<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<rss version="2.0"
	xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/"
	xmlns:wfw="http://wellformedweb.org/CommentAPI/"
	xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/"
	xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom"
	xmlns:sy="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/syndication/"
	xmlns:slash="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/slash/"
	>

<channel>
	<title>The National Memo &#187; Entertainment</title>
	<atom:link href="http://www.nationalmemo.com/category/entertainment/feed/" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" />
	<link>http://www.nationalmemo.com</link>
	<description>Breaking News, Smart Politics</description>
	<lastBuildDate>Tue, 21 May 2013 22:50:58 +0000</lastBuildDate>
	<language>en-US</language>
	<sy:updatePeriod>hourly</sy:updatePeriod>
	<sy:updateFrequency>1</sy:updateFrequency>
	<generator>http://wordpress.org/?v=3.5.1</generator>
		<item>
		<title>Teen Star Zendaya Finishes 1st On &#8216;Dancing&#8217; Finals</title>
		<link>http://www.nationalmemo.com/teen-star-zendaya-finishes-1st-on-dancing-finals/</link>
		<comments>http://www.nationalmemo.com/teen-star-zendaya-finishes-1st-on-dancing-finals/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 21 May 2013 18:19:04 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Associated Press</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Entertainment]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.nationalmemo.com/teen-star-zendaya-finishes-1st-on-dancing-finals/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[LOS ANGELES (AP) — Four finalists are vying for the &#8220;Dancing With the Stars&#8221; title, and just one point separates the top two contestants. A new champion will be crowned Tuesday. Football pro Jacoby Jones, Olympian Alexandra Raisman, singer Kellie Pickler and 16-year-old Disney Channel star Zendaya each did three dances on Monday&#8217;s episode of<br /><a class="moretag" href="http://www.nationalmemo.com/teen-star-zendaya-finishes-1st-on-dancing-finals/"> Read More...</a>]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>LOS ANGELES (AP) — Four finalists are vying for the &#8220;Dancing With the Stars&#8221; title, and just one point separates the top two contestants.</p>
<p>A new champion will be crowned Tuesday.</p>
<p>Football pro Jacoby Jones, Olympian Alexandra Raisman, singer Kellie Pickler and 16-year-old Disney Channel star Zendaya each did three dances on Monday&#8217;s episode of the ABC competition.</p>
<p>Zendaya was perfect in the judges&#8217; eyes, earning the maximum score for each routine.</p>
<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ve only just scratched the surface of your talent,&#8221; head judge Len Goodman said.</p>
<p>Pickler was a close second, collecting perfect 10s for her quickstep and freestyle dances, but finishing behind Zendaya in the cha-cha relay, which saw all four finalists perform to the same song.</p>
<p>Pickler&#8217;s freestyle brought judge Carrie Ann Inaba to tears.</p>
<p>&#8220;You just bared your soul on the dance floor and it was one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen,&#8221; Inaba said.</p>
<p>Raisman finished third after wowing the judges with a freestyle routine that incorporated gymnastics and stunts on vertical bars. Jones landed in last place, falling short on his action-packed freestyle that Inaba said distracted from his dancing.</p>
<p>Viewers were given until 11 a.m. EDT Tuesday to cast votes on Facebook. The show&#8217;s hosts, Tom Bergeron and Brooke Burke-Charvet, said ABC&#8217;s online voting system was down Monday night.</p>
<p>Each contestant will perform one last dance during Tuesday&#8217;s season finale to add points to their totals. Judges&#8217; scores combined with viewer votes will determine the new champion.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>Online:</p>
</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>AP Entertainment Writer Sandy Cohen is on Twitter: www.twitter.com/APSandy.</p>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.nationalmemo.com/teen-star-zendaya-finishes-1st-on-dancing-finals/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Justin Bieber&#8217;s Monkey Becomes German Property</title>
		<link>http://www.nationalmemo.com/justin-biebers-monkey-becomes-german-property/</link>
		<comments>http://www.nationalmemo.com/justin-biebers-monkey-becomes-german-property/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 21 May 2013 18:17:24 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Associated Press</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Entertainment]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.nationalmemo.com/justin-biebers-monkey-becomes-german-property/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[BERLIN (AP) — Justin Bieber&#8217;s pet monkey is now the property of Germany. Mally the Monkey was seized by German customs March 28 when Bieber failed to produce required vaccination and import papers for the animal after landing in Munich for a European tour. He had until midnight Friday to produce those documents. Customs spokesman<br /><a class="moretag" href="http://www.nationalmemo.com/justin-biebers-monkey-becomes-german-property/"> Read More...</a>]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>BERLIN (AP) — Justin Bieber&#8217;s pet monkey is now the property of Germany.</p>
<p>Mally the Monkey was seized by German customs March 28 when Bieber failed to produce required vaccination and import papers for the animal after landing in Munich for a European tour. He had until midnight Friday to produce those documents.</p>
<p>Customs spokesman Thomas Meister said after offices opened following a holiday weekend that officials received no documents. He said the customs authority issued an order later Tuesday formally transferring ownership of the animal to the German state.</p>
<p>Bieber, 19, has six weeks to contest the decision if he wants to do so. Germany&#8217;s Federal Agency for Nature Conservation said the monkey would be sent to a zoo somewhere in Germany, but officials declined to say exactly where to avoid security problems.</p>
