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The city of Verona is about to be filled with pop music this summer with the release of Juliet & Romeo, and yes, you read those names in the right order. A new spin on William Shakespeare's legendary tale of love and tragedy is coming soon from director Timothy Scott Bogart, taking direct inspiration from the same 1301 tale that spurred the Bard to craft the most famous lovers in all of fiction. It'll see Juliet and her Romeo, played by Black Mirror's Clara Rugaard and The Last Supper's Jamie Ward, respectively, not just defying the long-standing feud between the Montagues and the Capulets but the very conventions of Shakespeare's timeless story. As part of Collider's Exclusive Preview event for summer movies, we can share the official trailer for the musical film along with a conversation with the director, teasing the star-crossed romance ahead.

From the very beginning of the trailer,...

"The greatest love story of all time, set to the greatest music of our time." That's one of the hooks for the upcoming Romeo and Juliet adaptation from Briarcliff Entertainment, Juliet & Romeo. Briarcliff has set May 9, 2025 (Mother’s Day weekend) as the release date for this bold reimagining of arguably William Shakespeare's most popular play. Joining Briarcliff in bringing this visionary film to the big screen are global independent music powerhouses Lakeshore Records and Broadway Records, in partnership with Hero Entertainment and Rainmaker Films. The synopsis for the film, which seems to be part of a proposed trilogy, reads as follows:

"Set in 1301 at the end of Medieval times, theJuliet & Romeofranchise finds our most famous Star-Crossed lovers turning the tides on the history Shakespeare based his own story on, as they reveal the truth to the very future of the Empire. But the biggest twist in this most beloved of tales,...

Zoe Saldaña's latest movie, Emilia Perez, is a musical crime film that breaks new ground and has received 13 Academy Award nominations. As unique as it is polarizing, Emilia Perez is a reminder that Zoe Saldaña has been in movies with plenty of music and dance before. One of the most underrated movies of 2000, Center Stage, included a talented cast of dancers, including Saldaña, vying for a coveted position with the American Ballet Academy. Saldana played Eva Rodrigez, a gifted ballet dancer with a bad attitude, in her break-out role.

Fans of Saldaña and Emilia Perez will find Center Stage to be as captivating as it is fun. Saldaña is feisty as ever and showcases her diverse performance abilities in Center Stage in a way that makes it a must-see nostalgic classic.

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Nearly three decades after former high school outcasts Romy and Michele attended their 10-year high school reunion, a sequel to the 1997 movie Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion is moving forward at 20th Century Studios. The original film, which is Certified Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, starred Mira Sorvino and Lisa Kudrow as Romy White and Michele Weinberger. The titular duo are in talks to reprise their roles in the sequel.

Oscar-winner Sorvino and Emmy-winner Kudrow will also serve as executive producers on the Romy and Michele sequel, which is set to be directed by Tim Federle (High School Musical: The Musical: The Series). Sources told The Hollywood Reporter that the movie is expected to start filming in June, likely in Los Angeles.

Sorvino posted to the social media site Threads after news broke about the sequel film, saying “We’re pretty excited about it.”

Post by @mirasorvino View on Threads...

Romy And Michele’s High School Reunion is getting a sequel with Mira Sorvino and Lisa Kudrow in final talks to reprise their roles from the 1997 film.

The pair of actresses will also executive produce, and Tim Federle is attached to direct.

Production is eyeing a June start date, potentially in Los Angeles.

The reunion of all reunions was teased back in November 2024 when Sorvino told People that a deal had been made with a director and that she and Kudrow were on board as Eps. Then Kudrow shared in January the update that a “really good” script had been written.

Original scribe Robin Schiff returned to pen the sequel film. She has recently been behind Netflix’s hit series Emily in Paris as an executive producer and showrunner. Veteran producer Laurence Marks will also return after his work on the original film.

Mira Sorvino and Lisa Kudrow are in final talks to return for a sequel to the 1997 cult classic comedy “Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion.”

The new movie will be directed by Tim Federle, who created “High School Musical: The Musical: The Series” and wrote and directed the Disney+ original movie “Better Nate Than Never.” Returning from the original film are screenwriter Robin Schiff and producer Laurence Mark. Barry Kemp will also produce.

“Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion” follows two unsuccessful 28-year-olds who invent fake careers to impress their former classmates at their 10-year high school reunion. Schiff created the characters for her 1988 stage play “Ladies’ Room,” which starred a pre-“Friends” fame Kudrow. The actor was joined by Oscar winner Sorvino in the 1997 film, which was a moderate box office hit.

For decades since, Sorvino and Kudrow have fielded questions about a follow-up movie and, in 2022, they delighted...

The reunion is on.

A sequel to Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion is moving ahead at 20th Century Studios, with Mira Sorvino and Lisa Kudrow in negotiations to reprise their starring roles. The pair will also serve as executive producers.

