Innholdsfortegnelse for April 26, 2023 i The Hollywood Reporter

When the bombshell that Fox News and its star primetime host Tucker Carlson were parting ways hit the wire April 24, Fox Corp.’s share price went into a freefall. In minutes, the stock price fell 5.5 percent, wiping out more than $900 million from the company’s market cap. If Fox News is the financial crown jewel for Fox Corp. (defamation cases notwithstanding), Carlson was arguably its shiniest gem, by far the most watched individual host on the channel, and the one host who went all in on populism even as many of his colleagues toed the party line. In the company’s latest fiscal quarter earnings, Fox drove $4.6 billion in revenue and a net income of $321 million. The cable division (of which Fox News is the largest component by…

In the aftermath of the shock ouster of NBC Universal’s CEO, industry executives present a tale of two Jeff Shells. To some, Shell’s acknowledgment that he was departing because of “an inappropriate relationship with a woman in the company” came as a bolt from the blue. To others, not so much. “I’m totally flabbergasted,” says an executive who says he was close to Shell. “Jeff was supposed to be the buttoned-up guy.” Asked if he had suspicions of improper conduct, a former NBCU executive says, “No, not at all. Not even a whiff. Not even an inkling.” Another, though not a fan of Shell, says, “I’ve never seen any of that [kind of behavior]. Never. I’ve never even seen him be flirtatious.” A different portrait emerges from other NBCU sources.…

The beach has always appealed to Kelvin Yu. Having grown up in Palos Verdes before eventually settling in Santa Monica with his wife and two young children, he’s rarely lived far from it. This proximity has allowed him to become a deft surfer, though he’s too modest to call himself one. “I’m not incredibly proficient, but I have been doing it for about 30 years,” says Yu, 43, who often starts his days on the water. “It’s just a meditative exercise in multitasking where I can get a little quiet time.” Yu’s professional multitasking is less solitary. He serves as an executive producer on Fox’s long-running animated series Bob’s Burgers, still takes for-hire onscreen roles (Master of None, Wonder Woman 1984 and The Afterparty) and recently completed a labor of…

“It’s rich in history. The people are phenomenal. Vietnam was truly one of the most special and beautiful places I have been,” says Guy Ritchie’s The Covenant actor Alexander Ludwig of vacationing in the country, where luxury hotels and resorts include 2-year-old Capella Hanoi (from $350 a night). It offers 47 uniquely decorated rooms and suites, plus a Japanese teppanyaki for wagyu-focused dinners… The Four Seasons Resort The Nam Hai, Hoi An (from $855 a night), where Ben Feldman stayed, recently introduced a culturally focused four-night package (from $860) inclusive of excursions to two UNESCO-designated treasures, including the Imperial City of Hue… South of there, the beachfront resort Six Senses Ninh Van Bay (from $1,167) just opened the first in-resort solar farm in Vietnam, with an organic garden that produces…

Gucci Salon, West Hollywood The world’s first Gucci Salon store, an appointment-only boutique for VIP clients, just debuted. Conceived by set designer Gideon Ponte (American Psycho) to evoke the idea of a private home fused with Hollywood theatricality, the shop showcases the brand’s most luxurious pieces. 8409 Melrose Ave.; gucci.com Chanel, Beverly Hills In advance of Chanel debuting its Cruise 2023-2024 collection May 9 in Los Angeles, the house’s new four-story Rodeo Drive flagship will open May 5. At 30,000 square feet, it will be the largest Chanel boutique in the U.S. Designed by Peter Marino, the space will showcase a Jean-Michel Othoniel sculpture inspired by a pearl necklace. Exclusive pieces designed to celebrate the opening include Chanel Butterfly sunglasses ($575) and a white gold jumping-hour Monsieur Beverly Hills Edition…

