Bully Daily: Does the MPAA Really Have a Secret F-Word Study?

While the latest chapter in the rapidly expanding mythology of Harvey Weinstein involves the mogul shooting down a pitch from President Obama ("I sent him an e-mail back saying he was the most overqualified book scout I've ever had"), I remain preoccupied with the saga surrounding Bully, the Weinstein Company doc still embroiled in a battle with the MPAA ratings board to overturn its R for strong language. The publicity clamor continued Wednesday with a young bully victim dropping off a petition with a reported 200,000 signatures to MPAA HQ and Ellen Degeneres discussing the "controversy" on her show. But it's what quietly came the day before that seems the most intriguing. In an interview published Tuesday, Harvey confided to his LAT pal Patrick Goldstein that Bully's ratings appeal - which the Weinsteins say they lost by one vote - was itself the victim of a mystery MPAA study on language in films. And what a study! These idiots make Harvey look like Clarence Darrow: After the language in Kings Speech became a big issue, we did a survey to see if parents wanted us to overlook the language, [MPAA ratings board chair Joan] Graves told me. And what we discovered was that, overwhelmingly, parents said they wanted to know what kind of language there was in the film. We asked specifically about the F-word, which clearly bothers a large number of people. Thats just how they feel. Language matters. According to Weinstein, Graves brought up the still-unreleased survey as an argument against Bully in his appeal hearing. It was like a scene out of Perry Mason, Weinstein recalled. The news of the survey came out of nowhere. Joan summarized it in our hearing and it really hurt us. We lost our appeal by one vote and I think the survey cost us that vote. Graves told me she would eventually make the survey public but wouldnt commit to a specific timetable. Weinstein argues that theres no time like the present. If it says what Joan says it does, she should release it, he said. If it makes a strong point, maybe we could learn from it. But Id like to see the scientific evidence myself. I love it - this idea of the MPAA drawing up some Middle American focus group of parents and asking what alarms them most about contemporary movies. And that all these parents yelped, "It's the language! All those F-words in the King's Speech! What about the children?" before sobbing into the survey-taker's cardigan. Because "that's just how they feel." No wonder Graves won't release the study: It's trapped in her lower intestine with the rest of her shit. Anyway, if giving it a PG-13 means that none of us ever have to hear about Bully's ratings imbroglio again, then fine. Do it. Who cares? Harvey's 60th birthday is coming up in a couple weeks. I want Joan Graves to jump out of a huge cake clutching a big PG-13. Maybe those 200,000 kids can sign a card next. And Obama can clasp a Medal of Freedom around his neck to go with the French Legion of Honor designation, commemorating everything Harvey has done for those ravaged by the tsunami of caprice and illegitimacy known as the MPAA ratings process. Or whatever. Let's put this tragedy behind us. We've got a P.T. Anderson movie to get to. [LAT]

Tom Hollander Joins Invisible Lady

Take advantage of Fiennes' Dickens biopic The Charles Dickens bi-centenary is constantly fling interesting projects at us, like Mr Smallweed hurling cushions at his wife. Along with BBC and BFI seasons and Mike Newell's Great Anticipation, Take advantage of Fiennes is pointing The Invisible Lady, through which he'll also play in the author. Just revealed being joining him is Tom Hollander, who'll be playing Dickens' friend and frequent collaborator Wilkie Collins.Calling The Invisible Lady a "Dickens biopic" is useful shorthand, it ironically plays into what the it as well as the film are about: Dickens' secret mistress Ellen "Nelly" Ternan, and her airbrushing from his official history.Ternan will be a theatre actress (yearly youthful than Dickens' earliest daughter) with whom Dickens completed cheating throughout the final 13 years of his existence. Included in a less-than-respected profession, Nelly's social position was minimal, and Dickens visited inordinate measures to keep the bond in the public eye. Exposure as Dickens' mistress may have introduced the actress utter disgrace and ruin throughout his lifetime, but she did achieve some status after Dickens' dying, despite their relationship getting in those days emerged.Expect a colourful depiction around the world in the Victorian theatre, hiding an excoriating take a look at nineteenth-century social mores. Felicity Manley is playing Nelly, with Kristin Scott Thomas as Dickens' extended-suffering wife Catherine. Holland, after we mentioned, is Wilkie Collins, best-known since the author in the Moonstone as well as the Lady In White-colored, but furthermore a plentiful playwrite. He co-written The Frozen Deep with Dickens, plus it was that fateful production which Dickens and Nelly first met.The script is simply by Shame's author Abi Morgan, which is based on Claire Tomalin's book, first launched in 1991. Shooting starts in April.The Invisible Lady will be paperback from Penguin, and Tomalin's more recent Charles Dickens: A Existence is presently still only in hardcover from Viking.

