Guillermo del Toro’s “Frankenstein” didn’t exactly wow audiences and critics when it premiered at the Venice Film Festival, and when it landed at the Telluride Film Festival a day later for a pair of late-night screenings, the response was even more muted. Leaving Colorado, the airport gate was full of hushed conversations between people registering their disappointment with the movie.
“Frankenstein,” the talk went, had three strikes against it — a plodding story, computer-generated imagery that looked appalling and was employed to often ridiculous effect and, outside of Jacob Elordi’s affecting turn as the monster, acting that seemed wildly excessive (Oscar Isaac) or hopelessly lost (Mia Goth). In short: a mess.
But then “Frankenstein” traveled to the Toronto, a city Del Toro regards as his “second home,” and finished as runner-up to “Hamnet” for the festival’s People’s Choice Award. Now playing in a theatrical limited release ahead of its Nov. 7 Netflix premiere, the movie has found favor with the filmmaker’s devoted fan base, selling out theaters, including dates at Netflix’s renovated Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood, where admission lines wrapped around the block. And some prominent critics, including my colleague Amy Nicholson, have written some thoughtful reviews of the movie, praising Del Toro’s lifelong passion project. Amy calls it the “best movie of his career.”
So in this update to my post-festival Oscar power rankings for best picture, you’ll find “Frankenstein,” a movie that’s hard to place on this list but harder still to ignore. Previous rankings are parenthetically noted.
Falling out of the rankings since September: “A House of Dynamite,” “Jay Kelly”
10. ‘Avatar: Fire and Ash’ (Unranked)
A scene from 2022’s “Avatar: The Way of Water.”
(20th Century Studios)
The last “Avatar” movie grossed $2.3 billion and, yes, earned an Oscar nomination for best picture. Yet I’m hard-pressed to find anyone who’s truly excited about devoting half a day to see the next installment, which clocks in at 3 hours and 12 minutes. Just because the first two movies were nominated doesn’t mean this one will be. But underestimating James Cameron’s ability to connect with audiences — and awards voters — seems dumb. So here we are, No. 10, sight (still) unseen.
9. ‘Bugonia’ (10)
Emma Stone in “Bugonia.”
(Atsushi Nishijima / Focus Features)
Better than “Kinds of Kindness” but not nearly the triumph of “Poor Things,” this is mid Yorgos Lanthimos — off-putting, punishing and misanthropic but also featuring another showcase for Emma Stone’s bold, creative energy. There are a number of movies that could displace it as a nominee. Park Chan-wook’s “No Other Choice” offers a more humane — and funnier — look at ugly things people can do when desperate. But I’ll stick with “Bugonia” for now. After all, how many movies inspire people to shave their heads for a ticket?
8. “Frankenstein” (Unranked)
Oscar Isaac in “Frankenstein.”
(Ken Woroner / Netflix)
Netflix has four movies arriving during the awards season window — the meditative stunner “Train Dreams,” Katherine Bigelow’s riveting, ticking-clock thriller “A House of Dynamite,” the George Clooney meta-charmer “Jay Kelly” and “Frankenstein.” (That’s how I’d rank them in terms of quality.) One of these movies will be nominated. Maybe two. At this moment, nobody, including the awards team at Netflix, knows which one(s) it will be.
7. ‘It Was Just an Accident’ (7)
Mohamad Ali Elyasmehr, left, Madj Panahi and Hadis Pakbaten in “It Was Just an Accident.”
(Neon)
Jafar Panahi’s Palme d’Or-winning thriller possesses a withering critique of the cruelty and corruption of an authoritarian regime, combined with a blistering sense of humor. Panahi (“The Circle,” “Taxi”) has been imprisoned by the Iranian government many times for criticizing the government, and his courage has been celebrated for its spirit of artistic resistance. He has been a ubiquitous presence on the festival and awards circuit this year, eager to share both the movie and his story. As the Oscars have thoroughly embraced international movies the last several years, “It Was Just an Accident” feels like it’s on solid ground.
6. ‘Wicked: For Good’ (6)
Ariana Grande, left, and Cynthia Erivo in “Wicked: For Good.”
(Giles Keyte / Universal Pictures)
An academy member recently expressed some reservations about this movie to me — not about the sequel itself, but about the prospect of seeing stars Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande embark on another tear-soaked promotional tour. Whatevs. The first “Wicked” movie earned 10 Oscar nominations, winning for production design and costumes. With the added casting category, the sequel might just surpass that number.
5. ‘Marty Supreme’ (8)
Timothée Chalamet in “Marty Supreme.”
(A24)
Josh Safdie’s wildly entertaining, over-caffeinated portrait of a single-minded ping-pong player premiered on its home turf at the New York Film Festival and people left the Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall caught up in the rapture of the movie’s delirium. It might be the movie that wins Timothée Chalamet his Oscar, though he’ll have to go through Leonardo DiCaprio to collect the trophy.
4. ‘Sentimental Value’ (3)
Stellan Skarsgård, left, and Renate Reinsve in “Sentimental Value.”
(Kasper Tuxen / Neon)
Neon won best picture last year with Sean Baker’s “Anora,” and it’s not unreasonable to think it could run it back with “Sentimental Value,” Joachim Trier’s piercing drama about a family reckoning with the past and wondering if reconciliation is possible — or even desired. The three actors cast in familial roles — Stellan Skarsgård, playing a legendary director angling for a comeback, and Renate Reinsve and Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas as his daughters — are excellent, and Elle Fanning has a choice role as an A-list actor who becomes entangled in the family drama. And like “Anora,” this movie ends on a perfect, transcendent note. That counts for a lot.
3. ‘Sinners’ (4)
Michael B. Jordan in “Sinners.”
(Eli Ade / Warner Bros. Pictures)
“Sinners” made a lot of noise when it was released in April and, months later, belongs in any conversation about the year’s best movie. The job now is to remind voters of its worth at events like the American Cinematheque’s upcoming “Sinners” screening with filmmaker Ryan Coogler and Michael B. Jordan. With the level of its craft, it could score a dozen or more nominations, with only “One Battle After Another” as a threat to best that count.
The Gotham Awards did away with its budget cap a couple of years ago, allowing indie-spirited studio movies like “One Battle After Another” to clean up and, one supposes, the show’s sales team to move more tables at its ceremony. It was no secret that Paul Thomas Anderson’s angry, urgent epic would score well with film critics groups. (Panels of critics vote for the Gothams.) It’s just a question of how many dinners Anderson will have to eventually attend for a movie that has easily become the most widely seen film of his career.
As Brussels pushes ahead with a new wave of enlargement, the numbers behind Europe’s trade with its candidate countries reveal a story of dependence, asymmetry, but also a large, untapped potential.
The official EU candidates are Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia, Turkey, and Ukraine. Kosovo is treated as a potential candidate.
Together, they cover a diverse sweep of geography from long Adriatic coastlines to lush forests and some of Europe’s most productive farmland — also including some of Europe’s youngest populations.
But while trade flows between the bloc and future members are booming, the relationship remains unequal, with more EU-produced goods finding a market than those stemming from potential member states.
A relationship measured in billions
According to the European Commission’s 2025 Western Balkans trade factsheet, total trade in goods between the EU and the six Western Balkan partners reached €83.6 billion in 2024, up 28.6% since 2021.
Exports from the EU to the region stood at €49.06bn, while imports from the Western Balkans came to €34.52bn, leaving Brussels with a €14.54bn trade surplus.
The EU’s dominance as a market is overwhelming. It accounts for around 62% of all Western Balkan trade, whereas the region represents barely 1.7% of the EU’s external trade.
For Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Albania, between two-thirds and three-quarters of all exports go to EU countries.
“All (candidate) countries, with the curious exception of North Macedonia, have persistent trade deficits with the EU, meaning they import more from the EU than they export there,” explained Branimir Jovanović, an expert with The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies (WIIW).
“These are economies with small productive sectors. They do not produce enough of what they need, so they have to import, and they also do not produce enough to export,” Jovanović continued.
Over the past decade, North Macedonia has become a production base for components that go straight into EU industry that qualify for preferential access to the EU market under the Stabilisation and Association framework (SAA).
The result is that North Macedonia can sell a relatively high share of what it makes directly into the EU without being blocked by technical standards.
This is very different from, say, Albania, which leans more on raw materials and low-value textiles, or Montenegro, which is tourism-heavy and import-dependent in goods.
It is also different from Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia, which still import a lot of higher-value machinery from the EU and then export a more mixed, lower-value basket back.
Ukraine and Moldova import high-value EU machinery, vehicles and industrial equipment, while exporting mainly lower-margin goods. In essence, they supply raw materials and basic products, and the EU supplies the technology to produce them.
