Live From NY, It’s Jean Dujardin On ‘SNL!’

By MIKE FLEMING | Saturday February 11, 2012 @ 8:00pm PSTTags: Jean Dujardin, Saturday Night Live, The Artist, Zooey Deschanel
Mike Fleming

EXCLUSIVE: I’m hearing that The Artist star Jean Dujardin will make a surprise appearance on Saturday Night Live in an hour or so. From what I’m told, the producers wanted him, and it was a dream of his to do the show. So he flew in Friday from Paris for rehearsals, and flies right out in the morning to London for the BAFTAs. This is what you go through when you are a frontrunner for Best Actor and the voting closes on February 21. I understand that he does a bit of dancing in his segment on the show in an Artist-flavored edition of SNL‘s recurring Les Jeunes de Paris dancing sketches starring Taran Killam.

Comments (19)

Jodie Foster Sending Mel Gibson Film ‘The Beaver’ To All Academy Members

By PETE HAMMOND | Friday February 10, 2012 @ 2:19pm PSTTags: Jodie Foster, Mel Gibson, Summit Entertainement, The Beaver
Pete Hammond

EXCLUSIVE: In an unprecedented move this late in Oscar season, two-time Academy Award winning actress and director Jodie Foster, with the help of her film’s distributor Summit Entertainment, is sending DVD screeners of The Beaver (the Mel Gibson film she directed and … Read More »

Comments 53

OSCARS Q&A: Brad Pitt On ‘Moneyball’, His Status As A Multiple Nominee And Being A “Director Whore”

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Friday February 10, 2012 @ 11:31am PSTTags: Awardsline, Brad Pitt, Moneyball, Oscars, The Tree of Life

Brad Pitt is on a roll, even for Brad Pitt. Arguably the world’s No. 1 male movie star, he is at the top of his game, enjoying widespread critical acclaim for his 2011 output Moneyball and The Tree Of Life — which he both starred in and produced through his Plan B production company. Both scored Best Picture Oscar nominations but were troubled projects that likely would not have seen the light of a camera if not for Pitt’s determination and ability to make them happen. He has already won New York Film Critics Circle and National Society of Film Critics awards for best actor in Moneyball, and now he’s up for an Oscar for that role as Oakland A’s GM Billy Beane. He has smartly created a lasting career by working with some of the best directors around — he calls himself a “director whore” — and has become a first-class producer in the process. He sat for a wide-ranging conversation with Deadline Awards Columnist Pete Hammond that took place a few days after he learned of his multiple Oscar nominations.

AWARDSLINE: What was it about Moneyball that you knew, you just had to make this movie?
PITT: These guys (the Oakland A’s) are trying to survive in an unfair game, going up against conventional wisdom, starting from scratch and asking the questions “Why do we do what we do? Does it still make sense to us? Because we thought it made sense 100 years ago.” It’s a story of value, our own self-worth and this individual’s (Billy Beane) search for his own value in the process. It was such a relevant story for our time. I really hooked into it. Unconventional, difficult and unique and yet at the same time it had these undertones of what I loved in ’70s films. I put two years into this project and it went away and then put another year into it and it went away and I just couldn’t stand to see that happen on this one again. And Amy (Pascal, co-chairmen of Sony Pictures Entertainment) stuck with this: She is our patron saint at the end of the day. ’Cause she doubled down at a big risk. Read More »

Comments (17)

OSCARS: ‘Help’s Emma Stone To Present

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Friday February 10, 2012 @ 10:03am PSTTags: 84th Academy Awards, Emma Stone, Oscars

Beverly Hills, CA – Emma Stone will present at the 84th Academy Awards® ceremony, telecast producers Brian Grazer and Don Mischer announced today. It will be her first time presenting on the show. Stone appears in the Best Picture

… Read More »

Comments (1)

OSCARS Q&A: Mike Fleming Interviews Fox Searchlight’s Steve Gilula And Nancy Utley

By MIKE FLEMING | Friday February 10, 2012 @ 7:17am PSTTags: Fox Searchlight, George Clooney, Nancy Utley, Steve Gilula, The Descendants, The Tree of Life
Mike Fleming

