Tuner, now playing in theaters throughout Israel, is an offbeat, interesting drama and crime caper, with some funny moments.
Entertainment
'Hazbin Hotel,' A24's first animated series, imagines heaven and hell with a Broadway voice cast
When Vivienne Medrano was a kid, she stayed away from horror, anything considered adult and any images that might be considered inappropriate, especially on the internet, fearing that scary stories and sights might hold a malevolent power. But in high school, a flip switched.
“I saw ‘South Park’ for the first time, and I saw ‘War of the Worlds,’ the Steven Spielberg one,” Medrano, 31, said recently. “That’s not really a horror movie, but it was very dark, and it’s a very scary movie especially for a young person. I was like, ‘Whoa, that’s a different kind of feeling.’”
Fast forward to 2024 and Medrano, a bisexual woman and self-described proud, fiery Latina, is not only a horror fan but she’s also a horror maker, as creator, executive producer and director of Prime Video’s new animated horror-comedy show “Hazbin Hotel.” Premiering Friday, the eight-episode, adults-only series centers on Charlie (voiced by Erika Henningsen), the reigning Princess of Hell and daughter of Lucifer, who opens a rehabilitation center to help sinners and demons become angels before heaven begins its annual extermination of Hades’ resident evil-doers.
Vivienne Medrano, the creator of “Hazbin Hotel.”
(Ilya S. Savenok / Getty Images for Prime Video)
The show arrives five years after Medrano, who works under the name VivziePop, uploaded a 30-minute pilot to her YouTube channel that to date has gotten 93 million views. In 2020, the art-house studio A24 signed on to produce a full season — making it the first animated series they’ve produced — and later greenlighted a second. Four episodes drop the first week, then two more weekly through Feb 2.
The “Hazbin Hotel” universe is a brazenly colorful, queer-inclusive and fast-paced mishmash of outlandish grotesqueries and copious potty mouthing buoyed by — and here’s the double-take — a Broadway pop score.
Sam Haft and Andrew Underberg’s music and lyrics traffic in old-school want songs and uptempo dance numbers, like “A Happy Day in Hell,” the absurdly bloody but bright-eyed opening number that introduces Charlie and her fellow hellions.
The voice cast features bona fide Broadway stars, including in supporting roles Tony nominees Daphne-Rubin Vega (“Rent”) and Jeremy Jordan (“Newsies the Musical”) and Patina Miller (“Pippin”). Alex Brightman, a two-time Tony nominee, including for playing the title role in the musical “Beetlejuice,” voices two roles: Sir Pentious, a dapper evil-genius snake who makes weapons of destruction but has a vulnerable side, and Adam — the Adam, as in Eve’s man — an amped-up bro who runs heaven like a dictator.
Medrano and Brightman recently spoke about how horror and musical theater are cut from the same cloth, whether or not hell even exists and other topics on the entertainment-existentialist spectrum. Here, their interviews have been edited and condensed.
“Hazbin Hotel” is a TV show that combines musical theater and horror, a mix you don’t see all that often. Are you a fan of both genres?
Medrano: I have done some performing in my life but at a very amateur level. Theater is a place that I love and that inspires me. But I’m also an enormous fan of horror. I like things that get very dark.
Brightman: I’ve loved horror movies since I was far too young. I blame my parents. I’ve been a musical theater person since I was 8. Musical theater to me is slightly a religion. My parts in “Hazbin” are so crazy and anti who I am in real life. It’s fun to play weirdos and misfits, but I’m quite warm actually.
Vivienne, most of the horror fans I know are the sweetest people imaginable. Where do you think they get their love of scary things?
Medrano: As you grow up, your child-wonder stage goes away as you start to see and learn more about the darkness of the world. Horror is an escape from that. I think that’s why so many horror fans are so nice, because they have gone through some of the worst things and learned how to escape into fiction.
Horror requires you to not take things too seriously, because otherwise you’d be traumatized for the rest of your life. You have to allow yourself to be put in an uncomfortable position, which some people aren’t ready to do. But horror fans are willing to adapt. When it comes to empathy and connecting with other people, that’s an important thing.
