Category: News (Page 179 of 401)

John Hughes 1950 – 2009

August 6, 2009 /

John Hughes, the man responsible for capturing teen angst with more humor than anyone else in the 1980s, has died, and as a tribute, I offer up sixteen of my favorite quotes from the man who gave us “Sixteen Candles.” Your mileage with these selections may vary, particularly since I wanted to pay specific tribute to his writing (if we were limiting ourselves solely to films that he directed, we wouldn’t be able to use “Pretty in Pink” or “Some Kind of Wonderful”), but that’s what the Replies section is for, so don’t be afraid to leave your own favorites below.

1. “I understand that you little guys start out with your woobies and you think they’re great… and they are, they are terrific. But pretty soon, a woobie isn’t enough. You’re out on the street trying to score an electric blanket, or maybe a quilt. And the next thing you know, you’re strung out on bedspreads Ken. That’s serious.” – Jack Butler (Michael Keaton), “Mr. Mom” (1983)

2. “This is no longer a vacation. It’s a quest. It’s a quest for fun, I’m gonna have fun and you’re gonna have fun, we’re all gonna have so much fucking fun we’ll need plastic surgery to remove our goddamn smiles! You’ll be whistling Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah out of your assholes! I gotta be crazy; I’m on a pilgrimage to see a moose! Praise Marty Moose! Oh, shit!” – Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase), “National Lampoon’s Vacation” (1983)

3. “Can I borrow your underpants for ten minutes?” – The Geek (Anthony Michael Hall), “Sixteen Candles” (1984)

4. “Does Barry Manilow know that you raid his wardrobe?” – Bender (Judd Nelson), “The Breakfast Club” (1985)

5. “How about a nice, greasy pork sandwich served in a dirty ashtray?” – Chet Donnelly (Bill Paxton), “Weird Science” (1985)

6. “I love this woman, and I have to tell her. And if she laughs, she laughs. And if she doesn’t love me, she doesn’t love me. But if I don’t find out…oh, I love her too much.” – Ducky Dale (Jon Cryer), “Pretty in Pink” (1986)

7. “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” – Ferris Bueller (Matthew Broderick), “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” (1986)

8. “I like art, I work in a gas station, my best friend is a tomboy. These things don’t fly too well in the American high school.” – Keith Nelson (Eric Stoltz) – “Some Kind of Wonderful (1987)

9. “The last thing I want to be remembered as is an annoying blabbermouth. You know, nothing grinds my gears worse than some chowderhead that doesn’t know when to keep his big trap shut. If you catch me running off with my mouth, just give me a poke on the chubbs.” Del (John Candy), “Planes, Trains and Automobiles” (1987)

10. “In the end, I realized that I took more than I gave, I was trusted more than I trusted, and I was loved more than I loved. And what I was looking for was not to be found but to be made.” – Jake Briggs (Kevin Bacon), “She’s Having A Baby” (1988)

11. “You know what the gourmet here wanted? Hot dogs! You know what they’re made of, Chet? Huh? Lips and assholes!” – Roman Craig (Dan Aykroyd) “The Great Outdoors” (1988)

12. “Stand me up today, and tomorrow I’ll drive you to school in my robe and pajamas and walk you to your first class. 4:00, okay?” – Buck Russell (John Candy), “Uncle Buck” (1989)

13. “Where do you think you’re going? Nobody’s leaving. Nobody’s walking out on this fun, old-fashioned family Christmas. No, no. We’re all in this together. This is a full-blown, four-alarm holiday emergency here. We’re gonna press on, and we’re gonna have the hap, hap, happiest Christmas since Bing Crosby tap-danced with Danny fucking Kaye! And when Santa squeezes his fat white ass down that chimney tonight, he’s gonna find the jolliest bunch of assholes this side of the nuthouse!” – Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase), “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation” (1989)

14. “Bless this highly nutritious microwavable macaroni and cheese dinner and the people who sold it on sale. Amen.” – Kevin McCallister (Macauley Culkin), “Home Alone” (1990)

15. “Any little fraulein who expects anything more from me than a little bit of pleasure, a little bit of danger, and a great set of pectorals, she’s lookin’ for a fall right on her ass.” – Jim Dodge (Frank Whaley), “Career Opportunities” (1991)

And one to bring it on home…

16. Jake: Happy birthday, Samantha. Make a wish.
Samantha: It already came true.

R.I.P., Mr. Hughes. Thanks…and don’t worry: we won’t forget about you.

