| | | | | | What's news: Netflix has ordered additional episodes of 3 Body Problem and will also live stream NFL games at Christmas. CNN will host the first Biden-Trump debate. Donnie Yen will star in a John Wick spinoff movie. 16 women have accused David Copperfield of sexual misconduct. Furiosa received a 7-minute ovation after it premiered in Cannes. — Abid Rahman
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Hollywood at an AI Crossroads ►"Everyone is using AI, but they are scared to admit it." THR's Scott Roxborough and Winston Cho write that despite the recent labor actions to combat it, Hollywood has already started using artificial intelligence, presenting the industry with the existential threat that many predicted. The story.
—Market watch. The Toronto Film Festival on Thursday confirmed that it will add an official film market to run alongside its festival program, billing the venture as the "North American hub for buying and selling screen-based projects, intellectual property, and immersive and innovative content across all platforms" that aims to "elevate Canadian and international talent while driving global distribution and sales." Toronto has long been a spot where business gets done, but unlike Cannes or Berlin, the festival has never had an official market. The story.
—It's happening. CNN will host the first debate between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump on June 27. The debate will air live at 9pm ET from CNN’s Atlanta studios, with anchors Jake Tapper and Dana Bash set to moderate. No audience will be present to “ensure candidates may maximize the time allotted in the debate,” according to CNN. The debate is set to air live on CNN, CNN International, CNN en Español, CNN Max and CNN.com. The story.
—Multiple allegations. David Copperfield faces allegations of sexual misconduct and inappropriate behavior made by 16 women, according to an investigation by the Guardian. The accusations include the illusionist having "drugged three women before he had sexual relations with them, which they felt they were unable to consent to," according to the report. The allegations were made by women who insist they were under 18 years of age when they had encounters with the entertainer, with some women claiming they were as young as 15 years old. The story.
—Sexual misconduct claims. Rudy Abreu, a finalist on the 11th season of So You Think You Can Dance and dancer for artists including Camila Cabello and Jennifer Lopez, has been accused of sexual misconduct with a minor in a widely viewed TikTok video. Charley Bennett, a 22-year-old dancer, shared in the video that she first encountered Abreu in 2016 while touring with a dance convention. Bennett, who was 14 at the time, claims that Abreu crossed lines with her on multiple instances, including sending her “graphic” messages to her. The story. |
Disney-Fox-WBD Sports Streamer Gets a Name and Logo ►What's in a name? The forthcoming sports-focused streaming service from Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery and Fox has a name and logo. The service will be called Venu Sports (it’s pronounced like “venue”) and the companies say that it is still on track to launch this fall. The company also launched a website at Venu.com. The story.
—"We invested too much." Disney CEO Bob Iger gave a mea culpa for big losses incurred while launching streaming platforms like Disney+ during an investor conference appearance on Wednesday. "As we got into the streaming business in a very, very aggressive way, we tried to tell too many stories. Basically, we invested too much, way ahead of possible returns. It’s what led to streaming ending up as a $4b loss," Iger told the MoffettNathanson Media, Internet & Communications Conference. The story.
—🤝 Closed 🤝 Jeff Zucker and Gerry Cardinale’s RedBird IMI on Thursday closed its $1.45b acquisition of TV and film production powerhouse All3Media, the largest TV producer in the U.K., from Warner Bros. Discovery and Liberty Global. All3Media is behind such shows as the reality/competition series The Traitors and Squid Game: The Challenge, drama series The Tourist, and such films as World War I epic 1917. Regulators in the U.S., the U.K. and Germany approved the deal. The story. |
Netflix Orders 'Happy Gilmore' Sequel ►Get in the hole! Netflix has officially ordered a sequel to Happy Gilmore. The streamer announced at its upfront presentation to advertisers on Wednesday that it was moving forward with Happy Gilmore 2 with Adam Sandler on board to reprise his role as the titular rage golfer. Netflix didn’t release any details about the film, such as its story line, writer or director. The story.
—🎭 More GOLF talk 🎭 In his first scripted TV comedy series, Will Ferrell will star in Netflix's GOLF. The streamer has picked up 10 episodes of the series, which is co-created by Ferrell, Ramy Youssef — who will also have an onscreen role — and Josh Rabinowitz. In GOLF, Ferrell will play a fictional golf legend. Details on Youssef’s part are being kept under wraps though sources say the show isn’t a two-hander. Netflix also stresses that GOLF should be capitalized, though it’s unclear if it’s an acronym. The story.
