News

Warning: Contains Spoilers for Fire & Blood, the book on which House of the Dragon is based.

Milly Alcock returning as Rhaenyra Targaryen in House of the Dragon is less likely now she's been cast as Supergirl in the DC Universe. Taking on such a major franchise role makes it harder - though not impossible - to come back, and it had previously been confirmed she wouldn't return in season 2 anyway. Flashbacks or visions of Rhaenyra's younger years would have been powerful storytelling devices to bridge the gap in her history and further explore her relationship with Alicent.

Hopes for one theory about Rhaenyra Targaryen in House of the Dragon season 3 have, unfortunately, been dashed. Much of the excitement surrounding the Game of Thrones prequel is focused on the upcoming House of the Dragon season 2, which will release on HBO and Max in Summer 2024. The show is pretty much guaranteed a future beyond that,...

Milly Alcock's early casting ahead of the Dcu's Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow signals that she will have a substantial role in the DC Universe. The Dcu needs to explore the bond between Supergirl and Superman, while also stressing the fact that these heroes have wildly different personalities. Supergirl's origin story would be great to explore in the Dcu, as this is something that both The CW's Supergirl and the Dceu's The Flash neglected to investigate.

Milly Alcock has been cast as Kara Zor-El, a.k.a. Supergirl, for DC Studios' upcoming Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow, set within the newly-rebooted DC Universe, and she need look no further than previous iterations of the superhero to learn some valuable lessons. After achieving recognition with roles in Janet King, Upright, and as the young Princess Rhaenyra Targaryen in Game of Thrones spinoff House of the Dragon, Milly Alcock was revealed to have...

Exclusive: Tim Roth is replacing Ian McShane in Paramount+’s buzzy Australian drama series Last King of the Cross.

Roth takes on the role of antagonist Ezra Shipman in the Helium Pictures-produced serialized crime drama after McShane withdrew due to health concerns.

McShane was originally cast as Shipman in late March. He is also set to reprise his role opposite Keanu Reeves in John Wick: Chapter 4. Deadline has reached out to his reps.

The show’s producer/executive producer and Helium founder Mark Fennessy said: “It’s unfortunate that Ian is unable to join us and we wish him a speedy recovery. We are truly delighted that the super brilliant Tim Roth joins our cast as Ezra and cannot wait to see him breathe life into yet another unforgettable character.”

Inspired by John Ibrahim’s best-selling autobiography, the ten-part Last King of The Cross...

Festival

The Italian Cultural Institute in London, La Biennale di Venezia and Curzon have teamed for ‘From Venice to London,’ a season where seven films from Venezia 78 will be shown at Curzon cinemas across London from Nov. 18-22.

“The Lost Daughter,” directed by Maggie Gyllenhaal will open the season and “The Hand of God,” directed by Paolo Sorrentino, will close it. The other selections include “Qui rido io,” directed by Mario Martone; “La santa piccola, directed by Silvia Brunelli, “La ragazza ha volato, directed by Wilma Labate,” “Il buco,” directed by Michelangelo Frammartino; and “Ariaferma,” directed by Leonardo Di Costanzo.

President of the Venice Biennale Roberto Cicutto said: “This year the selection has been praised for its exceptional artistic quality. We are sure the London audience will appreciate its high calibre.”

Katia Pizzi, director of the Italian Cultural Institute in London, added: “It’s my special pleasure to welcome to...

One of the best things about the proliferation of streaming services is that we can finally watch some of the best foreign programming in the US without needing it to be Americanized.

We had a chance to talk about that and a lot more with Marta Dusseldorp, who has had several programs airing on Acorn TV, where the final episode of the final season of Jack Irish, in which she costars with Guy Pierce, drops today.

Having watched as many of her shows as possible, it was such a pleasure to chat with Marta. Please read about her interesting viewpoint on the show and a lot more below.

How do you feel about Jack Irish coming to an end? You've been doing that for a long time now.

Yeah, I think a decade. Well, it was time, I think, for everyone, but I think they did a beautiful job with the story,...

To mark the release of Ellie and Abbie (and Ellie’s Dead Aunt) on 19th July, we’ve been 3 copies to give away on DVD.

School captain Ellie (Sophie Hawkshaw) has a serious crush on her classmate Abbie (Zoe Terakes), and is worrying over inviting her to the Year 12 formal. When Ellie accidentally spills the beans to her mum (Marta Dusseldorp) and outs herself in the process, things start to get complicated and a little bit spooky. Enter her deceased aunt Tara (Julia Billington), a lesbian activist from the ‘80s who returns from the dead to act as a kind of fairy godmother to Ellie, guiding her through the trials and tribulations of her first love.

