Friday, October 4, 2024
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SAG Goes Big Time for “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” Points Toward Oscar Sweep

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The SAG Awards have spoken and “Everything Everywhere All at Once” is the big winner. Best Ensemble, Actress, and Supporting Actress nods were handed the hottest awards of the night.

The SAG Awards were shown on the Netflix You Tube channel. The behavior of the audience in the ballroom was terrible: no one sat in their seats, so the look on TV was pretty amateurish. Lots of empty seats were kind of a production negative.

Will all these winners win again at the Oscars? I think the only lock is Ke Huy Quan. I still think Best Actor, Actress, and Supporting Actress could alternately go to Austin Butler, Cate Blanchett, and Angela Bassett.

It doesn’t seem like “Everything Everywhere” can lose Best Picture at the Oscars. I loved The Fabelmans but the campaign fell apart. “Tar” is too intellectual. “Top Gun Maverick” is too commercial. Only “Elvis” has a serious shot at this point, but I don’t see it.

James Hong spoke so beautifully tonight when “Everything” won. I remember him doing Jane Wyman’s bidding on “Falcon Crest” 40 — yes, forty — years ago! He’s been working for 70 years. He indicated that he doesn’t understand “EEAAO” either. But the movie has great spirit, and like “Parasite,” brings in a world of artists who’ve not had opportunities. So if it wins, we can appreciate the joyous part of that experience.

Female Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture
Angela Bassett, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
Hong Chau, The Whale
Kerry Condon, The Banshees of Inisherin
Jamie Lee Curtis, Everything Everywhere All at Once
Stephanie Hsu, Everything Everywhere All at Once

Male Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture
Paul Dano, The Fablemans
Brendan Gleeson, The Banshees of Inisherin
Barry Keoghan, The Banshees of Inisherin
Ke Huy Quan, Everything Everywhere All at Once
Eddie Redmayne, The Good Nurse

Female Actor in a Leading Role in a Motion Picture
Cate Blanchett, Tár
Viola Davis, The Woman King
Ana de Armas, Blonde
Danielle Deadwyler, Till
Michelle Yeoh, Everything Everywhere All At Once

Male Actor in a Leading Role in a Motion Picture
Austin Butler, Elvis
Colin Farrell, The Banshees of Inisherin
Brendan Fraser, The Whale
Billy Nighy, Living
Adam Sandler, The Hustle

Cast in a Motion Picture
Babylon
The Banshees of Inisherin
Everything Everywhere All at Once
The Fablemans
Women Talking

Stunt Ensemble in a Motion Picture
Avatar: The Way of the Water
The Batman
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
Top Gun: Maverick
The Woman King

Female Actor in a Television Movie or Limited Series
Emily Blunt, The English
Jessica Chastain, George & Tammy
Julie Garner, Inventing Anna
Niecy Nash-Betts, Dahmer — Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story
Amanda Seyfried, The Dropout

Male Actor in a Television Movie or Limited Series
Steve Carell, The Patient
Taron Egerton, Black Bird
Sam Elliott, 1883
Paul Walter Hauser, Black Bird
Evan Peters, Dahmer — Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story

Female Actor in a Comedy Series
Christina Applegate, Dead to Me
Rachel Brosnahan, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel
Quinta Brunson, Abbott Elementary
Jenna Ortega, Wednesday
Jean Smart, Hacks

Male Actor in a Comedy Series
Anthony Carrigan, Barry
Bill Hader, Barry
Steve Martin, Only Murders in the Building
Martin Short, Only Murders in the Building
Jeremy Allen White, The Bear

Ensemble in a Comedy Series
Abbott Elementary
Barry
The Bear
Hacks
Only Murders in the Building

Female Actor in a Drama Series
Jennifer Coolidge, The White Lotus
Elizabeth Debicki, The Crown
Julia Garner, Ozark
Laura Linney, Ozark
Zendaya, Euphoria

Male Actor in a Drama Series
Jonathan Banks, Better Call Saul
Jason Bateman, Ozark
Jeff Bridges, The Old Man
Bob Odenkirk, Better Call Saul
Adam Scott, Severance

Ensemble in a Drama Series
Better Call Saul
The Crown
Ozark
Severance
The White Lotus

Stunt Ensemble in a Television Series
Andor
The Boys
House of the Dragon
Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power
Stranger Things

UPDATING Screen Actors Guild Awards (Watch Here LIVE) 8pm Eastern

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You can watch them right here in real time streaming. Follow me on Twitter @showbiz411, too.

