Joaquin Phoenix won’t be discussing his recent controversy without the affected parties.
The Oscar winner, who made headlines last month for exiting a gay drama movie just days before director Todd Haynes was set to begin filming, addressed the matter publicly for the first time during a press conference on Wednesday.
“I would just be sharing my opinion from my perspective and the other creatives aren’t here to say their piece, and it just doesn’t feel like that would be right,” he said at the Venice International Film Festival.
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“I’m not sure how that would be helpful. So, I just, I don’t think I will.”
Social media users are nonetheless still curious about Joaquin’s sudden departure from the unnamed Todd Haynes film, billed as a same-sex romance between a corrupt cop and a Native American who flee 1930s Los Angeles and head to Mexico.
Danny Ramirez, who appeared in 2022′s Top Gun: Maverick, had been cast as Joaquin’s love interest, and crews had reportedly already been hired in Guadalajara. But with no apparent plans to recast the Joker star’s role, the project has indefinitely stalled.
A representative for Todd Haynes told Entertainment Weekly on Wednesday that the director “will not be able to comment” on Joaquin’s remarks in Italy. However, producer Christine Vachon issued a blunt reaction to his abrupt departure in August.
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“It has been a nightmare,” Vachon reportedly said in a now-deleted Facebook post.
Lady Gaga and Joaquin Phoenix
Vittorio Zunino Celotto via Getty Images
Vachon, whose company has produced all of Todd Haynes’ feature films, seemed particularly miffed at Joaquin Phoenix, saying the movie “was HIS project that he brought to US” before changing his mind. A source close to the film told Variety that Phoenix got “cold feet”.
The actor has acknowledged experiencing the jitters over his acting work before, saying last year that he was “terrified” about his role as Commodus in 2000′s Gladiator.
“I’d obviously been acting since I was a kid,” he said on CinemaBlend’s ReelBlend podcast at the time. “I’d never been a part of a major production. And when I arrived on set for Gladiator, honestly, I was so sick. I was shaking.”
Joaquin went on to receive an Oscar nomination for that performance, but wouldn’t win his first Academy Award until 2020 with his part in Joker, the predecessor to Folie À Deux.
Since then, everyone from director Todd Haynes to Joaquin himself has had a go at discussing Joker: Folie À Deux’s musical elements – and whether it’s actually a musical or just a “film with music”.
Ahead of the movie’s Venice Film Festival premiere, Gaga was asked again about the project’s relationship with music.
“The way that we approached music in this film was very special and extremely nuanced,” she explained.
“I wouldn’t necessarily say that this is actually a musical, in a lot of ways it’s very different. The music is used to really give the characters a way to express what they need to say, because the scene and just the dialogue is not enough.”
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Now… is it just us… or is that not just exactly what a musical is? Either way, we’re pleased to see we weren’t the only ones confused…
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Musical – a play or movie in which singing and dancing play an essential part. or in other words “the music is used to really give the characters a way to express what they need to say because the scene and dialogue is just not enough” Gaga
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Musical – a play or movie in which singing and dancing play an essential part. or in other words “the music is used to really give the characters a way to express what they need to say because the scene and dialogue is just not enough” Gaga
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That’s literally what a musical is. Gaga should know better
It feels like they did a bunch of focus groups and the toxic male audience is scared of musicals so they no longer want to focus on the music https://t.co/1BjVpQbRpm
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That’s literally what a musical is. Gaga should know better
It feels like they did a bunch of focus groups and the toxic male audience is scared of musicals so they no longer want to focus on the music https://t.co/1BjVpQbRpm
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Weird. https://t.co/w2SZvohgrZ— M loves flowers (@somuchhappenin_) September 4, 2024\n\n\n","options":{"_hide_media":{"label":"Hide photos, videos, and cards","value":false},"_maxwidth":{"label":"Adjust width","placeholder":"220-550, in px","value":""},"_theme":{"value":"","values":{"dark":"Use dark theme"}}},"provider_name":"Twitter","title":"M loves flowers on Twitter / X","type":"rich","url":"https://twitter.com/somuchhappenin_/status/1831321241590096050","version":"1.0"},"flags":[],"enhancements":{},"fullBleed":false,"options":{"theme":"news","device":"desktop","editionInfo":{"id":"uk","name":"U.K.","link":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk","locale":"en_GB"},"originalEdition":"uk","isMapi":false,"isAmp":false,"isVideoEntry":false,"isEntry":true,"isMt":false,"entryId":"66d8638be4b09a3ee66d0c18","entryPermalink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/lady-gaga-tries-explain-joker-folie-a-deux-musical-we-re-confused_uk_66d8638be4b09a3ee66d0c18","entryTagsList":"ukfilm,lady-gaga,joker,venice-film-festival","sectionSlug":"entertainment","deptSlug":null,"sectionRedirectUrl":null,"subcategories":"","isWide":false,"headerOverride":null,"noVideoAds":false,"disableFloat":false,"isNative":false,"commercialVideo":{"provider":"custom","site_and_category":"uk.entertainment","package":null},"isHighline":false,"vidibleConfigValues":{"cid":"60afc140cf94592c45d7390c","disabledWithMapiEntries":false,"overrides":{"all":"60b8e525cdd90620331baaf4"},"whitelisted":["56c5f12ee4b03a39c93c9439","56c6056ee4b01f2b7e1b5f35","59bfee7f9e451049f87f550b","5acccbaac269d609ef44c529","570278d2e4b070ff77b98217","57027b4be4b070ff77b98d5c","56fe95c4e4b0041c4242016b","570279cfe4b06d08e3629954","5ba9e8821c2e65639162ccf1","5bcd9904821576674bc55ced","5d076ca127f25f504327c72e","5b35266b158f855373e28256","5ebac2e8abddfb04f877dff2","60b8e525cdd90620331baaf4","60b64354b171b7444beaff4d","60d0d8e09340d7032ad0fb1a","60d0d90f9340d7032ad0fbeb","60d0d9949340d7032ad0fed3","60d0d9f99340d7032ad10113","60d0daa69340d7032ad104cf","60d0de02b627221e9d819408"],"playlists":{"default":"57bc306888d2ff1a7f6b5579","news":"56c6dbcee4b04edee8beb49c","politics":"56c6dbcee4b04edee8beb49c","entertainment":"56c6e7f2e4b0983aa64c60fc","tech":"56c6f70ae4b043c5bdcaebf9","parents":"56cc65c2e4b0239099455b42","lifestyle":"56cc66a9e4b01f81ef94e98c"},"playerUpdates":{"56c6056ee4b01f2b7e1b5f35":"60b8e525cdd90620331baaf4","56c5f12ee4b03a39c93c9439":"60d0d8e09340d7032ad0fb1a","59bfee7f9e451049f87f550b":"60d0d90f9340d7032ad0fbeb","5acccbaac269d609ef44c529":"60d0d9949340d7032ad0fed3","5bcd9904821576674bc55ced":"60d0d9f99340d7032ad10113","5d076ca127f25f504327c72e":"60d0daa69340d7032ad104cf","5ebac2e8abddfb04f877dff2":"60d0de02b627221e9d819408"}},"connatixConfigValues":{"defaultPlayer":"8b034f64-513c-4987-b16f-42d6008f7feb","clickToPlayPlayer":"5a777b9b-81fe-41a6-8302-59e9953ee8a2","videoPagePlayer":"19654b65-409c-4b38-90db-80cbdea02cf4"},"topConnatixThumnbailSrc":"data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAEAAAABCAQAAAC1HAwCAAAAC0lEQVR42mNkYAAAAAYAAjCB0C8AAAAASUVORK5CYII=","customAmpComponents":[],"ampAssetsUrl":"https://amp.assets.huffpost.com","videoTraits":null,"positionInUnitCounts":{"buzz_head":{"count":0},"buzz_body":{"count":0},"buzz_bottom":{"count":0}},"positionInSubUnitCounts":{"article_body":{"count":7},"blog_summary":{"count":0},"before_you_go_content":{"count":0}},"connatixCountsHelper":{"count":0},"buzzfeedTracking":{"context_page_id":"66d8638be4b09a3ee66d0c18","context_page_type":"buzz","destination":"huffpost","mode":"desktop","page_edition":"en-uk"},"tags":[{"name":"ukfilm","slug":"ukfilm","links":{"relativeLink":"news/ukfilm","permalink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/ukfilm","mobileWebLink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/ukfilm"},"section":{"title":"Entertainment","slug":"entertainment"},"topic":{"title":"Film","slug":"ukfilm","overridesSectionLabel":false},"url":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/ukfilm/"},{"name":"Lady Gaga","slug":"lady-gaga","links":{"relativeLink":"news/lady-gaga","permalink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/lady-gaga","mobileWebLink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/lady-gaga"},"relegenceId":6039618,"url":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/lady-gaga/"},{"name":"Joker","slug":"joker","links":{"relativeLink":"news/joker","permalink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/joker","mobileWebLink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/joker"},"relegenceId":3468400,"url":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/joker/"},{"name":"Venice Film Festival","slug":"venice-film-festival","links":{"relativeLink":"news/venice-film-festival","permalink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/venice-film-festival","mobileWebLink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/venice-film-festival"},"relegenceId":3696994,"url":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/venice-film-festival/"}],"isLiveblogLive":null,"cetUnit":"buzz_body","bodyAds":["
What is this bullshit statement that these people have agreed on? Lady Gaga of all people surely should be aware that that IS what a musical is??? The Lady Gaga who belted Elphie songs during school lunches!!!??? 🙁 https://t.co/DD8O03NO3J
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The Lady Gaga who belted Elphie songs during school lunches!!!??? 🙁 https://t.co/DD8O03NO3J— nnzy (@astnanlof) September 4, 2024\n\n\n","options":{"_hide_media":{"label":"Hide photos, videos, and cards","value":false},"_maxwidth":{"label":"Adjust width","placeholder":"220-550, in px","value":""},"_theme":{"value":"","values":{"dark":"Use dark theme"}}},"provider_name":"Twitter","title":"nnzy on Twitter / X","type":"rich","url":"https://twitter.com/astnanlof/status/1831319493177639003","version":"1.0"},"flags":[],"enhancements":{},"fullBleed":false,"options":{"theme":"news","device":"desktop","editionInfo":{"id":"uk","name":"U.K.","link":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk","locale":"en_GB"},"originalEdition":"uk","isMapi":false,"isAmp":false,"isVideoEntry":false,"isEntry":true,"isMt":false,"entryId":"66d8638be4b09a3ee66d0c18","entryPermalink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/lady-gaga-tries-explain-joker-folie-a-deux-musical-we-re-confused_uk_66d8638be4b09a3ee66d0c18","entryTagsList":"ukfilm,lady-gaga,joker,venice-film-festival","sectionSlug":"entertainment","deptSlug":null,"sectionRedirectUrl":null,"subcategories":"","isWide":false,"headerOverride":null,"noVideoAds":false,"disableFloat":false,"isNative":false,"commercialVideo":{"provider":"custom","site_and_category":"uk.entertainment","package":null},"isHighline":false,"vidibleConfigValues":{"cid":"60afc140cf94592c45d7390c","disabledWithMapiEntries":false,"overrides":{"all":"60b8e525cdd90620331baaf4"},"whitelisted":["56c5f12ee4b03a39c93c9439","56c6056ee4b01f2b7e1b5f35","59bfee7f9e451049f87f550b","5acccbaac269d609ef44c529","570278d2e4b070ff77b98217","57027b4be4b070ff77b98d5c","56fe95c4e4b0041c4242016b","570279cfe4b06d08e3629954","5ba9e8821c2e65639162ccf1","5bcd9904821576674bc55ced","5d076ca127f25f504327c72e","5b35266b158f855373e28256","5ebac2e8abddfb04f877dff2","60b8e525cdd90620331baaf4","60b64354b171b7444beaff4d","60d0d8e09340d7032ad0fb1a","60d0d90f9340d7032ad0fbeb","60d0d9949340d7032ad0fed3","60d0d9f99340d7032ad10113","60d0daa69340d7032ad104cf","60d0de02b627221e9d819408"],"playlists":{"default":"57bc306888d2ff1a7f6b5579","news":"56c6dbcee4b04edee8beb49c","politics":"56c6dbcee4b04edee8beb49c","entertainment":"56c6e7f2e4b0983aa64c60fc","tech":"56c6f70ae4b043c5bdcaebf9","parents":"56cc65c2e4b0239099455b42","lifestyle":"56cc66a9e4b01f81ef94e98c"},"playerUpdates":{"56c6056ee4b01f2b7e1b5f35":"60b8e525cdd90620331baaf4","56c5f12ee4b03a39c93c9439":"60d0d8e09340d7032ad0fb1a","59bfee7f9e451049f87f550b":"60d0d90f9340d7032ad0fbeb","5acccbaac269d609ef44c529":"60d0d9949340d7032ad0fed3","5bcd9904821576674bc55ced":"60d0d9f99340d7032ad10113","5d076ca127f25f504327c72e":"60d0daa69340d7032ad104cf","5ebac2e8abddfb04f877dff2":"60d0de02b627221e9d819408"}},"connatixConfigValues":{"defaultPlayer":"8b034f64-513c-4987-b16f-42d6008f7feb","clickToPlayPlayer":"5a777b9b-81fe-41a6-8302-59e9953ee8a2","videoPagePlayer":"19654b65-409c-4b38-90db-80cbdea02cf4"},"topConnatixThumnbailSrc":"data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAEAAAABCAQAAAC1HAwCAAAAC0lEQVR42mNkYAAAAAYAAjCB0C8AAAAASUVORK5CYII=","customAmpComponents":[],"ampAssetsUrl":"https://amp.assets.huffpost.com","videoTraits":null,"positionInUnitCounts":{"buzz_head":{"count":0},"buzz_body":{"count":0},"buzz_bottom":{"count":0}},"positionInSubUnitCounts":{"article_body":{"count":7},"blog_summary":{"count":0},"before_you_go_content":{"count":0}},"connatixCountsHelper":{"count":0},"buzzfeedTracking":{"context_page_id":"66d8638be4b09a3ee66d0c18","context_page_type":"buzz","destination":"huffpost","mode":"desktop","page_edition":"en-uk"},"tags":[{"name":"ukfilm","slug":"ukfilm","links":{"relativeLink":"news/ukfilm","permalink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/ukfilm","mobileWebLink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/ukfilm"},"section":{"title":"Entertainment","slug":"entertainment"},"topic":{"title":"Film","slug":"ukfilm","overridesSectionLabel":false},"url":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/ukfilm/"},{"name":"Lady Gaga","slug":"lady-gaga","links":{"relativeLink":"news/lady-gaga","permalink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/lady-gaga","mobileWebLink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/lady-gaga"},"relegenceId":6039618,"url":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/lady-gaga/"},{"name":"Joker","slug":"joker","links":{"relativeLink":"news/joker","permalink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/joker","mobileWebLink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/joker"},"relegenceId":3468400,"url":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/joker/"},{"name":"Venice Film Festival","slug":"venice-film-festival","links":{"relativeLink":"news/venice-film-festival","permalink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/venice-film-festival","mobileWebLink":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/venice-film-festival"},"relegenceId":3696994,"url":"https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/venice-film-festival/"}],"isLiveblogLive":null,"cetUnit":"buzz_body","bodyAds":["
What is this bullshit statement that these people have agreed on? Lady Gaga of all people surely should be aware that that IS what a musical is??? The Lady Gaga who belted Elphie songs during school lunches!!!??? 🙁 https://t.co/DD8O03NO3J
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Don’t worry, Marge, it’s not a musical. It’s just that the music is used to give the characters a way to express what they need to say when the scene and dialogue are not enough. pic.twitter.com/uDP4FgS36i
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It’s just that the music is used to give the characters a way to express what they need to say when the scene and dialogue are not enough. pic.twitter.com/uDP4FgS36i— Joe Reid (@joereid) September 4, 2024\n\n\n","options":{"_hide_media":{"label":"Hide photos, videos, and cards","value":false},"_maxwidth":{"label":"Adjust width","placeholder":"220-550, in px","value":""},"_theme":{"value":"","values":{"dark":"Use dark theme"}}},"provider_name":"Twitter","title":"Joe Reid on Twitter / 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Don’t worry, Marge, it’s not a musical. It’s just that the music is used to give the characters a way to express what they need to say when the scene and dialogue are not enough. pic.twitter.com/uDP4FgS36i
Joaquin won an Oscar for his performance in the first Joker film, and returns for the sequel alongside new addition Lady Gaga as the iconic Batman villain Harley Quinn.
