Entertainment

As one of the fastest growing sports, Pickleball is taking over the United States — and soon our televisions. 

The beloved sport is now the premise of the new reality show called Pickleball Paddle Battle, hosted by former Bachelor Clayton Echard and he tells ABC Audio viewers are in for a treat. 

“We’re going to get some of the top competitors in the country to come in for a little bit over a week and they’re gonna compete against one another,” he explains. “Very quickly you’re going to get to see people get very passionate, very competitive, and competition just brings out the best in people and sometimes the worst.”

The prizes are “quite a big deal,” with one female and one male competitor earning a one-year-sponsorship contract with Pickleball Kingdom Productions. Also, one female and one male will be awarded their own Pickleball Kingdom franchises. 

Hosting Pickleball Paddle Battle will be a new venture for Clayton, he’s no stranger to reality television after being the lead on The Bachelor in 2021 and a contestant on The Bachelorette. So what advice does he have for the new Golden Bachelor?

“Give Jesse [Palmer] a really hard time for me… Also don’t do anything that I did,” he jokes, before adding, “I would also just tell him to just be authentically himself.”

“The worst thing that you can walk away from an experience with is knowing that you weren’t yourself and then you’re going to beat yourself up even more,” he continues.

Clayton also shared advice given to him by a former lead, “Don’t try to have control over everything … Let it go and just live in the moment. You cannot control everything with reality TV.” 

Pickleball Paddle Battle show details can be found at www.picklballpaddlebattle.tv. 

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Just in time for Halloween, FX has announced its anthology spinoff American Horror Stories will debut on Hulu Thursday, October 26.

The spinoff of Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk’s award-winning hit anthology series American Horror Story features a different story in each of its four new episodes, part of the “Huluweeen” event.

Details on the episodes are still secret, but Deadline reports Lisa Rinna will appear in one called “Tapeworm.”

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Shawn Levy, the Canadian-born director and executive producer of Stranger Things and the Ryan Reynolds hit Free Guy, will be honored at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival.

Levy is known for his work behind the camera, including Reynolds’ time-traveling family drama The Adam Project and 2016’s The Arrival, for which he was nominated for an Academy Award as a producer.

Levy will debut All the Light We Cannot See, a miniseries based on Anthony Doerr‘s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, at TIFF in September.

The Night at the Museum veteran will be given the inaugural Norman Jewison Career Achievement Award, named after the Oscar-winning Canadian filmmaker and producer behind Moonstruck and others.

“With a multi-faceted career spanning over 3 decades, Shawn Levy has become one of the most versatile filmmakers and storytellers of his generation,” said “thrilled” TIFF CEO Cameron Bailey in the announcement.

Levy will be presented with the award at the TIFF Awards gala fundraiser at the Fairmont Royal York Hotel on September 10.

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Ahead of Ahsoka‘s two-episode premiere on Disney+ on August 23, Lucasfilm has dropped a more than 7-minute special look into the history of the character.

The snippet, called A New Star Wars Legacy, features interviews with Ahsoka star Rosario Dawson, Mandalorian creator Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni, the guy who created Ahsoka Tano while working under George Lucas for the Emmy-winning animated series Star Wars: The Clone Wars.

The piece also shows how integral the master/apprentice relationship is throughout Star Wars, up to and including young Jedi learner Ahsoka and Anakin Skywalker, and between Star Wars creator Lucas and Filoni. It was the former who envisioned the character Filoni sketched as Anakin’s Padawan, it is explained, and as a result, Ahsoka was first seen by fans as a plucky teen.

Over the course of the series, and in the subsequent Star Wars: Rebels, she matures into adulthood, voiced throughout by Ashley Eckstein.

Dawson first picked up the baton — or literally Ahsoka’s twin lightsabers — in season 2 of The Mandalorian, in an episode directed by Filoni.

Dawson explains, “Ahsoka is one of the most developed characters in Star Wars, period,” and discusses “sinking into” the character through extensive makeup and training to expertly wield lightsabers ambidextrously, as Ahsoka does. “No matter how tired I was, I was like, ‘Sign me up for some more. Sign me up for some more,'” she declares.

