BAFTAs 2022: 'Dune' Leads Pack, Diverse Noms List Full of Surprises

►Snubs and surprises. The least surprising thing about the 2022 BAFTA noms is that Denis Villeneuve’s grand sci-fi spectacle Dune emerged with 11 nominations to lead The Power of the Dog (8) and Belfast (6).

The most (pleasantly) surprising thing is that last year's shift towards a more diverse group of nominees was no fluke, as evidenced most starkly by the best director category which features three women (Audrey Diwan, Jane Campion and Julia Ducournau), and two non-white filmmakers (Aleem Khan and Ryûsuke Hamaguchi) alongside Paul Thomas Anderson. 

There were snubs aplenty, with Kristen Stewart's Princess Diana film Spencer, incredibly, not finding favor at all with the Brits and in the acting categories a slew of new names edged out widely assumed frontrunners like Olivia Colman, Andrew Garfield, Nicole Kidman, Penélope Cruz, Denzel Washington, Bradley Cooper, Javier Bardem and Jessica Chastain. The full list of nominees.  

"I’m really excited by it – it’s a real mix." THR's man in London Alex Ritman spoke to BAFTA CEO Amanda Berry about the 2022 noms list and it seems she's chuffed to bits by the second successive year of diverse nominees (as well as a first BAFTA nom for Will Smith). Berry points to the various changes made before the 2021 nominations that were part of the process of creating a level playing field for all films. The story. 

—About the Oscars. Not to steal the thunder of the BAFTAs, but a bit of Oscars news dropped this morning. Leslie Jordan and Tracee Ellis Ross are set to reveal the 2022 Academy Awards nominations on Tuesday, Feb. 8. The story. 

CNN Chief Jeff Zucker Resigns After Relationship With Colleague Disclosed

►Shocker. Jeff Zucker, the chairman of WarnerMedia news and sports, and the president of CNN, resigned Wednesday in a move that shocked the media world. According to a memo, Zucker resigned after being asked about a personal relationship with a close colleague as part of the network’s investigation into Chris Cuomo. The colleague was Allison Gollust, who leads marketing and communications for CNN. The story.  

—"Who is so frail over at ABC?" THR's Alex Weprin goes inside Whoopi Goldberg's suspension from The View for her comments about the Holocaust and finds that within ABC, and among the media commentariat, the perspective that action needed to be taken was not universally shared. The story. 

—Dream team. Spike Lee will team up with Colin Kaepernick for an ESPN docuseries about the activist and former NFL quarterback’s life. Lee will direct and produce the project, which is part of a first-look deal Kaepernick's Ra Vision Media signed with Disney in 2020. Former ESPN anchor Jemele Hill is also a producer. The story. 

—A stage for Cage. The long-awaited third season of Donald Glover’s Atlanta, Lionsgate’s The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, where Nicolas Cage stars as Nicolas Cage, and Channing Tatum-Sandra Bullock adventure comedy The Lost City are among the headliners at this year's SXSW. The full lineup. 

—Another Jonestown project. Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Chloe Grace Moretz have signed on to star as cult leader Jim Jones and Jonestown survivor Deborah Layton in White Night, a psychological thriller about Jones’ infamous People’s Temple cult. Anne Sewitsky will direct the adaptation of Layton’s best-selling memoir, Seductive Poison, from a script by William Wheeler. The story.

—No rest for the wicked. Lucifer star Tom Ellis has has joined the cast of Hulu’s limited series Washington Black, based on Esi Edugyan’s best-selling novel. The show’s ensemble also includes Ernest Kingsley Jr. as the title character, Eddie Karanja, Iola Evans, Edward Bluemel, Sharon Duncan-Brewster and Sterling K. Brown, who’s also an executive producer. The story. 

Meta Stock Plunges 20 Percent After Earnings Miss

►"Macroeconomic challenges." Despite record Q4 revenues of $33.7 billion, Facebook-owner Meta Platforms Inc. missed Wall Street expectations, sending the stock plunging nearly 20 percent after hours. Even as Meta's daily active users rose by 5 percent to 1.93 billion, growth was the slowest in recent memory, and the company warned that the rest of the year is shaping up to be a choppy one as it continues its long-term strategic shift "towards building the metaverse." The results. 

—Still up, despite everything. Amid the Joe Rogan PR fiasco, Spotify said it had 180 million paid subscribers and 406 million monthly active users to end 2021, falling within its expectations for the quarter. Ad revenue grew to $445 million in Q4, up 40 percent year-over-year, while total revenue hit $3.04 billion. The results. 

