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Sofia Coppola: AppleTV dudes ‘pulled the funding’ for my miniseries

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I watched Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla over the holidays and I was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. Coppola really did a great job with the material (Priscilla Presley’s memoir) and she made a really good movie on a small budget and she got fantastic performances out of the two leads, Cailee Spaeny and Jacob Elordi. Sofia has been quite open about the constraints she faces when working with small budgets, and her struggles to get any kind of financing. The fact that Priscilla looked like it had a great costuming and set design budget is a credit to Coppola and her team. I bring this up because Coppola recently spoke to the New Yorker about how AppleTV canceled her dream project, a miniseries based on Edith Wharton’s The Custom of the Country, because of the budget and because the male executives found the female lead “unlikeable.”

Sofia Coppola continues to shed light on her unrealized adaptation of Edith Wharton’s “The Custom of the Country,” which she was developing as a five-episode series for Apple TV . In a new interview with the New Yorker, it’s revealed for the first time that Coppola had cast Oscar nominee Florence Pugh to star in the lead role of Undine Spragg, a Midwestern girl who attempts to ascend in New York City society.

News broke in May 2020 that Sofia Coppola was partnering with Apple TV on “The Custom of the Country.” By the end of 2021, the project was killed.

“They pulled our funding,” Coppola said. “It’s a real drag. I thought they had endless resources.”

Coppola’s series was not going to come cheap. Her most expensive film was 2006’s “Marie Antoinette,” which had a production budget of $45 million. The director said she was planning “Custom” to be “five ‘Marie Antoinettes.’”

“They didn’t get the character of Undine,” Coppola said of Apple executives, who she described as “mostly dudes.” “She’s so ‘unlikable.’ But so is Tony Soprano! … It was like a relationship that you know you probably should’ve gotten out of a while ago.”

Coppola previously told The New York Times that Apple execs did not want to spend the money on her five-hour adaptation due to issues they had with the main character. “The idea of an unlikable woman wasn’t their thing,” Coppola said at the time. “But that’s what I’m saying about who’s in charge.”

“The people in charge of giving money are usually straight men, still,” she said in her Times interview. “There’s always people in lower levels who are like myself, but then the bosses have a certain sensibility … If it’s so hard for me to get financing as an established person, I worry about younger women starting out. It’s surprising that it’s still a struggle.”

[From Variety]

While I’ve never read The Custom of the Country, it sounds like William Thackeray’s Vanity Fair, with a focus on the “social climbing” Becky Sharp. Still, Wharton’s books have been adapted to the screen several times already (to mixed results) and it does feel like this would have been the kind of ideal project for a streamer with unlimited funds. AppleTV throws all kinds of money on all kinds of weird sh-t. I’ve still never met one single person who watched one episode of Foundation. No one talks about For All Mankind (which is apparently a good show, but again, barely anyone watches it). The “unlikeable female lead” complaint is so gross as well.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.

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Elvis Insider: Lisa Marie Presley didn’t like the Priscilla script

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Baz Lurmann’s Elvis was made in cooperation with the Elvis Presley Estate, and Lisa Marie, Priscilla, and Riley Keough all had good things to say about it, which are excerpted on the movie’s Wikipedia page. But Sofia Coppola’s movie Priscilla was made without the estate. They refused to license any of Elvis’ songs to the project. Sofia and Priscilla worked closely in developing the movie, which in my view is all that matters, since it’s Priscilla’s story. But the Elvis Presley estate is not happy with the movie and has been sending “sources” to the media to trash talk it. Now an Estate “insider” is telling Page Six that Lisa Marie Presley (who died in January of this year) didn’t like the script. This is also confirmed by a “production source” who worked on the movie. I think the bigger story here is that the Estate is shook about the way that Sofia’s movie presents the relationship Elvis had with Priscilla.

Sources tell Page Six that it is not being warmly received by Presley insiders, and that before her sudden death in January, there was tension between Lisa Marie Presley and Coppola over its portrayal of her father.

Even the casting is causing unhappiness among the Presley camp: Spaen, at 5’1″ is towered over by Elorrdi, at 6’5″ a full 5 inches taller than the real Elvis.

The intent was surely to make them feel even more different than they were,” says an Elvis estate source: “Even down to the casting, you have this huge man and this tiny girl. It feels like somebody wanted to grossly misrepresent Elvis and Priscilla and their relationship.”

And the fact that the movie focuses on Priscilla being 14 when she met Elvis is also a source of discontent, with a source saying, “Elvis did nothing not within the nature of what Priscilla’s parents were ok with.”

