Quantcast
Channel: Amanda LePore – The WOW Report
Viewing all 11455 articles
Browse latest View live

Dead Celebrities! Spooky Flicks! Halloween Peen! It’s the Halloween Edition of The Top Ten Things That Make Us Go WOW for Radio Andy!

0
0

From Hollywood Boulevard, it’s The WOW Report for Radio Andy on SiriusXM! That’s right WOWers, World of Wonder Co-Founder Fenton Bailey, Executive VP of Development Tom Campbell, and WOW Report Editor James St. James have collaborated with reality TV guru and friend of WOW, Andy Cohen, on a weekly Top Ten Countdown of the things from the past week that make us go…WOW!

It’s a pop-culture obsessed hour complete with colorful diatribes, opposing opinions, and a dissection-like discussion that will make your drive home from work more fabulous!

You can now WATCH us recording the WOW Report in our gallery storefront on Hollywood Boulevard, just across the street from Hollywood’s oldest restaurant Musso & Frank!

We air TODAY at 4PM EST on SiriusXM, and again at 4PM PST (that’s 7PM EST). You can also catch the show on the SiriusXM app!

Let’s get started…

10) The Ghost of George Michael: New Showtime Doc Freedom 

We discuss the new Showtime documentary George Michael: Freedom which was weirdly also directed by George Michael. Could that be why the documentary seemed to gloss over one of the most pivotal moments in George’s career?

Skip forward to The Ghost of George Michael: New Showtime Doc Freedom @00:56

9) The Killing of a Sacred Deer

Colin Farrell and The Lobster director Yorgos Lanthimos team up again for The Killing of a Sacred Deer – Farrell’s second film with Nicole Kidman this year. James recently saw the film, so listen in to see what he thought of it.

Skip forward to The Killing of a Sacred Deer @7:00

8) Terror Weather: Geostorm 

Fenton recently saw the big budget film Geostorm – starring Gerard Butler & Abbie Cornish – about a super storm destroying the earth, and he thought it was…SUPER DISASTROUS…

Skip forward to Terror Weather: Geostorm @11:35

7) The Eternal Rita Moreno 

Tom recently had the pleasure of seeing the legendary EGOT (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, Tony) winning actress Rita Moreno just down the street from WOW headquarters at the Catalina Jazz Club on Sunset, and she did not disappoint! You’ll never believe which Hollywood leading man she had a secret affair with back in the ’50s!

Skip forward toThe Eternal Rita Moreno @18:45

6) Dead Sexy: Marlon Brando & James Dean 

Speaking of secret Hollywood lovers, were hunks Marlon Brando and James Dean GAY LOVERS?! You’ll NEVER believe who they were rumored to have had a threesome with!

Skip forward to Dead Sexy: Marlon Brando & James Dean @24:33

5) Satanic & Streaming: The Babysitter 

The Babysitter directed by McG and starring Samara WeavingJudah LewisHana Mae LeeRobbie Amell and Bella Thorne – is currently streaming on Netflix just in time for Halloween!

Skip forward to Satanic & Streaming: The Babysitter @29:25

4) Halloween Peen: Inmate Sues Penal System Over His 91-Hour Erection 

Tom told us the tale of an inmate in Oklahoma who was suing because the correctional officers didn’t believe him about his prolonged and drug-induced erection. Then we took a penis quiz!

Skip forward to Halloween Peen: Inmate Sues Penal System Over His 91-Hour Erection @35:02

3) Watcher in the Woods 

Find out what we thought of the Melissa Joan Hart directed remake of The Watcher in the Woods starring Angelica Huston.

Skip forward toWatcher in the Woods @39:40

2) Monstropolis: Astana, Kazakhstan 

Fenton is currently a little obsessed with the Central Asian ‘-stans,’ – you know…TurkmenistanTajikistanUzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, and sometimes Afghanistan – and this week we’re discussing Kazakhstan’s new capital Astana!

Skip forward to Monstropolis: Astana, Kazakhstan @45:25

1) Terrifying News: Justin Timberlake To Do Halftime for Super Bowl LII

Justin Timberlake was just announced as the halftime performer for the Super Bowl in February, and we have mixed feelings considering how he handled “Nipplegate” after he performed with Janet Jackson at the 2004 Super Bowl. Will he bring Janet out for a mea culpa?

Skip forward to Terrifying News: Justin Timberlake To Do Halftime for Super Bowl LII @52:05

Resistor of the Week – Senator Jeff Flake

How did a Republican senator from red state Arizona end up being our Resistor of the Week? Listen in to find out.

Skip forward to Resistor of the Week – Senator Jeff Flake @55:16

Listen in at 4:00PM EST and again at 4:00 PST (7 PM EST) on SiriusXM! Or listen whenever you want on the SiriusXM App!

And be sure to give your ears the gift of THE WOW REPORT on Radio Andy SiriusXM EVERY Friday.

Do something this weekend that makes YOU go WOW!!!

The post Dead Celebrities! Spooky Flicks! Halloween Peen! It’s the Halloween Edition of The Top Ten Things That Make Us Go WOW for Radio Andy! appeared first on The WOW Report.


Do You Have What It Takes To WIN? We’re Giving Away A VIP Package For RuPaul’s DragCon LA 2018!

