‘Dancing with the Stars’ live tour announced

Deadline is reporting that a defamation lawsuit centering on Netflix’s Emmy-nominated hit Baby Reindeer could have its day in court in May 2025.

A federal judge has set a trial date of May 6, 2025, in the $170 million suit against the streamer from Fiona Harvey, who claims the show’s stalker, Martha Scott, was based on her interactions with its creator, writer and star Richard Gadd.

As reported, Gadd claimed a chance meeting with Harvey at the pub where he worked led to her sending him “thousands of emails, hundreds of voicemails, and a number of handwritten letters” that “often included sexually explicit, violent, and derogatory content, hateful speech, and threats.”

In the series, Scott does the same to Gadd’s character, Donny, eventually leading to her being charged by police — something Harvey claims never happened in real life.

Gadd had previously said he’d testify against Harvey should the need arise, but insisted that his series “is not a documentary” and that “Martha Scott is not Fiona Harvey.”

He also said it was Harvey who outed herself, claiming she inspired the Martha character in an interview with Piers Morgan. In the same interview, she also denied sending Gadd “thousands” of messages — some of which Gadd attached to his formal statement as proof.

The trade notes there is a strong chance the matter will be settled before going in front of a jury.

Meanwhile, Baby Reindeer already won a pair of trophies at the Creative Arts Emmys, and Gadd is nominated for Sunday night’s ceremony for both his writing and his performance in the Best Limited or Anthology Series and Lead Actor categories.

His onscreen stalker, played by Jessica Gunning, snagged a nomination for Best Supporting Actress.

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Entertainment Tonight asked legendary filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola about the “fake review” controversy that surrounded the trailer to his forthcoming epic, Megalopolis.

As reported, a now-deleted trailer seemed to spin the lukewarm reception the film got from critics at the Cannes Film Festival by trying to claim other critics years ago hated his classics like The Godfather and Apocalypse Now.

However, the apparently AI-generated quotes from real-life reviewers were fake, and the marketing company behind the campaign was dismissed by Lionsgate, which apologized.

For his part, Coppola alleges he had nothing to do with it. “You know, it was a mistake, an accident,” he said. “I’m not sure what happened.”

It’s also open to interpretation what the filmmaker meant when he said, “I know there were bad reviews, I’m the one who said they were bad reviews.” It’s not clear if he meant he’s his toughest critic, or if he’s the one who flagged the phony blurbs.

Coppola also mentioned that the pet project — for which he gathered a who’s who of stars, like Academy Award nominees Adam Driver, Shia LaBeouf and Laurence Fishburne, and Oscar winners Jon Voight and Dustin Hoffman — was finally a chance for him to make a film that was truly his.

Coppola sunk a fortune of his own money into the movie.

He expressed, “When I made John Grisham‘s The Rainmaker, I took off, and I quit. And I just said, ‘I wanted to study, and … to learn what my kind of film is, whatever that might be.’ And after 14 years of that type of experimentation, I then came out and made a film that was my kind of film. So it’s not like anything you’ve ever seen.”

Megalopolis hits theaters Sept. 27.

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Tom Cruise is in early talks to star in a sequel to his 1990 film Days of Thunder, according to The Hollywood Reporter. “He’s talking [to Paramount] about Top Gun and Days of Thunder,” a source tells the outlet. “It’s going to be what comes together first in terms of a script. It depends on the idea and, ultimately, the script.” The NASCAR drama starred Cruise as Cole Trickle, a young hot-shot stock car driver who gets his chance to compete at the top level. Details of the sequel have not been revealed …

Netflix has dropped the official trailer for season 4, part 2 of Outer Banks. The drama series follows a group of teens dubbed the Pogues on the treasure hunt of a lifetime. “Buried secrets surface as the Pogues race to find a legendary artifact — with a dangerous gang of rival treasure hunters hot on their trail, reads the logline that accompanies the trailer. Chase Stokes, Madelyn Cline, Madison Bailey, Jonathan Daviss, Rudy Pankow, Austin North, Drew Starkey, Charles Esten and Carlacia Grant star. Outer Banks season four, part two, hits Netflix on Nov. 7 …

Alan Rachins, best known for playing Douglas Brackman Jr. on L.A. Law, the EV series co-created by his late younger brother Steven Bochco, and the father of Jenna Elfman’s character on Dharma & Greg, died died in his sleep of heart failure Saturday, Nov. 2 at Cedars-Sinai Medical Cente in Los Angeles, his wife, actress Joanna Frank, tells The Hollywood Reporter. He was 82. Rachins’ other credits include the 1995 film Showgirls …

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