The first reactions to director Jon M. Chu’s Wicked are descending upon social media like so many flying monkeys. Chu’s adaptation of the beloved Broadway musical—itself an adaptation of Gregory Maguire’s novel—is led by two powerhouse performers in Cynthia Erivo as Elphaba and Ariana Grande as Glinda. The first reactions are mostly raves, with folks calling it one of the very best adaptations of a Broadway hit ever, and Erivo and Grande are being hailed for knockout turns as the two future, star-crossed witches that have launched them into Oscar contention.
“Jon Chu IS a musical genius and the world he creates and the performances he captures are really next level,” writes Vanity Fair’s Chris Murphy. “Wicked is the best musical-to-movie adaptation since Chicago and Mamma Mia,” writes IndieWire’s Erin Strecker. “Glinda is the role Ariana Grande was born to play. Perfectly suited and genuinely a hilarious, scene-stealing performance. Cynthia Erivo’s heavenly vocals allow her to make Elphaba her own,” writes Variety’s Clayton Davis.
Wicked is the first big-screen adaptation of the juggernaut Broadway show and reveals the world of Oz before Dorothy dropped in and changed everything. The adaptation boasts the power ballads that rocked the Broadway stage and will enroll viewers at Shiz University, where Elphaba and Glinda cross paths and form an unlikely but profound friendship, one that will change both of their lives forever.
The supporting cast includes Jonathan Bailey as Fiyero—a love interest of both Elphaba and Glinda—Michelle Yeoh’s Madame Morrible, the headmistress of Shiz University where Elphaba and Glinda meet, Marissa Bode’s Nessarose, Elphaba’s younger sister, Bronwyn James’ Shenshen and Bowen Yang’s Pfannee, Glinda’s friends at Shiz U., and Jeff Goldblum’s Wizard of Oz.
Wicked’s production team includes production designer Nathan Crowley, a six-time Oscar nominee and longtime collaborator of Christopher Nolan (The Prestige, Dunkirk, Interstellar); Oscar-nominated costume designer Paul Tazewell; cinematographer Alice Brooks; and composers John Powell (Oscar nominee) and Stephen Schwartz (three-time Oscar winner).
L to R: Director Jon M. Chu with Cynthia Erivo (as Elphaba) and Ariana Grande (as Glinda) on the set of WICKED
Let’s take a flight around the Wicked reactions below. Wicked hits theaters on November 22.
Wicked is a cinematic spectacle that serves as one of the very best big screen adaptations of a Broadway musical ever. Jon M. Chu perfectly captures the magic of the Broadway show while adding in some of his own unique flourishes to the source material. Ariana Grande and Cynthia… pic.twitter.com/KyTFJCRcKz
i have seen the Wicked movie not once not twice but three separate times now and believe me when i say it is a complete and utter slay you will be gagged beyond belief everything you think the film looks like from your cracked iphones is wrong Cynthia and Ari truly are impeccable
Happy to confirm WICKED is the best musical-to-movie adaptation since CHICAGO and MAMMA MIA. Ariana Grande….is perfection!? @hillibusterr and I kept grabbing each other’s arm in delight.
#Wicked rocks, kids. Galinda is the role Ariana Grande was born to play. Perfectly suited and genuinely a hilarious, scene-stealing performance. Cynthia Erivo’s heavenly vocals allow her to make Elphaba her own. The team of artisans assembled by Jon M. Chu all put their signature… pic.twitter.com/OIXi9bnFZz
The world is not ready for how great @wickedmovie is. Jon M. Chu, Cynthia Erivo & Ariana Grande have gifted us a musical masterpiece that is much more than we could have ever expected. Ariana & Cynthia will blow you away. The production design and costumes are a visual spectacle. pic.twitter.com/TizvEL8tEh
I was ‘pessimistical’ going in, but…WICKED is a masterpiece. Ariana Grande makes Glinda sparkle: she milks every moment with gusto, humor and hair flips. Jon M. Chu added so much new life to the story that I can see why it needed to be 2 parts! Well worth the 20-year wait. pic.twitter.com/dJIYdoZgPc
#WickedMovie is an Oz-some spectacle that pops and enchants on the big screen. An absolutely stunning vision. Leads Erivo and Grande knock it out of the park. While this perhaps won’t convert many anti-musical folks, genre fans and die-hard Ozians (Wickhards?) will feast on this pic.twitter.com/HhqJc9cXAK
“Hell arrives tomorrow when we bring in the cardinals,” quips the fair-minded Cardinal Lawrence (Ralph Fiennes), the dean of the College of Cardinals, on the eve of the gathering to elect the new Pope. After the unexpected death of the current pontiff, it is Lawrence’s duty to oversee the titular Conclave, when over 100 cardinals from around the world gather to witness the cutthroat battle of succession steeped in tradition and secrecy.
In this riveting Vatican-set election thriller, director Edward Berger (All Quiet on the Western Front) takes us behind the veil into one of the most clandestine events in the world. As the deliberations begin, the cardinals are sequestered in their dormitories at the Casa Santa Marta for the duration of the conclave. On the cusp of profound change for the Catholic Church, several frontrunners emerge to pit the progressive camp against the hardline conservatives.
Oscar-nominated production designer Suzie Davies (Saltburn, The Courier) had her work cut out for her on this film. Since the Vatican does not allow filming at the Sistine Chapel or the Casa Santa Marta, replicas were built at the Cinecittà Studios in Rome. “The whole film is a jigsaw puzzle of locations in Rome and studio builds. We built the elements of the Sistine Chapel with the amazing craftsmen at Cinecittà and the rooms and corridors of the Casa Santa Marta,” Davies recalls. The six-month project included a core team of 20-25 people, in addition to approximately 100 plasterers, painters, construction staff, and set decorators.
Was the crew mostly local?
Yes, the craftsmanship is absolutely out of this world. It was fantastic having people with the knowledge there. Cinecittà is an amazing studio; it felt very exciting driving through those gates every day and working across Studio 5, the famous [Federico] Fellini stage.
What was it like to bring this sacrosanct process to life for the screen?
We know so much about the Vatican, but there’s a hidden side of the conclave that no one really knows. That works to our advantage because we can do our own thing to a certain extent. The tradition is well-documented, but not what happens behind the scenes. So, we ran with our artistic license to create that more brutal fascist architecture of this prison-like Casa Santa Marta. All their secretive meetings and underhand tactics were fun to play with in the corners of these buildings.
Director Edward Berger talks about balancing light and dark, masculine and feminine, and traditional and contemporary in this film. How does that play into your designs?
This film is about juxtapositions between what we think we know and what we don’t. We discussed playing with those elements to create a more dramatic visual story. Rome is beautiful with amazing ornate architecture, but it also has contemporary architecture that we decided to play with. The feminine shapes and gold, softer side were juxtaposed against hard black lines, and the whites, blues, and blacks against the gold and rich reds.
Those long hallways at Casa Santa Marta felt stifling—you’ve talked about wanting it to feel like a posh prison.
That’s a set built in Cinecittà, along with elements from some locations. That’s so great that you get that feeling. We wanted it to feel hermetically sealed—there was no fresh air since they couldn’t open the windows. So, all you could hear was the hum of fluorescent lights and the air conditioning, and those noises clattered around those corridors. I wanted them to look great, so I built the longest corridor I could. We looked for that location but couldn’t find the scale and design. So, we built it at Cinecittà on a long rectangular stage.
What made the Cardinals’ quarters feel cold, rigid, and bleak?
With those rooms, I was inspired by Italian architect Carlo Scarpa. Those little squares on the doors became a theme, which I think intimate the prison door. There’s no ornamentation or decorative moldings on the walls; it’s all very neat, brutal, and sharp.
Some of the revelations and tension occur during routine activities, such as meals in the dining hall and in the stairwells and hallways.
It’s interesting to see them in all their pomp and amazing costumes in the canteen or going up the stairs. Seeing them in unusual spaces gives the sense that it’s all happening right now. Often, the images of the conclave can be a Renaissance painting, like a Caravaggio. You think it happened ages ago, but it could happen right now.
This canteen in a military academy in Rome.It had a great, low ceiling but sort of brutal vibe that suits this thriller. We cleaned it up and painted it, put some blinds on the windows. I think the soldiers were very happy with what we did and decided to keep it that way.
What are some of your favorite scenes?
There’s a beautiful choral piece in the Gold Room at the Palazzo Barberini, where Lawrence gives a big speech in Latin and Italian [the homily that marks the beginning of the conclave]. The Palazzo is a museum with this beautiful gold room with silk gold wallpaper, a massive fireplace, huge windows, and an ornate painted ceiling. Lizy Christl’s costumes are extraordinary, and the casting of all those background artists is amazing. You spin around this room of gold and listen to this wonderful music; I found that really moving. When Edward and I first visited there, we were both blown away by the scale. We just knew this needed to be part of our world. In my job, sometimes it’s just as important to know what not to do. That location already had a lot, so all I did was build a 15-foot crucifix artwork for the space.
What other locations did you augment to fit in the story?
The room of tears at the very end, when the new Pope sits and wonders about his next movie, that’s an old farmhouse on the outskirts of Rome that we tidied up and painted that bright, deep red color.That was a very white stucco room underneath the Sistine Chapel that we painted red. The Conclave itself has adapted and changed the tradition over the years anyway, so we decided we could add some changes, too.
What about recreating parts of the Sistine Chapel—was that from an existing replica in storage at Cinecittà?
Cinecittà has some elements of it and ancient Rome on the backlot. So, we put that together in a slightly different configuration because we wanted our conclave to be more like a government, so the cardinals sat opposite each other. But the Sistine Chapel’s configuration wouldn’t have allowed that if we’d recreated it for real. Another known tradition is they’d carpet the Sistine Chapel to deaden the sound so that no one could hear their deliberations, but it’s usually beige. We thought that red on red adds to the drama, a bit of an homage to Cries and Whispers.
The cardinals vote until a two-thirds majority is achieved. That may sound boring on the page, but those sequences were suspenseful. How did you make the room where they vote interesting?
Very early on, Edward knew how all the chairs would be arranged, that each cardinal gets a pen, paper, a rule book, and their hat, those wooden spheres, and burning that paper. All those were specifically made to be very graphic. The DoP Stéphane Fontaine did a wonderful job creating those close-ups to give that sense of power and tradition. The stove that burns the papers is pretty well-documented, but we added a few more LED buttons to give it more intrigue and curiosity. We spent ages debating whether the graphics should be in English or Italian or should it just be a white sticker or a black sticker.
Did you have to recreate the “turtle fountain” as well?
There are turtles at the Vatican Gardens, and we found ornamental ponds in the Museo Etrusco in Rome. Filming there was tricky—there was a mosaic next it that no one could stand on, not even a turtle. So, we had to tiptoe around with them to get them to swim and acclimatize them to the water. We also filmed at the Royal Palace of Caserta in Napoli, where we see a turtle walking across an ornate marble floor.
In the beginning, when the Pope has just passed away,they immediately seal the room with a big red ribbon on the door.
