Month: April 2021

Memo to TV execs: The Oscars are dead. Sunday night’s nail-in-the-coffin Oscarscast on ABC plunged to an all-time low of 9.85 million viewers, down an almost incomprehensible 60 percent from the 24 million who watched last year’s telecast — and that was the lowest ever. It was also the first time in the show’s history that less than 10 million people tuned in, ratings territory once considered (sniff) pedestrian for the Academy Awards This from a supposed must-see event that in its heyday regularly averaged anywhere from 40 to 50 million viewers and soared to an all-time high of nearly 60 million in 1998. Imagine that. Those days are long gone now. It’s easy to excuse Sunday night’s dreadful showing by throwing in the pandemic factor, viewer fatigue, a...

Master Of NonePhoto: Netflix Recently, Netflix began talking about doing another season of Aziz Ansari and Alan Yang’s Master Of None, which we’ve known was a possibility for a few years even though Ansari has largely ducked out of the public eye after a report about sexual misconduct allegations was published in 2018 (other than when he used a stand-up set as an opportunity to make a pretty public apology). It would’ve been fair to wonder how Netflix would handle doing another season of the show, especially one that is so focused on a character who is a whole lot like Ansari and had tackled a sexual misconduct storyline in the past, but the how should’ve been obvious in retrospect: just cut Ansari’s character out of it and refocus the show on Lena Waithe’s character. That’s exactly ...

SpaceX owner and Tesla CEO Elon Musk poses as he arrives on the red carpet for the Axel Springer Awards ceremony, in Berlin, on December 1, 2020. Britta Pedersen | AFP | Getty Images Elon Musk hasn't appeared on "Saturday Night Live" yet, but he is already getting panned by some of its cast members. SNL announced Saturday on Twitter that the business mogul will host the late-night show on May 8. Other big names in the corporate world that have hosted NBC's popular late-night show include Donald Trump, before he was president, and Steve Forbes. Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, has become known for his eclectic and often controversial remarkss. He has faced backlash over his comments about the Covid-19 pandemic. He has spoken out about national s...

Chloé Zhao won best director, and her film Nomadland won best picture. Todd Wawrychuk/A.M.P.A.S. via Getty Images The 2021 Oscars Sunday was a little bit different. Play-off music didn't interrupt speeches, it was more relaxed.  Also history was made, with Chloé Zhao becoming the second ever woman to win best director and the first woman of color to nab that award. Minari's Youn Yuh-jung won best supporting actress...

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Image: Angela Weiss (Getty Images) I like to be in America, particularly in this very moment in time where we are able to watch the teaser trailer for the West Side Story reboot 10 times back to back, a feat not possible when the original musical came out in 1957. The new West Side will feature actual Puerto Rican actors playing Puerto Rican arrivals on mainland USA, a casting choice that was largely overlooked when the film version was produced in 1961 but at least introduced the wider world to the national treasure that is Rita Moreno. Moreno, one of the few Puerto Ricans in the first film, will also be in the reboot, albeit not reprising her role of Anita. However, there is one small fly in the casting ointment, and that is with Ansel Elgort. Elgort will be playing the male lead of...

He's gonna be in trouble. Photo by Chris Pizzello-Pool/Getty Images Parents often embarrass their kids, but during the Oscars on Sunday, things got reversed. After Daniel Kaluuya won best supporting actor for his role as Fred Hampton in Judas and the Black Messiah, his acceptance speech detoured into a place his mother couldn't have imagined. "My mum met my dad, they had sex, it's amazing," Kaluuya said, as his m...