Everybody loved Tom Wolfe’s novel The Bonfire of the Vanities, which was serialized in Rolling Stone in 1984-85 but then became a bestseller anyway. It was a clever, fast-moving sneer at 1980s big-city American life, where greed, ego, racism, classism, lust and real-estate envy combine in a toxic cocktail.
But everybody was disappointed by the 1990 Brian De Palma movie – with Tom Hanks, Melanie Griffith and Bruce Willis – which bombed big time.
Now Variety says Chuck Lorre, the showrunner who gave the world Two and a Half Men, The Big Bang Theory and other top sitcoms, has signed with Amazon to develop an eight-episode TV version of Bonfire. No casting yet, and no dates.
Let’s hope that by the time this comes out, Amazon TV is available in Canada, or that somebody else picks up the Canadian rights. Get with the program, Amazon!
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Overheard in a Bishop St. bar: “… single time we go into a movie or a concert he makes a big deal of silencing his phone and he tells me, “Phasers on stun!” If he does it once more, he’s gonna regret it.”
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Casper Smart got the old heave-ho from Jennifer Lopez after she caught him tomcatting around a second time. So says the usual un-named source in People mag, anyway. (Man, who is this source all these mags and websites keep quoting? That guy knows everything about everybody. But I digress.)
The source claims that the first time this happened, Not So (see what I did there?) talked his way out of trouble, solemnly promising to never, etc., etc. But then she caught him, this summer, up close and personal with some dancer.
Team Smart denied it all, but JLo was not soothed by his denials.
These two were together, mostly, from 2011 until this summer. He’s 29. She’s 47.
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Gwen Stefani and Gavin Rossdale finally finished their nasty divorce, and now they’re hoping to ease the pain with a profit of over US$20 million on the family home, TMZ.com reports.
This is a sprawling place in Beverly Hills – 15,000 sq. ft. (1,400 sq. m.) – on a hilltop: seven bedrooms, 7-and-a-half baths, fireplaces, tennis court, infinity pool, theatre, guest house … you know the drill.
They paid a mere $13.25 big ones back in 2007, and they’re asking $35 mil. now.
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Matthew McConaughey makes his directing debut not in a movie but in a six-minute documentary-style ad for Wild Turkey bourbon.
Winemag.com tells us that the parent company, Campari, first invited Matt to star in this thing, but he held out for writing and directing as well.
In the film, now online, Matt tours the distillery and gets into the product with the brand’s top distillers. There’ll also be a 30-second TV version.
“I wanted to get my hands in the clay,” McConaughey says.
Coming soon, maybe: A Wild Turkey “expression” mixed from whiskeys McConaughey selects.
He’s 46.
