A post-Katrina heist film has just been set and the cast has been announced
Terrence Howard, Wesley Snipes Eiza González Tip “T.I.” Harris, Demetrius Shipp Jr. and Shameik Moore will star in the drama, which is titled, Cut Throat City,
It is directed by RZA, who will also helm the soundtrack and score.
According to Deadline, the script written by P.G. Cusheri, “centers on four boyhood friends who return to New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward after Hurricane Katrina, to find their home decimated and prospects for work swept away. Turning to a local gangster for employment, the crew is hired to pull off a daring casino heist, right in the heart of the city.”
Supporting cast members as Joel David Moore, Kat Graham, Rob Morgan, Keean Johnson, Denzel Whitaker (The Great Debaters) and Isaiah Washington.
Filming is taking place now in New Orleans.
Source: Shadow & Act, Deadline
On this day in comedy on December 14, 1988, I’m Gonna Git You Sucka was released by United Artists
This acclaimed parody of Blaxploitation films was written, directed by, and starred Keenen Ivory Wayans. For this ghetto flick masterpiece, he enlisted icons from the 70s era of wacka-wacka guitars and perfectly coiffed fros. Jim Brown, Bernie Casey, Isaac Hayes, Steve James and Antonio Fargas represent the old school. Comedy actors Kadeem Hardison, Dawnn Lewis, Tony Cox, Ja’net DuBois and Anne-Marie Johnson as well as comedians Damon Wayans, Chris Rock, Robin Harris, David Alan Grier and John Witherspoon represent the new breed on the screen (as most were virtual unknowns in 1988). The movie also features Clarence Williams III, KRS-One, Marlon, Kim and Shawn Wayans, Gary Owens, Eve Plumb, Piggy Lipton, Robert Townsend and John Vernon.
The story is all about the gold. The neighborhood that returning military vet, Wayans comes back to has changed. Gone are the apple pies cooling on the window sill, little girls with pigtails playing hop scotch in the street and blue birds chirping on the branches. The place has been saturated with gold chains by the nefarious “Mr. Big”. Thanks to this status-symbol-pimp, Wayans’ brother OD’d from too many gold chains and thus Mr. Big must be stopped. Now! So, Wayans puts together a gang to squash a mob. With names like “Slade”, “Spade”, “Hammer”, “Slammer”, “Kung Fu Joe” and “Flyguy” there’s no way they can be stopped. Watch out, Whitey!
I’m Gonna Git You Sucka was met with positive reviews and was even shot as a TV pilot with many of the actors reprising their screen roles. The show didn’t sell, but the OG made good. On a $3 million budget, I’m Gonna Git You Sucka grossed $13,030,057 at the box office.
By Darryl “D’Militant” Littleton
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On this day in comedy on December 13, 1967, Comedian, Actor, Musician, Producer, Mogul, Jamie Foxx (Eric Marlon Bishop) was born in Terrell, Texas.
The multi-talented entertainer was a natural when it came to being funny. In the second grade if the kids were good Foxx’s teacher would reward them with a joke session by one of their own. Musically he was admittedly a reluctant piano student and credits his adopted grandmother’s insistence for his success. His piano lessons started when he was five years old and Foxx went on to play piano in his Baptist church, lead the choir, sing in a band called Leather and Lace and later study classical music and composition at the United States International University. Thanks to her stability and guidance he spent his formative years as not just a budding musician, but a top-rated student and star athlete (basketball and football, where he played quarterback and was the first in the school’s history to throw for over 1,000 yards).
Then one night, Eric Bishop walked into a comedy club and he left as Jamie Foxx. The year was 1989 and it was open mic night. His date dared him to go up, he did and decided he was going to keep doing it. The name change came to assure stage time. When comedy club managers looked at sign-in lists they always tried to get as many female comic’s up as possible because there were less of them than males. So he adopted the name Jamie since it sounded female. The Foxx part was less strategic; merely a tribute to Redd Foxx.
Foxx cut his teeth at the Comedy Act Theater and other clubs around Los Angeles. He won competitions and got middling attention (though his talent was evident paid gigs were so infrequent he had to sleep on couches as many unknown comedians do), but it was a scheduled week look booking at Atlanta’s Comedy Act Theater that changed his career. His week got held-over for weeks as lines grew around the block to see the dynamo performer: joking, singing, doing impressions and generally seducing his audiences with his unmistakable versatility. At the advice of a club promoter, he had a piano placed on stages for his act adding another dimension to his presentation.