Tim Federle, who wrote and directed the Disney+ original movie Better Nate Than Never and who created High School Musical: The Musical: The Series, will direct the feature, which is eyeing a June start date. Sources say the studio is looking to possibly shoot in Los Angeles, but nothing has been set.

Robin Schiff, who wrote the original and is known for showrunning the Neflix hit Emily in Paris, returned to pen the sequel. Laurence Mark, the veteran producer who produced the original, is also back in same role. Barry Kemp, the creator of 1980s series Newhart, is also producing.

The original, released in 1997, was made by Disney’s now-dormant Touchstones Pictures banner,...

Exclusive: Briarcliff Entertainment has acquired North American distribution rights to new musical franchise Verona’s Romeo & Juliet, in partnership with Hero Entertainment and Rainmaker Films. A modern reimagining of one of the most beloved love stories of all time, the first of the films will unspool wide on Valentine’s Day 2025, in one of Briarcliff’s biggest releases to date.

Set in 1301 at the end of Medieval times, Verona’s Romeo & Juliet finds our most famous star-crossed lovers turning the tides on the history Shakespeare based his own story on, as they reveal the truth to the very future of the Empire. But the biggest twist in this most beloved of tales is leaving the poetry of Iambic Pentameter in the past to tell the story with the help of original pop music.

With Clara Rugaard (Love Gets a Room) and Jamie Ward (His Dark Materials) in the lead as Romeo & Juliet,...

Deadline’s Most Valuable Blockbuster tournament is back. While studios during Covid wildly embraced the theatrical day-and-date model when cinemas were closed, they soon realized there’s nothing more profitable than a theatrical release and the downstreams that come with it. If anything, theatrical is the advertisement for a movie’s longevity in subsequent home entertainment windows. Entering the conversation in 2023 were the streamers, such as Apple, who have also realized the necessity of theatrical to eventize their movies. The financial data pulled together here for Deadline’s Most Valuable Blockbuster Tournament is culled by seasoned and trusted sources.

The Film

Barbie

Warner Bros

The road to riches for a live-action Barbie movie was long. The most recent ramp-up had come in 2009, when Universal and Greatest Showman producer Laurence Mark became attached. Then the project segued to Sony with Laurie MacDonald and Walter F. Parkes attached as producers, and at...

If everything old really is new again, the creative team behind Sunday’s 96th Academy Awards from the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood is hoping that putting forward some of the choices from past Oscar ceremonies will prove inspired this time around as well. During a virtual press conference this week with executive producer and showrunner Raj Kapoor, exec producers Molly McNearney (also host Jimmy Kimmel’s wife) and Katy Mullan, and music director Rickey Minor, they pointed to a few new wrinkles this time around – the most significant of which repeats a brainchild that drew raves during the first and only time it was attempted in 2009. That would be the introduction of each nominee in all four acting categories individually by a past winner.

It was done 15 years ago when Laurence Mark and Bill Condon conceived the idea of having each previous winner focus on a story involving a single...

The Oscars ceremony that took place in 2009 remains an all-time favorite for many who watched it, including your humble correspondent, largely because of the thrilling way in which the four acting Oscars were presented: Five past winners introduced the five current nominees for each award. This resulted in massive standing ovations from the audience at the Dolby (even awards show veterans like Brad Pitt and Meryl Streep looked absolutely giddy in cutaway shots); introductory remarks from past winners that left current nominees visibly moved (Anne Hathaway was in tears); and group hugs of the new winners that were akin to welcoming them into an elite fraternity or sorority (see: Kate Winslet).

Over the 15 years since that night, which was the brainchild of producers Laurence Mark and Bill Condon, Oscar lovers have been begging the Academy to bring back this Field of Dreams-like format. The Hollywood Reporter has learned and...

There’s a scene in the 2010 film Eat Pray Love where Julia Roberts’s character Liz basks in the experience of eating a guilt-free pizza. It was an important character moment for her–and for many audience members. And whatever your specific dietary preferences or requirements may be, we hope that you’ll enjoy whatever your guilt-free “pizza moment” is this Thanksgiving, surrounded by friends and family (chosen or otherwise.)

Food, of course, has played as major a role in cinema as any other basic human biological function, from the sprawling bowls of pasta in the works of Martin Scorsese, to the last decade’s trend of thoughtfully investigative health-leaning food docs such as Food Inc. and Forks Over Knives. Today, though, we’re leaving the scare-mongering at the kids’ table and indulging in some seriously calorie-dense, celebratory depictions of food on film.

So cinch up that lobster bib and...

When it comes to the road to blockbuster glory, some projects are willed, some happen instantaneously, while others go through a long development hell. That’s just what happens when you’re working toward what’s hopefully a billion-grossing title.

In the case of Mattel’s Barbie, it was a 14-year journey that began at Universal. It stands to reason that the toy company would be fiercely protective about a feature take on its 64-year-old doll that generates a reported $3 billion annually in revenue. The product first conceived as America’s Sweetheart has evolved with changing times, switching up her stereotypes and outfits from prom queen to flight attendant to Mad Men secretary to astronaut. A doll that was deemed iconic in the 1970s-era of pinups like Loni Anderson and Farrah Fawcett endured a backlash when critics deemed her an inappropriate role model for young girls. This, despite Mattel pushing...