We know it is sealed, but we made up how we would seal our door. We wanted it to be a little bit more dramatic, so I added the large metal knobs on the door to give that lovely shape. And then we found that brilliant machine that melts the wax. I think some could’ve have done it in the traditional way of lighting a candle and heating the wax, it was lovely to bring a contemporary element to it.
Costume designer Helen Huang bridges reality and comic book storytelling in The Penguin, finding a brilliant balance that gives the series weight and a churlish glamour befitting a story set in Gotham’s criminal underworld. The hit series led by showrunner Lauren LeFranc is familiar—Gotham is our most explored comic version of New York City—yet heightened and deliciously detailed, blending a tactical mob story with the haunting metropolis in a period of rapid decay following the Riddler’s bombing and flooding of the city at the end of The Batman—The Penguin is set in that tragedy’s aftermath. Huang’s work, in particular, is not only a treat to the eyes but deepens the duality of the characters and the famous comic book city.
As Oz Cobb (Colin Farrell) attempts to gain control of Gotham’s criminal underworld, audiences see all the good, the bad, and the ugly sides of him. The same goes for Sofia Falcone (Cristin Millioti), whose impeccable, ordered style often contrasts her intense interior life and the barely sublimated rage she has for all the men in her life who did her rotten. Characters are well-drawn through Huang’s eyes, who previously won an Emmy for Netflix’s brilliantly salty Beef.
Recently, Huang spoke with The Credits about crafting Oz, Sofia, and the titular character’s young partner-in-crime, Victor Aguilar (Rhenzy Feliz).
How do you balance showing all sides of Oz, running the gamut between his good and bad taste?
Well, with Oz, first of all, he is very concerned with masculinity. He probably grew up at a certain time, and the guys he idolized in his neighborhood represented what he viewed as masculine. So, his taste runs in that world, which is why he likes suits and structured tailoring. But he likes to think of himself as a rough-and-tough guy, so when he does more practical jobs, that’s what we designed for him.
Colin Farrell. Photograph by Macall Polay/HBOColin Farrell. Photograph by Macall Polay/HBO
Since it’s a comic book world, did you want to make some more heightened choices for him as well?
Something like The Penguin, you can never be totally realistic even though it’s grounded. You have to add that extra 20% of something that toes the line. We focused a lot on his silhouette, like how his lapels look. I like to think that Oz thought a lot about things like his head-to-lapel proportion. Later, in the episodes where he’s in the tunnels, we even did some classic workwear because Oz is dressing up for the part. He’s a man of the people, but I also think he likes old movies, so he gravitates toward these classic things, as well as things that might be flashy or distasteful to people like the Falcones.
Colin Farrell. Photograph by Macall Polay/HBO
How did you want the clothes to move with his body?
We tried to make it very close to his body. We also made his shoulders bigger, and his lapels were more 1970s-style, with bigger lapels to fit his dimensions and give it a timeless feel. We did take the waist in more. Oz probably really likes that silhouette. There’s a sense of insecurity about how he physically looks, so we tried to imagine what he’d tell the tailor if he got his suits custom-made. He also wore these pointy shoes in the movie, and when I saw them in person, I thought, “Oh, should we get him a more comfortable shoe?” But the decision was, no, he’d cram his foot into the pointy shoes because that’s how he feels his silhouette should be.
Colin Farrell, Cristin Milioti. Photograph by Macall Polay/HBO
For Victor, what were some of your photo references?
For Victor and all of Crown Point, I looked at many street photographers from the late 1970s to the 1980s, like Jamel Shabazz and Richard Sandler. We wanted Gotham to feel timeless, so I looked at those references for Victor. I personally love the ’90s; it creates a good contrast between his silhouette and Oz’s.
Colin Farrell, Rhenzy Feliz. Photograph by Macall Polay/HBO
How’d the ‘90s influence you?
The ’90s silhouette is bigger, which is why I went in that direction with him. Everything he wears in episodes one to three was made just for him. We remade a 1990s starter jacket, something inspired by a Fila jacket. We even printed a Gotham basketball T-shirt for him. I wanted to give him the feel of someone who might have gotten a hand-me-down from his dad that he now thinks is cool.That provides contrast with Oz, who is colorful, but when he goes dark, he goes very dark. Victor, in the beginning, is more composed, so we used more color and brightness for him. He wears denim, whereas Oz doesn’t. It was all about signaling to the audience the generational contrast between Victor and Oz.
Rhenzy Feliz. Photograph by Macall Polay/HBORhenzy Feliz and Colin Farrell. Photograph by Macall Polay/HBO
There’s a tangible contrast for Sofia Falcone as well. Early in the show, she’s buttoned up, but as an audience, we know there’s a lot of anger and sadness behind her eyes. How early on did you make that creative choice for Sofia?
We talked about that a lot. How should she appear when they first meet her? Lauren, the showrunner, wanted her to feel put together. They wanted to avoid the “crazy female” trope but also make her a challenge for Oz. She’s composed, so he doesn’t know where she’s at mentally. Cristin plays it very quietly but extremely threatening until she becomes openly threatening.
Cristin Milioti. Photograph by Macall Polay/HBO.Cristin Milioti and Colin Farrell. Photograph by Macall Polay/HBO.
What silhouette did you want for her?
We discussed her silhouette a lot because we didn’t want to go down the traditional sexy-female-comic-book-y path. We looked at 1960s silhouettes and ’90s Kate Moss. Her skirts are shorter, but they’re still very feminine in the Falcone world because we wanted her to contrast with her uncles and the other men running the organization, even Oz. We kept her feminine but in a different way than normally seen for a character like that.
Cristin Milioti. Photograph by Macall Polay/HBO.
How’d you want to show her evolution in the show?
Yeah, as her wardrobe darkened, we brought in faux furs to give her more texture. We wanted to give her a big silhouette and a lot of texture as her character grew darker. Her collars got bigger, and her shoulders got bigger. Everything was about creating a sense of dimension and power.
Cristin Milioti. Photograph by Macall Polay/HBO.
There’s a fine line there. Earlier, you mentioned adding 20% exaggeration, but what would 21% look like? What’s too much for The Penguin?
21% would take her wardrobe too far. It would make it less polished. If she started looking sloppy, or if we went too far in showing more skin, it would have felt off. We consciously covered her up more in the beginning, even when we began showing more skin later. Everything is still really beautiful. It all feels like it comes from the same closet; she’s just wearing it differently. 21% would make her a completely different person, and you need her to stay in that comic-book realm.
What does that process look like for you when interpreting a character arc? Are you putting note cards along with costumes on the wall?
I always try to think about what works in the world and how you visually want to see characters interact in a frame. I map out bigger themes for the show. For example, this show is about power and institutions failing people. Whether it’s the Falcones, a big crime institution, or Gotham City itself, which is failing its citizens, I break down these larger themes into the characters and try to show that through design. For the Falcones, we did a lot of old European glamour, while Oz and the people beneath him are more street, more new money. And then Victor is in a totally different world. I also look through tons of photographs, magazines, and books and put up what interests me most. Sometimes, you’ll throw an idea away, but later, when you read another version of the script, you’ll realize it fits. My husband calls my computer desktop the “junk drawer” because it’s so chaotic. I try to organize it at first, but eventually, it just becomes one folder labeled “Episode 108,” which is a trash dump of images. It’s all part of the process.
Rhenzy Feliz, Colin Farrell. Photograph by Macall Polay/HBOClancy Brown, Cristin Milioti. Photograph by Macall Polay/HBO.
Editor’s Note: The story contains spoilers to the movie Smile 2.
Prosthetic makeup designer Jeremy Selenfriend is no stranger when it comes to creating blood-curdling horror. He grew up watching Freddy Kruger films and turned an interest of the spooky into a career of conjuring some of the most terrifying dread imaginable. “It’s a weird thing to say, but when I was eight years old, I was in love with the Nightmare on Elm Street films,” he tells The Credits. “I don’t know why that was acceptable for a kid back in the eighties, but that was it for me, and I went on from there.” For Smile 2, Selenfriend, who reunites with writer-director Parker Finn, was more than up for the challenge.
The sequel to the 2022 horror hit sees popstar Skye Riley (Naomi Scott) become infected with the supernatural parasite in the midst of a comeback tour following a tragic car accident that took the life of her movie star boyfriend (Ray Nicholson) and left her scarred – physically and psychologically. Now, she’s imagining everything from her dead boyfriend, fans stalking her, and her mother (Rosemarie DeWitt) turning against her. She tries everything she can to stay “in control” and make it stop. But does she?
Naomi Scott stars in Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn FIlm “SMILE 2”
The nuanced story shines a terrifying klieg light on the music industry while giving audiences plenty of jump scares and gruesome deaths. The latter required close collaboration among Selenfriend, special effects supervisor Johann Kunz, visual effects supervisor Robert Beck, and, of course, Finn. While some of the bloody visuals were outright CG effects, most were grounded in practical effects that started with the work of Selenfriend and Kunz’s special effects team.
Below, the prosthetic makeup designer talks about working in New York, what blood is really like on set, and what goes into breaking someone’s jaw off their face. Yummy.
You’ve turned a childhood love of creating monsters into a career, eventually starting a business in New York dubbed Monster in my Closet FX. What’s the one thing you’d share about working professionally in NY after multiple decades?
That I’d rather be in New York than any other film locale. I’ve been lucky here on the East Coast that I got to grow with the size of the film industry here. It was just really taking off when I was cutting my teeth twenty-plus years ago. There are a handful of shows here, Law & Order, SNL, of course, and Broadway, but there wasn’t a whole lot of big stuff in New York. So you go to do a ton of really fun independent films where we were able to build my shop name. It’s been nice to kind of grow with the New York film community.
Naomi Scott stars in Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn FIlm “SMILE 2”
Since you’re embedded in the New York prosthetic makeup and creature scene, how do you approach bringing in new people for a project or mentoring?
I mentor from time to time. Every season, there’s a litany of emails about wanting to work with us, and we’ll look at the books and portfolios. And if there’s something in there that jumps out at me, that really off the beaten path where they put some real effort in and done something, I can see there’s actually artistry involved, whether it’s a sculpture or mold or any aspect of what we do, we ask them to come on in and give them a shot.
The technology behind creative workflows has evolved tremendously in the last five years, with 3D printing and even more so with artificial intelligence recently. Have you considered adding any of the more digital workflows to your process?
I’ll sculpt tangibly with my hands until the day I’m told I physically can’t, just because I genuinely love it. But I also respect the hell out of what’s going on with digital sculptors. For Smile 2, Naomi [Skye], she was all digital scans by Millennium FX in the UK. Morphology did some of the lifecasting from prints of the digital scans, and Studio Gillis was also involved again, like the first film. There was a lot of teamwork between departments and other shops.
You can tell there’s a lot of teamwork involved in the Smile films. One of the things that make them thrilling to watch is that, for the most part, the gore is grounded in practical effects.
