| | | | What's news: It's magazine day! This week's cover star is the endlessly hilarious Kristen Wiig. The TikTok ban is edging nearer. The EU has passed the world’s first comprehensive law regulating AI. HBO has renewed Real Time for two more seasons. Starz is developing a fourth spinoff of Power. Jurnee Smollett will star in Apple's Firebug. The Don Lemon Show will no longer be heading to X. — Abid Rahman
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Comedy Queen Kristen Wiig Is Back ►On the cover. Kristen Wiig has made a life out of improvisation, and she’s clearly still comfortable winging it now, at age 50. There's no career master plan, Wiig tells THR's Rebecca Keegan, saying "I believe things just fall into place when they’re supposed to." Wiig's latest bow to serendipity is Apple TV+’s Palm Royale, a 1960s-set comedy series premiering March 20 in which she plays the lead, Maxine, a social climber trying to infiltrate Palm Beach high society. But in life and career, she’s still improvising: "I don’t know what I’m going to do next year." The cover story. |
Hollywood Megamerger Dreams Are Dying ►Good news for the industry? After a decade of chasing scale for scale’s sake (think Warners’ $43b spinoff to Discovery), THR's Winston Cho writes that media dealmaking is slowing under the watchful eye of government regulators. The analysis.
—ICYMI, somehow. The House on Wednesday passed a bill that would lead to a nationwide ban of TikTok if its China-based owner doesn’t sell, as lawmakers acted on concerns that the company’s current ownership structure is a national security threat. The bill, passed by a vote of 352-65, now goes to the Senate, where its prospects are unclear. TikTok, which has more than 150m American users, is a wholly owned subsidiary of Chinese tech giant ByteDance Ltd. The story.
—🤝 Stake sale 🤝 Paramount Global has agreed to sell its 13 percent stake in Indian media company Viacom18 to Reliance Industries. The sale price is approximately $517m, according to a new securities filing. Reliance, a multinational conglomerate, is already the majority shareholder in Viacom18. Existing properties at Viacom18 include streaming service JioCinema and channels including Colors, Comedy Central and MTV. The story.
—A world first. The European Union made history Wednesday, passing the world’s first comprehensive law regulating artificial intelligence. The AI Act is expected to officially become law by May or June, pending formal approval from EU member countries, with provisions starting to take effect six months after the rules enter the lawbooks. Rules for general-purpose AI systems like ChatGPT will start applying a year after the law takes effect. The complete set of regulations is expected to be in force by mid-2026. The story.
—Free speech champion strikes again. Don Lemon won’t be bringing a show to Elon Musk's X platform, after all. On Wednesday, Lemon said that Musk "canceled the partnership I had with X … he informed me of his decision hours after an interview I conducted with him on Friday." The interview with Musk is slated to be the debut episode of The Don Lemon Show, which was supposed to debut on X and YouTube. Lemon says the interview will run as planned on YouTube, and that future episodes will be released there. The story. |
Kassan's Legal Salvo Tears Into UTA Amid Dueling Claims ►"Attempted diversion tactic by UTA." A legal showdown has erupted between Michael Kassan and UTA over the MediaLink founder’s departure, with Kassan claiming that he resigned after being lied to about his responsibilities and privileges at the firm and the agency saying it fired him for misusing company funds. In an arbitration action initiated by Kassan on March 12 against UTA that names CEO Jeremy Zimmer, he claims that UTA fraudulently induced him to agree to a sale of MediaLink "only to then walk back the very promises made." He resigned on March 6, preempting the agency terminating him the next day. The story.
—"He aspired to be known for so much more." Gerald Levin, the visionary executive in the early days of HBO whose career will be forever marred after he orchestrated the merger of Time Warner and AOL, a debacle that destroyed the value of employees’ retirement accounts and culminated in a historic $100b write-down, has died. He was 84. The obituary.
—"I needed to catch my breath and get through some of the hardest parts before sharing." Olivia Munn has revealed she was diagnosed with breast cancer. The actress shared in an Instagram post that she hoped that sharing her diagnosis would help others find comfort, inspiration and support on their journey. She explained that in February 2023, she took a genetic test that checked her for 90 different cancer genes, and she tested negative for all of them, including BRCA, which is the most well-known breast cancer gene. The story.
—"He’s doing much better." Jake Lloyd, the actor known for portraying young Anakin Skywalker in 1999’s Star Wars: Episode I — The Phantom Menace, has been in a mental health facility for almost a year, his mother shared this week. In a new interview, Lisa Lloyd said her son is now 10 months into an 18-month stay at a mental health rehabilitation facility following what she described as a full-blown psychotic break in March 2023, when he turned his car off in the middle of a three-lane road. She added that Jake was eventually diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. The story. |
Blavatnik Did Not Sign Off on Glazer's Oscars Statement ►"He didn't clear the speech." For THR, Jordan Hoffman has the scoop that The Zone of Interest producer Len Blavatnik didn't know Jonathan Glazer was going to give the speech he ended up giving at the Oscars, despite the filmmaker appearing to claim he spoke for the pro-Israel billionaire and co-producer James Wilson. The story.
