Why everyone's talking about Love on the Spectrum
Instead of being set on an island, or asking people to connect through a wall, or focusing on whether people are "there for the right reasons," this show brings a decidedly warmer energy to the genre. Now in its third season, the series follows people on the autism spectrum in the U.S. as they navigate the world of dating and relationships.
The new season lands at a particularly crucial time for autistic people in the U.S., as U.S. Health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has recently made troubling and scientifically inaccurate comments about the condition. Some of the cast have even spoken out about these comments, and suggested the U.S. Health secretary might benefit from watching the show.
Though it's won multiple Emmys and earned a loyal fanbase of viewers, some point out that the series isn't without its faults. Can a reality show change people's perceptions — and is this the show to do it for the autistic community?
Today on Commotion, author Sarah Kurchak and culture critic Glenn Sumi join host Elamin Abdelmahmoud to discuss the popular Netflix reality dating series, and what it can tell us about mainstream television's perceptions of autistic people.
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Winnipeg Free Press
3 hours ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
‘Building the Band' has Liam Payne's last major appearance before his death
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Netflix's new reality show, 'Building the Band,' unexpectedly became Liam Payne's last major appearance — moments the show's hosts say they, along with contestants and viewers, are lucky to have. The show features Payne as a guest judge, offering pointed but witty advice to young bands chasing success not unlike what he achieved as part of the culture-shifting boy band, One Direction. Payne died in October after falling from a hotel balcony in Argentina, not long after the show's production wrapped. 'Getting to see the real, true him that the world gets to remember him for, which you'll see on this show, is just a beautiful thing,' says the Backstreet Boys' AJ McLean, the show's host. Aalith Rose Larsen, from left, Cameron Goode, Donzell Taggart and Katherine Reorder of SZN4 pose for a portrait to promote "Building the Band" on Wednesday, July 16, 2025, in Los Angeles. (Photo by Rebecca Cabage/Invision/AP) 'Building the Band' flips traditional music competitions on their head, bringing together 50 up-and-coming artists who are tasked with singing for each other and forming groups based on those performances. The catch? They can't see how anyone looks. The first batch of episodes premiered in early July and the last few episodes, including the finale, will drop Wednesday. The show ultimately follows six bands working to develop their group sound and performances — until only one band is left standing, winning the $500,000 prize. The show is hosted by McLean, with Pussycat Dolls frontwoman — and newly minted Tony winner — Nicole Scherzinger mentoring the bands and Destiny's Child star Kelly Rowland serving as a guest judge alongside Payne. Payne's impact on 'Building the Band' The series opened with a dedication to Payne and his family, in which McLean said they 'never imagined we'd soon be saying goodbye to our friend' while filming the show. Payne first appears in the seventh episode for the showcase, where each band performs in front of a live audience and the judges, only about a week after they form. 'We were amazing dancers, obviously, in One Direction,' Payne joked in the episode while offering critiques to boy band Midnight 'til Morning, whose members expressed hesitations with dancing onstage. Band member Mason Watts then revealed his family had won tickets to sit front row at a One Direction concert when he was 11, stoking applause from the crowd and a heartfelt response from Payne. 'Ever since that moment, I wanted to be in a group,' Watts, originally from Australia, said in the episode. 'It's kind of a full-circle moment to be here with a group and performing in front of you. So, thank you, man.' Landon Boyce, a member of the show's other boy band, Soulidified, told The Associated Press that Payne left a lasting impact and was a leading example of how he hopes to carry himself as a performer. 'I remember Liam just said, 'Have fun,'' Boyce says. 'He just told us, 'I wish One Direction kind of, like, did what you guys were doing.' And I kind of just took that as like, let's just have fun and dance.' Payne is seen nodding along with excitement during the band's showcase performance, when they sang 'Sure Thing' by Miguel. Bradley Rittmann, another Soulidified member, told the AP they were 'on Cloud 9' after Payne said he would join their band. Payne applauded their ability to own the stage and acknowledged the unconventionality of their band due to the members' varying musical and fashion styles, saying he 'wouldn't put you guys together, but the result was amazing.' How it works: 'Love is Blind' meets 'The Voice' This show mashes together the likes of 'Love is Blind' with music competition shows like 'The Voice,' secluding contestants in pods, where they can only hear each other. Contestants can express interest by hitting a button during the performance, and then speak through voice chats to test their chemistry. The initial 50 contestants dwindled to just 22, comprising two boy bands, three girl bands and one mixed-gender group. Contestants chose their bandmates without input from the host or judges. 'It formed in the most real, raw, authentic way,' says Aaliyah Rose Larsen, a member of the mixed-gender band SZN4. 'I think we would have re-found each other in a million other lifetimes, in a billion other shows, because we were always meant to find each other.' The result of this process, judges say, are bands that labels traditionally wouldn't form, given members' differences in style and appearance — an important pillar of the show, McLean and Rowland say, given the current state of the music industry. 'Back in the beginning of our careers, your sophomore album was the one that would make or break you. Now you get one shot,' McLean says. 'To be able to give the power back to these individuals, to let them put each other together based on just raw talent and chemistry, never seeing each other, is a testament to truly what it is to be in a band.' An audience vote determines which bands continue on after each live performance. The last episode of the first batch left viewers on a cliffhanger, as Midnight 'til Morning and girl group Siren Society were voted in the bottom two. The next batch will reveal who was eliminated. Payne embraced the mentorship role Rowland says Payne was fully invested in the process and checked in regarding the bands' progress after filming. Payne had also expressed interest in mentoring the bands after the show ended, Boyce remembers. 'He was just honest. He called everything out, you know what I mean? Before they saw it, before we saw it,' Rowland says, adding that Payne had 'many shining moments' during his storied and decorated career, 'but this was a really incredible one.' Nori Moore, a member of 3Quency, 'had a lot of firsts' in the show as a young performer and says Payne's advice to contestants that they claim the moment every time they walk onstage was pivotal to her development as an artist. Larsen says viewers can watch the show and 'see his heart.' 'We know how much he loves the show,' says Katie Roeder, another SZN4 member. 'I know he's very proud of us and looking down on us.'