David Morrissey On For The Walking Dead

He's The Governor...With The Walking Dead more running than stumbling in the ratings on the telly box both across the pond and here, it's already been renewed for a third season. And now US channel AMC has announced that David Morrissey will join the cast.We'll add a possible *Spoiler Warning* here for anyone who has yet to read the comic books that the series is based on, though given how the series tends to deviate in terms of plot and characters' fates, it could be nothing of the sort.Morrissey will play The Governor, the cruel leader of a community called Woodbury that Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) and co stumble across. Given the comic's bleak outlook, you won't be surprised to learn that the Guv turns out to be a spectacularly nasty piece of work, and ends up doing some very nasty things to our heroes. So nasty, in fact, that we have a suspicion he'll be toned down a bit for TV.The Walking Dead, which also features Jon Bernthal, Sarah Wayne Callies, Laurie Holden Jeffrey DeMunn, Steven Yuen and Norman Reedus, airs Sunday nights in the US and the following Friday in the UK. The third season will kick off shooting this spring in Atlanta.

Actor Dick Anthony Williams dies

Actor Dick Anthony Williams, who came Tony nominations for "Black Picture Show" and "Just what the Wine-Merchants Buy" inside the seventies and was famous for his portrayals of Malcolm X both onstage and also on television, died Thursday, Feb. 16, in Van Nuys, Calif. He was 77. Throughout the time of four years beginning in 1972, Williams starred on Broadway in five shows, including "Ain't Made to Die an all-natural Dying," "We Interrupt The ProgramInch and "The Poison Tree." He will be a co-founding father from the completely new Federal Theater in NY. Later he carried out Malcolm X onstage in lots of productions of Rob Stetson's play "The Meeting" -- after you have carried out the African-American leader inside the 1978 NBC miniseries "King," about Martin Luther King Junior. (More youthful crowd reprised the role when "The Meeting" was presented on PBS in 1989.) His theater work also incorporated pointing and starring in "Hugely Buck White-colored" in the production staged in W just before the show's go to NY. Inside the seventies Williams came out in supporting roles in films for instance "Slaughter's Large Rip-Off" and "Five round the Black Hands Side" film credits also incorporated "Dog Day Mid-day," "The Jerk," "The Star Chamber," "Gardens of Stone," "Mo' Better Blues," "Edward Scissorhands" and "The Rapture," which he ongoing to accomplish bigscreen work to the 2000s. Round the smallscreen he will be a steady presence from his 1968 debut on "Dragnet" until his 2002 appearance on two cases of "The Shield" since the Rev. Neal Prepare. Among he recurred on ABC's "Us Recognition" in 1985-86 will be a regular round the network's series "Heart in the City" in 1986 and "Homefront" in 1991 and guested on shows including "Nanny as well as the Professor," "Ironside," "Starsky and Hutch," "The Rockford Files," "The Jeffersons," "Lou Grant," "L.A. Law," "Roc," "The X-Files," "Law and Order," "Chicago Hope" and "NYPD Blue." He was among the stars in the made-for-PBS play "Freeman," directed by Lloyd Richards and came out in Harriet Tubman telepic "A Girl Referred to as Moses." Born in Chicago, Williams needed up acting attending school. Contact Variety Staff at news@variety.com