—"I reflected on this incredibly arrogant man who equated Israeli Jews to Nazis." In a guest column for THR, documentary filmmaker Richard Trank, who won an Academy Award for producing the 1997 Holocaust film The Long Way Home, explains why Glazer's Oscars speech was offensive. The column. |
Gina Carano on Her Grudge Match With Disney ►"It became very popular to hate me and pick on me." In early 2021, after a long-running controversy over her social media posts, Gina Carano was fired from Disney+'s The Mandalorian. The MMA fighter turned actress became yet another cautionary casualty of the culture wars. But Carano is back in the news after she sued Disney and Lucasfilm for discrimination and wrongful termination. Further raising the profile of that case is the fact that her legal bills are being footed by Elon Musk. Carano opens up to THR's Seth Abramovitch about her Mandalorian firing, the toxic tweets that led to it, and why she’s tag-teaming with Musk to take Disney to the mat. The interview.
—"I felt that there is a real chance to flip a seat from a first term Republican." John Avlon has been a fixture on CNN over the last several years, following a five-year stint as EIC of The Daily Beast. Now the 51-year-old is running for Congress and aiming to unseat Republican incumbent Nick LaLota in a battle for New York’s 1st Congressional District. THR's Lachlan Cartwright spoke to Avlon on why he's ditching TV for frontline politics. The interview.
—"I like the idea of talking to somebody who’s really been through it." THR's Caitlin Huston spoke to Julia Louis-Dreyfus about her Ambie-nominated podcast Wiser Than Me. The multiple Emmy winner, who speaks with supremely accomplished older women on the podcast whom she calls an "untapped natural resource," discusses what she has learned from the likes of Jane Fonda, Diane von Furstenberg, Isabel Allende and Carol Burnett. The interview.
—"I’m very lucky to be a part of these ensembles of great actors and to be a part of projects that touch so many people." THR's Brian Davids spoke to the in demand Finn Wolfhard about his upcoming projects Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire, Stranger Things 5 and SNL 1975. The actor discusses juggling multiple roles at once, and talks about work on the final season of the Netflix show that became his big break: "This season is huge, but it's also kind of isolated as well." The interview. |
Strikes Delayed TV's Top Hits, But Audiences Came Back ►Loyalty. THR's Rick Porter writes that even after the toll of the dual work stoppages in Hollywood last year, totals for a host of broadcast shows are on par with or better than their 2022-23 averages. The analysis.
—"Two more years in the dream job of a lifetime." HBO has picked up two more seasons of Real Time With Bill Maher, which will take the weekly talk show through its 24th season in 2026. The show’s current order was due to expire at the end of this year. The renewal comes a few months after HBO also extended its other late-night staple, Last Week Tonight With John Oliver, through 2026. The story.
—Maximum Power. Starz is eyeing a further expansion of its Power franchise — this one a prequel featuring two of the key characters in the original series. The premium cable outlet is developing a drama titled Origins, which would follow younger versions of Ghost and Tommy, characters played by Omari Hardwick and Joseph Sikora in Power (Sikora also stars in the spinoff Power Book IV: Force). The project would be the fourth spinoff of Power, which premiered in 2014, following Book II: Ghost, Book III: Raising Kanan and Force. The story.
—🎭 Jurnee's end 🎭 Apple TV+ has added Jurnee Smollett to its forthcoming drama series Firebug. The Lovecraft Country star joins Taron Egerton in the series from Black Bird writer and executive producer Dennis Lehane. The show is loosely based on real-life events chronicled in the Firebug podcast hosted by Kary Antholis (who is an EP of the series). Firebug, produced in house by Apple Studios, will follow a troubled detective (Smollett) and an enigmatic arson investigator (Egerton) who are pursuing two serial arsonists in the Pacific Northwest. The story.
—🤝 First-look deal 🤝 Lee Cronin, the Irish filmmaker behind Evil Dead Rise, has joined forces with frequent collaborators John Keville and Macdara Kelleher of Wild Atlantic Pictures to launch Doppelgängers, a new production outfit focused on genre fare. The company has signed a first-look deal with New Line Cinema for its feature film projects. New Line released Evil Dead Rise in 2023, with the movie going on to gross $147m worldwide. Cronin and New Line are currently in development on a horror-thriller titled Thaw. The story.
—Home court advantage. Acclaimed filmmaker Bong Joon Ho's Mickey 17 will open several days early in South Korea. The movie will hit theaters there on Jan. 28, 2025, timed to the Lunar New Year holiday and three days before it begins its global rollout on Jan. 31. Mickey 17 had first been set to debut in theaters around the world this month, but its release was delayed due to production shifts caused by the strikes. Robert Pattinson stars in the adaptation of the 2022 novel Mickey7, from author Edward Ashton. The story.
