NBC Is Setting Aside ‘Celebrity Apprentice’ Until It Can Find a Replacement For Donald Trump
The network announced yesterday morning that the competition series is being put on an extended hiatus this coming season while executive producer Mark Burnett hunts for a new host. Despite rumors of NBC considering various business world personalities for the high-profile gig, executives are nowhere close to locking down a new name. In June, NBC cut business ties with Trump after his comments about Mexican immigrants. (EW)
It’s a Big Day For Relativity In Court, as a Judge Will Decide the Bankruptcy Timeline
U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Michael Wiles will decide whether to approve a $10.5 million loan to keep Relativity going. It’s the second installment in a $45 million Debtor In Possession financing plan from current lenders. Time, though, is the key issue as he crafts the bidding process — including conditions to clarify what assets a buyer could pick up, and what liens, leases, and loans come with them. (DH)
The ‘Star Wars’ Standalone Movie That Was To Be Directed By Josh Trank Has Been Pushed to 2020
Since Trank was removed from the project in April, Lucasfilm moved up the release of the young Han Solo film, which recently enlisted Phil Lord and Chris Miller to direct and which will now take the original 2017 release date of the earlier film, believed to be a Boba Fett origin story. The Boba Fett film will now open in 2020, a year after Star Wars: Episode IX is scheduled to hit theaters. (COL)
All the ‘Neighbors’ Are Returning For the Sequel, as Dave Franco Has Now Joined the Cast
The actor will join Seth Rogen, Zac Efron and Rose Byrne in Neighbors 2, as well as newcomers Chloe Grace Moretz, Kiersey Clemons and Beanie Feldstein. The plot is being kept under wraps, but sources say it involves a sorority that the new castmembers will be members of. Nicholas Stoller is returning to direct the sequel based on a script by Andrew Jay Cohen, Brendan O’Brien, Rogen and Evan Goldberg. (THR)
That ‘Training Day’ TV Adaptation Has Found Itself a Home At CBS
In a competitive situation, CBS has handed out a hefty pilot-production commitment to a Training Day follow-up based on the 2001 film, which starred Ethan Hawke and Denzel Washington, who won an Oscar for his performance. The potential series takes place 15 years after the movie and is set in the LAPD of 2015. Antoine Fuqua, who directed the feature film,will helm the pilot, which is written by feature writer and former LAPD detective Will Beall. (TLF)
A Pair Of Old Pros Join the Ed Helms-Owen Wilson Comedy ‘Bastards’
Academy Award winner J.K. Simmons and NFL Hall of Famer Terry Bradshaw are set to join the comedy, which is the directorial debut of veteran cinematographer Larry Sher. Film focuses on the two brothers whose eccentric mother raised them to believe their father had died when they were young. When they discover this to be a lie, they set out to find their real father, learning more about their mother than they probably ever wanted to know. (CS)
Terry George’s Historical Drama Starring Christian Bale Just Added A Classy Actress To the Cast
Shohreh Aghdashloo has joined Bale and Oscar Isaac in the historical romance The Promise. George is directing from a script he wrote with Robin Swicord, centering on a love triangle in 1922 with a medical student, an American journalist based in Paris and a beautiful and sophisticated woman, portrayed by Charlotte Le Bon. Bale will play the reporter, and Isaac will portray the student, conflicted by old-world traditions. Aghdashloo will play Isaac’s mother. (VAR)
Add Rihanna To the List Of Key Advisors For the Upcoming Season Of ‘The Voice’
The pop star/provocateur’s participation was announced yesterday by Peacock network president Robert Greenblatt at the TCA summer press tour. Over the last three seasons, fun. frontman Nate Ruess, Taylor Swift and Coldplay’s Chris Martin have mentored contestants from all four teams during the second set of one-on-one showdowns (historically called the Knockout Rounds or Battle Rounds Pt. 2). (TVL)
As ‘Mission: Impossible — Rogue Nation’ Prepares To Surrender the Box Office Top Spot This Weekend, Here Are 30 Essential Spy Films To Watch
Perhaps you’ve noticed — 2015 is truly the year of the spy movie. The Man from U.N.C.L.E. opens this week, but also, Paul Feig’s Spy is barely gone; Matthew Vaughn had his own Kingsman: The Secret Service” earlier in the year, and still to come is Steven Spielberg’s Bridge of Spies, Hitman: Agent 47, and … oh yeah… Spectre. (TP)
Screenwriters: ‘Pariah’
The undated, unlabeled 102-page screenplay by Dee Rees. (GITS)