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As you're no doubt aware, given our ongoing Emmy FYCs, the Television Academy is voting this week on the nominations for the 67th annual Primetime Emmy Awards (Sept 20th, 2015). Apologies to the small screen averse among you but as the lines blur between all the performing arts, so must we! We'll be back to a heavier movie focus in July but you know how June is: Tony Season climaxes and then Emmy voting happens. Consider Elisabeth Moss your new bridge mascot since she was just a nominee at the Tonys and she's in an Oscar-hopeful movies this year (Truth with Robert Redford and Cate Blanchett) and could be up for a final Emmy for her signature role Peggy Olson (Mad Men).
Ack!
It's so easy to get distracted when awards of any kind are the topic. Here are a few observations about the ballots after the jump but first... please to enjoy this NEW CATEGORY PROPOSAL (We need 2 more nominees for this category so that's your job in the comments)
Lest you forget, we have two Smackdowns this month. The first, already published, was for 1979 and for the second half of the month our retrospective love will be devoted to 1948 when these five women were nominated for Best Supporting Actress
Barbarba Bell Geddes, I Remember Mama
Ellen Corby, I Remember Mama
Agnes Moorhead, Johnny Belinda
Jean Simmons, Hamlet
Claire Trevor, Key Largo[winner]
Readers are the final panelist and your votes count (collectively) so between now and June 25th get your votes in with 1 (ouch) to 5 (total perfection) hearts for each. Please only vote on the performances you've seen (points are proportional so it doesn't affect the widely seen or the underseen).
To give you some context for the year, let's go over some high points of 1948...
Montgomery Clift becomes a superstar right out of the gate with his first two films: The Search and Red River
Great Big Box Office Hits: 1) The Red Shoes, 2) The Three Musketeers, 3) Red River, 4) The Treasure of the Sierra Madre 5) When My Baby Smiles at Me 6)Easter Parade 7) Johnny Belinda 8) The Snake Pit 9) Ingrid Bergman as Joan of Arc and 10) Erroll Flynn in The Adventures of Don Juan
Oscar's Best Pictures: Johnny Belinda (12 noms / 1 win), Hamlet (7 noms/4 wins), The Snake Pit (6 noms / 1 win), The Red Shoes (5 noms / 2 wins), and The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (4 noms / 3 wins). The Search starring Montgomery Clift probably just missed the cut-off with 4 major nominations, 1 win and a special Juvenile Oscar. Johnny Belinda and Sierra Madre shared the Golden Globe honors while Hamlet won Oscar's top prize
Happenings: Hollywood is still under the thumb of the HUAC hearings and many valuable players have already been blacklisted and/or jailed at this point; Post World War II anti-semitism is a mainstream topic which results in a Best Picture win early in the year for Gentleman's Agreement and then the banning of another film, David Lean's Oliver Twist, due to perceptions of anti-semitism in the character of Fagin (Alec Guiness); The US Supreme Court rules against religious instruction in public schools; Alfred Kinsey publishes "Sexual Behavior in the US Male"; Mahatma Gandhi is assassinated; a subway fare hike in Manhattan kicks it up to a whole dime.
Other Arts: Truman Capote's "Other Voices, Other Rooms" and Norman Mailer's "The Naked and the Dead" are published, Pulitzer winners include James Michenere's "Tales of the South Pacific," Tennessee Williams "A Streetcar Named Desire", and W.H. Auden for "The Age of Anxiety," Ed Sullivan and Milton Berle both begin their historical television superstardom this year with the variety shows "Toast of the Town" and "Texaco Star Theater" both of which will be retitled to reflect their star's name; "Mister Roberts" wins the first Tony Award for Best Play and "Kiss Me Kate" premieres on Broadway and will win the next year's inaugural Best Musical category.
Some Magazine Covers for Context Various movie queens, a reference to Shirley Temple's baby (her first child was born in January of '48), hot topics like Alfred Kinsey and Mahatma Gandhi, and more...