0
0

Let us help you get SICKENING!

That’s right hunties, you’ve heard that correctly! We’re giving away TWO RuPaul’s DragCon LA 2018 VIP Experience tickets and YOU could be the lucky winner.

But that’s not all. No way, squirrel friend, we’re giving you so much more than just two VIP experience tickets. We’re giving away an entire package!

If you’re the lucky winner of the RuPaul’s DragCon LA 2018 VIP Experience Giveaway, you get…

TWO RuPaul’s DragCon VIP Experience Tickets

TWO Hotel Rooms in Downtown LA for FOUR Nights

TWO Coach Flights to LA from the Continental US

TWO Premium Tickets to all THREE DragCon Parties

Are you gagged yet?!? If you’re the lucky winner, this is going to be the BEST. WEEKEND. EVER!!!!

Now, we know your next question is… How are we going to pick a winner? Well, you’ve gotta WERK in order to win. You didn’t think we’d just GIVE this incredible package away without putting in some work, did you?

Head on over to our Rafflecopter giveaway for all the details on how to get as many chances as you can to win this incredible VIP Experience for RuPaul’s DragCon LA 2018!

You must be 18 years or older to enter and win the giveaway which ends on Thursday, November 2. A winner will be announced at 12:00pm PST on Thursday, November 2.

What are you waiting for?!? Don’t you want to live out your DragCon LA Fantasy?

Get entering RIGHT NOW because you’ve only got until November 2! Remember, DON’T F*CK IT UP!

The post Do You Have What It Takes To WIN? We’re Giving Away A VIP Package For RuPaul’s DragCon LA 2018! appeared first on The WOW Report.

#Breaking: Mueller Investigation Issues First Grand Jury Indictments (Is It Manafort? Flynn? Both?)

0
0

A federal grand jury in DC, today just approved the first charges in the investigation led by special counsel Robert Mueller.

According to CNN;

The charges are still sealed under orders from a federal judge. Plans were prepared Friday for anyone charged to be taken into custody as soon as Monday, the sources said. It is unclear what the charges are.
A spokesman for the special counsel’s office declined to comment.

Mueller was appointed in May to lead the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election.
Under the regulations governing special counsel investigations, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who has oversight over the Russia investigation, would have been made aware of any charges before they were taken before the grand jury for approval, according to people familiar with the matter.

On Friday, top lawyers who are helping to lead the Mueller probe, including veteran prosecutor Andrew Weissmann, were seen entering the court room at the DC federal court where the grand jury meets to hear testimony in the Russia investigation.

Reporters present saw a flurry of activity at the grand jury room, but officials made no announcements.
Shortly after President Donald Trump abruptly fired then-FBI Director James Comey, Rosenstein appointed Mueller as special counsel. Mueller took the reins of a federal investigation that Comey first opened in July 2016 in the middle of the presidential campaign.

Mueller’s team has examined foreign lobbying conducted by former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, former national security adviser Michael Flynn, and others. His team has issued subpoenas for documents and testimony to a handful of figures, including some close to Manafort, and others involved in the Trump Tower meeting between Russians and campaign officials.

In addition to Mueller’s probe, three committees on Capitol Hill are conducting their own investigations.

Thy expect arrest to be made as early as Monday.

Christmas comes before Halloween this year!

(Photo, YouTube; via CNN)

The post #Breaking: Mueller Investigation Issues First Grand Jury Indictments (Is It Manafort? Flynn? Both?) appeared first on The WOW Report.

#BornThisDay: Costume Designer, Edith Head

0
0

via YouTube

October 28, 1897Edith Head:

“Fashion is a language. Some know it, some learn it, some never will.”

Edith Head believed modesty was unbecoming and that you should have anything and everything you wanted in life, but, you had to be dressed for it. She once explained that what she did was:

 “… A cross between magic and camouflage. We create the illusion of changing the actors into what they are not.”

Head knew about how to dress people. The legendary designer saw nearly all the top stars in Hollywood in their underwear or even less. As the greatest actors in American film studied themselves in the mirror, it was Head who was standing right behind them, making them look impossibly glamorous while carefully avoiding any glamour herself.

Hollywood’s most famous and prolific costume designer, Head had a career that lasted six decades. She designed clothes for 1,131 films, an average of 35 projects a year. She was the last costume designer to be under contract to a major studio, Paramount Pictures. When Paramount didn’t renew her contract after 40 years, she moved over to Universal Pictures without a contract, where she continued to work until her passing in 1981. She was a woman who succeeded in a world dominated by men.

Head was the favorite of Alfred Hitchcock (To Catch A Thief, Rear Window, Vertigo), Billy Wilder (Sunset Boulevard) and William Wyler (The Heiress, Roman Holiday).

Head wrote a pair of books: The Dress Doctor (1959) and How To Dress For Success (1967). She was also a reluctant star in her own right, appearing on talk shows, commercials and a regular spot offering advice to housewives on Art Linkletter’s House Party (1945-1969). She even played herself, giving a fashion show commentary in Lucy Gallant (1955) starring Jane Wyman, The Oscar (1966), The Pleasure Of His Company (1961), and on television in Columbo: Requiem For A Falling Star (1973) acting as herself, the clothing designer for Anne Baxter’s character. Her Oscars were displayed on her work table in the scene.