Sources tell us Lisa Marie was not thrilled with the script for “Priscilla” — and thought that her mother was being manipulated by the film’s makers.

“Lisa was not happy with the movie, it was more worrying about the script, its quality and that Priscilla seems to have been taken advantage of,” said the Elvis source, who has seen the movie and deemed it “horrible.”

Another insider who knew Lisa added: “Lisa wasn’t a fan, she didn’t like the script.”

Production sources acknowledged that Lisa Marie had been unhappy before seeing the script.

[From Page Six]

Another interesting tidbit in this article: they claim that Priscilla initially kept her involvement in Sofia Coppola’s movie a secret from her daughter, and Lisa Marie asked her not to sign on as a producer. I understand why Lisa Marie wanted to protect her dad. But I also think Priscilla has the right to tell her story. The Estate talks about Sofia’s movie like it’s some salacious tell-all. But anyone who’s familiar with Sofia’s work knows that’s not how she operates. Because some of her films are light on dialogue (like Marie Antoinette) I can see why Lisa Marie might have worried from the script alone. Apparently Priscilla has fewer speaking lines than Elvis. But Sofia’s movies also use imagery and atmosphere to make their points. And the fact that Priscilla spends so much of the movie not saying anything probably reflects the imbalance of power between them, and the way that Elvis leaned on her emotionally. She was supposed to listen to him, not to be listened to.

Check out the grammatical knots in how the Estate denies Elvis grooming Priscilla: “Elvis did nothing not within the nature of what Priscilla’s parents were ok with.” That is nonsensical. Denials like that just hum with the truth they’re trying to push away. Even if Priscilla’s parents were “ok” with Elvis dating her when she was 14 and he was 24…grooming is grooming is grooming.

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Photos credit: Avalon.red, Cover Images and Getty

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Sofia Coppola: in the 70s women ‘had nothing when they left their husbands’

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Sofia Coppola is one of the OG Nepo Babies but I also think her talent and work ethic are undeniable. She’s covering W Magazine ahead of the release of Priscilla, her upcoming biopic about Priscilla Presley. The photos in the magazine story are elegant black and white, and Sofia’s sporting a perfect smokey black wing eyeliner. There are new details in the interview about the movie, including how many costumes Cailee Spaeny wears as Priscilla: 120! And Sofia also mentions how Priscilla Presley reacted to the script. She went through it page by page and fact-checked small details. Sofia also empathized with women of Priscilla’s generation, who had a harder time leaving their husbands.

Cailee Spaeny wears 120 costumes in the film!: For the 30-day shoot in Toronto, Stacey Battat, Coppola’s longtime costume designer (who once worked at W as a style assistant), had to fabricate, commission, or organize 120 looks just for Priscilla. Coppola tapped into her fashion relationships: Chanel made Priscilla’s wedding dress in the same style as the original, and Valentino created suits and knitwear for Elvis, who is played by Jacob Elordi, known for his work on Euphoria. “We had about 100 outfits for Elvis and his pals, the Memphis Mafia,” Battat recalled. “My joke was that the Memphis Mafia had more costumes than they had lines.”

Priscilla Presley influenced both Sofia and Cailee: Both Coppola and Spaeny had spent time with Priscilla Presley herself. “She was open and complimentary of my work,” Coppola recalled, “but she was a bit tentative. I sent Priscilla the script, and she went through it page by page and gave me specific details, like ‘I didn’t have a teddy bear on my bed.’ But, in the end, I did reinvent some things, like Elvis’s bedroom. I wanted him to have a man cave—very dark and mysterious.”

During production, Priscilla offered to tell Spaeny exactly what she had felt before every scene in the script, before any encounter with Elvis. “We had many phone calls, but once I started filming, I stopped speaking to Priscilla because it became too overwhelming,” said Spaeny. “In the end, it had to be Sofia’s vision.”

It was harder for women to leave their husbands back then: “I was so impressed that Priscilla left Elvis,” Coppola explained. “She was always trying to be his fantasy, his ideal woman. I think about my mom’s generation and how hard it was to be independent. Women without any power or money at that time had nothing when they left their husbands. Priscilla had courage, and that seemed, to me, to be a universal theme.”

