1. Nas is working on an autobiography called It Ain’t Hard to Tell that is scheduled to come out next fall. Says music journalist Touré, who is collaborating with him on the project: “I’ve been talking to Nas about writing his autobiography for 15 years. This is hip hop history. We’ll tell his life & deconstruct some songs.” [via NME]
2. The first episode of Showtime’s new CIA drama Homeland is now streaming online, weeks ahead of its October 2 premiere date. What do you make of Claire Danes’ performance?
3. While it comes as no surprise that Tyler Perry topped Forbes’ list of the highest paid men in entertainment after making a whopping $130 million last year, we were kind of shocked that the only other actor to crack the top 10 was Leonardo DiCaprio, who brought in $77 million between May 2010 and May 2011.
4. Hugh Grant is the latest star to join the ensemble cast of the forthcoming film adaption of David Mitchell‘s award-winning novel Cloud Atlas. Already on board: Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Ben Whishaw, Susan Sarandon, and Hugo Weaving. [via THR]
5. Is the world ready for a Whitney Houston comeback? According to Rolling Stone, she’s planning to return to the big screen in Sparkle, a remake of a 1976 musical “loosely based on the story of the Supremes.” She’d be playing “the skeptical and unsupportive mother of the three main characters,” which seems like a bit of a waste to us.
Bonus Buzz: 20 Trendy Names To Call Your Grandma
As we mentioned yesterday, our hopes are high for this weekend’s season finale of Saturday Night Live. Between Justin Timberlake as the show’s host, and Lady Gaga as its musical guest, we figured that something interesting had to happen. Now, thanks to TMZ, we have confirmation of this fact: a preview of this week’s Digital Short. Will it be more of a “Motherlover” (which was funny) or a “Dick in the Box” (which changed our world)? We have no idea. Given that the lovely Susan Sarandon and Patricia Clarkson were also spotted filming, it will probably be more of the former, but we’ll definitely be tuning in to find out! [via Vulture]
A big thanks to Vulture for tipping us off to Moviefone’s hilariously-disturbing feature 15 Movie Posters Re-Imagined With the Stars Originally Cast. Sure, we realize that the casting decisions on most films change about a bajillion times before they make their to theaters. But there’s just something about literally seeing Johnny Depp’s head where we know we should be seeing Matthew Broderick’s that feels incredibly blasphemous. Almost as bad as the icky Meg Ryan/Al Pacino pairing on the poster for Pretty Woman or the horrible thought of John Travolta playing the old man baby in Benjamin Button. And trashy Melanie Griffith instead of the lovely Susan Sarandon in Thelma and Louise? Let’s not even talk about it.
The trailer for Tim Blake’s Leaves of Grass, otherwise known as the movie where Edward Norton plays a pair of twins, reminds us a bit of My Name Is Earl. That might be because of the heavy-handed use of Southern accents — though the film is set in Oklahoma. Then there’s the fact that it just looks really odd.
Keri Russell, Richard Dreyfuss, and Susan Surandon also star in this comedy, which tells the story of an Ivy League professor (Norton) who returns to his hometown after he learns that his redneck pot-growing brother (also Norton) is dead. But his twin isn’t dead, he’s just in big trouble with the local drug lord (Dreyfuss).
Read More »
After getting a sneak preview yesterday, today the trailer for Peter Jackson’s adaptation of Alice Sebold’s The Lovely Bones is up and available for your viewing pleasure, with an introduction by Jackson himself. Fifteen-year-old Saoirse Ronan stars at Susie Salmon, the murdered main character who narrates the story from heaven. Rachel Weisz and Mark Wahlberg play her parents, and Susan Sarandon makes what we believe is her grandmotherly debut. Will nerds turn out for a post-LOTR Peter Jackson without the draw of a giant primate? This may help: Pitchfork reports that Brian Eno scored the film. It’s set to open in December — Oscar bait, of course.
Read More »
Jaume Collet-Serra’s horror film Orphan is a demented masterpiece not to be missed. An ode to clichés past, it proves enjoyable not only for its truly bizarre ending, but also due to the child antagonist’s electrifying sense of fashion. On Cat Party they describe Orphan‘s style as “one part Madeline, one part Anna Karina,” though we believe the faux Russian accents place this demon seed squarely in Anna Karenina territory. Regardless, it got us thinking about some of the other fashionable leading ladies of horror films past and how to recreate their looks today. Read More »
Statesmen of note, like celebrities, elicit heartfelt responses — after all, both happen to be chosen representatives of the common folk, endorsed through ballot and ticket. So it came as no surprise that Rudy Giuliani’s brief appearance in Barry Levinson‘s epistemological film essay, PoliWood, drew an auditorium’s worth of gusty whistling and hissing, as if his actual person was present. Indeed, the tony world premiere at Tribeca of Levinson’s wry labor of love proved to be a festive and surprisingly participatory occasion, especially when the satiric director joined cast members Ellen Burstyn, Josh Lucas, Matthew Modine, Tim Daly, Wendie Malick, and Frank Luntz for a post-screening panel that produced a dicey comment: “Opinions are like belly buttons, everybody’s got one. Except Rush Limbaugh.” Read More »
Writing our reviews these past few months, suggesting shows to see and shows to skip, we’ve often found ourselves in the minority. No shame in that, but we hadn’t realized just how much we’ve been taking for granted: We assumed that everybody wrote off American Beauty and The Shawshank Redemption as phony, sentimental garbage. We assumed that everybody found Full House catchphrases painfully unfunny. We assumed that everybody hated overblown Oscar performances like Sean Penn’s in Mystic River (or Geoffrey Rush’s in Shine). We assumed that everybody had gotten over Jim Carrey’s “physical humor” a long time ago. We assumed that everybody hated Rent.
Walking out of Exit the King moments after the king exited, we assumed that this middling production would get mediocre reviews at best. We couldn’t have been more wrong. Read More »
Despite Jeremy Piven’s rave reviews in Speed-the-Plow, his acting abilities have their limits: There’s still a chance he could owe the show’s producers money, and permanently soured public/critical opinion against a Tony nod. In the words of his onscreen alter ego Ari Gold, maybe it’s time for him and Mamet to drop their beef and hug it out bitch. Read More »
