Amy Baer Latest Celebrity News & Gossip

Paramount+ today unveiled first-look photos for its upcoming film Jerry and Marge Go Large, starring Bryan Cranston and Annette Bening, also announcing that it will premiere exclusively on the platform in the U.S. on June 17. The film will roll out on Paramount+ in Australia, Canada and Latin America and in additional markets, when the service becomes available there later this year. It will be distributed by Paramount Global Content Distribution in remaining international markets.

Immediately off the back of its inclusion in the Cannes competition line-up, Ali Abbasi‘s The Apprentice has dropped a first look of Sebastian Stan as Donald Trump and Jeremy Strong as Roy Cohn.

Alex Ritman The first-look image of Sebastian Stan as a young, pre-TV star and pre-president Donald Trump in buzzy upcoming biopic “The Apprentice” has been revealed. Ali Abbasi’s feature — which has just been announced as part of the 2024 Cannes main competition — charts Trump’s ascent to power through what is described as a “Faustian deal” with the influential right-wing lawyer and political fixer Roy Cohn (seen in the still being portrayed by Jeremy Strong).

Katcy Stephan The stage at the 17th Annual Women in Film Oscar Nominees was scarcely big enough for the impressive show of sisterhood on display. The event, which celebrates the women, nonbinary and trans people nominated at the Academy Awards, coincided with International Women’s Day on March 8. When WIF CEO Kirsten Schaffer invited dozens of honorees to join her on the stage, they crammed in, shoulder-to-shoulder on the tiny platform at L.A.’s Catch Steak.

EXCLUSIVE: Here’s one you probably didn’t see coming: Sebastian Stan, the Emmy and Golden Globe nominee known for his work in the MCU and the acclaimed Hulu miniseries Pam & Tommy, has been tapped for the role of a young Donald Trump in The Apprentice, a new film from Cannes prize-winning Iranian filmmaker Ali Abbasi (Holy Spider).

Jordan Moreau Sebastian Stan is playing young Donald Trump in a movie titled “The Student” from Iranian filmmaker Ali Abbasi (“Holy Spider”), Variety can confirm. The cast also includes “Succession” Emmy winner Jeremy Strong as Roy Cohn and “Borat 2” and “Bodies Bodies Bodies” actor Maria Bakalova as Ivana Trump. According to the logline, “‘The Student’ is an exploration of power and ambition set in a world of corruption and deceit.

2023 ShortList Film Festival, chosen from award-winning shorts from across the world in the past year. This year’s films tell personal stories that captivate and inspire — including a film about two Chinese grandmothers, a film about scuba diving in the ruins of a tsunami and one film about the LAPD blowing up a neighborhood.The films – which include narrative, documentaries and animation - are available to watch and vote on from June 28 through July 12, exclusively on TheWrap. The award-winning short film that is chosen by TheWrap’s Industry Jury will be honored with the prestigious Industry Prize.

A study released by Women in Film Los Angeles finds that women-owned companies lag far behind men-owned companies in studio-subsidized film and TV deals.The report, titled “Women Entrepreneurs in the Screen Industries: Obstacles and Opportunities” and conducted by Pepperdine University associate professor Alicia Jessop, concludes that only 18.6% of studio-subsidized film deals and 35.7% of studio-subsidized television deals were with women-owned companies and only 18% of production companies with non-studio funding were women-owned.By comparison, the study released on Wednesday states that on average men-owned independent production companies receive more than seven times the amount of funding received by women-owned independent production companies.Said WIF Board president Amy Baer said in a statement: “The origin of this study was actually quite personal to the WIF Board. At a 2018 Board meeting, several highly accomplished women were sharing anecdotal frustrations about the obstacles to launching enterprise in the screen industry, while constantly watching men of equal experience and stature repeatedly and successfully land investment.

EXCLUSIVE: Entertainment Studios Motion Pictures has acquired global rights to Ghost Boys, Jewell Parker Rhodes’ 2018 novel for young readers that weaves genres to explore what happens after a Black child is killed by a white police officer.

Based on a true story, the film will see Cranston and Bening play Jerry and Marge Selbee, a retired couple living in Massachusetts who discover a mathematical loophole in the Massachusetts Lottery. By exploiting the system, the two win $27 million, using the money to revitalize their small Michigan town.

EXCLUSIVE: Renée Zellweger has come attached to star in The Back Nine, a comedy that Sex and the City’s Michael Patrick King will direct from a script he wrote with Jhoni Marchinko and Krista Smith. The film is set at Landline Pictures, the new label of MRC Film formed by Amy Baer, the former senior executive at Sony Pictures and CBS Films.

Angelique Jackson MRC Film has launched Landline Pictures, a new label targeting audiences over 50.

Women In Film, Los Angeles (WIF) is expanding its board of directors by six with the election appointments of Niija Kuykendall, Michelle Lee, Monica Levinson, Chris Nee, Shivani Rawat and Ida Ziniti. “Each of these impressive women is uniquely expert, whether as an executive, producer, creator, or agent," said board president Amy Baer, CEO of Gidden Media.

Angelique Jackson The leaders of Women in Film knew they had to do something different with its annual fundraiser in 2020. But they had no idea their brainstorming would lead to the organization’s first TV special, “Women in Film Presents: Make It Work,” which airs Wednesday on the CW.“We’ve been looking at our annual gala as a fundraiser for a couple of years in terms of how to pivot to something slightly different or more evolved,” Amy Baer, Women in Film board president, tells Variety.