Bob Goody Dies: Classically-Trained Actor And Co-Writer Of BBC Comedy ‘Wilderness Road’ Was 71

Disney CEO Bob Iger said the company has reached a new stage of its evolution in streaming and will consider “on occasion” licensing some titles to third parties.

For the first time, Bob Iger is speaking out and addressing the ongoing battle between the company and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. He also answered a frankly bizarre question about the company’s so-called “woke agenda,” both with the kind of poise and composure that made him such a favorite of his employees as well as the shareholders, during the Disney Shareholders meeting.“Let me if you don’t mind let me address this issue which I haven’t really done much publicly. But I’d love the opportunity just to put it all in perspective.

Bob Iger is back, debonaire, relaxed, articulate and talking up Disney IP via video in front of Walt Disney Word, where the company appears to have outmaneuvered Ron DeSantis for control. He also fianlly spoke his mind on the simmering feud, telling the company’s virtual annual shareholder meeting today that the governor’s apparent “retaliation” against Disney for exercising a right to free speech “is not only anti-business, but anti-Florida,” given the jobs, taxes, resources and revenue Disney provides the state.

Hit BBC comedy Ghosts is to end after the upcoming fifth season, bringing to a close one of the BBC’s most successful family comedies of the past generation.

Matt Donnelly Senior Film Writer Veteran film producer Bob Yari (“Crash”) and music executive turned content maker Marvin Peart have formed WonderHill Studios, a film and production entity that will also offer independent theatrical distribtuion.  Yari and Peat privately raised equity for the new company, for which they will serve as co-founders and co-CEOs. The label will also dabble in film acquisitions and rights sales to foreign territories.  “WonderHill Studios is eager to fill a crucial hole within the theatrical and television space, while also focusing on diversity in cinema and television in front and behind the camera. We are dedicated to building a diverse C-suite, and delivering quality independent films to the theatrical marketplace,” Yari said. 

Disney CEO Bob Iger has confirmed the first of three rounds of layoffs is starting this week as the company looks to reduce its workforce by about 7,000 employees.

Scott Huver After starring in “Paint” as a Bob Ross-esque (but far more angry and tortured) paint instructor, Owen Wilson admits he’s warmed to finding his own sense of zen calm — not with watercolors and brushes, but with Crayolas. “When my boys were little, at restaurants I’d give them crayons and try to calm them down, but I think that maybe adults should be doing that, too,” Wilson told Variety at the premiere of the IFC film at the Ace Hotel on Thursday. ”I don’t know why we ever stop doing that, because there is something really nice about trying to create something.” “I guess there’s that Picasso quote: ‘I want to spend the rest of my life learning to paint like a child,’” he mused. “Not worrying about anything and just expressing yourself — that feels good.”

The BBC has announced that the filming of Top Gear’s latest series will not resume after the corporation’s investigation into presenter Andrew "Freddie" Flintoff ’s crash. Former professional cricketer Flintoff, 45, was taken to hospital after being involved in an accident while shooting for the hit motoring show.The incident happened while he was at the Top Gear test track at Dunsfold Aerodrome in Surrey on December 13. His co-star Chris Harris - who presents the show alongside the former cricketer and Paddy McGuiness - was also at the Top Gear test track when it happened.

Gunter Nezhoda, a recurring and popular competitive bidder in A&E’s long-running show Storage Wars, died Tuesday in Utah six months after being diagnosed with lung cancer. He was 67.

Bobby Brazier paid sweet tribute to his late mother Jade Goody in a new Instagram post on Wednesday. The model and EastEnders star, 19, called Jade his 'guide' as he posed in new modelling shots amid his career taking off.  Jade tragically passed away in 2009 at the age of 27 following a battle with cervical cancer.

Bobby and Freddie Brazier were spotted taking part in a walk to mark the anniversary of their mother Jade Goody's passing on Wednesday. EastEnders star Bobby, 19, and his younger brother Freddie, 18, took part in the walk, which took place in Piccadilly Circus in London, on 22 March to commemorate the 14th anniversary of their mum's death. Jade died from cervical cancer in March 2009 when she was just 27 years old.

