show’s producers, the decision-makers were privately telling the face of their franchise they wanted him back and that he should remain patient, adds a show insider.

But the wheels of change were already in motion. On

How Chris Harrison Was ‘Iced Out’ of The Bachelor The longtime host sparked a firestorm when he excused a contestant’s racially offensive behavior, but he was on track to return until a ‘nail in the coffin’ GMA interview

BY JACKIE STRAUSE AND ASHLEY CULLINS

March 12, franchise stars Tayshia Adams and Kaitlyn Bristowe were announced as Harrison’s replacements on season 17 of The Bachelorette, starring Katie Thurston. Days later, the Gershrepped Harrison retained Bryan Freedman, the power attorney who had secured a sizable exit package for Gabrielle Union amid her dispute with NBC. “Chris Freedman hired Bryan when he realized they didn’t have his back,” says a show insider. “They kept saying, ‘You’re our guy and we’re going to protect you,’ but they never said a word to defend him after one messy interview in 19 years.” Harrison, Warner Horizon and ABC declined to comment.

Sources say that in the days leading up to the Bachelorette premiere, leaks in the press about Harrison’s negotiations and replacement hosts for summer spinoff Bachelor in Paradise signaled that the rift between the star host and producers became untenable. “Both sides had the intention of Chris returning, and he was putting in the work in order to make that happen.

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And then it suddenly took a turn. He was iced out,” this show insider says. Harrison instead walked away with a settlement — Deadline reported on June 9 it was a “mid-range eight-figure payoff,” but a source says that number is inflated, although the actual amount was still sizable.

Jeremiah Reynolds, an entertainment litigator who represented Sharon Osbourne in her exit from CBS’ The Talk, suspects that ABC and Warners opted to buy Harrison out, likely on the condition of signing a nondisparagement agreement, instead of fighting the public backlash.

“Networks and studios tend to be particularly sensitive and susceptible to social media criticism,” he says. “Unless a particular host drives a lot of ratings and value to the show, the safer course for them oftentimes is to part ways.”

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Harrison’s exit marks a new turn for the franchise after Disney-owned ABC had unveiled a set of inclusion standards in the fall of 2020. The goals, which came after major backlash against the Bachelor franchise over its diversity woes, are meant to hold accountable programs from Disney TV as well as thirdparty studios. Replacing Harrison with Bristowe and Adams was also a less expensive solution for producers. Though they were labeled as “co-hosts” onscreen, the duo are credited as “special guests.” Their negotiated rate, per an insider, is a far cry from Harrison’s millions per year.

Adams and Bristowe said they took on a larger role than expected in the season, which was filmed in a bubble in New Mexico, and were involved in creative conversations on The Bachelorette.

“We didn’t know what our roles were going to be and how much involvement we were going to have. But since day one, they said, ‘You’re a part of this,’ ” Adams told THR. The pair accounted for 7.6 percent of airtime during the two-hour premiere, per featured screen time tracker Instagram account @BachelorData, topping Harrison’s recent premiere high of 6.7 percent with James. And though the linear night-of ratings on June 7 were down 24 percent from previous seasons (on par with double-digit ratings declines for most series), Thurston’s premiere ended up first among the day’s broadcast shows in the key ad demographic of adults 18-49. Still, ABC and Warners are said to be taking a wait-and-seeapproach about whether they will bring the duo back for the 18th season of The Bachelorette with star Michelle Young.

Kaitlyn Bristowe (left) and Tayshia Adams (center) replaced Chris Harrison on The Bachelorette season 17, starring Katie Thurston (right).

J U N E 16, 2021

HARRISON, BACHELOR: ABC/CRAIG SJODIN. MONEY: ADOBE STOCK. FREEDMAN: COURTESY OF SUBJECT.

Ex-Bachelor host Chris Harrison, who will receive a sizable payout, wrote June 8: “While my two-decade journey is wrapping up, the friendships I’ve made will last a lifetime.”

F O R YO U R C O N S I D E RAT I O N

“PICTURESQUE” T H E N EW YOR K T I M E S

“TRAILBLAZING” GLAMOUR

“TIMELY AND TENDER” NPR

The Report Behind the Headlines

data-driven, analytical approach to find the best answer and use that as your North Star.”

At Discovery, “we call him the Renaissance CFO,” says chief corporate operating officer David Leavy, highlighting that the exec has an “aggressiveness to create value that aligns well with Zas” and that “he runs a tight ship but is also willing to invest and take swings where we see the opportunities.”

One of Wiedenfels’ mantras is that “cash never lies.” (Zaslav regularly touts Discovery as a “free cash flow machine.”) In 2017, Discovery reported $1.5 billion in free cash flow and Scripps reported $800 million. In 2019, before the pandemic entered the picture, the combined firm reached $3.1 billion.

Wiedenfels says the figure could have gone higher, but management decided to invest to “set ourselves up for future growth, because the bottom line of an individual year or As AT&T plans to spin off its film and TV assets, Discovery CFO quarter doesn’t matter relative to the longerGunnar Wiedenfels (motto: ‘cash never lies’) will look to make the numbers work: term value creation. That’s a theme that “You can’t just come in with your spreadsheet and say, ‘This is what we want to do’ ” also plays a role in our current transaction

BY GEORG SZALAI with WarnerMedia.”

Discovery has targeted $3 billion in cost Indeed, Wiedenfels has forecast annual n the summer of 2016, Gunnar Wiedenfels synergies after two years and plans to reearnings before interest, taxes, depreciation first met his future employer, Discovery invest savings into streaming content to and amortization of about $14 billion for the CEO David Zaslav, at the restaurant of power HBO Max and Discovery+ as they comnew Warner Bros. Discovery and “free cash flow the Ritz-Carlton on Central Park South in pete with Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon Prime. conversion of around 60 percent, which should Manhattan. After seven-plus years at German Wiedenfels described the synergies target as place us at or near the top of the industry.” That TV giant ProSiebenSat.1 — where he ended up “very achievable and conservative” during a implies free cash flow of about $8.4 billion, leading the finance division — he landed the June 8 investor conference and adds, “It’s very which Wiedenfels notes is key because it “will CFO role at Discovery, moving from Munich important to keep delivering on promises to support both rapid debt paydown as well as the to New York to start his new job in April 2017. build trust.” requisite direct-to-consumer investments and (Last fall, Discovery extended Wiedenfels’ The task may be steep. “Discovery has increased content spend.” contract through at least April 1, 2024.) proved in the context of Scripps that they Wiedenfels worked as a management Within months, the new finance chief can execute on an acquisiconsultant and engagement proved his dealmaking mettle, working with tion,” Morgan Stanley analyst manager at the global consulZaslav and other Discovery execs to seal the SNAPSHOT tancy firm McKinsey & Co. $14.6 billion acquisition of Scripps Networks Benjamin Swinburne says, but Then, at ProSieben, he was Interactive. After that sale closed in 2018, notes: “Turner is a much bigger NAME Gunnar Wiedenfels “extremely good at taking Wiedenfels’ team ended up company and more complex — TITLE CFO, Discovery unnecessary costs out of a reaching what the company says you have CNN and a significant 2020 FINANCIALS Company system” but also understood were more than $1 billion in cost amount of sports, so it is a difnet income of $1.2 billion on revenue of $10.7 billion “what makes creatives tick,” synergies — exceeding the initial ferent challenge. But they are OTHER ROLES Chairman of says former CEO Thomas $350 million target — via job all in the same business, while Zaslav the audit committee on the cuts, real estate consolidation, in the case of HBO and Warner, Ebeling. At the German TV supervisory board of German software giant SAP more efficient marketing spending and more. you are really in a whole difcompany, Ebeling recalls that HOBBIES Enjoys beekeeping Now the 43-year-old exec is expected to be ferent sandbox. Those pieces Wiedenfels launched a content (“The individual is just one the financial brain who can make the numare very different from the management system with part of a larger organism,” he explains) and flying his small bers and the broader changes work on another Scripps exercise.” incentives for managers to use plane, a 1966 V-tail Bonanza megamerger: The combination of AT&T’s With Warners focused a variety of available programWarnerMedia, including HBO, Warner Bros. mainly on scripted and ming “that struck a good and the Turner networks, and Discovery to Discovery on unscripted, there’s little overlap balance between financial requirements and create a broader content giant with an implied in the creative and content areas. So anaaudience share needs.” His takeaway: “He is an equity value of $100 billion. “I love challenging lysts expect cost and job cuts to come from excellent co-pilot for the CEO.” the status quo,” Wiedenfels tells THR, notthe corporate side and selling, general and Adds former Scripps chairman and CEO ing that media companies must constantly administrative expenses. “You can’t just come Kenneth Lowe, who now sits on Discovery’s reevaluate the way they do business in the in with your spreadsheet and say, ‘This is what board: Wiedenfels “is whip-smart and more digital age. “Most things in the status quo are we want to do,’ ” explains Wiedenfels. “But you than a numbers guy. He is focused on deliverprobably not optimal,” he says. want to at least start with a very rational and ing real transformation.”

Meet the Exec Targeting $3 Billion in Savings From the Warner-Discovery Merger

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WIEDENFELS: CHRISTOPHER GOODNEY/BLOOMBERG VIA GETTY IMAGES. ZASLAV: MONICA SCHIPPER/GETTY IMAGES FOR DISCOVERY, INC.

I

ONE OF THE BEST CONTEMPORARY PRESTIGE DRAMAS”

“RIVETING” “CAPTIVATING”

REMINISCENT OF THE BEST CRIME FICTION”

PHENOMENAL” “PROVOCATIVE” “THRILLING

ONE OF THE BEST SHOWS ON TV”

“IDRIS DELIVER[S] AN ELECTRIFIED PERFORMANCE”

EMMYS 2021

The Report | THE RACE

WHAT JEAN SMART’S SO-CALLED COMEBACK SAYS ABOUT COMEDY With a starring vehicle in HBO Max’s Hacks and a scene-stealing supporting turn in HBO’s Mare of Easttown, the actress is enjoying a ‘Jeanaissance’ — but, as her Hacks showrunner writes, it’s Hollywood, not the comedy doyenne, who’s finally catching up BY PAUL W. DOWNS

I

t’s been called the Jeanaissance. It’s also been called the Smartaissance.

Whatever you call it, the term has taken hold. When I first heard it, I wasn’t sure how to feel. Does “Smartaissance’’ suggest a rebirth of Jean Smart’s career? Because that seems insane. Jean has been working consistently for 35 years! Or is it, as in the revived interest in classical antiquity of the Renaissance, a revived interest in Jean Smart?

See that, too, feels hard to believe. Especially since, for me, Jean Smart has always been the Paul W. Downs created, showruns (with Lucia Aniello and Jen Statsky) and stars in Hacks.

highlight of whatever she’s in.

From Frasier to Fargo, I always want more Jean Smart. (I mean, The Brady Bunch Movie, anyone?!).

But speaking of the Renaissance, the artists that personify the period — Michelangelo, Botticelli, Leonardo da Vinci, et cetera — are all men. Not that there weren’t equally talented women making art. They were, too … but were busy being relegated to the margins. And that’s my guest column in ARTnews.

Actually, it’s already been written. In 1974, art historian Linda Nochlin asked in her article of the same name, “Why have there been no great woman artists?”

The answer, unsurprisingly, was systemic. She examines, among other things, the notion that greatness is equated with manliness. This idea that the arts, comedy among them, are historically less welcoming to those not born white and male, is a central theme of Hacks. Nearly six years ago, my co-creators Lucia Aniello and Jen Statsky and I were discussing the many incredible female comedians who never got

T H E HOL LY WO OD R EP ORT ER

their due in the way their male contemporaries did. And out of that discussion, Hacks was born — a show about two women of different generations both cast aside and relegated to the Las Vegas desert. We wanted to explore how society so easily dismisses women while celebrating mediocre white men. (Full disclosure: I myself am a mediocre white man.)

So we created Deborah Vance; a larger-than-life comedy diva and Vegas institution — exploring her life offstage and, specifically, the pain and loneliness that made her who she is. We wanted to make something grounded and real that, like life, was both funny and emotional. So when it came time to cast the part, we needed an actor who could play those poignant moments but also be funny enough to believably play a comedian and land hard jokes.

In short, we needed an actor with incredible range who could do it all. Oh, and she had to be in her late 60s and preferably not into QAnon. That’s already a pretty short list, sure, but for us, Jean Smart was always at

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the very top of it. Fortunately for us, she said yes.

Jean disappears into the role, and it feels like the part she was born to play. Which is ironic because in many ways, Jean is nothing like Deborah Vance; who, after years of leaning into selfdeprecating humor and telling the same jokes to Vegas tourists, has become hardened and stale.

Jean is the opposite. She’s quick and kind, funny and fresh in ways that most young people aren’t, much less those who have been making comedy for 35 years.

And that’s true even off camera.

After shooting a scene where Ava, the young writer she hires, has a sex dream about her, Jean whipped out a prop cigarette as a bit and walked around the set like a lothario after a conquest.

The next day, when she and her co-star, Hannah Einbinder, got to set, Jean said to her: “Huh. No flowers …”

She’s just liquid-funny. Comedy is supposed to be fleeting, a young person’s game. As you mature, you tend to age out. But Jean has only gotten sharper and funnier at every turn. I can only hope to be like her when I grow up.

It’s been a master class watching Jean bring Deborah Vance to life. She has elevated every scene, brought such depth to each emotional turn and landed every joke — often with the flourish of her character’s now-signature laugh. We’ve all loved Jean in comedies and dramas, but to watch her showcase all she can do at once has been thrilling. I guess that’s the Smartaissance for me: Jean has been so good, for so long, in so many different things — it was really all of us who needed to catch up.

The world was ready to see her in a leading role that allows her to display the full range of her genius. And in that way, Jean Smart is like Deborah Vance — a woman who has worked prolifically but who society could have appreciated even more deeply than we already did. Luckily, we are now. And much like the character she plays, I think Jean’s just getting warmed up.

HACKS: JAKE GILES NETTER/HBO MAX. DOWNS: RACHEL LUNA/FILMMAGIC.

In Hacks, three-time Emmy winner Jean Smart plays a trailblazing comedian who’s been relegated to a decades-long Las Vegas residency.

OUTSTANDING DRAMA SERIES

ALEX RIDER, THE BLACKLIST, THE BOYS, THE CROWN, FOR ALL MANKIND, FOR LIFE, THE GOOD DOCTOR, S.W.A.T.

OUTSTANDING LIMITED OR ANTHOLOGY SERIES COYOTE, THEM

OUTSTANDING TELEVISION MOVIE SALT-N-PEPA

© 2021 Sony Pictures Television Inc. All Rights Reserved.

The Report

7 Days of DEALS Who’s inking on the dotted line this week

TIK TOK ISN’T ‘OU T OF THE WOODS’ Y ET EV EN AS TRUMP BA N IS R EV ERSED

TikTok still faces regulatory review under the new administration.

law professor at the University of Texas at Austin.

ByteDance is engaged in a legal battle with the U.S. government over the divestiture of TikTok’s U.S. assets — a saga that began in 2019, when the Treasury Department’s Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) began investigating ByteDance over its 2017 acquisition of Musical.ly, the precursor to what is now TikTok. Though the sale of TikTok to Oracle and Walmart has stalled after it was unveiled last September, the back-and-forth between ByteDance and the U.S. government is expected to continue in the courts now that TikTok will be subject to separate investigations by CFIUS and the secretary of commerce.

“Until the CFIUS divestment order is resolved in some fashion,” Chesney adds, “the shadow will continue to hang over the company.” — J. CLARA CHAN

Taraji P. Henson

FILM Natalie Portman (CAA, France’s Agence Adequat) and Julianne Moore (WME, Management 360) will star in Todd Haynes’ family drama May December.

Jack Black (WME, Sloane Offer) and Ice Cube (WME, Prospect Park, Ziffren Brittenham) will star in Sony’s Oh Hell No from Bad Trip’s Kitao Sakurai.

U.S. Ad Spending Boom: $259 Billion Forecast in 2021 The economic recovery from the pandemic will lead Big to a record 14 percent gain Deal in global advertising spending this year, to $657 billion, and a 15 percent gain for a new U.S. high of $259 billion, a closely watched ad industry forecast finds.

Research firm Magna projects that this spending boom will be above the record 12.5 percent global gain in 2000, and a significant increase from the firm’s previous forecast of an 8 percent increase this year.

The predicted global ad gain of $78 billion in 2021 follows a decline of 2.5 percent in 2020 amid COVID-19 shutdowns.

The U.S. ad sales gain of $34 billion this year will come as digital ad sales are expected to grow 20 percent. National TV ad sales alone will rise 5 percent to $38 billion, expected to be fueled by the Tokyo Summer Olympics. In 2022, Magna expects

2021 U.S. Ad Sales Forecast Digital (Search, Video, Social) $179B +24% TV, Radio, Cinema, Print $81B +4% $50B

$100B

$150B

$200B

Source: Magna research (June 13); percentages are year-to-year growth forecast.

Kevin Bacon (MGMT, Gaines Solomon) will take on a villain role in Legendary’s Toxic Avenger, joining Peter Dinklage and Taylour Paige.

U.S. growth of 8 percent, to $280 billion.

Globally, digital ad formats will capture most of the growth, with ad sales expected to rise 20 percent to $419 billion, 64 percent of total ad sales. All 70 ad markets tracked by Magna are forecast to grow this year, with expected increases in China (16 percent) and the U.K. (17 percent) being among the largest. Vincent Létang, executive vp global market research at Magna, cited “faster than anticipated” recoveries in China, the U.K. and U.S. for the bullish forecast and added: “The acceleration in ecommerce and digital marketing adoption that started during COVID continues full speed into 2021.” — GEORG SZALAI

Rights Available! Hot new books with Hollywood appeal

John Legend (WME, Friends at Work, Del Shaw) will produce a feature film biopic on late comedian Bernie Mac. Kenji Kamiyama will direct Lord of the Rings anime feature The Lord of the

BY MIA GALUPPO

The Ride of Her Life (PENGUIN RANDOM HOUSE, JUNE 1)

Murder Most Fair (KENSINGTON, SEPTEMBER 2021)

BY Elizabeth Letts AGENCY WME

BY Anna Lee Huber AGENCY Marsal Lyon Literary Agency

In the vein of Wild or Eat Pray Love, the true story follows 63-yearold Maine farmer Annie Wilkins, who, after a doctor tells her she has two years to live, sets off across 1950s America on horseback in a quest to see the Pacific.

Set after World War I, this is the fifth book in a series (all titles available) about a former female spy who travels across England to solve murders while being pursued by a shadowy figure. This installment digs into postwar anti-German sentiment.

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TIKTOK: LIONEL BONAVENTURE/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES. HENSON: GREGG DEGUIRE/FILMMAGIC. BOOK: COURTESY OF PENGUIN RANDOM HOUSE. JAMIL: AMANDA EDWARDS/GETTY IMAGES. HILL: ANDREAS RENTZ/GETTY IMAGES. HOUSE: REALTOR.COM. SIMMONDS: MICHAEL LOCCISANO/GETTY IMAGES. SHEINDLIN: AMANDA EDWARDS/WIREIMAGE.

