‘Shining Vale’ Sends Courteney Cox Down a Haunted Rabbit Hole as Funny as It Is Chilling: TV Review

Caroline Framke Chief TV CriticIt takes six episodes for the characters of “Bridgerton” Season 2 to acknowledge the obvious. Ever since they first laid eyes on each other, Anthony Bridgerton (Jonathan Bailey) and formidable newcomer Kate Sharma (Simone Ashley of “Sex Education”) have shared such overwhelming sexual tension that most everyone in the same room can feel its vibrations of longing.

Courteney Cox is already getting pumped up for the next installment in the franchise!The 57-year-old actress recently revealed, during an appearance on the podcast , that she will be reprising her role as Gale Weathers in the next film in the long-running horror series.«I got the script yesterday,» Cox said on the episode. «I haven't read it yet, I just got it. I'm excited to read it.»The actress added that production could be starting in the next few months, telling Malkin, «I know they're going to start filming… I think, in June, in Canada.»«I don't know if I'm supposed to say anything!» she added with a laugh, before quipping, «Let me tell you the killer!»On Friday, the release date for the next  movie was also revealed.

Caroline Framke Chief TV Critic“Life & Beth,” Amy Schumer’s new show for Hulu, unfolds in three distinct acts. The first sees Beth (Schumer) as a wine salesperson in Manhattan who’s quietly miserable with her job and in her relationship to Matt (Kevin Kane), a “New York 8” who treats her like an inconvenient afterthought.

Courteney Cox is already getting pumped up for the next installment in the franchise!The actress recently revealed, during an appearance on the podcast , that she will be reprising her role as Gale Weathers in the next film in the long-running horror series.«I got the script yesterday,» Cox said on the episode. «I haven't read it yet, I just got it. I'm excited to read it.»The actress added that production could be starting in the next few months, telling Malkin, «I know they're going to start filming… I think, in June, in Canada.»«I don't know if I'm supposed to say anything!» she added with a laugh, before quipping, «Let me tell you the killer!»Spyglass Media and Paramount Pictures announced in February that they had given the green light to move forward with the next installment of the horror franchise.

Caroline Framke Chief TV CriticThe most interesting thing about the new comedy “Welcome to Flatch” just might be the way in which Fox is rolling it out. While the pilot episode will premiere March 17 on the broadcast network before airing weekly, the first seven (7!) episodes will also be available to stream on FoxNow and Hulu earlier that same day, thus giving curious viewers a chance to marathon half the season well before those who keep tuning in the traditional way.It might seem an odd approach at first glance, but the vast majority of comedies have always needed a few episodes to figure out the particular rhythms of their dialogue and cast chemistry — something “Welcome to Flatch” director Paul Feig knows well enough, having come in to “The Office” at the beginning of Season 2, right as the eventual smash hit was really beginning to gel.

Caroline Framke Chief TV CriticIt isn’t the fault of “Halo,” the TV series adaptation finally premiering March 24 on Paramount Plus after years stuck in development hell, that it comes on the heels of a plethora of TV and streaming options that look and feel similar enough to lessen its ability to shock and awe. From “The Mandalorian” (Disney Plus), to “Matrix: Resurrections” (HBO Max), to “Foundation” (Apple TV Plus), there are already plenty of big budget science fiction epics onscreen taking on the same themes as “Halo” (written for TV by Kyle Killen and Steven Kane, and produced in part by Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Television).

After forty years in show business, what else is there left for Nicolas Cage to do? At his best — for thirty years, in fact — the actor nimbly toed the line between blockbuster action hero and fully committed dramatic performer. Often aware of his onscreen habits and lampooned for his onscreen vocal and physical excesses, Cage intermittently played those expectations for greater dramatic tension and pure comedy.

Caroline Framke Chief TV CriticAs TV expands beyond its traditional borders and attracts talent that would otherwise typically stick to films, the troubling trend of people describing their shows as “a [x]-hour movie” refuses to die. It’s never quite clear what they mean, but for whatever reason, this inherent snobbery about the medium of television persists from some of the most prominent people making it.

Courteney Cox believes that women “go through a lot” once they reach a certain age.

Shining Vale, Starz’ new horror comedy co-created by Sharon Horgan (Catastrophe) and Jeff Astrof (Trial & Error), that’s the point. Leaning into clichés in order to answer the question “What if The Shining was a sitcom starring Courteney Cox?”, this eight-part series (served in bingeable, thirty-minute morsels) juggles jump scares and jokes at a rate of knots, whilst trying to dissect the ways in which women’s trauma is so often either demonised or dismissed out of hand.

