Labor

While real-world tech mogul Elon Musk suffered a major setback this week after pouring more than $200 million into Texas Republican campaigns that lost to protect his business empire, over on HBO’s “The Gilded Age,” robber baron George Russell is fighting tooth and nail against looming federal regulations to save his.

The period drama returned Sunday with its fourth season. After leaving George (Morgan Spector) at a major turning point in Season 3 — seemingly done with his marriage following Bertha‘s (Carrie Coon) forced engineering of their daughter‘s marriage, as well as his own survival of a near-fatal shooting — the couple is still at odds. As the new season picks up, George unravels under the looming threat of anti-monopoly laws targeting his industrial empire. And that’s just part of all the drama and fun that made the episode the show’s most-watched premiere yet, averaging nearly 4 million viewers across platforms, according to the cabler/streamer. Season 4 promises more tension as the Russells try to maintain their wealth and status while Agnes van Rhijn (Christine Baranski) tries to regain her position, all while the show’s various relationships face challenges, ultimatums or bittersweet developments. Ahead of this week’s second episode, I spoke with Sonja Warfield, who is co-showrunner of the series alongside creator Julian Fellowes, about how Season 4 kicks off — including that unexpected cameo from David Letterman and Matt Damon.

Also in this week’s Screen Gab, our writers recommend a new stand-up special from everyone’s favorite sitcom principal and a sports drama chronicling the life of Muhammad Ali. — Yvonne Villarreal

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Recommendations from the film and TV experts at The Times

Janelle James at the Vic Theatre in Chicago, where her Netflix comedy special was filmed.

(Elizabeth Sisson / Netflix )

“Janelle James: How Romantic” (Netflix)

Among the many gifts “Abbott Elementary” showered upon the culture was bringing Janelle James to national prominence. As work-averse principal Ava Coleman — a selfish, insulting character one is always delighted to see — she is as attractive as she is difficult. And as the show has gone on, the actor has found layers to play, including hints of a kind of existential melancholy. James began in stand-up — her biggest brush with fame was touring with Chris Rock in 2017 — and now she’s headlining her own, first hourlong special, which debuts Tuesday on the streamer and was filmed at Chicago’s Vic Theatre. Hang on through an opening salvo of political jokes that elapsed time and Tuesday’s election results have rendered stale (Rudy Giuliani, anybody? Joe Biden?) as James, laughing and dancing, unwinds into her real material — spending 24 hours in labor, the problems and perks of being suddenly famous, men and how they are, having money with a poor person’s mind. Of the power of comedy (and being on a hit sitcom) to unite a diverse audience, she says, “There’s one of everything in here. … We can all be in here and share a laugh, then everyone goes back to their respective neighborhoods, never to speak again. But for a small moment in time we were all friends. Because of me. So that’s nice.” — Robert Lloyd

Jaalen Best as Muhammad Ali in Prime Video’s “The Greatest.”

(Brooke Palmer / Prime)

“The Greatest” (Prime Video)

The multitude of projects about Muhammad Ali just received a new entry with Prime Video’s limited series “The Greatest,” starring newcomer Jaalen Best as the legendary boxer. The project traces Ali’s breakthrough as a gold medal boxer through his brutal battle with Sonny Liston. Viewers looking for a companion piece to the drama can check out Ken Burns’ 2021 epic documentary “Muhammad Ali.” Burns called the four-part miniseries an extensive look at a “man who may be the most iconic figure of the 20th century.” The filmmaker added that Ali was also a “very complex, dynamic man” who had an immeasurable impact stretched into politics, culture and religion.” — Greg Braxton

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A weekly chat with actors, writers, directors and more about what they’re working on — and what they’re watching

Morgan Spector and Carrie Coon in Season 4 of “The Gilded Age.”

(Karolina Wojtasik / HBO)

Clocks have rolled back and “The Gilded Age” Sundays have returned — the perfect couch rotting combo for fall. Lingering crises and fresh new scandals collide in Season 4 as our favorite New York elite navigate a fracturing power marriage, perilous childbirth, a horse-carriage breakdown that ignites a night of forbidden passion, and a titan‘s struggle to maintain his empire. Even Jack’s new invention, the electric mixer, couldn’t whip up a more delicious start. Episode 2 airs Sunday on HBO and will stream on HBO Max. I spoke with Sonja Warfield, the co-showrunner of the drama, about the premiere, that David Letterman and Matt Damon cameo and what’s ahead this season. — Y.V.