That started with our very first conversation with Parker back before the first one. I didn’t know who he was yet, and we were getting to know each other at the time and just talking about horror stuff. And he’s as into it as anyone I’ve ever met. He knows what he wants probably more than anyone I’ve ever met. He wants as much in-person on-set as he can possibly have, which we love the hell out of. It’s so great that there are still directors out there like that, but still also know there will be a healthy amount of visual effects for the film, too.
Naomi Scott, left, and Director Parker Finn on the set of Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn FIlm “SMILE 2”
Exactly. There has to be a balance since gags that are completely digital can sometimes take you out of the story because of how fake-looking they can appear.
I’m lucky in that I’ve gotten to do a lot of shows where, even if we know a gag is going to be completely VFX when all is said and done, I’ve had an actor say like, okay, but I still need to see my arm bulging up, because I’m acting and I need to know what I’m acting to and if there’s nothing there, I’m not giving the performance it deserves. So we build an entire rig for a thing, and sometimes we’re like, hey, that worked out great. We don’t even need the VFX, which is always a wonderful feeling. Parker is very good about trying it for real. We’ll get as much as we possibly can. We’ll augment later if we have to, and then some things going in are planned that way.
Lukas Gage stars in Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn FIlm “SMILE 2”
One of those visually crazy moments is the death of the character Lewis (Lukas Gage), who has been infected by the Smile demon. He smashes his face in with a weightlifting plate. What was your reaction to reading it in the script?
When I read that in the script, I was like, “Oh my god, I’ve never seen anything quite that extreme and brutal.” But because that happens within the first act, I knew we were in for a ride for the rest of it.
It’s a fantastic bloody mess. Was the disfiguration of his face something you can research?
I mean, can’t say I found any specific references. It’s tough as it’s a very imaginative thing. But we had a lot of MMA fight references, just extreme nose breaks and things like that. Relevant things, albeit nothing quite like a weight plate.
So, how did the team pull it off?
This was the one Parker was the most excited about and really wanted to nail the look for. We spent the most time with it and did a couple of different iterations of the sculptures. In the movie, there are three hits, and Parker wanted to make sure it was telling a continuous story and that each one was grander and bigger. It’s all happening simultaneously, and then, by the last one, we get to a VFX hybrid. We are actually seeing inside the head, seeing the skull, and seeing parts fall out. We also had this little puppeteer cheek flap thing tugging on a filament. That was practical. So we had practical, puppeteering, and VFX all going into that scene. It was great. We shot that over multiple days.
Lukas Gage stars in Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn Film “SMILE 2”
The color of blood is always an interesting choice, and Smile 2 has darker, thicker blood than something like Tarantino’s Kill Bill. Do you know what went into making it?
I can say that I was the jumping-off point for that, and the other department kind of matched what the practical makeup effects department was providing. So Sasha Grossman, the makeup department head, costume designer Alexis Forte, the teams in special effects and visual effects, and down the line, all matched us. But because the special effects guys were using rigs to spray blood and everything, it had to be a different kind of blood, so we had to find a balance of the color. Blood is always one of the funniest things to me on set because it’s one person bleeding, but about seven different departments have to be involved.
Are you sourcing the blood and materials in New York?
Yes, as best I can. I bring in very little from out of state. We have amazing suppliers in New York and Pennsylvania. I try not to go further than that.
We have to talk about the scene where a character’s jaw gets ripped off by a crowbar.
Oh yes. For starters, that was my little cameo in the movie.
That is exactly why we brought it up. How cool.
Thanks. That one came up late in the game. We did a similar, albeit less extreme thing in the first movie, and I think this was ok, how do we top that one? So, we created a full silicone head with jawbones and everything embedded inside like a jigsaw puzzle. Knowing the way Parker shoots, we knew we would want to do it a bunch of times, so I developed a way to reset it quickly and easily. We got it down to like a thirty-second reset.
How did you puppeteer it on set?
My shop guy, Jared, had his arms around the front of it, holding the actual crowbar. I’m puppeteering the crowbar from underneath. So he’s just acting as if I’m aiming it in. Parker wanted us to get the nastiest, grossest version that we could possibly get. I think we must have done twenty different takes of that.
At one point in the film, we see the enormity of the Smile villain. Was that done practically as well?
The monster was all created by Alec Gillis and Studio Gillis, but my team got to be part of that and puppeteer it. There are digital alterations in post, but we had that gigantic, crazy ass monster on set. The actor really reacted to it, and it was as big on stage as it is in the movie.
That’s refreshing to hear.
Yes. Alec Gillis is the guy who inspired me and whom I looked up to when I was eight years old. He didn’t come to the set for the first film, but he was there for this one, and it was wonderful to meet him.
That’s a full-circle moment. Another interesting full-circle thing about Smile 2 is all the references to The Shining – the casting of Jack Nicholson’s son Ray being the most obvious. This film opens the door for a new generation to watch that classic film.
I actually sent an email to Parker to this extent the other day. Those were all great, but it’s amazing to think that 30 years from now, people are going to be watching this franchise. It’s a legitimate piece of the horror lexicon now, and people are going to be watching it on Halloween and all through the spooky season, and that’s such a cool thing.
Ray Nicholson in Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn FIlm “SMILE 2”
Smile 2 is in theaters now.
Featured image: Naomi Scott stars in Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn Film “SMILE 2.” Courtesy Paramount Pictures.
Life as a pop star isn’t as great as it looks, if the smiles surrounding global sensation Skye Riley (Naomi Scott) are any indicator. Smile 2, director Parker Finn’s sequel to 2022’s surprise hit Smile, demonstrates the horror of having a public psychological breakdown triggered by the triple threat of hidden trauma, the immense pressures of fame, and a deadly curse.
After an addiction-induced meltdown and a car accident that killed her boyfriend, Paul Hudson (Ray Nicholson), Skye is freshly sober and planning a comeback tour. But a visit to an old friend, Lewis Fregoli (Lukas Gage), for off-script painkillers exposes her to the smiling affliction, as a deeply unwell Lewis transforms into a terrifying grinning caricature who kills himself in front of Skye. Skye keeps what she witnessed a secret, but she soon experiences the same hallucinations that come with the affliction, as the evil smile comes over the faces of fans, her backup dancers, and even her assistant (Miles Gutierrez-Riley). Her life falls apart, and whether at rehearsal or in her penthouse apartment, the pop star is desperately alone.
Lukas Gage stars in Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn FIlm “SMILE 2”
Cinematographer Charlie Sarroff, who also lensed Smile, heightens the film’s fright factor by using the camera to deepen Skye’s sense of isolation. But the show must go on, and even as the star’s visions grow increasingly real and violent, she rehearses and performs, which means Sarroff and his crew lit and shot arena-level pop performances, in addition to a private, horror-fueled meltdown. We spoke with the cinematographer about setting the stage for a credible pop show, playing up the star’s unusual experience of the smiling affliction, and how he created a unique sense of New York City on location and on set.
As you got into planning, were there specific horror tropes you wanted to lean into or avoid?
With Smile, we don’t necessarily want to lean into as much darkness. There are certain horror tropes there — jump scares and all that sort of stuff — but we did want to try and find something unique with Smile to develop its own language. We definitely play a lot with lensing, being on wide lenses, and being very close to Skye Riley. We just feel that it gives the audience a sense of vulnerability and anxiety, being really with the protagonist and not really seeing as much from her point of view and making her feel as alone as possible.
Naomi Scott stars in Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn FIlm “SMILE 2”
We’re also very aware that she doesn’t lead a normal life.
Obviously, this is set around a pop star, so she’s in an environment that can be quite glossy, heightened, and quite wealthy. We didn’t really want to shy away from that. We wanted to make sure that we had credibility going in and coming out. When she’s on stage, it feels like a real show. Lester Cohen, the production designer, did a really good job in helping craft the spaces that she lives in, which I was able to light to make feel unique like somewhere someone like her would actually live.
Naomi Scott stars in Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn FIlm “SMILE 2”
How did you approach the closeups and unusual angles used in this film?
That was definitely a language we developed in the first film, but with this one, we wanted to push it and go a bit bigger and bolder. Those interesting angles, being top-down and inverted, it’s really just represent that Skye Riley’s world is flipping upside down and turning on her. Everything that she thinks could be real may or may not be real. And again, it’s just to give the audience a sense of anxiety and confusion, to really get under the skin and create more tension.
Naomi Scott stars in Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn FIlm “SMILE 2”
How did you light and shoot Skye’s performances?
They kept me up at night. It was very important to us to create an environment that was credible. The Beyonce movie was out at the time. A few of us went to see that at the cinema in prep, and we took notes and looked at things that we liked and didn’t like. We watched a lot of shows, looking at the different designs of the stages. I think a really important thing about being a cinematographer is surrounding yourself with people who are really great at their job. One thing I made sure to do is to talk to a really good lighting designer who does live shows and bring that element in because it’s quite different from lighting a film with film lighting.
Director of Photography Charlie Sarroff on the set of Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn FIlm “SMILE 2”
Where were you shooting the performance scenes?
We shot it in Albany, New York. We were able to get the arena there for about five days. It was a really crazy experience, seeing the team turn the stage from an ice hockey game or a rock show or whatever it was the night before. It was a lot of stress, but the way that those people work is amazing. Hopefully, we pulled it off.
Director Parker Finn, left of Director of Photography Charlie Sarroff, center, on the set of Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn FIlm “SMILE 2”
How was shooting around New York?
The stages were based in Newburgh. We were in Albany for a week, and we shot a lot of different areas around two hours upstate from the city, like the Beacon area. My main camera assistants, operator, and grip had come up from New York City. My gaffer, Joel Minnich, is actually from New Jersey. I would say it’s a mix. There were some people in wardrobe that were from [upstate New York]. In Albany, a lot of the stage crew people who work with the arena were all locals. I like to try to be loyal to a crew that you love and like working with because there’s a shorthand there. I always try and fight to have people, if they’re not too far away, to have them on again.
The story also feels very New York. How did you use the cinematography to convey a sense of the city?
If the film is set in a city, I think it is very important to spend some time there shooting exteriors unless there’s an endless VFX budget and huge VFX extensions. It was really important to Parker, as well. He’s all about doing things in-camera and being authentic. We were able to spend about a week there during main principal photography. For example, the Manhattan Bridge and the bar’s exterior are actually in New York City.
On the set of Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn FIlm “SMILE 2”
How did you make Skye’s New York life feel specific to her character?
We just wanted to get a lot of scope and really feel the city and make it feel like this menacing place that could be quite lonely. That’s [conveyed through] Skye Riley’s penthouse apartment being up there on its own and having the view out to the city. We actually used LED panels for that. We opted to go shoot plates from the perspective of a building in downtown Manhattan, and then we just played them on these LED screens that PRG provided, and I feel like that helps give you that sense of realism. So all of that penthouse apartment was on stages in Newburgh, but you see the traffic moving and that atmosphere as the pollution gets in the way of lights and gives it the twinkle that you see.
Dylan Gelula, left, and Naomi Scott star in Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn FIlm “SMILE 2”
Something that looked really different was Skye’s flashback to the argument scene in the car before they crashed. How did you approach that?