External Entertainment, External Movies, Movie Comedies, Movies, News, Video

TCA Tour: Fox Executive Session

August 6, 2009 /

This morning, Peter Rice, Fox’s Chairman of Entertainment, and Kevin Reilly, Fox’s President of Entertainment, sat down for their network’s executive session, and you will be unsurprised to learn that they were positively bombarded with questions about Paula Abdul’s departure from “American Idol.”

“Paula is the only member of ‘American Idol’ whose contract was up this year,” said Rice. “We have been talking to her about it for most of the season, and we very much wanted her to return. In the past few weeks, the negotiation came to a conclusion, we made an offer that was fair to Paula, a substantial raise on the money she made in past, but Paula decided not to return. It was not our choice. We wanted her to come back to the show.”

Rice admitted that, given the short amount of time since Abdul’s announcement of departure, they didn’t have any big announcements to make about what they’d be doing, aside from the fact that
they would be focusing on the auditioning process and that it was their intention to have guest judges at each audition.

“We are talking to people now, a couple are confirmed, and we are talking about dates with others,” said Rice. “It’s our intention to have the guest judges be female pop stars, female performers, female artists.” Minutes later, he acknowledged that they had indeed gotten commitments from two such judges already: Katy Perry and Victoria Beckham.

“Between now and January,” said Rice, “we will come up with a more permanent solution on what we’ll do,” but of the inevitable change in dynamic with a new judge, he admitted, “There’s something exciting about that.”

Seriously, though, isn’t there still a chance she could still be back in the “Idol” fold come January?

That’d be a “no,” according to Rice. He says that the negotiations have concluded and that Paula Abdul is not returning.

“The expectation and hope was that Paula would come back,” he reiterated. “I think that when her current agent made a statement to the press two weeks ago, we thought, ‘What if she doesn’t come back?’ But we had no contingency. There is going to be a change, and we have to look at it as a positive change now, an opportunity for the show, to bring a different energy to it.”

Reilly, who had let Rice run with the ball, did finally chime in and remind us that, ultimately, the show is about the contestants. But I don’t think anybody bought that for a second.

Okay, that’s enough about Paula, but there was one more “Idol” note that came up during the session: no matter what you may have heard, Fox is not paying Ryan Seacrest $15 million to host “American Idol.” Seacrest’s $15 million deal is with CKX, Inc., which encompasses much more than “American Idol.” His original contract for “AI” remains in place.

Frankly, there wasn’t much time left after all of the Paula Abdul questions were asked and answered, but somewhere in the midst of it all, a few more random facts did slip out:

* The renewal of “Dollhouse” for a second season was due to the die-hard Joss Whedon fans, but Reilly swears that “it didn’t factor in from a fear place. It was more from a positive place. Those fans were there every week, and they stuck with it in a way that a lot of television fans don’t.” Now that he’s worked out the hiccups in the show, the official mandate for Season 2 of “Dollhouse” is for Joss to keep doing what he does.

* The decision to air the pilot of “Glee” as a standalone episode several months before its formal series premiere was “a marketing stunt,” one that did better than they ever imagined. Rice admits that the show’s a bit unique. “It’s definitely not saccharine, but every episode ends in an uplifting manner,” he said, going on to describe the series variously as “upbeat,” “subversive,” “sweet,” “emotional,” and “aspirational.”

* And, lastly, there are currently no plans to air the final six episodes of “King of the Hill.” Nice one, Fox. The series was always treated like the bastard child of the Sunday night animated line-up, so way to keep it that way to the very end.

American Idol, External Entertainment, External TV, Interviews, News, Reality TV, TCA Blog 2009, TCA Press Tour, TV, TV Reality

TCA Tour: “Bones” set visit

August 6, 2009 /

Of the set visits I’ve done this trip, the one to “Bones” was the most disappointing one to date. Don’t get me wrong, the Q&A with stars David Boreanaz and Emily Deschanel and producers Hart Hanson and Stephen Nathan made for a good time. The disappointment came from the fact that we’d been told that we’d be touring Dr. Brennan’s lab at the Jeffersonian, only to arrive and find that, due to filming commitments on that set, we’d be stuck hanging out at the FBI. I’m not saying it wasn’t cool to see that set, but…well, it’s like if someone told you that you were going to get to walk onto the field of Yankee Stadium, only to find out that you were actually only going to get to go into the locker room: they’re both cool in their own way if you’re a fan, but one’s definitely a damned sight more impressive than the other.

