Entertainment

To a shirtless photo of his Deadpool & Wolverine body that he posted to Instagram, Hugh Jackman voiced over a lengthy thank-you to a team of people who helped get him into superhero shape.

“Yeah, I had to turn up, and yeah, I had to do those deadlifts and I had to eat those meals,” he allowed, but gave the flowers to eight people.

Those included Beth Lewis, who has been his trainer for five years, not just for the film but his performances on Broadway and for an arena tour. He called her the “quarterback for this whole thing.”

Also getting thanks were Michael Ryan, who trained with Hugh since the actor was 20. Jackman also named the people who cooked and delivered his meals, which were tailored to his excessive training, for more than a year and a half.

Also getting a shout-out was a colleague named Whitney, whose job it was to “lube” up the star and make his skin glisten on set.

Co-star and producer Ryan Reynolds and director Shawn Levy also got praise, as did the movie’s assistant director, who made the final reveal of that body — during the movie’s climax where Wolverine’s shirt is conveniently blown off — go as smoothly as possible.

“I would not have achieved that result without them,” a “grateful” Jackman expressed about them all.

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Joaquin Phoenix and Lady Gaga‘s new movie, Joker: Folie à Deux, earned a lot of “Applause” at the Venice Film Festival on Sept. 4, but the reviews are another story.

Variety reports that after the movie’s world premiere, the audience gave director Todd Phillips‘ sequel, starring Phoenix as Arthur Fleck/Joker and Gaga as Harley Quinn, an 11-minute standing ovation. But over at RottenTomatoes.com, about half the reviews are “rotten.”

The Hollywood Reporter‘s critic David Rooney called Gaga a “compelling live-wire presence,” but complained that the overall movie is “often dour.”

He adds, “Phillips and co-writer Scott Silver in the first Joker had the sturdy bones of not one but two Martin Scorsese films, Taxi Driver and The King of Comedy, on which to hang their story and set their tone,” but the sequel, “is built on more of a conceit than a solid story foundation.”

Vanity Fair‘s reviewer Richard Lawson described the movie as “startlingly dull” and “a pointless procedural that seems to disdain its audience,” while the BBC’s Nicholas Barber called it a “dreary, underwhelming, unnecessary slog,” but noted that it was a “welcome opportunity to hear Gaga belting out some of the most romantic standards in the American Songbook.”

However, The Wrap‘s William Bibbiani called it “impressively odd,” and although he dinged the film — “even the title screams ‘film student trying too hard'” — the critic hailed the performances of Phoenix and Gaga, concluding of the sequel, “It’s genuinely a little daring, genuinely a little challenging, and genuinely a little genuine.”

Empire magazine’s John Nugent called the film “a genuinely original narrative.” Deadline‘s Pete Hammond praised it as a “brilliant musical return to a world of madness,” adding, “With song, dance, comedy, darkness, animation, drama, violence and more, this is a musical — if it even is a musical — like no other.”

We’ll see which camp the audience agrees with when Joker: Folie à Deux opens in theaters on Oct. 4.

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Warner Bros. has dropped the first teaser to A Minecraft Movie, the action comedy based on the block-building videogame phenomenon. The movie stars Jason Momoa in an a pretty extraordinary wig — with bangs, no less — as well as Wednesday‘s Emma Myers, and Peacemaker‘s Danielle Brooks, as well as Emmy winner Jennifer Coolidge. Apparently, Momoa, Brooks, and Myers’ characters find themselves transported to the cubist world of the game, where they encounter Steve, the avatar for every player in the game — here revealed to be Jack Black. The movie from Napoleon Dynamite and Black’s Nacho Libre director Jared Hess, opens April 4, 2025…

Netflix has greenlit an animated adaptation of Stephenie Meyer‘s 2020 companion novel Twilight: Midnight Sun. “A retelling of the first entry in the Twilight story, Midnight Sun unfolds entirely from the perspective of Edward Cullen, the captivating, and yes, extremely sparkly vampire who catches a young Bella Swan’s attention,” the streamer teases on its blog, Tudum.

The one-time sitcom king Jerry Seinfeld is returning to Caesars Palace in 2025. The stand-up and Unfrosted star is about to celebrate his 100th show at Las Vegas’ The Colosseum at Caesars Palace on Friday, making him Ceasars’ longest-running headliner and one of the longest-running headliners in the history of Las Vegas. There are limited tickets still available for Seinfeld’s final performances in 2024 on Friday and Saturday, but the venue has announced tickets will go on sale Friday for his 2025 stand. 

