Gong Li is for sure going to Shanghai, the Weinstein brothers' period drama, and John Cusack is in talks to join her.... Mark Ruffalo has been tapped to play a fellow U.S. Marshall opposite Leonardo DiCaprio in Martin Scorsese's Shutter Island, based on Dennis Lehane's novel about a hurricane at a nuthouse.... Nikki Reed (the vamplet from Thirteen) and Saw IV's Betsy "Avenging Angel" Russell have RSVP'd yes to Chain Letter, a slasher flick about a killer who targets kids who fail to forward a (see title). — Ben Katner
read more
On Wednesday night, CW's top-rated series, America's Next Top Model, showed double-digit growth last season and was the No. 1 show in its time slot with women 18-34. Next season, America's Next Top Model will stay in its 8-9 pm berth, followed by the new drama Gossip Girl from 9-10 pm. From The O.C. producers Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage, Gossip Girl is based on the best-selling young-adult book series of the same name. The show features an ensemble cast of new and veteran actors, including Blake Lively (The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants) and Leighton Meester (Surface), and chronicles the struggle for social supremacy among teens in a posh Manhattan prep school. The fun, sexy and dramatic hour is a perfect companion piece for Top Model's strong female audience, making Wednesday "Girls Night In" on The CW. On Thursday — television's most competitive night — Smallville and Supernatural deliver a solid mix of male and female viewers. On Friday, the wildly popular ...
read more
The O.C. OK, that's it. From here on out, I'm thinking of Marissa as MErissa. ‘Cause that's all she thinks about. I get it, her friend died. Very sad. A peripheral character — here for a multiepisode arc — died. Tragically. Was MErissa into Johnny Wohnny? It seemed like it. And yes, she's entitled to her grief, but I'm tired of MErissa treating Ryan like yesterday's news. So color me happy to see that our Ry guy had some sparks with Johnny's cousin, Sadie. Now my first thought when I saw her arrive on the scene was, "Oh, no, please tell me we don't have to put up with another newbie." But you know what? I already dig her. She shows promise, and hopefully she can get Ryan's mind off of MErissa. Besides, I loved Nikki Reed in the movie Thirteen. And I love her na
read more
Question: I just saw a direct-to-video movie called Havoc that was dedicated to Jessica Kaplan (1979-2003). Who was she and why is the movie dedicated to her?
Answer: When Los Angeles-born Jessica Kaplan was a 17-year-old high-school student at Santa Monica's famous Crossroads School, she sold a screenplay called The Powers that Be — about privileged white California kids who were into gangbanging ghetto culture until they run into the real thing — to New Line Cinema for a cool $150,000. This happened a full three years before 13-year-old Nikki Reed wrote a screenplay called Thirteen about her experiences as a wayward child of privilege, but Reed got far more publicity because her script was quickly produced and she costarred in the movie. Kaplan
read more
Nikki Reed, best known for leading Evan Rachel Wood down a path of sex, drugs and crime in the acclaimed indie film Thirteen, will appear in at least four episodes of The O.C. beginning early next year. It's not clear who she'll be playing, but what do you wanna bet she leads Marissa's troubled little sis Kaitlin down a path of sex, drugs and crime? Twenty bucks? Deal.
read more
