EXCLUSIVE: WME has signed up-and-coming filmmaker Sam Hayes (Pools) for representation. Hayes will soon wrap post-production on his debut feature, Pools—a coming-of-age story about pool-hopping that he wrote, directed and produced, starring Odessa A’zion, Mason Gooding, Michael Vlamis, Ariel Winter, Tyler Alvarez, Francesca Noel and Suzanne Cryer. The film shot last summer in Chicago and will […]
After a string of performers pulled out of this weekend’s planned NRA “Grand Ol’ Night of Freedom” concert in Houston, the musical event apparently has been canceled. The concert was to have taken place during the organization’s annual conference. Don McLean, Larry Gatlin, Larry Stewart, Lee Greenwood, T. Graham Brown and Danielle Peck all canceled […]
The Cannes Film Festival’s Un Certain Regard sidebar handed out its prizes tonight with top honors going to Lise Akoka and Romane Gueret’s The Worst Ones (Les Pires). The Jury Prize was awarded to Saim Sadig’s Joyland, the first Pakistani movie ever in official selection at Cannes. The Worst Ones is a drama about a […]
EXCLUSIVE: Avenue 5‘s space voyage may be coming to an end. Season 2 of Armando Iannucci’s space comedy, delayed by the pandemic, has not been scheduled yet. I hear it will likely launch in the fall and is expected to be the series’ last. A rep for HBO declined comment. This is not surprising. Season […]
UPDATE, 11:58 AM PT: “We ask ladies and gentlemen, that you hold Mr. Depp accountable for his actions,” Amber Heard’s lawyer Ben Rottenborn exclaimed today in the final moments of Johnny Depp’s $50 million defamation trial against his ex-wife. “Stand up for victims of domestic abuse everyone. Stand up for freedom of speech. Give Amber […]
When his mother spoke, Ernest remembers, everything sounded important. “I cling to her light,” he tells us in voiceover, an adult remembering how that felt. The Ernest he is recalling is just a little boy (Milan Doucansi), snuggled against Rose (Annabelle Lengronne, a wonderfully vivid presence), with his grave and clever older brother Jean (Sidy […]
EXCLUSIVE: Buffalo 8 has acquired North American rights to the musical drama Love Gets a Room from director Rodrigo Cortés (Buried) out of the Cannes Film Festival, slating it for a limited theatrical release this fall. The film starring Clara Rugaard (I Am Mother) and Ferdia Walsh-Peelo (Sing Street) is a romantic tale of love and […]
Javier Bardem addressed a packed Salle Bunuel on Friday as part of the Cannes Film Festival’s 75th birthday celebrations. Dressed down, relaxed and very, very funny, the actor addressed a wide range of topics in a Q&A that covered a lot of ground, from his marriage to Penélope Cruz to his experience on the Pirates […]
Paramount’s Top Gun: Maverick is soaring in its overseas debuts, clocking $33M from 47 markets at the international box office through Thursday. The Tom Cruise-starrer officially launched on Wednesday offshore, following paid previews in some hubs, and adds another 15 markets today, bringing the total to 62 in what is the studio’s widest release ever […]
Kelly Reichardt has been making minimal Americana since the early 1990s, mostly around the state of Oregon where she lives and mostly about her favored awkward squad: quiet square pegs who don’t quite fit the round holes society provides. In this ongoing quest she has found many collaborators, but none more attuned to her recessive […]
After a 36 year wait, the Tom Cruise sequel Top Gun: Maverick finally took off to a massive $19.3M in previews. That’s the highest grossing preview in Paramount Pictures’ history and the highest grossing Memorial Day preview in history. Previous big preview for Paramount was 2009’s Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen with $16M, which were on a Tuesday […]
UPDATE: Johnny Depp’s attorney told jurors that Amber Heard’s allegations of domestic abuse don’t make sense given that the actor has not been accused by any other woman of physical assault. “Before Amber Heard, no women ever … claimed Mr. Depp raised a hand to her in his 58 years,” attorney Benjamin Chew told jurors, […]
EXCLUSIVE: Amazon is in final negotiations to pre-buy rights to in-demand Cannes market package Saltburn, the next film from Promising Young Woman Oscar winner Emerald Fennell. Jacob Elordi (Euphoria), Barry Keoghan (The Batman) and Oscar nominee Rosamund Pike (Gone Girl) are attached to star in MRC’s Saltburn. Principal photography is set to begin this summer in the UK. […]