SAG lost its contract with NBC and made a new deal to air on Netflix beginning next year. So this year they’re streaming on Netflix’s You Tube channel (below). Sally Field will get a special lifetime achievement award, long overdue.

The SAG Best Ensemble Award often but not always predicts the Best Picture at the Oscars. It seems like “Everything Everywhere All at Once” has hijacked the awards season even though most people I talk to can’t follow it. What can you do? We’ll see if the SAG voters felt the same way.

Saving Elizabeth Banks: Director’s “Cocaine Bear” Makes More in One Weekend than Her “Charlie’s Angels” Reboot Did in Total

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Elizabeth Banks is back, and it couldn’t be nicer.

The smart, attractive actress turned director had big hits with the “Pitch Perfect” trilogy. (She produced the first one, produced and directed the second and third.)

Then came the “Charlie’s Angels” reboot in 2019. It was a total bomb. I can’t even remember who was in it. The flop made just $17.8 million in its total run, $55 million worldwide.

Suddenly, Banks the director was cold as ice. And that’s a total female director thing. Male directors can have flop after flop and keep coming back. But not women. It’s a one strike ballgame.

So now comes “Cocaine Bear.” With a $23 million opening weekend, the Bear made more in one weekend than “Charlie’s Angels” did in its whole run! Not only did this Bear resurrect Banks’s directing career, it did a lot of good for all the actors involved starting with the late Ray Liotta. It’s nice that he goes out in a hit. Plus, Alden Ehrenreich, who was unfairly treated when he starred as a young Han Solo, begins his rebound campaign.

And let’s not forget the bear himself. Last time we saw a bear he was viciously humping Leonardo DiCaprio in “The Revenant.” No one liked him. Now he’s like Gloria Swanson in Sunset Boulevard. See how you can turn things around in Hollywood?

Bravo to Elizabeth Banks! And if you want to see her act, stream a little gem called “Call Jane.” She’s terrific!

“SNL” Fail: Woody Harrelson Goes Anti-Vax, Pro Gun in Monologue, ID’s Manager For Transporting Drugs

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What fun! Woody Harrelson’s “SNL” monologue had him as pro gun and anti vax. Woody also ID’d his manager, Jeremy Plager, who was in the audience for transporting pot from California to New York.

Except for bits of “Weekend Update” and a parody of “The Whale,” the show was not funny. The opening Trump bit was surprisingly off kilter. And this was after a two week break!

Producers Guild Awards: Spielberg, Banshees, Lizzo, Others Skip the Night, (Watch) Tom Cruise Gives Dull Speech, “Everything Everywhere” Wins

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The Producers Guild Awards are droning into their fourth hour in Los Angeles.

Best Picture goes to “Everything Everywhere All at Once” like clockwork. Ridiculous, but there it is.

Many players are missing including Steven Spielberg, the “Banshees” actors, and Lizzo, who won an award.

From the pictures sent back from the ballroom, the PGA is in start contrast to the NAACP Image Awards going on at the same time. The PGA room is very white. In one picture that was posted there was one Black man sitting way in a corner. Also, a child was eating dinner at table 15. LOL.

Tom Cruise gave his usual bland speech. Tom has no anecdotes about Hollywood, and no sense of humor. His clip package is presented to the tune of “Also Sprach Zarathustra.”

Whichever movie wins Best Picture might win the Oscar and might not. Stay tuned for Sunday night’s SAG Awards, a much better indicator (but also not on TV).

Tom Cruise’s corporate speech is below. He leaves out of his many thank you’s directors Paul Thomas Anderson and Cameron Crowe, also Paul Brickman who have him his trademark hit with “Risky Business.” No one told Tom that the phrase he ends his speech with, “I am because we are,” was the title of Madonna’s self-hyping doc about Africa years ago. The movie was so much about her we called it “We Are Because I Am.”

EARLIER The PGA — not the golf group — is giving out awards in Los Angeles on a rainy night.

The Producers Guild gives two movie awards– feature film and animated. The latter was just won by “Pinocchio” and Guillermo del Toro. The feature film award won’t come for two hours. By then I will have watched “Saturday Night Live” and tried to remain awake. If “The Whale” wins, someone will spout off.