You said you were looking at social media a bit after the premiere. What stood out to you about what fans were responding to?

Marian. Someone had a lot of thoughts about some of Marian’s costumes. But then I read something about Marian and Larry having sex, and they don’t want to hear about her complaining about him this season — something like, “She just needs to go over there to his house and get her ring back.”

It’s been interesting to see the conversation around Marian’s freak-out the morning after she had sex with Larry — and the ramifications of premarital sex at that time.

Louisa [Jacobson, who plays Marian] did an amazing job conveying the gravity of the transgression; it just was all over her face. And Harry’s reaction, because he’s kind of surprised. They just had this roll in the hay, but it transmits to him as well. So really, kudos to Louisa for selling that. Wonderful actors like Louisa Jacobson help the viewer along in their understanding that this is about the worst thing that you can do, and then we have the scene afterwards. That walk of shame back and the aunts even say, “Oh, it was better that you took a cab because the impropriety of that.”

We also see Gladys survive this traumatic, life-threatening breach birth, ultimately welcoming a baby boy. Some of us have PTSD from Lady Sybil’s death in “Downton Abbey” and were very nervous about where it was going.

One of the first things I said to Julian when we first started working together was, “I might never forgive you for what you did to Lady Sybil.” I remember every frame of what Lady Sybil went through. … We wanted to make sure that [“The Gilded Age”] was different, so we worked closely with a doctor who specializes in Victorian medicine to figure out how we can make it traumatic, her life is salvaged, but she’s forever changed. It’s women’s health. There’s still more questions than answers, and especially back then when they had not even surfaced. Maternal mortality rate has been lowered in recent years in America. It’s real jeopardy, and it happens all the time and every day.

Women’s health and decisions surrounding it are not the only timely modern parallel. Something that looms large is wealthy business titans trying to exert profound, direct influence over American politics and policies. How was it to dig into that history this season, given the current real-world backdrop?

As we got the research in, and we started having conversations with Dr. Dunbar [Erica Armstong Dunbar is a co-executive producer and lead historical consultant on the series], it became abundantly clear that the reason why there have been so many regulations in business is because of the Gilded Age. We’re just right back where we started. I love this argument that is being used today that was being used back then, which is “let us regulate our ourselves.” That’s ridiculous. They changed America, and brought in wealth and industry and the railroad and all of that; at the same time, it has to be regulated. They cannot regulate themselves. Greed is one of the seven deadly sins.

Audra McDonald, left, and Denée Benton in “The Gilded Age.”

(Karolina Wojtasik / HBO)

Were you nervous about having this plot about anti-monopoly legislation or how it would be received by studio brass, given the Paramount and Warner Bros. merger?

It was not in my mind because it is the real history. We are being historically accurate.

There is a moment eight minutes into the premiere episode that, if you blinked, you missed it: David Letterman and Matt Damon made cameos as background actors. Apparently, David has long wanted to be a background actor, and this stunt was filmed as a field segment for the new season of his Netflix interview show; Damon got his start as a background actor. Were you in disbelief when you heard about this request?

I am a huge David Letterman fan. When I heard that there was a possibility that I could meet David Letterman, I was ecstatic and really kind of selfish. We shoot tandem sets, so there are two sets going at a time. My mandate was, “I’m on the David Letterman set that day. Take me there.” All the way in Long Island. I had an event that night. I didn’t care. I waited for David.

Forget Matt Damon.

What was so funny was that my dad is a huge Matt Damon fan, and whilst I was awaiting David Letterman, I had an audience with Matt Damon, who is the most lovely, kind person ever. So empathetic and gracious and wonderful, and game whatever they had cooking on Letterman’s show. Then I met David Letterman. It was an absolute blast. I was like, “This is a the best day at work in a long time.” It all started because someone on our staff was friends with someone on David Letterman’s show.

We see them casually crossing the street. Was it hard to decide what scene to plop them into?