<p>Mally, a capuchin monkey, has been cared for at Munich&#8217;s animal shelter since being taken into quarantine. The shelter&#8217;s manager says Mally, who is now 20 weeks old, has fared well and gained weight in its care.</p>
<p>The shelter has criticized Bieber for keeping such a young monkey as a pet, saying it shouldn&#8217;t have been taken away from its mother until it was a year old. Experts say capuchin monkeys also need to be kept in groups as they are very sociable animals.</p>
<p>German authorities now hope to reclaim the cost of Mally&#8217;s upkeep at the Munich shelter over the past two months, including care, food and vet visits.</p>
<p>Meister said a bill would be prepared and sent to Bieber. He put the cost at several thousand euros (dollars) but said authorities would not detail the specific amount.</p>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.nationalmemo.com/justin-biebers-monkey-becomes-german-property/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Depardieu To Play A Chechen Man Seeking Revenge</title>
		<link>http://www.nationalmemo.com/depardieu-to-play-a-chechen-man-seeking-revenge/</link>
		<comments>http://www.nationalmemo.com/depardieu-to-play-a-chechen-man-seeking-revenge/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 21 May 2013 18:16:43 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Associated Press</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Entertainment]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.nationalmemo.com/depardieu-to-play-a-chechen-man-seeking-revenge/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[GROZNY, Russia (AP) — French actor Gerard Depardieu will star in a drama about a Chechen man who seeks revenge for the killing of his son. Chechnya, a southern Russian province, has been in the spotlight since it emerged that the suspects in April&#8217;s Boston marathon bombing are ethnic Chechens. The predominantly Muslim province was<br /><a class="moretag" href="http://www.nationalmemo.com/depardieu-to-play-a-chechen-man-seeking-revenge/"> Read More...</a>]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>GROZNY, Russia (AP) — French actor Gerard Depardieu will star in a drama about a Chechen man who seeks revenge for the killing of his son.</p>
<p>Chechnya, a southern Russian province, has been in the spotlight since it emerged that the suspects in April&#8217;s Boston marathon bombing are ethnic Chechens.</p>
<p>The predominantly Muslim province was devastated by two separatist wars with Moscow, and its current Kremlin-backed ruler has been widely criticized for human rights violations.</p>
<p>The ruler, Ramzan Kadyrov, has been a gracious host to Depardieu, giving him an expensive apartment in the Chechen capital, Grozny, after the actor got Russian citizenship in January.</p>
<p>Depardieu said Tuesday that the drama, titled &#8220;Turquoise,&#8221; will be directed by French filmmaker Philippe Martinez and will also star British actress Elizabeth Hurley.</p>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.nationalmemo.com/depardieu-to-play-a-chechen-man-seeking-revenge/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>At Last: &#8216;Arrested&#8217; Is Reborn Sunday On Netflix</title>
		<link>http://www.nationalmemo.com/at-last-arrested-is-reborn-sunday-on-netflix/</link>
		<comments>http://www.nationalmemo.com/at-last-arrested-is-reborn-sunday-on-netflix/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 21 May 2013 18:07:10 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Associated Press</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Entertainment]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.nationalmemo.com/at-last-arrested-is-reborn-sunday-on-netflix/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[NEW YORK (AP) — Portia de Rossi only believed it was happening when her agent got the good news from the producers. Michael Cera only believed it was happening when the cameras rolled. It happened all right. After years of clamoring from fans and rumors firing them up while the cast hung on for a<br /><a class="moretag" href="http://www.nationalmemo.com/at-last-arrested-is-reborn-sunday-on-netflix/"> Read More...</a>]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>NEW YORK (AP) — Portia de Rossi only believed it was happening when her agent got the good news from the producers. Michael Cera only believed it was happening when the cameras rolled.</p>
<p>It happened all right. After years of clamoring from fans and rumors firing them up while the cast hung on for a green light, &#8220;Arrested Development&#8221; has risen from the dead with 15 half-hours premiering en masse on Netflix on Sunday at 3:01 a.m. EDT.</p>
<p>&#8220;Arrested Development&#8221; is the cock-eyed comedy blessed with a king&#8217;s ransom of talent and the twisted vision of its mastermind, Matt Hurwitz, that aired on Fox for three seasons as a cult favorite, then was canceled for low ratings — and maybe because it befuddled everyone who wasn&#8217;t hooked on its lunacy. (Those original three seasons are available for streaming on Netflix, too.)</p>
<p>&#8220;I think the show scored some &#8216;cool points&#8217; for dying before its time,&#8221; says Cera. &#8220;But there are still a lot more places for it to go.&#8221;</p>
<p>Yes, &#8220;Arrested Development&#8221; died young with a beautiful, if funny-to-look-at, corpse. But its fans weren&#8217;t ready to bury it. And said so.</p>
<p>&#8220;Clearly a lot of people DIDN&#8217;T like the show,&#8221; Jason Bateman allows, &#8220;so I guess all we were hearing from were those who do — and that happens to be a brand of people who are not afraid of speaking their minds.&#8221;</p>
<p>Now reanimated by public outcry, &#8220;Arrested&#8221; is going new places.</p>
<p>&#8220;Mitch and the cast didn&#8217;t want to do something not as good as the old series,&#8221; says Bateman (who plays Michael Bluth, the fractious family&#8217;s would-be mediating presence). &#8220;We didn&#8217;t want to do something lateral or just a retread.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;I think it&#8217;s new at every opportunity,&#8221; says Cera (who plays Michael Bluth&#8217;s straight-arrow son), &#8220;while retaining the show&#8217;s original heart.&#8221;</p>
