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Exclusive: Esther Povitsky (Dollface), Bobby Lee (Reservation Dogs) and Beverly D’Angelo (National Lampoon’s Vacation) are among the notable comedic talents set for Drugstone June — a new feature that Utopia, All Things Comedy, and Shout! Studios have partnered to produce for world sales.

Others set to appear in the film directed by Nicholaus Goossen (Grandma’s Boy) include James Remar (Sex and the City), Brandon Wardell (Easter Sunday), Danny Griffin (Fate: The Winx Saga), Patricia “Ms. Pat” Williams (The Ms. Pat Show), Miranda Cosgrove (iCarly), Al Madrigal (Morbius), Haley Joel Osment (The Kominsky Method), Matt Walsh (Veep), Jackie Sandler (You Are So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah!), Nick Rutherford (Rick and Morty), Jon “Dumbfoundead” Park (Awkwafina Is Nora from Queens), Trevor Wallace (Add-tv), Bhad Bhabie (Lights Out with David Spade), Steph Tolev (Old Dads), Jon Gabrus and Bill Burr (The King of Staten Island).

Drugstore June follows a...

Filmmaker Robert Schwartzman is throwing his hat in the ring with his new distribution company, Utopia. The newly launched company co-founded by Schwartzman will take a “filmmaker first” approach and will venture to SXSW next week to look at new films for potential acquisition. David Betesh, former head of global sales for Gunpowder & Sky, recently joined Utopia as the Head of Sales & Acquisitions.

In addition to sales and acquisitions, Utopia will also launch a technology platform later this year that will offer filmmakers multiple services including a streaming element. When it comes to filmmaker services, the company will focus on creating new revenue and monetization opportunities, improving the direct-to-consumer experience, and helping them maintain a global presence. The company’s platform will give filmmakers more control, higher marketing Roi, and stronger data collection tools than other platforms.

“Some filmmakers have specific markets or a target demographic in mind with their film,...

Stars: Robbie Kay, Jacob Batalon, Seychelle Gabriel, Jacob Batalon, Barbara Dunkelman, Tate Donovan, Zachary Levi | Written and Directed by Owen Egerton

Produced by popular YouTube outfit Rooster Teeth, Blood Fest aims to follow in the footsteps of self-aware meta horrors like Scream and Cabin in the Woods. Unfortunately, while there’s no doubting the filmmakers’ evident love for the genre, the end result isn’t nearly as funny or as clever as it thinks it is.

After a generic slasher movie prologue in which a young boy sees his mother get killed by a masked maniac, we’re introduced to horror-loving Dax (Robbie Kay) and his best buddies Sam (Seychelle Gabriel) and Krill (Jacob Batalon), who are desperate to attend horror festival Blood Fest, against the wishes of Dax’s strict father (Tate Donovan), who blames the genre for his wife’s (i.e. Dax’s mother’s) murder in the prologue.

Following up his Tribeca-premiering directorial debut, 2016’s Dreamland, director Robert Schwartzman headed to the American South with his second feature, The Unicorn. Featuring an outstanding ensemble, the film stars comedians Lauren Lapkus and Nicholas Rutherford as a couple who, four years into their engagement and unsure of themselves, opt for a threesome. Appearing yesterday in support of The Unicorn at Deadline’s South by Studio, Schwartzman sat down with his…...

Robert Schwartzman brought his latest movie to SXSW on Saturday and offered a very different take on the traditional romantic comedy: a longtime couple who hopes to save their relationship with a ménage à trois. “The Unicorn,” which is currently on the hunt for a distributor, was greeted with laughter and enthusiastic applause at its world premiere screening at Austin’s Stateside Theatre. Lauren Lapkus (“Crashing”) and Nicholas Rutherford (“Crunch Time”) star as Mal and Cal, who have been engaged for four years and have to suffer through yet another one of her parents’ renewal-of-the-vows ceremony. Much to Mal’s dismay, she finds out...