Barriers to trade
The Western Balkans trade with the EU under SAAs, which gradually remove tariffs and align national laws with EU rules as part of the formal accession process. By contrast, Ukraine and Moldova operate under Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Areas (DCFTAs), broader deals that open large parts of the EU single market in exchange for adopting much of the EU’s regulatory framework.
In essence, SAAs are a pathway to membership, while DCFTAs offer deep EU market integration without full membership. This distinction has, however, become blurred — with Brussels indicating that it believes in full membership for Ukraine and Moldova after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
“Countries exporting to the EU face many barriers aside from tariffs. Economists call these technical barriers to trade, such as phytosanitary standards,” Jovanović explained.
So even if they produce something that there is a demand for in the EU, it never reaches those markets because these companies might not have the necessary certificates.
“So, although unemployment has decreased, there is no real progress in development. There is also a real risk of a middle-income trap, in the sense that these economies remain assembly-line economies, with low wages and limited technological development and innovation.”
The same debate now extends to Ukraine, which formally opened EU accession talks in 2024. Despite the war, trade between the EU and Ukraine has surged. Eurostat data shows the bloc exported €42.8bn worth of goods to Ukraine in 2024 and imported €24.5bn, yielding a €18.3bn surplus for the EU.
The composition of that trade has shifted dramatically since the Russian invasion. Agricultural commodities still dominate Ukrainian exports such but the EU has become its conduit for reconstruction materials and machinery.
Neighbouring Moldova, another candidate country since 2023, shows similar patterns. The EU is Moldova’s biggest trading partner, accounting for 54% of its total trade in goods in 2024. Some 65.6% of Moldovan exports head to the EU.
Trade turnover reached about €7.5bn last year, with EU exports to Moldova amounting to €5.1bn and imports to €2.4bn.
EU standards, a distant dream?
The Western Balkans have made solid progress since the early 2000s, but full convergence with the European Union remains a distant goal, warned the OECD’s Economic Convergence Scoreboard for 2025.
The six economies have more than doubled their output in two decades — yet the region still only reaches about 40% of the EU average. At current growth rates, full convergence won’t arrive until 2074.
The region’s output per person (in purchasing-power parity terms) has more than doubled in 20 years, showing real improvement in productivity, investment, and living standards.
That means the Western Balkans are closing the gap, but painfully slowly, and the strong growth rates are offset by the much higher productivity and capital stock inside the EU.
Growth, on its own, is not enough for convergence. The Western Balkans need qualitatively different growth which is driven by innovation, skills, and higher-value industries.
Infrastructure and productivity are the region’s weakest links.
According to the OECD report: “The insufficient quality and coverage of core public transport infrastructure can be a significant obstacle to higher economic growth…as inadequate transport networks can severely constrain the connectivity of producers and consumers to global and regional markets.”
With regard to Ukraine, its economy has adapted after a historic shock, but the damage is staggering. Much of the population has been displaced and large swathes of infrastructure have been destroyed.
Output fell –28.8% in 2022 and rebounded +5.5% in 2023. Public finances are being stretched to the limit by defence needs, hindering convergence with EU member states.
Foreign investment: Friend or foe?
Foreign direct investment (FDI) brings factories and jobs to candidate countries, as well as building stronger links with existing EU member states. Even so, Jovanović argued that this has not led to “structural transformation” in the candidate nations.
The pattern is visible, for example, in Serbia — where car plants are boosting employment but the country is still importing high-tech machinery.
When FDI concentrates in lower-value stages of production and local supplier bases remain thin, wage gains are limited and more value is captured abroad.
“There is a duality in how FDI is perceived: politicians still see it as the key — sometimes even the only way — to develop the economy, while people are increasingly seeing it as a vicious circle,” said Jovanović.
“Hence, a change in the economic model is long overdue — with a more selective approach towards FDI, focusing on high-quality and high-tech investment and a greater focus on domestic companies through industrial and innovation policies,” Jovanović added.
The argument is clear: while FDI raises employment and links these economies to EU markets, it becomes transformative only when it upgrades the local production base.
Otherwise, candidate countries risk remaining an assembly platform rather than a full partner in Europe’s value chains.
A test of Europe’s promise
In the end, the numbers tell both a success story and a warning. They show integration without transformation: Exports are up, factories are open, but productivity and infrastructure still lag.
The next phase will need to hinge on quality, not just quantity, say experts. This means selective FDI that upgrades supply chains, targeted single-market access tied to reforms, and faster investment in skills, energy, and transport.
If Brussels and the candidates can shift from assembly to innovation, the gap can narrow within a generation. If not, the candidate countries risk remaining a dependable workshop rather than a prosperous partner.
MARK Percival believes St Helens are proving talk is not always cheap, especially when it comes from within.
For a frank discussion is proving the moment their season turned a corner.
3
Mark Percival has reveled how a ‘chat’ helped spark St Helens’ season as they aim for the Super League titleCredit: SWPIX.COM
Just over three months ago, boss Paul Wellens was getting all kinds of stick as the former four-time Super League and World Club champions floundered.
Now after nine wins in 11 matches, Saints are firmly in the race for a top three finish and defeating rivals Wigan tonight would put them in contention for second.
And centre Percival can pinpoint the moment the tide started to turn – and the real St Helens started showing up.
He said: “About 12 weeks ago, we all had a good sit down – I think it was after the Warrington game – and a chat.
“I’ve been part of this club for 12 years and I’d not had a chat like that for a long time. It wasn’t nice at the time, a lot of honest things were said.
“But I think it really did turn the corner for us. Since then, everyone’s bought into what we want to do.
“Everyone knows St Helens as a club – we play tough but also play smart. We lost that a bit. We were trying to beat teams by going out there and expecting it to happen.
“We wanted it easy at the time but over the last 12 weeks, we’ve relearned how hard it is.
“We beat Wakefield by a few points but everyone said it was harder than it seems. That’s because we were putting in the effort we were supposed to.
“And you feel for the coach sometimes when they’re copping the stick. It was to do with us on the field if I’m honest. We had a good enough team out there, but we weren’t performing.”
3
Percival and Saints have come good in recent weeksCredit: SWPIX.COM
St Helens and Wigan would be a fierce derby if they were playing tiddlywinks, never mind rugby league.
Throw in competition for England places against Australia and you have even more reason to perform, especially at centre.
As well as Percival, you have Saints’ Harry Robertson and Wigan’s Jake Warde battling it out as the 31-year-old admits one of those roles is taken if Herbie Farnworth is fit.
He added: “There are a lot of good players in my position. Harry, myself and Jake out there tonight.
“I know what I can do but I see the likes of Herbie and Jake as absolutely brilliant players. No-one’s getting in over Herbie, he’s probably the best centre in the world.
3
Centre Percival admits he is behind Herbie Farnworth in the England reckoningCredit: SWPIX.COM
“And I hope he’s fit for England’s sake.
“Harry’s superb and it’s kept me on my toes as we’ve players coming up who are athletic, strong, brilliant.
“Every club has a transition period. A few years ago, we had all that success but you lose players who won all that.
“Now we’re trying to build that team again and over the next few years, with the young lads we’ve got, it can get back to that as they’ve the ability to do it.”
Feedback is the seasoning that flavors the success of our favorite TV shows. Whether it’s from an executive, a trusted colleague or the actors, advice can shape tone, pacing, plotlines and character arcs — all of which can make or break a series. We asked some of this year’s Emmy contenders how creative collaborations provided the notes to their success.
“The Diplomat”
Allison Janney in “The Diplomat.”
(Netflix)
To create the unrelenting tension in the Netflix political drama, which was inspired by conversations with real diplomats, creator Debora Cahn turned to advice from “Homeland” showrunner Alex Gansa: “He said take whatever story that you’re planning in the last episode of the first season and do it in the first episode. And I was like, ‘Ooh, s—.’” The result hurls lead Kate Wyler (Keri Russell) into high-stakes chaos, none wilder than her clash with the vice president (Allison Janney) and a jaw-dropping Season 2 twist. “I was embarrassed to pitch it to the writers’ room. It was an unspeakably dumb idea and a bad cliche, but I had to get it off my chest. We looked for other things, but we kept coming back to it and realized that it did the thing that you really want a plot to do, which is it changes everything.”
“Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story”
Nicholas Alexander Chavez, left, Cooper Koch and Javier Bardem in “Monsters: The Lyle And Erik Menendez Story.”
