Drag Race RuCap: "RDR Live!"

For the next few months, Nick Taylor and Cláudio Alves will be following and recapping RuPaul’s Drag Race season sixteen…

Last week's episode was an eleventh hour tearjerker. Everybody cried.

CLÁUDIO: As ever, I’m disappointed with the Drag Race take on comedy challenges. In this episode, the dolls reprised an idea from All-Stars 8, doing RuPaul’s take on Saturday Night Live. Indeed, they even recycled some of the archetypes and scenarios from that latest All-Stars season, causing some in the fandom to accuse one of the new queens of copying an old gal who found herself in the same shoes. But we’ll talk about that later. All in all, this was my pick for the worst episode of the season so far even before its heartbreaking finish. But I know you have more affection for Drag Race comedy challenges than I do, so your reaction may have been radically different. Was it? 

NICK: This one let me down. I suppose the mediocre writing of the bits made it more authentic to the SNL experience, but almost everyone felt ill-served by the format of the challenge and the bits as scripted . . . .

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Go to link, bitch!

Today's Must Read: LA Times has a very insightful piece on Ellen Degeneres's arc in showbiz, how she won and then lost a generation of viewers

• THR ICYMI Oscar has restored the theatrical release requirement for eligibility along with a few very minor changes in other categories. Good move
• Collider Bong Joon Ho is finally starting his next film after his biggest sucess Parasite. Toni Collette, Mark Ruffalo, Naomi Ackie, and Robert Pattinson will star

After the jump Saturday Night Live departures, Simu Liu's memoir, Daredevil's renewal, Depp vs Heard, and more... 

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Once more into the Linkverse

• Cartoon Brew the animated features that will be competing at Annecy. Will any of these become eligible for the Oscar? There's usually several international contenders
• The New Yorker reviews the excellent French abortion drama Happpening which just opened in US theaters. 
• TFE... we also reviewed it here from Venice. Consider it a must see!
• AV Club Janelle Monae to play Josephine Baker in a tv series focusing on her role in World War II. Sounds fascinating.

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Amazon makes an anti-queer decision on Shortbus (2006), Chicago on Broadway is still stunt-casting, and more after the jump...

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Links: Yellowjackets, Ariana DeBose, Black Panther 2, etc...

• Advocate SNL leaned queer this weekend, pairing Ariana DeBose and Kate McKinnon multiple times during the show. We enjoyed that Sappho skit!
• Vulture reviewing Ariana's episode
• TFE in case you missed it we looked into SNL's history of Oscar-hopeful Hosts
• Cinema Seen yours truly guest starred on Eric Marchen's Canadian movie review tv show
• /Film if you haven't heard, Netflix is raising subscription prices in October

More after jump including New York Times Oscar-like ballots, Yellowjackets mania,  Arnauld Desplechin's next picture, and Carole Lombard's final film...

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Ariana DeBose, Saturday Night Live, and Oscar Campaigns

by Nathaniel R

As you may have heard Best Supporting Actress Oscar hopeful Ariana DeBose (West Side Story) will be hosting Saturday Night Live when the show returns tomorrow, January 15th. That's just 12 days before the Academy starts voting on nominations. Which got us to thinking: How often is Saturday Night Live used as a campaign stop for Oscar hopefuls and is it successful? Let's do a little research. We're only going back five years for time constraint reasons but we do wonder when this became a thing or if it's always been thus? I have only ever been a casual SNL viewer but perhaps there are Saturday Night Live experts reading who could shed some light...

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