Head was a self-made professional and self-made artist and she did most of which she did out of sheer determination. She could play fast a bit loose with the truth. She took credit for designs that she never created: Audrey Hepburn’s little black dress in Sabrina (1954) and the Paul Newman and Robert Redford wardrobe for The Sting (1973), for which she won an Academy Award.

Studio Still, Rear Window (1954), Paramount, courtesy of Brisson Archives

Sunset Boulevard (1950), Paramount Pictures, via YouTube

Yet, she was always discreet about the size and shape of the stars’ bodies, she knew about all the skeletons in their closets, yet she was never known to gossip. Head knew about the secrets of Mae West’s bust, Gloria Swanson’s wide waist and tiny feet (size 2 1/2), and Audrey Hepburn’s broad shoulders. She sometimes boasted that she could perform miracles:

“I accentuated the positive and camouflaged the rest.”

Head would make the movie stars, with all their flaws, look a million bucks. She influenced the way civilian women dressed also. She was a designer for Vogue Patterns at a time when home dressmaking was the thing, although Head didn’t actually know how to sew.

The sarong she designed for Dorothy Lamour in The Jungle Princess (1935) made Lamour a star (Head had her stitched into it) and it was copied by every swimwear manufacturer in the USA. It is still copied today.

For Elizabeth Taylor in A Place In The Sun (1951), Head accentuated Taylor’s bust and tiny waist with a strapless, bouffant-skirted white ball gown, scattered with violets. It then became the go-to prom dress for American teens. According to Head, Taylor had the most beautiful shoulders in Hollywood, so she created dresses for her to show them off.

Bette Davis:

“Edith Head’s life was all about glamour, 60 years of it, in the most glamorous place in the world: Hollywood.”

Head designed the brown silk, sable trimmed cocktail dress Davis wore as Margo Channing in All About Eve (1950), you know, the one that where she was warning everyone as she swept down the staircase for the big party scene to fasten their seat belts because it was going to be a bumpy night. When Davis had a fitting of the finished dress, the bodice and neckline were way too big. Head was horrified, but Davis pulled it off her shoulders, shook one sexy shoulder and stated:

“Doesn’t it look better like this anyway?”

Head won one of her eight Oscars for that classic film. Davis later bought the dress for herself, because she loved it that much. Head:

“There were eight important men in my life, and they were all named Oscar.”

Head fell into costume design. She had a job as a French teacher at the Hollywood School For Girls, but she bluffed her way into Paramount’s wardrobe department in 1932. She had borrowed other people’s drawings, put them together in a portfolio.

Head wasn’t the greatest designer in Hollywood History, but she may have been the smartest. She had a BA from UC Berkeley and a MFA from Stanford, yet she took a job at the studio as a sketch artist.

By 1938, she was the head designer, so to speak, working on every prestigious production Paramount made during the studio’s greatest age.

When she went to Universal Pictures, it was because of her friendship with Hitchcock. She did Tippi Hedren’s smart green suit made of textured tweed that would snag easily during an avian attack.

Head knew exactly how to work with movie stars, setting up her studio so that when a star walked in, the mirrors were placed perfectly, and the star was put in front of the mirror perfectly. Head dressed in grey tones, so she faded into the background.

She also had some tricks up her sleeve; the famous gown Grace Kelly wears in To Catch A Thief (1955)  really wasn’t all that except it was  made with a gold, flashy, beautiful fabric that photographed really well. Head always said if all else fails, put fur on it. Head adored Kelly and was hurt when the actor slighted her by not inviting her to design the dress she wore when she married Prince Rainier of Monaco. But, Head did create Princess Grace’s much photographed grey going-away suit.

Head’s career was not without controversy. After winning that Academy Award for The Sting, she was sued by the illustrator who really designed Redford and Newman’s clothes. The truth about her design of Hepburn’s little black dress emerged only after Head’s passing when Hubert de Givenchy quietly admitted that he had designed the frock that was copied everywhere. Head designed all the other costumes in the film.

Near the end of her amazing life, Head said:

“I regret never having dressed Marilyn Monroe, never designing uniforms for the Chicago Cubs, and being alone. It is much easier being remembered than trying to remember.”

It was an open secret in Hollywood that Head was a lesbian. She was discreet, to say the least. My research brought me no information about her lovers, although it was long assumed that she had a thing with Barbara Stanwyck.

Her last film project was Carl Reiner’s black and white film noir parody Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid (1982), starring Steve Martin. The film is dedicated to her memory.

Head’s final credits rolled in 1981, just four days before her 84th birthday. You can find her nowadays at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale.

In the Pixar film The Incredibles (2004), not to be confused with The Deplorables (2016), the film’s fictional superhero costume designer Edna Mode’s personality, mannerisms, sense of style, round glasses, and assertive no-nonsense character, are all homage to Head’s legendary accomplishments and personality.

I am so in touch with my inner 14-year-old boy, that I, of course, think it was fun to write the word Head, 34 times while composing this post.

I hold my copy like a Bible and have often referred to my edition of Dress For Success: Edith Head’s Formula For Dressing To Get A Man And Keep Him. Here are nine rules. Memorize them. There will be a test later:

 

  1. Decide want kind of man you want.

 

  1. Find out what kind of girls he likes.

 

  1. Know what kind of fashions pleases him.

 

  1. Don’t masquerade in clothes you hate just to attract a man. Be sure you are really, deep down inside, this kind of girl. If not, find another man!

