“Twilight: Breaking Wind, Part 2” took in $141 million, plus it has another $200 million abroad, for stupendous opening, breaking wind, dawn, and other records for vampires who can’t act in a campy trilogy-plus-one. Congratulations, world. In five years, these things will be remaindered to the dustbin of time, like Justin Bieber, Selena Gomez, Lindsay Lohan, Britney Spears, and half a dozen other Pet Rocks of the moment. (Remember when you were buying Paris Hilton’s jewelry on amazon?) Look for Taylor Lautner’s face on a Pez dispenser, and Robert Pattinson enjoying class reunions at the Night of 100 Stars with Luke Perry. Until then, Stephanie Meyers is getting the last laugh, and the LionsGate-Summit coffers- or is it coffins–are filling up exponentially. It’s all good. Just sayin. But…not so much.
Kathie Lee Gifford Leaves Out Juicy Part of Aimee Semple McPherson’s Life: Uncle Miltie
Kathie Lee Gifford’s musical about evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson is not a whitewash–she does tell us that Aimee liked her men, and she popped a lot of pills. But Kathie Lee did leave out one good story: that McPherson slept with comedian Milton Berle around 1930. Berle wrote about in his 2002 autobiography, detailing how he met McPherson when he was playing the vaudeville circuit and she was putting on outrageous shows to entice people into her Foursquare Church. Berle, it should be noted, was well known in Hollywood for the legend of his, er, sizeable manhood. (Ahem.) Kathie Lee could have written a cute song about this unusual coupling: an evangelist preacher and Jewish jokester.
Here’s the description of the events from Berle’s book via Wikipedia:
“I was both impressed and very curious … She was all dignity and class when it came her turn. The house went wild when she walked out into the lights.” Backstage, she invited him to see Angelus Temple. Instead, Berle wrote, the two of them went to lunch in Santa Monica, then to an apartment of hers where McPherson changed into something “cooler […] a very thin, pale blue negligee.” Berle said he could see she was wearing nothing underneath and that she only said, “Come in.” Berle said they met for the second and last time at the same apartment a few days later, writing, “This time, she just sent the chauffeur for me to bring me straight to the apartment. We didn’t even bother with lunch. When I was dressing to leave, she stuck out her hand. ‘Good luck with your show, Milton.’ What the hell. I couldn’t resist it. ‘Good luck with yours, Aimee.’ I never saw or heard from Aimee Semple McPherson again. But whenever I hear ‘Yes, Sir, That’s My Baby,’ I remember her.”
Scorsese “Surprise” 70th Birthday Party: No DeNiro, But Spielberg, Leo, Daniel Day Lewis Were There
UPDATED 11/18 AM: All week I was bursting to tell you about Saturday night’s surprise 70th birthday party at the Monkey Bar for director Martin Scorsese. But it wasn’t clear whether Scorsese actually knew what was happening, and I didn’t want to spoil the fun. On Monday night, I talked about it with Robert DeNiro at the premiere of “Silver Linings Playbook.” He told he couldn’t be there because he was representing the Tribeca Film Festival in Doha. He said, “I think Marty knows about it by now.”
Still–we waited. And so last night Steven Spielberg (with wife Kate Capshaw), Daniel Day Lewis (with his wife Rebecca Miller), and Leonardo DiCaprio (said to be very chummy with his “Wolf of Wall Street” costar Margot Robbie) were among the 120 guests invited to Graydon Carter’s Monkey Bar. I’m told that Scorsese–busy shooting “The Wolf of Wall Street”– was told that just 12 people were coming. What a surprise when he saw the guests! Harvey Keitel and Joe Pesci were among those on the guest list. Famed writer Philip Roth was there as well. In the end, the Monkey Bar was filled with everyone he’d ever worked with, from manager Rick Yorn to documentary filmmaker Albert Maysles, and of course Marty’s loyal and Oscar winning editor Thelma Schoonmaker. Thierry Fremaux, who runs the Cannes Film Festival, flew in just for the party.