Even though Fox Searchlight co-presidents Steve Gilula and Nancy Utley have turned “challenging films” like Slumdog Millionaire, Black Swan, Crazy Heart, Once, Juno, and 127 Hours into awards-season successes, they are the lowest-profile indie moguls you will find. At a time when they are steering two Best Picture nominees — the Alexander Payne-directed The Descendants and the Terrence Malick-directed The Tree Of Life – they tell Deadline about the struggles, glory and disappointment that is part and parcel of the indie distributor’s mission of finding audiences for prestige films. When it works, it’s wondrous. Slumdog Millionaire, a $15 million film that was nearly relegated to a direct-to-video fate by Warner Bros, won eight Oscars including Best Picture, and grossed $141 million domestic and $378 million worldwide; Black Swan, a $13 million film that flatlined several times during the 10 years it took to get made, grossed $107 million domestic and $329 million worldwide and won Best Actress for Natalie Portman; Once, an obscure Irish film that cost $150,000 to make, won Best Song and grossed $9.4 million stateside and $20.7 million worldwide; Crazy Heart, a $9 million film about a drunk singer, won Best Actor for Jeff Bridges and grossed $39 million domestic and $47 million worldwide; the $7.5 million Juno won Best Screenplay for Diablo Cody, and grossed $143 million domestic and $231 million worldwide. Here, they lay out how it’s done and why voters should consider The Descendants and The Tree Of Life for Best Picture and other honors. 

DEADLINE: Fox Searchlight has eight nominations, with two Best Picture candidates. Make a case why Alexander Payne’s The Descendants is a worthy best picture winner.
UTLEY: The Descendants is a remarkably beautiful and accomplished film that is in the vein of Oscar movies from a little bit further back, like Kramer Vs. Kramer, Ordinary People, Terms Of Endearment, even On Golden Pond or To Kill A Mockingbird. It is in the sort of subtle character-based, humanistic, realistic story-telling tradition. Sometimes it’s a little frustrating because our movie isn’t flashy, it doesn’t have a lot of showy or bling kind of elements in it. It’s highly naturalistic. But I think those kind of movies are important to moviegoers because they reflect their lives and issues. This is a movie that is going to stand the test of time. People will be watching this movie in 10 years, 20 years, in 30 years. That’s an important part of what should be considered in Best Picture.
GILULA: It’s also a film that has really resonated all the way from the rarefied world of the film critics and journalists out to the mainstream: the public. The major studios are making almost none of those kinds of films anymore and it’s not easy for us either. But the fact is that the material is so good, and you have one of the very best directors and some of the best actors telling what on paper is a very simple story but achieves the highest level of the art. Read More »

Comments (2)

OSCARS Q&A: ‘The Artist’s Jean Dujardin On His Doubts About The Black-And-White Silent Film And The Joy Of Taking Risks

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Thursday February 9, 2012 @ 10:28pm PSTTags: 84th Academy Awards, Awardsline, Jean Dujardin, Oscars, The Artist

It’s easy to pass off Jean Dujardin’s swath through awards season as the stuff manufactured by Weinstein machines. Hardly so. When SAG awarded its best acting prize to the unknown French actor Stateside over Hollywood fave George Clooney, it was clear that the status quo voted with their hearts. The Academy felt the same way, bestowing upon him his first Best Actor Oscar nomination. While Clooney morphs his dramatic essence from Michael Clayton through The Descendants, Dujardin — a Clooney-type in his homeland — trumps with his bygone set of dancing and mime skills. Dujardin admits he was daunted by challenges of portraying Hollywood silent film actor George Valentin — a composite of Douglas Fairbanks and Gene Kelly, topped off by the French actor’s uncanny Clark Gable mug. But he’s just being modest: Check out his previous collaboration with The Artist helmer Michel Hazanavicius, the 0SS 117 franchise, and it’s obvious that the actor’s physical talents were already there, the local comedy a mere warm-up before his graduation to silent black-and-white shtick. He spoke with AwardsLine’s Anthony D’Alessandro via a translator about his awards-season run.

