Are you watching, Meghan Markle? Because Princess Catherine appears to have a message after being publicly called out as one of the alleged “royal racists”!
20.11.2023 - 22:47 / variety.com
Angelique Jackson MRC and Lionsgate are developing a sequel to “The Blackening,” the hit horror-comedy from Dewayne Perkins and Tracy Oliver. After the microbudget production (just $5 million) made more than $18 million at the box office, producer MRC and domestic distributor Lionsgate have entered into talks with Perkins, Oliver and producer E. Brian Dobbins to develop a follow-up film.
Directed by Tim Story and co-written by Perkins and Oliver, “The Blackening” follows a group of college friends who reunite for Juneteenth weekend and are hunted by a killer who asks them to determine who is the Blackest among them — lampooning the common horror movie trope that sees the Black character die first. Perkins initially conceived the story as a sketch for his comedy troupe 3Peat, which developed into a short for Comedy Central, before Oliver reached out to develop it into a feature. The project premiered in 2022 as a TIFF Midnight Madness selection, where it was embraced by a raucous audience and landed a rich distribution deal from Lionsgate.
“The Blackening” hit theaters over Juneteenth weekend, grossing $2.5 million in its first day of release on its way to a $6 million opening weekend haul. That figure becomes more impressive when you consider that the horror-comedy’s production budget was only $3 million (the final tally comes to $5 million after factoring in P&A). In an interview, Oliver told Variety that “The Blackening’s” success has been empowering: “I keep telling the cast and other writers, there’s money out there.
$3 million is a lot easier to come by than $20-50 million. We don’t have to necessarily wait for a studio to say ‘Yes’ anymore. For a Black person, that’s inspiring.” There’s no word on the plot for the
.Are you watching, Meghan Markle? Because Princess Catherine appears to have a message after being publicly called out as one of the alleged “royal racists”!
“Entrepreneurship and acting are very similar. Both require the same kind of energy,” Goop CEO and Academy Award-winning actress Gwyneth Paltrow told a crowd during a career retrospective this evening at the Red Sea Film Festival in Saudi Arabia.
Selome Hailu Amazon Prime Video has renewed “Harlem” for a third season. From “Girls Trip” and “The Blackening” writer Tracy Oliver, “Harlem” follows four best friends in Harlem — Camille (Meagan Good), Tye (Jerrie Johnson), Quinn (Grace Byers) and Angie (Shonique Shandai) — who navigate new phases of their careers, relationships and big city dreams together.
It was the show that got everyone talking when it first launched last year and now the BBC have given the first look at series two of The Traitors.
Ethel Cain has announced her 2024 ‘The Childish Behaviour’ tour, with stops in North America, Europe and the United Kingdom.The alt-pop singer – who released her first album ‘Preacher’s Daughter’ in May last year, took to her official social media pages to share the handful of tour dates slated to commence in June 2024.Cain’s first show of the tour is set to Kick off on June 3 at Le Trianon in Paris, France. From there, the singer will head out to Amsterdam to play Paradiso on June 4 followed by a show at the Roundhouse in London on June 5.
Angelique Jackson On Friday night, Oprah Winfrey hosted a swanky celebration for “Lawmen: Bass Reeves” executive producer and star David Oyelowo at the Sunset Tower Hotel in West Hollywood. Photographers lined the driveway of the iconic hotel while a who’s who of Hollywood — including Gayle King, Lupita Nyong’o, Niecy Nash-Betts and the cast of the hit Paramount+ series — posed in front of a black and gold backdrop. Inside the luxurious venue, even more stars — like Macro chief Charles D.
Rebecca Rubin Film and Media Reporter Director Eli Roth is returning for seconds of “Thanksgiving.” He’s cooking up a sequel to his holiday-themed slasher film, with the follow-up set to open theatrically in 2025. It’s unclear if which — if any — any cast members will be back.
