Tolkien Director on Tracing Iconic Author’s Life From War to Middle Earth
The Finnish director Dome Karukoski’s biopic Tolkien traces the future of the “Lord of the Rings” author’s path from his peripatetic tween years through his Oxford attendance, intercut with his nightmarish experience fighting in the Battle of the Somme during World War I. Throughout, Karukoski offers a poetic depiction of the author’s fomenting imagination, seen through Tolkien’s eyes in the shadows of a child’s spinning light globe or marauding in the battlefield as Tolkien,
The Handmaid’s Tale Makeup Designer on Creating Misery in the Colonies
In Margaret Atwood’s novel “The Handmaid’s Tale,” the radioactive Colonies are more felt than described. We’re told it’s where all Gilead’s undesirables, the childless handmaids, the criminals, the sick and insane, are sent to die. In Hulu’s adaptation of Atwood’s novel, however, the Colonies became one of the show’s most fecund sources of misery in season two. As Maria Elena Fernandez described in a piece for Vulture, The Handmaid’s Tales creators did something brilliant when they set out to create the location—the asked Atwood what she had in mind when she wrote about them.
How the The Simpsons new Composers Took on Springfield
The Simpsons boasts not only the longest run of any scripted primetime series, along with catch-phrases and characters that have been part of popular culture for almost two generations, but theme music recognizable within its first few notes—on a short list with Star Trek, Hawaii Five-O, Batman, Sesame Street, and a handful of others.
And now that series has new composers.
Building Thousands of Years of History in Amazon’s Good Omens
“Corners are where everyone makes decisions. This is the point where you change directions.” And corners are usually located at crossroads, to boot, the very place—especially if you’re a Mississippi bluesman—where it’s said deals with the devil can be struck.
The corner in question, however, concerns an angel, and the London bookshop that he owns—part of Michael Ralph’s production design on the upcoming Amazon/BBC adaptation of Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett’s Good Omens.
Showrunner Lauren Morelli Spins New Tales of the City for Netflix
The interwoven stories of the residents of Barbary Lane are being told again. Introduced in author Armistead Maupin’s Tales of the City 40 years ago, and then adapted for television several times since the 1990s, the beloved San Francisco-set saga is being revived by Netflix and starts streaming this June.
Like its predecessors, which were based on Maupin’s nine novels, the 2019 version focuses a lot on the LGBTQ community—but it does so with some new characters and a modern take.
Qualified Director Jenna Ricker on Indy’s Pioneer Janet Guthrie
“This is my first documentary,” says producer/director Jenna Ricker, of Qualified, a look at the life of Janet Guthrie, the first woman—in that pre-Danica Patrick/Pippa Mann era—to ever drive a car at the Indianapolis 500.
The doc is part of ESPN’s 30 For 30 series, in celebration of the cable pioneer’s 30th anniversary. But you have to go farther back than that, to 1977, to find Guthrie in the cockpit of a racer at Indianapolis.
Martin Ruhe on Shooting George Clooney’s Catch-22 Adaptation
“Certain things I don’t think we’d be legally allowed to do now,” observes cinematographer Martin Ruhe, ASC, when reflecting on the prior attempt to bring Joseph Heller’s classic, absurdist, and decidedly non-chronological Catch-22 to the screen.
That would be the 1970 Mike Nichols film version, which was somewhat of a commercial and critical bust at the time but has since come to be regarded in more classic “70’s cinema” terms.
John Wick 3 Costume Designer Conjures Elegance Amid the Carnage
Italian-born costumer Luca Mosca pulled off a major sartorial coup in 2014 when he designed the instantly iconic suit worn by Keanu Reeves in John Wick. The elegant silhouette impacted pop culture to the point where Amazon now sells $139 “John Wick Suit” knock-offs. But to see the real deal, action fans have been flocking to director Chad Stahelski’s John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum,
Director Olivia Wilde & Screenwriter Katie Silberman on the Hilarious Booksmart
The creative team behind Booksmart wanted to showcase women being funny. Not one or two women, but many women.
“That’s how it is in our lives. All my female friends are as funny as my male friends. They’re not comedians; they don’t think of themselves as funny,” said screenwriter Katie Silberman, who shares writing credit with Susanna Fogel, Emily Halpern, and Sarah Haskins.
