Author: NY TIMES

Annoyed moviegoers may be making incorrect assumptions about why others in the theater are laughing. Some audience members might be chuckling because something onscreen is funny ha-ha; others may be laughing out of discomfort, surprise, or recognition; still others might titter to convey that they understood an obscure reference. Or maybe laughter is just contagious.“Sometimes I just hear someone else laugh and then it makes me think, maybe that was actually funny,” said Jordan Linekar, a manager for scripted and unscripted content at Paramount who sees movies in Los Angeles theaters about every other week. “Or sometimes people’s laughs are…

On the cover of his latest album, Alexandre Kantorow’s left arm falls back behind a piano bench. A wave builds slowly from his dangled palm, up through the straight line of his bare forearm, and crests around his shoulders before breaking, down through his arched neck and deeply bowed head, leaving, in the wash, his right hand at the keys.In this strikingly fluid photograph, taken by Fadi Kheir during Kantorow’s Carnegie Hall debut in 2023, he appears first as an unusually relaxed performer in flow. But the image reveals a second character. In the long hair draped messily over the…

Israel and Hamas appeared close to an agreement to declare a cease-fire in Gaza and release hostages held there, the Qatari government, a key broker in the talks, said on Tuesday, raising hopes after more than 15 months of war for some respite in the fighting.The latest round of negotiations follows repeated failed attempts to reach a breakthrough. But in recent weeks, officials familiar with the talks have voiced hope that a looming deadline was helping to close the gap: the end of President Joe Biden’s term and President-elect Donald J. Trump’s inauguration on Jan. 20.Mediators had “managed to minimize…

MELBOURNE, Australia — On the island that was once the center of the world of men’s tennis — the land of Laver and Rosewall, Emerson and Newcomb and other tennis gods — the strangest dynamic has emerged.The rest of the world is obsessed with Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz. Here, it’s all about their own tennis yin and yang.One of them is a top-10 player who will do whatever it takes to avoid controversy while dedicating every ounce of his energy to the sport. The other is an unranked unicorn who is best at the middle ring of a three-ring…

While many of Mr. Musk’s posts, particularly those on grooming gangs, originated in the ecosystem of far-right bloggers and activists, they are also tempting to mainstream politicians in search of a cudgel to use against their opponents. And they appeal to editors and broadcasters looking for a good story.“The British press and the broadcasters, to a degree, fell all over themselves to give Elon Musk publicity,” said David Yelland, a former editor of Rupert Murdoch’s tabloid, The Sun. “In the print press, they did it because they are extremely hostile to Keir Starmer. This is plain old Fleet Street bias.”Claire…

Matthew Giachelli got the call he anticipated on Thursday morning: The N.F.L. was moving the Rams’ playoff game to Arizona because of the wildfires raging in Los Angeles, and the league needed 200 gallons of paint pronto.The game on Monday between the Rams and the Minnesota Vikings would now be held at State Farm Stadium outside Phoenix, and it had to look and feel as if it were being played in the Rams’ usual home, SoFi Stadium. That included painting the field with the team’s and league’s logos and colors. The hometown Cardinals, though, did not have some of the…

The Biden administration issued sweeping rules on Monday governing how A.I. chips and models can be shared with foreign countries, in an attempt to set up a global framework that will guide how artificial intelligence spreads around the world in the years to come.With the power of A.I. rapidly growing, the Biden administration said the rules were necessary to keep a transformational technology under the control of the United States and its allies, and out of the hands of adversaries that could use it to augment their militaries, carry out cyberattacks and otherwise threaten the United States.Tech companies have protested…

At Azara Ballet, dancers aren’t expected to make eye contact with the directors and choreographers. If company members need an impromptu break from the harsh stage lights during rehearsal, they take one. They also receive clear directions about hair and makeup well in advance of performances.The priority at Azara is dancers’ health. Founded in 2022 by the dancers Kate Flowers and Martin Roosaare, who are both autistic (and are a married couple), the company, which is based in Sarasota and Bradenton, Fla., is a haven for neurodivergent performers. (The company is made up of 10 dancers, not all of whom…

Oliviero Toscani, an Italian photographer who used images of an AIDS patient and death row inmates to break the boundaries of fashion imagery as the creative mastermind of Benetton’s advertising campaigns, died on Monday. He was 82.His death was announced by his family on Instagram. They did not say where he died or cite a cause of death, but in August Mr. Toscani told the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera that he had been diagnosed with amyloidosis, a rare and incurable condition in which there is a buildup of protein.His shock-and-awe campaigns in the 1980s and ’90s helped turn Benetton…

Lambrini Girls, ‘Company Culture’All things patriarchal, capitalistic and obtuse are targets for Lambrini Girls, the gleefully obstreperous English punk duo Phoebe Lunny and Lilly Macieira. “Company Culture,” a blast at workplace harassment from their debut album, “Who Let the Dogs Out,” revs up instrumentally for nearly a full minute — clattery drums, buzz-bombing bass, dissonant guitar — before Lunny lets loose a brutally sarcastic tirade: “Human resources say I’m asking for it,” she barks. PARELESSpellling, ‘Portrait of My Heart’Chrystia Cabral, a California songwriter who records as Spellling, proclaims “I don’t belong here!” with mounting vehemence in “Portrait of My Heart,”…