There’s so much overlong TV out there in the streaming era, but the Starz horror-comedy “Shining Vale” has to be one of this year’s most damning, counter-intuitive examples. Because it needs to take up so much running time, its few good ideas about characters, alive and dead, lose much of their impact.

scream when she thought she encountered a ghost in her LA home.The “Scream” star, 57, recounted the horror tale on a recent episode of “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” — and shared why she felt she had to actually sell her Laurel Canyon pad because of it.Cox stars in the upcoming Starz horror-comedy series “Shining Vale,” and host Jimmy Kimmel, 54, asked her if she ever saw a ghost herself.“I didn’t believe it at first,” she said, adding that her house once was owned by burlesque dancer Gypsy Rose Lee, as well as singer/songwriter Carole King.The “Friends” actress then revealed that King, 80, came over to have a séance with her to banish the spirit from the property. However, Cox was too awestruck by the Grammy-winner to pay attention to their supernatural activity.

Caroline Framke Chief TV CriticA few episodes into “Our Flag Means Death,” aristocrat turned pirate ship captain Stede Bonnet (Rhys Darby) admires his spoils with a frisson of glee. “Why can’t one be a gentleman and a pirate?” he muses aloud to no one in particular, before deciding to embrace that inherent contradiction as his new moniker.

Friends star, who is best for playing Monica Geller in the hit sitcom as well as her role in the Scream franchise, appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on Monday (28 February) to promote upcoming horror-comedy series Shining Vale.When Kimmel asked Cox if she had encountered any ghosts herself, following a discussion of the eerie new show, she revealed she had in fact experienced one.“I have had one,” she replied, before going on to explain that she had owned a property in Laurel Canyon, Los Angeles that previously belonged to burlesque performer Gypsy Rose Lee, and subsequently Carole King.When King came to visit one day, the singer told her that there had “been a divorce that was really ugly,” and there was “a ghost in the house,” Cox told Kimmel. “And I was like, ‘Yeah, whatever.’“But other people who had stayed there with me, like friends of mine, said they felt an encounter with a woman who was sitting on the edge of the bed.”Although Cox didn’t initially take the reports seriously, she said, she later had an experience that changed her mind.

Caroline Framke Chief TV CriticTwo long years after Netflix first dropped its “Tiger King” docuseries, the first scripted stab at retelling the wild story of warring big cat enthusiasts Joe Exotic and Carole Baskin has landed, as was inevitable. “Joe vs. Carole,” premiering March 3 on Peacock, stars John Cameron Mitchell and Kate McKinnon as Joe and Carole as they vow to take the other down.

Scott Huver Between “Friends” and the “Scream” franchise, Courteney Cox knew that playing both comedy and horror were well within her wheelhouse — but something told her that the new Starz series “Shining Vale” would test her skills in unprecedented ways.“Such a dramatic role that also was comedic was a balance that I hadn’t played in quite this way,” Cox said at Monday’s series premiere at TCL Chinese Theater in Hollywood, where she was joined by co-stars Greg Kinnear, Mira Sorvino, Judith Light and Rob Morrow, as well as a familiar face from her TV past, Lisa Kudrow. “It’s a part that I’m just not used to being able to challenge, and it got me really excited about acting again.” “Shining Vale” was conceived by co-creators Sharon Horgan (”Catastrophe”) and former “Friends” writer Jeff Astrof as a comedic riff on “The Shining.” Cox plays Pat, a “lady porn” novelist struggling with writers’ block and depression who, after cheating on her husband (Kinnear), seeks a fresh start by moving her dysfunctional family into a new home with an increasingly unsettling vibes – and some unexpected ethereal occupants, like Sorvino’s perfectly put-together 50s-era spirit.Astrof said he immediately fell for the concept floated by Horgan.

Lisa Kudrow is always there for her friends!Kudrow attended the premiere of Courteney Cox and Mira Sorvino's new STARZ television series,  Monday.Unlike the bright pink suit she wore to the 2022 Screen Actors Guild Awards Sunday night, Kudrow opted for a more toned-down look, wearing a black and white striped long-sleeved blouse and black pants. The  actress carried her coat and black purse in her hand as she posed on the red carpet.