The camera needs to be right in between them. It’s not a big car. It’s an unbroken shot. It creates suspense and certainly makes you very uncomfortable. I really enjoyed that sequence. The vast majority of the film is shot on the Alexa 65. In this case, it was the Sony Rialto. You can remove the sensor and the lens and make it very small and compact. And it’s a brilliant camera as well, suited for much smaller spaces.
We spotted “Sarroff Mints” printed on the tin where Skye hides her painkillers. Was that your Easter egg?
That was a nice little gesture by Martin, our props master, and Lester, the production designer. I’m not getting any royalties! I didn’t really know that was happening until the day and then I was like, cool.
Smile 2 is in theaters now.
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Featured image: Director of Photography Charlie Sarroff, left, and Naomi Scott on the set of Paramount Pictures Presents A Temple Hill Production A Parker Finn FIlm “SMILE 2”
Jon Stewart isn’t going anywhere—at least through 2025. Stewart announced Monday that he’ll stay on The Daily Show as the once-a-week host on Mondays and remain an executive producer through December 2025. Stewart announced his return to the show nine months ago just as the presidential election was heating up—Stewart hosted The Daily Show from 1998 to 2015 and turned it into a cultural juggernaut—and his recent captaining of the program has boosted its ratings and profile.
When Stewart returned, the cadence was set that he’d mostly host on Monday nights through the presidential election. On Election Day, Stewart will be hosting a live, hour-long special on November 5, and the new extension means he’ll be on air for the first year of the winner’s term. Stewart will keep his Monday schedule, with The Daily Show‘s correspondents—Jordan Klepper, Ronny Chieng, Michael Kosta, and Desi Lydic—rotating hosting duties Tuesday through Thursday.
“I’ve truly enjoyed being back working with the incredible team at The Daily Show and Comedy Central,” Stewart said in a statement. “I was really hoping they’d allow me to do every other Monday, but I’ll just have to suck it up.”
The Daily Show recently won a second straight Emmy for Best Talk Series, and Stewart’s return has been a boon for the show’s ratings, which have averaged more than a million viewers since he got behind the desk again.
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA – SEPTEMBER 15: Jon Stewart (C), cast, and crew accept the Outstanding Talk Series award for The Daily Show onstage during the 76th Primetime Emmy Awards at Peacock Theater on September 15, 2024 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Kevin Winter/Getty Images)
“Jon’s incisive intellect and sharp wit make him one of the most important voices in political and cultural commentary today,” said Chris McCarthy, Paramount Global Co-CEO and president/CEO of Showtime & MTV Entertainment Studios. “His ability to cut through the noise and deliver clear-eyed insights is exactly what we need, which is why we are thrilled to have him leading The Daily Show for another year.”
For more on The Daily Show, check out these stories:
Featured image: NEW YORK, NY – AUGUST 06: Jon Stewart hosts “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” #JonVoyage on August 6, 2015 in New York City. (Photo by Brad Barket/Getty Images for Comedy Central)
Hot off Audience Award wins at both the Mill Valley and Middleburg Film Festivals, the filmConclave enjoyed phenomenal word of mouth on its way into theaters on October 25. Based on Robert Harris’ bestselling 2016 thriller, Conclave goes behind the sequestered doors of the Vatican to show the inner workings of selecting a new pope.
The story follows Cardinal Lawrence (Ralph Fiennes), who must run the conclave after his beloved friend, the current pope, dies unexpectedly. While acting in a managerial capacity, he is also working to get Bellini (Stanley Tucci), a more progressive cardinal, nominated as pope, all while undergoing a crisis of faith. Other cardinals are vying for the job, but intrigue and surprises come into play, including the unannounced arrival of Benitez (Carlos Diehz), a cardinal whose appointment the pope kept secret from nearly everyone. Throughout the entire process, Sister Agnes (Isabella Rossellini) is in charge of the hundreds of nuns tasked with keeping the cardinals well-fed and comfortable. She is meant to be seen and not heard, but for reasons that become clear, staying silent is impossible for her.
The visually sumptuous, exciting, and tense film is courtesy of Oscar-winning director Edward Berger (All Quiet on the Western Front) and Oscar-nominated screenwriter Peter Straughan (Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy). Not only is the film on many shortlists for the Best Picture Oscar, but so, too, are the performances from Ralph Fiennes and Stanley Tucci for Best Actor and Supporting Actor categories.
The Credits spoke to Edward Berger and Isabella Rossellini about their experience working on this fascinating tale of religious and political intrigue.
Isabella, Sister Agnes is expected to stay silent but is also very direct when she does speak. How did you go about building her as a character?
Isabella Rossellini: I went to a school run by nuns, and my nuns were a great inspiration. Of course it was written in the script, the way the nuns were, it’s not that I created anything, but I could identify or recognize it. The nuns at my school had a lot of authority and they weren’t coy. They are always man to man—so to speak. I remember they were very direct but also very respectful, and so when I played Sister Agnes, I thought of them and was very glad to have had that experience, so I didn’t hesitate. I knew them well.
There’s certainly a hierarchy at play, and it’s quite a contrast between them and the Cardinals. This is reflected in how Edward filmed them.
Rossellini: As an actor, I am just playing the role as written, and the nuns are everywhere the men are, but the genius was in how Ed covered it. One day, I saw how he was covering crowd movement. As actors, we are just moving from one place to another, but the camera was very high, and he had the nuns coming in, running like a school of fish or little ducklings in a row, just headed towards a destination, running in and out of the frame. They are not to disturb the men but just do their duty. The men, instead, were talking and interacting and taking up a lot of space. So you could tell what the hierarchy was through those images. Yes, we speak, and there is dialogue, but so much is said through images. Even while watching the film, I noticed that the nuns are always in the background, and sometimes they are just in shadow. There may be very little dialogue, but you always see them. They are there. That’s the director.
Isabella, in the scene where you speak up, how did you leverage the environment to capture Sister Agnes’s experience?
Rossellini: First of all, I was nervous. It was a room full of men, and I was the only woman in it. There were scenes with many nuns, but most didn’t speak Italian or English, so I felt very intimidated. I thought Sister Agnes would feel the same, so I used it for the scene. I could use that even though my heart was beating very fast; I had to steady myself and just be dignified.
Edward Berger: I remember hearing your heart in my ears.
Rossellini: I knew it would be good and would help if I was trembling and had a real fear of doing takes in front of so many men and all the technicians. It fit the character, so I was able to use it.
Edward, your films often explore the themes of doubt and liberation. How is that shown in Conclave, and how does having Ralph Fiennes as Cardinal Lawrence contribute to the story?
Berger: Well, Ralph’s character is basically based in doubt. He says at some point, “I have difficulty with prayer.” Just imagine. That’s like me saying I have difficulty believing in the power of the camera I’m using, or a writer saying, “I don’t believe my words anymore”. The central part of your being is taken away. He is on unsure ground and doesn’t know if he should be there. He’s lost. As a cardinal, that means you’ve had 20 promotions. You have a very powerful top job in the church. You’re a top Catholic. With that promotion comes responsibility, but sometimes that means losing the origin of why you made it. There are so many film CEOs who say they want to go back to producing. That’s Cardinal Lawrence. He yearns for the purity of his faith, but he meets that in another cardinal and recognizes that purity in Cardinal Benitez, but he is living in doubt. That’s why I needed an actor who could show what he was thinking, and with Ralph, you could see behind his eyes. It’s magical. You put the camera on him, understand exactly what he’s thinking, and follow each thought as if it were dialogue, but he doesn’t say anything.
And are there ways in which you bring in the idea of liberation or the hope of liberation in Conclave?
Berger: The architecture is one example of that. With the Casa Santa Marta, it is almost like a jail. That’s what we’re trying to equate it to, and when the doors close, and all you hear is the hum of the fluorescent light and Ralph’s breath. It’s really silent, with no air or light coming in. I wanted everything to feel shut in and oppressive and claustrophobic. It’s called ‘The Sequester.’ They’re not to have contact, so it must be lonely. Then, at the end, when the conclave is over, there’s a moment when the shutters rise, and Ralph goes to the window and opens it, and lets the air in. He hears female laughter, and he lets the light and the future in. Ideally, because you’ve lived through this oppression and darkness with Ralph, you, too, feel that relief and liberation of breathing fresh air again.
Rossellini: I think the film really is about doubt because it celebrates the mystery, which is what religion is about. I’m not a very religious person, but I did go to a nun school. I think this, in its own way, is a very religious film. I’m interested in how people will react to it because it accepts doubt and lives in the mystery. That’s really the basis of faith.
In the first image from Deliver Me From Nowhere, director Scott Cooper’s (Crazy Hearts) biopic about Bruce Springsteen, Jeremy Allen White has traded in his kitchen whites for the boss’s leather and denim.
The Bear star is stepping into one of his meatiest cinematic roles to date, taking on Bruce Springsteen in Cooper’s adaptation of Warren Zanes’ 2030 book “Deliver Me From Nowhere: The Making of Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska.” Succession star Jeremy Strong is on board as Springsteen’s longtime music manager, Jon Landau. Stephan Graham plays Springsteen’s father, and Paul Walter Hauser is guitar tech Mike Batlan. Odessa Young is rumored to be playing a love interest.
The first image reveals White as the Boss in a leather jacket and flannel shirt.
Deliver Me From Nowhere was adapted by Cooper, who directs with cinematographer Masanobu Takayangi, production designer Stefania Cella, and editor Pamela Martin all on board. Cooper’s Crazy Heart, centered on Bridges’ faded country musician, earned Bridges an Oscar for Best Actor and musicians T Bone Burnett and Ryan Bingham Oscars for Best Original Song. Eric Robinson and Ellen Goldsmith-Vein of the Gotham Group are producing Deliver Me From Nowhere, representing Scott Stuber’s first producing project since joining Netflix as the head of their film division.
The new film will follow the young Springsteen on his journey to make his sixth album, a departure from his previous work and one representing the Boss at his most stripped-down and personal. Springsteen recorded “Nebraska” in the sparest, least fussy way possible—on a four-track cassette in his bedroom in New Jersey. This was a few years before he and his E Street Band became a phenomenon with “Born in the U.S.A.”
“Beginning production on this film is an incredibly humbling and thrilling journey,” Cooper said in a statement. “Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Nebraska’ has profoundly shaped my artistic vision. The album’s raw, unvarnished portrayal of life’s trials and resilience resonates deeply with me. Our film aims to capture that same spirit, bringing Warren Zanes’ compelling narrative of Bruce’s life to the screen with authenticity and hope, honoring Bruce’s legacy in a transformative cinematic experience. It has been a great pleasure to collaborate with Bruce and Jon [Landau] as I tell their story, and their creative energy fuels every part of this journey. As well, I’m excited to reunite with my friend, David Greenbaum [president, Disney Live Action and 20th Century Studios], as he embarks on his new role at Disney, adding another layer of inspiration to this project.”
