| | | | | | What's news: It's magazine day! This week's cover star is YouTuber-turned-boxer Jake Paul. Netflix has canceled Kaos after one season and renewed The Night Agent. Hearst has signed a content deal with OpenAI. Sam Hargrave will direct Universal's Shinobi movie. — Abid Rahman
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How Jake Paul Found Redemption in the Ring ►On the cover. From his "Taj MaPaul" mansion in Puerto Rico, Jake Paul, the Trump-loving YouTuber turned heavyweight champ of viral trolldom, talks to THR's Seth Abramovitch about bouncing back from punchline to powerhouse as he prepares to meet Mike Tyson in supposedly the biggest boxing match of all time. The cover story. |
The Untold Story Behind the Release of 'The Apprentice' ►"With the stars we have and the reception we got in Cannes, it’s unheard of the way the industry has treated this film." After debuting in Cannes to an 8-minute standing ovation and rave reviews earlier this year, The Apprentice, the timely and improbably nuanced Donald Trump origins movie, finally hits theaters on Oct. 11 — but it almost didn’t make it to cinemas in time for the U.S. presidential election. In a must-read interview, THR's Patrick Brzeski spoke to the film's director Ali Abbasi and executive producer James Shani who reveal how they stared down legal threats from Trump and untangled a messy distribution deal to rescue the much-talked about picture from oblivion just in time for the final weeks of the campaign. The interview. |
Kamala Harris Hits 'Late Show,' 'Howard Stern Show' ► "I don’t even understand how this election is close." Howard Stern revealed that he plans to vote for Kamala Harris during her appearance on his SiriusXM show Tuesday, one of several stops in a media blitz the presidential hopeful is making this week as she enters the final month of her campaign. In the sit-down interview on The Howard Stern Show, Harris discussed her campaign and some policy but, as is typical with Stern’s interviews, the topics were more personal. Harris discussed her late mother, family and how her conversations with her friends and husband are a stand-in for therapy. The story.
—"This is what happens when I drink beer." Harris' media blitz continued Tuesday night with a visit to The Late Show. The vice president addressed the wild new reports about Donald Trump's relationship with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin but also had some fun, sharing a beer with host Stephen Colbert and getting rather candid about her feelings on Trump. The recap.
—🤝 Another content deal 🤝 OpenAI is partnering with Hearst, one of the nation’s largest owners of newspaper and magazine content. The collaboration, announced on Tuesday, spans over 20 magazine brands and 40 newspapers, becoming one of the company’s most sizable media partnerships. Included in the agreement will be content from the Houston Chronicle, San Francisco Chronicle, Esquire, Cosmopolitan, ELLE, Runner’s World and Women’s Health. The deal comes after OpenAI has been sued by several publishers and other copyright holders in lawsuits accusing it of pilfering their work without compensation and consent to train its technology. The story.
—"Like the proverbial cries of fire in a crowded theater, there are legal limits on us, too." Piers Morgan issued an on-air apology to Jay-Z and Beyoncé regarding an interview with Jaguar Wright, who made allegations on Morgan’s show Uncensored against the superstar power couple that turned out to be false. Wright, a singer, recently appeared on Uncensored , where she spoke about Sean “Diddy” Combs’ recent arrest. Wright claimed in the interview without evidence that Jay-Z and Beyoncé were "monsters" and that they both have hundreds of victims. On Tuesday, Morgan revealed on his show that Jay-Z and Beyoncé’s lawyers contacted him, and that Wright’s claims “were totally false and have no basis in fact.” The story.
—Sue-metal. A legal brawl has broken out between Universal Music Group and Limp Bizkit over an alleged flaw in the record company’s system that calculates royalties, with the band claiming that it didn’t receive any fees for its music until this year when it uncovered the alleged defect. Limp Bizkit, in a lawsuit filed in California federal court on Tuesday, accuses UMG of fraud, as well as breach of contract and fiduciary duty, for intentionally designing a software system that “systematically prevented artists from being paid their royalties.” It seeks a court order voiding its contracts with the conglomerate on top of damages that it says could exceed $200m. The story. |
Nolan's Next Movie Lands at Universal, Damon In Talks ►📅 Dated! 📅 After a historically successful collaboration on Oppenheimer, Christopher Nolan is staying put at Universal for his next feature project, which has a release date of July 17, 2026. Although details on the film are scant, sources say the project is not a big-screen take on 1960s British series The Prisoner, an endeavor Nolan contemplated in the 2000s. The filmmaker is lining up Matt Damon to star, with the Oppenheimer actor in talks. Securing Nolan's next project is a huge coup for Universal, after the bet on Oppenheimer paid off so spectacularly, with the film earning almost $1b at the box office and winning 7 Oscars. The story.