Boasting over 60 years of history due to its instantly-recognizable global appeal, the word "Barbie" holds a lot of power in shaping innumerable childhoods and worldviews. Greta Gerwig's audacious, refreshing take on this beloved IP in her latest film, "Barbie" will certainly enhance the brand's legacy and what it means to diverse demographics, but there's a reason why we're only getting a "Barbie" live-action movie 64 years after its product launch. While Barbie is a cultural staple, it is no easy task to weave a cinematic vision around its complicated legacy — any filmmaker interested in taking on this challenge would have to keep their commentary both fun and nuanced, while adding their own unique spin to the discourse in keeping with the times. Where Gerwig has succeeded, others were not so lucky.

There were serious, dedicated attempts to make a "Barbie" live-action film as far back as 2009, when the brand's parent company,...

Exclusive: Sony’s 3000 Pictures has acquired Delia Ephron’s New York Times best-selling memoir Left On Tenth. Ephron will adapt, with Greg Berlanti, Sarah Schechter, and Laurence Mark producing the feature. Daryl Roth is executive producing. Ephron will simultaneously write and develop the memoir as a play for Roth to produce and Susan Stroman to direct, marking the first time both a feature and play adaptation will be developed at the same time

The memoir has Ephron at the center as she struggles through several years of heartbreak. She’d lost her sister, Nora, and then her husband, Jerry, both to cancer. She channeled her grief the best way she knew: by writing a New York Times op-ed. The piece caught the attention of Peter, a Bay Area psychiatrist, who emailed her to commiserate and reminded her that they had shared a few dates fifty-four years before. After several...

Enter the contest below for the chance to win a pair of passes to attend an advance screening of Spinning Gold on Tuesday, March 28th at 7:00pm at the Mjr Troy!

What do Donna Summer, Parliament, Gladys Knight, The Isley Brothers, The Village People, and Bill Withers all have in common with the rock band Kiss? They all rose to their musical heights under the watchful ear of the music industry’s most colorful and brilliant music producer, Neil Bogart, founder of Casablanca Records, the most successful independent record company of all time. Along with a rag tag team of young music lovers, Casablanca Records would rewrite history and change the music industry forever. Their mix of creative insanity, a total belief in each other and the music they were creating, shaped our culture and ultimately defined a generation. In a story so unbelievable that it can only be true,...

Danette Herman was one of the key staff members of the Academy Awards ceremonies from the 1970s into the 2010s, beginning as a production assistant and rising through the ranks to become the show’s executive in charge of talent and coordinating producer. One of the few women to serve in key positions at the Oscars, she was with the show during the years of its highest ratings and largest cultural impact.

As the Academy prepares for the 95th Oscars ceremony, Herman asked TheWrap if she could share some memories of past shows, from an encounter with Katharine Hepburn in 1974 to a pair of anniversary shows in which she assembled historic groups of past winners. —Steve Pond

Congratulations to the Academy on 95 years of the Academy Awards. Almost 40 of those years are my history, also.

It began in April 1968 at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium. The 40th Academy Awards were hosted by Bob Hope,...

The official trailer for the forthcoming film Spinning Gold is now readily available and you can check it out right here on CinemaNerdz!

What do Donna Summer, Parliament, Gladys Knight, The Isley Brothers, The Village People, and Bill Withers all have in common with the rock band Kiss? They all rose to their musical heights under the watchful ear of the music industry’s most colorful and brilliant music producer, Neil Bogart, founder of Casablanca Records, the most successful independent record company of all time. Along with a rag tag team of young music lovers, Casablanca Records would rewrite history and change the music industry forever. Their mix of creative insanity, a total belief in each other and the music they were creating, shaped our culture and ultimately defined a generation. In a story so unbelievable that it can only be true, comes the motion picture event of the musical...

Exclusive: One notable title up for sale we’re hearing about at the European Film Market is Timothy Scott Bogart’s pop Romeo & Juliet musical, Verona starring Clara Rugaard, Jamie Ward, Rebel Wilson, Rupert Everett, Jason Isaacs and Derek Jacobi.

Verona will be the first film in a original pop musical trilogy based around the real-life 1301 story that inspired Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. A wide theatrical releaser this Christmas is being planned.

Bogart tells us, “We’ve set out to tell the greatest love story of all time, set to the musical pulse of our time. But Shakespeare only told part of that remarkable tale whose events changed the course of history!”

Voltage is handling international sales on Verona.

Bogart recently directed the 1970s-1980s set feature Spinning Gold about his record label exec father Neil Bogart’s rise and fall with Casablanca Records. That pic is coming out on March 31 in theaters.

Principal photography underway In Italy.

