Richard Lawson
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Articles by Richard Lawson
Nathan Fielder: Oscar Contender?
Hello, Mondaynistas! We’ve made it through another pointless weekend, and now we get to return to work! Back to the toil that defines us, that gives our lives shape and meaning. That’s what Sonya should have said to Vanya at the end of their play; “We’ll take our work. I believe that, Vanya, I do.” Because what could be more important?
‘Other Desert Cities’ Theater Review: Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Ed Harris and Allison Janney Fail to Make a Once-Timely Play Relevant Again
Performing Arts Now Reviews: What Do the Critics Think of Other Desert Cities on Broadway? Playbill - By Meg Masseron, Logan Culwell-Block • 32m Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Ed Harris, Allison Janney, Joe Kerry, and Lily Rabe star in the new production of the Jon Robin Baitz play. A new revival of Jon … HBO Now Julia Louis-Dreyfus is dynamite in 'Other Desert Cities' – Review AOL - Patrick Ryan, USA TODAY • 34m NEW YORK ‒ Welcome back, Selina Meyer.
‘Sense and Sensibility’ Made Me Swoon
Hello friends! This might be one of the last times I address you as something so generic. I’m going to run a poll next week to determine what the new Premiere Party reader’ moniker should be. Many of you have already sent in suggestions, but there is still time to do so: . And a reminder: I’d also love any questions you might have about the state of entertainment—or the state of anything, really. I want to do a mailbag post in the coming weeks, but I can’t do that if my mailbag is empty.
You Really Should See ‘NAZA’
Hi folks, Today’s letter is a little shorter than usual, because it didn’t feel quite right to attach anything else to a write-up of this particular film. I’ll try to make it up to you on Friday. In 2024’s shattering, Oscar-winning documentary No Other Land, we see families living in the West Bank contend with constant aggressions from Israeli soldiers: they are beaten and shot and arrested, their homes are destroyed, their humanity is denied in coldly systematic fashion.
Nobody Wanted to See the Facebook Movie
Oh hi! It’s come to my attention that a lot of you readers have the day off of work today, for the national holiday celebrating the town of Columbus, Ohio. Every year since 1907, people across these great United States take a pause from their labor—from the automobile assembly lines of Detroit, to the textile mills of Fall River, to the hidden marijuana fields of Humboldt County—to acknowledge the many wonders of the largest city in the Buckeye State.
Does ‘Carrie’ Belong in the Social Media Age?
Happy Friday, [insert name here]! There’s still time to send me suggestions for what I should call Premiere Party readers. Make your voice heard! . Oh, also, you should send mailbag questions to that same address. I want to know your burning questions about fall movies, TV, and whatever else. I need content, so please help me. How are you? I hope you’ve had a productive but also relaxing week. Me, I saw a couple of movies about tech, of the Facebook and OpenAI varieties.
‘The Social Reckoning’: Facebook Aunt
Hello my little tech heads! Yesterday was a grim day for me, as I spent hours in the company of various Silicon Valley psychopaths as they scrambled to amass (and hold onto) power while a few brave people tried (mostly in vain) to stop them.
At the Venice Film Festival, One Critic Hosts a Fabulous Dinner Party Original
Attending the Venice Film Festival is a rarefied privilege; only a lucky few get to gather at the annual celebration of movies and their makers, held in such a picturesque setting. That said, if you’re working during the festival—reviewing movies, conducting interviews, wrangling talent to make sure they make it to those movies and those interviews—it can be stressful. There is not much time to slow down and socialize, eat a proper meal, or even take in the majestic beauty of your surroundings.
Dakota Johnson’s Sad ‘SNL’ Episode
October the 5th be with you! Last week I asked you if there should be a nickname for Premiere Party readers, with which I might greet you at the top of every letter.
Did I Kind of Dig ‘Digger’?
Hello Octoberones! That’s a word, right? Pronounced like the fancy chocolate you buy at duty free when you’ve forgotten to get your significant other some more meaningful trinket from your business trip? I’m not saying that’s something I once did at the Berlin airport at 6 in the morning, but some of you might have. If you hate “Octoberones”—and you really ought to—do you think there should be another name for the Premiere Party community, a way for me to more regularly address you all?
