I definitely started looking at celebrity differently once I realized that the VAST majority of working actors, even ones whose names or characters you know, are just freelancers worried about lining up their next gig.

Agreed. No one wants to squint past the dancers in the foreground to see the list; I don’t know why they insisted on doing it this way again.

So, five months and a bunch of Academy Award nominations later: Did it?

Yes, I quite liked him in this (and in general). Playing the heavy seems to come pretty naturally to him as a performer, and I think he was a good choice for the role. A shame he disliked the experience of reshoots, but I thought what made it to the screen was pretty strong (though apparently not “too strong”).

I remember renting this on VHS and liking it well enough at the time. I don’t remember who played Lennon, either, but I do recall Stephen Dorff played Sutcliffe and the guy from Neverwhere wound up playing McCartney in this and another project.

I met Brian Peck when I was on the set of X-Men (in a civilian capacity) in 1999. He sat and socialized behind the camera pretty much the whole time my +1 and I were there; he didn’t have a role in the movie (though he eventually got a came0—in the same scene as Stan Lee, no less!). He told us he was there because he…

No in-joke, just the same dude link-spamming for his band regardless of actual context (including obit threads). Pre-Kinja he would have been roundly mocked and banned, but alas.

A degree from Miskatonic is really prestigious, since so many students mysteriously disappear or go insane before graduation.

I was going to say—we pretty much already had this in the Daredevil flashbacks.

That whole scene is a goldmine, starting from “Place of Automobiles.” Not bad for a clip that’s less than thirty seconds.

Agreed. I liked his performance(s), but Majors can be recast easily enough. Leaning into the multiverse concept makes it even easier for them.

I seem to be more positive than most on that era, but yes, of its many, many problems, exactly zero of them came down to Whittaker.

I know his name has been bandied about for this or Big Blue himself, and... yeah, I can see it. Interested to see what they do with these characters this time around.

I had this thought, too. And he's already Canadian!

“The film, Lanthimos’ first since The Favourite won Best Picture at the Oscars in 2019 [...]”

Don’t know if you found the Elvira anecdote in Guralnick’s book (haven’t read it), but she corroborates that take on Elvis in her own memoir (unlike her encounters with Tom Jones, Eric Burdon, Jimmy Page, or any number of other ‘60s and ‘70s rock stars whose orbit she entered, all of which are varying levels of…

It’s not; I think that was intended as a joke. The character’s name is Robert McCall.

Sure, you know, the original movie and... um... that one scene in Exorcist III people seem to like!

“Family is important” seems to have become the standard message for blockbusters. Inoffensive, vague, and generally agreeable.

It is! Her “OH MY GOOOOD!” is a pretty superb line reading, too.