Good morning: In today’s edition of The Industry, we look at:
Dumbledore. Dead but never forgotten. Hollywood’s affair with the stage; and Ron Perlman in chaps.
Let’s Go!
ACTOR MICHAEL GAMBON DIES AT 82 YEARS
Michael Gambon’s passing feels like a family member has died.
The second actor to play Albus Dumbledore, he began his tenure as Hogwarts’ headmaster with Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Gambon’s immense gravitas and subtle intensity suited director Alfonso Cuarón’s bleak take on the wizarding world. From Gambon’s first moment of screen time, he commands Harry’s attention as he cautions students to beware of dementors roaming the campus.
The book series marked a significant moment in my own development (Gabe Miller), from The Sorcerer’s Stone being read to me by my father to being able to read The Chamber of Secrets by myself.
As I mourn Gambon’s passing, I will seek to discover his non-magical but nonetheless enchanting performances as Edward VII, Oscar Wilde, and Winston Churchill. I’m comforted by Gambon’s wise observation as Dumbledore: “Happiness can be found even in the darkest of times if one only remembers to turn on the light.”
And Daniel Radcliff had this to say:
“With the loss of Michael Gambon, the world just became considerably less fun. Michael Gambon was one of the most brilliant, effortless actors I’ve ever had the privilege of working with, but despite his immense talent, the thing I will remember most about him is how much fun he had doing his job.”
The loss of Radcliff’s on and off-screen father figure marks another layer of erosion in the treasured series. From Alan Rickman (Snape) and Robbie Coltrane (Hagrid) passing, it seems hard to keep the nostalgia of childhood alive when my favorite magicians are passing away.
For More:
“Even in Silence, he Thundered.” A look at Gambon’s work onstage. We would have loved to see him in Beckett.
HBO Harry Potter Series. Casey Bloys, the HBO executive featured in our last edition promised to not use AI to generate show ideas and says the Potter show will be a faithful adaptation of the original book series. That’s a lot of promises, but we do believe in magic.
THE INDUSTRY NEWS
Another re-incarnation of Minority Report is set to open in London, Nottingham Playhouse February 16th. Morphing from Phillip K. Dick’s 1954 novel to Spielberg’s 2002 adaptation, to Max Borenstein’s (Godzilla) 2015 single season on Fox, there is an utter fascination with the source material.
This production intersects two trends: one of many of the author’s original novels being adapted for use in Hollywood (Blade Runner, Man in the High Castle, Total Recall) and the surge of plays taken from Hollywood films, Stranger Things, Paranormal Activity, and The Shining Opera to name just three.
We see it as more than a money grab as the Minority Report source material is still resonant as we learn from the play’s producer Simon Friend:
Saw X hits theaters tomorrow, September 29th. The series might have languished as direct-to-video genre gore, but instead, the overwhelming fervor for the Lionsgate franchise has pushed the total box officer return to over a billion dollars. For the 10th installment, the producers analyzed a brand study to see which elements of the series resonated with viewers. Using the data, they crafted this new chapter where the killer, Jigsaw, becomes not only the protagonist but a sympathetic one—the movie has received positive reviews.
THE ACTOR SPOTLIGHT
Ron Perlman is in a Western. Hellboy slings a six-shooter in Guillermo-sorry. That last bit is a fantasy. But Perlman is off in Oklahoma shooting Cottonmouth, a film about brutal enemies in Oklahoma’s frontier territory who fight over a prominent saloon. Perlman plays a sinister warden who runs a tortuous prison. Even though it seems like a standard revenge film, we’d show up for any Perlman picture, regardless of genre.
Toby Jones belongs in the category of legendary Harry Potter actors but often goes unnoticed for his achievement in the series because his character is most closely associated with a sock. Providing the voice for Dobby, Jones’ most recent projects involve a pair of series on ITV. In the eponymous Ruth, he plays a lawyer for Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be hanged in London. In the second, The Long Shadow, he plays Dennis Hoban, a detective who led the hunt for the Yorkshire Ripper.