<p>The new Netflix season takes the form of what you might call an anthology as it updates viewers, character by character with each episode, on the Bluth family — that once-wealthy, now-broke and at-each-other&#8217;s-throats clan squabbling in Newport Beach, Calif.</p>
<p>A wicked homage to the scandals of Enron and Tyco and a loopy foreshadowing of the 2008 Wall Street meltdown, &#8220;Arrested&#8221; premiered in 2003 as a sendup of high-end vanities, greed and corruption as displayed within the Bluth family circle.</p>
<p>Besides de Rossi, Cera and Bateman, the cast of &#8220;Arrested&#8221; Redux brings back Will Arnett, Alia Shawkat, Tony Hale, David Cross, Jeffrey Tambor and Jessica Walter, who reconvened in a strategic yet catch-as-catch-can fashion.</p>
<p>&#8220;There was no reality where we could get everybody for a full 7- or 8-month period,&#8221; explains Hurwitz. &#8220;That gave birth to the form we came up with for the new series.&#8221;</p>
<p>The 15 episodes dwell on individual characters during the six-year span from when the series was canceled in 2006 up through 2012. That structure was supposed to make it simple to book each actor for an isolated shooting schedule.</p>
<p>Then Hurwitz took his creativity another step. Since all the episodes are happening simultaneously, he couldn&#8217;t resist including crossover appearances from other actors in each episode. He wanted characters and story lines from different episodes to intersect. But his ambition made it all the trickier getting all the actors he needed in place for any given episode.</p>
<p>&#8220;In a quarter of the scenes, someone is green-screened in,&#8221; says Hurwitz, who goes on to concede that what began as a solution to a problem of logistics inspired him to create new problems for himself. For instance: &#8220;If two characters are having a conversation in one of those characters&#8217; episodes and that character&#8217;s life changes, then in the other character&#8217;s episode you show the other side of the conversation and the result of it on THAT character.&#8221;</p>
<p>The overall effect is a sort of hypertext array for the 15 episodes.</p>
<p>&#8220;Matt made it a choose-your-own-adventure season, in that you can watch any episode out of order and it makes sense but, depending on which order you watch them, the series kind of tells a different story,&#8221; says de Rossi (who plays spoiled materialist sister Lindsay).</p>
<p>Not that &#8220;Arrested Development&#8221; has ever chosen the simple or obvious path. From the start, it was dense, convoluted and layered, packed with sight gags, self-referential jokes, flashbacks, hand-held cinematography with run-on sequences (promoting improvisation to enhance Hurwitz&#8217;s scripts) and, of course, its droll, documentarylike narration by Ron Howard, one of the show&#8217;s executive producers.</p>
<p>On Fox, the show won six Emmys and a Peabody as well as critics&#8217; love while always fighting for its life in the ratings. But Hurwitz is philosophical about the obstacles his show has faced. They seem to have given him license to obliterate boundaries that otherwise would have hemmed him in.</p>
<p>&#8220;All of the limitations,&#8221; he says brightly, &#8220;are great creative opportunities.&#8221;</p>
<p>That applied to the new episodes&#8217; shooting pace, which Arnett describes as &#8220;run-and-gun and crazy.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;But it really worked to our advantage. It was &#8216;OK, get over here, here we go,&#8217; and we were right back into it,&#8221; says Arnett (who plays Lindsay&#8217;s older brother, Gob, a preening, mediocre stage magician). &#8220;After working together on the series before, all of us just kind of knew what we&#8217;re doing. There&#8217;s an implicit trust there. I know that sounds corny, but it&#8217;s true.&#8221;</p>
<p>This is a mutual admiration society: The cast heaps praise on Hurwitz, who volleys it back at his actors. And they all join in celebrating &#8220;Arrested&#8221; viewers, but for whom the show would be long dead and forgotten.</p>
<p>&#8220;There are way, way more fans of &#8216;The Big Bang Theory,&#8217;&#8221; notes David Cross (who plays Tobius Funke, a quack-psychiatrist-turned-actor-wannabe). &#8220;But they&#8217;re not as passionate as &#8216;Arrested Development&#8217; fans — because there&#8217;s more to be passionate about.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;In either a conscious or unconscious way, our audience thinks — and rightly so — it&#8217;s THEIR show,&#8221; says Jeffrey Tambor (who plays jailbird-patriarch George Bluth Sr.).</p>
<p>&#8220;A lot of people have told me over the years that they would build friendships around the show,&#8221; Ron Howard adds. &#8220;They would judge first dates on whether that person likes &#8216;Arrested Development&#8217; or not. It was a means of evaluation.&#8221;</p>
<p>Does that mean there might be children walking around today whose parents were united by &#8220;Arrested Development&#8221;?</p>
<p>&#8220;I think that&#8217;s fair to assume,&#8221; Howard says with a laugh.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>Online:</p>
</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>EDITOR&#8217;S NOTE — Frazier Moore is a national television columnist for The Associated Press. He can be reached at fmoore(at)ap.org and at http://www.twitter.com/tvfrazier.</p>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.nationalmemo.com/at-last-arrested-is-reborn-sunday-on-netflix/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Eminem&#8217;s Publisher Sues Facebook Over Song Usage</title>
		<link>http://www.nationalmemo.com/eminems-publisher-sues-facebook-over-song-usage/</link>
