Max has canceled its Pretty Little Liars reboot after two seasons, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin starred Good Witch‘s Bailee Madison as Imogen, described as “a true survivor” and the “final girl” to uncover the mystery of “A.” Chandler Kinney and Maia Reficco also starred …
Kathryn Crosby, the actress and singer best known for her roles in films like The 7th Voyage of Sinbad and Anatomy of a Murder, died Sept. 20 of natural causes at her home in Hillsborough, California, a representative for the Crosby family announced, according to Variety. Crosby, the widow of singer/actor Bing Crosby, was 90. Kathryn was also a frequent guest on her husband’s Merrie Olde Christmas specials. Bing Crosby died in 1977 at the age of 74 …
When Hope Calls has gotten a season 2 pickup at Great American Country, according to Parade. Season 2 launched with a two-part Christmas special called When Hope Calls: A Country Christmas back in 2021, but since then its fate had been up in the air. The When Calls the Heart spinoff follows the lives of two sisters, Lillian and Grace –played respectively by Morgan Kohan and Jocelyn Hudon –separated as children following the death of their parents and reunited as adults. When Hope Calls originally aired on the Hallmark Channel before moving to GAC …
Back in June, Sir Ian McKellen seemed to downplay a fall off a London stage during a performance of the Shakespeare adaptation Player Kings. A statement at the time said he was in good spirits and would make a speedy recovery. But now, several months later, McKellen reveals the whole thing was pretty scary.
“Apparently, I’m told by the company manager who’s holding my head as I lay on the floor, I said to her, ‘I’ve broken my neck. I’m dying,'” McKellen told ABC Audio in an interview from his home in London. “Now, I don’t remember saying that, but I must have felt it.”
He says he’s fine now, after fracturing his wrist and hurting his back, crediting the fat suit he was wearing in order to play rotund Knight John Falstaff with protecting his ribs and hips in the fall. And while physically he’s almost completely back to normal, the mental effects linger.
“I’m left with some disappointment,” McKellen confesses. “I’m ashamed that I didn’t complete — you know, my pride was bruised. How could this happen to me?” he asks with a chuckle. “And I suspect that although physically I’m healing, I wonder whether deep down there’s something mental or emotional that was jolted that needs to be attended to. And I’m attending to it by not working at the moment and resting.”
McKellen appears to be in a reflective mood as he discusses the fall, and his new film The Critic, in which he plays a prominent 1930s London theater critic named Jimmy Erskine, a once feared and respected tastemaker trying to recapture his glory days. Reviews, McKellen reveals, are a necessary evil for actors.
“We are seeking for approval. And we’re probably rather pathetic people who need that approval. We’re not confident enough of ourselves. So if you get a good review — oh, it’s an added pleasure. And if you get a bad review, it can be very hurtful,” McKellen admits.
And although he hasn’t been on the receiving end of a lot of bad reviews, the ones he has had are seared in his brain. Take for instance his turn in a Bernard Shaw revival in London’s West End when he was much younger. He starred in the play alongside a pre-Dame Judi Dench and recalls how he overheard a few fellow actors discussing his performance one night at a restaurant.
“One of them was going on and on and on about how dreadful I’d been. And I was typical of these modern young actors, using my voice in the wrong way and drawing attention to myself. And he just simply hadn’t enjoyed it.” McKellen says he laughed off the criticism, but the next night onstage it crept into his consciousness. “And as I looked into the audience talking away, I suddenly thought, ‘My God, every single person in this audience agrees with that actor that I heard last night. They all think I’m rubbish. I shouldn’t be here.’” He says he froze, forgot his lines and Dench had to rescue him.
Still, he swears if there’s a bad review out there, he’s going to read it. “I like to know. If people haven’t enjoyed the film of Cats I’d like to know about it.” 2019’s film adaptation of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Broadway musical Cats was savaged by critics, probably the worst-reviewed film McKellen has ever been in. McKellen didn’t get the blame, though. His portrayal of Gus the Theater Cat was mostly praised. And he may be returning to a role that garnered him some of the most praise of his film career: the mighty wizard Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings movies.
“There are going to be a couple of more films, I think, with some of the same characters in it. And I’ve been asked to stand by,” McKellen says. “But there’s no script that I read, and no date. All I can say, as far as I’m concerned, they better be quick.”
Quick, because at 85 years old, McKellen isn’t sure how much time he has left. “I’m rather living a year at a time, rather than two or three years at a time,” he says.
Gandalf is a part of his legacy, so if he can, he’s going to go to New Zealand and put on the robes. Legacy is a theme in The Critic, as well. In his downtime, legacy and what’s next are things McKellen has been thinking about a lot. He remembers going to visit a friend in the hospital, a friend who was dying, and asking him what he was thinking about as his life neared the end.
“And he said, ‘I don’t want to miss anything.’ And that’s rather my view,” McKellen says wistfully. He wants to know what’s going to happen. “How is AI going to really take over? I mean, what is life going to be like? When is the world going to settle down? Is the world going to survive? I won’t know. I won’t know. And I suppose I won’t care because I won’t exist.”
Vice President Kamala Harris will make her seventh appearance on CBS’ The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and first since nailing down the Democratic presidential nomination on Tuesday, Oct. 8, according to Variety. The appearance will come one night after her running mate Tim Walz guests on ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live! and both appear on CBS’ 60 Minutes …
Paramount Pictures has announced Nov. 21, 2025 as the release date for its The Running Man remake, starring Glen Powell, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The original 1987 film was set in a dystopian America, where a falsely convicted policeman — played by Arnold Schwarzenegger — gets his shot at freedom when he must forcibly participate in a TV game show where convicts, runners, must battle killers for their freedom …
Matt Damon and Ben Affleck are reteaming for new Netflix crime thriller titled RIP, according to the streaming service. They’ll be joined by Coming 2 America‘s Teyana Taylor and The Flash‘s Sasha Calle. Plot details are being kept under wraps. A release date has yet to be announced …
While the hit film has been available to purchase or rent on digital since August, Twisters will be streaming for free on Peacock in November.
The movie starring Glen Powell and Daisy Edgar-Jones has made more than $370 million worldwide since its release on July 19, and if you have Universal’s sibling streaming service, you’ll be able to catch wind of it on Nov. 15.
The update of the 1996 hit Twister that starred the late Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt has Powell playing Tyler, a hotshot storm hunter, who finds a reluctant partner in a Edgar-Jones’ Kate, a climate scientist.
“As storm season intensifies with terrifying phenomena unlike anything seen before, Kate and Tyler realize they may need to work together if they are to have any chance of taming, and surviving, an unprecedented outbreak of destructive tornadoes,” according to the movie’s synopsis.