The film’s cast also includes Zazie Beetz (returning from the first Joker film), Steve Coogan, Brendan Gleeson and Catherine Keener.
Joker: Folie À Deux hits cinemas on Friday 4 October.
During a joint interview with Brad Pitt in the September issue of British GQ magazine, George revealed he was “irritated” with the Pulp Fiction director, after the filmmaker claimed he wasn’t a real movie star.
“Quentin said some shit about me recently, so I’m a little irritated by him,” the Gravity star explained. “He did some interview where he was naming movie stars, and he was talking about [Brad Pitt], and somebody else, and then this guy goes, ‘Well, what about George?’. He goes, he’s not a movie star.
“And then he literally said something like, ‘Name me a [George Clooney] movie since the millennium.’ And I was like, ‘Since the millennium? That’s kind of my whole fucking career’.”
As Brad laughed, George continued: “So now I’m like, all right, dude, fuck off. I don’t mind giving him shit. He gave me shit.”
George and Quentin actually previously shared the screen in the 1996 horror movie From Dusk Till Dawn.
While the two-time Oscar winner didn’t actually direct the film in question, he did write it, and was seemingly heavily involved in the casting process, even selecting George because he thought they looked so similar.
And, George had some feelings about that comment, too, in a clip which resurfaced on social media last year…
Read George Clooney and Brad Pitt’s full interview in the September issue of British GQ, available on newsstands and via digital download from Tuesday 27 August.
If you saw Longlegs over the weekend, the chances are you may have left the cinema with a few questions. “What did I just watch?” being one of them, and “Am I going to be able to sleep tonight?” potentially being another.
And then, of course, there’s the titular character’s name. Despite everything we do end up learning about Nicolas Cage’s Satan-worshipping serial killer, it’s never actually made clear where he got the name Longlegs from.
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Well, director Osgood Perkins – the brain behind Longlegs – has cleared things up. Sort of.
Asked by Variety where Longlegs’ name came from, Oz said: “We writers just like words. We like how certain words sound and look and shape and feel.”
“Yeah, it has daddy longlegs and a creepy-crawly aspect to it,” he continued. “But it also feels ’70s to me — almost like a Led Zeppelin song or someone would have on the side of their van, something groovy like that. It feels like a vintage word that people wouldn’t toss around much today.
“It positioned the movie in a weird place. You don’t get to fully understand it. It doesn’t fully fit, which is more alluring to me and creates a curiosity that I think is important.”
Osgood Perkins
via Associated Press
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Oz also revealed that the character of Longlegs is one that he’s had in the back of his mind for some time.
“[He] was a character that had tried to make himself fit into other projects that I had worked on,” the filmmaker said. “When you’re writing all the time and generating specs and no one’s paying you or you don’t have any source material, you’re making shit up all the time. You end up with a universe of things that are swirling around, and you try to pull them out and stick them in.
“Longlegs was an entity, this shabby – is he a birthday clown? Is he a puppet master? Does he deal with stuffed animals? Is it little pianos? You start to wonder about this person who comes to your kid on their birthday and you’re in another room and you don’t know they’re interacting and that’s weird.
“He doesn’t abduct the kids because we’ve seen that 1,000 times before. He kind of talks to them. You start to be curious about that.”
Nicolas Cage at the premiere of Longlegs last week
via Associated Press
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Oz added: “When I decided that I was going to try for a serial killer procedural that was going to be something else, I needed a bad guy. Longlegs was like, ‘I’ll do it’.
“In your drawer of ideas, one of them says, ‘Put me in, coach’. And in goes Longlegs.”
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It’s been 20 years since Shaun Of The Dead arrived on screens and kick-started Edgar Wright’s iconic Cornetto Trilogy (later completed by Hot Fuzz and The World’s End).
The endlessly quotable, quintessentially British and laugh-out-loud zom-rom-com is an undisputed classic that still holds up two decades later.
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It’s also the movie in which the world got to know the loveable comedic duo Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, who star in the zombie apocalypse comedy as a directionless salesman and his lazy roommate, who must ward off an invasion by any means necessary.