Here’s the full image:
Jeremy Allen White as Bruce Springsteen. Mark Seliger/20th Century FoxJeremy Allen White as Bruce Springsteen. Mark Seliger/20th Century Fox
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Featured image: Jeremy Allen White as Bruce Springsteen. Mark Seliger/20th Century FoxJeremy Allen White as Bruce Springsteen. Mark Seliger/20th Century Fox
It was only a few days ago that Tom Holland appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and revealed that Spider-Man 4 was officially happening and would begin shooting next summer. Now, it’s been revealed that Spider-Man 4 has an official release date.
Holland will swing back into action as Peter Parker on July 24, 2026. The film will be directed by Shang-Chi director Destin Daniel Creton, and will arrive just two months after Avengers: Doomsday, which premiers on May 1, 2026 and sees the return of Robert Downey Jr. to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but crucially not as Tony Stark but rather as the arch-villain Victor von Doom, aka Doctor Doom.
The still-untitled Spider-Man 4 will be the first Spidey outing since the trilogy capping, critical and commercial smash Spider-Man: No Way Home bowed in 2021. That film boasted not just Holland’s Peter Parker but a three-pack of Parkers, with Andrew Garfield and Tobey Maguire reprising their Spider-Man roles in a multiverse-spanning epic that also saw the return of Willem Dafoe’s Green Goblin, Alfred Molina’s Doc Ock, and Jamie Foxx’s Electro. Holland had gone on Fallon then and famously said there weren’t any other Spider-Men in the movie except him.
“You totally, without a doubt, professionally lied to us all,” Fallon said. “But I will say, it was worth it.
It was only last week that Holland recently revealed on the Rich Roll podcast that he and Zendaya had read a draft of the Spider-Man 4 script, saying that while it needed some work, the writers had done a great job. “It really lit a fire in me,” Holland said on the podcast. “Zendaya and I sat down and read it together and we at times were bouncing around the living room, like this is a real movie worthy of the fans’ respect.”
There’s no word yet on whether Zendaya will reprise her role as MJ, who the villain might be, or how it will play into the events in Avengers: Doomsday. One thing’s for certain—2026 will be a big year for Marvel.
For more on all things Spider-Man, check out these stories:
We already knew that a new Predator film was headed our way—Predator: Badlands—the sequel to 2022’s Dan Trachtenberg’s hit Prey. But now, thanks to a conversation between 20th Century Studio Boss Steve Asbell and The Hollywood Reporter‘s Borys Kit, we now know there’s a secret, additional Predator film lurking on the 2025 release schedule.
Asbell revealed that after the success of Trachtenberg’s Prey, the director wasn’t interested in doing a Prey 2. So, Trachtenberg pitched 20th Century Studio “a bunch of ideas that were really crazy but really cool,” Asbell said. “We’ve actually done two of them. Two are coming out next year. One I can’t talk about yet, but the other is the live-action Predator film with Elle Fanning that just wrapped in New Zealand. That’ll be out theatrically sometime next year.”
The Predator (Dane DiLiegro), shown. (Photo courtesy of 20th Century Studios.)
Elle Fanning is starring in Badlands, a movie that Asbell says is “an absolute bonkers idea. It is a sci-fi thing, but it’s not what everybody thinks it is. And I mean, it’s awesome. It is so nuts. But in Dan, we trust.” But Asbell’s reveal to THR that Trachtenberg directed the second secret Predator film, too, is news to everyone. Badlands was already on the schedule with a November 7, 2025 release, and Asbell said the secret Predator Trachtenberg also directed would come out before, so that presumably means direct-to-streaming on Hulu. There’s no information out there about what this mysterious film will be about, but considering Prey was a self-contained period piece set 300 years before any previous Predator, we can guess that the new mystery film will have its own, separate time and place. Prey was delightful for just how different it felt from previous Predators, yet how it connected to the original 1987 film in the brutal simplicity of its setting. In the original, Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Dutch is a part of a commando team that gets slaughtered, one by one, by a Predator in a Central American jungle, until it’s just Dutch versus the Predator. In Prey, a young Comanche woman played by Amber Midthunder is pitted against Predator on Comanche Nation land in the Northern Great Plains in 1719.
Naru (Amber Midthunder) and the Predator (Dane DiLiegro), shown. (Photo by David Bukach.)
Badlands is reportedly not set in the past but will take place sometime in the future, and it just wrapped filming in New Zealand. Now, all we know about this mysterious third Trachtenberg film is that it exists, but given his track record, we can make an educated guess that it will be set entirely apart from the other two films.
When asked if there would be a new Alien vs. Predator film, a monster crossover that’s happened a number of times over the years, Asbell didn’t rule it out but admitted to no concrete plans.
“It wouldn’t be in the way you think. That’s the thing. Not in the way that it will just be called Alien vs. Predatoror anything like the original movies. If we do this, they’ll be organically created out of these two franchises that we’ve continued with characters that we fall in love with and those characters will combine…perhaps.”
We’ll keep you posted when we learn more about Badlands and this mysterious other Predator project. For now, you can stream Prey on Hulu.
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Director Danny Boyle’s nervy 2002 thriller 28 Days Later reinvigorated the zombie genre, introducing a version of the undead that was just as pitiless as previous iterations but quicker, more decisive, and more terrifying. Working off a script written by Alex Garland (who would go on to become an incredible director in his own right in films like Ex Machina, Annihilation, and Civil War) and cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle (who would later win an Oscar for his work on Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire), Boyle deployed Canon XL-1 digital cameras while filming on location in England, a novel approach at the time. Now, 22 years later, with Boyle, Garland, Mantle, and 28 Days Later star Cillian Murphy all reuniting for 28 Years Later, Boyle and his team have once again utilized a novel approach to give audiences something new.
Speaking with Collider, 28 Years Later co-star Ralph Fiennes revealed that Boyle shot the film, at least partially, using an iPhone 15 Pro Max. Fiennes is doing the rounds to talk about his critically acclaimed new thriller, Conclave, but he offered this juicy detail about how they filmed the movie after reports surfaced about Boyle choosing the iPhone. “Yeah, the iPhone attached on the back of huge lenses!“
This confirms previous reports that Boyle and his team eschewed the usual camera set-up and instead, again at least partially, utilized the iPhone, albeit in a highly advanced way—the phone was held in place by a protective cage and enhanced with attachments that increased its capabilities. In the original, camcorders were used to create grainier, rougher textures that befit the time and the context. The original featured a breakout performance by a then little-known Murphy as Jim, a young man who wakes up in a hospital in the U.K. to find out the country has been completely overrun by the undead. Now, decades later, Boyle returns and deploys arguably the piece of technology that defines our era to offer a vastly different visual palette that speaks to a new era of technology and, depending upon who you ask, the dread of living in a self-surveiling world.
28 Years Later reunites the original creative team and marks the start of a new era in the franchise. Its cast includes the aforementioned Murphy, returning as Jim and Fiennes, as well as Jodie Comer and Aaron Taylor-Johnson. But 28 Years Later is just the start of a new trilogy, written by Garland and set to feature director Nia DaCosta helming the second installment.
28 Years Later will be unleashed in theaters on June 20, 2025.
Featured image: LONDON, ENGLAND – OCTOBER 10: (EDITORS NOTE: Image has been converted to black and white) Ralph Fiennes attends the “Conclave” Headline Gala during the 68th BFI London Film Festival at The Royal Festival Hall on October 10, 2024 in London, England. (Photo by Gareth Cattermole/Getty Images for BFI)
Agatha All Along wiselybrings songwriters Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez back to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. This is only fitting, considering the two helped musically introduce Agatha to great acclaim inWandaVision. With the latest Disney+ series from creator Jac Schaeffer, the acclaimed music duo explores music history as they deliver time-spanning variations of the powerful “Ballad of the Witches Road.”
The music is integral not only to the plot but also to the characters in Agatha All Along. Following the titular character (played by the effervescent Kathryn Hahn) after she lost her powers in WandaVision, Agatha is no longer flying solo—she conjures up a coven to help her regain herself via the Witche’s Road. Through the power of song, the bond between the band of witches grows as Agatha reclaims her powers.
Recently, Kristen and Robert Lopez spoke with The Credits about crafting a hypnotic ballad, as well as their enchanting 1970s rock and roll spin on it from episode four.
“Ballad of the Witches Road” is beautiful. What were your first inklings for it?
Kristen: Well, it really came from Jac. Jac had written these incredible scripts. She brought us in after all the episodes had been drafted in some way, and we were able to see what the ballad was doing.
Robert: It even had dummy lyrics in it.
Kristen: Yes, all of the genres she wanted, all of the information. The real trick was, which song were we going to hit first? After thinking, we were like, “We should do the ‘70s ballad first.” It had to sound like a hit, had to be a love song, but it also had to hold all of these pieces of information from different episodes. We knew if we could get that one, then we could start stripping back.
For the ‘70s ballad version, what techniques or little things did you both use to ensure that the song fit this time in American music?
Robert: Jac is a huge Fleetwood Mac fan, as well as the Eagles and Hotel California, and Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young – those kinds of harmonies. We love that stuff, too. We steeped ourselves in it, especially that 12-string guitar sound that Hotel California has, which has always made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.It’s a bit of playing with the major and minor scale kind of mixed together to mirror qualities. I thought that was a good place to start musically. Then Kristen took that voice memo I emailed her.
Kristen: When I’m like, “Ooh, that!” – we’ll get it in a voice memo, and then he’ll shoot it to me. I sit in this giant bed with sheets of paper, like three screens up, and no one can interrupt me for six hours. I need to be in flow to feel all these pieces and channel them into a love song. That’s what that day was like.
Have you both considered the soundtrack having B-sides of just the voice memos?
Kristen: That’s a funny idea.
Robert: We are the demo singers of our own songs, so it’s fun to have a playlist of just us and watch it get replaced by the real thing as we go. It’s one of the markers of how we know we’re making progress.
Kristen: We both were in a cappella groups growing up. Do you know how every cappella group has their signature song? My acapella group had “Helplessly Hoping,” which is a Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young song. And then, for the sacred version, we both sang in churches. Bobby’s first job out of college was singing in an Episcopal choir. Sacred music lives in him.
Robert: Spiritual magic and music are all in the same world for me. That’s central to what we do, finding the magic in music. That’s definitely there in Frozen. We truly believe in this stuff. We make it, but we don’t know quite how or why it works. Sometimes, it’s just a weird alchemy. We were trying to capture the spell that a song can cast.
How’d you both want to get the hypnotic feeling in Agatha All Along similar to what you once sang in choir?
Robert: When I sang in a choir in college, we did a lot of plain chant, Gregorian chant. That’s a very specific singing, so we used that for the sacred chant. We also incorporated the idea of a drone – one character singing while the other sings the melody on top of it. There’s something magical about that, something ritualistic and solemn.
Kristen: It comes all the way from Europe over to America sometime in the 15th century, right around the time Agatha was hanging out in Massachusetts. It’s when the Salem witch hunts were happening, so this would’ve been the music of their time. That’s the origin of a lot of American music. These sacred songs become folk songs that you can sing in taverns and pubs. Then they become blues, and that blues gets turned into jazz in New Orleans, which eventually becomes rock. And that rock leads to all the music we have today.