Angelique Jackson Veteran television executive Jamila Hunter has been named president of Macro Television Studios, Macro founder and CEO Charles D. King announced Hunter’s new role at the company, where she will oversee the television team and the slate of projects in development and production. “I couldn’t be more excited to welcome Jamila to the company,” stated King.
Deadline’s Read the Screenplay series spotlighting the year’s most talked-about scripts continues with first-timer Alex Convery’s screenplay for the Ben Affleck-directed Air.
A new The Boys spinoff series is currently in the works!
Dancing With The Stars” is nearing the Season 32 finale, and Ariana Madix is pushing her way to the top. The “Vanderpump Rules” star has been fighting for high scores and fan votes all season long. However, she’s not using her personal tragedy to get ahead.Recently, Ariana Madix revealed that she has a huge rule involving her “Dancing With The Stars” routines.
Adam Sandler has returned with his latest project Leo, an adorable animation which follows the life of a school's pet lizard.
EXCLUSIVE: A documentary charting an expedition to the ancient capital of Genghis Khan‘s empire is in the works with French outfit Pernel Media.
Naman Ramachandran Actor-writer Vishnu Manchu has grand plans for big-budget Indian epic “Kannappa.” The film revisits the folk tale of Kannappa, an atheist hunter who became a devotee of Hindu god Shiva and plucked out his eyes in an act of extreme devotion. The story was previously filmed in the Kannada and Telugu languages as “Bedara Kannappa” and “Kalahasti Mahatyam” in 1954, both starring Rajkumar; in the Hindi language as “Shiv Bhakta” (1955), starring Shahu Modak; in Telugu again as “Bhakta Kannappa” (1976), starring Krishnam Raju; and in Kannada again as “Shiva Mecchida Kannappa” (1988), starring Rajkumar, Shiva Rajkumar and Puneeth Rajkumar.
Angelique Jackson Range Media Partners has signed Justin Piasecki, one of Variety’s 10 screenwriters to watch for 2023, for representation. Piasecki broke onto the scene with his 2016 Academy Nicholl Fellowship winning script “Last Meals” (formerly “Death of An Ortolan”) which is slated to go into production soon, starring Samuel L. Jackson and Boyd Holbrook, with Morgan Freeman’s Revelations producing.
There is a sequence of scenes in Andrew Haigh‘s acclaimed drama “All of Us Strangers” that will surprise both straight and queer audiences, but it’s not what you think. Sure, there is another buzzworthy sex scene between stars Andrew Scott and Paul Mescal for a fall movie season seemingly full of them.
To say that “Creed III” was a massive success is an understatement. Not only did the third film (and first directed by star Michael B.
EXCLUSIVE: Ciarán Hinds (Belfast) and Odessa Young (Mothering Sunday) are among the cast joining Jacob Elordi in the Prime Video Australia Original series The Narrow Road to the Deep North, a TV adaptation of Richard Flanagan’s Booker Prize-winning novel of the same name. Production on the new 5-part drama series kicked off Down Under today.
Killers of the Flower Moon,” an exhibit featuring artifacts from the Apple Original film and celebrating the artisans who contributed to its making, is open to the public this weekend from Nov. 17-19, and will reopen following the Thanksgiving holiday. Among the many notable items from the film on display at Apple’s Los Angeles headquarters in Culver City are the wedding outfits worn by Leonardo DiCaprio and Lily Gladstone; an immersive Osage roundhouse; collections of handmade Pendleton blankets; Stetson hats; a 1928 Chevy Coupe; and select props from the Billiard parlor set.
Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Even Meghan Markle can’t fathom what has made her old USA Network drama “Suits” pop off on streaming services this year, but she’s here for it. While walking the red carpet at Variety’s Power of Women event Thursday, Markle, The Duchess of Sussex, was informed by Variety’s senior entertainment writer Angelique Jackson that the legal drama has now crossed 45 billion minutes streamed on Netflix and Peacock combined, as of Nielsen’s latest weekly streaming report, released earlier Thursday.