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Box Office: “The Hobbit” Hits $200 Mil US, “Django” Beats “Les Miz” on Friday Night

Roger Friedman
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Box Office: “The Hobbit” Hits $200 Mil US, “Django” Beats “Les Miz” on Friday Night

The Friday box office put “Django Unchained” back at number 2, just beating “Les Miserables” for the spot. But both movies are booming, which is good for the box office and their respective studios. The Weinstein Company really needed “Django” to jump start its bottom line since “The Master” never took off and “Silver Linings Playbook” has been a slow and steady earner. All three movies will be up for Oscars certainly. Meanwhile: Universal, even with “Ted” and “The Lorax” finally gets their mass appeal Oscar nominee in “Les Miz,” the best of all worlds.

But “The Hobbit” has jolted back to number as kids took the box office back from adults. On Friday “The Hobbit” crossed the $200 million mark in the US. It’s a massive worldwide hit as part four of “Lord of the Rings.” Let’s hope the profits are divided more quickly and evenly than when the “LOTR” actors were filing lawsuits and going to the press.

And yes, poor “Jack Reacher” keeps getting beaten for fourth place by “Parental Guidance.” Tom Cruise suffering at the hands of Bette Midler and Billy Crystal. Every day a half a million dollar separates them. And then Tom has to suffer the indignity of a fake “girlfriend” on the cover of every tabloid. Read my review of “Jack Reacher” elsewhere on this site today.

One more thing: for some reason “Zero Dark Thirty” is struggling. Would a wide release have been the way to go? Oscar nominations on January 10th should help give it a push.

“Jack Reacher” Beaten by “Parental Guidance” Again, And It’s Easy to See Why

Roger Friedman
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“Jack Reacher” Beaten by “Parental Guidance” Again, And It’s Easy to See Why

The moment finally came last night. While my family was in seeing “Parental Guidance,” I sneaked next door and caught “Jack Reacher” at last. OMG, as the kids say these days. What was Tom Cruise thinking? “Jack Reacher” is losing box office daily to four other movies including the Bette Midler-Billy Crystal-Marisa Tomei flick and I can see why. “Reacher” is a befuddlement. It’s not exactly Tom Cruise’s fault, either. He is a fine actor–witness Jerry Maguire, Born on the Fourth of July, Magnolia.

You can see him struggling to make “Reacher” work. But it can’t. Cruise is completely miscast. He doesn’t get to flash his trademark smile once. “Reacher” is all gloom and doom. The character should have been played by Bruce Willis. Or even Denzel Washington. Jack Reacher is described in the books this movie is based on as six foot five. The actor doesn’t have to be that tall precisely, but a large, older sense of resignation is needed. Cruise attempts it, but his physicality does work against him.

“Reacher” is also a stagnant picture, and very talky. After the initial bout of sniper stuff (five people picked off, four of them women), “Reacher” has long sections of banter between Cruise and Rosamund Pike. Pike, by the way, must have been made to stand in trenches because she’s two or three inches taller than Cruise yet is often photographed alongside or below him. And you can tell. Anyway, Cruise’s strong suit is not glib give and take, or world weary wisecracking. He’s no Philip Marlowe. These scenes are quite exasperating.

Also, I take back the idea that this film costs more than the producers say it did. It looks like it cost 50 cents. Cruise is the most expensive object in it. And the static scenes make the under-lit, under-decorated rooms all the more glaring. Tom Cruise and ‘sparse’ are not ideas that go together. Without things whizzing past him, and exploding, he seems a little lost.

There’s talk that director Christopher McQuarrie is Cruise’s pick for the next Mission Impossible. Hmmm…As a writer maybe, but as a director? I’d rather have Tony Gilroy, who did so well this summer with The Bourne Legacy. Between this and “Valkyrie,” McQuarrie is better left to set pieces and small stages.

PS I came out of “Jack Reacher” — and a quarter filled theater at 5:30pm — mostly perplexed. The family, however, loved “Parental Guidance.”

“Les Miserables” Producer: “We Didn’t Need” Taylor Swift in Movie

Roger Friedman
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“Les Miserables” Producer: “We Didn’t Need” Taylor Swift in Movie

“Les Miserables” is a box office blockbuster. Our PAULA SCHWARTZ reports that Kennedy chasing, celebrity-boyfriend-songwriter country singer Taylor Swift auditioned for the role of Eponine but  lost out to Samantha Barks, the only unknown in the starry cast that includes Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, Anne Hathaway, Amanda Seyfried and Eddie Redmayne.

