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Last weekend saw Frozen II deliver the largest three and five-day Thanksgiving performances ever as the animated film has now pushed over $300 million domestically. This weekend the animated hit is sure to hold on to the top spot for the third weekend straight, nearing $350 million in its first 17 days. Meanwhile, Thanksgiving also saw strong debuts from the likes of Knives Out and Queen & Slim, while additional adult-targeted features such as Ford v Ferrari and A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood continued their solid performances. That said, this weekend's debut of Stx's animated pickup Playmobil is at something of a disadvantage as Frozen is sure to eat up the majority of its audience and even Focus's nationwide expansion of Dark Waters will have to navigate a crowded marketplace to gain a foothold.

Disney After a massive $125 million five-day performance last weekend added yet another record to the impressive start for Frozen II,

Fans of Harley Quinn got a new look at the movie Thursday at Comic Con Experience, the Brazilian convention in São Paulo, where Margot Robbie and the cast of next year’s Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) debuted all-new footage, including the opening sequence of the movie itself.

Two convention-only clips were screened for the audience, including a new trailer that focused more on Black Canary and Huntress than the first — as Black Canary (Jurnee Smollett-Bell) put it, Huntress (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) has “anger issues,” despite her shouted assertions to the ...

BAFTA will honour film producer extraordinaire Kathleen Kennedy with the Fellowship at the EE British Academy Film Awards on Sunday 2 February 2020.

Awarded annually, the Fellowship is the highest accolade bestowed by BAFTA upon an individual in recognition of an outstanding and exceptional contribution to film, games or television.

Fellows previously honoured for their work in film include Alfred Hitchcock, Steven Spielberg, Elizabeth Taylor, Stanley Kubrick, Billy Wilder, Ken Loach, Michael Caine, Anthony Hopkins, Laurence Olivier, Judi Dench, Vanessa Redgrave, Christopher Lee, Martin Scorsese, Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger, Helen Mirren, Sidney Poitier, Mel Brooks and Ridley Scott. Thelma Schoonmaker received the Fellowship at the 2019 Ee British Academy Film Awards.

Kennedy said, “British filmmaking has always played a significant role in both my life and career. The boundless creative vision of artists such as Tom Stoppard, David Lean, Chris Nolan, Stephen Daldry and Peter Morgan continues to inspire me. The recent Star

The Irishman drew an average minute audience of nearly 2.6 million viewers on its November 27 premiere on Netflix, holding steady through the long Thanksgiving weekend, according to new figures from Nielsen.

The company only tracks U.S. consumption, so the snapshot is just part of the picture. Netflix execs have been coy so far about numbers as the film has rolled through its limited theatrical run and moved onto the streaming platform. The film has racked up acclaim and early awards momentum, earning top honors this week from the New York Film Critics. In an appearance at a conference Thursday hosted by Variety, Deadline’s sister publication, Netflix film boss Scott Stuber was asked about the numbers but would say only that the company “is on [our] way to being happy with the movie.”

Nielsen said Martin Scorsese’s film gathered a total average minute audience of 13.2 million viewers in its first 5 days of streaming availability.

Amazon Studios has commissioned its first Australian original scripted series, with a reboot of hit Seven Network family drama, Packed to the Rafters.

Back to the Rafters picks up six years after the original show’s final season on free to air TV network, Seven, and will be written by series creator Bevan Lee and made for Amazon Prime by Seven’s production arm, Seven Studios.

Following Dave and Julie Rafter, Back to the Rafters will feature the original principal cast members Rebecca Gibney (Julie Rafter), Erik Thomson (Dave Rafter), Jessica Marais(Rachel Rafter), Hugh Sheridan ...

The season two finale of The Marvelous Mrs Maisel laid the groundwork for a transformative third season, as Midge (Rachel Brosnahan) leaves her former life as a housewife behind once and for all, turning down a marriage proposal in favor of going on a nationwide tour with pop star Shy Baldwin (Leroy McClain). As dramatic a decision as this is, it's not quite as shocking as Abe (Tony Shalhoub) abruptly quitting his tenured position at Columbia — and by extension, giving up the beautiful apartment that he and Rose (Marin Hinkle) have long called home.

The Weissmans’ “classic six”...

Spider-Man’s involvement in the McU came under threat earlier this year when rights-owner Sony was seemingly unable to reach an agreement with Marvel to allow the web slinger to continue appearing in Marvel films. The two companies eventually managed to work out their dispute, and it may have been due in part to franchise star Tom Holland.

On Wednesday night’s episode of “Jimmy Kimmel Live,” Holland opened up to Kimmel about a not-completely-sober call between him and Disney CEO Bob Iger, which Iger had told Kimmel about in an earlier interview.

According to Holland, when he found out that Sony might not let Spider-Man remain in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, he asked if he could send Iger an email.

