Universal Pictures has named Ashley Momtaheni and Kendel White as vice presidents of global communications. Momtaheni and White are based in Los Angeles and report to Evan Langweiler, head of global communications. The pair start their new roles this week. Their hiring comes as the Universal Filmed Entertainment Group restructures its communications department. Longtime executive
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Beijing’s city government reviewed a new anti-drug bill tightening oversight of celebrity drug use on Wednesday, the country’s latest attempt to codify its unspoken practice of banning entertainers with drug history. The bill was discussed at a meeting of the Standing Committee of the municipal People’s Congress, the city’s top legislative body. China’s congresses are
Even without today’s well-timed announcement that Pete Davidson would be playing Joey Ramone in an upcoming biopic, the 20th anniversary of his death would not have gone unnoted. April 15 stands out as Tax Day to many (even though in 2021, that doomy occasion won’t occur until May), but for some, it looms even larger
The untitled spinoff of “The Boys” at Amazon has added Reina Hardesty to its growing cast. Hardesty joins previously announced cast members Shane Paul McGhie, Maddie Phillips, and Aimee Carrero, Jaz Sinclair and Lizze Broadway, all of whom will play young superheroes. Set at America’s only college exclusively for young adult superheroes (and run by
“House of the Dragon,” the “Game of Thrones” prequel series currently in the works at HBO, has added Fabien Frankel to its cast. “House of the Dragon” is set a few hundred years prior to the events of “Game of Thrones” and tells the story of House Targaryen and the Targaryen civil war that became
Jennifer Breslow, most recently a content executive at Netflix, is joining Legendary Television as its executive vice president of TV and digital media. “Jennifer’s proven track record of identifying, developing and creating world class storytelling for global audiences makes her the ideal candidate to join Legendary as we continue to scale our television and digital
The new president of ABC News won’t start until May, but she already has a critical assignment: The top producer of ABC’s “Good Morning America” is leaving the show, Michael Corn, an ABC News veteran who worked alongside Diane Sawyer at “World News Tonight” and who has managed “GMA” since 2014, has left the company
Oscar-nominated filmmaker Ryan Coogler, producer Zinzi Coogler and writer and producer Sev Ohanian have teamed with Oscar- and Grammy-winning composer Ludwig Göransson, Senior VP of Marketing at RCA Records Archie Davis and Emmy-winning filmmaker Peter Nicks to launch Proximity, a new multimedia company. “It has been a great joy to form Proximity with some of
The Fyre Festival has reached a settlement with 277 ticketholders from the famously disastrous 2017 concert-that-never-happened, with each recipient being awarded $7,220 payouts. The settlement between the ticketholders and the trustee of Fyre festival assets was filed in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in the Southern District of New York on Tuesday; the news was first reported
The longest awards season in modern history is finally coming to a close with the opening of Oscar voting for the Academy’s roughly 10,000 members. The feeling among industry professionals and awards strategists is that many in the Academy at large decided to bow out of the first round of nomination voting. With a smaller
“Minari” is filmmaker Lee Isaac Chung’s semi-autobiographical tale of a Korean American family starting a new life in 1980s Arkansas. The characters — Jacob played by Steven Yeun, Monica played by Yeri Han and Soonja played by Yuh-Jung Youn — live in a small mobile home on an isolated patch of land, in the hope
Cartoon Network Studios debuted a new iteration of its animated shorts program, Cartoon Cartoons, its first dedicated shorts initiative in over a decade that will look to showcase diverse stories, discover new creative voices and mentor the next generation of animators. The program’s predecessor, an animated incubator, began in 1995 as World Premiere Toons, and
Zach “ZHC” Hsieh, a popular YouTube creator and artist, has been tapped as the host for Season 2 of YouTube’s “Instant Influencer” competition series, which promises one up-and-coming artist a $100,000 cash prize. Last month YouTube confirmed that James Charles, the beauty vlogger who hosted the first season of “Instant Influencer,” would not return to
“NCIS,” “Bull,” “SWAT,” “Blue Bloods” and “Magnum P.I.” have all been renewed at CBS. The network made the announcement on Thursday on Twitter. That will mean a Season 19 for “NCIS,” Season 6 for “Bull,” Season 5 for “SWAT,” Season 12 for “Blue Bloods” and Season 4 for “Magnum P.I.” All four shows are produced
“We have to cleans the balls,” a publicist warned “Big Shot” actor Cricket Wampler. “Don’t touch the balls.” The arrivals line at the 150-car drive-in premiere of the new Disney Plus series “Big Shot” on Wednesday night included racks of basketballs, but as Wampler grabbed one to show off her dribbling skills, she was told
