The Queen is unlikely to watch Oprah Winfrey’s box office interview with Meghan Markle and Prince Harry, but her courtiers have told The Sunday Times that Her Majesty is “pretty cheesed off” with the whole affair.
According to a report from the British newspaper’s royal correspondent Roya Nikkhah and the well-connected Tim Shipman, Queen Elizabeth II will ignore the CBS broadcast (which will be shown in the UK on Monday by ITV), and instead focus on a string of engagements this coming week.
Buckingham Palace aides came out swinging in the Sunday newspaper, branding the interview special a “circus” and claiming that the Queen is focused on the “big issues” facing the country, including children returning to school amid lockdown and the rollout of the coronavirus vaccine.
“The mood in the family is: can everyone just shut the hell up and can we just get on with the day job,” said one source. Other UK newspapers were briefed in a similar way on Sunday, with a source telling the Mail On Sunday: “On Monday most people in Britain will be thinking about schools going back, getting the vaccine and, at the Palace particularly, looking forward to the Duke of Edinburgh coming out of hospital. This is just a sideshow.”
The Sunday Times reported that there has been talk among royal courtiers about stripping Prince Harry and Markle of their Duke and Duchess titles, should the interview end disastrously for the royal family. The Queen would have to approve such a move, however, and a source close to Her Majesty told the newspaper that this nuclear option is “not up for debate.”
It comes as Buckingham Palace took the unprecedented step of launching an investigation into bullying allegations made against Markle in 2018, when she was based at Kensington Palace. The Times Of London obtained an email sent in October 2018 by Jason Knauf, a former communications executive for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, in which he claimed that Markle “was able to bully two PAs out of the household.”
A spokeswoman for the Sussex’s told Deadline that they were “saddened” by the accusation, which they put down to a “smear campaign” ahead of the CBS interview being broadcast on Sunday night. In promos for the sit-down, Markle says: “I don’t know how they could expect that after all of this time we would still just be silent if there is an active role that the firm is playing in perpetuating falsehoods about us.”
CBS broadcasts Oprah with Meghan and Harryat 8PM on Sunday. It will be shown on ITV in the UK at 9PM on Monday.
March 8 is International Women’ Day and March is Women’s History Month, and many outlets are celebrating with special events and/or programming. Here’s a roundup.
EVENTS/PANELS
On Broadway, the neon lights will shine on the fourth annual Women’s Day on Broadway. This year’s virtual event begins at 1 p.m. ET/11 a.m. PT March 12, with participants including Marija Abney, Laura Benanti, Tanya Birl, Pearl Cleage, Cara Cooper, Maria Manuela Goyanes, Alia Jones-Harvey, Gethsemane Herron-Coward, Vanessa Javier, Tavia Jefferson, Julia Jones, Eva Price and a performance by the Broadway Sinfonietta.
The Paley Center for Media in New York is launching a new quarterly series of high-profile conversations to celebrate the ongoing achievements of women and to explore the challenges they continue to face. It launches on March 8 with Choosing to Challenge: How Women Are Leading the Way, which focuses on women’s roles as leaders in our society and will address some of the most significant issues facing all women.
Across the pond, the Royal Opera House will stream Influence, Challenge and Change: What Is Next for Women in the Creative Industries? on its YouTube channel. It will be chaired by The Guardian chief theater critic Arifa Akba.
ATTN: is teaming with T-Mobile and the Little Market for Conversations with Changemakers, a speaker series that premieres March 8 and will feature Charlize Theron, Jane Fonda, Jessica Alba, Glennon Doyle, Kelly Ripa, Sofia Vergara, Amy Schumer, Chelsea Handler, Jameela Jamil and Dolores Huerta.
The livestreaming hub Bandsintown is teaming with Kitsuné Musique and shesaid.so for a tribute to women by women with a Women’s Day 24-hour mix. It will take place in two parts on March 8 and 9.
PROGRAMMING
CBS This Morning will mark International Women’s Day on March 8 with a Gayle King interview of Malala Yousafzai along with guests Stacey Abrams and Janelle Monae.
Starz will air director Freida Lee Mock’s documentary Ruth: Justice Ginsburg In Her Own Words on March 15, which would have been the late Supreme Court titan’s 88th birthday.
