Today In Entertainment

DECEMBER 23, 2020

What's news: WME makes an offer to settle WGA fight, FX greenlights a comedy from Taika Waititi, Blumhouse wins bidding war for rights to N.Y. Times kidnapping revenge article, Rep. Adam Schiff talks COVID relief bill, Discovery buys out almost all of Oprah's stake in OWN, His Dark Materials renewed for one last season. Plus: How the video game industry powered through the pandemic, and TV's grim ratings reality. --Alex Weprin

 A Christmas Deal?

►Could a deal be on the WME-WGA Christmas list? WME, the lone major Hollywood talent agency that has yet to make a deal with the Writers Guild of America to represent scribes since a standoff began 20 months ago, says it has submitted a new proposal to union leadership.

--“WME has updated the terms of our proposal and submitted it to the WGA in a good-faith effort to jumpstart our discussions. We want to find a way forward with the Guild and return to representing our writer-clients," a spokesperson for the Beverly Hills-based firm said Tuesday.

--The updated proposal from WME, led by president Ari Greenburg, follows breakthrough deals the guild has made with other talent firms this year after thousands of writers parted ways with their agents in April 2019. Paradigm inked a five-year agreement in March, UTA reached a deal in July and ICM Partners struck an agreement in August.  The story.

 FX Greenlights Taika Waititi Series

►FX has greenlit a comedy series about Native American teenagers from Taika Waititi and filmmaker Sterlin Harjo. Reservation Dogs, from FX Productions, will follow a group of four Native teenagers in rural Oklahoma who spend their days committing crime, as well as fighting it. The core cast, assembled by casting director Angelique Midthunder, comprises D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai (Netflix's Creeped Out, Murdoch Mysteries), Devery Jacobs (American Gods), Paulina Alexis (Beans) and newcomer Lane Factor. The story.

+HBO and the BBC will bring the saga His Dark Materials to a close with the show's third season. The two networks have renewed the fantasy drama based on Phillip Pullman's novel trilogy for a third and final season, with production set to begin in Cardiff, Wales, in 2021. The pickup comes six days before the second season finale airs on HBO. More.

+Bounce TV has set the showrunners and lead cast for its dramedy series Johnson. Led by D.L Hughley, the cast also includes Thomas Q. Jones, series creator Deji LaRay, Philip Smithey, Derrex Brady, Khalilah Joi, Terri Abney and Rosa Acosta. Jones and LaRay serve as showrunners. More.

►The grim TV ratings reality of 2020. As the pandemic caused production delays on scores of shows destined for spring and summer, a dwindling inventory of shows on traditional networks depressed viewing. As the year draws to a close, that leaves much of traditional TV in a sizable hole, Rick Porter writes. The column.

►Blumhouse wins N.Y. Times kidnapping revenge article after bidding war. Coming out on top of a heated bidding war, Blumhouse, the production company run by prolific producer Jason Blum, has won the screen rights to the New York Times piece "She Stalked Her Daughter’s Killers Across Mexico, One by One," a gripping and devastating story that personalizes the kidnapping epidemic in Mexico.

--Production companies Chernin Entertainment (Ford v. Ferrari), Makeready (Queen & Slim), Thunder Road (John Wick) and Amblin plus studios Lionsgate TV, 20th Television, UCP as well as HBO’s documentary division were among the companies that were vying for the rights. Sources say that up to 20 offers were made, including six-figure options and seven figure purchase prices. The story.

►Rep. Adam Schiff talks COVID-19 relief package's mixed-income, Save Our Stages language: "It was a give and take." After months of trying to include workers who receive both W-2 and 1099 income in COVID-19 unemployment relief, the Congressman discusses the language in the new package with Katie Kilkenny and why he wishes "it could have been a lot more." The interview.

 Discovery Buys Almost All of OWN

►Oprah Winfrey gets stake in Discovery as company takes 95 percent of OWN. The new deal increases Discovery's ownership in OWN from 73 percent to 95 percent, according to a source familiar with the situation. That person said Winfrey elected to swap most of Harpo’s interest in OWN for voting Series A shares in Discovery, valued at about $35 million Winfrey continues to serve as CEO and chief creative officer of OWN, though she now owns only a 5 percent stake in it. The story.

►Kumail Nanjiani, Kal Penn and more South Asian stars call out David Perdue in new #MyNameIs campaign video. After Asian Americans turned out in record numbers in the presidential election, Brad Jenkins and Meena Harris' Phenomenal Productions is joining forces with the Indian American Impact Fund (IMPACT) to mobilize voters in Georgia. The story.

