It’s a trio made in film lover heaven—Spanish writer/director extraordinaire Pedro Almodóvar and Oscar-winners Julianne Moore and Tilda Swinton teamed up for the auteur’s first English-language feature, The Room Next Door. Sony Pictures Classics has shared the first peek from Almodóvar’s latest ahead of its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival on September 2.
The Room Next Door is centered on former close friends and colleagues Martha (Swinton) and Ingrid (Moore), who met while working at the same magazine when they were younger. Their careers took divergent paths, with Ingrid becoming an autofiction novelist and Martha a war reporter—hard to find two more disparate forms of writing than that—whose lives converge once again.
This is the first film for Almodóvar since 2021’s Parallel Mothers, which similarly made its world premiere in Venice and earned Penelope Cruz the Volip Cup for Best Actress. Almodóvar is again working with phenomenal performers in Moore and Swinton and a supporting cast that includes John Turturo, Alessandro Nivola, Melina Matthews, and Juan Diego Botto.
The Room Next Door is slated for a December 20 release. Check out the teaser below.
For more upcoming films from Sony Pictures, check out these stories:
Director Justin Baldoni’s film adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s hit novel, It Ends With Us, in which Baldoni also stars as vicious neurosurgeon Ryle, is a surprise hit of the summer. The movie is a romance suffused with darkness, following Lily (Blake Lively as an adult, Isabela Ferrer as an adolescent) as she grows up and falls into a violent relationship that mirrors her parents (Amy Morton and Kevin McKidd).
As an adolescent in Maine looking to escape, Lily strikes up a secret, endearing romance with Atlas (Alex Neustaedter), a runaway fleeing his own violent stepfather. Both desperate to get out, as adults, they land separately in Boston, where Lily opens a flower shop and starts dating Ryle. When the former teenage sweethearts unexpectedly reconnect at Atlas’s (Brandon Sklenar) restaurant, it sets off a string of jealous, brutal incidents inflicted by Ryle on Lily.
At first, Lily denies what’s really happening in her relationship and carries on at her shop, assisted by Ryle’s funnier, kinder sister, Allysa (Jenny Slate, as both comic relief and moral center). As she gains clarity and a closer relationship with Atlas, she also finds herself in a situation where she’ll never truly be rid of Ryle. As a backdrop to this difficult web, Lily blossoms professionally—her lovely floral store does well, and she inhabits the kind of spaces reflective of hip young professionals, whether it’s Atlas’s stylishly homey restaurant or her boyfriend Ryle’s cold, if nicely turned-out condo.
We spoke with production designer Russell Barnes (No Hard Feelings, Americana) about the contrasts in Lily’s life from rural Maine to Boston, designing a unique look for the Lily Blooms shop, and recreating Maine and Boston on location throughout New Jersey.
The scenes the characters inhabit are often breathtakingly pretty, despite what’s happening between them. Was there a directive to pursue a sense of heightened beauty?
I made a deliberate effort to craft a heightened sense of beauty in the environments, but this beauty was always anchored in the characters’ personalities and journeys. The aesthetic wasn’t just for visual appeal; it served as a window into our characters’ inner worlds. We aimed to create spaces that viewers could visually explore, uncovering Easter eggs and character-driven details, much like rereading passages in the beloved book.
Blake Lively stars as Lily Bloom in IT ENDS WTH US. Courtesy Sony Pictures.
How so?
For Lily’s world, the goal was to create spaces that felt relatable and attainable—inviting and warm, with bursts of vibrant color and intricate details that mirrored her creativity and resilience. Atlas’s restaurant subtly echoed the essence of Lily Blooms, highlighting the parallel paths of these two characters. In contrast, Ryle’s world leaned into a regimented, cooler, and more high-end design, reflecting his controlled and structured appearance. We deliberately muted the color palette in certain environments during Lily’s darker periods, reflecting her emotional state.
Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni star in IT ENDS WITH US. Courtesy Sony Pictures.
What did your process look like to create the specific look of Lily’s flower shop?
The design process for Lily Blooms Flower Store began with extensive research into floral stores and social media floral events, extrapolating design elements that reflected Lily’s unique style. Justin and Blake brought their own ideas and inspirations, and from there, we built the aesthetic from the ground up, starting with the origins of the Lily Blooms location before it became hers. We decided the previous store would be a vintage French café—a quiet nod to Atlas—incorporating upcycled elements that followed Lily into her floral shop.
Jenny Slate and Blake Lively star in IT ENDS WITH US. Courtesy Sony Pictures
We tested hundreds of paint colors, selected dozens of wallpapers, and explored different finishes for the café. Blake, Justin, and I actually created a custom color for part of the store, we named it BBB (Blake, Baldoni, Barnes). Keen-eyed viewers will see the wallpaper from the abandoned cafe transition into the finished store. I had an image of a beautiful 1800s French tile that I’d saved for the perfect setting, which became the basis for the Lily Blooms floor. We printed it as a vinyl decal, complete with graphically added texture, cracks, and wear—a very effective movie cheat. As a huge upcycling fan, I also pulled set dressing from my own barn, including the iconic cash register, bar, and stools. My wonderful set decorator, Carrie Stewart, gathered exquisite detail pieces and furniture to complete the look.
Atlas’s restaurant feels, in a way, like it mirrors Lily Blooms. Was that intentional?
The mirroring of Atlas’s restaurant and Lily Blooms was entirely intentional. Both characters are building businesses from scratch with limited resources, so there’s a reclaimed aspect to their spaces. Both characters build art from organic materials with limitless passion. We incorporated floral elements and greenery into his restaurant, all with an underlying welcoming, warm feel. Lily needed to feel safe and secure in this environment. I wanted viewers to imagine that they might have both shopped at the same flea market or antique store, potentially missing each other as they wandered the rows of stalls, sourcing decorations for their respective spaces.
Blake Lively and Brandon Sklenar star in IT ENDS WITH US. Courtesy Sony Pictures.
Can you tell us a bit about setting up Lily’s childhood home across from the abandoned building where she first sees Atlas?
One of the more complicated aspects of the production involved the location for Lily’s childhood home. The locations department scoured New Jersey for a suitable home adjacent to an abandoned house but couldn’t find one that fit the story and design. We considered building the facade of an abandoned home next to the home used in the movie, but after much discussion, we decided to part out the two locations. We found a house two blocks away that was in the process of being renovated, and we fully dressed it to give it the derelict appearance. The view outside Lily’s childhood bedroom is actually a full VFX shot, as, in reality, there is only a lawn and street there.
While filming, did you work with any local businesses on the production design there?
We shot in New Jersey, with all our offices and support locations based there, including our construction and scenic shops and set dressing warehouse. The goal is always to support local businesses wherever we shoot, so we sourced as much as possible from local vendors. Lily Blooms Store was located next to the wonderful Bwe Kafe in Jersey City—a favorite spot for our film crew, who all love great coffee. There was a constant stream of our crew getting their caffeine fix! It was real joy to experience to see what New Jersey had to offer in the food and coffee scene.
Did you read the original book as part of your prep for the shoot?
I read Colleen Hoover’s book many times as part of my preparation. My wife and I took turns reading it as we traveled through Costa Rica and Nicaragua. By the time it reached the movie’s art department in New Jersey, it was a bit beat up, with beach sand in the creases, covered in handwritten notes and post-its highlighting different aspects related to the characters and design. We generated notes from it for each department, and it became the touchstone for the Lily Blooms store. It’s now a treasured piece of memorabilia for me, especially since Colleen Hoover autographed it!
For more upcoming films from Sony Pictures, check out these stories:
One of the most talented creators of her generation is returning to HBO with a brand-new series.
I May Destroy You creator and star Michaela Coel has set First Day On Earth at HBO, a ten-episode drama that will follow British novelist Henri (Coel) as she struggles to shake up her life and embarks on a journey to get unstuck.
“Work has dried up, [and] her relationship is going nowhere. So when she’s offered a job on a film in Ghana, West Africa – her parents’ homeland, where her estranged father lives – she can’t resist the chance to reconnect with him and the country of her heritage,” the logline from HBO reads. “But when she arrives, neither the job nor her father turn out the way she expected, and soon Henri has to deal with danger and hypocrisy, form new friendships, lose her illusions, and create a new sense of identity – one that might leave her stronger, but could also break her.
HBO and BBC will co-produce the new series, with Succession creator Jesse Armstrong serving as executive producer, in partnership with A24 and Various Artists Limited (VAL).
“I am delighted to be working with VAL, HBO and the BBC again, and to partner with A24,” Coel said in a statement. “Thanks to all of their combined taste, care and expertise, I feel our show is in great hands. First Day on Earth is another very personal story for me, which I hope will engage viewers from all over the world, and I can’t wait for audiences to go on Henri’s journey with her.”
When it arrived in 2020, I May Destroy You was one of the most exciting new series, and Coel won an Emmy for Best Writing for a Limited Series.
“Michaela’s words have the ability to transport the reader like no other,” said Amy Gravitt, executive vp comedy programming at HBO and Max. “I am thrilled to have the opportunity to continue the conversation that began with I May Destroy You, alongside our close collaborators at VAL, A24 and the BBC. With Henri as our guide, First Day on Earth is as lyrical as it is visceral in its excavation of the idea of home.”