Oprah Winfrey’s Super Soul premieres March 6 on Discovery+, with interviews during the month with Andra Day, Sharon Stone, Priyanka Chopra Jonas and Juliana Margulies. It also will stream OWN Spotlight: Andra Day starting March 6.
ESPN will premiere women’s sport-centric content throughout the month across multiple platforms, anchored by the March 16 hourlong primetime special, SportsCenter presents: espnW – History in the Making.
Revry’s March calendar includes female queer content including the crime-comedy feature Addicted to Fresno, civil rights documentary Political Animals, new animated series My Pride: The Series
ATTN: is teaming with T-Mobile and the Little Market for Conversations with Changemakers, a speaker series that premieres March 8 and will feature Charlize Theron, Jane Fonda, Jessica Alba, Glennon Doyle, Kelly Ripa, Sofia Vergara, Amy Schumer, Chelsea Handler, Jameela Jamil and Dolores Huerta.
Fox’s free streaming service Tubi is featuring a collection of titles dedicated to female-centric features, documentaries and directors, including the Underworld films, Whale Rider and Why We Laugh: Funny Women.
Southern California pubcasters KCET and PBS SoCal will have a slate that includes Dolly Parton and Friends: 50 Years at The Opry, Tina Turner: One Last Time, Carol Burnett: A Celebration, Freedom Writers: Stories from the Heart and Daring Women Doctors: Physicians in the 19th Century.
ABC Owned Television Stations celebrates women across the country, sharing their stories of perseverance, hope and triumph with the five-part series Our America: Women Forward, which premieres in newscasts on March 8. Watch the trailer here.
MSG Networks is marking the month by highlighting exceptional contributions of women throughout sports history, with subjects including Billie Jean King and Title IX and original programming from Athletes Unlimited, the organization of professional women’s sports leagues.
Indie SVOD service Film Movement will mark Women’s History Month with the premieres of seven films by female directors, including Godless, The Space Between: Marina Abramovic and Brazil, Queen of Hearts: Audrey Flack and more.
The 2020 classical music documentary Forte will be available to stream for free on March 8 — International Women’s Day — will be streaming for the rest of the month as well.
FUNDRAISING
Hillary Clinton, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and special guests Amanda Gorman and Chrissy Teigen are teaming for a virtual fundraising event. “International Women’s Day with Hillary Clinton and Nancy Pelosi” will feature a discussion ranging from the future of our democracy to why it’s so important for women to hold leadership positions.
CBS’ The Daily Show with Trevor Noah has been spotlighting “She Should Run,” a fundraising effort aimed at supporting more women to become candidates for local office.
DONATIONS
Netflix’s Head of Global TV Bela Bajaria announced that the first $5 million of the streamer’s recently announced Creative Equity Fund will go toward programs that help to nurture, develop and uplift women in the entertainment industry globally. The fund dedicates $20 million annually over the next five years to setting underrepresented communities up for success in the TV and film industries.
PODCASTS
The eight-part ABC News podcast In Plain Sight: Lady Bird Johnson, which is told in the former first lady’s own words from mostly unheard audio diaries, is available for free at most podcast outlets.
In honor of awards season, Real Time host Bill Maher affixed a special ribbon to his lapel and spoke out about an urgent new cause.
“It’s time to raise awareness about a very serious problem: raising awareness,” he cracked in the “New Rules” show-capper, “We raise too much of it, and it’s making us crazy, anxious and depressed. Must we be sad about everything all the time most of which we can’t do everything about?”
A daunting list of diseases and medical conditions are being acknowledged in the month of March, which, he joked, “comes in like a brain injury and goes out like deep-vein thrombosis. This coming week, he reminded his (still limited and socially distanced) audience, is World Salt Awareness Week — “a whole week to be aware of salt.”
A dense thicket of ribbons, flags, ads and hashtags, Maher said, has grown around this glut of misguided cause advocacy. People have become “so aware of every bad thing that could happen that we’ve completely run out of colors,” he lamented. Maher said used to like purple, but now that he’s been told it represents Alzheimer’s, lupus and the opioid epidemic, “it scares the sh-t out of me.”
