Entertainment

Dune, Denis Villenueve’s sci-fi epic starring Timothée Chalamet, Rebecca Ferguson, Oscar Isaac, Zendaya, Jason Momoa and Javier Bardem, topped the box office on its opening weekend, grabbing an estimated $40.1 million. The film, also available to stream on HBO Max, was predicted to make somewhere between $30-$35 million.

Dune, which opened internationally several weeks ago, has racked up an additional $180.6 million overseas.

Halloween Kills, last week’s #1, landed in second place, earning an estimated $14.5 million. It’s two-week total now sits at $73.1 million.

No Time to Die, in its third week of release, finished third with an estimated $11.9 million. The latest Bond flick has racked up $120 million here in the States and $405 million overseas.

Fourth place belongs to Venom: Let There Be Carnage, delivering an estimated 9.1 million. Its four-week total is now at $181.8 million. The Venom sequel added another $170.6 million internationally, bringing its worldwide tally to $352.4 million.

Rounding out the top five is this week’s only other major release: Ron’s Gone Wrong, the animated tale featuring the voices of Zach Galifianakis, Olivia Colman and Ed Helms. It earned an estimated $7.3 million, short of its predicted $10 million.

Wes Anderson‘s latest independent release, The French Dispatch, starring Bill Murray, Jeffrey Wright, Tilda Swinton and Timothée Chalamet, had an impressive opening, finishing in ninth place with an estimated $1.3 million.

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The cast and crew of Friends are mourning the loss of James Michael Tyler, The actor, who played Gunther on the hit sitcom, lost his battle with prostate cancer over the weekend. He was 59. 

Taking to Instagram Sunday evening Jennifer Aniston shared her condolences alongside a clip of a scene they had together on Friends. In the scene, Gunther confesses his love to Aniston’s Rachel, saying “I love you,” to which she responds, “I love you too,” before explaining that her love is more platonic than romantic. 

Alongside the snippet, the actress wrote, “Friends would not have been the same without you. Thank you for the laughter you brought to the show and to all of our lives. You will be so missed #JamesMichaelTaylor,” followed by the broken hearty emoji.

Courteney Cox, who played Monica on the series, also took to Instagram to pay tribute to Tyler, writing, “The size of gratitude you brought into the room and showed every day on set is the size of the gratitude I hold for having known you. Rest In peace James. [red heart emoji].”

News of Tyler’s death made waves after Friends producer Kevin Bright tweeted on Sunday, “James Michael Tyler Our Gunther passed away last night. He was an incredible person who spent his final days helping others. God bless you James, Gunther lives forever.”

The official Friends Twitter account also posted a tribute, writing, “Warner Bros. Television mourns the loss of James Michael Tyler, a beloved actor and integral part of our FRIENDS family. Our thoughts are with his family, friends, colleagues and fans.”

 

 

 

 

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Gretchen Carlson is returning to The View as guest co-host on Monday and Tuesday to talk “Hot Topics” as well as topics that are close to her heart.

The journalist has been advocating for women’s rights and workplace equality since becoming a #MeToo pioneer five years ago when she sued former Fox News CEO Roger Ailes for sexual harassment. She co-founded the organization Lift Our Voices, which aims to give a voice to those silenced by non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) and arbitration clauses.

“It became my passion project,” she tells ABC Audio of Life Our Voices. “Because I had the personal experience, but also because I wanted to pay tribute to the thousands, maybe millions of women who have never had their voices heard.”

While Carlson says she never aspired to be the “poster child for sexual harassment,” she’s made the most of the role and has seen her work’s power when it comes to inspiring others, including her own two teenage children.

Her story has also had an effect on pop culture — she was portrayed by Nicole Kidman in the film Bombshell and by Naomi Watts in the mini-series The Loudest Voice. She calls the experience “surreal,” especially because her own NDA from Fox prevented her from consulting on either project.

“I can’t even tell you if they were accurate or not,” she says. “But I have to look at it high level and know that these projects help so many other people.”

The View airs at 11 a.m. ET on ABC.

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Jason Sudeikis returned to his old stomping grounds this past weekend, hosting Saturday Night Live for the first time since leaving the show in 2013.

In the show’s opening sketch, President Joe Biden — played by new SNL cast member James Austin Johnson — grapples with his falling poll numbers and wonders and longs for the old days, when the press used to like him.

He’s then visited by “The Ghost of Biden Past” — played by Sudeikis, reprising his Biden impersonation from from 2013 — who gives 2021 Biden a pep talk, reminding him he’s still “Joe Freakin’ Biden.”

Sudeikis’ monologue took a couple of sentimental turns, with a shout out to his two kids with ex-wife Olivia Wilde — Otis, seven, and Daisy, five — then to reflect on the “historic” Studio 8A and how it shaped his life.

