Fan Fare
Entertainment behind the scenes
Did Gervais go too far at Globes?
The day afte
r the Golden Globes, and, in Britain at least, there is as much media chatter about show host Ricky Gervais and his no-holds-barred approach as there is about Colin Firth’s acting award for his portrayal of the stammering King George VI in “The King’s Speech”.
Normally the reaction on this side of the pond to major U.S. movie award shows is to champion the victorious Brits, or otherwise bemoan their failure. This year would have been no exception — joy for Firth, otherwise disappointment for the film about the British monarchy — were it not for Gervais and his less-than-gentle jokes that took aim at, among others, Charlie Sheen, Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp of “The Tourist”, The Hollywood Foreign Press Association, Cher, the actresses in Sex and the City, prominent Scientologists and Hugh Hefner.
The Gawker website’s reaction summed up its jaw-dropping bluntness: “Holy wow. Ricky Gervais … just opened the show with one of the most unrelentingly harsh and uncomfortable monologues in awards history.”
Some of the stars there on the night felt the need to hit back — Robert Downey Jr., the butt of one of Gervais’ less-than-flattering jibes, suggested that the host’s words were “hugely mean-spirited, with mildly sinister undertones”. The LA Times called the event a “snarkfest” and wrote of the “corrosive tone” Gervais set. Reflecting how taken aback some viewers were with his repartee, there was even online speculation that he had been sacked mid-show when he failed to appear for nearly an hour.
“Knight and Day” reviews, just like night and day
Perhaps it is the perfect title for a film. “Knight and Day,” the new action adventure movie starring Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz, hit movie theater screens on Wednesday to mixed reviews, with some critics loving it, some hating it. On Rottentomatoes.com, which aggregates reviews and scores films, “Knight and Day” received a 53 percent positive rating with 54 of 101 reviews liking the film and 47 finding it not to their favor.
Writing in The New York Times, veteran critic A.O. Scott says “Knight and Day” “consists of one over-the-top, overblown blowup session after another — not one showing a scrap of wit — arranged in unvarying, hysterical rhythm.” Another long-time reviewer, Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times, says: “It’s hardly a perfect film, not even close, but it is the most entertaining, made-for-adults studio movie of the summer, and one of the reasons it works at all is the great skill and commitment Cruise brings.”
Tom Cruise rejects “diagnosis” from Dr. Drew as Nazi garbage
Tom Cruise is no fan of psychiatry so he wasn’t too happy to get an unsolicited diagnosis from celebrity doctor Drew Pinsky — or so said his representative who compared the diagnosis to the “garbage” of the Nazis.
Pinsky, who hosts the nationally syndicated radio program “Loveline” and appears on cable TV on the VH1 reality show “Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew,” was interviewed for the July issue of Playboy, and wondered aloud why Cruise was ”drawn into a cultish kind of environment like Scientology.”
