Tim Gray-Senior Latest Celebrity News & Gossip

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentWhen Daniel Craig signed on as James Bond in 2005, he found himself under attack by snipers more vicious than any 007 had ever faced: the media.The naysayers immediately lamented the “blond Bond” and criticized his blue eyes. The London Daily Mirror on Oct.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentShowbiz careers have no logic because there are too many unpredictable factors: audiences’ fickle tastes, industry perceptions and, of course, luck.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentL.A.’s Rich and Successful Film Festival launches Sept. 4, starting at 1 p.m., at the Lumiere Music Hall in Beverly Hills.The festival spotlights work by independent filmmakers who live in Los Angeles County.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentThere weren’t many other figures of old Hollywood like Mae West, a bold comic performer who was at least 50 years head of her time in terms of her material and command of her career.She was born August 17, probably in 1893, though accounts differ.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentMonaco-based International Emerging Film Talent Association will showcase 32 in-progress documentaries at this month’s Cannes Marché du Film-Festival and will present a cash award of to one of them.The Marché runs July 6-15, concurrent with the broader Cannes film festival, which wraps July 17. This is the third year year IEFTA is offering its presentations.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentThe documentary “Beyond the Raging Sea” will make its European premiere July 4 as the centerpiece presentation of the Monaco Streaming Film Festival. The screening will take place in Monte Carlo’s Grimaldi Forum prior to the Festival’s Gala Awards evening.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentAt the start of “The One and Only Dick Gregory,” Chris Rock hails the standup/activist as “one of the greatest political comedians who ever lived” and the following two hours prove the point.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentActor Robert Sacchi, known for his close resemblance to Humphrey Bogart, died June 23 at Barlow Respiratory Hospital in Los Angeles after a brief illness. He was 89.Sacchi played the title role in the 1980 feature “The Man With Bogart’s Face.” He also appeared in many films, TV shows and commercials playing Bogart or a Bogart look-alike.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentA column of random thoughts:Whatever you think about the year’s movies, you have to admit the titles were confusing. For example, we had “Pieces of a Woman,”  “Promising Young Woman,” “I’m Your Woman,” “I Am Woman” and “Wonder Woman 1984.”That last title could also confuse future film historians.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentMonte Hellman, the maverick director of such films as “Two-Lane Blacktop,” “The Shooting” and “Road to Nowhere,” died April 20 at Eisenhower Medical Center in Palm Desert, Calif., following a fall in his home on April 19.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentFor the first time, there are two Asian Americans in Oscar’s director race: Lee Isaac Chung (“Minari”) and Chloé Zhao (“Nomadland”). That’s notable, but it’s even more extraordinary considering only four Asians were ever nominated as director before this.The four predecessors were spread over the decades: Hiroshi Teshigahara (“Woman in the Dunes,” 1965); Akira Kurosawa (“Ran,” 1985; he also won a special Oscar in 1989); M.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentIn the COVID era, we have been forced to rethink everything. And with home viewing becoming even more dominant as cinemas closed, the question has arisen: What exactly is a movie?Pundits and industryites focused this debate on streaming vs.

Tim Gray Senior Vice President“Sound of Metal” director Darius Marder made a series of “crazy” decisions with his first film, including casting Paul Raci in a key role — and shooting chronologically.The craziness paid off, with the film nominated for six Oscars, including best picture, screenplay, sound, editing, lead actor Riz Ahmed and supporting actor Raci.Marder insisted on shooting the film in sequence. “It’s especially difficult with your first feature.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentEffects supervisor Bill Watral enthuses about his team’s groundbreaking work on Disney/Pixar’s Oscar-nominated “Soul,” but is quick to clarify, “Every single department here had challenges of taking existing technology and applying it to new artistic uses.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentThis year, there were 366 films in Oscar contention, with 50-plus nominated — including three centering on disabled people.

Tim Gray Senior Vice President“Sound of Metal” director Darius Marder says he and his Oscar-nominated sound team — Nicolas Becker, Jaime Baksht, Michelle Couttolenc, Carlos Cortes Navarrete — wanted heightened naturalism to depict varying stages of hearing and deafness of lead character Ruben (Riz Ahmed).“This sound mix is as complicated as in an action film,” Marder says. “This has just as many tracks, but it’s not looking to wow you, like explosions.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentThe lead actress Oscar race is competitive, so there’s no guarantee that Andra Day will win for her socko performance in “The United States vs. Billie Holiday.” But Day has the kind of backstory that Oscar voters love: She (and the movie) appeared with little advance fanfare, and she makes a huge impact in only her second feature (after a tiny role in “Marshall”).

