Innholdsfortegnelse for June 19, 2024 i The Hollywood Reporter

Will Smith The star strikes while the iron is hot after his Bad Boys sequel reignites the box office, booking another Sony star vehicle, Resistor, based on the novel Influx. Will Lewis In a sign of discontent within The Washington Post over its incoming publisher’s strategy, owner Jeff Bezos sends a note to staff to shore up support for the beleaguered newsman. Robert Gibbs David Zaslav has found his new comms chief after the exit of Nathaniel Brown. The former Obama administration official will start at Warner Bros. Discovery on Aug. 5. Bill Rouhana The CEO of Chicken Soup for the Soul, and owner of the Redbox kiosk, clears out his entire board of directors, another turbulent moment for the embattled company. Showbiz Stocks $8.35 (+5.7%) LIONSGATE (LGF.A) Steve Mnuchin…

On the face of it, the June 12 reveal that Sony was buying Alamo Drafthouse Cinemas seemed like a significant step toward Hollywood studios once again owning movie theaters. After all, the rise of Tinseltown was possible only because most of the major studios owned the cinemas as well, allowing them more favorable terms with distribution. But that came to an end in 1948 when the U.S. Department of Justice issued the Paramount Decrees, which forced studios to divest of theaters because of antitrust concerns. Game over, or at least mostly. (Over the years, some exemptions were granted.) In 2000, the Paramount Decrees were rescinded, but studios aren’t busting down the door trying to buy up movie chains. They don’t need to now; they can get all the screens they…

A four-game sweep is never good for TV ratings in the NBA Finals. ABC and ESPN avoided that this year — barely — thanks to a Dallas Mavericks blowout of the Boston Celtics in Game 4 of the Finals on June 14. The Celtics’ June 17 win gave the franchise its record-setting 18th NBA title and ABC/ESPN its second straight five-game Finals — and second straight missed chance at the bigger audiences that six- and seven-game series nearly always bring. This year’s matchup ended with the fifth-smallest audience (11.31 million viewers) for an NBA Finals since Nielsen began keeping regular total-viewer stats in the late ’80s. Two of the four Finals that rank below it also happened in the past four years. Yet despite the decline in audience in recent…

Hollywood is a haven for hybrids, but what about an art space/boutique/newsstand? Wait, didn’t newsstands go the way of the dodo? Not completely. A decades-old newsstand at 8224 Sunset Blvd. has been resurrected as the Kiosk-o-thèque by one Arman Naféei, very much a hybrid himself. The Berlin-born former DJ founded the podcast Are We On Air? after moving to L.A. in 2016, and has hosted such guests as Patti Smith and designer Jonathan Anderson. Opened earlier this year, the Kiosk-o-thèque is “my 250-square-foot blank canvas,” says Naféei. “One day I just walked in, asked to rent it.” With an in-house team, he curates events and merchandise, including books, vintage magazines, vinyl, candles, even candy. The kiosk opened with a fashion-focused art show of Kodak Instamatics. In April, buzzy photographer Nadia…

Launched in 2022, The Hollywood Reporter’s annual New York Power Broker Awards, presented by luxury real estate publicity company The Society Group, bestow honors on the biggest sellers and savviest marketers in NYC and the Hamptons. In addition to revealing the 2024 Team of the Year and the Philanthropic Impact Award winner, THR is also sharing nominees in six categories. Winners will be announced in July. The Power Broker Awards are chosen by THR editors and are based on sales numbers, media presence, and the prestige of properties listed and sold. TEAM OF THE YEAR WINNER Compass’ Hudson Advisory Group, which did $752 million in deals between April 15, 2023, and April 15, 2024. PHILANTHROPIST IMPACT AWARD WINNER Corcoran Group’s Cathy Franklin, for her longtime support of the Breast Cancer…

