Entertainment

Christopher Nolan‘s award-winning nuclear age drama Oppenheimer is coming to Peacock on February 16.

The Golden Globe-winning film that stars Matt Damon, Robert Downey Jr. and Cillian Murphy, among many others, has already made its bow on paid digital, Blu-ray and DVD, but this will be the first time it’s available for free — at least to subscribers to NBCUniversal’s streaming service.

The film grossed more than $950 million worldwide — nearly unheard of for a drama, let alone a black-and-white one – and stands behind Joker as the second-highest-grossing R-rated movie ever.

The movie’s bow on IMAX also broke records for the large-format distributor; Nolan shot the film on IMAX, ushering in groundbreaking technological advances to do so.

Nominations for the 96th Academy Awards will be announced on January 23, and it’s very likely Oppehneimer‘s award-winning cast, and Nolan himself, will again be recognized.

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In a video chat with Cinemablend‘s podcast, New Girl alum Jake Johnson, who voices Peter B. Parker in the Spider-Verse animated franchise, revealed how he unexpectedly became a real hero to people during the pandemic.

When the pandemic first hit in 2020, Johnson recalled how everyone was nervous, so he leaned on his heroic character to help. “I would send voice notes out to kids as Peter Parker,” he explained. “And it started off as like a little nothing kind of funny thing I did where I just posted something on social media, like, ‘If your kids are spooked, send an email here and I’ll say as Peter Parker that like, ‘It’s going to be fine.'”

He noted, “I was scared about the pandemic, and my kids were young and asking questions that were getting spooky.”

To Johnson’s surprise, the idea took off: “The amount of responses were probably over 100,000 in a day,” he said, adding he needed to get his agency’s help to distribute all the messages.

He continued, “But what really hit me was how sad a lot of the … emails were, and how scared everybody was and how it would be adults being like, ‘Hey man, I know you said “kids,” but I’m 47, I live alone, I’m by myself. I’m terrified. I know I’m not an idiot. I know Peter Parker’s not real. And if you don’t mind, can you say that like, “To Steve: It’s going to be okay?”‘”

Johnson marveled, “It was amazing … And … it’s one of the reasons why I love the franchise so much. We [used] a fictional thing to just help you get through a hard moment.”

He added, “And it doesn’t matter if you’re 8 or 60. That’s f****** awesome.”

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Tom Cruise reportedly feels the need — the need for 3: Deadline reports a third Top Gun movie is in the works.

According to the trade, Top Gun: Maverick‘s Oscar-nominated co-writer Ehren Kruger will be back behind the keyboard, with the blockbuster’s director Joe Kosinski back to either direct or produce.

Deadline says the movie will reunite Cruise’s Pete “Maverick” Mitchell with Miles Teller‘s Bradley “Rooster” Bradshaw, and Glen Powell‘s cocky Jake “Hangman” Seresin. Original Top Gun producer Jerry Bruckheimer, who also backed Maverick 36 years after the original hit, will reportedly also be aboard.

After producer and star Cruise refused to release Maverick to streaming during the pandemic, the movie landed in theaters in 2022, and raked in nearly $1.5 billion worldwide.

It was also nominated for six Academy Awards, including Best Picture, ultimately winning a trophy for Best Sound.

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Instant Family‘s Isabela Merced has been tapped for a role in season 2 of HBO’s The Last of Us, according to Variety. She’ll play Dina, “a free-wheeling spirit whose devotion to Ellie — played by Bella Ramsey — will be tested by the brutality of the world they inhabit,” per the outlet. Merced becomes the third season 2 addition to the show, following Kaitlyn Dever and Beef star Young Mazino …

Deadline reports John Krasinski and Natalie Portman are set to star in Guy Ritchie‘s latest directorial effort, Fountain of Youth. The movie, per the entertainment website, follows “two estranged siblings — played by Krasinski and Portman — who partner on a global heist to find the mythological Fountain of Youth. They must use their knowledge of history to follow clues on an epic adventure that will change their lives — and possibly lead to immortality” …

The Drew Barrymore Show has been renewed for season 5, CBS Media Ventures announced on Thursday. The daytime chat show averages 1.1 million viewers. This season, the show has grown from October to December in key measurements, including +9% in households and +4% in total viewers. Host Drew Barrymore‘s guests this season have included Meryl Streep, Hugh Grant, Oprah Winfrey and Natalie Portman …

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The new Jake Johnson movie Self Reliance is a trip. It premieres on Hulu Friday and starts with Jake’s character, Tommy, being propositioned by Andy Samberg — playing himself — to get into a limo. Things get wildly weird from there.