“I just wanted to say thank you, I wanted to say, ‘This has been an amazing five years of my life, thank you for changing my life in the best way,

A hypnotic TV commercial for a local department store beckons — summons, really — shoppers for what amounts to a culturally mandatory annual winter sales event. It’s an ad that’s not unlike the ones for Silver Shamrock in “Halloween III: Season of The Witch,” and in “In Fabric,” it succeeds in the same way, bringing in unhappy bank employee Sheila (Marianne Jean-Baptiste) to look for a first-date dress.

She finds the Ambassadorial Function Dress, color: Artery Red. It’s an alluring garment summed up in the store’s catalog with hyperbolic copy like “body sensual, captivating, candlelight glances, canapé conversations.” Not really Sheila’s size, it somehow fits her perfectly. And though she protests that she normally wouldn’t wear something so bold, the commandingly seductive saleswoman, Miss Luckmoore, doubles down: “Daring eclipses the dark circumference of caution.” There’s really no arguing with that.

Naturally, the dress is haunted.

Comedy Central and Refinery29 have signed a digital content partnership to produce two comedy series featuring an all-female lineup of comedians, Variety has learned exclusively.

Slated to premiere spring 2020, the series will be co-branded and distributed on both Comedy Central and Refinery29’s digital platforms. While neither series is being eyed for a linear run at present, a release at some point on the ViacomCBS-owned cable channel isn’t out of the question given that Comedy Central owns the rights, according to sources.

The first series, titled “Cc x R29: Taking the Stage,” is a short-form stand-up series

Disney has issued a warning that visuals and sustained flashing light sequences in “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker” could affect those with photosensitive epilepsy.

The studio is working with the Epilepsy Foundation, which also issued a warning on Friday about the potential health risk.

“Out of an abundance of caution, we recommend that you provide at your venue box office and online, and at other appropriate places where your customers will see it, a notice containing the following information: ‘Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker’ contains several sequences with imagery and sustained flashing lights that may affect those who are susceptible to photosensitive epilepsy or have other photosensitivities,” Disney said in a letter to exhibitors.

The foundation thanked Disney for its efforts in advance of the movie’s release on Dec. 20. It noted that for about 3% of people with epilepsy, exposure to flashing lights at certain intensities or certain visual patterns can trigger seizures.

Harry Styles seems to be cribbing from another famous Harry in his new video for “Adore You”: Harry Nilsson. The cheeky, weird and magical video echoes, in part, Nilsson’s equally storybook-esque concept album-film, 1970’s The Point!

Style’s video centers around a figurative (and literal) fish out of water: the only boy in the dour Isle of Eroda who can smile and his unnamed fish pal. Nilsson’s film follows a similar conceit: It’s about round-headed boy named Oblio who lives in a Pointed Village where everyone has pyramid heads,

“Scarface,” which opened Dec. 9, 1983, made money at the box office but wasn’t immediately profitable. However, in the 36 years since, the film has been embraced as a classic. The project started as a 1930 pulp novel by Armitage Trail, inspired by gangster Al Capone, whose nickname was Scarface. On April 6, 1982, Variety announced star Al Pacino and director Sidney Lumet were working on a remake of the 1932 film, but before long, Brian De Palma stepped in as director. The original budget was $13 million-$14 million. When production wrapped in summer 1983, Variety reported the cost had ballooned to $37 million.

Just before the film’s holiday launch, Universal held a New York premiere screening and a party at Sardi’s, with an eclectic mix of guests including Cher, Raquel Welch, Lucille Ball, Eddie Murphy and Kurt Vonnegut, “who walked out during the grisly chainsaw shower scene,” Variety reported. The article added that an on-screen dedication

ABC veteran Keli Lee has left the international arm of ABC Studios as Disney considers the future of the London-based content unit, Variety has learned.

Sources said Disney has told the creative community that there “has been a re-evaluation of ABC Studios International” and that it is re-assessing “the creative direction” of the business.

There have been changes in Disney’s international operations in the wake of its acquisition of 21st Century Fox assets in March. Numerous film and TV staffers at both entities have moved around as the combined business takes shape, and ahead of the wider international rollout

The CW has spent the last year teasing its epic “Crisis on Infinite Earths” event, which begins on Sunday and brings together the entire “Arrowverse” in an unprecedented TV event whose plot spans both multiple timelines and an infinite number of realities.

The upcoming five-part event features not one, not two, but three different versions of Superman, two Lois Lanes, a futuristic Bruce Wayne, and a slew of characters that last appeared during the days of The WB. It’s the culmination of the last eight years, which began with “Arrow” in 2012 and now includes six different series.

Speaking with reporters Thursday at The CW’s Burbank offices, Marc Guggenheim, who is serving of showrunner for the “Crisis” event, described the production of the crossover as being “three-dimensional chess with Rubik’s cubes.” Guggenheim, who has been with the “Arrowverse” since its inception, spearheaded the effort with the help of each show’s individual showrunners.

