Support independent journalism, free from the trades and other publications that are part of the tinsel town machine.
For 12 years, Showbiz411.com has been covering Hollywood, Broadway, the music business and the business of celebrity. Ads are our main source of funding, but contributions (not tax exempt) from readers who enjoy the scoops, exclusives, and fact based reports are always welcome and very appreciated. To inquire about ads, email us at showbiz411@gmail.com.
The Beatles have a famous song called “Paperback Writer.”
Now the Rolling Stones’ Mick Jagger has a girlfriend who actually IS a paperback writer.
Melanie Hamrick, the mother of Jagger’s 6 year old son Devereaux, has published “First Position,” a novel about a ballerina, in paperback and on Kindle. Penguin/Berkeley is the publisher.
Hamrick herself was a ballerina. She and Mick just attended the gala opening night for American Ballet Theater. She’s 36, he’s 79 (but with the energy of 39). The couple just sold their estate in Florida — where they were near her family — and are sticking to New York.
Reviews? Entertainment Weekly said: “Hamrick makes her debut with this erotic novel that pulses with Black Swan energy…Hamrick offers up a thrilling meditation on the tension between love, desire, and art by combining the artistry of The Red Shoes with the eroticism of Fifty Shades of Grey.”
Mick promoted “First Position,” which hasn’t gotten a lot of publicity since it came out on Tuesday, on Instagram. His quote: “Pretty saucy!”
We all know how bad The Idol is, and all about its precariously low ratings. Last Sunday just 133,000 people watched on the HBO main channel.
Now Abel Tesfaye, aka The Weeknd, gives us a preview of Sunday night’s episode. He sings John Lennon’s “Jealous Guy” while his character shaves Lily Rose Depp’s legs in a bathtub. Meanwhile, Mexican housekeepers gossip about him by the pool.
“The Idol” has become peak hate watching, that’s for sure. But even the haters are staying away.
I hope John Lennon’s estate got a nice piece of change for the music license. I’ll bet they regret this now even though it’s a good cover. The Weeknd should stick to making records.
I feel bad for the Warner Bros. people who send out box office numbers every day. This is a sad story.
Last night, “The Flash” fell 81% — shocking — and made just $4.5 million. Another $9 million this weekend will bring it to just $85 million over two weekends. “The Flash” won’t get near $100 million until next weekend — at least.
With a budget of well over $200 million, “The Flash” will cause a huge write down at Warner Bros Discovery. It will go down in history as one of the studio’s biggest flops.
As I’ve said before, this didn’t have to be the outcome. The movie is good. But circumstances beyond its control — the star’s massive problems, angry fanboys, and so on — have contributed to its demise.
More box office: Jennifer Lawrence’s sort of awful “No Hard Feelings” is looking at a $16 million opening weekend in wide release. The reviews are mixed to bad. The main attraction is a naked but unafraid star.
“Asteroid City” went really wide yesterday and made a very healthy $3.8 million. Reviews are similar to “No Hard Feelings,” but there are a lot of stars. Total is now over $5 million, which is one fifth of the grand total for Anderson’s last film, “The French Dispatch.”
UPDATE TUES NIGHT 6.27: Julian Sands’ remained have been found in the San Bernardino Mountains. Condolences to his family and friends. This was a long saga for them and a tragic one.
EARLIER It’s been a little over six months since actor Julian Sands went missing on a hike on Mount Baldy in the San Bernadino mountains.
Searches yielded no results then, and nothing has changed. A new search conducted on June 17th also found no evidence of his body. There were originally 8 unsuccessful searches when Sands disappeared but weather became an issue.
The 65 year old British actor had starred in dozens of movies and TV shows, including “A Room with a View” and “Boxing Helena.” Sands’ devoted family has posted a statement supporting the search efforts on the same Tweet as the Sheriff’s Department.
Although missing hiker, Julian Sands, was not located during the recent search mission, the case remains active. We want to thank all the individuals who assisted in the June 17th search and the previous search missions. pic.twitter.com/TQqSvA1wAR
— San Bernardino County Sheriff (@sbcountysheriff) June 21, 2023
Ed Sheeran’s had a weird spring in America, that’s for sure.
First there was his copyright infringement trial. He won the case, but it seems like the whole saga left a bad taste.
From the trial he went to judge “American Idol” in place of Lionel Richie, who was playing at King Charles’s coronation. How weird was that? Sheeran is British, Richie is American.
On May 5th, as he was also launching a US tour, Sheeran released a new album, called “-“. Or “Subtract.” A couple of singles came with it. Ed’s last album, released in 2021, sold 2.5 million copies. The tour was selling well. So you’d think “Subtract,” the latest in a series of math albums, would do well.
Alas, “Subtract” is now dead, after just seven weeks. Total sales according to Luminate: 252,000 albums. It’s like it never happened.
After one big week, “Subtract” just disappeared. Like the Jonas Brothers new album, it just vanished. What happened? Was it so bad no one wanted it? And if so, why did Sheeran sell out Giants Stadium? Why is he playing two nights at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Mass? Why didn’t these fans who bought tickets also pick up the album?
It’s a headscratcher.
PS Sheeran tickets are pretty cheap. On Ticketmaster you can buy good tickets anywhere for about 100 bucks. Much different than Taylor Swift, Bruce Springsteen, or Beyonce. It’s kind of refreshing.
Paramount Plus is joining Warners/HBO/Max in the axing of programs. It’s also wiping them from their streaming service.
