Month: June 2022

George Clooney and Julia Roberts are reunited for the first time since 2016’s Money Monster, a real film I did not just makeup. The dynamic duo became an iconic one due to their sparkling, intense and funny chemistry in 2001’s Ocean’s 11, and now they’re back at it in the upcoming romantic comedy Ticket to Paradise.

Here’s the film’s official description, from Universal Studios:

Academy Award® winners George Clooney and Julia Roberts reunite on the big screen as exes who find themselves on a shared mission to stop their lovestruck daughter from making the same mistake they once made. From Working Title, Smokehouse Pictures and Red Om Films, Ticket to Paradise is a romantic comedy about the sweet surprise of second chances.

Ticket To Paradise also stars Kaitlyn Dever, Billie Lourd, and Lucas Bravo. It is expected to come to theaters on October 21. The film was directed by Ol Parker, the genius behind 2018’s smash hit Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again. If that film is any indication of what’s to come from Ticket To Paradise, we’re in good hands. The man simply knows how to direct a vacation movie, although this one might not include George Clooney and Julia Roberts embracing on a boat while people are singing ABBA’s “Dancing Queen.”

Momma’s Household Name is due out this Friday, July 1st and we won’t beat around the bush: this is 1,000 percent a band that needs to be on your radar. The Brooklyn indie outfit led by Etta Friedman and Allegra Weingarten are taking a big step up with on this one and every single has been an absolute heater. But wait… there’s another at the buzzer: Momma have just released “Motorbike,” along with a video, for one last hurrah before the album drops later this week.

Weingarten takes the lead on this one, about a daydream romance with a boy on motorcycle. It’s delightful pop songwriting where the verses paint the picture of the handsome rustic biker babe that she’s fantasizing about, before the chorus explodes with her love yearning charm. “Outside… Let the neighbors hear the sound. You can take me anywhere you like, your motorbike will wake up this whole town, for one night,” she sings.

“I wrote this song about a boy I had a crush on who really wanted nothing to do with me,” Weingarten said in a statement. “The song is basically just fantasy — even though it’s about a real person, it’s also about how we can make up elaborate ideas of who other people are in our heads, and get so caught up in these fake scenarios that they kind of end up feeling real. I wanted the song to feel like you’re escaping something, because my daydreams about this boy and his motorcycle were definitely an escape from my life at the time.”

Watch the video for “Motorbike” above and read our new interview with Momma.

Household Name is out 7/1 via Polyvinyl Recordings. Pre-order it here.

We’re less than a month from the return of Better Call Saul, which means we’re potentially less than a month from seeing Walter White and Jesse Pinkman for the first time since 2019’s El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie.

Better Call Saul co-creator Peter Gould confirmed in April that the Breaking Bad meth-makers would (finally) appear in the prequel series, while star Bob Odenkirk teased that they might be in more than one episode. Gould wouldn’t confirm whether the spoiler-friendly actor was revealing more than he should have, but he did tell Entertainment Weekly that “the way you see them and when you see them won’t necessarily be what you’d expect.”

Gould is proud that the Breaking Bad cameos (although it sounds like they’re more than cameos) are “keeping with the style” of Better Call Saul, not the other way around. He also said he’s heard a lot of fan theories about Walt and Jesse’s appearances, “and I’m happy to report I haven’t heard a theory that comes quite close to the actual fact… The thing that I’m really proud of is that we waited to see them until it was right for this story.”

The time is right for Kim to order a taco from Jesse who’s working at the Taco Cabeza around the corner from Saul’s office. (I hope he and Walt play a larger role than that, but I haven’t had lunch yet, and I can only think about tacos. Lalo understands.)

Better Call Saul returns to AMC on July 11.

(Via Entertainment Weekly)

Just a week after its heavy sigh of a finale, Honest Trailers has released an Honest Trailer for Disney Plus’ Obi-Wan Kenobi, which was supposed to and should have been a movie.

“Now that George Lucas cashed out and Disney turned the franchise into FIFA with lightsabers, open wide as they chuck another hunk of content down the Rankor pit of Disney Plus,” the video opens, with a brutal honesty that the Disney Star Wars shows deserve at this point.