Deal of the Week

Last August, when President Donald Trump issued an executive order that sought to ban TikTok in the United States, creators worried that the app would disappear overnight. Of course, it didn’t, and continued to thrive. So on June 9, when the Biden administration said it was revoking the order targeting TikTok but also implementing a process to investigate data and privacy concerns with the app — as well as others with ties to “foreign adversaries,” including China — creators weren’t fazed.

TikTok execs “did a great job [last year] to make sure that the creator community understood what was going on and their position, that they were full-steam ahead,” says Brian Mandler, co-founder of agency The Network Effect. Adds Maxwell Mitcheson, vp and head of talent at TalentX, a management firm that works with several of TikTok’s top creators: “It’s kind of been out of sight, out of mind, the idea that TikTok would get banned.”

In September, TikTok’s then-interim CEO, Vanessa Pappas, sought to reassure creators that TikTok, which has more than 100 million users in the U.S., was being built for the “long run” and, in April, the company installed parent company ByteDance’s Shou Zi Chew as its new chief executive to replace Kevin Mayer, who resigned in August.

Yet even with Trump’s order gone, TikTok isn’t “out of the woods” yet, notes Robert Chesney, a

11M

Universal Orlando visitors since the park reopened last June, hitting Big Number 2019 levels despite no international attendance, says CEO Jeff Shell.

Jamil

Hill

James Cameron listed both his Malibu homes in 2020.

Rings: The War of the Rohirrim for New Line and Warner Bros. Animation.

documentary series Catch and Kill: The Podcast Tales, expanding on his bestselling book, for HBO.

HBO Max has renewed Hacks for a second season. … Apple has renewed See for a third season.

Jameela Jamil (UTA, 3 Arts) will play villain Titania in Marvel’s Disney+ series She-Hulk.

Monica Lewinsky (WME, Grubman Shire) and her Alt Ending production company have signed a first-look producing deal with Disney’s 20th TV.

DIGITAL Jonah Hill (WME, LBI, Jackoway Austen) will star in Kenya Barris’ feature directorial debut, a Netflix project that the two will co-write and produce.

Former Bachelor producer Elan Gale (WME, Management 360, Myman Greenspan) is developing HBO Max reality dating series FBoy Island, hosted

by Nikki Glaser.

Jaboukie Young-White (CAA, 3 Arts, Lev Ginsburg) is adapting Vanessa R. Panfil’s book The Gang’s All Queer: The Lives of Gay Gang Members as a series for HBO, with Issa Rae exec producing.

Robin Thede (WME, Ziffren Brittenham) and London Hughes (UTA, the U.K.’s Curtis Brown, Haven, Ziffren Brittenham) will star in a reboot of ’80s comedy Perfect Strangers for HBO Max.

Chris “Ludacris” Bridges (CAA) and Beau Bridges (CAA) have joined Queen Latifah in Netflix thriller End of the Road.

Valerie Bertinelli (Innovative, Fusion, Jackoway Austen) will play Demi Lovato’s mother in NBC comedy Hungry.

Seth MacFarlane (CAA, Joy Fehily, Jackoway Austen) is developing a Ted prequel series for Peacock.

Gerard Butler (CAA, Alan Siegel) and Morena Baccarin (UTA, Seven Summits) will return for a sequel to disaster film Greenland.

Sweet Tooth showrunner Jim Mickle (CAA, Grandview) will direct God Country, Legendary Entertainment’s comic book adaptation.

TELEVISION Taraji P. Henson (M88, Ziffren Brittenham) will star as Miss Hannigan in NBC holiday musical Annie Live.

Ronan Farrow (WME) is executive producing

REAL ESTATE James Cameron sold one of his two side-by-side Malibu estates, a six-bedroom property with guest house, to producer John Linson for $8.2 million.

— COMPILED BY KIRSTEN CHUBA

THR, Esq.

Rep Sheet

Millicent Simmonds, star

CASE Rebel

of A Quiet Place Part II, signed with WME.

Entertainment Partners v. Judge Judy, CBS

Jim Rome, sports radio

WHY IT MATTERS

and broadcast host, signed with ICM.

Judge Judy Sheindlin can’t avoid new claims from an old foe. After settling a 2016 profits fight, Richard Lawrence (an agent who was involved in packaging of the show but didn’t rep the star) sued again. He now wants a cut of the nearly $100 million library sale.

An L.A. judge on June 11 overruled Sheindlin’s demurrer, which argued Lawrence lacked standing to sue.

Anna Diop, star on DC Universe series Titans, signed with M88.

Little Marvin, creator of Amazon drama series Them, signed with WME.

Southern Poverty Law Center, the legal advocacy nonprofit, signed with UTA.

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theatre.utk.edu

clarencebrowntheatre.com

Photo: Ashleigh Stochel, Suzanne Ankrum and Neil Friedman in The Merry Wives of Windsor, 2011; by Kenton Yeager

PERSON OF INTER EST

Yvonne Strahovski The Handmaid’s Tale star makes the leap to sci-fi action hero in Amazon’s The Tomorrow War

By Pamela McClintock

week after sending an audition tape for an American dramedy, Chuck, in 2007, Australia-born actress Yvonne Strahovski received a call saying she’d landed one of the lead roles, a CIA agent, in the pilot.

She booked a round-trip flight to Los Angeles but would never use the return ticket.

“Lo and behold, one thing led to another, and that was that.

Here we are 14 years later,” says Strahovski, 38. Her career can be described as a steady trajectory of success, including The Handmaid’s Tale — season four wraps June 16 — and The Tomorrow War, which marks her first starring role in a big-budget popcorn pic. In the film, out July 2 on Amazon, Strahovski brings Sigourney Weaver-esque nerves of steel to her role (opposite Chris Pratt) as an alien-battling scientist.

Strahovski — who followed Chuck with a turn on Dexter as the titular serial killer’s girlfriend — largely eschews the Hollywood spotlight. “I just love the outdoors and camping,” says the actress, adding that she and her husband and their young son “took some of the best family nature trips that I’ve ever had” during pandemicinduced downtime.

It was her casting on Hulu’s Handmaid’s Tale that garnered the actress her first Emmy nomination (in 2018) for her star turn as the villainous but complicated Serena Joy Waterford, who finds the tables flipped on her in the latest season. “Serena is definitely

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“The past few years have been really important in the industry,” says Yvonne Strahovski.

“Pushing diversity and pushing female stories helps us to tell stories that are more interesting and more representative of us as a people.”

villain-flavored but with a twist,” says Strahovski. “It’s always been interesting to watch June [Elisabeth Moss’ character] and Serena in opposition to each other.

They are two women living in an oppressive society at opposite ends of the spectrum.” And that’s set to continue when Handmaid’s returns for season five.

In building her career, “I’ve really fought for the opportunities that come about where I’m not pigeonholed. I’m thrilled with the sort of scope I’ve been given,” says the actress, who starred last year in the Australian limited series Stateless as a woman unlawfully detained under Australia’s controversial mandatory detention program for all non-citizens without valid visas.

How L.A. Will Celebrate Juneteenth As many entertainment companies plan a day off for the holiday — which marks the end of slavery — special events will take place across the city By Kirsten Chuba

J

STRAHOVSKI: MEG YOUNG. TOMORROW: FRANK MASI/COURTESY OF AMAZON STUDIOS. SERVING: COURTESY OF RESTAURANT (2). BEHARIE: MARCUS INGRAM/GETTY IMAGES. DELILAH: ROBERT MILLER.

Strahovski stars as a scientist fighting aliens in Amazon’s time-travel sci-fi film Tomorrow War.

Growing up, Strahovski made home movies as a tween with her dad’s camera — her parents were Polish immigrants — and starred in high school plays before attending the Theatre Nepean, an actor-training institution at the University of Western Sydney.

The calm, collected actress isn’t worked up over the fact that The Tomorrow War isn’t getting a big-screen release. Paramount and Skydance were set to open the sci-fi epic in theaters last year but had to delay its release because of the COVID-19 pandemic. In the meantime, Amazon Studios picked up the movie in a megadeal valued at $200 million.

“So much has evolved during the pandemic. In a lot of ways, it might actually have more eyeballs on it because people can watch it at home,” she says. “I feel like people are really aching for something of this kind of movie that has such an old-school kind of super action. We’ve been in isolation for the past year, and there’s this cool theme in the film about all of us coming together and standing up for one common goal, which is a really cool parallel between what we’ve been all experiencing in real life.”

uneteenth, the June 19 holiday commemorating the official end of U.S. slavery in 1865, was first acknowledged by many non-Black Americans amid 2020’s racial reckoning, with Hollywood companies moving to formally recognize the date. “Acknowledging the history — and marking the sacrifice of the people who were enslaved — is essential to moving forward in the right way,” says actress Nicole Beharie, who starred in the 2020 film Miss Juneteenth, about a Texas-set beauty pageant. While most states recognize Juneteenth as either an official or ceremonial holiday — California falls into the latter category — Beharie is among those who’d like to see it become an official federal holiday. “It should be nationwide,” she says.

Around L.A., a slew of restaurants and events will mark Juneteenth.

Beharie La Brea Avenue BBQ spot Bludso’s has commemorated the holiday for the past five years, this year once again offering specials on its Texas-style meats and strawberry cake made by owner Kevin Bludso’s mother. “African American culture is probably the least celebrated, and I want our holidays to be recognized just like anybody else’s holidays,” Bludso says. Hollywood vegan soul food spot The V Tree will host an open-mic night and offer traditional items like skillet bread, and L.A. group And Gather for Good

From top: The Serving Spoon in Inglewood, which launched a GoFundMe to stay open during the pandemic; the restaurant’s oxtails plate.

will put on its second annual Pies for Justice event, teaming up with local chefs to sell pies to benefit BLM L.A. and Süprmarkt, a low-cost organic grocery serving low-income communities.

DTLA will host the SoulfulofNoise Juneteenth Concert, while Leimert Park Village will celebrate with a weekend of live music, art and storytelling.

Juneteenth arrives just as California is set to fully lift its pandemic restrictions June 15 after a year that has been particularly hard on Blackowned businesses. Beloved Inglewood eatery The Serving Spoon launched a GoFundMe campaign in December to help stay afloat, raising more than $100,000. Earle’s on Crenshaw also held a GoFundMe so the restaurant could provide accessible meals to its community amid the shutdown, and favorite spots like Roscoe’s and Hawkins House of Burgers have reopened for dine-in.

Today, after surviving the pandemic roller coaster, Serving Spoon co-owner Angela Johnson says, “We are as busy as ever and are looking forward to continuing to provide the good food and customer service that we have been providing for 38 years now.”

NIGHTLIFE SCENE: DELILAH SETS VEGAS DEBUT The satellite of the L.A. nightspot, two years in the making, finds inspiration in clubs of yesteryear like the Cocoanut Grove By Melinda Sheckells

o photos allowed,” says h.wood Group co-founder John Terzian of the guest policy inside the new Las Vegas outpost of L.A. club Delilah, whose fans include Kylie Jenner and Justin Bieber.

Inspired by bygone spots like L.A.’s Cocoanut Grove, the supper club opens July 14 at Wynn Las Vegas on the Strip, where restaurants and clubs returned to full capacity June 1.

Delilah will feature a double art moderne staircase, live band, stage performers, candlelit fireplaces and a secret private dining room accessed via the kitchen. “Have dinner, listen to live music, watch the entertainment — or have a late-night dinner as the DJ comes on,” Terzian says.

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A pair of giant gilded palm tree columns decorate Delilah Las Vegas at the Wynn.

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About Town

Yes, I Did Say That!

Quotes

A look at who’s saying what in entertainment Compiled by Mikey O’Connell

“The data doesn’t lie.”

RIZ AHMED

The actor, in a statement, pushing a recent USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative study, which reveals that more than 90 percent of major films did not include any Muslim characters.

“Having had my own story hijacked for many years, I’m very interested in the voices or perspectives we historically don’t hear from or see.”

MONICA LEWINSKY

The Impeachment: American Crime Story producer, in a statement to THR, announcing her new Alt Ending Productions shingle and a content deal with 20th Television.

JAKE TAPPER

The CNN host, in Los Angeles magazine, on his relationship with ubiquitous Twitter personality Yashar Ali — whose complicated past was exposed in a recent profile.

“Lots of champang-unaaaaahhhh!!!”

“It is the rear end of an era.”

JIMMY KIMMEL

KATORI HALL

The comic, on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, eulogizing E!’s Keeping Up With the Kardashians — which aired its final episode June 10.

The P-Valley showrunner, on Twitter, revealing her plans to celebrate her Pulitzer Prize win for the play The Hot Wing King.

“If anything, that’s just unfair to the people at the food kitchen.”

“Far beyond what we thought we’d see.”

TREVOR NOAH

JEFF SHELL

The Daily Show host, on a June 10 episode, reacting to CNN analyst Jeffrey Toobin’s announcement that he volunteered at food banks, as penance, after being fired by The New Yorker for masturbating while on a Zoom call.

The NBCUniversal CEO, during a June 14 Credit Suisse conference, reflecting on the surprisingly robust post-COVID upfront sales market.

FLASHBACK!

Did I Really Say That?

OCT. 17, 2017

“You, too, can have one of these ugly sweaters.”

TED SARANDOS

The Netflix co-CEO poked fun at the fact that they were selling Stranger Things Christmas gear at Target during an earnings call. On June 10, the company announced a new online store as part of a massive new merchandising push to sell directly to consumers.

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“I couldn’t even comprehend that because of all the rejection I had gotten.”

TIG NOTARO

The comic, on Conan, crediting host Conan O’Brien with her career taking off after he first booked her to perform on his soon-to-end TBS show in 2011.

AHMED: MATT PETIT/A.M.P.A.S. VIA GETTY IMAGES. HALL: NOAM GALAI/GETTY IMAGES FOR “THE ICEMAN COMETH”. SHELL: JEFFREY MAYER/WIREIMAGE. SARANDOS: DIA DIPASUPIL/GETTY IMAGES. NOTARO: JON KOPALOFF/FILMMAGIC.

“It just feels like he’s always been in my life, but I don’t know that I’ve ever met him in person.”

© Viacom International Inc.

Rambling Reporter

By Chris Gardner

Lara Flynn Boyle Rejects ‘Comeback,’ Embraces Age

Skoll. Says Lawrence Bender, producer and board co-chair, “Jaden represents the new generation of environmental warriors who understand climate justice.”

Keke Palmer on Her New Film and Black Pain Shows like Barry Jenkins’ The Underground Railroad and Little Marvin and Lena Waithe’s Them have resurfaced critical examinations on how Black trauma is used to fuel entertainment. It’s something Keke Palmer was aware of last summer when she announced that she would be taking the lead

Lara Flynn Boyle has been visible only in paparazzi shots under Daily Mail headlines using words like “reclusive” or “unrecognizable,” but the actress can now be seen, for the first time in six years, on the big screen. Boyle, 51, stars opposite Bruce Dern in Death in Texas, an indie in which she plays a dying mother with a troubled son. “I was like, ‘Make me look even crappier than I already would,’ ” she says. “It was a commitment to myself to go in with no vanity.” After breaking out in the ’90s with Twin Peaks and playing the villain in 2002’s Men in Black II, Boyle has slowed down but insists this isn’t a comeback: “I never went anywhere.” Boyle, who doesn’t own a computer (“Could not tell you how to google”) is immune to bad headlines: “I’ll take the negative publicity … It’s worth it.” As for the “lovely hurdle” of aging, Boyle intones: “Bette Davis said it best: ‘Old age ain’t no place for sissies.’ ”

Supermarket Censors Cheeky Kim Kardashian Cover The June cover of Los Angeles features an illustratation by artist Justin Metz that re-creates an iconic Coppertone ad, but instead of a toddler in pigtails, it stars a selfie-taking Kim Kardashian with her bikini being tugged by a manicured poodle. The cover line, “The Kardashians’ Last Laugh,” was timed to the series finale of E!’s culture-shifting Keeping Up With the Kardashians. Not everyone is amused by Kim’s bare bottom

“A lot of complaints” from Gelson’s customers about the Kardashian issue led to the cover-up.

Jaden Smith’s Social Action Actor, director, rapper, activist and Louis Vuitton and New Balance brand ambassador Jaden Smith will be honored Oct. 13 by UCLA’s Institute of the Environment and Sustainability.

Smith co-founded Just Water, which uses plant-based packaging and sustainably sourced water and has deployed mobile water filtration systems in largely lower-income minority communities like L.A.’s Watts and in Flint, Michigan. His interest in clean water dates to noticing plastic bottles in the ocean while surfing at age 11. “The climate challenges we face are too big to leave any ideas unexplored,” Smith, 22, tells THR. “Supporting the very bright minds at the school tackling the toughest problems with intellect and action is the true honor for me and my nonprofit 501CTHREE.” Previous honorees include Ted Sarandos, Barbra Streisand, Al Gore and Jeff

“When I read Alice, I felt empowered,” says Keke Palmer of her new film.

role and exec producing Alice for director Krystin Ver Linden and Steel Springs Pictures. The story, “inspired by true events,” follows a woman in 1800s Georgia who escapes slavery, only to discover a shocking reality. “So many films that depict this time are rooted in victimization of the Black female lead,” Palmer said. “This story is the opposite — when I read Alice and filmed it, I felt empowered.”

She adds, “As hard as the history of my ancestors was in this country, I don’t look at it and say, ‘Oh my gosh.’ I say, ‘Wow, look at how far we’ve come.’ ”

Back on the Red Carpet The new Starz series Blindspotting kicked off with an L.A. premiere at Hollywood Forever Cemetery on June 13 featuring stars Jasmine Cephas Jones, Helen Hunt, Jaylen Barron and fatherly support from Ron Cephas Jones. The show, an extension of the 2018 film of the same name, is about “how the prison system affects the families outside — not just the prisoner inside — and through the women’s eyes,” Jasmine, also a producer, said on the COVID-safe red carpet. The event provided food trucks, socially distanced viewing sections and a performance from choreographers Lil Buck and Jon Boogz. Co-creator Daveed Diggs appeared via video from Canada, where he was stuck because of pandemic restrictions; he called the project “the best thing I’ve ever worked on.” — KIRSTEN CHUBA

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Got tips? Email rambling@thr.com

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3

TEXAS: COURTESY OF VERTICAL ENTERTAINMENT. PEAKS: ABC/PHOTOFEST. PALMER: MONICA SCHIPPER/GETTY IMAGES. FARROW: EMMA MCINTYRE /VF19/WIREIMAGE. EILISH: STEVE GRANITZ/WIREIMAGE. BONO: JOHN SHEARER/GETTY IMAGES FOR NARAS. CALDER: MICHAEL KOVAC/GETTY IMAGES FOR STARZ. HUNT: RICH FURY/GETTY IMAGES. JONES: CHRIS DELMAS/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES. POTESTA: MCCOY WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHY. AMEL, LEE: COURTESY OF SUBJECT. YOUNG: RAE DEVITO/COURTESY OF CAA. GUYTON: COURTESY OF EMANUEL HAHN/COMPLIMENTARY COLORS.