Pink, Maher continued, has infiltrated a number of corners of society as a beacon of attention for breast cancer. The color can be found everywhere from the office supply aisles of Staples to drill bits for fracking (that not a joke, and it’s a product which Maher noted “is probably giving us cancer”).
Most famously, the NFL signed on several years ago to turn player cleats, field markings and coaches’ hats bright pink every October for Breast Cancer Awareness Month. After going “on the record” as being against breast cancer, Maher despaired, “I’m trying to escape for a few hours – can’t I watch the game without thinking about cancer?! We’ve all heard about it. It’s like raising awareness for death.” Here, he imagined one unenlightened soul having his awareness raised. ‘Hey, what’s that black ribbon for? ‘Death’ ‘What’s that?’ ‘It’s when you’re not alive anymore. Would you like to hear more?!”
One culprit, Maher has concluded wasn’t a particular color but a very specific item in every kitchen: milk. “Someone in the ’80s looked at a milk carton and said, ‘What a waste, not using milk as a vehicle for missing children to plead with you to put down that shredded wheat and get out there and crack my cold case!’”
Budweiser, Maher ranted, pulled out of advertising on the Super Bowl and redirected the budget for advertising to “raising awareness of Covid — which I’m pretty aware of! Hey, Budweiser — you weren’t put on Earth to raise awareness. You were put on Earth to lower it.”
Airline crew members, he went on, now wear Black Lives Matter pins throughout flights on some airlines. “Can I just get a rum and coke and hold the white guilt trip until we land?”
Ribbons and all of the other signals, Maher said, are “not there to make me think, so much as to raise awareness of what a good person you are. This is to activism what putting a flag on your car is to patriotism.”
Superman & Lois is flying high following its debut. The premiere episode of The CW series drew 3.25 million total viewers in L+7, up 80% (+1.5 million) from Live+Same day, according to Nielsen, making it the most-streamed series premiere in the network’s history. Superman & Lois also ranks first among The CW’s premieres this season in A18-49. The series premiere had the largest percentage growth in the key demo among the network’s new series debuts, up 105% over L+SD to a 0.76 rating in L+7.
Additionally, beginning with episode two, each episode of Superman & Lois’ first season will feature additional footage or scenes when it becomes available on The CW app and CWTV.com after its broadcast on the network, the CW said Friday.
The network noted that the additional footage included in each of the extended streaming episodes will vary.
After the finale, the entire first season of Superman & Lois extended cut episodes will be available to binge on The CW app and CWTV.com, for free with no subscription or login required, until 30 days prior to the start of the next season.
The series, which was recently renewed for a second season, stars Tyler Hoechlin as Clark Kent/Superman, Elizabeth Tulloch as Lois Lane, Jordan Elsass as Jonathan Kent, Alexander Garfin as Jordan Kent, Erik Valdez as Kyle Cushing, Inde Navarrette as Sarah Cushing, Wolé Parks as The Stranger, Adam Rayner as Morgan Edge with Dylan Walsh as General Samuel Lane and Emmanuelle Chriqui as Lana Lang Cushing.
Based on the characters from DC created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, Superman & Lois is developed by Greg Berlanti & Todd Helbing, who serve as executive producers of the series with Sarah Schechter, Geoff Johns and David Madden. Todd Helbing wrote the teleplay for the first episode, based on a story by Greg Berlanti & Todd Helbing. Lee Toland Krieger executive produced and directed the first episode. Superman & Lois is from Berlanti Productions in association with Warner Bros. Television.
Warning: The following recap of WandaVision, Episode 9 “The Series Finale” contains some major spoilers:
First off, if the title of the episode is any indication, we definitely won’t be getting a second season of WandaVision.
Marvel Boss Kevin Feige told the press at TCA last week “to never say never” when it comes to a season 2 of the Elizabeth Olsen-Paul Bettany Disney+ Marvel series, but it’s certainly clear now that the series will bridge to the movies Captain Marvel 2 (or upcoming Disney+ Secret Invasion series) as expected and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.