—🎭 Dream team 🎭 Sydney Sweeney and Amanda Seyfried are looking to team up for an adaptation of psychological thriller The Housemaid from director Paul Feig. Lionsgate, which is behind the project, has closed a deal with Sweeney and is in final negotiations with Seyfried. Feig will helm from Rebecca Sonnenshine’s script, which is based on author Freida McFadden’s best-selling novel that first published in 2022. The Housemaid centers on Millie (Sweeney), who lands a job as a housemaid to wealthy couple Nina (Seyfried) and Andrew before learning that the pair hide dangerous secrets. The story.
—Move like stealth. Extraction filmmaker Sam Hargrave is attached to helm Universal's Shinobi, an adaptation of the Sega game series that seems tailor-made to his action strengths. The game debuted in 1987 in arcades, and focused on modern-day ninja Joe Musashi, a man who confronts great evil. Hargrave is a stuntman who transitioned into becoming an in-demand director with the Netflix Extraction movies, which were praised for their inventive and visceral action. The story.
—In-demand. Drew Hancock, whose upcoming directorial debut Companion is already generating buzz months before its release, has come aboard to write and direct My Wife and I Bought a Ranch, a supernatural horror feature in development at Amazon MGM Studios. The project unites some heavy hitters, and some big horror names, on the producing side. Producers include 21 Laps, the banner run by Shawn Levy, Dan Cohen and Dan Levine, as well as James Wan and Michael Clear’s Atomic Monster. Also producing is Scott Glassgold of Ground Control, which counts this year’s surprise hit Tarot among its credits. The story.
—🎭 Four more 🎭 Cassandra Scerbo, Adrianne Palicki, Q’orianka Kilcher and Angus Macfadyen have boarded The Wolf and the Lamb, a folk horror/thriller from writer and director Michael Schilf. The genre pic takes place during the western expansion of the 1870s and is shooting in Montana. Scerbo plays a widowed school teacher searching for her only son, played by Jaydon Clark, who is the latest child to go missing in a tight-knit mining camp. But when the son miraculously returns, he is more monster than man. The story. |
Riley Keough Talks Death of Lisa Marie Presley on Oprah Special ►"The moment my brother died, I was like, 'this is the end of her.'" For the first time, actress Riley Keough publicly discussed the death of Lisa Marie Presley and opened up about finishing her mother's posthumous memoir during CBS’s An Oprah Special: The Presleys – Elvis, Lisa Marie and Riley Tuesday night. In a wide-ranging interview, Keough spoke about the tragedy that has afflicted her family in recent years, her feelings towards her legacy and the future of Graceland. The recap.
—Quick as you like. Netflix has renewed The Night Agent for a third season, with the pickup coming several months before season two premieres. The streamer hasn’t set a specific date for the show’s return but says it will premiere in winter 2025. Production on season three is set to begin late this year in Istanbul and continue in New York after the new year. Created by Shawn Ryan and produced by Sony Pictures Television, The Night Agent was a breakout hit for Netflix last year. The show’s first season currently ranks seventh all time among English-language series in the streamer’s internal rankings. The story.
—Greek tragedy. Netflix has canceled Kaos after a single season. The decision comes about six weeks after the dark comedy, based on Greek and Roman mythology and created by Charlie Covell (The End of the F***ing World), made its debut on the streamer. Kaos appeared in Netflix’s top 10 charts for English-language series in each of its first four weeks, topping out at No. 3 for the week of Sept. 2-8. It earned 14.9m views (measured by total viewing time divided by running time) over those weeks, a middling number by the streamer’s standards. The story.
—🎭 Murray is present 🎭 Tubi is filling out the cast for its Lauren Graham-starring workplace comedy The Z-Suite. Rhys Darby, Mark McKinney, Dani Kind, Nadine Djoury, Richard Waugh and Peter Keleghan have nabbed guest-starring roles. They join earlier-announced series regulars Graham, Madison Shamoun, Nico Santos, Spencer Stevenson, Anna Bezahler and Evan Marsh in the comedy shooting in Toronto. The Tubi original is set at a boutique New York ad agency where generational divides see the established C-Suite and rising Gen Z employees clash. The story.
—📅 Dad jokes 📅 Seth Meyers is bringing his comedy to HBO. The NBC Late Night host will release Seth Meyers: Dad Man Walking on Oct. 26. The stand-up special, his first for HBO, was taped in front of a live audience in June at The Vic Theatre in Chicago. Unlike Meyers’ late night perch, where he’s heavily focused on politics and world events, the HBO hour centers squarely on his personal life. The story.
