"Chan" Tatum

Do any of you read GQ? I can't say that I read any magazine religiously anymore (my how things change) but I read this cover story. It's one of those celebrity profiles that makes you wonder why the star's personality offscreen doesn't transfer more to the silver screen.

One of the problems with The Eagle (full review) I think is that Channing Tatum is so serious in it that there's not a lot of tones to vary the star turn. Except, that is, for the tail end in which he cracks a smile and it suddenly feels like a different movie entirely. And one set in 2011 no less. But my point is that he sounds funny and loose and uninhibited in person -- here and elsewhere -- if not quite "wild" as the cover suggests and those things don't seem to be transferring to his performances.

I'm hoping some director can tap into this other engaging fun side of him in a future performance. But unless a male actor is a genius and adds lots of colors on their own to their performances, Hollywood rarely asks for the kind of emotive range from them that it regularly expects of the women. So for now masculine good looks and the ability to hold the camera will have to do.

Maybe his team is keeping him to buttoned up? I don't mean that literally since he still takes his shirt off with generous frequency. On his stripper past for example he says.

"I had wanted to tell people. I'm not ashamed of it. I don't regret one thing. I'm not a person who hides shit."

I'm not sure his people will be pleased with the copious alcohol imbibing in the article, but his delight in giving the journalist plenty of crazed details to work with is pretty funny. As is his virtual boasting at the article's end that the interviewer is not going to find a celebrity to top him any time soon.

More photos here.  I totally want this striped shirt so the advertisement (aka the photoshoot) worked its consumerist magic.

Vanity Fair 2011: "The Young and Beautiful"

Cover shot by Norma Jean Roy

The annual Hollywood Issue cover of Vanity Fair has been revealed with. It's called "The Young and Beautiful"

After the jump I've broken it down into sections so you can see it more clearly... still waiting for a super hi-res version though you can see a fairly good image at Vanity Fair's site. But nothing hi-res enough to print or see faces beautifully large. VF's site links are  malfunctioning so you can't yet read about the making of the cover just yet.

But here's blown up images for you... I'm a giver.

Click to read more ...

Curio: Warren Beatty, Young Lover

Alexa here. When Annette Bening gave a shout-out to husband Warren Beatty's 1962 Golden Globe win in her acceptance speech, I was reminded of this 1962 Movieland magazine of mine.  The issue means to cover Hollywood's "hot new crop of young lovers," and features Beatty, fresh off his Globe win and still under Elia Kazan's tutelage, on its cover.  (A must-read is this recent New Yorker piece on Kazan, but I digress.) The issue also covers Troy Donahue, Dick Beymer, Gardner McKay, Horst Buchholz and George Maharis, so clearly Beatty was the right choice for the cover. The section devoted to him, excerpted below, is hilarious in its critique of his acting and its predictions for his future.  

The handsomest of Today's YOUNG LOVERS and the one who's garnering most of the critical acclaim and column mentions: Warren Beatty. Many of those admirers have likened Beatty to James Dean. But apart from a few minor mannerisms (burying his hands in his pockets, peering intently through his glasses, standing stoop-shouldered) that lots of young men exhibit, the comparison is unjustified. A better parallel, for some remarkable coincidences, is Marlon Brando.

After a few roles on television and a little summer stock, Warren Beatty appeared in the short-lived New York play, "A Loss of Roses." But the experience was no loss to him: He got fine notices and the play's author, William Inge, was much impressed with him.  Inge, who had written a screenplay called "Splendor in the Grass," introduced the young actor to the man who was to direct the film, Elia Kazan.  And here's the first Brando link: Acting Style.

Will they still be around ten, twenty, thirty years from now?

As everyone has known, lo! these many years, Brando's first big click was in the theater, in the play, " A Streetcar Named Desire" - directed by, of course, Elia Kazan. At that time, Kazan was still very involved with the Actor's Studio as a director; so was Brando, as star student. In those days, Kazan was young Brando's mentor and the same influence is apparent in Beatty now. Which brings up my only criticism of him: A product of Northwestern's School of Speech, and Stella Adler's acting school in New York, he is closer to being that which he vehemently denies being - a "method" actor.

Warren Beatty is a good actor. But he will be finer when he re-fines some of his "methodisms." Such as the too-studied movements - just rising from a chair, he spills "soul" all over. And the too-deliberate reactions - his slow smile comes muscle by muscle by muscle. Beatty is under personal contract to Kazan for four more films so his method acting may get stronger before it gets better. Yet better it will get - anyone who comes under the remarkable power of Kazan cannot help but grow into a remarkable performer.

Finally, like Brando, the first of the method actors to light up the flicks, Beatty has that which elicits sighs from ladies in the audience: A pure, unadulterated animal magnetism. Translated, that means sex appeal. (Side comment: I asked a junior staff member on MOVIELAND and TV TIME for her reaction to W.B. Her succinct reply was, "Wow!"). Again, like Brando, Beatty's effect from all reports is just as magnetic off-screen. Which is the true test of every great on-screen lover.

Natalie Portman and Rooney Mara TOPLESS !

What? I was feeling jealous of everyone else's sensationalist headlines. It's weblag from that NYFCC brouhaha and that 'lazy journalism' Jacki Weaver was talking about in our interview. So, 'bout that headline. Define Topless. We're most concerned with definition #3...

...although we suspect most actresses would like us to use the obsolete definition, #5.

Ubiquitous NATALIE PORTMAN found that she just wasn't making enough bank this year from Black Swan or her four, yes four, 2011 features. Also, the covers of every magazine weren't enough now and won't be enough when she wins the Oscar and still won't be enough this summer when she gives birth either. So now you can find her photos inbetween the reams and reams of magazine articles about her as as she hawks Christian Dior's cosmetics and perfumes. Here she is posing for Miss Dior. 

Her children's children's children will have their trust funds all insured by the end of 2011. Also: many trees will die in her honor.

For what it's worth she's more naked in Wes Anderson's Hotel Chevalier (2007) than she'll ever be in a magazine and it's a damn good miniature performance, too.

Meanwhile...

W Magazine has a whole slide show featuring ROONEY MARA as Lisbeth Salander for David Fincher's The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (2011).

Rooney Mara as Lisbeth Salander

The photos are pretty amazing though we're still not crazy about that Millenium Trilogy in concept and apart from the money and that unbreakable serial killer obsessions of David Fincher's, we're still not sure why he's doing it. Especially since you know he's not going to actually make the sequels.

Rooney... remember how much she did with just three scenes in The Social Network? Imagine what she might do over the course of two hours!