October 17, 2007

Mark your calendars!
Hollywood scion, Alison Eastwood makes her featured film directing debut next week with Rails & Ties an intense, exquisitely acted film starring Kevin Bacon and Marcia Gay Harden above love, loss and family. (I don't want to make it sound too simplistic) Film opens October 26. (Interview with director to come.)

Since last week I bashed Warner Brother president Jeff Robinov for his stupid ass comments about not looking for scripts with women in the lead, I have to give him (or others at WB who deserve the credit) for having two films by female directors coming out in the next month. Both are daughters of directors (Alison Eastwood mentioned above, daughter of Clint; and August Rush, opening November 21 directed by Kirsten Sheridan, daughter of Jim Sheridan.)

Ricki Lake and Holly Robinson Peete star in the Lifetime movie on Monday night, October 22- Matters of Life and Dating which tells the stroy of a cancer survivors return to the world of dating. (advance review to come)

News
Grace is Back!
Debra Messing's hit mini series The Starter Wife will be a weekly series come spring 2008. USA has greenlit 10 episodes. "Starter Wife joins a USA slate heavy on skeins with male leads, including Monk, Psych, Burn Notice and The Dead Zone. Cabler is attempting to add more female-centered series, previously announcing plans for the Mary McCormack starrer In Plain Sight (working title)." (Variety)

The Hollywood Film Festival opens today. Here is a story on a documentary bring screened directed by Karen Gehres about her friend Elise Hill, a homeless woman living in NYC.
Her Friend Through Thick and Thin (LA Times)

Karen Arikian has been named new head of the Hamptons Film Festival. She is currently director of the European Film Market based in Berlin. She starts in March. (Variety)

Eleanor Ringel Gillespie the former movie critic of the Atlanta Journal Constitution will be honored on October 19 by Women in Film and Television's Atlanta chapter.
Eleanor Ringel Gillespie Honored for Creative Excellence (Alliance of Women Film Journalists)

Jorja Fox is officially leaving CSI (we already knew, but this is final confirmation) I read a while ago that she refused to sign the standard one year agreement that the rest of the cast did because the salary bump that they offered was too low. It's rare that someone stands up in this way since they get paid such crazy amounts of money anyway.
Jorja Fox quitting CSI (AP via USA Today)

Sarah Roemer and Elisabeth Shue have been cat the indie thriller Waking Madison written and to be directed by Katherine Brooks. (Variety)


Around the Web
Reese Witherspoon gets political for Rendition opening Friday (review to come)
Witherspoon Takes Dramatic Step in Rendition (AP via MSNBC)

Another take on the women are being pushed out of Hollywood stroy, this time from Australia
Say Goodbye to Hollywood, Baby (Sydney Morning Herald)

Yeardley Smith - The Voice of Lisa SimpsonMy Life as Lisa (The Telegraph)