It was really about scheduling. And what would be the least conspicuous because David Letterman does have that long beard. We held on to it for so long. We shot that back in May.

I want all good things for Peggy, in life, love and career. Her wedding to William is on the horizon. What did you want out of that moment for her?

Well, once I knew we had a bigger budget, I wanted all of it too. I really do think we deliver. I want to be mindful here. The location of where she gets married is exquisitely beautiful. We enter the wedding and the marriage with trepidation because there is real conflict, inherent conflict with this family in the form of Elizabeth Kirkland, played by the incredible Felicia Rashad. I think all weddings are fraught because you’re bringing together these different factions, and people want different things and have ideas and dreams. I think Peggy’s wedding delivers on all fronts. I think it delivers in terms of dramatic tension. I think it delivers in terms of set decoration. It delivers in terms of costume and, of course, performances and direction. I can’t wait for the audience to watch it and then watch it again. Accompanying the wedding will be some beautiful photography done by the Tyler Twins. Their work is really just exquisite, and I’m excited for the world to see all this. We’ve been holding all of this in.

Peggy and William are at the dawn of their relationship, just as Bertha and George are navigating a major stress point in their union.

Marriage is a journey. I’ve been married and divorced, and I just remember my dad’s advice early on was that there are always going to be these trials, and if you can make your way through them and end up together, you will be stronger for it. For Bertha and George, who’ve been married for many years now — he didn’t make a lot of money when they were first together, and now they they’re in this place of extreme wealth, and their lives have changed. And now he is going through something that couldn’t have been predicted. And Bertha rides for her husband. There are times when couples can go their separate ways, and, like my dad said, if you can find your way back together through the storm, and you’ve weathered it together, you’re stronger. I want that for Peggy and William. They want a Bertha-George marriage — if Bertha and George make it through.

I really worry about Agnes’ stress levels this season. I don’t think it’s a spoiler to say that. Later in the season, she delivers one line — “That article was poppycock!” — in a way that will live in my head as a GIF forever.

I even said something to Christine during the season — “We’re really putting you through it this season.” I love it, and she loved it too. She had a ball, and especially in Episode 3, which I got to write with Julian. I loved writing some of that dialogue because she just has so many highs and lows throughout the season, and it was like a masterclass for me to watch Christine go from the highest high to the lowest low. She wants revenge; she is out for blood because someone is attempting to take away her opportunities. It was delicious, and I’m glad that you liked it, and I hope the greater audience enjoyed it.

Is there a moment coming up from Episode 2 that you’re excited for people to see?

I’m excited for people to see more of the Black elite in Newport.

What’s the film or TV show that you’re recommending to everyone right now?

Well, I’m behind, but I love “Nobody Wants This” [Netflix]. I have not been able to watch all of it; we had a premiere for “The Gilded Age” and lots of things going on. But I love that show. I got to meet the whole cast at the Emmys. I’m a free advertisement for that show.

ICYMI

Must-read stories you might have missed

Voters in the Northern California city of Vallejo passed a ballot measure adopting binding arbitration with its public employee unions more than 50 years ago, following a bitter police strike.

The goal was labor peace. Under binding arbitration, an independent referee is brought in when negotiators hit an impasse. The final decision on wages, benefits and working conditions is taken out of the hands of the local elected officials and placed squarely with the arbitrator.

With Measure A on the Nov. 3 ballot, Los Angeles County voters have a chance to do much the same thing here.

The measure is being pushed by unions representing county firefighters, sheriff’s deputies and other public safety employees who by law cannot go out on strike, and who say binding arbitration adds balance to the negotiation process by taking away the unilateral authority held by the county Board of Supervisors.

No formal opposition to Measure A has been submitted. But in his summary of the potential impact this year, county chief executive Joe Nicchita shared news stories showing how binding arbitration has played out in other jurisdictions, including Vallejo.

In 2007, a mediator determined that despite fiscal travails, Vallejo couldn’t reduce the size of its fire department. Eight months later, with little budgetary wiggle room, the city declared bankruptcy.

Vallejo had been the first California municipality to adopt binding arbitration. In 2010, the voters decided to ditch it.

