Twins: Michelle's Blonde Brood

We're celebrating twins daily at 2:22 pm while we're in Gemini

Gratuitous Anecdote! I've always loved to draw and in my high school years it's what people knew me for. I won the High School's Departmental Award in Art (Do they still have departmental awards? Hell, do they still have art classes?) in that heady stretch of graduation celebrations where they keep honoring star pupils. One day early in my senior year or maybe it was at the end of my junior year, the art teacher asked one of the students to pose for the class. A guy I didn't know volunteered and I felt totally inspired. Instant crushing helps. He loved my drawing and we became fast friends after the class. The first day I went to his house after school I was stunned to see a whole house full of doppelgangers. He had one of those families where virtually every kid looked like a clone of the previous one and since he was the oldest they were all mini hims. And, yes, there was an actual set of twins to drive the point home. Have you ever met an identical family like that? It's kind of freaky.

Michelle Pfeiffer's first scene in THE WITCHES OF EASTWICK. She's buried in offspring

I flashed back to that memory while screening The Witches of Eastwick for its 25th anniversary week and smiling at Michelle Pfeiffer's introduction where a whole stream of authentically blonde children follow after like a trail of baby ducklings. There are two sets of siblings amongst these child actors who never worked again (perhaps they were locales?). The three towhead girls were played by sisters, surname "Ditmar" -- I couldn't find any information about them as they never acted again but if they're not triplets, there's a twin set in there!

Michelle Pfeiffer is so fertile ...onscreen. In real life the movie legend has only two children but onscreen her progeny number two dozen plus. For such a legendary beauty, Pfeiffer was never scared of screen parenting despite the widespread belief that you risk aging yourself out of leading lady roles when you start playing moms onscreen. La Pfeiffer didn't just dip her toe in to test the water but dove in headfirst becoming a mom onscreen for the first time in The Witches of Eastwick (she was only 28 years old while filming) not once not twice not thrice but six times over. And at the end of the movie Sukie Ridgemont had even had a seventh child, her first boy.

Daryl: Sukie, at last we meet.
Sukie: Hi. Hello. How are you?
Daryl: Let me look at those eyes of yours. My! You are a fertile little creature, aren't you?
Sukie: [uncomfortable laughter] Thank you... I think."
              -The Devil meets Sukie in The Witches of Eastwick. 

Pfeiffer's 27 Screen Children in the order I tend to remember them
Fertile indeed. 

• Alison Lohman - White Oleander (2002)
• Jonathan Jackson & Cory Buck - The Deep End of the Ocean (1999)
• Saoirse Ronan - I Could Never Be Your Woman (2007)
• Six Blonde Girls (Michele Sincavage, Nicol Sincavage, Heather Coleman, Carolyn Ditmars, Cynthia Ditmars and Christine Ditmars)- The Witches of Eastwick (1987)
• Claire Danes - To Gillian on Her 37th Birthday (1996)
• Brittany Snow - Hairspray (2007)
• Anthony J Nici - Married to the Mob (1988)
• Katharine Towne - What Lies Beneath (2000)
• Ryan Merriman & Michael McElroy - The Deep End of the Ocean (1999)
• Chlöe Grace Moretz - Dark Shadows (2012)
• Alex D Linz - One Fine Day (1996)
• Casey Boersma & Dylan Boersma (twins!), Daniel Henson & Jake Sandqiv (1999)
• Colleen Rennison & Tara Blanchard - The Story of Us (1999)
• Chase McKenzie Bebak - I Am Sam (2001)
• infant - The Witches of Eastwick (1987)
• Elisabeth Moss and Michelle Williams - A Thousand Acres (1997)
• infant - Amazon Women on the Moon (1987, her scene is a hospital delivery sequence if I recall correctly?) 

the only one I haven't seen

• Spencer Hudson - Personal Effects (2009) 

 upcoming

• Chris Pine - People Like Us (2012). Yes, she's technically old enough to have a 32 year old son. But her real children are not yet 20.
• Who will play her children in in the upcoming comedy Malavita (2013) ?  

Pfeiffer Pfridays. Should We Salivate Over "Malavita"?

It was recently announced that the one and only Michelle Pfeiffer is considering a substantial role in the new crime drama Malavita as the matriarch of a mafia family (Robert DeNiro plays the patriach) under witness protection who begin to act out in old violent ways. The film is based on the book "Badfellas" and it leans toward black comedy. The last time Pfeiffer was Married to the Mob, she was brilliant (and Golden Globe nom'ed) and the movie was delightful even in the non-Pfeiffer scenes. Is it wrong that I started to hyperventilate at the notion of Malavita, despite "Robert DeNiro" not doing anything at all for me onscreen since 1997?

Malavita will be directed by Luc Besson and while his films aren't exactly "performance showcases" in the 'actors' movie' sense nor particularly skilled with their comedy elements, he has delivered movies with memorably dangerous female star turns (think Natalie Portman in The Professional, Anne Parillaud in La Femme Nikita, and Milla Jovovich in The Fifth Element). So sign on the dotted line, diva. Make that movie!

Bruce Wayne: You've got a bit of a dark side, don't you?
Selina Kyle: No darker than yours, Bruce.  

If the sight of Pfeiffer blowing enchanted attackers to smithereens with a shotgun in Dark Shadows didn't make you smile a little than we can't be friends; Pfeiffer is always most thrilling when she plays a bad girl.