As fodder for true-crime dramas, the Candy Montgomery case is hard to top: On June 13, 1980, nearly two years after Candy (played here by Elizabeth Olsen) and Allan Gore (Jesse Plemons) began their extramarital affair, she stopped in for a visit with his wife, Betty (Lily Rabe), and somehow wound up hitting her 41 times with an axe. The premise is so irresistible, in fact, that it was chronicled just last year in Hulu’s Candy — which, though certainly not Love & Death’s fault, does it few favors. Creator David E. Kelley does differentiate his miniseries with a more restrained and empathetic tone, in contrast to Candy’s sour sensationalism. But despite generous pacing and fine performances, his seven-part HBO Max show has too little light to shed on its…

Moguls Shell’s Big Fall Behind the ouster of the NBCUniversal chief p. 11 Labor Strike Watch Studio cost-cutting in focus ahead of deadline p. 12 SZA The artist nabs her first Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 with “Kill Bill,” which jumped to the top of the list after 19 weeks on the chart. Nate Silver The FiveThirtyEight data wizard is exiting ABC News and leaving his statistics website, another casualty of Disney’s layoffs. Jonathan Lisco Yellowjackets, led by the showrunner, doesn’t disappoint in its season two launch with 5.5 million cross-platform viewers, ahead of a 5 million average for its first season. Cormac and Marianne Wibberley The National Treasure feature writers weren’t able to spin up gold with a Disney+ series as the adaptation was canceled after a single-season run.…

Amid an advertising downturn, media planners will be making their more selective bets after attending the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s Newfronts this year, set for May 1-4 in New York. As executives ready their pitches, here are a few key questions for the main presenters. AMAZON It’s already an advertising powerhouse, quietly generating more than $37 billion in ad revenue last year. But most of that ad revenue was tied to its retail business, where sellers are fighting to get in front of consumers. The Newfronts are more focused on video, where Amazon’s live sports properties and Freevee free streaming service are expected to have top billing. Thursday Night Football has quickly become the most popular live-streamed programming available, and the company is betting that its video ad business has room…

Barry’s Henry Winkler and His Bundt Cakes Exit Stage Left Upholding his reputation as one of the nicest men in Hollywood, Barry star Henry Winkler has been known to bring Bundt cakes to set as a treat for cast and crew. “It’s a regular thing,” Barry star and co-creator Bill Hader revealed during a recent appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live! “He’s like, ‘Stacey [Weitzman, Winkler’s wife] and I just wanted you all to have this,’ and it’s always these very interesting cakes.” At the HBO show’s season-four premiere April 16, Winkler elaborated to THR on why he goes the extra mile. “It is my small way to say thank you to an extraordinary crew that takes such good care of you,” Winkler said, noting that the tradition started randomly during…

Weddings Ghosts star Danielle Pinnock renewed her vows with dialect coach Jack Wallace at The Oaks Lakeside in Encino on April 8. The couple wed 10 years ago in a hospital ICU after Pinnock’s mom, Joan, suffered a stroke the night before their planned ceremony. Births Jillian Davine Moss, West Coast manager of talent and entertainment at Cartier, and Jacob Moss, a business manager at Grant Tani Barish and Altman, welcomed daughter Lev Iley Moss on Dec. 28 at Providence Cedars-Sinai Tarzana Medical Center. Congrats Caroline Currier was named president of Serena Williams’ new multimedia production company, 926 Productions, on April 17. Meredith Shea was appointed the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ first chief membership, impact, and industry officer on April 17. Cassie Thornton was hired as head of intellectual property partnerships…

When Toronto Short Film Festival organizers told deaf filmmaker and artist Chella Man they couldn’t offer accommodations like ASL interpreters or captioning for deaf and hard-of-hearing attendees, he wasn’t surprised. Still, he pulled his film Why Do People Want to Be Remembered from the fest. Aptly, his film tackles the challenges faced by those who are deaf and hard-of-hearing, specifically when they have to rely on often-glitchy technology. “We want the most diverse, inclusive, pushing-the-narrative stories,” says Man of the mandate from many festivals for submissions. “But the mission statement just doesn’t reflect their action.” Earlier this year, a Sundance Film Festival jury walked out of the premiere for the Jonathan Majors-starring Magazine Dreams when it became clear that the captioning device for Dramatic Competition jury member and Academy Award-winning actress…