		<comments>http://www.nationalmemo.com/eminems-publisher-sues-facebook-over-song-usage/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 21 May 2013 18:01:01 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Associated Press</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Entertainment]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.nationalmemo.com/eminems-publisher-sues-facebook-over-song-usage/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[DETROIT (AP) — Eminem&#8217;s song publisher is suing Facebook and an ad agency, saying they copied music from one of the rapper&#8217;s songs. Eight Mile Style filed a federal lawsuit in Detroit on Monday alleging that a 30-second Facebook ad broadcast online last month copied music from Eminem&#8217;s 2000 song &#8220;Under the Influence.&#8221; The Detroit<br /><a class="moretag" href="http://www.nationalmemo.com/eminems-publisher-sues-facebook-over-song-usage/"> Read More...</a>]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>DETROIT (AP) — Eminem&#8217;s song publisher is suing Facebook and an ad agency, saying they copied music from one of the rapper&#8217;s songs.</p>
<p>Eight Mile Style filed a federal lawsuit in Detroit on Monday alleging that a 30-second Facebook ad broadcast online last month copied music from Eminem&#8217;s 2000 song &#8220;Under the Influence.&#8221;</p>
<p>The Detroit Free Press ( ) reports that the ad was featured in a webcast by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg to announce Facebook Home, an interface for Android phones.</p>
<p>The complaint says Portland, Ore., ad agency Wieden+Kennedy copied Eminem&#8217;s music &#8220;in an effort to curry favor&#8221; with Facebook by catering to Zuckerberg&#8217;s personal likes and to &#8220;invoke the same irreverent theme&#8221; of the song.</p>
<p>Facebook spokesman Andrew Noyes declined comment. A message seeking comment was left Tuesday with the ad agency.</p>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.nationalmemo.com/eminems-publisher-sues-facebook-over-song-usage/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Microsoft Expected To Reveal Next-generation Xbox</title>
		<link>http://www.nationalmemo.com/microsoft-expected-to-reveal-next-generation-xbox/</link>
		<comments>http://www.nationalmemo.com/microsoft-expected-to-reveal-next-generation-xbox/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 21 May 2013 17:45:23 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Associated Press</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Entertainment]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.nationalmemo.com/microsoft-expected-to-reveal-next-generation-xbox/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[REMOND, Wash. (AP) — Will Xbox mark the spot once again for Microsoft? The company is set to reveal the next generation of its Xbox entertainment console during a presentation Tuesday at its headquarters in Redmond, Wash. It&#8217;s been eight years since the launch of the Xbox 360. The original Xbox debuted in 2001, and<br /><a class="moretag" href="http://www.nationalmemo.com/microsoft-expected-to-reveal-next-generation-xbox/"> Read More...</a>]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>REMOND, Wash. (AP) — Will Xbox mark the spot once again for Microsoft?</p>
<p>The company is set to reveal the next generation of its Xbox entertainment console during a presentation Tuesday at its headquarters in Redmond, Wash.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s been eight years since the launch of the Xbox 360. The original Xbox debuted in 2001, and its high-definition successor premiered in 2005.</p>
<p>For the past two years, Microsoft has led the gaming industry in console sales with the Xbox 360. In April alone, consumers spent $208 million on Xbox hardware, software and accessories, more than rival consoles from Nintendo and Sony, according to market research firm NPD Group.</p>
<p>Nintendo kicked off the next generation of gaming last November with the launch of the Wii U, the successor to the popular Wii system featuring an innovative tablet-like controller yet graphics on par with the Xbox 360 and Sony&#8217;s PlayStation 3. Yet Nintendo said the console sold just 3.45 million units by the end of March, well below expectations.</p>
<p>Sony was next, teasing plans for its upcoming PlayStation 4 at an event last February in New York. The reaction to that console, which featured richer graphics and more social features, was mixed.</p>
<p>Microsoft hasn&#8217;t said what games will be on display Tuesday, but Activison-Blizzard Inc. previously announced that &#8220;Call of Duty: Ghosts,&#8221; the next chapter in its popular military shooter franchise, would make an appearance at the event.</p>
<p>Xbox has been the exclusive home to such popular gaming franchises as sci-fi first-person shooter &#8220;Halo,&#8221; racing simulator &#8220;Forza&#8221; and alien shoot-&#8217;em-up &#8220;Gears of War.&#8221; In recent years, Microsoft expanded the scope of the Xbox 360 beyond just games, adding streaming media apps and the family-friendly Kinect system.</p>
<p>&#8220;They need to show good games,&#8221; said Stephen Totilo, editor of gaming site Kotaku.com. &#8220;There&#8217;s been anxiety among Xbox fans that Microsoft has forgotten or doesn&#8217;t value the core gamer as much. We saw this when Microsoft introduced the Kinect and went after families and kids.&#8221;</p>
<p>Tuesday&#8217;s event will give Microsoft the opportunity to address several questions about the rumored hardware, including what it will cost, whether it can play used games or Blu-ray discs and if it will require a constant connection to the Internet.</p>
<p>Microsoft likely won&#8217;t showcase all aspects of the new Xbox. The company has another presentation scheduled three weeks later during E3, the gaming industry&#8217;s annual convention in Los Angeles.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>Online:</p>
<p>http://www.xbox.com/</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>Follow AP Entertainment Writer Derrik J. Lang on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/derrikjlang.</p>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.nationalmemo.com/microsoft-expected-to-reveal-next-generation-xbox/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>In Coens&#8217; Cannes Hit, Oscar Isaac Gets His Break</title>
		<link>http://www.nationalmemo.com/in-coens-cannes-hit-oscar-isaac-gets-his-break/</link>
