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When Joaquin Phoenix collected his Oscar for Best Actor for Joker Sunday night, he quoted a song that his brother, River, wrote as a teen: “Run to the rescue with love and peace will follow.” But where, exactly, is that song today? And what was it called?

Rolling Stone reached out to River’s ex-Aleka’s Attic bandmate, Josh Greenbaum, who recalls: “It was a very long time ago — one of the songs Riv had written prior even to our connecting. And we never actually performed the song together. With me,...

Exclusive: Ever since it planted a flag in the shifting ground of the movie business, Stx Entertainment has fashioned itself a different kind of studio, an operation bent on proving Hollywood’s long-held assumptions about mid-budget films wrong.

That bid to stand apart has faced a harsh test this month as two star-driven, tweener films have fizzled on consecutive weekends. The Happytime Murders, with Melissa McCarthy, missed the target in its opening, and the Mark Wahlberg action movie Mile 22 fell sharply after a soft debut. Up next on September 7 is vigilante thriller Peppermint with Jennifer Garner, which is tracking for a comparable domestic opening.

The dicey stretch at the box office comes as the company considers going public, a maneuver that could bring expansion capital. An initial public offering on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange would yield about $500 million and could happen as early as September, but there are major hurdles in the way.

Harold Ramis and Bill Murray made beautiful comedy together. Their list of collaborations encompass “Caddyshack,” “Stripes,” and “Ghostbusters,” each of them among the funniest films of all time. Their masterwork, “Groundhog Day” is a sly and subversive romantic comedy that justly earned inclusion in the United States National Film Registry and is considered a modern classic. It also split the longtime friends and film partners apart. In Tad Friend’s definitive 2004 New Yorker profile of Ramis, the actor, writer and director who died Monday at 69, revealed that he was often at odds with Murray during filming of the 1993 comedy. Disagreements over the.

The best movie culture writing from around the internet-o-sphere. There will be a quiz later. Just leave a tab open for us, will ya? “Comedy First” — Tad Friend’s essential writing on Harold Ramis. It’s only available for a short time, but it’s an amazing profile of the comedic filmmaker and why his movies have lasting power. “The cognitive dissonance of disagreeing with great directors about their work” — Noel Murray at The Dissolve explores the funny feeling when you love a movie its director hates. “Film Criticism: State of the Art” — From Twitter to Rotten Tomatoes to the loss of Roger Ebert, Danny Bowes at CriticWire examines the crossroads at which professional criticism finds itself. “2014 is The Year We Make a Movie With Stephen Tobolowsky” — David Chen at /film is kickstarting The Tobolowsky Files Podcast into a movie. “John Landis on Harold Ramis: He Was Very Angry Not to Be Cast in Animal House” — Wouldn...

Ben Stiller has made no secret of the fact that he has high hopes for The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. In June 2012, The New Yorker ran a profile of Stiller in which writer Tad Friend followed the director-star while making the film, an adaptation of the James Thurber short story. The article made it clear that Stiller, who’s had hits directing broader comedies such as Zoolander and Tropic Thunder, wanted to go for something more seriocomic and thoughtful in tone. He further solidified those aspirations this past summer by taking the rather unconventional step of sending out letters...

These days, it seems like you can't swing a meth barrel without smacking into Bryan Cranston in one role or another. Cranston, who's been lauded for five seasons of drug-making, glasses-wearing excellence on AMC's "Breaking Bad," isn't just mixing up extra-potent crystal these days. He's in the upcoming "Godzilla" remake, is voicing the character of Jack Black's panda dad in "Kung Fu Panda 3," and he even popped up in a lil Best Picture winner by the name of "Argo." That's not even mentioning guest spots on "The Cleveland Show" and "The Simpsons," roles in the "Total Recall" remake and "Rock of Ages."

Really, cool it, Walt.

According to a lengthy New Yorker profile, the full text of which is only available online to subscribers, Cranston has also noticed that willy-nilly role-taking, and has put into place a plan to curb it. Cranston already has a daughter, but let's...

