Innholdsfortegnelse for Sep-11-15 Double i The Hollywood Reporter

IT’S A STAT THAT SHOULD make the TV business very nervous heading into the fall season: Half of the 2015-16 rookie class of broadcast shows has had a retooling, recasting or showrunner switcheroo. Why? Summer tinkering with fall shows isn’t uncommon, of course, but dozens of execs and agents contacted by THR say this season is among the worst they recall, and they cite several key reasons for the turmoil. There’s more pressure than ever on new shows to perform quickly in an environment where ratings for the vast majority of series are tiny. In addition, more shows are being picked up straight to series based on presentations rather than scripts (ABC’s The Muppets, The CW’s Legends of Tomorrow, Fox’s Scream Queens). And with nearly 400 scripted originals in production…

YOU COULD ALMOST call this fall’s New York Fashion Week (Sept. 10 to 17) for the Spring/Summer 2016 collections a reboot. The IMGproduced shows of NYFW are all moving from Lincoln Center to three new locations for the agency’s first fashion week fully co-developed with WME since merging in 2013: Skylight at Moynihan Station (360 W. 33rd St.), Skylight Clarkson Sq (550 Washington St.) and a headquarters called, aptly enough, HQ, behind Milk Made Studios (451 W. 14th St.; also where WME-IMG’s Made Fashion Week, supporting emerging designers, takes place). WME brought unique assets to the table, with their Art & Commerce Agency, which represents photographers, stylists and art directors and, more recently, Hollywood styling agency The Wall Group. “Since WME came on board,” says IMG Fashion’s senior vp and…

BLAME IT ON TMZ founder Harvey Levin. When interior designer Bradley Bayou and William Morris Endeavor partner Mark Itkin started looking for beach property eight years ago, they had no idea the search would land them on the Marina Peninsula. But gossip mogul Levin, who recently built a three-story contemporary oceanfront there, already had taken up residence on this low-profile sand strip below the Venice Pier, adjacent to Marina del Rey. “Harvey and his partner [chiropractor Dr. Andy Maurer] are friends of ours, so we’d come down and hang out with them here,” says Itkin, 62, who, as the head of unscripted television at WME, represents Jerry Springer and Jesse Ventura and has helped create such shows as Big Brother, Project Runway and this summer’s surprise hit, ABC’s Celebrity Family…

Did you know a lot about Hedda Hopper before taking the role in Trumbo? I knew of her. She’s such a powerful, interesting influence — at a time when women weren’t allowed a lot of power. Between her and Louella Parsons [syndicated columnist of the Los Angeles Examiner], the two of them worked their way into becoming extremely powerful movers and shakers. They could make or break a movie. Or a career. There is no one around like her today. [She was like] Twitter, Facebook, Maureen Dowd, the film critics, reaching out across the country. She had a huge power over the box office, much more than anyone nowadays. So what was your approach to the role? How did you prepare? When you play a role like this, you research the…

The Toronto Film Festival long has been touted as both the kickoff of Oscar season and a key market for finished films. But a closer look at the recent slates and sales begs the question: Does the fest still live up to the hype? On the awards front, last year’s best picture Oscar winner, Birdman, skipped Toronto altogether in favor of Venice and Telluride. The year before, best picture champ 12 Years a Slave played Toronto but only after Telluride. “We didn’t go to Toronto because we didn’t get into Toronto,” says Birdman producer John Lesher. “We showed it to them as an early cut. Let’s just say folks at Toronto weren’t as enthusiastic as everyone else was.” As for sales, last year’s Chris Rock comedy Top Five sparked a…

WELL BEFORE Toronto’s red carpet was overtaken by A-list glitz and its place secured in awards history with premieres for Chariots of Fire, The Big Chill and American Beauty, the festival’s three co-founders failed to procure even one major studio movie for their inaugural edition in 1976. Dusty Cohl, Toronto politico Bill Marshall and architect-turnedproducer Henk Van der Kolk had hatched a dream on the Carlton terrace in Cannes: to bring American stars and the best of European cinema to a sophisticated Toronto audience. But Hollywood showed zero interest in cannibalizing its domestic market: Hal Ashby’s Bound for Glory was promised by the director for opening night, but United Artists head Eric Pleskow overrode the offer. Warren Beatty’s Canadian cousin, Hollywood producer David MacLeod (Ishtar), was supposed to deliver Jack…

