Today In Entertainment

MARCH 30, 2021

What's news: Will Hollywood boycott Georgia over elections bill? A "very different" SAG Awards, Film Academy set to loosen in-person rules for the Oscars, American Gods to end, Barstool beats Michael Rapaport in defamation case, Nike sues over Lil Nas X sneakers, Cameo raises $100 million, a radio giant rebrands to chase podcast biz. Plus: Amanda Seyfried joins Hulu's The Dropout, and Russell Crowe joins the MCU. --Alex Weprin

 The Last Straw?

►Will Hollywood boycott Georgia over new voting law? James Mangold and Mark Hamill have said they want to boycott the state in the wake of its new voting restrictions — but others say that's not the best way to protest, Bryn Sandberg reports. 

--Georgia-based actor Steve Coulter, who has appeared in shows like P Valley and Yellowstone, asked Mangold to think twice before boycotting: "James... we here in GA fought like hell the last 4 years to turn it blue. We gave you two Dem Senators. Your boycott only hurts us, the thousands of rank & film actors & crew. Think before you cancel. Please. We’ve worked too hard."

--One on-the-ground Georgia production insider tells Sandberg they feel like the calls for a boycott are much weaker this time around. “It seems like a few years ago, it was a lot louder and the ball got rolling a bit quicker,” says the source, who acknowledges that cast and crew being out of work for so long amid the pandemic might be part of the reason other celebrities and studios aren’t immediately jumping on the boycott train. The story.

 A 'Very Different' SAG Awards

►How the 2021 SAG Awards will be "a very different awards show." SAG-AFTRA’s hourlong main event will be host-less, pretaped and feature appearances by plenty of talent including Riz Ahmed, Common, Mindy Kaling, Josh Gad and Rita Moreno.

--EP Kathy Connell: "We’re usually the shortest awards show on TV. And this year, we’re really going to be the shortest. We didn’t know what the year would bring in terms of where we would be in COVID, and to pretend that it was a normal year was just wrong. And we are the union, so we wanted our members to be protected. In some instances, our members are in production bubbles, [so] we wanted to make sure we weren’t going to do anything that would prevent them from [working]." The story.

+Film Academy set to loosen in-person attendance requirement for nominees. In response to widespread backlash about a requirement that nominees for the 93rd Oscars participate in the ceremony in-person or not at all, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is planning to offer nominees new accommodations. The story.

+In other awards news: The Canadian Screen Awards has revealed its nominations for its upcoming virtual ceremony, and Schitt's Creek leads the film and TV field with a total of 21 mentions, including for best comedy. The nominees.

►The Hitman's Bodyguard 2 has a new title — The Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard — and a new release date, Lionsgate and Millennium announced Monday. The sequel to the 2017 sleeper hit is moving up its release from Aug. 20 of this year to June 16 (the film was originally supposed to unfurl in 2020 but was pushed to 2021 due to the pandemic). More.

+In other film news: Armie Hammer has been dropped from Amma Asante's Cold War thriller The Billion Dollar Spy for Walden Media. More.

 The End of 'American Gods'

►American Gods is done at Starz. The Lionsgate-backed premium cable network has canceled the troubled Neil Gaiman drama after three seasons. Sources say Starz is in talks with producers Fremantle for a potential event series or movie that would wrap up the story based on Gaiman's novel of the same name. The story.

+Fox has made its first drama series order for the 2021-22 season. The network has greenlit Our Kind of People, a drama from Lee Daniels and Karin Gist (the network's Star). The show, developed under Fox's script-to-series model, is based on Lawrence Otis Graham's book Our Kind of People: Inside America's Black Upper Class. The story.

+The integration of WarnerMedia continues. The premiere episode of The CW's scripted drama Kung Fu will air an encore on TNT, while TBS' competition series Wipeout will re-air on the broadcast network. The plans, announced Monday, mark the latest efforts at WarnerMedia to boost content from the conglomerate's portfolio as the company continues to break down silos in a bid to better expose original content from its various platforms. The story.

+Amanda Seyfried is headed to Hulu. The Oscar-nominated Mank actress has been tapped to replace Kate McKinnon and star as Elizabeth Holmes in Hulu's highly anticipated limited series The Dropout. More.

►Peter Berg, the filmmaker behind Deepwater Horizon, Hancock, and Friday Night Lights, and his banner Film 44 have signed a first-look deal at Netflix to produce and direct live-action films and series. The pact comes just over a year after his last feature directorial effort, the action thriller Spenser Confidential, debuted on the streamer and become one of the company’s biggest hits of last year. More.

