Fan Fare
Entertainment behind the scenes
“The Informant!” Matt Damon feels fine looking fat
Much has been made of superstar Matt Damon adding 30 lbs of heft to take on his new role in Steven Soderbergh directed movie “The Informant!”. The movie hits U.S. theaters on Sept. 17, but it premiered at the Venice film festival earlier this week. You can read about it here.
“The Informant!,” whose backers hope to win an award for Damon playing a corporate whistle-blower in a U.S. agri-business, also debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival this week. On Friday in Toronto, Damon was talking to the media about his role.
Notably, the most asked question was about the extra junk he put in his trunk. How’d he do it? Mostly by eating pizza and drinking beer, he said. And Damon, perhaps uncharacteristically of a movie star once named People’s magazine’s sexiest man alive, said he liked carrying the extra pounds! He also said fans watching him shoot the movie in the midwestern U.S. would tell him he looked good with his wig, mustache and full face.
Or, were they lying? You be the judge, click below to watch.
Piracy sinks Fox columnist Roger Friedman
In the high stakes battle over piracy in Hollywood, a Fox News columnist lost his job on Monday after he reviewed a pirated copy of the upcoming movie “X-Men Origins: Wolverine.” Roger Friedman is a big name in Hollywood entertainment news, but media reports say that fact did not protect his job when his corporate colleagues at 20th Century Fox called for his head, nor did it help that Friedman wrote a positive review of the movie (which has since been removed from the Fox website).
The New York Daily News reports that an estimated 75,000 people have downloaded the free, illegal copy of “Wolverine,” which stars Hugh Jackman, and the studio is concerned that the high interest in the film online could slash its box office appeal. But no one is saying that Friedman leaked the movie, he just reviewed it. In that sense, was his punishment too harsh?
Cannes Fare 8 – Madonna hits town
Steven Soderbergh’s 4-hour film “Che” stumbles in several early reviews, and Madonna hits town with her new documentary.
