Entertainment

Keanu Reeves knows his way around a martial arts mat, what with his extensive training for The Matrix and John Wick franchises, and now he’s about to pay tribute to a groundbreaker within the combat sports.

Deadline reports Reeves and Oscar-winning director Fisher Stevens will co-produce a documentary on Benny “The Jet” Urquidez, who is credited with introducing mixed martial arts to the world. 

Now 71, Urquidez was a world champion karate and kickboxing legend who transitioned to training actors and coordinating fight scenes for movies. 

Incidentally, John Cusack was one of his students, and Urquidez takes him on in a famous scene in the actor’s 1997’s hit Grosse Pointe Blank. But Urquidez’s client list reads like a Hollywood’s who’s who: Everyone from Jackie Chan to the late Patrick Swayze to Michelle Pfeiffer trained with him over his long career. 

Emmy-nominated sports documentary editor and filmmaker Jennifer Tiexiera is directing the documentary. She tells the trade, “Benny’s fighting career was born out of his struggles with identity, poverty, and race, but he didn’t let those things define him. The result is a story about how struggle and sacrifice evolved into one about love, spirituality and deeper meaning.”

Keanu recently appeared in and produced another documentary, Brawn: The Impossible Formula 1 Story, which is streaming on Hulu.

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Kristen Stewart obviously still has some feelings for her Twilight character, Bella — just not her taste in men.

That’s what fans learned on a new installment of the Not Skinny But Not Fat podcast, when host Amanda Hirsch asked the actress and activist of Bella, “Do we not like her in retrospect?”

Stewart replied, “‘Do we not like her?’ Whoa. Hey, you better be careful. I don’t know if you can tell who you’re talking to right now,” she joked.

The Love Lies Bleeding star disagreed with Hirsch’s assessment that Bella was “a little desperate” to be with Robert Pattinson‘s vampire, Edward, noting, “Yeah, but he was trying to sort of control whether or not she made choices for herself.”

That said, Stewart offered, “I would have broken up with him immediately.”

In the bestselling books, and the movies starring Stewart, Bella wanted Edward to turn her into a vampire, but he refused. 

Stewart says in real life that would have been a deal-breaker for her. “I mean, if I was like, ‘Hey, I want to try that,’ and he was like, ‘No, this is just for me,’ I would be like, ‘Well, this is also just for me: My whole life. Without you.'”

She added of his motivations, “I get the sort of protection thing, but you gotta let a girl make her own choices.”

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On Thursday, The Jamie Lloyd Company announced the full cast for Tom Holland‘s West End return with William Shakespeare‘s Romeo & Juliet, including his star-crossed titular other half: Francesca Amewudah-Rivers.

The actress has a handful of theater credits under her belt, but only appeared on the fourth and fifth seasons of the BBC’s Bad Education on TV.

Also starring in the play are theater vets Tomiwa Edun, recently seen in Argylle, playing Capulet; Freema Agyeman, who appeared in The Matrix Revolutions, as Nurse; and as Friar, Michael Balogun from 2019’s TV adaptation of War of the Worlds.

As reported, the production about the tragic lovers will be staged at The Duke of York’s Theatre in London. According to the theater’s website, it promises to be “a pulsating new vision of Shakespeare’s immortal tale of wordsmiths, rhymers, lovers and fighters.”

Holland will start his run on Saturday, May 11, and the play is slated to run through August 3.

Tickets are already sold out.

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With Sex and the City episodes now on Netflix, new fans are enjoying seeing what Carrie, Miranda, Samantha and Charlotte were up to in New York City back in the day. 

However, their glam life as seen on TV would have run into some harsh financial realities in real life, according to data crunched by online casino company Nieuwe-Casinos.

Using various sources like the job site Glassdoor, the company put the salary of Sarah Jessica Parker‘s columnist Carrie Bradshaw at around $49,300 per year back when the show premiered 1998.

However, her “lifestyle costs” — which include everything from those Cosmos with the gals to smoking and of course her outfits — were more than $38,500 per year. 

At one point, the company points out Carrie says she spent 40 grand on shoes alone, meaning for all the glamour of the show, her character in reality could never afford it.

As an attorney, Cynthia Nixon‘s Miranda Hobbes’ salary in 1998 would be nearly $90,000, so while her lifestyle expenses would be steep at more than $38,000, she’d have her head above water. 