—Potential realized. ABC's first-year drama High Potential is thus far living up to its title in ratings terms. The procedural starring Kaitlin Olson has averaged better than 10m viewers across all platforms for its first two episodes, and with seven days of viewing for each. The Sept. 24 installment grew from 3.67m viewers for its initial airing to 10.72m with a week of streaming and DVR viewing — a nearly threefold increase. Cross-platform viewing pushes the first-year series to a nearly threefold increase over its on-air debut. The ratings. |
Broadway Box Office: 'Sunset Boulevard' Hits $1M ►Coming in hot. Romeo + Juliet, starring Rachel Zegler and Kit Connor, and Sunset Boulevard continued to be some of the hot tickets on Broadway last week as the two shows entered their second week of previews. Sunset Boulevard, starring Nicole Scherzinger, brought $1.08m across its first week of six previews, in the St. James Theater, and playing to a capacity of 93 percent. The average ticket price fell from last week’s high of $187.42 to $118.25. Opening night is scheduled for Oct. 20. Romeo + Juliet brought in just above $950,000 across seven previews, while playing to more than 100 percent capacity at the Circle in the Square Theatre, a smaller theater than Sunset Boulevard , and with an average ticket price of $166.71, the third highest in the industry for the week. Opening night is scheduled for Oct. 24. The story.
—🎭 Return to Broadway 🎭 Jonathan Groff is set to star in new musical Just in Time. In the show, Groff, a Tony winner for his role in last season’s Broadway revival of Merrily We Roll Along, will play Bobby Darin, the singer/songwriter known for “Beyond the Sea,” “Mack the Knife,” “Splish Splash” and more. Groff is also a producer on the project, alongside Tom Kirdahy, Robert Ahrens and John Frost. The show, developed and directed by Alex Timbers, will begin previews at the Circle in the Square Theatre starting March 28, 2025, with an opening night April 3. The theater is currently home to Romeo + Juliet, which is a limited run, set to close Feb. 16. The story.
—🎭 ICYMI 🎭 Sean Astin will make his Broadway debut this season in Elf the Musical. Astin will play Santa, with Tony Award nominee Grey Henson playing Buddy the Elf. The musical will play The Marquis Theatre starting Nov. 9, with an opening night Nov. 17. The show, based on the 2003 film Elf starring Will Ferrell, Zooey Deschanel and James Caan, is scheduled for a limited engagement through Jan. 4. The show follows Buddy, a human raised by Santa’s elves, as he goes to New York to find his real father. The story. |
TV Review: 'Sweetpea' ►"Intriguingly murky." THR's Angie Han reviews Starz's Sweetpea. Adapted from the novel by C.J. Skuse, the drama stars Yellowjackets and Fallout alum Ella Purnell as a bullied and overlooked young woman who reaches a violent breaking point and becomes a serial killer. The review.
—"Likably all-over-the-place." THR's chief TV critic Dan Fienberg reviews Hulu's La Máquina. The streaming service's first Spanish-language original series centers on an aging Mexican fighter who's persuaded to take on one last rematch, with potentially dangerous consequences, starring old friends Gael García Bernal and Diego Luna. The review.
In other news...
—A Complete Unknown trailer: Timothée Chalamet as Bob Dylan battles fame
—Cinema pioneer Costa-Gavras to receive lifetime achievement César
—TCM Classic Film Festival announces 2025 dates
—CNN veteran Katrina Cukaj to lead entertainment ad sales for Fox
—Doc Harris, Dragon Ball Z English narrator, dies at 76
—Nicholas Pryor, actor in Risky Business and Beverly Hills, 90210, dies at 89
What else we're reading...
—Caitlin PenzeyMoog is fascinated by Amazon's The Rings of Power attempting to tackle the idea of orc personhood [Vox]
—Heather Schwedel writes that there's only one reason why Netflix's Nobody Wants This has been the talk of social media: Adam Brody [Slate]
—Mark Sweney talked to Amazon MGM boss Jennifer Salke about the hunt for the next James Bond [Guardian]
—With 5.5m people urged to leave Florida as Milton nears, Patricia Mazzei and Isabelle Taft report the evacuation is one of the largest in the state's history [NYT]
—Lucy Acheson digs into the upcoming Paramount+ drama Curfew, in which men are subject to a curfew to tackle violence against women [BBC]
Today...
...in 1947, 20th-Fox unveiled director Edmund Goulding’s film noir adaptation of Nightmare Alley, starring Tyrone Power and Joan Blondell, at its New York premiere. The original review.
Today's birthdays: Steve McQueen (55), Guillermo del Toro (60), Rupert Friend (43), Tyler James Williams (32), Tony Shalhoub (71), Brian Blessed (88), Pete Docter (56), Jharrel Jerome (27), Bella Hadid (28), Nick Swardson (48), Jodelle Ferland (30), Scott Bakula (70), Chris O'Dowd (45), Jason Butler Harner (54), Brandon Routh (45), Michael Paré (66), Dana Wheeler-Nicholson (64), Jacob Batalon (28), Sheila Kelley (63), Colin Donnell (42), Sam Riegel (48), Jarod Joseph (39), Shera Danese (75), John O'Hurley (70), Steve Burns (51), Anna Castillo (31), Robert Wuhl (73), Erin Daniels (51), Kieren Hutchison (50), Melissa Villaseñor (37), Jennifer Aspen (51), Gethin Anthony (41), Richard Chaves (73), John Ralston (60), Cocoa Brown (52), Tomaso Sanelli (20), Gary Frank (74), Meg Bellamy (22) |
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