(Miles Crist / Netflix)
“In researching [the Menendez brothers case], [co-creator] Ryan [Murphy] mentioned, ‘I think this story is [Akira Kurosawa’s] “Rashomon.”’ That was the one note I was like, ‘Oh, I totally get this now,’” says co-creator Ian Brennan of the Netflix limited series. “We’re never going to know what the true story is, but that became a really good guiding light because we made sure that when we’re telling an aspect of this story that’s disputed, we’d go back and tell it the other way,” he says. “What we’re doing is based on as much truth as we can find, but I feel like you’re obliged to take some liberty. It’s not only to tell a story that’s entertaining but to get to those deeper truths that are sometimes occluded by the mundanity of some facts. It’s a painting, not a photograph.”
“Only Murders in the Building”
Steve Martin, left, Selena Gomez and Martin Short in “Only Murders in the Building.”
(Eric McCandless / Disney)
Creator John Hoffman says the idea for Hulu’s mystery-comedy came to him during the pandemic, when everyone was afraid to step outside their door. “This show is about lonely New Yorkers who found a connection between true crime and a death in their building,” he says. But his chief concern was injecting soul into the punch lines. “When I was talking about my ideas for how to make it more connective and humorous, I wanted the comedy to come from humanity as opposed to jokes and behavior. I was deeply surprised by everyone’s response, from the studio, the network and [executive producer] Dan Fogelman, that they wanted to lean into that more profound connective tissue that was more unexpected and dramatic at times,” he says. “There are a lot of personal things in that first season that I thought, ‘Well, that’s going to get me fired.’ But they accepted it.”
“Slow Horses”
Gary Oldman in “Slow Horses.”
(Apple TV+)
“[Executive producer] Graham Yost was always very clear that we should focus on adapting Mick Herron’s work and not just use it as a launchpad for some kind of offshoot,” says creator Will Smith of the clever Apple TV+ show, which follows a group of disgraced MI5 agents. “Whenever we got stuck in the room, Graham’s watchword would be, ‘Well, let’s look at what Mick wrote,’ and we would go back to the book and figure it out from there. So the tone of the books infused the scripts.” The outcome is a nail-biter of a tale with humor smuggled in like contraband. ”Our fabulous exec Jamie Laurenson and our brilliant [Season 1] director James Hawes both understood that nothing should ever feel like a joke, nothing should feel gratuitous or crowbarred for a laugh. It should all be thrown away, underplayed, said on the run.”
“What We Do in the Shadows”
The cast of “What We Do in the Shadows.”
“There’s a part of me that feels like it’s cheating, but it really helps,” says showrunner Paul Simms of the mockumentary shooting style behind the hilarious FX series, which portrays the awkward lives and bizarre pitfalls of centuries-old vampires. “If you’re writing a narrative show that’s not documentary format, people’s motivations have to come out in their dialogue. With this, you can have characters very directly and, in a very funny way, state their motivations.” Unlocking its full bite of wit were two keys. “One great thing about this format is that you’re not hamstrung by little continuity details in the edit. You can do jump cuts and jam in as much funny stuff without having to worry,” Simms says. The other, a network note: “From the beginning, FX and John Landgraf were saying the vampire stuff is fun, but it can’t be all vampire jokes. So our approach every season was to go in new directions and create constant tension.”
Severance stood out from the competition earning 27 Emmy nods, while HBO’s dark Batman spinoff, The Penguin, secured 24 nominations.
The nominees for the 2025 Primetime Emmy Awards have been announced.
Actors Harvey Guillen and Brenda Song revealed the nominations at the Television Academy’s Wolf Theater in Los Angeles, California, on Tuesday in advance of the 77th annual ceremony.
Severance stood out from the competition, earning 27 Emmy nods, while Apple TV’s The Studio topped the comedy categories with 23 nominations. HBO’s dark Batman spinoff, The Penguin, secured 24 nominations.
Abbott Elementary The Bear Hacks Nobody Wants This Only Murders in the Building Shrinking The Studio What We Do in the Shadows pic.twitter.com/a98KPPARH8
Javier Bardem, Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story
Bill Camp, Presumed Innocent
Owen Cooper, Adolescence
Rob Delaney, Dying for Sex
Peter Sarsgaard, Presumed Innocent
Ashley Walters, Adolescence
Cooper Koch as Erik Menendez, centre, and Nicholas Chavez as Lyle Menendez, right, in a scene from Monsters: The Lyle And Erik Menendez Story [Miles Crist/Netflix]
Supporting actor, comedy series
Ike Barinholtz, The Studio
Colman Domingo, The Four Seasons
Harrison Ford, Shrinking
Jeff Hiller, Somebody Somewhere
Ebon Moss-Bachrach, The Bear
Michael Urie, Shrinking
Bowen Yang, Saturday Night Live
Ike Barinholtz, from left, Kathryn Hahn, Chase Sui Wonders and Seth Rogen in a scene from The Studio [Apple TV+ via AP]
Supporting actress, comedy series
Liza Colon-Zayas, The Bear
Hannah Einbinder, Hacks
Kathryn Hahn, The Studio
Janelle James, Abbott Elementary
Catherine O’Hara, The Studio
Sheryl Lee Ralph, Abbott Elementary
Jessica Williams, Shrinking
Congratulations to the cast and crew of The Bear for their 13 Emmy® nominations. pic.twitter.com/Kqo30C1mb0
Talk about hosts with the most! Congratulations to both Ken Jennings and Colin Jost, and the whole Jeopardy! team on the 140th Emmy® nominations for the show! Thank you @TelevisionAcad#Jeopardy! #Emmyspic.twitter.com/FByCOGKJQn
That was the prevailing feeling among the Rams this week as they ended their off season with a “Mauicamp,” a low-key event heavy on bonding and light on drills for a team expected to contend for a championship.
Star quarterback Matthew Stafford is under contract for another potential Super Bowl run.
The Rams also added star receiver Davante Adams, drafted tight end Terrance Ferguson and bolstered depth to an ascending defensive front.
The Rams, however, have areas of concern as they head into a break before reporting to training camp at Loyola Marymount in July.
Offensive tackle and cornerback could be vulnerabilities for a team aiming to improve upon last season’s 10-7 record and an NFC divisional round loss to the eventual Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles.
Here’s how confident the Rams were in those positions going into free agency and the draft: They did not sign or select a player at either spot.
Whether that was wise is another matter.
Stafford, 37, remains the Rams’ most important player and — other than coach Sean McVay — their most valuable asset. So the tackles must foil edge rushers hellbent on hitting the quarterback while playing perhaps the most pressure-packed position other than Stafford’s.
With his play last season, Alaric Jackson convinced the Rams he was their longtime solution at left tackle. They awarded him a three-year contract that included $35 million in guarantees.
But uncertainty now reigns. Jackson sat out the final week of offseason workouts because he is dealing with blood-clot issues for the second time in his career. If, or when, he will be able to practice and play is unknown.
Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford passes during organized team activities on June 3.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
The Rams hurriedly signed D.J. Humphries, but the veteran is of late something of an unknown quantity. He played only two games last season for the Kansas City Chiefs after returning from major 2023 knee surgery and then suffering a hamstring injury.
Right tackle Rob Havenstein, 33, is entering his 11th season and the final year of his contract. He is coming off two shoulder surgeries.
Swing tackle Warren McClendon Jr. started five games last season, but he has not established himself as a frontline player. The Rams also recently signed eight-year pro David Quessenberry, who made 17 of his career 30 starts in 2021.
The Rams are confident in the secondary — in large part because of the defensive front.
A rush led by rookies Jared Verse and Braden Fiske helped the Rams rank 20th among 32 teams in pass defense last season. That rush is expected to improve with the addition of tackle Poona Ford and rookie edge rusher Josaiah Stewart.
So the Rams stood pat with the same defensive backs from last season.
Cornerback Darious Williams, 32, does not have salary guarantees beyond this season, according to Overthecap.com. Ahkello Witherspoon, 30, is playing on a one-year deal for the third consecutive season but was signed early enough this time to participate in offseason workouts.
Cobie Durant is in the final year of his rookie contract, and Emmanuel Forbes Jr. is trying to prove that the Washington Commanders erred by releasing the 2023 first-round pick last season.
Derion Kendrick, coming off a knee injury that forced him to sit out the 2024 season, was waived last week in a cost-cutting move and then re-signed with the Rams for a veteran-minimum contract. Josh Wallace and Charles Woods, undrafted free agents in 2024, also are on the roster.
Two-time Pro Bowl cornerback Jaire Alexander was recently released by the Green Bay Packers, but McVay said last week that was “not a direction” the Rams would go. Alexander signed with the Baltimore Ravens, the Rams’ Week 6 opponent.
