Acting is all about the craft? Fuck that! It's the easiest paycheck you'll ever cash, says Joaquin Phoenix: "I never prepare. I think that's completely overrated. It's a very simple job. All you have to do is . . . stand in the right spot and say the line. So I don't really believe in preparation." [Page Six]
· Will Smith re-teams with his Pursuit of Happyness creatives for Seven Pounds, the story of a guy who falls in love while trying to kill himself [Ed.note—Isn't it a little tacky to be announcing a suicide movie so soon after the Owen incident? Just sayin'.], hoping that audiences will shed just as many tears watching Smith nobly overcome personal adversity as they did when he was hugging his kid while sleeping in that filthy Happyness bathroom. [Variety]
· Audiences will get a chance to see David Duchovny try to fuck away the pain of being a writer for another twelve episodes, as Showtime gives Californication a second season pick-up. [THR]
· Apple keeps trying to drive away the Hollywood content partners that just want to love them, proposing to cut the price of TV episodes to 99 cents. [Variety]
· Rupert Murdoch gets a pay raise to $24.3 million per year, but still officially makes less than News Corp second banana Peter Chernin. [THR]
· And in other continuing-cinematic-love-affair news, Joaquin Phoenix and director James Gray can't get enough of each other, teaming up for the third time for the drama Two Lovers. [Variety]
PrivacyWatch celebrity sightings are submitted by our readers, and are posted several times a week, so if lady luck should happen to gift you with one, don't squander it: Write it up and send it in! Submit yours to tips[AT]defamer.com (please put "sighting" or "PrivacyWatch" in the subject line) and tell everyone about the time you took silent inventory of Ryan Gosling's Downtown YMCA workout routine.
PrivacyWatch celebrity sightings are submitted by our readers, and are posted several times a week, so send them in often. Submit yours to tips[AT]defamer.com (please put "sighting" or "PrivacyWatch" in the subject line) and tell everyone about the time you spotted Napoleon Dynamite doing comparative breast pump shopping.
PrivacyWatch celebrity sightings are submitted by our readers, and are posted several times a week, so send them in like you mean it. Submit yours to tips[AT]defamer.com (please put "sighting" or "PrivacyWatch" in the subject line) and let everyone know about the time you saw the star of your favorite new bra commercial reading someone the riot act, quite possibly over her appearance in that very ad!
· CBS announces that it will stream episodes of its shows (at least the ones it fully owns) on its broadband Innertube channel the day after they initially air on the "real" network. The online shows will still be ad-supported, so those looking to destabilize CBS's business model should still watch on DVR and blast through the commercials. [Variety]
Naturally, no plan to use a new platform for the delivery of creative content would be complete without an attempt to fuck the various Guilds in the ass. [Variety]
Fox Searchlight lands Wes Anderson's next project, Dajeerling Limited, which will employ Anderson regulars Owen Wilson and Jason Schwartzman, and, we hope, trusty safecracker/manservant Kumar Pallana. [THR]
Declining XM and Sirius stock prices have investors saying that the two satellite radio providers should merge, raising the tantalizing possibility that Howard Stern could one day browbeat new co-host Oprah Winfrey into riding the Sybian. [THR]
In what could be an epic brood-off, Focus Features signs up Mark Ruffalo and Joaquin Phoenix to star in the adaptation of the novel Reservation Road, with Ruffalo playing a character who flees the scene after running over Phoenix's son. [Variety]
Hollywood PrivacyWatch celebrity sightings are submitted by our readers. Send yours to tips[AT]defamer.com (please put sighting or PrivacyWatch in the subject line) and let the world know you saw Judd Nelson shopping for sex toys, but didn't recall his vibrator scene in From the Hip.
