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HBO, Netflix, FX Lead Critics Choice Awards with 15 Nominations Apiece

Roger Friedman
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HBO, Netflix, FX Lead Critics Choice Awards with 15 Nominations Apiece

The Critics Choice Awards for Television, along with the Movie Awards, will be seen live on January 15th on the CW Network. Chelsea Handler is host. All the nominees are excellent, but this season I really liked “The Bear” and its actors. Also, I loved Milly Alcock in “House of the Dragon.” Congrats to all!

TELEVISION NOMINATIONS FOR THE 28TH ANNUAL CRITICS CHOICE AWARDS

BEST DRAMA SERIES
Andor (Disney+)
Bad Sisters (Apple TV+)
Better Call Saul (AMC)
The Crown (Netflix)
Euphoria (HBO)
The Good Fight (Paramount+)
House of the Dragon (HBO)
Severance (Apple TV+)
Yellowstone (Paramount Network)

BEST ACTOR IN A DRAMA SERIES
Jeff Bridges – The Old Man (FX)
Sterling K. Brown – This Is Us (NBC)
Diego Luna – Andor (Disney+)
Bob Odenkirk – Better Call Saul (AMC)
Adam Scott – Severance (Apple TV+)
Antony Starr – The Boys (Prime Video)

BEST ACTRESS IN A DRAMA SERIES
Christine Baranski – The Good Fight (Paramount+)
Sharon Horgan – Bad Sisters (Apple TV+)
Laura Linney – Ozark (Netflix)
Mandy Moore – This Is Us (NBC)
Kelly Reilly – Yellowstone (Paramount Network)
Zendaya – Euphoria (HBO)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR IN A DRAMA SERIES
Andre Braugher – The Good Fight (Paramount+)
Ismael Cruz Córdova – The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power (Prime Video)
Michael Emerson – Evil (Paramount+)
Giancarlo Esposito – Better Call Saul (AMC)
John Lithgow – The Old Man (FX)
Matt Smith – House of the Dragon (HBO)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS IN A DRAMA SERIES
Milly Alcock – House of the Dragon (HBO)
Carol Burnett – Better Call Saul (AMC)
Jennifer Coolidge – The White Lotus (HBO)
Julia Garner – Ozark (Netflix)
Audra McDonald – The Good Fight (Paramount+)
Rhea Seehorn – Better Call Saul (AMC)

BEST COMEDY SERIES
Abbott Elementary (ABC)
Barry (HBO)
The Bear (FX)
Better Things (FX)
Ghosts (CBS)
Hacks (HBO Max)
Reboot (Hulu)
Reservation Dogs (FX)

BEST ACTOR IN A COMEDY SERIES
Matt Berry – What We Do in the Shadows (FX)
Bill Hader – Barry (HBO)
Keegan-Michael Key – Reboot (Hulu)
Steve Martin – Only Murders in the Building (Hulu)
Jeremy Allen White – The Bear (FX)
D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai – Reservation Dogs (FX)

BEST ACTRESS IN A COMEDY SERIES
Christina Applegate – Dead to Me (Netflix)
Quinta Brunson – Abbott Elementary (ABC)
Kaley Cuoco – The Flight Attendant (HBO Max)
Renée Elise Goldsberry – Girls5eva (Peacock)
Devery Jacobs – Reservation Dogs (FX)
Jean Smart – Hacks (HBO Max)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR IN A COMEDY SERIES
Brandon Scott Jones – Ghosts (CBS)
Leslie Jordan – Call Me Kat (Fox)
James Marsden – Dead to Me (Netflix)
Chris Perfetti – Abbott Elementary (ABC)
Tyler James Williams – Abbott Elementary (ABC)
Henry Winkler – Barry (HBO)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS IN A COMEDY SERIES
Paulina Alexis – Reservation Dogs (FX)
Ayo Edebiri – The Bear (FX)
Marcia Gay Harden – Uncoupled (Netflix)
Janelle James – Abbott Elementary (ABC)
Annie Potts – Young Sheldon (CBS)
Sheryl Lee Ralph – Abbott Elementary (ABC)

