Month: February 2024

Foundation

Just one week after it was announced that Foundation would resume filming after some issues involving budgetary and production concerns, the Apple TV+ sci-fi series has hit yet another snag, as co-creator David S. Goyer is stepping down from showrunner duties for the third season.

While Goyer will still be “creatively involved”, his position is being relegated to executive producer Bill Bost, although Goyer himself will still receive credit on Foundation. This may reasonably raise concerns for those who have been loyal to Foundation, as such a shakeup may point to even more significant behind-the-scenes problems, especially since it had previously been revealed that Goyer wouldn’t be directing any episodes of the third season, having helmed three episodes of the show’s first 20. One could possibly begin to deduce that these mounting issues may see even less involvement from Goyer, whose screenwriting credits include writing Batman Begins, Man of Steel and Terminator: Dark Fate. Could we possibly see Goyer removing himself entirely from the show?

One of the key problems currently surrounding the third season of Foundation – which will resume production in Prague next month – involves the ever-growing budgets, with The Hollywood Reporter noting, “Sources say Goyer and executives at the show’s production company, Skydance, clashed over the budget for the upcoming season.” Numbers-wise, the first season of Foundation cost around $45 million.

This is all quite a bit unfortunate, since Goyer had expressed so much excitement for the third season, stating, “I’m thrilled Apple has given us the opportunity to continue chronicling Asimov’s pioneering galactic saga…This time, the stakes for Foundation and Empire are even higher as the Mule takes center stage, along with fan-favorites Bayta, Toran, Ebling, and Magnifico Giganticus.”

Foundation has only garnered more attention and praise since debuting in 2021, with its second season holding a 100% critics score on Rotten Tomatoes, while the audience score sits at a strong 78%. Both numbers are well above the first season, which sits at 72% and 65%, respectively. While our own critic Alex Maidy gave both seasons a 7/10, he did say the writing for the sophomore outing was a noticeable improvement over the debut.

Are you concerned about David S. Goyer stepping away from showrunner duties on Foundation? How do you expect the third season to compare to the first two? Give us your thoughts below!

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Voyager

Star Trek will soon boldly go – again – where no man has gone before…OK, so many a man has been to Miami, but have they done so out of their sheer love for Star Trek? To celebrate the 30th anniversary of Voyager, Royal Caribbean is launching Star Trek: The Cruise VIII, which will give fans an immersive experience that will, yes, make them a voyager.

Next year, Voyager fans can board Royal Caribbean’s Explorer of the Seas – which had its maiden voyage in 2000, the year before the Star Trek series went off the air – to celebrate the series. And there will be plenty for them to do aboard the cruise ship, aside from making a mess of the buffets. According to the cruise’s official website, there will be a variety of shows, Q&A sessions, panels, trivia sessions, parties, theme nights, interactive events, and much more.

Those who grab a ticket for the cruise will have opportunities to meet a number of Star Trek: Voyager cast members, including Kate Mulgrew, Jeri Ryan, Jonathan Frakes, Robert Beltran, Robert Picardo, and Roxann Dawson, in addition to various guest speakers.

The Voyager cruise sails out of Miami, Florida before heading to Costa Maya, Cozumel and Belize City, before then heading back to Florida, with three days at sea in between. It will run from February 23rd to 2nd, 2025, with prices ranging from $1,950 to $10,200 per person.

As per the official website, “Star Trek: The Cruise is the ultimate immersive Star Trek experience. This 7-day voyage brings an unforgettable Star Trek experience that will transwarp you to another galaxy of entertainment! Mingle with your favorite stars and experience a vibrant community where everyone is welcome, and the fun never stops! Brace yourself for an interstellar journey unlike any other this side of the Delta Quadrant!”

Accordion to Chris Hearing, partner and executive director of Theme Cruises, “We’ve been planning our Voyager celebration for quite some time and are thrilled to share the news with Star Trek fans…It will be a truly special experience for our guests to see so many of Voyager’s crew members on Star Trek: The Cruise VIII.”

With that, we can’t help but remember the words of Harry Kim, whose portrayer, Garrett Kim, will be on board: “Maybe it’s not the destination that matters, maybe it’s the journey, and if that journey takes a little longer, so we can do something we all believe in, I can’t think of any place I’d rather be or any people I’d rather be with.” Oh, and there are waterslides!

You can currently stream Star Trek: Voyager on Paramount+.

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SAG Awards

The winners for this year’s SAG Awards have been unveiled, with Oppenheimer taking the guild’s top honor in the film category, while Cillian Murphy, Lily Gladstone, Robert Downey Jr. and Da’Vine Joy Randolph all earned individual statues, putting each as the definitive frontrunner at the Academy Awards next month. On the television front, Succession and The Bear took home their respective ensemble awards. Going into the ceremony, Barbie and Oppenheimer led movies with four nominations apiece, while HBO’s Succession landed five.

