Tag Archives: Michael Keaton

This weekend provides a fascinating lesson at the would-be star system and the extent to which it exists in Hollywood today. Jessica Chastain indeed as the top two movies of the weekend.
Mama (review), which was sold more on executive producer Guillermo Del Toro than anyone in front of the camera, debuted with a terrific $28 million over the Fri-Sun portion of the weekend, with $33 million expected by the end of the four-day Martin Luther King Day weekend (or twice its $15 million budget).
Zero Dark Thirty (everything I’ve written about that one thus far…) is projected to earn another $21 million by Monday, with $17 million of that coming from its Fri-Sun second weekend, a solid hold of just -28% from last weekend. The film’s ten day total is now $55 million and will be about $59 million tomorrow, or almost identical to what Black Hawk Down had after its first ten days. It opened on *this* weekend eleven years ago, ironically grossing exactly what Mama made over the four-day holiday and dropping 40% in weekend two for a $17 million second weekend. Even compared to the usual slate of early year (January/February) supernatural horror, Mama’s debut is the strongest yet, besting the $24 million debut of Michael Keaton’s White Noise back in January 2005 (that would be about $29 million today).
So does this mean that Jessica Chastain is a new movie star? Not quite.

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By Greg Hernandez
HollywoodNews.com: Catwoman is slated to surface in Christopher Nolan’s next Batman movie and she will be played by the “it girl” of the moment Anne Hathaway!
How big a star is Anne right now? HUGE! Not only is she co-hosting the Oscars next month with James Franco, but she also let it be known to ‘Glee’ creator Ryan Murphy that she’d like to play Kurt Hummel’s gay aunt on the show and it looks that that will happen.
Anne, who was terrific in last year’s ‘Love and Other Drugs’ opposite Jake Gyllenhaal, became a star nearly a decade ago in the ‘Princess Diaries’ movies and has since built an impressive body of work that includes an Oscar-nominated performance in ‘Rachel Getting Married’ as well as such classics as ‘Brokeback Mountain’ and ‘The Devil Wears Prada.’
Now she will add the role of Selena Kyle (aka Catwoman) in ‘The Dark Knight Rises.’
She has many acts to follow (it seems Catwomen really do have nine lives!) beginning with Julie Newmar’s performance as Catwoman in the original Batman TV series. She left the series and was replaced by a more sexualized and subversive Catwoman played by the one and only Eartha Kitt who could purr in the role like no one else. (Eartha is my personal fave).
Former Miss America Lee Meriwether played the part in the first Batman film in 1966 with the character pretending to be a Soviet journalist to entrap Bruce Wayne.
The next time we saw Catwoman was in the feature film ‘Batman Returns’ with Michelle Pfeiffer, armed with a whip, playing opposite Michael Keaton. She got raves for her portrayal of Catwoman as a secretary who assumes a new identity after a group of cats saves her life.
To read more from this article go to Greg In Hollywood.
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HollywoodNews.com: Will Ferrell enters the multiplex this weekend in an effort to make this summer a little bit more funny. Grabbing Mark Wahlberg at his side, an actor whose onscreen bad-tempered persona can scare away a gaggle of wrestlers, the duo are starring in Sony’s new buddy cop action comedy “The Other Guys.”
Already, “Other Guys” directed by Ferrell’s producing partner Adam McKay has booked $13.2 million in its opening Friday. The comedy, which follows two New York City cops, who are in need of more respect on the force, is poised to make $35 million by Sunday. Ferrell plays a wimpy cop accountant, while Wahlberg plays a disgraced, smart cop who accidentally shot Derek Jeter at the height of a World Series game.
Michael Keaton and Eva Mendes co-star.
“Other Guys” has scored an 80% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes with critics such as A.O. Scott of the New York Times saying, “The Other Guys is most authentically itself when it indulges in a free-form but nonetheless highly disciplined silliness that has the effect of dissolving, rather than piquing, whatever worldly anger or frustration you may be harboring.”
The second wide release this weekend is Disney’s threequel “Step Up 3D” which scored second place with $6.6 million. The film was co-financed by Summit Entertainment.
While the “Step Up” films are known for generating a hit single or two on the radio, it’s questionable why mass auds would yearn to see a dance film in 3D when the visual format has suited action, sci-fi and animated films. “Step Up 3D” scored a 51% rotten which means critics are split.
Ty Burr of the Boston Globe complains, “Watching this movie in 3-D is very much like sticking one’s head in a blender and hitting “pulse.’’
“Step Up 3D” follows a group of street dancers who pit themselves against top-notch hip-hoppers in a high stakes shakedown.