BEST LIMITED SERIES
The Dropout (Hulu)
Gaslit (Starz)
The Girl from Plainville (Hulu)
The Offer (Paramount+)
Pam & Tommy (Hulu)
Station Eleven (HBO Max)
This Is Going to Hurt (AMC+)
Under the Banner of Heaven (FX)

BEST MOVIE MADE FOR TELEVISION
Fresh (Hulu)
Prey (Hulu)
Ray Donovan: The Movie (Showtime)
The Survivor (HBO)
Three Months (Paramount+)
Weird: The Al Yankovic Story (The Roku Channel)

BEST ACTOR IN A LIMITED SERIES OR MOVIE MADE FOR TELEVISION
Ben Foster – The Survivor (HBO)
Andrew Garfield – Under the Banner of Heaven (FX)
Samuel L. Jackson – The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey (Apple TV+)
Daniel Radcliffe – Weird: The Al Yankovic Story (The Roku Channel)
Sebastian Stan – Pam & Tommy (Hulu)
Ben Whishaw – This is Going to Hurt (AMC+)

BEST ACTRESS IN A LIMITED SERIES OR MOVIE MADE FOR TELEVISION
Julia Garner – Inventing Anna (Netflix)
Lily James – Pam & Tommy (Hulu)
Amber Midthunder – Prey (Hulu)
Julia Roberts – Gaslit (Starz)
Michelle Pfeiffer – The First Lady (Showtime)
Amanda Seyfried – The Dropout (Hulu)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR IN A LIMITED SERIES OR MOVIE MADE FOR TELEVISION
Murray Bartlett – Welcome to Chippendales (Hulu)
Domhnall Gleeson – The Patient (FX)
Matthew Goode – The Offer (Paramount+)
Paul Walter Hauser – Black Bird (Apple TV+)
Ray Liotta – Black Bird (Apple TV+)
Shea Whigham – Gaslit (Starz)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS IN A LIMITED SERIES OR MOVIE MADE FOR TELEVISION
Claire Danes – Fleishman Is in Trouble (FX)
Dominique Fishback – The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey (Apple TV+)
Betty Gilpin – Gaslit (Starz)
Melanie Lynskey – Candy (Hulu)
Niecy Nash-Betts – Dahmer – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story (Netflix)
Juno Temple – The Offer (Paramount+)

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE SERIES
1899 (Netflix)
Borgen (Netflix)
Extraordinary Attorney Woo (Netflix)
Garcia! (HBO Max)
The Kingdom Exodus (MUBI)
Kleo (Netflix)
My Brilliant Friend (HBO)
Pachinko (Apple TV+)
Tehran (Apple TV+)

BEST ANIMATED SERIES
Bluey (Disney+)
Bob’s Burgers (Fox)
Genndy Tartakovsky’s Primal (Adult Swim)
Harley Quinn (HBO Max)
Star Trek: Lower Decks (Paramount+)
Undone (Prime Video)

BEST TALK SHOW
The Amber Ruffin Show (Peacock)
Full Frontal with Samantha Bee (TBS)
The Kelly Clarkson Show (NBC)
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)
Late Night with Seth Meyers (NBC)
Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen (Bravo)

BEST COMEDY SPECIAL
Fortune Feimster: Good Fortune (Netflix)
Jerrod Carmichael: Rothaniel (HBO)
Joel Kim Booster: Psychosexual (Netflix)
Nikki Glaser: Good Clean Filth (HBO)
Norm Macdonald: Nothing Special (Netflix)
Would It Kill You to Laugh? Starring Kate Berlant & John Early (Peacock)

Kirstie Alley May Have Hesitated Getting Cancer Treatment Because of Wacky, Tragic Scientology Beliefs

Roger Friedman
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Kirstie Alley May Have Hesitated Getting Cancer Treatment Because of Wacky, Tragic Scientology Beliefs

Kirstie Alley died yesterday from what her family described as a “recently discovered” cancer. She died in Florida, where she had a home near the headquarters of her cult like “religion,” Scientology. Alley was devoted to Scientology and its wacky beliefs, and some people are concerned that’s what kiled her.

L. Ron Hubbard, the nutty science fiction writer who founded Scientology, insisted the cult philosophies could cure cancer. Of course, it was a lie. But all of Scientology is based on lies and weird off-your-rocker stuff that has been proven wildly dangerous.

