Maybe it's coincidence that Ezra Miller had two films premiere over the weekend at the Tribeca Film Festival, where City Island -- his film currently playing in theaters -- won the audience award in 2009. But it's no accident, either. Since his 2008 screen debut in the harrowing prep-school drama Afterschool, the 17-year-old actor has built a reputation behind the scenes for fearlessness, intensity, comic chops, and holding his own against alpha-castmates like Andy Garcia, Liev Schreiber and Helen Hunt. And coming soon: Tilda Swinton.
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It's hard to believe that nearly 25 years into his pioneering career as the world's most influential, ambitious and successful BMX athletes, Mat Hoffman didn't have a film made about him until now. Perhaps harder still to believe: That it would take Jackass partners in crime Johnny Knoxville and Jeff Tremaine to finally get it done.
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The success of Stomp the Yard in 2007 might have heralded several things, but few would have predicted that its director, Sylvain White, would suddenly become a familiar name to the fanboy community. Then again, White is a major fanboy himself, and he's used his heat to attach himself to a number of cult properties, including an adaptation of the Frank Miller graphic novel Ronin and a film version of the classic video game franchise Castlevania (which he's since departed). The release today of White's The Losers (adapted from a DC Comics comic book series) may be the first example of his fannish tendencies made manifest, but if he has his way, it'll hardly be the last.
I talked to White today about how he weathers the scrutiny of superfans, and what he's got in mind for Ronin, his remake of the French film Le Magnifique, and several other properties.
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They may have lost Project Runway last night to Seth Aaron Henderson, but second- and third-place finishers Emilio Sosa and Mila Hermanovski seem to have gained some respect for one another since shooting their contentious season. In a Movieline interview with the opinionated duo, Mila and Emilio discussed disagreeing with Tim Gunn and Michael Kors, snipes from less "mature" contestants, and the state of their tensions (which I may have aggravated after Emilio noted that he hadn't watched the finale because he doesn't have cable, and I informed him that Mila called his final line "Harlem in 1994").
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Following a nail-biting finale against competitors Mila Hermanovski and Emilio Sosa, Seth Aaron Henderson was declared Project Runway's season seven champion. His Bryant Park collection comprised the cold and the carnivalesque. Leathers, plaids, Harlequin prints, and military jackets dominated his presentation, adding up to an explosive palette and hell of an opening statement on fashion's biggest stage. Movieline caught up with Seth Aaron this morning to discuss his big win, making Tim Gunn get on a trampoline, and what he's going to do with the strangest part of his earnings.
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Welcome back to Moment of Truth, Movieline's weekly spotlight on the best in nonfiction cinema. This week we hear from Leslie Zemeckis, whose film Behind the Burly Q opens Friday in NYC and May 7 in Los Angeles.
The new burlesque documentary Behind the Burly Q began as sort of a happy accident for director Leslie Zemeckis. The endlessly fascinating (if mildly hyperactive) results reflect something far more deliberate: A definitive glimpse at the lost era of popular stage shows combining musicians, comedy, acrobats and yes, a few underdressed ladies. Everyone who was anyone from the era -- and who was still alive when Zemeckis came calling -- appears in Burly Q, and their stories make for revelatory viewing. And not just because the pasties come off from time to time. either.
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Ask anyone what the difference is between the scandal-plagued tandem Eliot Spitzer and Tiger Woods, and they might think you're about to deliver a punchline. Ask Oscar-winning filmmaker Alex Gibney, however -- whose new documentary about the disgraced New York governor will appear this weekend at the Tribeca Film Festival as a work in progress -- and the distinctions are no joke at all.
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If writers historically are counseled to write what they know, then it might not seem so surprising that Jeff Daniels acts what he knows while playing frustrated novelist Richard Dunn in his new film Paper Man. Or maybe only partly knows: There might not be a distant wife (played by Lisa Kudrow) who leaves him in a cold Sag Harbor cabin to finish his second, not-so-highly anticipated second book. There isn't likely the 17-year-old stranger Abby (Emma Stone), roped into the mix as a sort of accidental emotional stabilizer. And there definitely isn't a cape-and-tights-clad imaginary friend named Captain Excellent (Ryan Reynolds) coaxing Richard's conscience along since childhood. But writer-directors Michele and Kieran Mulroney's curious indie does feature such influences orbiting the solitary, unglamorous head space that Daniels has plenty of familiarity with as the author of 14 plays -- and a 15th in the works.
Movieline recently spoke with the 55-year-old actor-playwright-songwriter about the quirky dynamics of Paper Man, when it's OK to have a voice in your head, and the writing methods that help him pen an entire play in a month or less.