In regards to how the finale directed by Matt Shakman and written by Jac Schaeffer extends to those big pics, read on. However, to clear up a few big things that some were expecting and did not occur: Big bad villain Mephisto never revealed himself, and as of this moment, Agnes’ husband Ralph doesn’t appear to be Mephisto. Later on in the episode as Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris) learns while being holed up with Evan Peters’ Quicksilver, he turns out to be an actor by the name of Ralph Bohner. Logically, it’s the “Ralph” who Agnes (Kathryn Hahn) kept referring to as her husband. In another ‘duh’, Evan Peters’ character is really not Pietro Maximoff. Also, walking away from tonight’s episode, it’s not clear how “The Series Finale” connects to Sony/Marvel’s upcoming Spider-Man: No Way Home movie. If that’s the case, we’ll learn more in December.
While we were all waiting at the edge of our seats for major revelations tonight, WandaVision‘s last episode wraps up in a favorable, although predictable way: Good triumphs over evil, i.e. Agnes doesn’t rule the day; and Wanda transforms into the Scarlet Witch as expected.
All of this said, there is a cliffhanger: Will Wanda ever see her family again, meaning hubby Vision and boys Billy and Tommy? And if so, when? Fast forward to the second of two end-credit sequences and we see Wanda, far away secluded in a cabin in a snowy mountain wilderness. As she enjoys a cup of tea on the porch, her alter ego, the Scarlet Witch is busy inside, going through Agnes’ Darkhold Book (aka the Book of the Damn) and in the distance, Scarlet hears the screams of Tommy and Billy calling for her help.
The first coda pertains to Monica. As she’s clearing up the debris from Agnes and Wanda’s fight in the Westview town square, with Hayward (Josh Stamberg) arrested in the distance, she’s called inside a movie theater (which looks a lot like the one on the Disney Burbank, CA lot) by an FBI agent who reveals herself to be a Skrull (you know, one of the aliens from Captain Marvel). Setting up the handoff to that sequel, the Skrull tells Monica, “He heard you’d been grounded. He’d like to meet with you.” Monica smiles. ‘He’ is greatly believed to be Samuel L. Jackson’s Nick Fury. Fury was last seen in the end credits sequence on a space ship in Spider-Man: Far From Home. Hence Monica’s next journey with Fury will be in Captain Marvel 2 or with him and Skrull leader Talos (Ben Mendelsohn) in Secret Invasion. Moments before, during the close of the episode, one of Monica’s parting conversations with Wanda is “Given the chance and given you power, I’d bring my mom back. I know I would.” Wanda answers, “I’m sorry. For all the pain I’ve caused. I don’t understand this power, but I will.”
Other major moments that went down during “The Series Finale”:
—There’s a lot of back-and-forth fighting between Agnes and Wanda. Remember from episode 8, Agnes absorbs power and this becomes Wanda’s constant headache on how to beat her throughout this episode. We begin “The Series Finale” with Agnes having a purple power chain around Tommy and Billy’s throats. Wanda feasibly releases them with a red bolt to Agnes’ chest. Like Darth Vader teaching Luke Skywalker a thing or two about the dark side during a lightsaber fight, we’ve got that going on with the clash between Agnes and Wanda here. “The Scarlet Witch isn’t born, she’s forged,” Agnes teaches Wanda during battle. “I’m not a witch, I don’t cast spells, no one taught me magic” cries Wanda. “It’s your destiny to destroy the world,” says Agnes before torturing a number of the Westview citizens, whom Wanda scurries to save.
“You’ve tied your family to this twisted world and now you can’t live without either,” says Agnes, “Save Westview or save your family.”
Later, on, in the ultimate showdown between Agnes and Wanda, it appears the latter has lost after zapping the former with enough red bolts. Wanda looks drained, but alas, it’s Agnes without the power, as the former regains her energy.
“In a given space only the witch who casts them can use her magic,” Wanda tells Agnes about using the Runes, “Thanks for the lesson. But I don’t need you to tell me who I am”. And the red witch ears begin to form on Wanda’s head as she absorbs all of Agnes’ power and becomes the Scarlet Witch in her full uniformed red gown. “Oh, God. You don’t know what you’ve done,” says Agnes. The two float back to the Westview town square where Wanda’s punishment for Agnes is making her the nosy neighbor indefinitely in Westview.
–A hysterical line from tonight, “Boys, handle the military, Mommy will be right back,” Wanda instructs Billy and Tommy on taking out Hayward’s troops in the town square.
