EXCLUSIVE: Takashi Yamazaki’s R-rated Godzilla Minus Zero is roaring in the November box office to a great start with what we’re hearing is around $6 million in previews. That includes fan shows from Godzilla Day Tuesday, last night and tonight, the latter being $4M+. Today’s showtimes began at 10AM. It’s very interesting that Godzilla Minus […]
“The state of the theater industry is perhaps on the up,” Ken Ziffren told a ballroom of entertainment lawyers after a recent strong box office. In his annual look at the industry, the Hollywood legal mandarin today put AI, tax credits, the creator economy, M&A, YouTube, the NFL and more in the spotlight along with […]
Warner Records was hit with approximately a dozen layoffs across the company this week, including executive marketing VPs Victoria “Torie” Mason and Dalia Ganz and senior VP of publicity Fount Lynch, sources confirm to Variety. At least five of the layoffs took place at the company’s Nashville office, where Mason and Lynch are based; VP […]
Paul Smith has never been afraid of color. In fact, he’s surrounded by it. “Welcome to my room!” the cheery 80-year-old says over a Zoom call as he moves his laptop like a toy airplane around his office headquarters in central London. Smith’s signature is whimsy: For him, fashion is about play. The suits he […]
Editor’s Note: November is National American Indian Heritage Month. The Department of the Interior’s Indian Affairs Office’s theme for 2026 is 250 Years and Beyond: Building a culture of service in Indian Country. In that context, filmmaker and TV writer Billy Luther puts his own sense of himself, his culture and his heritage in the […]
Croatian director Igor Šeregi is in a car on route to the Adriatic Film & TV Awards taking place at the luxury Porto Montenegro marina when he joins a Zoom call with producer Ivan Kelava to discuss their box office record-breaking Croatian Serbian cross-cultural comedy The Wedding. The picture takes its cue from the daughter […]
Riverdale’s KJ Apa gives surprisingly solid performance but this corny look at iconic actor’s life is missed opportunity The last time New Zealand actor KJ Apa took on a midcentury American pop-cultural icon, he was playing a nominally sexy yet often weirdly bloodless version of Archie Andrews, the feckless teen next door on the comic-book riff Riverdale. He also frequently ceded scenes to his scene partners, whether former teen idols like Luke Perry or newer, more dynamic personalities like Camila Mendes or Madelaine Petsch. Now he’s taking on an even more beloved and therefore trickier part: James Stewart, the Pennsylvania-accented avatar of decency who starred in dozens of classic films and spent decades as a box office mainstay. Yes, Archie has been promoted to a Jimmy Stewart biopic. The movie, called just plain Jimmy, focuses on Stewart’s willing military service during the second world war and its immediate aftermath. Here, Apa is in far less danger of being outshined by his co-stars; it’s competing memories of the real Stewart, available through so many great, good, and watchable-because-of-him movies, that he has to worry about. The substantial and perhaps only surprise that Jimmy has up its sleeve is that Apa does a reasonable imitation of one of the most immediately distinctive movie stars of all time. Plenty of people can approximate that famous voice, less clipped and urbane than so many of his costars, but Apa gets some of his gangly physicality, too. In scenes of distress (whether real-life or acted out on a movie set), he captures the way Stewart could look and sound as if he was about to topple over with overflowing emotion when he got himself worked up for a big scene. It’s not a note-perfect recreation, or even a particularly surprising one, but Apa does disappear into it. Continue reading...
The friendly neighborhood Spider-Man has swung Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) to a massive hike in second quarter profit. The box office success of Spider-Man: Brand New Day was the main reason SPE posted earnings of $488 million for the three months to September 30, a huge 527% swing on the $93 million posted in the […]
After Democrats flipped the U.S. House and Senate, some people took to social media to express their euphoric feelings as well as take jabs at Donald Trump.
AMC Entertainment swung to the black for the three months ended in September on higher revenue, noting market share gains in both domestic and international markets with CEO Adam Aron calling the chain’s second consecutive record quarter. The world’s largest exhibitor swung to a profit of $109.3 million from a year-earlier loss of $298.2 million. […]
In a key box office recovery test, the mega-exhibitor saw theater visits, ticket and concession sales rise with Christopher Nolan's 'The Odyssey' and 'Spider Man: Brand New Day' on its screens.
