News Analysis India

Tag: Apple TV

  • Jacki Weaver to star opposite Billy Crudup in series Hello Tomorrow!

    By Express News Service

    Actor Jacki Weaver will star in a key role opposite Billy Crudup in Apple’s upcoming original series Hello Tomorrow! The series is created, written, showrun, and executive produced by Amit Bhalla and Lucas Jansen. 

    Jacki WeaverSet in a retro-future world, the story revolves around a group of travelling salesmen hawking lunar timeshares. Jack (Crudup) is a talented, ambitious salesman whose unshakeable faith in a better tomorrow inspires his co-workers and revitalizes his desperate customers but threatens to leave him dangerously lost in the very dream that sustains him. Weaver will play Barbara Billings, Jack’s caustic and manipulative mother.

    Billy CrudupThe cast of the show also includes Hank Azaria, Haneefah Wood, Alison Pill, Nick Podany and Dewshane Williams. Bhalla and Jansen will serve as executive producers alongside Stephen Falk, Jonathan Entwistle, and Crudup. Blake Griffin, Ryan Kalil and Noah Weinstein will also serve as executive producers through their banner Mortal Media. Meanwhile, Weaver is currently filming the upcoming coming-of-age dark comedy, Wildflower. On TV, she was most recently seen in a guest-starring role in Yellowstone and as Lillian in Perpetual Grace, LTD.

  • WATCH | Tom Hanks’ sci-fi drama adventure ‘Finch’ drops first trailer

    By ANI

    WASHINGTON: The first official full trailer of Hollywood star Tom Hanks’ upcoming sci-fi adventure movie ‘Finch’ has recently been dropped by Apple TV+, where it will premiere on November 5.

    The movie narrates the story of a lone survivor of a global apocalypse who has embarked on a dangerous journey to find a new home for his unlikely family, a dog and a newly created robot.

    Hanks has portrayed the titular character, a robotics engineer, who is the only survivor of a solar event. Finch creates the robot named Jeff (Caleb Landry Jones) to take care of his loyal companion, dog Goodyear, when he’s gone.

    The almost 3-minute trailer of ‘Finch’ begins with Hanks’ character saying “It all happened so fast. There was a solar flare. Goodbye crops and food, goodbye everything,” as scenes of a deserted, dystopian America pass by. “So I hid, frightened and so alone, and I found you,” he continues, addressing the sweet dog.

    After Finch develops the robot Jeff, it learns its purpose (“Robots must protect dog”), the trio then set out west, embarking on a treacherous journey to beat a deadly storm to safety. “If we don’t go before that storm hits, we’ll die. All of us,” Finch says in the trailer.

    During the journey, they experience some lighthearted moments on the road, Finch teaching Jeff how to drive, Jeff learning how to “talk dog”, all while the pressures of the post-apocalyptic world seem to be closing in. Along the way, they navigate through extreme weather phenomena, merciless heat, UV radiation, and other unexpected challenges.

    “Do you think we’ll make it?” Jeff asks. To this, Finch replies, “Not without my team. What we do, we do together.” Finally, Jeff concludes, “I believe in you Finch.”

    ‘Finch’ comes after Apple TV plus acquired and released Hanks’ World War II feature ‘Greyhound’ last year.

    According to People magazine, the movie was originally slated to release in May 2020 and was then pushed to hit theatres that June due to the ongoing COVID pandemic. As most movie theatres remained closed, Apple decided to purchase the film to make it available for viewers at home instead.

    The movie has been directed by Emmy winner Miguel Sapochnik, who helmed several pivotal episodes of HBO’s ‘Game of Thrones’, including the fan-favourite ‘Battle of the Bastards’. It’s written by Craig Luck and Ivor Powell.

    Among the producing team is Robert Zemeckis, who directed Hanks in another solo survival tale, 2000’s ‘Cast Away’. ‘Finch’ was originally titled ‘Bios’, as per The Hollywood Reporter. 

    WATCH HERE: 

  • ‘Ugly Betty’ star America Ferrera joins Apple series ‘WeCrashed’

    By PTI
    LOS ANGELES: Actor America Ferrera will feature alongside Anne Hathaway and Jared Leto in Apple’s scripted series “WeCrashed”.

    According to Variety, the limited series is based on the Wondery podcast of the same name.

    The show is described as following the greed-filled rise and inevitable fall of WeWork, one of the world’s most valuable startups, and the narcissists whose chaotic love made it all possible.

    Leto will play WeWork founder Adam Neumann, with Hathaway set to essay the role of his wife and co-founder Rebekah Newmann.

    Both stars will also serve as executive producers on the show.

