ARAB TIMES, FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 2016
NEWS/FEATURES
20
People & Places
Brangelina
Jolie’s demand
Marion denies
role in divorce
LOS ANGELES, Sept 22, (AP):
Marion Cotillard is announcing
her pregnancy and shooting down
rumors of any romantic involvement with Brad Pitt.
“This is going to be my first and
only reaction to the whirlwind news
that broke 24 hours ago and that I
was swept up into,” the Oscar-winning actress wrote in a statement
posted Wednesday on Instagram .
The star of such films as “Inception” and “Rust and Bone” said that
she is “not used to commenting
on things like
this nor taking
them seriously
but as this situation is spiraling and affecting people I
love, I have to
speak up.”
Cotillard
affirmed her
longtime relationship with
Cotillard
actor Guillaume Canet. The
couple are parents to a 5-year-old
son. She said in her Instagram post
alongside a photo of bird soaring
through the sky that he is “the only
one that I need” and they are expecting another child.
Romantic
The actress, who won an Academy Award in 2008 for her performance as the legendary French
singer Edith Piaf in “La Vie en
Rose,” stars with Pitt in the upcoming World War II romantic thriller
“Allied.”
Several reports this week suggested a relationship between
Cotillard and Pitt was the reason
Angelina Jolie filed for divorce on
Monday.
“This crafted conversation isn’t
distressing,” Cotillard wrote.
“And to all the media and the haters who are quick to pass judgment, I sincerely wish you a swift
recovery.”
Cotillard says she hopes Jolie
and Pitt “will find peace in this very
tumultuous moment.”
A spokeswoman for Cotillard
didn’t immediately respond to messages seeking comment about the
post.
In the global hubbub over the
Brangelina divorce, Angelina Jolie Pitt’s demand for sole physical
custody of her six children with
Brad Pitt has attracted its share of
the attention. Yet experts say Jolie
Pitt won’t have the final say, and
that Pitt and the couple’s eldest son,
Maddox, may even have a voice in
custody arrangements.
Convey
Stacy Phillips, a veteran divorce
attorney, called Jolie Pitt’s request
for sole physical custody a “wish
list,” one that could change as the
divorce progresses. Phillips, like
many, saw the request as a message
to Pitt, although what the actress is
trying to convey won’t be known
for some time, if ever.
Pitt has yet to file his legal response to Jolie Pitt’s divorce petition, but each actor released statements Tuesday indicating their
children were the priority. The
pair has six children, ranging in
ages from 8-year-old twins Knox
and Vivienne to 15-year-old Maddox.
“It’s not uncommon that a person
would seek sole physical custody in
their initial filing,” said divorce lawyer Lori Howe. “That doesn’t mean
it is what they will end up seeking
if they resolve the case through
settlement or in a courtroom. ... She
very well could change her mind as
well. And there’s nothing to stop
her from doing that, despite having
checked those boxes on her petition.”
California law favors joint custody of children, and judges can
generally consider the opinion of
children who are 14 years or older
about which parent they want to
live with.
Divorce lawyers, however, say
the couple can avoid placing their
children in the middle of a divorce
if they work out an agreement in
private.
“The parents should be parents,
as opposed to letting the children
be the parents,” said Phillips, an
attorney in the Los Angeles office
of Blank Rome LLP. “They didn’t
ask for this. They need to be kept
as children.”
Attorney Steven Mindel said in
some instances, a judge may want
to know the opinion of children
younger than 14-years-old, but in
general, courts encourage parents
to work out the custody arrangements without protracted legal
fights.
“You generally don’t want a
child testifying against a parent,”
Mindel said. “It’s emotionally
draining on the child.”
Testimony doesn’t have to be in
a courtroom. It can be solicited by
an attorney appointed to represent
the child’s interests, or can be done
in a judge’s chambers, if necessary,
Mindel said.
In this Sept 12, 2016 photo, actress Lupita Nyong’o, a cast member in the film ‘Queen of Katwe’, poses for a portrait at The Omni King Edward Hotel in Toronto. (AP)
Film
Family-friendly film made in Africa
Nyong’o back on screen in ‘Katwe’
US film director, screenwriter and producer, Oliver Stone, arrives at the Hotel Maria Cristina to promote his film
‘Snowden’ during the 64th San Sebastian Film Festival, in the northern
Spanish Basque city of San Sebastian
on Sept 21. (AFP)
Witherspoon
Elba
Variety
LOS ANGELES: Open Road Pictures
has acquired all North American rights
to the romantic comedy “Home Again,”
starring Reese Witherspoon.
The film will be the directorial debut
of Hallie Meyers-Shyer, the daughter
of Nancy Meyers who is on board to
produce. Meyers-Shyer also wrote the
script and Black Bicycle Entertainment’s Erika Olde also financed the
film.