When Mark Tildesley read Anthony McCarten’s script for “The Two Popes,” he saw how integral the Sistine Chapel was to the narrative. As the film’s production designer, he knew he couldn’t film inside the Vatican, which meant he’d have to reproduce the location. “We did visit it with a leading expert — [producer] Enzo Sisti. His father was a sacristan there who had dressed two of the popes. He took us on a tour and explained the place to us. It was the first time I’d ever been in the chapel. It was a daunting task to imagine that we were going to reproduce this.”

Through discussions with the film’s director, Fernando Meirelles, and cinematographer, César Charlone, Tildesley knew Michelangelo’s iconic frescoes would be featured prominently. “We were going to do these close-ups,” he says. “We went to Cinecittà Studios, and it’s big enough

A version of this story about “The Two Popes” screenwriter Anthony McCarten first appeared in the Actors/Directors/Screenwriters issue of TheWrap’s Oscar magazine.

For screenwriter Anthony McCarten, the road to “The Two Popes” started with a death in the family. The British writer was in Rome when he received a text from a cousin telling him that a family member had passed away. “I was looking for a place to light a candle at chapel, and I decided, ‘Well, I won’t mess around, I’ll go straight to St. Peter’s Square,'” said McCarten, whose recent screenplays include “The Theory of Everything,” “Darkest Hour” and “Bohemian Rhapsody” (fact-based stories that have led to three of the last five Best Actor winners).

“And as fate would have it, or as God should determine, the square was full of about 50,000 people watching the rock star Pope Francis deliver a morning mass.

Cyndi Lauper has officially released her optimistic “Hope,” the singer’s first single since 2016.

Lauper has been performing the song since 2017, when her battle with psoriasis inspired her to pen the track.

“I’m so excited to finally release ‘Hope’ as a single. The song doesn’t really have too many words. I wanted everyone to get the message through the feeling of it,” Lauper said in a statement.

“With all the craziness going on in the world, we might not agree on much, but I think we can all

For cinematographer George Steel, the key to “The Aeronauts,” director Tom Hooper’s $80 million film starring Felicity Jones and Eddie Redmayne as balloonist-scientists who soar to 35,000 feet to break records in 1862, was to take the viewer along for the ride.

When Variety visited the cast and crew on set in London, Steel was crouched into the corner of the 8-by-8 balloon basket. “Tom was adamant that it should feel like the camera was in the basket with them,” says Steel. “[Most] of the shots didn’t deviate from that. There are a few shots on a crane from outside the basket, and then we used a helicopter. If you couldn’t do it for real, Tom wasn’t interested.”

Some of the first shots were of Redmayne and Jones at 2,000 feet above the English countryside, where Steel directed helicopters and drones to capture aerial shots without VFX. Jones’ stunt double, Helen Steinway Bailey,

Jason Reitman’s “Ghostbusters” sequel and reboot has a new title ahead of a trailer set to drop on Monday. “Ghostbusters: Afterlife” will open in theaters July, 10, 2020.

Reitman takes over directing duties from his father Ivan Reitman, and the new film stars Carrie Coon, ​​​​​Finn Wolfhard, Mckenna Grace and Paul Rudd.

Vanity Fair had a first look at Rudd, Wolfhard and Grace in the film, which is set in modern day and ties back into the “Manhattan Crossrip of 1984,” or the giant cataclysm that the Ghostbusters had to stop and that spawned a giant marshmallow man demolishing New York.

Also Read: Ghostbusters Are Back in First Teaser for Jason Reitman's Sequel (Video)

Now Rudd’s students, played by Wolfhard and Grace, seem to think the whole thing was a myth or a legend, and Rudd, who only remembers the event from being a child, is finding it hard to believe the Ghostbusters were ever real.

Ratings for Kelly Clarkson’s new syndicated daytime talk show are “Stronger” than anyone expected. Buckle up, we’ve got a lot of numbers and a lot of her song-title puns coming at you. Averaging a 1.5 household rating each day, “The Kelly Clarkson Show” is the highest-rated syndicated talk show to launch since Katie Couric’s “Katie” (a 1.9 at this same point in the freshman season) debuted in September 2012, according to Nielsen’s Live + 7 Day data through Nov. 17. “Kelly” is averaging 2 million daily viewers, whereas “Katie” got 2.5 million. That’s pretty good company to be in, but the competition between Kelly and Katie would actually be closer these days. In today’s landscape, that first season of “Katie” would very unlikely have — or possibly even approach — the same 1.9 rating and 2.5 million viewers. Generally speaking, television ratings were significantly higher seven years ago. In 2019, all these new viewing platforms fragment any one series’ potential audience.