IN JANUARY OF 2022, JON HAMM STARRED IN a commercial titled “Everyone But Jon Hamm.” The minute-long spot, for Apple TV+, played off the idea that everyone in the industry seemed to have a television show but him. When the concept was first pitched, Hamm hesitated. “I was like, ‘There’s a version of this that could go terribly wrong — just thirsty and weird,’” he says. But he knew the director and trusted that he’d strike the right tone. So, they moved forward: Hamm, on the couch, scrolling through a carousel of familiar faces with projects on the platform. “Samuel L. Jackson, Billie Eilish, Tom Holland, Chris Evans. What about Jon Hamm?” he says, to the camera. “Jen and Reese, no Jon? Feels like a missed opportunity.” Now, two and…

In 2019, Leslye Headland, fresh off two Emmy noms as co-creator of Russian Doll, was walking the blue carpet at the Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker premiere when she was asked if she had any Star Wars ideas of her own. Headland responded that she’s had Star Wars stories in mind since childhood and, in an Oscar-worthy performance, urged Lucasfilm boss Kathleen Kennedy to give her a shot. Well, the truth is that she was already hard at work on what would later be known as Star Wars: The Acolyte, becoming the first openly queer person to create a live-action project set in a galaxy far, far away. Headland ensured that the LGBTQ+ community was well represented on her new Disney+ series. She envisioned The Hate U Give star…

I came of age in my personal and professional life at a time when AIDS, that other pandemic, also came of age. Those were scary times. Almost everyone I knew during my coming out process is no longer here. I had an internship in public relations at Warner Bros. while in college, and after I graduated from USC, I got an opportunity to live and work in Russia, where you couldn’t and wouldn’t talk about your sexuality, and you never asked anybody about theirs because of the threat of capital punishment. I went about my business and shut off that part of my brain until I came back to Los Angeles to work for a dear friend, the late Nanci Ryder, who was the most gay-friendly person on the planet.…

Six months ago, a deal to sell Paramount Global (or at least control of the company via Shari Redstone’s National Amusements) seemed all but certain. Deep conversations were happening with a consortium led by David Ellison’s Skydance and Gerry Cardinale’s RedBird; a partnership between Sony Pictures and Apollo emerged as a possible spoiler; even Warner Bros. Discovery kicked the tires over a holiday meal between CEOs David Zaslav and Bob Bakish. According to a source familiar with the talks, Redstone’s request for a “majority of the minority” vote, in which other Class A shareholders could vote to approve or nix the deal, was a nonstarter for Skydance, and the studio was anticipating a regulatory review of more than a year, which gave Redstone pause. Skydance had secured approval from Paramount’s…

Marvel Studios keeps trying to unsheathe Blade, but the vampire thriller is stuck in its scabbard. The latest setback occurred in recent weeks when the feature lost director Yann Demange, the second helmer to exit the project. Some sources say both sides grew frustrated by Blade’s prolonged development process. Star Mahershala Ali is also said to be increasingly frustrated. Ali, who has been attached to the project since 2019, handpicked Demange after the project lost director Bassam Tariq in September 2022. At the time, Blade was in preproduction and about two months from principal photography, but Marvel came to believe that Tariq was not the best fit for the project, according to sources. Marvel then presented Ali with a list of directors for consideration, but Ali conducted his own search…

Weddings Casey McDonald, senior manager of global corporate communications at Mattel, married Taylor Drake, an associate at landscape architecture firm Pamela Burton & Co., on June 1 at B.R. Cohn Winery in the Sonoma Valley. The couple met in New York City in 2015. Congrats Amanda Baker-Lane was named global head of diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility at Amazon MGM Studios, Prime Video and Freevee on June 11. Bob Roback was hired as COO of UTA on June 12. Jennifer Koester was promoted to president and COO of Sphere Entertainment on June 12, and Carolyn Blackwood was named head of Sphere Studios on June 13. The Academy Museum elected Olivier de Givenchy to chair, Eric Esrailian to vice chair and Patricia Bellinger Balzer to secretary of its board of trustees…