Discovery Plus, the cable programmer’s fledgling nonfiction streaming service, is available on Amazon Prime Video Channels in the U.S. — although for now, Prime members are able to sign up only for the higher-priced version with no ads. Discovery Plus launched Jan. 4 in the U.S. on most devices and services, including Amazon Fire TV
SPOILER ALERT: Do not read if you have not yet watched “Let’s Meet,” the first season finale of “Made For Love,” streaming now on HBO Max. For seven-and-a-half episodes Hazel Green (Cristin Milioti) was on the run from her controlling tech-gazillionaire husband Byron Gogol (Billy Magnussen), but in the final moments of the first season
It won’t have the bowls of shrimp or free drinks, but TV’s annual week of upfront presentations will look a little more like its pre-pandemic norm. NBCU intends to kick off the industry’s usual week of presentations May 17 with a virtual event that will feature looks at scripted and unscripted originals, sports, news, and
Lame humor and incoherent plotting are among the shortcomings of “The Rookies,” an initially engaging but increasingly tedious Chinese action-comedy-thriller that not even kick-ass movie queen Milla Jovovich can breathe much life into. Undemanding genre fans might go for this Budapest-set hodge-podge about rookie secret agents tackling a deranged billionaire, but there’s not much here
Editor Barry Alexander Brown had completed his film “The War at Home” and had returned to Atlanta to research a project when he was first introduced to Spike Lee through a mutual friend. At the time, Lee was at New York University working on a cable TV project. The year was 1981, and later, Brown
It’s finally (almost) here! After an unusually long season, voting for the 93rd Annual Academy Awards opens April 15, closing on April 20. The winners will then be announced at a unique ceremony held across the globe on April 25. All the speculation about how the length of the season and pandemic viewing may have
Sarah and Emily Kunstler have spent their lives immersed in the civil rights movement, first as the daughters of “The Trial of the Chicago 7” attorney William Kunstler, and then forging their own careers crafting documentaries on criminal justice. But when filmmaker and lawyer Sarah Kunstler heard a speech by ACLU attorney Jeffery Robinson at
Academy Award-nominated documentary “Hunger Ward” paints an intimate portrait of the children in Yemen suffering from starvation and malnourishment as a result of war-induced famine. The United Nations World Food Programme estimates about 400,000 could die this year without urgent intervention, which is what director Skye Fitzerald hopes to catalyze with the film. Overcoming a
Pete Davidson is gearing up to portray punk rock pioneer Joey Ramone in the upcoming biopic “I Slept With Joey Ramone” for Netflix and STXfilms. The announcement comes on the 20th anniversary of Ramone’s death. The biopic will chronicle the life and times of the legendary musician — born Jeffrey Ross Hyman in 1951 —
Gwen Stefani isn’t one to celebrate anniversaries. “I don’t really pay attention to that stuff,” Stefani tells Variety. “I know some people live by it, birthdays and all that, but it’s just not something I care about.” But as “Don’t Speak” — No Doubt’s biggest hit, from their third album, “Tragic Kingdom” — turns 25
Independent music venues have been crushed by the pandemic, and last week’s breakdown of the Small Business Administration’s website has only delayed the $16 billion in federal relief they’re scheduled to receive. But they have received some financial aid from friends in high places, including Spotify, YouTube Music, and now Mick Jagger. The Rolling Stones
In a leadership shakeup, Tencent Music Entertainment Group has announced that Zhu (“Ross”) Liang has been appointed as the company’s new CEO, with Cussion Kar Shun Pang moving over to executive chairman of the company’s board of directors. According to the announcement, as CEO, Liang’s primary responsibility will be to oversee TME’s QQ Music, Kugou Music, Kuwo
Early on in “Vanquish,” Ruby Rose as Morgan Freeman’s improbable housekeeper is very awkwardly chopping some vegetable — the awkwardness providing a rare plausible moment, as Rose seems an even less likely maker-of-dinner than she does slayer-of-many-criminal-goons. If she’d kept slicing that carrot or whatever for the remaining 90 minutes here, the results would have
Franco-Egyptian filmmaker Namir Abdel Messeeh (“The Virgin, the Copts and Me”) has teamed with Paris-based production outfit Les Films d’Ici for his next feature, the autobiographical hybrid-doc “Life After Siham.” Building on themes he developed in his award-winning 2011 doc “The Virgin, the Copts and Me,” a self-reflexive exploration of family and identity that played
The 48th annual Annie Awards, celebrating the best in animation, are taking place on Friday, April 16 at 7 p.m. PST. The ceremony — often a predictor for which film will win the best animated feature category at the Oscars — honors winners in 36 different animation-related categories, including independent feature, production design, effects animation,