If you’re already planning your latest re-watch, here are the behind-the-scenes secrets you probably didn’t know…
It was inspired by an episode of Edgar Wright’s sitcom with Simon Pegg
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The whole concept of the Shaun Of The Dead was inspired by an episode of Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright’s sitcom Spaced. In the episode titled Art, Simon’s character stays up all night playing the video game Resident Evil, when he starts to hallucinate a zombie invasion.
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“I wrote an episode of Spaced where my character fights zombies in his flat. We had such a fun time shooting it, we thought we ought to make a zombie movie – like it was that easy,” Simon Pegg told The Guardian in 2020. “We really were so naive. We thought we could do anything.”
The cast and crew did not have high hopes for the film’s success
Simon Pegg and director Edgar Wright in 2004
Richard Young/Shutterstock
It’s hard to imagine now when we look back at the cult success of the film, but Shaun Of The Dead was not at all guaranteed to be a critical or commercial success.
“I didn’t know if anyone was going to see this film apart from my mum,” Simon Pegg told GQ in a recent retrospective.
Edgar Wright agreed: “I don’t think we had any thought of what it would be beyond the UK. And even that was like, please let it go down well in the UK… everything that came afterwards, travelling around the world with it, was a life-changing bonus.”
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The team were keen not to water down the Britishness of Shaun Of The Dead
Simon Pegg and Nick Frost in Shaun Of The Dead
Big Talk/Kobal/Shutterstock
Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, Simon Pegg said the success of the film was a “vindication of our intentions” to make the film “very, very British”.
“We didn’t make any concessions to sort of transatlantic-ism,” he added.
Movie execs wanted more A-listers in the cast
We of course now know Nick Frost and Simon Pegg as an inseparable comedic duo, but apparently industry folk were confused as to why director Edgar wasn’t vying for bigger names.
“There were some times people… didn’t understand necessarily why Simon and Nick together was so important,” Edgar told GQ. “There were a couple of times [where they said], ‘Ed is like the funniest part of the film. Why wouldn’t you go with somebody bigger?’.”
He added: “It was literally that thing of, like, ‘Could you get an American in this part? Could Jack Black play this part?’. And we were like, ‘No, it has to be Nick’.”
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And some pretty big names were actually thrown into the mix
Speaking during a recent oral history with IndieWire, Edgar recalled how they were asked to look at “casting up” to get some more high calibre names involved for the roles of Shaun’s girlfriend Liz and mother Barbara, which were written specifically for Kate Ashfield and Penelope Wilton.
“We met Kate Winslet about playing Liz and she liked it, but ultimately didn’t do it,” Edgar recalled.
Kate Winslet pictured in 2003
via Associated Press
Another British acting legend was very nearly involved
Two-time Oscar nominee and (at the time) future winner Helen Mirren was also considered for the role of Barbara.
In an excerpt from the book You’ve Got Red On You – about the making of Shaun Of The Dead – published in Rolling Stone, Edgar recalled the acting icon’s “brilliant” response.
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“She read the script and said, ‘I’m passing on the role of Barbara. I would only do the movie if I got to play Ed.’ Her reason was, ‘Well, Ed’s the funniest part.’”
As we know, it was Nick who went on to portray Ed, but we can’t help but admire The Queen actor’s resolve.
Helen Mirren in 2004
Jim Smeal/BEI/Shutterstock
Shaun Of The Dead ended up being really popular with some Hollywood heavy-hitters
Speaking to GQ, Edgar reeled off the names of people in the industry who supported the film with press quotes: Quentin Tarantino, Stephen King, Sam Raimi, Guillermo Del Toro, Robert Rodriguez and Frank Darabont being among them.
To say thank you, they even made each of them personalised versions of Shaun’s badge with their own names on it.
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A legend of the zombie genre was particularly impressed by the film
The cast of Shaun Of The Dead
Oliver Upton/Big Talk/Kobal/Shutterstock
Shaun Of The Dead was clearly an homage to the zombie genre, so much so that it impressed Night Of The Living Dead director George A. Romero.
In a 2008 interview with CinemaBlend, the director recalled: “So I get this message from these guys, and I didn’t know who they were. Some cat named Edgar Wright: ‘I made this movie, I hope you like it.’
“So next thing I know, some cat from Universal shows up like a guy with a bomb suitcase, the fucking print is chained to him. He starts saying, ‘We want to show you this movie at the local theatre. We arranged it.’ I see this movie a little too dark, but it was hilarious, man! And I flipped for it.”
That record-tossing scene actually required artist’s permission
One of the most memorable scenes from the film sees Shaun and Ed toss (very carefully chosen) vinyl records at two approaching zombies. It turns out they couldn’t just launch any old album, they actually had to get permission from the artists.
Edgar recalled Smooth Operator singer Sade Adu being particularly generous with her sign off for Diamond Life being one of the chosen albums. “It’s a tough thing to get someone on board [by] saying, ‘We want to trash your album!’” Edgar said in a quote from You’ve Got Red On You.
“Sade, who I’ve never met, signed her release and was down for it. To me, she’s the coolest person ever. It’s like, you don’t know us from Adam, we actually break your record in the shot, and you let us clear your likeness. That’s amazing.”