“Godzilla Minus Zero” should stomp to the top of box office charts, with the Kaiju sequel on track to earn a strong $30 million from 3,254 North American theaters in its opening weekend. The action adventure will tower over fellow newcomers including Warner Bros. Animation’s “The Cat in the Hat” and Searchlight’s dark buddy comedy […]
“Elden Ring,” one of the most popular video games of all time, takes place in a fantasy realm called the Lands Between — a space between life and death where humans battle gods and monsters for power. A24 has just wrapped production on the movie adaptation, representing the company’s biggest swing to date. The action […]
EXCLUSIVE: Cooper Tomlinson, fresh off Blumhouse/Focus Features’ global box office sensation Obsession, has found his next feature in the shape of mystery-thriller Seeker, opposite Jessica Rothe (Happy Death Day) and Mika Abdalla (Off Campus). We first told you about the project six weeks ago with Adam Rehmeier (Carolina Caroline) on board to direct the original […]
This insider’s history of the CIA explores the last 50 years of US foreign policy with granular detail and mordant humour The 250th year of the American experiment seems to invite a reckoning. For a young country, the United States is overblessed – or burdened – with myths about its foundation and how the nation has conducted itself at home and abroad. William T Vollmann’s 3,000-page novel A Table for Fortune is an epic attempt, 15 years in the making, to engage with the US’s past and present at an institutional and a personal level. The four simultaneously published volumes offer both a family story and an insider’s history of the CIA, in order to show the consequences of the quest for liberty and the belief in American exceptionalism. Vollmann’s previous novels have explored the ideological basis of American society, most notably those of the Seven Dreams series, published from 1990 to 2015, which depict the generally disastrous encounters between American settlers and Indigenous peoples. A Table for Fortune continues this project by investigating the last 50 years of US foreign policy, at the heart of which is 9/11, with the book “tracing the roots of that crime in one direction and its poisoned harvest in another”. Though the CIA has been fertile ground for many great American novelists – Don DeLillo, Norman Mailer – Vollmann is perhaps the first to represent the culture and daily activities of the agency in granular detail. His great gambit is to frame this as a dark workplace comedy of minor resentments, sexual tension and office banter. These sections are narrated by the institutional voice of the CIA itself in a relentlessly sardonic tone rife with acronyms, codenames and jargon rendered in multiple fonts. The mordant humour of the narrator, who regards all forms of death and suffering as “ fun ”, has a seductive quality that allows Vollmann to educate the reader about a broad sweep of geopolitical subjects ranging from the Angolan civil war to the interroga
Xavier Becerra was elected the next governor of California today, the first Latino to win the state’s highest office. In a race just called by the AP, Becerra, a Democrat, was long projected to easily defeat Republican Steve Hilton. Still the win to replace term-limited Gavin Newsom comes on a deep blue night with Democrats […]
The former seminarian is the first Democrat to win statewide office in the the conservative stronghold in decades
Heading into awards season, it’s always nice for any feature contender to have some juice at the box office, and Spain’s official Oscar entry has exactly that as La Bola Negra has easily become the country’s highest grossing local film year-to-date with $41 million per Rentrak. In total, La Bola Negra currently counts a running […]
'Other Desert Cities' was the top earner in a down week for Broadway.
Broadway business was off about 13% last week (from the previous week and from last season at this time) – maybe Halloween Saturday pulled away some attention? – with total box office for the 33 shows hitting $29,572,284. Attendance for the week ending November 1 was 251,700, down 4% from the previous week and 9% […]
Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi’s “La Bola Negra” has become the third highest-grossing Spanish film of all time at Spain’s domestic box office, earning an estimated €36.7 million ($41.0 million) through Nov. 1, according to Rentrak figures. Only Emilio Martínez-Lázaro’s blockbuster comedy “Ocho apellidos vascos” (“Spanish Affair,” $61.8 million) and J.A. Bayona’s disaster survival drama […]
Chinese investors placing high value on AI despite unpopularity of Sanxingdui: Future Past China’s first fully AI-generated movie has flopped, earning just 1.7m yuan (£191,000) at the box office despite costing “tens of millions” to make, according to its producer. But is it any good? The Guardian watched Sanxingdui: Future Past in a virtually empty cinema in Beijing, and found it no worse than plenty of human-centred mindless action flicks. Continue reading...