Thailand’s capital city of Bangkok — where Charlie Hunnam filmed much of Apple TV+’s Shantaram — feels especially buzzy of late. Earlier this year, Soho House’s first Southeast Asian outpost bowed in the pulsing Sukhumvit neighborhood, while Aman is set to open a second Thai property, Aman Nai Lert Bangkok, next year in a verdant park. Says Cher and the Loneliest Elephant documentary director Jonathan Finnigan, who’s filmed in the city, “Bangkok comes alive at night under the neon and the smoke coming up from the street vendors.” At the serene Capella Bangkok (from $650 a night), room and suite balconies offer impressive Chao Phraya River views, while the glamorous Bar Stella hosts live music after dark. Its 6,400-squarefoot Presidential Villa (from $10,200) by the river is the ultimate in…

No matter what else he felt, no matter what else was going on, above all Chris Pratt needed to keep a level head. He was Star-Lord, after all. The leader of the Guardians of the Galaxy. And James Gunn was going to need him. The week before, on July 20, 2018, Pratt and the rest of the cast were thrown into despair when Gunn, his close friend and filmmaker of the Guardians of the Galaxy movies, had been fired as director of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 after conservative personalities, rankled by his outspoken liberal views on Twitter, resurfaced decade-old tweets in which he joked about rape and pedophilia. Now Pratt was at church, looking for solace. The sermon that day involved the story of the Israelites circling the…

In the opening scene of the Apple TV+ series The Last Thing He Told Me, an adaptation of Laura Dave’s best-selling novel about a woman who teams up with her stepdaughter to track down her missing husband, Jennifer Garner’s character smashes her cellphone. Just before the screen cracks, we see the date: April 14, the exact same day that the first episode premiered. “That was a true coincidence,” says Dave, who served as executive producer. “Someone randomly chose April 17 as the day the story would start, but 17 is my bad-luck number, so I moved it up to the 11th, which made the date on the phone during that flashforward scene April 14.” It was a sign of the kismet that has blessed the show from the get-go. The…

Fatal Attraction — which wheezes back to life as a series starring Joshua Jackson and Lizzy Caplan, premiering April 30 on Paramount+ — began as the 1979 short Diversion, about a one-night stand gone haywire, which writer-director James Dearden fleshed out into a feature screenplay. With contributions from Nicholas Meyer (writer-director of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan), Paramount producers Stanley R. Jaffe and Sherry Lansing were convinced they had a viable erotic thriller on their hands. The script tells the story of Dan Gallagher (Michael Douglas), a married New York lawyer who has what he thinks is no-strings sex with Alex Forrest (Glenn Close), a publishing executive, while his wife, Beth (Anne Archer), and daughter are out of town. How wrong he is. Alex quickly becomes dangerously obsessed…

Hollywood has been cornered into a new period of fiscal austerity, with top studios adjusting to the sobering realities of streaming and the larger economic environment — even as entertainment labor unions are applying significant pressure to boost labor costs. This economizing ethos has forced adjustments big and small: Features are filming less in Los Angeles or New York; some crews are working shorter days and longer weeks; mid-budget affairs are becoming tougher to greenlight. Meanwhile, studios and streamers alike are facing down a series of union talks this spring and summer where above-the-line talent are seeking major raises — which is sure to increase entertainment companies’ operating expenses on film and TV projects. The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), representing the studios and streamers in labor…