The show has Ahsoka reuniting with live-action versions of her Rebels allies — including Mary Elizabeth Winstead as ace pilot and green-skinned Twi’lek Hera Syndulla and Natasha Liu Bordizzo as Mandalorian Sabine Wren — to stop an emerging threat in Lars Mikkelsen‘s Grand Admiral Thrawn.

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

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Bradley Cooper‘s upcoming romantic biopic Maestro, in which he plays famed composer Leonard Bernstein, dropped its first teaser on Tuesday. But it has already kicked off derision from people over Cooper’s look in the film.

It took some prosthetic work to get the actor and director to approximate Bernstein’s appearance, something detractors label “Jewface.”

The controversy attracted the attention of Bernstein’s children, Jamie, Alexander and Nina, who posted on X, formerly Twitter, a lengthy defense of Cooper’s choice.

“Bradley Cooper included the three of us along every step of his amazing journey as he made his film about our father,” their statement began. “We were touched to the core to witness the depth of his commitment, his loving embrace of our father’s music, and the sheer open-hearted joy he brought to his exploration.”

They continued, “It breaks our hearts to see any misrepresentations or misunderstandings of his efforts. It happens to be true that Leonard Bernstein had a nice, big nose. Bradley chose to use makeup to amplify his resemblance, and we’re perfectly fine with that. We’re also certain that our dad would have been fine with it as well.”

The trio also added, “Any strident complaints around this issue strike us above all as disingenuous attempts to bring a successful person down a notch — a practice we observed all too often perpetrated on our own father.”

They further expressed the “love” and “respect” Cooper showed for their father and mother, Felicia, played by Carey Mulligan in the film. “We feel so fortunate to have had this experience with Bradley, and we can’t wait for the world to see his creation,” they concluded.

Maestro opens in select theaters in November before debuting December 20 on Netflix.

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The Sound of Freedom, the child trafficking drama that’s the summer’s most unlikely blockbuster, beating the domestic hauls of $200-million-plus movies like Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning and the fifth Indiana Jones film, has made a profit for its crowdfunding investors, too.

To date, the Jim Caviezel-starring thriller that was produced by Angel Studios has made roughly $173 million on a production budget of around $14.5 million, and unlike the usual summer fare, relied on a word-of-mouth campaign to drive the movie’s business, instead of a hundred million dollar marketing budget.

Caviezel plays real-life former government agent Tim Ballard in the film, who quit his job busting child pornographers to take on his own mission of rescuing a little girl from sex traffickers in the Colombian jungle. He saved 123 people, including 55 kids, in the process.

Crowdfunding both paid for the movie and its marketing, with 6,678 people invested to support the P&A [Prints & Advertising] costs for the film. Angel reported Wednesday, August 16, that these investors are being paid back $1.20 for every dollar they tossed in to get the movie into theaters.

“[W]e are thrilled to be able to get funds back to them in three months,” said Neal Harmon, CEO of Angel Studios, in the announcement. “The Angel Guild is key to our theatrical strategy and paying out as quickly as possible is always our first priority.”

The announcement comes ahead of the movie’s first international roll-out: The Sound of Freedom will be launching in 21 countries before September 1, moving toward a global goal of 75.

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As Barbie‘s winning ways continue at the box office worldwide, the movie has just surpassed a personal high water mark for Warner Bros., taking down a superhero in the process.

Variety reports Barbie has passed $537.5 million at the domestic box office, beating Christopher Nolan‘s final Batman film, 2008’s Oscar-winning The Dark Knight ($536 million), for the title of biggest U.S. hit in Warner Bros. history.

Nolan, of course, need not fret: He has his own blockbuster with Oppenheimer — one half of the “Barbenheimer” phenomenon. However, Warner Bros. doesn’t get those bragging rights as Nolan made that movie with Universal, not his former cinematic home, WB.