—"We’re thrilled that we get to tell this story through to its epic conclusion." Netflix is going to bring back — and even conclude — 3 Body Problem. The streamer has greenlit additional episodes that will eventually wrap the acclaimed sci-fi epic from David Benioff, Dan Weiss and Alexander Woo. There’s no word yet, however, how many seasons or episodes the order will entail. The showrunners had previously hoped to get a total of four seasons to adapt the three books in Cixin Liu’s trilogy. In addition, Benioff and Weiss have renewed their overall deal with Netflix. The story.
—Game changer. Netflix will stream live NFL games, beginning this season. In a deal that changes the sports media landscape, the streamer has inked a deal to stream the NFL’s two new Christmas Day games, which it decided to carve out from its schedule earlier this year. Netflix will stream the games this year, instantly giving it access to the biggest live sports rights in the U.S. The two games on tap will be the Kansas City Chiefs vs. the Pittsburgh Steelers, and the Baltimore Ravens vs. the Houston Texans. The story.
—Real time with Kathryn Bigelow. Netflix has teamed up with Oscar-winning director Kathryn Bigelow for a harrowing ticking-clock thriller. The streamer has greenlit a film centered on a group of White House officials scrambling to deal with an incoming missile attack on the U.S. Sources say the story will be told in real time and that its tone harkens back to Bigelow’s foreboding 2012 hit Zero Dark Thirty, which chronicled the hunt for Osama bin Laden and the Navy SEAL mission to kill the terror leader. The story.
—More pickups. Tim McGraw and Kevin Williamson are the latest creatives to join Netflix. During upfronts, the streamer announced series pickups for a pair of scripted dramas. Ordered to series are an untitled bull riding drama starring and exec produced by McGraw; and The Waterfront, a thriller that brings creator Williamson back to North Carolina, where he filmed his breakout hit Dawson’s Creek. The story.
—Sporting chance. Netflix is getting into the Olympic spirit with its newest batch of sports docs. The streamer has partnered with the IOC on three series following gymnastics superstar Simone Biles and athletes in men’s basketball and track and field. Filmmaking teams for the three shows will gain access to the athletes and venues at the summer games in Paris. Separately, Netflix has ordered a series about the Dallas Cowboys and owner Jerry Jones, with a focus on the team’s dominant years in the early and mid-1990s. The story.
—Big increase. Netflix says that its ad-supported tier now has 40m monthly active users, as it seeks to shake up the technology and buying partners that currently power the offering. At its upfront preview, the streamer said that it had hit the 40m MAU number. For comparison, at its inaugural upfront last year it said it had “nearly five million.” In November 2023, Netflix said the ad-supported user base had tripled to 15m. The company says that over 40 percent of new signups are for the ads plan, suggesting that it is growing at a rapid pace. The story. |
'Superman & Lois' Final Season Gets Fall Spot on The CW ►Proper farewell. After more than a year away, Superman & Lois is set to return to The CW in the fall. The final season of the superhero drama is part of the network’s 2024-25 schedule — but it’s the only one of the handful of scripted series from The CW’s pre-Nexstar era that is currently on the schedule for next season. All American, its spinoff All American: Homecoming, and Walker are currently in limbo, with decisions on all three to come after they finish their current seasons. The story.
—🎭 Wild ride 🎭 Apple TV+ has landed 12 12 12, a scripted thriller described as a “contemporary international heist” series. The streamer is nearing a formal series greenlight for the project that will star Anthony Mackie and Jamie Dornan. 12 12 12 takes place over three timelines in a heist — the 12 months of planning to raid a bank vault beneath the streets of Zurich, the 12 hours of the actual heist and the 12 days after it. The drama revolves around an FBI agent (Mackie) and a career criminal (Dornan), who play a cat-and-mouse game across Europe. The story.
—"I am excited to explore my own ties to this region." CNN is planning a return to the travel-food genre after pulling back from original series under former CEO Chris Licht. The channel said Wednesday that it would be rebooting its Searching For franchise, with Eva Longoria set to host a new series, Eva Longoria: Searching for Spain. The new series will debut in 2025 on CNN, with Hyphenate Media Group producing the program. The story.
—Hopefully it's more The Office than Inbetweeners. Also at upfronts, CNN announced plans to launch a U.S. version of the long-running BBC comedy quiz show Have I Got News For You. CNN is calling it a limited series, with a debut set for the fall. HIGNFY is in its 66th season at the BBC, having launched in 1990. The program features two teams of panelists who answer questions about the week’s news, cracking jokes and sparking discussions in the process. Hat Trick Productions, the company behind the BBC series, will also produce the U.S. edition. The story.