Tom Cruise will receive the David O. Selznick Award even though Jerry Bruckheimer deserves it. Cruise will give an impersonal speech recalling what movies meant to him as a child in Missouri before he was taken by a cult.

Nominees are
Avatar: The Way of Water”
“The Banshees of Inisherin”
“Black Panther: Wakanda Forever”
“Elvis”
“Everything Everywhere All At Once”
“The Fabelmans”
“Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery”
“TÁR”
“Top Gun: Maverick”
“The Whale”

Cat Stevens aka Yusuf Signs with George Harrison’s Revived Dark Horse Records, Releases Version of “Here Comes the Sun”

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George Harrison’s wife, Olivia and son, Dhani, continue to do great things his name.

They’ve revived Dark Horse Records, George’s label, moving the whole catalog including “All Things Musgt Pass,” to BMG Records. They already made a publishing deal there.

Now Dark Horse has signed Yusuf Islam, aka Cat Stevens. They’re going to re-release a bunch of Cat Stevens albums that were out of circulation. Yusuf will also make a new album. The 70s hit singer songwriter will turn 75 years young this July. He’s recorded a new version of George’s “Here Comes the Sun.” which you can hear below.

Yusuf says on Instagram:

“George Harrison was beginning to explore Eastern mysticism around the time I was hospitalised with TB, in 1968. Lying in bed, I had a lot of time on my hands and ended up reading a Buddhist book called The Secret Path. That was the beginning of my own search for the light.

“While most of my generation were just into the music, I was a bit like George, where music became the key to something much higher. Following the rages of the 60’s, his consciousness was awakened, and George transcended to levels not many people ever get to experience. You can hear it in his lyrics, and see it in the way he lived and dealt with the material world – looking for a way out.

“George was one of the first to put on a charity concert for the poor, at the time millions of Bangladeshis were fleeing from conflict and becoming refugees. It was a brave thing to do, and against all establishment rules.

“I’m happy to sing one of his songs, especially as it represents the returning of light and hope to a seriously dark and broken world.”

Review: Oh, the Horror! “Cocaine Bear” Snorts Up $8.6 Mil Opening, With an Endearing CGI Lead Star

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Box office: “Cocaine Bear” made a total of $8.6 million on Thurs previews and Friday opening. It’s shooting for a weekend opening of $20 mil plus.

“Cocaine Bear,” a Universal film which opened last night, is exactly what you think it will be. It’s a high octane paced, gore and blood, really funny ride. Universal has another genre hit on their hands, following “Violent Night” and “M3GAN.”

Much is due to the talent of director Elizabeth Banks. She directs this insane comedic thriller with a deft, savvy, sarcastic and quippy touch. “Cocaine Bear” is loosely based on a true story about a drug smuggler (a terrific Matthew Rhys in a quick cameo) who in 1985 tossed out duffel bags of cocaine out on an airplane over the Chattahoochee National Forest in Georgia. In real life the bear died of overdosing on the cocaine, but writer Jimmy Alden and Banks take liberties, to say the least, with the story.

Our She bear (yes we find out she is female in a hilarious reveal as the film goes on) is very much alive, terrifying all who cross her path in her quest for her next high while at the same time protecting her cubs. And animal lovers don’t fret. The bear is CGI and she never comes off as the ‘bad guy,’ she’s actually quite endearing.

Even though there are various plot lines weaving in and out, Banks makes sense of them all and even gets the audience invested in these mostly wacko characters. Ray Liotta — in his final movie appearance, with a lovely dedication at the end — is terrific as Syd, the St. Louis drug lord looking for the elusive white powder for which he is on the hook. The threat of death looms over Syd and his family if he does not find it. His son, Eddie (Alden Ehrenreich,) and his pal, Daveed (O’Shea Jackson Jr.), reluctantly lend hands to help on that screwed up quest. The comedic back and forth between these too goof balls are among the funniest of the film.

Meanwhile, in a different part of the forest, tweens Henry (Christian Convery) and Dee Dee (Brooklynn Prince, so memorable in “The Florida Project”) cut school and get into shenanigans that could prove deadly. Dee’s Mom, an earnest nurse (Keri Russell) follows them in to find her daughter. At the same time the flirty park ranger (played hilariously by Margo Martindale) is entertaining her boy crush wildlife inspector Peter (Jesse Tyler Ferguson with a wild wig) as well as being tough with various hoodlums.