· MGM is close to a deal with the Weinstein Co. to become their exclusive distributor. The pact will be reflected in an update of their classic logo, replacing Leo the Lion with Bob Weinstein lying flat on his belly, roaring ferociously at an assistant who brought him a regular Diet Coke instead of a Diet Coke with Splenda. [Variety]
· The WGA gives its top screenwriting awards to Crash and Brokeback Mountain, for original and adapted screenplays, respectively. Paul Haggis tearfully dedicates the award to "all the carjackers I've known, or know, or will be blessed enough to come to know." Then, kissing his index finger and pointing it to the back of the room, he concluded, "This one's for you guys." [Variety]
· David Cronenberg's next film will be the Bruce Wagner-written Maps to the Stars, in what promises to do for showbiz what Dead Ringers did for gynecology. Hollywood execs with gaping head wounds: a marriage made in heaven! [Variety]
· Joaquin Phoenix and Mark Wahlberg reteam with The Yards director James Gray for We Own the Night, in which the duo play campus feminists who mount a candlelight vigil, that they may fear for their safety no longer. [Variety]
· Sexual Healing, the Marvin Gaye biopic long in turnaround, has finally been greenlit, with Jesse L. Martin in the lead, with the contingency that all the depressing "shot by his father" ending stuff be replaced with an uplifting Rent-inspired finale revolving around the number of seconds in a week. [THR]
Today's LAT has the strange, only-in-LA! story of the aftermath of Joaquin Phoenix's Thursday afternoon car wreck in Laurel Canyon. The stage was set for Hollyweirdness, with Phoenix—an Oscar nominee, you will recall—sitting in the overturned car, dazed and trying to decide if the whiteness before his eyes was the welcoming glow of the afterlife or simply a deployed airbag, when he heard a strange voice:
The much publicized Joaquin Phoenix appearance and screening of the Johnny Cash biopic Walk the Line at Folsom Prison took place Tuesday; after the movie was shown, Phoenix performed some Cash songs for a select group of inmates, as the rest of the 4,000 prisoners watched on closed circuit TV from their cells. Phoenix was then given a tour, which gave him a first hand look at Folsom culture:
• Rush and Molloy report that Jude Law and Sienna Miller are seen sucking face at Balthazar, while Page Six claims the two were having a screaming match outside the very same venue. Balthazar brings out a range of emotions in us, too.
• Angelina Jolie has nabbed herself a Cambodian citizenship and is spotted house-hunting with Brad Pitt in D.C. — finally giving our nation's capital a connection to pressing world issues. [Page Six]
• Crazy-ass Joaquin Phoenix now says he might leaving acting altogether. Is there any length he won't go to to promote Walk the Line? [Scoop]
• Jared Leto and Lindsay Lohan might not be such a hot item, as Leto was spotted with a hot blonde. Keep the faith, Lohan — Jason Lewis still loves you. [Page Six]
• Is Page Six darklord Richard Johnson the Inconsiderate Cell Phone Guy? [Lowdown]
• OK! magazine scraps a story depicting Kevin Federline as a bad husband and father after Britney Spears's people threw a hissy fit. Pussies. [Lowdown (2nd item)]
• On the press tour for Johnny Cash biopic Walk the Line, star Joaquin Phoenix nears meltdown status. Your heart has to go out to his flack, who had to explain why Phoenix asked an AP reporter "Do I have a large frog in my hair?" [Page Six]
• The best part about the logo for Jesus Juice wines, which blatantly mocks Michael Jackson? That the whole idea was thought of by CBS news producer Bruce Rheins. [R&M]
• Sharon Osbourne goes after Madonna, again, this time for looking like an "old hooker." We prefer to think of her as a majestic old lady of the night, but whatever. [Scoop]
• At the Paper nightlife awards, blogger Sarah "Ultragrrl" Lewitinn wins three awards, signifying traditional media's acceptance that bloggers and barflies are not mutually exclusive. [Page Six]
At last night's AFI Fest premiere of hotly-buzzed about Johnny Cash biopic Walk the Line, star Joaquin Phoenix fielded scores of red carpet questions about his uncanny, 'yes-that's-him-playing- and-singing' transformation into the Man in Black. But with one AP reporter, Phoenix gets momentarily sidetracked:
