| | | | | | What's news: The DOJ is suing Live Nation. Cassie thanked fans for their support after the Diddy assault video was released. Rapper Sean Kingston is under arrest. Freevee has canceled High School. Netflix has landed John Lee Hancock's feature Monsanto and is circling Cannes fave Emilia Pérez. — Abid Rahman
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THR's 10 Young Movie Stars Taking Hollywood by Storm ►Meet the new A-list. Are Timothée, Sydney and Glen the new Leo, Scarlett and Tom? Studio execs are certainly hoping they are, with Hollywood betting on stars like Paul Mescal and Jenna Ortega to carry slates and save the box office. The list.
—"No one should carry this weight alone." Singer Cassie has expressed gratitude for the support she has received following her allegations against Sean “Diddy” Combs and the recent release of the shocking video showing Combs physically assaulting her in 2016. "The outpouring of love has created a place for my younger self to settle and feel safe now, but this is only the beginning," she wrote in a statement posted to Instagram on Thursday. The story.
—UAE performance. Dave Chappelle said Thursday a "genocide" is striking Gaza amid the Israel-Hamas war to cheers during his performance in Abu Dhabi, the United Arab Emirates. The comedian also urged Americans to fight antisemitism, so Jews don’t feel like they need to be protected by Israel. Chappelle performed a wide-ranging comedy set in Abu Dhabi, and there were some chants of "Free Palestine" from the crowd. The story. |
Lady Gaga Debuts 'Chromatica Ball' Film in L.A. Premiere ►"I just didn't want to let all the fans down." Rocking black hair, bleached eyebrows and a white ensemble that she said was meant to resemble a car part, Lady Gaga debuted her Gaga Chromatica Ball concert special in her signature style on Thursday night, with a premiere screening in Los Angeles for her fans. The concert film follows Gaga during the Los Angeles stop of her 2022 Chromatica Ball Tour, as she takes over Dodger Stadium with both her biggest hits and new songs from her 2020 album Chromatica. The story.
—"I stood my ground." Kelly Rowland has clarified her viral encounter with a security employee at the Cannes Film Festival. In a new interview, the former Destiny’s Child member stood by her decision to call out the staffer for alleged mistreatment. "The woman knows what happened, I know what happened," she said. "I have a boundary and I stand by those boundaries and that is it." The story.
—Arrested. Rapper Sean Kingston was arrested in California on Thursday on fraud charges, several hours after a SWAT team raided his rented South Florida home. The AP reported that Kingston was taken into custody on a Florida warrant near Fort Irwin, California, according to the Broward County Sheriff’s Office. Earlier on Thursday, authorities said they arrested the rapper’s 61-year-old mother, Janice Turner, following a raid on his mansion in Southwest Ranches, Florida. The story. |
America's Most Trusted News Anchors Are… ►King Lester. When it comes to news anchors, Anderson Cooper humbles Sean Hannity and Rachel Maddow, while Lester Holt is the standout according to a new THR/Morning Consult poll. The survey, conducted May 4-5 among a sample of 2,239 U.S. adults, asked opinions about 40-plus major TV news stars, as well as surveyed trends about America’s fractured media diet during a presidential campaign year. The findings.
—It's on. The Justice Department has sued Live Nation for antitrust violations tied to its dominance over the live events industry. The department joined 29 states and the District of Columbia to file a lawsuit accusing the Ticketmaster parent of leveraging its unrivaled positions as the nation’s largest concert promoter, ticket seller and venue owner to undermine competition. It accuses the company of illegally locking venues into exclusive ticketing contracts, pursuing anticompetitive acquisitions intended to stifle competition and retaliating against rivals. The story.
—Cashing in. NBCUniversal cashed in on Vivek Ramaswamy’s activist play on BuzzFeed. The entertainment giant sold more than $10m worth of shares in BuzzFeed Wednesday, taking advantage of a brief surge in the company’s stock price. BuzzFeed stock soared Wednesday after Ramaswamy, the entrepreneur and former Republican presidential hopeful, disclosed that he had taken a 7.7 percent activist stake in the company, and would seek strategic changes. The story.