AWARDSLINE: I understand you were hesitant before committing to The Artist because it was a silent movie. What worried you?
DUJARDIN: The unknown. I didn’t know King Vidor’s movies and I was worried that Michel would ask me to uphold the entire film. I didn’t want to do a sub-category of Chaplin. Chaplin is unique, but there’s only one. Michel said “No, I want to make a love story.” And he told that with the camera. But there was a short week of doubt of “What am I getting myself into?” Then I regretted ever thinking like that because I never think of the completed film, rather the adventure of what I’m about to live. Read More »

Comments (7)

Oscar Venue Balks At Dropping Kodak Name

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Thursday February 9, 2012 @ 9:51pm PSTTags: Kodak Theatre

Bankrupt Eastman Kodak Co. shouldn’t be permitted to abandon naming rights to the Hollywood Boulevard venue that hosts the Academy Awards, the property’s management CIM/H&H Media asserted in a Manhattan Court filing. The 20-year agreement under which … Read More »

Comments (9)

OSCARS: Academy To Host Portrait Exhibition Of This Year’s Acting Nominees

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Thursday February 9, 2012 @ 10:34am PSTTags: 84th Academy Awards, Oscars, Out Of Character

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is opening a portrait exhibition of this year’s Oscar acting nominees, titled “Out Of Character”, on Saturday. The … Read More »

Comments (11)

OSCARS: Penelope Cruz To Present

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Thursday February 9, 2012 @ 10:02am PSTTags: 84th Academy Awards, Oscars, Penelope Cruz

Beverly Hills, CA – Academy Award® winner Penélope Cruz will present at the 84th Academy Awards® ceremony, telecast producers Brian Grazer and Don Mischer announced today. Cruz won an Oscar in 2008 for her supporting role in “Vicky Cristina

… Read More »

Comments (2)

OSCAR Q&A: George Clooney On ‘The Descendants’, ‘Ides Of March’ And His Love Affair With Making Movies

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Thursday February 9, 2012 @ 9:01am PSTTags: Awardsline, George Clooney, The Descendants, The Ides of March

At this point in his accomplished, eclectic career, George Clooney enjoys the luxury of taking his pick of film projects that inspire him. In 2011, those were two films: the political drama The Ides Of March, which Clooney co-starred in as well as directed and co-wrote; and The Descendants, co-written and directed by Oscar-winner Alexander Payne. The latter picked up five Oscar nominations, including a Best Actor nom for Clooney, his third in the category. Clooney will be busy on Oscar night, as he’s also up for Adapted Screenplay with his Ides co-writer Grant Heslov. Clooney talked with Deadline Awards Columnist Pete Hammond about his busy season.

AWARDSLINE: What made you most happy about The Descendants?
CLOONEY: I just wanted to work with Alexander first and foremost. I hadn’t read the script when we met in Toronto a little over two years ago. He said, “Do you want to do this movie?” And I said “Yep!” And then he sent me the script and I was just thrilled. It was sort of the same experience I had the first time I met with the Coen brothers and they said “Do you want to do a movie?” and then they sent me O Brother, Where Art Thou? and I was like how lucky I am! Read More »

Comments (3)

OSCARS: Angelina Jolie Added As Presenter

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Wednesday February 8, 2012 @ 10:05am PSTTags: Academy Awards, Angelina Jolie

Beverly Hills, CA – Academy Award®-winning actress Angelina Jolie will present at the 84th Academy Awards ceremony, telecast producers Brian Grazer and Don Mischer announced today.