Lara Flynn Boyle with James Marshall on Twin Peaks (inset) and in Death in Texas.

— even illustrated, despite much racier images posted on Instagram for her 227 million followers. A source sent Rambling Reporter a photo of a magazine rack at a Gelson’s in L.A.’s Valley Village, where staffers strategically placed cardboard to conceal Kardashian’s derriere. A Gelson’s spokesperson confirmed the butt ban: “After numerous complaints and concerns, [the store’s] response was to cover it up.” Quips LA mag editor-in-chief Maer Roshan: “I can’t help but wonder what it is about Valley Village, in particular, that finds Kim Kardashian so unappetizing?”

About Town

Hitched, Hatched, Hired

Heard Around Hollywood

Inside the industry’s celebrations and news

2

1 Matthew Kugler and Laura Potesta 2 Roxy June Amel 3 John Sacret Young 3

Power Dining Ronan Farrow (above right) and Jon Lovett (left) broke bread at Terroni. … Also having date night there on another evening was Billie Eilish with rumored beau Matthew Tyler Vorce. … Rob Reiner dined at Toscana in Brentwood. … Merois, the buzzy rooftop restaurant at the new Pendry West Hollywood, hosted an al fresco-dining Bono recently. He was later spotted down the coast at Montage Eilish Laguna Beach. … UTA partner Jeremy Barber lunched at the Beverly Hills Hotel’s Fountain Coffee Room counter.

Bono … Megan Fox took a break from making the rounds with boyfriend Machine Gun Kelly to hold court with ICM reps Chuck James and Carol Goll at Sunset Tower. … Bob Chapek and Jerry Seinfeld (separately) enjoyed a meal there as well. — C.G.

1

Weddings

Congrats

Jihan Robinson was

Gary McKay was

Laura Potesta, a

Jordan Helman

publicist at Rogers & Cowan PMK, married Matthew Kugler, a writer and producer at Treefort Media, on June 5 in front of 120 guests in a Los Angeles backyard.

was named head of scripted originals at Hulu on June 8.

tapped to be vp documentary programming for Disney’s new content brand Onyx Collective on June 7.

upped to GM of video game developer BioWare on June 14.

Mike Densmore joined UTA Marketing as head of growth and innovation June 9.

A3 Artists Agency promoted Alexis Elisha Cooper to vp human resources and Ulisses Rivera to director of communications June 11.

Lee

Tia Maggini was

Births Coco Francini, part-

4

1 From left: Keith Calder, Jaylen Barron, Rafael Casal, Margo Hall, Benjamin Earl Turner, Atticus Woodward, Jasmine Cephas Jones, Andrew Chappelle, Jess Wu Calder and Justin Chu Cary.

2 Helen Hunt 3 Star Jasmine’s father, Ron Cephas Jones.

4 The scene at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery.

ner at Dirty Films, and husband Brendan Lee, an assistant director, welcomed son Ronan Francis Lee on Feb. 21.

Writer-producer Arash Amel and wife Emma Amel welcomed daughter Roxy June Amel on May 17 at CedarsSinai Medical Center.

upped to senior vp scripted programming for Lifetime on June 10.

Eddie Gamarra was appointed vp literary affairs for Nickelodeon and Awesomeness on June 8.

Guyton

Remi Guyton was hired as partner and COO for cultural content company Complementary Colors on June 7.

Disney Branded Television promoted Lori Mozilo and Kim Berglund to vp original programming for Disney Junior on June 10.

Rubi Chavez joined Jacqueline Glover was named head of documentary programming and

media company Tastemade as head of marketing June 10.

To submit, send email to hhh@thr.com

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Deaths Ned Beatty, the acclaimed character actor known for his work in Deliverance, Nashville, Network and Homicide: Life on the Street, died June 13 of natural causes in Los Angeles. He was 83.

John Sacret Young, who co-created the Vietnam War TV drama China Beach, died June 3 of brain cancer in Los Angeles. He was 75.

Ernie Lively, who played the father of daughter Blake Lively’s character in the two Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants films, died June 10 of cardiac complications in Los Angeles.

He was 74.

The Business Creative Space

Kevin Hart and Bryan Smiley After building a career as one of the hardest-working comics in Hollywood, multihyphenate Hart is kicking into even higher gear with his production company and a new Obama-backed feature By Mikey O’Connell

K

evin Hart doesn’t make small moves. So when the prolific 41-year-old — whose films have grossed $4.2 billion at the box office and whose salad days of stand-up sold out arenas — decided to make an earnest go of producing, he was determined that it not be just another vanity shingle.

Though HartBeat Productions launched in 2009, Hart doubled down on the venture when he poached executive Bryan Smiley from Sony 10 years later. With a new president of film and TV and ambitions to build a brand that eclipsed its namesake funnyman, the staff swelled to 12 at their Burbank headquarters.

HartBeat projects include FXX breakout comedy Dave, upcoming STX feature American Sole, Netflix’s forthcoming miniseries True Story and a slate of at least four Hart vehicles under a massive new deal with the streamer.

HartBeat collaborators include former first couple Barack and Michelle Obama, whose Higher Ground Productions is distributing Hart’s Fatherhood (out June 18 on Netflix). “We want to make sure we’re doing it right, so that each apple that falls off our tree is one that you want to eat,” says Hart. “We don’t want people to bite and go, ‘Ugh!’ and throw it on the ground.”

Hart and Smiley run the company in congress — Hart, a font of energy and ideas, and Smiley, a studio vet with an eye for dealmaking — though often from a distance. When the pair spoke to THR over Zoom in May,

Kevin Hart’s office bar is a repository for the many drinkable gifts he receives and is open to staff when celebrating is in order.

Smiley was at his home office in West Hollywood and Hart was in a Budapest hotel room during a break from a film shoot.

Bryan, let’s start with you. What was your first job in Hollywood?

BRYAN SMILEY My first real job was

at New Regency, in 2006, doing product placement — like putting Mercedes and Jeeps in movies and shows. The dream, right? After maybe a year, I went to work for [Regency Enterprises founder] Arnon Milchan as one of his three assistants.

That had to be an interesting desk.

SMILEY He’s a fascinating figure.

Part businessman, part producer, part secret spy … I learned a lot from him. And, because he was constantly in the air, on Rupert Murdoch’s boat or somewhere crazy, he was always on the phone. So, I was in all of his meetings all the time — not the political stuff, the business stuff — and I learned so much from listening.

Kevin Hart (left) and Bryan Smiley were photographed April 19 in Hart’s office at the HartBeat headquarters.

Did it feel like a gamble leaving a nice studio gig like Sony when Kevin came to you about going in-house?

SMILEY Most people work their

entire careers to get the opportunity to partner with someone like Kevin, who greenlights movies and TV series. Sony was not happy, but what was I going to do?

KEVIN HART I’m lucky to have the relationship that I have with Sony, to get him out of the deal that he

Photographed by Adam Amengual

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was in. It just goes to show how important relationships are in this business.

What was the goal in deciding to grow HartBeat?

HART It’s about positioning myself

to be able to deliver on the things that I’m verbal about. It’s one thing to have eyesight, but if there is a plan and agenda behind what you see, then it just becomes about the execution. And I think it’s a really big deal, as men of color, to not only understand the business but to be respected as

Hart keeps a pink scooter from the time when daughter Heaven was young enough to ride around his office during her visits.

people who aren’t overly ambitious with their wants.

RÉSUMÉ Kevin, you seemed to clue into the importance of ownership very early in your career.

HART In this town, you’ve got

your “gatekeepers,” right? I think there is a void of people who truly understand how to be a partner to said individuals. You sell them something, they give you money for it. I put that money back in my company to keep selling. It’s about getting as many of those projects [going] as possible. So I just figured out ways to create on my own and to pitch on my own. I can do that shit in my sleep.

The Obamas’ company is distributing Fatherhood. How did they come on board?

SMILEY The message of the movie

is so strong for fathers, particularly Black fathers, and it’s a message that they embrace as a company and at their foundation.

HART I talked to Barack on the phone and our conversation focused on what made the film so appealing to me in the first place. It’s an opportunity to shine a light of positivity on the role of a Black father. We’ve been shown in one light onscreen for quite some time. Whether it’s getting out of jail, addicted to drugs, or just not present, there’s a stereotype that became the image for all. I mean, we had [Bill] Cosby, but you see what that’s turned into.…

Your Quibi series, Die Hart, just got a second season at Roku. Was that easily done?

HART [Jeffrey] Katzenberg is a great

partner and business mind, but things didn’t work out how they wanted. But the deals really made sense for the talent — so with Die Hart, I can now partner with Roku and give it a new release. It goes back to the power of IP. Having the ability to repurpose it is where the value comes in.

Distractions include one of the HartBeat-branded basketballs Wilson gifted the entire staff and a chess set.

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CURRENT TITLE

Founder (Hart) and president of film and TV (Smiley) PREVIOUS JOB

VP production, Sony Pictures Entertainment (Smiley) BIG HIT

Kevin Hart: Zero F**ks Given, Netflix’s top stand-up special of 2020 with over 21 million views

with my team and said, “I think there’s an opportunity to make the movies we want and have them actually get made.” And I’ve been number one at the box office, but I’ve yet to partake in this world at the highest level. We’re getting to a place where people are going back to the theaters, so we’ll see what happens. But right now, the priority is Netflix.

Bryan, what’s your reaction when you see something like the Knives Out deal?

SMILEY All the traditional studios

are launching their own platforms or closing distribution deals with existing platforms. I do believe theatrical is here to stay in some form, but streaming is what audiences want. What we care about, first and foremost, is to create film and TV that gets seen by the most people globally — and Netflix has that massive global audience.

Even in normal times, Kevin is on set a lot. What’s your communication style?

SMILEY A lot of people like to have

this moniker of “hardest-working man in Hollywood,” but the reality is that we are on a nine-hour time difference right now — and whether it’s 8 a.m. or 9 p.m., we’re on the phone so many times during the day. And, more importantly, our senior executives have access to Kevin when they need it.

You just signed a deal with Netflix.

Any reservations about letting go of a wide theatrical release?

So when are you two in a room together next?

HART I care about this business

SMILEY Oh, I’m flying 14 hours to

in general, and it’s good to stay current. The pandemic was there, and the world of studio films was just kind of up in the air. I met

see Kevin this weekend.

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Interview edited for length and clarity.

The Business Analysis

LEGAL | ERIQ GARDNER

Is a Famous Face a Form of Intellectual Property?

A Philadelphia news anchor’s fight with digital giants who hosted an unauthorized image of her in ads has caught the attention of SAG-AFTRA, as it raises novel questions about likeness rights

A

s the co-anchor for Good Day Philadelphia, the local Fox affiliate’s morning news program, Karen Hepp is accustomed to hearing and seeing all sorts of crazy stuff. But nothing could prepare this TV veteran for the moment three years ago when colleagues began taking her aside to show her something remarkable: a screenshot of Hepp smiling at a hidden security camera. The image was captured at a convenience store in New York and was now being used to advertise an online dating app.

Soon, Hepp would discover that her visage had spread to every dirty corner of the internet — she was the face for an erectile dysfunction cure; she had become the featured example of a “MILF” on message boards; and her image had even made it to porn sites. Hepp, a mother of three, ERIQ GARDNER is legal editor at

large for The Hollywood Reporter.

was embarrassed and disgusted.

So she acted. She sued some of the websites that were hosting the illicit image, including Facebook and Reddit. “This case is about owning your own identity,” Hepp tells The Hollywood Reporter. “It’s insulting that someone can do this and hijack your life.”

Then, she lost. In June 2020, a Pennsylvania federal judge dismissed her suit. The court’s rejection might have been eventually forgotten as yet another example of the broad immunity tech companies enjoy under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. But, on appeal, Hepp’s legal campaign became provocative enough to capture the attention of SAG-AFTRA, which warned in an amicus brief that the rights of all performers could be on the line.

Hepp v. Facebook is now exploring the boundaries of the tech industry’s favorite legal shield and the nature of intellectual

property — with appellate judges like Thomas Hardiman at the 3rd Circuit throwing out all sorts of challenging and somewhat humorous questions like the one he asked at a June 2 hearing in the case: “People can make a lot of money as a hand model, or so I hear. Is that intellectual property — the shape of your hand?”

Every year, thousands of individuals launch suits against social media services in an almost quixotic battle to navigate rough digital waters and recover a semblance of control over what others are posting about them online.

Almost all are losing efforts. If these individuals get lucky, they might convince the site to remove objectionable content based on broken terms of service. But even that can be unsatisfactory, as many like Hepp get tired of the resulting game of whack-a-mole.

By design, the internet is a place where freedom reigns and moderation is often lacking,

Illustration by Victor Kerlow

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but another thing is also true: Policymakers have seen fit to give intellectual property holders some legal advantages when attempting to control the distribution of pirated content. That’s where Hepp v. Facebook comes into play. The local Fox star in Philadelphia is claiming that being famous is an asset and that her face is a form of intellectual property. And legal observers are paying attention to the appeal.

Eric Goldman, a law professor at Santa Clara University School of Law, calls the district court’s dismissal of this case “a conspicuous outlier in Section 230 jurisprudence” before adding, “If the 3rd Circuit bases its reversal on a crazy theory, they could mess up Section 230 jurisprudence in situations far beyond the publicity rights context.”

To understand how much noise this 51-year-old news personality is making — perhaps eventually at the Supreme Court — requires some legal history. Back in the 1950s, a federal judge was examining a dispute between two companies producing baseball cards. One had signed a bunch of players to exclusive promotional contracts. The other hadn’t and didn’t care about its rival’s supposed exclusivity. “A man has a right in the publicity value of his photograph,” wrote the judge in issuing an injunction against the rogue company.

Since that ruling, many states have run with this concept by giving individuals the right to sue over commercial exploitation of their persona. And some, like Hugo Zacchini, have done just that. Nicknamed the “human cannonball,” Zacchini took on a local Ohio TV station that had broadcast his entire 15-second act. In 1977, in Zacchini v. ScrippsHoward Broadcasting Co., the U.S. Supreme Court agreed with his argument that he’d have no incentive to perform if TV broadcasters could show his act without his consent. A right of publicity law had trumped a First Amendment defense.

Dance Design & Production Drama Filmmaking Music

“UNCSA has taught me that after the preparation is done, the most courageous and fruitful thing you can do as an artist is to trust, let go and enjoy the work in the here and now.”

— Jason Sanchez, School of Drama

UNCSA.EDU/DRAMA

The Business Analysis

What specific legal claim is Hepp pursuing against Facebook, Reddit and Giphy? That’s right — the same one used by Zacchini; that these social media sites violated her right of publicity. The Good Day Philadelphia star is alleging the defendants have no right to profit off her image and likeness.

Her legal strategy might not be as potentially impactful but for an overlooked element of Section 230.

That 1996 law ensures that no interactive computer service is treated as the publisher of content contributed by users. This typically means that if Individual A tweets something defamatory about Individual B, the latter can’t hold Twitter responsible in a libel suit. Increasingly, many people are aware of Section 230 as it has become a hot target of political ire, but what’s less discussed is one of the exceptions: “Nothing in this section shall be construed to limit or expand any law pertaining to intellectual property.”

This limitation means a digital network can’t use Section 230 to escape a claim for hosting pirated movies, songs or other creative works of authorship. (The Digital Millennium Copyright Act, another mid-’90s statute, would spell out rules for ISPs with respect to such works.)

It raises novel questions ripe for discussion in the digital age. What else counts as intellectual property? And do right of publicity claims beat Section 230 immunity as an exempted form of IP? SAG-AFTRA sure hopes so.

The guild cares deeply about the

Hepp has been at the Philly Fox affiliate for more than a decade.

The security camera image of Karen Hepp ended up on a variety of sites across the internet, including an ad for a dating app on Facebook.

exploitation of its members and has been lobbying for more robust publicity right laws around the nation to guard against phenomena like deep fakes.

“At any given point of time, there are tens, if not hundreds of thousands of individuals, including among them actors, models, athletes, spokespersons, and countless other professionals who are actively making, or are attempting to make, a career and living through the use of their names, likenesses, images, reputations and personas in a public forum,” states SAG-AFTRA’s amicus brief in the Hepp case.

“The very cornerstone of their careers is their ability to exploit their rights in these intangible, but often very valuable, assets.”

Notably, this isn’t the first time an appeals court has wrestled with the interplay between Section 230 and right of publicity laws. In 2007, the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals took up adult publisher Perfect 10’s suit against several websites that had stolen images of its models. The reason Section 230 provided a shield against right of publicity claims, the 9th Circuit then concluded, was that Congress had only carved out federal intellectual property laws (right of publicity laws are state laws).

But Section 230 only says “any law pertaining to intellectual property,” not “any federal law,” and, at the 3rd Circuit’s June 2 hearing, Facebook confronted judges who teased a potentially more expansive exemption to its immunities.

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“The most natural reading is that [exemption] only applies to federal [IP] law,” said Kirkland & Ellis partner Craig Primis, who’s representing the social media giant. “As [U.S. Supreme Court] Justice [Antonin] Scalia often said, Congress doesn’t put elephants in mouseholes, and this would be an elephant of allowing analogous torts in through the intellectual property section.”

Hardiman shot back, “It’s a little bigger than a mousehole. The word ‘any’ is pretty big. You want us to replace ‘any’ with ‘federal.’ ” Third Circuit Judge Peter Phipps echoed the sentiment, adding, “It’s weird if states actually can make intellectual property laws and then we read this to say those aren’t in play.”

As a fallback, Facebook and the other websites being challenged by Hepp are arguing that right of publicity claims aren’t intellectual property at all but are rather a species of privacy law. This provokes a discussion that falls somewhere between a law review article and a feature in Cosmopolitan.

On one hand, many states now allow individuals to bequeath their rights of publicity to descendants. Think about the estates of celebrities and how they are now profiting off licensed images of dead stars in everything from T-shirts to holograms. That sure sounds like intellectual property. And if there’s any doubt, the Supreme Court in Zacchini wrote how right of publicity guarded the “proprietary interest of the individual”

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and was “closely analogous to the goals of patent and copyright law, focusing on the right of the individual to reap the reward of his endeavors and having little to do with protecting feelings or reputation.”

But then again, give it some thought — and it becomes rather strange to treat one’s face as something akin to a Bob Dylan song, a Martin Scorsese movie or a Milan Kundera novel.

“Isn’t it more like intangible property?” asked Phipps at the hearing. “What about it is intellectual?”

Vera Ranieri, a lawyer at Durie Tangri representing Reddit, agreed. “[Hepp’s] name and likeness exist without any creativity,” she argued. “I have a right of publicity. You have a right of publicity. We all have this right without needing to engage in any intellectual labor.”

Is that argument enough to save tech companies from the Section 230 exemption? Time will tell; a ruling from the 3rd Circuit probably won’t come for many months.