—🤝 Much needed W 🤝 Paramount Global and cable TV giant Charter Communications have agreed a new carriage deal. Paramount, which owns CBS, Paramount+, MTV, Comedy Central, BET, Nickelodeon and other brands, has cut a multi-year deal with Charter that will keep its networks available for Charter customers, and make the Paramount+ “Essential” tier available to Charter’s TV subscribers free of charge, as well as BET+ Essential. The story. |
Netflix Data Dump Highlights Global Reach ►Behemoth. Netflix has released another huge batch of data about the time users spent with the service, and the top of its series list demonstrates how wide its global reach is. The No. 1 series for the second half of 2023, as measured by Netflix’s view metric, was One Piece based on the Japanese manga and anime. Four of the next five shows — German miniseries Dear Child, Lupin from France, and British shows Who Is Erin Carter? and Sex Education — originated outside the U.S., and the sixth, The Witcher, is based on novels by Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski. The story.
—Fond farewell. The finale of Shōgun pushed the series to its best showing so far on Nielsen’s streaming charts. The FX-produced Hulu series had 608m minutes of viewing time for the week of its finale, April 22-28. That’s a 45 percent jump from the prior week and Shōgun’s highest total in the nine weeks it has made the top 10. Its previous best was 513m minutes for its premiere week, which featured the debut of two episodes. Fallout claimed the overall No. 1 spot for the third straight week, the first such streak for a show on Amazon Prime Video. The streaming rankings.
—Back of the net! The Premier League continues to be a winner for NBCUniversal, with the world’s most watched soccer league scoring record ratings for NBC, Peacock and USA Network for the 2023/2024 season. On Thursday, NBCU revealed that for the 2023/2024 season, NBC Sports averaged 546,000 viewers per TV match window, meaning that it was the most-watched Premier League season ever in the U.S. Collective viewership for the last day of the season hit nearly 3m, and the 2023/2024 season saw the first match ever to top 2m viewers. The ratings.
—Writing was on the wall. Amazon Freevee has opted to cancel High School, the heartfelt series inspired by the memoir from Grammy-nominated twin sibling performers Tegan and Sara Quin after a single season. Despite rave reviews, High School last aired in October 2022 with the formal decision to cancel the show coming nearly two years after the fact. Sources tell THR's Lesley Goldberg that Freevee wanted to renew the show, but ultimately, the completion rate for High School left Freevee and Amazon execs little choice but to cancel the series. The story. |
What Happened to $100M Box Office Openers? ►"Hollywood is sucking wind right now." For the first time in more than a decade — excluding the worst period of the COVID-19 crisis — no movie opening during the first six months of the year has come close to hitting the $100m mark in its domestic launch. Studio and theater chain executives knew this year was going to be a challenge amid major tentpole delays — but May is already a historic flop. THR's Pamela McClintock looks into what's going on and whether this is a blip or a worrying trend. The analysis.
—📅 Get excited 📅 Steven Spielberg's next movie will hit theaters on May 15, 2026, Universal and Amblin Entertainment announced Thursday. The untitled movie is described as an original event film created and helmed by the iconic director, but plot details are being kept under tight wraps. Based on a story by Spielberg, the screenplay is written by longtime collaborator David Koepp, whose previous work with Spielberg includes the scripts for Jurassic Park and The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. The story.
—🎭 All-star cast 🎭 Amazon MGM Studios has rounded out the cast of its all-star holiday comedy Oh. What. Fun. Jason Schwartzman, Eva Longoria, Joan Chen, Devery Jacobs, Havana Rose Liu and Maude Apatow have been added to the call sheet while Danielle Brooks has signed on for a cameo in the Michael Showalter-directed feature, which is currently shooting in Atlanta. Michelle Pfeiffer is leading the ensemble that already include Felicity Jones, Chloë Grace Moretz, Denis Leary and Dominic Sessa. The story.
