15 « January « 2009 « Film News Briefs

Archive for January 15th, 2009

Thursday, January 15th, 2009

THURSDAY JANUARY 15, 2009

PROJECTS ANNOUNCED

Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage are going back in time for their upcoming “Gossip Girl” spinoff. The new CW project will focus on a younger version of “Gossip Girl’s” Lily van der Woodsen (Kelly Rutherford). Spinoff centers on the character as a wild teenager in 1980s Los Angeles, when she was known by her maiden name, Lily Rhodes. Spinoff will be produced as a backdoor pilot, as expected, and air May 11 as an episode of “Gossip Girl.” In the new project, which is based on an original idea by Schwartz and Savage, Lily moves in with her sister, the black sheep of the family, after a falling out with her parents. In the process, she must adjust to living in the San Fernando Valley (during the height of the Valley Girl craze) and going to public school, having previously attended a wealthy Montecito boarding school.

PROJECT UPDATES

With Mickey Rourke and Sam Rockwell negotiating to play key villains in “Iron Man 2,” Marvel Entertainment and director Jon Favreau are now looking for the right thesp to play femme fatale Black Widow, another nemesis for Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark. Emily Blunt has emerged as the frontrunner to play Natasha Romanoff in the “Iron Man” sequel. She’s a Soviet superspy who doubles as Black Widow, a beauty in a skintight black costume enhanced by high-tech weaponry.

Thesp Idris Elba has been cast on “The Office” as a new rival to Dunder Mifflin regional manager Michael Scott (Steve Carell). Elba, most recently seen in Guy Ritchie’s “Rocknrolla,” will appear in six episodes later this season. Details are slim on his plot line, other than he’ll play a no-nonsense hire at Dunder Mifflin’s corporate office who will throw Michael Scott into turmoil.

ACQUISITIONS/FESTIVAL NEWS

On the eve of Sundance, Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions Group has acquired all North American rights for the underground fighting drama “Blood and Bone.” Story centers on an ex-con (Michael Jai White) who takes the underground fighting world by storm in his quest to fulfill a promise to a dead friend. Michael Andrews penned the screenplay. Ben Ramsey directed the pic. Eamonn Walker, Julian Sands, Nona Gay and Kimbo Slice round out the cast.

Los Angeles-based Unified Pictures has struck a two-picture U.S. theatrical distribution deal with Cinema Epoch for the revenge film “The Perfect Sleep,” directed by Jeremy Alter and starring Roselyn Sanchez, and the romantic dramedy “Bob Funk,” directed by Craig Carlisle and starring Rachel Leigh Cook. Both films will be released in theaters this spring. Magnolia Home Entertainment will handle home video distribution. “Funk” stars Cook, Michael Leydon Campbell, Amy Ryan, Grace Zabriskie, Eddie Jemison and Stephen Root. The film is produced by Unified’s Ben Ruffman and Keith Kjarval. It revolves around the quick-witted and sardonic title character who is fired from his job by his mother. In an attempt to regain his job and his life, he agrees to quit drinking, go to therapy and report to a new boss who just happens to be the girl he has fallen for. “Sleep,” directed by Alter from a script by Anton Pardoe, stars Roselyn Sanchez, Anton Pardoe and Patrick Bauchau. Alter, Pardoe and Kjarval produced for Unified. In the movie, a tortured man returns to the city he swore he would never return to in order to save a woman he has always loved yet can never have.

BUSINESS NEWS

Underlining the need for specialty units to think globally, Focus Features will create a new entity under its umbrella: Focus Features Intl., which will now include Universal’s international production operation. Focus Features CEO James Schamus will oversee both as he continues to operate its domestic production and distribution arm. And the company will have stronger relationships with the burgeoning filmmakers who have been working with Universal Pictures’ international production prexy Christian Grass, who adds a title as co-chief exec of FFI. Grass and his production group have forged deals with filmmakers around the globe, mandating local-language production. But with the new deal, these filmmakers will have the opportunity to work with Focus’ foreign sales and distribution outfit to show their films in other territories – including, possibly, North America. Focus’s 2008 “In Bruges” points up what some shuttered specialty divisions elsewhere learned the hard way: You can’t survive on domestic grosses. “In Bruges” earned $8 million domestically but $25 million overseas.