Mix Tape (Born in '48) Olivia Newton-John, Stevie Nicks, Grace Jones, Kenny Loggins, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Donna Summer, Jackson Browe, and Steve Winwood
Actors We ♥♥♥♥ Hard at TFE that were born in '48 Bernadette Peters, Dianne Wiest, Barbara Hershey, Kathy Bates and Christopher Guest
Other Key Showbiz Figures From '48's Fine Vintage Joe Dallesandro, Samuel L Jackson, John Carpenter, Gérard Depardieu, Bonnie Bedelia, Margot Kidder, Bud Cort, Kate Jackson, Mercedes Reuhl, Phylicia Rashad, Linsday Crouse, Mimi Kennedy, Nathalie Baye, Nell Carter, George RR Martin (author), Ben Burtt (sound genius), Colleen Atwood (costume designer), Javier Aguierresarobe (cinematographer), Edward Lachman (cinematographer), Lindy Hemming (costume designer)
Showtune to Go: Nat King Cole's "Nature Boy" is released which will later play a key role in one our mutual favorite films of all time Moulin Rouge! (2001)
Team Experience continues to share their picks for this year's Emmy nominations. Here's David on Michael Sheen.
If Lizzy Caplan's Virginia Johnson is the heart of Masters of Sex, Michael Sheen's Bill Masters is its head - its proud, dedicated, fearful psychosis, driving the narrative into a quagmire of sexual and social confusion. Virginia's emotion flows easily from her, but Bill's is buried beneath acres of childhood trauma built into cracked defences. He is akin to the other current TV icon of past American masculinity, Don Draper – and one episode even leaves him in the dark glow of a deserted office in a shot that could have come straight from Mad Men.
Sheen’s brilliance in the part is in how he retains the audience’s sympathy and investment despite his frequently frustrating episodes of stubbornness, anger, hypocrisy and cruelty. As Bill repeatedly contends, he "never meant to hurt anyone" - a clichéd excuse that is beautifully grounded in the reality of Sheen’s performance. Ironically, Bill is only really able to pull off an emotional façade in his most vulnerable moments, whether spitting cruel barbs back at his brother Frank or trying to shut out Virginia’s inquisitive gaze as she delves into his childhood (in the masterful third episode, ‘Fight’, set almost entirely in their hotel room).
Sheen and Lizzy Caplan in 'Fight'
Tasked with portraying such an intricate mind, it would have been easy for Sheen to make him inscrutable, shutting the audience out as spectators of Bill’s great intellect. Instead, Sheen delineates almost endless contradictions and conflicts while humanising a man who insistently refuses emotionality. As Bill discovers that his first patient needs to be himself, and as he opens up to Virginia, Sheen is careful not to abandon the inherent resistance of Bill’s nature to both of these developments, crafting a compelling and detailed story of a man more fascinating than his work. The defining moment of Sheen’s second season might be when Virginia orders him to strip before her – rarely do we see any man so controlled and exposed, but especially this one.
Margaret here with breaking news: Hollywood loves money, water is wet and Pitch Perfect 3 is officially in the works.
Pitch Perfect 2 is still in theaters, and presumably since it's nearing a $300 million worldwide take (which would be more than respectable even without its vastly profitable soundtrack tie-in), Universal has just announced that they've staked out July 21, 2017 for the threequel.
Critics were less than enthused about the second installment, but heaven knows if they can squeeze three movies out of The Hangover and Meet the Parents then there's no harm in in making room for movies starring and produced by women in the franchise club.
Screenwriter Kay Cannon is in talks to return for round three, and while there's no word on whether Elizabeth Banks will be back to direct, it has been announced that both Rebel Wilson and Anna Kendrick are on board.
See how ecstatic she looks?
The question is... how? Considering how inevitable another sequel seemed, it was strange to see the Pitch Perfect 2 screenplay consistently cutting off potential avenues for a sequel.
Of course, the most sensible (read: boring) solution would be to repeat the premise with a new slate of actors and have the original stars cameo in mentorship roles. But it's early yet, and we can hold out hope for a dramatic creative swerve. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a gritty game-change chronicling the harsh reality of post-college a cappella life, where the gang reunites to busk in the big city by night while by day they try to break into an unsympathetic industry. Featuring lots of shaky-cam, naturally. In what direction would you steer the Pitch Perfect series?
We've been falling behind with current trailers. So here are a few key future favorites (or not) that we missed talking about. Do these promos sell you on their movies / seasons respectively?
YNMS notes and trailers follow after the jump for the all-star thriller Everest, the action spy comedy The Man From U.N.C.L.E., the potential Oscar player Bridge of Spies and HBO's The Leftovers Season 2.
But let's start on the mountaintops with...EVEREST
Wednesday, June 17, 2015 at 6:00PM 