    Ferrera will play the role of Elishia Kennedy, a brilliant young entrepreneur seduced into joining WeWork whose life is turned upside down as a result.

    The show will also star actor Kyle Marvin as Miguel McKelvey, the co-founder of WeWork.

    Lee Eisenberg and Drew Crevello are on board as creators, while “This Is Us” duo John Requa and Glenn Ficarra will direct and executive produce.

    Apart from “WeCrashed”, another WeWork TV series is in the works with Nicholas Braun on board to play Adam Neumann in the drama created by Stephen Falk.

    The series is based on a book from Wall Street Journal reporters Eliot Brown and Maureen Farrell.

    Ferrera is best known for her featuring in shows such as “Ugly Betty” and “Superstore”.

    She has also starred in movies like “Real Women Have Curves”, “The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants” films, and the “How to Train Your Dragon” series.

  • Video games coming to Netflix? Latest hiring offers a clue

    SAN RAMON (United States): Netflix has hired veteran video game executive Mike Verdu, signalling the video streaming service is poised to expand into another fertile field of entertainment.

    Verdu’s addition as Netflix’s vice president of game development, confirmed Thursday, July 15, 2021, comes as the company seeks to sustain the momentum it gathered last year when people turned to the video streaming service to get through lockdowns imposed during the pandemic. 

    Netflix wound up adding 37 million worldwide subscribers last year, by far the largest annual gain in its history. But the landscape has changed dramatically now that the easing pandemic has allowed people to return to a semblance of their normal lives. The video service stumbled out of the gate during the first three months of this year, posting its smallest first-quarter subscriber increase in four years, and it predicted its springtime gains would also be meager. The Los Gatos, California, company is scheduled to report its results for the April-June period on Tuesday.

    Adding video games would give Netflix another way to build upon the nearly 208 million subscribers that it boasted at the end of March. It wouldn’t come as a surprise either, given that Netflix co-CEO Reed Hastings has long said the company competes as much against video games for a piece of people’s leisure time as it does against other video streaming services offered by the likes of Amazon, Hulu, Walt Disney Co. and Apple.

    Netflix didn’t directly comment on its potential entry into video gaming, but left little doubt about its intent by announcing Verdu’s title at the company. Verdu is joining Netflix from Facebook’s Oculus, where he oversaw the virtual reality headset maker’s games. He previously worked at video game makers Electronic Arts and Zynga.

    Now the biggest questions are when Netflix might start to offer video games and whether it intends to charge a separate fee to play them or include them as part of its video streaming services.

    In a research note, CFRA analyst Tuna Amobi called video games a logical complement to Netflix’s vast library of TV series and films, helping to set the stage for eventual price increases that most subscribers will accept.

    Greg Peters, Netflix’s chief operating officer, told investors in April that video games could be another way to engage subscribers already immersed in the stories unfolding in the service’s TV series and movies.

    “We’re trying to figure out what are all these different ways that we can increase those points of connection, we can deepen that fandom,” Peters said at the time. Verdu will be reporting to Peters in his new job. 

    Investors seemed to be taking a wait-and-see attitude on Netflix’s potential foray into video games. The company’s stock price dipped by 1% to close Thursday at $542.95. While much of the stock market has been notching record highs recently, Netflix’s shares are down by 8% from their peak of $593.29 reached in January. 

  • Oscar-nominated actress Glenn Close joins Apple TV Plus thriller ‘Tehran’

    By ANI
    WASHINGTON: American actor Glenn Close is set to star in the second season of Apple TV Plus’ original series ‘Tehran’.

    As per Variety, Close is slated to play the role of Marjan Montazeri, a British woman living in Tehran in the espionage thriller from Netflix’s ‘Fauda’ writer Moshe Zonder and Omri Shenhar.

    Close, who has been nominated for multiple Oscars, will be a series regular in the second season of the Israeli thriller. The series aired on Apple TV Plus last summer and has become a global hit for the platform.

    The show originally premiered on Israel’s KAN public broadcaster last June. Apple TV Plus picked up the title from distributor Cineflix Rights as an acquisition, but following its success for the streamer, boarded the show as a co-producer.

    The first season of the series told the story of Tamar Rabinyan (Niv Sultan), a young Mossad agent undercover on a top-secret mission in the heart of Tehran.

    The series also stars Shaun Toub as Faraz, the head of internal investigations with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, and Shervin Alenabi as Milad, a young Iranian dissident, and hacker who gets caught up in Tamar’s web of deception.

    The first season of the show, which is created by Moshe Zonder, Omri Shenhar, Dana Eden and Maor Kohn, and directed by Daniel Syrkin, was filmed in Athens. It brought together a diverse cast and crew of Israelis, Iranians, Greeks and more.