In 1999 Jolie took home the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for her performance

… Read More »

Comments (0)

Natalie Portman Sets First Post-Oscar Roles, Back To Back Terrence Malick Films: Berlin

By MIKE FLEMING | Wednesday February 8, 2012 @ 8:18am PSTTags: Knight Of The Cups, Lawless, Natalie Portman, Terrence Malick
Mike Fleming

EXCLUSIVE: Natalie Portman has committed to her first two movie roles since winning the Best Actress Oscar for Black Swan and taking maternity leave. Portman is joining the casts of the Terrence Malick films Knight Of The Cups, and Lawless. … Read More »

Comments (14)

Oscars Q&A: Kathleen Kennedy On ‘War Horse’ And Working With Steven Spielberg

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Tuesday February 7, 2012 @ 10:39pm PSTTags: Kathleen Kennedy, Steven Spiel, War Horse

Steven Spielberg On War Horse’s Four-Legged Actors, 3D And Lessons Learned


After being ignored by critics groups and other awards in the runup to Oscar nominations, Kathleen Kennedy and Steven Spielberg’s War Horse finally burst out of the gate with six including for Best Picture. The others were for Art Direction, Cinematography, Original Score, Sound Editing and Sound Mixing. A Spielberg collaborator for more than 30 years, Kennedy started out as his secretary. She became a co-founder of Spielberg’s Amblin Entertainment in 1981, garnering producer credit on E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial in 1982. She left Amblin in 1992 to form the Kennedy/Marshall Co. with husband Frank Marshall, whom she met while working on Spielberg’s Raiders of the Lost Ark, but the creative partnership with Spielberg has continued. Collaborations over the decades have included Jurassic Park and Schindler’s List. While Kennedy has countless credits independently of Spielberg (recently, 2007’s The Diving Bell and the Butterfly and Persepolis) the two always seem to end up back together. Kennedy also produced Spielberg’s  animated The Adventures of Tintin and the upcoming Lincoln with Daniel Day Lewis. Kennedy talked to AwardsLine contributor Diane Haithman about one of Hollywood’s most celebrated partnerships.

AWARDSLINE: What inspired the movie version of War Horse?
KENNEDY: I took our two teenage girls to see the play [in London], having no idea that it would be something I would be attracted to as a film. It was around the same time we were doing the score on Tintin. I was sitting on the scoring stage with Steven and told him I had seen this extraordinary play. I told him, I keep thinking about whether it’s a movie – it was extraordinary to watch the puppeteering, but I couldn’t help thinking how majestic real horses could be. Steven instantly said that sounds like a perfect movie story. He said “see where the movie rights are.” It turned out that Michael Morpurgo had been approached by a number of people but he hadn’t really entertained any movie offers. We were shooting within a year, which is fairly unusual.

AWARDSLINE: War Horse was a Christmas Day film, and Tintin came out a few days before. What is your strategy?
KENNEDY: We talked about this very, very carefully, in terms of how this was going to be difficult. We don’t have a lot of stars in either film. It was going to put a tremendous amount of pressure on Steven. But we also felt that, even if it were a completely different filmmaker, we would have probably made the same choice to release them during the Christmas holidays, because we felt they were the best films. Read More »

Comments (11)

Oscars Q&A: Letty Aronson Has Big Brother Woody Allen’s Back On ‘Midnight In Paris’

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Tuesday February 7, 2012 @ 9:04pm PSTTags: Awardsline, Letty Aronson, Midnight In Paris, Woody Allen

When it comes to Academy recognition, Midnight In Paris writer-director Woody Allen’s view isn’t that far from the Groucho Marx philosophy held by his Annie Hall alter ego Alvy Singer: Allen would never want to belong to a club that would want someone like him as a member. After Annie Hall scored four Oscar wins, it seemed Allen was an Oscar club member for years to come, especially with 21 nominations under his belt. Not so according to his producer and younger sister Letty Aronson, who has shepherded his films since working on 1994’s Bullets Over Broadway. She also is behind Allen’s latest Oscar Best Picture nominee, which also earned him Director and Original Screenplay noms. Aronson assesses Midnight In Paris, her 18th collaboration with Allen, as well as her brother’s awards-season track record with AwardsLine’s Anthony D’Alessandro.

