You may have heard that Bill Maher hated the Barbie movie — an all-too-predictable outcome for a 67-year-old crank who some HBO exec thinks is “edgy” because he spends so much of his airtime railing against “wokeness.” You’d think someone whose film acting CV includes winners like Pizza Man, Tomcats, …
Read More »Carrie Bradshaw Has Always Been a Terrible Prude
This week’s episode of And Just Like That… picks up where we left off twenty years ago: Carrie Bradshaw and Aidan Shaw are in bed together in a fancy hotel. They can’t seem to get room service delivered, but it seems like they’re having a lot of sex. Later on, …
Read More »The Deadly Shark Attack That Rocked a Community: 'It Was Like Jaws'
A beach and fishing community reels in the wake of a fatal shark attack that has everyone on edge. How will order be restored? You don’t have to make Jaws inferences; the new HBO documentary After the Bite does the work for you. “I’m not exaggerating, it was like Jaws,” …
Read More »How Did Charlotte Become the Breakout Star of 'And Just Like That…?'
I have never been a huge fan of Charlotte York Goldenblatt, the Upper East Side princess played by Kristin Davis in Sex and the City. As a New York Jew, I didn’t relate to her WASP-y country club optimism, nor was I particularly charmed by her wide-eyed pearl-clutching at her …
Read More »Edi Patterson Explains Why Judy Is the Most Gangster of 'The Righteous Gemstones'
The Righteous Gemstones wouldn’t gel without Judy. The middle sibling and only sister among three adult heirs to a televangelist empire in the brash, ungodly HBO series — played by the comedic wonder Edi Patterson, also a writer on the show — Judy Gemstone is a chaotic hinge for her …
Read More »'Full Circle': Steven Soderbergh's Max Series Is a Confounding Mystery
Midway through Steven Soderbergh’s new thriller miniseries Full Circle, Sam Browne (Claire Danes) asks her brooding husband Derek (Timothy Olyphant), “Is there something else going on?” The query comes as the Brownes are dealing with a kidnap threat against their son, an apparent murder, and someone targeting the corporate empire …
Read More »When Cops Let a Serial Killer Terrorize Queer New York
One of the most telling moments of Last Call: When a Serial Killer Stalked Queer New York, the new HBO docuseries about a serial killer who terrorized gay men in the Nineties, comes when director Anthony Caronna is interviewing a pair of retired police detectives who worked the case. The …
Read More »David Simon, Creator of 'The Wire,' Requests Leniency for Man Charged in Michael K. Williams' Death
David Simon, co-creator of The Wire, has asked a Manhattan judge to grant leniency to a man being charged in connection with the 2021 drug overdose death of actor Michael K. Williams. Carlos Macci, 71, is one of four men charged in connection with Williams’ death. All have pleaded guilty, …
Read More »'The Idol': HBO's Cringey Drama Ends Not With a Bang But Whimper
We come not to praise The Idol, but to bury it. That is assuming Sunday’s fifth episode is the last gasp for the widely scorned HBO series. The show’s creative team claims a five-episode season was the plan all along, scathing criticism be damned; HBO has not come out and …
Read More »Who's Giving HBO's 'The Idol' All of These Five-Star Ratings?
After The Idol’s much-buzzed-about premiere at Cannes in May, Sam Levinson predicted that he and co-creator Abel “The Weeknd” Tesfaye were about to have the “show of the summer” on their hands. The series about the self-described “sleaziest love story” in Hollywood starring a global superstar alongside Lily-Rose Depp was …
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