—Vision, what of him? As Agnes and Wanda do battle throughout the episode, so do Hayward’s White Vision and Wanda’s “Conditional” Vision. White Vision initially appears and Wanda thinks it’s really him; he takes her face in his hands and begins to crush her. But then “Conditional” Vision shows up and knocks him down. There’s a lot of crash, bang, boom between “Conditional” Vision and White Vision. The latter is programmed to take “Conditional Vision” out. But then “Conditional Vision” logically convinces White Vision that he’s not the guy he’s looking for. “Conditional” Vision scans the memories of White Vision, which jog through all of regular Vision’s moments in the MCU up to Thanos’ destroying him, and in a moment of clarity, White Vision declares, “I Am Vision” and swoops up to the sky and disappears. End of that.
Toward the end, Wanda and Vision take their sons home to put them to bed. Wanda has the Hex dissipating around Westview. As it approaches their house, Wanda and Vision know it’s the temporary end of him, as well as a long nap for the boys. Wanda and Vision see the red Hex coming, and he knows it’s the end, for a while. He may be back at some point in the future, but he gets he can’t live in Wanda’s world right now. In a teary moment, Vision asks Wanda, “What am I am?” She answers, “You, Vision, are the piece of the mind stone that lives in me. You are a body of wires and blood and bone that I created. You are my sadness and my hope. But mostly, you are my love.”
And if that didn’t make you cry, well, then you’ve got the stone cold heart of Thanos.
UPDATED: The Night Shift star Eoin Macken has been tapped as the male lead opposite Natalie Zea in NBC’s drama pilot La Brea. Another NBC series star, Chicago P.D.‘s Jon Seda, is one of three actors, originally cast in the project a year ago and released in June, who have been brought back to reprise their roles, along with Veronica St. Clair and Chiké Okonkwo.
In La Brea, written by David Applebaum, when a massive sinkhole mysteriously opens in Los Angeles, it tears a family in half, separating mother (Zea) and son (Martin) from father (Macken) and daughter (Gorecki). When part of the family find themselves in an unexplainable primeval world, alongside a disparate group of strangers, they must work to survive and uncover the mystery of where they are and if there is a way back home. (The family’s last name has been changed from Wolcott to Harris)
Macken’s Gavin Harris, Eve’s (Zea) recently estranged husband, full of swagger and charm. Martin’s Josh Harris, Gavin’s son who coasts through life on his wit, has great sense of humor and an undeniable charisma. Macken and Martin replace Michael Raymond-James and Caleb Ruminer, respectively, who had been originally cast in the roles.
Seda plays Dr. Sam Velez (originally Dr. Benjamin Glass). The father of a teenage girl (St. Clair), he carries himself like the general of an Army. Santiago plays Veronica. Very rigid and formal, she does her best to comfort and protect her younger sister.
Applebaum executive produces with Avi Nir, Alon Shtruzman, Peter Traugott, Rachel Kaplan and Ken Woodruff. Universal Television, a division of Universal Studio Group, is the studio, producing with Keshet Studios.
Zea, Gorecki, Seda and Okonkwo were all part of the original La Brea cast last year. Production of the pilot was derailed by the coronavirus pandemic. At the end of June, when pilot cast option expire, NBC and Uni TV extended Zea and Gorecki and released the rest of the cast while putting the project in a straight-to-series consideration with a six-script order.
NBC did pick up La Brea to series in January. In anticipation of the pickup, the network reached out to Seda, Okonkwo and St. Clair. Okonkwo closed a new deal in time for the official series order and was included in the announcement. Seda and St. Clair subsequently also signed on to return.
This marks a third consecutive series lead on an NBCUniversal series for Macken, following NBC’s The Night Shift and Syfy’s Night Flyers. Macken is filming the male lead opposite Elisha Cuthbert in Irish thriller The Ten Steps and recently wrapped the Millennium feature Till Death with Megan Fox. He wrote, directed and produced the 2020 Irish indie feature Here Are the Young Men which starred Anya Taylor-Joy, Finn Cole and Dean-Charles Chapman. He is repped by ICM Partners, Magnolia Entertainment and Saskia Mulder at the Artists Partnership.
