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Six Hollywood Casting Directors Receive Death Threats

Roger Friedman
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Six Hollywood Casting Directors Receive Death Threats

http://tinyurl.com/3x6bt2a

Backstage, the theatrical publication, reports today that six Hollywood casting directors received death threats on November 7th.

It’s unclear whether the death threats have any connection at all to the murder early Tuesday morning in Beverly Hills of beloved publicist Ronni Chasen.

The report says that five casting directors, all at studios, received the death threats by phone. Their union rep was immediately notified, and he put out a industry wide notice immediately asking for any other instances. A sixth casting director reported a similar threat. The local police were informed immediately.

Memorials for Chasen are being organized right now. One occurred last night at the Four Seasons hotel in West Hollywood. Another is being planned for tonight in New York.

“Love And Other Drugs” Director Says Pfizer Had No Say About Movie

Roger Friedman
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2
“Love And Other Drugs” Director Says Pfizer Had No Say About Movie

Ed Zwick‘s romantic dramacom, “Love and Other Drugs,” which opens November 24th, pokes fun at Pfizer and other big pharmaceutical companies.

The sexy film, based on former Pfizer salesman Jamie Reidy‘s memoir as a Viagra rep, is unsparing. It uses the Pfizer logo, and has constant references to drugs like Viagra, Zoloft, and Prozac.

Jake Gyllenhaal plays Jamie Randall, the randy, promiscuous salesman who became a star by selling Viagra when it was new. Mixed in with Jamie bedding many women, and finally falling for Anne Hathaway, is an insiders’ look at how Big Pharma woos doctors and convinces them to push their brands over others.

At first, I thought Pfizer must be in on this. How else would they allow their logo, name, and brands to stamped all over a major motion picture?

But Zwick said last night that he’s had no contact with Pfizer or anyone else. “This is not a product placement. But the Fox lawyers told us to go ahead.”

The whole prescription drug culture is lampooned. A homeless man starts eating Prozac samples and is soon all cleaned up. He even gets a job interview. There’s lot of popping of Viagra, especially for orgies and three way sex–Jake’s Jamie gets it on with two beauties. He also winds up in the emergency room when his Viagra-induced erection goes well beyond four hours.

Ouch!

Reidy, you should know, left Pfizer and went to work for Eli Lilly. They fired him the day “Hard Sell: The Evolution of a Viagra Salesman,” was published.

Update: The Beatles $149 Box Set In ITunes Top 10, Along with 3 Other Albums

Roger Friedman
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Update: The Beatles $149 Box Set In ITunes Top 10, Along with 3 Other Albums

UPDATE November 17th, 4:45pm: the box set is now number 10, and “Abbey Road,” “Sgt. Pepper” and “the White Album” are also in the ITunes Top 10. Success? Oh yes.

The Beatles have been on ITunes for less than 24 hours and this is where they stand already.

On the singles charts, the Fab Four haven’t cracked the top 20, but they’re all over the place otherwise.

22-“Here Comes the Sun,” 29-“Let It Be,” 31-“In My Life,” 36-“Blackbird,” 40-“Come Together,” and 59 “Hey Jude.”

Things are considerably better on the album charts, where the ITunes Number 12 download is the $149 Beatles Box Set.

The other Beatles albums to chart right away are:

6- “Abbey Road,” 8-“The White Album,” 9-“Sgt. Pepper,” 15-“1967-70 (Blue album),” 18-“1962-66 (red album),” 19-“Rubber Soul,” 20-“Magical Mystery Tour,” 21- “Revolver,” and 25 – “Let it Be.”

So yeah, essentially, it was a good plan.

More later…

Anne Hathaway to Co Host Nobel Peace Concert Next Month

Roger Friedman
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Anne Hathaway to Co Host Nobel Peace Concert Next Month

Oscar nominee Anne Hathaway has been chosen to join Denzel Washington in presenting the Nobel concert in Oslo next month. Musical performers include Elvis Costello and Herbie Hancock.

Hathaway is having quite a year. It was only last week that she was depicted in the tabloids as running out, teary-eyed, from her own birthday dinner with her family.

“What?” her father, Jerry Hathaway, a respected New York attorney, said when he heard that for the first time last night at the premiere of “Love and Other Drugs.”