Kim Cattrall‘s sassy Samantha Jones would be pulling in around $55,000 as a publicist in 1998, though all those drinks, hair appointments and we assume birth control would run her more than $38,400. This doesn’t account for her extensive clothing collection. 

Finally, Kristin Davis‘ Charlotte York was an art gallery owner in 1998, pulling in around $53.5 a year, but minus brunches, taxis and drinks, she’d be left with just nearly $16,000. 

Methodology and results have not been verified or endorsed by ABC News or The Walt Disney Company.

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Jerry Seinfeld‘s near-obsession with breakfast cereals on Seinfeld was channeled into his directorial debut, Unfrosted, the Netflix film about the birth of the Pop Tart.

The trailer for Unfrosted: The Pop Tart Story, also starring Melissa McCarthy, Amy Schumer, Christian Slater, Hugh Grant as Tony the Tiger and Bill Burr, among many others, has just popped up online.

Set to David Bowie‘s “Rebel Rebel,” the snippet starts with a dramatic rocket launch countdown from the point of view of a Pop Tart heating up inside a toaster.

The visual syncs with what Jerry previously revealed about the 1963-set project: The story of the pastry’s invention “is told like The Right Stuff.”

“I believe we have split the atom of breakfast,” Jerry’s Kellogg executive Bob Cabana exclaims of the discovery.

There’s a space race of sorts going on between “sworn cereal rivals” Kellogg’s and Post “to create a pastry that will change the face of breakfast forever.”

To help their chances of beating Amy Schumer‘s Post president, Cabana “stacks the deck with ringers,” including Chef Boyardee (Bobby Moynihan) and fitness icon Jack LaLanne (James Marsden).

The race “to reinvent breakfast” goes all the way up to the White House, with Burr playing JFK. “You have to win,” he says, asking for a progress update. McCarthy’s character unveils a “not to scale” sketch of the Pop Tart.

“What are you guys, five years old?” JFK blasts back. “Little John-John draws better than that, and I think there’s something wrong with him.”

Netflix calls the film “a wildly imaginative tale of ambition, betrayal and menacing milkmen — sweetened with artificial ingredients.”

The movie, which also stars Sebastian Maniscalco, Peter Dinklage and Cedric the Entertainer, pops up May 3.

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Dune: Part Two star Florence Pugh gave Marvel fans a behind-the-scenes peek of her next MCU movie, the star-studded Thunderbolts, on Instagram.

Dressed as her character, former assassin Yelena Belova, Pugh begins by exiting her studio trailer with a friendly “Hey guys!”

As she walks, she explains she’s been off Insta partly because she was “whisked off to Atlanta to go shoot a movie that I’m really not allowed to talk too much about.”

“But I can show you some things, sneakily, as long as you don’t tell anyone,” she says coyly.

As Pugh walks on the studio lot, she points out random crew members before entering a studio and whispering because shooting is underway. “I can show you a sneak peek of some of the sets,” she says, spinning her camera around to reveal what appears to be an elevator shaft.

As she continues, she says, “Oh, I can show you Jake,” meaning Jake Schreier, the movie’s director.

“What are we allowed to show?” Pugh asks, only for him to reply, “I don’t even think you’re even allowed to be doing this!”

With that, she reveals “Thunderbolts” on the back of a director’s chair.

The movie will see Pugh’s character team up with other MCU vets, including David Harbour as Red Guardian, Sebastian Stan‘s Bucky Barnes/The Winter Soldier, Wyatt Russell‘s John Walker/U.S. Agent and Julia Louis-Dreyfus‘ shadowy Valentina Allegra de Fontaine.

“We’re having an amazing time, and I can’t wait for you to see what we’ve made!” she says before signing off with a kiss to camera.

The movie comes out May 2, 2025.

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

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Shonda Rhimes‘ daughter is in for the ride of a lifetime.

The famed TV producer shared in an Instagram post that one of her three daughters recently started watching Grey’s Anatomy for the first time.

“My not so tiny human started watching @greysabc for the first time yesterday,” she wrote. “My brain is breaking.”

“I am dead. DEAD,” Rhimes continued. “But so glad she’s getting to see the women her mom created. #GreysAnatomy.”

