Entertainment

In a touching new article in AARP The Magazine, Jeff Bridges speaks candidly about his battle with lymphoma, which he revealed in 2020, and a subsequent fight with COVID-19.

Bridges recalls he was on a pandemic break of shooting his FX show The Old Man when he noticed something was wrong. “I was doing some exercises while on the ground and felt what seemed like a bone in my stomach. I thought to myself, Hmm. But it didn’t hurt or anything,” he explained, so he put off seeing a doctor.

He later found out he had lymphoma and a 9-by-12-inch cancerous tumor near his stomach.

While being treated with chemotherapy, his immune system was suppressed and he contracted COVID. “Cancer was nothing compared to the COVID,” the actor recalled, explaining he spent five weeks in the hospital.

“I was in surrender mode,” he admitted. “I’d say to myself, ‘Everybody dies, and this is me dying.'”

He explained, “I fought by surrendering, which is not the same as giving up … What I really felt at the time was love. … So what I did was more like giving in to love, you know?”

Bridges said after leaving the hospital he set “really small goals.”

“At first, they’d say, ‘How long can you stand?’ For a while, my record was 45 seconds before I’d collapse. And then they were saying: ‘Oh, look, you’re standing for a minute! That’s so cool, now can you walk five feet?'” he recalls.

He met a goal of walking his daughter Hayley down the aisle in August 2021; that September, he announced his cancer was in remission.

Bridges, who feared he’d never work again, returned to finish shooting The Old Man in October 2021, calling it “like a dream.”

The mass in his stomach is now the size “of a marble,” Bridges said, and he’s about to start work on season 2 of the spy drama.

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Robert De Niro‘s Tribeca Enterprises company announced that his 1993 directorial effort, A Bronx Tale, is coming back in a special 30th anniversary edition on Blu-ray, 4K UHD and video on demand platforms. 

The anniversary edition will be released September 12.

Written by and co-starring Chazz Palminteri, and based on his hit one-man play, the movie starred De Niro as a hardworking bus driver and father in the New York City borough whose son (Lillo Brancato) falls under the influence of Palminteri’s mob boss Sonny LoSpecchio.

In the announcement, De Niro noted, “As my directorial debut, A Bronx Tale helped me to see what it’s like on the other side of the camera. I’m excited to present this newly restored 30th Anniversary Edition and hope that it will be enjoyed by new audiences everywhere.”

Palminteri said, “As an actor and writer, A Bronx Tale was the spark that lit my career. … I was blessed to have Robert De Niro direct my script and make a perfect film that will last for generations to come.”

Additionally, Tribeca announced there will be a special 30th anniversary screening of the film on Saturday, June 17, to close out this year’s Tribeca Festival, which was founded by De Niro and longtime collaborator Jane Rosenthal. They will join Palminteri for a Q&A panel after the screening. 

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Tuesday is National Turtle Day, and what better way for Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon Movies to celebrate than by announcing they’ve bumped up the release of the upcoming animated movie Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem.

The movie, co-written and co-produced by The Boys‘ Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, will now hit theaters August 2.

The film features the voices of Rogen, along with his pals Paul Rudd and his The Neighbors co-star Rose Byrne, as well as Hannibal Buress, John Cena, Jackie Chan, Ice Cube, The Bear‘s Ayo Edebiri, The Mandalorian‘s Giancarlo Esposito, Maya Rudolph and Post Malone, among others.

The studios tease, “After years of being sheltered from the human world, the Turtle brothers set out to win the hearts of New Yorkers and be accepted as normal teenagers through heroic acts. Their new friend April O’Neil helps them take on a mysterious crime syndicate, but they soon get in over their heads when an army of mutants is unleashed upon them.”

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For Netflix freeloaders, the free streaming buffet is coming to a close. On its media site, the streaming giant revealed its long-rumored plan to stop the practice of users sharing their passwords. 

In an email to subscribers, Netflix wrote, “Your Netflix account is for you and the people you live with — your household. Everyone living in that household can use Netflix wherever they are — at home, on the go, on holiday — and take advantage of new features like Transfer Profile and Manage Access and Devices.”

That said, for people who don’t live under your roof, well, they’re out of luck, unless you’re feeling generous. 