Supervisor Holly Mitchell voiced concerns about Measure A when the board discussed placing it on the ballot this year.

“Arbitrators aren’t elected,” she said. “They’re not required to weigh countywide trade-offs like homeless services, like healthcare, capital improvements, all those things.”

The board voted 4-0 to place binding arbitration on the Nov. 3 ballot, with Mitchell abstaining. Supporters say there are sufficient protections to prevent the county from experiencing the financial tribulations that Vallejo and other cities suffered in part because of binding arbitration.

“This process opens up the books, allows the parties to come together and base decisions on facts rather than political preferences, and it also shows whether there are actually resources to meet the demands that are coming,” Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, an architect of the measure, said in an interview.

Horvath previously noted that just six of the 21 jurisdictions in California that have instituted binding arbitration, including two counties, have had to resort to it.

If a majority of county voters approves Charter Amendment A, it will cover 14 bargaining units representing some 16,500 county workers, among them lifeguards and deputy medical examiners. It would not apply to bargaining units whose workers can strike.

In the current system, if the sides are unable to reach an agreement, the supervisors can impose a final offer that the unions must accept. While contract negotiations are frequently contentious, historically the supervisors mandating final terms is rare; The Times previously reported that it has happened only twice since 2001.

Under the proposed measure, contract negotiations would begin as they do now, with the presumption that both sides bargain in good faith. However, if agreement proves impossible and an impasse is declared, a three-member arbitration panel would take over.

In that case, the county and the union each would select one member, with the sides together choosing the third person, who would serve as the panel’s chair. The arbitrators would hold hearings and weigh evidence related to employment elements such as wages and hours. In the end, the binding ruling would be made public.

Derek Hsieh, executive director of the Assn. for Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs, said the current process began with a group of labor unions launching a signature-gathering drive to put binding arbitration before voters. That led to working with the supervisors and the county chief executive, who, Hsieh said, wanted to ensure there were certain safeguards.

Hsieh said binding arbitration would represent an important and balanced change.

“Currently, the employer has near unilateral control over what the contract provisions are,” he said.

He added that the threat of going before arbitrators would spur both county and union negotiators to reach an agreement before someone else takes over, and that it would prevent either side from pushing a “wild proposal” that arbitrators would quickly reject.

Dave Gillotte, president of the International Assn. of Firefighters Local 1014, which represents more than 3,000 L.A. County Fire Department employees, agrees that the very threat of winding up in binding arbitration would encourage negotiating teams to cut a deal.

“Binding arbitration really brings about leverage to move both parties to work hard to get a contract done, where we don’t have that now,” Gillotte said.

The practice of using binding arbitration to resolve union and government disputes has been around for decades.

“These are routine laws that are part of the labor relations framework,” said Justin McBride of the UCLA Institute for Research on Labor and Employment.

The strong union support for binding arbitration would seem to suggest that the process favors organized labor over elected local governments. McBride said academic studies don’t support that premise, and that neither side overwhelmingly comes out on top.

He pointed to a 2010 study from Cornell University that examined decades of negotiation outcomes in New York. One finding was that after a few years, the number of cases that wound up in arbitration declined, indicating that the sides learned to work together.

“Everyone gets a deal, and just like in a lot of contracts maybe both parties aren’t 100% with it, but that’s kind of the nature of collective bargaining,” McBride said.

Still, there have been instances in which decisions by independent arbitrators contributed to a municipality’s economic challenges, and elected officials were unable to unwind the rulings.

In her interview with The Times, Horvath said arbitrators would be expected to make decisions that consider the county’s fiscal situation.

“That’s what this is designed to do,” she said.

While no formal opponents to Measure A are listed on the ballot, some progressive groups aren’t on board. The voter guides for community organization L.A. Forward and prison abolition proponents La Defensa both urge a “no” vote. The inclusion of the Sheriff’s Department influenced that decision.

“We believe law enforcement special interest groups should not be treated as labor or given more leverage in negotiations,” La Defensa wrote in its guide. “More money and more power for the Sheriff’s Department is the crux of our opposition. By bundling deputies with firefighters and lifeguards, Measure A weaponizes a process we would otherwise support.”