Peacock has dropped a trailer for its next true-crime series, The World’s Most Notorious Killers. Each of the five episodes center on a gruesome crime. The show “travels the globe to reveal the chilling stories of five renowned international murder cases, featuring firsthand accounts from individuals close to each case and those seeking justice.” The show debuts Sept. 17 on the streaming service.

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It’s time to go back to the ballroom.

Dancing with the Stars announced the star-studded cast of season 33 of the reality competition series on Wednesday. Among the contestants are Olympian and pommel horse specialist Stephen Nedoroscik, Bachelor Nation leads Joey Graziadei and Jenn Tran, and notorious “fake heiress” Anna Delvey. But if host Julianne Hough could pick a dream contestant, who would it be?

“Chris Hemsworth actually won the Australian version of Dancing with the Stars. And I’m just saying, you know, you got to do the American one if you’re going to really claim being the Dancing with the Stars champ,” Hough told ABC Audio at the Disney Upfront event in May.

“I would come back and dance for that,” Hough said. “Could I dance and host at the same time?”

As for what fans can expect this season, Hough says get ready for “nostalgia and the familiarity of why Dancing with the Stars is so special,” along with some surprises.

“We already have such a tight family that anybody who comes in, hopefully they feel supported and excited,” Hough said.

The host and two-time winner also described why she thinks the show is so beloved and has lasted for 33 seasons.

“It’s multigenerational,” Hough said. “You can watch it with your kids and your grandparents and your parents and bring the friends over. It’s something that brings joy and harmony and something that, like, yes, we’re competitive by nature and this is what this show’s about, but we’re also rooting for each other. And I think just in the climate of life right now, I think we just need something that feels joyful and hopeful and that we can compete … but at the same time support each other.”

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The show’s fourth season just got underway, but Only Murders in the Building has been renewed for a fifth.

Hulu announced on Wednesday that Steve Martin, Martin Short and Selena Gomez will all return as stars and executive producers of the Emmy-nominated comedy series.

The fourth season of the series is packed with other stars, too, including Meryl Streep, Melissa McCarthy, Eugene Levy, Jane Lynch, Richard Kind, Kumail Nanjiani, Molly Shannon, Zach Galifianakis and Eva Longoria.

The show that was nominated for 21 Emmys for its third season is currently Certified Fresh at 97% on the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes.

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While the show Friends was shot in Los Angeles, it was set in New York City, and in an effort to help fans celebrate the show turning 30, On Location Tours is focusing on the fan-favorite sitcom.

On Sept. 22 — the show’s actual 30th birthday — the company that lets fans see some of their favorite real-life movie and TV locations will showcase the city Ross, Rachel, Monica, Chandler, Joey and Phoebe called home.

Starting at 12 p.m. that day, On Location is promising “an unforgettable journey through the city that became the show’s unofficial seventh character.”

According to the ad copy, “Led by a charismatic local actor tour guide … stops on the tour include the famous Friends Apartment Building in Greenwich Village and the Lucille Lortel Theater, where Joey Tribbiani once starred in a memorable off-Broadway production.”

Along the way, nearly 60 other TV and movie locations will be pointed out.

The tour guide will also conduct a Friends trivia contest for you and those who will always be there for you.

“The Friends 30th Anniversary is a milestone we couldn’t miss celebrating,” said Erin Miller, PR & marketing manager at On Location Tours. “Friends has left an unforgettable mark on New York City, and we’re thrilled to bring fans closer to the locations that played a pivotal role in the show.”

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Back in 2018, Winona Ryder revealed that she just might be married to Keanu Reeves, thanks to Francis Ford Coppola‘s hiring real Romanian priests while filming their onscreen wedding in his 1992 film Bram Stoker’s Dracula. 

While that movie — and the cinematic ceremony — was many years ago, their bond is still going strong, Ryder tells the Happy Sad Confused podcast.

The actress explains she and Reeves text on the regular and, “We always say who it is, even though it says it on the text. So like on his birthday I go: ‘Happy birthday, my husband.’ And then he’s like, ‘Hey, my wife, I love you. KR 57. Like on each birthday he’s like KR 57 or whatever his age is. He’s always done that.” 