Theater’s Biggest Night Ariana DeBose returned to host the Tony Awards for the third time — this year from the David H. Koch Theater at Lincoln Center — in a ceremony that saw stars Sarah Paulson (Appropriate), Jonathan Groff (Merrily We Roll Along), Daniel Radcliffe (Merrily We Roll Along) and Jeremy Strong (An Enemy of the People) take home their first honors. Among the night’s top awards, The Outsiders was named best musical and Merrily We Roll Along won for best revival of a musical, while Stereophonic was named best play and Appropriate won for best revival of a play. “In the most trying of times, art is imperative” DeBose told the audience. “The collective experience can cross boundaries and unite people.”…

The six comedians who gathered for THR’s first Stand-Up Emmy Roundtable insist they don’t worry about their comedy being fact-checked in this moment. Sure, the sextet — Mike Birbiglia, Alex Edelman, Jacqueline Novak, Jenny Slate, Taylor Tomlinson and Ramy Youssef — read The New Yorker profile of Hasan Minhaj from last September that said he exaggerated or made up stories for effect in his specials. But several present suggest the hullabaloo was at best confusing and at worst absurd. “It speaks to a massive integrity void in our society that we look at entertainers and stand-ups the way that we do,” says Youssef. “A politician talks, and the [common person] is like, ‘Yeah, he’s probably lying,’ and then they’re like, ‘But this comedian!’” The hourlong conversation at The Georgian Hotel…

BABY REINDEER (NETFLIX) What makes this show addictive is also what makes it disturbing, devastating and occasionally funny: its brutal honesty. Richard Gadd’s account of stalking and abuse spares no one, least of all his semi-autobiographical stand-in. But it also finds empathy for imperfect victims and troubled perpetrators alike — the latter played by Jessica Gunning with ferocious commitment. — ANGIE HAN EXTRAORDINARY (HULU) In a TV landscape teeming with super-powered folks, this series stands out — and not just because its protagonist, Jen (Máiréad Tyers), is the rare adult in her universe without a special ability. Really a quarter-life coming-of-age comedy in genre packaging, the second season digs even deeper into its characters’ psyches to explore themes as relatable as sexuality and loss. — A.H. FANTASMAS (HBO) A show…

The Savannah College of Art and Design is again bringing a generous helping of Southern hospitality to France’s Luberon Valley for the SCAD Lacoste Film Festival, which runs June 27 to 29. Now in its third year, the fest was conceived as a top-up highlight for college students doing their semester abroad at SCAD’s sumptuous campus in Lacoste, an inexcusably picturesque medieval village in the heart of Provence. “[SCAD founder and president] Paula Wallace always wants to make sure our students have access to the best of everything,” says Christina Routhier, executive director of SCAD Theaters and Festivals. “The focus [at SCAD Lacoste] is on film majors: acting, directing, production, costume design. So it was a perfect fit to bring in a film festival.” The event is a complement to…

Embarrassed? Hardly. Sad and fearful? No way. Joyous? Absolutely. That was the vibe on the morning of June 17 when Disney Entertainment co-chairman Alan Bergman cracked open the champagne to toast those who had worked on the making and marketing of Inside Out 2, which is the year’s first box office blockbuster. “It’s been a while since we did this,” says one person attending the celebration on Disney’s Burbank lot, in reference to rough times for the once-invincible Pixar, where Pete Docter also arranged a toast. For its part, Pixar delivered a film that has won over both critics and audiences in continuing the story of Riley, who is now 13 and must contend with a new crew of emotions invading her head in addition to the old standbys, led…

How Brad Could Bump Into Angelina in Venice Running into an ex at a party can be awkward. But imagine if the party is the Venice Film Festival and the exes are Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. That potentially incendiary meet-cute could well happen, as both are starring in films that seem to be probable contenders in Italy. Pitt’s movie, Wolfs, doesn’t sound much like festival fodder — it’s a buddy comedy about rival crime-scene “fixers” who are both called to remove the same dead body, directed by the guy who made Spider-Man: Far From Home, Jon Watts — except that Pitt’s buddy in the film is George Clooney, a part-time Italiano who gets lots of love in Venice. Jolie, meanwhile, is starring in Maria, a drama about opera singer…