Seda starred for seven seasons on the Chicago franchise as Detective Antonio Dawson. One of the original stars of the franchise, he started off as a recurring on the mothership Chicago Fire before he was spun off to Chicago P.D. He also appeared for a time on the short-lived legal drama spinoff Chicago Justice. He previously played Nelson Hidalgo on Treme. Seda is repped by APA, Luber Roklin Entertainment, and Barnes Morris Klein & Yorn.
Martin, who graduated from college at the start of the pandemic, recently did a guest stint on CBS’ All Rise and has been posting videos on social media, gaining over 544K followers. He is repped by CAA and MGMT Entertainment.
La Brea is St. Clair’s first series regular role. She has previously guest-starred on Unbelievable and 13 Reasons Why. She’s repped by Untitled Entertainment and Sloane, Offer, Weber & Dern.
Red Arrow Studios, the production group owned by German broadcaster ProSiebenSat.1, took a €46 million ($55M) hit to its revenue in 2020 after the coronavirus pandemic halted production around the world.
Red Arrow-owned Kinetic Content landed a big Netflix hit in the shape of Love Is Blind, but it was ultimately an unsettled year for the production empire amid Covid-19.
ProSiebenSat.1 shelved plans to sell the company because of the pandemic, while the producer’s CEO James Baker was among a number of senior executive departures. Red Arrow is now overseen by a ProSieben advisory board.
According to ProSieben’s full-year earnings, Red Arrow’s total revenue fell 6% from €730M in 2019 to €684M last year. Adjusted EBITDA dropped 12.6% to €42M. Revenue picked up in Q4 last year, when sales hit €235M, compared with €222M in 2019.
ProSieben said: “The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic also had a high impact here in the second quarter in particular, with the international program production business being particularly hard hit. After program productions in the US in particular had to be largely stopped or postponed in mid-March, there were still restrictions there in the further course of the year.
“As the restrictions on public life were eased, production business recovered slightly in the third quarter and was above the level of the previous year in the fourth quarter due to catch-up effects. The performance in program distribution, our global sales business, was also clearly positive over the full-year. However, this was unable to compensate the decline in production business over the first nine months of 2020.”
More broadly, ProSieben’s 2020 earnings were in line with unaudited results it published in January. Group revenue stood at €4.05 billion, while EBITDA was €706M. This compared with €4.1B and €872M in 2019.
EXCLUSIVE:Gabriel Vasquez and Roman White, country music biz mainstays and the executive producer and director, respectively, of the upcoming faith-based Netflix musical film A Week Away, have signed with UTA and launched their new banner Rove Productions. They will be based in Nashville.
A Week Away, which bows on March 26, stars Kevin Quinn and Bailee Madison in the story of a troubled teen (Quinn) who after a run-in with the law must choose between juvenile detention and a Christian summer camp. He chooses the later and falls for a camp regular (Madison) who helps him find a sense of belonging in the last place he expected.
Vasquez, the founder of Vazquez Entertainment who has worked with musical artists including Amy Grant, Steven Curtis Chapman, Building 429, Newsboys and Jaci Velasquez, is the co-creator and producer of the faith-based musical.
White, who has helmed music videos for the the likes of Taylor Swift, Justin Bieber, Carrie Underwood, Josh Groban and Maren Morris among others, produces and directs the pic. With Rove Productions, they plan to focus on films, musicals, Broadway stage productions, animated features, worldwide tours, and TV and literary properties.
Both have movie industry credits already, with White writing and directing 2015’s coming-of-age music pic Summer Forever and Vasquez co-executive producing the 2015 thriller Wildflower.
White wrote and directed his first film, “Summer Forever” (Relativity and Disney) and has been successfully directing commercials and films ever since.
“We are thrilled to be able to join forces and combine our 20+plus years of experiences and talents under one umbrella,” said Vasquez. “A Week Away is just the beginning of the type of films we see the Rove umbrella creating, combining our love of music and story in compelling new ways.”
Added White: “We bring years of both creating and curating artists, music, music videos, games, SFX, and live events to the table. Film is now the next natural progression for both of us. We are excited to be based in Nashville and thrilled to be represented by Heartland and the extraordinary UTA team. We have multiple new projects in several stages of development and pre-preproduction and look forward to this next season for Rove.”