Inside, there was dancing, and of course a montage of blooper clips from all the Scorsese films. I’m told that guests each got little “flip books” with the name “Marty” emblazoned on them. There was music and dancing, although Spielberg cut out around 11pm, exhausted from promoting “Lincoln” all weekend to junket press that had been flown in from all over the world.
DeNiro wasn’t the only luminary who couldn’t make it. “Saturday Night Live” producer Lorne Michaels had to spend the night at NBC for his show–and it was his birthday, too.
Aerosmith Ex Manager Won’t Stop Causing Trouble for the Group
Aerosmith is back and better than ever. Their album, “Music from Another Dimension,” sold 70,000 copies last week in its debut. That’s about right for veteran groups and acts. This week it should do a little better than half that. But album sales are no longer the measure of success for acts of that age–it’s all about concert tickets. Aerosmith has pretty much sold out Madison Square Garden for Tuesday night. Stubhub.com has around 900 tickets in circulation, which is a small fraction of the MSG total.
But Aerosmith’s former manager, Tim Collins, now lost to time, keeps spitting in the wind at Steven Tyler and co. This week he planted (through a friend of his–a and I can guess who it is) a nasty item in Page Six claiming the group is no longer speaking to each other, and they’re angry about the album and ticket sales. Hogwash, says a source. “They’re doing great and making lots of money.” This, of course, must anger Collins, who hasn’t worked with the group since George Bush was president– and I mean Bush 41, not 43.
Meantime, Sony would do well to give a real push to “What Could Have Been Love” from the new album. That’s a hit single all right, and one that should be pouring out of every AM radio in the land.
PS The Stones and The Who are touring. But FYI Aerosmith is still the only group with its original members intact. All others, dream on!
What Could Have Been Love: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d7lCZ0rpH3o
The Vampires Strike Back: Final “Twilight” Takes in $71 Mil on Friday Night
“Twilight 3.2” or as I like to call it, “Twilight: Breaking Wind,” took in $71.2 million last night in the good ol’ USA. The final installment in a brilliant marketing scheme now has a total worldwide take of $162 million in just one and a half days.
It was a good night for the box office anyway. “Skyfall” raked in another $12.3 million. Steven Spielberg’s “Lincoln,” an actual film, expanded its theatre count and took in $6.3 million. “Silver Linings Playbook,” another Oscar contender, opened in limited release and sold out its showings. It moves up to 440 theatres on Friday, November 23rd. “Silver Linings” significantly outplayed “Anna Karenina,” which is in the same number of theatres–16.
But “Twilight” remains a phenomenon of inanity. This last bite of the box office wasn’t the biggest opening of the entire series, but it was just a salacious whisper away. The first part of this fourth movie, “Twilight 3.1,” beat it by about $400,000.
The insatiable appetite among tweens for Vampire stories remains an enigma, but the veins just keep on opening. It’s also fascinating that there’s no economy until there is one– for things like this, expensive Apple products, and Taylor Swift merchandise.
Meantime, that insipid couple at the center of this thing continue to generate massive amounts of faux headlines. And the real vampire classic couple (see photo) never had to deal with that!
Judd Apatow Directs His Entire Family, Even His 90 Year Old Grandma, in “This is 40”
I’ve met Judd Apatow and his actress wife Leslie Mann a few times. I always liked them but I didn’t know much about them. After watching “The is 40” and doing a little research I feel like I know a lot now. “This is 40” is written and directed by Apatow, and stars Mann and their two young daughters playing the children of Mann and Paul Rudd. In the film, Rudd owns a successful record label, and he only signs acts he’s passionate about but don’t really sell. One of those acts is real life late 70s cult hero Graham Parker, now 62 and one of my favorite singers of all time. Parker and his original, legendary band the Rumour are reunited for “This is 40.”
Are you following this? Apatow’s 90 year old grandmother, Molly Shad, also appears in the film. Her late husband, Bob Shad, Apatow’s maternal grandfather, died in 1985 at age 65. He was in the pre-rock record business, but also wound up introducing Big Brother and the Holding Company (featuring Janis Joplin) and the Amboy Dukes (featuring Ted Nugent). He mostly issued jazz records. His labels were cult like but never really big, just influential. So you see where Apatow gets the inspiration for Paul Rudd’s Pete character.