		<comments>http://www.nationalmemo.com/in-coens-cannes-hit-oscar-isaac-gets-his-break/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 21 May 2013 17:41:24 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Associated Press</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Entertainment]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.nationalmemo.com/in-coens-cannes-hit-oscar-isaac-gets-his-break/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[CANNES, France (AP) — Joel and Ethan Coen had almost given up on casting the lead for their film &#8220;Inside Llewyn Davis.&#8221; The part, a folk musician in early 1960s Greenwich Village, demanded the elusive combination of someone who could both carry a movie and perform the songs central to the film. Then they met<br /><a class="moretag" href="http://www.nationalmemo.com/in-coens-cannes-hit-oscar-isaac-gets-his-break/"> Read More...</a>]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>CANNES, France (AP) — Joel and Ethan Coen had almost given up on casting the lead for their film &#8220;Inside Llewyn Davis.&#8221; The part, a folk musician in early 1960s Greenwich Village, demanded the elusive combination of someone who could both carry a movie and perform the songs central to the film.</p>
<p>Then they met Oscar Isaac.</p>
<p>&#8220;It just didn&#8217;t happen until he walked in the room,&#8221; says Joel Coen. &#8220;There was a point at which we wondered if we&#8217;d written something that was essentially impossible to cast.&#8221;</p>
<p>The Coens have long been known for their casting acumen, but they may have outdone even themselves with Isaac, a 33-year-old, Juilliard-trained actor with a few notable credits to his name but nothing on par with a major Coen brothers release. The film was greeted ecstatically at the Cannes Film Festival at its Sunday premiere, with Isaac hailed as the festival&#8217;s breakout star and a possible Oscar nominee.</p>
<p>&#8220;I finally got the shot,&#8221; Isaac said in an interview. &#8220;And I got it in this context, which is more than I honestly could have ever imagined for myself.&#8221;</p>
<p>In the film, Isaac plays Llewyn Davis, a character very loosely modeled on folk musician Dave Van Ronk. Despite his evident talent for personal songs with traditional folk influences, he&#8217;s an artist just barely out of step with history. Bitter and increasingly frustrated, he&#8217;s a raging failure, missing his moment, one instead grabbed by Bob Dylan.</p>
<p>For many, Isaac&#8217;s story is kind of an inverse of Llewyn. He is a young actor who gets his chance — &#8220;his minute,&#8221; says music supervisor T Bone Burnett — and takes advantage of it.</p>
<p>&#8220;The whole story is about a guy who never gets there,&#8221; says Burnett, the frequent Coen collaborator. &#8220;And yet the actual person who&#8217;s playing that guy, does it. He seizes that minute like a motherf&#8212;&#8211;.&#8221;</p>
<p>Isaac isn&#8217;t as sarcastic or as antagonistic as Llewyn: &#8220;My energy toward people is very much like &#8216;I mean you no harm,&#8217;&#8221; he says. And he&#8217;s trying not to get too far ahead himself with his rousing success at Cannes. His instinct, he says, &#8220;is always to diminish any good thing, so as not to be devastated later.&#8221;</p>
<p>While Isaac says that he identifies with the role fortune and opportunity plays in catching a break, he more associates with the workmanlike attitude of both Llewyn and the Coens. For him, it was as much about gradually working toward &#8220;Llewyn Davis&#8221; as it was landing a single break.</p>
<p>&#8220;I remember when I was getting out of school, I was like, &#8216;If they just gave me one shot. If they gave me the one shot, oh man, I know I can do it,&#8217;&#8221; he says. &#8220;Then I got my first movie and it came and it went, and I was like, &#8216;If they just gave me one more shot, just another shot.&#8217; Then I started getting work, and I realized it&#8217;s not about that. It&#8217;s not about the shot. It&#8217;s about work.&#8221;</p>
<p>Born in Guatemala and raised in Florida, Isaac grew up playing in a variety of bands as a guitarist and singer, everything from ska to a hardcore band in which he sported blue hair. But since coming out of Juilliard, the New York actor has found his musical talents valuable in Hollywood. He also played a musician in the direct-to-DVD high school reunion comedy &#8220;10 Years.&#8221;</p>
<p>His most notable previous credits include Madonna&#8217;s British period film &#8220;W.E.&#8221; and Nicolas Winding Refn&#8217;s neo-noir &#8220;Drive,&#8221; in which he played the formerly incarcerated husband of Carey Mulligan&#8217;s character. (Mulligan co-stars in &#8220;Inside Llewyn Davis,&#8221; along with Justin Timberlake.)</p>
<p>But when he heard about the Coens&#8217; film, he knew that his combination of skills was perfectly suited to the part.</p>
<p>&#8220;I said: I have to get a shot at this movie because I feel like my 33 years of life have been preparing me to do something like this,&#8221; says Isaac.</p>
<p>He first submitted a recording of himself performing the traditional blues ballad, &#8220;Hang Me, Oh Hang Me,&#8221; which Llewyn plays in the film. He auditioned for a casting director and then later for the Coens. Usually, as a guard against later disappointment, Isaac immediately tosses a script after an audition. But he didn&#8217;t this time, and kept working on the part for the next month before Joel Coen called to tell him he got the part.</p>
<p>His preparation included performing the film&#8217;s songs, like Llewyn, in downtown New York clubs. Buster Keaton was an influence in forming a &#8220;mask of melancholy.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;I would go to parties with that and try to interact with people with that,&#8221; says Isaac. &#8220;It&#8217;s tough because it&#8217;s not about being cool. In a way, it&#8217;s just about being very open and very up front with who you are. That was a scary place to live in.&#8221;</p>
<p>But the music was central to character, a kind of window into Llewyn&#8217;s soul. A bit of advice from Burnett (who also did the music for the Coens&#8217; &#8220;O Brother, Where Art Thou?&#8221;) was crucial: &#8220;Sing like you&#8217;re singing to yourself.&#8221;</p>
