| June 1, 2026 
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More ‘Friends’-style friends | | From left, May Hong, Ella Hunt, Will Angus and Bhavesh Patel in “Not Suitable for Work.” Cara Howe/Disney |
Dear Watchers,Since “Friends” ended its run in 2004, many television writers and producers have tried to repeat its formula: Put together a small group of characters — preferably young adults living in a city — and tell warm, snappy stories about pursuing dreams and falling in and out of love. It seems easy, but it’s hard to get the chemistry right. The writer-producer Mindy Kaling’s “Not Suitable for Work” is not a “Friends”-tier sitcom — at least not yet. But Kaling and her frequent creative partner Charlie Grandy (the series’s showrunner) do understand that assembling a likable cast is the most important part of making a show like this work. “Not Suitable for Work” (the first three episodes of which debut on Hulu on Tuesday) follows a group of five longtime pals and new acquaintances who live in the same New York apartment building. Josh (Jack Martin) is an aspiring investigative journalist and the privileged son of a media mogul. Davis (Will Angus) is an outwardly cocky finance bro with the heart of a romantic southern gentleman. Kel (Nicholas Duvernay) is a medical student who would rather be an actor. These three boys live across the hall from Abby (Avantika), the harried assistant to a celebrity stylist, and AJ (Ella Hunt), an ambitious financial analyst at Davis’s firm. It is easy to compare these characters to their “Friends” counterparts: Kel is a bit of a Joey, Abby’s kind of a Rachel, and so on. The show is missing a Phoebe, though. In her place we get Davis and AJ’s demanding boss, Bill (Jay Ellis), who keeps injecting himself into his underlings’ personal lives. Each episode usually involves someone trying to make a good impression at the office — like Josh trying to prove to his co-workers that he’s not just a nepo baby — while also making tentative romantic moves toward one or more of their neighbors or colleagues. The map of who is crushing on whom gets messy quickly. “Not Suitable for Work” is a bit overstuffed in the early going, as Kaling and Grandy hustle to get all of the various back stories and story lines in place. And sometimes the show is too reliant on tossed-off Gen Z references and raunchy jokes. But as Kaling has shown with her series “Never Have I Ever” and “The Sex Lives of College Girls,” she knows how to create characters that are flawed but funny, and who become more endearing over time. Also this week | | Javier Bardem and Amy Adams star in a new series adaptation of “Cape Fear.” Apple TV |
- In “Bring Me the Beauties: The Model Cult,” the prolific documentary filmmaker Chris Smith (“100 Foot Wave,” “American Movie”) tells the strange-but-true story of Eternal Values, a 1980s and ’90s New Age community that preyed on supermodels. The first of the series’s three episodes debuts on Monday, on HBO and HBO Max.
- A London woman’s 1992 murder — witnessed by her 2-year-old son — has inspired two very different TV projects. “The Murder of Rachel Nickell” is a documentary film about the controversial case, while “The Witness” is a scripted series about how Nickell’s partner tried to protect their son from a media frenzy. Both are available on Thursday, on Netflix.
- In the new TV mini-series adaptation of the noir classic “Cape Fear,” Javier Bardem plays Max Cady, an ex-con determined to torment the attorneys (played by Amy Adams and Patrick Wilson) who put him in prison. The first two episodes arrive on Friday, on Apple TV.
- The series formerly known as “Interview With the Vampire” has been retitled “The Vampire Lestat” (for this season at least) as the over-the-top horror show shifts to adapting a different Anne Rice novel. The first episode, which begins the story of how an ancient vampire became a modern rock star, debuts on Sunday, on AMC and AMC+.
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