Sylvain Tron

French production company Birth is celebrating the first anniversary of its U.K. office with "Bloody French," a video featuring the perpetually smug Tobias Menzies. Menzies plays Prince Philip in The Crown. Taking on his mantle of comic entitlement, he kicks off with a recap of his own résumé, which also includes Outlander and Game of Thrones. But when the time comes to talk about Birth U.K., he mispronounces the name, like an actor who didn't bother reading the sponsor script all that well.

Just when the summer movie season should be kicking into high gear, theaters that have stood empty are now struggling with how to reopen and bring moviegoers back. For the past three months, Covid-19 has taken away one of our true escapes from reality: watching a film on a big screen in a dark theater while surrounded by others sharing in the experience. Ironically, it was this sense of escape that made the movie industry virtually recession-proof, even during wars and economic calamities.

People are typically in three places—their residence, place of employment, and a third location often related to socialization and enjoyment (gym, restaurant). Covid-19 has flipped this notion on its head, and now all of these have been drilled down to one singular point: the home. The idea of these "third places" comes from sociologist Ray Oldenburg.