<p>Along with Burnett, Isaac collaborated with Timberlake and Marcus Mumford. Using the parlance of musicians, Timberlake said Isaac &#8220;threw it down&#8221; in his performance.</p>
<p>&#8220;It felt like a little bit of serendipity,&#8221; Timberlake says of the Cannes reception to Isaac. &#8220;Just seeing the looks on people&#8217;s faces looking at him like, &#8216;Where did you come from?&#8217; It felt like: &#8216;Llewyn finally made it.&#8217;&#8221;</p>
<p>Moviegoers will surely become more familiar with Isaac when CBS Films releases &#8220;Inside Llewyn Davis&#8221; this December in the heart of awards season. (He also co-stars alongside Kirsten Dunst and Viggo Mortensen in the upcoming thriller &#8220;Two Faces of January.&#8221;)</p>
<p>&#8220;Why this movie is so personal — I think to all of us — is because of the recognition that it just as easily can go the other way,&#8221; Isaac says.</p>
<p>&#8220;There&#8217;s very few geniuses that are shooting across the sky like Shakespeare or Dylan. The rest of us, it&#8217;s like you have to work and be talented, but you got to be lucky for a lot of this stuff to happen.&#8221;</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>Follow AP Entertainment Writer Jake Coyle on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/jake_coyle</p>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.nationalmemo.com/in-coens-cannes-hit-oscar-isaac-gets-his-break/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Ari Folman Animates Robin Wright In &#8216;The Congress&#8217;</title>
		<link>http://www.nationalmemo.com/ari-folman-animates-robin-wright-in-the-congress/</link>
		<comments>http://www.nationalmemo.com/ari-folman-animates-robin-wright-in-the-congress/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 21 May 2013 16:04:11 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Associated Press</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Entertainment]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.nationalmemo.com/ari-folman-animates-robin-wright-in-the-congress/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[CANNES, France (AP) — Hollywood is hell. That&#8217;s an idea to set tongues wagging at the Cannes Film Festival, and it&#8217;s the distinct impression left by Israeli director Ari Folman&#8217;s head-spinning part-animated feature &#8220;The Congress.&#8221; Fittingly, Cannes provided the inspiration for the director&#8217;s dystopian vision of the entertainment business, which stars actress Robin Wright as,<br /><a class="moretag" href="http://www.nationalmemo.com/ari-folman-animates-robin-wright-in-the-congress/"> Read More...</a>]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>CANNES, France (AP) — Hollywood is hell.</p>
<p>That&#8217;s an idea to set tongues wagging at the Cannes Film Festival, and it&#8217;s the distinct impression left by Israeli director Ari Folman&#8217;s head-spinning part-animated feature &#8220;The Congress.&#8221;</p>
<p>Fittingly, Cannes provided the inspiration for the director&#8217;s dystopian vision of the entertainment business, which stars actress Robin Wright as, well, actress Robin Wright — a 40something performer whose career is on the slide.</p>
<p>Folman conceived the kernel of the film when he came to the festival in 2008 with &#8220;Waltz With Bashir,&#8221; his Academy Award-nominated animated film about his experiences as a young Israeli soldier in Lebanon in the 1980s.</p>
<p>The director said he was walking through the bustling movie marketplace at Cannes when he saw an elderly woman.</p>
<p>&#8220;And my sales agent asked me, do you recognize this lady? And I said no,&#8221; Folman said. &#8220;And he told me her name and I was shocked, because she was this goddess American actress from the 70s. She was in her 70s, and no one recognized her. And this is Mecca for cinema, this place!</p>
<p>&#8220;And I thought, she&#8217;s got in front of her, everywhere, the image of her young, stolen forever in the movies. And here she is and she has to live with her image forever young, but she&#8217;s getting old.&#8221;</p>
<p>Folman diplomatically declined to name the actress. But he said the episode gave him a way to realize a long-held dream of adapting &#8220;The Futurological Congress,&#8221; a satirical sci-fi novel by Polish writer Stanislaw Lem in which pharmaceutical overlords keep the population hooked on hallucinogenic drugs.</p>
<p>In the movie, Wright agrees to become a &#8220;scanned actor,&#8221; a digital avatar owned by her studio. The digital Wright can be endlessly, agelessly used in new movies — the studio makes her &#8220;Agent Robin&#8221; in a sci-fi action series — while the flesh-and-blood person grows old in obscurity.</p>
<p>The film&#8217;s live-action first half is an entertainingly bleak depiction of Hollywood, with an on-the-ropes Wright berated by her agent (a delicious Harvey Keitel) and bullied by her studio boss (a malevolent Danny Huston).</p>
<p>Wright has been called brave for taking on issues of aging and image so directly. But Folman said he didn&#8217;t see it that way when he offered the role to the actress after sitting across from her at an awards ceremony and thinking she looked sad.</p>
<p>&#8220;I think it&#8217;s a great role,&#8221; he said. &#8220;She is Robin Wright, she is Agent Robin in the movie, she&#8217;s an animated character, she&#8217;s an old Robin at the very end, she sings two songs — it&#8217;s a great role.</p>
<p>&#8220;Although Harvey Keitel told me one day on the set, &#8216;Man, she is so brave. You could have offered me the world, I would never do what she does in this movie.&#8217;&#8221;</p>
<p>Wright has said she doesn&#8217;t think she is playing herself, even though she and her screen character share a name and many biographical details, including roles in &#8220;The Princess Bride&#8221; and &#8220;Forrest Gump.&#8221;</p>
<p>Once Wright has been digitally scanned, the movie switches to animation as the character visits a conference at a luxury hotel — where her films screen endlessly and she goes unrecognized — and learns of a sinister plot to make the power of celebrity even more addictive.</p>