Review: ‘War’ Is ‘Industry’ For Nice People
This standalone review is exclusive to VIP readers. If you’d like to read it in full, please subscribe at the prompt below. If you do—and I really think you should—you’ll receive three dispatches a week, including my Friday recommendations column, in addition to my undying gratitude. The latter is worth its weight in gold.
The Fall Box Office Is Booming
Oh, it’s you again! So happy you’re here. It’s the last Monday in September, which means we will soon be fully immersed in the ancient druid holiday of Spooky Season, a month of feasts and merriment culminating in a bunch of guys dressed in slutty hockey player costumes at some party at Le Bain.
Robert Pattinson Is Ready for ‘Primetime’
Hello, leaf-peepers. I hope you’ve had a good week. It’s been a crisp, cool few days here in New York City, everyone bustling around in their transitional jackets and talking in guarded tones about the blessed break in humidity—it’s great weather, but it also augurs the frigid horror to come. But that’s a couple of months away, so for now we are enjoying the reprieve from the sticky clench of August, its foul odors and weary tempers.
Andrew Garfield’s Big Flop
Hiya Humpers! Should that be the greeting for every Wednesday letter? I think it’s cute and not at all gross. It’s almost as beautiful as “tweeps,” a neologism that is now an . . . oldgism? A paleogism? Maybe that’s it. Anyway, hi. I’m sure many of you have spent the last couple of days dancing in the streets now that it looks like the Paramount acquisition of Warner Bros. is going to go through.
Can Gay Spaniards Conquer the Oscars?
Monday. What a concept! I hope you all had a lovely weekend. Did you go apple picking? I had an apple on Saturday and actually said out loud, “This tastes like fall!” And I must admit I did suddenly have a vision of going upstate in the next few weeks and yanking some apples off of trees and then bringing them home to . . . I dunno, let rot on the counter? But it was a fleeting notion, a bit of early autumn madness, and then it was gone.
Are Video Game Movies Good Now?
Happy Friday, dear letter-openers. Today begins the very last weekend of summer 2026, which hardly feels possible. It seems like just yesterday, or at least just a few weeks ago, that June was busting out all over. And now we are tilting away from the sun, toward the cold of night.
Andrew Scott Is the Best Actor So Far
Oh, hello. There comes a time in every person’s life when one must leave Toronto. Some poor souls, like doomed J.T. Yorke, leave it in a most dramatic and final fashion. Others, like me, simply hop aboard a propeller-ed aircraft and zip over to Newark.
The Debut review – Julianne Moore is a thrill in Jesse Eisenberg’s oddball comedy
; ; ; Continue reading More for You ; ; ; ; Continue reading More for You
The Debut review – Julianne Moore is a thrill in Jesse Eisenberg’s oddball comedy
Jesse Eisenberg’s last two directorial efforts – the prickly comedy When You Finish Saving the World and the slightly softer A Real Pain – are small films rooted in the real world. They have their little idiosyncrasies, their bits of cinematic flair, but they keep their feet grounded in the here and now.
The Best Movie at Toronto, So Far
Hello, hosers! I’m still here in Canada, where a bartender said “we don’t serve that” when I ordered a bourbon the other night. What he meant was, bourbon is an American product, and everyone in this country is boycotting such things as much as they can at the moment. The bartender said it in a joking way, but he meant it, too. I said the usual thing one says when traveling abroad these days—I’m not one of those Americans, I promise—and we had a little laugh about it.
Prima Facie review – fiery one-woman play is flattened into a bland movie
Suzie Miller's award-winning 2019 play Prima Facie employs a familiar narrative device: a hotshot London barrister finds herself on the other side of the bar, subject to the very legal tactics she once so ruthlessly employed. Not as a defendant, but as the accuser in a rape case. We've seen versions of this before – a powerful figure suddenly caught in a struggle against a system they helped perpetuate – but Miller's play distinguishes itself by putting the onus on to one actor.