Apatow tried making one “adult” comedy in 2009 with “Funny People” and it didn’t work. With “This is 40,” Apatow really succeeds. Even if “This is 40” is too long (it really needs to be cut by 15 minutes), it still works abundantly. Leslie Mann, because she’s Mrs. Apatow and always stuck in the second banana role, never gets enough credit. In this film, she not only shines but she sort of takes over the film from Rudd (and that’s not easy to do). She does remind me of Julie Hagerty crossed with Gracie Allen, but it’s just an echo. Mann is a gifted comedienne on her own. I hope she at least gets a Golden Globe nomination out of this.
Apatow has lots of hits he’s either written, directed, or produced, or some combo of those roles. Most are commercial hits without much real world grounding. There’s a lot of misogynist stuff, male bonding, women as objects. But now he’s 40, he’s softened, his daughters are growing up and he can’t get away with it. “This is 40” is his personal growth movie. But it’s not saccharine or preachy, it also avoids some of the smug sanctimoniousness that has crept into a few of his other films and a lot of Adam Sandler’s. He gets the tone just right. My only nitpick is too many name brand references and inside-Hollywood jokes. (The kids are watching “Lost.” The adults gossip about George Clooney’s personal life. It’s annoying.)
Rudd and Mann, in the film, have been married 15 years. They live well but teeter on financial ruin. Each has a terrible father who in turn has a second marriage with young children. (Interestingly, the mothers are almost not mentioned at all.) They’re still in love, but they are just crossing the line from maybe staying together to realizing they are in it for life. How Apatow managed to direct his whole family through a fictional version of his own life is another story. But, again: it works. And you can feel his whole oeuvre making a big turn toward something new and exciting.
I hope Universal is about to market the hell out of it. This is a sweet spot film for people 35-50. They’re going to get it in a big way. “This is 40” is just a smart, funny comedy inhabited by the good people Apatow had a hard time defining before this. Now he’s got it.
PS Great soundtrack that includes Graham Parker and the Rumour as the cult band of the 70s, and Ryan Adams as his contemporary parallel. Parker sing shis classics “Local Girls” and “Protection.” I hope everyone who sees the film immediately downloads the seminal album, “Squeezing Out Sparks.” Apatow has a great ear.
Rolling Stones Not Participating in All Star Hurricane Sandy Concert
The announcement this week of the 12-12-12 concert for Hurricane Sandy relief included all the big rock star names–Springsteen, Joel, The Who, etc. But one name that wasn’t in the mix was the Rolling Stones. Both Mick Jagger and Keith Richards participated in the Concert for New York after September 11th back in 2001.
This time around, by coincidence, the Stones are all in New York on December 12th. They’re playing a show on December 8th at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, and two shows December 13th and 15th at the Prudential Center in Newark. But sources tell me there are no plans for the Stones to join the 12-12-12 festivities as a group, and that Keith Richards is definitely doing it either. It remains to be seen if Jagger will participate or show up at all.
(I have a great idea for him: let Mick come alone and sing “Salt of the Earth” with the house band. He’ll steal the show. “Let’s drink to the hard working people…”)
To be fair, they could use the night off before the two Prudential shows. Charitable contributions are another thing, altogether. The Stones could still make a splashy announcement of a big donation to the Robin Hood Foundation or Red Cross. We will await that eagerly.
Meantime, HitsDailyDouble reports that the Stones Greatest Hits package, called “Grrrrr,” will sell between 27,000 and 30,000 copies in its debut week on the charts. Given that everyone has all these hits in many forms, that’s pretty good.
Hugh Jackman Bringing “Les Miz” Cast to Museum Dinner; Sting, Nile Rodgers Reset for Jan 31st
If there’s a lot of anticipation about “Les Miserables,” then the spotlight will really be on this year’s dinner for the Museum of the Moving Image. On December 11th the Museum is honoring Hugh Jackman with an all star dinner at Cipriani Wall Street. Hugh, who never misses a chance to put on a tuxedo, is attracting quite the crowd. I’m told the entire “Les Miz” gang will be there, with Anne Hathaway already confirmed. Other stars also signed up are Liev Schreiber, Alec Baldwin, and Rachel Weisz. (Can Daniel Craig be far behind?) Every year the MMI has a swell event….