On the heels of the beautiful first trailer for "The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty" comes word that Ben Stiller's new film will debut at the 2013 New York Film Festival. "The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty" was set as the Centerpiece Gala presentation by festival organizers on Thursday.

"Ben Stiller has expanded on James Thurber’s beloved short story and crafted a beautifully lyrical comic epic, grounded in present day realities and concerns. He is wonderful in the lead, Kristen Wiig is nothing short of magical as the woman of his dreams, and it’s great to see Shirley MacLaine in perfect form," Kent Jones, Nyff’s Director of Programming and Selection Committee Chair said in a press release announcing the premiere. "'The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty' is one terrific ride, and I'm thrilled that we're able to present it as our Centerpiece screening."

That's likely...

Ben Stiller's adaptation of "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" has been discussed as an Oscar contender since The New Yorker published a story on Stiller last June. The film's first trailer, a gorgeous and stylish teaser that is available above, does nothing to dissuade that awards buzz.

"If I say to Fox that this movie is like 'Little Miss Sunshine' or 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,' they freak out, understandably, because they're spending real money and they need to sell it as a big comedy," Stiller, who has directed four feature films in addition to "Walter Mitty," told New Yorker writer Tad Friend. "So I keep referring to 'Forrest Gump,' because it wasn't a big comedy, really, but it also made a ha-zillion dollars. I'm trying to do two things at once: make a movie that brings in a lot of people,...

Ben Stiller and Jay Roach have known each other since first working together on "Meet the Parents" in 2000, and those 13 years of friendship made the pair's conversation at the Tribeca Film Festival on Sunday afternoon just that: a conversation. As part of the Tribeca Talks: Directors' Series, Stiller and Roach, both directors, discussed all matter of moviemaking and seemed to come to one unavoidable conclusion.

"It's really hard to get most movies made," Stiller said about the current state of the industry. "Especially independent films, and even just regular, mid-range budgeted dramas. The genre movies and sequels are obviously what becomes the thing."

Which is what makes Stiller's newest film such an anomaly. The 47-year-old directs and stars in the upcoming 20th Century Fox film "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty," an adaptation of the James Thurber short story of the same name. That work, which was originally published...

During last week's The New Yorker Festival 2012, Ben Stiller and Letter from California columnist Tad Friend talked backstage about the magazine's recent profile of the actor, comedian, writer and director (clip below).  They got along, apparently, although both mentioned nursing migraines after a four to five hour interview.  Stiller says that while he tries to avoid reading what is written about him, he did read Friend's piece.  Entitled "Ben Stiller, 'Walter Mitty,' and the Dilemma of Modern Stardom," the article chronicles Stiller's ambitious efforts to make the James Thurber short story into a film -- and goes on to forecast the future of comedy in American film.  In this short clip, Stiller goes so far as to say that the feature contains some "really interesting stuff."  (Profile linked here, 'New Yorker' subscription required for the full article.)...

Ben Stiller gets a 15-page profile in the latest edition of The New Yorker, a fascinating piece that not only illustrates how difficult it is for an A-list actor to remain on the A-list, but also how exacting Stiller is as a filmmaker. Writer Tad Friend got unprecedented access to Stiller as he developed the 2013 comedy-adventure "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" for Twentieth Century Fox. It's basically a must-read for anyone who ever purchased a movie ticket, an inside look at big-budget movies that even goes way beyond eye-opening recent interviews with Barry Sonnenfeld and Adam McKay.

In addition to being a striking look inside the world of Stiller, The New Yorker piece also lays out in no uncertain terms exactly what Hollywood executives are looking for in their blockbusters: safe repetition. Last year, nine of the 10 highest grossing movies were sequels. This year, only three sequels are in...

Filed under: Movie News

In this week's edition of The New Yorker, Tad Friend profiles Andrew Stanton, a long-time member of the "Pixar Braintrust" who's making his live-action directing debut with 'John Carter.' That Disney film hits theaters in 2012, and has already cost upward of $250 million -- meaning it will have to earn around $700 million to make a sequel worthwhile. As the profile indicates, Stanton is under a lot of pressure, continually tinkering with the Taylor Kitsch-led film -- something that might seem odd expect for the fact that it's also how he worked at Pixar.