In 1991 Foxx became a cast member of the Fox network runaway hit, In Living Color. His signature character of Wanda, the ugly girl looking for love, catapulted him to national prominence. He had a recurring role in another Fox hit, Roc, and then Jamie Foxx got his own self-titled sitcom on the WB. Soon films were added to the equation (The Truth About Cats & Dogs, The Great White Hype, Booty Call, Players Club, Held Up) with his breakthrough in Oliver Stone’s 1999 football epic, Any Given Sunday. Foxx played opposite acting legend Al Pacino, who after a scene cut told Foxx he was a helluva an actor. That statement played out in nominations for subsequent films, Collateral (Academy Award Best Supporting Actor nomination) and Ray, the role of musical genius Ray Charles culminating in a Golden Globe for Best Actor and an Oscar as well as a slew of other acting accolades.
On the musical front, Foxx took his cemented fame to concentrate on his initial entertainment goal: music. His collaborations with Twista, Kanye West, Ludacris and Field Mob all shot up to the top of the charts. His Platinum-certified album, Unpredictable debuted at #2 and went to #1 the following week. The Grammy Award winning artist released his third album, Intuition (his first was 1994’s Peep This) in 2008 and produced even more hits. He not only made his own chartbusters, but made frequent appearance on practically everyone else’s songs; including the country group Rascal Flatts. His album Best Night of My Life debuted in 2010 followed by Hollywood: A Story of a Dozen Roses in 2015.
Besides more movies (Jarhead, Miami Vice, Dreamgirls), Foxx expanded his brand by moving into radio. He established “The Foxxhole” for Sirius-XM with a format of comedy and music. He’s done animated voices (Rio), produced programming for other talents (In the Flow with Affion Crockett), hosted award shows (BET Awards, MTV Music Video Awards), toured (2006’s The Unpredictable Tour and 2009’s The Blame It Tour), had televised stand-up comedy specials (Straight from the Foxxhole, I Might Need Security, Lost, Stolen and Leaked) and made more movies (The Soloist, Due Date, Horrible Bosses, The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Django Unchained, White House Down, Annie).
A perennial award nominee, Jamie Foxx is the recipient of over two dozen acting awards and half dozen musical honors.
By Darryl “D’Militant” Littleton
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On this day in comedy on December 12, 1980 Stir Crazy was released by Columbia Pictures.
This Richard Pryor / Gene Wilder comedy marks the first time a film directed by a black director grossed over 100 million dollars. The director was Sidney Poitier and the true figure was $101,300,000 on a $10 million budget. It was the third biggest box office hit of 1980 right behind The Empire Strikes Back and 9-to-5. With music by Tom Scott, Stir Crazy was a fun ride.
The story is about mistaken identity. Pryor and Wilder are in the entertainment business, but have soured of living in New York. So they pack up and head to Hollywood, taking odd jobs along the way. One of those gigs is a promotion for a local hick bank. The duo dresses up like giant chickens and dance around like fools singing a silly song. When Pryor and Wilder go on their lunch break, two unsavory characters steal their chicken suits and rob the bank. When our clueless and hapless heroes return to work they’re arrested and put through a hasty trail that nets them 125 years in a maximum security prison.
Life behind bars does not agree with Pryor and Wilder. Between their court-appointed lawyer asking them to relax while he appeals and the guards attempting to break them down, they’re ready to go. Their exit strategy makes its appearance in the form of a lucky break. The cocky warden wants to humiliate the two New Yorkers and test their manhood by having them ride the mechanical bull in his office. To the warden’s surprise, as well as that of his galoot guard, Wilder can not only stay on the bull, he’s a natural born rodeo star. This gets the warden to thinking. If he has Wilder ride in the upcoming annual rodeo he can finally win the big bet from the warden at the competing penitentiary.