Toronto Sun
a day ago
- Toronto Sun
In ‘Happy Gilmore 2,' Christopher McDonald will still eat you for breakfast
Published Jul 21, 2025 • 8 minute read Old rivals come face to face in "Happy Gilmore 2." Photo by Netflix / Scott Yamano/Netflix Reviews and recommendations are unbiased and products are independently selected. Postmedia may earn an affiliate commission from purchases made through links on this page. Christopher McDonald does not deliver threats in rhymes. He does not tell fans to go back to their shanties. He would never say he eats 'pieces of s— like you for breakfast.' (He'd prefer to have a green smoothie with protein powder, spinach and fruit.) He is not, in other words, Shooter McGavin. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. THIS CONTENT IS RESERVED FOR SUBSCRIBERS ONLY Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada. Unlimited online access to articles from across Canada with one account. Get exclusive access to the Toronto Sun ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment on. Enjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalists. Support local journalists and the next generation of journalists. Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword. SUBSCRIBE TO UNLOCK MORE ARTICLES Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada. Unlimited online access to articles from across Canada with one account. Get exclusive access to the Toronto Sun ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment on. Enjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalists. Support local journalists and the next generation of journalists. Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword. REGISTER / SIGN IN TO UNLOCK MORE ARTICLES Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience. Access articles from across Canada with one account. Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments. Enjoy additional articles per month. Get email updates from your favourite authors. THIS ARTICLE IS FREE TO READ REGISTER TO UNLOCK. Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience. Access articles from across Canada with one account Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments Enjoy additional articles per month Get email updates from your favourite authors Don't have an account? Create Account But also, kind of, isn't he? Almost 30 years after he first played the role, McDonald is picking out his beige Polo and getting his 9-iron ready for his return as the rival to Adam Sandler's failed hockey player turned links champion in 'Happy Gilmore 2,' which arrives on Netflix on July 25. The warmly remembered, thoroughly silly 1996 sports comedy helped lay the groundwork for Sandler's stratospheric career – and made McDonald's face synonymous with his character, the kind of guy who'll let someone know he's a jerk by asking for a Diet Pepsi. (In the words of McGavin: 'Choke on that, bay-bay!') It almost didn't happen. By the time he was 40, McDonald was already considered one of Hollywood's most dependable heels – the strikingly handsome dude with the mug you wanted to repeatedly punch who was churning out scene-stealing performances in films like 'Thelma and Louise.' But he turned down the part in 'Happy Gilmore' not once but twice in 1995. It's not that he didn't believe in the script or Sandler, then a recent SNL alum. But after more than three months filming the science fiction thriller 'Unforgettable,' McDonald was burned out and didn't want to be an absentee dad to wife Lupe and their kids. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. 'It's exceptionally difficult to do that and to leave your partner with that kind of responsibility,' McDonald, now 70, says in a video conversation in early July. 'So, I just said no to Adam.' Then, McDonald played a hell of a round of golf and immediately wondered if Sandler and the producers still needed him on the green. 'I was feeling my oats,' he says. He agreed to do the film when he and his family got housing near the set in Vancouver for the summer. 'They paid me to play golf,' he says, 'and I'm still pinching myself.' For years, McDonald hoped the industry's opinion of him would shift from supporting actor to leading-man material, saying in 2000, 'I've been one away from something huge for the longest time.' But in a career in film and television that's included more than 100 projects over nearly a half-century, McDonald has had something huge all along in McGavin, the finger-gun-blasting, sweater-draped, privileged doofus who has earned his place among the greatest sports villains in cinematic history. Your noon-hour look at what's happening in Toronto and beyond. By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc. Please try again This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. 'That was my one away, probably, because I can't walk down the street without getting, 'Shooter! Shooter! Shooter!'' McDonald says. Once, a guy recognized McDonald as Shooter as he was relieving himself at a urinal at a Buffalo Bills game. 'Shooter is the gift that keeps on giving.' – – – Being a compelling jerk on screen – and McDonald has played more than a few of them – is an art. Just ask Sandler. 