Month: November 2021

CAA has signed documentary filmmakers Rintu Thomas and Sushmit Ghosh, directors of “Writing With Fire,” which won an audience award and special jury award at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival, and was just nominated for best feature honors by the International Documentary Assn. CAA will also represent Black Ticket Films, the social justice-focused production company

Fast-growing Korean conglomerate CJ ENM, the distributor of “Parasite,” is in talks to acquire the majority of Endeavor Content in a deal valued between $900 million and $1 billion. CJ ENM came in with most attractive bid for 80% of the production-distribution unit out of a wide field of financial and strategic suitors, a source

Annabella Sciorra has been set to star in “Fresh Kills,” an upcoming feature film set in the world of organized crime. Jennifer Esposito is writing and directing the film, marking her feature directorial debut. She will also act in “Fresh Kills” alongside Sciorra. Inspired by Esposito’s upbringing in Staten Island, “Fresh Kills” tells the suspenseful

Hailee Steinfeld and Jeremy Renner brought some holiday cheer to Hollywood Blvd. on Wednesday night for the launch of their new Disney plus series “Hawkeye.” The dress code for the event was “Marvel holiday chic” and guests were certainly feeling festive, with fans rocking a mix of Christmas sweaters and Santa hats as well as

Brett Morgen, the freewheeling director behind “Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck,” “Jane” and “The Kid Stays in the Picture,” is finalizing a top-secret David Bowie project based on thousands of hours of rare performance footage of the musician, most of it previously uncirculated, sources confirm to Variety. Morgen has been at work on the Bowie

Jurnee Smollett has landed the female lead in “The Burial,” a new courtroom drama from Amazon Studios. The “Lovecraft Country” actor will star opposite Jamie Foxx and Tommy Lee Jones in the Maggie Betts-directed project. Based on a true story, the film follows a bankrupt funeral home owner who decides to sue a rival businessman

Ryan Reynolds and Will Ferrell’s upcoming movie “Spirited,” a musical rendition of the Charles Dickens classic “A Christmas Carol,” will feature all-new songs from Benj Pasek and Justin Paul. Three rising songwriters, Sukari Jones, Khiyon Hursey and Mark Sonnenblick, will write the tunes with Pasek and Paul, the duo behind “La La Land,” “Dear Evan

Among its many surprising pieces of entertainment history arcana, the Variety Archives contain stories from the 1930s involving an arena sadly familiar to business managers: government seizures of entertainers’ assets. But these seizures took place not because of any financial malfeasance, but because the artists were Jewish. As early as 1933, Variety was reporting on

Netflix’s “Don’t Look Up,” the last shoe to drop this awards season, was unspooled before a crowd of BAFTA voters at the Harmony Gold Theatre on Wednesday night. In attendance for a Q&A with the Oscar-winning stars Leonardo DiCaprio (“The Revenant”), Jennifer Lawrence (“Silver Linings Playbook”) and Meryl Streep (“Kramer vs. Kramer,” “Sophie’s Choice” and

Actress Kristen Stewart delivers the performance of her career in Pablo Larraín’s “Spencer,” which has thrust her to the forefront of the best actress conversation. But when asked about her thoughts about possibly nabbing her first nom, she bluntly, albeit sarcastically, tells Variety‘s Awards Circuit Podcast, “I don’t give a shit.” Adds Stewart: “The Oscars

“Bohemian Rhapsody” grossed more than $900 million at the global box office, but the screenwriter says he has not seen a penny of net proceeds, because he was told the film actually lost $51 million. Anthony McCarten, a London-based novelist and playwright who also wrote the scripts for “Darkest Hour” and “The Theory of Everything,”