Hollywood Finally Gets Roasted Properly in <em>The Studio</em>

There is a special kind of courage required to make fun of Hollywood while working inside Hollywood. The Studio, streaming on Apple TV+, has it. The show follows Matt Remick, a newly appointed studio head played by Seth Rogen, as he tries to keep movies alive while every executive, actor, billionaire and focus group screams directly into his soul.

It is not subtle, exactly. One episode turns a celebrity funeral into a content opportunity; another treats the making of a prestige movie like a hostage negotiation conducted by people wearing expensive sneakers. But subtlety is overrated when the target is an industry that once spent millions trying to teach audiences that a cat could be a detective. The Studio is fast, nasty and packed with cameos that land because the joke is usually about the guest star’s public persona, not merely “Look who showed up.”

Benny’s Picks

The Studio — Apple TV+. Start with the first two episodes and watch how quickly the show turns “movie executives are ridiculous” into “movie executives are terrified, lonely goblins.” The best joke is that everyone claims to care about art while secretly refreshing the opening-weekend projections. Finally, a workplace comedy where the workplace has a private jet and no moral center.

Adolescence — Netflix. This four-part British drama is grim, but it earns every ounce of its gloom. The single-take episodes are not a gimmick; they make every hallway, classroom and police station feel like a tightening knot. Watch it when you have the emotional bandwidth, not while folding laundry unless you enjoy ruining towels with anxiety.

Sinners — in theaters. Ryan Coogler’s vampire movie is muscular, strange and gloriously uninterested in behaving like a tidy franchise starter. Michael B. Jordan brings enough swagger for two men, and the music is not background decoration—it is the movie’s beating heart. See it on a big screen, where the vampires can properly invade your personal space.

Chappell Roan, “The Giver” — wherever you stream music. Roan remains one of pop’s most entertaining arguments against behaving normally. The song is theatrical, cheeky and built for the exact moment when your kitchen becomes a Broadway stage and the spatula becomes a microphone. Your neighbors did not ask for this performance. They will receive it anyway.

Skip It: The Electric State — Netflix. This is a $100-million movie with the personality of an airport charging station. It has robots, famous faces and lavish visuals, yet somehow feels like a screensaver that learned the word “trauma.” Popular does not mean alive.

Sleeper Pick: How To with John Wilson — Max. It is technically a comedy series, but that description undersells its peculiar magic. Wilson wanders through ordinary life—housing, weddings, furniture, the human need to lie politely—and finds tiny pockets of cosmic absurdity. It is the television equivalent of opening one junk drawer and discovering the entire universe inside.