But upon further reflection, Phipps may have given a hint to his thinking when he mused, “Isn’t some creativity or intellect inherent in every person’s likeness?” He continued: “I mean, everyone tends to pick the clothes they wear, the haircut they get, things like that. Other people work much more on their posture. On some level, it strikes me that inherent in every type of presentation, there’s some degree of creativity or intellectual operation.”

MORE MAYHEM”“BEST SEASON

“ FIERCE DARK TWISTS LEAD TO GREAT TV”

CABRAL] INFUSES ‘COCO’ WITH A FERAL INTENSITY AND STREETWISE AUTHENTICITY”

“SIMMERING TENSION” BEAUTIFULLY DIRECTED AND ACTED”

“A DISTINCTIVE BLEND OF

GASOLINE AND ADRENALINE”

...

RICHARD CABRAL

OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING ACTOR IN A DRAMA SERIES

Style Travel

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Pixar’s Luca Offers a Taste of Seaside Italy inque Terre — meaning Five Lands — is an area comprising five villages on Italy’s northwest coast whose culture and natural beauty has made it a popular spot for visitors and a key inspiration for Portorosso, the fictional town that serves as the setting for Pixar’s latest film, Luca.

Set to debut June 18 on Disney+, Luca is the feature directorial debut of Enrico Casarosa, who was Oscar-nominated for his Italy-set Pixar short La Luna. As with all Pixar films, work on Luca involved research trips, in this case to the province of Liguria (which includes Cinque Terre), to inform the details and authenticity of the film’s setting, a seaside Italian village during the late ’50s.

Casarosa made for the perfect tour guide because he grew up in Liguria’s capital, Genoa.

The filmmakers also assembled a “culture trust,” as Pixar calls it, as well as cultural consultants and Italian co-workers.

In Luca, two teenage sea monsters — Luca (voiced by Jacob Tremblay) and Alberto (Jack Dylan Grazer) — have an adventure when they venture out of the Mediterranean sea and into a village, where they take human form. The idea was inspired by local folklore and legends, including the ancient tale of slayer “Saint George and the Dragon, which is a symbol of Genoa,” Casarosa explains, adding that the

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town of Tellaro (about an hour south of Cinque Terre) is a “charming fishing village with a legend of the Polpo Campanaro, an octopus who rang the bell of the church to warn the villagers of an incoming pirates raid.”

Production designer Daniela Strijleva says the team was careful to give Portorosso the feel and hues of the Italian Riviera. “The beaches in the Cinque Terre have these tiny little pebbles. They’re not sandy. The colors of the water are these beautiful greens and deep blues, like emerald colors. The palette is very warm, and it’s composed of a handful of colors ranging from yellows, the salmon “These towns have to kind of hang on for dear life,” says Luca director Enrico Casarosa of the way the houses of Cinque Terre are perched between sea and mountains.

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J U N E 16, 2021

colors to these terra-cotta reds.”

Cinque Terre — whose five towns are Monterosso, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola and Riomaggiore — was named a Strijleva UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1997 and is known for its steep hills of terraced fields that local organizations preserve.

In 2015, the area drew 2.5 million visitors; during the pandemic, most travelers came from inside Italy.

For those planning to visit Cinque Terre, Casarosa suggests renting an apartment to experience the area. “I highly recommend walking between the five towns and trying the local wine, Sciacchetra,” says Casarosa.

Elsewhere in Liguria, the director recommends eating “the most amazing” gelato at Il Siculo in Genoa as well as getting the focaccia al formaggio at Revello bakery in Camogli, a quiet village up the coast from Cinque Terre.

(For more information on Italy’s COVID-19 current travel restrictions, see page 44.)

“One of my favorite times,” recalls Strijleva, “was when we went to the town of Manarola and there’s a huge rock in the middle of the marina and people climb and dive from that.

It’s like a 35-foot-high rock. [Enrico] was like, ‘OK, I’m going to see you later.’ And he did this beautiful dive.”

LUCA, ITALY: COURTESY OF PIXAR (9). CASAROSA, STRIJLEVA: DEBORAH COLEMAN/PIXAR. SERENO: VINCENT DEHOE/COURTESY OF BRAND. RESCHIO: PHILIP VILE/COURTESY OF BRAND.

Director Enrico Casarosa portrays the Italian Riviera through animated fountains, pesto, Vespas and sea monsters, set in a fictional village inspired by Liguria’s famed Cinque Terre area By Carolyn Giardina

CHECK ING IN

The Best New Places to Stay (Elsewhere) in Italy

IL SERENO HOTEL Lake Como, Lombardy On the scenic northern Italian lake where George Clooney has a second home, the ultra-exclusive Il Sereno Hotel has just added Villa Pliniana (above) — an 18-bedroom, 16th century palazzo whose visitors have included Napoleon, Lord Byron and composer Gioachino Rossini — to its offerings. Full buyout only, around $157,000 a week; serenohotels.com

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CASTELLO DI RESCHIO Lisciano Niccone, Perugia A castle that dates to 1050 has been reimagined as a hotel with 36 suites and a spa inspired by a Roman bathhouse, all set on a 3,700-acre estate in the Umbrian hills. Rooms from $920 a night, includes breakfast; reschio.com

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1 Luca’s fictional town of Portorosso. Inset: the real town of Vernazza in Cinque Terre.

2 Catch of the day in seaside Italy.

3 The production team based the Vespa scooters seen in the film on a late-’50s model.

4 During the research trip, the team enjoyed plenty of pesto, which originates in Genoa.

5 In the movie, Luca and Alberto (both at right) devour their plates of pasta topped with pesto when they try this dish for the first time. Says Casarosa, “We put the details in there; for example, there’s a traditional way to cook it with string beans and potatoes in the actual boiling water of the pasta.”

6 A fountain with a sea creature stands in Portorosso’s square. “Through [out the real-life province of] Liguria,” says Casarosa, “you’re going to find a lot of fountains with these strange dolphins.”

7 Traditional gozzi boats. “[Young fishermen] have these unique kind of boats; they do night fishing. They would go out with their fathers [and] grandfathers,” says Casarosa.

8 Octopus detail seen on the research trip.

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A room, decorated with custom-made beds and light fixtures, at Castello di Reschio in Perugia, in the Umbria region.

PARAGON 700 Ostuni, Puglia Located in the heel of Italy, this elegant 11-room property inhabits a restored 18th century palazzo featuring walled gardens, antique frescoes and a mix of baroque and contemporary furniture.

A 50-foot private yacht is available for bespoke experiences on the Adriatic.

Rooms from around $365 a night, includes breakfast; paragon700.com VILLA IGIEA Palermo, Sicily Looking out over Palermo’s marina, this 72-room art nouveau-style palazzo with terraced gardens is the latest Rocco Forte Hotels property. Its Florio restaurant spotlights grilled catch of the day and Sicilian pastas. Rooms from $510; roccofortehotels.com

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Style Travel

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W here Hollywood Is Traveling: ‘Places That Have Previously Brought a Lot of Happiness’ hanks to COVID-19 vaccines, many in Hollywood are traveling again.

In recent weeks, Miles Teller and wife Keleigh Sperry as well as Shailene Woodley and fiance Aaron Rodgers hiked in Hawaii; Molly Sims and Scott Stuber hit St. Barts; and Winston Duke hung out at Four Seasons Punta Mita, north of Puerto Vallarta in Mexico.

And as restrictions loosen up, travel specialists are noticing a trend. “People are just really looking forward to getting back to the places that have previously brought a lot of happiness,” says Melissa Biggs Bradley of boutique travel company Indagare.

That holds true for Lionsgate and BBC Studios L.A. Partnership head of scripted programming Rachel Bendavid, who is planning a return trip to Zihuatanejo, Mexico. “Being there is comfort food for us,” she says. Echoes Jennifer Gwartz, executive vp at UCP, “We’re returning to Nantucket, where we’ve spent

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past summers,” she says. “It’s back to basics, reuniting with friends and appreciating quieter, meaningful moments together.”

Europe also is calling as many countries have opened or soon will open their borders to American visitors. “This is the time to experience Europe as authentically as you can without cruise ships, tour buses and wallto-wall crowds,” says Jack Ezon, founder of bespoke travel company Embark Beyond. Bendavid and her family, recognizing the opportunity, later this summer will head to Spain (where Madrid’s grand Mandarin Oriental Ritz recently reopened). “We’ve spent time there, it’s familiar and will feel more relaxing now,” says Bendavid. TV producer Laurie Zaks plans to travel to Puglia. “I haven’t been on a plane for over a year, but I love Italy and it feels like a good time to go,” she says.

Given updated European entry requirements, planning is critical to avoid delays. “Each country has 5

1 A luxe cabin at Montana’s Green O (rooms from $3,515 a night, food and drink inclusive).

2 Hotel Ynez in the Santa Ynez Valley (from $199 a night on weekdays; $264 on weekends).

3 “I haven’t left my kids in a year!” posted Molly Sims about her recent St. Barts trip.

4 Winston Duke enjoyed a boat ride at the Four Seasons Punta Mita ($1,550 a night in July and August).

5 The Mandarin Oriental Ritz in Madrid (from around $970 a night), which reopened after a renovation.

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its own nuances, so plan ahead and double down on VIP greeters [through airport concierge services] to help usher you through arrival,” says Ezon. “Italy alone requires several conditions be met to enter without quarantining, including a 72-hour PCR test prior to boarding what’s designated as a COVID-Free Flight, followed by a rapid test upon arrival, and those testing and immigration lines can be over two hours long.” Ezon also recommends getting a membership to Covac Global, a medical evacuation repatriation service.

“If you get COVID overseas, they’ll get you home safely.”

Those who find Europe still too daunting are vacationing closer to home. “No flying for us,” says This Radicle Act president Karyn Smith-Forge. She plans to spend time in Santa Barbara’s Santa Ynez Valley (where recently opened properties include the Hotel Ynez). In Sonoma, the reservation to score will be at chef Dustin Valette’s new restaurant The Matheson when it opens in July in Healdsburg. Among mountain areas in the West, a hot new getaway spot is The Green O, an adults-only forest hideaway of 12 modernist home-style accommodations on The Resort at Paws Up’s 37,000-acre ranch in Montana. Says Biggs Bradley, “We’re seeing an intense desire to be immersed in nature. It’s about returning nostalgically to those days of summers past.”

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BEDROOM: COURTESY OF THE GREEN O. DOG: KARYN R. MILLET/COURTESY OF HOTEL YNEZ. RESTAURANT: MANOLO YLLERA/COURTESY OF MANDARIN ORIENTAL RITZ. DUKE: @WINSTONCDUKE/INSTAGRAM. SIMS: SPREAD PICTURES/MEGA/NEWSCOM.

Post-lockdown, 2021’s summer vacations are about returning to cherished destinations for many industry insiders.

Plus, the buzziest new spots in Madrid, Montana, Sonoma and Santa Ynez By Elycia Rubin

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D R A M A A C T O R R O U N D TA B L E

‘Now There Isn’t That

Jonathan Majors, photographed remotely May 16 in Los Angeles, says “it’s a matter of empathy” when it comes to execs and creators understanding Black roles.

Says Regé-Jean Page of the Bond rumor: “It gets clicks; it has nothing to do with anything that has happened in any rooms.” He was photographed remotely May 8 in Belfast, Northern Ireland.

Elephant in the Room’

John Boyega, Jonathan Majors, Josh O’Connor, Regé-Jean Page and Chris Rock talk the impact of speaking out in Hollywood, family reactions to sexy roles and how on-set support goes a long way: ‘Your fellow actors will give you more jobs than your reps’ BY

Lacey Rose

PHOTOG R APH E D BY

Austin Hargrave

D R A M A A C T O R R O U N D TA B L E

it too much, I don’t want to spoil it.” But I was such a fan [of Fargo], I took the meeting anyway, and then he presents me with this offer, and I’m like, “Whatever you want me to do, I’m down.” Because I saw how he handled Bokeem Woodbine [who played Mike Milligan].

MAJORS He’s wicked in that.

ROCK Sometimes people do amazing work and then when they handle Black people, it’s horrible.

But with [Hawley], I saw how he handled Bokeem and I was like, “I can totally be in your hands.”

During the course of

an hour in mid-May, five of the industry’s most talented actors, full-stop, convened for a conversation — part of The Hollywood Reporter’s annual Emmy Roundtable series — that whipped between emotional and gut-busting with little warning. There was no subject off-limits as Bridgerton’s Regé-Jean Page, The Crown’s Josh O’Connor, Fargo’s Chris Rock, Lovecraft Country’s Jonathan Majors and Small Axe’s John Boyega moved from a powerful discussion of the role race plays in Hollywood to slightly frothier ones about splurges, sex scenes and, yes, those crazy Bond rumors. The fivesome came into the Sunday morning chat having never met one another, much less worked together, and left with plans to gather again.

Can you expand on that idea?

ROCK Yeah, Bokeem is that good.

When you take on darker roles like your Fargo one, do people expect you to be that comedian when the director yells “cut”? And how does that impact you as a performer?

JOSH O’CONNOR I get people who

smile and then don’t really know where to pin me. They come up and start saying, “You’re the guy.”

And you’re like, “Yeah.” And then they say, “Go on, what, what is it?”

And then you’ve got to decide in, like, a split second whether you’re going to share your entire CV. Mine’s not massive, but still, it’s a predicament. (Laughs.)

JONATHAN MAJORS For me, it’s just a look and they go (raises eyebrows) and you do a little head nod, like, “Yeah, you’re not crazy.”

JOHN BOYEGA The same for me. It’s normally a distant eye contact and then for some reason, we connect in the mental realm and they understand and I nod, and they nod, and we keep it moving.

MAJORS That’s kind of the best, though, isn’t it? You feel seen for what you did, not for who you are.

CHRIS ROCK I always say not everybody recognizes me right away, but the minute they hear my voice, they know exactly who I am.

ROCK I don’t have a hard time

staying in character, if that’s what you’re asking. Especially with Fargo — because with bad guys, there is an undercurrent of humor in them. Like De Niro in The Untouchables is kind of funny.

Jack Nicholson in The Departed is kind of funny. Denzel in Training Day is hilarious. You know what I mean? I don’t think you turn that guy off. I do have to make sure he is measured, because you can go too far and lose the edge.

Like, who the hell is funnier than Joe Pesci in Goodfellas? But at the same time, he is terrifying. As far as on the set, we’re in a new day. I used to be a very funny guy on the set. I’d have the whole set rolling, but I’ve gotten the memo — “Shut the fuck up and go to your trailer.”

(Laughter.)

Many of you are nodding.

MAJORS Because it was deep, and

When you were told Noah Hawley wanted to meet with you, your initial thought was not, “Oh, he wants me to star in Fargo.” How come?

ROCK I thought he wanted me to

Then what?

ROCK Comedians don’t have mys-

tique. We’re not singers. When you like a comedian, you kind of know everything about them. So, it’s “How’s your daughter?” “Hey, I went through a divorce.” Or, I don’t know, it’s Grown Ups, it’s New Jack City. …

host his wife’s charity event or something. [Fargo] is a big job. And sometimes you can respect something so much, you don’t even want to be a part of it. Years ago, when I had my own show on HBO, it was at the height of The Sopranos, and I got a couple of offers to be on The Sopranos, and I was like, “I like

T H E HOL LY WO OD R EP ORT ER

I go, “It’s a matter of empathy, of life experience.” It’s such a strange experience for minorities — I view it, unfortunately, as a bit of a ladder. And if you’re born into a certain circumstance, be it poverty or whatever, in order to survive, in order to accomplish a certain level of existence, you have to climb. And I don’t mean this in the ambitious way, I mean this in, like, you have to educate yourself — you have to remove yourself from the ditch that you’re born into. That’s what education means, right? And in doing so, you pass other experiences; and as you pass those experiences, you

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“All the roles that I’d love to have a go at … you have to be in your 70s to do,” says Josh O’Connor, photographed remotely May 15 in London.

embody those experiences, and then you have empathy for those experiences. And it’s interesting that, as brother Chris was saying, the executives sometimes never did the climb, so they have a hard time trying to understand what that is. And it was nice for me to hear Chris say that, because I often go, “Oh, they’re just nervous, they get a little scared talking about the sister or the brother or the woman in the climate that we’re living in.”

ROCK Some of it is that. (Laughter.)

PAGE I’m with Jonathan, the key is empathy. Some folks aren’t good at writing or directing or handling Black characters or female characters or disabled characters or anything outside their experience, but I’ve always seen [us] as

ALL PRODUCTION BY NATALIE GIALLUCA. PREVIOUS SPREAD: PAGE STYLING BY JEANNE YANG, GROOMING BY RHONA PHIPPS-TYNDALL. THIS SPREAD: STYLING BY HARRY LAMBERT, GROOMING BY JOE MILLS FOR KEVIN MURPHY AND LAB SERIES.

Let’s start easy. If a fan is coming at you, what is he or she most likely to say, do and recognize you from?

He’s Val Kilmer-in-Tombstone good. And once you see that, you go, “OK, this guy [Hawley] has no problem putting himself in that character’s shoes.” I write, right? So, when you hand a studio a script, what you notice a lot of times is everyone gives you notes of the character they most identify with. The women in the room give you notes about the women, the underlings in the room give you the notes about the underlings, and the head guy gives you the notes about the lead.

They don’t even realize they’re doing this. Now the problem is that some people have a hard time imagining they’re Black, so there’s no notes on the lead if he’s Black. Or if the lead girl is Black, there are no notes from the white women. Because they couldn’t step into it. But Noah had no problem being Bokeem, and that’s why it’s written so well.

family’s Whatsapp group — were they sufficiently prepared for the show’s sex scenes?

PAGE No one was sufficiently

prepared. I wasn’t sufficiently prepared, and I was there. (Laughs.)

I think people were grateful for the intensity of the romantic aspects of Bridgerton; I’m not sure how grateful I was to watch it for myself. It was overwhelming. But I think people were looking to be overwhelmed. My family doesn’t want to be overwhelmed by my backside, specifically, too often, but they’ll take it on this occasion because everyone seems to be terribly happy.

How do the rest of your families factor into your choices?

Jonathan, you’ve said your mom struggled with your first role.

MAJORS Yeah, I was in a show

the empathy bridge. When you were talking about embodying experiences, that’s what actors do.

MAJORS Yeah.

PAGE And a lot of the time the people you meet are through culture, through books, through TV shows — you put yourself in people’s shoes by living vicariously through the people here a lot of the time. That’s a lot of how we build empathy for the world around us. So, the key to that is building up more and more leads from groups that are not normally seen as the protagonist, because you put yourself in the protagonist’s shoes. If that executive at the top of the studio had seen more stories with all the people they don’t relate to, they may be able to relate to

them better, particularly if those stories are of a higher quality.

This is a frivolous career, we play make-believe for a living, but we do help with that empathy gap if we do our job right. That’s the lie I tell myself, anyway. (Laughs.)