‘Lemonade’ Review: Newcomer Lewis Brophy and Barry Keoghan Lead a Paint-by-Numbers Irish Drama About a Teen Caught in the System
How much do good intentions count? If a film — like say, documentarian Kim Bartley's debut narrative feature, Lemonade — has its heart and its sociopolitical care in the right place, can audiences overlook or excuse its glaring clichés, its generic plotting?
How to Make the Most of the Venice Film Festival, According to a Critic Who Goes Every Year Original
When one thinks of the Venice Film Festival, a few indelible, almost impossibly exotic images spring to mind. The most recent may be Lady Gaga with her legs coyly crossed over the side of a water taxi as she announced her arrival to town for the premiere of A Star Is Born.
Can This TIFF Be Saved?
Happy Friday, Degrassi students! I have made it safe and sound to Toronto, arriving by propeller plane gliding down over shimmering Lake America. Things here are pretty lively, the locals taking to the streets demanding 51st statehood, singing hosannas to their future liberator from the tyranny of Canadian rule. Upon seeing my passport, the Billy Bishop Airport custom agent’s eyes welled up and he thanked me for my citizenship, telling me he hoped he can someday soon call me his countryman.
How to make the most of the Venice Film Festival, according to a critic who goes every year
When one thinks of the Venice Film Festival, a few indelible, almost impossibly exotic images spring to mind. The most recent may be Lady Gaga with her legs coyly crossed over the side of a water taxi as she announced her arrival to town for the premiere of A Star Is Born .
Being Heumann review – Coda director’s disability rights drama is well-intentioned but clunky
On my way to Toronto, I wheeled my suitcase toward the taxi that would take me to the airport, finding the curb cut in the sidewalk so that my luggage could roll seamlessly down to the street. What a nice convenience provided by municipal governments all over the United States, one that so many of us take wholly for granted. But there was a fierce struggle for their existence, once deemed a radical, far too costly alteration to the nation's infrastructure.
‘Stuffed’ Review: Jodie Comer Rises Above a Limp, Gross-Out Corpse-Themed Musical
Of the sadly many dwindling artforms whose slow (or rapid) declines we've been mourning over the years, the original musical is high on my list of sorrows. Broadway struggles to launch successful new works — meaning, ones not based on a movie we're nostalgic for, or built around the jukebox catalog of a beloved artist — and they're practically non-existent on film, save for some arthouse stuff like Leos Carax's Annette or Joshua Oppenheimer's The End.
‘Stuffed’ Review: Jodie Comer Rises Above a Limp, Gross-Out Corpse-Themed Musical
10 hours ago What, exactly, is the measure of greatness when it comes to comic strips? The daily newspaper comic is a very limiting art form, with only a few panels — and sometimes even just one panel — to express a joke or a sentiment. Because of its brevity, it's easy to trivialize the medium as simply the …
The Most Surprising Movie At Venice . . .
Oh hello there. Greetings from an aeroplane over the sea. We are currently passing over Ireland, which is sending all its bumpiest air up our way, those bastard Catholics. I occasionally go through bouts of flight phobia, and I would say I’m firmly in one at the moment. I know turbulence is just like waves on the ocean—which is a mantra I sometimes say to myself in my head—and that after 10 days of being on all kinds of boats, I should be just fine with that.
What the Hell Is Going On with Best Actress?
Buongiorno ragazzi! Look, there’s no easy way to say this. I am currently writing this letter from the rooftop pool bar at the JW Marriott private resort island in the Venice lagoon. I’ve been put up here for my last two nights as part of a little thing I’m working on, and while my tiny San Marco apartment with its sloped ceilings was perfectly charming, I am a small bit thrilled (okay, a big bit) to be suddenly in the lap of secluded luxury.
‘Woman Unknown’ Review: A Sharp, Haunting Portrait of Denmark’s Post-War Reckoning
Many of us in America have a utopian idea of Denmark, perhaps for good reason: It ranks quite high on indexes of happiness and social infrastructure and civil rights. But, of course, any nation has its painful eras, one of which is conjured up in May el-Toukhy's post-WWII drama Woman Unknown. The film is an effectively dark portrait of open wounds left by Nazi occupation, the past terribly coming to bear on what is meant to be a time of great relief and celebration.