While the NFL largely shuts down until the start of training camp, general manager Les Snead in the past has added players before it opens and after it begins.
But for now, with their Hawaiian excursion behind them, the Rams appear ready to go with what they’ve got.
The Emmys’ limited series/TV movie acting categories have come to represent some of the best and most-talked-about shows on television, and this year’s crop of contenders is no exception.
The seven actors who joined the 2025 Envelope Roundtable were Javier Bardem, who plays father, victim and alleged molester Jose Menendez in Netflix’s “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story”; Renée Zellweger, who reprises her role as the British romantic heroine in “Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy”; Stephen Graham, who co-created and stars in “Adolescence” as the father of a teenage boy who commits a heinous murder; Jenny Slate, who plays the best friend of a terminally ill woman in FX’s “Dying for Sex”; Brian Tyree Henry, who portrays a man posing as a federal agent in order to rip off drug dealers in Apple TV+’s “Dope Thief”; Elizabeth Banks, who takes on the role of an estranged sibling and recovering alcoholic in Prime Video’s “The Better Sister”; and Sacha Baron Cohen, who appears as the deceived husband of a successful filmmaker in Apple TV+’s “Disclaimer.”
The Times’ news and culture critic Lorraine Ali spoke to the group about the emotional fallout of a heavy scene, the art of defying expectations and more. Read highlights from their conversation below and watch video of the roundtable above.
The 2025 Limited Series / TV Movie Roundtable: Elizabeth Banks, left, Sacha Baron Cohen, Jenny Slate, Javier Bardem, Brian Tyree Henry, Renée Zellweger and Stephen Graham.
Many of you move between drama and comedy. People often think, “Drama’s very serious and difficult, comedy’s light and easy.” Is that true?
Banks: I think the degree of difficulty with comedy is much higher. It’s really hard to sustainably make people laugh over time, whereas [with] drama, everyone relates to loss and pining for love that’s unrequited. Not everybody has great timing or is funny or gets satire.
Henry: There’s something fun about how closely intertwined they are. In my series, I’m playing a heroin addict running for my life, and I have this codependency with this friend … There’s a scene where I’ve been looking for him, and I’m high out of my mind, and I find him in my attic, and all he’s talking about is how he has to take a s—. And I’m like, “But they’re trying to kill us.” You just see him wincing and going through all these [groans]. It is so funny, but at the same time, you’re just terrified for both. There’s always humor somewhere in the drama.
Banks: There’s a reason why the theater [symbol] is a happy face/sad face. They’re very intertwined.
Renée Zellweger of “Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy.”
Renée, with Bridget Jones — how has she changed over the last 25 years and where is she now with “Mad About the Boy”?
Zellweger: Nobody’s the same from one moment to the next, one chapter to the next and certainly not from one year to the next. It’s been a really interesting sort of experiment to revisit a character in the different phases of her life.
What I’m really grateful for is that the timing runs in parallel to the sort of experiences that you have in your early 20s, 30s and so on. With each iteration, I don’t have to pretend that I’m less than I am, because I don’t want to be the character that I was, or played, when she was 29, 35. I don’t want to do that, and I certainly don’t want to do that now.
So it was really nice to meet her again in this place of what she’s experiencing in the moment, which is bereavement and the loss of her great love, and being a mom, and trying to be responsible, and reevaluating what she values, and how she comports herself, and what’s important and all of that, because, of course, I relate to that in this moment.
There’s a certain level of sociopathy.
— Brian Tyree Henry, “Dope Thief,” on the lengths actors will go to get the shot
Stephen, “Adolescence” follows a family dealing with the fallout of their 13-year-old son being accused of a brutal murder. You direct and star in the series. What was it like being immersed in such heavy subject matter? Did it come home with you?
Graham: We did that first episode, the end of it was quite heavy and quite emotional. When we said, “Cut,” all of us older actors and the crew were very emotional. There were hugs and a bit of applause.
And then everyone would be like, “Where’s Owen?” [Cooper, the teenage actor who plays Graham’s character’s son]. “Is Owen OK? Is he with his child psychologist?” No, Owen’s upstairs playing swing ball with his tutor. It was like OK, that’s the way to do this — not to take myself too seriously when we say, “Cut,” but when I am there, immerse myself in it.
Let’s be honest, we can all be slightly self-obsessed. My missus, she’s the best for me because I’d phone her and say, “I had a really tough day. I had to cry all day. My wife’s died of cancer, and it was a really tough one.” She goes, “The dog s— all over the living room. I had to go shopping and the f— bag split when I got to Tesco. There was a flat tire. They’ve let the kids out of school early because there’s been a flood. And you’ve had a hard day pretending to be sad?”
Bardem: I totally agree with what Stephen says. You have a life with your family and your children that you have to really pay attention to. This is a job, and you just do the job as good as you can with your own limitations. You put everything into it when they say, “Action,” and when you’re out, you just leave it behind. Otherwise, it’s too much.
Certain scenes, certain moments stay with you because we work with what we are. But I think it doesn’t make you a better actor to really stay in character, as they say, for 24 hours. That doesn’t work for me. It actually makes me feel very confused if I do that.
On the show “Monsters” I tried to protect Cooper [Koch] and Nicholas [Alexander Chavez], the actors who play the children, because they were carrying the heavy weight on the show every day. I was trying to make them feel protected and loved and accompanied by us, the adults, and let them know that we are there for them and that this is fiction. Because they were going really deep into it, and they did an amazing job.
Elizabeth Banks of “The Better Sister.”
Elizabeth, in “The Better Sister,” you portray Nicky, a sister estranged from her sibling who’s been through quite a bit of her own trauma.
Banks: I play a drunk who’s lost her child and her husband, basically, to her little sister, played by Jessica Biel. She is grappling with trauma from her childhood, which she’s trying not to bring forward. She’s been working [with] Alcoholics Anonymous, an incredible program, to get through her stuff. But she’s also a fish out of water when she visits her sister, who [lives in a] very rarefied New York, literary, fancy rich world. My character basically lives in a trailer park in Ohio. There’s a lot going on. And there’s a murder mystery.
I loved the complication … but it brought up all of those things for me. I do think you absolutely leave most of that [heaviness] on set. You are mining it all for the character work, so you’ve got to find it, but I don’t need to then infect my own children with it.
Sacha Baron Cohen of “Disclaimer.”
Sacha, you have played and created these really gregarious characters like Ali G or Borat. Your character in “Disclaimer,” he’s not a character you created, but he is very understated. Was that a challenge?
Cohen: It took me a long time to work out who the character was. I said to [director] Alfonso [Cuarón], “I don’t understand why this guy goes on that journey from where we see him in Act 1.” For me it was, how do you make this person unique?
We worked a lot through the specificity of what words he uses and what he actually says to explain and give hints for me as an actor. A lot of that was Alfonso Cuarón saying, “Take it down.” And there was a lot of rewriting and loads of drafts before I even understood how this guy reacts to the news and information that he believes about his wife.
Jenny Slate of “Dying for Sex.”
Jenny, “Dying for Sex” is based on a true story about two friends. One has terminal cancer, and the other — your character — supports her right up until the end. Talk about what it was like to play that role in a series that alternates between biting humor and deep grief.
Slate: Michelle Williams, who does a brilliant job in this show, her energy is extending outward and [her character] is trying to experiment before she does the greatest experiment of all, which is to cross over into the other side. My character is really out there, not out there willy-nilly, but she will yell at people if they are being rude, wasteful or if she feels it’s unjust. [And she’s] going from blasting to taking all that energy and making it this tight laser, and pointing it right into care, and knowing more about herself at the end.
I am a peppy person, and I felt so excited to have the job that a lot of my day started with calming myself down. I’m at work with Michelle Williams and Sissy Spacek and Liz Meriwether and Shannon Murphy and being, like, “Siri, set a meditation timer for 10 minutes,” and making myself do alternate nostril breathing [exercises].
Brian Tyree Henry of “Dope Thief.”
Brian, many people came to know you from your role as Paper Boi in “Atlanta.” The series was groundbreaking and like nothing else on television. What was it like moving out of that world and onto other projects?
Henry: People really thought that I was this rapper that they pulled off the street from Atlanta. To me, that’s the greatest compliment … When I did “Bullet Train,” I was shocked at how many people thought I was British. I was like, “Oh, right. Now I’ve twisted your mind this way.” I was [the voice of] Megatron at one point, and now I’ve twisted your mind that way. My path in is always going to be stretching people’s imaginations, because they get so attached to characters that I’ve played that they really believe that I’m that person.