Mike Rinder, a famous Scientology refugee, wrote on his blog today (I added the bold face type):

Though Hubbard claimed to have the cure for cancer — especially on NOTs (New Era Dianetics for OTs) — two of the more prominent Scientologists to have died (Kirstie and Kelly Preston) both succumbed to the disease, yet both had done all there was to do on NOTs. (See blog post L. Ron Hubbard on Cancer) Like the other cures promised by Hubbard in Dianetics and thereafter, the real tragedy is that people believe that Scientology auditing and/or PTS handling will resolve their physical conditions. Often, seeking solutions through auditing, chiropractors or the latest fad cures only available in Mexico, they delay resorting to medical treatment until it is too late. I fear this may have been the case with Kirstie given the wording of the announcement that her cancer was “only recently discovered.” These days it is not common for cancer to be rapidly terminal if it is diagnosed early.

It’s perhaps the saddest aspect of the whole scientology bag of worms — that people die sooner than they should because of their faith in the promises of Hubbard. He certainly didn’t live up to his own claims — he was a physical and mental mess when he died.

Kirstie Alley was very funny on “Cheers” and in some of her movies. She wrecked her career with her fealty to Scientology, to Donald Trump, and to becoming obsessed with weight. She had a good career but could have had a better one if she hadn’t turned into a caricature of herself. This is a sad end, sadder all the more if she could have been treated.

Brendan Fraser, Starring in “The Whale,” Wittily Quotes “Moby Dick” About His Oscar Chances This Year

Paula Schwartz
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Brendan Fraser, Starring in “The Whale,” Wittily Quotes “Moby Dick” About His Oscar Chances This Year

It’s all in the eyes. Brendan Fraser plays Charlie, a morbidly obese gay man desperate to reconnect with his teenage daughter (Sadie Sink), in “The Whale,” Darren Aronofsky’s new moody film, written and adapted by Samuel D. Hunter from his 2014 Off Broadway play. All the action takes place in a dark, decrepit apartment full of clutter like candy wrappers and pizza boxes. This is not a movie that screams Merry Christmas.


Fraser wears a gelatinous body suit to play a 600 lb man, with legs so bloated even a short trip to the bathroom is a Herculean-like effort. Encased in the fat man suit, only Fraser’s face is left unadorned of prosthetics, so it’s left to his round and expressive eyes to convey emotion and do all the dramatic work.


It’s a face audiences have come to love for 30-some years, in comedies like “Airheads” and “The Mummy” franchise. Because of familiarity to his films and the sweetness of his characters there’s a natural connection with audiences; we recognize Charlie in some subliminal way, and the empathy for him is strong.

Last week Fraser, along with Aronofsky and Hunter and co-stars Sink and Ty Simpkins, turned up at the AMC Lincoln Square last week for a screening and Q&A to promote the film. It was a relief to see Fraser was normal size. A little older, but the sweetness in his face was still there.

During the Q&A Fraser was asked if he knew right away when Aronofsky approached him that despite some prosthetics, this was going to be incredibly soul bearing for him as an actor.

 He said, “I knew that really from just reading the script. I felt a great deal of empathy and connection to the story in a way that I wasn’t anticipating. I was moved by it. I was moved about how a man who’s made life choices, the life choices that Charlie has, have led him to a place where he lives alone, has been having certain regrets, harming himself by overeating, and comes to the realization that in what little amount of time he has left, and, we the audience, know it’s five days, that unless he can reconnect with his daughter, his very salvation is at risk. So he makes that decision.

He continued: “Look, I’m a dad, I’ve got three kids and that’s the engine that moves me no matter what I’m doing. And to think that it fueled me in this performance in so many ways, to think that how heartbroken, crestfallen, anyone would feel to come to that realization, that late-stage and their life. That having had left a child under the circumstances, whatever circumstances, if you had a chance to turn it around or make it right somehow, you would.


“And I felt that only after having read the script, which I have to admit, right now, wasn’t before I met Darren. I knew that he wanted to make a film, as I was told, and I knew very little about it, but I knew that I wanted to be a part of it very much, as would any actor worth his weight in salt.”