Labor unions and other supporters are digging deep. The unions representing sheriff’s deputies, firefighters and other employee groups reported raising $7.7 million through mid-October to campaign in favor of Measure A, according to financial disclosure reports.

No campaign funds have been reported in opposition to Measure A.

Caracas, October 24, 2026 (venezuelanalysis.com) – Venezuelan Acting President Delcy Rodríguez announced a series of measures aimed at expanding tax collection.

In a televised broadcast on Wednesday, Rodríguez announced the immediate suspension of the mandatory use of fiscal printers. Introduced in 2018, the devices recorded every transaction and reported it in real time to the country’s National Integrated Customs and Tax Administration Service (SENIAT).

The costly equipment posed a significant barrier for entrepreneurs and small business owners, particularly in the country’s interior, where authorized suppliers are scarce.

Superintendent Román Maniglia said the decision is part of SENIAT’s technological modernization that will pave the way for the gradual introduction of digital invoicing, which will soon be available free of charge to all economic sectors. 

“We seek to lower the barriers to formalization across all sectors, particularly for the smallest businesses, entrepreneurs, and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs),” he stressed.

Rodríguez also announced a review of the registry of Special Taxpayers, known as “special contributors,” with the list reduced from 132,000 to around 44,000. These are individuals or legal entities that, because of their high income or assets, are subject to additional tax obligations.

According to the acting president, the review will add those who should have been included in this category and remove those who were classified as special taxpayers without meeting the relevant criteria.

Rodríguez said the changes are intended to improve tax services and expand revenue collection. She added that fiscal revenues rose by 27% in October, although she did not specify the basis for comparison or provide a breakdown of the amount collected. 

“We have been discussing the very low number of people who pay taxes in the country. This is a matter of fairness,” she added.

The latest announcements follow prior measures to facilitate tax collection. Earlier in October, SENIAT and banking superintendency SUDEBAN formalized an agreement to exchange information in real time in order to “strengthen revenue collection” and “facilitate the identification of potential tax discrepancies.”

The tax authority is now also interconnected with the Autonomous Service of Registries and Notaries (SAREN), the Administrative Service for Identification, Migration, and Immigration (SAIME), and the Central Bank of Venezuela (BCV).

“We have a very important system for cross-referencing information which, together with a new statistical information system, will allow us to start collecting what is owed,” Rodríguez said in this week’s broadcast. She added that the fiscal revenues will be directed to the Venezuela Renace Foundation, which is responsible for repairing and rebuilding homes damaged by the twin earthquakes of June 24.

The acting government has likewise announced a tax reform to be unveiled before the end of 2026. Its stated goal is to “harmonize the tax burden” so that it supports economic growth and private-sector production. 

In parallel, the Rodríguez administration is also pushing labor reform plans alongside private sector lobbies FEDECAMARAS and FEDEINDUSTRIA. The business representatives are proposing a “Law on Labor and Social Consensus,” also referred to as the Labor Emergency Law, that will reportedly reduce labor costs for employers. 

The proposal is being discussed with select trade unions, including the government-aligned Bolivarian Socialist Workers’ Central of Venezuela (CBST).

According to reports, the draft legislation seeks “transitional and alternative solutions” to the crisis in workers’ incomes and the stagnation of the minimum wage, which has remained frozen since 2022 while authorities prioritized non-wage bonuses. The proposal would not formally overhaul the entire Organic Labor Law, Workers and Employees (LOTTT), enacted under President Hugo Chávez in 2012, but labor activists warn that it would effectively sideline some of its provisions.

The landmark 2012 legislation reinstated the retroactive calculation of social benefits and severance based on a worker’s last salary, a provision that business groups want to eliminate, while trade unions consider it a red line. Workers’ organizations have staged multiple protests in recent months, demanding that the Rodríguez administration convert non-wage bonuses into salaries and reinstate collective bargaining rights.

Edited by Ricardo Vaz in Caracas.

The brilliant Korean filmmaker Lee Chang-dong is a suffering protagonist’s best friend, exploring the buried pain in people like no other filmmaker. But he’s never been so delicately novelistic, and so accessibly human, as with his latest movie, “Possible Love,” even when Lee is spinning the enigmatic vibes he’s known for.