For more on Warner Bros., Max, and more, check out these stories:
From Hollywood to Bollywood, Benetone Films has provided production services for over 100 feature films, TV series, and 1,000 TV commercials in over two decades. The Bangkok-based company is also a key provider for foreign productions filmed on location in Thailand. Ten projects have been approved through Thailand’s incentive scheme, including 2020’s The Forgotten Army for Amazon Studios and 2022’s Blood & Treasure season 2 for CBS Studios.
In recent years, the company has extended its expertise from production services and branched out into making its own original content for the Thai and international markets. These include 2023’s Congrats My Ex!, a romantic comedy available worldwide on Amazon Prime Video; 2022’s Wannabe, a 16-episode hip hop drama series available on Viu Thailand; and 2020’s Someone, an eight-episode drama series previously steamed on HOOQ Thailand.
Thailand has also regained its footing as a popular filming destination post-COVID. Last year, 466 incoming productions, from film and TV series to TV commercials, documentaries, and variety shows, chose Thailand as a filming location and generated a revenue of $188.52m (THB6.6bn), the highest ever recorded by the Thailand Film Office.
We spoke with Kulthep Narula, co-founder and COO of Benetone Films, about filming incentives, the increasing emphasis on soft power to grow the industry, and the country’s global competitiveness. He is also the president of the Foreign Film Production Services Association and on the working group of the new Soft Power Committee. According to the Thai-based Creative Economy Agency, soft power is a strategy by which a country disseminates its brand and image through media, culture, and tourism to influence economic policy favorably.
How is Thailand shaping up to be a regional production hub?
Thailand is well positioned at the top of the list when people think of a foreign film location. The country’s knowledge base and skill set have been developed over a long period of time, and Thai crews have often been praised for their skills. The highly developed tourism infrastructure also lends itself to practical use. Many filming destinations are accessible by multiple flights, with hotels and medical facilities nearby. We hope the current government will provide more logistics and financial support for foreign film production.
How is the current government and the industry pushing the envelope further to entice more incoming shoots?
In my view, Thailand is by far the best destinationin Southeast Asia and even Asia, reflected by the growth in the number of incoming productions and total revenues year-on-year. It’s important for the government to see the merits of the incentives—that the economic values they bring surpass the cash rebates—and the need to be competitive globally.
How is the incentive program working? What is the feedback from industry practitioners and foreign producers on the incentive scheme?
The current incentives are 15-20% cash rebates. The industry is hoping for a more attractive rate to compete better—30% is a good number—as incentives have proven to create demand and give a healthy boost to tourism. We all want more incentives so a larger pool of projects can come to Thailand. We have to stay competitive and be ahead of the game. Incentives are critical, and it’s also important to make the whole process smooth, including getting work permits and visa renewals for film units. We constantly work with government agencies to create awareness and enhance the process.
Can Thailand attract big international productions? What sort of infrastructure and skills training is required?
Thailand has been doing this for 40-50 years. It’s one of the first countries to do so. It has attracted many diverse countries worldwide for productions, from China, India, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and the US. Thailand can learn best practices from different countries and create a robust system over time. Thai crews gain further knowledge as they work on more production.
Thailand Creative Content Agency (THACCA) is expected to be in operation in 2025. It will be the first single agency encompassing all creative and cultural sectors. How is that a game-changer?
The government has recognized soft power as a strategy, like food, film, fashion, fighting (Muay Thai boxing), and festivals. THACCA aims to oversee the overall entertainment industry, incorporating private members such as producers, exhibitors, post-production companies, and actors. This is the first time that the film and content industry has been recognized as an industry and as an important tool to complement and enhance other industries. It was fragmented in the past. Korea has implemented it very well for the past 20 years, and what they’ve done is commendable. We will pick what is applicable to Thailand.
How do the regional and international OTT platforms help bring more foreign productions to Thailand?
There are two levels. First, foreign productions come to Thailand through the likes of Disney, HBO, Universal, and Amazon Prime. They know Thailand well and are comfortable with the country, so they will continue to come to Thailand. The second level is local content. Netflix is making more Thai content, which is great for the local industry. Foreign platforms give Thai filmmakers and producers the opportunity to create good content and some content is more suitable for online.
How do we draw the audiences back to the cinemas post-Covid?
It’s important to make them feel that going to the cinema is an experience. If the film is good, and cinemas offer the latest technology, it will receive a warm reception, and people will still watch it in the cinemas even if they know it’ll be on the platform later.
For more interviews with filmmakers and producers taking big swings in Asia, check these out:
The void is a post-apocalyptic wasteland where Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds) and Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) cross paths with familiar faces and new superheroes with stark new powers. The buddy comedy sees them fighting to save universes in the hope of redemption and purpose. Along the way, high jinks and limbs fly sky-high while the two most mismatched superheroes of all time try to fight their way to understanding.
The Shawn-Levy-directed epic features a whopping 300 costumes. “Doesn’t sound like a lot, but it’s almost like they were all our lead actor costumes,” co-costume designer Graham Churchyard tells The Credits. “They were sort of principal costumes because even when you get to the Ant-Man arena, and we got all the henchmen, all the Fox Legacy characters come out and fight with the guys.”
We spoke to Churchyard about outfitting legends and little-known characters alike and resurrecting Wolverine’s iconic yellow suit from the comics and animated series.
For the superheroes from the 20th Century Fox movies, how closely did you want to get the original costumes?
Well, we updated Johnny Storm [Chris Evans] because of the joke that he’s half Captain America, half Johnny Storm. I’d worked on The First Avenger: Captain America, building the suit there. I’d also worked on Avengers: Ultron. Alex Byrne was the costume designer, and I was in the workshop making Ultron. I mean, Thor and Black Widow, we did a lot. The pants that Chris wears as Johnny Storm are somewhere between Ultron and First Avenger in that sort of Captain America combat pants with similar high-top boots. But then the top half was a sort of version of Fantastic Four. I suppose that we looked at the colors of the Fantastic Four and then just made our own color decision based on balancing it with the fact that it’s in the void. Everything is distorted in the void. It’s a slightly more dusty, aged-down version.
How about Wesley Snipe’s Blade? How closely did he want to get to the original costume?
Basically, we weren’t allowed to use the signature black cloak because he’s not a Fox. It’s new. We submitted a lot of different drawings, so we ended up with a version of the Blade coat that was green. I went to see Wesley in New York with this green coat, and it’s just like, “Blade doesn’t wear green.” “Yeah, sorry, Wesley. They won’t let us use the black leather coat.” Why not? IP from a different studio, and we weren’t allowed to cross over with the IP. Thankfully, the very nice people at New Line let us do a version of the tactical vest, the armored vest. I was really happy with that costume. I was really happy with all the costumes, but because of limitations, you are going backward to reverse-engineer something to suit an IP. I think it worked out well, whereas every other costume we just went forward with if you see what I mean.
For example, Gambit. Where did you start with his costume?
Yeah, that is quite a problematic costume to execute with the crazy silver boots and the purple armor. It’s a shame that he didn’t remove the coat in the final cut because underneath, we have all the signature bands of the purple stripes on the arms and legs, which are in the comics. There may be a moment when he’s swirling around in the Ant-Man arena where you might fractionally glimpse them. But that coat worked so well in all those fight sequences.
Coats are always tricky, right?
With all of these superhero coats, you never get there the first time. There are always changes. There were different ideas. I want to say he was just a little bit more Louisiana, literally a gambler, a bit more Western-looking with the armor. It is sort of shorter and softer. It was more like a vest, and then he had western pants on. So, that evolved to where a group of people, studio producers, and the director, feel comfortable and then sign off on it. You have to constantly feed them with new ideas and new illustrations because that’s just the way it works.
How’d those conversations go with Wolverine’s signature blue and yellow costume? What were the practical challenges there as well?
Out of everyone, that’s probably the most constricting costume. It’s very corseted and restricts the torso in every direction. It took a while to get to a moment where he could actually run around and breathe properly. When you’re as physical as Hugh, he is in such ludicrously incredible condition, so there’s expansion on your chest. It’s a bit like a firefighter when people say, “Oh yeah, firefighters have the ability to increase their chest size by about six or eight inches.” Well, we know that when you’re running around doing stunts and intensely breathing, you just need a lot of space.
It was just total joy. Why had we never done this before? All of those conversations, why did we not do this before? You go into a fitting, and you go, “Oh, the proportion on the vest to the pants is not quite there. We need to sort of cheat the belt and make some adjustments to the belt to make it more integral. Let’s make his leg and torso more of a proportionate look.” The first fittings you are playing with stuff like that.
Where’d you go from there after the first fitting?
After New York, we returned to London and did a few more. There was major excitement when we did the first fitting of the mask—that was goosebumps time. It was on a Saturday morning, but we were pushing because we had to shoot it three days later. So, we did a fitting with him on a Saturday morning. There were only a couple of us around, including the people who made the mask. We asked, “Are we ready to show this to the grownups?” Hugh was just so overwhelmed by seeing the whole costume complete for the first time.
It was wonderful to see Old Man Logan finally realized when Deadpool searches across the multiverse for the right Logan to help him save his timeline. How satisfying was building that costume for you?
Old Man Logan had a slightly different costume where he was just in a henley with the sleeves pushed up. Then it’s like, “No, we want to hide the shotgun under the blanket.” And then suddenly, the heavens opened when we were about to shoot, and it just rained. We always had the hat. I had it standing by just in case that happened, but we had this worn-out derelict wax sort of hunting jacket that had to be used at the last minute.