Check out the full list of winners from the SAG Awards below:

Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture

American Fiction

Barbie

The Color Purple

Killers of the Flower Moon

Oppenheimer – WINNER

Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role

Annette Bening – Nyad

Lily Gladstone – Killers of the Flower Moon – WINNER

Carey Mulligan – Maestro

Margot Robbie – Barbie

Emma Stone – Poor Things

Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role

Bradley Cooper – Maestro

Colman Domingo – Rustin

Paul Giamatti – The Holdovers

Cillian Murphy – Oppenheimer – WINNER

Jeffrey Wright – American Fiction

Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role

Emily Blunt – Oppenheimer

Danielle Brooks – The Color Purple

Penelope Cruz – Ferrari

Jodie Foster – Nyad

Da’Vine Joy Randolph – The Holdovers – WINNER

Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role

Sterling K. Brown – American Fiction

Willem Dafoe – Poor Things

Robert De Niro – Killers of the Flower Moon

Robert Downey Jr. – Oppenheimer – WINNER

Ryan Gosling – Barbie

Outstanding Action Performance by a Stunt Ensemble in a Motion Picture

Barbie

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny

John Wick: Chapter 4

Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One – WINNER

Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series

The Crown

The Guilded Age

The Last of Us

The Morning Show

Succession – WINNER

Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series

Brian Cox – Succession

Billy Crudup – The Morning Show

Kieran Culkin – Succession

Matthew Macfadyen – Succession

Pedro Pascal – The Last of Us – WINNER

Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series

Jennifer Aniston – The Morning Show

Elizabeth Debicki – The Crown – WINNER

Bella Ramsey – The Last of Us

Keri Russell – The Diplomat

Sarah Snook – Succession

Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Television Movie or Limited Series

Uzo Aduba – Painkiller

Kathryn Hahn – Tiny Beautiful Things

Brie Larson – Lessons in Chemistry

Be Powley – A Small Light

Ali Wong – Beef – WINNER

Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Television Movie or Limited Series

Matt Bomer – Fellow Travelers

Jon Hamm – Fargo

David Oyelowo – Lawmen: Bass Reeves

Tony Shalhoub – Mr. Monk’s Last Case: A Monk Movie

Steven Yeun – Beef – WINNER

Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series

Abbott Elementary

Barry

The Bear – WINNER

Only Murders in the Building

Ted Lasso

Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series

Alex Borstein – The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel

Rachel Brosnahan – The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel

Quinta Brunson – Abbott Elementary

Ayo Edebiri – The Bear – WINNER

Hannah Waddingham – Ted Lasso

Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series

Brett Goldstein – Ted Lasso

Bill Hader – Barry

Ebon Moss-Bachrach – The Bear

Jason Sudeikis – Ted Lasso

Jeremy Allen White – The Bear – WINNER

Outstanding Action Performance by a Stunt Ensemble in a Television Series

Ahsoka

Barry

Beef

The Last of Us – WINNER

The Mandalorian

As actors make up the highest percentage of voting AMPAS members, the SAG Awards tend to be a strong indicator of that season’s winners. In addition to these winners, Barbra Streisand was honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award. SAG-AFTRA made its biggest headlines last year during its 118-day strike, which, paired with the WGA’s, put Hollywood at a standstill.

What do you think of the SAG Award winners? Will the four core acting categories match up at the Oscars next month?

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splitting heirs

While two of Monty Python’s most famous former members, Eric Idle and John Cleese, are embroiled in a very public feud, it wasn’t always this way. In recent weeks, Idle has been vocal about how he feels the Monty Python estate is being handled, with him targeting Terry Gilliam and his daughter, Holly, who manages the rights, directly. John Cleese jumped to their aid, writing on X (perhaps in a tongue-in-cheek way) that (referring to Idle) “we always loathed and despised each other, but it’s only recently that the truth has begun to emerge.” 

Now, this might need to be taken with a grain of salt, as Cleese has a notoriously dry wit. Let’s not forget that he eulogized his best friend, Graham Chapman, by saying, “Good riddance to him, the freeloading bastard! I hope he fries.” That was lovingly tongue-in-cheek, although Idle and Cleese always seemed to have a frostier relationship than the others. But, it wasn’t always so, with Idle and Cleese once making a non-Python movie together called Splitting Heirs, that’s been somewhat lost to time.