You get to explore American music history in the show. Were there any new lessons while working on Agatha All Along, something that stuck with you?
Kristen: There’s always something to learn during mastering and mixing because that’s such an odd science. The moment it goes from your mix to the master…
Robert: It’s painstaking.
Kristen: Yeah, because we definitely wanted Patti’s voice to stick out in a way that a pop song would not; you wouldn’t hear Patti LuPone’s voice hitting so high. So, exploring how we keep the individual voices in a process that’s so much about smoothing everything out was fun.
Robert: Actually, the thing I didn’t know was Fleetwood Mac’s “Silver Spring.” I didn’t know that song. It’s one of Jac’s favorites, and she said, “You’ve got to watch the live recording.” It was 20 years later, and they finally sang it together on stage. You can see she turns to him, and he’s looking away because it’s all about his infidelity. There’s a moment where he meets her gaze, and the whole song takes on a level of drama. We were both crying watching it. Such an incredible song. It deepened my appreciation for that era and that group.
Which is basically one of the greatest soap opera stories in music, right?
Kristen: Well, it’s obviously in the zeitgeist. We had already written this song, and then we heard about this little show – it’s not little anymore – called Stereophonic, which also explores the drama behind iconic songs. But Jac had written the whole episode long before Stereophonic came to Broadway. We’re all fascinated by these songs that live rent-free in our brains.
Robert: Everybody loves the behind-the-scenes of music. In many ways, Agatha is about that. It’s about the formation of this coven, which is kind of like a band – the infighting and the search for connection. WandaVision was about being trapped in a bubble, and Agatha All Along was about breaking out and finding your people.
How else did you want the music to tell that story?
Kristen: Everyone in this coven has something to heal. These songs are part of that healing. There’s healing in the sacred version that brings these isolated witches together. When we sing in harmony, oxytocin is produced. It’s the bonding hormone that’s also produced when breastfeeding. Singing together creates bonding and love. You don’t even have to sing – you just have to be in the same space as people singing. It truly creates a physical connection.
Lumon Industries is back in business. What is that business? Well, that’s part of Severance‘s cryptic, compelling dread.
It’s been three years since Severance‘s first season, and the trailer for season two reintroduces us to Adam Scott’s Mark S., returning to the Lumon offices after he let his “innie” loose on the outside world and learned, to his shock and horror, that the wife he thought he’d lost in a car accident is actually alive and working at Lumon—she’s the wellness counselor, Ms. Casey (Dichen Lachman), who he had met with repeatedly during season one.
The big reveal in Severance season one was that the Lumon employees who toiled in the office actually never left—the people who worked there with Mark, including Helly (Britt Lower), Irving (John Turturro), and Dylan (Zach Cherry), had their home lives and work lives completely severed via a very bizarre, clearly NSFW procedure. The new trailer reveals that Mark’s return to the Lumon office finds new faces at the desks that used to be occupied by Helly, Irving, and Dylan—”Who are you people?” he asks. The one familiar face is his manager Milchick (Tramell Tillman) who is there to welcome him back with some supremely creepy balloons.
Joining the aforementioned cast from season one are Patricia Arquette, Christopher Walken, Jen Tullock, and Michael Chernus. Newcomers include Gwendoline Christie, Alia Shawkat, Bob Balaban, Merritt Wever, Robby Benson, Stefano Carannante, John Noble, Ólafur Darri and Sarah Bock.
The wait for season two has been long, especially considering it ended on such a delicious cliffhanger. The talent involved in Severance, including Ben Still as a producer and director, means that the wait will almost certainly be worth it. Check out the trailer for season 2, which arrives on Apple TV+ on January 17.
For more stories on Apple TV+ series and films, check these out:
Actor-turned-director Dev Patel, best known for his breakthrough role in Slumdog Millionaire, received a well-earned standing ovation for his directorial feature debut, Monkey Man, at the SXSW Film & TV Festival in Austin Texas this past March. His thrilling, kinetic debut went on to win the Headliners Audience Award.
The fight-filled action epic produced by Get Out and Us director Jordan Peele was inspired by the story of the half-monkey, half-human Hindu god Hanuman. Patel stars as the Kid, an anonymous young man nursing a wound so elemental it becomes a source of inexhaustible rage and, ultimately, power. Set in Mumbai, the plot revolves around the bone-shattering revenge journey as The Kid dons a gorilla mask and sets out to avenge his mother’s murder. Following its world premiere at SXSW, Monkey Man was released in the United States by Universal in April.
Monkey Man was meant to film in Mumbai, where it was set; however, the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic derailed those production plans. Like the Kid, the cast and crew of Monkey Man needed to find a new way toward their goal.
The production ended up in Batam, an island in Indonesia that is a short ferry ride from Singapore and home to one of the largest production and animation facilities in Southeast Asia, operated by Infinite Studios.
Infinite Studios has been a busy fount of creative action. In the past decade, its Batam facilities’ productions have included the HBO Asia series Grisse, Folklore, Dead Mine, Halfworlds, and Serangoon Road. Since Monkey Man was shot there, Batam has recently hosted more original series productions: Operandi Gerhana for Singapore’s MediaCorp and Losmen Melati, produced by Infinite Studios and Taiwan’s Catchplay. Later this year, the studio will release the feature film Orang Ikan, which is set to premiere at the gala section of the upcoming Tokyo International Film Festival (October 28-November 6).
We spoke to Mike Wiluan, CEO of Infinite Studios, about how the production overcame the many challenges of shooting during COVID-19 on the island of Batam and got Patel’s scorching debut into theaters.
From India to Indonesia, how did Monkey Man end up on Batam Island?
I’ve known Dev Patel for some years. He was a frequent guest at the Singapore International Film Festival (SGIFF) when I was the festival chairman. Unfortunately, Monkey Man was in preparation in Mumbai when COVID-19 hit, and the production had to be shut down. Dev and his team called me and enquired whether they could move the production to Batam. We had just completed a show and had space for them.
HOLLYWOOD, CALIFORNIA – APRIL 03: Dev Patel attends the Los Angeles premiere of Universal Pictures’ “Monkey Man” at TCL Chinese Theatre on April 03, 2024 in Hollywood, California. (Photo by Kevin Winter/Getty Images)
That was at the peak of the pandemic. What made Patel think Batam was the right place?
As Covid was spreading and countries shutting down with strict controls, we had to immediately present the opportunity to relevant government agencies in Indonesia to prepare a safe and plausible way to continue production. Batam and the studio in Nongsa were very isolated, including the resorts that would be entirely dedicated to the show; the authorities were confident that the project could be managed. The entirety of the production was produced in our studios in Nongsa and some remote locations in Batam. There were some plates and drone shots done in Batam.
How did the pre-production and production come together once Batam was confirmed as the alternative filming location?
Once we had government approvals, we contacted the Indonesian Embassies around the world to facilitate visas for the heads of departments and actors. Dev and his team were the first into Batam and began their 14-day quarantine immediately. As designs were finalized, the sets, both interiors and exteriors, soon started to be built on the backlot. It took around three months of preparation before shooting commenced. The time was extended as strict COVID protocols were adhered to. From pre-production to production, the shoot took around six months.
What kind of filming support did Infinite Studios provide?
Infinite Studios provided studio facilities, government permissions, production administration, casting, logistics, catering, camera and technical equipment, building, and the provision of local film crews.
Batam served to double up as Mumbai, which is a very distinct, bustling city. What kind of sets need to be built?
The two soundstages (30 sq ft and 14 sq ft) acted as interior spaces, and many interiors were built. The backlot (one hectare) was used as Mumbai’s modern city, so the facades were decorated in Mumbai fashion, including props. There were some mock-up sets on our empty land and forest areas that doubled as village sets. Other locations we filmed included an abandoned hotel, which had a ballroom, full-size service kitchen, and lifts. Some more derelict areas of Batam were used.
How did you manage crowd scenes with many extras while adhering to strict COVID protocols??
We carefully ensured that different types of extras went through quarantine and testing procedures. Day background extras were separated into different areas, and the assistant directors carefully ensured they were shot in efficient groups.
You mentioned the HODs were from overseas. What was the ratio of overseas and local crew?
We had HODs from overseas, such as cinematographers, action choreographers, production designers, and wardrobe. Several key HODs from India brought cultural relevance, especially in wardrobe. Most of the crew (90%) were from Indonesia and supported all departments.
Productions worldwide are now available online to viewers everywhere. You are also a filmmaker, having directed both films (Buffalo Boys, upcoming Orang Ikan) and series (Operandi Gerhana, Losmen Melati). What are your thoughts on copyright?
We are finding that more often when we release content on streaming platforms, it is quickly uploaded onto social media. TikTok has been a frequent platform for snack-sized content, which is then uploaded multiple times to form an episode. For a country like Indonesia, which thrives on social media, we have found a huge viewership from watching bite-sized content on social media platforms. The shows have become very viral, and viewership numbers are significant.
Filming “Buffalo Boys” at Infinite Studios in Batam.
Is there anything you can do?
Some platforms take action to bring the content down, but it is an endless task as they quickly appear elsewhere. Some platforms may see this viral spread as a positive view on promotion and a potential boost to their subscriber base. However, as producers, much effort has been spent crafting the show to be seen as intended, and it quickly appears elsewhere, so seeing this effort being cut into bite-sized chunks can be frustrating.
Indonesia seems to be slow to make any production incentives available. Has it made any progress lately?
Government incentives greatly increase our competitive edge as a production house and studio with significant infrastructure investment in Indonesia. The discussion on incentives has been a long road that has been championed not only by us but by the entire industry, which is looking to produce better-quality films for a growing domestic market with the potential for overseas distribution.
How’s the progress been so far?
Despite much effort in lobbying government ministries and agencies, many of these discussions are heard but, sadly, not acted upon. More recently, there have been efforts to announce some programs based on a matching fund scheme, but even then, the process has been rather vague. The long and toothless argument of Indonesia being a ‘cheap’, ‘value added’ or ‘location diverse’ destination is not something we want to boast about. We have deep talent and a committed, skilled workforce who have evolved tremendously in leaps and bounds over the years, with thanks to the box office growth and original productions from streamers.
What are the real roadblocks here?
Much of the footdragging comes from the fact that administrators do not understand the nature of the industry and how the industry provides an economic domino effect across other business ecosystems. Not to mention the benefits of fostering growth and potential of the country’s fledgling creative sector, but also the positive public relations image for Indonesia globally – in particular to its tourism industry, which still remains a key strategic growth sector today. However, as box office numbers continue to grow and more Indonesian filmmakers are making headlines in festivals and working overseas – the government is taking notice and giving support. However, the support is more of a blessing than actual defined incentives.
What kind of action should be taken that will benefit the industry?
