ESSENTIAL INDUSTRY and AWARD NEWS, compiled by REBECCA KEEGAN
Friday, September 1, 2017
It's opening day at Telluride, and either the altitude or last night's Gary Oldman gondola sighting has me feeling woozy.
Hello from Colorado, where we're gearing up for a busy weekend of film-going at 8,750-feet, watching Damien Chazelle take his skills to Netflix and hearing from Tig Notaro.
ROCKY MOUNTAIN HIGH
I'm writing this before I dash off to the Gray Head Wilderness Preserve for the Telluride patron's brunch, the lovely event that kicks off the Telluride Film Festival, where my favorite A-lister is always the guy with the magnificent Santa beard who mixes Bloody Marys atop an artfully arranged stack of hay bales. From there I will head to the as-yet-unannounced patron screening—expect a major Oscar contender to unfurl—and then to see Francis Ford Coppola's re-edited version of The Cotton Club before taking in a night of new films. There are plenty to choose from, with Greta Gerwig'sLady Bird,Alexander Payne'sDownsizing, and Joe Wright'sDarkest Hour among them. My colleague, V.F.'s film critic Richard Lawson, and I will be filing dispatches from the festival through the weekend, and V.F.'s photographer Justin Bishop will be capturing portraits of filmmakers, actors, and Telluride characters in this Rocky Mountain wonderland. You can follow our Telluride coverage through the weekend here.
PEAKS TV
V.F.'s Laura Bradley e-mails:
Just a couple of days left until Showtime airs its two-part Twin Peaks finale, and though the ratings may be low and much of the remaining audience baffled, it remains appointment television for those who would rather be baffled than binge watch. While it's almost certain that the final chapters will not answer every question on fans' minds, we're hoping to get closure on at least a few mysteries—like what's going on with Sarah Palmer, and who, exactly, Judy and Linda are. Also, while we're at it, we've got to ask: is Sonny Jim gonna turn out O.K.? The original series, as well as Fire Walk with Me, left plenty of fans' questions unanswered, and we're guessing this season will be no different—but here's hoping David Lynch is willing to throw us a bone or two here and there.
By Suzanne Tenner/SHOWTIME.
NETFLIX, JE T'AIME
V.F.'s Katey Rich e-mails:
Barry Jenkins is currently working on a series for Amazon, Kenneth Lonergan is writing Starz's upcoming Howard's End miniseries, and now Damien Chazelle is ready to make it a trend: Oscar's Best Director Class of 2016 is all about the small screen. Netflix announced today that Chazelle will executive produce and direct two episodes of The Eddy, an eight-episode musical drama that will be set in Paris and filmed in French, English, and Arabic. Chazelle is also at work on a Neil Armstrong biopic starring Ryan Gosling, so movies aren't dead yet, but the consistent wooing of top-tier directors by streaming services can't feel good for the independent film business that once sheltered them. But for Chazelle, who made La La Land as much a love letter to Paris as to Los Angeles, a series set in a Paris music club sounds about as perfect as it gets.
HEADING SOUTH
V.F.'s Yohana Desta e-mails:
Tig Notaro's Amazon dramedy One Mississippi is back for a second season on September 8 and it is really something special. The series takes a slight step back from its devastating first season, which saw Tig's character, a Mississippi-based radio host, grow haunted by the surprise death of her mother. This season, Notaro is taking a lighter approach (by her standards, anyway), delving into the show's romantic side and adding more punchlines per capita. I interviewed her about producing, writing, and starring in the second season. In our chat, she spoke at length about how the all-female writers room was handling the Trump presidency, and how important it was for them to include a serious subplot about sexual harassment in the workplace this season. "Every single person in the room had experienced some sort of assault or harassment," she says. "There's six of us, and then there's a writers' assistant, so that's seven women in a room. And seven out of seven could say yes, something happened." Notaro also lightly danced around her cold war with Louis C.K., noting that he still hasn't reached out to her after she spoke out against his sexual-misconduct allegations. "I don't know what the future holds," she said.
EARBUDS TIME
V.F.'s Katey Rich e-mails:
Before Richard Lawson headed off to the mountains to join Rebecca on a gondola ride into movie heaven, he joined the latest episode of the Little Gold Men podcast to tell Mike Hogan, Joanna Robinson, and me about what to expect from the flood of Oscar buzz about to come our way. As Richard says in the episode, it can be hard to keep track of the hype, the backlash, the backlash-to-the-backlash, and then eventually the actual buzz, but there's one thing you can rely on: "I have a really easy rubric for our listeners: if I tweet something, it's correct." Find out what Richard will be tweeting about and more by listening to the full episode.
That's the news for this overcast day in Telluride. What are you seeing out there? Send tips, comments, and fresh horseradish to Rebecca_Keegan@condenast.com. Follow me on Twitter @thatrebecca.
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