TORSTEN NEUMANN, 50, FREELY ADMITS HE might be a dying breed, given his fierce commitment to independent film. He originally created Germany’s Oldenburg Film Festival, founded in 1993, to be that country’s answer to Sundance, championing directors and films outside the mainstream. But more than two decades later, the world of indie film is nearly unrecognizable. “Art house cinema has become a second tier of mainstream cinema, and the film festivals have followed that trend,” says Neumann. “Too many festivals just follow the circuit; they take the approved art house films from the A-festivals. Films that are more challenging — harder to market — get lost. But a festival’s job, in my mind, is to stand up for exactly those films.” This year, Oldenburg again is defiantly hoisting its indie…

MTV Video Music Awards Los Angeles, Aug. 30 FOR EXECUTIVE PRODUCER VAN Toffler’s last VMAs, not only did the night go off without a hitch, with performances from Macklemore & Ryan Lewis and Pharrell Williams, among others, but it also was the most tweeted-about nonsports program ever, with 21.4 million tweets in the U.S. (though early reports had viewership down from 2014). Big winners included Taylor Swift — who won video of the year for “Bad Blood” and brought up her gang of girls to accept the Moonman — and Kanye West. Six years ago, he commandeered the mic from Swift, but now she was all smiles as she presented him with the Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award. During his 13-minute speech, West announced his candidacy, provoking a social media…

IN JUNE, A GROUP OF FORWARD-THINKING film and web executives met at the offices of Ted Sarandos at Netflix in Beverly Hills to discuss how best to advance the finance opportunities afforded by crowdfunding. Among the group of 25 were: Michael Barker, Sony Pictures Classics; Liesl Copland, WME; Nick Gonda, Tugg; Micah Green, CAA; Ted Hope, Amazon Studios; Robert Kyncl, YouTube; Franklin Leonard, The Black List; Keri Putnam, Sundance Institute; Slava Rubin, Indiegogo; and Brent Weinstein, UTA. In addition, filmmakers Morgan Spurlock, Alex Winter, Burnie Burns and Freddie Wong attended, as did consultant Ivan Askwith of Crowdfunding Campaign Manager. The following article by Professor Tim Wu of Columbia Law School and John Sloss of Cinetic Media came out of that discussion but is not necessarily representative of the views of…

… THE SCENE BEING SHOT ON THIS BALMY OCTOBER AFTERNOON IS OF A BEVERLY HILLS COCKTAIL PARTY IN 1947. A huge swimming pool, lit by a hundred floating tea light candles, glows in the early evening. A band plays jazz under a striped cabana while men in black tie mingle with women in silvery gowns. And at the center of it all is a debonair figure in a white dinner jacket, smoking a cigarette through an ivory holder, arguing with guests about the decadent and corrupt capitalist system. “Dalton Trumbo was a socialist, but he loved being rich,” says Bryan Cranston, the 59-year-old Breaking Bad star who grew a topiary-like mustache to play the wealthiest communist in Hollywood, the original limousine liberal, in Trumbo, premiering Sept. 12 at the Toronto…

Thanks to a recently opened pedestrian tunnel linking Billy Bishop airport to downtown Toronto, the likely first destination for Bleecker Street CEO Andrew Karpen, Sony Pictures Classics’ Tom Bernard and Michael Barker, Freeheld’s Julianne Moore, February’s Kiernan Shipka and other travel-weary New Yorkbased insiders just got a lot more comfortable. Toronto-bound execs and talent no longer have to wait up to 20 minutes to take a 90-second ferry ride from the island airport. Instead, arriving A-listers just descend two extralong escalators to a 30-meter-deep tunnel — which took three years and $82.5 million to build and will be repaid by airport users forking over an “airport improvement fee” — under Lake Ontario. From there, four automated sidewalks whisk you to a bank of elevators at the other end to get…

STANDING ATOP A VERDANT SUMMIT NEAR Benedict Canyon, Brad Pitt smoked a cigarette and gazed toward the ocean. A gentle afternoon sun played over the chaparral and sage below. It was 2002, and Pitt had come to Beverly Hills to take stock of a coveted piece of real estate. From the San Gabriel Mountains to Malibu, Los Angeles stretched out in a quiet, glittery panorama. It was the highest peak for miles, a true king’s plot. He turned to Gary Morris, a developer and friend. “So?” mused Pitt. “You think I should buy this?” Morris told Pitt that if he “made another movie or two,” he could probably afford it. An L.A. native with salt-and-pepper hair and a wiry frame born of years of ultra-marathons, Morris knew better than to…