Regé, I’ve seen you say that there was a conversation early on as Bridgerton was coming together that the show would feature a diverse cast but it would not be colorblind casting and that was important to everyone involved.

What were those conversations?

PAGE Well, yeah, and they’re the

same conversations I’ve had since the beginning of my career. I had it on Roots, which was a story predominantly about people of color.

[On Bridgerton,] it’s about how

T H E HOL LY WO OD R EP ORT ER

do we go into the past and look at the images we already have and spotlight joy within that? Where are our opportunities to spotlight Black joy, because otherwise you go into the past and you think that it’s Black folks’ job to suffer for a while, carry a moral for the white folks, and then we all move on. And finding opportunities for us to be splendid and spectacular and joyous and romantic was the theme of my involvement from the very beginning. And Sylvie’s Love came out at the same time, and it was exactly the same conversations — about where’s our old-school Hollywood love story?

You’ve also acknowledged that you sent several warning texts and flashing red light emojis to your

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called When We Rise. It’s the first job I got coming out of graduate school, and I played this beautiful fella named Ken Jones, who was a gay rights activist. And my mother is a pastor, I was raised in the church, and my mother never had any issue with me being an actor; but she was always concerned about spirits and the vulnerable [positions] that I’d potentially put myself in, her knowing her son and how I work. And that book [the Bible] says some crazy shit around that, things I do not agree with, especially in regard to one’s sexual preference. My mother, being a pastor in Texas, where I’m from, began to experience some blowback from the church, from people around her, with the idea of it, as the previews began to come out. And it’s not that me and my mother fell out, but I did say, “Ma, you just need to watch it, I can’t talk to you until you do.”

And she did?

MAJORS I actually have a photo

of my entire family watching it.

And my mother called me and she said, “You know, son, I didn’t know. I loved it.” I was like, “Oh, you loved it, huh? OK, cool.” That moment was quite emboldening for me; it said [a lot about] what we do for a living, the art we make, the choices we make, because that was the hardest audience right there, for that

character, for that role. For a very stern, Southern, Black preacher woman, to see her eldest son play something that she religiously did not understand, and then for us to give light to that through the show, and for her to then understand it, that’s a gift. And because it was the first thing, it really allowed me to go, “I can go anywhere. Bring the humanity to it, just tell the truth.”

Anyone else?

BOYEGA My dad’s actually a

preacher as well, but I guess he don’t care, man. (Laughs.) He’s a Nigerian guy, moving his family over to the U.K. to start his life, and then his son says he wants to be an actor. For him in the paradigm of finances, building your own generational wealth, having your own stability, that just does not compute. Even when I got Star Wars, they don’t know what that is. They’re from Nigeria, they like Nollywood films. My mum and dad will see Robert De Niro in a movie and won’t react. But let them see Femi [Jacobs], and that’s when they’re going to get real happy. Teaching them the way Hollywood works has been so interesting, but there are certain things I don’t want to change.

Like, I like the fact that when they get on the red carpet, they get cold and they’re like, “John, I want to go inside.” (Laughs.)

Josh, you came onto The Crown when the series was already a phenomenon. So you go in, eyes wide open, about what will likely happen to your career. How do you prepare yourself and your family for that?

O’CONNOR Yeah, it was sort of

a surprise, but not a surprise because we knew what happened to those [actors]. To me, my family, my friends, people around me, it was less about “Oh, your life’s going to change” and more about just being cautious and supportive and understanding of the times that you have to look out for each other. I was thinking about this recently because it was Mental Health Awareness [Month], and one of the things I feel very fortunate about in our industry is that there’s this sense of family. I don’t know if everyone else feels it, but I’ve always felt a

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sense of support. Because what we put ourselves through when we explore character is actually a very tricky mental flex, and so [you need that] support network.

And [it’s not only when you’re] playing characters but also with all the trimmings that go along with being an actor and in the public eye. So I suppose what I’m saying here is that I feel very lucky to have these [men here] and everyone else in our industry to pick up the pieces when I’m having a mild breakdown.

Regé, you hosted Saturday Night Live and leaned into this reputation you now have as a sex symbol.

We often ask women, but rarely ask men, what’s your comfort level with that? And do you ever want to scream, “I’m a highly trained actor, I can do other things, too”?

PAGE I don’t think I need to

scream, because hopefully I can do that in the work. And to [answer] the last question, there is a responsibility to my family. I think I owed them that side of things because I know that,

for instance, my brother finds it incredibly hard to watch Roots, he can’t do it. And I need to look after my family in the more traumatizing work, as much as I look after them when they’re going to have a couple of blushes. I thought that I owed them that for putting them through the previous trauma.

And there’s always a conversation with the people you love watching you go through these empathy bridges we’re talking about, these very far removed experiences that are massive — and I keep

ROCK: STYLING BY CHLOE HARTSTEIN, GROOMING BY LISA DEVEAUX. AXE: PAUL CALVER/ AMAZON STUDIOS. BRIDGERTON: LIAM DANIEL/NETFLIX. CROWN: DES WILLIE/NETFLIX. FARGO: ELIZABETH MORRIS/FX. LOVECRAFT: ELI JOSHUA ADE/HBO.

D R A M A A C T O R R O U N D TA B L E

myself honest by imagining the rest of the audience is my family, and I owe them balance in that experience, too. There was also a personal circle that got completed for me on Bridgerton. The scene in particular that my brother can’t watch [from Roots has me] dragged away from my family in this carriage and sold into bondage in the U.K. I never thought that I’d do many parts in the 19th century, and then I’m back in the 19th century on Bridgerton, and there’s a moment on set

where I’m rolling down the street in this lord’s carriage and I’m like, “Oh shit, I own this now.” That’s what I felt I owed my family at the other end of that circle.

John, you got up at a protest last spring and in the middle of your powerful speech said, “I don’t know if I’m going to have a career after this.” With hindsight, were doors closed to you that day?

BOYEGA Yes, there are individuals

in powerful places that would

respectfully take a distance and be like, “You know, that boy is trouble.” (Laughs.) But the [lesson] for me is to see that as a God-given filter and not to see that necessarily as an attack.

Because to survive the times, and I’m speaking about mental health, the way in which you see things, your perspective, needs to be an ever-changing model. And remember, I didn’t plan to speak that day, but the megaphone was in my hand and it was like, “Oh, shit, I might as well say what’s on my mind.” It was the first time I’ve ever protested, I’ll be honest. I don’t come from [an] activist family. But there were a lot of emotions pent up, and people were going crazy and, yeah, naturally I was like, “Oh shit, some exec is going to view that and be like, “Pull that bitch.

Pull him.”

O’CONNOR I remember watching it on the news and thought it was magic. John spoke so beautifully and with such fire. And I remember thinking when he signed out with that, if there’s anyone who doesn’t want to work with John, then John, you do not want to work with them. I guess that’s what you’re saying.

BOYEGA Yeah. And then Steve [McQueen] called and was like, “John, we’re doing reshoots, I want you to come back.” And these new scenes that he wrote [into Small Axe] and the layers he wanted to add, I now had this fire and this new perspective. And Steve was just going, “I’ll give you the arena in order to display these emotions, and it aligns with who Leroy is as a character, so it’s perfect.” It was reality reflected in art.

Nic Cage was going to play Superman. There were wardrobe fittings, miniature sets, I was hanging out with Tim [Burton], and the whole thing fell apart.

PAGE Have you ever seen Kevin Smith’s talk about [that movie falling apart]? I listen to it once a year, just to keep me grounded about the Hollywood process.

ROCK Yeah. I was going to be Jimmy Olson. So, there’s a part of me that’s like, man, where’s my superhero movie? I was this close.

JOH N BOY EG A Small Axe (Amazon)

JONAT H A N M AJOR S Lovecraft Country (HBO)

JOSH O’CON NOR The Crown (Netflix)

For all of you, I’m hoping you can complete this sentence: I wish Hollywood would cast me as a … ?

BOYEGA I want brother Regé as

“Your character is going to get you as much work as your talent,” says Chris Rock, photographed remotely May 16 in New Jersey.

Superman. Or Jonathan. I want one of you guys to just go in there and fly. Just someone with knotted hair, fly. (Laughter.)

MAJORS Wicked.

BOYEGA Josh, I’d love to see you as a villain. And Chris, I’d love to see you as a villain also — something really dark and messed up.

ROCK I was actually cast in Superman 20 years ago when

R EGÉ-J E A N PAGE Bridgerton (Netflix)

C H R I S RO C K Fargo (FX)

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D R A M A A C T O R R O U N D TA B L E

ROCK My favorite character ever is

Coalhouse Walker in Ragtime. So, some modern version of that.

O’CONNOR I feel like all the roles that I’m always like, “God, I’d love to have a go at that,” I think you have to be in your 70s to do.

(Laughter.) I don’t know why I’ve got a strange sort of obsession with [playing older]. When I was auditioning for drama school, you were supposed to pick one classical speech, like from Shakespeare, and one modern speech, and my drama teacher and I didn’t know what to pick. You were supposed to pick something roughly your age. I was 18 years old.

MAJORS Lear?

O’CONNOR Yep, I did a speech from Lear. (Laughs.) And then I did a speech from an Alan Ayckbourn play, where I was a guy in his 80s in a retirement home. Those were my speeches. And all the drama schools were like, “You are crazy.”

Anyway, I got into one. So, maybe, like, if Gandalf came along today … (Laughter.)

PAGE Yeah, no, there’s a market for that Gandalf prequel, man.

BOYEGA I see it, I see it. (Laughter.)

Jonathan, how about you?

MAJORS Edward Scissorhands.

ROCK Oohhh, yeah.

MAJORS I would maybe give that a

go. That or like I’d do the biopic of homo sapiens from evolution or play some animal, like CGI a T. rex or something. If we’re going to go for it, let’s go for it. (Laughter.)

PAGE I’m imagining the inside of Jonathan’s head is literally like the opening of Lovecraft Country, and there’s just 100 different pop culture monsters flying around, and Jackie Robinson is fighting Cthulhu.

Regé, you’re now contending with Bond rumors. …

PAGE Yeah, [because] it gets clicks.

It’s got nothing to do with me

— nothing to do with anything that has happened in any rooms or any meetings. It’s literally just a thing for people to talk about. So it’s flattering, but it’s just a game.

It’s much more fun to hear John throw out things.

John, you’ve yet to cast yourself.

BOYEGA I’m trying to get that

Bridgerton money, man. I need to wear them skintights, I need to be the new guy up in there.

PAGE Tell you what, I’ll have that Star Wars money, you can have the Bridgerton money. (Laughter.)

BOYEGA But, honestly, something like that. Give me a horse and a lovely maiden and all of that.

John, you’ve been vocal about your experiences as a Black man in the Star Wars franchise. With hindsight, would you do anything differently? And as others at this virtual table launch their own franchise careers, any advice for them?

BOYEGA Acting is so unique to your

circumstance, even the way you get into it. My experience is my experience and I liked that, at the time, people like Ray Fisher and a few others came out and spoke about their experiences. I think that in itself will begin to effect change, because now there isn’t that elephant in the room. But these brothers don’t need any bloody advice from me.

MAJORS I will just speak to that, just brother to brother. John, because you did what you did, you did the job, you did the work, brilliant work, you then spoke about the work, about your process in the work, and that then changed the ecosystem for anybody coming in behind you. That in and of itself is full-circle the job of the artist. That experience changed your instrument and therefore changed the entire industry. So, I guess this is a thank you, bro.

Thanks for speaking out on all that and thanks for doing your thing. That’s it.

BOYEGA Thank you, bro.

PAGE Exactly the same sentiment.

I think you give more than you think you do. Like, I’ve already taken a lot from you just in terms of how you carry yourself in public and how you’ve spoken about your journey. Even though you don’t think that you’re giving [advice], know that it’s being received out here. So, I’d throw in a thank you to you, too.

BOYEGA Love, man, love you both.

TUNE I N ON THR. COM

I want to end by asking you what do you wish you’d known or done differently when you were first starting out. Like, Chris, maybe you’d advise yourself against buying that red Corvette with your first SNL check?

ROCK Oh God, no, I had fun with

that Corvette. (Laughter.) That guy had a ball. I don’t know, that your parents were right? In the sense that there’s a lot of talented people and your character

THR Roundtables will roll out through June in print and online. Watch new episodes of Close Up With The Hollywood Reporter on THR.com/Roundtables and YouTube.

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STYLING BY JASON REMBERT, BARBER JIMMIE TURNER, MAKEUP BY JEREMY DELL.

And now? What would you love to do, if only Hollywood was offering?

the Game Boys yet, but I’ve done my version, and that’s fun, you know? There’s something to that, and that’s the living of it. So, I wouldn’t tell myself anything. I’d say, “Just keep going, bro. Don’t change a thing.”

BOYEGA Dude, that was some Superman shit right there. You’re cast. (Laughter.)

PAGE I want John as my agent. But the advice I’d give is be supportive. Be what everyone here was today, because that makes everyone stronger.

ROCK I’ve been doing this a long time. Your fellow actors will give you more jobs at the end of the day than your reps.

MAJORS Just saying that, I’m thinking, I got to get these brothers’ numbers, man, ’cause like I got about three things that, like, “You think you want to come over …?” (Laughter.)

PAGE And know that when you’re not supportive, people talk about you.

ROCK Yeah, a movie is three months. Three months is way too much time to be around somebody you don’t like. I could deal with an asshole for a day but not three months. Mm-mm.

“It was the first time I’ve ever protested,” says John Boyega of his speech at a June 2020 rally against the police killing of George Floyd, which went viral.

He was photographed remotely May 16 in New Orleans.

is going to get you just as much work as your talent. Like, you ever have a friend that’s a good friend, but you wouldn’t want him to date your sister? Like, “Oh man, this guy is cool, but I wouldn’t want him to date my sister.” It’s important that people kind of like you enough for you to date their sister — to think you’re not just a talented person, but someone who’s reliable, who has integrity, who’s maybe not an addict. And if people feel that way about you, you’ll probably work a lot.

I love that. Who else?

PAGE I just bought Game Boys.

O’CONNOR Honestly, my first pay-

check was for two lines in Doctor Who, and it covered my rent for a month and I was so excited.

BOYEGA Who was the Doctor at

What about the rest of you? Is there advice you would tell your younger selves?

the time?

O’CONNOR Matt Smith. I had two

lines, and it was at the beginning of the episode, and then I was strangled to death. I had my entire family, a whole lot of them, gathered around one TV set to watch it, and the way it works on Doctor Who is you have this little opening bit and then [I’m] strangled, dead, and then the credits come up for the beginning of the episode. So [the strangling] happened, and then I got this text from my mum going, like, “Really good so far, I’m looking forward to seeing more.” About 50 minutes later, it’s just a text going, “That was it, wasn’t it?” They’d watched the entire episode. They didn’t even like Doctor Who. (Laughter.)

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MAJORS I was at a coffee shop with

this random guy, this brother named Malcolm. I just got to say his name, he was so beautiful.

And we were just sitting there, and I have a habit of taking notes when people talk. And the fella is my age and he said something where I went, “Hmm, I feel that.”

He said, “If I know what’s going to happen, there’s no excitement.”

It was that simple. There’s no excitement. And so when you ask that question, that’s the first thing that came to mind. I won’t speak for anyone else but, like, that is the journey. You know what I mean? I haven’t bought the Corvette yet, I haven’t bought

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Imagine if it was a series.

ROCK Ohhh no. Assholes are day

players. (Laughter.)

Well, thank you all for being here.

MAJORS We’ve just been sitting

around at church, now service is over.

ROCK All you guys do amazing work, so thank you.

BOYEGA Likewise, you’re a legend, man.

PAGE The truth is, I’ve been inspired by everyone in this room, so genuinely thank you for your work.

MAJORS Same, brother. The only regret is that we’re not in person.

ROCK We’ll all see each other at Regé’s Bond premiere. (Laughter.)

PAGE You’re not helping, man!

ROCK We’ll herd up!

PAGE Tell you what, if that happens, you’re invited, fine. (Laughter.)

ROCK Directed by Ryan Coogler, I can’t wait.

Interview edited for length and clarity.

“We have to change the canon,” says Dee Rees, whose films Pariah and Mudbound are both to be included in the Criterion Collection. She was photographed June 3 at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in New York.

‘I Hope It’s Not a Fad’

As Dee Rees becomes the first African American woman to have a Criterion release, the press-shy director talks about staying off social media, her hope that the Black filmmaking resurgence is more than a trend, and the joy of breaking new ground: ‘Maybe I shouldn’t have been first, but it doesn’t diminish the pride I feel’ B y R e b e c c a Ke e g a n • P h o t o g r a p h e d by J a i L e n n a r d

n 1995, while trying to buy a movie ticket, Dee Rees got an early lesson in the bias of film industry economics. Then a freshman at Florida A&M University, Rees went to the local multiplex in Tallahassee to see Dead Presidents, a crime drama about Black Vietnam veterans directed by the Hughes brothers, who were among a group of Black filmmakers making strides in the business in the ’90s, alongside directors like Spike Lee, John Singleton and Julie Dash. “[The theater owners] weren’t selling out the theater,” Rees says. “They were saying, ‘We don’t want too many people in the theater at the same time. We don’t want any problems at this showing.’ They were actively suppressing ticket sales.” For Rees the memory serves as an example of the ways, subtle and overt, that Hollywood has often undervalued the work of Black artists. “That was during this blossoming of all these great Black filmmakers,” she says. “And even their stats got depressed.”

Twenty-six years later, Rees, 44, is part of another great flowering of Black cinema, one with more women and LGBTQ filmmakers behind the camera this time. On June 29, she will join an elite group within the film industry when the Criterion Collection releases her 2011 debut, Pariah, an acknowledgment that the $500,000 indie drama about a Black teenage lesbian belongs alongside films by Martin Scorsese, Alfred Hitchcock and Akira Kurosawa. Rees will be the first African American woman and the first queer woman of color to receive a Criterion release, which is considered a kind of unofficial canonization by film buffs. The only other Black female filmmaker in the collection is Martinique-born Euzhan Palcy, who directed the 1989 film A Dry White Season; Dash’s 1991 film, Daughters of the Dust, is available on Criterion’s streaming service but is not part of the official collection of more than 1,000 films that Criterion has remastered and reissued with special features on Blu-ray and DVD. “I maybe shouldn’t be the first,” Rees says, speaking by Zoom from the kitchen of the apartment in Harlem she shares with her wife, writer Sarah Broom. “Maybe it should have been Julie Dash. I would start with that acknowledgment, but it doesn’t diminish the pride I feel.”

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In the 10 years since Focus Features released Pariah, Rees has written and directed two movies for Netflix — Mudbound, for which she became the first Black woman nominated for an Oscar for adapted screenplay, and The Last Thing He Wanted, whose reception from critics was much cooler, as well as HBO’s Bessie, which won four Emmys, including outstanding TV movie. She’s now at work on an adaptation of George Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess for MGM, is directing episodes of Cary Joji Fukunaga’s Apple TV+ World War II series, Masters of the Air, and holding on to a thick stack of unproduced original screenplays. “I had to be flexible to still be here, but I was determined to still be here, to last,” she says. “Just keep making shit.”