Words of encouragement from Leo’s own on-set father figure, Martin Scorsese, who worked with him from 2002 Gang’s of New York, when Leo was only 26 to his latest, Killers of the Flower Moon (trailer), 21 years later.
“He has range. He keeps growing. He also has a lot of courage. I know he’ll go to places that other people might pull back from… I’ve been working with him over the years he’s been growing as a person. He’s maturing from a young kid to a young man. As he changes in life, he’s changing on film.”
From the trailer and the overwhelming 9-minute standing ovation at Cannes, we can’t wait to see whatever Leo has in store for us behind Marty’s lens.
THE INDUSTRY TECH NEWS
Meta vs. Apple: Good or bad for cinema? The two tech giants, in a continuous battle for one-ups-manship, first sparred in the social media sector. Apple masked the IP addresses of their devices, effectively gutting the effectiveness of FB’s ability to offer valuable tracking insights to its advertisers.
Now Meta is striking back with the Quest 3, releasing on October 10th, a direct competitor to Apple’s flagship VR product, the Apple Vision Pro, out in early 2024. Both devices promise an alternative to going to the movies. One in which the wearer straps on the headset in their living room and is transported into a full-scale theater.
While Apple is capitalizing on its ever-expanding Apple Originals library to maximize the number of hours users spend on-device, Meta has signed a deal with NBCUniversal which will bring it Yellowstone, Suits, as well as horror movies from Blumhouse Productions, and Jordan Peele’s Monkeypaw.
We are concerned that the mass adoption of these VR devices in the future spells a virtual end for consumer interest in going to the cinema. One can only hope that in this Ready Player One-esque world, film lovers will still be moved by the very experience of going to the cinema.
Punching back at the big guys, Mubi UK is investing in indie cinema by financing new films. Although revenue grew by 53%, net losses deepened by 534% from $578,000 in 2021 to $3.09 million last year. Luckily, their parent company, Mubi, which boasts an impressive collection of films by Wong Kar-wai, Robert Altman, Lars Vin Trier, and Fritz Lang is subsidizing the losses. In fact, we believe these losses are simply evidence of the company investing in infrastructure for the future of streaming. Mubi is here to stay and so in cinema despite the big-tech push towards VR.
INDIE FILMMAKER SPOTLIGHT
Wes Anderson is at his best when there’s a synchronicity between subject matter and style. His adaptation of The Wonderful Story Of Henry Sugar, originally a short story collection from Roald Dahl, accomplishes this task. The short, now available on Netflix, unfolds like a storybook. Literally. The sliding sets circumscribe the persnickety Ralph Feinnes (Dahl) and Benedict Cumberbatch (Sugar) into a delightful world.
If we didn’t know better, we would have thought Peter Dinklage and Anne Hathaway were married. The deceptive headline in Screen Rant obscures that their matrimony is a fictitious premise of Rebecca Miller’s She Came To Me. Jazzed for the movie.
Kristen Dunst would make a steller a casting director. Her eye for talent recently focused on Cailee Spaeny, whom she personally recommended to her long-time friend Sofia Coppola as the lead for Priscilla. On Dunst’s advice, Spaeny was cast and went on to win the Volpi Cup for Best Actress at the Venice Film Festival—just another reason to make “Casting Director” an Oscars category.
THE INTERNATIONAL NEWS
Many short films perish into obscurity. Others launch director’s careers. Film4, in conjunction with BFI, has, in turn, launched “Future Takes.” A short film competition that greenlights shorts for up to $110,000 each. The quality of the 400 submissions was “incredibly high,” according to the two companies, so they upped their slate from seven projects to nine. We think it’s great to see two companies of such caliber breathing new life into burgeoning filmmakers:
ON THIS DAY
1948: “Hamlet” directed by and starring Laurence Olivier opens at Park Avenue Cinema (Best Picture 1949).
Today’s edition was written by: Gabriel Miller, Clarke Scott, and Spencer Carter.