Cinemark, the nation’s third largest exhibitor, saw revenue jump 23% to $1.1 billion for the three months ended in September, its best-ever third quarter amid a broad box office rebound. The shares are up about 4% in premarket trade. The company reported gains across categories including premium large format box office (XD, Imax) and ScreenX), […]
The movie theater giant, led by CEO Sean Gamble, saw concession and admissions revenues rise from year-earlier levels.
Black Bear’s period comedy “Wicker,” directed by Alex Huston Fischer and Eleanor Wilson and starring Olivia Colman, Alexander Skarsgård, Peter Dinklage, and Elizabeth Debicki, clinched the top spot at the U.K. and Ireland box office, debuting at No. 1 with £1.76 million ($2.34 million). The film narrowly edged A24’s psychological thriller “Primetime,” directed by Lance […]
Sidney Prescott will return for “Scream 8.” Neve Campbell confirmed that she will reprise her role as the ultimate final girl after Sidney survived her latest run-in with the Ghostface-masked killers in “Scream 7.” The 2025 movie was a major box office success, tallying the 30-year-old franchise’s biggest opening ever ($97.2 million worldwide) and ultimately […]
The City of Los Angeles and its partner film office will extend a pilot program through April 2027 that aims to reduce the cost of permits for television, movie and other productions. FilmLA, the film office for the city and county of Los Angeles, announced today it will continue accepting applications without interruption for its […]
Charles de Gaulle is arguably one of the most iconic figures in French history but for filmmaker Antonin Baudry, the story of how the wartime leader came to embody the French Resistance during World War II had largely been overlooked by filmmakers. With De Gaulle: Resistance and Liberty, an ambitious two-part historical epic, Baudry looked […]
John Goodman is finally speaking out about “Digger” flopping with critics and at the box office. During an appearance on the “Happy Sad Confused” podcast, the actor said all of the negative pre-release buzz for the movie effectively killed its chances of making money at the box office. “Digger” cost north of $160 million to […]
The city of Lexington, Kentucky, is looking to expand its local well of production experts. FilmLEX, the city’s official film and entertainment office, has partnered with the Location Mangers Guild International for a workforce development initiative, “From Page to Place: The Art of Location Management.” The two-day workshop is aimed at a wide range of […]
The new gig is a reunion for ThankYouX and Powell: During the latter's run at Paramount Pictures, he painted of portrait of Steve Jobs for her office on the lot.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom, on the eve of the 2026 midterm elections, is calling for another major expansion of the state’s Film and TV Tax Credit Program. Newsom is proposing an increase to California’s entertainment production incentive program from $750 million in annual tax credits to at least $1 billion, expanding what the governor’s office […]
Spain’s indie film distributors are flexing growing box office muscle — and attracting a broader range of buyers to Valladolid’s Merci market. Presented at Merci, Rentrak figures showed that members of Adicine, Spain’s leading association of independent film distributors, saw box office receipts rise 45% through September. Elastica Films’ “La Bola Negra,” released Sept. 25, […]
The former CEO of ITN and BBC Studios top executive was hired by the global streamer's London office in November 2020.