How much fun did you two have with the Wolverine variants? Was there much experimentation there?
Well, that’s directed by the script and the studio, so I can’t claim those variants were my idea. It was just like, “Hey, we’re having Henry Cavill.” All these people have code names, so they talk about the code names all the time. But when they have those ideas, you have to quickly get some illustrations done and present the thing in the script. You have to realize it as an illustration and then as a finished costume with all the stages in between. So, you’re talking about weeks before things really get the costume, but the little Wolverine, all of them—they were there in the script.
For more on Deadpool & Wolverine, check out these stories:
The wait is over—director Fede Alvarez’s Alien: Romulus is here, and with its arrival comes the return of one of the most iconic movie monsters of all time.
While the film stars Cailee Spaeny (coming in for rave reviews), alongside a cast of young stars like Isabela Merced, Spike Fearn, David Jonsson, Archie Renaux, and Aileen Wu, Alien: Romulus brings back the xenomorph, which for our money might be the most viscerally terrifying creature from any sci-fi film, ever. Swiss artist H.R. Giger designed the dripping, double-jawed, exquisitely gnarly monster, and in the decades since, it has been expanded into a sci-fi species unparalleled in savagery and grotesque beauty in the cinema or on TV. One of the things that has made the xenomorph so consistently compelling is there is absolutely no reasoning or pleading with the creature; unlike other alien races in popular sci-fi films and series, the xenomorphs aren’t sapient toolmakers, they boast no technological civilization, no human-like behaviors or traits (save for the survival instinct) to work with. They are primal, almost primordial predators who exist to propagate their species at all costs. That means protecting their single, fertile queen with a breed caste of warriors and other specialized types, which include the “face-huggers” you’ll see again in Romulus who attach themselves to their host’s body and implant their endoparasitoid larvae inside. Unpleasant, yes, but also unforgettable.
Alvarez’s film is the rare interquel, existing on the Alien timeline between Ridley Scott’s 1979 stunner Alien and James Cameron’s thrilling 1986 sequel Aliens. Those two films boasted a career-defining performance by the great Sigourney Weaver as Ellen Ripley, the resourceful, gritty heroine who was able to go face-to-multiple-faces with xenomorphs aboard the USS Nostromo (Alien) and the Sulaco (Aliens) and live to tell the tale.
For Romulus, Alvarez got the idea for his story from a deleted scene from Aliens that showed children running among the workers in the space colony. “I remember thinking about what it would be like for teenagers to grow up in a colony so small and what would happen to them when they reached their early 20s,” Alvarez said in the press notes. So Romulus tracks those grown teenagers, led by Spaeny’s Rain, who is desperate to get off the mining colony of Jackson’s Star and ends up joining a crew of space colonizers who go to scavenge a decommissioned space station to find the technology they need to leave their doomed planet behind. Unfortunately for Rain and the rest of the crew, the decommissioned space station is not abandoned—but the life aboard isn’t the welcoming sort.
In a last look at the xenomorph before the film’s wide release, all those beautiful, horrifying details first captured in Alien are fully displayed. The first iteration of the creature was in Giger’s lithograph, Necronom IV. For Alien, Italian special effects designer Carlo Rambaldi designed the xenomorph’s head with exacting detail, and in the following sequels, Cameron and filmmakers like David Fincher (Alien 3) and Alvarez have been bringing the endoparasitoid extraterrestrial species back again and again, with some occasional tweaks and augmentations.
While the cast of Romulus has been praised, specifically Spaeny, for grounding the film in human concerns, the xenomorph always reigns supreme in any addition to the franchise that it’s featured in. Here are some last looks at the most legendary alien creature of them all:
Netflix has dropped the first trailer for its upcoming animated series Terminator Zero, and eight-episode anime series that boasts a stellar voice cast and offers an intriguing expansion to the iconic sci-fi franchise.
Terminator Zero is part of the same universe as the film series but will introduce us to new characters. Partly set in 2022 during a raging war between the few human survivors of the machine apocalypse and partly set in 1997, when the artificial intelligence Skynet became self-aware and started its war against humanity, the series is centered on a soldier sent back in time to protect the scientist Malcolm Lee (André Holland). Malcolm is trying to develop a new AI system that will compete with Skynet, but his work has caught the attention of another time-traveler, an assassin from the future who means to stop him. His own fate and the fate of his three children hang in the balance.
“I was looking at the franchise and the first two movies in particular,” Terminator Zero showrunner Mattson Tomlin told Netflix’s Tudum. “And why are we still talking about this franchise 40 years later? You strip away killer robots, you strip away Judgment Day, what do you have left? You have stories about families.”
The cast includes Timothy Olyphant as the Terminator, Rosario Dawson as Kokoro, Japan’s artificial intelligence that is a direct competitor to Skynet, Sonoya Mizuno as Eiko, a resistance fighter sent back in time to stop Malcolm from creating Kokoro, and Ann Dowd as the Prophet, a philosopher who guides the human resistance in the future.
Check out the sneak peek below. Terminator Zero arrives on Netflix on August 29.
Here’s the official synopsis from Netflix:
2022: A future war has raged for decades between the few human survivors and an endless army of machines. 1997: The AI known as Skynet gained self-awareness and began its war against humanity.
Caught between the future and this past is a soldier sent back in time to change the fate of humanity. She arrives in 1997 to protect a scientist named Malcolm Lee who works to launch a new AI system designed to compete with Skynet’s impending attack on humanity. As Malcolm navigates the moral complexities of his creation, he is hunted by an unrelenting assassin from the future which forever alters the fate of his three children.
For more on big titles on Netflix, check these out
Manhuntgraphic designer Gina Alessi had a significant assignment when she was brought on board Apple TV+’s stellar limited series about the hunt for John Wilkes Booth (Anthony Boyle) in the aftermath of Abraham Lincoln’s (Hamish Linklater) assassination—among other historical recreations, Alessi was tasked with making sure Abraham Lincoln’s deathbed at the Petersen House next to the Ford Theater, down to the pattern on the blanket, was period perfect. It was not an insignificant challenge, even if most of us would be hard-pressed even to name the place Lincoln died (show of hands for those of you who thought he died at Ford Theater—I’m raising mine), let alone what the wallpaper looked like. But it was Alessi’s job to make sure that every detail was period-perfect, including every object you see on screen, from antique maps to newspapers to telegrams, canvas banners, police wagons, store signage, and all the scraps of paper you see scattered around the bustling War Department, the HQ for the titular manhunt.
The details piled up in the telling of the 12-day manhunt, tracking an effort led by U.S. Secretary of War Edwin Stanton (Tobias Menzies), as Stanton’s allies, including Detective Lafayette Baker (Patton Oswalt) and a maid, Mary Simms (Lovie Simone) with intimate knowledge of Booth’s movements, help him ferret out a conspiracy that’s larger than one delusional, murderous former-actor.
Alessi and the production team, including Sarah Stimpson and David Tousley, relied on local vendors throughout Georgia to design and dress the show, including Speedi Sign and Graphics in Savannah, Dangling Carrot East in Atlanta, Saga Boy Studios in Atlanta, and more. We spoke to Alessi about her hunt to create or find the perfect pieces to give Manhunt its stunning verisimilitude.
How’d you first get involved with the series?
I worked with production designer Chloe Arbiture on Drunk History, whichwas such a good kickstart for my career because you have to do these sketches for all these different time periods, and the best boot camp for a graphic designer getting into film because you’re rapidly progressing through graphics. I did medieval graphics one day, 1980s graphics the next, and futuristic graphics afterward. Then Chloe landed Manhunt, and she brought me on. It was our first really big period show. I was super excited.
Do you have a favorite time period?
A lot of people ask me what my favorite and least favorite time period is, and I’ve heard graphic designers say they love the Victorian era, for example, but are terrified of any futuristic era. For me, I love the process almost more than any particular time period. I hadn’t done a show set in this time period before, but I love the process of figuring out this period. You have to immerse yourself in the script. Manhunt is set in the 1860s, and my next show was set in a video game office in the present day, completely different. For the below-the-line crew, it’s a job at the end of the day, and you take what comes at you and do your best. It’s always exciting when a job also aligns with something incredibly exciting, and that’s what Manhunt was for me.
Anthony Boyle in “Manhunt,” now streaming on Apple TV+.
Tell me about the filming process in Georgia.
It was primarily filmed in Savannah, Georgia, and we had a unit that shot in Philadelphia. We didn’t shoot in D.C. or Virginia or the regions where some of this stuff is located, but we did research a lot.
One fascinating element of Manhunt is how little many of us—speaking broadly for the American public here, always a good idea—actually know about the specifics of Abraham Lincoln’s assassination and aftermath, save for the location, maybe the date, and the assassin John Wilkes Booth. So, what was your brief when you came on board?
Research was a huge part of this. The show is based on James Swanson’s book, so my first introduction was I picked up the book. I read as much as I could before we got thrown into the chaos of building it. The first couple of chapters were mind-blowing for me—it was a conspiracy of all these guys, and I think the original plan was to kidnap Lincoln and all these different cabinet members—to me, it kind of seemed like Booth was making things up as he went.
An excerpt from James L. Swanson’s book, highlighted by Gina Alessi. Courtesy Gina Alessi/Apple TV+.
