Imagine John Lennons life story on the big screen because its happeningUK production company Ecosse Films in conjunction with the UK Film Council is developing a biopic on the iconic musician The Hollywood Reporter reports Nowhere Boy will explore the teen pre-Beatle years of Lennon and his befriending of former bandmate Paul McCartneyMatt Greenhalgh will pen the screenplay while visual artist Sam Taylor-Wood is slated to direct The flick will be shot on location in Lennons hometown of Liverpool EnglandCasting for the all-important roles is under way producers sayNo word on a release date Joyce Eng
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I've been thinking a lot about Tom Snyder since his death from leukemia was made public, in part because my mind already had been preoccupied with the '70s, when this unforgettable talk-show icon was in his late-night NBC heyday.My own late-'70s time warp was prompted by a 30-year high-school reunion over the weekend in which I referenced That '70s Show more than once. (Did we really look like that? Dress like that? Have hair like that? Only our senior class pictures know the truth, and I'm not sharing.) During my high school and college years, Snyder was a blazing, sometimes hair-raisingly pioneering presence in what had been a late-night wasteland following Johnny Carson's legendary Tonight Show.Snyder's show, which aired from 1973 to 1982, was called Tomorrow, and to me, the title always underscored the fact that everything about it was a bit ahead of its time. The show's level of discourse, its idiosyncratic host with his brash intensity and eclectic range (historic interviews w...
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Fans of the late John Lennon are calling for a boycott of Chapter 27, a critically hailed (yet not picked up at Sundance) look at Mark David Chapman (played by Jared Leto), claiming its release would fulfill Chapman's prophecy of becoming famous by murdering Lennon. Some protesters are even lobbing death threats at Lindsay Lohan, who costars in the film. "It's nonsense," exec producer John Flock tells the New York Daily News, pointing out that Chapter 27's take on Chapman is not sympathetic, and "he comes off as a monster in the end."Elsewhere, Lohan is back at work on her stripper pic I Know Who Killed Me, but, post-rehab, is said to be "moody," "late" and "miserable" on the set, spies tell the New York Post. Also, out of fear of pushing herself too hard, La Lo has bailed on her next project, A Woman of No Importance, in which she was to costar with Annette Bening.
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We knew him as Frank Barone, the gruff grandpa who made merry mischief with his sons, his long-suffering wife Marie and his horrified in-laws for nine seasons on Everybody Loves Raymond. Also as the comical monster of Young Frankenstein, tapping and yowling to “Puttin’ on the Ritz.” And let’s not forget Clyde Bruckman, the wry, melancholy psychic who foresaw his own death (among others, including Mulder’s) in one of the most memorable X-Files episodes ever. It was for that X-Files guest shot that Peter Boyle won his Emmy in 1996, but he won America’s heart (and was nominated seven times) as the most curmudgeonly of the comic engines in the splendid ensemble cast of Everybody Loves Raymond, one of the last great classic TV comedies. His cranky rapport with Doris Roberts, who played Marie to his Frank, was so popular they reprised their roles for several retro Alka-Seltzer commercials after Raymond folded. It was great seeing them again, reminding us of h...
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Doctor WhoHaving gone into the future, our Geordie-or-somwhere-else-in-Northern-England-voiced doctor boogied into the past with Rose. Incidentally, I thank the folks who pointed out that the doctor does not have a Cockney. As John Lennon sang, I should've known better. My only defense is that my computer was giving me fits, causing my brain cells to click together like one of those swinging marble novelty items that sits on the desks of bored executives. (As much as I like the attention, please don't inundate me with pedantic e-mails about the history of swinging marble thingies.) The TARDIS was playing games of her own. Instead of going to 1860 Naples, like the doctor programmed her to, it deposited the Time Lord and Rose in 1869 Cardiff. Notice how the doctor made Rose change her clothes ("You'll start a riot, Barbarella!") wit
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