Innholdsfortegnelse for January 27, 2017 i The Hollywood Reporter

The Emmys’ limited series category, by its nature, constantly reinvents itself. But several recent schedule moves — FX’s American Crime Story: The People v. O.J. Simpson follow-up, set during Hurricane Katrina, has been pushed a year, and Showtime’s Twin Peaks revival will arrive too late for 2016 consideration — might alter the 2017 and 2018 races. That, coupled with a second season of AMC’s The Night Manager still in the planning stages, gives a potential boost to a slew of HBO minis — The Night Of, Big Little Lies and The Young Pope — and FX stalwarts American Horror Story and Fargo, along with Ryan Murphy’s new anthology Feud. “I never want to be in a situation of feeling like we have to rush something onto our air because we…

Casual showrunner Liz Tigelaar first heard about the Women’s March on Washington while she was drinking wine and “freaking out” about the election with her wife, PR pro Alison Rou, and some friends. “We were like, ‘F— it. We’re going,’ ” says Tigelaar, who will rally with industry pals including producer-director Nancy Hower, Criminal Minds exec producer Erica Messer and producer Diane Ruggiero. They’re just a few of the execs and creators who’ll line up alongside such stars as Viola Davis, Olivia WIlde and America Ferrera, who all have declared their intention to march (“for the protection of our rights, our safety, our health and our families” is the stated mission on the organizers’ website). For Anonymous Content’s Joy Gorman Wettels, the call to action ignited on a group text…

The Girl-Power Bathrooms at WME The women’s restrooms at WME have gotten an inspirational upgrade. The mirrors in the facilities inside the Beverly Hills agency are coated with dozens of sticky notes featuring handwritten messages penned by staffers, visitors and clients. The notes appeared around Donald Trump’s presidential win and have been kept up for more than two months, confirms an agency rep. While some comments are in response to the election (“Love Trumps Hate”; “Pussy Grabs Back”), others are quotes about work in a male-dominated industry: “Slay Queens”; “What If Beyonce Quit When People Told Her No?”; “Think of Oprah.” (Interesting side note: Winfrey is a WME client; Beyonce is not.) The mirrors follow a similar showing at HBO’s New York HQ. Who Will Host the White House Correspondents’…

Just two years ago, Jason Ropell’s job didn’t exist. Now, as worldwide head of motion pictures for Amazon Studios, he oversees production, distribution and marketing for all of the streaming giant’s original and acquired films, along with content licensed in the U.K., Germany and Japan. Since leaping into original film 18 months ago, Amazon Prime aggressively has built an ambitious slate, licensing tens of thousands of movies from all the major studios and partnering with theatrical distributors to first release in theaters — unlike its rival Netflix, which buys movies directly for its platform. Its slate has included more than a dozen titles in just the past year, including Woody Allen’s Cafe Society, Whit Stillman’s Love & Friendship, the Oscar-shortlisted documentary Gleason and, in its biggest success, awards favorite Manchester…

In the beginning, before its iconic Golden Arches spread throughout the land, McDonald’s was a single, unassuming stand launched in 1948 in an octagonal building in San Bernardino, Calif. That restaurant, and one of the first franchises opened by businessman Ray Kroc in Des Planes, Ill., in 1955, are the key sets in The Founder, in which Michael Keaton plays Kroc as he spreads the McDonald’s gospel. Because that first McDonald’s was demolished long ago, production designer Michael Corenblith gathered research by collecting archival photos; contacting the greatnephews of Dick and Mac McDonald, the chain’s creators; and visiting the small museum in San Bernardino on the original restaurant’s site, where he found blueprints and other props from the period. The original McDonald’s, says Corenblith, had a “prewar carhop architectural vocabulary…

You’re going to Sundance with a domestic drama called Golden Exits and a Roxanne Shante biopic, Roxanne Roxanne. Is acting something you’ve always wanted to do? I was interested in acting in the ’80s, but I thought I was really bad at it. I was in a movie called Lost Angels with Hugh Hudson, the Chariots of Fire director. That was really bad, the worst movie. It was an interesting lesson in how Hollywood works: The movie was supposed to be about rich kids getting sent away by their parents, but then because Colors was a really big movie at the time, they changed the script to be like, “Oh, they should be in gangs.” It was awful. What was shooting Golden Exits like? How was Alex Ross Perry as a director? He’s terrible. He’s…

Long hours and unusually close quarters at Sundance make it a more challenging fest than most for families. “It’s not your typical working vacation where there is any sort of schedule,” says Scott Quintavalle, who attended as a manny/assistant with a couple who worked on an Oscar-winning documentary. All-hour screenings and late-night dinners can bring a hefty price tag for full-time help. “I was expected to be on and with the kids 24/7,” says Quintavalle. Katie Provinziano, managing director of L.A.-based Westside Nannies, says parents should plan to shell out $400 to $600 a day on childcare, depending on the nanny’s level of experience and the number of children. For many, the benefits of bringing the family outweigh the cost. Electric City Entertainment producer Lynette Howell Taylor hit the fest…