The warden’s plans fail when Wilder refuses to participate. The guards make him work until he’s supposed to drop. He still won’t do it. They put in solitary confinement. No, he won’t do it. Finally he agrees as long as the warden gives him a bigger cell and lets him pick his own rodeo team. Agreed. The team is made up of the group of prisoners Pryor and Wilder have befriended and who all plan to escape during the rodeo. That plan works wonders as the huge mass murderer opens a panel for each member of the crew to slip out. Once Pryor and Wilder leave they all meet up and some of the crew head off to south of the border. As Pryor and Wilder drive off in their car the court-appointed lawyer cuts them off. He got a judge to let them off with his newly submitted evidence. They’re free to go on with their lives and Pryor, Wilder and the lawyer’s cousin, who Wilder is now hooked up with, drive off into the sunset as the lawyer waves his good-bye.
Stir Crazy received favorable reviews. Written by Bruce Jay Friedman, the film featured the talents of Georg Sanford Brown, Franklyn Ajaye, Grand L. Bush, Jobeth Williams and Craig T. Nelson.
By Darryl “D’Militant” Littleton
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After multiple women accused Def Jam founder Russell Simmons of rape and sexual misconduct — which he denied in a long statement to The New York Times Wednesday —Simmons deleted his Twitter account and posted a statement on Instagram Thursday.
“Today, I begin to properly defend myself,” he wrote. “I will prove without any doubt that I am innocent of all rape charges. Today, I will focus on ‘The Original Sin’ (Keri Claussen), the claim that created this insane pile on of my #MeToo. Stay tuned! We’ll share evidence today… And tomorrow the case of Jenny Lumet. My intention is not to diminish the #MeToo movement in anyway, but instead hold the accusers accountable. #NotMe.”
Claussen said late in November that Simmons had apologized to her privately for assaulting her in 1991, when she was 17. Simmons has denied her allegation.
In an article published Wednesday, three women told the New York Times that they were raped by Simmons in incidents dating back to 1988. The LA Times has also reported accounts from five new women dating back to the 1980s.
Tina Baker, a singer, alleged that Simmons raped her in the early 1990s, when he was her manager. Drew Dixon claimed that Simmons sexually harassed and then raped her when she was an employee of Def Jam Recordings in 1995. Toni Sallie, a music journalist, said that Simmons raped her in 1988.
Simmons denied the allegations in a statement provided to Variety.
“I vehemently deny all these allegations,” he said. “These horrific accusations have shocked me to my core and all of my relations have been consensual.”
Simmons had already stepped down from his companies, including Rush Communications, following allegations from writer Jenny Lumet, who alleged that he sexually assaulted her in 1991. Variety had earlier reported that Simmons and Brett Ratner were both investigated by the Beverly Hills Police Department for an alleged sexual battery in 2001. The L.A. Times also reported allegations that Ratner and Simmons engaged in sexual misconduct in the early 1990s. Simmons has denied each allegation of non-consensual sex.
Source: Variety
Jerrod Carmichael
Benny and Josh Safdie, the brother filmmaking team behind the Robert Pattinson crime thriller Good Time, will tackle the remake of 48 Hours for Paramount Players.
Chernin Entertainment, the production outfit behind the Planet of the Apes franchise reboot is producing with Safdie collaborators Oscar Boyson and Sebastian Bear-McClard.
48 Hours was one of the movies that helped launch the big-screen career of Eddie Murphy as well as the buddy cop genre. Murphy and Nick Nolte starred as a convict and cop, respectively, who must team up to catch a pair of cop killers within 48 hours.
An early Joel Silver production, the movie was directed by Walter Hill, whose credits include The Warriors, Steve McQueen’s The Getaway and Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Red Heat, and who brought a gritty sensibility to the proceedings.
As with Good Time, Josh Safdie will handle script duties on top of directing and will co-write the script with Ronald Bronstein, who co-wrote Good Time. New to the equation will be Jerrod Carmichael, the comedian who starred in and co-created the NBC comedy The Carmichael Show.
Good Time has brought acclaim to the Safdies and has been nominated for several Independent Spirit Awards. The brothers were nominated for a Palm d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, where the movie premiered and won an award for its score.
The duo is repped by WME.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter
Girls Trip star Tiffany Haddish has joined Ike Barinholtz in The Oath, a satirical thriller Barinholtz wrote and is also directing.
Also boarding the ensemble project are Star Trek star John Cho, Carrie Brownstein (Portlandia), Billy Magnussen (Ingrid Goes West), Meredith Hagner (Search Party), Jon Barinholtz (Superstore), Nora Dunn (The Guilt Trip), and veteran actor Chris Ellis (Murder in the First).
QC Entertainment, one of the companies behind Get Out, is financing and producing the movie, which begins shooting this week.
