Bryan Cranston to receive Lifetime Achievement Award from Santa Fe International Film Festival

September 24, 2024

ABC

The upcoming Santa Fe International Film Festival has announced it will be honoring Bryan Cranston with its Lifetime Achievement Award.

Not coincidentally, his drama Breaking Bad was set in Santa Fe, New Mexico — a fact mentioned by SFiFF Executive Director Liesette Bailey in the announcement.

“Bryan Cranston’s work has inspired generations of actors and captivated audiences worldwide, cementing his place as one of the most respected and accomplished figures in the industry,” she said.

“We are truly honored to present him with the Santa Fe International Film Festival Lifetime Achievement Award, not only in recognition of his exceptional body of work, but also for the deep connection he shares with the people of New Mexico and the lasting impact he has made on our community with his role in the iconic series ‘Breaking Bad.'”

Cranston will be honored on Oct. 19; the event takes place Oct. 16 through Oct. 20.

Kathy Bates denies retirement from acting: “It was misunderstood”

Disney/Stewart Cook

Well, it looks like Kathy Bates isn’t retiring after Matlock after all.

Bates stopped by ABC’s On the Red Carpet show before Sunday night’s 76th Emmy Awards, where she threw cold water on a New York Times story that Madeline Matlock in the forthcoming CBS reboot would be her final role.

As much as she said she was “flattered” that the retirement report “went around the globe,” Bates told ABC’s George Pennacchio that she was “misunderstood.”

“I think it was misunderstood because I … had one foot out the door until I read Jennie [Snyder] Urman‘s script and I was like, ‘OK, now we’re talking. And I want the show [Matlock] to run for years and years,” she said.

The original series of Matlock ran from 1986 to 1995, starring Andy Griffith as a defense lawyer named Benjamin Matlock.

The reboot show will chronicle Bates’ character, who rejoins the law workforce as a senior, scoring legal victories in courtrooms. In the interview with the New York Times to discuss the show, she said she felt like she was called to do the role, especially after experiencing some injustices in the early days of her career.

“Everything I’ve prayed for, worked for, clawed my way up for, I am suddenly able to be asked to use all of it,” she said at the time. “And it’s exhausting.”

Despite her success, when reflecting on her acting career, she only recalled some of the blunders, telling the New York Times, “I never felt dressed right or well.”

“I felt like a misfit,” she said. “It’s that line in Misery when Annie says, ‘I’m not a movie star.’ I’m not.”

Her comments notwithstanding, a source told ABC News on Monday that “it is understood that Bates changed her mind [about retiring] after doing Matlock.”

Matlock will premiere on CBS Sept. 22 and will be available to stream on Paramount+.

Clueless: Alicia Silverstone “alive and well” after eating a “mildly poisonous” fruit she found

Daniel Kroll/BSR Agency/Getty Images

Alicia Silverstone is a famous actress, but it’s obvious she was never a Girl Scout. If she had been, she’d know not to eat strange fruit one comes across in the wild.

However, that’s apparently what she did, according to a video on Instagram.

On Monday, the avowed vegan star posted a video of a fruit she came across in a garden on a London street, saying, “OK, I’ve discovered something that I can’t figure out what it is and I need your help,” adding it looks like a “tomahto.”

“I just bit into this because it was on the street, and we were discussing whether it was a tomato. It’s definitely not because look at these leaves,” she said, aiming her phone camera through a fence.

Internet sleuths quickly identified the plant as a solanum pseudocapsicum, which bears the poisonous fruit known as the Jerusalem or Christmas cherry.

Silverstone later followed her post with another stating, “Alive and well! Don’t worry… I didn’t swallow.”

Apart from the potentially hazardous practice of eating strange fruit, others just thought it was rude. “[Y]ou think it’s respectful to take something out of someones [sic] garden without their consent?? Where are your manners?” one respondent griped.

“Come back as what?” Robert Downey Jr. on how Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige got him back into the MCU

Jesse Grant/Getty Images for Disney

In July, Robert Downey Jr. stunned fans by revealing at San Diego Comic-Con that he’s returning to the Marvel Cinematic Universe — but as villain Dr. Doom, not Tony Stark.

Stark, of course, sacrificed himself to save the world at the climax of 2019’s Avengers: Endgame, and Feige has subsequently gone on the record that he didn’t want to “magically undo” that.

To The Hollywood Reporter’s Awards Chatter podcast, Downey explained how that twist came to be.

He recalled that he and his producing partner — and wife — Susan Downey were chatting with the studio’s president, Kevin Feige, when he mentioned something that took the Downeys aback.

“He said, ‘It just keeps occurring to me, if you were to come back …,'” Downey said. “Susan was like, ‘Wait, wait. Come back as what?'”

“How can we not go backwards? How can we not disappoint expectations? How can we continue to beat expectations? And he brought up Victor Von Doom. I looked into this character,” the actor said.

“Later on, he goes, ‘Let’s get Victor Von Doom right.'”

Downey said Disney CEO Bob Iger had already been made aware of Feige’s idea, reporting, “I like it.”

Four-time Marvel blockbuster directors Joe and Anthony Russo are also returning to the MCU with Downey behind Doom’s mask in 2026’s Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars, set for 2027.

Marvel Studios is owned by Disney, the parent company of ABC News.