Showbiz History: Mary Tyler Moore Debut, Charlie Chaplin Exile, Brangelina Split

10 random things that happened today, September 19th, in showbiz history

1913 Frances Farmer born in Seattle. She becomes a movie star and is eventually committed to an asylum as told in the movie Frances (1982) -- See, American Horror Story wasn't the first time Jessica Lange won awards for living in an asylum. 

1927 Happy 92nd birthday to Tony winner and Oscar nominee Rosemary Harris! We thank her for all her fine performances and for bringing another great actress, Jennifer Ehle, into the world...

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Months of Meryl: The Devil Wears Prada (2006)

John and Matthew are watching every single live-action film starring Meryl Streep. 

Meryl talking to director David Frankel during shooting

#34 —Miranda Priestly, ferocious editor-in-chief of Runway magazine.

JOHN: How do you solve a problem like Miranda Priestly? Or, more specifically, The Devil in Prada? How do you make walking into a room a distinct and indelible character trait? How do you continue assembling a mannequin’s outfit while simultaneously delivering a brutal lecture about the color cerulean? How do you not only resist but upend the misogyny inherent in your role? How do you grip the audience by their necks while still having them root for your victory? When your name is Meryl Streep, such issues are not problems or challenges, but more like Smith & Wollensky porterhouses, plump, juicy, bloody gifts, presented to you on a plate...

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Months of Meryl: Prime (2005)

John and Matthew are watching every single live-action film starring Meryl Streep. 

Meryl Streep as therapist with Uma Thurman as her client in Prime (2005)

#32 — Lisa Metzger, an Upper West Side therapist whose client begins dating her much younger son.

JOHN: The most depressing thing about Prime is that director Ben Younger reportedly spent eight years writing it. Equally depressing is the sight of Meryl Streep, Actress of Her Generation, wasting her time on this insipid project, and the subsequent dearth of roles for actresses over fifty that her involvement signifies. Here’s a fun kernel for a comedy skit: a kooky, Upper West Side therapist learns that the 37-year-old woman she is treating has begun dating her 23-year-old son, ensuing comic hijinks, oversharing, and ethical quandaries between therapist, son, and client. Now, imagine that idea stretched out for nearly two hours, sans comedy or romance, and you’d have Prime, easily one of the worst movies in Streep’s filmography...

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Months of Meryl: Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events (2004)

John and Matthew are watching every single live-action film starring Meryl Streep. 

 

#31 —Aunt Josephine, an agoraphobic, grammar-obsessed, hermetic eccentric.

MATTHEW:  Who says Meryl Streep doesn’t make movies for kids? In 2004, Streep lent her talents to Brad Silberling’s film adaptation of A Series of Unfortunate Events, Lemony Snicket’s (née Daniel Handler) acclaimed literary series that, over the course of 13 novels, chronicled the many misfortunes and menacing adventures of an orphaned trio of children...

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50 Kristins for Kristin's 50th

by Jorge Molina

Today, Tony, Emmy and Grammy-winner (that’s right, she only needs an Oscar to EGOT; get on it, Hollywood) and human ray of sunshine Kristin Chenoweth turns 50 years old. To honor her career, her legacy, and that impossibly high pitch matched only by her charisma, let’s take a look at 50 roles and appearances that she has gifted the world in almost three decades of work, in no particular order:

1) Her Broadway debut in an adaptation of Moliére’s Scapin as Hyacinth in 1996. 

2 & 3) Her two most iconic Broadway roles: A featured Tony-winning turn as Sally in You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown in 1999, and the Best Actress Tony-nominated performance as Glinda, the Good Witch in the world phenomenon that was Wicked in 2003.

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