Entertainment

On Thursday evening at the Norman Lear Center in Los Angeles, a collection of television shows will be hailed for their ability to “inform, educate and motivate viewers to make choices for healthier and safer lives.”

Original Saturday Night Live cast member Laraine Newman will host the Lear Center’s Hollywood, Health & Society’s Sentinel Awards show.

Honored this year will be ABC’s Abbott Elementary and Grey’s Anatomy; HBO’s The Morning Show and Hacks; Fox’s The Simpsons; Apple TV+’s Expats and The Big Cigar; Prime Video’s Gen V; FX’s Feud; AMC’s Dark Winds; and NBC’s Lopez Vs. Lopez.

“I love the idea of shows that deal with the conversation of the most pressing issues that we’re dealing with in our culture,” Newman tells ABC Audio. “And all of these shows present it in a way that is the most palatable way imaginable, which is comedy, which is also exactly what Norman Lear did.”

The performer is also celebrating dual 50th anniversaries this year: The Groundlings comedy troupe in which she was an original member and Saturday Night Live, which had its first show on Oct. 11, 1975. 

Newman was on the show until 1980’s season. She said it took some time to realize SNL‘s significance: “I think subsequent years, when it was clear that it was going to be an institution and that each year, with each successive cast … it always moved the tone and voice and style of comedy forward.”

The show’s first-ever episode is the basis of Jason Reitman‘s film Saturday Night, for which she was extensively interviewed. Emily Fairn plays Newman. “I loved the movie,” Newman gushes, calling it “incredibly entertaining and exciting.”  

The movie plays out in real time, ending with Cory Michael Smith, playing Chevy Chase, saying, “Live from New York: It’s Saturday Night!” — which Newman said brought her to tears.

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The Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown doesn’t come out until December, but we’re getting our first look at what went into turning Timothée Chalamet into the legendary singer.

A new behind-the-scenes featurette was just released, giving fans insight into the project. It includes clips of Chalamet singing Dylan classics like “The Times They Are A-Changin'” and “Like A Rolling Stone,” which he performed live during filming.  

“It was important for me to play and sing on set because it was in the spirit of the movie to do it live,” Chalamet says, with music supervisor Steven Gizicki adding, “He learns the entire thing top to bottom. That’s harmonica and guitar and vocals. It’s pretty special.” 

Talking about Dylan as an artist, Chalamet shares, “Bob wouldn’t let himself be boxed in, which for me as a young artist is the most inspiring.”

“Many of the artists through American pop culture that had the balls to turn their back on what was expected of them, that moment started with Bob,” he adds. “His words are relevant. ‘Times They Are A-Changin” is relevant, ‘Blowin’ in the Wind’ is relevant.”

Elle Fanning, who plays a character named Sylvie Russo, adds, “He changed folk music forever and music forever.” 

A Complete Unknown is set to open Dec. 25. It follows Dylan from his arrival in New York City at age 19 to his groundbreaking decision to “go electric” at the Newport Folk Festival in 1965.

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Just in time for Halloween, Airbnb has announced it is opening the doors to the Deetz residence, the home made famous in Tim Burton‘s hit Beetlejuice movies. 

“Take in Delia’s extraordinary home during this otherworldly experience at the famed Deetz residence just as she left it — shrouded in a black mourning veil for her beloved husband and full of memories, her esteemed artwork, ghosts and a portal to The Afterlife,” the home sharing company teases.

The home is located in Hillsborough Township, New Jersey, subbing for the fictitious Winter River, Connecticut, of the films.

The listing bears a personal invitation from Delia Deetz, the quirky avant-garde artist played by Catherine O’Hara in the franchise.  

“Now that my work is posthumously appreciating in value and recognition, it’s only fair that artistic souls be invited to my magnificent home. So, come admire my life’s work and Create with a capital C in the first-ever art class from beyond the grave.”

“Just watch out for that pesky trickster in the attic!” she warns of Michael Keaton‘s “ghost with the most.”

Oh, and if you do happen to say the B-word three times, “don’t be surprised if some really strange things happen,” the company warns. “You may even find yourself in The Afterlife. Follow the glowing green light into the Waiting Room with the rest of the recently deceased.”

You won’t be able to stay in the home overnight, “due to some recent ‘spiritual difficulties,'” but the doors are open for 10 three-hour bookings, taking place Nov. 16 to Nov. 27 for up to six guests each. Find out all the details here. 