But it was a hard “no” from one British music legend
The scene also depicts the pair deciding which Prince albums they should use as weapons, but it was nearly David Bowie at the centre of those deliberations.
David Bowie on stage in 2004
via Associated Press
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“The only other bit that we wrote, as far as I recall, is at one point we did David Bowie albums,” Edgar told GQ. “I think it was like: “Hunky Dory, no. Ziggy Stardust, no. The Labyrinth soundtrack…”
“I think we reached out to David Bowie’s publicist, and I heard something secondhand that he was touchy about Labyrinth, so that was a no.”
But they had more luck when it came to another musical sequence
Don’t Stop Me Now by Queen isn’t the most obvious choice to soundtrack a violent zombie assault, but director Edgar was a huge fan of the iconic band. Thankfully, they were able to get the sign-off for this one.
“We choreographed the entire fight to that song, which was a real worry because it hadn’t been cleared for use and could have ended up being way too expensive,” Simon told The Guardian. “So we wrote a begging letter to Queen guitarist Brian May and he was lovely about it.”
They let bored local kids be in the film
Edgar recalled to IndieWire how there was a “group of disgruntled teenagers who were throwing stones at the camera because we were on their turf”.
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He went on: “In an attempt to make peace with the teenagers, we promised that they could be in the film. A couple of days later, they went through makeup, dressed up as zombies and they’re in the film — you can see them when Shaun is next to the garden fence!”
And just in case you were wondering about the significance of the Cornetto…
Nick Frost enjoying a Cornetto on the set of Shaun Of The Dead
Oliver Upton/Big Talk/Kobal/Shutterstock
When Nick’s character needs a Cornetto to help him nurse a hangover, this was actually borrowed from director Edgar’s real life.
“The appearance of the Cornetto ice cream in Shaun Of The Dead is because it was a hangover cure for me in college and because it seemed like a funny thing for Nick Frost’s character to want on a Sunday morning,” Edgar shared in a piece with Focus Features.
“It’s popped up again because we had gotten free Cornettos at the Shaun Of The Dead premiere, so we thought if we wrote Cornetto into Hot Fuzz, then we would get them at that premiere as well. For some reason we did not, and I felt let down by the lack of free ice cream but by that point it was too late.”
Hollywood star Shelley Duvall has died at the age of 75.
Shelley will be best remembered for her work with the director Robert Altman, which included Nashville, Thieves Like Us, 3 Women and Popeye, as well as her legendary performance in the horror film The Shining.
Her life partner Dan Gilroy confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter that the Bafta and Emmy nominee died in her sleep on Wednesday night at her home in Texas, due to complicatons from diabetes.
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Dan said in a statement: “My dear, sweet, wonderful life partner and friend left us. Too much suffering lately, now she’s free. Fly away, beautiful Shelley.”
Shelley’s big-screen debut came in 1970 when she first collaborated with Robert Altman on the dark comedy Brewster McCloud.
The pair worked together numerous times throughout the 1970s, before she was cast as Wendy Torrance in Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation of The Shining.
Shelley with co-stars Danny Lloyd and Jack Nicholson in the 1980 movie The Shining
Warner Bros/Hawk Films/Kobal/Shutterstock
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In the years that followed, she made no secret of the difficulties she experienced working on the iconic horror film, reportedly being made to shoot one memorable scene more than 170 times in a row.
Her other work included Woody Allen’s Annie Hall and Jane Campion’s The Portrait Of A Lady.
Shelley played Olive Oly to Robin Williams’ Popeye in 1980
Walt Disney/Paramount/Kobal/Shutterstock
Shelley continued to work on screen throughout the 1990s and 2000s, before taking an extended break from the spotlight after 2002’s Manna from Heaven.
During her hiatus, she made a heavily-criticised appearance on the US daytime talk show Dr Phil, during which she spoke candidly about her own struggles with her mental health.
Last year, she made her return to the big screen in Scott Goldberg’s The Forest Hills, which marked her final performing credit.
When you picture the original Gladiator film from 2000, the first thing that likely comes to mind is Russell Crowe as Maximus Decimus Meridius. However, in an interview with Vanity Fair, the actor revealed that he actually almost dropped out of the film entirely as he didn’t like the script, and there were some strange inclusions that he didn’t agree with.
“I was confident about my abilities as a leading man. What I wasn’t confident about with ‘Gladiator’ was the world that was surrounding me.
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“At the core of what we were doing was a great concept but the script, it was rubbish, absolute rubbish. And it had all these sorts of strange sequences.”
