More stories

  • in

    Here are the nominees for best picture.

    “All Quiet on the Western Front”“Avatar: The Way of Water”“The Banshees of Inisherin”“Elvis”“Everything Everywhere All at Once”“The Fabelmans”“Tár”“Top Gun: Maverick”“Triangle of Sadness”“Women Talking” More

  • in

    What will be nominated? Our expert makes his predictions.

    Expect the unexpected: This is an unusually fluid awards season, and most of the top categories still feel up for grabs.When it comes to best picture, three films have been nominated by the producers, directors and actors guilds — “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” “The Fabelmans” and “The Banshees of Inisherin” — and each has won a televised award for best film, too. Those are your front-runners in a category that recently expanded to 10 guaranteed slots, followed closely by “Tár,” the intellectual favorite, and “Top Gun: Maverick,” the popcorn pick.The next two slots should go to two box-office success stories: “Elvis,” the rare adult drama to make a killing last year, and “Avatar: The Way of Water,” which put up eye-popping numbers all through the Oscar-voting period and is poised to pass $2 billion worldwide.What about another huge sequel, “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” which made the producers’ lineup, and the epic-scaled “RRR” and “The Woman King,” both of which that guild snubbed? ABC executives would be thrilled if the telecast could tout those crowd-pleasers, but the expanded best picture lineup has never been dominated by so many action-driven blockbusters. (And I’d have more faith in “Wakanda Forever” if the Screen Actors Guild, which gave the first “Black Panther” its top film prize, had nominated this sequel in the same category.)The best actor winner almost always hails from a film nominated for best picture, so if you think a resurgent Brendan Fraser could go all the way this year, then expect a nod here for “The Whale,” which cast him in a transformative role as a 600-pound recluse. And though Netflix has been pushing “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery,” it’s the streamer’s German-language “All Quiet on the Western Front” that most resonates with the voters I’ve spoken to.There’s still a shot that the Sarah Polley-directed “Women Talking,” which received a SAG ensemble nomination, or the British fave “Aftersun” could show up here. But I’m predicting the final slot goes to the class-warfare comedy “Triangle of Sadness,” which won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, just as another social satire, “Parasite,” did four years ago.For my predictions for the nominees in the other top categories, read more here. More

  • in

    ‘Room’ Will Be Staged on Broadway, Starring Adrienne Warren

    Emma Donoghue adapted the show from her best-selling 2010 novel; she also wrote the screenplay for the 2015 film.“Room,” Emma Donoghue’s harrowing story of a young boy raised in a shed where he and his mother are held captive by a sexual predator, was a best-selling novel in 2010, and then a much-praised film in 2015.Now a stage adaptation of the story is coming to Broadway with Adrienne Warren, a Tony-winning actress, starring as the boy’s mother. Warren, a founder of the antiracism organization Broadway Advocacy Coalition, won the Tony in 2021 for her electrifying performance as Tina Turner in the “Tina” biomusical. She has since appeared in the film “The Woman King” and the television series “Women of the Movement” and signed a development deal with a production company.The stage adaptation of “Room,” which is a drama with songs, has had several productions, starting in 2017 in the British Isles — at Theater Royal Stratford East in London, Abbey Theater in Dublin and National Theater of Scotland in Glasgow — and then last year in Canada, at Grand Theater in London, Ontario, and the Princess of Wales Theater in Toronto.Asked whether the production would be considered a play or a musical for awards purposes, Jim Byk, a spokesman for the show, said, “The producers have previously described ‘Room’ as a play with music, but as there has been considerable work done since the last production, they do not plan on making a definitive call on this until after the show is frozen, as is traditional for productions that could technically qualify for either category.”The Broadway production is scheduled to begin preview performances April 3 and to open April 17 at the James Earl Jones Theater. Donoghue, the Irish Canadian author of both the novel and the screenplay, has also written the stage adaptation; the songs are by two Scotswomen, Kathryn Joseph and Cora Bissett. Bissett is also directing the show.“Room” is being produced by Sam Julyan, James Yeoburn, ShowTown Productions and Hunter Arnold. More