Red alert. All hands to battle stations. On Stardate 47634.44, known to most as Jan. 31, 2017, Star Trek rights holders CBS and Paramount will begin a copyright trial against a most unlikely defendant: Alec Peters, who solicited money on crowdfunding sites and hired professionals to make a YouTube short and a script of a planned feature film focused on a fictional event — a Starfleet captain’s victory in a war with the Klingon Empire — referenced in the original 1960s Gene Roddenberry television series. The video and script, which features such arguably copyrighted elements as Vulcan ears, the Klingon language and an obscure character from a 1969 episode, sparked a lawsuit in December 2015. Now before R. Gary Klausner, the same federal judge in Los Angeles who presided over…

Carlito Rodriguez, writer-producer for Fox’s Empire, credits his career break to a place he dubs “magical Starbucks.” When Rodriguez moved from New York in 2010, he searched for an outpost of the chain in Burbank. “The constant buzz of coffee shops tricks me into thinking I’m not pushing the boulder up the mountain by myself,” says Rodriguez, who spotted Damon Lindelof in line the day after reading THR’s 2013 cover profile on the Lost co-creator. “Before I could talk myself out of it, I tapped him on the shoulder, like, ‘Hey, man.’ ” Rodriguez later was named a Humanitas New Voices for Drama winner, upon which Lindelof suggested a meeting at his office on the Warner Bros. lot, where the then-new writer was offered a job on the first season…

Beatriz at Dinner (CAA/UTA/WME) DIRECTOR Miguel Arteta BUZZ Based on a screenplay by Mike White (School of Rock), the film pits a Mexican immigrant (Salma Hayek) against a self-satisfied billionaire (John Lithgow) — a setup that perhaps couldn’t be more timely. Fun Mom Dinner (ICM/UTA/WME) DIRECTOR Alethea Jones BUZZ In the wake of Bad Moms’ box-office success ($179 million worldwide), buyers are eager to see this comedy about four moms (Katie Aselton, Toni Collette, Bridget Everett and Molly Shannon) whose night out takes an unexpected turn. Landline (UTA) DIRECTOR Gillian Robespierre BUZZ Obvious Child’s Jenny Slate heads up the ensemble cast (which includes John Turturro, Edie Falco, Abby Quinn, Jay Duplass and Finn Wittrock) in this comedy set in the pre-cellphone days of the ’90s. Mudbound (WME) DIRECTOR Dee Rees BUZZ In the…

Marti Noxon sidles up to the counter of her favorite Studio City breakfast nook, scans the menu and orders herself a plate of corned beef hash. “I need a proper meal,” she says, before rattling off a comprehensive list of what she’d eaten the evening prior: a protein pack, some beets, a bag of chips … “I was lying in bed last night adding up the calories of my horrible day of eating and then deciding whether I could have this or that for my dessert, and I was like, ‘When am I going to be done with this?’ I mean, my vagina is dead, I’m sexually irrelevant, who the f— cares? At what point do I decide that I can stop?” This is the remnant of an eating disorder…

How could this man be elected president of our country?!” That’s a sentiment I’ve noted in some form or another in recent weeks. Since you’re a reader of THR, I am sure you have either had a similar thought or heard it from friends. The reason for this sustained incredulity and its accompanying painful anxiety is simple: It is difficult to understand how Donald Trump could be elected president because, Ms. or Mr. Denizen of the entertainment industry, you think of the United States as your country. The problem is you’re wrong. It’s their country. Being a vegan, atheist, mostly libertarian gun owner who thinks we should have much stronger gun laws, I don’t ever remember feeling culturally identified with any group in this country, much less the nation as…

Never before in modern history have we had a president-elect so ill-informed, ill-tempered and illequipped to deal with the major issues that face this country. The counterintuitive election of Donald Trump has left political pundits from both parties throwing up their hands and saying, “All we can do is hope for the best.” But as Mark Wahlberg’s character in Deepwater Horizon warns the executives ignoring the oil platform’s numerous problems right before it bursts into flames: “Hope is not a strategy.” And based on the cabinet nominations Trump recently has made, people of color have little reason to be hopeful. That’s why it’s especially important over the next four years that black celebrities give voice to those who will not be heard by the incoming administration. Given that the country…

AIRDATE 9 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 26 (The CW) CAST K.J. Apa, Lili Reinhart, Camila Mendes, Cole Sprouse, Madelaine Petsch, Ashleigh Murray, Luke Perry CREATOR Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa When it comes to making television, dares are about attitude, not aptitude. The CW’s new series Riverdale is a crazed dare of a TV show, and while it may defy qualitative norms in terms of narrative coherence and character consistency, it is utterly committed to the strange thing it’s doing. And that counts for something. Adapted for the small screen by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa (Glee), Riverdale is not your father’s Archie story. But the Archie that older viewers remember from decades of digests and double digests — the redhead with the beat-up jalopy who splits his affections between dedicated blonde Betty and spoiled brunette Veronica…