<-- Just after reading the news I was catching up with Mad Men --holy smokes that episode! -- and while scrolling through the commercials this very welcome image appeared (courtesy of People Like Us).

Everytime La Pfeiffer threatens to return to us I remember that she's very skittish about her fame and you never know if she'll vanish again for another 3-5 years. But does this recent burst of activity (New Year's Eve, People Like Us, and Dark Shadows all in a seven month stretch!) suggest that she wants it again? You have to want it and I always hope she'll get hungry again. The internet has been tossing around her name around (along with dozens of other under-employed mature actresses) as ideal casting to play the crazy long-missing mother of Emily Van Camp on Revenge which is a great great soap --holy smokes that finale! --  populated by chilly bad girls. Pfeiffer herself has expressed a love for the quality television of this era but despite the multi-orgasmic notion of watching Pfeiffer throw down with the resurgent delicious Madeleine Stowe, I'm hoping she doesn't actually do any TV. She's one of the great female movie stars who hasn't really gone there post fame. If she ever decides to act full time again, the big screen totally deserves and needs her.

• would you like to see Pfeiffer married to the mob again?
• did she thrill you in Dark Shadows?
• and, sort of Off Topic, who would you die to see as Emily's insane (we hope) mother on Revenge?

Review: "Dark Shadows"

This article was originally published at Towleroad in my weekly column

Chloë Grace Moretz is judging you!

With the world too busy seeing The Avengers (reviewed) for a second time last weekend, Dark Shadows premiered to considerably less fanfare and bank than Tim Burton and Johnny Depp collaborations are generally greeted with. So who will even notice that we're one week late to the ball? Young Carolyn Stoddard (Chloë Grace Moretz) will -- she's so smugly superior -- but she prefers the word "happening". She's quick to school her out-of-time vampire uncle Barnabas Collins (Johnny Depp) that no one throws "balls" anymore.  

Actually, Carolyn, Tim Burton does...

Click to read more ...

Divalinkious

Clothes on Film on every costume worn by Doris Day in Pillow Talk. Love it.
Felix in Hollywood Louise Brooks is looking at you.
Film Doctor on Dark Shadows. (Eek. I pforgot the promised pfeiffer pfriday posting). He says my pfavorite thing anybody has said about Michelle Pfeiffer recently:

America does not appreciate her enough... she deserves to be treated at least as well as France treats Catherine Deneuve

I've always felt the Deneuve/Pfeiffer comparison was apt. But the auteurs aren't biting or Pfeiffer isn't baiting. Deneuve, on the other hand who is 15 years her senior, is still making vital films for important directors. 

A New York Night *CONTEST* Sarah Jessica Parker is inviting you to her place if you win the contest to attend her Obama fundraiser. Yes, I entered. We need a sensible President and, more importantly, I need to be inside SJP's home!
Towleroad the Magic Mike pr blitz has begun. 
Time countsdown the 10 greatest movies made since the year 2000. Kind of an odd list -- very Oscar bestpicturey -- but lists are like pizza. Usually worth devouring even when far from satisfying. I'm in love with number•1

ways in which the upcoming Tonys are just like the Oscars
Gold Derby on the "precursors" the Drama Leagues. It may lock up the expected Tony wins.
Everything I Know... hates Ghost the Musical -- based on the hit movie Ghost (1990)-- and would like to remind Tony voters about about one of our Oscary pet peeves:

 I would like to remind the Tony voters that "best" design doesn't necessarily mean "most expensive" or "most complicated." Ideally, it would mean "design that works with the dramatic intent of the piece, enhancing the inherent effectiveness of the work, rather than hiding the fact that there essentially is no effectiveness." 

Amen. I haven't seen this musical but this is a standard awards group problem.

Oh what the hell. 2 more links to go.
My New Plaid Pants [nsfw] is always reminding me of hot things I've forgotten, like Game of Thrones' Nikolaj Coster Waldau doing Clive Owen in Bent (1997)
Rope of Silicon Ewww. what the hell with Matthew Fox's new body for Alex Cross. He plays a serial killer. (If you believe the movies, serial killer is practically as common a profession as waitressing!)

Pfeiffer Pfriday

I recently got a Pfacebook message from one of her biggest pfans  and he asked me if I'd misplaced my love for the one and only Michelle Pfeiffer. "Of course not!" I wanted to shout only to immediately realize that though she's been far less elusive than usual: magazines, press conferences for Dark Shadows, fresh on DVD with New Year's Eve, at premieres -- I've said pfew words. This must be corrected.

This is my favorite 2012 pfoto of her, taken last month at Cinema Con where she was honored as a "Cinema Icon".

Catwoman black / Susie Diamond sexy.

Since I abandoned my Thursday "Burtonjuice" series which y'all didn't seem to be into, I'll redirect my eyeballs and pfantasize about Pfeiffer each Pfriday till People Like Us premieres... even if it's only a pfoto. Deal?

With Pfeiffer back on the red carpet I was expecting a parade of sleek black but she's been mixing it up: Red and gold to Dark Shadows premieres; black at Cinema Con; gray at the Globes in January (couldn't find a full length pfoto since she didn't do the press lines); purple at New Year's Eve in December.

poll by twiigs.com

Red and black are her standbys (it's easy to see why) but it's nice to see variety. Lock-wise Pfeiffer has never much believed in variety, preferring long curly toussled for most of her career give or take stick straight detours here and there.

With Dark Shadows opening today (more on that later) here's a pflashback to the Batman Returns premiere 20 years ago...

Penguin. Batman. Catwoman. Burton