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Jen McDonnell

Dakota Johnson and Andrew Garfield Talk Fame and Films

-The Social Network costars Dakota Johnson and Andrew Garfield reunited for a conversation for Vanity Fair. “It makes you focus on the things that matter and the relationships that matter,” Garfield says about fame. “Sometimes… if someone says, ‘Hey, are you the guy from the thing?’ I’m like, ‘No, I look like him,’ and then we can have an actual conversation.”

-Meanwhile, Andrew Garfield says he’s open to reprising his role as Spider-Man, which should surprise no one at this point.

-“I feel like nobody knew what the f**k to do with me,” says Jenny Slate in Marie Claire of the parts she was getting (or not getting) offered.

–Bella Hadid is giving us permission to cry. Way ahead of ya, girl.

–Kristen Stewart has never been more relatable than when she talks about being starstruck by Neve Campbell at a restaurant.

-The writers for And Just Like That know that everyone hates what the revival has done to Steve’s character, but are sticking to their guns. (Not that they can change anything now, but I’m guessing the backlash about the Che Diaz character took them by surprise, too. But them not anticipating that Che would be such a loathed character is pretty indicative of how clueless this show is.)

-Following backlash, West Side Story star Rachel Zegler apologized for reenacting Britney Spears’ recent tweets to her sister Jamie Lynn.

–Willem Dafoe and Katy Perry have been announced to appear on next weekend’s SNL, which got this story trending again.

-The George Clooney and Julia Roberts rom-com Ticket to Paradise is temporarily suspending production due to rising COVID cases in the Queensland, Australia.

–Paul Walter Hauser (the character actor from Richard Jewell, I Tonya, Cobra Kai) went a little crazy last night on Twitter over …*checks notes*…the NYT’s film critics daring to make an Oscar wish list.

-Yellowjackets is working towards a season two premiere later this year, which is wild. Godspeed, writers room!

-I’m glad Leighton Meester is coming back to TV, but I wish it was on a better reviewed show than How I Met Your Father.

-Welp. I’m guess I’m going to stop linking to the A.V. Club so much, which is a shame because it’s one of my fave sites for pop culture criticism. It’s awful to watch yet another beloved publication consumed by a private equity consolidation and callously dismantled.

-In a truly odd casting choice, Daniel Radcliffe will play Weird Al Yankovic in Roku’s upcoming biopic about the musician and comedian.

-Encanto’s “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” has surpassed Frozen’s hit “Let It Go” as the highest-charting song from a Disney animated movie in 26 years. I watched the movie with my niece over the holidays and that song is *still* stuck in my head.

-Gotta say, I love Twitter’s new billboard campaign, which features celebs who once tweeted about their now-fulfilled dreams.

-Adam Scott finds a creepy way to achieve work/life balance in the trailer for the Apple TV drama Severance.

–Oscar Isaac is afraid to fall asleep in the trailer for Disney+’s new Marvel series Moon Knight, costarring Ethan Hawke. This video of those two reacting to the trailer is better than the trailer itself. I gotta assume that enthusiastic hug at the end has already been GIF’d.

Joss Whedon Just Can’t Help Himself

joss whedon new york mag

-I’m bummed that New York magazine gave a full profile feature to Joss Whedon. Did he really need this big of a platform? Again? Luckily, it doesn’t come off as a redemption piece, but only because the man can’t stop playing the victim. Every answer he gives is pretty much a disaster. He talks about having affairs with actresses on the Buffy set: (“‘I feel fucking terrible about them,’ he said. When I pressed him on why, he noted ‘it messes up the power dynamic,’ but he didn’t expand on that thought. Instead, he quickly added that he had felt he ‘had’ to sleep with them, that he was ‘powerless’ to resist. I laughed. ‘I’m not actually joking,’ he said. He had been surrounded by beautiful young women — the sort of women who had ignored him when he was younger — and he feared if he didn’t have sex with them, he would ‘always regret it'”), he blames the Justice League reshoot issues on the cast’s behaviour, saying Gal Gadot simply didn’t understand his jokes (“English is not her first language, and I tend to be annoyingly flowery in my speech”) and casts doubts on Ray Fisher‘s motives for speaking out (“We’re talking about a malevolent force. We’re talking about a bad actor in both senses”). The piece actually ends with him saying, “I think I’m one of the nicer showrunners that’s ever been.” Oh, and he alludes to possibly being responsible for another kid’s death when he was five. An absolute and total catastrophe of an interview.

–Ray Fisher has responded to Whedon‘s new comments against him through Twitter: “Rather than address all of the lies and buffoonery today — I will be celebrating the legacy of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Tomorrow the work continues.”

–Prince Harry says he won’t visit the UK until he can pay for police protection. He’s tried hiring private security but UK intelligence won’t share with them the credible threats. And to make matters worse, the timing of the story is gross.

–Tiffany Haddish was arrested in Georgia on suspicion of DUI.

–Britney Spears seems to be open to the idea of making amends with her younger sister, Jamie Lynn. “I admire you for being strong … just know I love you and I think you know that already more than anything!!!”

–Kanye West doesn’t want his and Kim Kardashian’s four children to have TikTok accounts. Which…sounds reasonable.

