• Apple will finance Ridley Scott's Napoleon epic Kitbag starring Joaquin Phoenix. (Bet you hundreds of millions of dollars that they change the title.) Ridley is such a workaholic. He is 83 and still attached to at least 6 upcoming projects as a director (not to mention his producing work) and completing work on his next epic The Last Kingdom and also has that HBO series Raised by Wolves currently running. That's a lot of energy for an octogenarian!
• Vogue Tilda talks about her career with playwright Jeremy O Harris
• Deadline Nicole Kidman and Javier Bardem to play Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz in Aaron Sorkin's Being the Ricardos. It takes place during the production of one episode of I Love Lucy. We love a tightly focused biopic. Yes, this is the same project that Cate Blanchett was once attached to (back in 2015). Do you think Nic & Javi look anything like these two?
More after the jump including Sex and the City revival and the Kennedy Center Honors...
• Playbill Kennedy Center Honors this year will go to choreographer/director Debbie Allen, stage & screen star Dick Van Dyke, singer-songwriter Joan Baez, singer-songwriter Garth Brooks, and the violinist Midori. Congratulations to all five of them! Imagine how nice it will be to see President Biden at these.
• NYT Siegfried of Siegfried and Roy fame has passed away, eight months after Roy
• Cartoon Brew on The Hollywood Reporter's animation roundtable with the directors of Soul, Wolfwalkers, Bombay Rose, Over the Moon, and more
• Go Fug Yourself a 40th anniversary tribute to Dynasty
• The List Michael Peña has replacced Stanley Tucci in the Roland Emmerich action flick Moonfall
• Netflix unveils their 2021 slate which promises a new movie every week. Content, content, content (let's hope we get some cinema out of it)
• /Film Paramount is selling another of its delayed potential blockbusters, Tomorrow War, to streaming. What will the few remaining major distributors even have to release in theaters in the next two years if they sell everything?
• MNPP Film Movement have picked up Bruce LaBruce's latest, Saint Narcisse
• Out Sex and the City is getting a revival with its lading leadies now in their 50s. We're all for sexually vibrant fierce middle aged women as protagonists but the idea of reviving this without Samantha / Kim Cattral? Yikes.
• Advocate Brendan Fraser, who is not fat and not gay, is set to play a 600 lb gay man in a new Darren Aronofsky (!!!) movie called Whale. Project sounds interesting, though
• Towleroad Luke Evans has broken up with his boyfriend but seems pretty zen about the 'sensationalizing' press coverage
Politics because who can avoid it right now?
• Variety Lady Gaga and Jennifer Lopez to perform at Biden's inauguration. Tom Hanks will host the primetime network special.
• Slate "Move Fast and Fix Stuff" smart advice for the Biden Administration
• The Atlantic gets it exactly right that the current GOP (still in hundreds of positions of power) is a much greater threat to Democracy than Donald Trump. After the violent insurrection, they still voted EN MASSE to throw out the results of a legal election paving the way for a more successful coup down the line unless they're ALL dealt with.
• Vox fascinating discussion about two-party systems and how they are meant to balance and moderate each others most extremist views... and why that's not working now. And yes Weimar era Germany is discussed.