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Filed under: Celebrity Interviews, Movie News

Before Kristen Wiig and her friendly bridesmaids stormed the box office this summer and made Hollywood realize that women are actually really funny and bankable, Anna Faris was held up as the beacon of female comedians. As Tad Friend wrote in his profile of Faris for The New Yorker (which printed pre-'Bridesmaids'), "What's at stake [for female comedians] is not merely a tenable marketplace for 'hard' female comedies but a fresh vantage on romance and, perhaps, a fresh way of seeing men and women." That fresh way may be something like 'What's Your Number?'

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Try this one on for size:

"'To make a woman adorable,' one successful female screenwriter says, 'you have to defeat her at the beginning... It's as simple as making the girl cry, fifteen minutes into the movie.' Relatability is based on vulnerability, which creates likability. With male characters, smoking pot, getting drunk and lying around watching porn is likable; with females, the same conduct is hateful. So funny women must not only be gorgeous; they must fall down and then sob, knowing it's all their fault." — Tad Friend in "The New Yorker," April 11, 2011

The folks over at Nerve.com put together a video that illustrates this theory -- though perhaps taking the "fall down" part a bit more extremely than what Mr. Friend had in mind. Hey, everything's open to interpretation in this business, so watch a screenwriting technique in action -- many, many times over...

Beautiful Women Falling Down: A Short Film In honor of Bridesmaids, an ode to the clichés of romantic comedies. "'To make a woman adorable,' one female sucessful screenwriter says, 'you have to defeat her at the beginning... It's as simple as making the girl cry, fifteen minutes into the movie.' Relatability is based on vulnerability, which creates likeability. With male characters, smoking pot, getting drunk, and lying around watching porn is likeable; with females, the same conduct is hateful. So funny women must not only be gorgeous; they must fall down and then sob, knowing it's all their fault." — Tad Friend in The New Yorker, [...]...

Here's the thing: All this buzz for "Bridesmaids" is making some of us cringe a little. It's not that the movie (co-written by star Kristen Wiig) doesn't deserve its high praise; it's friggin' hilarious. But the fact that it's being touted as "groundbreaking" or "'The Hangover' with women" or "The first women's comedy men will like" just shows what a ridiculous double standard Hollywood – and movie audiences – live by when it comes to funny women.

We've got news for you – women are just as funny as men (Tina Fey is just one step away from world domination), and they always have been -- remember Lucille Ball, Gracie Allen, Carol Burnett, and Gilda Radner? Women, however, just haven't ever had as many opportunities to prove their comedy chops as men. Here are four reasons why.

Numbers. When more than one funnyman stars in a movie, it creates a fraternity...

The Hollywood Reporter (Aka "Press Release Bulletin Board") calls Faris's newest movie script a "stalker comedy". This comes days after Faris admits that Hollywood sucks and women aren't allowed to be funny to The New Yorker.

In the April 11th, 2011 article entitled "Funny Like a Guy" (seriously) in the New Yorker Magazine, Anna Faris was interviewed by Tad Friend about her comedic career and where it's going.

While Friend's article does have some funteresting insights (like the Bechdel Test Rules for Gender Bias: The Bechdel Test is a way of examining movies for gender bias. The test poses three questions: Does a movie contain two or more female characters who have names? Do those characters talk to each other? And, if so, do they discuss something other than a man?), it's a rather depressing article about how female-driven blockbusters are rare because they don't make money, and because they don't make money studios hate them.

In last week's issue of The New Yorker, Tad Friend cleverly uses a profile of comedienne Anna Faris ("Funny Like a Guy") as a way to examine the woeful state of women's roles in Hollywood today. He interviews Stacey Snider, Amy Pascal, Judd Apatow and others as he attempts to understand why Hollywood, dominated by men, so demeans and discourages smart movies by and about women. The article reminds us that men don't think women are funny, that the studios believe that women will go to see movies about men, but men will Never go to a rom-com, which therefore command much lower budgets. And an actress like Faris can only carry a modest-scale movie because she, unlike Reese Witherspoon, doesn't have pull overseas. That ...