As for the music, what did you imagine the residents of heaven and hell to sound like?
Medrano: I’m a musical snob. I was very much like, ‘The music needs to sound coherent and relatively Broadway.’ One challenge was that all the characters have a different kind of sound. Like with Alex, one of his characters is very rock themed and the other is very old and Victorian-ish, kinda steam-punky. Neither of those characters feel like they lend themselves to a regular Broadway sound. In the soundtrack, one second it’s pop, the next it’s something Latin-y. It’s so cool how well they were able to pull that off.
Broadway would kill to have a cast like yours.
Medrano: As a theater fan, it’s absolutely mind-blowing. Patina, I remember I saw her in “Pippin.” She was such a standout performer, and I could never get her performance out of my head. When it came to casting, she was one of the people we reached out to directly to play a role. The fact that she said yes, that’s incredible. I’m on cloud nine when it comes to the cast.
Alex Brightman voices Sir Pentious and Adam in “Hazbin Hotel.”
(Greg Allen / Invision / Associated Press)
Alex, what are some of the differences between stage and voice acting that you notice most?
Brightman: There are huge differences but also more similarities than you’d think. In both, you use all of yourself. In animation, you can step back a tiny bit from choreography, hitting your marks and being seen from the balcony. The only big difference is that you can get it wrong 500 times. Onstage, you get one chance but you can’t cut and hold and go back and do it again.
I’m an improv guy, so getting the chance to do alternate takes is great. But the one shot in musical theater is exciting. I love that things can go wrong.
And, man, is there swearing in this show.
Brightman: [Laughs] I don’t believe that everything is for everybody. If you are offended by swearing, then that’s fine. People are allowed to be offended. But I think art can’t move forward unless we try things. I’m glad they created a show that’s unsavory for some, but for others, it will be their favorite thing.
Vivienne, to what extent do you consider yourself, like Charlie, to be a princess of hell?
Medrano: I’m a queer woman on the internet who made something popular. You can only imagine. We’re both in this position of fighting uphill battles to just have our dreams exist. Charlie is a character that not only do I relate to directly but I’m also like, ‘She’s so plucky and determined and energetic.’ She’s a very aspirational character for me.
Sir Pentious, the character voiced by Alex Brightman.
(Prime Video)
Put on your theology hat: What is the show saying about the tug of war between good and evil?
Medrano: That’s a very complicated answer, and that’s what I like. The show is meant to represent and be about the gray between two pillars. It’s about redemption and second chances, but really, it’s also about what does that actually mean? People who go through hard things and trauma and become bad or nasty people, really sometimes it is just love and support and faith in them that can change them. We’ve seen that all across history.
Everyone has their relationship with forgiveness and redemption and with people who have wronged them. I don’t even know if it should ever have a definite answer, because I don’t know if there’s a universal answer.
To bring it back to musical theater, that’s basically the premise of “Wicked,” trying to understand why the wicked witch became who she did.
Medrano: “Wicked” is a beautiful story. Seeing stories about what leads someone down a dark path, to me,m is very enlightening because it’s usually something very big. Sometimes it’s justifiable, sometimes it’s never. But at least it’s understandable. A big influence of mine is “Bojack Horseman,” another show that’s very intricate with its complexity of how awful the main character is. But you understand every aspect of what got him there.
Do you believe in hell?
Brightman: I would say I consider myself a spiritual-leaning agnostic. I think maybe something’s going on but I don’t know that I’d give it shape. In this moment, and I’m willing to change, I would say no.
Medrano: It’s complicated. I have no idea what happens in the universe. But sometimes I wish it existed. Who knows what the criteria is.
By ABBIE BERNSTEIN / Staff Writer
Posted: June 26th, 2026 / 08:03 PM
SUPERGIRL movie poster | ©2026 Warner Bros./DC Studios
Rating: PG-13
Stars: Milly Adcock, David Corenswet, Eve Ridley, Matthias Schoenaerts, Diarmaid Murtagh, Jason Momoa, David Krumholtz, Emily Beecham
Writer: Ana Nogueira, based on characters created by Jerry Siegel & Joe Shuster
Director: Craig Gillespie
Distributor: Warner Bros./DC Studios
Release Date: June 26, 2026
The new SUPERGIRL doesn’t have that “Eureka! This is how you do this now” spark that galvanized its immediate franchise predecessor, last year’s SUPERMAN. Director Craig Gillespie and screenwriter Ana Nogueira, basing the film on characters created by DC Comics’ Jerry Siegel & Joe Shuster, probably wisely, aren’t going for that.