‘Woman Unknown’ Review: A Sharp, Haunting Portrait of Denmark’s Post-War Reckoning
Many of us in America have a utopian idea of Denmark, perhaps for good reason: It ranks quite high on indexes of happiness and social infrastructure and civil rights. But, of course, any nation has its painful eras, one of which is conjured up in May el-Toukhy's post-WWII drama Woman Unknown. The film is an effectively dark portrait of open wounds left by Nazi occupation, the past terribly coming to bear on what is meant to be a time of great relief and celebration.
‘Oasis: Don’t Look Back in Anger’ Review: A Rich and Poignant Celebration of a Beloved Band’s Glorious and Improbable Return
A funny thing happened to me while watching the new film Oasis: Don't Look Back in Anger. I had been somewhat dreading the assignment, as I often find music documentaries tedious, and in particular did not want to watch two hours of brothers Noel and Liam Gallagher bickering and puffing themselves up. So I trudged into the theater quite skeptical. Before too long, though, a tear came to my eye. And then, to my surprise, I basically couldn't stop crying for the rest of the film.
Robert Pattinson’s Oscar Journey Begins
Ciao ciao! The peak of the Venice Film Festival has arrived, and I feel like I’m finally getting my stride. It has gotten hotter and more humid, which has meant that I’m drinking about six gallons of acqua frizzante a day, but the heat has somehow not dampened the mood.
‘The Basics of Philosophy’ Review: Paul Schrader Does Some Deep — and Discomfiting — Thinking About a College Professor’s Guilt
When Paul Schrader's new moral drama The Basics of Philosophy begins, we are on a fictional college campus where John (Jack Huston), a professor of philosophy, gives an introductory lecture about the meaning of his course. Soon after, we see him in his office with a female student, who is begging for a grade change. She makes a clumsy attempt at seduction that he rebuffs, but the charged moment lingers in the air for several scenes afterward.
Venice Diary: The Mara Sisters Have Landed
Buongiorno, mi amici. Hello from Venice, where the boats are running full and the lines are long. Though, so far the vaporettos actually aren’t quite as crowded and the lines aren’t quite as long as they have been in past years. I’ve heard talk from a colleague or two that attendance is down this year, partly because the lineup isn’t so strong and, maybe, because last year’s once-glittering lineup ended up being sort of a letdown.
Tom Cruise Will Never Die
Ciao ragazzi! Well, I am finally actually in Italy, after a long-delayed arrival due to my airplane breaking while we were flying over the ocean. (That is actually kind of what happened, but we landed back in New York safe and sound and mad as hell.) Mind you, this does not mean my trip has gone smoothly since. I was supposed to go to Slovenia (the country) for a couple days for a little vacation, and I actually made it to my first connection on time, despite my late arrival in Venice.
Reviewing My Plane Movies, Pt. 1
Hello Party people, Greetings from Venice! Things look a bit different from the last time I was here. There are a lot of security checkpoints, there’s a Hudson News, there are multiple Delta lounges— Wait, oh, right, I’m not in Venice, as I am supposed to be. I am instead still at John F. Kennedy International Airport, to which my airplane returned early Friday morning after we’d flown east for two hours, because the aircraft’s weather radar broke.
Seeking Jacob Elordi for the End of the World
Hello friends, We’ll get to my thoughts about some new stuff that’s out this week in a bit, but I don’t think I could start this letter—or that anyone could start any letter, maybe!—anywhere else but with the death of Dolly Parton, one of the greatest entertainers and celebrities there’s ever been. She was a dream: a warm wit, a golden voice, a vibrant actor, a do-gooder, a sage, a virtual friend and mentor and pastor to many millions of people.