Netflix has partnered with Hachette’s Les Editions Albert René and playwright Alain Chabat to create the first-ever animated limited series, based on the iconic French comic book The Adventures of Asterix.
The 3D animated series will be made in France and streamed on Netflix around the world in 2023. Chabat, who wrote and directed 2002’s Mission Cléopâtre, will serve as showrunner.
Mission Cléopâtre was the most successful of Asterix’s numerous screen appearances and the third highest-grossing feature film in French history, according to Dominique Bazay, Netflix’s director of original animation.
Each of Asterix’s 38 volumes features the pugnacious warrior and his irreverent village companions keeping a tiny corner of ancient Gaul free from bumbling Roman invaders.
The Netflix series will be based on Asterix and the Big Fight, where the Romans, after being constantly embarrassed by Asterix and his village cohorts, organize a brawl between rival Gaulish chiefs and try to fix the result by kidnapping a druid along with his much-needed magic potion.
In a blog, Bazay said: “I have been talking with Celeste Surugue at Albert Rene for years about how to bring Asterix to Netflix. We built a great relationship of trust and mutual respect around our love for these characters.
“I’m French Canadian, and like most francophones around the world, I grew up with Asterix, his sidekick Obelix and loyal companion Dogmatix. I watched the animated specials and read the books religiously. If you’d told the 8-year-old me that one day I’d help bring these characters to life… I wouldn’t have believed you!”
“Look, we’re getting the message out about wearing masks, guys,” quipped judge Ken Jeong during the TCA session for Fox’s The Masked Singer. “If you want to wear a mask out in public; if you want to wear a mask on television — I mean, how better than to get the message out and [make a profit] than to wear masks!”
Dr. Ken is part of the popular “Masked” franchise as he is on The Masked Singer, which debuts its fifth season on March 10 and The Masked Dancer. When the producers asked if they were concerned about the expansion of the franchise to something like The Masked Chef or even The Masked Athlete, they had no issue because of the popularity of the existing shows. Jeong added, “The Masked Singer is the mothership — this is such an exceptional show!”
Fellow judge Robin Thicke chimed in: “The level of star power in season 5 is at another level!”
In addition to giving us a sneak peek at a performance of the performer in a Russian Doll costume singing “Shallow” from A Star Is Born (it was both moving and bizarre), it was revealed that this season will introduce “Cluedle-doo”, the show’s first-ever secret celebrity guest who will stir the pot with new clues about identities.
McCarthy Wahlberg pointed, “He messes with us! we think he’s going to give us an amazing clue — sometimes he does, but sometimes he’ll steal it or not tell us!”
This season’s roster of masked singers includes Grandpa Monster, Chameleon. Black Swan, The Piglet, Porcupine, Phoenix, Russian Doll and Snail — but it won’t stop there. The season will also feature wildcard rounds (costumes to be announced) which will feature an unknown number of masked celebrities who will take the stage during the run of the series. At the end of the show the incognito wildcard will attempt to take the spot of another masked celeb in the group to compete for the trophy. This will definitely mix things up.
“It just adds a freshness to the whole show,” said Plestis of the wildcards. “It brings a whole new life to the series so we’re excited by it.”
This season also brings Niecy Nash into the fold as guest host while Nick Cannon is sidelined by Covid-19. Breen said that Cannon will return halfway through the season, but the EP said that they were incredibly lucky to have Nash on board as host fill in last minute. “She had chemistry with the panel — she was just a producer’s dream,” said Breen. “She was absolutely fantastic.”
“Niecy’s a boss…she’s a queen,” lauded Scherzinger.
“I have never felt so welcomed,” said Nash. “I just walked in the door and every single person supported me and was so kind.”
Because of Covid-19, the show was impacted in the fourth season and the protocols will stay in place including the virtual audience, social distancing, and of course the masks. In terms of booked celebrities to step in the costumes, the producers say that so many celebs have wanted to be on the show and a lot of them have the time now.
“Celebrities have said, yes, their schedules are [freer] but they want this platform — they miss performing, they miss the stage,” said Scherzinger. “This is the perfect opportunity to get back out there.”