EastEnders youngster Bobby Brazier has left fans feeling emotional after posting a sweet tribute to his late mother, TV star Jade Goody, 14 years after she lost her battle with cancer.Taking to Instagram earlier this week, the 19-year-old soap star - took over the role of Freddie Slater, son of Little Mo Mitchell (Kacey Ainsworth), with the character last being seen as a baby - posted a series of modelling snaps.The caption to Bobby's striking denim-dressed collection of photos read: "Genes on his side, god in his heart and goody as his guide", seemingly making reference to his late mum's surname. And fans of the TV newbie quickly flocked to the comment section to wish their condolences to Bobby, with many noting the resemblance between him and former Big Brother star Jade.

Jade Goody, in a rare interview. The Big Brother star died in 2009 at the age of 27, after being diagnosed with cervical cancer. Son Bobby, now 19, was just five at the time.

How could a trip to the motherland go so hilariously, disastrously wrong? The quartet at the heart of Adele Lim’s “Joy Ride” – Ashley Park, Sherry Cola, Stephanie Hsu and Sabrina Wu – have no idea what they’re in for at the top of the trailer, which Lionsgate released Friday ahead of the film’s premiere at SXSW.The trailer begins with the origin story of Audrey (Park) and Lolo’s (Cola) friendship, when they meet at a park as young kids. Lolo punches a white boy in the throat after he calls Audrey a racist slur, sealing the deal on their lifelong friendship.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Xavier Henry-Rashid’s London-based sales agency Film Republic has closed deals for multiple territories on “F*cking Bornholm,” a tart comedy of social discomfort. The film had its international premiere in the main competition section of Karlovy Vary Film Festival, where it won the Europa Cinemas Label award. In his review, Variety’s Guy Lodge commented that Polish writer-director Anna Kazejak‘s “precise, piquant film deserves wider festival exposure and discerning distributor interest.” It has now been acquired by Iceland’s Bio Paradis, Arsenal for Germany, Austria and Switzerland, Lithuania’s Garsas, Slovenia’s RTV, Israel’s Yes and Sweden’s Lucky Dogs. The international trailer has its debut below.

Blood Orange, will be presenting a new 12-part series about classical music on BBC Sounds.The first three episodes of Composed with Devonté Hynes will are available to be streamed on BBC Sounds from today here, while all episodes will be broadcast weekly on BBC Radio 3. The series is set to “celebrate all aspects of classical music” while also touching on aspects of the wider musical world from electronic music to soundtracks.Hynes is also set to explore the music that inspired his career and the ways in which modern classical music is evolving, and he is also set to take the opportunity to shine a light on overlooked composers.Each episode focuses on a different theme, including 20th and 21st century opera, music for cello and contrabass and piano music for escapism.

Guy Lodge Film Critic Nearly 125 years after her assassination, the Empress Elisabeth of Austria — or Sisi to her enduring cultists — continues to inspire a veritable industry of portraiture in Europe: In the last year alone, a novel, two TV series (one of them a glossy Netflix affair) and two feature films have been dedicated to the tightly corseted royal icon. Viewers outside the Continental sphere of Sisi-mania may only have registered one of those films, Marie Kreutzer’s chic, subversive anti-biopic “Corsage,” which might make the second, German director Frauke Finsterwalder’s lush, irreverent “Sisi & I,” seem to them a too-soon spare — coincidentally repeating several tricks from Kreutzer’s anachronistic playbook with its modern feminist inflections, contemporary soundtrack cues and sensational fashions, albeit with plenty of its own panache.

Bob Odenkirk’s next project is a very surprising remake.

Returned Disney CEO Bob Iger acknowledged that fans had a right to be irked as theme park ticket prices crept higher under the previous regime, and said it wasn’t the best way to manage the brand.

Disney CEO Bob Iger called succession top priority as he moves to turn the company around and, with the board, name a new chief executive before the end of his two-year contract.