—Bagged. Netflix has landed John Lee Hancock's fact-based legal drama feature Monsanto. Man-of-the-moment Glen Powell, Anthony Mackie and Laura Dern star in the high-profile package that was acquired at this year’s Cannes film market. The Blind Side filmmaker directs the movie from a script he wrote with Michael Wisner, Alexandra Duparc and Ned Benson. Producers on the film include Moritz Borman, Eric Kopeloff, Jon Levin, Philip Schulz-Deyle, Adam McKay and Kevin Messick. The story.
—Circling. Netflix is in talks to acquire Emilia Pérez, one of the most talked about titles in Cannes this year. The movie, from writer-director Jacques Audiard, follows a cartel leader who hires an undervalued lawyer to help him withdraw from his business and realize a plan he has been secretly preparing for years, to transition into a woman. Zoe Saldaña stars in the film, along with Selena Gomez and Edgar Ramirez, with breakout Karla Sofia Gascón as the title character. The story.
—🏆 Félicitations! 🏆 Simon of the Mountain, the debut feature from Argentinian director Federico Luis, has won the Grand Prize at the 63rd edition of Cannes Critics’ Week. Argentinian actor and singer/songwriter Lorenzo Ferro stars in the coming-of-age story of a young man struggling with a mental disorder. The story.
—🏆 Inaugral winner 🏆 Matthew Rankin's experimental drama Universal Language, a surrealistic tribute to Persian cinema, has won the first-ever Chantal Akerman award, an audience prize presented to the best film in the Directors’ Fortnight section of the Cannes Film Festival. The prize is named after the Belgian auteur, who died in 2015, director of Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles, which was voted the greatest film of all time by the latest Sight and Sound critics poll. The story. |
'Grey's' Pair on S20 Finale, Letting Go of Derek's Legacy ►"The friendship that Owen and Amelia have now is really enviable." For THR, Max Gao spoke to Grey's Anatomy stars Caterina Scorsone and Kevin McKidd about the two-part season finale. The longtime co-stars unpack all the shock-endings to the penultimate season 20 episode and chat about playing the "perfect ex relationship" on TV. Warning: Spoilers! The interview.
—"It’s incredibly tough because it feels like we have so many more years in us." THR rapscallion Ryan Gajewski spoke to Station 19 star Jason George about the series finale of the ABC drama. The actor expects fans to "be in tears" when the firefighter series ends its seventh and final season with a two-part finale that kicked off Thursday night. Warning: Spoilers! The interview. |
Film Review: 'Atlas' ►"A mediocre not-quite-rom-com disguised as a mediocre sci-fi." THR's Angie Han reviews Brad Peyton's Atlas. Jennifer Lopez plays a data analyst forced to team up with an AI robot in order to prevent an apocalypse orchestrated by a different AI robot in this Netflix film, co-starring Simu Liu and Sterling K. Brown. The review.
—"More like heart failure." THR's Jordan Mintzer reviews Gilles Lellouche's Cannes competition entry Beating Hearts. French actor turned director Lellouche’s sophomore effort, a crime romance drama, features Adèle Exarchopoulos, François Civil and Vincent Lacoste. The review.
—"A rich tale of love and loss in the big city." Jordan reviews Payal Kapadia's Cannes competition entry All We Imagine as Light. The first Indian film to play in the Cannes' main competition since 1994, the moving Mumbai-set drama stars Kani Kusruti and Divya Prabha as a pair of nurses who've settled in India’s largest city. The review.
—"A sober and sincere refugee story." Jordan reviews Mahdi Fleifel's To a Land Unknown. The writer-director's second feature follows a pair of exiled Palestinians immigrants in Athens, trying however they can to make it out. The review.