Cameron Mackintosh told Paula at a party for the movie that the famous singer-songwriter had been interested in the role. “She’s a lovely woman and she auditioned, and she was completely un-starry. And she’s talented. It’s just that actually the requirements of that role were better fitted by Sam.”

“Every single person in this film, whether they’re known or unknown, auditioned for this movie,” Mackintosh said. “Nearly every name you’ve heard in the gossip columns are true, came up for Eponine, and it’s wonderful I think that somebody completely unknown got it.”

As for the big-name factor Swift could bring to the show, the producer said, “We didn’t need it. Les Misérables is the star.” It’s run for 27 years, and in 2014 “Les Miserables” is  slated to return to Broadway.

Barks came to the producer’s attention in 2008 when he and Andrew Lloyd Webber did a television show called “I’d Do Anything.” The show was a talent search for a Nancy to play opposite Rowan Atkinson in Oliver. Barks got into the quarterfinals but she didn’t win because, the producer said, she was too young for the role. He later cast her as Eponine on London’s West End for a year. And now she’s playing Nancy in ‘Oliver.” It was during a curtain call in January after the show that Mackintosh came on stage and announced that Tom Hooper had chosen Barks to play Eponine in his film. “Now she’s playing Nancy for me, and I’ve given her three weeks off to publicize the [movie],” Mackintosh explained.

Barks, who grew up in the same Isle of Man,  moved to London when she was 16 to go to drama school. She never imagined the success or opportunities that would come to her as a result of coming in third on the television show. “To be experiencing things like singing with Liza Minnelli, singing with Idina Menzel, having one on one mentors like them. I never dreamed that that would happen to me, so I just left kind of wide eyed and excited I got to experience that. I never thought one day that here I’d be promoting a film I’m just so proud of,” she said. “I’m so proud to have played Eponine on such a scale like this film. I started auditioning when I was 18 and now I’m 22, so, really, for the last four years it’s been the most consistent part of my life.”

She also heard the rumors of big names that auditioned for the part of Eponine but blocked it out of her mind. “My main aim to not think about that,” Barks explained. “I had enough to think of. This was the biggest opportunity of my life so I just had to throw my full heart and soul into being as good as I could in the audition room and try not to focus on any other aspects of that.”

“Dead Accounts” Cutting Its Broadway Run Short

Roger Friedman
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“Dead Accounts” Cutting Its Broadway Run Short

This time it’s no fun to be right. But I told you two weeks ago that “Dead Accounts,” the play with Katie Holmes as a featured player, was not going to make it. Yesterday producers announced the Theresa Rebeck written play will close on Sunday, January 6th. It was supposed to run through February 24th.  It’s not Katie’s fault, or the actors’, or director Jack O’Brien. “Dead Accounts” is a slight piece of work, ready for off Broadway at best. Also, it’s barely a two-acter. It could have played without an intermission. It’s no wonder that so few people would cough up more than $100 a ticket to see it. Those poor actors, all talented, weren’t able to fill a third of the Music Box Theater every night. Someone wrote that Katie Holmes should have been able to attract more customers. Nonsense. The play got bad reviews, not her. She did fine, so did everyone else including Norbert Leo Butz. Next time, producers should take a hard look at the material.

http://www.showbiz411.com/2012/12/10/broadway-dead-accounts-could-be-dead-soon-katie-holmes-play-drops-25

Bette Midler, Billy Crystal Take Tom Cruise for a Second Day in a Row

Roger Friedman
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Bette Midler, Billy Crystal Take Tom Cruise for a Second Day in a Row

Tom Cruise is just not having a good year. He can only hope that 2013 will be better. He was skunked by Katie Holmes and her family. His whole Scientology mishegos was exposed. And now this: for a second day in a row, Bette Midler, Billy Crystal and a bunch of children trounced him at the box office. Cruise’s “Jack Reacher” was once again beaten by “Parental Guidance,” the Midler-Crystal-Marisa Tomei family comedy. Yikes. “Reacher” did just $3.8 million. Not good. Meantime, “Les Miserables” is number 1 with $30 million in three days.

And: “Django Unchained” is booming with $25 million in the same time. “The Hobbit: An Unnecessary–whoops–Unexpected Journey” already has crossed the $500 million line with most of it coming from foreign sales. “Silver Linings Playbook” is a limited release hit as well. “Reacher” is doing the same or just a tad not as well as the comedy “This is 40.” Tom Cruise needs a romantic comedy. Tom, call Charles Shyer or Nancy Meyers, pronto. Put down your guns.

http://www.showbiz411.com/2012/12/28/bette-midler-billy-crystal-take-tom-cruise-for-a-second-day-in-a-row

http://www.showbiz411.com/2012/12/27/an-oscar-primer-for-academy-members-countdown-to-january-3rd

Fontella Bass, The Great Singer of “Rescue Me,” Dies at 72

Roger Friedman
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Fontella Bass, The Great Singer of “Rescue Me,” Dies at 72

I met Fontella Bass in 2001 at the Rhythm and Blues Foundation dinner that year. The great singer of “Rescue Me,” a song she co-wrote, and is played on the radio constantly, told me this: “I wrote Rescue Me,” she said, “but the producers I was working with never put my name on it. When I asked them about it, they said, Don’t worry, we’ll take care of it.”

I wrote then: Nearly 35 years later, Bass has never seen a penny in publishing royalties from the much-recorded, bestselling song. She was so disheartened from the experience, she told me, that she left the United States for several years and made a career in Europe.

Fontella Bass died Wednesday in St. Louis. She was 72. Was she cheated by Chess Records and a lot of other people? Yes. And if there were a Performance Rights Act, she would have been paid each and every time “Rescue Me” was and is played on oldies radio. Instead, Fontella Bass goes to the grave having made radio chain owners and record company executives rich, rich, rich.

You can watch her now in our video player on the home page. RIP, Fontella. Your voice will always be heard.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2253825/Rescue-Me-soul-singer-Fontella-Bass-dies-72-suffering-heart-attack.html

 

Downton Abbey Shocker: Spoiler Alert So Read Only if You’re Strong

Roger Friedman
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Downton Abbey Shocker: Spoiler Alert So Read Only if You’re Strong

Downton Abbey Shocker: STOP READING RIGHT NOW IF YOU DON’T WANT TO KNOW. Remember that when Dan Stevens and I crossed paths the night “The Heiress” opened on Broadway, he wouldn’t answer any questions about his future on Downton Abbey. His obnoxious publicist pulled him away from me so fast I had razor burns. More recently, when I ran into him at a movie premiere, Stevens was calmer. But he still said, “Wait. You’ll see.” And on the Christmas special shown in the UK on Tuesday, the sad news was confirmed: Matthew Crawley is dead. Dan Stevens has left the building. And the show. Will he be able to leverage Downton Abbey into movie fame here in America? Hard to say. He’s going to try. But I guess it’s the difference between being Jeremy Irons or Anthony Andrews– the two stars of “Brideshead Revisited.” Alas, Matthew dies in a car crash. Who will manage Downton Abbey now? Read more here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/downton-abbey/9765334/Dan-Stevens-Why-I-left-Downton-Abbey.html

Kate Winslet’s Third Marriage Makes Her Mrs. Rocknroll

Roger Friedman
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Kate Winslet’s Third Marriage Makes Her Mrs. Rocknroll

People–my friends, family, etc– often ask me, What are these celebrities really like? Are they crazy? And I say, no no, there are really great ones. One of the ones I really like is Kate Winslet. She’s tremendously talented and so level headed. She raises her kids in nearby Chelsea, and all the schoolkids’ friends come to all of her premieres and opening nights.

So now I can report that Winslet, who is 37 and an Oscar winner, has married for the third time. This ’round it’s someone named Ned Rocknroll, and he’s 34. That’s his legal name, although he was born Abel Smith, and he’s the nephew of billionaire adventurer Richard Branson.

According to People and other outlets, it was a secret ceremony that neither Winslet’s parents nor the groom’s knew about. Leonardo DiCaprio, twice her co-star in films, gave her away. In real life, Winslet has two children, one by ex husband Sam Mendes, director of “American Beauty” and “Skyfall.” Those children will have such great material with which to write memoirs. I hope they are taking notes.

You can look at this a couple of ways. It sounds nuts, right? But she married into a really rich family. Also, if you’re famous and beautiful and have an Oscar, you might as well live it up, right? Elizabeth Taylor didn’t stick around Chelsea going to PTA meetings in her thirties. Life is for living.