People feel like they have an ownership of who you are. I love the challenge of having to force the imaginations of the viewers and myself to see me in a departure [from] what they saw me [as] previously. Because I realize that when I walk in a room, before I even open my mouth, there’s 90 different things that are put on me or taken away from me because of how I look and how I carry myself.
Javier Bardem of “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story.”
Javier, since doing the series are you now frequently asked about your own opinions on the Menendez case? The brothers claim their father molested them, and that is in part what led to them murdering their parents.
Bardem: I don’t think anybody knows. That’s the point. That was the great thing about playing that character, is you have to play it in a way that it’s not obvious that he did those things that he was accused of, because nobody knows, but at the same time you have to make people believe that he was capable.
I did say to Ryan [Murphy] that I can’t do a scene with a kid. Because in the beginning, they do drafts, and there were certain moments where I said, “I can’t. It’s not needed.” The only moment that I had a hard time was when [Jose] has to face [his] young kid. It was only a moment where Jose was mean to him. That’s not in my nature.
Henry: I discovered, while doing my series, “My body doesn’t know this isn’t real.” There’s an episode where I’m shot in the leg, and I’m bleeding out and I’m on all this different morphine and drugs and all this stuff, and I’m literally lying on this ground, take after take, having to mime this. To go through the delusion of this pain … in the middle of the takes, it was just so crazy. I would literally look at the crew and say, “Somebody hug me! Somebody!”
Stephen, that scene where you confront the boys in the parking lot with the bike, I was just like, “Oh, my God, how many times did he have to do that?” This kid gets in your face, and I was like, “Punch the kid!” My heart went out to you, man, not just as the character but as you being in there.
Graham: Because we did it all in one take, we had that unique quality. You’re using the best of two mediums. You’ve got that beauty and that spontaneity and that reality of the theater, and then you have the naturalism and the truth that we have with film and television. So by the time I get to that final bit, we’ve been through all those emotions. When I open the door and go into [Jamie’s] room, everything’s shaken. But it’s not you. It’s an out-of-body experience and just comes from somewhere else.
Bardem: Listen, we don’t do brain surgery, but let’s give ourselves some credit. We are generous in what we do because we are putting our bodies into an experience. We are doing this for something bigger than us, and that is the story that we’re telling.
What have been some of the more challenging or difficult moments for you, either in your career or your recent series?
Zellweger: Trying not to do what you’re feeling in the moment sometimes, because it’s not appropriate to what you’re telling. That happens in most shows, most things that you do. I think everybody experiences it where you’re bringing something from home and it doesn’t belong on the set. It’s impossible to leave it behind when you walk in because it’s bigger than you are in that moment.
Banks: I would say that the thing that I worked on the most for “The Better Sister” was [understanding] sobriety. I’m not sober. I love a bubbly rosé. So it really did bring up how much I think about drinking and how social it is and what that ritual is for me, and how this character is thinking about it every day and deciding every day to stay sober or not. I am also a huge fan of AA and sobriety programs. I think they’re incredible tools for everybody who works those programs. I was grateful for the access to all of that as I was making the series. But that’s what you get to do in TV. You get to explore episode by episode. You get to play out a lot more than just three acts.
Stephen Graham of “Adolescence.”
Stephen, about the continuous single shot. It seems like it’s an incredibly difficult and complex way to shoot a series. Why do it?
Graham: It’s exceptionally difficult, I’m not going to lie. It’s like a swan glides across the water beautifully, but the legs are going rapidly underneath. A lot of it is done in preparation. We spend a whole week learning the script, and then the second week is just with the camera crew and the rest of the crew. It’s a choreography that you work out, getting an idea of where they want the camera to go, and the opportunity to embody the space ourselves.
Cohen: That reminds me of a bit of doing the undercover movies that I do because you have one take. … I did a scene where I’m wearing a bulletproof vest. There were a lot of the people in the audience who’d gone to this rally, a lot of them had machine guns. We knew they were going to get angry, but you’ve got to do the scene. You’ve got one time to get the scene right. But you also go, “OK, those guys have got guns. They’re trying to storm the stage. I haven’t quite finished the scene. When do I leave?” But you’ve got to get the scene. I could get shot, but that’s not important.
Henry: There’s a certain level of sociopathy.
Slate: I feel like I’m never on my mark, and it was always a very kind camera operator being like, “Hey, Jenny, you weren’t in the shot shoulder-wise.” I feel like such an idiot. Part of it is working through lifelong, longstanding feelings of “I’m a fool and my foolishness is going to make people incredibly angry with me.” And then really still wanting to participate and having no real certainty that I’m going to be able to do anything but just make all of my fears real. Part of the thing that I love about performance is I just want to experience the version of myself that does not collapse into useless fragments when I face the thing that scares me the most. I do that, and then I feel the appetite for performance again.
Do you see yourself in roles when you’re watching other people’s films or TV show?
Graham: At the end of the day, we’re all big fans of acting. That’s why we do it. Because when we were young, we were inspired by people on the screen, or we were inspired by places where we could put ourselves and lose our imaginations.
We have a lot of t— in this industry. But I think if we fight hard enough, we can come through. Do you know what I mean? It’s people that are here for the right reasons. It’s a collective. Acting is not a game of golf. It’s a team. It’s in front and it’s behind the camera. I think it’s important that we nourish that.
Henry: And remember that none of us are t—.
Bardem: What is a t—? I may be one of them and I don’t know it.
There has never been a shortage of TV series that take place in Los Angeles, the longtime hub of the American television industry and its players. But the 2025 Emmy season features such a wealth of shows set and shot in and around L.A. that we couldn’t resist spotlighting how several of them use the iconic locale we call home.
‘Shrinking’
Jason Segel, left, Jessica Williams, Christa Miller and Ted McGinley in “Shrinking.”
(Apple)
The Apple TV+ comedy, which follows an interconnected group of co-workers, friends and neighbors, is set mainly in Pasadena and Altadena. Location manager David Flannery, a fifth-generation Pasadena native, notes, “So often [these cities] play for everywhere else in the world. But we want to show exactly where we are — which is just a little more specific than general L.A. — and that the characters are grounded in very real places.” These sites have included the Rose Bowl, Pasadena City Hall, Pasadena’s Central Park (featuring the landmark Castle Green building) and the South Pasadena train station. The Laird and Bishop family homes, with their adjoining backyards, may look like a set but are actually neighboring Altadena houses, both of which survived the Eaton fire.
‘Only Murders in the Building’
Martin Short, left, Selena Gomez and Steve Martin in “Only Murders in the Building.”
(Eric McCandless / Disney)
Although Hulu’s Emmy-winning comic mystery is the ultimate New York tale, its Season 4 opener sent its crime-solving lead trio to Tinseltown to pursue a movie adaptation of their popular podcast. Co-creator and showrunner John Hoffman, calling in during the show’s Season 5 shoot, says, “Last season had to start in L.A. It really kicks off a season that is specific to cinema, to moving images.” Filming took place on the classic Paramount Studios lot, at the historic Il Borghese condo building in Hancock Park and at an “ultra-glamorous, deeply L.A.” Hollywood Hills home, which served as studio exec Bev Melon’s party house.
‘Nobody Wants This’
Kristen Bell and Adam Brody in “Nobody Wants This.”
(Adam Rose / Netflix)
Creator-showrunner Erin Foster can’t imagine her Netflix rom-com about a progressive rabbi and a gentile sex podcaster set anywhere but her native Los Angeles. “You have to write what you know, and that’s what I know,” she says by phone from her West Hollywood home. “In L.A., people are following their dreams, so it says a lot about who someone is. I think the same applies to locations in a TV show: They all signal where [the characters] are in their life and who they are.” Some of these illustrative locales have included Westwood’s Sinai Temple, the Wilshire Boulevard Temple in Koreatown, the Los Feliz 3 Theatre, Calamigos Ranch in Malibu and WeHo’s Pleasure Chest sex shop.
‘The Studio’
Seth Rogen and Catherine O’Hara in “The Studio.”
(Apple)
Seth Rogen and company’s raucous creation about a beleaguered movie studio chief is rooted in firsthand experience. “Seth knows this town very, very well,” says supervising location manager Stacey Brashear. “He and [co-creator] Evan Goldberg wrote in 90% of the locations, including the [John] Lautner-designed, Midcentury Modern houses that studio executives like to collect.” Among these eye-popping sites are the Silvertop house above the Silver Lake Reservoir and the Harvey House in the Hollywood Hills. Adds Brashear, “I feel like our locations are actual characters in the show.” Among the Apple TV+ series’ many other L.A. locations: the Warner Bros. studio lot, the Smoke House Restaurant in Burbank, Lake Hollywood Park and the Sunset Strip’s Chateau Marmont.
