On what turned out to be the year's most patriotic weekend, Americans flocked in droves to go see a bunch of American meat-bodies zoom it up in another country. Some others went to go look at a fake bird in that same country, but mostly people watched the cars.
Sean Lennon turns 34 today. Sharon Osbourne is turning 57. Newly retired pro golfer Annika Sörenstam is 39. Former Senator Trent Lott is turning 68. Director Guillermo del Toro turns 45. Tony Shalhoub is 56. Jackson Browne is 61. John O'Hurley of Seinfeld and Dancing with the Stars is 55. Actor Brandon Routh is turning 30. C-SPAN founder Brian Lamb is 68. Singer-songwriter P.J. Harvey is 40. And Randy Spelling—son of Aaron and Candy and brother of Tori—turns 31 today. A few weekend birthdays are below.
Bobby Flay turns 44 today. You can wish him a happy birthday in person: He'll be the featured attraction at the NYC Wine & Food Festival event this evening at Chelsea Market. Also celebrating: Sean Lennon is 33. Trent Lott turns 67. Sharon Osbourne is turning 56. Pro golfer Annika Sörenstam is 38. Actor John O'Hurley is 54. Actor Brandon Routh is 29. Jackson Browne is 60. Director Guillermo del Toro is 44. And Randy Spelling, son of Aaron and brother of Tori, is turning 30.
Picture it: you get a fancy-schmancy director to make a film about one of America's most beloved characters; it has a huge budget, impressive effects, big name talent, and... it totally sucks. Ang Lee's The Hulk immediately comes to mind, as does Bryan Singer's Superman. They were both critical and commercial failures, plus they were boring as all hell. But this summer, the Hulk franchise got a less sucky, more successful reboot. And that got Hollywood's wheels a'spinnin'. Could the same thing be done for The Man of Steel? It's complicated. Watch as we untangle the twisted tale after the jump.
When it comes to intertwining underage sex, loveable drug addicts and coldblooded serial killers, nobody does it better than Bret Easton Ellis. So when we heard a while back that The Informers would finally follow in the footsteps of Less Than Zero and The Rules of Attraction and make its way to the big screen, we couldn't have been more giddy. But now, IGN is reporting that Brandon Routh's turn as Jaime, the vampire-like leading man with a penchant for sucking blood, will be left on the cutting room floor; as anyone who has read the book will attest, his character was both a central figure in and a critical element of the depraved stories Ellis included in this book. The question is this: with no blood, gore, zombie fangs or Superman, will The Informers even be The Informers at all? Or will it just be Less Than Zero: The Sequel, minus the sight of a drugged up and passed out Robert Downey Jr. sprawled on the beaches of Malibu?
This may shock many of you, but we've been hearing rumors for years that giving girls a few drinks can make them feel more romantically adventurous. And, according to People, this very rumor was put into action when 21 star Kate Bosworth shot her love scenes with co-star Jim Sturgess. As she recently admitted at a New York screening, "We were both so drunk...Jim and I became such good friends, we decided to have a couple of drinks, loosen up and go for it." Which got us thinking: seeing as how Kate's been required to do the whole sex scene thing with quite a few actors over they years, what other combination of sedatives, drugs and drinks must she have had to pop and sip in order to get down and dirty with the likes of James Van Der Beek and (gulp) Kevin Spacey?
It's been a long while since the name Brandon Routh—the dashing young man plucked from obscurity to fill Superman's tights in the all-Kryptonian hero's long-awaited and quickly forgotten return to the big screen—has come up. So it was with a measure of genuine delight that we received an e-mail blast entitled, "ENTERTAINMENT TONIGHT IS EXCLUSIVELY INSIDE THE SECRET WEDDING OF 'SUPERMAN' BRANDON ROUTH," a subject line that effectively teased the many details of the one-movie-long resuméd actor's mystery-enshrouded nuptials therein:
Think back, to long before Superman returned to our planet to thrill audiences with his heroic feats of lovelorn supermoping, to when the world's attentions were focused primarily on Kal-El's codpiece, aka the Bulge of Steel™—a protuberance of such reportedly goodly sized dimensions, a team of CGI artists were rumored to have been brought in to digitally diminish the young, unknown star Brandon Routh's groin into something less gasp-worthy. The Oh La La blog (somewhat NSFW if you don't want to be caught perusing a site featuring lots of muscley, shirtless dudes) has taken screencaps of a DVD bonus feature in which the newcomer is wearing a skin-tight, leave-no-nut-to-the-imagination leotard, even going so far as to magnify the critical area for your bulge-scrutinizing convenience. And while Mr. Routh has nothing to be ashamed of, it's certainly nothing close to the elephantine sex-organ-goiter the press had initially made it out to be. Perhaps it's a SuperGrower.