…The We Are Family Foundation has rescheduled its annual fundraiser for January 31st. Sting and Trudie Styler are being honored at the Hammerstein Ballroom event, and Sting will be playing along with foundation founder Nile Rodgers and Chic. The original date was October 29th, and was long in the planning until Hurricane Sandy wiped the whole thing out. We Are Family Foundation was started in 2001 right after September 11th, and supports programs for racial tolerance and builds schools all over the world…
…The Beatles’ Apple Films have put out a call for anyone who has video or memorabilia from the group’s 250 or so live performances. They’re going to make a documentary out of all of it and are obviously light on material. The film is called “The Beatles Live Project” and offers fans the opportunity to upload said video onto the Beatles website. But uploader beware: nowhere in this plan is there mention of being paid for your footage, photographs, or audio recordings. Why would you give the Beatles, who are zillionaires, free stuff? For the glory of being included? No, no, no. We love the Beatles, but they are more than capable of paying for rights to material not owned by them.
Steve Buscemi’s Production Company Filming Doc About Breezy Point Disaster
Exclusive: Details are still a little sketchy, but I’m told that award winning actor Steve Buscemi– of “Boardwalk Empire” fame– is filming a documentary about the Hurricane Sandy disaster in Breezy Point. About 111 homes were burned to the ground in Breezy Point during the Hurricane, wiping out an entire community. Buscemi’s Olive Production Company, in which he’s partnered with Stanley Tucci, is already on the case. Buscemi, a former firefighter, is particularly interested in getting this story out. Documentary filmmaker Liz Garbus is said to be involved as well. Olive’s Wrenn Arthur has been out in Breezy Point with a camera crew for several days trying to chronicle the devastation. No word yet on what the film will be or who will show it, but HBO and Sheila Nevins is the likely scenario. It’s not clear yet whether the film would also include footage from the Jersey Shore or Atlantic City, where “Boardwalk Empire” is set. Updates coming…
Jennifer Lawrence, Sensational in “Silver Linings,” Doesn’t Memorize Lines
Jennifer Lawrence is 22. You know her from two movies, essentially: “The Hunger Games,” which I liked a lot, “Winter’s Bone,” which I thought was annoying. Today she opens in “Silver Linings Playbook,” which even Manohla Darghis of the New York Times, is in love with. “Silver Linings” will open slowly across the country as awards season kicks in, but it’s far and away the most emotionally satisfying film of 2012. David O. Russell has directed the Best Ensemble of the season–and they are some group.
Lawrence’s Oscar “moment” comes in the middle of the film, when Robert DeNiro — playing the father of her kinda boyfriend (Bradley Cooper)– accuses Tiffany (Lawrence’ character) of ruining the ‘juju’ of the Philadelphia Eagles because Cooper has been with her on Sundays and not his father. Watch for this scene. Tiffany swoops in and corrects DeNiro so succinctly in a scene-for-the-ages that you know she’s just won the Oscar. It’s one of the film’s many delights. But this scene ranks up there with Jack Nicholson in “Five Easy Pieces” telling the waitress where to hold the chicken.
“Winter’s Bone” also featured masses of dialogue. But guess what? Lawrence does not sit up all night memorizing her lines. She told me the other night at an advanced screening: “I look over the script, but I don’t sit there memorizing. I read it, and I know where I’m going, I know what it’s about.”
Whatever works, I say. All I know is David O. Russell couldn’t be happier. I can’t wait to hear responses from readers who see “Silver Linings” these next two weeks. While “Argo” is an exceptional thriller, and Denzel Washington is quite riveting in “Flight,” the family from “Silver Linings” is the most memorable group of characters in one place this season. As the movie draws to a close, you realize you’re going to miss them very much. That’s the sign of great filmmaking.