","type":"video","meta":{"author":"Vanity Fair","author_url":"https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIsbLox_y9dCIMLd8tdC6qg","cache_age":86400,"description":"Russell Crowe takes us through his illustrious career, including his roles in ‘Young Doctors,’ ‘L.A. 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Confidential\r\n04:52 Gladiator\r\n09:46 A Beautiful Mind\r\n13:41 Cinderella Man\r\n16:52 American Gangster\r\n20:25 Thor: Love and Thunder\r\n23:04 The Pope’s Exorcist\n\nStill haven’t subscribed to Vanity Fair on YouTube? ►► http://bit.ly/2z6Ya9M\r\n\r\nWant to stay in the know? Subscribe to Vanity Fair Magazine and be exquisitely informed ►► http://vntyfr.com/2RuQGW2\r\n\r\nABOUT VANITY FAIR\r\nArts and entertainment, business and media, politics, and world affairs—Vanity Fair’s features and exclusive videos capture the people, places, and ideas that define modern culture.","options":{"_cc_load_policy":{"label":"Closed captions","value":false},"_end":{"label":"End on","placeholder":"ex.: 11, 1m10s","value":""},"_start":{"label":"Start from","placeholder":"ex.: 11, 1m10s","value":""},"click_to_play":{"label":"Hold load & play until clicked","value":false}},"provider_name":"YouTube","thumbnail_height":720,"thumbnail_url":"https://i.ytimg.com/vi/C23LrxaUx-0/maxresdefault.jpg","thumbnail_width":1280,"title":"Russell Crowe Breaks Down His Career, from ‘Gladiator’ to ‘The Pope’s Exorcist’ | Vanity 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One of these ‘strange sequences’ was scenes in which the gladiators rode chariots that had promotions for olive oil and other products on them.
While this may have seemed like an anachronistic choice for the filmmakers, gladiators in the Roman Empire really did take on endorsement and product placement deals.
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According to the marketing experts at Banknotes: “The Colosseum was the mecca of entertainment in Ancient Rome, exposing gladiators to thousands of people at once.
“This is why historians have long suggested that Roman Gladiators were arguably the first influencers of purchasing behaviours.”
Russell did actually know this but said that it just wouldn’t resonate with audiences. He exclaimed: “That’s all true but it’s just not going to ring right to a modern audience, they’re going to go, ‘What the fuck is all this?’”
And despite being only two minutes long, we’re already feeling pretty emotionally exhausted by the whole thing.
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In the upcoming film, which is set to hit cinemas later this year, the two Oscar nominees play a pair of strangers who fall in love after Florence’s character, Almut, hits Andrew’s with her car.
The movie then follows the highs and lows of their love story over the course of several decades, including their early relationship, career milestones, the birth of their child and subsequent health issues.
Check out the trailer for yourself in the video below. Just maybe make sure you’re sitting down first, alright…?
","type":"video","meta":{"author":"A24","author_url":"https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuPivVjnfNo4mb3Oog_frZg","cache_age":86400,"description":"SUBSCRIBE: http://bit.ly/A24subscribe\r\n\r\nFrom director John Crowley and starring Andrew Garfield and Florence Pugh. 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The film was helmed by John Crowley, perhaps best known for his work directing the Oscar-nominated historical drama Brooklyn.
An official synopsis teases: “Almut and Tobias are brought together in a surprise encounter that changes their lives. Through snapshots of their life together – falling for each other, building a home, becoming a family – a difficult truth is revealed that rocks its foundation.
“As they embark on a path challenged by the limits of time, they learn to cherish each moment of the unconventional route their love story has taken, in filmmaker John Crowley’s decade-spanning, deeply moving romance.”
“No great tryst ever started with someone being rational,” says the always-wise Kathy Bates as grandmother Leila Ford in Netflix’s newest rom-com, A Family Affair. One could argue that the same truism also applies to romantic comedies, especially the great ones.
Like all movies, rom-coms ask us to suspend our disbelief, to settle into our couch and let ourselves believe in anonymously heartfelt email exchanges and wish for bouquets of sharpened pencils. We watch them with the belief that things will work out, that a seemingly dysfunctional friendship can make two people surprisingly good wedding dates and even better lovers. From Nora Ephron classics such as You’ve Got Mail to more recent indie films such as Plus One and Rye Lane, great romantic comedies, like a life-changing love affair, offer both escape and self-discovery. And, most importantly, they remind us to hope.
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Admittedly, this is a high bar for a genre that is so often dismissed and undervalued, but when I learned that Nicole Kidman, Zac Efron and Joey King would be starring in a romantic comedy together, I thought they just might be able to reach it. However, instead of lifting up a genre, A Family Affair reinforces the sad state of rom-coms right now.
In it, Zac plays difficult movie star Chris Cole who falls for Brooke, the mother of his 24-year-old assistant, Zara. Like the cast, the premise is promising. On its surface, the film could even be touted as a mash-up of the recent age-gap romance The Idea Of You with a classic Notting Hill-esque twist (a movie star falling in love with a non-celebrity).
However, in execution, A Family Affair misses the mark and often doesn’t feel like a rom-com at all. Is the movie supposed to be a rom-com with emotional depth or a parody of one? It doesn’t know. This problem is most evident in the stark dichotomy between the characters’ trope-y personas and their sincere relationships.
Joey King as Zara Ford and Kathy Bates as Leila Ford in A Family Affair
Tina Rowden/Netflix
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Zac plays a caricature of a movie star, embodying the stereotype of being an out-of-touch celebrity (he hasn’t been to a grocery store in 10 years) who has forgotten how to treat other people with respect, especially his assistant Zara. Zara is the quintessential entitled young person who is working her first job and struggling because she’s a – dare I use the term – “nepo baby” (her mum is basically Joan Didion) who feels like her producing career should begin sooner, so she can step outside of her mum’s shadow. That mum, Brooke, is suffering from writer’s block and hasn’t dated in the decade since her husband died, and she longs to remember what it feels like to be a woman, not a mother or wife to a man who was jealous of her success.