Criterion first contacted Rees about releasing Mudbound, which earned a total of four Oscar nominations, but Rees asked them to consider Pariah (Criterion will release Mudbound in the fall).

“Pariah was the film of my heart, and to me, should be in,” she says. When Pariah premiered at Sundance in 2011, critics praised the authenticity of its writing; the warmth of lead actress Adepero Oduye, who went on to appear in 12 Years a Slave and The Big Short; and the craft of then-unknown cinematographer Bradford Young, who would become the first African American cinematographer to be nominated for an Academy Award, for his work

beautiful as it was. And I wanted it to stay as we had crafted it.”

Rees grew up in Tennessee, and though Pariah is set in Brooklyn, the movie was semiautobiographical in its portrait of the protagonist’s family. Like Rees, the lead character, Alike, is the daughter of a police officer, and her parents are troubled by her sexuality. After Rees came out, as an adult, there was a period of time when she and her parents didn’t speak; when Focus acquired Pariah, Rees invited them to a screening and was wracked with anxiety. “There were parts of them in the characters, and so I was worried about what they would see,” she says.

Rees’ lawyer found her crying in the bathroom, and coaxed her out to the theater, where her mother was talking to the film’s lead actress. “She was hugging Adepero and saying how amazing she was and how the story needed to be told,” Rees says. “I was like, ‘Mom?’ ” Her father’s reaction was more reserved, but the film provided a catalyst for them to begin speaking again. “They saw that I wasn’t what they imagined a lesbian could be,” Rees says. “I wasn’t depressed and alone and in a bar. My dad said, ‘It looks like you have a lot of people around you that love you. And that’s all we ever wanted.’ ” Pariah made a scant $770,000 at the box office and played in only 24 theaters, but it found an audience at film festivals and,

“ I wa s d et e r m i n e d t o st i l l be h e re, to l a st .” on 2016’s Arrival, after which he shot Solo: A Star Wars Story in 2018. The Pariah filmmakers had used donated film from Kodak and cashed in favors to get heavily discounted color correction at Deluxe, so when Criterion provided the opportunity to remaster it, “We thought, ‘Oh, maybe we need to relook at it,’ ” Rees says.

“But Brad checked it out and was like, ‘No, the color is fine. It looks great.’ ” The rough sound mix betrays Pariah’s low budget, Rees says, but she opted not to change it for the Criterion release. “It felt

eventually, on Netflix. Although international distributors had told Rees, she says, that “Black doesn’t play overseas,” foreign film festivals kept reaching out to her, including the South African Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, which was attended by LGBTQ filmmakers from some African countries where homosexuality is illegal. “When we played that festival I had the biggest sense of ‘Wow, coming to this film is an act of defiance,’ ” Rees says.

Rees had earned an MBA at Florida A&M, and started working

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in marketing after college, fashioning campaigns for practical products like panty liners and shoe inserts. “It shaped me only in that it made me very clear on what I don’t want to do,” she says.

“Having survived a cubicle, I was super clear on why it’s better to be struggling in the thing that you love to do than to be having a solidity in something that is soul-sucking.” She had already been fired from two marketing jobs and was on thin ice at another when she had a life-changing revelation at a commercial shoot for Dr. Scholl’s DynaStep inserts.

“They were positioning the actor on a pane of glass. And putting a camera under the glass to show him jumping up and down,” Rees says. “And I was like, ‘I want to do this.’ ” Despite being told by a PA on the shoot that she would never get in, she was accepted to NYU’s graduate film production program on the strength of

a portfolio that included a short story she had written and photos she had taken on her grandfather’s digital camera, and ended up having Spike Lee as her professor.

Lee later hired her as an intern on two of his projects, Inside Man and When the Levees Broke, and served as a mentor and executive producer on Pariah. From Lee she learned “that everything’s got to be on the screen. You don’t get to stand up front beside the screen and explain while it’s playing.”

Even with Lee’s backing, though, finding financing for Pariah was an uphill battle. “No one really wanted to touch it,” Rees says. “People felt like, ‘This is a niche film. It’s not saleable. They thought that it was only going to play to Black lesbians.”

Through a mixture of grants, favors and the naivete of youth, she got the movie made and distributed. Looking back, she misses that naivete sometimes. “Pariah,

COURTESY OF THE CRITERION COLLECTION (3)

I didn’t give a shit who saw it, if anybody saw it,” Rees says. “I think about the numbers now in a different way. And I wish I could forget that, unlearn that and not think about what’s commercial. I wish I could go back to ‘Just make it. And if one person sees it, it’s fine.’ ” Rees does tune out other measures of industry stature, however. When critics jeered at The Last Thing He Wanted, “I didn’t read the reviews but understand that it generally got trashed,” she says. “I didn’t read reviews for Mudbound or Pariah or Bessie either. I just generally know how it goes by what my friends and reps play back to me.”

Pariah didn’t win any guild awards or Academy recognition, and it came four years before #OscarsSoWhite. It was the success of another queer Black film five years later, Moonlight, that Rees believes helped her film find new viewers on Netflix. While promoting Moonlight, director Barry Jenkins praised Pariah, and on social media, audiences talking about Moonlight pointed one another toward Rees’ film.

The 10 years since Pariah opened have seen enormous change in Hollywood, from the emergence of streamers to the consolidation of traditional studios, and Rees feels that the kind of movies she’d like to make are becoming increasingly rare. “The film industry has changed in that in a weird way it’s become more transparent about the commerciality,” Rees says. “There’s no guise of ‘We’re trying to be artistic.’ It’s films of either $100 million or no million. The mid-range feels less possible. Amazon, Netflix and Apple have picked those things up. But it feels like there’s a bias in attention.” The pandemic, Rees says, revealed the importance of a theatrical release, for better or worse. “Being in theaters is really just about marketing,” Rees says.

“And so all these good films still came out, but no one paid attention to them because they were streaming. Let’s reconfigure what we give our attention to. If there are no billboards, what do you want to watch?”

Social movements like #MeToo and Black Lives Matter have increased awareness in

The Criterion release of Rees’ debut film features interviews with the cast, including Adepero Oduye (left) as Alike and Charles Parnell (top right), who plays her father.

Hollywood about bias in hiring and greenlighting, but it was often white male executives and producers who forwarded Rees’ career, including former Focus Features chief James Schamus, former HBO Films president Len Amato, producer Cassian Elwes and Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos.

“I’ve benefited from conscious executives who had vision and beliefs,” Rees says. “And were conscious people before these things came into wider discussion.”

The Criterion release includes interviews with Rees, the film’s cast and crew, and insights from Black female film scholars Michelle Parkerson, Jacqueline Stewart, Kara Keeling and Cassie da Costa. “We have to widen the canon,” Rees says of earning the exclusive distributor’s imprimatur. “There’s a blind spot in terms of the gatekeepers, of how we think about what’s important, what’s technique. Sometimes Black filmmakers, when we make something that’s great … there’s a feeling that you stumbled into it.

Or they’re looking over our shoulder like, ‘Who is the person really responsible for this thing?’ ” In a New York Times story last summer, Criterion, a privately held, New York-based home entertainment company, came under scrutiny for the lack of diversity in its collection. “We have come to recognize that Criterion is seen as more than just a home video company, that we now play a role in shaping the perceived canon of film culture,” Criterion president Peter Becker says in an email to THR. “With that comes a responsibility to seek out a broader and more diverse array of voices both

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in our library and in the curatorial community that informs our work. We hope that the breadth of filmed expression in our disc release slate and on the Criterion Channel over the coming months and years reflects the seriousness with which we take that responsibility.” Pariah, Becker says, is “a great film with a depth of honesty and artistic integrity that have made it stand the test of time.”

While the industry’s recent drive toward inclusion is welcome, Rees is also wary. “I hope it’s not a fad,” she says. “I hope it’s not a trending thing. ‘OK, we did that.’ And in five years it’s going to be back to business as usual.”

Rees stays off social media (though she joined briefly during the pandemic to participate in Questlove’s DJ sets on Instagram).

“I just feel like I’m too sensitive and it wouldn’t be good for me,” Rees says. When Pariah was coming out, Focus tried to convince her to get a Twitter account. “I was like, ‘I just can’t. I can’t jump in,’ ” Rees says. “There was never any point after that where I felt like, ‘Oh, I should have.’ That’s one thing I’ll just be behind on.”

In 2015, Rees married Broom, who received a National Book Award for her first book, the memoir The Yellow House, and the filmmaker calls their relationship “a balm.” “She’s always turning me on to something new,” Rees says. “Early on, I thought I had a bigger book collection. And that was our courtship, like, ‘I’ve got to get more books than you.’ And then she sent me the picture of the books just in her bathroom.

And I was like, ‘Oh, holy shit. OK, you got me beat.’ ” During the

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interview in her kitchen, Rees is positioned in front of a bookcase and typewriter. “That’s her area,” Rees says, waving her arm. “One of her writing areas.”

During the pandemic, Rees began adapting one of her own unproduced scripts, a sci-fi story, into a graphic novel. Because of Mudbound and Bessie, she gets calls about historical biopics and dramas, but what she is dying to make is a sci-fi story, and writing and directing Kill All Others, an episode of Amazon’s 2018 Philip K. Dick anthology series, was an attempt to showcase her chops in that genre. She has never been asked to make a comic book film, she says, but would like to.

Rees has also been at work on the Porgy and Bess script, adapting the 1935 opera about Porgy, a disabled Black street beggar living in the slums of Charleston, South Carolina, and Bess, who is trying to turn away from her former life as a prostitute and drug addict. “It’s getting into the themes I want to talk about, like Black land loss and displacement,” Rees says. “It speaks to the timelessness of this love at odds with circumstance. Here’s this connection that’s good. Here’s this circumstance that’s not what we want it to be. And both those things can be happening. It will be a really interesting take if it gets done. Fingers crossed.”

Oduye, who first met Rees during an audition at NYU for the 2007 short film that would become Pariah, says, “Who Dee is now, she has always been. She was always so clear about her approach to storytelling and character, her specificity, her eye as an artist. So confident.”

Rees says she was faking some of that confidence when she was younger, but she isn’t faking it anymore. “The moment I left corporate America and went to film school, that was me being me,” Rees says. “I’m still the tomboy.

My mom was always like, ‘Oh my God, can you please wear one dress?’ I’m like, ‘I’m not changing.’ ” In a classroom of 30 at film school, she says, “There was no one to imitate. So it was like, be the self that you want to be. Put on that swagger and just say, ‘Be the me that I want to live up to.’ ”

EMMYS 2021 2

DRAMA SERIES

EXPLORING THE POWER, PERKS AND PITFALLS OF CHOSEN FAMILY

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Many of this year’s top dramas focus on relationships characters form beyond those they’re born into, revealing how found connections can help people rebuild lives post-trauma — or sustain the pain BY ROBYN BAHR

wanted roots, so she grafted herself to the most dendritic and deeply entrenched family tree in all of Western civilization. The series emphasizes that, regal or not, an individual doesn’t typically marry just a singular person but an entire ecosystem of personalities, emotions and egos. This is something Meghan Markle, the real-life daughter-inlaw of Princess Diana, has sadly learned all too well over the past few years.

The concept of “chosen family” — the people you form close bonds with even though there’s no biological tie — means lots of different things to lots of different people, and this broad theme is at the pith of this year’s Emmys race. While family of choice remains concomitant with the needs and cultures of some queer people ostracized from their own, it also applies broadly across TV 7 Bridgerton 8 The Mosquito Coast 9 The Crown

storytelling. Many of the 2021 drama series contenders project a heartening viewpoint of chosen family, reminding us that found connections can help people rebuild their lives and identities anew after trauma. Conversely, others showcase that the “chosen family” of who we marry can also end up entrapping folks while hopes for a future die on the vine.

Feeling emotionally disoriented is more an opportunity than a detriment for characters on Disney+’s space Western The Mandalorian, NBC’s family melodrama This Is Us and HBO’s steampunk fantasy The Nevers.

While these dramas are steeped in the suffering caused by intergenerational abandonment and orphandom, their writers never treat their protagonists like lost little lambs. Instead, the leads eventually find some measure of comfort or power in accepting

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their fates and inviting new people into their lives.

For The Mandalorian’s eponymous bounty hunter (Pedro Pascal), a lone wolf covered headto-toe in intergalactic armor at all times, this means begrudgingly adopting a telekinetic toddler he initially was going to sell to a baddie. For the damaged folks orbiting the ever-lovable (and sometimes crazy-making) Pearson clan of This Is Us, this means letting go of past pains to embrace new kith over old kin. And the young women of The Nevers may live a sort of sci-fi Dickensian existence as superpowered waifs residing on the margins of Victorian London society, but they’ve made a home together at an orphanage/ boardinghouse for people who share their gifts.

Cultivating support systems with others who have both loved and suffered like you can be a vital lifeline for wounded people, even if the rewards of newly found human connection don’t always save the day. Horrifying loss and abuse connect the ensembles on Amazon’s revisionist superhero dramedy The Boys, Hulu’s dystopian thriller The Handmaid’s Tale and FX’s life-affirming queer celebration Pose. On the first two seasons of The Boys, a group of revenge-seeking misfits work together in secret to take down the

NEVERS: KEITH BERNSTEIN/HBO. US: RON BATZDORFF/NBC. BOYS: COURTESY OF AMAZON STUDIOS. MANDALORIAN: COURTESY OF DISNEY+. TALE: SOPHIE GIRAUD/HULU. POSE: ERIC LIEBOWITZ/FX. BRIDGERTON: LIAM DANIEL/NETFLIX. COAST: COURTESY OF APPLE TV+. CROWN: DES WILLIE/NETFLIX. GAME: COURTESY OF HBO.

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n the penultimate episode of The Crown season four, Diana (Emma Corrin) and Charles (Josh O’Connor) perch in silent discomfort inside a palace drawing room, each contemplating the inevitable death of their marriage. You imagine they’re finally going to rip each other to shreds and euthanize this sham of a union, but they’re soon led into an even stuffier parlor to be dressed down by the queen and Prince Philip. Queen Elizabeth (Olivia Colman), solemn and precise, isn’t interested in her son’s or daughter-in-law’s health — rather, she’s concerned about the integrity of the monarchy. If a royal marriage fails, according to her, so does the public’s faith in their ancient institution. Diana devotedly absorbs the scolding, even when Elizabeth shames her for casual dalliances with low-born men while her own son carries on a brazen and long-term love affair. The young woman promises to do better, love Charles better. She submits, lying to herself just for a bit of meager affection or tolerance from a trusted elder.

The Crown posits that a vulnerable 19-year-old like Diana chose this family, seemingly the most rock-solid coterie in all of Britain, after growing up in a broken and neglectful home. She

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1 The Nevers’ gifted main characters Amalia True (Laura Donnelly) and Penance Adair (Ann Skelly) protect each other.

2 Randall (left, Sterling K. Brown) and Kevin (Justin Hartley) on This Is Us. 3 Gina Carano, Pedro Pascal and Carl Weathers on The Mandalorian.

4 The misfits on The Boys.

5 June (left, Elisabeth Moss) and Janine (Madeline Brewer) work together on The Handmaid’s Tale.

6 On Pose, Pray Tell (Billy Porter) and Blanca (Mj Rodriguez) are friends who consider themselves family.

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corporate and Disneyfied caped crusaders who have ruined their lives, while on season four of The Handmaid’s Tale, lead character June (Elisabeth Moss) similarly leads an underground resistance network of fellow trafficked Handmaids and other Gileadean victims to topple the theocratic regime that has enslaved them.

Despite their pounding grief — grief for those who have died from AIDS and grief for those who rejected them for embodying their true selves — the maturing characters of 1980s- and 1990sset Pose wish to thrive, not just survive. The series’ gay and trans chosen families, initially formed through ballroom culture and other forms of expressive artistry, reach for the stars in Pose’s third and final season and eventually find material success as well as emotional closure.

The family you take on as an adult doesn’t always bring joy, solace and solidarity, unfortunately.

As evinced throughout The Crown, multiple non-Windsors beyond Diana make sacrifices to enter and stay in the royal family, but at a high personal cost to them.

Prince Philip (Tobias Menzies in the most recent seasons) must give up his inherent machismo and sense of adventure so his wife can lead a nation. Princess Margaret’s (Helena Bonham Carter) photographer husband refuses to do the same, leading to

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the end of their coupling and the start of her demise, which plays out in the fourth installment. I cannot wait to see what the series does with Fergie.

The desperation to be loved and accepted in a new marriage and family also propels much of the pathos in Netflix’s period romance Bridgerton, which sees a chaste debutante (Phoebe Dynevor) eventually welcome the carnality of newlywed life. Conflicts with her emotionally detached husband (Regé-Jean Page) and revelations about the dark-hearted bloodline he comes from, however, spur problems that seem to imprison her in uncertainty. In contrast, entering a life of crime, debt and off-the-grid homesteading was exactly what The Mosquito Coast’s Margot Fox (Melissa George) signed up for upon marrying anticonsumerist fugitive Allie (Justin Theroux). When the U.S. government tracks them down, it’s up to Margot to protect her family and the future she envisioned when she chose Allie.

These questions of chosen family feel especially potent as we confront a shifting pandemic in the U.S. During the past 18 months, people across the world have had endless time to rethink their relationships and what they value most in a partner or kindred spirit. Some of us are still learning how to choose wisely.

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Historically, the TV Academy Tunes In for Veteran Shows

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n the past 20 years of the Emmys, the first seasons of a show have won the drama series prize just four times: Lost in 2005, Mad Men in 2008, Homeland in 2012 and The Handmaid’s Tale in 2017. More than half of the victories since 2000 have gone to the same three series: The West Wing, Mad Men and Game of Thrones, all winning for four consecutive seasons.

So what does that mean for 2021? Last year’s winner, Succession, isn’t eligible, so it won’t be a back-to-back win for that HBO darling. Netflix, still looking for its first victory in the category, has The Crown’s fourth season in the race and could have the upper hand, though there are other veteran shows — former winner The Handmaid’s Tale for its fourth season; This Is Us’ for its fifth; and Pose, for its third and final season — vying for a trophy. And of course there are several new shows — including Lovecraft Country, Bridgerton, The Mosquito Coast and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier — hoping to defy the odds. — REBECCA FORD

Drama Series Wins by Show Since 2000 The West Wing

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Mad Men

4

Game of Thrones

4

The Sopranos

2

Breaking Bad

2

Lost

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24

1

Homeland

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Handmaid’s Tale 1 Succession

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HBO’s Game of Thrones didn’t pick up its first win until its fifth season.

Reviews Television

Rose Byrne is typically excellent as an ’80s housewife turned aerobics star, but the Apple TV+ comedy around her is surprisingly sour and unfocused By Daniel Fienberg There are people for whom exercising means a long, solitary, contemplative run. Others, however, require loudly articulated reinforcement ranging from gentle cajoling to flat-out abuse.