 

  1. Learn all you can about him: his hobbies, his interests, his likes, his dislikes.

 

  1. Be interested in his interests.

 

  1. Choose your wardrobe to please him and suit his way of life.

 

  1. After you get him, stay the way you were and don’t relax into a post-marriage slump of careless marriage.

 

  1. Look reasonably enticing in the morning and better at night.

 

The post #BornThisDay: Costume Designer, Edith Head appeared first on The WOW Report.

October 28th: It’s YOUR Birthday, Bitch!

0
0

Trump & GOP Try To Diffuse the Russia Probe (Nixon Tried with Watergate –How’d That Work Out?)

0
0

Yesterday, CNN broke the news that Robert Mueller‘s investigation is handing down one or more indictments and arrests may come as early as Monday.

Trump has been trying to deflect attention and focus once again on Hillary Clinton. (Why this now? Two words; Mueller. Indictments.)

As The Washington Post is reporting, BLOTUS and Republicans in Congress are demanding new scrutiny of Clinton’s actions as secretary of state, try to jeopardize investigations of Russian meddling in the 2016 election just as the probes are closing in on Trump’s inner circle.

In the span of a week, House and Senate Republican leaders announced two investigations into Obama-era decisions involving a uranium deal that increased Russia’s share of the U.S. nuclear market — and another into how the FBI handled Clinton’s use of a private email server while she was secretary of state.

Trump has cheered on the new Republican-driven investigations, which have resurrected some of the president’s most-favored jabs against Clinton during the 2016 presidential campaign.

Asked about the uranium deal Friday, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said:

I can tell you that we do think that there’s a lot of cause for concern regarding that deal, and we certainly think it should be looked into.

She denied, however, that the White House is trying to steer the congressional investigations away from Russian meddling.

The president wants to see this completed,” she said. “There’s still no evidence of collusion between the president and anyone. . . . If any collusion took place, it would be between the DNC and the Clintons. And I think we’re starting to now see that all of the things that the Democrats had accused this president doing, they were actually guilty of themselves.

Naturally, Democrats are crying foul, pointing out that the investigations are a blatant strategy to distract attention from the investigations into Trump’s alleged Kremlin ties, and suggesting the White House may be (IS!) working actively to assist the GOP’s efforts.

Trump tweeted the same day Mueller’s charges were coming down that Clinton helped secure a favorable ruling on the uranium deal in exchange for Russian contributions to her family foundation.

The White House official denied Friday that Trump had done anything inappropriate. He was not authorized to speak publicly on the issue but said,

Are we directing it? No. Are we welcoming it? Yes.

Trey Gowdy and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) are partnering to examine the FBI’s handling of Clinton’s email probe. They announced their investigation in the same hour as Nunes told the news media about his uranium probe.

The Oversight Committee’s ranking Democrat, Rep. Elijah E. Cummings (D-Md.), said in a statement this week.

Apparently, if President Trump says ‘jump,’ House Republicans say ‘how high’? And if he says ‘heel,’ they stand down from conducting serious, credible oversight.

As both sides press forward with their new probes, political battlefronts are forming along party lines.

(Photo, YouTube; via Washington Post)

The post Trump & GOP Try To Diffuse the Russia Probe (Nixon Tried with Watergate –How’d That Work Out?) appeared first on The WOW Report.

Mom Kills Herself & 3 Kids By Driving SUV Off a Cliff –On Purpose

0
0

Noel Janet Bankhead

A woman intentionally steered her SUV off a cliff into a lake last year, killing herself and her three children, authorities say.

(The horrific crash occurred in June of 2016 but the investigation’s finding were just released.)

The County Sheriff’s Office announced yesterday that investigators have concluded that Noel Bankhead, 40, of Boise, Idaho drove her Land Rover off the sharp drop off on the side of a road near the Idaho 21 bridge over Lucky Peak, known as the High Bridge.

The SUV went down more than 50 feet before it hit the water and quickly sank to the bottom of the reservoir.

Witnesses said that Bankhead was driving north at about 7 a.m. when she slowed down, turned, pointed the SUV toward the cliff, and suddenly accelerated.

No skid marks or indication of braking was found no evidence of mechanical problems with the SUV was found.

Bankhead and her children — Anika Voermans, 13, Logan Voermans, 11, and Gwyneth Voermans, 8 — all died from drowning associated with blunt force trauma.

The children’s deaths were ruled homicides, while their mother’s death was a suicide. A motive is still unclear but an autopsy on Bankhead revealed that she had no alcohol or medication in her system at the time.

Authorities have since placed several large boulder along the dropoff after the crash to prevent other drivers from going over.

Gwyneth, Logan & Anika Voermans

(Photos, YouTube, Bowman Funeral Parlor; via USA Today)

The post Mom Kills Herself & 3 Kids By Driving SUV Off a Cliff –On Purpose appeared first on The WOW Report.

#LGBTQ: Ryan Murphy’s New Series “Pose” Will Have Largest Transgender Cast Ever

0
0

Evan Peters, Kate Mara, James Van Der Beek & Tatiana Maslany

Indya Moore, Hailie Sahar, & Angelica Ross

MJ Rodriguez & Dominique Jackson

Ryan Murphy is making TV history again with his latest FX drama Pose, with the largest cast of transgender actors in series regular roles ever for a scripted series.