Okay, I know, I’m complaining about not getting to see my favorite set when you’re probably saying, “Yeah, but, still…Bones and Booth were right in front of you!” And you’ve got a point: that was pretty cool. I’ve never actually had a chance to chat with Ms. Deschanel before, but I’ve talked to David before, and he’s always a lot of fun to talk with. And if you’ve never seen him do an interview before, let me assure you that, for as much characterization as the writers have brought to the table at “Bones,” there’s still a heck of a lot of Seeley Booth in David Boreanaz, and vice versa.

So, of course, if we’re talking about the upcoming season of “Bones,” then what you really want to know is if Bones and Booth are finally going to get together.

“Do you honestly think I am going to answer that question after what I went through last season?” asked Hanson, with a laugh.

“We did end up in bed together,” Deschanel reminded us. “It was in our minds, but that changes our relationship, and you will see that going into season 5. That changes our relationship for good. Basicall,y he wakes up and you don’t know whether it was his coma or my books or both, in some way. The fact that it was in our minds does in fact change your relationship, and you will see it changes our relationship even more than just being in our minds.”

“You look at each other differently,” acknowledged Hanson, “and it’s quite evident, especially in the first episode. You see the relationship has evolved because of that experience.”

“Well, I’m just trying to get my memory back, so that’s probably what you’re seeing,” said Boreanaz, with a grin.

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External Entertainment, External TV, Interviews, News, TCA Blog 2009, TCA Press Tour, TV, TV Action, TV Dramas

RIP Budd Schulberg

August 6, 2009 /

The ending of Budd Schulberg‘s extraordinary life at age 95 last night was just a little strange for me personally. By a very odd coincidence, just the night before I finished watching the 1959 TV production of “What Makes Sammy Run?,” Schulberg’s great and possibly never-to-be-filmed 1941 novel about Hollywood careerist dehumanization (yes, it goes back that far, at least). The DVD included an interview he gave just last year. Given his age and fairly obvious frailty, I wondered how long it would be before I’d be writing one of these posts on him. He was not a young man, but this is still too soon.

Anyhow, what can you say about the writer of “On the Waterfront” and “A Face in the Crowd” — two of the most acclaimed screenplays ever written — and the nastily on-point movie business novel which was so effective it is supposed to have driven the usually jovial John Wayne to physical violence? Of course, Schulberg got it from all sides, though for differing reasons.

Like most liberals, I have serious complaints with how Schulberg and his more famous directing collaborator, Elia Kazan, comported themselves during the McCarthy era, and certain lines in both of their most famous films stick in my craw. While Budd Schulberg never abandoned his liberalism, it’s clear to me that his entirely justified anticommunism took a form that helped that American extreme-right, harmed the first amendment, and bolstered the most vicious aspects of U.S. foreign policy. Still, there’s no denying the power and clarity of his writing or the moral values they expressed at their best.

As it happens, I posted one great scene from “A Face in the Crowd” just last week. I’m posting more after the flip, starting with a scene with Andy Griffith and Patricia Neal that should knock your socks off.

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Actors, Actresses, External Entertainment, External Movies, External TV, Movie Dramas, Movies, News, TV, TV Dramas, TV DVDs

TCA Tour: “Dollhouse” set visit

August 5, 2009 /

Last year, I had a chance to visit the “Dollhouse” set, and it was absolutely breathtaking. This year, I went to visit it again, and the effect was the same. I just wish I liked the show as much as I like the Dollhouse itself. But, hey, maybe that’ll change when I finally get a chance to sit down and watch the Season 1 set in its entirety…particularly the bonus 13th episode, “Epitaph One,” which the show’s creator, Joss Whedon, describes as “an incredibly strange sort of bookend to the show.”

When we first arrived on the set, the actors were still shooting elsewhere on the Fox lot, so Whedon held court before the assembled throng of critics (some of whom may or may not have actually been bowing before him) and spoke to the second season of “Dollhouse” all by his lonesome, which he described as “the biggest surprise of my career.”

“What can I say?” asked Whedon. “I really didn’t expect to be sitting here again for a while. This has been like skiing in a cartoon where you go up the mountain and down the mountain and up and down. Right now, we are pretty high up on it because we realized that we were actually going to have to work for a living this summer.”

Okay, I’m sure the Whedon-ites will want to know every last word that Joss had to say, but for the sake of those who – like myself – still have good intentions of playing catch-up before Season 2 begins, I’ll do you the favor of waiting ’til post-jump to offer up his comments.

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External Entertainment, External TV, Fall TV Preview, Interviews, News, TCA Blog 2009, TCA Press Tour, TV, TV Action, TV Dramas, TV Sci-Fi

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