Box Office: Cameron Diaz Still Sells Tickets

Hey kids, it's Nathaniel. Amir is busy Hot Doc'ing it up in Toronto (yet another springtime festival!) so I'm here to quickly recite the box office chart. The producers of the Christmas release Annie (previously discussed) must have breathed a huge sigh of relief at the box office receipts for The Other Woman in which Diaz and her two new frenemies (Leslie Mann & Kate Upton) plot to destroy Jaime Lannister who is sleeping with all of them on the down low. Yep, people will stay come out in droves for Cameron Diaz in comic mode. Annie will open big... it's got several marketing hooks even before you get to audience love for funny Cam. 

I haven't yet seen The Other Woman yet but I hear it's quite regressive. Consider this scathing provocatively titled review at The Stranger...

The point of this movie is not sisterhood, but making sure women band together in the name of heterosexual competition. Cameron Diaz is too sexy, Leslie Mann is too frumpy, and Kate Upton is boobs, but boobs that are not good enough to keep a man goddammit. Nicki Minaj joins this horror show as the Sassy Black Secretary™ (it’s 2014, right?)...

THE TOP TEN
01 THE OTHER WOMAN $24.7 *NEW* 
02 CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER $16 (cum. $224.8) Review
03 HEAVEN IS FOR REAL $13.8 (cum. $51.9) 
04 RIO 2 $13.6 (cum. $96.1) 
05 BRICK MANSIONS $9.6 *NEW* 
06 TRANSCENDENCE $4.1 (cum. $18.4)  
07 THE QUIET ONES $4 *NEW* 
08 BEARS $3.6 (cum. $11.1)
09 DIVERGENT $3.6 (cum. $139.4) Review
10 A HAUNTED HOUSE 2 $3.2 (cum. $14.2)

In addition to Tribeca Film Festing, I went to Estelle Parson's new play The Velocity of Autumn in the hopes of catching at least one potential Tony Best Actress nominee before the announcement. But get this: Estelle called out sick so I was stuck with an understudy! The understudy wasn't bad and I liked the play about a very old very cantankerous lady armed with molotov cocktails in her Park Slope brownstone because her children want to put her in a nursing home. And yet it's so obviously a star vehicle (there are only two characters, Tony winner Stephen Spinella plays her son) that I was missing the expert comic timing of the Oscar-winning Parsons throughout. She would have maximized the punchlines and elevated it. The understudy switcheroo hasn't happened to me in a long time though so I made my peace with the theater gods quickly 'bout it. They've been good to me for the past several years and we've all called out sick from work in our lifetimes.

But I still fear the Tony nominations on Tuesday because I've seen like nothing that will be nominated this year. I was concentrating on Off Broadway too much I guess.

WHAT DID YOU SEE THIS WEEKEND? 

Supporting Smackdown '68: Lynn, Sondra, Kay, Estelle and Ruth

The revival of "StinkyLulu's Supporting Actress Smackdown" now in its new home at The Film Experience continues. The year is... [cue: time travelling music] 1968.  Oscar skipped the Globe nominees in this category from For the Love of Ivy, The Lion in Winter and Finian's Rainbow and despite their love of Oliver! AND of women in musicals AND of prostitutes with hearts of gold they also skipped newcomer Shani Wallis. Instead they went with these five...

Tony Curtis presented the 1968 Best Supporting Actress Oscar

THE NOMINEES

Estelle Parsons, the previous year's winner in this category for Bonnie & Clyde returned for a victory lap (though she skipped the ceremony). She was joined by two showbiz veterans: Ruth Gordon, a three time nominee for screenwriting who was in the middle of a surprising golden years reinvention as a beloved character actress, and Kay Medford, who had previously experienced her greatest successes on stage. Filling out the shortlist were two fresh faces nominated for their film debuts: Sondra Locke (who would later partner up with Clint Eastwood both on and offscreen for 14 years) & Lynn Carlin (who would later vanish into a series of guest spots on television).

Who will win the Smackdown? Read on 

Click to read more ...

Introducing... Five Nominees 1968

I've hinted at it before but we're going to try "Introducing..." as a series, since we love contemplating how actors and filmmakers introduce us to key characters in the movies. There's a real specific art to it if you want the character to stick. So herewith, as prelude to Wednesday's Smackdown, is how the five Supporting Actress nominees of 1968 are introduced in their films. In future non-Smackdown episodes we'll just concentrate on one entrance. But for our purposes here, quintuplets!

I've listed the nominees by how soon they show up in their respective films.

8 minutes in... Estelle Parsons as "Calla" in Rachel Rachel
This entrance is smartly staged by first-time director Paul Newman. It has the clarity of a theatrical entrance albeit without any heightening or glamour. As Rachel (Joanne Woodard) leads her schoolchildren downstage right with some silly arm wavings, an atypically 'light' gesture from this uptight teacher, Calla descends stage left from a higher floor into view, with her own flock, as if conjured by that sudden shift in tone. You immediately sense that they're very different women but as Calla gets closer to the camera, her shift from screechy schoolmarm to close co-worker chum is complete; the women lean in together co-conspiratorially.

Click to read more ...

Link As We Know It

i09 offers a look at the clockwork man in Scorsese's The Invention of Hugo Cabret
Gold Derby wonders if Oscar winner Estelle Parsons (Bonnie & Clyde) has a Tony Award in her very near future.
In Contention Guy shares his review plans for The Tree of Life in light of its premiere plans. And the new poster. Why yes, reader, here it is. Enjoy.

Gold Derby Academy to honor Sophia Loren in May
Playbill Kristin Chenoweth is coming back to Broadway. Details are unknown but bliss will surely follow.
Self Styled Siren 10 Films that the Siren Should Love But Doesn't. What a fun idea for a list. It's not classics you don't like that everyone else does... it's films you should like, given what you typically respond to, but just don't.

Finally...here's the Onion's vicious but laugh out loud funny Katharine Heigl tragedy "In Freak Accident, 34 Katherine Keigl Films Released At Once." Thanks to Glenn for pointing it out.

In Freak Accident, 34 Katherine Heigl Films Released At Once

So so funny though that Venus & Mars poster / concept reads 100% like a real movie. For a second I thought it was. My favorite bit was the 700% rise in self-blindings and the stressed EMT.

We're doing the best we can out here but the movies are just coming out too fast.

In truth I am one of those rare souls who kind of likes Katharine Heigl. BUT here is how I escaped the hatred: I didn't see all these crappy movies she stars in and I only watched like one season of Grey's Anatomy because it was a shlocky gooey mess. If there is one star in need of saying "no" unless it's a prestige project with A list director next time, it's her. She has enough money. A hiatus until a quality offer shows itself is the only answer to turn this ship around.