Reeves, for the record, just turned 60. 

Winona added, “I would literally do anything, though, with him. Like, he is so special.”

However, that vow might not include doing a John Wick movie, the 52-year-old clarifies, because those involve so much stunt work. “I’m just thinking of my bones,” she quips.

It was during a 2018 interview with Entertainment Weekly that Reeves confirmed Ryder’s marriage story. “We did a whole take of a marriage ceremony with real priests. Winona says we are, Coppola says we are, so I guess we’re married under the eyes of God.”

The friends never actually dated, for what it’s worth.

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Stranger Things creators Matt and Ross Duffer have lined up some impressive names for the forthcoming sci-fi series they’re producing called The Boroughs.

Netflix has tapped Oscar winner Geena Davis and nominee Alfre Woodard; Tony-winning Spider-Man baddie Alfred Molina; The Sinner Emmy nominee Bill Pullman; and Denis O’Hare from American Horror Story and Clarke Peters for the eight-episode series.

According to the streamer, they play residents of a seemingly picturesque New Mexico retirement community who “must band together to stop an otherworldly threat from stealing the one thing they don’t have: time.”

The show was created by Jeffrey Addiss and Will Matthews, vets of the beloved Netflix series The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance.

To the streamer’s blog, Tudum, the Duffers enthused, “While the heroes in The Boroughs have a few more years on them than the kids from Stranger Things, they are a similarly lovable bunch of misfits, and we can’t wait for you to join them on an adventure that is at turns scary, funny, and deeply touching.”

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FX dropped the trailer to its forthcoming horror drama Grotesquerie on Wednesday, and shrewdly, considering the whole “Swelce” phenomenon, it’s introduced by one of its co-stars, NFL star and Taylor Swift‘s BF, Travis Kelce.

“You might see some familiar faces,” he smiles as the spooky snippet opens.

Grotesquerie has Niecy Nash Betts playing Lois Tryon, a troubled detective assigned to a series of particularly troubling murders. “You have to really hate people to do what was done here,” she says at one crime scene. “It’s inhuman. No, it’s unhuman,“ she says.

“It’s like God left the keys to the candy store for the devil,” she says in a confessional booth.

Tryon teams up with a Catholic nun and journalist (Micaela Diamond) who specializes in the occult to try to get to the bottom of the murders, which seem tied to the supernatural.

Add to this the killer — or killers — appear to be taunting the pair, leaving clues behind.

Travis is seen warning the investigators, “There’s no future after this.” His character wasn’t named by the producers, but he appears to be a member of a murderous cult.

The series from Ryan Murphy was co-produced by Betts and her co-star Courtney B. Vance, and also stars Lesley Manville, Nicholas Alexander Chavez and Raven Goodwin.

Grotesquerie premieres Sept. 25 at 10 p.m. ET on FX and streams the next day on Hulu.

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(NOTE LANGUAGE) Joaquin Phoenix intentionally made himself thin to the point of looking sickly for 2019’s Joker, shedding more than 50 pounds in a performance that won him a Best Actor Oscar. 

But to play Arthur Fleck aka Joker in the forthcoming sequel, Joker: Folie à Deux, he had to do it all over again — something made more difficult by the film’s new physical requirements, he told a panel at the Venice Film Festival, where the movie premieres Wednesday.

“I’m not going to talk through specifics of the diet, because I just think nobody wants to hear that,” he said Wednesday, according to Variety.

The new movie, in which Phoenix stars opposite Lady Gaga as Harley Quinn, prominently features music and dance sequences, unlike director Todd Phillips‘ blockbuster original.

The actor continued, “This time, it felt a bit more complicated just because there was so much dance rehearsal that we were doing, which I didn’t have last time. So it felt a bit more difficult.”

He added, “I’m now 49, I probably shouldn’t do this again. This is probably it for me.”

He also said that Gaga “also lost a lot of weight,” noting, “It was really impressive.”

For her part, the actress/recording artist demurred, saying, “I think we transformed into our characters over a period of time, and we continued to hone in every kind of detail.”

For the record, Phoenix admitted to being “so angry” at himself “for making such a big deal about” the weight loss last time, because “it just sounds like an actor going on and on about how much weight they lost.”

“You just do what you’re f****** supposed to do,” he continued. “So this time I was like, ‘I’m not going to do that.'”

Joker: Folie à Deux opens Oct. 4.

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