April 18, 2022

What's news: Fantastic Beasts 3's lackluster debut raises questions about the franchise. The Batman sailed past $750 million. Jay Leno offered his take on the Will Smith incident at the Oscars. BTS announce the release date of their new album. Plus: Chinese censors have met their match in Megan Thee Stallion — Abid Rahman

'Fantastic Beasts 3' Makes Tepid $43M Box Office Bow

►Trouble in Wizarding World. Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore opened to a tepid $43 million at the domestic box office over Easter weekend after earning $20.1 million on Friday, including $6 million in Thursday previews. It is faring better overseas, where it earned another $71 million for a global tally of $193 million (it opened last weekend in select markets).

The $200 million movie — which marks the third installment in J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter spinoff franchise — is landing well behind his predecessors. THR's Pamela McClintock writes that as franchises become ever more important to Hollywood studios, it remains to be seen whether this particular series can keep going.

In 2016, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them debuted to $74.4 million domestically after earning an A CinemaScore. The second installment, Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, came in below that, or $62.2 million, or 16 percent. Dumbledore came in 30 percent behind Grindelwald. Both Grindelwald and Dumbledore earned a B+ CinemaScore.

Despite the FB3 gloom, Warner Bros. had a good story to tell with The Batman, which flew past the $750 million mark at the global box office, including $365 million in domestic receipts and $386 million internationally. The film is the top-grossing film of 2022 to date, and one of the biggest of the pandemic. The box office report.

Inside Coachella

►"Dude this is so weird, I should not be headlining this shit!" Coachella’s long-awaited return this weekend saw big Hollywood stars like Leonardo DiCaprio, Timothée Chalamet and Keke Palmer hit the festival to take in stunning performances from the likes of Billie Eilish, Megan Thee Stallion and Disclosure. THR's Kirsten Chuba and Sydney Odman round up all the best action from Saturday night. The recap.

—ICYMI. Kirsten and Sydney were there for day one of Coachella 2022, which saw Brit clothes horse and sometime popstar Harry Styles sing his little heart out as the weekend's first headliner with big performances from the likes of Daniel Caesar, Phoebe Bridgers and Lil Baby too. The recap.

—"WAP" breaks through the Great Firewall of China. Returing to Megan Thee Stallion, the rapper's risqué Coachella performance wowed festival fans on Saturday but also proved to be a huge headache for censors in China. The performance was livestreamed on WeChat, but censors didn't know where to put the black bar when the dancing on stage got rather suggestive. The story.

'Black-ish' Star Anthony Anderson On Getting Emotional While Filming Final Episode

►"I didn’t think it was going to hit me the way that it did." Tracee Ellis Ross isn’t the only Black-ish star who became emotional while filming the final season of the ABC comedy series. Anthony Anderson opened up about filming the eighth and final season of the show, which airs its series finale April 19, in an interview with Ellen DeGeneres. Asked if he cried, Anderson replied: “I did. I didn’t cry as much as Tracee Ellis Ross, though. She cried every day.” The story.

—"Daytime snake-oil carnival." Donald Trump’s endorsement of Dr. Mehmet Oz in the Pennsylvania Senate race — and Oz’s "shit show" campaign itself — aren’t sitting well with John Oliver. The Last Week Tonight host savaged Oz on Sunday night's episode, decrying among other things Oz running for office in Pennsylvania despite living in New Jersey and complaining about the high cost of gas while reportedly being worth more than $100 million. The story.

—ICYMI. Saturday Night Live’s cold open touched on everything from Elon "that was a joke" Musk trying to buy Twitter and Britney Spears announcing her pregnancy, to Coachella and bad reviews for Morbius. Lizzo pulled double duty as host and musical guest. The recap.

—"The thing that’s most disturbing wasn’t the slap." Jay Leno gave his thoughts on the Will Smith slap incident at the Oscars. In a recent interview, the former Tonight Show host called Smith a “good guy,” while explaining the most troubling part of the whole ordeal for him was the Oscar-winner "smirking" and "yelling obscenities" at Rock after he retook his seat. The story.