Emma Stone and new boyfriend Dave McCary might be keeping their budding romance mostly under wraps, but a source tells People that the Saturday Night Live director is a great match for the La La Land star

The Oscar winner, 28, and helmer, 32, first met at the end of last year when she was hosting SNL and starred in the Dec. 3 sketch “Wells for Boys,” which he directed.

“Dave has this core of kindness and sweetness,” the source says of the two-time Emmy nominee. “He’s tall and fit, confident and funny. He’s not someone who seeks the spotlight.”

McCary hails from San Diego,...

The beloved sketch comedy group Good Neighbor was originally formed in 2007 by Kyle Mooney, Beck Bennett, Nick Rutherford, and Dave McCary. The comedians racked up millions of YouTube hits with their offbeat and uncomfortable sketch videos, including such notable standouts as "My Mom's a Milf", "Is My Roommate Gay?", "420 Disaster," and "Unbelievable Dinner," based on Steven Spielberg's Hook. In 2013, Mooney and Bennett joined Saturday Night Live as featured players along with McCary, who stayed behind the camera as a segment director. Now Mooney and McCary are transitioning to the big screen with the indie comedy Brigsby Bear, a feature-length narrative about friendship, family, and nostalgia that deftly blends humor and heart to create something that is both odd and oddly affectionate. Directed by McCary and co-written by Mooney and their childhood friend Kevin Costello, Brigsby Bear stars Mooney as James, a sensitive young adult living in an underground bunker with his over-protective parents,...

The year is 2017. Homosapians live in a heavily nostalgic society always looking to Make what Made them happy as kids Make them happy as adults. Specifically all you mid-20 year olds and beyond looking for nostalgia for your comfort food. Never has there been so many fat 29 year olds with matching Batman socks looking to relive simpler times. Before work. Before bills. Before the world turned into whatever chaos engulfs our news cycles and threat of Nuclear disaster lies in the hands and a small-minded ego maniac………. (I’m talking to myself here). Kids who grew up in the 80’s and 90’s may go down in history as the most nostalgic generations, as the ones that came before didn’t have as much pop culture and future generations have too much pop culture for anything to truly stick. This nostalgia is in due part to Hollywood reviving every old franchise...

Chicago – “Live from New York, it’s a new generation of ‘Saturday Night Live’ movies!” Four guys from SNL… performers Kyle Mooney and Beck Bennett, segment director Dave McCary, and producer/performer Andy Samberg all pitch in to create “Brigsby Bear,” the odd story of a man-boy who loves a TV show.

“Brigsby Bear” is a sweet movie, and “Saturday Night Live” cast member Kyle Mooney is perfect as that man-boy named James, who was kidnapped as a child and forced to live in underground shelter, because his captors Ted and April (Mark Hamill and Jane Adams) tell him the air is too poisonous to breathe. The only TV programming they give him to watch is “Brigsby Bear,” and that is produced in secret by his fake father Ted. James grows to early manhood, and a raid on the shelter puts him back into the real world, and his real...

A new horror comedy from Austin-based Rooster Teeth, written and to be directed by Owen Egerton, has lined up a number of young Hollywood actors to take on roles — Jacob Batalon (Spider-Man: Homecoming), Robbie Kay (Heroes: Reborn), Nick Rutherford (SNL, Crunch Time) and Tate Donovan (The Man in the High Castle) with Rooster Teeth's Barbara Dunkelman (Rwby). Egerton, a screenwriter who has twice appeared on the industry-famous Black List, and has written and directed the…...

Following the success of its first film, Lazer Team -- for which a YouTube Red sequel is currently in the works -- Austin-based production powerhouse Rooster Teeth has announced its third-ever feature: Blood Fest.

The horror comedy film will tell the story of the founder of an iconic horror movie festival who's secretly harboring a diabolical agenda. When attendees at the convention start dying, three teen horror fans must band together to fight off madmen, monstrosities, and other terrifying scenarios. Blood Fest is written and directed by Owen Egerton, and will star Jacob Batalon (Spider-Man: Homecoming), Robbie Kay (Heroes: Reborn), Rooster Teeth’s Barbara Dunkelman, Nick Rutherford (SNL), and Tate Donovan (The Man in the High Castle).