‘Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story’
Chloë Sevigny and Javier Bardem in “Monsters: The Lyle Aand Erik Menendez Story.”
(Netflix)
This Netflix limited series revisits the 1989 murder of wealthy Beverly Hills couple José and Kitty Menendez by sons Erik and Lyle, a crime notoriously connected to Los Angeles. “It was such a period of decadence and grandeur, and Beverly Hills was kind of the poster child for that,” says production designer Matthew Flood Ferguson. “I wanted to recapture the [town’s] glamour and celebrity culture.” He also notes, of L.A.’s diverse architecture, “You can get quite a few different looks all in the same place.” These “looks” included a grand Hancock Park-area home standing in for the Mendendez mansion, Koreatown’s Wilshire Colonnade office complex, a 1970s-built Encino bank building, Beverly Hills’ Will Rogers Memorial Park and the former Sunset Strip site of Spago, restored to look as it did in its heyday.
‘Hacks’
Megan Stalter left, and Hannah Einbinder at the Americana at Brand in “Hacks.”
(Kenny Laubbacher / Max)
Unlike past seasons, in which L.A. often subbed for Las Vegas, Season 4 of “Hacks” is mostly shot and set in Los Angeles. Says Lucia Aniello, co-creator with Paul W. Downs and Jen Stasky, “Much of [the season] is getting back to the roots of L.A. comedy. It really is a love letter to Los Angeles — and to the comedy world.” Adds Downs, “The show is a lot about people outside of the industry looking in. By being in L.A., we got to really explore what that means.” Some key locations: CBS Television City, the Lenny Kravitz-designed Stanley House, the Americana at Brand and Echo Park’s Elysian Theater; the Altadena estate doubling for Deborah Vance’s Bel-Air mansion was lost in the Eaton fire.
‘Running Point’
Kate Hudson and Max Greenfield in “Running Point.”
(Katrina Marcinowski / Netflix)
Loosely based on the life of Lakers President Jeanie Buss, this Netflix comedy is “filled with a lot of L.A. DNA,” says co-creator and showrunner David Stassen. He adds that, like Buss, the show’s star, Kate Hudson, “is also part of a dynastic L.A. family. Plus, she knows Jeanie, she loves the Lakers and she grew up going to games.” Though much of the season was filmed downtown at Los Angeles Center Studios, location work included the Pacific Coast Highway south of Venice (where Cam, played by Justin Theroux, crashes his Porsche), downtown L.A.’s elegant Hotel Per La and homes in Sherman Oaks and Woodland Hills. The L.A. skyline gets quite the workout here as well.
‘Forever’
Lovie Simone in “Forever.”
(Elizabeth Morris / Netflix)
Netflix’s reimagining of Judy Blume’s 1975 novel unfolds in 2018 Los Angeles, where it evocatively explores first love between teens Justin and Keisha. Showrunner and L.A. native Mara Brock Akil considers her adaptation “a love letter to Los Angeles and to the idyllic life we’re all trying to live in this city, where dreams are not isolated to one particular neighborhood.” Key parts of the story take place around Keisha’s home in the View Park-Windsor Hills area, with the show’s many other L.A. locations including Ladera Park, St. Mary’s Academy in Inglewood, the Grove and the Original Farmers Market, Griffith Park and the Santa Monica Pier. Adds Akil, “A lot of people [in L.A.] are moving around on public transportation, which I wanted to shine a light on too.”
Academy Award winner Billy Bob Thornton, who plays chain-smoking crisis manager Tommy Norris in Taylor Sheridan’s latest hit “Landman,”seems like a guy who can’t be intimidated. But get him in a room with Allison Janney and the truth comes out.
“I was afraid of you,” he tells her sheepishly on The Envelope’s Emmy Roundtable for drama actors.
“Really?” says Janney, the Oscar-, Emmy- and Golden Globe-winning performer who appears as cunning Vice President Grace Penn on the Netflix political thriller “The Diplomat.”
“The first time I met Allison, it was at another press function thing,” he says to the room. “And just seeing you, as an actor, and parts you play … But also, you have this very dignified quality about you.”
“It’s my height, I think.”
“No,” he continues. “You just have the face of someone who is powerful and really intelligent. So some idiot like me comes in, and I’m like, ‘Maybe I shouldn’t talk to her.’”
This is what happens when you gather seven Emmy contenders whose performances so convincingly shape our perceptions of who they are in real life. This year’s group also included Sterling K. Brown, who plays Xavier Collins, a Secret Service agent seeking the truth in Hulu’s “Paradise”; Britt Lower, who plays both wealthy heiress Helena Eagan and defiant data refiner Helly R. in Apple TV+’s “Severance”; Jason Isaacs, who plays Timothy Ratliff, an American financier desperately trying to keep a secret from his family in HBO’s “The White Lotus”; Noah Wyle, who plays Dr. Michael “Robby” Robinavitch, a senior attending physician at a Pittsburgh trauma center in Max’s “The Pitt”; and Kaitlin Olson, who plays the underestimated but brilliant police consultant Morgan Gillory in ABC’s “High Potential.”
Read on for excerpts from our discussion about how they tap into their layered performances, navigate the business and more — and watch video of the roundtable below.
The 2025 Emmy Drama Roundtable. Back row from left: Britt Lower, Jason Isaacs, Noah Wyle and Kaitlin Olson. From row from left: Billy Bob Thornton, Allison Janney and Sterling K. Brown.
(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times)
Tell me about an “Oh, my God, did that just happen?” moment — good or bad — from your early years on a Hollywood set. Kaitlin, your first credit was “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” I can’t imagine what it’s like making Larry David laugh.
Olson: Oh, you just have to scream in his face and insult him, and then he thinks that’s really, really funny. But yeah, there were no marks and there were no lines. So I didn’t really have an “Oh, my God” moment. You just talk and shut up when you should shut up.
Isaacs: On my first day [on 1989’s “The Tall Guy”], I remember I arrived first thing in the morning. I was playing Surgeon No. 2 in a dream sequence that Jeff Goldblum was in. The director, who’s hassled and busy, he goes, “OK, we’re going to start with you. We’re coming in on the dolly. But because I’m on a very wide lens, if you could start the eyeline somewhere near the bottom of the jib and then just go to the corner of bottle, then take it to the edge of the matte box when we’re getting close.” And I went, “Right … What the f— did any of those words mean?” Jeff is just out of frame. And he’s in his underpants, and it’s a dream sequence for him. And we’re just about to go and roll the cameras, and Jeff goes, “Hold on a second.” And he stands up and he starts standing on a chair reciting Byron love poems even though he was not in the shot. I’m like, “I don’t understand what the hell is going on here.” Years later, I sat next to him at a wedding and I said, “Do you remember that night?” He went, “Yeah.”
Jason Isaacs of “The White Lotus.”
Have there been moments where you fell out of love with acting or where you felt like, “This isn’t working out”?
Janney: My career didn’t start till I was 38 or something, because I’m so tall, and I was literally uncastable. I went to the Johnson O’Connor [Research Foundation]. And I did three days of testing to see what else I could possibly do.
Issacs: What is that?
Janney: It’s an aptitude testing place. They ask you to do all this stuff, and at the end of it they say, “This is what you should be.” And they told me I should be a systems analyst. I had no idea what that was. And the next day, I got cast understudying Faith Prince and Kate Nelligan in “Bad Habits,” a play at the Manhattan Theatre Club.
Allison Janney of “The Diplomat.”
Brown: I’ve never fallen out of love with it. I was an economics major in college who wound up switching to drama. When I got out of grad school and [was] hopping around through regional theater, I wound up booking a TV show, “Army Wives,” for six years, and a few years into the show, I was like, “I think I’ve done everything that I want to do with the character.” So when they came dangling the carrot for people to reup after Season 6, I was like, “I’m curious to see what else the universe has in store.” I was able to pay off student loans. We had our first child, I had a home and I was like, “Let’s take a gamble on Brown.” I did a pilot for AMC that didn’t get picked up; then had a recurring [role] on “Person of Interest” for six episodes. I was like, “Oh, man, I got a wife and a kid and a house. Did I mess up? Should I have stayed on the show or not?”
Then I auditioned for [“The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story”], and I didn’t hear anything for four months. I was down in New Mexico shooting this movie, “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot,” and I was having this really sort of morbid moment of going through my IMDb Pro account and looking at everybody who had booked all of the things that I had auditioned for. I was like, “Oh, Bokeem Woodbine booked Season 2 of ‘Fargo.’ Good for him.” And I got a call from my manager saying, “They want you to screen test with Sarah Paulson for this thing.” I was the only person that they brought in to audition for it.