The upcoming sixth season of The Good Fight will be the last for the acclaimed series, which helped launch Paramount+ predecessor CBS All Access as its first original series. Production is currently underway in New York City on Season 6, which will premiere September 8. This wraps a 13-season run for Robert and Michelle King, […]
It was the 75th anniversary of the Cannes Film Festival this year and certainly the fest itself thought that alone was cause for celebration, and they did exactly that, but they were not the only ones with reason to party. As the pandemic cancelled the 2020 fest, and downsized the 2021 fest, there was definitely […]
EXCLUSIVE: The Coalition of Asian Pacifics in Entertainment and Janet Yang Productions announced the four winners of the inaugural Julia S. Gouw Short Film Challenge, which awards a $15,000 production grant to four AAPI women or non-binary filmmakers. Selected from a pool of over 400 applicants, four grantees will be offered networking opportunities with Emmy […]
Afternoon Insiders, Max Goldbart here. Cannes is wrapping and we have the very latest from the Croisette, plus a hell of a lot more in this week’s deep dive. Read on. Au Revoir, Cannes Cautious optimism: Diana Lodderhose here, back with week two of our Cannes roundup. For most, this year’s festival will be remembered […]
Magnolia Pictures acquired U.S. rights from TrustNordisk to King’s Land, a period epic starring Mads Mikkelsen and produced by Danish production house Zentropa. The film will be directed by Nikolaj Arcel, and is written by Arcel and Anders Thomas Jensen. Jensen and Mikkelsen most recently collaborated on Riders of Justice, and Arcel and Mikkelsen on […]
EXCLUSIVE: Broadway’s Felicia Boswell (Jesus Christ Superstar Live In Concert) will be making her West End debut this July when she takes over from Beverley Knight (Bodyguard Musical), the chart-topping Queen of British Soul, in the enormously enjoyable hit show The Drifters Girl, which has been running at The Garrick Theatre since last November. Knight departs The […]
MUBI has acquired rights to Cannes hit Holy Spider for the UK, Ireland, LatAm and Malaysia. Danish-Iranian filmmaker Ali Abbasi’s feature, which had its World Premiere in the Main Competition and has been one of the fest’s buzziest titles, follows the true story of family man Saeed, who embarked on a religious quest to “cleanse” the Iranian […]
After taking home the Un Certain Regard Fipresci prize in 2018 for the trans-female ballet dancer feature Girl, filmmaker Lukas Dhont returned to home to find himself staring at the blank page for his next project. That would ultimately be this year’s in competition movie, Close, which grapples with teen suicide and has a lot of buzz on […]
Contestants on this year’s Love Island will take part in inclusion training and hear from former Islanders before appearing on the show as producer, ITV Studios’ Lifted Entertainment, boosts its duty of care protocols for season eight. Ahead of the series, which launches shortly on ITV 2, the Islanders will be offered video training and guidance covering […]
SPOILER ALERT: This review contains details of the first two episodes of Disney+’s Obi-Wan Kenobi series. The Force is not strong with Obi-Wan Kenobi. Debuting a few hours earlier than anticipated on Disney+, the first two episodes of the Ewan McGregor starring miniseries are almost all undiluted nostalgia with no wisdom to impart and not […]
On the heels of his latest Tom Cruise stunt, The Late Late Show‘s James Corden has reunited with another frequent guest, Harry Styles, who trusted the comedian with making a music video for his song “Daylight.” In his directorial debut, Corden shot the video in Brooklyn for $300 in three hours. The duo knocked on […]
Daniel Brühl and Macaulay Culkin have joined the cast of the Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia directed thriller, Rich Flu, which we told you about back at EFM with Rosamund Pike attached to star. Production is expected to start in the fall. In the film, a strange disease is killing off some of the richest and most influential people on […]