The timely script, set in a politically divided America where citizens have to take an oath of loyalty, focuses on a man has to make it through the Thanksgiving holiday without destroying his family.
Character details for Haddish and others are being kept under wraps.
Haddish also joins Oath as an executive producer.
Sean McKittrick, Ray Mansfield and Edward H. Hamm Jr. are producing the pic. Also producing are Barinholtz, Andrew Robinson and David Stassen.
QC and UTA are co-repping the film for domestic sales.
Haddish appeared in such movies and shows as Keanu and The Carmichael Show before breaking out in a big way with this summer’s surprise hit, Girls Trip. The Universal comedy grossed over $115 million. The actress recently nabbed a role in the Kevin Hart comedy Night School. Haddish is repped by APA, Principato-Young and Del Shaw.
Cho, who plays Sulu in the Star Trek movies, is coming off of starring in the acclaimed drama Columbus, which was nominated for several Independent Spirit Awards. He is repped by UTA, 3 Arts Entertainment and Morris Yorn.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter
Universal Pictures acquired On the Run, an action-comedy pitch by Aeysha Carr. Kevin Hart has attached to star and he will produce through his Hartbeat Productions banner with Will Packer and his Will Packer Productions label.
Carr will write the script. She is currently scripting the Kevin Hart/T.I.-produced show The Studio, which is in development at Showtime, and she is supervising producer and a writer on Brooklyn Nine-Nine. She was supervising producer and writer on The Carmichael Show.
In On the Run, Hart will play a hit man whose assignment goes awry when the target isn’t who he expects. Hart has Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle and Night School coming. Packer and Hart have teamed together before on the Ride Along and Think Like A Man franchises.
Kevin Hart is about to hitch a ride on satellite radio.
Laugh Out Loud, the digital comedy network formed in a partnership between Hart and Lionsgate, is launching a full-time channel on SiriusXM early next year.
The Laugh Out Loud channel on SiriusXM is slated to debut sometime in the first quarter of 2018. It will feature a weekly show hosted by Hart, along with stand-up routines, comedic interview shows, and other programming featuring what LOL says will be a “selection of diverse comedic voices.”
Lionsgate and Hart launched the Laugh Out Loud streaming-video service in August, featuring original scripted and unscripted comedy series, stand-up specials, licensed programming, and live broadcasts. According to Lionsgate, in the first 30 days, the LOL app was downloaded more than 500,000 times.
“SiriusXM is the perfect partner to introduce a whole new audience to our Laugh Out Loud brand,” Hart said in a statement. “The world will soon discover that — believe it or not — I’m even funnier on radio.”
SiriusXM had 27 million paying subscribers and 5.2 million paid-promotion listeners as of the end of the third quarter of 2017. The company is 69% owned by John Malone’s Liberty Media.
Kevin Hart “is an unparalleled entertainer,” said Scott Greenstein, SiriusXM’s president and chief content officer. “SiriusXM is excited to have Kevin create a new channel that showcases his many talents and features other comedy voices chosen by Kevin.”
Hart is represented by UTA and 3 Arts. He next appears in Sony Pictures Entertainment’s “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle,” debuting on Dec. 20, alongside co-stars Dwayne Johnson, Jack Black and Karen Gillan.
Source: Variety
Regina Hall has been added to the cast of the upcoming Shaft remake.
According to Variety, she will be a former love interest of Samuel L. Jackson’s John Shaft and the mother of Jessie T. Usher’s younger Shaft.
She also joins Richard Rountree, who is reprising his role as the original Shaft, and Alexandra Shipp who is the love interest of Usher’s Shaft.
The film “follows Usher, a nerdy FBI agent who, after his friend dies under suspicious circumstances, launches his own investigation, reluctantly enlisting help from his estranged father — the legendary, stuck-in-the-’80s-but-still-cool John Shaft.”
It is a part of a groundbreaking Netflix deal, with the streaming giant paying “more than half the film’s high $30 million budget, in exchange for international rights and the ability to put the film on its streaming outside the U.S. two weeks after New Line releases theatrically in the United States.” This model could set a standard for “urban-themed” releases (READ: black) that don’t do well as well overseas. This is important because Netflix international audiences will be able to hop on this not too soon after it is hot in the U.S.
It is set to premiere on June 14, 2019.
Source; Variety, Shadow & Act