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Over the course of Monica Potter's 15-year acting career, the Cleveland-born actress has divided her time between the big screen, with projects like Con Air and Along Came a Spider, and the small screen, with series Boston Legal and Trust Me. But when executive producer Jason Katims (Friday Night Lights) offered Potter the opportunity to converge mediums with Parenthood, NBC's dramedy based on the 1989 Steve Martin film, the actress hesitated. A mother of three herself, Potter was not sure that she could accurately portray Kristina Braverman, a tightly wound mother trying to raise her autistic son (Max Burkholder) and teenage daughter Haddie (Sarah Ramos) while maintaining her marriage (to Adam, played by Peter Krause) and navigating the many relationships of her her in-laws, the mighty Braverman clan.
Last week, Potter tested out her new hands-free technology by phoning Movieline to explain how she conquered her fear of TV motherhood, reclaimed her Cleveland accent and felt after her favorite character was canceled.
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How famous is Alex O'Loughlin? Ask him and he'll assure you that he isn't, but ask the marketers who put his name above the title on ads for the Jennifer Lopez romcom The Back-Up Plan and they may whistle a different tune. The truth is that O'Loughlin is the sort of actor who's been on the verge of stardom for a while now, a charismatic, handsome Australian with the sort of dedicated female fanbase that comes when you play a sexy vampire in your first American project, the television series Moonlight. That series was canceled, as was O'Loughlin's last show Three Rivers, but CBS has high hopes that an O'Laughlin-led Hawaii Five-O revival will be a fixture of its fall schedule.
On the eve of The Back-Up Plan's release this Friday, O'Loughlin called up Movieline to discuss the way Jennifer Lopez informs his notion of celebrity, the amount of faith CBS executives have had in him, and how he still smarts (just a little!) from losing the role of James Bond.
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How's this for an unlikely trajectory: in your late teens, become a Japanese action star, and then, in your late forties, transition into English-language dramas. That's how it's happened for Hiroyuki Sanada, who got his start in Sonny Chiba's action club in Japan but crossed over to Western films with an appearance in 2003's The Last Samurai. Since then, Sanada's worked almost exclusively on American productions, and though he has a few big-budget films under his belt, he's also appeared on Lost (as this season's temple master, Dogen) and in two films directed by James Ivory, The White Countess and this week's The City of Your Final Destination, where he plays the younger lover to Anthony Hopkins.
Sanada called up Movieline last week to chat about the film, what it was like to curl up naked next to the man who played Hannibal Lecter, and the bait-and-switch that happened when Lost producers asked him to join the cast.
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Jay Nicolas Sario's fourth-place finish on Project Runway isn't just a loss for the 31-year-old San Francisco resident himself -- it kinda sucks for us too. Jay's deocy collection at Bryant Park was a master class production, and seeing Michael Kors rendered asthmatic would have been a record-early Christmas treat. Sadly, Jay was eliminated in favor of Mila last night, but he took time to tell Movieline about Tim Gunn's advice, Mila's "expected" collection, and the fellow designer who helped him during a dark hour.
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While Betty Suarez and Co. hung up their orange ponchos during last night's series finale, a few members of the Ugly Betty cast celebrated their four-year run at Oatarian's Grand Opening Cocktail Event in New York City. Among them was 15 year-old Mark Indelicato, who has spent his middle school years embodying Betty's wise, fashion conscious nephew Justin. Now that he's free to explore a life outside of Queens, Indelicato excitedly outlined his upcoming work schedule to Movieline's sister site Hollywood Life, revealed just how he's currently following in Betty's footsteps, and discussed his dream role. Oh, and if there's a potential Ugly Betty film, count him in.
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Welcome back to Moment of Truth, Movieline's weekly spotlight on the best in nonfiction cinema. This week, we hear from John Sloss, the veteran sales agent-turned-rookie distributor of Banksy's directing debut Exit Through the Gift Shop. It opens Friday in New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco.
Leave it to mischievous street-art godhead Banksy to completely overturn cinema with his first foray into feature filmmaking, Exit Through the Gift Shop. More specifically, leave it to Banksy to permute the documentary genre with expert zeal, turning a film ostensibly about him into a film about its original director. It sounds both more and less complicated than it really is when you think about it -- a testament to the shadowy artist's dexterity with narrative and character. But what about his dexterity with facts?
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When Lost began, Jorge Garcia's Hurley was mainly used as comic relief, though he's since shown himself to be capable of much more during the show's six seasons. Fortunately for Garcia, he got to flex all of those acquired muscles last night in the show's final, Hurley-centric installment. As he prepares to say goodbye to the series forever, the 36-year-old actor rang up Movieline to discuss last night's episode, the machinations involved in getting guest star Cynthia Watros to return, and the difficult moments yet to come.
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