Oscar Watch: If Beale Street Could Talk’s KiKi Layne on Love, Stillness, & Working With Barry Jenkins

KiKi Layne stars as Tish Rivers in Barry Jenkins’s adaptation of the novel by James Baldwin. A beautiful love story layered in social commentary, as relevant now as it was when the novel was originally released in 1974, Layne draws the viewer in with one of the best performances of the year, making you feel her hope, her fear, her potent love and, ultimately, her resolve. A relative newcomer to feature films,

Black Lightning Star Cress Williams on TV’s Most Human Superhero

The CW has been delivering the superhero goods on the small screen for years now, but things have gotten really interesting since 2014. That was the year the network began airing a yearly crossover event that involved many of the stars from their live-action series.  The event, called the “Arrowverse,” connects the superheroes from Arrow, The Flash, and Supergirl, while including folks like Superman, John Constantine and more.

Going Deep With ABC’s A Million Little Things‘ Rising Star Christina Ochoa

A few short years ago, A Million Little Things star Christina Ochoa was driving for Uber in Los Angeles, wondering whether or not she should go back to Spain. The grand-niece of the 1959 Noble Prize winner Severo Ochoa (a physician and biochemist who secured the prize for his work on the synthesis of RNA) and the daughter of acclaimed Spanish sculptor Victor Ochoa, Ochoa has many other passions. She has a deep,

How Russell Hornsby Prepared for Emotional Role of Starr’s Dad in The Hate U Give

The Hate U Give takes no time to build up to the powerful message it delivers. The film opens on one of its most important and intimate scenes. A father, tough and terrified, lectures his seemingly too young kids on how to interact with police officers. Their mother tries to temper his tone, but he knows his children are entering a world where he is running out of time to protect them. Russell Hornsby offers a raw portrayal of a private moment every parent wishes they didn’t have to have.

Rosamund Pike & Director Matthew Heineman on Their Riveting Biopic A Private War

A Private War is the story of the intrepid journalist Marie Colvin, who endured terrible trauma including the loss of an eye and post-traumatic stress disorder before being killed in Syria during the siege of Homs. Rosamund Pike, who plays Colvin, and director Matthew Heineman talked to The Credits about blending documentary and narrative and about Colvin’s contradictions and convictions.

Tell me about how you created the physicality Marie Colvin,

SCAD Savannah Film Fest: Jitters Writer, Director & Star Otoja Abit

Actor Otoja Abit had an idea for a short. It was a simple idea that concealed a depth of feeling; what if we got to see a young man, moments before his wedding ceremony, question whether or not he was making the right choice. Abit, who has acted on TV (The Defenders, The Night Of), film (Stonewall), and in theater in New York, wanted to take what he’d learned and make something himself. 

Roma Actress Yalitza Aparicio on Carrying Alfonso Cuarón’s Astonishing Film

Roma, the opening night film at Middleburg Film Festival, played to a sold-out crowd of film lovers. As the end credits rolled, it was greeted with rapturous applause.

The film is leaving an indelible impression and gathering accolades from audiences and critics alike. Winning the Golden Lion Award for Best Film at the Venice Film Festival, Roma is creating Oscar buzz for auteur writer/director Alfonso Cuarón,

Green Book‘s Viggo Mortensen on the Power of a Great Script

The much-anticipated new release from director and co-screenwriter Peter Farrelly, Green Book, was just given the Audience Award for Best Narrative Film at the Middleburg Film Festival. The film has been received with equal enthusiasm at all its screenings, garnering, among others, the Grolsch People’s Choice Award at the Toronto International Film Festival. The story, which is based on the experiences of the real people portrayed in the film, is about the development of a lifelong friendship between working-class Italian-American Tony Lip (Viggo Mortensen) and erudite piano virtuoso and African-American Doctor Don Shirley (Mahershala Ali),

The Mid90s Cast on Skating & Sticking to the Script in Jonah Hill’s Directorial Debut

Sunny Suljic, the young, breakout star of Mid90s, says most audiences don’t even know that he’s a proficient skater in real life. But for Suljic that’s proof that he did a convincing job playing a novice skateboarder in Jonah Hill’s directing debut.

Truth is, the pint-sized Suljic, at just 13, is as adept at extreme skateboarding as the rest of the movie’s young ensemble of non-professionals (Na-kel Smith, Olan Prenatt,

Rupert Everett on Writing, Directing & Starring in his Oscar Wilde Biopic The Happy Prince

Fans of both Rupert Everett and literary great Oscar Wilde have been patiently waiting for the release of the new film The Happy Prince, which has been 10 years in the making. The film Everett wrote, directed, and stars in is an unvarnished look at Wilde’s last few years, following his decline after release from a two-year imprisonment for homosexuality. We spoke to Everett about what inspired him as a first-time director,

Ike Barinholtz on his Funny/Terrifying Directorial Debut The Oath

In a future that seems as if it could arrive tomorrow, American citizens are instructed to pledge their loyalty not to their country, but to the president. That’s the premise of The Oath, the first feature directed by Ike Barinholtz. The comic actor, known from such series as madTV and The Mindy Project, also wrote the satire, which begins as a family gathers for Thanksgiving dinner.