Michael Sheen, Nat Wolff and Lake
Bell have also joined the cast. Variety
first reported Witherspoon’s involvement earlier this year.
“Home Again” is the story of a
recently separated mother of two
(Witherspoon) whose new life in Los
Angeles is overturned when she decides
to take in three young, charismatic guys
who become part of her unconventional
family.
The film is scheduled to begin production in fall of 2016 and is expected
to be released in the US in fourth quarter
2017. MadRiver is selling the international rights to the film. (RTRS)
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LONDON: London’s Madame Tussauds
museum said on Wednesday it had separated its wax figure replicas of Angelina
Jolie and Brad Pitt after the Hollywood
power couple announced their split.
Jolie’s attorney said on Tuesday the
actress had filed for divorce from Pitt,
her romantic partner since 2005 and
husband of two years.
“We reacted quickly to yesterday’s
news of the separation of Angelina Jolie
and Brad Pitt and their plans to divorce
by mirroring the separation in the attraction,” a Madame Tussauds spokesperson
said.
“The couple’s wax figures, which
were launched in 2013, have been split
up and are now featured at a respectful
TORONTO, Sept 22, (Agencies): The
filmmaker Mira Nair was familiar with
the regal grace of Lupita Nyong’o long
before most.
The Indian-born, New York-based
Nair has been close friends with
Nyong’o’s family for years. One of
Nyong’o’s first jobs in the movies
was interning in New York for Nair’s
production company. She also later
worked for Nair’s Uganda-centered
film school, Maisha Film Labs.
What does Nair recall of Nyong’o as
a younger woman?
“Like she is: immensely thoughtful and stylish,” Nair says with a
laugh. “She wouldn’t speak unless
she had something to say. And full of
fun, which sometime you guys don’t
see. But there’s a real appetite for life
there.”
In the African chess prodigy tale
“Queen of Katwe,” a now much more
established Nyong’o has reunited with
Nair for a film that reflects much of the
actress’s past, as well as her future. It
is, surprisingly, the first time moviegoers have gotten to see Nyong’o’s face
on screen since her breakout, Oscarwinning performance in 2013’s “12
Years a Slave.”
In the three years since, she’s appeared in “Star Wars: The Force
Awakens” in a motion-capture performance, lent her voice to “The Jungle Book” and starred on Broadway
in Danai Guirira’s Liberian drama
“Eclipsed,” earning a Tony nomination. But “Queen of Katwe,” she says,
epitomizes the kind of film she wants
to be in.
Success
“The success of ‘12 Years of Slave’
distance from each other. Angelina is
keeping Nicole Kidman company and
Brad Pitt is with his several time co-star
Morgan Freeman.” (RTRS)
❑ ❑ ❑
LOS ANGELES: Jing Tian has joined
the cast of Legendary’s “Pacific Rim 2”
has put me in a position where I can
choose,” Nyong’o said in a recent interview. “I want to honor the opportunity
that I’ve been given. So I’ve worked
very hard to choose things that I’m passionate about because I think I’m most
useful when I feel conviction. I want to
continue to do work that moves me and
develops cultural conversations.
“It takes one film at a time, one story
at a time, to actually shift the norm,”
she adds.
“Queen of Katwe,” which opens
Friday, is itself an anomaly. It’s a
family-friendly film made in Africa
with an entirely black cast — a first
for Disney. The film tells of Phiona
Mutesi’s (newcomer Madina Nalwanga) rise from the Katwe slums in
Kampala, Uganda, to elite levels of
chess. Nair shot it in South Africa
and Uganda. Nyong’o plays Phiona’s
head-strong mother.
The local flavor, as well as the real
people the story is based on (who appear briefly but movingly at the end),
gives “Queen of Katwe” an infectious
spirit. During one celebratory scene in
Katwe, extras mixed with nearby onlookers, eager to join in the exultation.
“Because this doesn’t happen very
often, we were all filled with such gratitude to be able to tell this story,” says
Nyong’o.
Even if Nyong’o wasn’t sitting in
a high-back chair at a Toronto hotel
shortly after the film’s screening at the
Toronto International Film Festival,
the 33-year-old would appear queenlike, herself, given her calm poise and
precision with words.
Although Nyong’o now seems remarkably at home on any red carpet,
she spent years hesitating to commit to
starring John Boyega.
Scott Eastwood also toplines with
Steven S. DeKnight is directing.
Thomas Tull, Mary Parent, Jon
Jashni, and Guillermo del Toro will
produce the action-adventure along with
Boyega and Femi Oguns under their
Upper Room Productions shingle. Cale
acting. As an undergrad at Hampshire
College, she initially explored other
roles on film sets.