No matter what’s in the crystal ball for the remainder of 2024 — “the election always brings uncertainty into the equation,” says Douglas Elliman star Fredrik Eklund — one thing is clear: New York’s power sellers again made their marks over the past year. Despite high interest rates, inflation and competition with South Florida, Manhattan continued to see jaw-dropping sales at towers like 220 Central Park South and the Central Park Tower, where Elliman’s Eklund | Gomes team just closed a condo for $115 million. For 2024’s list of the top agents in NYC and the Hamptons — which includes THR’s New York Team of the Year, Compass’ Hudson Advisory Group — The Hollywood Reporter not only crunched total sales numbers but also scoured public records for celebrity listings and…

In the making since 2019, Page Hurwitz’s new Netflix documentary, Outstanding: A Comedy Revolution, taps a throng of queer notables — from Wanda Sykes, Rosie O’Donnell and Lily Tomlin to Joel Kim Booster, Fortune Feimster and Bob the Drag Queen — to show how LGBTQ funny people have left their mark and challenged others’ perceptions for more than a century. “None of these comedians set out to change the world. They set out to make people laugh,” Hurwitz said at the film’s Tribeca Festival premiere ahead of its June 18 streaming debut. “And along the way, they did change the culture and, I think, they changed the world.” Featuring an intergenerational and diverse cast, the documentary — set against the backdrop of the Netflix Is a Joke Fest’s Stand Out:…

Valorie Curry has played a lot of characters over the years with whom she had almost nothing in common — a murderous cult member in Fox’s The Following, a paramedic who moonlights for the mob in Amazon’s The Tick, a cryptid researcher in 2016’s Blair Witch sequel — but few have been quite as starkly antithetical to Curry’s personal beliefs as Firecracker. Firecracker, the latest mutant to join Amazon’s superhero satire The Boys in its new fourth season, is politically divisive, with extremist and often hateful opinions on everything from vaccines and CIA conspiracies to the LGBTQIA community. Curry, who identifies as a lesbian — she first came out as pansexual on Instagram in 2019, during National Coming Out Day — should have been repelled by Firecracker. But her reaction…

On a brisk April afternoon in the East Village, Griffin Dunne steps through a portal to his past. He has hustled up the stairs of a tenement too old for elevators despite its gentrified gleam. The hallways are narrow but clean and the doors look modern, new — until we arrive at the apartment we’re seeking. Layers of chipped paint speak of the passage of decades. The threshold is uneven — an entry to an era of slanting wooden floors, fire escape patios and bathrooms the size of tiny closets. Inside, hats of fantastic shapes and sizes dot the blue walls, and everywhere there are books and flyers about Blondie, the Pyramid Club, Candy Darling, David Wojnarowicz, etc. Here is the habitat of a performance artist, impeccably preserved for decades…

CHALLENGERS Smart, seductive and bristling with sexual tension, this is Luca Guadagnino’s most purely pleasurable film to date. As dynamic as the many tennis matches it depicts, the love-triangle drama pits the rivalry on the court of two former BFFs against their competing desire for a self-possessed woman whose hunger to win is not diminished by an injury that cuts short her own career. It helps that the chemistry of stars Zendaya, Josh O’Connor and Mike Faist is off the charts. — DAVID ROONEY LA CHIMERA Italian filmmaker Alice Rohrwacher’s invigoratingly strange and lyrical film revolves around a fascinating pocket community: the tombaroli, illegal grave-robbers who dig up Etruscan relics and make their money selling those antiquities to fences, who in turn sell them to museums and collectors for vastly…

Tuition-free” is becoming the new buzzword, as several of the world’s top drama schools plan to adopt that policy starting this fall, including the graduate programs at Juilliard and USC. These join a number of existing free programs on The Hollywood Reporter’s annual list of the best drama schools, as they look to expand accessibility and mitigate the debt many drama students bring into continuing education. It’s a big positive step in a year when many schools have been emerging from the pandemic era of largely online classes and leaning into more inclusive, tech-forward curriculums. In addition to broadening access to more diverse candidates and wanting to stay competitive with recruitment, the push to go tuition-free at USC was spurred on by the writers and actors strikes. “Just knowing how…