By the time the cult sitcom “Party Down” began airing on Starz in 2009, after a six-year search for a network home, it had become a Great Recession comedy. Set at a different gathering or celebration each week, the show followed Los Angeles’s worst catering crew—a ragbag of struggling actors, writers, and comedians glued to their flip phones, who approach basic hospitality like an exotic custom. Naturally, their clients are even less sympathetic. In the second episode of the series, the servers attend to a group of college Republicans. With then Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger playing the part of Godot, the workers are forced to make chitchat with the conservatives while they wait for the guest of honor to arrive. Henry (Adam Scott), a bartender whose brief stint as the star of a ubiquitous beer commercial effectively killed his former acting career, rolls his eyes at the overconfident twerps preaching hard work and perseverance. But the students find an acolyte in Henry’s dopey boss, Ron (Ken Marino), who dreams not of fame or fortune but of rise-and-grinding his way to managing a franchise of a soup-centric chain restaurant. With the exception of Henry, each member of the Party Down waitstaff is hopeful (or delusional) enough to think that meritocracy will work out in their favor. But only Ron is naïve enough to believe in capitalism.
Denne historien er fra March 06, 2023-utgaven av The New Yorker.
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Denne historien er fra March 06, 2023-utgaven av The New Yorker.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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The Football Bro - Pat McAfee brings a casual new style to ESPN.
If, on a cool weekend morning in autumn, you happen to be watching “College GameDay,” on ESPN, don’t worry about figuring out which of the broadcasters behind the improbably long desk is Pat McAfee. He’s the one with the roast-pork tan, his hair cut high and tight, likely tieless among his more businesslike colleagues. The rest of the onair crew—Lee Corso, Rece Davis, Kirk Herbstreit, Desmond Howard, and, newly, the former University of Alabama coach Nick Saban—tend to look and dress and talk like participants in an old-school Republican-primary debate. McAfee, though, favors windowpane checks on his jackets and a slip of chest poking out from behind his two or three open buttons. If the others are politicians, he’s the cool-coded megachurch pastor who sometimes acts as their spiritual adviser.
The Dark Time. - On the Arctic border of Russia and Norway, an espionage war is emerging.
On the Arctic border of Russia and Norway, an espionage war is emerging. The point of contact between NATO and Russia's nuclear stronghold is the small town of Kirkenes. For years, Russia has treated the area as a laboratory, testing intelligence and influence operations before replicating them across Europe.
MIRROR IMAGES
‘A Different Man” and The Substance.”
OTHER PEOPLE'S MONEY
Proximity to wealth proves perilous in Rumaan Alam’ novel Entitlement.”
EYES WIDE SHUT
How Monet shared a private world.
WITH THE MOSTEST
The very rich hours of Pamela Harriman.
HUGO HAMILTON AUTOBAHN
On the Autobahn outside Frankfurt. November. The fields were covered in a thin sheet of snow.
TRY IT ON
How Law Roach reimagined red-carpet style.
SORRY I'M NOT YOUR CLOWN TODAY
Bowen Yang's trip to Oz, by way of conversion therapy and S..N.L.”
SNIFF TEST
A maverick perfumer tries to make his mark on a storied fashion house.