Voltage Pictures is launching international sales at EFM on the pop musical Verona to star Clara Rugaard, Jamie Ward, Rebel Wilson, Rupert Everett, Jason Isaacs and Derek Jacobi

Writer-director Timothy Scott Bogart’s original feature is based on the story that inspired Shakespeare to write Romeo And Juliet.

Production is underway in Italy and the producers have earmarked a wide US theatrical release for Verona in the December holiday season.

Ferdia Walsh-Peelo, Rupert Graves, Dan Fogler and Tayla Parx and Ledisi round out the cast. Evan Bogart is scoring and producing the original music for...

Casablanca Records is one of the most influential music labels in history, but the story of its founder, Neil Bogart, isn't as well-known as it should be. Donna Summer, Parliament, Gladys Knight & the Pips, The Isley Brothers, The Village People, Bill Withers, and the rock band Kiss all rose to great heights thanks to Bogart and were signed to the label that would become the most successful independent record company in history. Now, the film "Spinning Gold" looks to transport audiences back to the 1970s, when disco reigned supreme, funk was beginning to pick up steam, and Neil Bogart was on top of the world. Here's everything you need to know about the upcoming music producer biopic, and more.

Spinning Gold Release Date And Where You Can Watch It

"Spinning Gold" will be available in theaters starting March 31, 2023. The film is being distributed by Hero Entertainment and Howling Wolf Films,...

The official trailer for Spinning Gold has dropped and it explores the rise of Neil Bogart as the founder of Casablanca Records. Watch the preview in the video posted above.

Donna Summer, Parliament, Gladys Knight, The Isley Brothers, The Village People, and Bill Withers all have one thing in common with the rock band Kiss — they all rose to their musical heights under the watchful ear Bogart, the founder of Casablanca Records, the most successful independent record company of all time.

Along with a rag-tag team of young music lovers, Neil and Casablanca Records would rewrite history and change the music industry forever. Their mix of creative insanity, a total belief in each other and the music they were creating, shaped our culture and ultimately defined a generation. In a story so unbelievable that it can only be true, comes the motion picture event of the musical journey of Neil...

On Thursday, Netflix officially revealed the first full-length trailer for Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre’s feature film adaptation of “Lady Chatterley’s Lover,” which is based on the 1959 novel of the same name by D.H. Lawrence.

The synopsis for the upcoming romantic drama reads as follows:

“Connie, born into wealth & privilege, finds herself married to a man she no longer loves. When she meets Oliver, the estate’s gamekeeper, their secret trysts lead her to a sexual awakening. She faces a decision: follow her heart or return to her husband and endure what society expects of her.”

You can watch the trailer below:

It stars Emma Corrin, Jack O’Connell, Matthew Duckett, Joely Richardson, Ella Hunt, and Faye Marsay. Clermont-Tonnerre directed the film with a screenplay by David Magee. It was produced by Laurence Mark, Pete Czernin, and Graham Broadbent under the production banners of Blueprint Pictures and 3000 Pictures.

“Lady Chatterley’s Lover...

Netflix and Sony 3000 Pictures unveiled the first trailer for the forthcoming film adaptation “Lady Chatterley’s Lover,” based on the classic novel about a neglected woman whose affair with her husband’s gamekeeper sparks a sexual awakening.

Fans of the D.H. Lawrence novel’s steamier sections won’t be disappointed: plenty of bodice-ripping, bare buttocks and rain-soaked embraces are to be found as Lady Constance “Connie” Chatterley (Emma Corrin) and Oliver (Jack O’Connell) pursue a forbidden romance.

The blue-hued clip starts off with a flashback to Connie and Clifford Chatterley’s wedding day, their austere expressions saying it all. “I’m not really a part of this world,” Connie confesses during a montage of lonely days at the estate.

After she happens upon Oliver bathing outside one day, they strike up an acquaintance that gradually blooms into something more: “I don’t think I’ve realized how lonely I’ve been until now,...

Exclusive: Timothy Scott Bogart’s movie Spinning Gold about his music producer father, Neil Bogart, and the iconic label he built, Casablanca Records, will hit theaters on Friday, March 31, 2023.

The release and distribution will be handled by Hero Partners in partnership with Howling Wolf Films, with Universal Pictures Home Entertainment distributing across transactional home entertainment.

Neil Bogart saw the rise and fall of Casablanca Records, which in its heyday from the mid-to-late 1970s was a powerhouse in the disco sphere with artists such as Donna Summer, pop bands like The Village People and hard rock with Kiss. The boom of the music scene and opulence of the drug era took its toll on Casablanca. The label was ultimately put into a strenuous financial position, and was in need of hits; their desperation relying on a 1974 two-record set of audio highlights from TV’s The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, entitled...

