Bryan Fogel’s first documentary, “Icarus,” helped uncover the Russian doping scandal that led to the country’s expulsion from the 2018 Winter Olympics. It also won an Oscar for him and for Netflix, which released the film.

For his second project, he chose another subject with global interest: the killing of Jamal Khashoggi, the Saudi Arabian dissident and Washington Post columnist, and the role that the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, played in it.

A film by an Oscar-winning filmmaker would normally garner plenty of attention from streaming services, which have used documentaries and niche movies to attract subscribers and earn awards. Instead, when Mr. Fogel’s film, “The Dissident,” was finally able to find a distributor after eight months, it was with an independent company that had no streaming platform and a much narrower reach.

“These global media companies are no longer just thinking, ‘How is this going to play for U.S. audiences?’” Mr. Fogel said. “They are asking: ‘What if I put this film out in Egypt? What happens if I release it in China, Russia, Pakistan, India?’ All these factors are coming into play, and it’s getting in the way of stories like this.”

...

Netflix was eager to have “Icarus” several years ago, buying the film for $5 million after it debuted at Sundance in 2017. “Fogel’s incredible risk-taking has delivered an absorbing real-life thriller that continues to have global reverberations,” Lisa Nishimura, who was Netflix’s vice president of original documentaries, said in a statement at the time.

Mr. Fogel wonders if the company would be as excited about that film now.

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In January 2019, Netflix pulled an episode of the comedian Hasan Minhaj’s series, “Patriot Act,” when he criticized Prince Mohammed after Mr. Khashoggi’s death. Mr. Hastings later defended the move, saying: “We’re not trying to do ‘truth to power.’ We’re trying to entertain.”

...

“I love Netflix and considered myself part of the Netflix family after our wonderful experience with ‘Icarus,’” he said. “Sadly, they are not the same company as a few years ago when they passionately stood up to Russia and Putin.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/24/business/media/dissident-jamal-khashoggi-netflix-amazon.html

A 4-year-old girl coping with the loneliness of the pandemic created a tiny garden, and kindled an unlikely friendship with an enchanted neighbor who moved into her tree.



Kelly Kenney was taking a late-night walk to clear her thoughts in her Los Angeles neighborhood this spring when a colorful pinwheel caught her eye. She stopped and found herself gazing down at an elaborate fairy garden at the base of a tree, complete with painted rocks and tiny trinkets.

Pinned to the tree was a Polaroid picture of the garden’s creator, a young girl named Eliana, and a poem using a medieval-looking storybook font that told her neighbors how to use the garden: “Our 4-year-old girl made this to brighten your day / Please add to the magic, but don’t take away / These days can be hard, but we’re in this together / So enjoy our fairy garden and some nicer weather.”



Ms. Kenney hatched a plan, and on the next night, she left a note at the garden pretending to be a fairy named Sapphire, after Ms. Kenney’s September birthstone, who had taken up residence in the tree. She promised she’d leave glittery magical resin dice (a pandemic hobby for Ms. Kenney) if Eliana completed three tasks she listed that were etched in kindness. And the next day, they were finished.

The note kindled a friendship tied to the fairy garden that would last through some of the darkest months of the pandemic and hardships of 2020 for both a little girl and her grown-up neighbor. Ms. Kenney chronicled the experience in a wildly popular Twitter thread this month.

“I felt like immediately when I found it, the whole family wedged themselves into my heart,” Ms. Kenney, a photographer, said about the fairy garden. “I was so alone at the time, physically and mentally, and I felt like these people were kindred spirits.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/24/style/fairy-garden-covid.html

We’re heartbroken to have to announce our beautiful daughter Francesca passed away last night in the arms of her mom and dad. There will always be a Bean-sized hole in our hearts for her. We’re so grateful to have known her love.

Francesca we love you.

https://twitter.com/KFILE/status/1342523811535712258