A couple of other storylines are intertwined as well. Combine them all with various limbs being tossed in numerous weirdly funny death sequences and at 90 minutes, Banks briskly keeps the story going staying true to the outrageousness of it all. Along with pop culture references like Reagan’s war on drugs, Wikipedia facts, and cool old footage, Banks is smart and savvy enough to know what the story is and should be. The cast of this surreal comedic thriller are all terrific. “Cocaine Bear” is nothing if not entertaining, and the ludicrous funny brutality of the rollicking premise pays off in spades, or shall we say, snorts!

TV: Tonight May Be the End for Dwayne Johnson’s “Young Rock,” and ABC Cancels “The Goldbergs” After 10 Seasons

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The TV landscape is changing fast.

Tonight may be the final episode of “Young Rock.” Dwayne Johnson’s comedy about his early years has never caught on with viewers.

This is the end of season 3, which had 1.4 million average per episode. NBC owns the show so they’ve let it drift on, but by now the show is in a headlock. Johnson just thanked fans on Twitter, basically saying goodbye.

Meanwhile ABC is finally burying “The Goldbergs.” George Segal died, Jeff Garlin left, no one really knew the show was still on. But since those two events there was zero need to watch it. I guess “The Goldbergs” will rattle into syndication as a cure for insomnia. They treated Garlin very badly, Good riddance.

“SVU” Wipes the Floor with Ellen Pompeo’s “Greys” Exit by More than A Million Viewers, NBC Wins Night

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The long, long, long drawn out exit of Ellen Pompeo from ABC’s “Grey’s Anatomy” did ok but not great in fast overnight ratings from last night.

“Law & Order SVU” beat it handily, by about a million viewers. NBC and Dick Wolf won the night, too.

What’s really weird is that “Station 19,” the “Greys” spin off at 8pm, beat “Greys” slightly in total viewers.

I think fans have had enough of Pompeo and the revolving door at “Greys.” It’s had a negative effect.

Meantime, beloved Mariska Hargitay directed last night’s “SVU” in which she referenced her late mom, 60s star Jayne Mansfield. “SVU” has a devoted audience, and they wouldn’t have missed Hargitay in charge.

“SVU” did 4.89 million, “Greys”: only 3.46 million. CBS was in a rerun night because, I don’t know, we’re still in sweeps?

And get this: also beating “Greys” in total viewers last night was NBC’s finally-growing “Organized Crime.” Thanks to “SVU” and crossovers, “OG” is at last hitting its stride.

Film Critics Throw in the Towel, Wendell Pierce Stock Keeps Rising, Oscars Hire Crisis Team that Resigned from Golden Globes

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It’s been a busy week in the movie world.

Two highly regarded film critics announced that they’re stepping down or moving on to other things. A.O. “Tony” Scott, my favorite New York Times film reviewer, is joining the New York Times Book Review as their lead guy. No more daily movie reviews in the Times. This is very sad. Tony was the absolutely clearest Times reviewer who more often than not “got it.” I will miss, and I’ll bet filmmakers who counted on his intelligence will, too…Meantime, Alfonso Duralde of The Wrap is ankling his post to finish a book. He promises something “big” after that. Who knows? Maybe he’ll take Tony’s place at the Times next fall…

Wendell Pierce is just coming off an acclaimed run on Broadway as Willy Loman in “Death of a Salesman.” He should win a Tony for his work. Tomorrow at the NAACP Image Awards, Pierce is up for Outstanding Actor in a Television Movie, Limited-Series, and Dramatic Special in the No Equal Entertainment production of “Don’t Hang Up.” In “Don’t Hang Up,” Pierce plays Chris Daniels, a man who receives a call that his daughter has been kidnapped. The kidnappers demand that he completes a series of different missions to get her back, including one crucial direction to not hang up the phone….

Last year, pr maven Ken Sunshine, whose firm is Sunshine Sachs et al, gave up representing the Hollywood Foreign Press Association when the Golden Globes became mired in scandal. Last week the Motion Picture Academy announced it had hired a “crisis” team for the Oscars in case anything like last year’s Will Smith slap might happen. It’s unlikely, but just in case it seems like Sunshine Sachs Morgan & Lylis is on the game. They’re the right people to have in line. The Oscars are ready! But probably putting the nominees back in theater seats, and not at tables (as they were last year) will minimize the possibilities of people wandering about…