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Kyle Mooney and Dave McCary are well aware that keeping secrets in Hollywood can be a futile endeavor, but that hasn’t stopped them from trying to keep too much information about their comedy “Brigsby Bear” from leaking to potential moviegoers. Armed with a deliberately thin official synopsis and a gleefully weird set of trailers, the filmmakers are eager for audiences to see their film without knowing too much beforehand, instead experiencing the special charms of “Brigsby Bear” with as little prejudice as possible.

It’s a pretty big ask for a movie that debuted over six months ago. It’s also part of the reason why the first-time filmmakers are so high on their distributor, Sony Pictures Classics, which made it clear from their first meeting that they were all-in on the childhood best friends’ big vision — even if it meant keeping mum on some of its most inventive twists.

It's not often that a high-school friendship blossoms into a successful professional relationship, but writer-director Dave McCary and his best friend Kyle Mooney have pulled it off. After college, the duo founded Los Angeles-based sketch comedy group Good Neighbor (with Beck Bennett and Nick Rutherford), developed a huge YouTube following (Louis C.K. and Steven Spielberg are fans), and were snatched up by Saturday Night Live. Now, nearly four years later, McCary is…...

Exclusive: Heading into the market, Los Angeles-based Cinedigm has expanded its relationship with Rooster Teeth to encompass international sales on a trio of titles.

For the first time, the parties will offer Day 5, Rwby and Crunch Time to Mipcom buyers from Europe, South America, Asia and Australia.

Cinedigm is the exclusive sales agent on these titles and represents digital, home video and linear television rights.

“Our audience has been thrilled with the new premium content we’ve been releasing on First, the Rooster Teeth Svod platform,” said Rooster Teeth CEO Matt Hullum.

“From the apocalyptic drama Day 5 to the hilarious sci-fi comedy Crunch Time to the breakout anime hit Rwby, we’re excited to share this content with new audiences around the world.”

Day 5 (pictured) is a six-part long-form dramatic series set in the immediate aftermath of a fatal sleep epidemic as a drug addict, a doctor and a red-eye pilot search for answers...

After solidly tackling the post-apocalyptic thriller with “Day 5,” Rooster Teeth takes a swing at the science-fiction comedy genre with its second, “Crunch Time,” and hits it out of the park once again.

Read More: ‘Day 5’ Review: Rooster Teeth’s Post-Apocalyptic Drama Thrills (And Kills)

Starring five lovable weirdos as eccentric science students, “Crunch Time” clips along at a breakneck pace, seamlessly weaving wacky gags and colorful characters into its intriguing plot exposition. From the discomfort of an interrogation room, the characters in “Crunch Time” recount the shenanigans that got them handcuffed to a metal desk answering to two steely-faced detectives. (Brett Morrin and “True Detective’s” Michael Hyatt, no less). The motley crew explains the origins of “the brain-frame,” a “machine that allows you to place yourself inside another person’s mind.”

Read More: ‘David’ Review: ‘Marcel The Shell’ Meets ‘Twin Peaks’ In Dean Fleischer-Camp’s Surreal Series...

The Austin-based production company Rooster Teeth first rose to prominence with its long-running, critically-acclaimed web series “Red vs. Blue,” about the adventures of two groups of soldiers engaged in a civil war. Now, Rooster Teeth will launch their next series this weekend: Andrew Disney and Bradley Jackson’s “Crunch Time.” The series stars Samm Levine (“Freaks and Geeks”), Nick Rutherford (“Saturday Night Live”), Jessy Hodges (“True Blood”), Avery Monsen (“Maron”), Brent Morin (“How to Be Single”), and more.

Read More: ‘Crunch Time’ Exclusive Featurettes: New Web Series Follows Four Grad Students Who Create a Black Hole In Their Lab

The series follows four bored, but brilliant grad students who start making money by placing people in a lucid dream machine they’ve created. Of course, things eventually go haywire and they accidentally open up a small black hole in their college lab. Now, the team is being interrogated by the...