Then the Honest Trailer suggests that Obi-Wan Kenobi is just another story of a classic Star Wars hero who becomes a sad, broken (and/or a recluse), like Han Solo in The Force Awakens (2015) and Luke Skywalker in The Last Jedi (2017). “Prepare for a show that reminds you how great the prequels were when they’re cut down to a three-minute recap montage.” Topher Grace, is that you?

The trailer also addresses some glaring flaws in the show, such as Obi-Wan asking Princess Leia how old she is (wouldn’t he know since he was at her birth and is also aware of how old her twin brother Luke is?) and that the show follows the classic “old or middle-aged man has a cute young protege” narrative that is definitely not getting old after decades upon decades.

Phony and Petey have a lot in common. Aside from having five-letter mononym stage names that start with P and end with Y, the two were actually college roommates once upon a time. Now, they’re yet again occupying each other’s space, but this time it’s on a new song, as Phony has recruited Petey for “Kaleidoscope.”

The song starts with mostly just piano and vocals before electronic instruments swell to guide the song to its apex and cathartic end. The track comes from At Some Point You Stop, Phony’s upcoming album set for release on July 29.

Phony says of the tune, “This song is about gaining perspective and the importance of looking at things from every angle. I’ve never had a song that was just piano but it was the first thing that came to mind. Petey and I were roommates in college and had always loved each other’s music but never played with each other on a record. I called him up one day and said, ‘You wanna sing on this piano song of mine?’ and he said, ‘Of course.’ I had everything written already, so we just got bagels then hung at the house for an hour and it was done.”

Meanwhile, the two have some big plans for this summer and fall: Phony is going on the road with Joyce Manor while Petey has his own tour lined up and a few shows supporting Manchester Orchestra. In March, Petey also shared a 22-minute film based on his album from last year, Lean Into Life.

Listen to “Kaleidoscope” above.

For everything that has been reported up to this point about Deandre Ayton‘s future, the Phoenix Suns still have the clearest path to signing him to an extension due to his status as a restricted free agent. Still, the simple fact of the matter this entire time has been that Ayton wants to be compensated like a max player while the Suns aren’t quite there, and according to Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN, that continues to be the case.

Wojnarowski went onto SportsCenter and discussed the current state of play with Ayton, which continues to be that the two sides are steadfast in their positions.

“There’s no traction there,” Wojnarowski said. “There hasn’t been. They had a chance to do an extension last year at a max number. Phoenix has simply decided they don’t value Deandre Ayton on a max contract.”

There are, apparently, teams that disagree with the Suns’ assessment. Further, there is some optimism that a sign-and-trade can be worked out with Ayton that gets him paid, while Phoenix is able to get something back for the talented big man.

“The good news for Deandre Ayton is a number of teams around the league do,” Wojnarowski said. “And I think as a restricted free agent, what most teams are expecting right now as they jockey to get involved with Deandre Ayton is a sign-and-trade scenario where, obviously, because he’s a restricted free agent, Phoenix could match and offer sheet and keep him. I think what Phoenix and Deandre Ayton would prefer is they come to an agreement where the Suns get some assets from a team, whether it’s draft picks or players or cap space, and Deandre Ayton gets his max contract elsewhere.”

The Suns took Ayton with the No. 1 overall pick in the 2018 NBA Draft.

After being named in Cassidy Hutchinson‘s highly damaging testimony to the January 6 committee, Rudy Giuliani attempted to conduct his own damage control. Per usual, Giuliani’s efforts spectacularly backfired as he may have accidentally incriminated himself in a deleted tweet.

Hutchinson’s explosive testimony outlined what was happening in the White House in the lead-up and execution of the Capitol assault, and it’s left Trump world spinning thanks to allegations of the former president facilitating weapons being brought to his “Stop the Steal” rally. Giuliani’s name was mentioned several times in connection to both the alleged planning of the January 6 event and the request for pardons afterwards.

In a tweet on Wednesday, Giuliani claimed Hutchinson couldn’t have known he asked for a pardon because she wasn’t in the room. “The January 6 Witch Hunt Cabal has now exceeded even its prior fraudulent,” Giuliani wrote via Raw Story. “The last witness was a reckless liar. Contrary to her false testimony she was never present when I asked for a pardon.”

However, realizing that he just admitted to requesting a pardon, Giuliani deleted the tweet and attempted to massage his remarks by saying, actually, he told Trump he didn’t need one. Yeah, that’s the ticket.