►Barstool Sports beats Michael Rapaport's defamation claims. A judge won't hold the bro network liable for tarring its former podcaster as a racist, a domestic abuser and a D-list actor with a STD — but in a wild 64-page opinion, the judge sends contract claims to trial. The story.

+Nike sues over Lil Nas X sneakers: Lil Nas X's limited edition satanic-themed Air Max 97 shoes — the ones that cost more than a grand, sold out in under a minute and may contain actual human blood — weren't authorized by Nike, according to a suit filed Monday in New York federal court. Nike says MSCHF Product Studio, the company the rapper partnered with to launch 666 pairs of kicks, materially altered its trademarked product without permission and it isn't thrilled that people think the company endorses satanism. More.

In business news...

+Cameo, the platform that connects celebrities to their fans, has raised $100 million at a valuation of just over $1 billion, the company says. Cameo says it will use the cash to improve its core product, roll out new products like fan clubs and "Cameo Calls," expand its global presence to more countries, and grow its burgeoning B2B business. The story.

+A new "Audacy": Entercom Communications, the country's second largest radio company, wants to make sure consumers and Wall Street know that it's more than just a broadcaster. The company will rebrand as "Audacy," with the transition beginning immediately. As part of the move, the company will sunset the "Radio.com" brand in favor of Audacy. More.

+Also: Hans Vestberg, chairman and CEO of telecom giant Verizon, saw his 2020 overall compensation rise to $19.09 million, up from $18.09 million in 2019. More.

Casting roundup: Oscar-winning actor Russell Crowe is down under to appear in Thor: Love and Thunder. Crowe is expected to play a small role in Taika Waititi's film... Several actors and actresses have been added to the Disney+ Obi-Wan Kenobi cast, including Moses Ingram, Joel Edgerton, Bonnie Piesse, Kumail Nanjiani, Indira Varma, Rupert Friend, O’Shea Jackson Jr., Sung Kang, Simone Kessell and Benny Safdie... Tony Hale, Alia Shawkat, Jake Lacy and Clark Gregg have joined Aaron Sorkin's Being the Ricardos...

Revolving door: Fox News is bringing a member of the Trump family onto its payroll. The cable news channel has hired Lara Trump, the daughter-in-law of former president Donald Trump, as a contributor. She is married to the ex-president's son Eric... Village Roadshow Entertainment Group has tapped Tristen Tuckfield as executive vp, feature film...

►TV review: Inkoo Kang reviews the HBO hybrid docuseries Exterminate All the Brutes, writing that filmmaker Raoul Peck "seeks to shift our perspective, again and again — to get us to see the founding of America as inherently genocidal, to situate race relations today within a centuries-old exercise of homicidal racism and soul-destroying greed and to sit with the mind-boggling amount of suffering that European and American colonial powers inflicted." The review.

In other news...

--Adult Swim announced the return of its Emmy-winning animated series Rick and Morty. Season five will get underway on Sunday, June 20th at 11 p.m.

--CAA has assembled a packed lineup of Asian American influencers and leaders to discuss the wave of anti-Asian violence and hate that continues to sweep the country.

--Roadside Attractions has picked up the North American rights to Rita Moreno: Just A Girl Who Decided To Go For It, a documentary about the trailblazer in Latina representation after a world premiere at Sundance.

--The Hong Kong International Film Festival has scrapped its opening-night world premiere of Where the Wind Blows, a widely anticipated crime thriller directed by local industry veteran Philip Yung. The festival said in a statement that the cancellation was made "upon request from the film owner" due to "technical reasons." Over the past several years, such references to vague "technical problems" have become a common euphemism for last-minute censorship complaints by China's increasingly repressive film regulators.

--The first signs of a post-pandemic spring for live entertainment have arrived with news that the Asian Comedy Fest will return for a live/digital hybrid event.

--South Korean supergroup BTS issued a statement on Monday night condemning the recent wave of anti-Asian violence and hate that is sweeping the U.S. and shared their own experiences of the racism they have faced for being Asian.

--Netflix, hot off the international success of its crime comedy series Lupin, starring Omar Sy, has unveiled a slate of new French-language productions.

What else we're reading...

--"T-Mobile to scale back TV service plans" [WSJ]

--"Spotify jumps into social audio, acquires sports-focused live audio app" [NBC News]

--"Pepé Le Pew apologizes" [The New Yorker]

--Disney held a town hall on Monday for employees of its media and entertainment division. Here's what happened [Julia Alexander]

Today's birthdays: Celine Dion, 53, Piers Morgan, 56, Warren Beatty, 84, Eric Clapton, 76, MC Hammer, 59.

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MARCH 30, 2021

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