Barinholtz plays the host,

TIFF 2018: First Man Actor Skyler Bible on Working on Damien Chazelle’s Revelatory Space Drama

First Man represents the first time we’re getting a full-blown biopic about the legendary astronaut Neil Armstrong. Academy-award winning director Damien Chazelle‘s film, scripted by Spotlight and The Post‘s Academy-award winning scribe Josh Singer (based on the book by James R. Hansen) tells the story behind the first manned mission to the moon, with the focus squarely on Armstrong (Ryan Gosling). The Apollo 11 mission that ultimately leads to Armstrong’s iconic first steps on the moon took a decade to prepare,

American Horror Story: Cult‘s Emmy-Nominated Actress Adina Porter on Playing in the Dark

Bronx born and raised with theater roots, Adina Porter’s path to her first ever Emmy-nomination has taken her from the boards to the small screen in some of TV’s most demanding yet delicious roles. Before she became one of Ryan Murphy’s American Horror regulars, you may have seen her Alan Ball’s True Blood on HBO as Lettie Mae Thornton. Lettie Mae was Tara (Rutina Wesley)’s alcoholic mother, a character who was supposed to be killed off in season one but who survived,

Bo Burnham and Elsie Fisher Discuss the Social Media Influences that Shaped Eighth Grade

When writer-director Bo Burnham set out to make Eighth Grade, his acclaimed new account of middle-school anxiety, he had plenty of reasons to be anxious himself. He’d never directed a feature film before, and his subject was a 13-year-old girl, something he’d never been. But any apprehension was balanced by his relief at not being in front of the camera.

“I was very aware of my limitations,” Burnham told The Credits recently while in Washington with his star,

Ben Foster on his Moving Portrait of Fatherhood in Leave no Trace

In Leave No Trace, Ben Foster plays a man who’s fled American society, carrying just a few things with him — most significantly his teenage daughter, Tom (Thomasin McKenzie). Foster’s Will is apparently a military veteran, but writer-director Debra Granik never tells his story. The character seems a bit like a post-traumatic version of the violent men Foster has played in such movies as Hell or High Water.

The Last O.G.‘s Allen Maldonado on Riffing With Tracy Morgan, Writing Scripts & More

Allen Moldonado is a writer, performer, filmmaker, and entrepreneur, currently co-writing and co-starring in The Last OG, opposite Tracy Morgan. In an interview, he talked about his “Netflix for short films,” Everybody Digital, creating the character of Cousin Bobby as actor and writer, and surviving the “actor’s Olympics” of daily soap operas.

I love the idea of an app to watch short films. Tell me how it started.

Skyscraper‘s Byron Mann Talks Dwayne Johnson, Action Pics and TV

Byron Mann is a remarkably versatile actor who appears opposite Dwayne Johnson in the upcoming action thriller Skyscraper, which looks like a combination of Die Hard and Towering Inferno. In an interview, the star of Arrow, The Big Short, Hell on Wheels, and Street Fighter, talks about the challenges of the green screen, getting fit for shirts-off action scenes,

Mj Rodriguez on Breaking Out as Blanca on Ryan Murphy’s Pose

For many actresses, playing a lead role in a television show is a personal accomplishment. For Mj Rodriguez, who stars in the new FX series Pose, it’s so much more than that.

Rodriguez, a native of New Jersey who got her start in musical theater and has appeared on Nurse Jackie and Luke Cage, speaks of her casting as a triumph not only for herself but for all transgender women.

Chloë Grace Moretz on Why She Had to Have The Miseducation of Cameron Post

It’s hard to believe that Chloë Grace Moretz is just 21. Besides her poise, sophistication and groundedness, the Georgia native has amassed a diverse body of work, ranging from genre fare like Kick-Ass and Let Me In to acclaimed indies with renowned directors. She played Isabelle in Martin Scorsese’s Hugo when she was 14, and faced off with Juliette Binoche, as one actress manipulating another on- and offscreen, in Olivier Assayas’ Clouds of Sils Maria.

Merritt Wever Transitions From Loopy Nurse to Frontier Toughie in Godless

Merritt Wever has no idea why she was picked to play a tough frontier woman in Netflix western Godless, but the New York actress wasn’t about to ask questions when writer-director-creator Scott Frank came calling. “I don’t go nosing around like that,” says Wever, who won a 2013 Emmy co-starring in Nurse Jackie as Edie Falco’s sly, exuberant sidekick Zoey Barkow.

Standing in extreme contrast to Zoey, Wever’s Emmy-buzzed portrayal of Mary Agnes McNue celebrates a gun-wielding bisexual badass who defends the frontier town of LaBelle in 1884 after all the menfolk get killed in a catastrophic mining accident.