A marriage story weighty enough to bear two fascinatingly complex couples, it explores a web of isolation and desire knotted with the divisions and woes of society today: class, labor, media. The film fairly vibrates with ominous tension even in scenes in which seemingly nothing happens. (Which, admittedly, is a Lee staple if you remember his last film, 2018’s eerie psychological thriller “Burning.”) Astonishingly acted, intricately written, with nary a shot out of place and never insulting to its audience, “Possible Love” is a masterpiece of everyday struggle — essentially, who bears it and who doesn’t — and easily among the year’s best films.

At the funeral for a colleague who committed suicide in the wake of a disastrous labor strike, out-of-work Ho-seok (Sul Kyung-gu, of Lee’s “Peppermint Candy”) would rather brood in the car alone and let his patient, grasping-for-connection wife Mi-ok (Jeon Do-yeon, a Cannes prize-winner for her turn in Lee’s “Secret Sunshine”) be around others. With these blue collar parents’ grade-school-age son a tangibly quiet presence, a seemingly impassable unhappiness oozes from the opening scenes. The appearance inside the funeral home, however, of a documentary crew interviewing laid-off workers spurs Mi-ok to engage with the outgoing director, Ye-ji (Cho Yeo-jeong), whose reserved, well-to-do husband Sang-woo (Zo In-sung) is in tow. When Mi-ok agrees to participate in Ye-ji’s film, a friendship forms.

Is it friendship, though, or a mutually useful rapport? The women couldn’t be more unalike in terms of background and status. Mi-ok has to tell Ye-ji that her expensive clothes don’t jibe with someone championing labor issues. But they have a breezy, even jokey openness, fed by the stories Mi-ok tells on camera as well as soju-fueled double dates with their spouses. They also have in common husbands who are remote, albeit for vastly different reasons. Hedge-fund-rich Sang-woo has an air of cool privilege, while the gloomy, taciturn Ho-seok harbors unprocessed trauma about what happened during the strike, the details of which are judiciously doled out to us in flashbacks. (Lee drew the background for his scenario from a real-life labor protest met by a government crackdown that shocked the country.)

But underneath what seems promising, the beginnings of empathy and maybe healing, there’s something performative and calculated in this fast bond. There are Ye-ji’s filmic needs — “I’m trying to love these people,” she says privately to Sang-woo after he calls her behavior with them “Method acting” — and Mi-ok’s swirl of intentions, hoping to save her husband with not ignoring the allure of her new pal’s quietly confident and wealthy man. Right at the moment when more cracks materialize, Ye-ji invites this broken family for a shared weekend at Sang-woo’s vacation mansion.

You may be forgiven for anticipating a potboiler climax when a lush hideaway with a private beach is concerned, and what occurs there is indeed juicy. But that’s only because Lee, in his finest screenplay to date, has laid out precisely where his vectors of hardship, exploitation, pent-up anguish and hidden desire are going to converge. Just add more alcohol and more reminders of these couples’ experiential chasm, and Lee’s command of irony in a simmering atmosphere is in a league all its own.

The documentary angle, of course, is this great director probing the ethics in his own vocation as an intrusive force, one that shapes lives, emotions and, in this case, the weight of a genuine tragedy. In much the way he finessed a truth about art facing evil in “Poetry,” the camera here is both predatory and a tool for catharsis. In one scene, the confluence is literally breathtaking.

Best-of lists were made for performances like Jeon’s. With tear-swollen eyes and an anxious intelligence that imbues Mi-ok’s mission of repair with heartbreaking energy, she is this movie’s restless soul of want: a wife, lover, worker and mother trapped between the balm of recollecting better times and worry for the future. Alongside Sul’s deftly handled, physical characterization of a proud man swallowed by hurt he could never imagine, “Possible Love” stands as one of the more sensitively wrought depictions of a wounded marriage you’ll ever see.

And when it’s over, it somehow doesn’t feel over. Maybe no scene better embodies Lee’s exquisite communion with his characters than his last one, which supplies them with a hint of grace. “Possible Love” hovers over the moment’s sublimity like the moonlight and I haven’t stopped thinking about its elemental beauty since.