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Chris Hemsworth, star of Marvel’s Thor and Avengers films, is in talks to play the titular character in Disney’s upcoming Prince Charming movie, according to Variety. Plot details have yet to be revealed, including whether the film will be live or animated. Wonka filmmaker Paul King is set to direct. Disney is the parent company of ABC News …

Netflix has given Virgin River an early season 7 renewal ahead of its season 6 premiere on Dec. 19, the streaming service has announced. Season 6 will follow Mel and Jack, played respectively by Alexandra Breckenridge and Martin Henderson, as they take the next steps leading up to their wedding. Showrunner Patrick Sean Smith tells Netflix’s Tudum, “I think we’ve only just begun to see Mel and Jack function as a married couple, which is exciting. … Season 7 will explore the honeymoon phase for them as they’re building their lives on the farm, which can come with its own obstacles.” …

Youn Yuh-jung, who won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for her role in the film Minari, has joined the season 2 cast of the Netflix anthology series Beef, opposite Oscar Isaac, Carey Mulligan, Charles Melton and Cailee Spaeny, the streamer has announced. Season 2, per Netflix, will center on a young couple that “witnesses an alarming fight between their boss and his wife, triggering chess moves of favors and coercion in the elitist world of a country club and its Korean billionaire owner.” The first season of Beef, starring Steven Yeun and Ali Wong, took home eight Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Limited or Anthology Series …

Laurie Metcalf and Eric McCormack will guest star in season 2 of CBS’ Elsbeth, according to Variety. Metcalf will appear in the series’ eighth episode as Regina Coburn, “the star of a police procedural who yearns for artistic fulfillment after playing a no-nonsense, hardened detective for two decades,” per CBS. The following episode with feature McCormack as Tom Murphy, “the charismatic and charming founder of Heiwa Zen Center, an upscale holistic wellness retreat that caters to the one-percent.” Elsbeth follows Carrie Preston‘s titular character, Elsbeth Tascioni, a role she previously played on The Good Wife and The Good Fight, as she leaves Chicago and heads to New York for a new investigative role …

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This week on The Golden Bachelorette, Joan Vassos left Malibu, California, for hometown dates.

Vassos was introduced to the families of each of the remaining men, Guy, Pascal, Jordan and Chock, and was shown around each of their hometowns.

Vassos’ first hometown date was with Guy in his hometown of Reno, Nevada. They cruised Lake Tahoe on a boat, after which Vassos met his family, who told her that she “fit right in” with them.

At the end of their date, Guy told Vassos that he’d “fallen” for her “big time,” and that he could “envision time together in the future.”

Vassos then made her way to Chicago for the first of two hometown dates. Her first date in the Windy City was with Pascal, who took her to his salon and introduced her to his son Maxim and daughter Natalie. Like Guy’s family, they said they were able to see a future with Joan joining their family, sharing that she already “feels like family.”

Her next date with Jordan in Chicago was spent eating deep dish pizza and rainbow cake. But it was during her meeting with his family that she candidly told Jordan’s daughters that she wasn’t sure if Jordan was as committed as the other men, leaving her to question whether she should “take a leap of faith” with him.

During Vassos’ final hometown date with Chock in Wichita, Kansas, she was welcomed with open arms by many from Chock’s family during a gathering to honor Chock’s late mother.

When Chock learned about his mother’s death in an earlier episode, he rushed home to be with his family, but came back to continue his journey with Vassos. She told his kids, Taylor and Tyler, how she admired that he put his family first in that moment. Like Guy, Chock told Vassos that he was “falling in love” and asked her to promise him not to break his heart.

Ahead of the rose ceremony, Vassos told Golden Bachelorette host Jesse Palmer that out of all the men, she possibly had the “deepest connection” with Chock.

She also told him about how “worried” she was that Pascal and Jordan weren’t ready for a relationship.

In the end, Vassos said goodbye to Jordan.

Here’s who’s going to Tahiti for fantasy suite dates next week:

Chock, 60, an insurance executive from Wichita, Kansas
Guy, 66, an ER doctor from Reno, Nevada
Pascal, 69, a salon owner from Chicago, Illinois

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Netflix is pulling the curtain back on one of the biggest pop culture touchstones of the 1990s, The Jerry Springer Show, ABC Audio has confirmed.

On Jan. 7, 2025, the streaming service will debut Jerry Springer: Fights, Camera, Action, which will feature “first-hand testimony and revelations from show insiders,” including interviews with former guests and producers who shed light on “the destruction it caused.”