“I was just trying to figure out where
in this industry, if not in the front of the
camera, I would fit in,” she says. “I had
always been discouraged that it was
possible. I was from Kenya and I didn’t
know any Kenyan actors in America. It
just didn’t seem like a possible career
path.”
Nyong’o, born in Mexico and raised
in Kenya, had a very different upbringing than the impoverished ones of
“Queen of Katwe.” But, as Nair says,
“Like Phiona, she’s harnessed her potential and thankfully the world has
rewarded her for it.”
“I spent a lot of time denying the fact
that I wanted to be an actor, and I felt I
could bring this to the film,” Nyong’o
says. “It’s about having the courage to
pursue your dream and it takes courage because sometimes your dreams
are unconventional and surprising and
uncomfortable for those around you to
understand.”
❑
❑
❑
Former child star Linda Blair frightened the wits out of a generation of
moviegoers as the possessed pre-teen
with a penchant for projectile vomiting
in iconic horror movie “The Exorcist.”
But four decades on, you get the
feeling she’d be happy never to answer
another question about her 1973 portrayal of the demonic Regan MacNeil,
a role that will always define her.
AFP caught up with Blair at the red
carpet opening of Universal Studio’s
“Halloween Horror Nights” festival
in Southern California, where she had
been invited ostensibly to promote a
Boyter will serve as the film’s executive
producer.
The first “Pacific Rim,” directed by
del Toro, also starred Charlie Hunnam,
Rinko Kikuchi, Idris Elba, Charlie
Day, and Robert Kazinsky.
“Pacific Rim” was set in the near
future with Earth at war with the
UK picks Iranian horror
movie as ‘Oscar’ entry
Leonardo DiCaprio speaks onstage at the Friars Club honoring Martin Scorsese
with the Entertainment Icon Award at Cipriani Wall Street on Sept 21, in New York
City. (AFP)
LOS ANGELES, Sept 22,
(RTRS): Babak Anvari’s Farsilanguage thriller “Under the Shadow” has been selected by BAFTA
as the United Kingdom’s Foreign
Language Academy Award entry
for 2016, Variety has learned exclusively.
The film, which premiered at
the Sundance Film Festival in
January, will be released by Vertigo Releasing in the UK on Sept
23 and by XYZ Films and Vertical in the US on Oct 7.
Vertical Entertainment and
XYZ Films are releasing the
film theatrically in North America and globally on digital platforms.
new “Exorcist”-themed haunted house.
Bigger
But the 57-year-old is a hard woman
to keep on topic, and every question
about arguably the best-known horror
film in history returns her to her much
bigger passion — her animal welfare
work.
The verbal backflips she performs to
bring the conversation back to her activism are as impressive as her famous
character’s 360-degree head spin.
“This is a party for me, for the film,
for my animals, because everything as
far as merchandise goes to the Linda
Blair Worldheart Foundation on my
percentage,” she tells AFP.
“So this is a celebration to make
their lives better while everybody else
can appreciate and enjoy this amazing
opportunity.”
Blair has 68 acting credits to her
name, although the only one you could
be confident of the average filmgoer
knowing is “The Exorcist.”
She grew up in rural Connecticut,
where she inherited a deep love of nature and animals from her parents, and
had been modeling in New York and
appearing in commercials when the audition for “The Exorcist” came up.
She was Oscar-nominated, won a
Golden Globe and appeared in a succession of films over the coming years,
including disaster movie “Airport
1975” and an unloved “Exorcist” sequel.
Arrested for conspiracy to possess
cocaine at 18, her promising career hit
the skids and she was restricted mainly
to appearances in B-movies as the critical acclaim was replaced with “Golden
Raspberry” awards for bad acting.
Kaiju, monsters that emerged from an
interdimensional portal at the bottom of
the Pacific Ocean. The movie went on
to gross more than $411 million at the
worldwide box office.
Boyega will play the son of Elba’s
character, who sacrificed his life in the
original film. It’s still unclear who Tian
will play. (RTRS)
❑ ❑ ❑
LOS ANGELES: Writer-director Joss
Whedon unveiled the first of a series of
get-out-the-vote videos on Wednesday
that not only implores people to get to
the polls on Nov 8, but also warns of
the consequences of electing a certain
candidate.
Donald Trump is not named, but
one of the stars featured in the spot,
Don Cheadle, refers to a “racist abusive
coward who could permanently damage
the fabric of our society.”
Martin Sheen says, “We cannot
pretend both sides are equally unfavorable.” He’s echoing a sentiment
expressed by many Hillary Clinton
supporters that the media has been
engaging in a “false equivalence” in
covering both candidates.
Others in the video include Mark
Ruffalo, Keegan-Michael Key,
James Franco, Julianne Moore,
Leslie Odom, and Neil Patrick Harris.
(RTRS)