A lot of the book is written from his words in letters and people’s accounts, and the humanity of these characters really comes through. Booth came across as this sniveling, whiney, entitled, and very emotional guy.
The performances were really great. For graphics research, it’s like each of us researches our specialties. So, the art department might research the architecture of the War Department. I would be going in with a team of three graphic designers: myself, David Tousley, and Sarah Stimpson. Three of us would be asking what pieces of paper are on the tables.
An image from “Manhunt” provided by Gina Alessi/Apple TV+.
What do the telegrams look like? We called it the strategy room where they disused Booth’s whereabouts and the conspiracy, that room is covered in maps, so we had to research how maps were made at the time, we spent a lot of time on the Library of Congress site. They have an incredible collection of scanned maps and battle plans and all the things, so part of the cool thing is we got to reproduce maps from the Library of Congress because those are in the public domain, so we could resource them and reprint them and put real 1860s material into our sets. Obviously, you can’t get more authentic than that.
Graphics created for “Manhunt” by Gina Alessi, Sarah Stimpson, and David Tousley. Courtesy Apple TV+
What materials were used in the maps made in the 1860s, and how did you reproduce them?
We noticed that sometimes we think of giant maps as giant pieces of paper where a single map is printed very big. Now we have the technology to make large-scale prints. Back then, looking at all the research, I found that a lot of it was copper plate engraving. They’d take a piece of copper, etch out an illustration of map lines, and use that plate to print it. That’s how engraving was done in those days, either with wood or copper, and they’d put ink on it and press that down onto paper. A large map would have been made up of several sheets of smaller paper because you’re not going to print a 20-foot-wide piece of copper. We made design rules for ourselves, and even though we have the capability, we’re not going to print a 20-foot-tall map of the United States. So the graphics team made a custom collage of smaller sheet maps, so when you step back and look at the whole thing, it’s the entire East Coast. We traced over real maps for that and redrew every sheet ourselves for that particular piece.
Alessi and her team’s work on the maps in the War Department in “Manhunt.” Courtesy Gina Alessi/Apple TV+Tobias Menzies, Brandon Flynn and Damian O’Hare in “Manhunt,” now streaming on Apple TV+.
Was there any favorite piece of the show you worked on?
I’ve been calling Manhunt the wallpaper show. Every set is wallpaper-drenched because they loved wallpaper back then. Our production designer wanted to lean into color because when modern people think of the past, we think of this sepia tone or black and white, but when we looked at samples from then, they were so colorful. The War Department has two patterns we were involved in; the Telegraph Room is dark blue with a starry cross pattern, which I custom drew for that set. A lot of the other wallpapers are similar to how we’d go onto the Library of Congress for vintage maps; we’d find sources where we could scan actual antique wallpapers, so Sarah [Stimpson] and I resurrected these scraps, and if they had damages, we’d clean up the pattern, restore the color digitally, tile it out, and then print it and install it on the set. Now I’m completely in love with wallpaper, it’s such an interesting artistic medium.
A wallpaper test print in “Manhunt.” Courtesy Gina Alessi/Apple TV+
Lincoln’s death wasn’t in Ford’s Theater, which I’d wrongly assumed for my whole life, but it’s next door at the Peterson House. How did you recreate his deathbed, and specifically, the blanket that covered him?
This is my favorite project to talk about in Manhunt. It was my first day hired on the job, and the set decorator came to me and said, ‘So, welcome to the show. I just talked to this blanket fabricator that we were going to use for the blanket, but unfortunately, they say they need the print files this Friday. So I jumped in straight in on day one to that blanket. In the 1860s, photography was very new. It was a little bit tricky when you were trying to be as authentic and accurate as possible, but you only had one historical photo of the actual room, which contained the blanket and the vertical striped wallpaper. It’s an antique vintage photo, so it’s super blurry and grainy and black and white. I studied the pattern in Photoshop; this beautiful floral medallion was in the middle, with this field of geometric triangles. That surprised me because they looked so different and modern. Then, there was a beautiful floral border. So I got my iPad and redrew that whole pattern. Studying Lincoln’s death, one of the things that was really interesting was the Peterson House was like a little boarding house; it wasn’t special, it wasn’t fancy, and a lot of the men were standing around while this was going down. The opinion of the time was it wasn’t a stately place for the president of the United States to die. It was an everyman’s house, and I think that’s really interesting to think about when you’re trying to recreate something. My own little sappy addition is I picked out a flower that had symbolic meaning, an Irish flower, and I drew that into the blanket because it fit with the style. It symbolizes courage, wisdom, and leadership.
Alessi and her team’s research and work on Lincoln’s deathbed in “Manhunt.” Courtesy Gina Alessi/Apple TV+
For more stories on Apple TV+ series and films, check these out:
The Dark Lord reigns supreme in the second trailer for season two of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.
Season two finds our Middle-earth heroes facing the most formidable threat imaginable. You know his name, but he’s been disguising it for years; first he was Halbrand (Charlie Vickers), now he’s an elf named Annatar, but the name that Lord of the Rings fans know and all Middle-earth fears is Sauron. The new trailer is definitely on the bleaker side for Galadriel (Morfydd Clark), Celebrimbor (Charles Edwards), and the rest of the folks trying to fight against this ancient evil—and it’s especially galling that he’s been hiding amongst them for years.
Like the first trailer, this second look shines a light on just how ambitious Prime Video’s series has aimed to be, setting the bar at no less than the grandeur of Peter Jackson’s films to the small screen. Season two will track Sauron’s attempt to create the Rings of Power, bringing all the dwarves, elves, men, wizards, and Harfoots under his control. Galadriel and her small, mighty band are the thin line that stands between Sauron and his goal.
Season two will also further develop the Stranger (Daniel Weyman), revealed at the end of season 1 as one of Middle-earth’s most powerful future wizards. While it hasn’t been confirmed, the implication is that this is the young Gandalf.
Check out the trailer here. The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power season 2 arrives on Prime Video on August 29.
Here’s the official synopsis for season two:
Sauron has returned. Cast out by Galadriel, without army or ally, the rising Dark Lord must now rely on his own cunning to rebuild his strength and oversee the creation of the Rings of Power, which will allow him to bind all the peoples of Middle-earth to his sinister will. Building on Season 1’s epic scope and ambition, Season 2 of Amazon’s The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power plunges even its most beloved and vulnerable characters into a rising tide of darkness, challenging each to find their place in a world that is increasingly on the brink of calamity. Elves and dwarves, orcs and men, wizards and Harfoots… as friendships are strained and kingdoms begin to fracture, the forces of good will struggle ever more valiantly to hold on to what matters to them most of all… each other.
For more on Amazon Prime Video, check out these stories:
James Cameron is famously a very busy, very driven man. He’s currently working on Avatar 3, recently revealed as Avatar: Fire and Ash at Disney’s D23 Expo. The film is due in theaters on December 19, 2025, and will feature a more militant and hostile race of the Na’vi called the Ash People. This blockbuster will be followed by Avatar 4 and 5, which are currently set to be released in 2029 and 2031.
In a freewheeling must-read interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Cameron touched upon a few of his upcoming projects, some well known, like the Avatar sequels, and one that appears to be something he’s working on in secret—a new Terminator.
For Avatar 4 and 5, the previous scuttlebutt was that Cameron would be passing the directorial duties off to someone else, but when THR asked him if he was planning on directing those films, Cameron said this:
“Absolutely. I mean, they’re going to have to stop me. I got plenty of energy, love doing what I’m doing. Why would I not? And they’re written, by the way. I just reread both of them about a month ago. They’re cracking stories. They’ve got to get made. Look, if I get hit by a bus and I’m in an iron lung, somebody else is going to do it.”
THR also asked Cameron about his involvement in Fede Alvarez’s upcoming Alien: Romulus, an interquel set between Ridley Scott’s 1979 original Alien and Cameron’s 1986 sequel Aliens.
“I saw a rough cut six months ago, so I’m sure it’s changed a lot. And I viewed it once. I gave some notes to [director Fede Álvarez]. He and I aren’t close pals. I mean, I wish him the best with it, but I think it’s been overstated that I had some big creative input to that film. I think Ridley [Scott] did because Ridley was an actual producer on the film. So I’m just putting it in perspective.”
Speaking about another franchise near and dear to Cameron’s heart, THR asked him about his thoughts on Netflix’s upcoming animated series Terminator Zero. He had this to say:
“It looks interesting. My relationship to that is very much like The Sarah Connor Chronicles — other people spinning stories in a world I set in motion is interesting to me. What’s their takeaway? What intrigued them about it? Where are they going with it? It looks like they’re going back to the root cause of Judgment Day — the nuclear war — and whether that’s an ultimate timeline. I’d be curious to see what they’ve come up with. I’m working on my own Terminator stuff right now. It’s got nothing to do with that. Like with The Sarah Connor Chronicles, they occasionally touched on things I had been playing with completely independently. So there’s some curiosity there. It’s not a burning curiosity, but, obviously, it’d be nice to see it succeed.”
When THR was admittedly surprised by this news and wanted to know more, Cameron deployed his underappreciated humor:
“It’s totally classified. I don’t want to have to send out a potentially dangerous robotic agent if you were to talk about it, even retroactively.”