“We had a very nice birthday,” he insisted. He doesn’t read the rags, so he had no idea what we were talking about.

Anne chimed in, wearing a Valentino dress and drinking non alcoholic beer. “I was jet lagged, I got up from the table to answer my phone. I guess I wasn’t smiling enough!” she said, forcing a facetious smile.

Then she told her dad about presenting the Nobel prize.

Hathaway is in town to promote “Love and Other Drugs” with co-star Jake Gyllenhaal. She’s also hosting “Saturday Night Live” this weekend. Will she sing? “We’re about to find out,” she said, heading to the rehearsal from the after party at Rouge Tomate.

Considering she’s quite a bit exposed in “Love…”, Hathaway remains unaffected, chipper and gracious as always. She met everyone last night, signed everything.

In the movie, she plays Maggie, a young woman with onset Parkinson’s Disease who is determined not to let it interfere with her life. She instead has a rousing sexual affair with Gyllenhaal that turns into love. It’s like a 2010 version of Erich Segal’s original “Love Story.”

This time, the tag line could read: Love means not having to keep your clothes on.

Indeed, Gyllenhaal and Hathaway are not shy. One 15 year old girl at the party, daughter of a guest, said the movie was “a little racy.” Oh yes. But Ed Zwick is a consummate director who knows how to make this kind of film and these people come alive. After all he and partner Marshall Herskovitz created “thirtysomething” and “Once and Again.” Zwick has put a sophisticated high gloss coating on this story, and kept it several cuts above the usual three hanky chick flick. Alas, every woman in the Directors Guild Theater was crying her eyes out at the end of “Love…”

PS The film has a great soundtrack put together, ‘natch, by Randall Poster. Among the gems: the Kinks‘ “A Well Respected Man” perfectly cued up to one of Jake’s entrances.

Ronni Chasen, One of the “Good Guys,” Murdered

Roger Friedman
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Ronni Chasen, One of the “Good Guys,” Murdered

In the last couple of hours all I’ve done is listen to people on the phone crying. Our friend–everyone’s friend–Hollywood publicist Ronni Chasen was brutally murdered last night in Beverly Hills. It seems like it was a car jacking but there are a lot of questions. She was shot, according to the police, five times in her Mercedes at the corner of Sunset and Whittier. If you don’t know the area, that corner at 12 midnight is desolate. It’s really the suburbs. Ronni was on her way home from the “Burlesque” premiere in Hollywood.

The shocking part of it is that Ronni was one of those rare people in Hollywood who everyone liked and admired, and many loved. She was so hard working, and so earnest, and loved what she did who she represented. The last few years at her own agency, Ronni and her associate Jeff Sanderson did a wonderful job promoting the composers of soundtracks for films. This year, she was also working with Michael Douglas and on a couple of films for Best Picture. But mainly she was busy touting the likes of Alexandre Desplat or Hans Zimmer. They’d never gotten so much attention before Ronni got to them.

What’s happened is a tragedy and a shock. We all accept random violence when we see it on the news. But when it’s one of your own, it’s unfathomable. Ronni, your family has endured a great loss. But your other family has too. You will be sorely missed.

Pictured: that’s Ronni in between Dev Patel and Freida Pinto, from working on “Slumdog Millionaire.” Jeff Sanderson is at left.

Paul McCartney to Play Sirius Show at the Apollo Theater

Roger Friedman
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1
Paul McCartney to Play Sirius Show at the Apollo Theater

Leave it to Paul McCartney. He’s upstaged the Beatles-I Tunes announcement. McCartney is going to play the famed Apollo Theater in Harlem on December 13th.

The show is part of a big promo push through Sirius satellite radio for his “Band on the Run” reissue. It’s also to celebrate Sirius’s 20 millionth subscriber.

McCartney at the Apollo? Jeez. That is going to be one historic show.

More info at www.sirius.com. Congrats to Sirius’s Scott Greenstein and Steve Leeds. And to the Apollo. Wow.

Beatles-on-ITunes: Pffftt– So What As It Turns Out

Roger Friedman
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0
Beatles-on-ITunes: Pffftt– So What As It Turns Out

Call it the biggest non event of the week.