For every breaking People story reporting the sad news of the best boy who got away comes a joyous new celebrity wedding exclusive to take its place. We'll leave it to you, however, to decide how revved up you should get about the recently unknown star of a disappointing summer blockbuster asking his mostly anonymous girlfriend to marry him:
Audiences of Superman Returns marveled at its unknown star, Brandon Routh, and the ease and confidence with which he delivered a substandard Christopher Reeve impression in his first big screen foray. A memory shared by his mother reveals how the actor's early, girl-shunning discipline and good-times abstention helped guide him to greatness:
We'd never begrudge our newest, highest-profile cinematic superhero any endorsement opportunities that might arise from his gig as the Man of Steel, but there's something unintentionally hilarious about Brandon Routh's infomercial for Rope Yoga. We trust Routh's claims that this form of exercise was invaluable to his preparation for the physical rigors he would face on the Superman Returns set, but each time we see him demonstrating the machines upon which he trained for his strenuous flying harness work, it's hard not to imagine that archnemesis Lex Luthor has entangled him in Kryptonite ropes, bonds from which he's struggling to break free before Lois Lane takes her final step towards oblivion on a nearby booby-trapped StairMaster.
On the eve of Superman Returns' premiere, the LAT takes a moment to revisit the icon's various hairstyles over the years. Why, we're not exactly sure, though a comparative timeline highlighting changes in the size and style of the Package of Steel™ would have been inappropriate for a family paper. The piece even goes so far as to consult a "Hollywood stylist" on tips for achieving the looks at home. (Though it egregiously omits perhaps the greatest single coiffured Superman of all time, Indian Superman.)
· We're not exactly sure why we find an old modeling photo of the new Superman reading a back issue of Vanity Fair so funny, but the humor value of Brandon Routh calling upon God to smite those who would shitcan him from a soap opera is self-evident.
· Not surprisingly, not all children immediately take to Christopher Walken.
· The real Homeland Security department features fewer Kiefer Sutherlands and terrorist beheadings than what you see on 24.
· The existence of the Adventures of Keira Knightley's Jaw blog is our latest reminder that genius and totally unhinged insanity are sides of the same crazy/beautiful coin.
I'd like to thank Chris Nolan, who directed Batman Begins. I want to thank him for getting rid of those bloody nipples, and for giving the Dark Knight back some dignity...
Joel Schumacher and George Clooney might have made great strides by reimagining Batman as a rubber-nippled, impressively cod-pieced bondage queen, but we don't think the tag-team of Bryan Singer and the previously obscure Brandon Routh are quite up to the task of delivering Gay Superman until at least the second installment of the revived franchise. Still, it was quite generous of The Advocate to preemptively include the new, still-unproven Man of Steel in its Summer Gay Superhero Issue; placing his image above the names of established bigscreen homosexual presences like Ian McKellan and Kevin Spacey ensures that he won't be forgotten while he decides on the right time to come out of the phonebooth.
Joel Schumacher and George Clooney might have made great strides by reimagining Batman as a rubber-nippled, impressively cod-pieced bondage queen, but we don't think the tag-team of Bryan Singer and the previously obscure Brandon Routh are quite up to the task of delivering Gay Superman until at least the second installment of the revived franchise. Still, it was quite generous of The Advocate to preemptively include the new, still-unproven Man of Steel in its Summer Gay Superhero Issue; placing his image above the names of established bigscreen homosexual presences like Ian McKellan and Kevin Spacey ensures that he won't be forgotten while he decides on the right time to come out of the phonebooth.
Two species from seemingly opposite ends of the universe—comic book geeks and Robertson Blvd.-wandering trend whores—merged last night as Kitson launched their new line of Superman-themed, heroically overpriced crap. And on hand to help push the $900 Swarovski crystal-encrusted S-shield cocaine-receptacles purses were none other than Superman Returns stars Brandon Routh and Kate Bosworth. A starstruck reporter for Comicbookresources.com sets the scene:
Good Morning America film critic Joel "I loved it!" Siegel rounds up the coming summer blockbusters on ABCNews.com, noting that the average budget comes in at around $160 million, or $80 million per Sonny Crockett beer boob. He also makes the following observation about a creative bit of studio counterprogramming:
As Superman Returns' release date of June 30 quickly approaches, look for media coverage to increase from a meager trickle of mostly gossipy items on the subject of Brandon Routh's goodies to a full-on torrent of Warner Bros.-sanctioned, P.R.-friendly coverage. USA Today took its flying leap into Supermania today with a "first look" gallery of the bulge in action, accompanied by a story which ledes with the passing of the (giant, flaming) torch:
