TV Review: 'The Staircase'
►"Rises above the true-crime trend." THR's chief TV critic
Dan Fienberg reviews HBO Max's
The Staircase. Colin Firth, Toni Collette, Michael Stuhlbarg, Juliette Binoche, Dane DeHaan and Parker Posey star in this scripted limited series based on the acclaimed documentary
The Staircase about a North Carolina author accused of murdering his wife in 2001.
The review. —
Yes! Yes! Yes! Meg Ryan is set to dust off her ’90s rom-com roots and will direct and star in
What Happens Later alongside David Duchovny. The film — based on the play
Shooting Star by Steven Dietz, who co-wrote the screenplay alongside fellow playwright and novelist Kirk Lynn and Ryan — is described by the filmmakers as an “evolved and nostalgic take on the romantic comedy."
The story. —
Bravo! Paul Schrader, director of
American Gigolo,
Cat People,
First Reformed and
The Card Counter and the screenwriter of Martin Scorsese’s classics
Raging Bull and
Taxi Driver, will be honored with this year’s Golden Lion for lifetime achievement at the 2022 Venice International Film Festival.
The story. —
Top job. Eva Yates has been promoted to director of BBC Film, taking the role that is being vacated by Rose Garnett as she moves to A24. She will now lead one of the U.K.’s most important backers of independent film and a unit that helps develop and co-produce around 12-15 features each year.
The story. —
This Week in TV. THR's
Rick Porter runs down the TV premieres, returns and specials over the next seven days. Among the things to look out for over the coming week include the debuts of HBO Max’s
The Staircase, Hulu’s
Candy and Paramount+'s
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, the return of the Peacock comedy
Girls5eva, Amazon's
The Wilds and Apple's
Tehran as well as season finales for several broadcast dramas.
The full guide. In other news... —Netflix:
Movies and TV shows leaving in May —Netflix’s
new releases coming in May 2022 —
Obi-Wan Kenobi drops intense new trailer for Star Wars Day —Daniel Radcliffe
transforms into “Weird Al” Yankovic in first trailer for Roku biopic —Roku to
develop original series with Martha Stewart, Emeril Lagasse —Russo Brothers shingle
AGBO hires Scott Nemes to head television —Disney streaming
adds to executive team with hires from Netflix, Meta —AFM managing director
Jonathan Wolf to exit —TikTok star
Chris Olsen signs with CAA —Snap
unveils equity pledge to increase representation on its original programming What else we're reading... —Here it is, part 2 of Evgenia Peretz's incredible expose of
Grey's Anatomy writer Elisabeth Finch (seriously, this popped the monocle right off my face) [
VF]
—Story on social media startups like HalloApp that are trying to reshape online discourse (making it a bit nicer with fewer Nazis, essentially) [
WSJ]
—Cecilia D'Anastasio with an interesting story on former YouTubers and Twitch streamers finding new ways to make to avoid burnout [
Bloomberg]
—Rather concerning: "Even Biden’s allies have no clue what he’s doing on abortion" [
Daily Beast]
—Adam Serwer on Alito’s plan to repeal the 20th century [
Atlantic]
Today... ...in 1944, MGM premiered
Gaslight in New York at the Capitol Theatre. The thriller went on to claim two Oscars at the 17th Academy Awards, including a best actress nod for Ingrid Bergman.
The original review. Today's birthdays:
Will Arnett (54), Alex Lawther (27), Shameik Moore (27), Richard Jenkins (75), Lance Bass (43), Abigail Hawk (37), Ashley Rickards (30), Ana Gasteyer (55), Julian Barratt (54), Jean Yoon (60), Stefano Sollima (56), Randy Travis (63), David Della Rocco (70), Steve Barron (66), Eleanor Coppola (86), David Blocker (67)