The five transgender actors are MJ Rodriguez, Indya Moore, Dominique Jackson, Hailie Sahar, and Angelica Ross. All will be playing transgender characters.

Also cast in the series are Ryan Jamaal Swain, Billy Porter and Dyllon Burnside along with Emmy winner Tatiana Maslany (Orphan Black), James Van Der Beek, Kate Mara and AHS regular Evan Peters.

Set in the 80s, Pose will look at the rise of the luxury Trump-era universe, the downtown social and literary scene and the ball culture world.

Peters and Mara play New Jersey couple Stan and Patty, who get sucked into the glamour and intrigue of New York City in the 1980s. Van Der Beek plays Peters’s financial kingpin boss Matt. Maslany plays a modern dance teacher who takes a special interest in the talent of Damon (Ryan Jamaal Swain).

MJ Rodriguez, who plays Blanca, has appeared on Nurse Jackie and The Carrie Diaries, and Dominique Jackson (Elektra) is a fashion model and fixture in the current New York ball scene. Hailie Sahar (Lulu) has been seen on Mr. Robot and Transparent. Angelica Ross (Candy) was recently on Transparent as well as on several episodes of Claws.

In conjunction with Murphy’s Half Initiative, the series will bring on emerging transgender directors to be mentored through his Directing Mentorship Program. Leiomy Maldonado (known as the “Wonder Woman of Vogue”) and Danielle Polanco will be choreographing the series’ ball scenes. (Polanco has choreographed for Janet Jackson, Jennifer Lopez and Beyoncé.)

Says co-creator Steven Canals,

We are thrilled that Pose pushes the narrative forward by centering on the unique and under-told experiences of trans women and gay people of color. Ryan has assembled a strong team of storytellers and innovators to collaborate on telling this important narrative. As a Bronx-bred queer writer of color, I’m honored to aid in ushering this groundbreaking show into homes.

The pilot of Pose goes into production next month in New York City.

Ryan Jamaal Swain, Billy Porter & Dyllon Burnside

(Photos, publicly shots; via Deadline)

The post #LGBTQ: Ryan Murphy’s New Series “Pose” Will Have Largest Transgender Cast Ever appeared first on The WOW Report.


#QueerQuote: John Waters

#FirstLook: Bob the Drag Queen’s “Yet Another Dig” Feat. Alaska. Watch

0
0

Bob the Drag Queen‘s new song Yet Another Dig has him teamed up with RuPaul’s Drag Race All Star 2 winner Alaska Thunderfuck for some shade and actual slaying…

Bob says the song was inspired by an online feud between two queens on Drag Race,

One of the girls said something online that could be considered shady. Then it became something between Drag Race girls, more of a Drag Race inside joke.

The song came about backstage while I was on the Haterz Roast tour with Alaska. We started talking about and it grew from there. I reached out to a producer who wanted to work with me and ‘Yet Another Dig’ was born.“

(Who could the two queens be? Any guesses…?)

The lyrics star out,

Yet another dig, I’ma get another gig
I’m gluing down my lace front, yet another wig
Collecting coins, getting yet another big paycheck
Who’s next? Tell me who’s on deck
You’re sippin’ on the Hater-ade, yet another swig
Frying up some bacon, bitch, yet another pig
I’m a Redwood and you’re yet another twig
All Stars 2 was yet another rig

Watch.

(Photos, screen grabs, via Cosmopolitan)

The post #FirstLook: Bob the Drag Queen’s “Yet Another Dig” Feat. Alaska. Watch appeared first on The WOW Report.

#SpoilerAlert: Sneak Peek of the Season Finalé for the Trump Administration (Set to “From Russia, With Love”) Watch

0
0

Yes, kids, it’s almost Mueller time!

For all those who can’t wait for the season ending of the Trump Administration’s dumpster fire of a political shit show. This video is dedicated to the Steele Dossier, The Washington Post, The New York Times, our homey Comey and, of course, Robert Mueller himself. To all those that make this current darkest timeline liveable until it collapses back unto itself.

It’s all set to the perfect song, From Russia with Love sung by Matt Monro in 1963.

Watch.

The post #SpoilerAlert: Sneak Peek of the Season Finalé for the Trump Administration (Set to “From Russia, With Love”) Watch appeared first on The WOW Report.

#BornThisDay: Winona Ryder

0
0

Photograph: © Darla Khazei, PacificCoastNews

 

October 29, 1971Winona Ryder:

“I went from weirdo teenager to pixie waif to them not knowing what the hell to do with me.”

Just for fun, a little Mel Gibson anecdote from Ryder:

“I remember fifteen years ago, I was at one of those big Hollywood parties. And, he was really drunk. I was with my friend, who’s gay. He made a really horrible gay joke. And somehow it came up that I was Jewish. He said something about ‘oven dodgers,’ but I didn’t get it. I’d never heard that before. It was just this weird, weird moment. I was like, ‘He’s anti-Semitic and he’s homophobic.’ No one believed me!”