—Conan, go to Wales! Max has picked up a second season of O’Brien’s travel series Conan O’Brien Must Go, Max announced at the Warner Bros. Discovery upfront presentation on Wednesday. Season two will have six episodes, two more than the initial run. The renewal comes four weeks after the first season premiered on Max. The show follows O’Brien as he travels to different countries to meet fans he first encountered on Conan O’Brien Needs a Fan, an offshoot of his Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend podcast. The story. |
Donnie Yen to Star in 'John Wick' Spinoff ►🎭 Caine is able 🎭 Lionsgate is developing a John Wick spinoff movie around Donnie Yen’s Caine assassin character. Yen will reprise his John Wick: Chapter 4 role in the untitled project, set to shoot in Hong Kong in 2025. The franchise expanding film, with no director yet announced, will follow the events of John Wick 4 as Caine has been freed from his obligations to the High Table. The story.
—🎭 Another big name 🎭 Natasha Lyonne is the latest star to join The Fantastic Four. The actress is set to board the cast of the forthcoming Marvel Studios movie in an undisclosed role. The film will star Pedro Pascal as Mr. Fantastic, Vanessa Kirby as Invisible Woman, Joseph Quinn as Human Torch, and Ebon Moss-Bachrach as The Thing. The cast also includes Julia Garner as a female Silver Surfer and Ralph Ineson as Galactus, in addition to unannounced roles for Paul Walter Hauser and John Malkovich. The story.
—🎭 Plane sailing 🎭 Kirsten Dunst and Daniel Brühl are the latest to join the Swedish filmmaker Ruben Östlund's The Entertainment System Is Down. The feature takes place on a long flight in which the onboard entertainment system fails, leaving the passengers to deal with their own boredom — to darkly comedic results. Östlund is shopping the package at Cannes, with Keanu Reeves already attached to star. The production has purchased a retired Boeing 747 for the shoot. The story.
—🎭 Robot rock 🎭 Andy Samberg is set to star in a comedy feature from the directing team known as Radio Silence. Amazon MGM Studios has landed the comedy pitch package for The Robots Go Crazy, with Radio Silence’s Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett attached to helm the film and Samberg attached to star. Plot details have not been disclosed, but the movie is described as an action comedy. Samberg, Ali Bell, Akiva Schaffer and Jorma Taccone will serve as producers for The Lonely Island's production company Party Over Here. The story.
—🎭 Smile 🎭 Lily Allen is the latest star to join Night and Day, an adaptation of the comedic Virginia Woolf novel. The singer and actress joins a cast that includes Haley Bennett, Elyas M’Barek and Timothy Spall, who will bring to life the 1919 novel revolving around the daily lives and romances of two women. Katharine Hilbery (Bennett), is an Edwardian astronomer who avoids love, while Mary (Allen) is a straight-talking, fearless, funny suffragette. Jack Farthing rounds out the cast for the feature. The story. |
Cannes Day 3 ►THR's crack team is in Cannes for the 77th edition of the world's greatest film festival. Read our day 3 digital daily here.
—7 minutes! Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, the fifth installment in George Miller’s celebrated action franchise, had its world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival on Wednesday night and was greeted with a seven-minute standing ovation in the Grand Lumiere Theatre as Miller and members of his cast, including stars Anya Taylor-Joy and Chris Hemsworth, looked on. The story.
—Going big. Imax revealed on Thursday that Francis Ford Coppola’s highly anticipated Megalopolis, premiering at the Cannes Film Festival on Thursday evening, will get a global Imax release. “The film is going to get an Imax release,” Imax CEO Richard Gelfond told the press during a Megalopolis event in Cannes. “One of the things that we pride ourselves on is being filmmaker-friendly. So we’ve committed to Francis to do a global Imax release.” The story.
—"I was grieving the losses and I felt pretty vulnerable." On the eve of the world premiere of her new film Bird at Cannes, festival favorite Andrea Arnold revealed that the shoot was the toughest of her career. “It was the hardest film I ever made,” Arnold said from the stage on Wednesday while accepting the 2024 Carrosse d’Or, or Golden Coach Award, at the Directors’ Fortnight in Cannes. The story. |
Film Review: 'Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga' ►"Max is missed." THR's chief film critic David Rooney reviews George Miller's Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga. Anya Taylor-Joy and Chris Hemsworth and Tom Burke star in this fifth entry of the post-apocalyptic action series that began 45 years ago with Mad Max, this time churning up a Wasteland War in a prequel to Fury Road. The review.
—"Alluring but lacking a distinctive edge." THR's Lovia Gyarkye reviews Agathe Riedinger's Cannes competition entry Wild Diamond. In Riedinger's debut feature, a young woman obsessed with beauty and hungry for fame endeavors to become a reality TV star. The review.