Grey’s Anatomy, created by Rhimes, premiered on March 27, 2005, and is currently airing its milestone 20th season on ABC.

The series, the longest-running primetime medical drama, has given TV fans beloved female characters like Meredith Grey (Ellen Pompeo), Cristina Yang (Sandra Oh), Izzy Stevens (Katherine Heigl), and Miranda Bailey (Chandra Wilson) — and those are just the series regulars from season 1.

Someone tell Rhimes’ daughter to buckle up and prepare to have her heart broken — and put back together — over and over again: Remember that season 5 finale? Blue Post-It note, anyone?

Grey’s Anatomy airs Thursdays at 9 p.m. ET on ABC, with episodes streaming on Hulu the following day.

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A sequel to the 2018 film A Simple Favor is officially in the works.

Amazon MGM Studios announced Wednesday that director Paul Feig and stars Anna Kendrick and Blake Lively will reprise their roles for A Simple Favor 2, a co-production with Lionsgate.

Other cast returning for the sequel include Henry Golding, Andrew Rannells, Bashir Salahuddin, Joshua Satine, Ian Ho and Kelly McCormack.

The synopsis for the film notes that it’s the “return of Stephanie Smothers (Kendrick) and Emily Nelson (Lively) as they head to the beautiful island of Capri, Italy, for Emily’s extravagant wedding to a rich Italian businessman.”

“Along with the glamorous guests, expect murder and betrayal to RSVP for a wedding with more twists and turns than the road from the Marina Grande to the Capri town square,” the synopsis continues.

No release date was announced for the film, though production is set to begin sometime in spring.

The 2018 film was based on Darcey Bell‘s 2017 novel of the same name. Jessica Sharzer returns as screenwriter, with revisions from Laeta Kalogridis and Feig.

A Simple Favor earned more than $97 million at the worldwide box office, according to Box Office Mojo, and is Certified Fresh on the aggregator Rotten Tomatoes.

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In the latest installment of the Director’s Guild of America’s Director’s Cut podcast, Steven Spielberg put Dune franchise director Denis Villeneuve up with some of the most famous filmmakers of all time.

Spielberg called it “an honor” to sit and talk with the director and showed that by immediately heaping historic praise on him. “Let me start by saying there are filmmakers who are the builders of worlds. It’s not a long list and we know who a lot of them are. Starting with [Georges] Méliès and [Walt] Disney and [Stanley] Kubrick, George Lucas,” Spielberg began.

He continued, “Ray Harryhausen I include in that list. [Federico] Fellini built his own worlds. Tim Burton. Obviously, Wes Anderson, Peter Jackson, James Cameron, Christopher Nolan, Ridley Scott, Guillermo del Toro. The list goes on but it’s not that long of a list, and I deeply, fervently believe that you are one of its newest members.”

Oscar winner Spielberg, who knows a little something about the genre, with the classics E.T. and Close Encounters of the Third Kind, went on to call the second Dune “one of the most brilliant science fiction films I’ve ever seen.”

He also called the scene with Timothée Chalamet‘s Paul Atreides riding a massive sandworm in the sequel “one of the greatest things I have ever seen. Ever!”

Later in the conversation, Spielberg asked Villeneuve if he could see any of his Dune cast members directing one day. Denis immediately answered that the “brilliant” Zendaya was “always listening” behind the camera and said he “would not be surprised” if she becomes a director.

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A teaser debuted Wednesday for Kinds of Kindness, the follow-up to Poor Things from its director, Yorgos Lanthimos, and producer/star Emma Stone.

Their fellow Poor Things alums Willem Dafoe and Margaret Qualley also star, as do Jesse Plemons, Hunter Schafer, Hong Chau, Joe Alwyn and Mamoudou Athie.

The teaser opens on Stone recklessly driving a sports car, followed by shots of the film’s star-studded cast.

Kinds of Kindness is described as a “triptych fable” following the pursuits of various characters. Lanthimos had previously explained to The Guardian that it is composed of three stories, with each actor playing “three different parts.”

The forthcoming Searchlight Pictures film tracks “a man without choice who tries to take control of his own life; a policeman who is alarmed that his wife who was missing-at-sea has returned and seems a different person; and a woman determined to find a specific someone with a special ability, who is destined to become a prodigious spiritual leader,” according to the synopsis.

Kinds of Kindness opens in theaters on June 21.

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