After billing its big Beatle announcement as a huge event, Apple blew it. Missing their 10am deadline by seven minutes, the faux Applers (the Beatles had Apple first, y’know) just put up a picture of the group and a display of the albums.

Not even music playing in the background: baby you’re a rich man, too.

Someone should tell the copywriters for ITunes that under “Influencers” (is that a word?), they are missing the songwriting team the Beatles admired most. When Lennon and McCartney came here, they said they wanted to be like Carole King and Gerry Goffin.

Under “Followers” they’re missing Aimee Mann, Todd Rundgren, XTC, Squeeze and Klaatu. At the very least. It would also be nice to have links out to Billy Preston, the Fifth Beatle and only artist to be credited on a Beatles record. And maybe a link to Badfinger and the new Apple Records remasters.

Also, ironically, you can find more and better information just posted on www.beatles.com including news of a special video just made available from the group’s 1964 show at the Washington Coliseum. No mention of it on the ITunes page. And that just means that Jeff Jones of the Beatles’ Apple was better prepared than Steve Jobs’s Apple.

UPDATE: For some reason, you can get a lot more info on www.apple.com. It’s just going to www.itunes.com where little is posted. Weird.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Premiere: “Is this the Ninth Movie or What?”

Roger Friedman
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2
Harry Potter and the Deathly Premiere: “Is this the Ninth Movie or What?”

Ah yes: the premiere for “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part One.”

Rude security, nasty publicists. Cast and director kept far from people who are even at the premiere. Warner’s even hired off duty NYPD to help them in the theater. This, my friends, was a first.

Security team using night goggles in Alice Tully Hall to see if invited guests–like Matthew Broderick and Sarah Jessica Parker, maybe?– are illegally recording the movie for pirating.

Hollywood comes to New York. Better to see exiting Warner’s chief Alan Horn, who’s done a great job and will be missed when he steps aside.

Few actual celebs at the premiere other than the Brodericks, who brought 8 year old son James. And Rob Thomas of matchbox twenty with beautiful wife Marisol.

From the movie: Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, and Emma Watson. And Ralph Fiennes.

The Warners people seated all the Time Warner magazine people they could find, even editors-in-chief, in Siberia. Near the ‘regular’ press peeps, like yours truly.

Of course, celebs were spread thin as pate last night around Manhattan with a dozen different big events. “Harry Potter” was obviously not a priority.

The movie itself: very very dark, long, and kind of discombobulated. “Harry Potter” fans will love it, of course. Does it make sense? Who knows? Lots of great special effects.  Great snakes, if you’re into that. Great big ones. Also, Daniel Radcliffe, fresh from a year naked in “Equus,” takes his shirt off a couple of times. There’s some odd, icky pseudo sexual references. The movie has an overall creepy quality.

I must confess, I am no “Harry Potter” expert. But did Dobby the elf always look and sound so much like Gollum from “Lord of the Rings”? He sure does now. Wow.

Best line of the night: Matthew Broderick said: “I wish they’d start with ‘Previously on Harry Potter’ just to catch us up.”

Second best line, from another guest: “Is this the ninth one or what?” No, it was the seventh. One more to go.

Beatles Record Label, EMI, Calls for a 10AM Company Meeting–In Time for I Tunes Announcement

Roger Friedman
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1
Beatles Record Label, EMI, Calls for a 10AM Company Meeting–In Time for I Tunes Announcement

EMI, the Beatles’ beleaguered record label, has called for a company wide meeting Tuesday morning at 10am Eastern Time.

That’s the same time that Steve Jobs will take a stage–in California, at 7am–to announce that Apple has finally secured the Beatles catalog for ITunes and downloading.

What they said would never happen is about to occur. Maybe hell has frozen over.

The long tug of war between the Beatles and EMI regarding downloading would be ended then, as well. In the background of this game, it was EMI unwilling to bow to the Beatles on pricing that made downloading an obstacle.

But so much has changed in the last week. EMI is in a free fall, with Terra Firma losing their case with Citigroup. The latter triumphed, and Terra Firma is now in peril of having to sell EMI to Warner Music, let Citigroup take them over, or somehow raise the money to soldier on. It’s doubtful that the Beatles would have just allowed themselves to become a free floating pawn in the game. It’s possible that the downloading issue, long on the table, finally came in to play.