—Exodus continues. Roxane Gay, the host of The Roxane Gay Agenda podcast, has removed her show from Spotify amid a growing number of high-profile departures from the streaming platform. Brené Brown, who has two exclusive podcasts with Spotify, announced that she would be pausing the release of any future episodes of Unlocking Us and Dare to Lead. The story.  

—Huge deal. British telecom giant BT Group is in exclusive talks with Discovery to merge its sports channels unit BT Sport with the latter's Eurosport. The new entity, a 50/50 joint venture between BT and Discovery, creates a television sports giant with rights to the English Premier League, Champions League and the Olympics. The deal also puts an end to DAZN's interest in BT Sport. The story. 

—All over. The legal battle between Fox and longtime Simpsons composer Alf Clausen over his 2017 termination is officially over after the parties reached a resolution and secured dismissal in two courts. The story. 

—Charged. Four men believed to be members of a drug distribution crew have been charged in the overdose death of actor Michael K. Williams five months ago. All four were arrested Tuesday and were in custody based on criminal complaints in Manhattan federal court, including one defendant who was arrested in Puerto Rico. The story. 

'And Just Like That' Finale Sees the Limitations of Sisterhood

►Rewriting the hollow happy endings. After And Just Like That's sobering finale, THR critic Robyn Bahr writes that, despite the show's try-hard cultural tone deafness, its superfluous vision of carefree mega-wealth and its insistence that insufferable Che Diaz is the funniest and most famous comedian in the world, she sincerely hopes the series is greenlit for a second season. Warning spoilers. The critic's notebook. 

—"I don’t recognize myself in Che." To say that Sara Ramirez's Che Diaz has been a polarizing figure on And Just Like That is putting it mildly, with the brash comedian being described as “the indisputable worst character on television.” But, in a recent interview addressing the backlash, Ramirez is doing their best to ignore the chatter about Che. The story. 

—Stellar opening. A 40th anniversary screening of Steven Spielberg’s E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial will kick off the 13th annual TCM Classic Film Festival on April 2. Spielberg and producers Kathleen Kennedy and Frank Marshall are scheduled to be in attendance for the screening at the TCL Chinese Theatre in Hollywood. The story. 

—Striking out on his own. American Horror Story co-creator Brad Falchuk is teaming with Byron Wu for an Asian American drama series called The Brothers Sun at Netflix. The project marks Falchuk’s first solo series for Netflix since he reunited with longtime collaborator Ryan Murphy with his own overall pact with the media company. The eight-episode series will be set in L.A. and Taiwan and feature an all-Asian writers room and cast. The story. 

—"They're older, but definitely not wiser." THR critic Frank Scheck reviews Jeff Tremaine's Jackass Forever. Most of the old crew, and some new additions, return for more humiliation and physical abuse in this latest and supposedly final installment of the long-running franchise. The review. 

In other news...

—Netflix’s new releases coming in February

—Netflix: Movies and TV shows leaving in February

—Gaslit trailer: Julia Roberts, Sean Penn star in Watergate drama 

—Alec Baldwin to make rare public appearance at Boulder International Film Fest

—The Bold Type actor Sam Page desires $4m for revamped Palisades digs

—AMC Networks’ Jennifer Caserta to step down as HR boss

—Cinematographer Roger Deakins knighted at Windsor Castle

—Dolly Parton to host 57th Academy of Country Music Awards

—Ellen Kuras set to be first woman to receive ASC Cinematographers lifetime achievement award

—Donna Cline to receive Art Directors Guild lifetime achievement award

—WME hires three agents to bolster brand partnership team

—Archie Comics names Mike Pellerito editor-in-chief 

What else we're reading...

—Amy Kaufman's profile on Pam & Tommy star Lily James [LAT]

—How to quit Spotify without losing your music [Washington Post]

—Why celebrities are buying Bored Ape NFTs and why it's troubling [Polygon]

—Why Roland Emmerich's Moonfall won't be shown in Canada's theaters or be available on-demand there [Globe and Mail]

—Cillian Murphy on the final season of Peaky Blinders and the late, great Helen McCrory [Esquire]

Today... 

Today's birthdays: Bridget Regan (40), Isla Fisher (46), Maura Tierney (57), Morgan Fairchild (72), Warwick Davis (52), Nathan Lane (66), Blythe Danner (79), Fredric Lehne (63), Costa Ronin (43), Anthony Russo (52), Elisa Donovan (51), Tim Heidecker (46), Amal Clooney (44), Frank Coraci (66), Tallulah Willis (28)