Photo Credit: Sony, Disney
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By Sean O’Connell
Our coverage of “The Other Guys” press conference — with Will Ferrell, Mark Wahlberg, director Adam McKay, Eva Mendes and Michael Keaton — continues this morning as we edge closer to the film’s Aug. 6 release date.
Don’t be surprised if the comedic chemistry between Ferrell and Wahlberg is the second element audiences focus on when leaving “The Other Guys.” That’s only because top of mind will be an unexpectedly arresting visual sequence dropped in the middle of the film that conveys a night of drinking in a rowdy pub, with Ferrell and Wahlberg getting progressively more drunk and sequences getting progressively more bizarre.
“That was actually shot in pre-production,” said McKay after joking that Wahlberg actually took over the camera and shot the entire sequence.
“We were supposed to just do stills of these guys drinking at the bar, like off of a digital camera. And as we approached it, we were just like, ‘Oh, that’s kind of boring. We’ve seen that done before.’ We had just seen that video, the Philips one of the clowns fighting the police that was circulating on the Internet for a while. (Watch it here!) Oliver Wood, our DP, and I just loved that, and so we decided to take a crack at a low-budget version of it. And we just sort of did it by the seat of our pants. We had no idea if it was going to work. And uh, yeah. I think that was all pulled together in about 5 days, that whole thing, which was crazy.”
The interplay between the movie’s leads, however, is crucial to the film’s success, and Ferrell does a nice job squeezing laughs out of Wahlberg’s perpetual frustrations. When Ferrell was asked if it’s normal for comedians to watch each other’s backs on set, the funnyman surprised a few of us with his answer.
“Um, no,” Ferrell said with a straight face (though he was obviously joking). “I feel like it’s more important to be really cutthroat on a set and not have your back for each other. That provides a certain tension. It makes for a horrible work environment, but boy, does it pop on screen!”
Speaking of popping, Wahlberg gets to pop a cap in famous New York Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter … ideal for the self-proclaimed Red Sox fan. When asked if he had any input into the humorously violent scene, Wahlberg joked, “No, but [...]

HollywoodNews.com: O dios mios.
Will Ferrell is planning to headline and produce a Spanish-language comedy “Casa de mi padre” (“House of My Father).
No word on the plot, but the film is expected to keep its Spanish language with English subtitles.
Ferrell’s production label with director Adam McKay, Gary Sanchez, will be overseeing the project.
No word on who is directing.
Ferrell’s next comedy, “The Other Guys,” directed by McKay opens on Friday. Mark Wahlberg and Michael Keaton also star.
U.K.’s Empire Online was following the story.
Photo Credit: Splash
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By Sean O’Connell
Hollywoodnews.com: We’re finally able to spill the beans on our exclusive coverage of Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg’s cop comedy “The Other Guys” which opens in theaters this Friday.
Last month, we were able to attend a press conference with the “Guys,” as well as director Adam McKay and co-stars Eva Mendes and Michael Keaton. We’ll bring you exclusive content from our interviews all week long, leading up to a full review of “The Other Guys” on opening day.
One of the first questions directed at McKay asked how he balanced the requisite cop-drama elements with the script’s intended comedy.
“You know there are certain beats that you have to hit,” McKay told the gathered journalists. “(Steve Coogan) has to be taken from them in the car, because that’s what’s happening to them in the scene. And then you know also know when there are scenes where you can just go off. If it’s Mark saying a monologue or Will chewing out Mark, you know you’ve got room there. We sort of identify the areas where you can get sort of fuzzy and crazy, like when Michael (Keaton) was talking to the Bed, Bath and Beyond employees. We improvised about a half-hour worth of material out of just that, where it just went on and on.”
“This, probably, is the most plot-driven movie we’ve done,” Ferrell added.
When asked if he contributed knowledge of action-movie mechanics, thanks to his extensive experience shooting pictures like “Max Payne,” “Shooter,” “The Departed” or “The Italian Job,” Wahlberg admitted, “I obviously had a lot of fun making this movie. I certainly felt very comfortable when it came to anything cop-ish or action (related). But with all of the other (comedic) stuff, I just basically wanted to follow their lead.”
“It was funny, we’d be shooting a big, giant action scene, and Will and I would be like, ‘Wow, look at this. We’re breaking a window!’” said McKay. “And Mark would come over, almost yawning, and be like, ‘Yeah, we did this one time except I was being shot out of a cannon and I was on fire.’ And we’d be like, ‘You know what, Mark, let us have our fun. Please.’”
We’ll have more coverage of “The Other Guys” as the week progresses, including additional quotes from Ferrell, Wahlberg, Eva Mendes and Michael Keaton.