Sterling K. Brown of “Paradise.”
Your series are largely confronting or commenting on real-world anxieties or subjects that are changing in our world in real time. Noah, with Dr. Robbie and what he says about what’s going on in the healthcare system — we’re seeing him cope with the aftermath of COVID-19. We’re seeing stories that are very timely about vaccinations. Talk about what was important to you with this series and what you wanted to show through these characters.
Wyle: “ER” was very much a patient-centric show in a lot of ways. And this was more of an exercise to be practitioner- and physician-centric, to really show the toll that the last five years since COVID has taken on that community. The thesis being that it is as fragile as the mental health of the people that we have in those jobs and the quality’s what we received. Even though we had to peer into a crystal ball and try to figure out a year ago what would be the topical cases of today, we were really more interested in how everybody’s coping mechanisms have allowed them to practice what they’ve been doing for the last five years. How they’ve compartmentalized the toll it’s taken on them personally, and explore that in real time. Aggregate tension on a shift where you’re just embedded with them without release. The outset was more about identifying the mental health of the practitioner than identifying the ills in society … Can I just say how effing cool it is to sit at this table with you all and be the uncool one to say that I feel like my impostor syndrome is off the rails right now?
Olson: No way.
Noah Wyle of “The Pitt.”
Hopefully you’ll all guest star on each other’s shows by the time this is over.
Janney: I would love that.
Britt, what really spoke to me about “Severance” was its exploration of grief, but within that too, there’s the corporate overreach and the work-life balance that I think all of us can appreciate. Did it show you anything about how you navigate your work-life balance or what you could do better?
Lower: The cast talks a lot about how the “Severance” procedure is kind of like what we do for a living. We go to work and put on a different outfit and assume a new identity. There were some moments where you’re walking down the corridors on the way to your job, and there’s kind of this meta quality of being inside of a show about compartmentalizing and switching into a different part of yourself. But I think it’s so relatable. I think we do that as humans. We show up differently in different spaces in our lives, whether it’s work or home or going home for the holidays, versus your baseball team. You just put on a different person really.
Britt Lower of “Severance.”
Isaacs: If I go away to do a job on location somewhere, I can actually — even at my ripe old age; I’m a father and I’m a husband — just park my life and forget that. Now I see that metaphor very clearly and it’s irresponsible. I’m so much more comfortable in the fictitious world than I am in the real world.
Do you feel like there’s a misconception that you guys are just all at the pool?
Isaacs: I’m not really an actor anymore; I just do “White Lotus” publicity for a job. And in the billions of interviews, people expect you to say, “It was a holiday. We were in this resort.” Well, we’re not really in the resort. So I’ve said a few times, “You make friends. You lose friends, romances or whatever; things happen between departments and all the backstage drama that we’re all used to.” Well, the online world went mad trying to deconstruct, trying to work out who knew who and who was [doing what]. Actually, I’m talking about all the crew and all the departments — not that it’s anyone’s business. But it’s trying to deconstruct what we all think of each other. And what happened there is so much less interesting than Mike White’s brilliant stories. You shouldn’t be interested in who went to dinner with who. I kind of wish I hadn’t opened my mouth about it, but I don’t want to pretend it was a holiday. Not just the way that the show blew up but also the level of microscopic interest in anything any of us said, tweeted, posted — there aren’t many new experiences for actors who’ve been around a long time, but this one has been shocking, and I’m quite glad that it’s abating now. I’d like to return to my normal life, but I don’t know how people who are uber-famous deal with it.
The level of microscopic interest in anything any of us said, tweeted, posted, is a new — there aren’t many new experiences for actors who’ve been around a long time, but this one has been shocking.
— Jason Isaacs, on fan attention to ‘The White Lotus’
Billy Bob, how did you come to navigate it? You’ve experienced the extreme effects of that.
Thornton: You mean in the world of Hollywood and all that?
Isaacs: Do you go to the supermarket, take the subway … Do you do the stuff I do?
Thornton: It depends on what year it is. I’ve gone through times where I couldn’t go anywhere. Once my life got bigger, and that really happened with … I mean, I was a working actor doing OK, but “Sling Blade” is the one that, literally overnight, it was a crazy thing. From that point on, it’s been pretty steady. What I’ve done to not get involved in all that is I don’t really go anywhere. I’m either working or I’m at home with the family or in a recording studio or on the road. You don’t see me in the [tabloid] magazines, at the parties and all that kind of stuff.
I’ll put it this way. Right now, with “Landman,” we thought it was going to be successful. We had no idea that it was going to be like this. I mean, we’ve got fans in Iceland and stuff. I can’t go to a Walmart in Texas. It’s literally impossible. I tried it. I would walk three feet at a time. Texans, their personalities are also very big, and they don’t really come up and go, “Excuse me, mister.” It’s not like that. It’s like, “Hey man, what’s going on? Get in a picture with me.”
I’ve had a reputation — weirdo. Angelina and I were vampires. We drank each other’s blood. You look on the internet, and there’s some kind of thing you’re trying to look up and, inevitably, it’ll show something else. So you go, “I hate this. I hate the internet, but I got to see it.”
Billy Bob Thornton of “Landman.”
Isaacs: There’s no good version of you. You either look much better on the screen or much better in real life. I wanted to say [looks at Allison], because I was a huge “West Wing” fan, I did some “West Wing,” I couldn’t break out of thinking that Bradley [Whitford] and Janel [Moloney] were, in fact, Josh and Donna. Did people think you were that political? People assumed you were that character?
Janney: I’ve been such a disappointment for people who think that I am C. J. [Cregg, her character on “The West Wing”], because I couldn’t be less like her. I’m not that person who’s able to verbally cut someone down in the second that she needs to. It was so great to play her, but I remember when they had the Democratic National [Convention] in California and there were more people who came up to me and asked me, “After this is over, will you come work for us? Will you come to…” I’m like, “You don’t understand. I’m so not like that.” And now on “The Diplomat,” playing the president of the United States and the smartest person in the room, it’s so much fun for me to play those kind of women because I’m not [like that]. I mean, I’m not an idiot, but I know nothing about being in the world of politics or being manipulative.
Kaitlin, “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” is in its 17th season now. You’re on “Hacks.” When you’re signing on to something like “High Potential,” what factors do you consider when thinking about how long you want to commit to something?
Olson: I don’t ever want to play a character that starts to get old to me. “Sunny” doesn’t feel like that to me because it’s a satire and the world’s always providing us with new content. And we do eight to 10 episodes a season. So it’s 17 seasons, which is insane, but it’s not even 20 episodes. It’s so much fun, which is the reason I’m not sick of that character yet. But I feel the same way as you, [Allison], when I’m playing characters who are super-smart, and then I have to talk about it, I just go into panic mode.
How has it been getting into Morgan’s head?
Olson: I love the other characters that I play, but there’s heart to this, and she’s a good mom and she is very insecure but puts on a big show. I love that she’s scrappy and has to figure it out, and she trusts that she will and doesn’t rely on anybody else to help her figure it out. The most important thing are her kids. I think she’s just fascinating to play.
Kaitlin Olson of “High Potential.”
What’s the most impressive skill you picked up on the job? Noah, you know I’m going to start with you. You went to medical boot camp. You’ve done really well with sutures. You can intubate any one of us, I think.
Wyle: I’ve never performed one.
Isaacs: The night is young.
Wyle: I wish everybody an opportunity to slip into a role that you have such great muscle memory with from another aspect of your life when you play a musician or when you do circusing or whatever. When you do something you’ve done for so long, and then you get to do it again, it is just amazing how much it’s in your body and how you don’t have to worry about that stuff. There was a moment earlier where Sterling choked on the grape in the greenroom. I was so ready to intubate him, even if it wasn’t necessary.
Thornton: I went to air-traffic control school for “Pushing Tin,” so I can still say, “Delta 2376, turn left, 20-0-4-0” and “Clear the Alice approach one-four right, call the tower one-eight-three,” because you just don’t forget it. That’s not air-traffic control, that’s just a line. With Noah, he learns this skill that he has been doing over the years, and that kind of knowledge is invaluable. Anytime you have stuff to do, without just acting, like you’re doing busy work — you’re, like, here’s how you do an appendectomy — and you learn and when you’re picking up the right tools, you’re saying the right stuff, you’re making incisions — that stuff you’ve got to learn.
Isaacs: One of the great privileges of being an actor that maybe doesn’t show up onscreen is you get to walk in people’s shoes. I shadowed heart surgeons and plastic surgeons and politicians and criminals and soldiers, and it’s just an amazing privilege to be in people’s lives and talk about it. And there may be some tiny bit you pick up for the screen.