Silberman credited Olivia Wilde, the actress who makes her feature directorial debut on Booksmart,
Costume Designer Michael Wilkinson on Outfitting the Live-Action Aladdin
In Guy Ritchie’s live-action remake of Aladdin, Disney revisits Agrabah, the fictional Arabian land where a plucky street thief and his incorrigible monkey sidekick cross paths with an unlikely love interest, the local sultan’s daughter, Princess Jasmine. Similar to the 2017 Beauty and the Beast remake, turning a bustling, fictional historic animated township into a three-dimensional place is a colorful, lively affair. In both, labyrinthine city streets give way to the intensity of nature,
John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum Director on the Film’s Epic Stunts & Real Dogs
Chad Stahelski started out as a kick-boxer, served as Keanu Reeve‘s stunt double in The Matrix and rose through the ranks as a stunt choreographer with his own 87eleven Action Design before co-launching the John Wick franchise in 2014. Directing Reeves as an indomitable assassin, Stahelski has staged most of the 54-year-old actor’s action sequences “in camera,” minimizing digital effects in favor of physical performance. The old school approach has wowed fans to the tune of $261 million in world wide box office,
Composer Herdis Stefansdottir on her Intimate score for The Sun is Also a Star
Herdis Stefansdottir, scoring artist for the new release The Sun is Also a Star, is a rare example of a female composer working on a major studio film. She was hired when she was 7 months pregnant, and says that had a major impact on the creation of her emotional, often intimate score.
The film follows the college-bound romantic Daniel (Charles Melton) and a Jamaica-born pragmatist Natasha (Yara Shahidi) who meet—and fall in love—over one momentous day in New York City.
Trial by Fire Director Edward Zwick on Revisiting a Heartbreaking Story
Cameron Todd Willingham, who’s played by British actor Jack O’Connell in director Edward Zwick‘s Trial by Fire, was not an exemplary character. But he almost certainly didn’t set the 1991 blaze that killed his three young daughters, an alleged crime for which he was executed by the state of Texas in 2004. The fire was likely accidental, as was demonstrated by the evidence presented in David Grann’s 2009 New Yorker piece and Incendiary: The Willingham Case,
How Avengers: Endgame‘s Editor Handled Time Traveling Twists & Turns
SPOILER ALERT: This story reveals plot points seen in Avengers: Endgame and other Marvel films.
Even before Avengers: Infinity War was completed editors Jeffrey Ford and Matthew Schmidt were already working on what they were calling Avengers 4 in April of last year. The project, shrouded in secrecy, was to be a culmination of 10+ years and 22 films in the making cleverly dubbed Avengers: Endgame.
Avengers: Endgame Visual Effects Supervisor on Happy Hulk, Lebowski Thor & More
Spoiler alert for those of you who still haven’t seen Avengers: Endgame.
The Marvel universe’s supersized super-villain Thanos (Josh Brolin, plus CG) last year dealt a heavy hand to overpopulation in Avengers: Infinity War, wiping out half of humanity with a snap of his fingers warmed by his Infinity Stone encrusted gauntlet. Five years onward the Avengers are looking stuck, with those remaining still in mourning and low on solutions.
Costume Designer Jennifer Rogien on Outfitting Netflix’s Brilliant Russian Doll
As Nadia, Russian Doll’s wise-cracking heroine who dies repeatedly only to be reborn in the bathroom of her birthday party, Natasha Lyonne looks the part of the quintessential New York woman (which, in real life, she is), her all-black ensemble from boots to blouse easily complementing the withering energy with which she confronts her friends, ex, the homeless guy on the corner, and assorted other compatriots. In contrast, the only other soul in the world who understands her plight because he,
The Bespoke Technology That Made Netflix’s Black Mirror: Bandersnatch Possible
Sugar puffs or frosties? Yell at dad or pour tea all over a keyboard? By now, the audience choices and subsequent on-screen fallout possibilities in Netflix’s first interactive film for adults, Bandersnatch, have been well documented across the web. Home-made flow charts painstakingly illustrate the complexity of 19-year-old video game creator Stefan’s journey as he tries to develop an interactive computer game in 1984, navigating relationships with his irritating father,
Finding the Funny With Long Shot Director Jonathan Levine & Actress June Diane Raphael
Long Shot stars Charlize Theron as Charlotte, an elegant, poised, hyper-competent Secretary of State who wants to run for President and Seth Rogen as Fred, an awkward, shlumpy, but principled journalist. Charlotte hires Fred to help write speeches that will reveal her warmer, more accessible side. It is romantic, it is funny, and it is surprisingly sweet. In an interview with The Credits, director Jonathan Levine and June Diane Raphael,
Star Michael Ealy on Household Horror in his new Thriller The Intruder
New thriller The Intruder stars Michael Ealy and Meagan Good as Scott and Annie Russell, a newly married couple who have bought what they hope is their dream home from longtime owner Charlie Peck (Dennis Quaid). They slowly discover Charlie is not only having a hard time letting go, but he’s also getting obsessive. Michael Ealy talked to The Credits about his good guy role, the joy of working opposite Dennis Quaid,
Dr. Ruth Westheimer Talks Life, Sex, & Ask Dr. Ruth
As a follow-up to The Keepers, documentary director Ryan White found a very different, very inspiring story in Ask Dr. Ruth, which is releasing in theaters on May 3rd. The film examines the fascinating life of Dr. Ruth Westheimer, a Holocaust survivor who became the country’s most widely known and celebrated sex therapist. In following this famously straightforward woman as she enters her 90s, audiences will see she is as energetic and enthusiastic as she’s ever been.
