–Issa Rae talks about building her comedy empire in her Rolling Stone interview, which features an EXCELLENT cover.
-Actually, it seems like this whole week has been a series of excellent magazine covers, including Christina Aguileraon Health, the creators of Minari on THR, and Lucy Luion Women’s Health.
–Chrissy Teigen just couldn’t stay away from Twitter. I feel that.
-British actress Helen McCrory, best known for her performances in Peaky Blinders, Penny Dreadful, and as Narcissa Malfoy in the Harry Potter franchise, has died at the age of 52 after a battle with cancer.
-Following the success of Barb & Star, Kristen Wiig and Annie Mumolo are teaming up now with Disney to develop a musical comedy focused on Cinderella’s evil stepsisters. Ok, but I also want more Barb & Star.
–Carey Mulligan has joined the cast of Adam Sandler’s next movie, which I’m assuming is more Uncut Gems than Just Go With It.
–Milo Gibson and Laurence Fishburne star in the trailer for Under The Stadium Lights, the true story of a small-town high school football team who beat all the odds to win their state championship.
–Esquire profiled Tom Holland, and you can tell how much the fact that Marvel refuses to trust him with plot secrets anymore messes with his head. He says of the upcoming Spider-Man film: “In [Endgame], Robert Downey Jr.’s funeral scene, for the longest time I was under the impression that it was a wedding. I’m 100 percent sure that they’re still tricking me.” He does seem more confident that the rumours of Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield making cameos aren’t true, though. “No, no, they will not be appearing in this film. Unless they have hidden the most massive piece of information from me, which I think is too big of a secret for them to keep from me.”
–Britney Spears’ boyfriend Sam Asgharislammed her dad in post following release of the Framing Britney Spears documentary. He posted on Instagram: “Now it’s important for people too understand that I have zero respect for someone trying to control our relationship and constantly throwing obstacles our way. In my opinion Jamie is a total dick.” When TMZ caught up with him later, he added “Once he starts treating his daughter right, then we can be on good terms.”
–Spears reportedly is aware of the doc but hasn’t yet watched it. She did just tweet this though: “Each person has their story and their take on other people’s stories…Remember, no matter what we think we know about a person’s life it is nothing compared to the actual person living behind the lens.”
-Meanwhile, a video of Craig Ferguson refusing to mock Britney Spears has gone viral. I remember when he said this because a lot of us who were working at an outlet covering celebrity news began feeling the same.
–Sandra Bullock and Brad Pitt are teaming up for a new action movie.
–Pedro Pascal continues to seem like a great human. Lux Pascal opened up about her brother’s reaction to her coming out as a transgender woman: “Pedro is an important part of this. He was the first person to gift me the tools that started shaping my identity. [When I came out to him, he said] ‘Perfect, this is incredible!'”
-The National Society of Film Critics has released a statement regarding Variety’s apology for its review of Promising Young Woman. This is such a tough one. On one hand, critics should be able to express opinions. On the other, that review had some brutal sentiments about her appearance that an editor should have caught. And this statement makes it seem like Carey Mulligan objected to it because it might affect her chances in awards season, which is gross.
-I’m still not sure how it happened, but my friend and I ended up watching The Best Man again last weekend. And now comes news that the entire cast is returning for a limited series.
-The CW has ordered a pilot for a live-action Powerpuff Girls reboot from Diablo Cody, and Ava DuVernay’s superhero drama Naomi.
-Slate got a lot of people angry yesterday for this truly dumb piece on romance novels. I stopped reading after the first couple of paragraphs when I saw a Fabio reference, which is a dead giveaway that they’re ignorant about what’s going on these days in the genre. If your outlet has to cover romance for Valentine’s Day, maybe get a writer who recognizes that it’s a billion-dollar industry and doesn’t hate all pop culture that’s largely by and for women? (FWIW, I liked this piece about which book to read based on your fave romcom — Bet Me is the best! — and this podcast on how the perfectly structured The Hating Game changed the chicklit genre).
-Christmas Day is going to be a bonanza of new content. We’ve got Bridgeton on Netflix, Wonder Woman 1984 on HBO Max and Promising Young Woman on video on demand. (I had no idea that writer-director of PYW is Emerald Fennell, who played Camilla on the most recent season of The Crown.) She and Carey Mulligancover Variety and talk about making the most audacious, feminist movie of the year.
-Speaking of cover stories, this is a very good one from THR on the career implosion of Johnny Depp, a casualty of Hollywood’s sycophant culture in which his wild spending and substance abuse were rarely challenged. “He’s just never been told no for the past 35 years.” Some of the highlights: despite being fired from Fantastic Beasts after only shooting one scene, he’ll still be paid his full $16-million fee due to him having “a pay-or-play contract, which requires that he be fully compensated whether or not the film is made and even if it is recast,” production on Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales had to be shut down for two weeks after Depp reportedly swallowed eight ecstasy pills, and his romantic partners allegedly include former co-starsAngelina Jolie, Marion Cotillard, and Keira Knightley.
–Kurt Russell and Goldie Hawn cover the latest issue of People and talk about their 37-year relationship. “People who have been together for a long time, they experience something that only people who have been together for a long time can talk about and relate to. For people like us, the marriage certificate wasn’t going to create anything that otherwise we wouldn’t have.”
-This is a great piece on how 2020 was the year celebrities lost their shine. “With little else to do, celebrities have been showing their asses at every opportunity. Similarly, as we sit at home with nothing to do, we have been more than willing to hand their asses to them with newfound rigour.” (Dolly Parton is the only celeb I can think of who is ending the year with an even stronger reputation than she started it with.)
-Disgraced Hillsong pastor Carl Lentz has entered treatment for anxiety, depression, and burnout.
-A True Blood rebootis in the works at HBO. This is weird, mostly because there are SO many buzzy supernatural books out there right now that they could adapt instead. When True Blood was good, it was good but I remember longgggg stretches where it was very, very bad.
–Shawn Mendes played Spill Your Guts with James Corden and had to eat blood and pork jelly to avoid picking between who he liked collaborating with more: Justin Bieber or Taylor Swift. He also refused to answer how much he’s been paid for his Armani endorsement, which led to him eating scorpion dusted plantains.
–Natalie Portman appeared on Dax Shepard’s podcastdiscussed how “being sexualized as a child took away from my own sexuality because it made me afraid. It made me feel like the way I can be safe is to be like, ‘I’m conservative, and I’m serious, and you should respect me, and I’m smart and don’t look at me that way.'”
-Memoirs continue to be a cash cow for celebs. Amazon Studios is prepping a new docuseries about Jessica Simpsonbased on her memoir, while Mariah Carey says she’s in talks for a potential movie or TV series based on hers.
–Victoria Beckham gushed about son Brooklyn’s wife-to-be Nicola Peltz in a new interview. “They’re so happy. She’s wonderful, sweet, and kind. She’s such a lovely, warm woman. We couldn’t have asked for Brooklyn to meet a more adorable lady. We’re very, very happy. We love her, he’s so happy.”
–Jason Sudeikis talked about how his character on Ted Lasso was inspired by Robin Williams. I didn’t think I was going to like that show, but it ended up as one of my faves of the year.