Poland will hold the first round of voting in its presidential election on Sunday.
This is a hotly contested race between two main candidates – one from Civic Platform, the lead party in the ruling Civic Coalition, and the other an independent backed by the main opposition party, Law and Justice (PiS).
While much of the power rests with the prime minister and parliament in Poland, the president is able to veto legislation and has influence over military and foreign policy decisions. The current president, Andrzej Duda, who is from PiS, has used his veto to block reforms to the justice system that the government has been trying to enact for some time.
Furthermore, reports of foreign election interference have recently spooked voters who are primarily concerned with issues such as the Russia-Ukraine war, immigration, abortion rights and the economy.
Here is all we know about the upcoming vote:
How does voting work?
Polish citizens aged 18 or older can vote. There are about 29 million eligible voters. On Sunday, they will select a single candidate from a list of registered presidential candidates. If a candidate wins at least 50 percent of the vote, they win the election. If all candidates fall short of the 50 percent threshold, the country will vote in a second round for the two top contenders from the first round on June 1. The winner of that contest will become president. The election is expected to go to a second round.
Presidents may serve a maximum of two five-year terms in Poland. The current president reaches the end of his second term on August 6.
What time do polls open and close in Poland?
On May 18, polls will open at 7am (05:00 GMT) and close at 9pm (19:00 GMT).
What’s at stake?
In 2023, current Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s Civic Coalition ascended to power, ending eight years of rule by the PiS party’s government.
While Tusk promised to reverse unpopular judicial reforms enacted by PiS, President Andrzej Duda, a former nationalist ally of the party, has hampered Tusk’s efforts by using his presidential power to veto legislation.
What are the key issues?
Key issues dominating this election include the Russia-Ukraine war.
When the war first broke out in February 2022, Poland threw its full support behind Ukraine, welcoming more than one million Ukrainian refugees who crossed the border without documents.
On May 10, Tusk, alongside other European leaders, visited Kyiv and gave Russian President Vladimir Putin an ultimatum to enact an unconditional 30-day ceasefire in Ukraine.
However, relations between Poland and Ukraine have grown tense. Earlier this year, Polish farmers led protests, arguing the market had been flooded with cheap agricultural products from Ukraine.
There are also emerging reports of Ukrainian refugees facing discrimination in Poland, as well as resentment about welfare provided to them.
There have been growing fears of a spillover of Russian aggression to Poland due to its proximity to Ukraine. On May 12, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Warsaw said an investigation had revealed that Moscow’s intelligence agencies had orchestrated a massive fire at a shopping centre in Warsaw in May 2024.
Several candidates for the presidential election have proposed raising the defence budget to 5 percent of GDP.
Poles also have economic concerns about taxes, housing costs and the state of public transport.
Abortion is a key issue in Poland. Poland has some of the strictest abortion laws in Europe. Women are only allowed to have abortions in cases of rape or incest or if their life or health are at risk.
In August 2024, Tusk acknowledged that he did not have enough backing from parliament to deliver on one of his key campaign promises and change the abortion law.
Opinion is also split on whether LGBTQ rights should be restricted or expanded in the country.
The country is also divided over how involved it should be with the European Union (EU), with the PiS taking the stance that the country would be better off forming an alliance with the United States than the EU.
Who is running?
A total of 13 candidates are vying for the presidency. The top four candidates are:
Rafal Trzaskowski
Trzaskowski, 53, has been the liberal mayor of Warsaw since 2018 and is an ally of Tusk, affiliated with the PM’s political alliance, Civic Coalition. He is also a senior member of the Civic Platform party (PO), which heads the Civic Coalition. Trzaskowski was narrowly defeated by Duda in the 2020 presidential election.
During his time as mayor, he was lauded for investing in Warsaw’s infrastructure and culture. He proposes to increase defence spending to 5 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) and to develop Poland’s arms and technology industry.
Trzaskowski has liberal views. He is pro-Europe and one of his campaign promises includes strengthening Poland’s position in the EU. Another one of his pledges is to relax abortion laws, however, he has been quiet on this issue during the run-up to the presidential election. He has also been supportive of the LGBTQ community and has attended pride parades. This could alienate some more conservative voters who live outside urban centres.
For this reason, right-wing voters may vote against him in the second round of voting. Trzaskowski could also lose support from centrist and progressive voters, who are frustrated by Tusk’s inability to bring reform to abortion laws.
Karol Nawrocki
Nawrocki, 42, is a conservative historian standing as an independent candidate backed by the PiS party.
His academic work has been centred around anti-communist resistance. He currently administers the Institute of National Remembrance, where his removal of Soviet memorials has angered Russia. He administered the Museum of the Second World War in northern Poland from 2017 to 2021.
His campaign promises include lowering taxes and pulling Poland out of the EU’s Migration Pact and Green Deal. He also wishes to allocate 5 percent of GDP to defence. Nawrocki is critical of giving more rights to LGBTQ couples.
Nawrocki has had a fair share of controversies in the past. In 2018, he published a book about a notorious gangster under the pseudonym “Tadeusz Batyr”. In public comments, Nawrocki and Batyr praised each other, without revealing they were the same person.
Slawomir Mentzen
Mentzen, 38, is a far-right entrepreneur who leads the New Hope party, a member of the Confederation coalition. He has degrees in economics and physics; owns a brewery in Torun; runs a tax advisory firm; and is critical of government regulation, wishing for significant tax cuts.
Mentzen has used social media platforms to connect with younger voters.
He believes that Poland should not take sides in the Russia-Ukraine war. He wants to ensure the Polish constitution overrides EU laws and wishes to withdraw from the EU Green Deal. He opposes LGBTQ rights and opposes abortion, even in cases of rape.
Ahead of the 2019 election for the European Parliament, he said: “We don’t want Jews, homosexuals, abortion, taxes or the European Union.” Since then, he has tried to distance himself from this statement.
While Poland offers free higher education, Mentzen dropped in opinion polls after he advocated for tuition fees in state schools in late March.
Szymon Holownia
Holownia, 48, is a former journalist and television personality-turned-politician. He is the speaker, or marshal, of the lower house of parliament, the Sejm.
In 2020, he founded a centrist movement called Polska 2050, which burgeoned into a party and ended up joining Tusk’s coalition.
Holownia wishes to promote regional development alongside better access to affordable housing and improving the public transport system. He says he wants to reduce bureaucracy, support Polish businesses and develop Poland’s domestic arms production capabilities.
Other candidates
Three leftist candidates are also running the election including Deputy Senate Speaker Magdalena Biejat, 43, an advocate for women’s rights, minority rights, affordable housing and abortion access; Adrian Zandberg, 45, who has made similar promises to Biejat; and academic and lawmaker Joanna Senyszyn, a former member of the Polish United Workers’ Party.
Other candidates include far-right Grzegorz Braun, who was pilloried globally for using a fire extinguisher to put out Hanukkah candles in parliament in 2023, and journalist and YouTuber Krzysztof Stanowski, 42, who does not have a political programme and wants to show Poles behind the scenes of the campaign while raising money for charity.
What do the opinion polls say?
As of May 12, Trzaskowski was in the lead with the support of 31 percent of voters, according to Politico’s polling aggregate. Nawrocki was in second place with 25 percent, while Mentzen had 13 percent and Holownia had 7 percent.
When will we know the results?
As soon as polls close, Ipsos will release an exit poll based on surveys undertaken at 500 randomly selected polling stations. While this is not the official result, it is expected to be highly indicative of which way the vote is going. Partial results may start to emerge on Sunday night or Monday.
In Poland, voting always takes place on a Sunday. In 2020, the official results for the first round of voting were confirmed on Tuesday morning.
What is the election interference controversy about?
On Wednesday, Poland said it had uncovered a possible election interference attempt via advertisements on Facebook.
“The NASK Disinformation Analysis Center has identified political ads on the Facebook platform that may be financed from abroad. The materials were displayed in Poland,” according to a statement by NASK, which is Poland’s national research institute dealing with cybersecurity. “The advertising accounts involved in the campaign spent more on political materials in the last seven days than any election committee.”
The NASK statement did not specify which countries’ financial backers of the campaign were believed to be based in. Fears of Russian election interference are high in Europe after Romania declared a do-over of its November presidential election after reports emerged of alleged Russian election interference. The first round of the repeat election took place on May 4, with the second round due to happen on May 18. This was after far-right politician Calin Georgescu, who was polling in single digits during the campaign, surprisingly emerged victorious.