From the moment it was published in 1928, D.H. Lawrence’s steamy romance of a commoner and artistocratic wife has met with outrage and enduring popularity. It was so scandalous an unexpurgated version never appeared until an obscenity trial in Britain in 1960 was won by the publisher of the uncut version, leading to 3 million more in sales — not to mention the several film and TV versions that have been tried throughout the years including a 1955 film that itself was subject to cries for censorship. Now French actress and filmmaker Laure deClermont-Tonnerre has given it a new whirl in an uninhibited and sexy, but quite respectable, version starring Emma Corrin (The Crown) as Connie, who marries happily into England’s upper crust only to have a raging affair with her husband’s new gameskeeper Oliver Mellors, played by Jack O’Connell. This thing, without the right and convincing chemistry between the two lovers,...

Click here to read the full article.

Ahead of a Sept. 17 all-member meeting of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, newly appointed Academy CEO Bill Kramer took questions from Hollywood correspondents, signaling an era of greater transparency — with members and with non-members — from the organization behind the Oscars.

Kramer will leave town next week on a trip that will take him to major fall film festivals — Venice, Telluride, Toronto and London — as part of an effort to cater to an increasingly international organization (“25 percent of our members are now non-u.S.”) and to support the return of film festivals and the theatrical moviegoing experience. But planning for the next Oscars ceremony, which is set for March 12, 2023, will not wait until he gets back to town. In fact, it is already well underway, having started earlier in the year than ever before, Kramer says: “We’ve been talking to...

Exclusive: Joely Richardson, Ella Hunt and Faye Marsay have rounded out the cast of 3000 Pictures and Netflix’s adaptation of Lady Chatterley’s Lover starring Emma Corrin, Jack O’Connell and Matthew Duckett. This will be the first film to be produced under the new partnership where Sony Pictures will offer Netflix a first look at any films it intends to make for streaming. The deal was announced in April and part of that deal allowed Sony to offer Netflix a first look at any films it intends to make directly for streaming or decides later to license for streaming, and Netflix has committed to make a number of those films over the course of the deal.

The pic will be directed by The Mustang helmer Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre. Life of Pi scribe David Magee wrote the script. Academy Award nominee Laurence Mark and Academy Award nominees Pete Czernin and Graham Broadbent...

Exclusive: Jack O’Connell and Matthew Duckett have joined Golden Globe Winner Emma Corrin in Lady Chatterley’s Lover for Sony’s 3000 Pictures and Netflix. This will be the first film to be produced under the new partnership where Sony Pictures will offer Netflix a first look at any films it intends to make for streaming. The deal was announced in April and part of that deal allowed Sony to offer Netflix a first look at any films it intends to make directly for streaming or decides later to license for streaming, and Netflix has committed to make a number of those films over the course of the deal. Sources say that while Sony will not distribute the film, Netflix can still choose to have it run theatrically if they please for an awards qualifying run given Elizabeth Gabler, who runs 3000 Pictures, track record with award season pics.

Lady Chatterley’s Lover...

Lin-Manuel Miranda in the animated musical “Vivo” plays an adorable-looking kinkajou, or a “honey bear” native to the rain forest. And he’s been tasked with delivering a song and a love letter to a music superstar played by Gloria Estefan.

This first trailer for “Vivo” comes from Netflix and Sony Pictures Animation, and the film features new songs from the “Hamilton” creator as the kinkajou also named Vivo as he travels across the world. He teams up with an energetic tween girl to help him get to Estefan’s character and deliver a song that will change the world and help reconnect two former partners.

“Vivo” also stars in its voice cast Zoe Saldaña, Juan de Marcos, Brian Tyree Henry, Michael Rooker, Nicole Byer and newcomer Ynairaly Simo as Vivo’s plucky young travel companion.

Kirk DeMicco (“The Croods”) directs “Vivo,” which is co-directed by Brandon Jeffords and written...

Netflix dropped the full trailer Thursday for “Vivo,” Lin-Manuel Miranda’s love letter to Cuba and his first starring animated musical, made at Sony Pictures Animation (streaming August 6th). In addition to conceiving the idea a decade ago and writing eight original songs, Miranda voices the title character: a singer-musician kinkajou (a rainforest “honey bear”), who plays music in a lively Havana square with his beloved owner Andrés (Juan de Marcos of the Buena Vista Social Club). That is, until tragedy strikes, and Vivo journeys to Miami to deliver a love song to retiring superstar, Marta (Gloria Estefan) with the help of energetic tween Gabi (newcomer Ynairaly Simo).

“It’s taken so many turns, but at the heart of this story is this incredible friendship between Andrés and Vivo, and how it launches Vivo on an incredible journey from Cuba to Florida, where he does a lot of growing up,...

Exclusive: Spinning Gold, the long-in-the-works biopic about 1970s Casablanca Records chief Neil Bogart, is heating up again in time for the Cannes Virtual Market. The pic, written and directed by Bogart’s son Timothy Scott Bogart, has added Wiz Khalifa to play Parliament leader George Clinton, Tayla Parx to play Donna Summer, Ledisi to play Gladys Knight and Lyndsy Fonseca to play music manager Joyce Biawitz.