“My son, we are hunters, the greatest the world has ever known,” says Russell Crowe’s character at the top of the new trailer for director J.C Chandor’s Kraven the Hunter. We find the son he’s speaking to, Sergei Kravinoff, aka Kraven the Hunter, in prison, but not for long. “The Hunter is a myth,” a fellow inmate tells Kraven—a costly mistake. Kraven proves that the myth of the Hunter has an ounce of truth and makes a bold, brutal escape that shows off his merciless fighting style. This is one dude you really don’t want to question.
Chandor’s film is the first to feature this classic Spider-Man villain who debuted in the pages of the comics in 1964. Taylor-Johnson’s Sergei Kravinoff is left for dead by his father after a lion attack, but it turns out that the lion’s bite has given him immense powers. Sergei uses these powers to become Kraven the Hunter, the protector of the animal kingdom, no matter the human body count.
Sergei’s father isn’t his only antagonist in the film; Alessandro Nivola plays Aleksei Sytsevic, aka the Rhino, a beastly figure with the strength to overpower anyone, including Kraven. The trailer boasts plenty of new footage, all moodily set to Johnny Cash’s “The Man Comes Around,” as Kraven stalks poachers and bad guys and eventually faces the Rhino in a climactic battle.
This is the second trailer for Kraven the Hunter, providing another glimpse at Chandor’s R-rated film’s approach to telling Kraven’s origin story, which turns the villain in an antihero and makes him part of Sony’s stable of misunderstood, monstrously powerful Spider-Man villains—Jared Leto’s Morbius, who boasts the superpowered versions of a vampire bat’s strength, and Tom Hardy’s Venom, the product of the marriage between an alien symbiote and a man. Kraven’s connection to animals after his violent communion with the lion allows him to communicate with them as he tracks his own prey. “My father puts evil into the world,” Kraven says in the first trailer to Ariana DeBose’s Calypso. “I take it out.”
Joining Crowe, Taylor-Johnson, DeBose, and Nivola are Fred Hechinger, Christopher Abbott, and Levi Miller.
Check out the red band trailer below. Kraven the Hunter hits theaters on December 13.
For more upcoming films from Sony Pictures, check out these stories:
With the first reactions to Alien: Romulus calling it a genuinely terrifying sci-fi experience, we thought it was a good idea to give you some grounding in precisely where the film is situated before you brave the theater to see it. Romulus is the rare interquel, connecting what happened in the 57 years between the fateful Nostromo mission of 1979’s Alien and sole survivor Ellen Ripley’s (Sigourney Weaver) next mission, in 1986’s Aliens, alongside a unit of colonial marines.
Ridley Scott directed Alien, James Cameron was at the helm of Aliens, and the newest film comes at the hands of Evil Dead director Fede Álvarez, but both Scott and Cameron are on board with Romulus — the former is a producer, and the latter is an unofficial consultant. In fact, Alvarez met early in the writing process with Cameron and based his idea on a deleted scene from Aliens where children were running among the workers in the space colony. “I remember thinking about what it would be like for teenagers to grow up in a colony so small and what would happen to them when they reached their early 20s,” Alvarez said in the press notes. And with Álvarez embracing the practical grittiness so beloved in the first two films, the interquel already has a lot of positive buzz going for it.
Among the elements that have helped the franchise achieve cult status is the director’s cut of Aliens, so it’s fitting that the seed of the idea for Romulus came from one of the 1986 film’s deleted and subsequently restored scenes. Álvarez told the Hollywood Reporter that he was interested in telling the story of those kids a little further on in time, and Romulus, which follows a group of space colonizers who encounter a Xenomorph while scavenging an old space station, features a particularly youthful cast of actors, including Cailee Spaeny, Isabela Merced, and Spike Fearn.
Romulus was originally headed straight to Hulu, but during shooting, 20th Century Studios opted to give the film a theatrical release. Alvarez’s decision to write an interquel set between Alien and Aliens (besides the first two films, there are six others in the franchise: sequels Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection, prequels Prometheus and Alien: Covenant, and crossover films Alien vs. Predator and Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem) firmly roots his installment in the grungier sci-fi horror world that launched the franchise. Álvarez has also mentioned his interest in the main characters residing in a space colony that has yet to fully terraform, i.e., become Earth-like and hospitable to human life. He’s also clearly passionate about the aesthetics of the first two films. In 1979, Alien’s look was particularly groundbreaking, with the Xenomorph designed by Swiss artist H.R. Giger and the Nostromo crew’s spacesuits created by French artist and cartoonist Jean Giraud, better known by his pseudonym, Moebius.
Alien introduced us to Weaver’s soon-to-be iconic Ripley, a heroine with the grit and pluck usually reserved for male characters at the time. Ripley’s aboard the commercial towing ship the Nostromo, which is on its way to Earth carrying a seven-member crew in cryosleep. They are awakened by a transmission from a nearby moon that comes through the ship’s computer, Mother. It’s company policy to investigate the transmission, which Ripley later figures out is actually a warning. The Nostromo lands on the moon, and crew members Dallas (Tom Skerritt), Kane (John Hurt), and Lambert (Veronica Cartwright) find the source of the signal, a derelict alien ship. The ship contains a large, dead alien and a room full of eggs, one of which Kane touches, causing a creature to emerge and glom onto his face. Dallas and Lambert get him back to the Nostromo, where Ripley tries to prevent them from coming on board but is overridden by Ash (Ian Holm), who also tries to remove the alien from Kane but cannot due to its corrosive blood. The creature dislodges itself and dies, and Kane awakens, seemingly pretty unhurt by the preceding events. The plan is to return to stasis when an alien bursts out of Kane’s chest in one of the more famous film scenes known to humankind. Kane dies, the alien escapes, and the rest of the crew, including a cat named Jones, try to find and kill the creature.
The alien vanquishes the crew one by one, and during the course of the hunt, Ripley, now the ship’s senior officer, learns a secret through Mother: Ash has been ordered by the company that owns the ship to bring the alien to Earth to be studied. Ash tries to kill Ripley, but crew member Parker (Yaphet Kotto) clubs him on the head, and Ash is revealed to be an android. After confirming what the android knows, he is shut down and burned. Before the remaining crew can destroy the ship and escape, the alien (fully grown, Bolaji Badejo played the alien) kills Parker and Lambert. With Jones the cat, Ripley manages to escape and have the Nostromo self-destruct, only to realize the alien has also made it onto the shuttle. She eventually succeeds in pushing it out of an airlock, and she and Jones go back into stasis to finally head for Earth.
Aliens picks up after Ripley spends 57 years in stasis and awakens on a medical ship. Questioned by her company bosses from the Weyland-Yutani Corporation, she tells them about the eggs found on the ship on exomoon LV-426 and the alien aboard the Nostromo. In the time that she’s been asleep, LV-426 has been transformed into a space colony currently undergoing terraforming, and her employers don’t believe her story. When they lose contact with the colony, however, Ripley is asked to accompany a Colonial Marine crew aboard the ship Sulaco to investigate. She agrees, on the condition that the aliens be destroyed. They find open eggs, dead face-hugging aliens, and the dead colonists, who are cocooned as incubators for the alien offspring. They also find a lone human survivor, a girl named Newt (Carrie Henn). When the Marines kill an infant alien after it bursts out of a colonist’s chest, adult aliens awaken and kill and take hostage a number of the Marines. Ripley takes control of the situation and manages to rescue several of the crew, but a stowaway alien on board the dropship used to get back and forth to the Sulaco kills its pilots, causing it to crash.
Once again, there’s a traitor in their midst, but this time, it’s not the on-board android, a trustworthy entity named Bishop (Lance Henriksen), but the Weyland-Yutani corporate representative, Burke (Paul Reiser). Ripley learns he had ordered the space colonists to investigate the alien eggs, which he wanted to recover and profit from via biological weapon research. Meanwhile, Bishop learns that the dropship crash damaged the colony’s cooling system, and the power plant will overheat and explode, killing them all. Ripley and Newt wind up trapped with two of the smaller aliens, but are rescued by Marines. A further alien attack kills off Burke and sees Newt taken hostage. Ripley insists on rescuing her and, in the course of doing so, also destroys the cache of alien eggs and the organ the alien queen uses to lay more. The queen follows the survivors by stowing away on the landing gear of the remaining dropship and onto the Sulaco before the colony explodes. The queen attacks Bishop, Ripley once again manages to triumph by getting the alien off the ship through an airlock, and she, Bishop, Newt, and surviving marine Hicks (Michael Biehn) go into hypersleep to get back to Earth.
Based on the first two films, if there’s one thing we can feel confident about going into Romulus, we shouldn’t expect too many human survivors. But who will make it through unscathed is an open question, given the all-new cast (a safe bet is on Spaeny’s character, Rain, however). Will there be chest-bursting aliens? We’d imagine so. Is there going to be a cat? Less likely. But with Álvarez committed to both the earlier films’ style as well as their unique brand of space horror, we know we can’t wait to find out.
For more on Alien: Romulus, check out these stories:
The first reactions to director Fede Alvarez’s Alien: Romulusare here after 20th Century Studios unleashed the film on audiences at the world premiere in Los Angeles. Romulus is the eighth installment in the iconic sci-fi franchise, which began in Ridley Scott’s 1979 classic Alienand is set between that film and James Cameron’s thrilling 1986 sequel Aliens.