It’s tough to consider doe-eyed, dark-haired, emotionally fragile Winona Ryder without taking into account the myths that surrounded her as she came to define a certain kind of 1990s authentic cool. For young people during that era, Ryder represented someone outside of the mainstream. She became known in late 1980s as a sort of cult-movie ingénue: the Goth Lydia Deetz in Tim Burton’s horror-comedy Beetlejuice (1988); Veronica, the smart member of the mean-girls clique, in the dark comedy Heathers (1989); and tomboy cab driver Corky who picks up a Hollywood executive played by Gena Rowlands in Jim Jarmusch’s Night On Earth (1991). She was the very embodied the essence of Gen-X Existentialism in Ben Stiller’s Reality Bites (1994). Ryder became an icon of idiosyncratic angst, but she was also one of the most precociously talented actors of that generation.

From “Beetlejuice” (1988 ), The Geffen Film Company and Warner Bros, via YouTube

 

Ryder was born Winona Laura Horowitz. Her mother is an author and editor, and her father is a publisher and antiquarian bookseller. Her godfather was psychedelics guru Timothy Leary, which explains some stranger things. She grew up in San Francisco, except for four years when they all lived in a commune in Northern California.

As a youth,  she fell in love with the movies, especially attracted to the work of Bette Davis, Gena Rowlands, and Audrey Hepburn. Her acting idols would be proud of her work during her adult era: The Crucible (1996) with Daniel Day-Lewis and Joan Allen; Alien Resurrection (1997), alongside Sigourney Weaver; Francis Ford Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992); Girl, Interrupted (1999), which she also executive produced, and Darren Aronofsky’s psycho drama Black Swan (2010).

Her work in Martin Scorsese’s The Age Of Innocence (1993) brought her an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress, and two years later, she received another Oscar nom, this time as Best Actress for Little Women (1995).

But, Ryder took a little bit of a hiatus from showbiz to study constitutional law, linguistics, and etymology. She claims to have an archivist gene, possibly inherited from her father who was Timothy Leary’s official archivist.

She returned to acting in 2015, as a city council president who advocates for integration opposite Oscar Isaac in the HBO limited series Show Me A Hero, and then blowing away critics and audiences last year as the frantic but determined mother Joyce Byers in the Netflix supernatural, super-duper series Stranger Things, which brought Ryder Golden Globe and SAG Award nominations. She won the SAG for Best Ensemble, along with her Stranger Things cast.

The many faces of Winona Ryder at the 2017 SAG Awards, via TNT Television

 

Although Ryder doesn’t have children, she has real onscreen rapport with the young actors on Stranger Things. Of her character Ryder wrote:

“I feel tremendous compassion for her, like she was one of these people that had dreams, but she had kids. And it made me think of all the women I know who have kids, who when they talk about their lives as mothers, they always say ‘But I love my kids, I wouldn’t trade them for the world’. Like they feel guilty for even hinting that they’d want something outside of kids! It’s a weird thing.”

Unlike most people these days, Ryder is not on social media. She says she doesn’t know how to use it, and is glad because it spares her the experience of being stalked or harassed online. She says she knows what it is like to be bullied:

“As a kid, I was obsessed with the movie Bugsy Malone and had cut my hair short. I remember the halls were empty and these kids started shouting ‘faggot’, and I didn’t think they were talking to me. Walking home after leaving the nurse’s office, I remember pressing on the bandage because I wanted it to look more dramatic. I had this inner monologue going of Humphrey Bogart, like, ‘being roughed up!’. I was pretending I was in some gangster movie. It was oddly my way of dealing with it, because if I didn’t, I probably would have been really scared.”

She is open about her own struggles with anxiety and depression, which brings us to what you’ve probably been thinking about if you think about Ryder: she came under intense scrutiny and was the subject of many a joke when in December 2001, she was charged with shoplifting more than $5,000 worth of merchandise from Saks Fifth Avenue in Beverly Hills. Several types of prescription medication were found in her possession at the time of her arrest. Every move of Ryder’s experience with the judicial process made news. Despite pleading not guilty, she was convicted of grand theft in November 2002. Ryder was sentenced to 480 hours of community service and three years’ probation. She was also ordered to pay several fines and undergo counseling.

Everyone talked about her as being cray-cray. Ryder had very public romances with Johnny Depp, Matt Damon and Dave Pirner from the band Soul Asylum. She and Depp were engaged in the 1990s, and he had her name tattooed on his arm.

In the years that followed, Ryder kept a low profile, only working occasionally. That is until Stranger Things. She can hardly hide now.

Stranger Things is set in the 1980s and is an homage to pop culture of that decade and is informed by the works of Steven Spielberg, John Carpenter, and Stephen King. The Duffers were drawn to Ryder because of her predominance in the films of the 1980s. Ryder praised that the show’s multiple storylines required her to act for Joyce as if “she’s out of her mind, but she’s actually kind of onto something”. It is a balancing act that Ryder pulls off perfectly.

With Noah Schnapp at the Stranger Things Season 2 premiere, Photograph: © Joe Sutter, PacificCoastNews

 

The second season of the sweet and scary Stranger Things began streaming on Friday, October 27. Although there has been no official word from Netflix, The Duffers say they are in pre-production for Season Three.

 

The post #BornThisDay: Winona Ryder appeared first on The WOW Report.