For more info on Mr. Rocknroll, here’s a great interview with his previous wife, whom he married in 2009 when she was 21.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2052300/Eliza-Pearson-Hearing-Ned-Rocknroll-dating-Kate-Winslet-painful.html

Why did Mr. Smith change his name? Said his ex: “It was hysterical. We had discussed him doing this many times before, but I wasn’t sure whether he’d do it. The whole thing was about having fun with your name. He thought we all took ourselves too seriously so it was about reacting against it. He looked into just being ‘Ned’, with no surname at all but, apparently, that’s illegal so we couldn’t do it.”

Ned also worked for his uncle briefly as head of head of ‘astronaut relations and marketing.’ Said the ex: “He made that title up himself and it’s on his business cards…The job didn’t impress me. But his passion was incredible, and it really drew me to him. ‘He would say to me, there is no destination. The destination is now, now, now. The journey is the destination. We’re not trying to get somewhere. And that’s a really valuable lesson.’”

 

Box Office Update: Bette Midler-Billy Crystal Comedy Beats Tom Cruise Shooter-Upper

Roger Friedman
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Box Office Update: Bette Midler-Billy Crystal Comedy Beats Tom Cruise Shooter-Upper

Here’s an update on Christmas Day box office, thanks to numbers from boxofficemojo,com: Bette Midler and Billy Crystal’s family comedy, “Parental Guidance,” with Marisa Tomei, handily beat Tom Cruise in “Jack Reacher” for fourth place. The first three films were “Les Miserables” with $18.1 mil, “Dhango Unchained” with $15 mil, and “The Hobbit” with $11.3 million.

But who would have expected Midler and Crystal, names not seen above the credits or opening a film in more than a decade, to knock it out of the park? With $6.3 million they outpaced Cruise by $1 million. Of course, with kids, on Christmas, do you take them to see a Disney type comedy or a movie where a sniper picks off five people in the first few minutes? You tell me.

Kudos to Midler and Crystal, who are not exactly family fare from the old days. They were both pretty R rated comedians, delivering cutting edge stuff with a sweet smile. Now, in their 60s, they just deliver the sweet I guess. Imagine if Midler stopped in mid movie and told one of her old bawdy jokes!  But you know, now they’ll get a little franchise out of this, maybe one or two more “Parental Guidance”episodes and find a new audience. That’s called reinvention.

As for Cruise, who has refused to reinvent himself, “Reacher” has been something of a reach. The thriller now has $23.5 million since Friday, which wouldn’t be bad if your star didn’t get the first $20 million before costs and the movie didn’t cost at least $80 million. I guess some of that will be mixed into his “Mission Impossible” pay out.

Elsewhere, “Zero Dark Thirty” is doing well, but presenting an interesting problem day to day. On Monday and Tuesday it did less well than on the weekend. Instead of building interest, the Kathryn Bigelow directed thriller (yes, it’s a thriller) didn’t maintain its highs in very limited release. It’s hard to say how this bodes for the future. All the controversy should have pushed more people to see it, as they did for “Django.” But maybe “ZD30” will fare better once the kids are back in school.

Celebrity Skyrocket: Tom Cruise’s Tabloid “Date” Was a Steakhouse Manager Last April

Roger Friedman
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Celebrity Skyrocket: Tom Cruise’s Tabloid “Date” Was a Steakhouse Manager Last April

Meet Cynthia Jorge. Last April she was an assistant manager at some place called Benjamin Steakhouse on East 41st St. Today she’s on the cover of supermarket tabloid “Life & Style” for her “wild nights” with Tom Cruise. America is a dream come true! Cynthia was profiled on a website called JoonBug last April http://joonbug.com/national/firstcourse/Behind-the-Plate-with-Benjamin-Steakhouses-Cynthia-Jorge/H6hv6UxUFEL.

Not a trendy place. So now Cynthia’a at the very loud and buzzy Beauty and Essex on the Lower East Side. She’s not a waitress, kids. She’s a trained p.r. girl, with a degree in the subject. And that’s how she made it onto Page Six today after Tom Cruise “tracked her down” to dance with her at another nightclub.

The cynic here must raise an arched eyebrow. Our “Jack Reacher” star needs to dance with somebody; Cynthia sees an opportunity. He’s 50, she’s 26, and the numbers add up.

The next Mrs. Cruise? Why not? Read that Joonug piece: Cynthia was a vegetarian for 10 years before going to work for the steak house. She’s extremely adaptable.

Also, Cynthia wrote in 2007 on LinkedIn: “A former nightlife promoter, I am extremely outgoing, agile and comfortable in stressful situations.”

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