For an extra $7.99 a month, you can add an outside user to your account, the streaming giant says.

A similar policy was launched overseas last year for Netflix’s global users.

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Apple TV+’s Reese Witherspoon-produced, Jennifer Garner-starring drama series The Last Thing He Told Me has become the most-watched limited series since the streaming platform launched in 2019, ABC Audio has confirmed.

Based on Laura Dave‘s bestseller, the show sees Garner’s Hannah and her stepdaughter Bailey (Angourie Rice) looking for Hannah’s husband, Owen (Game of Thrones‘ Nikolaj Coster-Waldau), who vanishes, and leaves only a cryptic note and a duffel bag full of cash.

The series drew 4.5 million unique viewers in its first 31 days of streaming, and now ranks only behind the Emmy-winning phenomenon Ted Lasso and Shrinking, the dramedy series starring Harrison Ford and co-creator Jason Segel.

Rice explains having the author of the book on board as a producer made all the difference. “What’s so incredible about Laura Dave is that she knows the story inside out. She has an answer for everything,” Rice tells ABC Audio.

“But she’s also curious about what you think and what you want to bring to it. And I think that incredible combination of flexibility, but also complete understanding of the world and the characters and the story that she has created, that is just such a joy and such a treat as an actor to have access to that on set every day,” she adds.

Aisha Tyler plays Hannah’s bestie Jules and said the show appeals to fans of the book, as well as those who haven’t read it. “Like I played (video game) The Last of Us, and then I loved the series because it was just more of what I love about the game,” she says, adding those who have read the novel get “like a super-sized serving of the world that they loved.”

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With all the subtlety of a tank — literally, he crushes a Mercedes in the open — Arnold Schwarzenegger appears in a new Netflix spot teasing the streaming giant’s summer slate.

“No one likes action more than I do, so that’s why I accepted the big new job of chief action officer,” Arnold says, before signing off on an explosion — and teasing Chris Hemsworth‘s upcoming Extraction 2; Jennifer Lopez‘s Mother; Heart of Stone; the upcoming season of The Witcher; and, of course, his upcoming action comedy series Fubar, among others.

“Nobody knows action more than I do, and nobody hits like Netflix,” the action icon says in the clip.

While Mother is already available for streaming, Fubar debuts Thursday, May 25, followed by the action comedy Blood and Gold the next day.

Schwarzenegger’s documentary Arnold drops June 7; Bloodhounds premieres June 9; Extraction 2 on June 16; and the reboot of the action series iNumber Number debuts on June 23.

The Witcher returns June 29, while the action comedy The Out-Laws drops on July 7, followed by the reboot Bird Box Barcelona on July 14. Jamie Foxx‘s They Cloned Tyrone drops on July 21, and Gal Gadot‘s techno thriller Heart of Stone debuts on August 11.

The sizzle reel also teased as “coming soon” the Asian gangster series The Brothers Sun with Oscar winner Michelle Yeoh and the action picture Lift with Kevin Hart.

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(SPOILERS AHEAD) On the heels of Fast X‘s #1 domestic box office debut, Vin Diesel says multiple Fast & Furious spinoffs are already in development, including a female-led installment.

“I started developing the female spinoff…in 2017 with other spinoffs, and the sooner I deliver the finale, the sooner I can launch all the spinoffs,” Diesel told Variety at Saturday’s Charlize Theron Africa Outreach Project Block Party.

At the film’s Rome premiere on May 12, Diesel, who plays Dom Toretto, hinted the franchise wouldn’t end with the upcoming 11th installment as previously thought.

“Look how many characters and great talent there is in the movie,” Diesel said of the possible 12th film. “There was no way I can pull that off unless I had everyone on for five seconds.”

Fast X features the surprise returns of Gal Gadot‘s Gisele and Dwayne Johnson‘s Luke Hobbs, and Diesel says he’s “so excited to have them back home and even more excited to see fan reactions and to see how happy it makes people.”

Michelle Rodriguez revealed that Gadot had shot cameos for earlier films, but they didn’t make the final cut.

“We have shot other things a long time ago that might not have fit that specific movie as a finale,” Diesel explained. “Doing tags is a very tricky thing because you want your great talent but at the same time you have to be very careful to maintain the emotional state of your audience at the end of the movie.”