Production is now underway in New Jersey, and Capstone will introduce the film to Cannes market buyers next week.

Jeremy Jordan plays Neil Bogart in the the pic that charts the rise of his Buddah and Casablanca labels in the 1960s and ’70s with a roster that included Donna Summer, Kiss, Parliament, Village People, The Isley Brothers, Gladys Knight and Bill Withers among others.

Jay Pharoah, Michelle Monaghan, Jason Isaacs, Jason Derulo, Sebastian Maniscalco, Dan Fogler, Chris Redd, Peyton List, Pink Sweat$, Casey Likes,...

Exclusive: Netflix has licensed all global rights, sans China, to Sony Pictures Animation’s Vivo. The movie, directed by Oscar nominee Kirk DeMicco (The Croods) and co-directed by Brandon Jeffords (Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2) with new songs written and performed by Tony-winning Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda, was recently scheduled for a theatrical release on June 4. The new drop date on Netflix is still to be determined.

I understand this is a similar deal to Netflix’s pickup of Sony’s Kevin Hart movie Fatherhood whereby Netflix gets the first window, which is streaming, and Sony will retain home entertainment and linear TV rights to all other territories, including China theatrical, after the pic’s exclusive run on the streamer.

Note the recent licensing of Sony’s Vivo by Netflix is outside the streamer’s new multi-year $1 billion deal with the Culver City studio. That deal commences in 2022, as previously reported,...

At the end of the strangest, rockiest awards season ever, it’s no surprise that the 93rd Academy Awards will be a very different Oscars show. The ceremony is (mostly) taking place in a train station, downtown Los Angeles’ Union Station, instead of a theater; awards will be given out in front of the smallest in-person audience in about 90 years; the red carpet will be scaled back dramatically; and Covid-19 protocols will have an impact on just about everything that happens.

I can’t help but think there’s an element of “Let’s just get this over with” to this year’s Oscars, coming at the end of an interminable awards season that has lasted two months longer than usual. But the singularity of the season also makes this the most tantalizing Oscars in decades, and potentially one of the most important.

As Steven Soderbergh, who is producing the...

The producers of this year’s very unusual 93rd annual Academy Awards have promised to do the entire broadcast as if it were a movie itself. In line with that, they are “casting” it that way too with an ensemble of 15 stars to handle all the presenting duties, and also in lieu of a host (for a third straight year).

Among the “cast” though, the producers appear to be sticking with at least one Oscar tradition: to have all four acting winners from the previous year return to present the four acting categories this year. Specifically how they will be employed into the show the Academy didn’t say, but you can assume that is the reason Joaquin Phoenix, Renee Zellweger, Brad Pitt and Laura Dern are part of the proceedings.

Phoenix, Zellweger, and Dern did the honors similarly at the Golden Globes, though Pitt will be making his first...

Fresh off her stint playing Diana, Princess of Wales, in Netflix’s period drama “The Crown,” Emma Corrin is gearing up to portray another high-society woman. The actor in talks to star in “Lady Chatterley’s Lover,” a romance drama about the scandalous affair between star-crossed lovers.

Based on D.H. Lawrence’s novel, the story follows the wealthy and privileged Lady Chatterley, who finds herself married to a man she doesn’t love and engages in a torrid affair with a gamekeeper on their English estate. The book was originally published in Italy and France in the 1920s, but it wasn’t printed in the United States until 1959 due to obscenity.

Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre, whose credits include “The Mustang,” “Mrs. America” and “The Act,” will direct the film. “Life of Pi” screenwriter David Magee is set to pen the script, and 3000 Pictures, the production company founded by Elizabeth Gabler, is backing the big-screen adaptation.

Exclusive: Following a week where she landed the Golden Globe and Critics Choice Award for her portray of Princess Diana in Netflix’s The Crown, rising star Emma Corrin looks to have found a feature to follow that role up with. Sources tell Deadline Corrin is in negotiations to star in 3000 Pictures’ Lady Chatterley’s Lover, which will be directed by The Mustang helmer Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre.

Life of Pi scribe David Magee wrote the script. Academy Award nominee Laurence Mark and Academy Award nominees Pete Czernin and Graham Broadbent of Blueprint Pictures are producing.

Based on the classic D.H. Lawrence novel, a story well ahead of its time, we follow the life of Lady Chatterley, a woman born to a life of wealth and privilege, who soon finds herself married to a man that she eventually falls out of love with. Lady Chatterley engages in a torrid affair with...

Late last week, Variety broke the news that a sequel to the 1989 cult classic Troop Beverly Hills was in the works with Israeli director Oran Zegman. For those not familiar with the original, it’s about a wealthy Beverly Hills mother (Shelley Long) who leads her daughter’s Wilderness Girl troop after her husband leaves her for another woman. The cast is packed with future stars like Jenny Lewis, Tori Spelling, Carla Gugino, and Kellie Martin.

The film begins with an animated sequence set to “Make It Big” by the Beach Boys,...

Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre is in active negotiations to direct “Lady Chatterly’s Lover” for 3000 Pictures, led by Elizabeth Gabler.

“Life of Pi” scribe David Magee wrote the script.

Oscar nominee Laurence Mark and Pete Czernin and Graham Broadbent of Blueprint Pictures are producing.

Based on the classic D.H. Lawrence novel, the story revolves around the life of Lady Chatterley, a woman born to a life of wealth and privilege, who soon finds herself married to a man that she eventually falls out of love with. She engages in a torrid affair with a gamekeeper on their English estate, discovering more desire and intimacy than she thought possible.

Lawrence’s risque novel has been adapted several times, including a 1981 version with “Emmanuelle” star Sylvia Kristel and a less-explicit 2015 TV version with Richard Madden.

Marisa Paiva and Nikki Cooper are the executives overseeing the project for 3000 Pictures.

De Clermont-Tonnerre’s drama...

Jody Sawyer and her terrible turnout are about to pirouette into a new venue: the small screen.

A TV adaptation of the 2000 dance movie Center Stage is in development at Sony Pictures Television, our sister site Deadline reports. Sweet/Vicious creator Jennifer Kaytin Robinson is on board to write, executive-produce and direct the pilot.

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Laurence Mark, who produced the film and its two sequels — Center Stage: Turn It Up...

Exclusive: Today marks the 20th anniversary of the Columbia Pictures film Center Stage, which was released on May 12, 2000 and launched the feature careers of Zoe Saldana and Amanda Schull.

Center Stage, a follow-up series to the cult film, has now been put in development by Sony Pictures Television. It comes from Sweet/Vicious creator Jennifer Kaytin Robinson, Laurence Mark, producer of the 2000 movie and its two sequels, and Temple Hill Entertainment.

Written by Robinson, who also executive produces and will direct the potential pilot, Center Stage is a series continuation of the original film set today within the highly competitive world of dance. It follows a new, inclusive class of dancers as they work to stay at the academy and clash against the traditional students and style the Aba is known for. Ballet has always been a conformist world, but with Cooper Nielson now at the helm of the Aba and the ABC,...

Sony Pictures has set a date for the sequel to 2018’s animated hit “Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse,” which won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature Film this year. The as-yet untitled follow-up to the Marvel spinoff that nabbed more than $375 million worldwide off a $90 million budget will debut in theaters on April 8, 2022. Sony dropped the news via the studio’s Twitter account Friday afternoon.

Phil Lord and Christopher Miller (who also trumpeted the news on Twitter) will return to produce the sequel, which picks up where the Marvel/Columbia Pictures movie co-directed by Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, and Rodney Rothman, left off. The original film’s voice cast included Shameik Moore, Jake Johnson, Hailee Steinfeld, Mahershala Ali, Brian Tyree Henry, John Mulaney, Nicolas Cage, and Zoë Kravitz.

While no details have yet been released for the “Spider-Verse” sequel, a post-credits sequence in the original film teased the arrival of...

Exclusive: Richard Dreyfuss has been set to play Roulette Records chief Morris Levy, and Sebastian Maniscalco is playing music visionary Giorgio Moroder in Spinning Gold, the film about ’70s Casablanca Records chief Neil Bogart that his son Timothy Scott Bogart is directing from the script he wrote. Bogart said he has also cast Winslow Fegley to play his father in his childhood years.

Bogart’s Boardwalk Entertainment has fully financed the picture with Jessica Martins’ Hero Entertainment. In a film that will feature some of the most iconic music of the 1970s, Jeremy Jordan plays Bogart and Michelle Monaghan plays his wife, Beth; Samuel L. Jackson plays Parliament leader George Clinton, Kenan Thompson is Motown’s Berry Gordy, Jason Isaacs is Al Bogart (the record producer’s father), Jason Derulo is Ron Isley of the Isley Brothers, Jay Pharoah is Wbls radio DJ Frankie Crocker, D.L. Hughley is Parliament’s Bootsy Collins,...

Exclusive: In a Hollywood moment where Bohemian Rhapsody and Rocketman became hits fueled by the music of single acts, what better time to tell the long-gestating movie story of Neil Bogart, complete with the music of the iconic artists who flourished on his Casablanca Records label in the ’70s including Donna Summer, Kiss, Parliament, Village People, The Isley Brothers, Gladys Knight, Bill Withers and Curtis Mayfield?

Production will begin July 16 in Montreal on Spinning Gold, a film written and to be directed by Timothy Scott Bogart, son of the late musical idolmaker who died in 1982 of cancer and lymphoma at age 39.

Bogart’s Boardwalk Entertainment has fully financed the picture with Jessica Martins’ Hero Entertainment, and here is the cast: Samuel L. Jackson plays Parliament leader George Clinton (the Godfather of Funk), Kenan Thompson plays Motown’s Berry Gordy, Jason Isaacs plays Al Bogart (the record producer’s father), Jason Derulo...