Choosing the right path for transparently and fairly administering incentives still needs further robust study. The other complicated issue is that these incentives (if acted on now) would need to involve several ministries, including the Ministry of Finance. But with the elections completed and a new cabinet being formed, we are waiting to see if there will be dedicated and clear administrators who will handle this matter moving forward. We are hopeful, given that several international productions have brought wide praise for our talented filmmakers. However, the loudest voices have come from the public, who are incredibly proud of the achievements made so far. The government has taken notice, and with the new cabinet soon to be in place, we hope the road ahead will lead to a final destination that will benefit the industry as a whole.
For more interviews with filmmakers and producers taking big swings in Asia, check these out:
Tom Holland came on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon ready to unleash a major web of movie news.
“Next summer, we start shooting,” Holland told Fallon. “Everything’s good to go. We’re nearly there. Super exciting. I can’t wait!”
Holland was talking about Spider-Man 4, of course, which will be the first Spidey film since the trilogy capping instant classic Spider-Man: No Way Home bowed in 2021 and revealed Holland’s Peter Parker teaming up with Parkers past—Andrew Garfield and Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Men—to vanquish a trio of classic villains. It was on Fallon before No Way Home that Holland appeared, and Holland said there weren’t any other Spider-Men in the movie except him.
“You totally, without a doubt, professionally lied to us all,” Fallon said. “But I will say, it was worth it.
Tom Holland is Spider-Man and Zendaya is MJ in “Spider-Man: No Way Home.” Courtesy Sony Pictures.
It wasn’t easy for Holland, Garfield, and Maguire to keep their secret safe from the press and eager public sniffing around the possibility that there would be a super-team of Spider-Men in No Way Home, but Holland said they went to great lengths. “We were in a bubble. Tobey and Andrew would come to set in a cloak. It was like something out of Star Wars. It was hilarious.”
Holland had recently revealed on the Rich Roll podcast that he and Zendaya had read a draft of the Spider-Man 4 script, saying that while it needed some work, the writers had done a great job. “It really lit a fire in me,” Holland said on the podcast. “Zendaya and I sat down and read it together and we at times were bouncing around the living room, like this is a real movie worthy of the fans’ respect.”
Jon Watts directed the three previous Spider-Man films, but as of September, Shang-Chi director Destin Daniel Cretton was in talks to helm Spider-Man 4.
You can watch Holland’s appearance on Fallon here:
For more on all things Spidey-related, check out these stories:
Production designer Jess Gonchor felt right at home on director Jason Reitman’s film Saturday Night, a pulsing recreation of the moments leading up to the first-ever broadcast of Saturday Night Live, which aired on October 11, 1975. Similar to Reitman, who fulfilled a dream of being a guest writer on SNL for a week on Season 35, Gonchor also worked in sketch comedy, so he knew “the inner workings of what this is and what it needed to be.” What that meant for the two-time Oscar-nominated production designer was that everything had to be interconnected.
“I do a lot of things that are nostalgic to me,” says Gonchor, whose list of credits includes No Country for Old Men, True Grit, Hail, Caesar!, and Little Women. “But this was really special to be able to go back and make it about scenery.”
Jess Gonchor on the set of “Saturday Night.” Courtesy Sony Pictures.
In turning back the clock to recreate the now iconic Studio 8H, Gonchor found the original blueprints for Rockefeller Center to fully conceptualize the engineering of the original floorplan. The research informed the designs that would be built on soundstages in Atlanta, where Reitman and cinematographer Eric Steelberg would shoot 360 degrees with a pace that didn’t allow for any holes in the set builds.
Below, Gonchor shares with The Credits how he designed the 1970s period sets, how pace influenced his work, and the one thing they had to shoot in New York.
This is your first project with director Jason Reitman. What made you want to be part of this project?
A lot of times, I’ll get scripts, read them, and do them for many different reasons, but this one, as soon as I started reading it, I was like, I actually think I can make a difference in this movie.
How so?
It’s beyond up my alley. I have spent a lot of time in the exact situation of trying to get a show up and running that had to launch, either open a curtain or turn on a camera at a certain time. I really felt connected with the material more so than I have on any other project. So as I am reading it I’m seeing all these things unfold and getting more and more excited about it.
In designing Saturday Night, did Reitman suggest any specific themes or ideas to guide your approach in prep?
Jason was a big part of the process. This got started before the writer’s strike, so we started a little, and then we were down for several months with the strike. But all that time, I was noodling away at what I thought it could be, so I had a really long runway to figure things out on my own time. We both agreed that we wanted to honor what was there historically but put our own little twist on it, which allowed for the functionality of the script that he had written.
Designing the set for “Saturday Night.” Courtesy Sony Pictures.
When you say functionality, are you referring to how there’s this kind of real-time feeling to how the story unfolds?
Yes.I think the best note that Jason gave me was, he said, listen, we’re going to be moving through these environments very quickly, so I want to personalize each one so nobody’s confused about if they’re in hair and makeup or if they’re in wardrobe, or if they’re editing, the control room, which on paper seems academic and easy. Somebody’s going to go into a control room and see monitors, but in some of these environments, you really fly through pretty quickly. So he wanted to make sure that the production design told the story of just how lost you could get in the environment. He leaned on me a little bit to create chaos through the scenery and how that can build tension.
Designing the set for “Saturday Night.” Courtesy Sony Pictures.
How did that real-time feeling of the story affect your approach?
First of all, you don’t get to do a movie these days where there are zero visual effects in the production design. So the whole thing was built on a stage where the camera could look anywhere, and it all had to be ready on day one of filming because they were flying through all the hallways, the rooms, up the balcony, up to the ninth floor… all those things. So it all had to be ready at one time. We really studied it through a couple of physical models that we made in prep, and then Jason and Eric Steelberg, our cinematographer, taped it out on the stage. It was a very theatrical approach, which is the world I come from anyway, so I really thought of it less as a movie set and more of an environment for theatrics to unfold.
Behind the scenes of “Saturday Night.” Courtesy Sony Pictures.Creating the set of “Saturday Night” in miniature before production design began. Courtesy Sony Pictures.
You taped out the entire set design?
Yes. It was a big stage, like 40,000 square feet. We taped out the stage from the elevator to the back wall. Then Jason and a couple of people grabbed a script, and we all walked out of the scenes to make sure the timing was right. All of the movement was calculated and timed to see how long it would take to get from stage left to stage right. It let him figure out how the cameras would flow, the pace, and how all these things came into play while figuring out the sets.
Behind the scenes of “Saturday Night.” Courtesy Sony Pictures.
You can tell there is a real harmony between the production design and the story, not just a string of locations the characters visit.
They really lived in it because there was nothing fake about it. We couldn’t take anything for granted as far as what the camera was going to see, and that was a good thing. I think that’s really the difference, and it really inspired the performers and the crew to be in that environment.
“Saturday Night.” Courtesy Sony Pictures.
It couldn’t have been easy to recreate SNL‘s Studio 8H, one of the most iconic stages in the world, yet it feels like we’re seeing it here for the first time. How did you pull that off?
Most of my movies I try to make something stand out in the environment whatever it may be but in some ways it was actually different on this film. I think it was William Eggleston, the photographer, who started framing things in photos so people would look around the photograph and not just stare at the center of it. I didn’t want to take anything away from the performances, but I wanted to create an environment that people could look around the screen to absorb.
Besides shooting in Atlanta, production also shot in New York, right?
Yes, we only shot for two nights in New York outside for the marquee and on the skating rink. We didn’t get all the work done on the skating rink, so we had to recreate some of that on stage in Atlanta as well. But even if you had all the money, you owe it to the audience and everyone involved to shoot outside the marquee in New York.
The costumes, hair, makeup, and shooting on 16mm take us back to the 1970s. What was your approach to the 1970s palette?
The costumes, the hair and makeup, and everything transports you to that time and place right away. For me, I was trying to get into the history of that studio. 30 Rock was built for Arturo Toscanini and the NBC Symphony Orchestra. It was a recording studio before it became a TV studio, so the big picture of Toscanini outside the control room is no accident. It was meant to be as if Toscanini was looking at Lorne Michaels every time he went into the control room. It was this idea that it was bad enough that TV had taken over radio, and now, this show where he performed as the maestro is taking over the stage. There are a lot of those types of things in the design—I always tried to make it feel timeless.
Director Kelly Marcel and star Tom Hardy finally unleashed Venom: The Last Dance on Monday night, with Sony Pictures premiering the film in New York. This means that now that Hardy’s Eddie Brock and best alien symbiote buddy Venom have finally waltzed in front of a crowd, the first reactions have flooded social media.
The Last Dance is, as its title suggests, Hardy’s final turn as the investigative reporter turned body-snatched antihero, appearing in a story he cooked up with first-time director Marcel, a longtime Venom scribe herself. Marcel has been working with Hardy since the very beginning in director Ruben Fleischer’s 2018 hit Venom and then the sequel, Andy Serkis’s Venom: Let There Be Carnage, which co-starred Woody Harrelson as the alien symbiote that made Venom look mild-mannered by comparison. The Last Dance picks up after the events in Let There Be Carnage, with Eddie and Venom now pursued by Earthly authorities and some seriously upset baddies from Venom’s home planet.
“Hunted by both of their worlds and with the net closing in, the duo is forced into a devastating decision that will bring the curtains down on Venom and Eddie’s last dance,” the logline states. Hardy is joined by newcomers Juno Temple and Chiwetel Ejiofor, alongside Rhys Ifans, Peggy Lu, Alanna Ubach, and Stephen Graham.
The reactions have been almost uniformly positive, with folks writing that it’s a whacky, wild, funny, and fitting end to Hardy’s three-film run as the world’s most adaptive human, becoming best buds with the insatiable alien symbiote who took over his body. It’s a road trip movie with a lot of good old-fashioned alien head-chomping.
Plus, Hardy and Marcel made a great team. Hardy wrote in an Instagram post last November that he loved making the final film with Marcel. “It’s been and continues to be a lot of fun this journey — there’s always hard turns to burn when we work, but [it] doesn’t feel as hard when you love what you do and when you know you have great material and the support at all sides, of a great team. I want to mention very briefly how proud of my director, writing partner and dear friend Kelly Marcel I am. Watching you taking the helm on this one fills me with pride, it is an honour. Trust your gut, your instincts are always spot on.”
Venom: The Last Dance hits theaters on October 25. Let’s have a peek at some of those first reactions.