    Filming of the second season, which will air in 2022, is slated to begin soon and will also reportedly take place in Greece, despite an ongoing legal dispute over using funds allocated to the Israeli public broadcaster to produce a show overseas.

    Shenhar is a writer for the show alongside Zonder. Executive producers are Eden and Shula Spiegel for Donna and Shula Productions, along with Zonder, Shenhar, Syrkin, Alon Aranya for Paper Plane Productions, Julien Leroux for Paper Entertainment, Peter Emerson for Cineflix Studios, and Eldad Koblenz for Kan 11. ‘Tehran’ is distributed internationally by Cineflix Rights.

    Close has been nominated for eight Oscars across four decades, most recently for her role in ‘Hillbilly Elegy’. She has three Emmys and three Tony Awards.

    The actor recently completed filming on Apple TV Plus film ‘Swan Song’, alongside Mahershala Ali and Naomie Harris.

  • How Chennai girl Vidhya Iyer wrote her way to Hollywood

    Express News Service
    When Vidhya Iyer was 17 and living in Chennai, she daydreamed of a career in showbiz. She knew she was good at writing. By the time she was out of school, she had known what she wanted to do – write comedy for television.

    However, at that time, she thought it was absurd to even contemplate a career in entertainment. She followed her peers into computer engineering college. But some dreams, however absurd, do come true.  Currently working in entertainment capital Los Angeles, Iyer has Hulu’s animated comedy Solar Opposites, Apple TV’s Little Voice and Disney’s Mira: Royal Detective to prove it.  

    While in college, she reached out to people in the industry. Heeding their advice, film school appeared to be a good first step. “I wrote my first script and applied to the top five film schools,” she says.

    She was accepted by AFI in Los Angeles, from where she started her film journey.  Currently working on Season 3 of Solar Opposites, Iyer admits playing the footlights game is not easy. “The industry is extremely competitive and tough,” says the writer, who does Improv comedy, which helps in her writing.

    But writing comedy is not her only forte. She co-wrote a short film, Raksha, with Jhanvi Motla in 2017. It is about a woman who has been told that she is cursed. Raksha has been screened at over 15 film festivals and received the Best International Short Film Award at the Delhi International Film Festival 2017.

    She has also co-written Kanya with director Apoorva Satish about a girl with dreams of becoming a swimmer, and how the onset of her first period affects her aspirations. The film had its European premiere at The Raindance Film Festival 2020. 

    How does her cultural identity weigh in on her work? “Personally, I feel the anxiety of bearing the burden of representing my community and culture as a whole in everything I write. It is a pressure I put on myself because I know representation and telling authentic Indian stories matters,” she explains.

    Working in Mira: Royal Detective gave Iyer the chance to tell authentic Indian stories in a fun fictional world. Season 1 of the series was aired on Disney Junior in March 2020. The plot is based in imaginary Jalpur and represents Indian children and adolescents. It gives children from all over the world a chance to observe Indian festivals such as Holi and Diwali, besides learning about the traditional attires.

    In the age of swiping right and left every week, Iyer has been able to maintain a stable relationship. In LA, that is a ‘Herculean task’ she believes, because “in this industry, relationships mirror the business – they’re fleeting and people’s ambitions can give birth to conflict”.

    So is LA really the fairyland where one keeps bumping into sunglass-sporting celebs? Iyer laughs, “While running into Hollywood celebrities is pretty common, I get starstruck by writers instead – Josh Bycel (Happy Endings, Scrubs) and Mike McMahan (Rick & Morty),” she adds.

    Iyer’s story is important because it mirrors that of many Indians finding a space of their own in Hollywood too. A Chennai girl just did.  

  • Justin Timberlake to star in ‘Confessions of a Dangerous Mind’ series for Apple

    By PTI
    LOS ANGELES: Actor-singer Justin Timberlake is set to play American host Chuck Barris in an hour-long drama series.

    The untitled series, whose script has been acquired by Apple TV Plus, will be based on Barris’ 1984 memoir “Confessions of a Dangerous Mind”, reported Deadline.

    In the book, Barris had claimed that his public identity as the “Gong Show” host and creator of game shows like “The Dating Game” and “The Newlywed Game” was actually a cover for his real job as a CIA assassin.

    The book was previously turned into a 2002 movie, which was directed by George Clooney and featured Oscar winner Sam Rockwell as Barris.

    Miramax and Paramount Television Studios will co-produce the show.

      “Ray Donovan” executive producer David Hollander will be the showrunner, along with writer Jon Worley, who has penned the pilot.

    The show will mark Timberlake’s second project at Apple TV Plus after he featured in movie “Palmer”, which released on the streamer’s platform in January this year.