'Chris was the real deal – more than us comedians – and he took it serious. We were kind of like, 'Here comes the real actor,'' Sandler says of McDonald's original performance as McGavin. 'He took every costume serious, every scene meant a lot to him, and he thought through everything.' The news of the 'Happy Gilmore' sequel follows McDonald's standout role as casino CEO Marty Ghilain in the HBO Max comedy 'Hacks,' which earned him an Emmy nomination in 2022. Together, the projects have brought about a period of appreciation for the performer, from peers and fans of a character actor whom everyone loves to hate. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. 'He understands how to elevate something that isn't overdone, but it lets the audience know that it's a comedy and he's playing a despicable villain,' says John Slattery, who performed alongside McDonald in the Broadway revival of 'The Front Page' in 2016. 'He's in on the joke – and he's everything you want in an actor like that.' Julie Bowen agrees, noting how McDonald could have played McGavin as a cartoon character who 'could just be nothing but smarm and a big smear of gross.' 'But there's something about the way Chris plays it that's right behind the eyes. When he says, 'I eat pieces of s— like you for breakfast,' he doesn't just scowl. There's a drop in his face and this look of, 'Oh no, I didn't mean that,'' says Bowen, who is reprising her role as Virginia Venit in the sequel. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. It's a few days after the July Fourth holiday, and McDonald is hiding out in his colorful man cave while some friends are watching Wimbledon in the other room. He remembers the days before Shooter McGavin well, even if some people don't. Raised as one of seven children in Romulus, New York, by his father, James, a high school principal, and his mother, Patricia, a real estate agent, McDonald was premed at Hobart College before deciding to give acting a try his senior year and continuing his drama studies in London. After some early unforgettable films, including as T-Bird member Goose McKenzie in 'Grease 2,' McDonald unleashed his inner blowhard in 'Thelma and Louise' as Darryl Dickinson, the patronizing, chauvinistic husband who desperately struggled for any sense of control. While he maintains he never tried to be a career villain, audiences and studios saw him as the actor who could find humanity in the bad guy. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. 'You can never judge your character, and you can never say, 'Well, this guy's a major a-hole.' You just say, 'This is how he thinks, and we're going to push that to the limit and see how far we can get,'' McDonald says. 'I guess I get typecasted a bit because people love the way I play the jerks and the bad guys.' When Tim Herlihy co-wrote the 'Happy Gilmore' script with Sandler, he says, they didn't have a specific inspiration in mind for McGavin, other than someone who was handsome and preppy and would grow increasingly deranged over Gilmore's success. But by the time McDonald came on board, Herlihy emphasized, the actor's ability to 'make the straight lines funny' is what made McGavin such a great, pompous fool, in the lineage of Ted Knight's Elihu Smails in 'Caddyshack.' This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. 'I don't want to overstate this, but coming from SNL, me and Adam sometimes viewed actors as people to work around, almost like, don't screw this up,' says Herlihy, who also co-wrote 'Happy Gilmore 2' with Sandler. 'Chris was one of the first times we got more than what we imagined in our heads, and we imagined it pretty good.' Bowen initially thought of McDonald as Hollywood in the best way: charming, funny, smooth. Their takes from the 'Not Happy Place' – where Venit, Gilmore's love interest in lingerie, and McGavin, both dressed in all black, aggressively make out in a nightmare daydream – turned McDonald from co-worker to friend, she says. Years later, Bowen remembers going down an escalator after one of her Emmy wins for 'Modern Family' and seeing McDonald come up another escalator next to her. Without missing a beat, they knew what to do. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. 'Immediately, we leaned over the two escalators, and I'm with my husband at the time and I'm holding an Emmy, and I lean over, and we just go [disgusting make-out noise with her tongue]. And we never mentioned it again,' she says, through laughter. 'I turned to my husband and I was like, 'You're cool with that, right?' He was like, 'Trust me, yeah, but you guys are weirdos.'' There's a scene in the new movie where McGavin and Gilmore come face to face in a graveyard, before a fistfight nearly 30 years in the making. At the cemetery, there are headstones honouring the characters from the first film who have died. In a film full of nostalgia and cameos, mortality is front and centre for these characters. The topic comes up a couple of times, unprompted, in our chat. A few days earlier, McDonald's longtime friend, actor Michael Madsen, died of cardiac arrest at the age of 67. He lists the names of other actor friends who've died too young in recent years, like Ray Liotta and Bill Paxton. 'It's just crazy,' he says, admitting he's still overwhelmed by Madsen's passing. 