Netflix layoffs have trickled down to the UK. Deadline is told that around 2% to 3% of the London office of several hundred staff have been laid off, including Anna Mallett, who was VP Production in the UK and EMEA. Others to have left work in areas like PR and marketing, we are told. Mallett […]
Watching Congresswoman Haley Stevens attempt to explain her 11th-hour endorsement of Republican Mike Rogers over her fellow Democrat Abdul El-Sayed in Tuesday’s election to become the next United States Senator from Michigan, my primary feeling was one of relief. Thank God this person didn’t beat El-Sayed in the primary, despite outspending him in a landslide. […]
Constantin Film and Sony Pictures’ horror reboot “Resident Evil” secured its fourth consecutive weekend at number one across mainland China, grossing RMB28.5 million ($4.3 million) over the Oct. 30–Nov. 1 frame, according to data from Artisan Gateway. Since launching during the Golden Week corridor on Oct. 5, the video game adaptation has generated a cumulative […]
Japanese animated phenomenon “Chiikawa the Movie: The Secret of the Mermaid Island” held the No. 1 position at the South Korean box office over the weekend of Oct. 30–Nov. 1, securing its third consecutive weekend atop the rankings. According to data from KOBIS, the tracking service operated by the Korean Film Council, the Toho-distributed fantasy […]
Sony Pictures Classics’ John Turturro-starring The Only Living Pickpocket in New York by Noah Segan topped $1.9 million in a major week 2 expansion from six to 1,112 screens. The story of an aging New York pickpocket racing to return a valuable stolen USB drive to a vengeful crime family has an estimated cume of […]
Director Zach Cregger’s “Resident Evil” has notched a notable box office milestone, climbing to $400 million in global ticket sales. His reboot of the ’90s zombie video game has earned $157.399 million in North America and $242.6 million overseas for a worldwide haul of exactly $400 million. It’s now the highest-grossing installment in the 24-year-old […]
It was an awful weekend at the global box office, but a lot of that has to do with the fact that there’s no major wide Hollywood release (or China local blockbuster title for that matter) more than the Halloween holiday itself impacting worldwide ticket sales. If there’s any indication of how bad the weekend […]
The North American box office faced a slump this weekend.
A24’s Elizabeth Holmes documentary “You Can See Everything” and DC’s comic book adaptation “Clayface” are vying for first place at the domestic box office, with each film on track to collect around $10.5 million over the weekend. Although it’ll be a close call, “You Can See Everything” has the slight edge with $10.6 million while […]
In this web exclusive, Hollywood historian Sam Wasson, author of the biography "Frank Capra: A Life," talks with Lee Cowan about Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed's emotional performance in Capra's 1946 classic "It's a Wonderful Life," and how the director created a timeless classic – even if it wasn't the box office giant he'd hoped for.
Taika Waititi has taken to social media to defend “Klara and the Sun” amid poor reviews and bleak box office numbers, sharing an Instagram post featuring the film’s poster and its Rotten Tomatoes audience score of 78%. (In contrast, the critic score is 28% — the “Jojo Rabbit” director’s lowest yet). “I haven’t read a […]
A24’s “You Can See Everything” narrowly beat Warner Bros. and DC’s “Clayface” at the Friday box office, cementing its status as the must-watch documentary — or film, for that matter — of the moment. The buzzy Elizabeth Holmes doc generated $3.56 million on its third Friday from an expanded 3,243 North American theaters and should […]
FRIDAY PM UPDATE: Halloween’s trick on the weekend domestic box office is currently seeing a fight between A24’s You Can See Everything and Warner Bros/DC’s Clayface with $10M+ apiece, though the odds are in favor the incarcerated failed Theranos founder versus a Gotham celebrity whose face melts. You Can See Everything is counting $3.2M today […]
Box office authority Gower Street Analytics has revised their 2026 annual global ticket sales forecast to $35.7 billion, up 2.9% from their previous estimate which they reported at April’s CinemaCon. Their forecast is based on Rentrak actuals and Gower estimates. If the global B.O. hits $35.7B, that will rep a 6.3% uptick from last year’s […]
Watch Bradley Whitford and three other actors from the Broadway revival of Aaron Sorkin’s classic courtroom drama argue in an office at the New York Times Building.
The star takes on her biggest challenge yet: resurrecting her family’s Cantonese restaurant. She discusses the stress of rewatching her sitcom, nearly becoming a meat inspector … and her beloved matriarch, who passed away after filming I’m embarrassed I didn’t bring anything. It’s 10-something in the morning, and I’m meeting Nora Lum, 38 – best known as rapper, comic actor and writer Awkwafina – the morning after the Bafta TV awards. I feel that I should have brought her a pastry pick-me-up. Yet here I am empty-handed. “It could have been Chinese buns,” she playfully suggests. Yes, it could have been. Especially because we are meeting to discuss her new series on Apple TV, Awkwafina: The Unlikely Cook. It sees the star of box-office hits Crazy Rich Asians and Marvel’s Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings travel across the US to learn from a new generation of Asian American chefs, in the hope that she might revive her own family’s long-closed Cantonese restaurant. But there’s one problem: she can’t cook. Continue reading...