To ensure he had his mythology right, Alvarez met early on in the writing process with Cameron himself and based his idea on a deleted scene from Aliens where children were running among the workers in the space colony. “I remember thinking about what it would be like for teenagers to grow up in a colony so small and what would happen to them when they reached their early 20s,” Alvarez said in the press notes.
Cailee Spaeny stars as Rain Carradine, a young woman looking to escape her life after her parent’s death on Jackson’s Star, the mining colony where she lives. Rain joins a crew of space colonizers who go to scavenge a decommissioned space station to find the technology they need to leave their doomed planet behind. Unfortunately for Rain and the rest of the crew, the decommissioned space station is not abandoned; there is life aboard, and it is not kind. The horrors to come connect Spaney’s Rain to the original alien slayer, Sigourney Weaver’s iconic Ripley, who first appeared in Ridley Scott’s game-changing 1979 original Alien.
Spaeny is joined by David Jonsson, Archie Renaux, Isabela Merced, and Spike Fearn.
Let’s take a spin around social media to find out what folks are saying after the premiere. Alien: Romulus hits theaters on August 16:
Alien: Romulus is shockingly good.
This movie is so inventive with horror, thrills, and visuals while never crossing into gratuitous blood or gore. It emulates the original Alien movies so well.
I had to pick my jaw up off the floor in the third act. That was insane. Wow. pic.twitter.com/0XVQsx2tkQ
#AlienRomulus had me on the edge of my seat with suspense. Fede Alvarez understood the assignment and passed with flying colors. As a fan, I loved the new elements and twists that were introduced. This has breathed new life into the Alien franchise and could be one of the best. pic.twitter.com/ZAt81ddIJa
ALIEN: ROMULUS: Has all the great hallmarks of what you would expect in an Alien flick but never feels like it’s pandering to nostalgia or fan service…and even goes into a crazy new direction. Fede Alvarez & the cast just gave birth to summer’s best movie.
#AlienRomulus is the first time I have been terrified during one of the Alien movies. Cailee Spaeny’s Rain is a perfect character to follow on this journey and through Fede Álvarez’s twists and turns, you never really know where Romulus is headed. The 3rd act is truly WILD. I dig… pic.twitter.com/vEaiz5966B
Alien: Romulus is absolutely gorgeous and somehow honors every single movie that came before. Cailee Spaeny and David Jonsson are great leads, and the alien effects are so satisfying. The finale will be divisive, but I loved it. Big fan of this one.
Fede Alvarez’s #AlienRomulus is gnarly, gripping & gorgeously bleak (everything from the story to Olivares’ cinematography to Wallfisch’s score). Innovatively delivering smart, savvy stuff, subtly playing the greatest hits. Cailee Spaeny & David Jonsson dominate. This rules! pic.twitter.com/kEuDZku2Oz
#AlienRomulus is a bonkers roller coaster ride through the previous six Alien movies, using bits of all them, to tell a focused, mostly standalone story filled with glorious gore & scares. It gets better as it goes along, ending with a phenomenal big swing of a third act. pic.twitter.com/mY8Hkbe0gD
Alien: Romulus is phenomenal, a deep-cut homage to the original that leans satisfyingly hard into the series’s familiar horrors. It’s a profoundly intense, back-pressed-tight-against-your-seat horror show, filled with several nasty, wicked, acidic surprises. pic.twitter.com/0aSXWP7sN5
Moviegoers apparently love an underdog, at least when it takes the form of Ryan Reynolds’ Avengers wannabe Wade “Deadpool” Wilson. Deadpool & Wolverine, the biggest R-rated movie of all time, with more than a billion at the global box office, co-stars Hugh Jackman and comes fully loaded with a slew of superheroes newly arrived in the Marvel Cinematic Universe now that Disney owns the studio that once controlled the rights to X-Men and other comic book characters.
The action comedy is scripted by Reynolds, director Shawn Levy, Zeb Wells, and writing partners Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, who first started collaborating as teenage movie nerds growing up in Phoenix, Arizona. After Reese and Wernick broke out in 2009 with Zombieland, Reynolds enlisted them to write Deadpool, followed in 2018 by Deadpool 2.
Speaking from their homes in Los Angeles, Reese and Wernick identify the man they call “The Elevator,” break down the cameo selection process and speculate about why their new movie struck such a huge chord with audiences.
How does it feel to be co-writers of the biggest R-rated movie in history and the most popular film so far of 2024?
Paul: I’ll let you in on a little secret. We debuted the movie at Comic-Con Hall H, and it was the greatest theatrical experience of our lives. We had an audience of 6500 people laughing and oohing and ahhing at the exact same time. It was more fun watching the audience than actually watching the movie. Then I came home – – and this is going to be embarrassing…
Rhett: Oh no.
Paul: My kids and I made a graph chart, the box office and the calendar, and now I’ve got this chart hanging over my bed in the master bedroom with the [box office] results…
Rhett: This is what not to do if you come out to Hollywood and want to be a happy person.
Paul: It feels amazing, I guess is the short answer.
Why do you think this movie has resonated with audiences in such a robust way?
Rhett: Hugh and Ryan together are like a Reese’s cup where the chocolate and the peanut butter meet together, and it’s just the right taste.
Paul: Not to bring down the room, but I also think there is an element of dread in the world these days. Between politics and life and everything else, Deadpool & Wolverine provides an escape to a fantastical world and gives people a reason to forget what’s going on outside the dark room they’re sitting in for two hours and seven minutes. We’re such a disparate society now; everybody doesn’t like everybody, and no one sees eye to eye on stuff, so here’s a movie where you can sit in a theater full of people you don’t even know and laugh with them. That feels good for everybody, especially us, who helped create the world.
You’d been trying out different ideas for a third Deadpool movie when Hugh Jackman called and said he wanted to play Wolverine. The only problem is that Wolverine is dead and buried at the end of 2017’s Logan. How did you develop a plot that would bring Wolverine back from the dead?
Rhett: Thankfully, we had this history set up in recent Marvel projects of a multiverse with variants of the same character who live in different universes and proceed down a slightly different path. It quickly became clear that we could use the Time Variance Authority and this place called the Void to take advantage of Marvel story elements that people already understand.
Featured image: Hugh Jackman in ‘Logan.’ Courtesy 20th Century Fox.
Borrowing primarily from the Loki TV series?
Rhett: Mostly from Loki. Yeah. The idea of variants and multiverses also gave us a nice way to transition back to: “Okay we’re all on one timeline again” and because Disney bought Fox, we’ve got some new characters merging within the MCU. We’re going to have X-Men, we’re going to have the Fantastic Four, we’re going to have Wolverine. That was super exciting.
The friction between Deadpool and Wolverine drives the story in classic odd-couple fashion. Were you inspired by old-school action comedies in this vein?
Paul: For sure. Planes Trains and Automobiles, Midnight Run, 48 Hours — we grew up with that kind of mismatched R-rated road trip comedy. Once Hugh came aboard, it almost didn’t matter what the movie’s plot was, right? Deadpool and Wolverine have to get from point A to point B but their interactions are the plot of the movie in a sense. You can understand the Marvel plan and the Time Ripper and the Void, but when you boil it all away, what I tell my folks, who don’t know anything about the Marvel universe, is that it’s about the journey of two guys who learn to become more accepting of one another. It’s about friendship. That’s the core of the movie, and yes, we were highly inspired by these comedies of the past.
You guys have functioned as a two-person team for decades, and now, here you are, collaborating with three other writers. How did that go?
Paul: Shawn and Ryan have also been writing together for about 15 years now, so there’s a bit of a hive mind. We were essentially Zooming our way through it to break the story with Ryan being sort of the bottleneck that everything runs through. He was like the showrunner, making sure all the pieces fit. We’ve had this character living in our heads since 2009, when we started writing the first Deadpool, so to have Ryan’s voice both in our heads and on screen in Zoom calls was invaluable.
Paul: Always. We call him “The Elevator” because Ryan elevates everything he touches. In the edit bay, on set, in the writing process. [Co-writer] Zeb [Wells] is terrific, too, so the comedy was kind of the easiest stuff to come by because there were a lot of funny people around. Then it becomes about making sure the story makes sense, giving it heart, and having Hugh and Ryan bring it to life.
How did you sketch out the character arcs for Deadpool and Wolverine?
Rhett: To us, it felt a little like being in rehab with two lost souls who ended up there for very different reasons. Wade’s having a mid-life crisis. His real goal was to be part of a larger team, the Avengers, but he dropped out because he didn’t feel like he mattered anymore. In Hugh’s case, he dropped out for more macabre and horrifying reasons in that he’d failed to defend his friends, taking revenge and killing people who perhaps didn’t deserve it. Through their friendship, this irreverent lunatic and the hard-boiled, angry guy find meaning, a place where they don’t loathe themselves.
Fans have gone wild over The Deadpool & Wolverine cameos. How did you figure out which Marvel characters deserved a cameo?
Paul: For us, it was about “Which superhero characters from the Fox universe got screwed?” Blade, Wesley Snipes just kind of got… screwed. Elektra [Jennfer Garner]. . . got screwed. Quite honestly, Channing Tatum [who repeatedly tried and failed to make a Gambit movie] as Gambit — by never getting screwed, he got screwed. We literally looked at IMDb pages to see who hasn’t had the heroic proper ending that we can now put on the Mount Rushmore of Fox superheroes.