Sophie Hawkshaw plays Ellie and non-binary actor Zoe Terakes, is Abbie (ABC’s Janet King). Julia Billington is Aunt Tara and Marta Dusseldorp is Erica, Ellie’s mother. Marta is one of Australia’s most recognised actresses,...

We don't have a lot going on this week, but we hope you find something you'll enjoy to watch this week.

There is a new Netflix movie called Gunpowder Milkshake, Jack Irish makes his final stand on Acorn, and Dr. Death wreaks havoc on Peacock.

And don't forget Schmigadoon on Apple TV+! We'll be covering that one in depth. Check it out.

Sunday, July 11

8/7c Big Brother (CBS)

The time slot premiere of Big Brother picks up with Frenchie in power, but will the wildcard competition change the trajectory of the game?

With the nominations coming up, Frenchie needs to make a plan to secure his future.

With alliances forming, who landed where?

It’s going to be fun!

9/8c Good Witch (Hallmark)

There's a focus on couples on the next Witch as Tom and Martha celebrate their anniversary.

Will this emphasis on love bring Stephanie and Adam closer together?...

Marta Dusseldorp in ‘Wentworth’ (Photo credit: Sarah Enticknap).

In a world away from A Place to Call Home, Marta Dusseldorp has donned the prison track suit with a guest role in Foxtel’s Wentworth, which resumes shooting this week.

Her character Sheila Bausch, a senior figure in the True Path cult, is on remand, charged with the murder of nine people at the cult’s retreat.

Described as highly intelligent, charismatic and manipulative, Sheila worked as the personal secretary for True Path’s founder Dr Mendel (Brian Vriends).

The Fremantle production re-starts after shutting down on March 23, just before a planned hiatus. The show has the advantage of being shot in its own large building in Melbourne, which has the flexibility of moving scenes set in a small cell to a bigger cell.

Executive producer Jo Porter, who is Fremantle’s director of scripted, said: “We have carefully adjusted our...

If you like your horror movies set in the Australian wilderness à la Rogue, Wolf Creek, or Road Games, then you may be interested in The Marshes, which is coming to Blu-ray, DVD, Digital HD, and VOD on June 16th following its release on Shudder earlier this year:

From the Press Release: Los Angeles – Rlje Films, a business unit of AMC Networks, has picked up select rights to The Marshes from Shudder, AMC Networks’ streaming service for horror, thriller and the supernatural. The Marshes will be released on VOD, Digital HD, DVD and Blu-ray on June 16, 2020.

The horror/thriller stars Dafna Kronental, Mathew Cooper, Sam Delich, and Eddie Baroo. Roger Scott makes his feature directorial and screenwriting debut with the film. Rlje Films will release The Marshes on DVD for $27.97 and on Blu-ray for $15.95.

In The Marshes, when a group of young microbiologists head deep into the Australian wilderness to test water samples,...

Rlje Films, a business unit of AMC Networks, has picked up select rights to The Marshes from Shudder, AMC Networks’ streaming service for horror, thriller and the supernatural. The Marshes will be released on VOD, Digital HD, DVD and Blu-ray on June 16, 2020.

Check out this terrifying trailer:

Now you can win the Win the DVD of The Marshes. We Are Movie Geeks has three copies to give away. Just leave a comment below telling us what your favorite horror movie from the past year is. (mine’s Midsommar). It’s so easy!

1. You Must Be A Us Resident. Prize Will Only Be Shipped To Us Addresses. No P.O. Boxes. No Duplicate Addresses.

2. Winner Will Be Chosen From All Qualifying Entries.

The horror/thriller stars Dafna Kronental (41, The Menkoff Method), Mathew Cooper (Burning Kiss, “Janet King”), Sam Delich (“Home and Away,” “Mr Inbetween”), and Eddie Baroo (Son of a Gun,...

Bob Campbell.

Screentime executive chairman Bob Campbell has retired from the production company he co-founded with Des Monaghan 23 years ago.

That marks the end of an era at the company best known for the Underbelly franchise, Pine Gap, Wolf Creek, Cloudstreet, Janet King and Anzac Girls as well as light entertainment fare such as Anh’s Brush with Fame, Rbt, Hughesy, We Have a Problem and The Secret Life of Four Year Olds.

The co-founders sold a controlling stake to French-based entertainment giant Banijay in 2012 and Monaghan stepped down as executive chairman in 2014.

Campbell departed before the completion of Banijay’s takeover of the Endemol Shine Group (Esg), which will create one of the world’s biggest independent production and distribution banners with a catalogue of 85,000 hours.