For her part, Rodriguez still hasn’t committed to appearing in any spinoffs, noting, “You pass the baton on. You take the back seat. You go passenger side. When it comes to the next generation, you have to. It’s the only way to let them define the future.”

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CBS on Monday announced season 3 of Secret Celebrity Renovation will premiere July 28, followed by the 25th season premiere of Big Brother on August 2, the debut of the musical game show Superfan on August 2 and season 2 of The Challenge: USA on August 10. The network delayed the launch of its summer reality programing as a safety net in the event the Writers Guild of America strike should delay production of its scripted series, according to The Hollywood Reporter…

Variety reports Apple TV+’s The Last Thing He Told Me was the most watched limited series ever since the streaming service’s launch in 2019. Nielsen data obtained by the outlet reveals the series drew 4.5 million unique viewers in its first 31 days of streaming. Additionally, the series premiere reached 3.4 million viewers, and is Apple TV+’s #3 title behind Ted Lasso and Shrinking. The Last Thing He Told Me stars Jennifer Garner as a wife who investigates her husband’s disappearance…

Paramount announced on Monday that its new Paramount+ and Showtime bundle will launch June 27, according to Deadline. The bundle will cost users $11.99 per month, while Paramount+ without Showtime will cost $5.99 — a $2 increase from the current Paramount+ premium plan. “By integrating the Showtime premium and critically acclaimed portfolio with the service’s already broad and popular slate, all at a competitive price, we will solidify Paramount+ as a cornerstone in streaming,” said Tom Ryan, President & CEO Paramount Streaming, in the announcement…

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Alec Baldwin marked the last day of filming on his latest film Rust on Monday with an Instagram post honoring the cast and crew.

Alongside an on-set photo of co-stars Frances Fisher and Patrick Scott McDermott, Baldwin wrote, “Last day of filming RUST in Montana. Sorry that I did not get to work with this living legend, the great @francesfisher. Patrick, I envy you.”

“It’s been a long and difficult road. But we reach the end of the trail today,” the 65-year-old actor continued. “Congratulations to Joel, Bianca, and the entire cast and crew. Nothing less than a miracle.”

The “long and difficult road” was the only oblique reference Baldwin made to the fatal shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, 42, while he was practicing using a Colt-style .45 revolver on the New Mexico set in October 2021. Director Joel Souza was also injured when a live round — instead of an inert “dummy” round that had been loaded into Baldwin’s pistol — discharged.

Prosecutors recently dropped involuntary manslaughter charges against the actor in April, after investigators reportedly found the gun that fired to be mechanically improper.

The movie’s armorer, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, whose responsibilities on set included handling of the firearms and ammunition, was also charged with involuntary manslaughter, but days ago, her lawyers lobbied for the charges to be dropped. They claim the investigation was “sloppy” and the prosecutors biased.

Prosecutors found a dangerous “mix” of hundreds of dummy rounds, firing blanks, and live ammunition on the movie’s New Mexico set.

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Seth Rogen and Rose Byrne are JUST FRIENDS in the show Platonic, premiering Wednesday on Apple TV+.

They star as a pair of old friends who reconnect, and chaos ensues. But don’t expect it to be a will they/won’t they type of show, watching it and expecting their characters to hook up.

“We work so hard for that not to happen,” Byrne tells ABC Audio. “We wanted the audience to be relaxed, to let go of that expectation, and just enjoy what was going to happen.”

“It’s not a show about that,” she adds. “It’s a show about a friendship.”

Rogen echoes the same sentiment, stating, “These two people were not romantically interested in one another. Even if her husband had a hard time believing it and my friends had a hard time believing it.”

“And that all feels very real, you know? But we also firmly believe that it is possible and real for a man and woman to have a friendship, you know?”

Even though Byrne and Rogen wanted to steer clear of the expectation that their characters hook up, they did have some fun with the notion. 

“It’s a trope that we’re playing with, obviously,” Bryne explains. “So inspired by a lot of, like, the classic When Harry Met Sally, for instance. But this is not that. This is saying that you can do it.”

“And in the end, the show is about these personalities, this friendship that just can’t sustain because it’s too extreme, you know, high highs and lows,” she continues. “And can they ever just have a more of a, you know, happy medium.”

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