[Via W Magazine]

There was a tweet making the rounds on my corner of the internet recently about how long marriages in “ye olden days” weren’t necessarily happy marriages. They were long marriages because it was harder for women to get out of them. Even though Priscilla was famous, she was isolated, and it did take courage for her to leave Graceland. I excerpted the part where Cailee and Sofia talk about her involvement because I sensed…an undercurrent. It comes across like Priscilla wanted more control than Cailee or Sofia were interested in giving. What Cailee says is especially striking–that she stopped speaking to Priscilla because Priscilla was overwhelming her. I know why Priscilla wanted to be so closely involved–it is her life story after all. At the same time, artists are always going to interpret things differently and bring their own perspectives to a story.

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photos credit: IMAGO/Manfred Segerer / Avalon, MPP/Avalon, Getty and via Instagram/W Magazine

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Priscilla Presley defended Sofia Coppola’s upcoming biopic about her

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Earlier this year Priscilla Presley did something very tacky and cold when she attempted to invalidate her daughter Lisa Marie’s will after her death. Priscilla wanted to be a trustee of the Presley estate, but Lisa Marie had amended her will several years ago to take Priscilla out of that role, and make Riley Keough and her brother the main trustee. Riley paid Priscilla a lump sum of $1.4 million to get her to back off, basically, and remains the sole trustee of her mother’s estate. It must have been such an ordeal for Riley Keough to go through–to have her grandma basically sue her when she was still processing her mother’s death. I’m putting that to one side. But I wanted to mention it as context because I think that all of this drama is one reason why some people at the Presley estate has some less than complimentary things to say about Sofia Coppola’s upcoming biopic, called Priscilla. Several nameless “officials” from the estate ran to TMZ to complain about the film after getting an advanced viewing. They accused Priscilla of doing a “money grab” but also took aim at Sofia Coppola.

After recently igniting a bevy of family drama over the fate of her late daughter Lisa Marie Presley‘s trust, Priscilla is once again ruffling feathers when it comes to the Elvis Presley Estate—but this time, it has to do with the new biopic coming out about her life with the late music icon.

Earlier this week, the trailer dropped for the new Sofia Coppola film, which is based on Priscilla’s 1985 biography, Elvis and Me. Shortly after the teaser premiered for the upcoming picture, titled Priscilla, a member of the Elvis Presley Estate spoke out to denounce the film, claiming it was made without their knowledge.

Officials from the estate told TMZ that the film was “produced without the Estate’s knowledge or consent,” and called it a “money grab” on Priscilla’s part.

One official who already saw the film also criticized Coppola’s writing and directing, calling it “horrible,” and stating, “It feels like a college movie.”

“The set designs are just horrific, it’s not what Graceland looks like,” the source added.

But Priscilla, on the other hand, has a much different feeling about the upcoming movie, taking to social media to voice her excitement over the film adaptation of her book.

“I am excited about the interpretation of my book by the masterful Sofia Coppola,” she wrote in an Instagram post on Thursday, along with a shot of the movie poster, starring actors Jacob Elordi and Cailee Spaeny as Elvis and Priscilla.

“[Coppola] has such an extraordinary perspective and I have always been such an admirer of her work,” Priscilla continued in her post. “I’m certain this movie will take everyone on an emotional journey.”

[From Parade]

I highly doubt the “officials” from the Presley estate did not know about this movie. The trade papers reported on this movie going into production in September of last year. I do believe that Priscilla wanted to keep these people out of the film. Honestly, it’s a movie about her life, not just Elvis, and Sofia has said that Priscilla is an executive producer, so it’s her call. She’s the foremost expert on her own life, and I don’t think she needs the estate’s consent to tell her own story.  I LOLed at the comment about horrific set designs. I feel like set design is something Sofia usually gets right. It is true that Sofia’s movies have an impressionistic kind of vibe–they may have historical anachronisms, but those things reflect the perspective of the main character. That’s why a pair of Converse All-Stars sneak their way into Marie Antoinette even though it takes place in the 18th century. If she isn’t doing a perfectly accurate recreation of what Graceland looked like, she probably has a good reason artistically for doing that.

She may be the most nepo baby to ever nepo baby, but Sofia is a skilled and accomplished writer and director in her own right–only someone with an axe to grind would say otherwise. I can’t imagine these same complaints being lobbed at a male director. I think the folks at the estate are also worried about it being a story from Priscilla’s perspective because Elvis basically groomed her when she was fourteen years old and he was an adult man. I don’t think Sofia is going to shy away from that in this movie, and that’s what the “officials” at the estate are really mad about.

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The trailer for Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla Presley movie is out: will you watch it?

the-trailer-for-sofia-coppola’s-priscilla-presley-movie-is-out:-will-you-watch-it?