<p>The movie&#8217;s audacious shifts of tone, and its swirling, psychedelically tinged animation, have elicited diverse reactions at Cannes, where &#8220;The Congress&#8221; opened the Director&#8217;s Fortnight competition.</p>
<p>Many saw it as original but uneven. It&#8217;s inarguably a strikingly original work by a director who is both amused and despairing about the modern entertainment business.</p>
<p>Folman, a genial, bearded 50-year-old sporting a gold medallion and an earring, says he fears the sort of movies that inspired him — the director-driven American cinema of the 1970s — is dying, soon to be found only in cinema museums.</p>
<p>And don&#8217;t get him started on 3-D, CGI and the other digital tricks that, Folman thinks, are ruining movies.</p>
<p>&#8220;The role of the director is completely different (today),&#8221; he said. &#8220;Until recently the urgency on the set to make a movie was huge. Today, it&#8217;s only part of the job, because you can fix everything afterwards. The set is blue screens, and then you build it and you can fix it. And sometimes it&#8217;s for the good, but I can give you examples where it&#8217;s terrible.</p>
<p>&#8220;My favorite sci-fi movie ever is &#8216;Blade Runner.&#8217; This film was done with hand-made crafts.&#8221;</p>
<p>For the movie, director Ridley Scott &#8220;built the sets — it&#8217;s wood and paper and plastic and aluminum. I see this movie every few months on a big screen at home and it will live forever.</p>
<p>&#8220;Same guy did &#8216;Prometheus&#8217; last year. Who saw it?&#8221;</p>
<p>Folman is keeping the flame burning for an older form of cinema — but it&#8217;s a slow and laborious process. &#8220;The Congress&#8221; took five years to make, and slightly under an hour of animation required two years of work by animators in nine countries.</p>
<p>&#8220;I try not to look at myself as this nostalgic (person),&#8221; Folman added, pausing a second before adding: &#8220;But.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t say we will have scanned actors. I think the human side will win. I am a true believer in that.</p>
<p>&#8220;But if I look at my kids and the way they use everything — iPads and electronics and everything — I have to be honest with myself and say, if my kids, in 15 years&#8217; time, see a movie with scanned characters, they won&#8217;t give a damn.&#8221;</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>Jill Lawless can be reached at http://Twitter.com/JillLawless</p>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.nationalmemo.com/ari-folman-animates-robin-wright-in-the-congress/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Charismatic Las Vegas Mob Lawyer Mayor Pens Memoir</title>
		<link>http://www.nationalmemo.com/charismatic-las-vegas-mob-lawyer-mayor-pens-memoir/</link>
		<comments>http://www.nationalmemo.com/charismatic-las-vegas-mob-lawyer-mayor-pens-memoir/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 21 May 2013 14:26:07 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Associated Press</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Entertainment]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.nationalmemo.com/charismatic-las-vegas-mob-lawyer-mayor-pens-memoir/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[LAS VEGAS (AP) — Oscar Goodman ran Las Vegas for 12 years with a showgirl on his arm and a martini in his fist. A former mob lawyer, he promoted his city and himself with antics that lent credibility to his self-given title of &#8220;Happiest mayor in the universe.&#8221; Now, two years into a semi-retirement,<br /><a class="moretag" href="http://www.nationalmemo.com/charismatic-las-vegas-mob-lawyer-mayor-pens-memoir/"> Read More...</a>]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>LAS VEGAS (AP) — Oscar Goodman ran Las Vegas for 12 years with a showgirl on his arm and a martini in his fist.</p>
<p>A former mob lawyer, he promoted his city and himself with antics that lent credibility to his self-given title of &#8220;Happiest mayor in the universe.&#8221;</p>
<p>Now, two years into a semi-retirement, Goodman has written a memoir about his career representing figures out of Martin Scorsese films, his three terms in office and his continuing role as Sin City&#8217;s cheerleader-in-chief.</p>
<p>There are no real bombshells here, but the book reads like a relaxed tour of Las Vegas from the mob era to the present day, with a tipsy gossip by your side.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s all part of the continued branding of one of Las Vegas&#8217; most colorful and defining characters.</p>
<p>In &#8220;Being Oscar: From Mob Lawyer to Mayor of Las Vegas — Only in America&#8221; released by Weinstein Books on Tuesday, Goodman uses the same jocular, unapologetic tone he employed during his martini mayorship.</p>
<p>As mayor, Goodman advocated cutting off the thumbs of graffiti vandals. He secured an official sponsorship from Bombay Sapphire gin.</p>
<p>In the book, the 73-year-old father of four grouses about sneaky FBI tactics, attempts a rapprochement with casino mogul Sheldon Adelson and calls a group of police officers lying pieces of &#8230; well, a word politicians outside of this sin-drenched city would be well-advised to avoid.</p>
<p>As is often the case with Goodman, it is difficult to know where the man ends and his persona begins.</p>
<p>On a recent afternoon at the sprawling Las Vegas home he has shared with his wife since 1976, a bearded and bespectacled Goodman acknowledged he may have lost track of that distinction himself.</p>
<p>He said he needed his bluster during his 35 years representing some of the nation&#8217;s most notorious mob figures, including Anthony &#8220;Tony the Ant&#8221; Spilotro, famously portrayed by Joe Pesci in the movie &#8220;Casino.&#8221;</p>
<p>&#8220;It was David and Goliath,&#8221; he said. &#8220;I walked into court by myself, and there was an entourage of prosecutors against me. I had to have that kind of personality because I could never show any weakness. If I showed weakness, they would eat my clients alive.&#8221;</p>