Rory Callaghan will continue to run Screentime as CEO. In an unrelated move, Screentime executive producer Johnny Lowry has been promoted to head of non-scripted,...

Kirsty McGregor and Gemma Brown won Best Casting in a Feature Film for ‘Hearts and Bones’.

The Casting Guild of Australia (Cga) named 10 actors as its top emerging talent of 2019 and celebrated the best casting of the year at its annual awards Friday evening in Melbourne.

Leading the winners was Kirsty McGregor, who took home three awards, including Best Casting in a TV Comedy for Foxtel’s Mr Inbetween (series 2) and further two with colleague Gemma Brown, including Best Casting in A Feature Film for Hearts and Bones, and Achievement in Casting for ABC children’s series The Unlisted.

Annie Murtagh-Monks won Best Casting in a TV Drama for her work on The Heights series 1, while Best Casting in a TV Miniseries and Telemovie went to Angela Heesom for Sbs’s The Hunting. Best Casting in a Short Film went to Stevie Ray for Strangers.

Annie Murtagh-Monks won Best Casting...

Kate Box and Zoe Terakes on the ‘Wentworth’ set.

The time when cis-gender people could play transgender characters on screen is fast disappearing, according to Zoe Terakes.

“I’ve never seen a cis-gender person tell a transgender story 100 per cent believably,” the young actor, who identifies as non-binary, tells If.

“There is a level of authenticity in representation that comes when you have somebody who gets it, feels it in their bones and they have lived it.”

Terakes has joined the cast of season eight and nine of Fremantle/Foxtel’s Wentworth playing Rebel ‘Reb’ Keane, who is terrified after being sentenced to prison.

Reb was born female, came to feel she was trapped in a man’s body and now identifies as a female-to-trans man.

Reb’s parents send Reb to a cult-like “rehabilitation” clinic in an effort to “cure” their “daughter,” which has echoes of Joel Edgerton’s feature Boy Erased.

Rupert Penry-Jones in ‘The Commons’. (Photo: John Platt)

British actor Rupert Penry-Jones, Ryan Corr (Bloom) and David Lyons have joined the cast of Stan/Playmaker Media’s The Commons.

They join the previously announced headliners Brit Joanne Froggatt (Downton Abbey) and Damon Herriman, most recently seen on film in Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood and on Foxtel’s Mr Inbetween.

Additionally, the cast will be bolstered by television stalwart John Waters, Fayssal Bazzi (Stateless), Simone McAullay, Andrea Demetriades, Felix Williamson, Inez CurroĢ (Picnic at Hanging Rock), Dominic Ona-Ariki and Zara Michales (Diary of an Uber Driver).

The eight-part high end drama production was created by Aacta Award-winning showrunner Shelley Birse (The Code), who wrote the series with a team including Matt Ford, Michael Miller and Matt Cameron.

Currently being shot across Sydney, the thriller is directed by Jeffrey Walker alongside Rowan Woods and Jennifer Leacey. Described...

‘Why Are You Like This‘.

Comedy Why Are You Like This, one of four pilots supported through Screen Australia and the ABC’s Fresh Blood initiative, has been greenlit for a six-part series.

Created and written by Naomi Higgins, Humyara Mahbub and Aunty Donna’s Mark Samual Bonanno, Why Are You Like This follows best friends Mia and Penny as they navigate their 20s in Melbourne, along with Penny’s dramatic and aloof housemate, Austin. Guided by their own modern day moral code, they confront complex social issues in an outrage driven world, leaving a path of destruction in their wake.

Screen Australia and the ABC’s ongoing Fresh Blood initiative is designed to uncover a new generation of comedic talent. Why Are You Like This was one of four pilots produced thanks to the program in 2018, alongside Michael Cusack’s Aacta-nominated Koala Man, Becky Lucas and Cameron James’ Be...

Marta Dusseldorp, Glenn Gainor, Alex Dimitriades and Ben Young will join chair Rachel Ward on the jury which will determine the winner of this year’s $100,000 CinefestOz Film Prize.

Owen Trevor’s Go!, John Sheedy’s H is for Happiness, Ben Lawrence’s Hearts and Bones, Mirrah Foulkes’ Judy & Punch and Paul Ireland’s Measure for Measure will compete for Australia’s biggest film prize.

“The quality of this year’s Film Prize finalists is exceptionally high and we are delighted to have a jury of equal calibre to decide on the winner,” CinefestOZ chair Helen Shervington said.