Instead, the SUPERGIRL makers are intent on providing a lively adventure, getting to the point quickly and letting the action unspool with unquestionably strong motivation, abetted by plenty of punch-ups, kicking and frequent explosions.
Supergirl, aka Kara Zor-El (Milly Adcock), is from the now-dead planet Krypton, just like her cousin Clark/Kal-El/Superman (David Corenswet). However, where Clark has chosen to remain on Earth, where the yellow sun gives him superpowers that allow to help Earth’s residents, Kara likes to party on planets that have a red sun, where she has no unusual abilities.
This is because Kara seems to have taken to heart a dictum from a different comic book universe – with great power comes great responsibility – and decided the inverse is true: with no power comes no responsibility.
We get insight into exactly why Kara is so duty-averse over the course of SUPERGIRL, and it’s probably not a spoiler to say that she re-examines some attitudes as events unfold.
Kara plans to celebrate her twenty-third birthday on a backwater red sun planet. The bar where Kara chooses to drink is entered by preteen Ruthye Knoll (Eve Ridley), whose family has been murdered by brigands, led by the horrendous Krem (Matthias Schoenaerts). Ruthye is out for revenge. Kara thinks Ruthye is a bit young and pure-hearted to be on a murderous quest.
Even on a planet with a red sun, though, Kara is still handy with fists and feet. Ruthye sees what Kara can do and concludes she is the ideal ally. Kara absolutely refuses to help. Then something occurs that credibly rouses Kara to do whatever it takes to achieve her aims, which sort of line up with Ruthye’s.
No explanation is needed for why Kara feels such urgency, which we easily share. Her concern for Ruthye is understandable and her connecting to larger purpose is shown rather than spoken.
Intriguingly, the aesthetics of SUPERGIRL are largely those of STAR WARS, with some MAD MAX and BLADE RUNNER thrown in. The filmmakers have a good time with all sorts of utterly nonhuman alien people and figuring out how to make interplanetary versions of familiar items like vending machines.
The pace is pleasingly brisk and the structure doesn’t require much exposition. When they hit a hard-to-answer question like why Kara is Supergirl while Clark is Superman, they acknowledge it and then get out from under without irritating anybody.
For anyone wondering about the veracity of the recording from Superman’s parents that appeared in SUPERMAN, a quick line of dialogue here confirms it (sorry, Jor-El supporters).
There is the expected amount of CGI involved, including a great motion-capture performance by Kara’s dog Krypto (modeled upon executive producer/SUPERMAN director James Gunn’s dog), but a lot of the stunts and makeup appear gratifyingly practical.
Adcock is fine in all of Kara’s moods, from wasted to resistant to determined, with a delightful reaction to feeling her body’s response to the yellow sun. Ridley is an appealing young hero, and Corenswet offers wholesome support. Schoenaerts lets Krem revel in his own soft-spoken vileness, and Jason Momoa enthusiastically portrays an intergalactic bounty hunter. David Krumholtz is affecting as Kara’s scientist father.
SUPERGIRL isn’t going to redefine superhero movies, but it’s a perfectly enjoyable example of the form.
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In 2015, musician Roberto Carlos launched Boleros de Noche, an annual concert series held in Los Angeles that aimed at preserving and showcasing the Latin American bolero music genre.
This year, the event is celebrating its 10th anniversary with performances at the Ford on Aug. 1 by Puerto Rican singer and former Calle 13 member iLe and L.A.-based bolero trio Voz Bohemia
On Friday, the city of L.A. honored the series’ decade-long run and legacy of uplifting bolero music by declaring Aug.1 “Día del Bolero.”