The Ted Lasso star also joined Weekend Update anchors, Colin Jost and Michael Che, and dusted off his devil character, who bragged about some of his recent accomplishments, including Jost’s marriage to Scarlett Johansson.

Sudeikis’ devil also claimed responsibility for Florida, The Houston Astros, Tom Brady and Lil Nas X.

Later, Sudeikis revived his red sweatsuit-clad over-enthusiastic back up dancer, Vance, in Kenan Thompson‘s recurring sketch, “What’s Up with That,” joined by fellow SNL vet, Fred Armisen as the sax-playing Giuseppe.

Sudeikis was joined by musical guest Brandi Carlile.

Kieren Culkin, who stars in the HBO drama Succession, will host when SNL returns November 6.

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Actor James Michael Tyler, who played Gunther on Friends, has lost his battle with prostate cancer. He was 59.

Friends producer Kevin Bright tweeted the news on Sunday, writing, “James Michael Tyler Our Gunther passed away last night. He was an incredible person who spent his final days helping others. God bless you James, Gunther lives forever.”

The official Friends Twitter account also posted a tribute, writing, “Warner Bros. Television mourns the loss of James Michael Tyler, a beloved actor and integral part of our FRIENDS family. Our thoughts are with his family, friends, colleagues and fans.”

Earlier this year, Tyler revealed to NBC’s Today show that his fight against the illness left his lower body paralyzed, keeping him from participating in the recent HBO Max Friends reunion in person. He did appear via a video greeting. 

The actor told Today the cancer was at stage 4, and had spread to his bones. “So eventually, you know, it’s gonna probably get me,” he said.

He also explained his cancer worsened during the pandemic last year.

“I missed going in for a test, which was not a good thing,” he explained. “So the cancer decided to mutate at the time of the pandemic, and so it’s progressed.”

Some time ago, Tyler told ABC Audio he was “grateful” his character left such an impression on the sitcom.

“I got there, started with one word, and really no storyline whatsoever. You got to say ‘Yeah,'” he recalled.

“I believe the whole like ‘Gunther’s unrequited love for Rachel’ was only supposed to be about one or two episodes, but they kept that story arc for 10 years, which I’m very grateful for.”

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Lennie James has played Morgan Jones in The Walking Dead universe starting from the show’s pilot in 2010, and reappeared many times before transitioning to the spin-off show Fear The Walking Dead. 

Nobody’s more surprised by that than Lennie, he tells ABC Audio. “I started out just doing one episode and I’m not sure people believe me when I tell them that it genuinely was just one episode.”

James explains he was surprised when producer Gale Ann Hurd wanted him to be a permanent part of the series, but as a busy character actor, he wasn’t always available.

In Fear The Walking Dead, his character is now pitted against Colman Domingo‘s Strand, who has morphed from reluctant hero to formidable, megalomaniacal opponent.

“If someone had told me at the beginning that this is where it was going to go, I would have said I don’t believe it,” James noted. “It’s kind of snuck up on me and taken me by surprise.”

The journey of James’ character has taken Morgan from a mourning husband bent on revenge to a Zenned-out-seeming samurai-like figure, to something quite different nowadays.

“At each point there has been a new challenge, each point there’s been something that has been worth taking on and worth seeing what it was like with this guy,” he explains. “And he’s he’s never really kind of stopped challenging me, stopped surprising me and stopped interesting me, which is why I’m still here. I suppose doing it.”  

Fear The Walking Dead airs Sunday nights on AMC, and streams anytime on the AMC app.

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Halyna Hutchins, a well-admired cinematographer who was blazing a new path for women in her field, was killed Thursday in a tragic accident on the set of the film Rust in New Mexico.

Alec Baldwin fired the shot from the prop gun that left Hutchins dead and the film’s director, Joel Souza, injured. A source tells ABC News that Hutchins’ husband, Matthew Hutchins, spoke with Baldwin, who has been very supportive.  Meanwhile, colleagues rushed to social media to mourn the 42-year-old artist. 

“I think she was going to be a very famous, very successful DP,” director Adam Egypt Mortimer, who worked with Hutchins on the 2020 film, Archenemy, told the Los Angeles Times. “She was showing people what she could do.”

Hutchins was remembered by colleagues for breaking barriers for women in Hollywood’s male-dominated cinematography sector. Fellow cinematographer Elle Schneider paid tribute to Hutchins on Twitter Friday, remembering her as a “friend and rockstar cinematographer.”

“Women cinematographers have historically been kept from genre film, and it seems especially cruel that one of the rising stars who was able to break through had her life cut short on the kind of project we’ve been fighting for,” Schneider wrote.

Joe Manganiello, who also worked with Hutchins on Archenemy, called the DP “an absolutely incredible talent and a great person.”

“…She was the kind of cinematographer that you wanted to see succeed because you wanted to see what she could pull off next,” he recalled.