Dimitriades made his acting debut in Michael Jenkins’ The Heartbreak Kid followed by Ana Kokkinos’ Head On. Other film performances include Three Blind Mice, Ghost Ship, Deuce Bigalow, Kings of Mykonos, Summer Coda, The Infinite Man and Ruben Guthrie.

His TV credits include The Slap, The Principal, Seven Types of Ambiguity, Wanted,...

Sophie Hawkshaw (L) and Zoe Terakes in ‘Ellie & Abbie (& Ellie’s Dead Aunt)’.

Since Zoe Terakes came out, the proudly gay actor has not been offered any screen roles as straight characters – but that has not hindered the 19-year-old’s flourishing career.

There is no such discrimination in the theatre world and Zoe is currently performing in Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge at the Ensemble Theatre, directed by Iain Sinclair.

She made her stage debut as Catherine, a college student who is romantically involved with Italian immigrant Rodolpho, in the Old Fitz Theatre production of the play while she was studying for the Hsc.

Miller’s play has been a talisman for her as she appeared in the Melbourne Theatre Company production, also directed by Sinclair, earlier this year.

Terakes is gratified by the growing acceptance of Lgbtqi actors and storylines but she tells If: “In the...

Sophie Hawkshaw (L) and Zoe Terakes in ‘Ellie & Abbie (& Ellie’s Dead Aunt)’.

Since Zoe Terakes came out, the proudly gay actor has not been offered any screen roles as straight characters – but that has not hindered the 19-year-old’s flourishing career.

There is no such discrimination in the theatre world and Zoe is currently performing in Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge at the Ensemble Theatre, directed by Iain Sinclair.

She made her stage debut as Catherine, a college student who is romantically involved with Italian Rodolpho, in the Old Fitz Theatre production of the play while she was studying for the Hsc.

Miller’s play has been a talisman for her as she appeared in the Melbourne Theatre Company production, also directed by Sinclair, earlier this year.

Terakes is determined to overcome the attitude prevalent in sections of the screen industry that gay actors can’t be convincing as straight characters.

Julia Billington

When Julia Billington was at the National Institute of Dramatic Art there was a tacit belief among sections of the screen industry that a gay actor could not come out.

“It wasn’t spoken about but it was an undercurrent, a hangover from the past decade,” she tells If. “If you were queer, you should keep it on the down-low.”

Since she graduated from Nida in 2008 clearly there has been growing acceptance of the Lgbtqi community, although it’s far from universal.

Citing the 38.4 per cent of respondents who voted no in the same sex marriage plebiscite in 2017, she says: “We can pat ourselves on the back but there is still a long way to go.”

Currently Billington is relishing playing Tara, a lesbian who died in the 1980s and is reincarnated as a fairy godmother in Monica Zanetti’s rom-com Ellie & Abbie (& Ellie’s Dead Aunt).

Adapted...

Top (l-r) Sophie Hawkshaw, Zoe Terakes; Bottom (l-r) Rachel House, Marta Dusseldorp.

As a teenager Monica Zanetti searched in vain for gay rom-coms which she could watch with her mother, while Neil Armfield’s same-sex romantic drama Holding the Man was a major influence.

That has inspired the writer-director to make her feature directing debut on Ellie & Abbie (& Ellie’s Dead Aunt), which, unlike Armfield’s film has a happy ending.

Shooting in Sydney started today, starring Marta Dusseldorp, fellow Janet King alumni Julia Billington, Kiwi Rachel House, Zoe Terakes and newcomer Sophie Hawkshaw.

Zanetti adapted the screenplay from her eponymous play which was staged in 2017 at The Depot Theatre in Marrickville, her second feature credit after Jonnie Leahy’s 2014 drama Skip Deep.

Hawkshaw’s Ellie is 18 and struggling to find the courage to ask classmate Abbie (Terakes) to the formal. Luckily her aunt Tara (Billington), a lesbian who died in the 80s,...

Critically praised Australian series Safe Harbour is set to make its U.S. debut on Hulu. As part of a deal with NBCUniversal Television and New Media Distribution, the four-part event drama will debut August 24 on Hulu.

Safe Harbour tells the story of five Australians on a yachting holiday from Darwin to Indonesia, whose idyllic vacation takes a disastrous turn when they come across a broken-down fishing boat, full of desperate asylum seekers. The Australians decide to help, towing the refugees, but when they wake the next morning the fishing boat is gone. Five years later they meet some of the refugees again and learn the truth. Someone cut the rope between the two boats and, as a result, seven people died when the fishing boat sank. The revelation drives a wedge of mistrust between the Australians, as they grapple with protecting themselves and doing the right thing. The refugees...