—🎭 Solo work 🎭 Tár star Nina Hoss has signed on to star in The Other Side, an upcoming adventure thriller from director Mariko Minoguchi. The German actress will play Hanna, a doctor who, during the midst of an epidemic, goes into self-isolation in the mountain wilderness to protect herself and others. The Other Side is Minoguchi’s follow-up to her well-received feature debut Relativity, which premiered at the 2019 Munich Film Festival and won the best screenplay and best first feature prizes at the German Film Critics Awards. The story. |
Film Review: 'The Fall Guy' ►"The rare big studio film that feels human." THR's Lovia Gyarkye reviews David Leitch's The Fall Guy. A stuntman (Ryan Gosling) tries to save the production of his ex-girlfriend's (Emily Blunt) directorial debut in Leitch's ode to the craft, which premiered at SXSW. The review.
—"More fussy than fun." Lovia reviews Michael Mohan's Immaculate. In this horror feature, Sydney Sweeney plays an American nun who moves to an Italian convent filled with sinister secrets. The review.
—"Requires patience, but then amply rewards it." THR's chief film critic David Rooney reviews Bernardo Britto's Omni Loop. Mary-Louise Parker and Ayo Edebiri star in this sci-fi drama set in the near future that follows unlikely collaborators puzzling over time travel while one of them remains stuck in the same five days on repeat. The review.
—"The dog's the thing." THR's Frank Scheck reviews Simon Cellan Jones' Arthur the King. Mark Wahlberg plays an adventure racer who forms a powerful bond with a stray dog in this film based on a true story, also starring Simu Liu, Juliet Rylance, Nathalie Emmanuel, Ali Suliman, Bear Grylls and Paul Guilfoyle. The review.
—"Gets stuck in the lock." THR's Leslie Felperin reviews Joy Wilkinson's 7 Keys. Emma McDonald and Billy Postlethwaite star as a pair of new lovers who break into houses over a holiday weekend in Wilkinson’s debut feature. The review. |
TV Review: 'Apples Never Fall' ►"Fine performances in a middling mystery." THR's Angie Han reviews Peacock's Apples Never Fall. An all-star cast including Annette Bening, Sam Neill, Jake Lacy and Alison Brie are featured in this adaptation of a thriller by Big Little Lies author Liane Moriarty. The review.
—"Superfluous thriller elements derail likable dramedy." THR's chief TV critic Dan Fienberg reviews Max's The Girls on the Bus. Melissa Benoist and Carla Gugino lead a series inspired by former New York Times reporter Amy Chozick's book about covering Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign. The review. In other news...
—Robert De Niro, Bobby Cannavale butt heads while caring for autistic child in Ezra trailer
—Dua Lipa, Coldplay, SZA and Shania Twain set for Glastonbury Festival
—Kristen Wiig, Ryan Gosling returning as SNL hosts in April
—Scooter Braun launches campaign to help Palestinians, Israeli hostage families
—WME hires Erin Kapor to rep creative directors
—Robyn Bernard, General Hospital star, dies at 64
What else we're reading...
—David Levene and Miriam Gillinson talk to the likes of Sarah Jessica Parker, Joseph Fiennes, Jared Harris and other theater stars about their dressing room routines [Guardian]
—A rather harrowing story from Fortesa Latifi who spoke to the grown up children of mommy bloggers who reveal the reals costs of living their lives online [Cosmopolitan]
—With Soho House under pressure from investors, Rupert Neate looks at how rapid global expansion may have come at the cost of exclusivity and left members feeling like the club was no longer "special" [Guardian]
—Maria Abi-Habib, Natalie Kitroeff and Frances Robles report that Haiti's descent into chaos and violence was accelerated by the gangs working together [NYT]
—Jonathan Haidt makes an impassioned, and well argued, case for the end of smartphone based childhoods [Atlantic]
Today...
...in 2013, A24 released Denis Villeneuve's Enemy in theaters. The film, the French-Canadian filmmaker's second English-language film and second collaboration with Jake Gyllenhaal, was a critical success and earned ten nominations at the Canadian Screen Awards. The original review.
Today's birthdays: Billy Crystal (76), Michael Caine (91), Quincy Jones (91), Aamir Khan (59), Kevin Williamson (59), Meredith Salenger (54), Ansel Elgort (30), Corey Stoll (48), Johnny Flynn (41), Jamie Bell (38), James Frain (56), Rita Tushingham (82), Abby Ryder Fortson (16), Gary Anthony Williams (58), Grace Park (50), Megan Follows (56), Chris Klein (45), Daniel Gillies (48), Laila Robins (65), Penny Johnson Jerald (63), Tamara Tunie (65), Betsy Brandt (51), Season Hubley (73), Ryan Cartwright (43), Murielle Telio (31), Giorgio A. Tsoukalos (46), Adrian Zmed (70), Garwin Sanford (69), Elise Neal (58), Etan Cohen (50), Bruno Dumont (66), Lokesh Kanagaraj (38) |
| Michael Culver, the veteran British actor who portrayed the doomed Captain Needa in The Empire Strikes Back and a bigoted police inspector in David Lean’s A Passage to India, has died. He was 85. The obituary. |
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