Rooster Teeth, which has been a mainstay of the web-series world since bursting onto the scene with “Red vs. Blue” in 2003, is about to launch its next show: “Crunch Time,” a sci-fi comedy/adventure starring Samm Levine (“Freaks and Geeks,” “Inglorious Basterds”), Nick Rutherford (“Saturday Night Live”), Jessy Hodges (“Grey’s Anatomy”) and Avery Monsen (“Maron”). Watch the trailer below.

Read More: ‘Crunch Time’ Exclusive Featurettes: New Web Series Follows Four Grad Students Who Create a Black Hole In Their Lab

Here’s the official synopsis: “In a highly classified location, a gang of misfit grad students are interrogated by government operatives. Why? Because the world is about to end, and it’s all their fault. How did it all start? With a last ditch effort to win back love…by way of an extremely dangerous, untested, lucid dreaming machine.”

Read More: ‘Crunch Time’ Featurette: A Look Inside The Rooster...

Some of the greatest scientific discoveries were accidental, but many of the world’s catastrophes were caused by petty foolishness. The new web comedy series “Crunch Time” from and Rooster Teeth assumes both of those ideas, examining what happens when ingenuity and selfishness causes a cataclysmic event and if it’s possible to walk back from the brink of total destruction

Read More: ‘Crunch Time’ Featurette: A Look Inside The Rooster Teeth Sci-Fi Comedy Series Starring Samm Levine

The series follows four brilliant grad students who started making money by placing people in a lucid dream machine they created. But as a result of their actions, they create a small but potentially world-ending black hole in their college lab. Now, they’re being interrogated by top-secret government operatives who are tasked with cleaning up their mess, only they must cooperate with the scientists to do so. The problem is that...

This year Fullscreen Films and Rooster Teeth released the crowdfunded record breaker “Lazer Team.” After launching an Indiegogo campaign to fund the project and raising $2.4 million, the comedy was released in theaters in January and on YouTube Red a month later. Now, the Austin-based production company is giving audiences a new comedic sci-fi series, “Crunch Time.”

The six-episode comedy follows a group of grad students who, to make some money, start putting people into a lucid dream machine. Unfortunately, things start to go terribly wrong, accidentally creating a black hole that could destroy the world.

Read More: ‘Lazer Team’ Sequel Coming To YouTube Red in 2017

Mashable has exclusive images of the series which stars Samm Levine, Nick Rutherford, Jessy Hodges, Avery Monsen, Brent Morin and Michael Hyatt, among others. A cool new featurette was also released to give audiences an inside look at what to expect.

“It’s ‘Inception’ meets ‘Weird Science,...

Teeth has dubbed the middle months of 2016 as its “summer of animation,” but by the end of the season, the digital studio will have fit some live-action laughs into its schedule, too. It has released a story featurette for Crunch Time, a half-hour, sci-fi comedy that is expected to launch on September 11th.

Crunch Time will follow a group of grad students who accidentally open up a black hole while fooling around with a machine that induces lucid dreams. The show’s cast is a good one; it includes Samm Levine (Freaks And Geeks), Nick Rutherford (Good Neighbor), Vine weirdo Avery Monsen, and Rooster Teeth co-founder Burnie Burns. Several of those performers appear in the aforementioned featurette, which was uploaded on August 11th, a month before Crunch Time’s slate premiere date.

Crunch Time is one of two new shows available exclusively to those who subscribe to Rooster Teeth’s premium service,...

Rooster Teeth is branching out, and as it does, its paying subscribers will serve as its target audience. The Austin-based entertainment company, which recently released its first feature film, has announced two new web series: A sci-fi comedy called Crunch Time and a thriller called Day 5. Both will be available exclusively to Rooster Teeth’s paying subscribers, referred to as its “sponsors.”