From the fitness craze of the ’80s to real and virtual spin classes today, there has long been an allure to enlisting coaches to become the motivating voices in your head. But what are the voices in their heads? What are the exercisers exorcising?

That’s one of the questions driving Apple TV+’s Physical, a 10-episode dramedy (installments run a half-hour) with an unrelenting sour streak sure to alienate any viewer who makes the mistake of thinking they’re tuning in for a vaguely campy slice of lighthearted nostalgia. If

you accept, going in, that Physical is actually a dark and tormented character study driven by an ultra-intense performance from Rose Byrne, there are things to be engaged by. But I’ve rarely seen a show more committed to following storylines I didn’t care about at the expense of its best assets.

Byrne plays Sheila Rubin, a tightly wound San Diego housewife looking for purpose in the early ’80s. Sheila once found motivation in ballet and in participating in 1960s protest movements with husband Danny (Rory Scovel). But her dance studio has closed and Danny has become a complacent college professor more interested in flirting with coeds than big ideas.

Cursed with a self-flagellating inner monologue (that we hear in

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AIRDATE Friday, June 18 (Apple TV+) CAST Rose Byrne, Rory Scovel,

Dierdre Friel, Della Saba, Lou Taylor Pucci, Paul Sparks, Ashley Liao CREATOR Annie Weisman

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Rose Byrne is a bored San Diego wife who takes her passion and makes it happen after stumbling upon a mall aerobics dance class.

antihero in the half-hour tradition of shows like Weeds or Nurse Jackie, and Byrne makes her drive appropriately terrifying.

Were Physical actually about Sheila and her path from misery to empowerment via aerobics — a completely unnecessary in medias res opening shows that by 1986, she’ll be a superstar of some sort — it would be recommendable, if not always pleasurable.

But despite its compact episode run times, the show is determined to tell too many additional stories that crowd out what ought to be its primary focus. Sheila’s husband decides to run for local office, and his campaign becomes nearly half the show. I can’t imagine anybody excitedly watching this leering lump work his way through his political aspirations; Scovel is possibly too good at making Danny into a wishywashy waste of space.

Then there’s a storyline involving Sheila’s somewhat-friend

PHYSICAL: COURTESY OF APPLE TV+. KEVIN: JOJO WHILDEN/AMC.

Physical

voiceover), Sheila has a ritualized eating disorder involving meticulously wrapped hamburgers and a tawdry motel.

At the mall one day, Sheila catches a glimpse of an aerobics class led by energetic Bunny (Della Saba). That class will end up giving her both a sense of purpose and, on the eve of the VHS revolution, a stake in the future.

Creator Annie Weisman (Almost Family) has a very good sense of what makes Sheila tick.

Sheila is hard to like, but nobody knows that better than Sheila, and the role gives Byrne the opportunity to explore the contrast between an all-too-perfect exterior — her cheekbones and springy hair could go off and star on a show of their own — and an internalized isolation that leaves her distracted and prone to making the worst decisions possible. She’s a ticking time-bomb

Greta (Dierdre Friel) and her kingmaker husband (Ian Gomez).

Friel at least makes Greta one of the show’s more sympathetic characters. You also have Paul Sparks playing John, a mall mogul who may be the only person who understands Sheila’s level of self-loathing. And finally there’s Bunny and aspiring filmmaker Tyler (Lou Taylor Pucci), who have the closest thing to a healthy relationship in the series.

I get what Weisman is going for. Physical is full of men feeling emasculated in a world where they’re nevertheless still masters of the universe and frustrated women treated, at best, as passive inspirations for their spouses. There’s a unifying, underlying theme of the hollowness of Reagan-era prosperity. I can imagine how, in a different format, the pieces might come together in an illuminating way.

Here, they simply do not. Danny’s election is a black hole of boredom. John’s capitalism is a black hole of glumness. Because Saba is a firecracker and possibly the show’s breakout, and because Pucci’s amiable burnout provides the show its only real laughs, I can almost justify the time spent on their characters (despite the head-scratching sense that every other Bunny-Tyler scene was cut).

A real possibility: Physical is supposed to be an ensemble, but Byrne being as good as she is throws off the balance. With a less potent lead performance, the show would be bad, because then you’d invest in nothing. But at least you wouldn’t resent every storyline other than Sheila’s for sapping the momentum, which directors starting with Craig Gillespie (Cruella) struggle to maintain, no matter how many classic ’80s needle-drops the soundtrack features.

I’m not sure Weisman has really found the right tone here, though Physical should put an end to those early rumors that Apple was sanding rough edges off its shows in order to build an aspirational brand. Most of the people in the series are bleakly damaged, and the world around them matches.

I can’t say I feel particularly compelled to be that inner voice motivating you to watch.

Annie Murphy (left) and Mary Hollis Inboden are women mired in multi-cam misogyny.

Kevin Can F**k Himself

Schitt’s Creek star Annie Murphy headlines an ambitious AMC dramedy about a multi-cam sitcom wife in a single-cam world By Daniel Fienberg Valerie Armstrong’s basic concept for AMC’s Kevin Can F**k Himself is possibly my favorite TV series premise in years.

For those who have forgotten, back in 2016, Kevin James starred in a sub-mediocre CBS multi-cam sitcom called Kevin Can Wait, a dated show about a self-absorbed man-child married to the oft-exasperated Donna (Erinn Hayes). Hayes, an extremely talented comic actress wasted as the arms-folded wet blanket, was not to blame for Kevin Can Wait being bad. But she became the scapegoat, and the series unceremoniously killed off her character between seasons.

Cut to Kevin Can F**k Himself, which looks like a dated multi-cam about self-absorbed man-child Kevin (Eric Petersen), constantly getting into misadventures with his equally juvenile friend Neil (Alex Bonifer) and Neil’s grouchy sister Patty (Mary Hollis Inboden).

The only person unamused by the shenanigans is Kevin’s wife, Allison (Annie Murphy).

Allison has a secret: When she leaves the over-lit domestic sphere dominated by her needy husband, her world changes: The series becomes a gritty, shadow-filled single-cam.

Allison’s artificial smile melts away and we see the dissatisfaction of a woman who has dreams of her own but, instead, has to keep biting her tongue and looking the other way as her husband’s various schemes and harebrained ideas leave them stuck in a blue-collar hole in Worcester, Massachusetts.

I love the idea of a show that literally exposes the quiet desperation of the sitcomwife archetype, as well as revealing how borderline sociopathic so many sitcom husbands have been over the years. Like Disney+’s WandaVision, Kevin Can F**k Himself requires a certain knowledge of the conventions of the genre and the way women have sometimes been trapped in thankless supporting roles AIRDATE 9 p.m. Sunday, June 20 (AMC) CAST Annie Murphy, Eric Petersen, Mary Hollis Inboden CREATOR Valerie Armstrong

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and TV marriages that would be considered certifiably abusive if they were real.

The series has a tremendous asset in Murphy, perhaps the breakout among breakouts from Schitt’s Creek. She nails the brittle tenuousness of the sitcom wife’s default “Sigh, that’s my Kevin!” resignation and, as the story takes Allison to a more dramatic place, is completely sympathetic. Allison is trapped, consciously or not, in a bad multi-cam sitcom, and I understand the desire to establish that sitcom for contrast in the first episode or two.

By the third and fourth episodes sent to critics, though, I began to resent that we remain trapped watching that same bad sitcom even when Allison isn’t onscreen. The more time we spend with that bad sitcom — practically half of each episode — the harder it is to tell if performances like Petersen and Bonifer’s are expertly reproduced bad performances or just bad performances.

The show seems to want us to think that outside the multi-cam, Allison is in the “real” world. The problem is that this ostensibly more authentic space actually just resembles a SMILF or Wayne or other Sundance Labfriendly “indie” comedy of your choice; it’s just a different set of visual and narrative clichés.

It’s also unclear what the show is targeting with its satire. OK, “bad sitcoms.” I get that.

But to what end? The joke would be stronger if it were directed more consciously at the Hollywood system that breeds bad shows, the advertisers that keep them afloat. Kevin Can F**k Himself isn’t as funny or dramatic as it should be because it never figures out if it’s punching up, down or at all.

The pilot is promising. The next two episodes, whether focusing on the bad multi-cam or Allison’s budding friendship with former flame Sam (Raymond Lee), are flat. The fourth episode begins steering the show toward something darker and establishes Inboden as a capable foil for Murphy. There’s a series here.

I’m just not sure it’s worthy of the premise.

Step into the spotlight at SCAD From film and television to sound design, performing arts, and production design, SCAD launches creative dreams on screen, on set, or behind the scenes.

Say hi and apply at scad.edu/apply

* According to a recent study, 99% of Spring 2019 graduates were employed, pursuing further education, or both within 10 months of graduation.

(Above) Girls Raised In The South (GRITS), a SCAD student-produced sitcom by Chad Morton (B.F.A., dramatic writing, 2018), navigates the weighty and often controversial issues faced by the Black community.

Backlot Innovators, Events, Honors

Top 25 Drama Schools

The World’s 25 Best Drama Schools From L.A. to London, the next generation of screen and stage talent is learning the craft at these institutions By Seth Abramovitch

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f COVID-19 sounded the death knell for theater and production, it didn’t manage to snuff out acting schools, many of which were quick to adapt (Zoom-based writing collaborations! Radio plays!) to the changing landscape. With the light now at the end of the proverbial tunnel, those schools are deftly mapping out the path back into the classroom. (Columbia is even throwing in a free year.) What the pandemic year has proven is that the appetite for content — and the actors necessary to bring it to life — has never been stronger. As training grounds brace for a sharp increase in applicants, The Hollywood Reporter consulted with insiders, alumni and casting pros for its annual ranking of the best places to earn an acting degree.

JUILLIARD

JUILLIARD: T CHARLES ERICKSON/COURTESY OF SCHOOL. BLOOM: GREGG DEGUIRE/GETTY IMAGES.

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NEW YORK

Classes have been conducted in person since November 2020 at Juilliard, where a fouryear BFA acting program and a four-year MFA acting program are offered. Students from both levels of this most elite of conservatories cross paths in studio work (voice, movement, scene study, etc.). Recent grads include In the Heights’ Corey Hawkins and Search Party’s Brandon Micheal Hall. On the faculty end, a ninemonth search led to the hiring of Derrick Sanders, founder of Congo Square Theatre, dedicated to work

“rooted in the African diaspora,” as the new associate director of the school’s drama division.

Students recently made waves protesting a planned $2,000 tuition increase to about $51,000.

The final year’s tuition is waived for grad students. (All tuitions cited are annual.)

YALE

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NEW HAVEN, CONNECTICUT

The school, which operates in partnership with the Yale Repertory Theatre, offers a threeyear acting MFA only and features one of the starriest lists of graduates — including WandaVision’s

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Kathryn Hahn, Watchmen’s Yahya Abdul-Mateen II and 2021 Oscar winner Frances McDormand.

Tuition is $34,000 — but the school boasts that 85 percent of students receive financial aid.

NYU — TISCH

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NEW YORK

As New York theater and TV and film production perk back to life after a year of stasis, this school, which is actually two separately run schools — Tisch Drama and the Graduate Acting Program — benefits greatly from being right in the heart of the action. Tisch has a proven track record Bloom at both the undergraduate (My Crazy Ex-Girlfriend’s Rachel Bloom) and graduate level (Moonlight’s André Holland). Carl Cofield joins the latter, three-year program this fall as department chair. He was previously associate artistic director of the Classical Theatre of Harlem. A new performance facility at 181

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Juilliard drama students in a production of Shakespeare’s As You Like It from 2019.

Mercer St. is nearly complete and will feature NYU’s first professional-level proscenium, a fly-loft theater for student production, plus rehearsal and training spaces. Tuition for undergrads is $59,000; grad school is $65,000, with financial aid available (on average, students receiving aid are responsible for covering 30 percent).

UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA SCHOOL OF THE ARTS WINSTON-SALEM, NORTH CAROLINA

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The four-year undergrad program is among the premiere training institutions to offer a BFA in acting. The program was among the most innovative in getting its students on their feet throughout the pandemic, with a combination of filmed theater, radio plays and socially distanced in-person shows. Anthony Mackie (The Falcon and the Winter Soldier) and Billy Magnussen (Made for Love)

Backlot Top 25 Drama Schools

UC SAN DIEGO

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SAN DIEGO

Graduate students work closely with the top-ranked La Jolla Playhouse at UCSD, where Toby Onwumere (The Matrix 4) got his MFA. The school puts a strong emphasis on mounting new plays, working in close partnership with the Wagner New Play Festival.

B.A.s in theater are also offered, and students have access to the school’s five theater spaces (four of which are shared with the La Jolla Playhouse). Undergrad tuition is $15,000 for California residents and $45,000 for outof-state; grad students have their tuition waived and are given a monthly stipend of $2,500.

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LONDON ACADEMY OF MUSIC & DRAMATIC ART LONDON

12 Years a Slave’s Chiwetel Ejiofor and Stranger Things’ Joseph Quinn both graduated from this institution, the oldest drama school in England (founded 160 years ago). Three degrees are offered to prospective students: a three-year B.A. in professional acting, a twoyear MFA in professional acting, and a one-year M.A. in classical acting for the theater. Tuition is about $30,000.

CARNEGIE MELLON

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PITTSBURGH

The first school in the United States to offer a degree

in acting remains one of its very best. Only a BFA in acting is available — a four-year program with an emphasis on musical theater that boasts Gary Kline, one of the finest vocal teachers in the world, on the faculty. Matt Bomer (The Boys in the Band) and Ming-Na Wen (Mulan) are graduates. An assistant dean for diversity, equity and inclusion, Valeria Martinez, has been appointed to oversee representation at the university’s College of Fine Arts. Tuition for undergrads is $58,000; grad school is $36,000, with some scholarships and aid available.

GUILDHALL

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Another of London’s vibrant training grounds has put its graduate program on hold as it reconfigures a new version “eligible for U.K. government funding” to make it more affordable. But its B.A. in acting is still Coel going strong — an intensive, three-year cycle that has produced the likes of Michaela Coel, the powerhouse behind HBO’s I May Destroy You. Tuition is $30,000.

THE OLD GLOBE & USD

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SAN DIEGO

This MFA program accepts just seven students per class for a two-year, year-round immersion into classical and contemporary theater studies. During the pandemic year, Sam White, artistic director of Shakespeare in Detroit, directed A Midsummer Night’s Dream via Zoom — the virtual production was viewed by public schools throughout San Diego and Detroit. Tuition is fully covered for each student accepted and a monthly stipend is given to help toward living expenses.

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Case Western’s production of Middleton, which was the last show of 2019-20.

LONDON

BROWN UNIVERSITY PROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND

The MFA’s usually the thing at Brown, where students tread the boards at the affiliated

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Trinity Rep. But grad admissions are on pause for the 2021-22 school year as the school gets back up to speed post-COVID-19.

The undergrad program is in full swing, however, and the school has produced the likes of Laura Linney and John Krasinski, a playwriting major who graduated in 2001. The drama school is the only Ivy League institution that fully covers tuition for graduate students. Undergraduates can expect to pay $58,000, however.

UCLA

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LOS ANGELES

After a year’s hiatus, the three-year MFA acting degree at UCLA is being offered once again, as is its four-year B.A. in theater.

This remains the best L.A.-based degree acting program, where everyone from Jack Black to Black Chad’s Nasim Pedrad has studied. Graduate tuition is $11,000; undergrad is $13,000 for California residents, $43,000 out-of-state.

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ROYAL ACADEMY OF DRAMATIC ART LONDON

Taron Egerton and Cynthia Erivo are just two of the multitalented stars to come out of this famed conservatory, which offers a three-year B.A. in acting and a one-year master’s acting lab. The undergraduate stream is divided between “exploration,” “assimilation” and “application.” Whatever that means, it’s working — RADA produces some of the finest actors in the world. Out of 4,500 annual applicants, only 14 are chosen.

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Tuition for international students is approximately $30,000, with some aid available.

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UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE KNOXVILLE, TENNESSEE

With the affiliated Clarence Brown Theatre resuming live performances in November (a new production of A Christmas Carol), this Southern jewel of a program — which offers a B.A. in theater and an MFA in acting — is back on track. The school’s Carousel Theatre will be replaced with a state-of-the-art facility due for completion in 2023.

Alums include How to Get Away With Murder’s Conrad Ricamora and Tramell Tillman, soon to be in Apple TV+’s Severance. Tuition is waived for grad students, plus an annual stipend of $16,000 is offered; out-of-state tuition for undergrads is $31,000.

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AMERICAN CONSERVATORY THEATER

SAN FRANCISCO

The MFA program is on hiatus, but for those dying to get their feet wet at the school that trained Brie Larson and Zendaya, this West Coast institution is offering 15-week programs called “San Francisco Semester” that will return to in-person instruction in Fall 2021. Tuition is $30,500.

USC

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LOS ANGELES

USC’s proximity and deep ties to Hollywood mean students there might get a visiting lecture from someone like Lisa Kudrow, Bryan Cranston or

CWRU, UCLA: COURTESY OF SCHOOL. NYU: ELLA BROMBLIN/COURTESY OF SCHOOL. COEL: KARWAI TANG/WIREIMAGE. BLACK: SAMIR HUSSEIN/WIREIMAGE. BRIE: VIVIEN KILLILEA/GETTY IMAGES FOR WARNERMEDIA AND AT&T. SHAW: TASOS KATOPODIS/GETTY IMAGES FOR SCAD ATVFEST 2019.

are alums. Tuition is $23,000 for out-of-state, $6,500 for in-state, with scholarships available.

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An NYU Tisch School production of Jackie Sibblies Drury’s play Marys Seacole in 2020.

Tony Shalhoub, all of whom have stopped by to share some wisdom. The school offers a B.A. in theater and an MFA in acting.

New Amsterdam star Ryan Eggold, Saturday Night Live’s Beck Bennett and Ozark’s McKinley Belcher III all attended. Tuition is $58,000.

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NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF DRAMATIC ARTS SYDNEY

This force from Down Under produces some of Hollywood’s biggest talents — from Baz Luhrmann to Cate Blanchett and Succession’s Sarah Snook. The program is three years and offers a Bachelor of Fine Arts. It also gives students an Australian actor’s union membership, the equivalent of an Actors’ Equity card in the U.S., meaning grads can immediately work professionally in both countries. Twenty-four students are accepted. Tuition is $24,000.

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

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NEW YORK CITY

This MFA program gave every student in the acting department a year on the house due to COVID-19. It has also beefed up its BIPOC faculty, hiring Scott Whitehurst to oversee its Shakespeare in the Schools initiative and Nikkole Salter to teach text analysis. Recent grads making it in the biz include Tamera Tomakili (currently shooting HBO’s Showtime) and Marcel Spears (a series regular on CBS’ The Neighborhood). Tuition is $72,000. In the third year, it drops to roughly $14,000.

CASE WESTERN RESERVE

NORTHWESTERN

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An undergraduate theater major and two-year MFA in acting are available, with grad students performing annually at a Summer Stage season at the school’s Evanston campus. Billy Eichner got his B.A. in theater there in 2000; four years later, Lily Rabe (appearing next in American Horror Story: Double Feature) did the same. Tuition is $57,000.

