HBO Max may get a Harry Potter series, with each season focusing on one book
Embed from Getty Images Harry Potter may be getting a redux. I could insert some
The trailer for the Harry Potter 20th anniversary reunion: we’re family
Last month we heard there was going to be a full HBO special for the
Kate Hudson is casually dating Diplo, Katy Perry’s ex, but his rep denies it
Kate Hudson was seen leaving the Met Gala in May with Diplo (above), whom you might remember as Katy Perry’s ex and the guy who saw through Taylor Swift’s BS before it was as transparent as it is now. (After reviewing some stories about his beef with Taylor, he seems rather prescient about her.) Kaiser reminds me that Diplo is also a highly successful producer and DJ and that she would still hate bang him. So would Kate Hudson, apparently, because these two are said to have hooked up some time last week in Ibiza. Kate Hudson has found her boy of summer: Diplo. “They are dating,” a source reveals a source reveals in the new issue of Us Weekly. The actress and the DJ, both 37, who exited NYC’s Met Gala together in May, connected in mid-July near Ibiza, Spain, the insider says. She was vacationing with girlfriends; he had a day off after playing nearby at club Pacha. (His rep denies the romance.) She documented her travels and raved about her trip via Instagram. “What a blast,” the Marshall star posted July 18. “Til next time, Ibiza!” Before the getaway, she reunited with her ex fiancé, Muse frontman Matt Bellamy, to celebrate their son Bingham’s fifth birthday by jetting to London July 9 to see the new Harry Potter play, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. (The Glee alum also shares 12-year-old son Ryder with her ex-husband, Chris Robinson.) [From US Magazine] Good for her. It looks like a casual hookup and that seems like the type of relationship Kate prefers. Also she like musicians, her last thing was with Nick Jonas and of course she has son Bing with Muse’s Matt Bellamy and was married to The Black Crowes’s Chris Robinson. (To my friend J who insisted last week that DJs/producers are not musicians, you are WRONG. I didn’t tell you to your face but I will do so in this passive aggressive way now.) I would kind of love it if Kate and Diplo became a power couple and started a PR feud with Taylor and Tom. That’s not going to happen, but it would be like Gossip Christmas and Gossip New Year’s put together. Also, do you remember how Cher tweeted earlier this week that Kate Hudson’s clothing subscription service, Fabletics, seemed like a scam? Well Life & Style has a new story about how Kate is mad at her mom, Goldie Hawn, for buying clothing from a competitor. They quote a source who says that Goldie “recently went into Exhale, a spa in NYC, and bought loads of great Victoria Keen yoga pants and spawear.” Kate was said to be “furious… [she] obviously wants her mom to be wearing her Fabletics line.” Goldie has Instagrammed photos where she’s wearing Fabletics but she said Kate sent them to her. It’s not like Goldie is going to pay $50 a month to get sent clothing someone else picks for her, she wants to go in and buy it herself. photos credit: WENN and Pacific Coast News
Ruby Rose had just performed at Pulse nightclub: ‘nothing I can do but cry’
As most of you unfortunately know by now, a man whose name I will not dignify by writing walked into the Orlando nightclub Pulse early Sunday morning and committed a heinous act, the worst mass shooting in US history. Among those for whom this hit far too close to home was actor and DJ Ruby Rose. Ruby is a strong voice and advocate for the LGBTQ community and had just recently done a gig at Pulse. Ruby Rose has shared an emotional social media post after the horrific Orlando mass shooting, revealing she performed in the city where 50 people were slain only last week. “Woke up in tears to hear the news about Orlando. Devastated, heartbroken, sick,” the Aussie actor and DJ posted on Facebook and Instagram. “I played there last Friday and last night I performed after Pride in LA. From the DJ booth you see laughter, love, dancing freedom and beautiful people living their lives not harming anyone. It’s one of the beautiful things to see from stage.” “This horrific tragedy has me on my knees at the mercy of a greater power to ask the simple question of ‘When will this end’ … I’m praying for Orlando, I’m crying for Orlando and I am there with you in spirit sending my love and strength.” [From Page Six] I cannot begin to imagine what it would be like for Ruby to have been in that location, celebrating one day and waking up to find out that about a week later 50 lives were taken there. I had a loose connection to the UCLA shooting earlier this month and the chill of having proximity to tragedy is hard to shake. The heartbreak from this tragic event is far reaching. J.K. Rowling posted the following to her Twitter Sunday to honor one of the victims, Luis Vielma. Luis worked on the Harry Potter ride at Universal Studios in Orlando: Luis Vielma worked on the Harry Potter ride at Universal. He was 22 years old. I can't stop crying. #Orlando pic.twitter.com/Nz2ZCWxNsS — J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) June 13, 2016 Walt Disney World, which was another potential target for attack, and Universal both lost cast members. I have a friend at Disneyland, Anaheim and all cast members are devastated. Even if they had not met their East Coast counterparts, there is a real sense of family among the parks. I absolutely believe J.K. feels Luis’ loss personally. You can see a couple of general tributes posted by the cast members here and here. The Daily Beast has profiles and photos of many of the young people whose lives were cut tragically short. I don’t know how to close this post with the proper respect. Please know my heart goes out to anyone and all affected by this. By way of concluding, I want to leave the thoughts of Michigan State Representative Jeremy Moss: I literally never want to hear again that LGBT people in the bathroom are a threat to public safety. — Jeremy Moss (@JeremyAllenMoss) June 12, 2016 Embed from Getty Images Embed from Getty Images Embed from Getty Images There is nothing I can do today but cry and pray as I lay in shock after waking to the horrible senseless crime in Orlando. — Ruby Rose (@RubyRose) June 12, 2016 I was in Orlando friday and played to a beautiful mostly LGBT crowd and I never once imagined reading this days after. These lives taken. — Ruby Rose (@RubyRose) June 12, 2016 Photo credit: Twitter, WENN Photos and Getty Images
J.K. Rowling on reaction to new Hermione: ‘I thought that idiots were going to idiot’
