Colin Jost limps away from Olympics surfing correspondent gig amid “growing list of ailments”

August 8, 2024

NBCUniversal

After scraping his foot on a coral reef and getting a staph infection, then suffering a subsequent ear infection, SNL‘s “Weekend Update” co-anchor Colin Jost has apparently signed off as NBC’s “Olympic surfing correspondent.”

While the funnyman told NBC’s Olympics anchor Mike Tirico he had a “growing list of ailments” in the South Pacific and planned to get “as many infections as there are Olympic Events,” Deadline reports Jost has left Tahiti, and the network replaced him at the surfing beat with Australian weatherman Luke Bradnam.

Jost recently updated his Instagram with footage of a pre-taped, hard-hitting interview with Teahupo’o [TAY-ah-HOOP-oh], a display of skulls in Tahiti that shares the name with the monster wave break in which the Olympic competition is taking place.

Jost asked the wall-mounted noggins if the term “Teahup’o” is “offensive to skulls.”

One replied the term is in fact insulting and just another example of “this anti-skull nonsense: You know, they put us on the poison label, they put us on the pirate flag.” Some commenters correctly pointed out that the mounted skulls sounded suspiciously like Triumph the Insult Comic Dog’s alter ego, comedian Robert Smigel.

Jost captioned the video bit by saying, “Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated.”

Deadline notes it’s not known if he’ll be rejoining NBC’s coverage of the Summer Games in Paris.

Selena Gomez, Viola Davis, Steve Martin and more named as Emmy Awards presenters

ABC/Television Academy

On Monday, the Television Academy announced the list of presenters for this year’s 76th Emmy Awards.

Among the presenters will be many of this year’s nominees, including Only Murders in the Building trio Selena Gomez, Martin Short, and Steve Martin, as well as their fellow nominees Kristen Wiig, Jean Smart, Da’Vine Joy Randolph, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Nava Mau, Jane Lynch, Matt Bomer, Lily Gladstone and Christine Baranski.

Also among the dozens of presenters announced are Oscar winners Kathy Bates, Viola Davis and Ron Howard, as well as Oscar nominee Colin Farrell, former Emmy winners Niecy Nash-Betts, Steven Yeun, and Candice Bergen, and country music legend and actress Reba McEntire.

The full list of presenters can be found here.

The 76th annual telecast, hosted by Eugene and Dan Levy, will broadcast live on ABC on Sunday, Sept. 15 from the Peacock Theater at L.A. LIVE in downtown Los Angeles. It will also stream on Hulu from Sept. 16 through Sept. 22.

“Creative genius” Francis Ford Coppola suing ‘Variety’ over on-set behavior stories

ABC

One of the most recognized names in Hollywood is going after one of the most recognized trades about Hollywood.

Francis Ford Coppola is suing Variety — and two of its writers specifically — for libel over articles that alleged he made unwanted advances toward female extras on his movie Megalopolis.

The coverage claimed Coppola hugged, kissed and danced with extras behind the scenes of a party scene in the film.

Incidentally, Lauren Pagone, one of those actresses quoted in an Aug. 2 follow-up article, has sued “the filmmaker and others in Georgia for civil battery, civil assault, and negligent failure to prevent sexual harassment,” according to Deadline.

Coppola’s motion, filed in Los Angeles Superior Court on Tuesday, doesn’t mention that lawsuit.

However, the trade says his suit claims the original July 26 article contains “false and defamatory statements” meant to “damage” his reputation and cause him “severe emotional distress.”

Deadline quotes the suit from Coppola’s attorneys: “Some people are creative. Very few people are creative geniuses. In the world of motion pictures, Plaintiff Francis Ford Coppola … is a creative genius. Some people are jealous and resentful of genius. Those people therefore denigrate and tell knowing and reckless falsehoods about those of whom they are jealous.”

Further, it says, “Variety Media, LLC … its writers and editors, hiding behind supposedly anonymous sources, accused Coppola of manifest incompetence as a motion picture director, of unprofessional behavior on the set of his most recent production,” adding, “Each of these accusations was false and knowingly so.”

Coppola is seeking $15 million in damages.

After the original Variety piece broke, Deadline ran an interview with another extra, Rayna Menz, who insisted the director “did nothing to make me or for that matter anyone on set feel uncomfortable.”

Ryan Reynolds teases Nat Geo series ‘Underdogs’ with documentary clip about “boring” wolverines

Jed Cullen/Dave Benett/WireImage

In a bit of a hat trick, Ryan Reynolds managed to plug his blockbuster Deadpool & Wolverine, tweak his friend and co-star Hugh Jackman and promote an upcoming nature series he’s narrating for Nat Geo in one fell swoop.

Reynolds captioned a social media video post, “Many of you haven’t been asking about the wolverine documentary we didn’t spend much time making.” He presented a nature video of an actual wolverine, “one of the largest and laziest members of the weasel family,” which “is actually pretty boring.”

“We shot 15 hours,” Ryan narrates of footage of the animal sleeping and scratching itself. “And these are the HIGHLIGHTS!”

He also deadpans that the animals are known for “their pungent aroma,” adding, “I can vouch for the ‘pungent aroma’ part, especially after a dance number.”

The nature video then cuts to a view of Jackman in his Wolverine — capital W — costume, to which Ryan says, “Here we can see an older male wolverine, sadly sulking out of its den one last time, probably for a paycheck.”

It cuts back to the footage of the actual animal, which Ryan insists “just f****** sucks.”

The snippet ends with a plug for Underdogs, which is a real nature documentary coming out in 2025 from National Geographic. It’s a project that Reynolds promised in 2023 to be “entertaining, surprising and will do justice to animals usually stuck as supporting cast.”

Disney is the parent company of National Geographic and ABC News.