►Oscars: International committee brings back required viewings (and leniency) in time of COVID. Also, in this year of the pandemic, Portugal and Canada have been allowed to provide alternate entries, even after the submission deadline passed, after their original entries were deemed ineligible. The story.

+Oscars 2021: A guide to the top 45 movies in the race. Even amid a pandemic, the show must go on, and these films — from Ammonite to Judas and the Black Messiah to Nomadland — are set to stake their claim in an awards season like no other. The guide.

+The Life Ahead, a new Italian film which features an awards-contending performance by the legendary Sophia Loren, will be feted with the Capri, Hollywood — The International Film Festival's Humanitarian Award, the fest announced Tuesday. The fest's 25th — and first virtual — edition will run from Dec. 26 through Jan. 2. More.

+Michelle Latimer's documentary Inconvenient Indian has been withdrawn from the Sundance Film Festival after the Canadian director came under scrutiny for claiming Indigenous family roots in a Quebec Algonquin community when promoting her film ahead of its Toronto Film Festival world premiere last summer. The story.

►How the video game industry quietly powered through a pandemic. From breakout "COVID" hits to the rise of in-game musical events, record franchise sales and the launches of two next-gen consoles, the year 2020 has actually been eventful for games, Trilby Beresford writes. The story.

►Bryan Fogel on Hollywood reticence to distribute The Dissident and companies looking "the other way" on human rights abuses. The documentary director (Icarus) takes companies doing business with Saudi Arabia to task in his new film chronicling the murder of Jamal Khashoggi and says he wants viewers to voice "their own form of dissent." The interview.

►Cineplex raises $90.6 million in fresh cash with property, loyalty program deals. Cineplex has raised CAN$117 million (US$90.6 million) in fresh cash to help repay debt by selling its Toronto headquarters and leasing it back and expanding its customer loyalty program. More.

►Making of The Midnight Sky: How George Clooney battled extreme cold (and a pandemic) to make his sci-fi epic. Tackling his most ambitious movie yet, a meditation on loneliness and redemption, the actor-director endured a subzero shoot, mastered the latest VFX and navigated the COVID-19 lockdown, Carolyn Giardina writes. The story.

+Mank: How the cinematography of David Fincher's film took inspiration from Citizen Kane. While legendary DP Gregg Toland and the indelible images he created for Orson Welles’ masterpiece inspired the new movie, the director and cinematographer Erik Messerschmidt aimed for a look that suggests an echo, not a copy. More.

►Bob Newhart on his iconic Elf role and his (hilarious) choice for who he wants to play him in a biopic. Although the icon jokes he has been "dragged kicking and screaming" into the technology of the 21st Century, his stand-up classics finally being made available on streaming platforms is thrilling, he tells THR's Ryan Parker. The interview.

Obituaries: Harvey Litwin, the former MCA publicity executive who co-founded the Agency for the Performing Arts, died Dec. 15 of heart failure in New York City. He was 89... Rick Squire, a marketing executive for NBC, CBS and Fox, died Thursday of heart failure at his home in Long Beach, California, a family spokesman said. He was 68.

Editor's note: Today In Entertainment will be off for Christmas weekend. We will be back with a new edition on Monday, December 28.

In other news...

--California Gov. Gavin Newsom appointed Secretary of State Alex Padilla on Tuesday as the state's next U.S. senator to fill the seat being vacated by Vice President-elect Kamala Harris.

--Jonathan Rhys Meyers and John Malkovich will star in a pandemic-inspired thriller, The Survivalist, which recently wrapped production.

--The Bachelorette finale ended with a proposal — and no live show — amid pandemic.

--The International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) has unveiled the competition lineup for its 50th-anniversary edition, which will run in two separate events —one virtual, one in-person—in 2021. The virtual IFFR will be held Feb. 1-7, with a summer in-person festival planned for June 2-6. 

--Eddie Murphy and Arsenio Hall are ready for a fresh Zamunda-to-New York City adventure in the first teaser trailer for Coming 2 America.

What else we're reading...

--"The dub conundrum" [Vulture]

--"What happened to Maria Bartiromo? The Trump election fraud story has the TV news biz asking" [LA Times]

--"Why on earth is someone steaing unpublished book manuscripts?" [NY Times]

--"Vimeo is becoming a standalone company after booming during the pandemic" [The Verge]

--"Village Voice set for 2021 comeback under controversial new owner" [Mediaite]

--"The biggest star on TV right now? Barbour jackets" [WSJ]

Today's birthdays: Finn Wolfhard, 18, Eddie Vedder, 56, Harry Shearer, 77, Naked Cowboy, 50.

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DECEMBER 23, 2020

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