It’s clear that the Academy tasked producer Donna Gigliotti and co-producer/director Glenn Weiss with reinventing the Oscar show this year. After all, the promise of a show limited to three hours, made by the AMPAS Board of Governors in August, before the producers was hired, was enough to demand a new approach.

As we all know, two of the ideas that were to make this a new kind of Oscar show — the creation of a new “Popular Oscar” category and the shifting of several categories into the commercial breaks — were scrapped, the first in September and the second just last week.

That’ll make it significantly harder (and quite possibly impossible) for Gigliotti and Weiss to hit that three-hour limit, but they’ll probably trot out a few new takes on an old model. We won’t know how well it’s going to work until Sunday night...

Poor Oscar. It seems the annual ceremony is always plagued by some sort of controversy, either before or after the event — sometimes both. This year started with the controversial addition of the Most Popular Movie category, which was quickly scrapped. Then came the infamous Kevin Hart hosting fiasco with the surprise decision to have no host at all. That led everyone to reflect on the last time there was no host, which was a disaster 30 years ago (remember Rob Lowe dancing with Snow White?). No invitation for acting winners to return; presenting several categories in commercial breaks — both ideas abandoned. As we careen towards what promises to be an interesting broadcast this Sunday if nothing else, let’s go back in time exactly 10 years ago to one of the best shows ever.

SEEOscar Hosts: Performers Who Have Hosted the Academy Awards

A fun part of looking back through Oscar history is remembering the many hosts.

Twelve years after the launch of digital upstart Deadline Hollywood disrupted the print-focused Hollywood trade space, Deadline is part of new initiative looking to change the way ad buying for the entertainment trades is done. Deadline and sister Pmc brands TVLine and Gold Derby on Tuesday held the first Awards Upfront presentation.

“Why do an Awards Upfront?,” said Chief Revenue Officer & Gm Stacey Farish in her remarks at the event, held at NeueHouse. “We were the first company to start as a Digital entertainment trade site. And, now, we’re the first to create an Awards Upfront. It’s in our DNA to be the leaders, the innovators and the out-of-the box thinkers.”

The upfront, which included presentations from all three online publications, was hosted by actress-comedian Nicole Byer, emcee of Netflix’s hit reality series Nailed It!, who brought levity to the proceedings and poked fun at the three...

ABC just began rolling out commercial spots for the 91st annual Academy Awards, which airs on February 24, but for the first time in a long while those ads had not a single mention of a host, traditionally a known fact in most similar Oscar TV spots in recent years. But then again, this coming Oscar show does not have a host after the two-day reign of comedian Kevin Hart came crashing down exactly one month ago after some of his offensive long-ago Twitter remarks came to light.

Since then, Academy officials and their chosen producers this time around — Donna Gigliotti and Glenn Weiss (who also is directing again) — have offered radio silence on who just might host, even not officially acknowledging that Hart dropped out. As far as I can tell, Gigliotti hasn’t given a single interview regarding her plans or ideas for the show, and Weiss has also...

Let’s hear it for ‘undiscriminating’ audiences, the kind that want nothing more in a movie than a hundred minutes of combat action, suspense, scary monsters and gross-out gore. They’ll get their fill in Stephen Sommers’ Cuisinart blending of Titanic, Aliens and Die Hard. It’s quality fast food exploitation; just keep your medicine handy if you’re allergic to brainless cornball dialogue.

Deep Rising

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1998 / Color/ 2:35 widescreen / 106 min. / Street Date August 21, 2018 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Treat Williams, Famke Janssen, Anthony Heald, Kevin J. O’Connor, Wes Studi, Derrick O’Connor, Jason Flemyng, Cliff Curtis, Clifton Powell, Trevor Goddard, Djimon Hounsou.

Cinematography: Howard Atherton

Film Editor: Bob Ducsay, John Wright

Original Music: Jerry Goldsmith

Special Creature and Makeup Effects designer and creator: Rob Bottin

Second Unit Director: Dean Cundey

Produced by John Baldecchi, Laurence Mark

Written and Directed by Stephen Sommers

Deep Rising must...

Exclusive: It’s always nice to see another female screenwriter get a gig. Tiffany Romigh has been tapped to write an untitled romantic comedy for Nickel City Pictures and the production company’s partner, Telepool GmbH. Romigh most recently completed work on the Amy Baer/Laurence Mark produced Parents’ Weekend.

The plot of the romantic comedy is being kept under wraps right now. Romigh’s Getwell Road script is currently in pre-production with Gold Star Films.

The author of two novels, Elasticity and Deferred, Romigh was also a successful advertising copywriter at Ogilvy and Deutsch as well as VP of Consumer and Lifestyle at Edelman Public Relations prior to becoming a screenwriter.

Nickel City Pictures, which recently acquired the Silver Bear book series from author/screenwriter Derek Haas is currently building an interesting slate of feature films. Those include Marlowe adapted by Bill Monahan, Hammer written by Adam Cooper and Bill Collage,...