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentNetflix’s “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” fulfills an idea that was nearly 40 years in the making: a film version of August Wilson’s play.In October 1984, Variety’s Richard Hummler reviewed its Broadway debut, praising Wilson as “a new writer of talent and power.” He added “The play will likely have a healthy production life elsewhere and could make a gripping film.”Three years later, Variety’s Kathleen O’Steen asked Wilson if he would like to see his plays, such as

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentNominees for the 93rd Academy Awards are a reminder that Oscar is like a Rorschach test: It means different things to different people.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentWhen the 20th annual Movies for Grownups Awards air March 28 on PBS, the winners will include career achievement honoree George Clooney, who turns 60 this year and whom AARP exec Tim Appelo described as “a slam dunk argument against ageism.”Hoda Kotb will host the event on “Great Performances,” the fourth time that the annual awards have aired, always on PBS.The winners were announced March 4.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentWhen Oscar nominations were announced March 15, mainstream-media headlines focused on the usual topics: best picture, the four acting categories and Hollywood’s current obsession, inclusion. These are all worth talking about, but the MSM virtually ignores one key element every year: The artisans.Those individuals are key to a movie’s success, as everyone in the industry knows.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentSome pundits worry that the Oscar ceremony won’t feel like the real thing, because the late date (April 25) is disorienting and because the show will be divided between two venues, L.A.’s Union Station and the traditional Dolby Theatre. In truth, a fluid date and multiple locations go back to Oscar’s earliest days.The first televised ceremony in 1953 had cameras in both Hollywood and New York, a tactic that continued through 1957.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentTop prizes at the USC Scripter event Saturday went to screenwriter Chloé Zhao and author Jessica Bruder for “Nomadland” as well as scripter Scott Frank and novelist Walter Tevis for Netflix’s “The Queen’s Gambit.”As in past years, the award goes to both the scriptwriter(s) as well as the writer(s) of the original material.Searchlight Pictures’ “Nomadland” is based on the nonfiction book “Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century.” Zhao thanked

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentPresenters and honorees at the April 4 SAG Awards are likely to air political views, which inevitably will inspire public indignation: “Why should anybody listen to you people?” Naysayers often see this as a 21st-century liberal conspiracy, but actually, it was the U.S.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentEvery film presents unique production problems, and Searchlight’s “Nomadland” had a high degree of difficulty. Writer-director Chloé Zhao and her team wanted total authenticity as they filmed nomads who travel from job to job in the U.S.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentHulu’s “The United States vs Billie Holiday” won the top prize and Aaron Sorkin (“The Trial of the Chicago 7”) was a double winner in AARP Magazine’s annual awards, while “This Is Us” and “The Queen’s Gambit” were saluted in AARP’s first TV honors.The winners:Picture/Movie for Grownups: “The United States vs.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentPete Docter, director and co-writer of Pixar’s “Soul,” appraised his co-workers by saying, “This team is crazy good.”The film entailed four years of production and hundreds of workers. “I think most of the team were excited to stretch outside the box of what people might expect from an animated movie.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentOscars are a time capsule. Though pundits may quibble about nominees or winners, one thing is beyond question: The film choices reflect the year in which they were released.For example, in 1946, “The Best Years of Our Lives” hit a nerve as people were trying to rebuild their lives after WWII.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentSound people had a tough year. Like everyone else in the industry, they found less film work.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentHollywood has always adapted to world changes, and Oscar campaigning this year has effectively adjusted to COVID. But one part of the awards season is missed more than the others: seeing a contender on the big screen.Studios have delayed several big-scale films, including “Dune” and “West Side Story,” until later in 2021.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentAfter the Oscar-nominated “The Hunt” (2012), writer-director Thomas Vinterberg reunites with actor Mads Mikkelsen for “Another Round,” an Oscar contender in multiple categories, including international film. Mikkelsen is a potential first-time Oscar nominee as a man who experiments with three friends to see if they will function better by increasing their blood alcohol level.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentWhen Oscars are handed out, it’s possible best picture, director, writing and all four acting wins will be for films about real people.The odds of this sweep seem slim. But this past year has been all about unexpected events, so anything is possible.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentMoviegoers think they understand the life of a screenwriter. Thanks to “Sunset Boulevard,” “In a Lonely Place,” “Barton Fink,” “The Player,” “The Muse,” “Seven Psychopaths,” “Adaptation,” “Trumbo,” “Mank” and others, the image is clear: Scripters are friendless, cynical people hunched over a solitary keyboard, plagued by self-doubt and studio interference.Of course Pixar is the exception to every rule.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentLiv Ullmann has been an international star since 1966’s Ingmar Bergman’s arthouse hit “Persona”; indeed, she is best-known for her collaborations with Bergman, acting in 10 of his films, and directing two of his screenplays; he was also the father of her daughter, author Lin Ullmann.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentAside from being well-made and effective as a movie, Warner Bros.’ “Judas and the Black Messiah” has a goal: to counter decades of government lies about the Black Panther Party.The party was founded by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale in 1966, and ceased operations in 1982. The film, which started streaming Feb.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentFilmmakers need to be a bit psychic. They work on projects for years, not knowing if the fickle audience will connect with the themes and topics when the film eventually opens.