The World Beyond BetterMost > The Culture Tent
"Glee" anybody?
Aloysius J. Gleek:
http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2012/01/lea-michele-chris-colfer-wont-be-getting-glee-spin-off-will-return-next-season.html
Lea Michele, Chris Colfer
Won't Be Getting Glee Spin-Off,
Will Return Next Season
By Josef Adalian
Today at 4:11 PM
It looks like Ryan Murphy and Team Glee are closer to figuring out how to handle the pending graduation of several key characters, including those played by Lea Michele, Cory Monteith and Chris Colfer. When last we left the drama over the future of the Fox musical drama, co-creator Ryan Murphy told Deadline that plans for a spin-off were on hold and that a decision on whether to revive them would be made in 2012. Well, the verdict is in: "There will not be a Glee spin-off," Fox Entertainment chief Kevin Reilly said definitively Sunday at his network's portion of the semi-annual TV Critics Association press tour. However, Michele, Colfer, et. al., "are graduating," Reilly says. So they're leaving the show? Probably not.
When asked by reporters whether Michele would return, Reilly said the actress "will still be part of the show." Afterward, when asked to clarify the status of Michele and the other graduating seniors, Reilly admitted that he hadn't yet "looked at all of the contractual situations" of the actors. "But we'd like to have all of them back," he said. As for just how the Glee producers plan to include former high school students in a show about high school, Reilly would only say that Murphy has come up with "a cool idea for next season" and that he couldn't say more. Later, Vulture asked if perhaps producers were mulling a show-within-a-show, or a split focus where some episodes would be set in Lima and others in whatever new universe is created for the former McKinley students. "I'm alluding to some version of that, but I don't want to get ahead of myself," he said.
While Reilly's remarks on Glee might seem a bit vague, they were actually among the more definitive pronouncements of the day, at least when it came to existing shows. The Fox chief said he still hasn't figured out whether to renew Terra Nova, House, or Fringe. "We've done a good job avoiding some of these big decisions," he quipped. Reilly sounded like a man who wants to renew Nova, however, praising the show as a success despite what he conceded were some creative hiccups. The other two shows, however, may see their fates come down to financial issues, with Reilly noting that both shows carry hefty price tags. He promised House producers would get the chance to resolve storylines should this end up being its final season, and he also begged Fringe fans to hold off campaigning for the show's survival just yet. "Please don't start the letter-writing campaign," he said. "I can't take it." Reilly even begged off on the matter of whether The X Factor will bring back host Steve Jones, saying only that Ryan Seacrest has proven he's worth the big bucks he currently makes (and perhaps the big raise he'll likely get as part of his latest contract negotiation).
Reilly did have a few rock-solid things to announce. He unveiled Fox's plans to create a new Saturday late-night animation block designed to foster new toon talent. Former Adult Swim programming chief Nick Weidenfeld has been appointed to run a new unit in charge of developing shows for both the late-night lineup and for a new digital animation platform Fox plans to create. Producer Hend Baghdady (Warren the Ape ) will serve as exec in charge of production for the unit, which will produce up to 50 digital short-form programs each year, starting this year. The late-night block will debut next January and is expected to start off with four series per season. One series which will not be part of Fox's future: The low-rated and critically reviled Jonah Hill toon Allen Gregory. Reilly said the series has been cancelled.
Aloysius J. Gleek:
http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2012/01/darren-criss-on-his-broadway-debut-glee-fans-getting-backstage-and-playing-kristen-wiigs-love-interest.html
Darren Criss on His Broadway Debut,
Glee Fans Getting Backstage,
and Playing Kristen Wiig’s
Love Interest
By Bennett Marcus
Today at 3:00 PM
Darren Criss sings a lot on Glee and gives impromptu performances on promenades and at benefits — but are you ready for him to sing Backstreet Boys on the big screen? Well, it’s definitely happening, Imogene co-director Shari Springer Berman told Vulture. Criss, who plays Kristen Wiig’s much younger love interest in the movie, will act as a sorta-kinda-Jersey guy “in a nineties impersonation band,” Berman said. “I made him work really hard.” Berman was one of many guests, including Alan Cumming and Susan Sarandon, at the Darby in New York last night, where Criss was being feted by the Peggy Siegal Company and Calvin Klein Collection for his three-week stint on Broadway. (He's replaced Daniel Radcliffe as the lead in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying ; later this month, Nick Jonas will take on the role.) We spoke with Criss — who performed five songs at the intimate event, including his piano-ballad rendition of “Teenage Dream” — about the challenges of Broadway, Glee fans getting backstage, and acting opposite Kristen Wiig.
It’s been about a week since you’ve been on Broadway.
I know, yes. It’s been insane.
So what have you learned?
Well, I’ve learned that Daniel Radcliffe is a freaking superhero. You know, I know exactly what I signed up for … I’m very fortunate that it was a three-week run, and there’s the pro and cons: The pro is that you’re in and you’re out. But the con is also, oh, bummer, by the time you’re at three weeks you’ve gotten really in the swing of things, you have to leave. It’s kind of bittersweet. But because I know that’s the amount of time I’m doing it, I’ve kind of exerted my energy in sort of … what’s the word I’m looking for? Accordingly. I’ve been exerting energy accordingly, whereas Dan was doing it for a better half of a year, so I don’t know how he paced himself, because I would have just puttered out, man. [Laughs. ]
What’s been the sort of most amazing moment about this whole experience, when you said, “Wow!”?