<p>Goodman writes about his efforts to remain apart from his underworld clients. But he did pick up some of their habits and trappings, including a policy against representing &#8220;rats&#8221; and the dark, pinstripe suits he still wears to this day.</p>
<p>In 1999, Goodman gave up his multimillion-dollar job as an attorney to enter politics, and quickly became one of the most flamboyant and recognizable elected officials in the land.</p>
<p>The Las Vegas mayor&#8217;s office is relatively weak — one of seven equal votes on the City Council — but Goodman used the showmanship that served him so well in the courtroom to infuse the position with something approaching rock star status.</p>
<p>He famously demanded an apology from President Barack Obama for speaking derisively about Las Vegas casinos in the context of encouraging belt-tightening, and took steps to establish a mob museum, which now memorializes a part of Las Vegas lore that many would just as soon forget.</p>
<p>Goodman also performed official duties, including the state of the city address, flanked by sequin-drenched showgirls and with a bottomless cocktail within easy reach. Both props make an appearance on the cover of his book.</p>
<p>He writes that these antics were all in the service of his overarching goal: to revitalize downtown, a dilapidated stretch of older casinos a few miles north of the Strip. Goodman is widely acknowledged to have helped bring about the area&#8217;s hipster renaissance.</p>
<p>&#8220;Because I was the mob lawyer who was turned mayor, people listened, and the phone, which had not rung, began to ring,&#8221; he said.</p>
<p>Again, it is difficult to square the hard-drinking persona that Goodman presents with what he was able to accomplish. He writes that while in office, everyone knew not to call him after 5 p.m. because he wouldn&#8217;t remember the conversation. He also says he wrote the memoir in longhand, being &#8220;completely computer illiterate.&#8221;</p>
<p>Not everyone was won over by the Goodman charm.</p>
<p>When he announced his candidacy, the Las Vegas Review-Journal ran an editorial headlined &#8220;Anybody but Oscar.&#8221;</p>
<p>But through it all, the outlandish comments and habits that would have made him unelectable anywhere else only fed his popularity in Vegas. He was easily re-elected twice, and left office in 2011 after term limits prevented him from making another bid. His wife ran and successfully replaced him.</p>
<p>In his new role as memoirist, Goodman stays true to the mantra of self-indulgence that made him a perfect mascot for his town. Anyone looking for soul-searching and self-reflection will come away empty handed.</p>
<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s a funny thing when you say it out loud, but I always liked myself,&#8221; Goodman writes.</p>
<p>Do readers really need to know a list of his most illustrious classmates at Haverford College in Pennsylvania? His bar exam grade? That he loves his parents very much, and that they helped make him who he is?</p>
<p>Goodman knows the haters are out there, and he doesn&#8217;t seem to care.</p>
<p>&#8220;I was never in doubt, and I know that bothered some people,&#8221; he writes. &#8220;It&#8217;s who I am.&#8221;</p>
<p>Goodman continues to draw adoring crowds as the town&#8217;s official ambassador, and spends enough time at official events to spark rumors of a shadow mayorship. The book, he writes, is an effort to stay relevant.</p>
<p>As the clock ticked down toward his five o&#8217;clock martini, a collection of Oscar Goodman bobblehead dolls — one of his trademarks — nodded from a bookshelf near the big screen television. Photos of Goodman posing with various dignitaries while holding various drinks winked from the tabletops.</p>
<p>Goodman said there is one trophy he feels he&#8217;s still missing: a biopic. But he&#8217;s confident his memoir will be turned into a film.</p>
<p>You don&#8217;t get to be the happiest mayor in the universe by second-guessing these things.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>Hannah Dreier can be reached at http://twitter.com/hannahdreier.</p>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.nationalmemo.com/charismatic-las-vegas-mob-lawyer-mayor-pens-memoir/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Toby Keith Says Okla. Hometown Is &#8216;strong&#8217;</title>
		<link>http://www.nationalmemo.com/toby-keith-says-okla-hometown-is-strong/</link>
		<comments>http://www.nationalmemo.com/toby-keith-says-okla-hometown-is-strong/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 21 May 2013 07:08:06 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Associated Press</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Entertainment]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.nationalmemo.com/toby-keith-says-okla-hometown-is-strong/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Country music performer Toby Keith says he grew up in the area near Oklahoma City that was hit by a devastating tornado. Keith issued a statement saying Monday&#8217;s tornado in Moore, Okla., devastated the community in which he grew up. The city has embraced Keith&#8217;s celebrity and his name is on<br /><a class="moretag" href="http://www.nationalmemo.com/toby-keith-says-okla-hometown-is-strong/"> Read More...</a>]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Country music performer Toby Keith says he grew up in the area near Oklahoma City that was hit by a devastating tornado.</p>
<p>Keith issued a statement saying Monday&#8217;s tornado in Moore, Okla., devastated the community in which he grew up.</p>
<p>The city has embraced Keith&#8217;s celebrity and his name is on the Moore water tower.</p>
<p>Keith says he remembers riding his bicycle through the stricken neighborhoods. Rescuers are still working to pull people from the rubble in the community that&#8217;s southwest of Oklahoma City.</p>
<p>Keith says Moore &#8220;is strong and will persevere.&#8221;</p>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.nationalmemo.com/toby-keith-says-okla-hometown-is-strong/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
	</channel>
</rss>