—"How could you possibly have known?" Jerry O’Connell has apologized to Wil Wheaton for not being there for the actor when Wheaton suffered emotional trauma as a child. The pair, appearing on CBS' The Talk, were talking about being child actors in Rob Reiner's Stand By Me when O'Connell addressed the abuse that Wheaton went through. O’Connell then added: “But I want to say, to the bigger picture, you never know what someone is going through when you’re with them." The story.

—Doing some good. Netflix is throwing its weight behind female Arab filmmakers, teaming with the Lebanon-based Arab Fund for Arts and Culture on a new grant. The one-off grant of $250,000, which comes via the Netflix Fund for Creative Equity, will go to women producers and directors in the Arab world, with five projects shortlisted. The story.

TV Review: 'Better Call Saul' S6

►"A thrilling beginning to an inevitable end." THR TV critic Angie Han reviews season 6 of AMC's Better Call Saul. The fates of Jimmy (Bob Odenkirk), Kim (Rhea Seehorn), Mike (Jonathan Banks) and more hang in the balance as the Breaking Bad prequel enters the first half of its sixth and final season. The review.

—"Spirited and satisfying wartime intrigue." THR's chief film critic David Rooney reviews John Madden's Operation Mincemeat. Colin Firth, Matthew Macfadyen, Kelly Macdonald and Penelope Wilton star in this Netflix film based on the true story of a World War II British intelligence unit’s scheme to break Hitler’s grip on Europe with a high-risk diversionary tactic. The review.

—"I’m not done with her at all." Kiernan Shipka is ready to see what Sally Draper might be up to these days, nearly 15 years after she originated the character on AMC’s beloved series Mad Men. In a recent interview, Shipka said she would be open to revisiting the role at some point to explore a grown-up version of Sally. The story.

—Hark ARMY! BTS fans might be mourning the end of the group's "Permission to Dance On Stage – Las Vegas" residency, but now they have some big news to celebrate instead: The Korean septet has announced the release date of their next album. The next album drops on June 10, so mark it down in Google calendar. The story.

—"I don’t take postponing a show lightly." Kiwi popster Lorde canceled two concerts on her Solar Power Tour this weekend due to laryngitis. The shows, originally scheduled to take place at Uncasville, Connecticut’s Mohegan Sun Arena on Friday and Washington, D.C.’s The Anthem on Saturday, have been rescheduled for August. The story.

In other news...

—Hoppy Easter! 22 of the funniest, coolest, cuddliest and creepiest rabbits in pop culture

—FaZe Clan adds competitive gamer Edgar Valdez to talent roster

—Art Rupe, record executive who signed Little Richard and Sam Cooke, dies at 104

—Wendy Rieger, veteran TV anchor in Washington, dies at 65

—Erewhon’s newest indulgence: $165 tote bags from Casablanca

What else we're reading...

—Facebook is pulling back from its foray into podcasting barely a year after it started to take them seriously [Bloomberg]

—Not sure about this, but it was mildly amusing: "The Dropout is a show about how Girlboss anthems will ruin your life" [Slate]

—In yet another Girls 10th anniversary story, Kyndall Cunningham reassesses Allison Williams "iconic" turn as Marnie Michaels [Daily Beast]

—Emma Beddington's enjoyable profile of Sian Clifford (Claire from Fleabag), on life after, well, Fleabag [Guardian]

—Interesting piece of Shanghai and how its Zero Covid is not working [Vox]

Today...

...in 1973, MGM unveiled Richard Fleischer’s dystopian, 98-minute sci-fi drama Soylent Green in Los Angeles at Red Carpet theatres. Set in NYC in 2022, the film depicts a world ravaged by inequality, food scarcity and climate crisis with women facing oppression. It starred Charlton Heston, Leigh Taylor-Young and Edward G. Robinson in his final film role. The original review.

Today's birthdays: Rick Moranis (69), David Tennant (51), Vanessa Kirby (34), Alia Shawkat (33), Britt Robertson (32), Maria Bello (55), America Ferrera (38), Chloe Bennet (30), Eric Roberts (66), Edgar Wright (48), Jane Leeves (61), Melissa Joan Hart (46), Hayley Mills (76), Rosie Huntington-Whiteley (35), Eli Roth (50), Eric McCormack (59), Moises Arias (29), Conan O'Brien (59), Fredro Starr (51)

Patrick Carlin, a comedy writer, author, podcaster and brother of the late George Carlin, has died. He was 90. The obituary.

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