I mean, God, I’m so inarticulate about the whole experience because it’s been so overwhelming. It’s everything that all of my Broadway friends said it would be, which is complete and total elation, you know, at the end of the show. The fun thing about doing live theater is that there’s a sort of real-time catharsis and there’s a real sense of immediacy of creating it then, there, and now, and the audience and the people onstage are really experiencing something together. And there’s a rush to that that cannot be defined into words. When you’re doing TV and film it’s very secluded, and it’s inherently sort of compartmentalized into different things.
Have there been any snafus? Cell phones ringing in the audience, missed cues, split pants?
My opening night, I have an electric shaver, it broke in the sink. You know, they combust very easily; if you press one button, the springs and all kinds of stuff fall apart and they kind of combusted in my hands. But nobody saw it and I put it together in the knick of time before you saw it again. So it never happened.
You were shaving your beard?
In the show, yes. But yes, I had a little winter beard before that.
The Times said you grow a beard when you’re off the Glee set.
Well, when I don’t have to shave I don’t shave. [Laughs. ]
What about working with Beau Bridges? He told me before it began that you have to jump over him.
Yes, I do. Was he being figurative or was he saying [laughs ] metaphorically I have to leap over his talent?
He was being literal. He said you have to leap over him, he hoped you had hops.
Yeah, there’s a number where we’re sort of jumping around and playing a little leapfrog, and, uh, I certainly do jump over Beau. But he’s, obviously, such a talented, wonderful man, and he’s one of these guys that’s been in the business forever, so my fun experience has just been picking his brain. [Whispers ]: Tell me stories. Tell me Elizabeth Taylor stories. You know, Tell me anything you’ve got. And he will. So he’s been a delight to work with.
Nick Jonas is going to take your place, and you are taking Daniel Radcliffe’s place. Have you met either of them?
I’ve met both. And Dan has been nothing short of a complete gentleman, and so supportive and available to me. He made that very clear when we met, if I had any questions or concerns — and this was during the remainder of his run. I told him at one point, like, “Hey, man, that is so nice of you, but I won’t come bugging you. Enjoy yourself, you know, this is a very significant and emotional time for you. I’d hate to bug you during your last week.” But all the same, he was very open and said if you want to talk or anything and talk about the show or the character, I’d be happy to give some pointers. And I certainly haven’t felt held back from doing that. Nick is a phenomenal musician, a phenomenal talent; unlike me and Dan, this is not his first time at the rodeo. This is a welcome home for him, for Broadway. He’ll be just fine. It’s us newbies you’ve got to worry about. [Laughs. ]
Any fun stories about the Glee fans that have been coming to the show and crowding the stage door?
Uh, yeah. The cool thing for me is that a lot of the fans that have come backstage that I’ve met are fans that have been with me since before Glee. And those are the people that are really touching to me. And all the Starkids — I have a production company called Starkid, and, obviously, Glee kids. Of course there’s the Glee kids. But I sort of expect that because there’s an exposure level there that’s a little more palpable. But it’s nice when I see the people that have been there since the beginning, that knew me from nothing and now know me on Broadway. So it’s a pretty special wheel.
You did the movie Imogene with Kristen Wiig. What was that like?
Like a big old smile. I haven’t seen it yet, but it’s a delightful little story.
What was it like working with Kristen Wiig?
Amazing. She’s incredible. I mean, what is there to say that hasn’t already been said about Kristen Wiig? She’s a phenomenal star, and she deserves everything that’s coming her way right now.
When you performed Katy Perry's “Teenage Dream,” you said it was the song that changed your life. Can you elaborate on that?
Do I really need to? I was a struggling actor, a part-time composer, and all of a sudden they put me in a blazer, slick my hair back, and give me a Katy Perry song on a hit show, and a year and a half later I’m on Broadway. So, yes, it’s the song that changed my life.
Aloysius J. Gleek:
http://www.tvline.com/2012/01/glee-season-3-rachels-dads-brian-stokes-mitchell-jeff-goldblum/
Glee Exclusive:
Rachel's Gay Dads
Revealed!
By Michael Ausiello
January 17, 2012 07:52 PM PST
Brian Stokes Mitchell and Jeff Goldblum
As far as parental cliffhangers go, it’s second only to the identity of the Mother on a certain CBS sitcom: Glee has finally cast Rachel’s gay dads, and TVLine can reveal which musically-inclined actors landed the plum parts.
A show insider confirms to TVLine exclusively that onetime Law & Order: Criminal Intent detective Jeff Goldblum and Broadway veteran Brian Stokes Mitchell have been tapped to play Hiram and LeRoy Berry, the adoptive parents of Lea Michele’s character.
The duo will first appear in the show’s Valentine’s Day episode — which as luck would have it will actually air on Feb. 14, and is titled “Heart.” And yes, they will sing.
Although Goldblum is best known for his movie and TV work, he’s also an accomplished jazz pianist who made his Broadway debut back in 1971 in the Tony-winning musical Two Gentleman in Verona.
Mitchell, meanwhile, is something of a Great White Way legend, having appeared in dozens of high-profile productions including Jelly’s Last Jam, Ragtime, Man of La Macha and Kiss Me Kate (for which he won a 2000 Tony Award for Best Actor.) His TV credits include playing Kelsey Grammer’s onscreen nemesis on Frasier and a love interest for Vanessa Williams’ Wilhelmina on Ugly Betty.
Thoughts?!
Jeff Wrangler:
--- Quote ---Thoughts?!
--- End quote ---
Yeah. I'm so old I always think of Brian Stokes Mitchell first as Dr. "Jackpot" Jackson on TV's Trapper John, M.D. :-\
(Of course, that means BSM is no spring chicken, either. ;))
Kelda:
Like the idea of Jeff G...
But we saw pics of her Dads in her locker in the first ever episode. And one of them was Black!
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