#VenomTheLastDance isn’t just fun, IT’S THE BEST VENOM MOVIE BY FAR! It’s the funniest, most emotional, best story & it takes the silliness we love & fully embraces it full force. They do A LOT of cool symbiote stuff & we couldn’t have gotten a better ending to this trilogy that… pic.twitter.com/7TPAF78My8
I’ve seen #VenomTheLastDance and it’s the most cinematic, monumental #Venom movie to date. Eddie Brock and Venom’s dynamic is at its strongest in this one and the stakes are so much higher. I had a LOT of fun with this one…the final act is BONKERS! pic.twitter.com/7sEBGMZpEY
Venom The Last Dance is a whacky buddy roadtrip that stretches its PG-13 rating as far as it will possibly go. Simply put – Venom 3 is classic guilty pleasure cinema. Turn your brains off and let #Venom snack on ‘em. pic.twitter.com/7geSd29O3O
#VenomTheLastDance REVIEW: A huge EPIC & EMOTIONAL finale!! Tom Hardy gives EVERYTHING & Sony has never been better. Stunning action satisfies with all nineteen inches. Not just another Venom movie, it’s one of the BEST comic book films ever! A fitting end setting up what’s next. pic.twitter.com/IXO4WEHZ4L
#VenomTheLastDance is the best of the “Venom” movies — the insanity has been ramped up significantly but so has the heart. It’s not perfect but it’s super entertaining and there’s a giant monster that chews people up and sprays blood out of the back of its head. Pretty nuts. 🕷️ pic.twitter.com/Ebp5ONseEG
#VenomTheLastDance sees Tom Hardy go all in for a fun finale befitting the franchise. With stacks of set pieces ranging from kooky to crazy, this doesn’t hold back with the Venomenal action. Take it for what it is. Grab some popcorn and go with the flow of this raging road movie. pic.twitter.com/neW56JxTLg
#VenomTheLastDance takes you on a wild and exhilarating journey from start to finish! It’s a fun popcorn movie that reminds me of the early 2000’s comic book movies. The action is great & is a tribute to action films from the 80’s. There’s a ton of funny moments. Are there plot… pic.twitter.com/b0wY5qkck4
Venom: The Last Dance is the most entertaining of the trilogy. It’s largely a funny and sweet road trip with Eddie and Venom living their Thelma & Louise fugitive dreams, including car karaoke and dog rescuing. You might even find yourself getting emotional. #VenomTheLastDancepic.twitter.com/9vFtq3eJfT
Just saw @VenomMovie and it’s a blast. Probably one of the better movies in the trilogy. It’s full of action and emotion. The pairing of Eddie and Brock are what holds the film together thanks to Tom Hardy. Plus a lot of love for comic book fans who follow the lore. #venompic.twitter.com/aFh42RoWoz
Matt Murdock and Wilson Fisk themselves—Charlie Cox and Vincent D’Onofrio, respectively—arrived at this past weekend’s New York Comic for Marvel’s Daredevil: Born Again panel. Marvel Studios officially announced that the long-awaited return of Murdock, Fisk, and co are arriving on Disney+ on March 4th, 2025.
Think this guy could win a Daredevil cosplay contest?
Daredevil: Born Again will reunite Cox’s sight-impaired superhero and D’Onofrio’s brutal criminal super-boss Kingpin for the first time since they clashed back when Daredevil was a Netflix series from 2015 to 2018. Matt Murdock had a brief, quite funny cameo in Spider-Man: No Way Home and a meatier role in She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, while D’Onofrio’s Kingpin has appeared in both Hawkeye and the spinoff series Echo.
In fact, Marvel’s upcoming Disney+ series will follow the grittier tone established in Echo, which was led by Alaqua Cox’s Maya Lopez and centered on her tortured past and her relationship with Kingpin. We already know that Born Again will see the return of one of the most brutal of all of Marvel’s antiheroes, Jon Bernthal’s The Punisher, as well as former Daredevil cast members Deborah Ann Woll as Karen Page, Wilson Bethel as Bullseye, and Elden Henson as Foggy Nelson.
Born Again is the first Marvel series on Disney+ to feature a showrunner (previous series were led by head writers and directors), with Dario Scardapane, a writer on the original The Punisher. The original Daredevil was gritty and often brutal, and in keeping with this change in tone, Marvel brought on fight and stunt coordinator Philip Silvera, a veteran of the original Netflix series, who will act as both stunt coordinator and second unit director for the new series. Loki directors Aaron Moorehead and Justin Benson were brought in to guide the show.
For more on all things Marvel Studios, check out these stories:
Featured image: NEW YORK, NEW YORK – OCTOBER 19: Charlie Cox attends the Marvel Fanfare with C.B. Cebulski at New York Comic Con at Javits Center on October 19, 2024 in New York City. (Photo by Bennett Raglin/Getty Images for Disney)
At this past weekend’s New York Comic Con, DC Studios co-chief James Gunn had a lot to say. He, his fellow Creature Commandsexecutive producer Dean Lorey, and cast members from DC’s upcoming animated series revealed the wild first trailer, and while he was there, Gunn dished on some of the studios’ most marquee upcoming projects.
Those projects include his big-time reboot, Superman, which will fly first out of the gate and become DC Studios’ marquee first feature. Gunn wrote and directed Superman, which stars David Corenswet as Clark Kent/Superman and Rachel Brosnahan as Lois Lane. Gunn also teased Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow, based on Tom King’s comic “Woman of Tomorrow,” starring Milly Alcock as Kara Zor-El/Supergirl and directed by Craig Gillespie, and finally, the upcoming new series Lantners, starring Kyle Chandler as Hal Jordan and Aaron Pierre as John Stewart, two members of the Green Lanterns Corps who travel to Earth to work on a murder mystery set in the American heartland.
On the Superman front, a lot is riding on Gunn’s reboot of DC’s most iconic superhero—unless you prefer that Dark Knight fella from Gotham—which kicks off the feature slate for Gunn and co-DC Studios chief Peter Safran, which they’ve titled “Chapter 1: Gods and Monsters.” Gunn reassured fans that, yes, Superman’s superheroic dog, Krypto, will be in the new film. Considering Gunn’s third and final Guardians of the Galaxywas a loving homage to Rocket the Raccoon (voiced by Bradley Cooper)’s tragic past, Gunn has proven that he has no issues fronting an animal’s point of view.
“Krypto, that’s been something that’s just been amazing,” Gunn said at New York Comic Con. “We’ve been working with him in the edit. He’s an incredible part of the story to me personally. When I was writing the screenplay, he came in and kind of changed everything up.”
As for Corenswet’s performance as Superman, Gunn was very excited.
“We’re deep in the process of editing. David Corenswet is going to f**ing blow people away. He is the movie star that everyone just dreams he could possibly be. I don’t think anyone really understands the depth of this guy’s talent dramatically, comedically. He’s the best physical action star I’ve probably ever worked with. I feel good about it, and I’m really hard on stuff, so it’s been fantastic… It won’t be too long before we see a trailer, but it also won’t be too soon.”
As for Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow, Gunn seemed just as enthused about reintroducing Superman’s cousin, Milly Alcock’s Kara Zor-El, and how Tom King’s comic “Woman of Tomorrow,” offers extremely rich source material for the character.
“[Writer] Anna [Nogueira] came in, and she pitched the story to me of Supergirl, and it was just one of the best pitches I’ve ever heard, and she immediately wrote it,” Gunn said. “She came in with the first draft that was great, and it’s just gotten better and better. Then [director] Craig [Gillespie] has been incredibly easy to work with, and I can’t wait for that to come out.”
For DC Studios’ upcoming Lanterns, Gunn talked about the latest and most major casting addition along with Kyle Chandler’s Hal Jordan, and that’s Aaron Pierre’s John Stewart.
“Aaron Pierre is somebody who I’ve wanted to work together with for a long time,” Gunn said. “People don’t know, but he was almost cast as Adam Warlock. He’s an amazing actor, and I just really admired him from the beginning of his career. Seeing him read with Kyle was one of those miraculous moments. I don’t care what they’re saying, I just love what they’re saying together. When we first started the DCU, the first couple of weeks of heading this out, we got together with a group of writers, and Tom King was one of those writers, and we were in this room, and we came up with sort of this concept for Lanterns. It’s a very grounded series, a very real series, which is a strange thing to say about a Green Lanterns show. But it’s going to be something like nobody’s ever seen before.”
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James Gunn had a lot to share New York Comic Con, and arguably the biggest news also included a fun first trailer. That would be for Gunn’s new-look DC Studios’ animated series Creature Commandos, a seven-episode Max original written and executive produced by Gunn, which tracks a secret team of incarcerated monsters recruited for the world’s most dangerous missions. These Creature Commandos are “your last, worst option,” according to the series logline.
Taking the stage at the Con on Saturday, Gunn said that Creature Commandos would be “something beyond what any of us expected.”
The Commandos panel included Gunn, fellow executive producer Dean Lorey, and voice cast members David Harbour (Frankenstein), Frank Grill (Rick Flag, Sr.), Steve Agee (Economos), Zoë Chao (Nina Mazursky, and Sean Gunn (GI Robot and Weasel).
David Harbour is Frankenstein and Frank Grillo is Rick Flag Sr. Photograph by Courtesy of Max
Gunn promised that his and Peter Safran’s DC Studios, which they’ve been reimagining and retooling to bring all DC Studios titles into a unified narrative universe, would be unveiling Commandos as a show that was totally “its own thing.” Gunn said the same for the rest of DC’s new slate. “Every single project out of DC Studios is going to be its own thing. We want this to be very different from what Supermanis going to be when that comes out,” he said, pointing to Lanterns and Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow. “It’s a connected universe, but we’re not imposing any overall aesthetic.”
Executive producer Dean Lorey said that the ton of Commandos is more grounded despite the killer cast of oddballs.
We were looking to do something that was sort of grounded, but with some style to it. It’s got a lot of really dark, dark tones. The palettes are really cool. But as you can see, it’s very action-oriented. It sets itself apart from, say, Harley Quinn and those kind of shows. It feels more adult.”
Check out the first trailer for Creature Commandos.
Creature Commandos was already something Gunn was working on before he and Safran took over DC Studios. “It was written when I started as the CEO of DC Studios. I had talked to Max about creating something afterPeacemaker did so well. I talked to Peter Girardi about creating an animated series. I like the Creature Commandos. I love monsters. I love Frankenstein, the story of Bride of Frankenstein. It seemed like the perfect thing to do,” he said. “I wrote the scripts without a deal. Then I happened to get hired instead of DC studios, and I am very gracious. Thank you, self.”
There will be lots more characters in Creature Commandos, voiced by some very well-known and beloved figures, both as performers and within the DC Studios world. One of those is Viola Davis, who returns to voice Amanda Waller. “She just grounded it so well, and she’s so incredible in the show,” Gunn said. “She gets a chance to do a little bit of humorous stuff too. Some emotional stuff. She just really brought everything together. I’m so fortunate to have her as a person in my life and in my career.”
That cast also includes Indira Varma, who is on board as Bride of Frankenstein, Alan Tudyk as Doctor Phosphorous, Maria Bakalova as Illana Rostovic, and Anya Chalotra as Circe.
GI Robot in “Creature Commandos.” Courtesy Photograph by Courtesy of Max.
Gunn also joked that Creature Commandos borrows a bit from that ABC classic Lost. “The first episode is you see the team come together, but then every episode after that explores the backstory of one of these characters — not necessarily the origin, in some places, the origin — but just something from their past that we see about how they got to the place where they are today,” he said. “And we get to know these characters in a much more intimate way because of that. I think it’s a really fun way to get to know. You see that some of them are a lot better than maybe we think they are at the beginning of the series, and some of them are even worse.”
The new series arrives on Max on December 5.
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