FOR THE 99.9999 PERCENT WHO WILL NEVER CLIMB MOUNT Everest, the new 3D Imax drama Everest provides plenty of vividly illustrated reasons to leave it off one’s bucket list. However, there are quite a few reasons to see this robust dramatization of a 1996 trek on the world’s tallest mountain that went disastrously wrong, from eye-popping visual techniques to finely shaded characterizations to the realistic details that give the film texture. With its perilous premise and gallery of individuals, some of whom are destined not to make it, you could say Everest is a disaster movie in the old Hollywood sense — but it doesn’t feel like one (that’s a good thing): Director Baltasar Kormakur never goes in for cheap shots or sensation for sensation’s sake. Telling the same story…

WE’RE SHOOTING A WHITE-WATER RAPIDS sequence in pancake-flat Manitoba. Can you make it happen?” That’s just one of thousands of requests Canadian crewmembers field each year when Hollywood productions head north for cheaper crews and lush locales. Here, four production/location pros reveal their tricks on high-profile shoots. MANITOBA LOCATION: WINNIPEG USED IN DreamWorks’ canine drama A Dog’s Purpose, starring Dennis Quaid and Britt Robertson. Currently in production. BIGGEST INCENTIVES 45 percent, labor-based Manitoba film and video production tax credit. SET REPORT “The script originally called for a whitewater rescue. It’s flat here. There’s not a lot of white water; it’s all very lazy rivers,” says executive producer Alan Blomquist. “But we found a spot with a dam that held back the water that, when released, it came out really fast.…

Beverly Hills Dives Into No-New-Pools Panic In recent weeks, Beverly Hills residents have been alarmed at the thought that their backyards might be left high and dry, with calls pouring in to the offices of landscape architects and pool designers. “The drought has people worried that the next step in conservation may involve cities placing moratoriums on future pools,” says Kathleen Ferguson of Kathleen Ferguson Landscapes. Adds Pooltastic Designs’ Bill Holloway: “I get one to two calls a week from potential clients.” A recent pool ban was passed by the Laguna Beach City Council, but that was overturned after 45 days. Beverly Hills spokeswoman Therese Kosterman tells THR that no moratorium is being considered. “It’s just a rumor,” she says. Kosterman notes that new pool construction is OK as long…

THE TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL MARKS a reunion of sorts for David Linde, the longtime film executive who ran Universal Pictures with Marc Shmuger before they were ousted in 2009 just before Comcast bought NBCUniversal. Lava Bear, the production and financing company Linde launched four years ago with his own money and backing from India’s Reliance Entertainment, will be in Toronto for the premiere of the immigration thriller Desierto, starring Gael Garcia Bernal — whose career was launched by Y Tu Mama Tambien, a film Linde handled when he ran Good Machine — and directed by Jonas Cuaron, son of Y Tu Mama and Gravity filmmaker Alfonso Cuaron. Desierto is one of four Lava Bear films set for release in the next year as the company faces crucial box-office tests; they…

You’ve been out of Breaking Bad for a while now. How do you make your career decisions these days? I tell my agency [UTA], “Do the best you can.” They say, “We want to tell you about the deal.” I say, “Are you happy?” “I think we could get a little more.” “All right, try.” I don’t want to appear smug, but I don’t need a job. I’ve been really poor, forecloseon-your-house poor. And I’ve been rich. Rich is better. But I’m just now starting to get used to the hour of fame. I haven’t been able to let the dust settle yet. Do you like your “hour of fame”? Being [famous] is almost like being a pregnant woman. People think they can just put their hand on your belly and…

WITH DISTRIBUTORS like Relativity and Radius out of the mix and others such as Alchemy, Bleecker Street and The Orchard staking their ground, the film acquisition landscape is shifting against the backdrop of the Toronto Film Festival. Cash-flush players Netflix, Amazon and Broad Green are expected to flex their muscles, while an increasingly quiet Harvey Weinstein remains the biggest question mark among market regulars. (Will he remain on the sidelines like he did at last year’s fest or pull off a big buy to bolster the company’s image after losing key executives?) On paper, this year’s slate of finished films available for U.S. distribution lacks the same level of buzz as last year’s, when Chris Rock’s Top Five sparked a feeding frenzy. “I don’t see any movie that’s like, ‘God,…