#StrangerThings: British Actor Charlie Heaton Banned From Entering U.S.

0
0

Heaton with Natalia Dyer, Stranger Things, Photo from Netflix

Stranger Things’s Charlie Heaton has been banned from the USA.

Cutie pie actor Charlie Heaton, the 23-year-old British actor who plays Jonathan Byers on the Netflix super-popular, supernatural series Stranger Things, was denied entry into the USA, missing the gala Season Two premiere and party in Hollywood because traces of cocaine were found in his luggage at LAX.

As reported in the British tabloid The Sun, Heaton was caught by drug-sniffing dogs. Border officials then allegedly found traces of a very small amount of white powder on his personal items. The Sun cited an anonymous source who confirmed it to be cocaine.

Heaton was not arrested, but was detained at LAX and then put back on a plane to London.

Netflix has made no comment about the incident or on Heaton’s future on Stranger Things. Although Netflix has made no official announcement, the show’s creators / writers / executive producers, The Duffer Brothers, have said that work has already begun on Season Three. Stranger Things  began streaming in July 2016, just when things were really getting strange in America.

The post #StrangerThings: British Actor Charlie Heaton Banned From Entering U.S. appeared first on The WOW Report.

October 29th: It’s YOUR Birthday, Bitch!

0
0

#FakeNews: The Internet Is Flipping Out That Ian McKellen Died! (He’s Alive.)

0
0

Ian McKellan at the New York premiere of ‘Beauty And The Beast’ in March 13, 2017.

Actor Sir Ian McKellen IS alive, despite frenzied reports that he had he passed away.

People have been circulating a story that he died on Tuesday, October 24, but it’s fake news. McKellen is currently in a performance of King Lear at the Minerva Theatre in Chichester, England.

A report from the Mail Online claimed,

“A spokesperson for Ian McKellen on Tuesday says the English actor has died. He was 78. In a statement, publicist Rose Ward says McKellen died of cardiac arrest.

‘He had been fighting pneumonia, which caused him to be hospitalised some months ago and was responding to treatment. His publicist said cause of his death is probable an acute coronary event, due to natural causes. He had pre-existing medical conditions, Ward said.’”

But Millie from the Minerva Theatre said that he’ll be performing there and told Gay Star News,

“Ian is very much alive and kicking.”

The Daily Mail reviewed McKellan’s performance in King Lear and said,

“It’s often said that by the time you are old enough to play Shakespeare’s King Lear, you’re past it…. Not Sir Ian McKellen.

A decade ago he was magnificent in Sir Trevor Nunn’s gorgeously extravagant if over-embellished Royal Shakespeare Company production. Now aged 78, he’s an older if no wiser Lear in Jonathan Munby’s clear, thoughtful, terrifically well-paced revival. Hair thinner and greyer, he’s plumper but still every inch the king, and then some.”

McKellen of course, played the iconic roles of Gandalf in the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit trilogies and Magneto in the original X-Men as well as scores of theatre productions.

We’re glad to hear he’s still with us and working.

McKellan in “King Lear”

(Photo, Pacific Coast News, Daily Mail; via Gay Star News)

The post #FakeNews: The Internet Is Flipping Out That Ian McKellen Died! (He’s Alive.) appeared first on The WOW Report.


#ArtDept: “Pumpkinhead – Self-Portrait” by Jamie Wyeth

0
0

Pumpkinhead – Self-Portrait (1972)- Jamie Wyeth

James Browning Wyeth (born 1946) is a contemporary American realist painter, a third-generation American artist: son of Andrew Wyeth, one of America’s most popular painters, and the grandson of Newell Convers Wyeth, famous for his distinctive, illuminating illustrations for special editions of classic novels.

Jamie Wyeth:

“Everybody in my family paints – excluding possibly the dogs.”

In fact, non-human subjects are a common theme in his work. He paints livestock and other animals with the same care and intensity he devotes to portraits of people. He won precocious fame with Portrait Of Pig (1970), his gorgeous picture of a pink and white sow.

His first one-man show was in NYC when he was only 20-years-old, and there was a career retrospective of his work shortly before his 30th birthday.

Since the 1970s, Wyeth usually paints on corrugated cardboard. He says that he likes the rough striated effect it gives to his paintings. He even recreates that feel on his works on canvas.

In the 1960s Wyeth purchased a property on Monhegan Island, Maine, which had previously been owned by Rockwell Kent, the famed American painter of modernist wilderness landscapes admired by his grandfather. He also has a home in his native Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania. In the 1990s, his parents sold him the Tenants Harbor Lighthouse on Southern Island in Maine that they had owned since 1978. He has written that the lighthouse tower provides him with a studio with the solitude he enjoys for his work.

The Wyeths: Three Generations, a huge exhibition is currently on view at the Portland Art Museum through January 2018. And, Andrew Wyeth: In Retrospect is currently at the Seattle Art Museum. Jamie Wyeth’s work can also be found at The White House, The National Gallery Of Art, National Portrait Gallery, Fine Arts Museum Of San Francisco, and the Museum Of Fine Arts, Boston.

Pumpkinhead – Self-Portrait sold for $1.7 million at Sotheby’s in 2015 to an anonymous buyer. He lives at the Brandywine River Museum, Chadds Ford.

