It’s a day that ends in ‘y’ so why not?
Donald Trump is on the prowl, looking to be jailed in contempt of court. In his latest post he calls Judge Arthur Engoron “crazy,” “nutjob,” and “unhinged.”
Trump also calls NY AG Letitia James
“racist.”
Trump is most scared of Engoron calling daughter Ivanka — who recently partied with the Kardashians — as a witness. Maybe Ivanka can use Kim Kardashian as her lawyer.
Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour movie may be slowing down. Could it mean not hearing the singer’s name as much?
Nah.
Eras Tour made $4.8 million Friday night, down 54% from last Friday. That brings the total to $139.8 million. It could cross $150 million over the weekend, but that won’t happen until Tuesday, when Halloween screenings will only cost $13.13 in a promotion.
Is the movie really slowing down? A little. Will it hit $200 million? Eventually. Box office will now be doubly fueled by the release of Swift’s re-made “1989” album, which is projected to sell at 200K copies at least by Thursday night. Her albums and singles are all over the charts and will be until someone in the music biz develops other artists or releases new music.
Dame Judi Dench, one of the last great people anywhere, is publishing a book about Shakespeare next April. I guess it’s out in the UK already because she went on a chat show and stopped time reciting a little Bard.
This is just a gift for the weekend.
Shakespeare’s Sonnet 29, When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes
Judi Dench was on Graham Norton last night to push her new book about her life and work with Shakespeare. After making the point we quote Shakespeare daily without knowing it, this happened: pic.twitter.com/CIhP39b4Bs
— Justin Sherin (@wychstreet) October 27, 2023
When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,
Desiring this man’s art and that man’s scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,
(Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven’s gate;
For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.
The Rolling Stones should be very pleased.
“Hackney Diamonds,” their first album of new material, finished in 4th place for its debut. Total came to 91,000, over-performing early estimates by 15,000.
Number 1 was Blink-182, followed by Drake, and Bad Bunny. The latter was on “SNL,” which goosed sales a little.
The Stones did great considering they have almost no radio play at all. Classic rock stations will only play the group’s greatest hits. Top 40 has been sacrificed to mediocrity. It’s actually amazing that next week all non top 40 stations owned by I Heart Radio will play the Beatles’ new record. A lot of money went into that promotion. How weird would it be if radio refused to play the Beatles?
The Stones at number 3 beat Morgan Wallen, Taylor Swift, and other contemporary acts.
Almost all of the Stones sales came from CD, LP, and downloads. Very little streaming. Stones fans want that record in their hands!
Who knew Rob Morrow could sing Frank Sinatra’s “Summer Wind”? And very well?
We found last night when Rob — star of “Northern Exposure,” the cunning judge who helps Paul Giamatti on “Billions” — crooned the late Jennifer Estess‘s favorite song to a room full of heavy hitting donors and celebrity friends at Project ALS‘s 25th anniversary.
The party at Jazz at Lincoln Center was in memory of Jennifer, founder of Naked Angels Theater group, and in tribute to living HerALS survivors who came on stage and performed a skit that was kind of amazing — even though they were in wheelchairs or using computers to speak.
Jennifer — a dynamo, if you knew her — was diagnosed with ALS in 1998. She was 35. Her doctors told her to “max out her credit cards and eat junk food.” (This is similar to what the great Nancy Davis’s doctors told her when she was diagnosed with MS. So she also started another huge charity for that, Race to Erase MS.)
Jennifer’s amazing sisters, Valerie and Meredith, have run Project ALS since she died, and in the process sound like trained medical professionals the way they have studied this horrible disease. Under them, Project ALS has raised $125 million for research and has funded therapies and medications where none existed before. The whole thing is extraordinary.
Ben Stiller — who knew Jennifer, as I did, back in the day — proved to be a charming emcee for the night with Christine Taylor. Funny and gracious, they reminded me of Ben’s parents, Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara. Julianna Margulies spoke from the heart, and the audience included Katie Couric, writer-actor Geoffrey Nauffts, Nancy and Andrew Jarecki, Michael Berman — who with John Kennedy Jr. helped Jennifer launch Naked Angels– and his famous decorator wife Victoria Hagan, plus Broadway stars Andy Karl and his wife Orfeh. I also ran into Jonathan Burkhart, another old Jennifer friend, producer of the event, and co-founder and president of the Nantucket Film Festival
You’d have thunk that Project ALS was just a vanity deal when it started. But you didn’t know Jennifer or her sisters. They’ve turned this foundation into one of the most important sources of funding for this deadly condition, and helped families cope with impossible situations. The stories we heard last night were about survival and hope. One family contributed $100,000 from the stage despite experiencing their own loss. Others testified to surviving and maintaining thanks to doctors and programs they’ve met through Project ALS.
Put this group on your end of year donations.
PS Why Rob Morrow singing “Summer Wind”? It was Jennifer’s favorite song, of course. She had great taste! (Also, Rob was there with Naked Angels 25 years ago, along with Marisa Tomei, Fisher Stevens, and so many more!)
We won’t get to see “Magazine Dreams” this Oscar season.
That’s just as well, frankly. I saw it in January and really didn’t care for it. Now no one else will see it either.
The reason is that star Jonathan Majors faces a domestic abuse trial next month. Four charges are pending against him on November 29th in New York. After many delays. the judge in the case has cleared the way.