Despite being in “Star Trek” game for 50 years, Paramount is canceling the animated “Star Trek Prodigy” after one season. The producers were renewed for Season 2, but that’s not happening. And “Prodigy” is being wiped from the Paramount Plus platform.
Other shows cancelled include “The Game,” “Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies,” and “Queen of the Universe.” They’re also being wiped from the system.
I don’t understand this rush to erase shows that have already aired, from a digital system. They’ve been paid for, and can exist for eternity taking up no space.
All four shows will be shopped by CBS Productions to other platforms. In the case of “Prodigy,” that might be the first time a “Star Trek” show went to another network. Doesn’t that defeat the whole branding thing?
Ethan Coen, working solo and not with brother Joel, has made a movie with his wife, Tricia Cooke, the Coens’ film editor. “Drive Away Dolls” is described as a “queer comedy,” a kind of kooky “Thelma and Louise” for the 2020s.
“Drive Away Dolls” premieres September 22nd, so look for it to be front and center at the Telluride and Toronto film fests. It’s almost curious that it’s unspooling a few days before the New York Film Festival.
The film stars Margaret Qualley and Geraldine Viswanathan, with Beanie Feldstein, Pedro Pascal, Matt Damon, Colman Domingo, and Bill Camp. This Ethan’s first movie without brother Joel, who made his own award winning film, “The Tragedy of Macbeth,” two years ago.
Cooke, who’s been married to Coen since 1990 (they have two children), told Variety: “I’m queer, and I’ve always identified as queer. Making a queer movie that was fun, playful and didn’t take itself too seriously especially back when we wrote it in 2002 seemed like a really fun and interesting idea.”
The trailer looks like a lot of fun, with the energy of “Raising Arizona” and other off beat Coen comedies. It’s going to be a hot ticket. Ethan also tells Variety that there’s a lot of sex in it, a first for a Coen movie.
Sony should just put Spider Man in every movie and be done with it. They’ve got the number 1 film with
“Spider Man: Across the SpiderVerse,” making money like crazy.
But everything else they try is a disappointment. That brings us to Jennifer Lawrence, an Oscar winner, getting naked and running around a beach in “No Hard Feelings.” Apparently there are a lot of soft feelings. The raunchy comedy took in $2.1 million on Thursday night (which includes last week’s sneak peeks). Per theater was just $783.
Wes Anderson’s “Asteroid City” made $60,000 last night. It’s up to $1.2 million. Going wider this weekend.
“The Flash” is fading. It only made $2.8 million last night, not so different than “No Hard Feelings” but in more theaters. If only we could go back in time and fix so many things here.
“This documentary follows Roman Polanski in the city where he lived as a child, in the company of his lifelong friend, photographer Ryszard Horowitz, a Holocaust survivor, whom he met in the Jewish ghetto of Krakow during the Second World War. Together, they walk the streets and confront their memories…
Controversial director Roman Polanski had a life before his legal troubles.
He grew up in Krakow, Poland during World War II. His navigation through the war and the Holocaust have been written about but now Polanski talks about his memories of the time with Ryszard Horowitz. “Promenade a Cracovie” is being released abroad on July 5th. Mateusz Kudla et Anna Kokoszka-Romer are the directors. I hope someone in the US has the good sense to bring it here.
Not since Marvin Gaye released his “Here My Dear” album in the late 70s has anyone been able to top him.
But now Kelly Clarkson has dropped “Chemistry,” a divorce album that should have been called “Vendetta.” The cover features her as Jesus on the cross, so you know up front what’s coming, and it won’t be good.
Clarkson had a nasty breakup with husband Brandon Blackstock, father of her two children. She wound up paying a lot of money to get rid of him after he broke her heart on a number of fronts. Now we get to hear all about it on “Chemistry,” a dark, unpleasant album that twists Clarkson’s tremendous voice until it’s shrieking.
Did we need this? (Apparently not. The first track is called “Skip this Part,” and believe me, you’ll want to.)
The song everyone is talking about this morning is called “Rock Hudson.” Clarkson compares Blackstock to the closeted gay movie star who died of AIDS. She says in interviews today that she didn’t mean the song to have that connotation, just that Blackstock was her “hero” in the movie of her life. But the damage is done. There were plenty of movie star names to choose from. This was one is specific.
Years ago, Clarkson ran afoul of music mogul Clive Davis when she turned in an album full of tuneless warbling. It was her third release, called “My December,” and featured a terrible single called “Never Again,” which was a flop. Initial sales — and this was before streaming and Clarkson’s TV show — were slow. It took 10 years for the album to sell 800,000 copies. And she wound up leaving RCA Records for Atlantic Records.
“Chemistry” debuts at number 1 this morning on iTunes. But there are no singles for radio play, and so far only one — “Lighthouse” — a shrieker– has made it to 31. Other songs with titles like “Me, “Mine,” “High Road” — which she didn’t take, “My Mistake,” and so on, all cover the same territory. It’s what we call “on the nose.” There’s no allusion or imagery. It’s just “I hate you.” In fact, there’s a track at the end — the only good one– called “I Hate Love” with Steve Martin on banjo.
It’s too bad Clarkson wasted her high profile from her talk show, and her insanely good voice– on this nonsense. She could have had a summer of hits just releasing album of her “Kelly-oke” covers from the show. Or she could have worked with Atlantic’s Pete Ganbarg — who steered her to hits on RCA — to come up with some great pop songs like “Since U Been Gone.” But the only audience for “Chemistry” is the Glenn Close character from “Fatal Attraction.” And we know what happened to her.