The majority of Rooster Teeth’s productions have starred its own cast of loveable personalities, and in that regard, both of the upcoming shows will be significant departures for the studio. Crunch Time, which will follow goofy grad students as they fool around with their equipment and accidentally open up a black hole, features a strong cast that includes Good Neighbor’s Nick Rutherford and Freaks And Geeks’ Samm Levine. In contrast, Day 5 will be a drama series -- Rooster Teeth’s first -- that will star Jessee C.

The Writers Guild of America has just announced the nominations for their annual awards for Best Screenplays (by writers who are guild signatories). That’s right, before you get nervous thinking that your favorite may have been left off the list, you must remember that the WGA is the group that is not all-inclusive and leaves out several of the top contenders each year due to them not being part of the guild or not following their very specific rules. For this reason, you won’t see Inside Out, The Hateful Eight, and Ex Machina in the Original Screenplay category or Room, Brooklyn, or Anomalisa in the Adapted screenplay category.

Taking a look at what’s left over for the nominations, we find many that were expected to make a showing, including Spotlight and Bridge of Spies for Original Screenplay, though they apparently had to sink to really low depths...

The Writers Guild of America announced some of its nominees for its 2015 awards on Thursday, including television, new media, and radio, and among the TV nominees are series both new and old, and all beloved.

In the comedy series category, freshman Netflix show "Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt" scored a nomination for best series, as well as an overall best new series nod. "The Last Man on Earth" also landed in that latter category, and was singled out for its pilot episode writing, too.

On the drama side of the equation, lauded "Breaking Bad" spinoff "Better Call Saul" also got best series and best new series nominations, in addition to a an episode writing nod. Newly-minted Emmy winner "Game of Thrones" also scored a best drama citation, as well as an episodic writing nomination.

The full list of nominees released this week are below. Nominations in the theatrical and documentary categories will...

Fox’s new half-hour animated comedy series “Golan the Insatiable,” which stars Rob Riggle and Aubrey Plaza, is set to premiere May 31 at 9:30 p.m., the network announced Tuesday. Ken Marino, John Dimaggio, Maria Bamford, Rachel Butera and Nick Rutherford will also lend their voices to the cartoon. “Golan” is the first Animation Domination High-Def series to land a primetime series order. The comedy follows a mighty godlord (Riggle) from an alternate dimension who arrives in Oak Grove, Minnesota, where his only friend is a macabre, 9-year-old girl named Dylan (Plaza). She constantly urges him to wreak havoc on her town.

Can there be anything funnier than seeing Clint Howard make fun of your “yutes” word choice? Well save of course for the obvious My Cousin Vinny judge, I think not.

But that’s not why I gathered you here today. Bradley Jackson’s brilliantly bored mind is why we’re here.

Intramural is a sports comedy written by Jackson in his sophomore year of college about a boy named Caleb (played by Jake Lacey) who is a fifth year college senior in denial about life after school. In his efforts to relive his college career as freshman intramural football champion, he tries to reunite the team, even after his friend Grant Rosenfalis (Nick Kocher) became paralyzed since the last time they played.

Andrew Disney directs this comedy, which stars Lacey and Kocher in addition to Nikki Reed, Nick Rutherford, Gabriel Luna, Brian McElhaney and SNL members Kate McKinnon, Beck Bennett and Jay Pharoah.

Are SNL's growing pains over as it enters its 40th season? It certainly didn't seem that way from the show's bizarre season opener. While Chris Pratt—and Chris Pratt's abs, in a supporting role—conducted themselves amiably, the show seemed to lack the festive air we'd expect from a premiere tied to such an important season. Instead, it seemed on a mission to prove that a new era has come to Studio 8H—one with a markedly different tone. There was only one notable cameo, and it came from Pratt's wife, Anna Faris—not, as might have been expected,...

Having marital trouble? Look no further than Ryan Bailey. The Los Angeles-based actor is the man behind Talking Marriage with Ryan Bailey, a web series that takes place inside a worthless talk show about the trials of marriage. Bailey takes the leading role as a host who is qualified to talk about marriage; after all, he has been married himself for five whole years. That joke explains the gist of Talking Marriage. It is a deadpan portrayal of the worst talk show in the world, with all sorts of little touches that add to the incompetence. Bailey spends most of the show bantering with his producer, ugly titles (in Comic Sans, of course) flash across the screen every few seconds, and the boom operator repeatedly lowers his microphone into the shot. Fans of intentionally bad comedies like Black Dynamite will appreciate the similar style on display here. Bailey also manages...