As DreamWorks toppers labor to shore up financing for their post-Paramount incarnation, the bills keep mounting. DreamWorks is expected to write a check today for $26.5 million of the $30 million-$35 million it owes Par for the right to keep 17 films in its fold. Remarkably, DreamWorks principal Steven Spielberg will be dipping into his personal coffers — perhaps for the first time in his career — to foot half the bill. Indian conglom Reliance is covering the other half, according to a DreamWorks source. By paying the lump sum, DreamWorks will hold onto projects including “The 39 Clues,” “The Trial of the Chicago 7,” “Dinner for Schmucks,” “Motorcade” and “Atlantis Rising.” In addition, Spielberg and Reliance are splitting the solo company’s hefty overhead, which Paramount sources said was $50 million a year when DreamWorks was owned by the Melrose studio.

The American Federation of Television & Radio Artists has signed its first deal covering performers working on audiobooks produced by Audible.com. The union said Wednesday that the 18-month pact establishes minimum rates and employer contributions to the AFTRA Health & Retirement Plans for AFTRA members working on audiobooks produced by Audible.com, one of the Internet’s largest online distributors of audiobooks. The agreement expires on June 30, 2010. AFTRA said the tentative deal was reviewed and unanimously approved in November by its administrative committee, pending resolution of several minor issues.

INDUSTRY MOVES

Apple shares tanked after-hours Wednesday on news that CEO Steve Jobs is taking a medical leave of absence until the end of June as his medical condition is “more complex” than originally thought and his health poses a distraction for the company. In an e-mail to staff published by Apple after the market close, Jobs said he has tapped COO Tim Cook as the executive in charge of day-to-day operations at the tech giant.

STRIKE NEWS/LABOR ISSUES

In a contrast with its brutal internal battles, SAG has quietly set a start date on Feb. 23 for launching joint negotiations with American Federation of Television & Radio Artists on a new contract with the ad industry. The SAG-AFTRA contract with commercial producers, which has been extended twice, expires March 31. The bargaining will mark a return to solidarity at the contract table for the two thesp unions, which battled each other publicly last year after negotiating separately with Hollywood’s majors on the feature-primetime contract. AFTRA members inked a new contract with the studios in July, while SAG has been mired in a months-long impasse.

SAG’s internecine battle over its strike authorization vote battle isn’t over yet. That was the message sent Wednesday by the slim majority of SAG board members who regrouped after the 30-hour boardroom brawl in which their efforts to remove the guild’s national exec director Doug Allen, stop the strike authorization vote and replace the guild’s negotiating committee were thwarted by a marathon filibuster mounted by Allen supporters. But although they lost the battle, key board members vowed to continue working to block the planned strike vote from commencing this month.

TECHNOLOGY/MULTI-PLATFORM CONTENT

Movielink got $150 million from studios to build a download service that was supposed to transform digital delivery. Now Blockbuster, the vidtail chain that picked it up at a fire-sale price little more than a year ago, has abandoned the technology all together. On Wednesday, the chain inked a deal with rival CinemaNow that calls for the latter to supply technological support for Blockbuster’s digital storefront. Both companies will pool their digital libraries under the joint service, to be called Blockbuster Powered by CinemaNow. It is expected to launch in the second quarter.

OBITUARIES

Two of our favorites passed away yesterday. Ricardo Montalban (best known, of course, for his iconic roles on Fantasy Island, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Police Squad: The Naked Gun and, of course, for talking about the rich, Corinthian leather featured on your standard Chrysler Cordoba) and Patrick McGoohan, who created and starred in The Prisoner (which is only one of the coolest TV shows, like, ever) both died in their respective Los Angeles homes. Montalban was 88, McGoohan was 80. Not the biggest stars in Hollywood by any means, but respected and beloved nonetheless. Godspeed, Gentlemen. You will be missed.

WEBSITE TO WATCH

http://www.newseum.org/

This website for the News-themed Newseum museum on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington D.C. is, at first glance, nothing more than an informational/promotional tool for the 250,000 square foot institution, founded to celebrate and inform the public about the history of news gathering in the U.S. But click around and you’ll find some very cool stuff. The museum’s curators and web editors do a great job posting stories about news trends, such as Monday’s posting about how front page ads are nothing new. (The New York Times attracted attention for running an ad for CBS across the bottom of its front page earlier this month but the practice dates back to the 18th Century.) Test your news knowledge with the Flash game News Mania. Noam Chomsky, co-author of Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media, would particularly enjoy Today’s Front Pages. It features daily PDFs of the front pages of 692 different newspapers from 69 countries. (Chomsky found that smaller newspapers follow the lead of papers of record such as The Times when deciding what stories to run with.) Find out for yourself. You can sort papers by region or view them by clicking on an interactive map of each continent. Archived pages are available for major events dating back to the Columbia Shuttle Explosion in 2003.