  • in

    Edward R. Pressman, Film Producer Who Boosted Many Careers, Dies at 79

    Oliver Stone, Terrence Malick, Kathryn Bigelow and other directors were just starting when he took on their projects.Edward R. Pressman, a prolific film producer who guided some of the earliest movies by Brian De Palma, Terrence Malick, Oliver Stone, Kathryn Bigelow and other leading directors, died on Tuesday in Los Angeles. He was 79.The cause was respiratory failure, his family said.Mr. Pressman was producer or executive producer on almost 100 movies across a range of genres. His career began in the late 1960s and by 1988 had already resulted in enough acclaimed films that he was the subject of an 11-movie retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art in Manhattan.The New York Times said then that he “has been distinguished by his dedication to both highly literate and decidedly quirky movie projects during the last two decades.” And he still had some three decades and more than 60 movies ahead of him.Jack Nicholson as the labor leader Jimmy Hoffa in the 1992 film “Hoffa.” Mr. Pressman persuaded David Mamet to write a screenplay, recruited Mr. Nicholson to star and made an unconventional choice for director: the comic actor Danny DeVito.Liaison/Hulton Archive, via Getty ImagesMr. Pressman’s name is on films about intriguing real-life figures — “Hoffa” (1992), with Jack Nicholson as the Teamsters boss Jimmy Hoffa; “The Man Who Knew Infinity” (2015), which starred Dev Patel as the Indian mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan; “Paterno” (2018), the HBO film in which Al Pacino portrayed the football coach Joe Paterno. It is on action fantasies like “Conan the Barbarian” (1982), the movie that brought Arnold Schwarzenegger to stardom. It is on scalding crime dramas like “Bad Lieutenant” (1992) and “American Psycho” (2000).His biggest claim to fame, especially early in his career, may have been his willingness to take a chance on unproven talent.One of his first forays as a producer was a movie about a murder that may or may not have been committed by one of two formerly conjoined twins, “Sisters” (1972) — Mr. De Palma’s breakthrough in the creepy crime genre. (Mr. Pressman was also a producer on a 2006 remake, directed by Douglas Buck.) Two years later, he produced Mr. De Palma’s comic drama about a disfigured composer who sells his soul, “Phantom of the Paradise,” which has become a cult favorite.Martin Sheen and Sissy Spacek in “Badlands” (1973), the first feature directed by Terrence Malick. Mr. Pressman said he was partial, especially early in his career, to movies like this one that were “the expression of a single vision.”Michael Ochs Archives/Getty ImagesIn between those two he produced the first feature directed by Mr. Malick, “Badlands” (1973), which starred Martin Sheen and Sissy Spacek, both still early in their careers, as criminals on the run. In 1981 he produced the horror film “The Hand,” the first studio feature directed by Mr. Stone.In 1990 he and Mr. Stone were producers on the crime drama “Blue Steel,” a film by another relative newcomer, Ms. Bigelow; 30 years later she became the first woman to win the directing Oscar, for “The Hurt Locker.” Mr. Pressman also took a chance on David Byrne, the lead singer of Talking Heads, producing Mr. Byrne’s feature debut as a director, the offbeat comedy “True Stories” (1986).Whatever project he was involved in, Mr. Pressman generally avoided the hands-on approach some other producers favor.“The hardest thing I’ve learned over the years is that I’m getting paid a lot of money to produce a movie, but sometimes the best thing to do is nothing,” he told The New York Times in 1992, when he was making “Hoffa.” “I don’t need to impose myself.”Nonetheless, he knew he played a vital role.