Netflix teases that the “jaw-dropping, premium two-part series” will explore “how this daytime talk show became one of the biggest and most outrageous TV hits of the nineties.”

It teases further, “But behind the entertaining facade lay some darker truths. As we hear from the producers and ex-guests … a murkier picture begins to emerge of the destruction it caused, raising renewed questions about who was responsible, and how far things should go in the name of entertainment.”

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On Wednesday, Netflix dropped the hard-hitting trailer to the second part of the sixth season of Cobra Kai. 

The drama shifts overseas, to Barcelona, and the international competition called the Sekai Taikai “where Miyagi-Do will face new challenges and old enemies as they fight to become world champions.” 

The tease continues, “Can they stay united as internal rivalries bubble back to the surface?”

The trailer shows the international match-ups don’t go well for Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio) and Johnny Lawrence (William Zabka)’s Miyagi-Do team, and of course, looming over their team’s heads is Martin Kove‘s Kreese. “Some of us have nothing to lose,” he hisses at Daniel. 

Cobra Kai season 6 part 2 premieres Nov. 15.

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Apple TV+ has dropped a new trailer to its second season of its Emmy-nominated Severance, and it ramps up the paranoia.

Set to The Who‘s “Eminence Front,” the trailer shows Adam Scott‘s Mark feverishly running through the halls of his creepy company Lumon, seemingly trying to find a way out. 

In voice-over, Britt Lower‘s Helly tells him, “Everything they told you about Lumon is a lie.”

The clip also flashes back to Mark’s vow to the company — and the medical procedure — to “sever” his personal memories from his work memories.

Helly is later heard saying, “We are miserable.”

Amid a montage of disturbing images, including a sketch of a hallway with a red heart in the middle, Adam finds that very hallway, with an elevator “down” arrow taking the place of the heart.

Then a bomb is dropped: “My wife,” Mark says in voice-over, followed by a scream, “She’s alive!”

Then, he runs around the corner and finds his co-workers — and says, “Who are you people?”

Just then, Tramell Tillman‘s Milchick enters holding blue helium balloons with Mark’s face on them for the occasion. “Welcome back, Mark S,” he says. “Been a minute.”

The Apple TV+ series returns Jan. 17, 2025, followed by one episode every Friday, through its finale on March 21, 2025.

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Tom Holland is giving fans a major update on his forthcoming fourth Spider-Man film.

“All I can tell you is that it’s happening,” Holland said Wednesday on Good Morning America when asked about the latest news for his iconic web-slinging Marvel superhero while promoting his new nonalcoholic beer, Bero.

Holland said they’ve been working on the movie’s concept but now feel it’s “strong enough” to go ahead, revealing that shooting begins next summer.

“The idea is crazy,” he teased. “It’s a little different to anything we’ve done before, but I think the fans are gonna really respond to it.”

Holland also shared his reaction to the news that former Iron Man actor Robert Downey Jr. is making his return to the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Victor von Doom aka Doctor Doom, saying he’s “obviously delighted.”

The forthcoming Spider-Man 4 will be Holland’s first time back in his Spidey suit since 2021’s Spider-Man: No Way Home, which saw him team up with former Spider-Man actors Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield.

Holland has played the character in several ensemble MCU films, first in 2016’s Captain America: Civil War, and most famously in 2018’s Avengers: Infinity War and 2019’s Avengers Endgame.

His other solo outings include 2017’s Spider-Man: Homecoming and 2019’s Spider-Man: Far From Home.

Marvel Studios is owned by Disney, the parent company of ABC News.

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Colman Domingo is set to make his directorial debut with the upcoming drama film Scandalous, Deadline reports. The movie will follow the love affair between Kim Novak and Sammy Davis Jr. that took place in 1957. Sydney Sweeney has been tapped to play Novak, while David Jonsson will play Davis Jr. Sweeney will also produce the film, which is expected to begin filming after she and Domingo finish shooting the highly anticipated third season of HBO’s Euphoria …

Tom Cruise‘s next project is set to begin filming soon. Cruise will lead Alejandro González Iñárritu‘s latest movie for Warner Bros. This is the director’s first English-language film since his Oscar-winning drama The Revenant. This project, still untitled with plot details under wraps, will shoot in the U.K. as early as next month, Variety reports …

A24 fans, make sure to check out the new trailer for director Brady Corbet‘s historical drama The Brutalist. The studio is set to release the film, which stars Adrien Brody and Felicity Jones, on Dec. 20. The story follows a Jewish architect who immigrates to the U.S. with his wife after World War II …

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