Meghan Markle’s New Netflix Dream
Hello Party folks, I hope you enjoyed whatever it is you did this weekend. Did you go swimming in the ocean? Did you finally drive your car to the top of Mount Washington so you could get that bumper sticker? (They still make those bumper stickers, right?) Did you pick up your kid from extended-session summer camp and notice that they have a new swagger about them, and now you’re wondering if they maybe made out with someone the night of the talent show, as is tradition?
What I Watched for Fun This Week
Today’s full letteris available only to VIP subscribers. If you’d like to join those merry ranks—and I’d be so appreciative if you did—you can do so by clicking here.Thank you in advance! I love you! Hello Party people! I hope this message finds you well. Me, I’m abuzz with anticipation! I leave for Venice, Italy, Europe next Thursday, kicking off a whirlwind tour of cinema’s glittering new merchandise.
A Terrific Film About Gen Z Anxiety
Today’s full post is exclusively available to Premiere Party VIP subscribers. If you’d like to read the whole thing, you can do so by upgrading your membership here. I hope you’ll consider getting the full Party experience, as I need all the subscriber help I can get to keep this thing running. And on that note . . . A quick request! I’m getting ready to pack my bags for Venice and Toronto and I’d love to know what you want to see from fall film festival coverage, and beyond.
Adam Sandler’s Successful Nepo Project
Hello Partygoers, Another week begins, hurtling us toward the day our government honors us for our labor. It’s nice that we get the one day, and then otherwise the current government (and governments prior to it) work tirelessly and ruthlessly to dismantle the unionization that the holiday was established to commemorate. But I’m getting ahead of myself; Labor Day isn’t for a few weeks.
You Must See Anne Hathaway’s Dinosaur Movie
Hello there! Well, you’ve gone and completed another week. I hope you are proud of yourself. That may sound sarcastic, but I mean it! What with everything going on and all, it’s an accomplishment just to clock in every day and get through it. I hope you’ve had at least a little fun these past five days, and that you have much to look forward to this weekend (some recommendations of things you could go watch are forthcoming).
What If Two Actors Share One Oscar?
Hi readers, It’s midweek! You’ve almost made it to the glorious promised land of the weekend, which means you’re only a few days away from watching the premiere of Lanterns, the Green Lantern TV series that’s a spinoff of James Gunn’s Superman movie. Doesn’t that sound terribly exciting? Well, I dunno, maybe you are excited.
The Romcom Is Dead Yet Again
Hello readers! We’ve made it to another week. Did you know that the dog days of summer have a formal start and end date? I long thought that the term was simply a poetic description of the period of the season when things feel their shaggiest, when we are all panting like household pets, hiding under chairs for shade, ready for fall. But no, it actually has to do with astronomy.
I Liked the “Sex Purge” Movie
Welcome to another What to Watch column! Congrats on it being Friday. It seems like just Monday that the week started, and now it’s already over. It’s been a whirlwind five days here at Premiere Party HQ, where we basked in Spider-Man’s riches and went long on Ryan Murphy’s ongoing project of grafting his sexual pathology onto an entire group of people.
‘The Shards’ Is Another Ryan Murphy Debacle
Igby Rigney and Kaia Gerber in ‘The Shards’ Ryan Murphy’s rise as a preeminent TV producer (and writer, and director) happened to coincide, roughly, with the beginning of my career as a critic. Sure, he had Popular back when I was in high school, and Nip/Tuck came along during my college years.
Spider-Man Is Officially Richer Than You
Hello, dear readers! I hope you had a wonderful weekend. If you can believe it, I actually did not watch much of anything over the last few days. I was staying with friends in Litchfield County, CT and there just wasn’t really time to steal away and stream a few episodes of, oh I dunno, House of Stassi or whatever. The Money (Web) Shot Something else I didn’t do this weekend is make $927 million. Did you make $927 million dollars this weekend?
What to Watch This Weekend
Goodbye, July! What a month it was, of crushing heat and hellish discourse about ancient Greek literature. Tom Holland appeared in approximately 3,000 YouTube challenges on his Kafkaesque promo tour for two movies. Spain recolonized Argentina or something. It’s been a lot! And now it’s over. But there is much to look forward to.
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