I'm linking out... ♫ I want the world to know, gotta blog it so...

Guardian Carrie Fisher is doing an advice column? What happy potentially hilarious news
Salon They're prepping a Rumi biopic and the filmmakers want Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert Downey Jr for the leading roles of Rumi and his mentor Shams. Those were real people and Persian muslims. Here we go again with Hollywood's tone deaf casting imperatives... (sigh)
Coming Soon Jennifer Lawrence to star in a movie about Elizabeth Holmes, once estimated to be worth $4.5 billion and now nothing. Adam McKay to direct so we're guessing he got a taste for Oscar with The Big Short and wants more.

MTV Teo Bugbee looks at the career of James Wan from Saw (2004) to The Conjurer 2 (2016)
Village Voice Angelica Jade Bastién on the female gaze of American Psycho
Pajiba gets vicious with a list of 'female equivalents of Sam Worthington' (i.e. generically attractive & completely unmemorable but they keep getting big roles) including Zoey Deutch, Britt Robertson, and Lily Collins (who Warren Beatty will try to make happen again soon in his Howard Hughes movie). But I have to admit Lily James is growing on me so I wouldn't have included her   
Pride Source actress Lea Delaria (Orange is the New Black) thinks "LGBT" needs to go and be replaced by Queer. Actually we're kinda for it as there are more and more letters attached "LGBTIQA"
/Film Helena Bonham Carter and Mindy Kaling are joining Bullock & Blanchett in that Oceans Ocho movie we were fantasy casting earlier 
The Tracking Board ... and speaking of Oceans 11, that movie's director Steven Soderbergh is making a new heist movie himself called Logan Lucky. The cast will include Hilary Swank, Adam Driver, Seth MacFarlane, Daniel Craig, Katherine Heigl, Channing Tatum, and Riley Keough. 

Tony Season
Playbill in counterprogramming for the Tony Awards, TCM will play Alexander Hamilton (1931), the biopic starring George Arliss. Haha.
Gothamist good god, I'm seeing Hamilton just in the nick of time. They're upping the price of premium seats to $849 each and orchestra seats to $179-199. That is insane. I sometimes wonder what would happen if everyone just refused to go to theater priced over $50 for an entire year. It might make the art more accessible / popular. I'm seeing the show next week 

P.S.
And look, two of the greats met each other! President Obama and Madonna. As Madge points out they're both Leos so it's "a cosmic convergence"

A meeting of the Leo's! 🦄. A Cosmic Convergence!! . 2 ❤️#rebelhearts @jimmyfallon

A photo posted by Madonna (@madonna) on Jun 9, 2016 at 1:24am PDT

Links

Fistful of Film Fisti is sharing 100 reasons why Xavier Dolan's Mommy is his all time favorite film
Buzzfeed has an extensive interesting essay on Jennifer Garner's transformation from promising actress to magazine-celebrity mom
Tracking Board Bong Joon-Ho (Snowpiercer, Mother) is doing a monster movie for Netflix that will star the Gyllenhaal, Tilda, Kelly Macdonald and Lily Collins. Somehow they chose the only boring cast member in that list for the photo

Pajiba 11 examples of terrible singing in movie musicals - fine list except for including Christian Bale & Ewan McGregor - love both of those performances and I'm a total nitpicker with movie musicals
Demanders great piece on The Flash's vision of masculinity (so different than other superheroes, thank god)
Ali Benz "Reasons why Nicole Kidman is a legend"
Towleroad wide ranging Sir Ian McKellen interview with Owen Jones
Playbill The Fosters had a musical Romeo & Juliet episode
AV Club an archive of unsold TV pilots
Variety Jenna Dewan Tatum (Mrs Channing Tatum) will host a new dance competition series for ABC
The Russo Brothers show "Chris Evans" the finished Captain America: Civil War and get his reaction. What's his favorite part?
Guardian has a very oddly timed screed against the mediocrity of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Oddly timed because a certain DC behemoth is opening right now and...
Rotten Tomatoes... reviews are abysmal for Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice

Titles / Release Dates:
Woody Allen's 2016 picture (starring Steve Carell, Kristen Stewart, Parker Posey and more) takes place in the 1930s and is called Cafe Society. It might debut at Cannes; Ben Affleck's next Oscar hopeful as a director, the Prohibition era drama Live by Night (which he also stars in) will open October 20th, 2017 

OffScreen For Fun
Cracked 10 Facts to make you feel better about the upcoming presidential election
Kenneth in the (212) a catty meme
The Gaily Grind  Easter Egg Butts (nsfw)

Important!
Goldie Hawn has joined Instagram.

My happy hour cocktail 🍸#greenjuice

A video posted by Goldie Hawn (@officialgoldiehawn) on Mar 9, 2016 at 6:37pm PST

 

The Bening Returns

My loyal subjects!

You may trumpet the glorious news, loudly. I am soon returned to you. As you prepare to indulge in Mad Max: Fury Road this weekend, please understand that I had no choice but to turn down the role of "Imperator Furiosa," a fierce military commander. For who would believe me as anything less than "Empress" or "Immortan". The help? Please. 

My man-servant Beatty has yet to title his next picture but I deigned to offer my support for his loyalty since 1991. The first still features the film's biggest draw, pictured below with Lily Collins. After that epic, sure to sweep the Oscars, I have agreed to star in three more films. Why should Mary Louise have all the roles/fun? I am to play Catherine, the eponymous character in "The Great" though we only have a script right now so you must be patient. Before that I will headline the film adaptation of the classic play "The Seagull" (with some upstart named Saoirse Ronan).

After that tour de force, I will lead ladies-in-waiting Greta Gerwig and Elle Fanning through Mike Mill's film "20th Century Women."  Forgive the title for I bridge centuries.

Your Queen,

- The Bening

Review: "Mirror Mirror"

This review was originally published in my column at Towleroad.

Once upon a time there lived a director with big canvas visual ideas. He would stretch them across just about any surface and start painting. Serial killer craziness (The Cell), muscle queen mythology (The Immortals), and uncategorizable period fantasy (The Fall) were all fair game. Any topic would do including a comic spin on Snow White because why the hell not? 

His name was Tarsem Singh or Tarsem or Tarsem Singh Dwandwar or Tarsem Dwandwar Singh because he could never settle on a signature. He would halfheartedly skim screenplays until inspiration struck. Once the spell was cast, he'd toss the script into the fire, chug absinthe, and speed dial Eiko Ishioka. He'd sketch until the last of the words had turned to ash and only his drawings remained*. The end. 

*not his real process.

Whether you live happily ever after from watching his movies depends on what you go to the movies for. [Continue]

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Vanity Fair 2012 'Thoroughly Modern Actresses'

The "Hollywood Issue" cover is here! You can't see me but I'm totally throwing confetti. It's one of the ten greatest Oscar season traditions (do I feel a list coming on? Maybe later).

Mario Testino took over photography duties for the first time. The girl's with the hardest working teams behind them (how do you think anybody lands the front cover?) are, from left to right, Rooney Mara, Mia Wasikowska, Jennifer Lawrence, and Miss Ubiquity 2011 Jessica Chastain. On the inside folds we get from left to right: Elizabeth Olsen, Adepero Oduye, Shailene Woodley, Paula Patton, Felicity Jones, Lily Collins and Brit Marling.

A zoom in for a closer look... 

Lisbeth, Katniss, "Mia Vashivovkoska" (thanks Meryl), and Miss Ubiquity

RuPaul's Drag Race premiered again last night so you'll forgive this outburst... 

GAG ON THE ELEGANZA!"

Not that any of these beauties look like drag queens... though Shailene Woodley wins the awards for "looking the least like herself" and Rooney Mara is still working the most easily duplicated look should you want her as your new style icon. 

more zoom-ins, reader questions, and fun trivia after the jump!

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