It’s one thing to write a cameo but actually getting the actor who plays that character to commit might be more complicated. Did you get everybody you wanted?
Paul: The great news for us is that Deadpool comes with a lot of cool, so when Ryan picks up the phone or writes an email, the answer is usually “Yes.” We’d be like, “Okay, how about Chris Evans as Johnny Storm?” You literally hear the keyboard tapping on the other end, Ryan typing a text to Chris Evans. “Yeah, he’ll do it.” Chris had done a cameo for Ryan in Free Guy, and Ryan did one for Chris in Ghosted; they’re buddies, so then Chris has to make a deal with Marvel. We stay out of that. Once they figure it all out, Chris comes on set and gets fitted for the Johnny Storm suit.
Rhett: Paul pitched that idea of the mislead, where you think Chris Evans is Captain America, and it turns out he’s Johnny Storm. Almost from the jump,even before Hugh [joined the cast], everyone was: “That’s going in the movie.”
There are so many funny bits in this movie. Do you have personal favorites?
Rhett: The thing that’s probably nearest and dearest to me is the minivan fight. My wife and I bought a Kia Carnival for our kids, so the idea of Deadpool and Wolverine being trapped together inside a minivan, the most bland place to ever fight, saying horrible things to each other, and then Deadpool setting off Wolverine one too many times with the word “Gubernatorial” — that’s probably my biggest contribution.
You two have spent 15 years dreaming up Deadpool stories. Where do you go from here?
Paul: Deadpool never dies; that’s his superpower. We’re constantly being surprised by this franchise and the underdog keeps rearing its literally ugly head. So, who knows? I’ll just say we’ve done a trilogy, and if that’s all we write, great, move down the road. But if we get called back in by the coach, we’ll probably answer the call.
For more on Deadpool & Wolverine, check out these stories:
Marvel has unleashed the trailer for the return of Kathryn Hahn’s Agatha Harkness in Agatha All Along.
Hahn returns as the outwardly bubbly Agatha Harkness, one of Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen) and Paul Bettany (Vision)’s seemingly perfect neighbors in WandaVision, but who turns out to be the series’ big bad, the witch next door. WandaVision showrunner Jac Schaeffer leads the new series in the same role and serves as director of the pilot episode.
In Agatha All Along, Hahn’s Harkness is in a spot of trouble after Wanda Maximoff banished her with a spell in the climax of WandaVision, but thanks to a plucky goth teen with lots of questions and a streak of fearlessness, he unleashes Agatha, “the coven-less witch,” from her banishment. The new series will track Agatha as she attempts to complete the Witches’ Road, a brutal gauntlet of trials that, should one make it to the end, reward them with all she’s missing. Agatha and her new teen sidekick gather a group of down-on-their-luck witches to hit the Witches’ Road together.
Joining Hahn in the cast are Sasheer Zamata, Ali Ahn, Maria Dizzia, Paul Adelstein, Miles Gutierrez-Riley, and Okwui Okpokwasili, with Debra Jo Rupp, Patti LuPone, and Aubrey Plaza.
Check out the trailer below. Agatha All Along arrives on Disney+ on September 18.
For more stories on 20th Century Studios, Searchlight Pictures, Marvel Studios and what’s streaming or coming to
We’ve finally got our first look at Disney’s Snow White.
Disney revealed the first look at its new take on the iconic classic at its D23 event this past Friday. Rachel Zegler stars in the title role, with Gal Gadot playing the Evil Queen. The film is directed by Amazing Spider-Man director Marc Webb, and Dear Evan Hansen and The Greatest Showman songwriters Benj Pasek and Justin Paul add their musical chops to the film’s tunes.
The latest Snow White is a fresh take on one of Disney’s most beloved original films, 1937’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, which is credited with helping launch Disney into the media empire it is today. The storyline has been utilized in countless retellings, including the 2012 film Snow White and the Huntsman, which starred Kristen Stewart as Snow White, Chris Hemsworth as the Huntsman, and Charlize Theron as the Evil Queen.
This latest Snow White is based on a screenplay by Barbie writer/director Greta Gerwig, who also co-wrote it with Erin Cressida Wilson. It’s not the only live-action take on a classic coming out of Disney in the coming months—Mufasa: The Lion King, from director Barry Jenkins, comes out on December 20.
Check out the new trailer here. Snow White enchants theaters on March 21, 2025:
For more stories on 20th Century Studios, Searchlight Pictures, Marvel Studios and what’s streaming or coming to
Even if Deadpool & Wolverine hadn’t become the year’s top-grossing movie, self-described comics nerd-turned-screenwriter Zeb Wells would have been thrilled just for the opportunity to furnish Ryan Reynolds’ Deadpool character with snarky wise-cracks. Joining Reynolds, director Shawn Levy, Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, Wells, who previously penned “Venom: Dark Origin” and “The Amazing Spider-Man” comic books, says, “I was a huge fan of the first two Deadpool movies, so for me, getting to write a movie about Deadpool with Deadpool in the room—I was pumped.”
The R-rated blockbuster resurrects Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine and his retractable claws seven years after he died in Logan. The squabbling superheroes embark on a gory, cameo-studded mission to save their multiverse timelines.
Speaking from his home state of Colorado, Wells discusses life inside the writer’s room and explains how Deadpool & Wolverine‘s post-apocalyptic “Void” bears more than a passing resemblance to a rival blockbuster franchise.
Audiences have been laughing, shouting, and connecting in a very boisterous way to Deadpool & Wolverine.Why do you suppose that is?
Ryan does so well with that character, especially because it feels like everyone watching the movie is on the joke and going along for the ride. I saw the premiere, and everyone was cheering, but I thought, “Well, that’s a premiere audience.” So I got out to Colorado to see how the movie played there, and people were cheering just as loud, if not louder.
Deadpool & Wolverine has five writers. What was it like collaborating with so many people?
Usually, when you see that many names on a script, it’s because people came in after the first writers, but they weren’t really working on the script together. Deadpool & Wolverine was a situation where we were all breaking the movie together, writing it together, and basically working as a small writers’ room.
Did each of you focus on a different aspect of the story?
Shawn and Ryan kept an eye on the emotions and the heart of the character, and then I brought a lot of comic book knowledge. Because I had the nerd credentials, I’d get in there every once in a while and throw in a little nugget that I thought people would get a kick out of.
Ryan Reynolds spent years thinking about how to make a third Deadpool movie. At what point did you get involved?
I did a little consulting on the project when Ryan, Shawn, Rhett, and Paul were trying to figure out the third Deadpool. Then they got the call from Hugh Jackman, and all these ideas that had been percolating went away. That’s when I came on but was out of the loop about Hugh. After I’d signed the papers and the NDA, Shawn called me and said Hugh was in. I was so excited I almost threw up.
This movie boasts many jokes per minute. What was the process for generating all that funny dialogue?
Deadpool’s not allowed to say anything boring, so we spent a lot of time writing those scenes. They have to move the story along and move the character along, but they also have to be as funny as Deadpool can be. That’s a very high bar to hit when Deadpool’s in the room, so I really needed to bring my A-game. The things I’m most proud of are the jokes I wrote that made it to the screen because I know if Ryan says the line, he must think it’s funny, too, or else he’d punch it up. For me, it was exhilarating to think, “I wrote something Deadpool wants to say.”
Deadpool occasionally becomes sincere and says things like “I want to matter.” Did you guys build in those serious moments from the start?
Anywhere Deadpool goes, it’s going to be funny, by nature, and that buys you little heartfelt moments here and there where Deadpool can drop the armor. It’s a pretty cool story machine with a lot of fun levers to pull.
The main lever being Hugh Jackman as gruff Wolverine. Unlike Deadpool, he does not crack jokes.
Which was great because with Hugh bringing all that soul to the character, that’s where you get the [dramatic] tension. Wolverine’s been through a lot of pain and trauma. He’s trying to be a good guy, but his violence comes out at odd times. We wanted this to be a funny Deadpool [movie], but it’s got to be a Wolverine movie as well, so that was the challenge.
SPOILER ALERT
Who came up with that crazy “Mad Max” parody when Deadpool and Wolverine wind up in the “Void” hellscape?
I made up the idea that the situation could maybe be Mad Max-like, and then Shawn ran with it. I mean, it’s almost impossible to do an apocalyptic wasteland [without referencing Mad Max] because they did it so well.
Logistically speaking, how did the five of you collaborate? Did you gather physically in the same room at the same time or . . .
There was a lot of Zoom, then writing, then getting back on Zoom. At one point, Rhett and Paul were summoned to meet with Ryan. I went to New York to meet with Ryan and Shawn. We’d do our revisions on Final Draft and pass them around.
Deadpool & Wolverine fans have gone wild over the cameos from famous actors who pop up out of nowhere, do a scene, and disappear. Was there a lot of re-writing where you weren’t yet sure which actors would wind up being in the movie?
On big movies with big name actors, there’s always a lot of moving parts, schedules, and availabilities. Also, the MCU is a big, sprawling beast, and if you did something with [certain] characters, it would mess them up. So yes, there are old versions of the script with other characters. The [actors] come in, they leave, you beg beg beg, and suddenly they’re back. You just hop on and do the best you can with the information you have.
You talked earlier about sort of serving as the writing team’s resident nerd based on your background as a comic book writer. For a lot of people, being able to write comics for a living probably sounds like a dream job. How did that happen for you?