Asked about the Oscar buzz he’s received since the film premiered in Venice and received a standing ovation, Fraser said: “I feel both bashful and happy and staying in the here and now. And I think of our friend Herman Melville, who in his novel ‘Moby Dick’ once wrote that. “I know not all that may be coming, but come what will, I will go to it laughing.”

Sunday Ratings: “Yellowstone” Shows Fatigue, Drops by 760K Fans, “White Lotus” Ramps Up as the End Nears

Roger Friedman
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Sunday Ratings: “Yellowstone” Shows Fatigue, Drops by 760K Fans, “White Lotus” Ramps Up as the End Nears

I don’t watch “Yellowstone” on a regular basis so I don’t know if the story has taken a turn for the worse. But this Sunday, the ratings on the main Paramount channel dropped by 760,000 viewers from the previous week.

What happened? I don’t know. Keep in mind, “Yellowstone Season 5” through last week is number 1 in home viewing of all DVD and streaming. And the numbers on CMT, the other cable channel that carries it, were up. Is there general “Yellowstone” fatigue? Maybe. I guess we’ll see as the season proceeds.

Meantime, “White Lotus” had its sixth and penultimate episode. Numbers were about the same as the previous week– 684,000– on HBO, so that’s good news. HBO is doing a great job with publicity, there are stories everywhere about what will happen in this Sunday’s finale. My guess is that Daphne (Meghann Fahey) kills her horrible husband, Cameron (Theo James) and gets away with it.

My wild theory is that Daphne planted the condom wrapper to cause trouble with Ethan and Harper. Maybe Ethan kills Cameron in a blind rage. After all, the wrapper was left but not the condom? Daphne could have come in through the open adjoining door.

Who else dies? Maybe minor characters like Lucia’s pimp (or brother) at the hands of Albie, and definitely either the uncle or brother in the Jennifer Coolidge storyline. Coolidge will move on, probably without her absent husband, Greg, to season three.

Let’s hope season three gets back to the level of the first season, with more sympathetic characters and more story than just kink. These were seven brutal episodes!

“SNL” Drops by 800,000 Viewers Back Below 4 Million with Pregnant Keke Palmer and SZA — But Help is Coming

Roger Friedman
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“SNL” Drops by 800,000 Viewers Back Below 4 Million with Pregnant Keke Palmer and SZA — But Help is Coming

On this past weekend’s Saturday Night Live, Keke Palmer– star of “Nope” — hosted and revealed she’s pregnant.

But the home audience didn’t know that would happen and a lot of them weren’t watching. Ratings fell to 3,.994 million, around 800,000 fewer than the last episode with David Chappelle spouting stupiid anti-semitic comments.

The music guest was SZA, who’s always good but didn’t sizzle with the audience.

Still, there was plenty of good stuff starting with the cold open featuring Kenan Thompson as a clueless Herschel Walker.

This Saturday, the numbers should jump pretty high as the hosts are Steve Martin and Martin Short. The musical guest is Brandi Carlile, and I’m sure Selena Gomez — who co-stars with the Martins in “Only Murders in the Building” — makes an appearance. They should do a parody of the show set in the “SNL” studios.

Live and learn.

Shocker: “Cheers” Star Kirstie Alley Dies After Bout with Cancer at Age 71, Made Scientology Her Primary Focus — Did It Fail Her?

Roger Friedman
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Shocker: “Cheers” Star Kirstie Alley Dies After Bout with Cancer at Age 71, Made Scientology Her Primary Focus — Did It Fail Her?

This is a shock: “Cheers” actress Kirstie Alley has died from cancer at age 71. Her family says in a statement:

“To all our friends, far and wide around the world… We are sad to inform you that our incredible, fierce and loving mother has passed away after a battle with cancer, only recently discovered,” reads the statement. “She was surrounded by her closest family and fought with great strength, leaving us with a certainty of her never-ending joy of living and whatever adventures lie ahead. As iconic as she was on screen, she was an even more amazing mother and grandmother.”

Alley starred as Rebecca in “Cheers,” and after that in her own series, “Veronica’s Closet.” She was also well known for the “Look Who’s Talking” series.