AWARDSLINE: Midnight In Paris is Woody Allen’s highest grossing film of all-time ($148.4 million worldwide). Why did this title resonate widely with audiences?
ARONSON: When I read the script, I said to Woody, “Who’s going to come see this?” No one has heard of Man Ray or Gertrude Stein. He is always determined to make the movie that he has a vision for and it’s my job to always ask “I wonder who will go see it?” It’s one thing to read the script and quite another to actually see the film. How do I account for its success? It’s been a crossover film in terms of younger folks, which I attribute to either the parents going and saying “you gotta see this” or taking their kids to it. This was also a breakout film partially because people have a love affair with Paris. Read More »

Comments (5)

Who Wants A Jean-George Sandwich?

By NIKKI FINKE | Tuesday February 7, 2012 @ 11:23am PSTTags: 84th Academy Awards, George Clooney, Jean Dujardin, Oscars

84th Academy Awards Nominees Photo

Comments (8)

Oscar Q&A: Rachael Horovitz And Michael De Luca On ‘Moneyball’s Path To The Screen

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Tuesday February 7, 2012 @ 10:41am PSTTags: Michael De Luca, Moneyball, Rachel Horovitz

Although it had a troubled history with original director Steven Soderbergh leaving just days before production was to start, Moneyball is the classic example of producers saying “never say die.” That is certainly the case with Rachael Horovitz, who originally optioned the Michael Lewis book Moneyball: The Art Of Winning An Unfair Game, which dealt with Oakland A’s General Manager Billy Beane’s attempts to put together a successful team using unorthodox methods and a miniscule budget. Horovitz, a former VP at Fine Line Features and an exec at Revolution Studios, won an Emmy and Golden Globe for her company Specialty Films’ maiden voyage, Grey Gardens, and was bound and determined to make this movie happen. Eventually Sony got into a bidding war with Warner Bros and brought in Horovitz’s former New Line colleague Michael De Luca to co-produce. De Luca — New Line and DreamWorks’ former production head and now a successful producer of films like The Social Network, 21, Ghost Rider and the upcoming Butter and The Sitter – helped shape the film before Soderbergh’s exit and remained a strong force afterward when his Social Network colleague Scott Rudin came on board. Horovitz and De Luca talked to Deadline Awards Columnist Pete Hammond about the many curveballs Moneyball faced on its way to the screen — and six Oscar nominations including Best Picture and Best Actor for Brad Pitt.

AWARDSLINE: Rachael, you started this project, you optioned the book. Tell me how this came about.
HOROVITZ: The book had terrific heart. I felt that (the role of) Billy Beane would be great for an actor, and that the human story of the material was relatable. I was certain that the rights wouldn’t be available and they were. So, stunned, I took a shot at trying to set it up and discovered that all of the studios passed on it. So then I went back to the drawing board and came up with a pitch and set it up at Sony. Mike was just moving over from DreamWorks to being a producer at Sony and we had worked together at New Line. Read More »

Comments (5)

Inside Oscar Nominees Luncheon: Hammond

By PETE HAMMOND | Monday February 6, 2012 @ 7:09pm PSTTags: Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Glenn Close, Max Von Sydow, Meryl Streep, Michelle Williams, Oscar nominees lunch
Pete Hammond

Today’s 31st annual Oscar nominees luncheon was typically relaxed and collegial — a place where there were only winners, at least for today — and contenders could catch up with old friends who also just happen to … Read More »

Comments (1)

84th Academy Awards Nominees Photo

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Monday February 6, 2012 @ 6:38pm PSTTags: 84th Academy Awards, Oscar Nominees Luncheon

(Names below): Nominees … Read More »

Comments (11)

EXCLUSIVE: Oscars Won’t Perform Both Nominated Songs From ‘Rio’ Or ‘Muppets’

By NIKKI FINKE AND PETE HAMMOND | Monday February 6, 2012 @ 5:41pm PSTTags: Academy Awards, Man Or Muppet, Oscar nominated songs, Real In Rio

EXCLUSIVE… UPDATE: It was bad enough that just about every eligible tune in the Best Original Song category was omitted from this year’s Academy Awards nominations. Or that, due to their complicated voting system, the music branch of the … Read More »

Comments 44
More Deadline | Hollywood »