Character portraits for the play Harry Potter and the Cursed Child were released over the weekend and they are all lovely; take a look on Pottermore. As we reported in December of last year, Olivier-Award winning actor, Noma Dumezweni, was cast as Hermione in this production. After the announcement, people with nothing better to do complained to the Twitterverse about her casting. The issue was not her credentials but the fact that she is not white and that somehow flies in the face of the characterization of Hermione. At the time, J.K. Rowling gave the following statement in support of the casting choice: Canon: brown eyes, frizzy hair and very clever. White skin was never specified. Rowling loves black Hermione ? https://t.co/5fKX4InjTH — J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) December 21, 2015 JK wrote the story upon which Jack Thorne’s play is based. HPatCC takes place 19 years after the gang has graduated Hogwarts. Harry is married with three children and the youngest, Albus, is reluctant to carry on the family legacy. The story is a continuation from the books, not the movies so it really doesn’t matter who played the part in the movie, even if they did a wonderful job in that role. Now that the dust up on social media has died down, JK expressed her annoyance about the controversy and did so in classic JK fashion. JK Rowling has revealed her frustration at online reaction by “a bunch of racists” to news that the role of Hermione will be played by a black actress in the eagerly awaited new play Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. The production, which has broken records by selling 175,000 tickets in 24 hours, is tipped to be the theatrical event of the year. But the Harry Potter creator criticised those who have suggested that Hogwarts’ studious heroine could not be played by the Olivier-award-winning actress Noma Dumezweni. “With my experience of social media, I thought that idiots were going to idiot,” she said in an interview with the Observer. “But what can you say? That’s the way the world is. Noma was chosen because she was the best actress for the job.” While the vast majority of people responded positively to the casting decision, Rowling said: “I had a bunch of racists telling me that because Hermione ‘turned white’ – that is, lost colour from her face after a shock – that she must be a white woman, which I have a great deal of difficulty with. But I decided not to get too agitated about it and simply state quite firmly that Hermione can be a black woman with my absolute blessing and enthusiasm.” Dumezweni was cast by the play’s director, John Tiffany – known for the productions Black Watch and the musical Once – who has collaborated with Rowling and the playwright Jack Thorne, writer of This Is England and The Last Panthers. Tiffany said he was surprised by the opinions expressed online, but had stopped reading the comments. “I am not as Twitter-familiar as Jo and Jack, so I hadn’t encountered its dark side, which is just awful. But what shocked me was the way people couldn’t visualise a non-white person as the hero of a story. It’s therefore brilliant that this has happened.” [From The Guardian] I always cast books in my head and producers never go with my picks when they are made into movies. Shockingly, I am able to get over it and see the film without bias. I remain at a loss over the criticism of Noma; I would be thrilled to see someone of her caliber perform. Elphaba in Wicked needed to be green, it was a huge point in the story but Hermione’s skin color has no affect on her. I think I’ll save my outrage for the fact that I will never get tickets to this show and not the fact that Hermione is not alabaster or Ron not-ginger enough. Embed from Getty Images Photo credit: WENN and Fame/Flynet Photos and Getty Images
‘Batman v. Superman’ opens with $424 million worldwide: sad or awesome?
DC Comics apologists aside, most critics and audience members thought Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice was a terrible movie. But that didn’t stop anyone and everyone from going to see it on Easter weekend. On Friday, the film was already been tracked for a $180 million opening weekend domestically, and by Sunday, it had pretty much met that, opening with $170.1 million domestic, and $424 million worldwide. Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice shattered box office records, opening to an estimated $170.1 million domestically over Easter weekend. Not only did Zack Snyder’s superhero epic set a new record for the all-time biggest March opening, obliterating The Hunger Games’ $152.5 million, but Batman v Superman now stands as the sixth biggest opening of all time. It also squeaked by Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 ($169.2 million) to earn Warner Bros.’ biggest opening ever. Internationally, it added another $254 million for a worldwide total of $424 million — the fourth-biggest global opening of all time. Domestically, Batman v Superman didn’t manage to surpass its Marvel counterparts like The Avengers or Iron Man 3, but it did beat both globally, becoming only the fourth movie in history to cross $400 million worldwide in one weekend. Ben Affleck’s Batman also dethroned Christian Bale in The Dark Knight Rises ($160.9 million) and The Dark Knight ($158.4 million) as the biggest Batman and DC Comics openings ever. Batman v Superman’s runaway success spells good news for Warner Bros. after a lackluster 2015, and the studio had several pricy flops last year, including Jupiter Ascending, The Man From U.N.C.L.E., and Pan. [From EW] Well… good for Warner Bros… I guess. The good news is that there won’t be mass layoffs at Warner Bros because everyone over there decided to spend money like drunken sailors on shore leave. The bad news is that some people will start to believe that this (unsustainable) business model has legs. And while it shows that the Batman and Superman names are enough to get people in seats, that doesn’t mean that the film will stand the test of time, you know? But it does show that people are excited for the Wonder Woman movie, and that the Justice League movie is going to continue happening unabated. The next big test for this core audience of teen and 20-something men who love dark-as-hell superheroes and sh-tty scripts? The Suicide Squad, which comes out in August. Sad Batfleck is in that too. Embed from Getty Images Embed from Getty Images Photos courtesy of WENN, Fame/Flynet, Getty.
Tom Hiddleston nominated for an Evening Standard Award: will he show up?
Yay, Tom Hiddleston news. These are photos of Tommy Hiddleston at the London Evening Standard