But Alley’s primary focus in later years was promoting Scientology. They underwrote a diet company for her which closed quickly. Strangely enough. although she lived in Maine, Alley died at the Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa, Florida, not far from Scientology headquarters. She’s the second woman in Scientologist John Travolta’s close personal circle, including his late wife Kelly Preston, to succumb to cancer.

Sources point out that Alley had been living near the Scientology center in Clearwater. They also point out that Scientology believes illnesses can be cured by Scientology “tech” — their mumbo jumbo that has nothing to do with medicine or regular medical treatment.

Alley is survived by her adult children, adopted with former husband, Parker Stevenson.

Broadway: Neil Diamond Juke Box Musical “A Beautiful Noise” is a Big, Incoherent Mess

Roger Friedman
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Broadway: Neil Diamond Juke Box Musical “A Beautiful Noise” is a Big, Incoherent Mess

I am sad to report that there is very little salvageable in the new musical that opened last night about singer songwriter Neil Diamond called “A Beautiful Noise.” It is a not so beautiful mess.

Last night the best thing that happened at the opening was Diamond itself, fighting Parkinson’s Disease, leading the crowd at the Broadhurst Theater in “Sweet Caroline” from his aerie booth above the orchestra seating. Alas, he won’t be able to do that at every performance.

I felt bad for Neil. He had to witness this atrocious show that uses as a framing device him as an old man (played as a wan and unappealing depressive by Mark Jacoby) recalling his life with a useless shrink (Linda Powell) on stage. They sit in club chairs and review Diamond’s career without ever establishing who he is, why the audience is here, or what the heck is going on. And they sit there through the whole show! It’s a device so that Diamond’s songs can be woven into a very contrived kind of docu-script that mixes up the chronology of his real story, plays with facts like they’re toys, and leaves us with one dimensional characters.

So last night Diamond had to watch from his balcony seat as two Neil Diamonds fought each other on stage. One was this old man who whined about being depressed his whole life with three marriages and some unknown number of children. This Neil makes you want to kill if not yourself someone as he spends the whole evening feeling bad for himself while he claims to be rich, rich, rich. (The whole point of the musical, it seems, is that Neil Diamond became wildly wealthy. That’s his real achievement.)

The other Neil Diamond on stage is played by Will Swenson, who looks like Kurt Russell playing Elvis Presley. Swenson has got Diamond’s singing down, and he nails the more bombastic parts of the Neil Diamond who went Vegas in the mid 70s studded with sequins and Farrah Fawcett hair and never looked back. If only Swenson had more to work with, like an actual idea of Neil Diamond.

There were two Diamonds in real life, too. There was the cool Brill Building writer who gave us hits with the Monkees, and songs like “Solitary Man” and “Kentucky Woman” when he was on Bert Berns’s Bang label. Then Diamond moved to MCA Records’ Uni label and had a bunch of hits like “Cracklin Rose” and “Sweet Caroline,” a hit that was not a big deal when it was released but has turned into a singalong at Red Sox games for unknown reasons. He was so hot at Uni that Diamond was invited to introduce new labelmate Elton John at the Troubador in 1970. (That story is not included here.)

But this story has been inverted and perverted for “Beautiful Noise.” All the facts have been rearranged. Nothing makes sense or is historically correct. At Bang, Neil is confronted by Berns and a mobster with a gun. Maybe that happened, but Diamond’s time at Bang was over soon enough because Berns died after two years and Diamond moved on, first to Uni and then to Columbia Records. Here it seems like Berns– who wrote and produced a ton of classics — haunted Diamond forever and was a really bad guy. Not true. And Diamond’s really famous but cringeworthy projects — like his remake of “The Jazz Singer,” and his work on “Jonathan Livingston Seagull — are completely skipped.

But who cares what was true or false? Everything in “Beautiful Noise” is upside down. What’s worse is, there is no script. There is no book for this musical. We don’t learn anything about Neil Diamond’s early life until almost the end of the show, and even then it’s very cliched. All we really know is that he had three wives, and it seems like the third wife– who’s 30 years younger and he married a decade ago– dictated a toast to herself in the second act. I laughed out loud. The script also takes swipes at wife number 2, Marcia, mother of his children and to whom he was married for twenty five years. She’ll be thrilled.