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By Steve Mendelson
Hollywoodnews.com: ‘Inception’ was number one for the third straight weekend, as it fended off three challengers and neared the $200 million mark. Dropping just 35%, the Chris Nolan thriller grossed another $27.5 million for a new total of $193 million. It will likely cross the $200 million mark on Tuesday, its nineteenth day of release. By Wednesday, it will surpass the $205 million gross of ‘Batman Begins’ to become Nolan’s second-highest grossing domestic grosser, behind the $533 million earned by ‘The Dark Knight.’ At this point, ‘Inception’ is having a slightly leggier run than ‘Star Trek,’ with smaller drops to compensate for a lower opening weekend (it too ended weekend three with $191 million). So it would appear that the audience-pleasing mind-bender should finished between $260-300 million, depending on how well it handles the direct demo competition in the next few weekends. Ironically, it will lose at least some of its IMAX screens a little earlier than expected, as ‘Avatar’ has a planned re-release on August 27th in IMAX and 3-D theaters. There’s not really much more to say aside from repeating the fact that the film has already recouped its budget in domestic numbers and is slowly expanding overseas (it’s worldwide total is now $363 million).
The big new release was Paramount’s ‘Dinner For Schmucks,’ which had an unusually low screen count of just 2,911 screens. While the reviews were decidedly mixed and the marketing was almost low-key, the picture still proved the drawing power of Steve Carell and/or Paul Rudd, as the film opened with $23.3 million anyway. This remake, of a French comedy, underwent a bit of a makeover following disappointing test screenings, apparently to add more heart and compassion to an inherently mean-spirited story. We won’t know whether the changes had an effect until next weekend (opening weekends are about marketing, second weekends are about audience reaction), but my dad didn’t care for it one bit (‘a movie for schmucks’). Regardless, this proves that star power is not completely dead, as pretty much anyone who saw this went because of one of the big names involved (I’m sure the appearance of Zach Galifianakis didn’t hurt).Regardless, the film cost a somewhat reasonable $69 million (remember when only big-budget action films cost more than $50 million?), but it’s probably going to get hammered next weekend, when the all-star (Will Ferrell, Mark Wahlberg, Dwayne Johnson, Samuel L. [...]

By Sean O’Connell
HollywoodNews.com: Mel Gibson and Danny Glover. Sylvester Stallone and Kurt Russell. Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg?
OK, so the “Saturday Night Live” veteran and the Oscar-nominated star of “The Departed” aren’t the first people you’d think to pair in an action vehicle. Unless, of course, you are Adam McKay, director of Sony’s upcoming action-comedy hybrid, “The Other Guys,” in which case the idea tickles you pink.
In the film, which opens Aug. 6, Ferrell and Wahlberg are NYPD officers with polar opposite personalities who must overcome their differences if they’re going to apprehend a white-collar criminal (played by Steve Coogan). The actors sat down with co-stars Eva Mendes, Michael Keaton, and director McKay for an interview with a handful of journalists. HollywoodNews.com was there, and we’ve got the exclusive video of this “Other Guys” event.

“THE OTHER GUYS” INTERVIEW PART 1

“THE OTHER GUYS” INTERVIEW PART 2

“THE OTHER GUYS” INTERVIEW PART 3

“THE OTHER GUYS” INTERVIEW PART 4

“THE OTHER GUYS” INTERVIEW PART 5
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HollywoodNews.com: “Toy Story 3″ star Michael Keaton has admitted he turned his back on Hollywood so he could bring up his son. Keaton, 58, who voices the role of Ken in the new Pixar flick, starred in movies such as Beetlejuice and Batman but he left the lifestyle behind so he could raise his son Sean.
He said to UK newspaper Daily Mirror: “I was raising a child full time, sharing the responsibility with his mom. He lived with me half the time so I chose not to go away and make certain movies.” Keaton added that he also got fed up with the movies he was being offered at that time.
He said: “One reason is, I got bored. I felt I was repeating myself and wasn’t having a lot of fun doing what I used to have fun doing. So I was always selective to a fault and not doing things which maybe I should have done.”
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By ANTHONY D’ALESSANDRO
HollywoodNews.com: It’s an odd question to ask in the third season, but what exactly does Sookie want in a longtime male companion?
Seriously.
This thought crossed my mind after watching the Amy Heckerling mobster satire “Johnny Dangerously” for the 34th time.
Just stay with me on this.
There’s a great scene where Michael Keaton, as kingpin Dangerously, looks out on the horizon with Marilu Henner, as his g.f. Lil, and dreams of a picket-fenced life. They pull out the stops hysterically, envisioning the American Dream, i.e. joining the PTA and talking to a neighbor named Fred.
What’s hysterical is you know that such a life isn’t even within their grasp – they’re gangsters.
The same can be said about Sookie and her desire to maintain a long-term relationship with her roguish gaggle of monstrous gentleman callers. If Bill ever had to lead young boys on a cub scout trip, he’d eat them before dinner.
Which begs the question: What does Sookie want in her romances with vampires and werewolves? Does she want vampire babies? Does she want to spend the rest of her life fending off enemy werewolves and bloodsuckers? And what about Bill’s jealous ex, Lorena? Sookie has to worry about her stopping by to borrow a cup of flesh.
Yes, sans Sookie’s desire to hang with Bill, there would be no “True Blood.” But in Sunday’s episode “9 Crimes,” Sookie is faced with a future without Bill.
Long story longer, Bill at the onset of the episode phones Sookie and breaks up with her. He’s just had some violent sex with Lorena and realizes he’s too much of an animal to be with Sookie. His desire to have bloody whoopee, (which makes S&M look like a walk in the park) can only be fulfilled by having hook-ups with female vampires. No reason to lead Sookie on; it will never work. Very mature move Bill. If only Edward and Jacob could have that much foresight in “Twilight.”
For Sookie, Bill represents a break from the hum-drum small-town life among the mossy oaks. He’s both Superman and James Dean in the deep South. That works well for Sookie since she’s always felt like an outsider with those mental talents of hers. Life is exciting with Bill – you get to leave Bon Temps and hang out in swanky vampire hotels and [...]