Perhaps it’s not surprising that genre-hopping British director Stephen Frears — with royalist drama The Queen, record-store comedy High Fidelity and film noir The Grifters to his name — should choose the story of disgraced American cycling hero Lance Armstrong for his latest project. The Program stars Ben Foster and will have its world premiere at Toronto, ahead of which the 74-year-old, two-time Oscarnominated director spoke with THR about cycling, doping and how history will judge the seven-time Tour de France champion. You’re not a cycling fan. Why did you want to make a film on Lance Armstrong? Because I wasn’t interested in making a biopic. I was interested in making a crime film. In January, Armstrong did an interview with the BBC where he was much more straightforward and…

*Approximate values based on USD conversion. RED-CARPET STYLIST HAYLEY ATKIN, 37, WHOSE CLIENTS include Mindy Kaling and Beth Behrs, hails from Toronto (“I lived the first 20 years of my life there”) and remains rooted in the city’s fashion scene. After all, her mother, Barbara, was fashion director at Canada’s luxury department store Holt Renfrew. Here, the stylist, who resides in Studio City, tells THR where she shops when she’s back north. Where do you shop for women’s clothing and accessories? The vintage store Mama Loves You (541 Queen St. West). They have the best boho dresses in town. This store makes me feel like a lady of the canyon. What about favorite spots for men’s clothing and accessories? I always take my husband to Sydney’s (682 Queen St. West).…

There are funny people all over the world, and I don’t think Canadians are necessarily extrahilarious. But the fact that our professional football league once had only nine teams, and two of those teams shared the same name, Roughriders, does indicate something unique. A lot of it has to do with the weather. You’re stuck inside the house and also your own multipletoqued head most of the year because it’s so freaking cold. (A toque is what you Earth people call a knit winter hat.) Throw in the heavy flow of British and American influences on our culture and our desperate need to be polite about said cultural flows, or pretty much anything else, and the result will become comedy, or a stress-related heart condition. But that’s what I love…

1. SHOW ME A HERO (HBO) David Simon’s six-part miniseries, directed by Paul Haggis and based on real events, initially gives off a slight “eat your vegetables” whiff. But the first-class storytelling and acting will hook you. Starring Oscar Isaac as a 1980s Yonkers, N.Y., mayor embroiled in a racially charged public housing dispute, the drama richly rewards viewers for their investment — and emerges as a potential Emmy heavyweight for 2016. — TIM GOODMAN 2. SEX&DRUGS&ROCK&ROLL (FX) This sharply funny and wonderfully spot-on comedy features creator Denis Leary as an aging New York rocker who discovers he has a very talented daughter. Channeling the star’s searing sense of humor into an entertaining and accessible package, each half-hour episode also is full of insights into aging, family, friendship and love.…

Congratulations to the emerging talent of 2015! Ontario’s winning combination of world-class infrastructure, competitive financial incentives, diverse locations, and superb talent and skills has created an ideal creative environment. Film and television are big business in Ontario — thanks for being part of it.” KAREN THORNE-STONE, PRESIDENT & CEO , ONTARIO MEDIA DEVELOPM ENT CORP. Ontario Media Development Corp. supports the province’s $12.4 billion creative economy – including filmmaking – by providing programs, services and funding. It facilitates and nurtures innovation and excellence in Ontario’s cultural media by stimulating creative production and new models of collaboration that keep the film business thriving. In their own words, two of the province’s emerging talent share why their hearts belong to Ontario. “Shooting the show in southern Ontario during the warmer months makes…

THERE IS NO WAY, except with my unique techniques, that you would know this,” cautioned Anthony Pellicano as he gave information to a client, lawyer Terry Christensen, during a call Pellicano, now 71, recorded in 2002. In those days, Pellicano was Hollywood’s most high-profile private eye, and his “unique techniques” were wiretapping, which is what got him convicted in 2008. The PI (whose personality evokes Showtime’s Ray Donovan) partially won an appeal Aug. 25 from a three-judge panel. It remains to be seen whether the net result will shave any time off his internment at the Federal Correctional Institution in Big Spring, Texas, where he’s scheduled for a 2019 release. Pellicano’s fall from grace began when FBI agents raided his office in 2002 with a warrant for “all audio recordings…