Variety 06/12/2024

It’s been more than 25 years since Kate Winslet sailed with Leonardo DiCaprio on “Titanic,” where he shouted some of the most famous words in film history: “I’m the king of the world!” But in the years since, Winslet’s done her share of running things too. Consider the places that she’s steered her career since 1997, from “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” to “Little Children” to the “Avatar” franchise. And most recently, Winslet brought a chilly air of dominance to her role as a dictator in HBO’s satirical “The Regime.” Winslet’s Elena Vernham is the germophobic chancellor of a Central European country, who is struggling to establish her authority over a people who don’t trust her — for good reason. Uptight and biting as Elena (think Miranda Priestly working…

“IF” isn’t exactly a box office bright spot. But Paramount’s kid-friendly fantasy about imaginary friends has ambled along in the time since its soft $33 million debut. Its current tally — $93 million domestically and $160 million worldwide — is decent for an original live-action PG film. Actor Patrick Schwarzenegger (who has no discernible connection to the film) prophesied this staying power when “IF” fell short of initial projections. “Give it a few weeks,” he wrote on X. Shortly after, as Universal’s “The Fall Guy” suffered a similar fate, he shared, “I know I’m a broken record … but … ‘Fall Guy’ continues to have crazy legs,” while conceding that the “budget was still too high.” Especially in this dismal summer season, some box office watchers have questioned the need…

Buzz for the new play “Invasive Species” infiltrated the downtown New York theater scene like a swarm of spotted lanternflies. Maybe you noticed one of those photos of Jennifer Lawrence wearing a ball cap bearing the play’s red logo. Or you caught clips of the star-studded opening-night performance, with Quinta Brunson, Chris Rock, Harvey Guillén and Morgan Spector all in the crowd. Or you came across the show on TikTok, where the production’s most watched post has racked up 4.8 million views. Powered by savvy promotion and A-list connections, “Invasive Species” has made a sceney splash for its 28-year-old writer-star, Maia Novi. The New York-based Argentinian’s autobiographical debut play turns her disorienting real-life experience in a Yale psychiatric hospital into a frank, highly the-atricalized roller-coaster ride that careens across reflections…

Of the many blessings bestowed upon the world by the internet, there may be none greater than the revelation that, at some point in life, just about everyone has secretly lusted after a hot dad in an animated movie. Hot cartoon dads come in all shapes, sizes and ages — from gods, kings and superheroes to run-of-the-mill papas who just happen to be distressingly, distractingly attractive. To celebrate Father’s Day — and the return of the internet’s favorite foxy paterfamilias in Pixar’s “Inside Out 2” — here is a wildly subjective list of the hunkiest patriarchs in animated cinema. (And before you ask, no, we did not consider nonhuman fathers. Apologies to Mufasa stans everywhere.) INSIDE OUT Bill Andersen (aka Dad) At first glance, Riley’s dad is aggressively ordinary. But…

“Don’t worry,” Kyra Sedgwick assures me as she assembles a salad. “I washed my hands.” We’re in her Manhattan apartment with its commanding view of Central Park, and Sedgwick, a self-described “putterer,” is in perpetual motion — microwaving black beans, fetching a serving spoon for the chicken mole, liberating a bottle of Tabasco from the cupboard. The feast she’s pulling together is leftovers from a dinner Sedgwick and her husband, Kevin Bacon, hosted for her castmates from “All of Me,” an Off Broadway play about two disabled 20-somethings who meet cute in Synecdoche. In the romantic comedy, Sedgwick plays an emotionally callused woman juggling two jobs to pay the rent. She’s also struggling to accept her daughter’s worsening condition due to muscular dystrophy, as well as her desire to have…

My colleague Emily Longeretta had a Variety scoop recently that was such a perfect sign of the times. As she reported, FX’s Emmy-winning “The Bear” — which is debuting its third season at the end of June — finally had its series premiere on FX at the start of the month, via a four-night marathon of Season 1 episodes. “Hit FX Series to Finally Premiere on FX,” we joked should be the headline. If you’re not in the industry — or even if you are, but don’t pay attention to the branding stuff that we Reporters Who Cover the Entertainment Business obsess over — you might be scratching your head. Hasn’t “The Bear” always been on FX? Well, yes and no. In recent years, the lion’s share of new FX…