That 1993 film was Idle’s attempt to break into the American market as a solo comedy star, similar to how Cleese had with A Fish Called Wanda. Indeed, Idle had a minor hit in 1990 with the memorably titled Nuns on the Run, but Splitting Heirs was to be more ambitious. It paired him with Rick Moranis, who was coming off the Honey I Shrunk the Kids movies at the time and was about two babies that got switched at birth. Rick Moranis is an American who finds out he’s a long-lost heir to a family of British aristocrats, but his best pal, who shares the same birthday as him, becomes convinced that he is, in fact, the heir. The friend – you guessed it – is played by Idle. 

In the film, Idle tries to recover his presumed birthright through a series of schemes, but he gets into trouble when he consults with a shady lawyer, played by John Cleese, who believes he wants Moranis dead – which is not so. The film is an amusingly old-fashioned romp, but it likely seemed dated in 1993 in a way A Fish Called Wanda had not, and it died quickly at the box office. It’s mostly known for being one of Catherine Zeta-Jones’s first movies, with the twenty-three-year-old actress being the girl both Idle and Moranis are fighting over.  One of the strangest things in the movie is that Idle is playing a character at least twenty years younger than he was at the time (he was fifty when this was made and is playing a guy in his late twenties- early thirties) and not too convincingly. One might say the whole movie is a tad ego-driven, with Idle’s two love interests being played by two of the sexiest twentysomethings in England at the time (Zeta-Jones and Sadie Frost), but then again Cleese got to romance Jamie Lee Curtis in A Fish Called Wanda, so who cares?

But again, the most notable thing is that Cleese co-stars (in a glorified but extended cameo), in a solo movie made by the one guy everyone assumed was his biggest rival. It’s interesting to see them work together in a non-Python film, and I imagine Cleese had a decent enough time making it, as he hired this film’s director, Robert Young, to make his Wanda follow-up, Fierce Creatures.

Indeed, it’s sad to see Idle and Cleese at odds, as both men are in their eighties, and one always likes to assume that by the time we reach that milestone, we’re beyond petty things such as money. Alas, that’s rarely the case, isn’t it?

If you want to see Splitting Heirs, you can buy it here, but at the moment, it’s not streaming anywhere. 

Have you ever seen this rather obscure romp? Let us know in the comments. 

The post Splitting Heirs: Before they were feuding, John Cleese and Eric Idle made an obscure 90s comedy appeared first on JoBlo.

barbie, greta gerwig, margot robbie
Greta Gerwig arrives at a photo call for “Barbie,” Sunday, June 25, 2023, at the Four Seasons Hotel in Los Angeles. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP)

When the Academy Award nominations were announced last month, much of the discussion focused on two so-called “snubs” for Barbie: Greta Gerwig for Best Director and Margot Robbie for Best Actress. Both seemed like locks, since Barbie was one of the biggest films of the year and had been generating awards buzz for months. Added to that, both Gerwig and Robbie would be nominated by their respective guilds, an odds-on sign that they would work their way into Oscar nods. And while plenty have chimed in on the Barbie “snubs”, now Gerwig herself has weighed in, championing her lead.

Speaking with Time, Gerwig said that she was rooting for a Best Actress nomination for Margot Robbie, who added far more dimension to Barbie than we could she ever expected. “Of course I wanted it for Margot…But I’m just happy we all get to be there together.” And there will be plenty of other nominees in attendance, as Barbie is up for eight Oscars.

And while Gerwig may not have sealed a Best Director nod for Barbie, she is nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay, something even she noticed has gone under the radar. “A friend’s mom said to me, ‘I can’t believe you didn’t get nominated,’…I said, ‘But I did. I got an Oscar nomination.’ She was like, ‘Oh, that’s wonderful for you!’ I was like, ‘I know!’” Also garnering few headlines is Robbie’s nomination for producing the Best Picture nominee. And so while Gerwig and Robbie may have brought the most attention by being “snubbed” in the categories they’re more associated with, that they are still each nominated is no ignorable feat.

As far as how the DGA nominations compared to its Oscar equivalent, Christopher Nolan, Yorgos Lanthimos and Martin Scorsese overlapped, while Barbie‘s Gerwig and The Holdover‘s Alexander Payne were edged out by Justine Triet and Jonathan Glazer for Anatomy of a Fall and The Zone of Interest, respectively. Looking at the SAG nominees, it’s apparent that Anatomy of a Fall’s Sandra Hüller snuck in instead of Robbie.

Christopher Nolan won the DGA Award earlier this month, further solidifying him as the favorite for the Best Director Oscar. This weekend will see SAG awarding either Lily Gladstone or Emma Stone with Best Actress, giving the victor a stronger shot at the Oscar. Regarding the WGA, Gerwig and Noah Baumbach are up for Best Original Screenplay, while AMPAS placed them in the Adapted Screenplay category.

Do you think either Greta Gerwig or Margot Robbie has the slightest chance of taking home gold for their Oscar-nominated parts on Barbie?

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