—"Uneven but affecting." THR's Lovia Gyarkye reviews Mo Harawe's The Village Next to Paradise. In his Cannes-history-making feature, the Somali filmmaker portrays an ambitious family living under the threat of drone strikes and death. The review.
—"A shimmering fusion of memory and movie love." THR's Sheri Linden reviews Arnaud Desplechin's Filmlovers! Through narrative vignettes and nonfiction musings, and with a cast that includes Mathieu Amalric and Anatomy of a Fall star Milo Machado-Graner, the French director explores the experience of watching movies. The review. |
Thank Pod It's Friday ►All the latest content from THR's podcast studio.
—TV's Top 5. THR's Lesley Goldberg and Dan Fienberg break down the latest TV news. This week's episode begins with the headlines, including news on a new show from Steve Carell and Bill Lawrence, Marvel’s Vision and Silk, the Dexter prequel castings and the latest batch of Netflix’s "ratings." There's a segment on the future of Amazon Freevee and another on the prospects of The CW. There's also the mailbag and Dan reviews the final season of Evil on Paramount+ as well as its Lollapalooza doc, plus Netflix’s Tires and the Beach Boys doc on Disney+. Listen here.
—Awards Chatter. THR's executive awards editor Scott Feinberg talks to the great and the good of Hollywood. In this live episode, Scott spoke to Hannah Einbinder. The standup comedian and actress reflects on her greatest influences, how she was changed by getting on and off Adderall and what it's like acting for the first time on a Max comedy Hacks opposite the legendary Jean Smart. Listen here.
In other news...
—Beetlejuice Beetlejuice trailer revives Michael Keaton in long-awaited sequel
—Celine Dion opens up about health battle, possible stage return in Amazon doc trailer
—Loewe x On’s latest collab is here: See the stylish sneakers that stars will likely wear this summer
—Grace Kelly’s grandson lands fashion campaign for Monaco Grand Prix
—Kendrick Lamar drops $40m on a 9-bedroom estate in L.A.
—Rideback Rise taps former Warner Bros. exec as first-ever CEO
What else we're reading...
—Emma Jones reports on France's divisive reckoning with MeToo that exploded at this year's Cannes Film Festival [BBC]
—With the release of Furiosa, Miles Surrey marvels at the mad, mad world of Mad Max created by visionary Aussie filmmaker George Miller [Ringer]
—An important piece from Roxana Hadadi, as she writes that Ryan Gosling's most important co-stars are his amazing jackets [Vulture]
—Scott Stossel concedes that Novak Djokovic may be the greatest tennis player ever, but he just can't stand him [Atlantic]
—Here's your Friday list: "The best A24 TV shows, ranked" [TV Insider]
Today...
...in 2000, Paramount unveiled John Woo’s Mission: Impossible II in theaters. The Tom Cruise spy franchise starrer went on to gross $546m during its global run. The original review.
Today's birthdays: Bob Dylan (83), Roger Deakins (75), Jim Broadbent (75), John C. Reilly (59), Alfred Molina (71), Greg Berlanti (52), Kristin Scott Thomas (64), Daisy Edgar-Jones (26), Doug Jones (64), Tommy Chong (86), Sarah Hagan (40), Cayden Boyd (30), Amanda Silver (61), Jia Zhangke (54), Johannes Roberts (48), Will Sasso (49), Brianne Howey (35), Adam Demos (39), Sybil Danning (77), Charlie Plummer (25), Bryan Greenberg (46), Synnøve Macody Lund (48), Lily Newmark (30), Callie Hernandez (36), Dash Mihok (50), Dana Ashbrook (57), Eric Close (57), Jo Joyner (47), Kimberley Crossman (34), Julie Dretzin (56), Kim Yoon-hye (33), Parker Sawyers (41), Jerod Mixon (43), Karis Campbell (48), Eric Cantona (58) | | | | |