Saturday Night Live‘s Weekend Update desk is getting another makeover.

In its second iteration since Seth Meyers left the NBC sketch series last winter to host Late Night, Weekend Update as Season 40 opens will be cohosted by SNL scribe/sometime Daily Show correspondent Michael Che and… second-year newsreader Colin Jost.

Related Saturday Night Live Season 40: Chris Pratt, Sarah Silverman Picked as First Hosts

“This is about a new era, what feels appropriate for now,” SNL boss Lorne Michaels told the New York Times, which broke the news. “That’s why we did a lot of combinations and tests,...

Leslie Bibb is going from one of the Gcbs to, well, just a plain ol’ B.

Bibb, who recently appeared on NBC’s About a Boy, will play the titular character in Amazon’s new comedy pilot Salem Rogers: Model of the Year 1998, our sister site Deadline reports.

Related Fall TV Spectacular: Exclusive Scoop and Photos on 42 Returning Favorites, Including About a Boy

Her character, Salem Rogers, is a self-centered former supermodel who reunites with her former assistant — now a self-help writer — after completing a 10-year stint in rehab.

Ready for more of today’s newsy nuggets? Well…

* Saturday Night Live...

After making a killing in the United States, Indiecan Entertainment is releasing Travis Long’s Kill Me Now (written by Cracked.com’s Michael Swaim) on VOD across Canada, today, April 22nd, 2014. The horror-comedy will be available on iTunes, Rogers, Bell, Mts, and more.

Written by Michael Swaim and directed by Travis Long, Kill Me Now was filmed on location in Effingham, Illinois, and stars Michael Swaim, Brett Fancy, Kyle Mooney, Beck Bennett, Nick Rutherford, Jacob Reed, LisaMarie King, Brentan Schellenbach, Nick Mundy, Kaitlin Large, Dan Rubiano, Noah Byrne, Katy Stoll, Katie Willert, and Daniel O'Brien.

Synopsis:

In the not-too-distant past, with the help of a windowless van and a jar of chloroform, a group of Internet sketch comedians were hauled off to the backwoods of Illinois to shoot their first movie! The horror comedy features Streamy and Webby Award winner Michael Swaim (“Agents of Cracked”) and the casts of “Those Aren’t Muskets!

Ralph Smyth Entertainment has commenced production on the comedy in Austin, Texas.

Russell Wayne Groves, Andrew Lee, David Ward, Red Sanders and Tucker Moore are producing the story of a college senior who assembles a team of misfits for one last epic run in an intramural American football league before moving on to the real world.

Andrew Disney will direct a screenplay by Bradley Jackson. Jake Lacy, Nikki Reed, Kate McKinnon, Jay Pharoah, Nick Kocher, Brian McElhaney, D C Pierson, Michael Hogan, Sam Eidson, Beck Bennett and Nick Rutherford are among the cast.

“With Intramural, we’re setting out to make an epic sports movie for the guys who don’t deserve one,” said Disney. “We’ve got a hilarious script, a terrific ensemble cast, and one hell of a production team. I can’t wait to start shooting in Austin.”...

"Twilight" star Nikki Reed and "Saturday Night Live" players Kate McKinnon and Jay Pharaoh are set to star in the indie comedy "Intramural." Cast also includes Jake Lacy ("The Office"), "Much Ado About Nothing" stars Nick Kocher and Brian McElhaney, Michael Hogan ("Battlestar Galactica"), Sam Edison ("Zero Charisma"), D.C. Pierson ("Mystery Team") and Good Neighbor sketch comedy members Nick Rutherford and Beck Bennett, the latter of whom is best known for starring in At&T's "It's Not Complicated" ad campaign. Story follows a fifth-year college senior who assembles a team of misfits for...