In the opening scene, Zara is cursing in standstill traffic because she’s late to deliver a pair of diamond earrings to Chris, so he can break up with the latest woman he is seeing. Simultaneously, Brooke is across Los Angeles bemoaning to Kathy Bates’ character (her former editor and mother-in-law) about her inability to write. Neither of these tropes play well.
But the actors do. The result is that Nicole, Zac and Joey’s delivery of Carrie Solomon’s unbalanced script swings the film from satire to sincerity in a disorienting way. For example, when Chris and Brooke first meet, their conversation is stilted and interesting and unobtrusively funny (he doesn’t know the myth of Icarus despite starring in a huge franchise called Icarus Rush). Their first kiss is part of a sweet exchange of dialogue that is one of the movie’s few swoon-y moments. But, as the encounter becomes steamier, the tone shifts.
Suddenly, a widow who hasn’t kissed someone in a long time is letting a man rip off her dress (but it’s OK because it was 50% off at Nordstrom) and tearing his bespoke shirt made from the wool of an endangered animal off his unbelievably toned body (but she’s worth the unethical clothing’s damage). When Joey’s character walks in on them and runs into the door, adding physical comedy to the mix, the moment becomes even more confusing. Was it supposed to be sweet, sexy, satirical or silly?
This tonal inconsistency plagues the film. It also emphasises its plot holes. For example, Chris is so famous that he’s unable to grocery shop, but he can sit in his assistant’s pediatrician office (a setting that is supposed to play as comedic) next to her and her mum who he just slept with. This is the kind of disbelief one might be able to suspend if the other components of the movie were working, but they aren’t.
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In “A Family Affair,” Efron plays a difficult movie star who falls for the mother (Kidman) of his 24-year-old assistant, Zara (King).
Tina Rowden/Netflix
Ultimately, the tropes and tonal shifts overshadow the less produced moments that are fresh and interesting and could have underpinned a truly great rom-com. Most of these moments occur during conversations, especially in the second half of the movie.
Zara is struggling with the realisation that her mum’s life is about more than mothering, and she is a person who deserves happiness, but she also doesn’t want Chris to hurt her mum. Brooke is having a hard time opening herself up to a relationship that could end with hurt. This mother-daughter dynamic and depiction of coming-of-age as a lifelong process are easily the film’s highlights, and it should have leaned into them.
While these rom-coms (and Anyone But You’s box office success and the resurgence of rom-coms on streaming platforms) have been lauded as proof that the genre is back, all of them have left me rubbing my eyes in disbelief, wondering if I just watched the same movie that other critics and viewers said they loved.
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I’m not writing this to be a contrarian or detract from a viewer’s enjoyment (all art is subjective), but I do want to know what happened to the modern rom-com in its purest form? When did we lose the plot of clandestine emails and No. 2 pencils, and why is it so rare to capture that magic in movies today? Why is Plus One an aberration?
In our hyperbolic, engagement-driven world, everything is either “the greatest” or “the worst”, and A Family Affair is neither. It is mediocre, run-of-the-mill, exactly what we have come to expect from most content. And that’s the problem. It’s watchable.
When the goal is getting eyes on the small screen, rom-coms like this and The Idea Of You become successes not because they are great but because we are willing to consume them in large volumes. I still hold this up as proof that people want rom-coms, but I’m losing faith in the new movies we now qualify as “great” ones.
Jude Law’s rather, um, extreme measures to get into character on the set of his new film, Firebrand, didn’t sit well with his co-star, Alicia Vikander.
Firebrand, which hit cinemas last week, is a historical thriller that probes the relationship between England’s King Henry VIII (played by Law) and his sixth and last wife, Catherine Parr (Vikander).
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In order to portray Henry VIII in his final days, Law said he worked with a perfume specialist to come up with a “repulsive” fragrance that would reflect his character’s mental and physical state.
“You’ve got to step into these characters every day. And so sometimes if you can do something that just is, not really a shortcut, but it’s about really finding a place,” he told Business Insider in an interview published this week. “It’s a ritual, and it can just put you in a certain frame of mind or mood. It can help or it certainly helps me.”
But when Law suggested that Vikander “got used” to the stench, his co-star quickly interjected.
“I didn’t really, it was that bad!” she told Business Insider.
Jude Law and Alicia Vikander at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival, where “Firebrand” had its world premiere.
Lionel Hahn via Getty Images
The subject of Law’s aroma has come up numerous times during the rollout for Firebrand, which premiered at France’s Cannes Film Festival last year and was screened at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York earlier this month.
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“I read that Henry, because of these agonising ulcers he had on his legs, really smelled like he was actually rotting,” Law told Yahoo! Entertainment last week. “So we came up with this disgusting odour that created a pungency and sickening scent around him.”
As to what such an odour would actually entail, the Sherlock Homes actor told Variety last year that the perfume specialist had concocted an “extraordinary variety of blood, fecael matter and sweat.”
Whether such levels of preparation on the “Firebrand” set ultimately paid off is questionable, however, as early reviews have so far been mixed.
Though The Hollywood Reporter praised the movie for “[rescuing] an inspiring woman from history’s footnotes,” Slant called it “often shapeless and rudderless.”