Barbie is expected to soon unseat The Super Mario Bros. Movie, which grossed $1.36 billion and is the highest grossing movie of the year; Greta Gerwig‘s film has made $1.2 billion worldwide since its debut just four weeks ago.

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On Wednesday, August 15, Netflix dropped the teaser to its anime series-take on the 2010 cult hit Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. The teaser to Scott Pilgrim Takes Off, set to a tune from Scott’s band Sex Bob-omb, shows loads of action.

As reported, the streaming service snagged the full cast of the Edgar Wright-directed original film, with Wright producing the animated version.

Also back on board are Michael Cera voicing his title role of Scott Pilgrim; Mary Elizabeth Winstead (Ramona Flowers); Chris Evans (Lucas Lee); Aubrey Plaza (Julie Powers); Anna Kendrick (Stacey Pilgrim); Brie Larson (Envy Adams); Satya Bhabha (Matthew Patel); Kieran Culkin (Wallace Wells); Alison Pill (Kim Pine); Brandon Routh (Todd Ingram); Jason Schwartzman (Gideon Graves), Mae Whitman (Roxy Richter); Johnny Simmons (Young Neil); Mark Webber (Stephen Stills) and Ellen Wong (Knives Chao).

Based on the graphic novel series, the 2010 movie centered on awkward Scott’s attempts to defeat the seven evil exes of his love, Ramona Flowers. Although it was a dud at the box office, in the years since, it has become a fan favorite.

The Scott Pilgrim anime series debuts November 17 on Netflix.

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New posters and a release date for American Horror Story: Delicate Part One have arrived.

In one image, Kim Kardashian appears with long, platinum blonde hair and a spider resting on her chest, the spider’s abdomen standing in for a pregnant belly.

“You’re in our web now,” the caption reads.

Another image features actress Emma Roberts with long hair and a satin dress, also cradling a spider on her stomach, as an expectant mother would her baby to be.

“Don’t worry, we’ll hold you,” the caption for Roberts’ poster reads.

A first look for the next AHS installment was released last month. The teaser, which was set to “Rock-A-Bye Baby” featured Kardashian, Roberts and Cara Delevingne.

AHS: Delicate is being compared to the classic 1968 psychological thriller Rosemary’s Baby, and centers on a woman in the public eye who is convinced darker forces are sabotaging her pregnancy journey.

Cast members for the upcoming installment include Pose star Michaela Jaé Rodriguez, Hellraiser star Odessa A’zion and The Resident veteran Matt Czuchry.

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Quinton Aaron, who played Michael Oher in the 2009 movie about Oher’s life, The Blind Side, is weighing in after a headline grabbing lawsuit related to the movie.

And like he did in the movie, Aaron is protecting his onscreen mother, Sandra Bullock, who won an Oscar for her performance.

On August 14, Oher filed a petition alleging Sean and Leigh Anne Tuohy tricked him into signing a conservatorship when he was 18, and cut him out of profits from his own life story.

The couple denied the allegations, and claimed Oher, who was homeless before they welcomed him into their family, took part in a “shakedown.”

In a statement, the Tuohys said, they “opened their home to Mr. Oher, offered him structure, support and, most of all, unconditional love. They have consistently treated him like a son…His response was to threaten them, including saying that he would plant a negative story about them in the press unless they paid him $15 million.”

Snarkers online then began dragging Bullock as a result of Oher’s lawsuit, with some suggesting she should give back her Academy Award.

However, Aaron isn’t having it.

He tells the Daily Mail that the controversy is “heartbreaking,” adding, “I was under the assumption, like everybody, that the family was good all these years.”

However, he said Bullock, who recently lost her romantic partner Bryan Randall to ALS, should be out of bounds. “Sandra just suffered a loss and everything, so I’m pretty sure she’s probably trying to stay out of the [spotlight] and just handle her situation as best she knows how,” he said in a video interview.

“Leave her alone,” the actor warned after reading “disturbing” comments. “Don’t come for my mama. I’m six-foot-eight, 400-plus pounds, and you don’t want those problems.”

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