Deep Inside Hollywood
By Romeo San Vicente
Neo and Trinity! The red pills that those unpleasant internet dudes keep going on and on about (incorrectly)! Very cool outfits of the cyberfuture! Itβs all coming back around again with a fourth βMatrixβ installment, officially a go at Warner Bros. Lana Wachowski will direct and is co-writing the film alongside Aleksandar Hemon (βSense8β) and David Mitchell (βCloud Atlasβ). Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss are also back on board. Now, we have no idea what it will be about because the Wachowskis are legendarily quiet about content until itβs ready to be seen. And really, who needs spoilers? Weβve watched the growth and flowering of Wachowski World from the time of βBound,β through βSpeed Racer,β and up to the unfairly maligned β and also quite extravagantly weird and wild β βJupiter Ascendingβ and the fact is that we are here for every new twist and turn in the spaced-out journey. At the moment, Lilly Wachowski seems to have no involvement in this, but we assume sheβs going to be hovering around doing β¦ something? Cameras roll in 2020, so youβll probably get to re-enter the Matrix sometime in 2021.
Julianne Moore is a βMothertruckerβ
If you saw Julianne Mooreβs appearance with Billy Eichner on his show βBilly on The Street,β youβll recall him saying, βFor a dollar sheβll do something understated!β And that is how the moviegoing public generally thinks of the Academy Award-winning actress. But we also know she has range, and itβll probably come in handy when she stars in the upcoming Jill Soloway (βTransparentβ) film βMothertrucker.β Moore will play Instagram-famous personality Joy βMothertrucker,β Americaβs lone female ice road big rig trucker. Joy is also the subject of Amy Butcherβs memoir of the same name, about the relationship formed between them when Butcher went to Alaska to ride along on a dangerous drive. The book will be published by Amazon in early 2022, probably around the same time as the filmβs release. Meanwhile, the role of Amy is still in the casting process but expect one of the current crop of young A-listers to attach herself soon.
βEuphoriaβ gets a second season
Is the HBO series βEuphoriaβ good or bad? Is its dominant narrative revolving around a group of cisgender female and trans femme teenagers progressive? Or does it engage in exploitation when its characters suffer in grand, frightening ways? Does its harrowing depiction of drug use, sexual violence and other trauma make it honest or irresponsible? Sometimes itβs difficult to sort out. But we do know that its cast, led by the impressive Zendaya, is giving it their all, and the dreamily hazy music video qualities it possesses make it seem highly attractive even as it depicts a fairly brutal vision of adolescence. And now thereβll be a season two β thank goodness, because all its story lines ended in cliffhangers β so when we gather up our courage to dive back into the relentlessly grim teenage tragedy, itβll probably already be waiting for us. Weβll be on board in the anticipation of a hopeful, if not necessarily happy, ending for these kids. They deserve it.
20 years of βMerrily We Roll Alongβ
The classic Stephen Sondheim musical βMerrily We Roll Alongβ is the story of friends whose show business careers span 20 years. When the action begins they are middle-aged, successful, estranged and unhappy. And then the story moves back in time, little by little, ending with a powerfully moving final act that sees them all headstrong young comrades full of hope and belief in the power of that friendship. Well, who better to film this sort of years-spanning saga than Richard Linklater, the man who shot his adolescent epic βBoyhoodβ over the course of 12 years with the same actors, allowing his main character to grow up before the audienceβs eyes. This time, though, the shooting schedule β already in progress βΒ will last two decades, and twentysomething stars Ben Platt (βDear Evan Hansonβ), Beanie Feldstein (βBooksmartβ) and Blake Jenner (βGleeβ) will shoot the beginning of the film sometime in the late 2030s, when theyβve reached actual middle age, for a theatrical release sometime close to 2040. Now letβs hope that there are still theaters in 2040 and that climate change has been adequately addressed so that thereβs still an audience. Happy waiting!
Romeo San Vicente is voting for whoever likes the Green New Deal.