The irony of “Magazine Dreams” is that it’s an intense film about a violent body builder who’s several lightbulbs short of a chandelier. The movie is grim and unpleasant and would never been an Oscar contender under any circumstances. Majors would probably have gotten a nomination from the Indie Spirit Awards.
Disney has a real problem with Majors. They’re very tied up with him beyond “Magazine Dreams.” He’s set to play the villain in the new “Avengers” movies from Marvel, which will be filmed when the SAG strike is over. But it’s unlikely that will happen, either, even if Majors is acquitted (which is too bad). So the “Avengers” movies — which would generate hundreds of millions of dollars — are just magazine dreams themselves at this point.
Last night Taylor Swift’s “Eras Tour” concert film returned to theaters after three days off for homework and Girl Scouts meetings.
The film dropped 56% from the previous Thursday for a total of $2.6 million.
Winning the top spot was “Five Night at Freddy’s,” which took in a whopping $10.3 million.
The weekend looks scary for both movies, although Swifties will still go to theaters even as the novelty has worn off.
But Taylor has plans for Halloween. “Eras Tour” will play Tuesday night for $13.13 per ticket for everyone. It’s the reverse of “31” and Swift’s favorite number, as well. Fans are encouraged to dress up as their favorite “Era,” which means I’ll be wearing clothes from way before Swift was born (if that’s what it means).
Meantime, Taylor Swift has nine of the top 10 songs on iTunes right now. She also has 13 slots between number 21 and 50. Maybe she should just have her own chart at this point!
Taylor is also selling a $70 polyester sweater on her site. Limit 10 to a customer!
“Billions” is over. The series finale dropped at midnight on the Showtime app. It will run on Sunday for one last night.
“Billions” was always the best written and acted show on TV. Long before “Succession,” the drama wittily revolved around greed and the approval seeking of a son with his father. But Showtime did nothing for it despite several Emmy worthy performances every year.
In the last couple of years, “Billions” survived the pandemic, and also the write out of a main character — Bobby Axelrod — when actor Damian Lewis’s actress wife Helen McRory fought a brave battle with cancer. Lewis went back to the UK and Bobby was written out.
This season more than any other “Billions” became a kind of meta riff on itself. In previous years. characters made arcane references to cultural totems, quoting movies, citing strange historical events that would send the viewer to Google search mid- sentence. But this season, everyone was doing it, and it could have been a drinking game.
But this weekend’s finale is different. The artifice is gone as Brian Koppelman and David Levien wrap up a bravura series. All the loose ends are tied up very satisfyingly. The show has come full circle. Some people move on.; Some return to their old patterns with renewed vigor. The door is left open for “Trillions” or “Zillions” or whatever Paramount has in mind.
It’s funny that Paramount-Showtime would even want a continuation. In the seven seasons, they produced nary an Emmy nomination for Paul Giamatti, Damian Lewis, Maggie Siff, or David Costabile. I once asked a Showtime chief why this was, and he replied that maybe no one at the network liked someone involved with the show. I was speechless.
Anyway. the finale ends on the right note as everyone gets what they want. I was thrilled to see a whole scene play out at Joe Junior’s coffee shop on Third Avenue — even though the real Joe Junior’s on Sixth Avenue is gone. “Billions” was always as fun as “Mad Men,” moving around to various watering holes in town (even the Corner Bistro is shown in the finale).
Maybe “Billions” will have a second life, like “Suits.” I sure hope so. I will miss these people a lot, especially Taylor, played by Asia Kate Dixon. I remember when a casting call went for a non binary actor to play this part. Dixon soared in the role. I look forward to seeing them turn up in the sequels. And Jeffrey DeMunn– he needs a special SAG Award for MVP in a drama.
The New York Times boast all the news that’s fit to print. That news used to be written by humans.
But it looks like the Times is going let bots do their journalism. They’re looking for “a senior editor to lead the newsroom’s efforts to ambitiously and responsibly make use of generative artificial intelligence.”
I’m not kidding. How the mighty have fallen. It’s on their job listings.
Have we reached the end of civilization now?
“This editor will be responsible for ensuring that The Times is a leader in GenAI innovation and its applications for journalism. They will lead our efforts to use GenAI tools in reader-facing ways as well as internally in the newsroom. To do so, they will shape the vision for how we approach this technology and will serve as the newsroom’s leading voice on its opportunity as well as its limits and risks. “
Here are the qualifications for this job, which pays between $180,000 and $200,000:
Specific responsibilities include:
Basic Qualifications
Preferred Qualifications
Hundreds of actors have signed a letter saying they’d rather continue the SAG AFTRA strike over getting a raw deal from the studios.
Negotiations resume today. The studios’ PR let it out that they could walk away and resume in January if they can’t nail down a deal. Sources yesterday said there was “cautious optimism” about settling in the next few days.
What’s on the table if no deal is reached, and the two sides don’t talk again until January? There are massive repercussions.
The biggest disaster would be no TV shows for the rest of the 2023-24 season. Pilot season begins in February of every year. If the strike isn’t settled until January, all planning will be aimed toward a relaunch in September.
More immediately: the Emmy Awards have still not happened for last season. They’re scheduled for January 15th. The Critics Choice Awards are set for the 14th. The Golden Globes in some form are planned for January 7th. They are major marketing tools for the studios, all of them. They would be scuttled if the strike were still on. The studios can’t afford that.
Last night I ran into a number of SAG members at the Project ALS charity dinner in New York. The words “cautious optimism” hung in the air over the crowd. But no one is ready to “cave in.”