“Once again the January 6 Committee of ‘Russian Collusion’ Liars suborned perjury from Cassidy Hutchinson. I specifically told President Trump I did not want or need a pardon,” Giuliani wrote in a new tweet. “I, also, have witnesses to corroborate that she and the Committee are perpetrating yet another lie.”

To be clear, what Giuliani may have done here is attempt to discredit a witness by saying, “Nuh uh, she wasn’t even in the room when I totally did the thing she’s accusing me of.” Classic Rudy.

(Via Raw Story)

Snail Mail is about to have a busy summer. Not only does the Lindsey Jordan-fronted band have a headlining tour in support of Valentine to look forward to, they’ll also be a part of Turnstile’s Love Connection Tour (along with Jpegmafia) and are taking part in Courtney Barnett’s Here And There touring “festival.” Now, Snail Mail has added more material to its arsenal with two new songs releases in the Spotify Singles series.

“Feeling Like I Do” is a cover of a Superdrag song off of their 2002 album Last Call For Vitriol, while the band also put out a new version of “Headlock,” from Valentine. The biggest shift on the new version of “Headlock” is in Jordan’s delivery. She sounds like a vocalist who has been perfecting her range and experimenting with new ways to convey lyrics like, “Man enough to see this through. Man, I’m nothing without you.”

In a statement, Jordan said of the main difference between the two versions, “The original was recorded almost two years ago, and the more I perform the song the more I think of ideas that I wish I had put into the original. This version gave me the opportunity to implement some of those ideas.”

Meanwhile, the “Feeling Like I Do’ cover gave Jordan an opportunity to have fun with a favorite song. “I love it, and I’ve loved it for a while,” she said. “And I was able to make it my own by singing on it.”

Listen to Snail Mail’s “Headlock” and “Feeling Like I Do” cover below.

20 years ago, an emerging 17-year old Canadian pop-punk singer named Avril Lavigne released her debut album, Let Go, and enamored the world with earworm singles like “Sk8er Boi,” “Complicated,” and “I’m With You.” Those songs are still a part of pop culture consciousness today and the album has been certified Platinum seven times over by the RIAA. As she celebrates the album’s 20th anniversary, Lavigne has been having a career resurgence, performing “Complicated” on stage with Olivia Rodrigo and releasing her latest album, Love Sux.

But nothing can really top the lightning in a bottle of Let Go, and to commemorate the anniversary, Lavigne, who is about to get married again, took to TikTok to recreate the album’s now-iconic cover photo. Back then, the redhead teen stood with arms crossed on a New York City intersection, on Canal Street on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. She wore baggy blag pants, matching black trench coat, and boots, along with a blasé expression that just seemed to say, “Whatever, dude.” The image captured the apathy that counterculture teens felt about living in a soon-to-be post-emo world.

In the cover shot recreation video, Lavigne walks matter-of-factly onto the same Canal St. intersection in broad daylight. She crosses her arms and tilts her head not caring what’s happening around her. “I’m Just A Kid” by Simple Plan plays and it’s pop punk perfection once again. Check it out below.

The Holiday, Shrek, and The Mask are all good movies with one thing in common that sets them apart from every other movie. As it turns out, all perfect cinema can be traced back to one important player: Cameron Diaz.

Diaz famously retired from acting in 2014, returning for a minuscule cameo in 2019’s Charlie’s Angels and also a one-time stint on RuPaul’s Drag Race earlier this year, of course. It looks like her hiatus is coming to an end, so we can breathe a sigh of relief that one day, maybe, there could be another Shrek movie out there.

According to Variety, Diaz is slated to return to the big screen (well, whatever screen you stream Netflix on) alongside Jamie Foxx in the action-comedy Back In Action, where she will seemingly be back in action. Diaz and Foxx have worked together on numerous projects in the past, including Any Given Sunday and her last movie role pre-hiatus, Annie.

There are minimal plot details, though the movie is being written by Neighbors’ Brendan O’Brien and directed by Seth Gordon, who worked with Diaz on Horrible Bosses.

Diaz has been quiet since stepping back from Hollywood, a move she famously did not regret, as she felt like she was being treated like a “machine.” The actress has had some time to rest and recharge, so perhaps now is the perfect time to ask about a potential Being John Malkovitch follow-up.

(Via Variety)