Johnson, who wrote and directed the movie, tells ABC Audio the movie is about “a guy [who] gets an opportunity to play a dark web hunting game where he’s being hunted for his life in 30 days. If he wins, he gets $1 million.”

However, Tommy finds a loophole — he can’t be killed if he’s with people.

The movie is based on the popular yet bizarre Japanese game show Susunu! Denpa Shōnen, about a guy forced to live by himself to see what he could endure. It’s a premise Johnson found “really fun and comedic.”

“I wanted the audience to want to get to the ending enough so that they wouldn’t be checking Instagram during the movie,” he explains. “And I wanted to mess with tone and have a score that kept driving, and I want it to be building and building and building. And then I wanted a surprise and a surprise and surprise.”

It also gave Johnson a chance to explore some social issues — specifically, “That idea of how far are we going to push with entertainment. … And then when, like, Survivor came around and you’re watching people starve. You know, Billie Eilish has the great line about like, I like watching Survivor to see people suffer.”

“I’m like, man, culture is changing,” he adds. “And my kind of take on it is, like, what’s a fun version of that?”

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Following Jo Koy‘s widely panned turn as host of the Golden Globes Sunday, some are seeing a high-profile gig in John Mulaney‘s future after he reportedly killed it Tuesday as the host of the Motion Picture Academy’s 14th Governors Awards.

The event wasn’t televised, but Mulaney delivered, according to video posted by the academy.

“As a boy, I would always watch the non-televised Governors Awards, even though they only started 14 years ago,” he said. “My family would gather around the turned-off TV … and I’d think, ‘Someday, that’s gonna be me.'”

However, the line of the night came regarding honorary Oscar recipient Angela Bassett, with Mulaney saying, “Here’s how great an actress Angela Bassett is: she got an Oscar nomination for a Marvel movie. That’s like getting a Pulitzer Prize for a Reddit comment.”

Incidentally, that comment made Oppenheimer‘s Robert Downey Jr. hide his face laughing.

Mel Brooks and E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial editor Carol Littleton were also granted honorary Oscars. Additionally, the Sundance Institute’s Michelle Satter will be honored with The Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award.

On the latter, Mulaney said previous winners of the award included “Frank Sinatra, Angelina Jolie and Tyler Perry, so it’s really unclear what this award means,” drawing more laughs.

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In a heartfelt, and often hilarious, conversation with his former high school classmate, Robert Downey Jr. sat opposite Rob Lowe in a new installment of Rob’s Literally podcast.

In talking about his awards run with Oppenheimer, recent Golden Globe winner Downey explained how bad reviews for the bomb Dolittle, a movie he starred in and produced, led him to career heights with Christopher Nolan‘s atomic bomb movie.

“I felt so exposed after being in the cocoon of Marvel where I think I did some of the best work I will ever do, but it went a little bit unnoticed because of the genre,” Downey says.

In the end, the actor “did myself a favor, because the rug was pulled so definitively out from underneath me and all the things that I was leaning on as opposed to what my understanding of confidence and security was — boy did they evaporate. And it rendered me teachable.”

Downey adds, “And the crazy thing is they say when the student is ready, the Nolan will come — I mean, the teacher will come. And that’s what happened.”

Nolan had expressed to The New York Times Magazine that he told RDJ he wanted him free of his “usual go-to things” — the “fast-talking, charming” persona — to play Lewis Strauss, the foil to Cillian Murphy‘s J. Robert Oppenheimer.