There were signs all day. Apple worded its sign on the ITunes front page with two Paul McCartney song titles: “Another Day” and “Tomorrow.”

Apple also is making the announcement at 7am PST, so that London press can be accomodated before deadlines at 3pm. It wouldn’t be too much of a surprise to see Paul, Ringo, Olivia Harrison and Yoko Ono on the stage with Steve Jobs.

Will it be a big deal after all this? Yes. Even though Beatles CDs are ubiquitous, and songs have been uploaded into MP3 players and IPods for years, the portability and immediacy of being able to download songs will really be huge. It can only be hoped by purists that albums like “Abbey Road” and “Sergeant Pepper” will be available as albums only. But sadly, that’s unlikely.

Mel Gibson Jokes, Etc At Clint Eastwood Museum of Tolerance Dinner

Roger Friedman
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4
Mel Gibson Jokes, Etc At Clint Eastwood Museum of Tolerance Dinner

A Clint Eastwood tribute at the Museum of Tolerance in Beverly Hills? Leah Sydney reports from LA for us: You know there’s going to be a Mel Gibson joke.

It came early in the evening from master of ceremonies George Lopez. “Tonight we’re honoring a true Hollywood Icon Clint Eastwood-the roles he has chosen as an actor, the loner trying to do right,  the underdog. As a director he’s chosen films about personal struggles, freedom and dignity.  So it is fitting that you are being honored tonight.  By the way I was a little disappointed that the construction on the Mel Gibson wing has stopped.”

He added: “This is an amazing organization. Latinos have a Museum of Tolerance in Arizona.  Nobody goes.  You have to jump a wall to get in.”

Everyone was in on the act, from Rabbi Marvin Hier to Arnold Schwarzenegger to Eli Wallach. (Clint’s lovely wife Dina, pictured with her husband.) It was all to kick off the Museum’s first film festival, called MOTIFF.

Rabbi Hier told the intimate VIP crowd.  “The clergy loves Clint Eastwood for righting those who have been wronged and forgotten and for confronting the purveyors of darkness with his unique of  his own Miranda rights, “Go Ahead, Make My Day.”

Eli Wallach–who’s almost 95 and had just received his Lifetime Achievement award from the Academy the night before-  handed Clint a birthday card..which he opened up –and the theme of the Good Bad and The Ugly played. Wallach then later told the story that:

“I spent a night once in bed with Clint Eastwood.  I know it sounds strange, but when we were filming it-we went to Spain. The hotels were full, so we stayed in Clint’s friends apartment.  There was one room, so Clint asked, Which side do you want to sleep on?  Me , being an old radical, said “I’ll take the left side.”

Arnold Schwarzenegger said: “I love this guy.  Ever since I was in Austria as a kid watching his movies.  I know He doesn’t like to admit that he’s a few years older than I am .  But he was an inspiration to me to come here to America.  To be an actor and a leading man who would be in action movies.  I would not have done The Terminator if he had not paved the way for great action movies. If he wouldn’t have    ‘Make My Day’ and all those kind of lines. It made me follow with ‘I’ll Be Back’ and those kind of lines. He’s an extraordinary director and actor.  Between the two of us we have five Oscars. They’re all his..but who’s counting? This guy is just a legend and bigger than life.”

Then Clint Eastwood spoke:

“On the way down here, somebody cut us [Clint and his wife Dina] off in traffic. He pulled around in front and he gave me the finger.  So I  rolled down my window  and started to yell.  My wife said Clint, you’re getting a Tolerance Award.”

After the laughter died down, Clint continued:

“Hey, his cat might have died in the morning.  I realized, whenever you have an argument in traffic or something, you never know if someone is coming from a funeral or something. It’s food for thought. You don’t have all the facts ever.

“I want to thank Eli,  but Eli, the bed was not that narrow.

Revisiting all those film clips is a great novelty for me. I’m 80 now, I wouldn’t normally admit that except that Eli is here.  That makes me feel young.  He’s saying Oh to be 80 again and I’m saying oh to be 70 again.  It’s all relative.  “

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