Boleros are ballads noted for their slow tempo and romantic lyrics accompanied by a crooning vocal style. Though the genre originated in Cuba, it quickly gained popularity across Latin America, with each culture putting their own spin on it. In the early 20th century, the evolving sound of boleros was shaped by the Cuban group Trio Matamoros, Mexican composer Agustín Lara, Puerto Rican artist Rafael Hernández and Ecuadorian singer Julio Jaramillo.
The genre saw a resurgence in popularity in the 1980s and ‘90s when famed Mexican artists Juan Gabriel and Luis Miguel embraced the bolero sound. In recent years, the bolero movement has been modernized and electrified by artists such as Mon Laferte, Romeo Santos, Adrian Quesada and Kali Uchis. In the last five years, Quesada has released two bolero albums, “Boleros Psicodélicos” and “Boleros Psicodélicos II,” that mix the genre’s classic sounds with elements of psychedelic rock.
“Over the past decade, Boleros de Noche has presented numerous concerts featuring both local and international artists, has brought together thousands of people across the city to bask in the lush orchestration of this music,” said City Councilmember Nithya Raman, who presented Carlos with the honor. “For so many in the Latino community and beyond, this isn’t just music, it’s memory, it’s home, and perhaps most importantly, it’s heritage being carried forward.”
Raised in L.A. County by parents who immigrated from the Mexican state of Oaxaca, Carlos says he first fell in love with live performance and bolero music in his midteens, when he would frequent the now-defunct Teatro los Pinos in South Gate.
He yearned for that same level of comfort and awe at music and wanted to share that with a larger audience. The first iteration of Boleros de Noche took place in 2015 at an art gallery in Echo Park.
“Over the years, I have heard countless stories from audience members who tell me how this music reminds them of their parents, grandparents, first loves and family traditions,” Carlos said Friday at City Hall. “Ten years ago, bolero was rarely part of our city’s cultural conversation, and today bolero programming can be found across Los Angeles, and I’m honored that Boleros de Noche has been a driving force behind its growth.”
Boleros de Noche has sold out shows at the Ford over the last few years and has featured artists such as Gaby Moreno, Marisoul and the legendary trio Los Panchos. In 2025, the event made its debut at Chicago’s historic Symphony Center.
The bolero genre’s popularity and cultural significance has been spotlighted outside of L.A. in recent years as well.
On Dec. 5, 2023, UNESCO, the United Nation’s agency aimed at safeguarding social and cultural foundations, recognized the musical genre as an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.
As part of Friday’s ceremony, Carlos and his bolero group Los Rebeldes Románticos performed several tunes, including the Mexican bolero classic “Sabor a Mí.”
Last year, Carlos spoke with The Times about his ambitions for Boleros de Noche and the mentality that drives the event series.
“At Boleros de Noche, [I want] for us to speak in Spanish, to feel recognized, to do this music as a celebration for all these artists that unfortunately became background music for a lot of like weddings and quinceañeras,” he said. “How about if we celebrate them and give them recognition? How about if, through my events, I can take people back to the 1940s to my experience at Teatro los Pinos?”
Given recent attacks on Latinos on the local and national levels, Carlos said he hoped his events would create a safe and welcoming gathering place.
“It’s about bolero music. It’s about community. It’s about people. It’s about the musicians,” he said. “Many of the musicians were undocumented. They brought this music to L.A. through their hometowns.”
Movie Reviews
Film review: ‘Tuner’ mixes classical music, crime, and Dustin Hoffman | The Jerusalem Post
It co-stars Dustin Hoffman in a story of a young piano tuner, Niki (Leo Woodall), a former music prodigy with perfect pitch who suffers from hyperacusis, a condition that makes him extraordinarily sensitive to loud noises.
In a series of events that are a bit improbable but that seem quite credible while you’re watching, Niki discovers his finely tuned hearing gives him a great talent for safecracking, which brings him to the attention of a crime gang.
It features a clever, often surprising screenplay, co-written by its director, Daniel Roher (who won an Oscar for the documentary, Navalny) and Robert Ramsey. There are also wonderful performances from the cast, which also includes distinguished actress Tovah Feldshuh of Nobody Wants This and Fauda star Lior Raz.