The most expensive private suite at Crypto.com Arena might have never gotten built if it weren’t for the pandemic. The Hideaway Luxury Suite — an exclusive venue from Stadium Status, a private members club for sports and live entertainment that affords high-profile artists and musicians access to Hideaway and other premium suites around Los Angeles — is a moody, Gucci-wallpaper adorned custom suite that cost more than $2 million for the buildout. “It really was a unique opportunity that was presented to us from Crypto.com Arena. Historically, they would never allow people to customize or do anything like we did to our suite … but with the pandemic, they were sort of in distress, like all other entertainment properties, with the lack of events,” says hospitality and entertainment entrepreneur…

After working together on 2019’s Knives Out and 2022’s The Gray Man, Chris Evans and Ana de Armas debuted their third collaboration, the Apple TV+ action rom-com Ghosted, on April 18 in New York City. The duo, who play love interests in the film, were joined by director Dexter Fletcher and co-stars Amy Sedaris, Tate Donovan and Lizze Broadway. Evans told THR why he and de Armas work so well together: “Some people you just get along with. I have great working relationships with a lot of people in this town, and if you have a good one, it’s nice to run it back,” he said. “Ana and I are lucky enough to have found ways to get onscreen together again.” Meanwhile, de Armas remembered how they “clicked” when they…

It was a decidedly dolce vita evening in the Italian capital April 20 at the launch party for THR’s first European edition, THR Roma. Hundreds of guests attended the lavish soirée in the majestic Palazzo Brancaccio, in central Rome. Luminaries from the worlds of film, television and fashion converged to celebrate the kickoff, including Cinecittà CEO Nicola Maccanico; local Netflix content exec Tinny Andreatta; Piera Detassis, president of the Academy of Italian Cinema; Alessandro Michele, who recently exited his role as creative director of Gucci; The White Lotus’ Beatrice Grannò; and Italian actress Ornella Muti. “Rome embodies the history of cinema,” said THR Roma editor-in-chief Concita De Gregorio to the assembled crowd. THR Roma is a multimedia platform that includes a website and print magazine. Added Nekesa Mumbi Moody, THR’s…

I went to Vietnam in spring 2022 to film A Tourist’s Guide to Love while the country was still closed to Westerners [because of the pandemic], so it was really special. It felt like we were kind of sneaking in. I love Rachael Leigh Cook, and this is a passion project for her. She was producing and starring in it, and she reached out asking if I’d be willing to come to Vietnam for a little bit. I didn’t ask any other questions. really, really great group of people — hadn’t worked in two years. Everybody tells you before you go to Vietnam that they’re just the nicest, greatest people, but it’s still surprising to see how true that is. This movie was perfect because it was the kind of…

Valerie Perrine has a knack for cheating death. At 25, Perrine — best known for playing Miss Teschmacher, girlfriend to Gene Hackman’s Lex Luthor in 1978’s Superman — was working in Las Vegas as a topless dancer in the Lido de Paris revue at the Stardust Hotel. She met a charming guy in the lounge who said he was a hairstylist to the stars. They began dating. He invited Perrine to an intimate dinner party in L.A.’s Benedict Canyon. She found an understudy, but the understudy fell ill, and Perrine was forced to perform. The party she missed would go down in infamy: It was the one in which the Manson Family slaughtered six people, including Sharon Tate and Jay Sebring — Perrine’s new hairstylist boyfriend. Then, when she was…

The reshot ending of Adrian Lyne’s 1987 Fatal Attraction is one of the most successful blunders in Hollywood history. Sure, turning Glenn Close’s scorned Alex Forrest into a nearly unkillable slasher villain undermined what was interesting or relatable about the character. But it also made for a rousing climax that left bloodthirsty audiences cheering. It helped birth a blockbuster. The film’s conclusion was such a violation of the story’s setup and thematic substance that it’s surprising it took so long for us to get a longform reconception of Fatal Attraction. “There’s only one way for something to end,” Alex (Lizzy Caplan) asserts in the eighth and final episode of Paramount+’s new version. “There’s only one decision to make. How are you going to get to that ending?” Unfortunately, the new…