I went to film school at CU Boulder. I learned enough that when a comics magazine held a short film contest, I had a friend who looked like the Incredible Hulk so we painted him green and made a dumb short film about how the Hulk had lost his job and was down on his luck. That won the contest. Then someone from Marvel saw the video and offered me a job writing comics.
Circling back toDeadpool & Wolverine, this film is loaded with self-referential humor. As Wade Wilson, Ryan Reynolds says, “Yes, I’m a character in a story, but I’m also an actor in a movie from Marvel, and I’m going to make all kinds of inside jokes about the superhero film industry.” How did you approach the use of pop culture references in the script?
There’s so much superhero literacy now just because kids have grown up with these movies, and people like me—who read comics when we were kids—for many years just wanted the superhero movies to be good, and suddenly, they got good. Now everyone knows who Spiderman is, and they know who Captain America is, so this movie plays really well to the common knowledge we all share.
Three-time Oscar nominee Michelle Pfeiffer is entering the Yellowstone-verse.
The celebrated actress is set to star in the Yellowstone sequel in creator Taylor Sheridan’s growing narrative empire. Pfeiffer will lead a new series set in the present day, a continuation of Sheridan’s flagship series. It’s not the only spinoff coming—there’s also a prequel series in the works set in 1944.
Pfeiffer will lead and executive produce the sequel series, titled The Madison. It’s being billed as a study of grief and human connection centered on a family from New York City who heads to the Madison River valley in central Montana.
“Michelle Pfeiffer is a remarkable talent who imbues every role with emotional depth, authenticity, and grace,” said Chris McCarthy, Paramount Global Co-CEO and President/CEO, Showtime & MTV Entertainment Studios. “She is the perfect anchor to the newest chapter of the Yellowstone universe, Madison, from the brilliant mind of Taylor Sheridan.”
Pfeiffer is the latest big-name star to enter Sheridan’s expanding Yellowstone universe, following Harrison Ford and Helen Mirren, who recently starred in the prequel series 1923, which debuted in 2022 and followed the Duttons during the early 20th century upheavals of Western expansion, Prohibition, and the Great Depression. A second and final season of 1923 is in pre-production now. That series followed another prequel series, 1883, which aired in 2021 and 2022 and starred Faith Hill, Tim McGraw, Sam Elliott, and more. Set during the Civil War’s aftermath, 1883 was centered on the Dutton Family as they went to Texas and joined a wagon train headed west to Oregon before ultimately settling down in Montana to establish the Yellowstone Ranch. The upcoming prequel 1944 will follow the events of 1883 and 1923.
The final episodes of Yellowstone arrive on November 10, and they finally reveal how Sheridan handled the exit of star Kevin Costner, who played John Dutton in the juggernaut series until now. While Costner’s got another western epic, his four-part cinematic series Horizon, on his plate, Pfeiffer will take the lead as the biggest star in the Yellowstone-verse.
For more films and series from Paramount and Paramount+, check out these stories:
Featured image: HOLLYWOOD, CALIFORNIA – APRIL 27: Michelle Pfeiffer attends the 49th Annual AFI Life Achievement Award Honoring Nicole Kidman at Dolby Theatre on April 27, 2024 in Hollywood, California. (Photo by Kevin Winter/Getty Images for Warner Bros. Discovery)
It was arguably the most crucial—and brutally delayed—alliance forged in the narratively rich if dragon-delayed season two finale of House of the Dragon—Daemon Targaryen (Matt Smith) finally and truly bent the knee to his queen, Rhaenyra Targaryen (Emma D’Arcy), and delivered her the massed armies of the Riverlands. At long last, Daemon said that Rhaenyra was his brother, King Viserys’ (Paddy Considine) chosen successor, a truth he had refused to accept for years. In bending the knee, Daemon immediately strengthened Rhaenyra’s position immeasurably—she’d already successfully found fresh dragon riders to tip the scales (pun intended) in her favor against the bloodthirsty Prince Regent Aemond Targaryen (Ewan Mitchell) and his supporters—now she had the massed armies of the Riverlands pledging their loyalty and their swords.
Matt Smith, Emma D’Arcy. Photo by Ollie Upton/HBO
Daemon’s change of heart took a change in his vision, primarily those nurtured in him by the “witch,” Alys Rivers, during his stay in Harrenhal. Alys has been prodding Daemon to snap out of his self-obsessed bluster by opening him up to dreams, nightmares, and visitations, many from his dead brother Viserys, who has tried telling Daemon, in life and now in death, that wearing the crown isn’t a prize to be coveted or a gift of power, but a burden and, at worse, a curse. But it isn’t until Alys leads Daemon into the Godwood that his transformation reaches its necessary conclusion. In a brief moment, Daemon spies what appears to be one of the mystical Children of the Forest, scuttling away into the brush. Then, placing his hand on the Weirwood Tree, Daemon has a vision that brings us back through some of the most seminal moments in Game of Thrones.
Gayle Rankin is Alys. Photograph by Ollie Upton/HBO
Daemon sees much in his brief communion with the tree. There is Daenerys Targaryen and her dragon hatchlings, as well as the dreaded Night King and his undead army, the evil beyond the mortal evils that plague the schemers and dreamers in Game of Thrones. Daemon also sees visions closer to home—Rhaenyra on the Iron Throne hits hard; a message from Queen Helaena echoing something Alys told him previously—they’re all pieces of a larger story, not the movers of the pieces itself—hits harder.
These visions bring home for Daemon the truth of what his brother Visersys used to say about the Song of Ice and Fire, prompting him to kneel before his wife and true queen.
What was so surprising about the finale is that the eleven dragons in the play for the armies of the Greens and the Blacks weren’t pitted against each other in battle. At least not yet. The massive, imposing Vhagar, Prince Aemond’s steed, had glimpsed in the previous episode the reality that Rhaenyra has padded her numbers. The dragons left waiting to hunt and burn in season 3 include Syrax, Dreamfyre, Vermax, Vermithor, Caraxes, Seasmoke, Silverwing, Moondancer, and newcomers Sheepstealer and Tessarion.
Emma D’Arcy. Photograph by Theo Whiteman/HBO
What Daemon’s vision did was give the headstrong, often petulant, would-be king a shot of humility just when Rhaenyra needed it most. Daemon and the Riverland armies now give her manpower to back her dragons. However, what was left to be seen is precisely how this all plays out—we’ll have to wait until season three to find out.
For now, what we do have are Daemon’s visions of the Song of Ice and Fire and how one man’s humbling and acceptance of a woman in power might change the fate of all men and women in Westeros and beyond.
For more on Warner Bros., Max, and more, check out these stories:
In writer/director Jon Watts’s upcoming original film Wolfs, which will make its world premiere at the 81st Venice Film Festival, Brad Pitt and George Clooney are finally sharing the screen together again for the first time in 16 years. Now, Apple Original Films has made a fresh deal with Watts to write, direct, and produce a sequel for Pitt and Clooney.
Wolfs is also slated to have a limited theatrical run, beginning on September 20, before bowing globally on Apple TV+ on Friday, September 27. This strategy is a bit of a pivot from the original plan of giving the film a wide theatrical release, the hybrid strategy Apple used for Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moonand Ridley Scott’s Napoleon. Apple will continue that method for another Brad Pitt film, his upcoming Formula One drama F1 from Top Gun: Maverick director Joseph Kosinski.
Wolfs stars Pitt and Clooney as a pair of fixers called in on the same job where a dead body (presumably) needs to be taken care of. Usually operating as lone wolves, Pitt’s Nick and Clooney’s Jack are thrust into an increasingly stressful, unasked-for, single-night working relationship. This becomes especially true when the dead body turns out to be not so dead after all.
The Pitt and Clooney reunion has been a long time coming, arriving 24 years after they first appeared in Steven Soderbergh’s Ocean’s Eleven franchise, playing Rusty Ryan and Danny Ocean, respectively. We haven’t seen them on screen together since the Coen Brothers’ 2008 dark comedy Burn After Reading, so it was big news when it was announced that they were co-starring and co-producing Wolfs. Pitt’s Plan B and Clooney’s Smokehouse Pictures both produced Watts’s original film, and as Deadlinereports, Wolfs has tested strongly with audiences.
The cast includes Amy Ryan, Austin Abrams, Poorna Jagannathan, Rob Riddell, Irina Dubova, and Hassani Rizzo. Wolfs is Watts’ first original film since his breakout Cop Car—he has lately been the helmer behind Sony’s mega-popular and critically acclaimed Spider-Man franchise, starring Tom Holland and Zendaya.
“Wolfs is the kind of big event movie that makes Apple TV+ such an exceptional home for the best in entertainment,” Apple Original Films head of features Matt Dentler said in a statement. “With George and Brad’s remarkable and engaging chemistry under Jon Watts’ extraordinary direction, Wolfs blends all the great elements of comedy, action, and drama into a hugely entertaining movie that will leave audiences ready for what’s next. Releasing the movie to theaters before making it widely available to Apple TV+ customers brings the best of both worlds to audiences, and we’re excited to see fans embrace the movie as we start working with Jon on the sequel.”
Check out the trailer below. Wolfs will be released in theaters on September 20 and will stream exclusively on Apple TV+ on September 27.
Featured image: Brad Pitt and George Clooney in “Wolfs,” premiering in theaters on September 20 and globally on Apple TV+ on September 27.
