‘Bad Moms’ duo reportedly book ‘Spa Weekend’ for Leslie Mann, Anna Faris and more
Jon Lucas and Scott Moore, the writers behind the blockbuster The Hangover and the writer-directors of the hit Bad Moms, have booked a Spa Weekend with some very funny women.
Deadline reports Mom‘s Anna Faris, Knocked Up‘s Leslie Mann, Always Be My Maybe scene stealer Michelle Buteau and Wedding Crashers‘ Isla Fisher will appear in a girl’s trip comedy called Spa Weekend.
The trade reports the film centers on three friends who take the titular trip — but when Jane, Coco and Sophie’s “trainwreck friend” Mel crashes the party, “the relaxation quickly descends into chaos with hilarious consequences.”
Comedian and Saturday Night Live cast member Punkie Johnson says she won’t be returning to the show for its 50th season this fall.
Johnson broke the news following a stand-up date at Brooklyn’s Union Hall on Wednesday evening, when an audience member asked her what she’s looking forward to in what would have been her fifth season on the sketch show.
Johnson replied, “Oh, I’m not coming back.”
Because her comment was abrupt, Johnson said she woke up on Thursday to texts and messages about it — so many that later Thursday evening she took to social media to clarify. “There’s no bad blood, there’s no bridges burned,” she insisted.
“Bro, I love my people. I didn’t think this was gonna be a big deal. This is why Dave Chappelle make people lock up their phones,” she joked, referencing how the comedian doesn’t allow people to shoot his stand-up shows.
“SNL was a dream that I didn’t even know that I could achieve,” she continued. “Man, I was part of one of the most elite institutions in comedy, and I’m so grateful. That’s still my people.”
Her video post got support from former cast members like Cecily Strong, and current ones including Chloe Fineman and Ego Nwodim, the latter of whom wrote, “Love you til the death of me Punkie!! Now get off instagram and whatever tf editing app you used and call me back please!”
Incidentally, it was recently announced that former SNL star Maya Rudolph will return to play Vice President Kamala Harris in the run-up to the 2024 election; Punkie had played Harris in a few sketches since joining SNL in 2020.
Meanwhile, Molly Kearney, who joined Saturday Night Live in 2022, just announced on Instagram “a wrap on my time on SNL,” calling it “an honor.”
A first look at Glen Powell starring in the new half-hour comedy series Chad Powers was released on Thursday, featuring a photo of Powell with a mop-top haircut decked out in football gear.
The series coming to Hulu, which has officially started production, has an executive producing team that includes former NFL stars Peyton and Eli Manning, Powell and Loki veteran writer Michael Waldron.
The release also noted that the show is based on a sketch that originally aired on ESPN+’s Eli’s Places series, in which Eli explored various college football scenes across the country.
Powell, who has been featured in a streak of several high-budget films in recent years, including Top Gun: Maverick, Anyone But You, Twisters and Hit Man, co-wrote the pilot with Waldron.
The Manning brothers are no strangers to entertainment, hosting ESPN’s Manningcast, a Monday Night Football broadcast of Peyton and Eli Manning.
Disney, the parent company of ABC News, is the majority owner of Hulu.
Throughout its award-winning run, HBO’s Game of Thrones introduced viewers to hundreds of characters, which might be a tall order for someone who is trying to binge.
However, for the approximately 1 in 50 who live with prosopagnosia — or face blindness — it’s even tougher.
The show’s deep bench of characters is one of the reasons scientists out of England’s University of York used the series to study the condition that, as its name suggests, causes people to be unable to recognize faces.
Kira Noad, the lead author of the study and a PhD student at the university’s Department of Psychology, said: “We chose to show participants footage from Game of Thrones because the series captivated people around the world with its strong characters and their deeply nuanced personalities.”
The scientists scanned the brains of people as they watched the show; the test subjects included people who have seen the show and those who haven’t, and also people who have the condition and those who don’t.
The “exciting” results showed recognizing someone isn’t just skin deep, researchers say.
Senior author of the study, professor Tim Andrews, said the results “suggest that our ability to recognize faces relies on what we know about people, not just what they look like.”
He adds: “While it was believed that we recognize faces by learning their visual properties — such as features, configuration, and texture — our study indicates that it involves connecting a face with knowledge about the person, including their character traits, body language, our personal experiences with them, and our feelings towards them.”
For the record, Brad Pittsays he’s one of the 1 in 50, so don’t be put off if you ever run into him and he seems aloof.