—"A chilling exploration of silence and complicity." Lovia reviews Rungano Nyoni's On Becoming a Guinea Fowl. In the I Am Not a Witch director's second feature, produced by A24, the death of a problematic uncle instigates domestic turmoil. The review.
—"Piercingly sad." THR's Leslie Felperin reviews Magnus von Horn's Cannes competition entry The Girl With the Needle. The Danish drama centers on the vulnerability of pregnant women at a time when abortion was illegal and other options few and far between. The review.
—"A gripping manhunt movie that packs a stealthy wallop." THR's Jon Frosch reviews Jonathan Millet's Ghost Trail. Premiering in Cannes' Critics' Week sidebar, Millet's film stars Adam Bessa as a Syrian refugee tasked with tracking down his former torturer. The review.
—"Brutally honest and occasionally hilarious." THR's Jordan Mintzer reviews Sophie Fillières' This Life of Mine. The final feature from the French director, who died in 2023, stars Agnès Jaoui (The Taste of Others) as a writer on the verge of a nervous breakdown. The review.
—"A hauntingly minimalist war reenactment." Jordan reviews Roberto Minervini's The Damned. The Italian director behind Stop the Pounding Heart, The Other Side and What You Gonna Do When the World’s on Fire? follows a battalion of Union Army soldiers scouting the West and trying to stay alive in his latest feature. The review. |
TV Review: 'Bridgerton' S3 ►"Still plenty sweet, but not quite as delectable." THR's Angie Han reviews season three of Netflix's Bridgerton. A wallflower strikes up a romance with a longtime friend while trying to conceal her identity as the anonymous author of high society's most notorious scandal sheet in the new set of episodes. The review.
—"A bit too calculated for its own good." THR's Frank Scheck reviews John Krasinski's IF. The A Quiet Place helmer steps away from the horror genre for this live-action/animated movie featuring an all-star voice cast. The review.
In other news...
—Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo soar in full Wicked trailer
—Blake Lively is swept up by Justin Baldoni as trauma bubbles in It Ends With Us trailer
—Dune: Prophecy teaser trailer released by Max
—Jake Gyllenhaal signs Marcello Hernandez’s yearbook in SNL promo
—The Last of Us S2 first look photos: Joel and Ellie return
—Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour projected to boost U.K. economy by $1.27b
—Jessica Hausner named jury president at Locarno Film Festival
—Beverly Hills Hotel, Casa Cipriani among inaugural 3-Michelin key properties in U.S.
—CAA digital media co-head Frank Jung leaves to launch new venture
—NFL star Stefon Diggs signs with SMAC Entertainment
—Gloria Stroock, McMillan & Wife and Fun With Dick and Jane actress, dies at 99
What else we're reading...
—Kyndall Cunningham writes that the Amy Winehouse film Back to Black might just be the worst of the recent rash of bad music biopics [Vox]
—Max Tani reports on the internal strife at the New York Times as staff complain about management's "unwillingness to tolerate dissent" and their dismissive attitude towards young reporters [Semafor]
—Boris Kachka writes that we may have reached "peak theater" as no one seems to know how to succeed on Broadway anymore [Vulture]
—Claire Moses reports on how the Dutch are backing their Eurovision entrant Joost Klein to the hilt [NYT]
—In an op-ed, Seth Simons writes that after spate of recent controversies including the walkout at Duke University, Jerry Seinfeld's "teflon legacy could finally be at risk" [Daily Beast]
Today...
...in 2002, George Lucas unveiled Star Wars: Episode II — Attack of the Clones in theaters, where it would go on to gross $645m globally. The original review.
Today's birthdays: Janet Jackson (58), Pierce Brosnan (71), Megan Fox (38), Danny Trejo (80), Melanie Lynskey (47), Lynn Collins (47), Thomas Brodie-Sangster (34), David Boreanaz (55), Debra Winger (69), Jim Sturgess (46), Tori Spelling (51), Jayden Revri (25), Jing Lusi (39), Alice Wetterlund (43), Mare Winningham (65), Deniz Akdeniz (34), Vincent Regan (🏴 59), Joseph Morgan (43), Yannick Bisson (55), Ali Skovbye (22), Peter Onorati (71), Tiya Sircar (42), Jessica Morris (45), Khary Payton (52), Rupert Young (46), Tracey Gold (55), Stanislav Yanevski (39), Miles Heizer (30), Rebecca Front (60), Ramon Tikaram (57), Josefine Lindegaard (26), Brían F. O'Byrne (57), Kevin McDonald (63) |
| Roxanne Rosedale, the glamorous model and actress who assisted host Bud Collyer on the 1950s game show Beat the Clock and appeared in the Marilyn Monroe-starring The Seven Year Itch, has died. She was 95. The obituary. |
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