Come on! This is f—ing nuts, right?” asks developer Bruce Makowsky as he stands on a deck with a 280-degree view of L.A., showing THR what has been known quaintly as a “million-dollar view.” Makowsky, who sold Swedish video game billionaire Markus Persson a Beverly Hills mansion for $70 million in 2016, just put the finishing touches on a $250 million spec home in Bel Air. If that listing price is met, it would beat the previous top U.S. luxury home sale — a $147 million East Hampton pad — by more than $100 million. The home offers 12 bedrooms, 21 baths, seven staffers, an 85-foot Italian glass infinity pool and the helicopter from the ’80s TV show Airwolf. “This is what Hollywood is about,” says Makowsky. “Who is not…

A s America prepares for the inauguration on Jan. 20, we, the united women of these United States — holding hands in solidarity with our boyfriends, our girlfriends, our brothers, our uncles, our nephews and our husbands — will march on Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, Park City and all across the world on Jan. 21 to show our passion and resolve for the democratic spirit of America that respects all women’s right to live in a society as equals, not as second-class citizens. Women are under a rightwing political assault, and I intend to fight back with all my might against a Republican president, a Republican Congress and the radical, religious right who are drooling to defund Planned Parenthood health services nationwide. Planned Parenthood is an American institution that is…

Births Gary Shanas, vp media strategy & planning at the Disney-ABC Television Group, and wife Emily Judson Shanas welcomed daughter Alice Mae on Jan. 9 in Pasadena. Producer Scott Stuber and his wife, actress Molly Sims, welcomed son Grey Douglas Stuber on Jan. 10. Weddings Don Wilcox and Nicole Falkenberg of Fox Searchlight (Wilcox in international marketing and distribution, and Falkenberg in publicity) were married Jan. 14 at Wynn Las Vegas. The pair will honeymoon in Punta Mita this summer. Congrats Jason Bergsman was upped to executive vp at The Chernin Group on Jan. 12. Annapurna Pictures promoted Chelsea Barnard to president of film Jan. 12. ICM Partners hired Denise Draper as an agent in the international television and media department on Jan. 11, and Daniel Cohan as an agent…

Kumail Nanjiani was doing a stand-up show in Chicago in 2007 when he heard a female voice heckling him from the audience. “I was like, ‘Well, this girl is really cute,’ ” he remembers and later asked the woman out on a date. Amazingly, they hit it off. But since she turned out to be a Christian, and he’s a Muslim, he had to hide the relationship from his observant Pakistani parents — until she got sick and was put in a medically induced coma for eight days, prompting Nanjiani to buck tradition and declare his love. If you had a meet-cute story like this one, you’d make a movie out of it, too. The Big Sick, which premieres at Sundance on Jan. 20 (UTA is selling), isn’t just based…

With Robert Redford’s Zoom restaurant (660 Main St.) shuttering on May 31 after 21 years, John Sloss, founder of Cinetic Media, jokes he and his guests may have to “burn the place down” during his famous annual Monday night fest blowout there this year. (Building owners: He is kidding!) For now, Sundance festival director John Cooper still counts Zoom among his preferred spots. “I know it’s Redford’s restaurant and all, but what makes me favor it besides the food, good wine and lovely staff are the photos on the wall that represent the festival’s history and legacy. I feel happy being there, surrounded by images of the great talents I have had the honor to meet.” There are no special goodbye parties planned at Zoom during the fest this year;…

Except for the female victims, horror movies mostly are a male-dominated genre. But a group of filmmakers is heading to Park City with a film so tightly packed with female DNA that its title is XX. Directed, produced, written and acted almost entirely by women, it’s an old-fashioned, anthology-style creep fest made up of four tales that touch on the sorts of subjects found less often in male-centric horror flicks: teenage ostracism, self-imposed starvation, bullying and motherhood. “XX was created in direct response to the lack of opportunities in film, particularly in the horror genre,” says Jovanka Vuckovic, the horror zine journalist turned producer who in 2012 came up with the idea for the film with her friend Todd Brown, a onetime horror website founder currently working at specialty production…

Immigrants helped build Hollywood, and now, in the Trump era, immigrants need Hollywood’s help. The American film industry was launched by immigrants — specifically, Eastern European Jewish immigrants who felt like outsiders in their new home. As a new wave of immigrants, mostly Latinos and Asians, leads America’s demographic makeover in the 21st century, we need Hollywood to tell stories that speak to the humanity and complexity of the lives of millions of people. There would be no Trump presidency without a Make America Great Again campaign that was centered on immigration and the systematic othering of Muslims and immigrants, with illegals as the country’s ultimate bogeymen. I am one of those illegals (about 11 million of the estimated 43 million immigrants living in the U.S. are here illegally, according…

“After the defeat of the DREAM Act, I was on the second floor of the West Wing with some fellow staffers, mourning the Senate’s rejection of DREAM while celebrating the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. Lots of mixed emotions. The president came into the room and reminded us that while DREAM was defeated, we came closer than ever before (losing by just five votes), and that only continued advocacy could get us there in the long run. He wanted us to share with folks working on these issues that they should keep fighting. That’s the kind of clear-headed, realistic and optimistic thinking that was so inspiring every day as a staffer. On Inauguration Day, ironically, I’ll probably be stuck at work in a fake White House filming Designated Survivor, but…