-Meanwhile, Kanye West went on Instagram Live to complain that he wasn’t invited to daughter Chicago’s birthday party — but Kim Kardashian was reportedly shocked he said that. He was later pictured at the party.

-Euphoria’s Hunter Schafer and Dominic Fike (who plays new character Elliot) might be dating.

-Oh no. Bryce Dallas Howard is the latest celeb to start promoting NFTs.

–Kendall Jenner insists she asked her friend’s permission before she showed up to her wedding in that barely there dress.

–Jeff Goldblum and Kyle MacLachlan walked in Prada’s menswear show at Milan Fashion Week.

-Is Chloe Sevigny shooting her shot with Jason Momoa via Instagram?

-God, what a stellar week of TV. First up was the Station Eleven finale, which left me crying happy tears. For a pandemic show based on a somewhat bleak book, those last 10 minutes were the most uplifting thing I’ve seen in ages.

-The other big finale everyone’s talking about is Yellowjackets. I love that the showrunners aren’t afraid to shoot down fan theories. Meanwhile, there’s been some great writing about this show, including this piece on how it embraces its gen x roots, this revealing interview with the showrunners, as well as the various excellent weekly recaps.

-Speaking of Yellowjackets, this is a great interview with Christina Ricci, who is stealing the spotlight every week amid a whole show full of scene stealers. She talks about moving to New York when she was a teen and choosing her apartment because it was in her favourite book (“I lived in the Police Building in Little Italy. We moved into that building because I was obsessed with The Alienist”) and how people treat her worse on the Yellowjackets set as soon as she’s dressed as Misty (“I was just, like ‘Oh, this is so interesting, that just because I’m wearing this wig and glasses they’ve forgotten I’m No. 3 on the call sheet'”).

-In other Yellowjackets cast interviews, Melanie Lynskey says her three leading co-stars supported her when she was body-shamed on set by a producer.

-I liked this piece about how we’re finally moving away from mystery-box TV.

-Scream had a really strong opening weekend at the box office.

-People can’t get enough of Peacemaker’s opening credits dance sequence. John Cena and Jennifer Holland talked about nailing the “stoic” moves.

-Game of Thrones’ Nikolaj Coster-Waldau fights the elements in the Against the Ice trailer.

 

Priyanka Chopra on the “Professional Hazard” of Social Media

Priyanka Chopra vanity fair

–Priyanka Chopra covers Vanity Fair and talks about the social media frenzy that followed after she dropped Nick Jonas‘ name from her Instagram handle. “It’s a very vulnerable feeling, actually, that if I post a picture, everything that’s behind me in that picture is going to be zoomed in on, and people are going to speculate.”

-In a new Harper’s Bazaar profile, artist Anna Marie Tendler reflected on her “surreal and shocking” divorce from comedian John Mulaney.

–Britney Spears has responded to her sister Jamie Lynn’s recent ABC News interview in multiple Instagram posts. Britney’s first post mentioned that she had a fever of 104 but her security team wouldn’t leave the premises to get her medicine (or, presumably, a covid test?!), while her latest post said that her sister had “stooped to a whole new level of LOW” and denied Jamie Lynn’s story that she once grabbed a knife and locked them in a room.

–Pete Davidson won’t be hosting the Oscars, mostly because he’s too tied to NBC and the show airs on ABC.

-Meanwhile, unverified leaked audio of what seems to be Kanye West’s newest single has the lyric, “God saved me from that crash/ just so I can beat Pete Davidson’s ass.”

–Anne Hathaway‘s new look is giving people Devil Wears Prada vibes.

-Black Panther: Wakanda Forever has resumed filming after Letitia Wright was injured in a stunt almost five months ago. (Is it horrible that when I first heard about her injury, I didn’t think that was the real reason she couldn’t film?)

-Everyone leaving Lady Gaga hanging out to dry in this clip from an actress roundtable is amazing.

–Geena Davis says she was once denied a role because the leading man said she was too old, even though he was older than her.

-Here’s Prada’s new menwear campaign with Tom Holland.

-This is an excellent debate on the quality of Station Eleven. Personally, I think it’s the best show I’ve seen in ages, but it took me a while to figure out that I liked the odd numbered episodes so much more, and that was because the even numbered ones tended to focus on the travelling symphony. I still haven’t watched the finale yet cause I adored episode 9 so much, I kind of want to savor it.

-Speaking of buzzy shows, I like this piece about how Yellowjackets is great because you can either get really deep into theorizing or just ignore the theories completely. (I need to catch up on episodes, but I also think the comparison to Annihilation is spot on.)

-Aw man, Netflix is raising its prices again in the US and Canada.

-Orange Is the New Black’s Danielle Brooks showed off her wedding pics. That dress is stunning.

-FX has ordered a Justified revival, with Timothy Olyphant set to return as Raylan in the limited series.

–Alec Baldwin turned over his cell phone to law enforcement officials as part of the investigation into the fatal shooting on the set of the film Rust after it was reported that he’d failed to do so despite a search warrant.

-Here’s the trailer for Netflix’s limited series Inventing Anna, which is Shonda Rhimes‘ latest and is getting lots of buzz.