Variety 1/5/2023

Barbara Walters never did anything quietly — not even retire. When she ended her 50-year television career in May 2014, ABC marked the occasion with a big party and a primetime special. It also named the news division’s New York headquarters after her, though the exacting Walters later complained that the plaque commemorating the honor wasn’t big enough. On April 8 of that same year, just a few weeks before her final appearance on “The View,” Walters graced the cover of Variety — the last magazine cover she ever did. We didn’t even need to print her name; her face in profile, so familiar from decades of newsmaking interviews, told the story. In that interview, Walters didn’t hold back — she threw subtle shade at “The Talk,” CBS’ rival to…

If you need her, editor-at-large Kate Aurthur is down the “Tár” rabbit hole, having disappeared there during the reporting of her cover story about the Todd Field and Cate Blanchett film. Chief correspondent Elizabeth Wagmeister visited with Chelsea Handler in the backyard of the star’s Beverly Hills home, where the two ate Domino’s thin-crust pizza and chatted about comedy, Netflix and the patriarchy. In her first piece since being named Variety ’s executive editor of film and media, Tatiana Siegel returns to familiar ground, covering the latest plot twists in the Warner Bros.-DC soap opera, this time starring Dwayne Johnson, Henry Cavill and David Zaslav. Alexi Lubomirski, who most recently photographed our Oscars Actors on Actors portfolio, captured Cate Blanchett and Todd Field on Nov. 18, 2022, in Los Angeles: “Photographing Cate…

It’s the night before New Year’s Eve, and my phone is blowing up with sad emojis. “Devastated?” “I’m so sorry.” “Oh no, Barbara!” Oh no, is right. If Barbara Walters — who died at 93 on Dec. 30 after a career that changed TV and journalism in a way that no one else has or ever will — were still with us, she would have immediately asked for a different time slot to announce her passing. Maybe a weekday morning, so that all living presidents could issue prompt statements, lauding her vast achievements. Wouldn’t that be better for ratings? There would need to be breaking-news banners on every network, along with a clip reel of her greatest interview hits. She’d request (OK, demand) a “20/20” special anchored by Oprah Winfrey,…

The Golden Globes are back. After two years of being clobbered by controversy and boycotts, the Hollywood Foreign Press Assn.’s 80th event will take place in person Jan. 10 (yes, it’s on a Tuesday, to avoid conflict with NBC’s “Sunday Night Football”) and return to NBC and Peacock as a three-hour telecast. Last year’s ceremony was a simple event at the Beverly Hilton, with no nominees or audience present for the announcement of winners. In the weeks and days leading up to the show, Hollywood players debated whether it was time to give the HFPA a second chance. After all, it has made strides toward increasing diversity among its membership and revised some of its questionable business practices. Turns out that, as Variety was the first to report, most of…

There was a time when the Golden Globes were one big nonstop party train. There were countless soirees leading up to the ceremony, and studio post-show parties throughout the Beverly Hilton’s ballrooms and at nearby clubs and event spaces. But most of that is MIA this year. It could be that the C-suite is reluctant to embrace the HFPA so soon after its two scandal-ridden years. Or, more than likely, it’s another way for execs to cut spending at a time when budgets industrywide are being slashed faster than you can say, “And the Golden Globe goes to …” However, some celebrations are popping up. Here’s what’s going down this year. Jan. 6, Friday Fashion Plates W magazine used to throw the Globes weekend’s must-attend party at Chateau Marmont. This…

From chaos comes order, to paraphrase Nietzsche. And that is certainly the hope in the new year when it comes to the DC Extended Universe, which endured the most tumultuous 12 months of any studio division in 2022. Amid the upheaval, the upcoming “The Flash” teetered following a series of arrests and meltdowns involving its star Ezra Miller, closely guarded “Aquaman” deal points were laid bare in the Johnny Depp-Amber Heard defamation trial, and the $78 million “Batgirl” movie was permanently shelved in post-production as a write-down. All that was just an appetizer for an executive shake-up that landed James Gunn and Peter Safran in the DC driver’s seat. But perhaps nothing was as dramatic as Henry Cavill returning as Superman in a “Black Adam” cameo, only to lose the…