“Beautiful Noise” also looks bad which is weird considering David Rockwell designed it. Lamps from the Sixties hang down from the sky, there are no sets except some Vegas set ups and vertical neon bars. When Neil and Marcia break up it’s on a bare set except for a fake looking David Hockney painting hanging in mid air. And don’t get me started on the surprisingly terrible choreography from the usually inventive Stephen Hoggett, or the regrettable musical arrangements. Eek, most of them are like
Up with People.

We’ve had a lot of these pop jukebox musicals in recent years, like successful ones for Michael Jackson, Cher, Motown, and Carole King. “Jersey Boys,” from the same producers as “Noise,” proved far more effective in its story telling. But this show has no plot, no characters, no drama, no laughs. It just exists for the songs, some of which are performed very well and others — like a Vegas “Tits and Ass” dance number from Marcia (Robyn Hurder, in an uphill battle)– which is just embarrassing.

On top of that the show punts at the end, not letting Swenson’s Neil Diamond have the big final moments, Instead those go to the old man who’s been sitting on the stage all night, which makes no sense whatsoever. It would help if this guy could sing or dance, but he can’t. Swenson, who’s been building to this big moment, is denied his shot.

One more thing about facts: famed singer songwriter Ellie Greenwich’s history is really screwed with this in this show. She wrote dozens of hits including “Leader of the Pack” and “River Deep Mountain High.” She was married to her songwriting partner Jeff Barry and they worked with Phil Spector. In this show she seems like Diamond’s manager, which she wasn’t. She discovered him and they worked together a bit. But Ellie Greenwich was such a big deal that there was 1984 musical just about her called “Leader of the Pack.” This show does her no favors.

I guess Neil Diamond fans will come to “Beautiful Noise” to sing along and see a tribute concert kind of show. But they’ll never learn where this nerdy Jewish kid came from, how he switched from singer songwriter to Elvis clone over night, what his songs meant, or what the chair was all about in “I Am…I Said.” When this show passes, I hope the cool Neil returns to his legacy, the one who plugged songs with Donnie Kirshner. (Actually, I still can’t believe there’s no nod to that period, when Neil crossed paths with Goffin and King, Neil Sedaka and Howard Greenfield, Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, etc. )

“A Beautiful Noise” is truly a song sung blue.

Remembering Aline Kominsky-Crumb, An Icon for Feminists and Women Caricaturists in All Media

Regina Weinreich
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Remembering Aline Kominsky-Crumb, An Icon for Feminists and Women Caricaturists in All Media

“The Crumb documentary is ruining my life,” complained Aline Kominsky-Crumb in 1993, as Terry Zwigoff’s biopic about Robert Crumb, her husband, gained acclaim, becoming a darling on the festival circuit. “Next thing you know, we’ll be invited to the Jerusalem Film Festival.” All of this drama was played out in a comic strip that appeared in The New Yorker magazine. Festival director Leah von Leer saw an opportunity and wrote to the Crumbs. “Your nightmare has come true. You are officially invited.”

Aline, sadly, died on Saturday at age 74 from pancreatic cancer in Sauve, France.

Nominated for an academy award for best documentary feature, “Crumb” was a revealing look not only of this famous cartooning couple but Robert’s unusual family, capturing his highly eccentric and artistic brothers just before one committed suicide. Passionate for jazz, Robert had a huge record collection. Vinyl filled a room. Fearing an atmosphere of violence in their area of California, where gun ownership was de rigeuer, the Crumbs left for the south of France and lived in a multi-storied house carved out of the rock on the Vidourle river banks.

“Did your records make it across the Atlantic?” I asked him as a way of saying hello when I encountered Robert and Aline in the lobby of our hotel in Jerusalem; I too came with a film, a documentary about the writer/composer Paul Bowles who lived in Tangier. The Crumbs and my family—my husband Bob Salpeter, our two daughters, and my mother aged 73 and a survivor of Auschwitz –hung out. While Aline and I gabbed away getting to know one another—we had grown up in the New York City boroughs, finding our escape to Manhattan; we had ties to the Soho Weekly News– Robert was helping my mother navigate the streets, gentle as could be. Aline dubbed her own mother Blabette, but genuinely liked mine grasping her spirituality.