The podcast began with Lowe and Downey reminiscing about meeting at Santa Monica High School in the early ’80s, when Lowe was already a successful young actor.

“I wanna to say I was jealous, but that’s not deep enough,” Downey said, cracking up Lowe.

While Lowe had a career and good attendance, Downey, on the other hand, “was a hot mess,” both actors recalled with a laugh.

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School is almost back in session.

A new trailer for the upcoming season 3 premiere of Abbott Elementary has arrived, and it shows off the first look at what is in store for our favorite gang of teachers this time around.

“You guys missed a lot,” series creator and star Quinta Brunson says in character as second-grade teacher Janine Teagues.

She’s not wrong – the season 2 finale aired over eight months ago in April 2023. To make up for lost time, the supersized season 3 premiere will be an hour long.

“Welcome back slackers,” fan-favorite character Principal Ava Coleman, played by Janelle James, says over the school’s loudspeakers. “I’ve got cameras all over this joint.”

The trailer cuts to Ava watching over the school’s security camera system with a box of popcorn in hand, enthusiastically laughing as she creates chaos.

We also see flashes of the other main cast, such as Tyler James Williams as Gregory Eddie, Chris Perfetti as Jacob Hill, Sheryl Lee Ralph as Barbara Howard and Lisa Ann Walter as Melissa Schemmenti.

The trailer ends with Brunson’s Janine introducing iPads into her classroom. “You guys are going to be the first to use our brand-new iPads,” she tells her students. Quickly, however, Janine learns that every iPad’s battery is dead except for one. All the children huddle up together to use it.

“Is it fun doing it all together?” Janine asks her kids.

“No,” they tell her honestly, before she delivers one of the series’ signature deadpan stares into the camera.

The season 3 premiere of Abbott Elementary airs February 7 on ABC and drops on Hulu the next day.

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ABC’s well-performing medical drama The Good Doctor will end with its forthcoming seventh season, ABC Audio has confirmed.

The show from Sony Pictures Television and ABC Signature centered on Freddie Highmore‘s autistic physician Dr. Shaun Murphy, and the “obstacles, triumphs and milestones his character, as well as his colleagues” faced at San Jose St. Bonaventure Hospital.

The series ranked as the #1 entertainment show in the Monday 10 p.m. hour last season in the key 18-49 demographic.

In a statement, Highmore called playing Dr. Shaun Murphy “an immense privilege and one of the most remarkable and rewarding experiences of my life.”

The English actor expressed gratitude to the show’s executive producers David Shore and Liz Friedman, “and lovely cast, writers, and crew who made this show possible.”

Highmore continued, “Caring deeply is what got us here. Thank you to Sony and ABC, and to everyone who has watched along at home.”

He added cheekily, “With love from Vancouver… tequila, stat!”

The final season of The Good Doctor kicks off Tuesday, February 20, at 10 p.m. ET on ABC.

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HBO has dropped a new trailer to its final season of Curb Your Enthusiasm, teasing “one final act” for Larry David.

That’s, of course, “TV Larry,” the semi-autobiographical version of the Seinfeld co-creator David has played on the Emmy-winning show for 12 seasons.

As Larry is shown tangling with everyone from ex-wife Cheryl Hines to returning players Ted Danson and Vince Vaughn to, of course, Susie Essman‘s alter ego Susie Green, a title card reads: “Don’t be mad he’s leaving, be mad he stayed so long.”

David, who Essman calls a “walking f****** virus” in the promo, later admits to a disappointed fan, “I really did the best under the circumstances of a person who hates people and yet had to be amongst them.”

Late last year, when announcing the series would be wrapping up with one final season, David said in a statement, “As Curb comes to an end, I will now have the opportunity to finally shed this ‘Larry David’ persona and become the person God intended me to be – the thoughtful, kind, caring, considerate human being I was until I got derailed by portraying this malignant character.”

The 12th and final season of Curb premieres February 4 at 10 p.m. ET on HBO and Max, wrapping the series with an April 7 finale.

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