“It’s the creative urge that makes me work,” he told American Film magazine for a 1988 article. “The pleasure is, to some extent, vicarious, but it’s no less creative for that. It is creating a world by bringing together creative financing with creative filmmakers. In a sense, producing can be compared to conceptual art.”Although Mr. Pressman and his company, Pressman Film, worked with major studios, he was partial, especially early in his career, to independent films — movies that were “the expression of a single vision,” as he put it in a 1989 interview with SBS of Australia, like “Badlands,” which was both directed and written by Mr. Malick.Other times, he viewed his job as bringing together the right director, writer and actor, as with “Hoffa” — he persuaded David Mamet to write a screenplay, recruited Mr. Nicholson to star and, after a few other candidates proved not to be a good fit, made an unconventional choice for director: the comic actor Danny DeVito.“I think of myself as a catalyst in attracting the key elements,” he told The Times.And sometimes he was the person who validated a director’s vision, as he was for Ms. Bigelow on “Blue Steel,” which, in addition to directing, she wrote with Eric Red.“The script for ‘Blue Steel’ was rejected multiple times; the general response was, ‘Could the NYC police officer be a man instead of a woman?’” Ms. Bigelow said by email. “I said, no. Then Ed Pressman agreed. Jaimie Lee Curtis played the officer. Ed offered a lifeline.”Charlie Sheen, left, and Michael Douglas on the set of “Wall Street” (1987), one of many movies on which Mr. Pressman worked with the director Oliver Stone.Sunset Boulevard/Corbis, via Getty ImagesEdward Rambach Pressman was born on April 11, 1943, in Manhattan. His parents, Jack and Lynn (Rambach) Pressman, founded the Pressman Toy Corporation, and, especially after his father died when he was a teenager, there was some expectation that Edward would go into the family business, but his interests veered to other things.At Stanford University, he studied philosophy, earning a bachelor’s degree in 1965, and he first started thinking about a career in the movie business.“I had a roommate my senior year whose father was a director,” he told American Film in 1991, “and we’d talk about making films.”The prospect of actually doing so seemed remote, he said, but it became a reality when, studying for a year at the London School of Economics, he met Paul Williams, a fellow American who was going to Cambridge and who shared his growing interest in films.“I thought he was, you know, Cecil B. De Mille,” Mr. Pressman said, “and he thought I was Louis Mayer.”They jointly produced a short that Mr. Williams wrote and directed, “Girl” (1967). Two years later they combined again on a feature, “Out of It,” again written and directed by Mr. Williams; Jon Voigt was in the cast, as he was for Mr. Pressman’s next project with Mr. Williams, “The Revolutionary” (1970).Mr. Williams had only a limited career after that, but Mr. Pressman was on his way.His later movies included Mr. Stone’s “Wall Street” (1987), a defining movie of the 1980s. It was while making Mr. Stone’s “The Hand” that Mr. Pressman met Annie McEncroe, who was in the cast (for most of her movie career she was billed as Annie McEnroe); they married in 1983. She survives him, along with their son, Sam Pressman, an executive at Pressman Film; a sister, Ann Markelson; and a brother, Jim. Arnold Schwarzenegger in “Conan the Barbarian” (1982), directed by John Milius and produced by Mr. Pressman. In addition to producing prestige films, Mr. Pressman liked making movies based on pulp magazine and comic book characters.Universal Pictures-Sunset Boulevard/Corbis, via Getty ImagesIn addition to advancing the careers of directors and actors, Mr. Pressman advanced a genre: He was big on making movies based on pulp magazine and comic book characters, something that was not as common when he began doing it in the early 1980s as it is today, in the age of digital effects.“Conan the Barbarian” and its sequel, “Conan the Destroyer” (1984), were based on the pulp character created in the 1930s by Robert E. Howard, and Mr. Pressman’s comics-inspired films included “The Crow” (1994) and several sequels, as well as “Judge Dredd” (1995).“Comic books, video games, interactive software — these are all areas where artists can create with great freedom and imagination,” he told Business Wire, prophetically, in 1993. “They will be a major part of the motion picture industry’s future.” More