'That's what hits me at a certain age. We're only here for a short time.' This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. The deaths of his friends and peers have, in some ways, served as another reminder of how being largely recognized as McGavin has been a blessing. The character's popularity surged into the 21st century once the film hit Blockbuster and cable channels like Comedy Central, where a modest box-office success morphed into a rewatchable cult classic for '90s kids. McDonald's popularity as McGavin soared even higher in the social-media age, where he's been frequently GIFified for memes. McDonald even set up a Cameo account where people can still pay to have him send a personalized message as McGavin. 'I've embraced this character,' he says. 'It's been a godsend in a lot of ways.' – – – It was McDonald's last day of shooting, and McGavin had just thrown a cup of scalding-hot coffee in the face of Frank Manatee (played by Benny Safdie), the owner of rival golf league Maxi Golf. When they got the scene done in one take, the crew applauded McDonald for bringing McGavin back to life. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Then McDonald looked over and saw Sandler, holding the elusive gold jacket. The last time we saw McGavin with the gold jacket, he had stolen it from Gilmore and was running away from an angry golf mob. But now, finally, it was Shooter's turn. 'He said, 'Alright, Shooter. I know you've wanted this. This is for you,'' McDonald recalls. Sandler had the gold jacket made up for McDonald, hoping they could find a way in the script to give McGavin what he's always wanted. When that didn't pan out, Sandler thought, Well, we made the coat, so we might as well give to the man. The crew howled as if McGavin had actually won the Tour Championship. McDonald welled up, overcome by the act of kindness. Wearing the gold jacket, McDonald channeled his inner McGavin and started strutting, saying, 'That's right, baby!' 'He stayed in character and acted like it was the greatest moment of his life,' Sandler remembers. 'It was a well-deserved moment for Chris and Shooter.' This is what it might have looked like if McGavin had won the gold jacket all those years ago. What's better than that? 'There were tears welling up, not just because it's a gold jacket, but the fact that they saved one for me,' McDonald says. 'You don't forget that.' Read More Toronto & GTA Uncategorized Editorial Cartoons Canada Football
Canada News.Net
2 days ago
- Canada News.Net
Netflix rides ‘Squid Game' surge but keeps revenue goals cautious
LOS GATOS, California: A blockbuster quarter fueled by global hits like Squid Game has helped Netflix beat second-quarter earnings expectations and raise its revenue forecast for the year, though analysts say investor hopes were set even higher. The company reported earnings per share of US$7.19, slightly ahead of the $7.08 estimate from analysts polled by LSEG. Revenue totaled $11.08 billion, just over forecasts of $11.07 billion. Net income came in at $3.1 billion, edging expectations of $3.06 billion. Netflix also raised its full-year revenue guidance to between $44.8 billion and $45.2 billion, citing "healthy member growth," strong ad sales, and a weaker U.S. dollar. Previously, the company had forecast revenue of up to $44.5 billion. The update followed the late-June release of the final season of Squid Game, the dystopian Korean series that became Netflix's most-watched non-English language title. The new season drew 122 million views in just days, helping boost Netflix's performance late in the quarter. Still, the stock fell 1.8 percent in after-hours trading, with some analysts saying the company's updated guidance felt cautious. "The full-year outlook now feels quite conservative, which is problematic for a stock priced for perfection," said Thomas Monteiro. "At this stage, the company appears overly dependent on further price increases — at least through 2026 — to drive revenue." The company's efforts to expand its advertising business continue, including through an ad-supported tier and recent forays into live programming like WWE wrestling. However, Netflix has said advertising will remain a secondary contributor to revenue growth in the near term. Among the other shows released during the quarter were Sirens, The Four Seasons, and a third season of Ginny & Georgia. Netflix no longer reports quarterly subscriber numbers and has instead asked investors to focus on profit. It said member growth beat forecasts but came late in the quarter, limiting its impact on revenue. Looking ahead, Netflix projected $11.5 billion in revenue and net income of nearly $3 billion for the next quarter — both slightly above Wall Street expectations. Two major releases are on the horizon: a new season of Wednesday in August and the final episodes of Stranger Things in November and December. Both shows rank among Netflix's most valuable franchises globally. In a post-earnings call, Chief Financial Officer Spencer Neumann was asked about the possibility of acquiring assets from other media firms. He reiterated Netflix's preference for organic growth: "We've historically been more builders than buyers, and we continue to see big runway for growth without fundamentally changing that playbook."