CLEVELAND

Over 1,100 hopefuls audition every year to land one of eight coveted spots in this MFA program, which offers students professional stage opportunities at the affiliated Cleveland Play House. It’s a three-year intensive program that features a strong lineup of guest artists (playwright David Henry Hwang, for example). A new performance space, the Maltz Performing Arts Center, opens later this year. The program is tuition-free plus a stipend is offered.

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SANTA CLARITA, CALIFORNIA

This Is Us star Ron Cephas Jones joined the faculty this year to teach acting at CalArts, where Cecily Strong, Alison Brie and The Chi’s Tiffany Boone studied. A four-year BFA and three-year MFA program are offered, and professional opportunities are available to students through the affiliated CalArts Center for New Performance. The program — close to Brie L.A. — also features interdisciplinary opportunities with other departments (like the cutting-edge digital media program). Tuition is $53,000 for graduate and undergrad.

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FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY SARASOTA, FLORIDA

A three-year MFA program operating in conjunction with the Asolo Repertory Theatre, the program chooses 12 students each year to participate in a rigorous training and performance schedule. The Asolo season has already been announced, beginning in November with Everybody, a modern spin on the 14th century morality play Everyman. Upon graduation, all students will walk away with an Actors’ Equity card. Tuition is $19,000 out-of-state, and free for graduate students.

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SOUTHERN METHODIST UNIVERSITY DALLAS

Brian Baumgartner acquired

CALARTS

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CHICAGO

the building blocks for what eventually would become The Office’s Kevin at this institution’s Meadows School of the Arts. No time was wasted during the pandemic year, either, as SMU and Clark Atlanta University collaborated, via Zoom, on Good Trouble, a cycle of six original short plays about race that premiered virtually in April. Tuition is $45,000 for undergrads. A full-ride scholarship is offered to all grad students plus a stipend.

UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI — K.C. KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI Chicago Med star Nick Gehlfuss

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trained at this conservatory MFA acting program, among the strongest in the Midwest (a B.A. in theater is also offered).

The program works in partnership with Kansas City Repertory Theatre as well as other regional theaters, giving both grad and

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undergrad students professional acting opportunities before a diploma touches their hands.

Tuition is $25,000.

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SAVANNAH COLLEGE OF ART AND DESIGN SAVANNAH, GEORGIA

The School of Entertainment Arts at SCAD puts a big emphasis on its facilities and has undertaken the construction of a “Hollywood-style film backlot” on its 10-acre campus.

The BFA and MFA Shaw programs have produced a striking number of working actors, including recent grads MK Smith, Charmaine Shaw and Christian I. Noble, all of whom can currently be seen in Barry Jenkins’ The Underground Railroad for Amazon Prime. (A total of 70 SCAD alumni and current students worked on the production in some capacity.)

Tuition is $38,000.

SUNY PURCHASE PURCHASE, NEW YORK Edie Falco, Parker Posey and Stanley Tucci are just three

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of the starry names to attend this school’s Conservatory of Theatre Arts, which offers a BFA in acting that gives students performance opportunities at the Purchase Repertory Theatre. Recent grad Colby Hollman was plucked out of rehearsals for his final student production to appear in AMC’s Fear the Walking Dead. Out-ofstate tuition is $33,000; New York residents pay $23,000.

UCLA staged a production of Bertolt Brecht’s The Resistable Rise of Arturo Ui as part of the 2019-20 theater season.

J U N E 16, 2021

Backlot Awards

‘Fashion Is Just Another Way to Tell a Story’ Drag Race winner Symone found his voice on the runway By Mikey O’Connell

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home in on it. It’s important, if uring 13 seasons of you’re an artist, to have a point RuPaul’s Drag Race, the of view and to say something. I most nominated show at really thought about everything this year’s Critics Choice Real TV when it came to the runway, Awards, no participant managed and I really approached it with to combine social commentary three things in mind. I wanted with sartorial flair like Symone.

The 26-year-old drag queen (given to look like myself, never anybody else; I never wanted it to name Reggie Gavin) won in April look like a costume; and I wanted on the back of his impeccable comedic timing and deftly crafted to say something. Fashion is just another way you looks that incorporated can explain yourself and materials like durags Critics Choice Real tell a story. and store-bought braids.

TV Awards While on the road for a June 21 string of Pride Month It’s also a way to connect dates, Symone chatted with your audience. with THR about crafting the disI’m not the biggest talker. Drag tinctive looks and the enduring has always been a way for me to appeal of VH1’s 19-time Emmyexpress myself. I really wanted winning competition. people to connect with me through my drag because I’m not just wearing these clothes for You delivered such a consistent the sake of looking pretty on the statement in your looks over the runway — which I can do, but, you course of the season, celebrating Black culture in both the execution know, that’s easy.

and with your materials. Has that always been a part of your drag?

Making people think isn’t easy.

It always has — but, going into the show, I definitely wanted to

No, it’s not. It’s hard, but it’s also fun. I went through every

little detail of those looks with a fine-tooth comb because it’s so important for me to have those nuances.

What’s been the most surprising opportunity since you won? I was personally surprised to hear you on Wait, Wait Don’t Tell Me. The NPR gig, that was one I did not see coming. I’ll be completely honest, I had to do my research on that one. And it’s a pretty big deal!

You don’t really think of the divas getting an opportunity like that, but what’s great is that I don’t

SYMONE ON SERVING LOOKS

“You want to take what comes your way, but you also want to be smart about what you take,” Symone says of his post-win deals.

know how much of that audience is watching Drag Race. So maybe they got an introduction. People on Twitter were like, “You just explained drag to my dad!”

Did being on the show change your opinion of it?

This show has literally changed the world. We wouldn’t have a lot of the things we have, as gay people, without this show. It’s shifted the conversation and the movement and a lot of people’s views on gay culture. That part is kind of mind-blowing. I’m still processing the significance.

You got an enthusiastic DM from Rihanna. Any other outreach?

Ariana Grande reached out to me, so did Hayley Williams.

Janet Jackson didn’t person-

Sporting a minidress made of Polaroid selfies, Symone graced the Drag Race runway in outfits made of (clockwise from left) beads, durags, rhinestone bullet wounds and braids: “You can have fun and make people think.”

Interview edited for length and clarity.

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ally reach out, but I know that she watched my lip sync to “The Pleasure Principle.” It’s all amazing, but I was truly gagged by that Rihanna DM.

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‘An Act of Therapy for the Public’ Three years after Anthony Bourdain’s suicide, Morgan Neville explores a life cut short

By Rebecca Keegan

Did you know Anthony Bourdain?

I never met him. [Ugly Delicious host] David Chang was a friend, and there were a bunch of people I got to know on Ugly Delicious who were friends with him. He Morgan Neville built his food cred on David Chang’s Ugly Delicious.

was such a godfather figure to going to talk about this.” People everybody in that world that definitely grilled me on, “What do I understood his importance, you want this film to be?” [Chef] and then when he died, I saw the Éric Ripert was one who said, crater it left. The hardest part “Why do you want to make this of making this was talking to film?” and I said, “I want to make people from Tony’s life, many of a film that Tony would recognize whom hadn’t processed what had himself in and that can live up to happened. These interviews were the complexity of who he was.” hands down the most difficult ones I’ve ever done for a film. I Was there anybody you wanted to feel like the film itself is an act of talk to who you weren’t able to? therapy for the public. Like, how No. I know a lot of people wonder the hell does somebody like Tony about [Bourdain’s girlfriend when Bourdain kill himself? he died] Asia [Argento].

AFI Docs My goal is to have people Part of the problem Film Festival not just think of his death with her part of the June 22-27 when they think of him. story is that it’s incredSilver Spring, ibly Byzantine. It’s very Maryland tabloidy. If you get into There’s so much existing the she said, he said-ness of what footage of him. How do you decide happened, it asks a hundred other what to include?

God. There was an insane amount questions and doesn’t get you any closer to understanding him. It’s of material — and not just from narrative quicksand. the shows. Somebody had started making a documentary about him right when [Bourdain’s 2000 So did you reach out to her or did memoir] Kitchen Confidential you just decide … was published. We got 60 hours No, I didn’t. of footage just from that. Here’s a guy in his mid-40s who feels Was CNN Films attached from like his life is kind of over, which the beginning? he says in Kitchen Confidential, Yeah. When Tony died, some whose story hadn’t even begun. people were sniffing around doing documentaries. CNN and the estate and his manager and How did you persuade people to lots of people close to him put talk to you? out a press release saying, “We’re People were reluctant. But there making a film about Tony,” and was also this feeling like this it stopped everybody else from was only ever going to happen doing anything. But they actuonce. We have Ottavia [Busia], ally had no intention of making a his [former wife], saying it in the film. It was more of a placeholder. film, but several people said to me, “This is the only time I’m ever About a year later, they said,

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Before his death, Bourdain’s life was documented in nearly 300 episodes of series such as No Reservations and Parts Unknown.

“Well, maybe we should actually think about doing something.”

And several months after that, his production partners on CNN said, “Look, we’re all way too close to this to judge what it is. We like you, we trust you, go and make your film and we’ll live with it,” which they did.

So no one said to you, “Make sure CNN looks good in this?”

No. I had final cut, which was important. But they understood it — that they couldn’t be objective.

Who did you consider your audience?

Initially I was thinking of [Bourdain] as my audience. I love Tony’s taste because it’s a lot of my tastes. He was a music aficionado, a cineaste and he loved books. I wanted [the documentary] to have a bold approach because that was very Tony. But Tony only gets you most of the way there. He doesn’t get you all the way there because there’s always a part of his story that he didn’t have a perspective on.

Having done all these interviews with everybody and feeling the depths of the grief, I felt like Tony would be uncomfortable with that. But he doesn’t get to say — because they have to live with that and he doesn’t.

Interview edited for length and clarity.

ROADRUNNER: CNN/FOCUS FEATURES. NEVILLE: MIKE COPPOLA/FILMMAGIC.

T

he 2021 AFI Docs Film Festival, with a mix of virtual events and in-person screenings at the AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center in Silver Spring, Maryland, includes a centerpiece screening of Morgan Neville’s Roadrunner: A Film About Anthony Bourdain. The director, whose other work includes the Oscarwinning 20 Feet From Stardom, the box office hit Won’t You Be My Neighbor? and the Netflix series Ugly Delicious, spoke with THR about the delicate task of telling Anthony Bourdain’s story — from his origins as a New York chef, through his emergence as a beloved TV journalist to his death from suicide in 2018 at age 61.

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Behind-the-scenes photos of the Pose series finale — including Mj Rodriguez and Billy Porter’s final scene together (right), with Steven Canals directing.

B

urning bright and fast, FX’s Pose — a landmark series for trans representation — came to an end after three seasons on June 6.

Bittersweet until that very last episode, Pose often walked the line between joy and tragedy — mirroring the journey of so many individuals in the world of New York’s ballroom culture at the height of the AIDS epidemic.

Speaking in May, one day after the THR cover story in which he revealed he’s been living with HIV for 14 years, Pose actor Billy Porter was joined by co-star Mj Rodriguez and creator and showrunner Steven Canals to talk about their series’ legacy and what’s next for LGBTQ POC representation in entertainment and for themselves.

I am catching you at the tail end of a huge journey. Has it sunk in that it’s all over?

Mj and Steven, tell me about the reaction on set when Billy shared this news with the cast and crew?

BILLY PORTER For me, it has. As we

all know now, it was a heavy lift for me — playing Pray Tell, while in my own life, being [HIV] positive.

It was, ultimately, very healing.

Art can heal trauma, and I used Pray Tell as a proxy to do that.

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MJ RODRIGUEZ I had actually

known for a while. That’s something that’s very sacred, something you keep to yourself until the other person is ready.

So when that happened at the

Clockwise from top left: THR’s Mikey O’Connell, Mj Rodriguez, Steven Canals and Billy Porter on May 20.

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end of the show, I was so proud and happy that he got to say it for himself — that he did it on his own terms. Now he’s changing the world for everybody, so I’m here for it. Billy is my boo. If anybody has something to say, well, you got to deal with me.

STEVEN CANALS Similar to Mj, Billy disclosed his status to me in the very beginnings of filming the first season. Once I began directing episodes, it was important to me to make sure that I was holding space — because I was aware that, narratively, what we were doing was asking you to either revisit old wounds and traumas or asking you to possibly visit fears that you may have. A lot of the show felt like therapy, for all of us.

POSE: ERIC LIEBOWITZ/FX (2).

‘Change Is Only Consistent When We Are Vigilant’ Pose creator Steven Canals and stars Billy Porter and Mj Rodriguez reflect on their very unique TV legacy By Mikey O’Connell

Partnered Feature THR x Closer Look In Conversation

to be in Hollywood. I’m ready to have the larger reach.

Janet Mock touched on this when she spoke at the season three premiere — the idea that Hollywood has a history of mistaking one example of change for actual change. Are you optimistic that this show will have lasting impact for trans representation?

PORTER Change is only consistent

parallels to this moment, right?

The parallels of HIV and COVID. You have to choose life. Yeah, it’s hard. The Buddha says life is suffering. When you can lean into that reality, you suffer less.

The series balanced the historical trauma these characters would have endured during the ’80s and ’90s with joy and even elements of fantasy. Was it important to show both?

CANALS In the first season, it felt

tricky because we recognized that we were playing with these tonal shifts. It’s always trying to find the balance. When thinking about the show overall, though, and certainly this last season, the truth is that it really wasn’t that hard to lean into the joys and the traumas because that is what it means to live a life. We, as a community, as Black and brown people, as queer and trans people, we are resilient. This [show] didn’t have to be solely a story about our traumas. We could honor our existence.

PORTER I question “fantasy.”

It’s not fantasy. As Black and brown people living in this world, we choose joy and we choose life every day. What you saw on that screen is not fantasy at all.

It’s a choice. And that’s what we’re trying to teach. There are

Mj, when you signed on for the show, was it important for you to have assurances that there would be that balance?

RODRIGUEZ Extremely. I did my due

diligence by looking up a lot of women who were in the ballroom scene before me. One of the poignant figures that spoke to me the most was Angie Xtravaganza.

Back in 1984, she was a woman who was living on life’s terms, but she chose the fantasy and she went into the ballroom. That’s where the fantasy lived. I think the balance was knowing that out in real life, there may not be a space of comfort.

Pose that I wrote was much darker than what the show became. I saw Pose as being a companion piece to The Wire — really, really dark and gritty. That’s typically the type of stories I like to tell. And then, when we began breaking the show, Ryan [Murphy] gave me a note. He said, “The joy that you have being a queer person of color, I want to feel that joy on the page.” That changed everything.

We went back to that original pilot and revamped it. One thing that never changed was that we always knew that the end of the story would be ’95, ’96, to tell the story of the height of the HIV/ AIDS epidemic.

Billy, you came to this show after spending so many years on Broadway. With theaters reopening, are you going back or staying the course with Hollywood?

PORTER Hollywood, child.

How did the vision for the show, particularly with these final episodes, evolve from the inception or that pilot script?

CANALS The very first draft of

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Hollywood! I did Broadway for 30 years. Don’t get me wrong.

I love my Broadway peeps, but eight shows a week? I did it. I did it for decades. So now I’m ready

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when we are vigilant. Frederick Douglass said eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. I apply that to every part of my life. Having been in this business, having come out in 1985, the possibility of Pose and all these characters was impossible. I didn’t even know how to dream about it.

But I stayed vigilant, and I kept pushing for the change. Now Pose is here. So, no, it’s not perfect.

There needs to be way more representation. But I’m going to borrow from Kamala Harris: We may be the first, but we’re definitely not going to be the last.

CANALS I think that what Janet highlighted, what’s so important and key, is that there is a burden of representation. When it comes to Hollywood, there’s only ever enough room for one. If you are an LGBTQ+ person, a person of color or a woman, you’re likely going to be in spaces where you are the only. It’s a lot of work to represent an entire community.

It’s exhausting.

RODRIGUEZ Though change is slow, it’s still happening. I think we are the examples of what change looks like when we actually show up and do the work. I may possibly be the only trans woman on a new [series] I have [an untitled Maya Rudolph comedy for Apple TV+], but I’m still there. I get the chance to actually hold space with others who are not like me. I never thought that that would happen in a million years.

PORTER Dreaming the impossible, honey. That’s what Pose did.

Interview edited for length and clarity.

91 Years of THR Memorable moments from a storied history

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The Fast and the Furious Juggernaut Started in 2001 could be a direct-to-video release.

There just wasn’t that pressure on the movie.” Partly inspired by a 1998 Vibe article about illegal street racing in New York, Furious reunited Moritz with director Rob Cohen and Walker; the three had just worked together on Universal’s The Skulls. While Walker was a lock for Brian O’Conner, the role of Dominic originally was offered to Timothy Olyphant, who passed. Enter Diesel, an unknown actor with a small role in Saving Private Ryan under his belt. “I had seen some stuff Vin had done very early on and I was a big proponent of him,” recalls Moritz. “I pushed [thenchairperson] Stacey Snider and the execs at Universal.” Diesel was part of an inclusive cast decades

before that became desirable in Hollywood, with stars including Michelle Rodriguez and Jordana Brewster. “If we were trying to be realistic, there was no other way we would have done it,” says Moritz of the casting. “It wasn’t a calculated thing.” A movie about fast cars needed the right title.

One night, a documentary about

B-movie king Roger Corman gave Moritz the answer when the 1954 crime drama The Fast and the Furious popped on the screen. He approached Corman, who happily relinquished the rights. At an early test screening, “people went wild,” recalls Moritz. “We said, ‘My God, we’re on to something.’ ” — AARON COUCH

From left: Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Chad Lindberg and Johnny Strong in 2001’s The Fast and the Furious; inset, THR called the film “an old Roger Corman movie … revved up,” in its June 22, 2001, review.

The Hollywood Reporter, Vol. CDXXVII, No. 23 (ISSN 0018-3660; USPS 247-580) is published weekly; 40 issues — one issue in May and July; two issues in October; three issues in September and December; four issues in January, February, June, August and November; and five issues in March and April; plus 22 special issues: 5 in January; 1 in February; 2 in March; 1 in April; 7 in June and 6 in August — by The Hollywood Reporter, LLC, at 11175 Santa Monica Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90025.

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Twenty years ago, no one realized just how far living life “a quarter mile at a time” — as Vin Diesel’s character Dominic Toretto so poetically puts it — would take The Fast and the Furious. The scrappy crowd-pleaser starring Paul Walker as an undercover LAPD detective and Diesel as the leader of a group of street racers spawned eight sequels and a spinoff (the latest, F9, out June 25) that have grossed more than $6.15 billion to date. “We didn’t know what the rules were and weren’t. We just kind of went off and did it,” recalls producer Neal H. Moritz, who notes the film’s $38 million budget was low enough to have the team left alone. “I’m sure they believed in the worst case scenario that it

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