Several times we visited the Crumbs in the south of France. We occupied a room that had Robert’s giant sculpture of an Aline-like figure, with outsized thighs, wearing cartoon clothes similar to the ones Aline found in the country flea markets. Aline was a superb cook, memorably stuffing a fish with vegetables and spicing with fresh ginger. A post-hippie who led locals in Pilates, she went for a bit of plastic surgery later on. One year when we arrived, Aline’s French boyfriend settled in with the Crumbs. Robert had his own ‘friend’ in the States. The had each written about their open marriage.

My girls, Nina and Jane, played with their daughter Sophie, running through the narrow streets of the medieval town. They wanted to know if they could do the same in New York where we lived, on Third Avenue. The Crumbs made a big impression. Robert doodled in the local bistros, making drawings of the regulars. Known for his Janis Joplin Cheap Thrills album cover, his Hogarth-like sketching style, irreverent subjects, he was huge in Europe and elected to the American Academy of Arts & Letters.

Aline, an icon for feminists and women caricaturists in all media, had a more subterranean career, her self-effacing characters in the manner of the great Joan Rivers’ self-deprecating humor, and others such as Lena Dunham, who championed women for who we are. Grounded in a deep humanity, Aline kept it real in her books, and subversive magazines. A pioneer in the genre, Aline recounted her life in her graphic drawing memoir, “Need More Love,” recognizing that her “Twisted Sisters” were at once a manifestation of the culture’s innermost fears about women’s power and the need to laugh at ourselves.

It breaks my heart that she is gone.

Box Office: “Top Gun Maverick” Audience Exhausted as Theater Re-release is A Fly Over

Roger Friedman
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Box Office: “Top Gun Maverick” Audience Exhausted as Theater Re-release is A Fly Over

This weekend’s box office was par for the course, with “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” totaling up $394 million. The big 400 is in its sights in a couple of days. The US and international takes are about equal with the total so far around $733 million. That’s about half of what “Black Panther” did, but no one can complain.

Paramount re-released “Top Gun Maverick” to 1,864 theaters. There was not a clamor to see it again, however. The total take there was just $700,000, or $376 per screen. Pretty much everyone in the world has seen this movie at least once or twice, so this was just for promotional purposes.

The really big story is Searchlight’s “The Menu,” which has taken in $24.7 million and has become the coveted word of mouth movie. Someone says, “There’s nothing out there, what should I see?” And their friend replies, “Have you seen The Menu?” That’s what every studio wants! Congrats. Ralph Fiennes is having a moment as he’s also in a hit off Broadway show that no one can get into.

All the smaller Oscar buzzed movies are still struggling, which is too bad. It seems like MGM stopped reporting numbers on “Till” completely. Their “Bones and All” has been eaten alive, as well.

Broadway Exclusive: David Byrne’s Amazing “Here Lies Love” Finally Coming this Spring, Should Win the Tony Award Hands Down

Roger Friedman
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Broadway Exclusive: David Byrne’s Amazing “Here Lies Love” Finally Coming this Spring, Should Win the Tony Award Hands Down

I told you all about David Byrne and Fat Boy Slim’s “Here Lies Love” back in 2014. It was a sensation at the Public Theater off Broadway in two separate runs.

Now I can tell you that “Here Lies Love” is coming to Broadway this spring for the first time. It will open at the Broadway Theater, where most of the seats are being torn out to make away for this brilliant immersive musical.

That’s right: there will be some seats, but mostly the audience stands and moves with pieces of the stage as the actors are on top of those pieces. When I saw it at the Public I thought it was the most wonderful, innovative thing I’d ever seen. I think Broadway audiences are going to crazy when they see it. Look for many Tony Awards because this show is what Broadway needs and must have to stay alive.

Byrne and Fat Boy Slim wrote the show about Fernando and Imelda Marcos’s rise to power. The great great great Ruthie Ann Miles played Imelda at the Public. I hope she’s returning to her first role. She went on to win a Tony as Featured Actress in “The King and I” in 2015. I have no doubt she could pick up Best Actress in this production. And as always, Alex Timbers stages this show. And the show itself will sweep the musical category.

I’m psyched. PS Wear sneakers, you move around pretty quickly.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=slLrhcS5oyE
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