It’s interesting how biopics seem to be coming in pairs lately. I first noticed that Tom Holland and Jamie Bell both have Fred Astaire biopics in production. (The Old Hollywood nerd in me thinks both of them are a bad idea but I have a little bit more faith in Jamie to carry it off.) Now, hot on the heels of Baz Lurhmann’s Elvis, Sofia Coppola is releasing a related biopic about Elvis’ wife Priscilla. I’m sure I read about it when it went into production but it fell out of my memory. The trailer just came out for Sofia’s movie, called simply Priscilla, and I have to say, I’m intrigued. Jacob Elordi from Euphoria plays Elvis, and Cailee Spaeny from Mare of Easttown is Priscilla. More details about the movie:

The official synopsis: “When teenage Priscilla Beaulieu meets Elvis Presley at a party, the man who is already a meteoric rock-and-roll superstar becomes someone entirely unexpected in private moments: a thrilling crush, an ally in loneliness, a vulnerable best friend,” reads A24’s synopsis for Priscilla. “Through Priscilla’s eyes, Sofia Coppola tells the unseen side of a great American myth in Elvis and Priscilla’s long courtship and turbulent marriage, from a German army base to his dream-world estate at Graceland, in this deeply felt and ravishingly detailed portrait of love, fantasy, and fame.”

Jacob Elordi says word salad about Old Hollywood actors: “I was just like, damn, Elvis Presley wanted to be James Dean. He wanted to be Marlon Brando. I’ve researched almost every actor from that time period, and I passed [Elvis] off as an entertainer and singer. But then he was an actor. I guess, in a way, I’m trying to learn from these people,” said Elordi at the time. “Because I obviously don’t have any friends that have been through the same thing, really, so they’re almost like guiding beacons,” he added.

How Sofia’s movie will be different from Elvis: “I loved how Baz approached his story in a very collage-y way, but I’m glad it didn’t go into much of Priscilla’s story because now I can really dive deep. I think Baz is so unique and his take on that story was so creative,” said Coppola. “But Priscilla is such a minor character in that film, so I never felt like I was treading on the same territory. I love that people were so into his film about Elvis, and now in a few years there’ll be another film about Priscilla. I think it’ll be interesting to have two completely different interpretations of the same events and time period,” she said.

[From People]

We’ll see if Jacob Elordi can cut the mustard as a passable Elvis, especially after Austin Butler’s career-making turn, but I have my doubts. The fact that Jacob compared himself to Elvis, James Dean and Marlon Brando, even indirectly, doesn’t bode well for the size of his ego. Those three men left eternal marks on American culture and are some of the most influential performers of the last century. Jacob, as far as I’m concerned, is just an Australian dude with an unusually prominent Adam’s apple. He has all the charisma of room temperature oatmeal. But I have not seen Euphoria, so maybe I’m being too hard on him.

The elephant in the room with all of this is that Priscilla was underage when she met Elvis. She was fourteen, and he was an incredibly famous 24-year-old man. For a lot of people that’s reason enough to not watch this movie, and I understand that. The thing I’ve always appreciated about Sofia Coppola’s work is how well she captures female alienation. Roger Ebert wrote something in a review for Sofia’s movie Marie Antoinette that struck a chord with me and I’ve always remembered it since. To him, Marie Antoinette was about “the loneliness of being female and surrounded by a world that knows how to use you but not how to value and understand you.” To me Marie Antoinette is a masterpiece (controversial, I know). I think, judging by the 45 seconds of the trailer, Sofia will take a similar approach here with Priscilla. We will see the whole story from Priscilla’s point of view, including the power imbalance between her and Elvis. I think it’s going to be good.

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Sofia Coppola’s 16-year-old daughter Romy is the best director in the Coppola fam

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We are living in a world in which Sofia Coppola is 51 years old and she has a 16-year-old daughter. Sofia actually has two daughters: Romy Mars, 16, and Cosima Mars, 12. Their father is Thomas Mars, the French musician, and Thomas and Sofia have been married since 2011. I have no idea where they live or how they raise their girls, but Romy has decided to shed some light on how she’s grown up. Keep in mind, Romy and Cosima are second-generation nepo babies. Sofia was arguably the Gen X poster girl for nepo babies, especially since she made a “name” for herself when her father, Francis Ford Coppola, cast her in The Godfather Part III. Anyway, second-gen nepo baby Romy is on TikTok and she made a hilarious video wherein she spoke about being grounded – for using her dad’s credit card to try to charter a helicopter from New York to Maryland to have lunch with a “camp friend” – and then tried to make pasta and there’s something about a “fiascA” because of Women’s History Month. This is possibly the greatest directing project ever attached to the name “Coppola.”