Photo by John Jascoll, Brandywine River Museum

Jamie Wyeth (1970) by Andy Warhol, Hirshhorn Museum

The post #ArtDept: “Pumpkinhead – Self-Portrait” by Jamie Wyeth appeared first on The WOW Report.

#QueerQuote: Vincent Price

0
0

Screenshot- The House On Haunted Hill (Allied Artists), public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

“I sometimes feel that I’m impersonating the dark unconscious of the whole human race. I know this sounds sick, but I love it.”

Vincent Price (1911-1993)

The post #QueerQuote: Vincent Price appeared first on The WOW Report.

Kathy Griffin Comes For TMZ’s Harvey Levin (& Gives Out His Phone Number!)

0
0

Kathy Griffin attacked openly gay TMZ founder, Harvey Levin in an semi-unhinged video posted to Twitter and YouTube yesterday. She also releases his personal phone number. In the video, Griffin says,

I just want you guys to know Harvey Levin, Harvey Levin a blogger, is very much in bed with everyone from Hollywood to Donald Trump.

Griffin says she made the video as a result of TMZ’s fueling the fire that erupted after she received criticism for posting a photo in which she held a fake severed head resembling Trump. Griffin apologized for the video but was nevertheless the subject of controversy, losing her job with CNN’s New Year’s Eve program. In August, Griffin retracted her apology and said the whole thing was

blown out of proportion” and that she “lost everybody.

Near the beginning of the 17-minute video, Griffin plays a voicemail left by Levin on her cell phone in which he leaves his number for her to call back.

I don’t have a minute to call him but maybe you do.

(Kathy, we love you, most of the time, but what’s with the Joan Crawford eyebrows?)

Watch.

(Photo, Twitter; via Page Six)

The post Kathy Griffin Comes For TMZ’s Harvey Levin (& Gives Out His Phone Number!) appeared first on The WOW Report.

#XmasInOct!: Trump’s Son-in-Law, Jared Kushner, May Get Arrested Monday

0
0

Based on the confirmed news about Robert Mueller having filed criminal charges in Trump’s Russia scandal, we pretty much that one or more of Trump’s people will be arrested on Monday.

The $64,000 question now is who exactly is getting arrested. Several developments on Friday pointed to Michael Flynn, while others pointed to former Trump campaign chair, Paul Manafort.

However, an FBI insider now says that the most likely individual to be arrested on Monday is someone MUCH closer to Trump himself.

Scott Dworkin of the Democratic Coalition revealed on Saturday afternoon that he

was just told by attorney who used to work at FBI that Jared Kushner is most likely the one being arrested Monday.

Dworkin cautioned that

My bet’s still Manafort.

As the Palmer Report pointed out earlier today, new details about jurisdiction seem to point to criminal charges being simultaneously or successively filed against multiple individuals across multiple grand juries – so it’s entirely possible that we’re looking at multiple arrests.

Trump has spent the last few days trying to draw attention away from Russia and back to Hillary Clinton. He’s also tried to publicly distance himself from Paul Manafort, despite Manafort having been his campaign chairman and campaign manager.

Trump is closer to Michael Flynn, who not only served in the campaign, but went on to become Trump’s White House National Security Adviser before being forced out in scandal. Trump would likely take the Flynn news harder.

But Ivanka’s hubby, Jared Kushner is even closer and his arrest would send Trump over the edge.

So, now we wait. We’ll see who gets arrested on Monday, if anyone. Based on the legal experts the Palmer Report has spoken with, it’s highly likely that even Trump’s own associates don’t yet know if they’re about to be the ones who are arrested.

It’s also highly likely that Trump himself doesn’t yet know.

(Photo, Palmer Report; via Palmer Report)

The post #XmasInOct!: Trump’s Son-in-Law, Jared Kushner, May Get Arrested Monday appeared first on The WOW Report.

#LGBTQ: Kevin Spacey Issues Apology to Actor Anthony Rapp (& Comes Out!)

0
0

Kevin Spacey at the “Baby Driver” premiere in Europe, June 2017

Rapp at 15 in his first movie, “Adventures in Babysitting”

Kevin Spacey has issued an official statement in response to allegations made by actor Anthony Rapp, who told BuzzFeed News that Spacey made a drunken sexual advance on him when he was just 14 years old.

Spacey, who claimed not to remember the incident, said that if he did do what Rapp has alleged then he owes him the “sincerest apology” for his “inappropriate” behavior.

Rapp described Spacey climbing on top of him on a bed at a party in 1986 before he was ultimately able to get away and leave the room.

Spacey also took the opportunity to address the rumors about his sexuality, revealing for the first time publicly that he

chooses to live as a gay man.

In a 2010 interview, Spacey declined to specify his sexual orientation, saying,

No one’s personal life is in the public interest. It’s gossip, bottom line.

Not to make light of anyone’s coming out, but we’ve all known for a LONG time and choosing to come out when accused of sexual misconduct looks like deflection. But it must feel better to be out now, and to apologize –although, it doesn’t excuse the bad behavior.

(Photo, Pacific Coast News; via Daily Beast)

The post #LGBTQ: Kevin Spacey Issues Apology to Actor Anthony Rapp (& Comes Out!) appeared first on The WOW Report.

Viewing all 11455 articles
Browse latest View live




Latest Images