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Friday, September 17, 2021 at 5:00PM • Tom and Lorenzo Jessica Chastain goes full disco queen at the premiere of The Eyes of Tammy Faye
• Out Very sad about this. HBOMax has cancelled the excellent queer series that you aren't watching Genera+ion. We can only hope its ferociously talented leading man Justice Smith gets another role as good soon. Martha Plimpton the shows other MVP is never lacking for work so we don't worry about her
• Forbes why Chris Nolan chose Universal as he leaves his longtime Warner Bros home
Betty Boop, Simu Liu, Miriam Margolyes, Stephen Sondheim, The Bodyguard, and more after the jump...
• Australia Men's Health Simu Liu profile and photoshoot
• YouTube Stephen Sondheim on The Late Show -- he's actually writing new music!
• New York Times movie musical star Jane Powell (Royal Wedding, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers) has died
• THR TBrilliant Emmy nominee Michael K Williams (Lovecraft Country) dead at 54 (this happened while we were in Venice, hence no mention of it on the blog -- how terrible!)
• Cartoon Brew bizarre story about a false myth of the creation of the cartoon character Betty Boop, misinformation that most of the internet now believes. PBS has retracted the story six years later
• NYT Broadway's biggest hits reopened Tuesday and people are pretty emotional about it
• Advocate congratulations to Garret Clayton (King Cobra, The Fosters) who has married his longtime boyfriend. Alicia Silverstone officiated!
• Daily Mail excerpt from a new memoir by the hilarious British actress Miriam Margolyes
• Actors in Scandinavia Finland's 2020 Oscar submission Tove a biopic about a famous children's book author just won the big prizes at the "Jussi Awards"
• /Film The Bodyguard remake is back on at Warner Bros. This seems like a spectacularly bad idea to us. But we can't say it any better than Guy Lodge did. He tweeted...
There is nothing worth remaking in The Bodyguard, a nonsense film from a threadbare script that we remember only because it captured Whitney Houston at the absolute, incandescent supernova zenith of her stardom. You can’t remake Whitney Houston, so why bother? https://t.co/fwvKkRnHNF
— Guy Lodge (@GuyLodge) September 15, 2021
Reader Comments (14)
I get all of the reasons for not having another Bodyguard film. However, if you put Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper in front of the camera for that again, I'd happily watch. They're a great star pairing, and I think audiences would love to see them in a film together again.
Chastain looks great and like she's having the time of her life. I love the drag queen inclusion too. Very excited to see her film, and hopefully, for her to have a nice run at awards between Tammy Faye and Scenes for the next year.
I would watch a remake of The Bodyguard that reteams Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper. Maybe Guy Lodge can play Rachel’s nasty PR man, Sy.
Oh come on, don't you want to see another actress get the chance to win a fake Best Actress Oscar for their starring role in 'Queen of the Night' in a Bodyguard remake?
Since it was supposed to be Diana Ross and Ryan O'Neal in the first place (script by Lawrence Kasdan, directed by John Boorman) and the version that finally got made isn't exactly God's gift to cinema, why not "remake" The Bodyguard?
A remake of The Bodyguard? Fuck that!
Jessica Chastain looks incredible and... put her in a disco movie!
I'm ambivalent towards a Bodyguard remake. If they get great stars then cool, if they don't, then oh well! The original movie is far from a masterpiece, but it's fun and if I want to see a better version of it I can always watch Beyond the Lights.
Keep Gaga and Bradley far away from it. They're great together, but if/when they reunite it should be in something completely different from A Star is Born.
THE BODYGUARD isn't good, which... well, if you're going to remake something, might as well be something that wasn't good in the first place. But it is a cultural landmark and, as Guy alluded to, they don't make stars like they used to. I remember when they kept talking about remaking this with Rihanna what feels like ten years ago now. Who could they possibly use today? Unless it's Taylor Swift then there's really no point. And I do not want a BODYGUARD with Taylor Swift.
If a director actually took the project seriously then maybe? I just imagine that instead of *cinema* like we got with A STAR IS BORN, we'd get some dull as dishwater cover version with a Camila Carbello style lead who can't sing and the movie would look like garbage. Flat and overlit like so many movies these days.
I'm VERY annoyed HBOMax canceled Genera+ion especially since they renewed the Gossip Girl revival and just WHYYYY. Justice for Justice Smith! That said, if they renew The Other Two (which everyone SHOULD be watching also) then I will forgive them.
I too am very emotional that Broadway is back. I have tickets to see two shows next month. I can't wait to be back to live theatre!
Apparently, Lizzo wants to star in the Bodyguard remake and she wants Chris Evans to be her co-star.
But I'm with Guy on this. Whoever gets cast in the part will forever be compared to Whitney and Whitney is just going to win each time.
Perhaps a solution would be to gender reverse the roles? A female bodyguard maybe? It would give the script something to play with maybe create a dynamic for the actors to play around with.
I have read Miriam Margolyes's memoir and I would SERIOUSLY recommend it. So many juicy titbits about Hollywood stars from Maggie Smith and Barbara Streisand to Leonardo DiCaprio and more.
On the set of 'The Age of Innocence', Margolyes found Pfeiffer so beautiful that she greeted her by saying 'Hello Fatty' which Pfeiffer apparently loved. But more interesting is that Daniel Day-Lewis and Winona Ryder were reportedly *very* close on the set and Margolyes asked them if they were fucking. Day-Lewis retorted that 'you can't ask questions like that Miriam' and Miriam said she didn't even need to ask.
Damn, it looks like Miriam Margolyes's book won't be out in the US until May. I will definitely put it on my reading list, though.
Gaga and Cooper have too much sense (and have been too good at managing their careers) to star in a remake of The Bodyguard.
I was hoping for a little more than just a quick mention and a link to her obit for Jane Powell. She might not have been Elizabeth Taylor famous, though she was a huge star in her day, but she really was one of the last major performers of the Golden Age of musicals to exit the stage.
I am completely with Guy Lodge. The Bodyguard is worthless outside of Whitney Houston, and Debbie Reynolds' fun blink and you miss it cameo.
joel6 -- she was going to get her own post but between venice ending and nyff screenings beginning i just couldn't manage it.
First, Jessica Chastain is coming for that Oscar, she deserves it , also saw her in HBO Scenes from a Marriage and she's stunning.
The Bodyguard, really ? That was bad and just a vehicle for WH. Just stop remaking (good or bad) movies, just watched The Guilty and Gyllenhaal is brilliant, as usual, but in the end I was like "Why bother ?".
Unless someone is bringing something new to the table (a la Dune), just don't. I am already feeling annoyed by The West Side Story (don't touch classics).