this tiktok of sofia coppola’s daughter… this means so much to me pic.twitter.com/6AQtWNhAgG

— savannah ~* (@savbrads) March 21, 2023

What’s your favorite part? Where she doesn’t know the difference between onions and garlic so she slices up some shallots? Or when she claims her parents are “never home” so her babysitter and babysitter’s boyfriend are her “replacement parents”? Here’s the thing – I’ll buy that Sofia and Thomas are self-involved, but also… Romy seems like a completely normal (out-of-touch) kid. Sofia and Thomas cared enough to ground her, you know? But she’s from an Italian family and she doesn’t know the difference between shallots, onions and garlic? Mamma mia, mannaggia! (I absolutely guarantee that Francis Ford Coppola dotes on his granddaughters but he really needs to teach them how to cook.)

Sofia Coppola and Thomas Mars’s daughter holding up her father’s Grammy for fun on TikTok is actually something very special. pic.twitter.com/jtA2oAiO90

— Ryan (@boysforpeles) March 21, 2023

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Photos courtesy of Getty, TikTok.

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Your Favourite TV Show Is Probably Cancelled

Community cancelled

-It was a TV network bloodbath this afternoon, with NBC and ABC cancelling a bunch of shows, including Crisis, Believe, Super Fun Night, Revolution (the third JJ Abrams show to be axed this week) and a couple I actually watch: Trophy Wife, Suburgatory and — most heartbreakingly of all — Community. Now we’ll never know who the Ass Bandit is!

-Just in case you thought we were now stuck in the darkest timeline, here’s a good article on why we were lucky to get five seasons of Community in the first place.

-In really surprising news, Hannibal survived (likely because of its international funding deal, proving ratings don’t always matter when it comes to renewals).

-There’s still no word on Parenthood’s fate, and fans are freaking out. (My bet is it’s coming back, especially since NBC just wiped out its entire slate of dramas. Pay cuts are reportedly on the table though, so it all depends on if the cast is willing to play ball.)

-In happier TV news, Elisha Cuthbert, Krysten Ritter, David Duchovny, Casey Wilson and Kate Walsh are all returning to TV.

–Justin Bieber has passive-aggressively responded to Seth Rogen‘s repeated slamming of him. It hasn’t stopped Seth at all.

-Sad news: The View’s Sherri Shepherd is divorcing husband Lamar Sally.

–James Franco told Letterman he shared that naked selfie on Instagram because “it’s what the people want.” What people? I’m gonna need names!

-Also, James Franco may play Tommy Wiseau in movie about the making of The Room…which actually makes a lot of sense.

-Uh oh. Is Hilary Duff a Scientologist?

–Lupita Nyong’o‘s photos from inside the White House are so goddamn adorable!

–Rebel Wilson has been cast as the lead in a Private Benjamin remake, which I don’t hate.

-I keep forgetting that Paul Wesley is dating his former Vampire Diaries costar, Phoebe Tonkin. I’ve been side-eyeing her ever since she had a hissy fit over the fact that people were saying mean things about her character on The Originals on Tumblr. Maybe stop Googling your name, lady.

-The Breaking Bad spin-off just added three new cast members. So this is really happening, huh?

–Nicole Kidman has responded to the royal family’s outrage over her Grace Kelly biopic.

–Conan O’Brien gently eviscerated Sharon Stone’s new movie to her face on his show last night.

-I have got nothing but love for Angelina Jolie‘s crow-print dress. It’s much better than the jumpsuit-y thing she wore earlier.

-Meanwhile, here’s a new clip from Maleficent.

–Lea Michele and Glee creator Ryan Murphy are in talks to team up for a real Funny Girl Broadway revival.

–Jason Priestley‘s book tour is the gift that keeps on giving. Now he’s telling stories about former roommate Brad Pitt and a penis pump.

–Lady Gaga took a jab at Katy Perry for having green hair and riding a fake horse on tour.

–Sofia Coppola‘s The Little Mermaid isn’t even out yet, and already FunnyorDie is spoofing it.

–Miranda Lambert is laughing off the latest rumours of a divorce from Blake Shelton.

-Here’s a clip from Hilary Swank and Tommy Lee Jones‘ western The Homesman, which is heading to Cannes.

–Mila Kunis talked about her pregnancy on Ellen.

–Jon Hamm has a really, really big head.

–Steve Carrell and Jennifer Garner play frazzled parents in the trailer for Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.

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