L.A. Times - Entertainment News

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• Actresses over 40 on a cinematic roll
• The Coen brothers redo 'True Grit' for their first western
• Julie Taymor's visions manifest in 'Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark' and 'The Tempest'
• Engagement pictures of Prince William, Kate Middleton released
• Dramas so dark they're funny
• Michael Jackson estate is warily watching rival releases
• Mexican TV moves beyond the telenovela
• The Sunday Conversation: With Carrie Fisher
• New on DVD: 'Despicable Me'
• 'Glee': Tonsillitis brings production to a halt

Actresses over 40 on a cinematic roll Posted: 12 Dec 2010 12:00 AM PST Meryl Streep, Sandra Bullock, Annette Bening and other leading ladies beyond 40 are in prime form on the screen as studios pay attention to an older female audience and actresses flex their producer muscles. In 1962, the year she was nominated for an Oscar for playing a grotesque has-been in "What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?," 54-year-old Bette Davis placed an ad in Variety. "Thirty years experience as an actress in Motion Pictures," the ad read. "Mobile still and more affable than rumor would have it. Wants steady employment in Hollywood. (Has had Broadway)."

The Coen brothers redo 'True Grit' for their first western Posted: 12 Dec 2010 12:00 AM PST Charles Portis' novel rather than the 1969 John Wayne film piqued their interest, the siblings say. Jeff Bridges, their Rooster Cogburn, agrees. It wasn't the celluloid ghost of John Wayne that inspired the Coen brothers to go off into the dusty ravines and bleak prairie land of New Mexico to make "True Grit," their 15th feature film and first western. No, this was a project with a storybook beginning.

Julie Taymor's visions manifest in 'Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark' and 'The Tempest' Posted: 12 Dec 2010 12:00 AM PST In the ambitious new musical and Shakespearean film, the director brings her fantastical ideas into being. — Jammed with computers, cables and technicians, the orchestra section inside the Foxwoods Theatre looked like the control room at a particle accelerator, yet it was a very different kind of physics experiment Julie Taymor was trying to manage.

Engagement pictures of Prince William, Kate Middleton released Posted: 11 Dec 2010 12:00 AM PST The upcoming nuptials of Prince William and his fiancee, Kate Middleton, became even more official Saturday, with the release of a pair of engagement photographs. The upcoming nuptials of Prince William and his fiancee, Kate Middleton, became even more official Saturday, with the release of a pair of engagement photographs.

Dramas so dark they're funny Posted: 12 Dec 2010 12:00 AM PST Cable seems to have a different idea of comedy, where shows such as 'Nurse Jackie,' 'Weeds' and 'Californication' fit the bill. On network TV, it's another story altogether. When Edie Falco won an Emmy for outstanding actress in a comedy for her role in "Nurse Jackie" earlier this year, she looked not only surprised, but also surprisingly irritated. Holding the statue at arms length, she said "Oh, this is just the most ridiculous thing that has ever, ever happened in the history of this lovely awards show. Thank you so much. I'm not funny."

Michael Jackson estate is warily watching rival releases Posted: 12 Dec 2010 12:00 AM PST The King of Pop's mother, Katherine, has formed an alliance with Toronto entrepreneur Howard Mann. The estate's lawyers are monitoring releases from his Vintage Pop Media. For someone trying to sell a book, it couldn't get much better than this: Oprah Winfrey, the nation's reader-in-chief, was holding up a glossy volume of Michael Jackson photographs for her vast television audience while tossing softball questions to its co-author, the late singer's 80-year-old mother.

Mexican TV moves beyond the telenovela Posted: 12 Dec 2010 12:00 AM PST Melodramatic soap operas may still rule Mexico's small screen, but Once TV, Televisa and others have launched edgy series like 'XY' and 'Bienes Raíces' that reflect a risk-taking, U.S.-style sensibility making waves in the television industry. One weekly drama probes modern manhood in famously macho Mexico. Another show traipses through trendy Mexico City on the heels of not-quite-grown-up grown-ups fumbling with life and love. A third plunges underground, where strange experiments are taking place in the city's sewers. (It's a cop drama, no less.)

The Sunday Conversation: With Carrie Fisher Posted: 12 Dec 2010 12:00 AM PST She tells all about herself in her one-woman play 'Wishful Drinking.' Carrie Fisher takes on the scandalous breakup of her parents' marriage, when her father, Eddie Fisher, left her mother, Debbie Reynolds, for Elizabeth Taylor; her erstwhile marriage to Paul Simon, her turn as Princess Leia in "Star Wars" and its continuing ripples and much more in her savagely witty one-woman Broadway play, "Wishful Drinking," which comes to HBO on Sunday at 9 p.m. The special includes archival footage from Fisher's colorful life.

New on DVD: 'Despicable Me' Posted: 12 Dec 2010 12:00 AM PST Steve Carell voices a supervillain in the computer-animated tale. Also new: 'The A-Team,' 'The Other Guys,' and 'The Town.' Steve Carell voices a supervillain in the computer-animated tale.

'Glee': Tonsillitis brings production to a halt Posted: 11 Dec 2010 10:35 AM PST Several "Glee" cast members have come down with tonsillitis, forcing the show to shut down production today, a rep for the show confirms.

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