The characters have a nice, funny raport
When Tuner opens, Niki is working in a piano-tuning business in New York with a former musician, Harry Horowitz (Hoffman).
The beefy, laconic, young man treats the garrulous, wisecracking Harry with respect, listening patiently to all his jokes and stories about the good old days when he worked with jazz greats.
These two have a nice rapport, as Niki drives Harry all over the New York area in an old van and eats in diners with him.
Niki does the work while Harry sits on a sofa, critiquing him.
The two stick out like sore thumbs in the many mansions where they work on spectacular pianos that haven’t been played in decades, for clients who ask them if they can also repair toilets and modems.
Harry, who never made much of a living despite his talent, has fallen on hard times, and he and his wife, Marla (Feldshuh), are barely scraping by. Niki is also broke.
Recognizing what a great musician Niki is, Harry tries to cajole him into playing again, but the younger man refuses, living an isolated life and trying not to draw attention to himself.
The three incidents that set the plot in motion
Harry has forgotten the combination to his safe and needs to open it. When Niki goes on YouTube to look at a video on how to do it, he discovers that his sensitive hearing makes him a genius at safecracking.
Harry becomes ill and, due to a mess with Medicare, suddenly falls into a huge debt; and Niki meets Ruthie (Havana Rose Liu), an extremely ambitious pianist and composing student, who is astounded by his perfect pitch.
Soon, Niki’s talent for safecracking draws the attention of Uri (Lior Raz), an Israeli who runs a bogus security company, where he uses his knowledge of his client’s homes and passwords to steal what he contends are minor trinkets, but which add up to big money for his gang, much like Jon Hamm’s character in the Apple TV series, Your Friends and Neighbors.
Raz hams it up as a character who fits the stereotype of the obnoxious Israeli in the US, and lords it over his supposedly bright accomplice, Yoni (Gil Frank), and his much dimmer nephew, Benny (Nissan Sakira).
Much of the comedy in the movie comes from Uri browbeating the two, and if you can understand the Hebrew, it’s even funnier than the subtitles.
Criticisms of Tuner
Niki’s romance with Ruthie, which develops quickly, feels a little convenient at times, though the screenplay paints a realistic picture of the competitive world of high-level music students. You know, for most of the movie, that eventually Niki will reveal to her that he was once a great pianist, and when it comes, it’s something of an anti-climax.
After Hoffman’s character gets sick, he disappears from the rest of the movie except for a couple of scenes, and that’s too bad. It’s great to see Hoffman having fun as Harry, and the scenes where he and Niki banter help humanize the younger man, making him more likable and less self-centered.
Woodall is one of the most in-demand young actors. He played a hunky love interest in both Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy and the Netflix series Vladimir; he also appeared in the second season of The White Lotus.
He has a buff body and conventional leading-man good looks, and generally plays confident, happy-go-lucky guys, which means he is cast against type here.
Niki is the kind of role that might seem better suited for actors like Josh O’Connor, Jeremy Allen White, or Timothée Chalamet. Woodall has to work hard to convince us he is withdrawn and feels out of place in all the mansions where he tunes pianos, but his charm wins out, and soon, you come to accept him in the role.
Mixed music and mixed genres
The soundtrack features a mix of classical music and jazz, and it’s clear it was made by a director who appreciates both.
Tuner settles neatly into a mini-genre of movies that feature plot lines that combine piano-playing characters and crime, that include James Toback’s Fingers with Harvey Keitel, and Jacques Audiard’s remake of it, The Beat that My Heart Skipped with Romain Duris; Francois Truffaut’s Shoot the Piano Player with Charles Aznavour; and Eugenio Mira’s Grand Piano with Elijah Wood. It also recalls the spirit of Bob Rafelson’s Five Easy Pieces, which features Jack Nicholson in one of his best performances; here as a piano prodigy who has rejected his oppressive family and become an oil field worker.
Tuner shares some of the bleakness typical of 1970s films, like Fingers and Five Easy Pieces. At times, the movie moves jarringly between brooding, almost noir-like darkness and scenes with the chatty Harry or the bumbling gangsters.
It might have been a stronger film if Roher had gone in one direction instead of mixing genres, but it would likely have been less entertaining.
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