Hutchins was born in Ukraine and grew up on a “Soviet military base in the Arctic Circle surrounded by reindeer and nuclear submarines,” according to a biography on her website, which also says she began her career as an investigative journalist on documentary productions before moving to Los Angeles.

Sick and devastated to hear that my friend and rockstar cinematographer Halyna Hutchins was killed on set today in New Mexico. I don’t have words to describe this tragedy. I want answers. I want her family to somehow find peace among this horrific, horrific loss. pic.twitter.com/ElAQNMuQvR

— 𝖊𝖑𝖑𝖊 𝖘𝖕𝖎𝖉𝖊𝖗 🕷️🕸️ (@elleschneider) October 22, 2021

 

 

 

 

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Sunday night’s episode of CBS’ SEAL Team, “Nine Ten,” takes a look back at the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, through the eyes of David Boreanaz‘s Jason Hayes and his fellow team members. 

The episode takes place both in the present day, and via flashbacks showing where they all were before that terrible day 20 years ago. The cast assembled at the 9/11 Memorial for part of the episode.

“One of the things that hit me hard at the site, we were the first show to shoot down there at Ground Zero, was talking to a few officers that were present during that time,” Boreanaz tells ABC Audio. 

“And the stories, some of the stories that they were telling were not only hard to hear, but hard to understand and comprehend that that energy,” Boreanaz continues. [W]here they were that day, and what was happening around them. The sounds, the sights. Very disturbing. Words are hard to put into place with this one.”

He adds, “Being there and shooting this show really was about remembering the lives that were lost that day, right, 20 years ago. Sure, we’re a show that it can examine that where were these characters 20 years ago, why they got into the fight on terror, which is great storytelling. But being there and remembering and honoring that was something else. And man…It was very impactful.”

One of the challenges was finding actors who could play Borenanz’s character and others at that point in their lives. “Trying to find Jason Hayes was difficult, but the kid who played him was great and it was fun to talk to him and kind of see where he was coming from,” Boreanaz says.

He calls “Nine Ten” a “very special episode.”  

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As Kandi Burruss prepares for the second birthday of her daughter Blaze next month, she’s looking back at the trauma of Blaze’s birth via a surrogate.

Blaze was one of twin embryos, and the Real Housewives of Atlanta star remembers the emotional moment when she found out one of the twins didn’t make it after the embryo transfer to their surrogate.

“We were super happy, obviously, that she was pregnant. Then, you know, they did the scan and we were super, super excited ’cause both embryos took initially,” Burruss said this week on People‘s Me Becoming Mom podcast. “Then, a few weeks later one of them, I don’t know what they call it, but it went away. So we lost one of them.”

After the joy of the pregnancy, it was a painful time for Burruss.

“I was super sad because, once again, we’re thinking that we might have twins, and then they tell us, ‘Yes, both of them are there.’ Then we’re all happy, excited,” the 45-year-old entertainer explains. “The numbers were going up, and then they stopped going up. Then you’re sitting there praying, hoping that something is going to change. And it didn’t change.”

The Xscape member and her husband, Todd Tucker, also have a son, Ace Wells, 5, plus Kandi has a daughter, Riley, 17, from a previous relationship.

Blaze is her first child via a surrogate, and she says the process has not affected her ability to have a special relationship with her.

“I guess [the] initial thinking is, like, just because somebody doesn’t physically have their baby that they won’t be able to have that same bond as a mother who physically pushed the baby out,” she says. “If you ever had a doubt in your mind — that is not true.”

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Shannon Lee, the sister of Brandon Lee, late son of legendary martial artist Bruce Lee, has weighed in on the fatal firearm accident Thursday that took the life of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins. 

The camerawoman was fatally injured on the set when Alec Baldwin pulled the trigger on a prop firearm on the set of the Western Rust. The film’s director, Joel Souza, was also injured.

Brandon Lee was mortally wounded by a prop revolver in 1993, on the set of The Crow.

“Our hearts go out to the family of Halyna Hutchins and to Joel Souza and all involved in the incident on ‘Rust'” reads the post on Lee’s account, which is managed by his sister.

“No one should ever be killed by a gun on a film set. Period,” the post concludes, with a broken heart emoji. 

An investigation is underway as to what went wrong on Rust‘s New Mexico set. 

The New Mexico Film Office released a statement Friday, reading, “We along with the entire film community in New Mexico are saddened by the tragedy that happened on the set of Rust, yesterday. We send our deepest condolences to the family of Ms. Halyna Hutchins and are keeping positive thoughts for a complete recovery for Mr. Joel Souza. The safety and well-being of all cast, crew, and filmmakers in New Mexico is a top priority at all times.”

Our hearts go out to the family of Halyna Hutchins and to Joel Souza and all involved in the incident on “Rust”. No one should ever be killed by a gun on a film set. Period. 💔

— Brandon Bruce Lee (@brandonblee) October 22, 2021

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