Golden Globes Trial: No Decision Likely Before Late March Or Early April

HFPA: Our Rights Are Being Held Hostage Freelance journalist Dominic Patten is covering the trial for Deadline. It looks like its going to be awhile before theres a decision in the trial between the Hollywood Foreign Press Association and Dick Clark Productions over TV rights to the Golden Globes. In an order issued late Friday afternoon, Judge A. Howard Matz has reset the start clock to at least February 28. And as a source close to the case told Deadline, This could take 30 or 60 days, so expect to see a decision by no earlier than late March or early April. One week after closing arguments ended, the judge in the two-week long non-jury case issued a one-page order asking the plaintiffs and the defendants for a revised Proposed Findings of Fact. The judge ordered the parties to supplement their previously lodged Proposed Findings of Fact by providing specific, concrete support from the trial record. At the conclusion of closing arguments on February 10, Matz told the lawyers and the court that it is going to be some time before I can turn back to this. Still as one would expect on such a case with hundreds of millions of dollars at stake the judge, who could have asked for supplements to both sides’ previously submitted evidence and documents during the trial itself, was very specific about what he wanted to use as the basis for his decision in the case. Plaintiff shall provide this support for paragraphs 25 through 96 of its Proposed Findings of Fact. Defendants shall provide this support for paragraphs 15 through 151 of their Proposed Findings of Fact. These supplemented Proposed Findings of Fact and shall be lodged by no later than Tuesday, February 28, 2012. On February 7, the last day of testimony in the case, Matz had urged lawyers Daniel Petrocelli for the HFPA and Marty Katz for DCP to speak with your respective clients to come to their senses and come to a settlement. The Judge warned that without a settlement, which never materialized, and his decision for one side over the other, appeals could see this still in the courts by the time the 2013 Golden Globes comes around. Whichever way he goes, a source said, he is going to want to be bulletproof.

Paget Brewster to Exit Criminal Minds in the Finish of year

Paget Brewster Paget Brewster is departing Criminal Minds again. "Red carpet wonderful years playing Emily Prentiss, I've made the decision it's the perfect time that i can move ahead,Inch Brewster stated inside a statement. "Around I'll miss my Criminal Minds family, I'm looking forward to the near future along with other possibilities."Added showrunner and executive producer Erica Messer: "I was all sad to listen to this news, but we respect and support any decision Paget really wants to make. Personally, I am a huge fan and will still be one wherever she goes." Take a look at photos from Criminal MindsThis would be the second time Brewster leaves the show. Last season, she made a decision to depart - asking the authors to get rid of her character, Emily Prentiss - when CBS reduced her episodecount and fired A.J. Prepare. But because she still were built with a year left on her behalf contract, Brewster needed to film a high cliff-hanger ending for Prentiss rather. CBS decided to let Brewster shoot NBC's comedy pilot, My Existence Being an Experiment, however when it wasn't acquired, CBS rehired Brewster, together with Prepare, last May.Brewster told TVGuide.com recently that they was not aware from the extra year on her behalf contract and was surprised when CBS worked out the choice.Felony Minds' Paget Brewster: Prentiss and Hotch may have a "nice little moment""I shot an airplane pilot also it did not go, and they stated, 'You're back!' I'd another year on my small contract which i did not learn about, and so i needed to return! I stated, 'Hey, I kinda want an apology and perhaps an increase.A Plus they were really like, 'No, we'll sue you!'" she stated. "The entire factor was, regrettably, chaos. It had been dumb. They thought they'd cut costs by eliminating us ... and ultimately got the two of us back."Though her contract determined her return, Brewster, who became a member of Minds in Season 2, stated she was pleased to return and would sign up for next season "whether it calculates." Based on Deadline, which first reported this news, she made a decision to leave after CBS and ABC Galleries, which creates the show, refused her request to pursue a comedy project throughout pilot season.Criminal Minds' A.J. Prepare on JJ's large fight: You will see how tough she isBrewster accepted to us that they skipped doing comedy. She performed Kathy on Buddies and it has made an appearance on numerous sitcoms through the years, including Andy Richter Controls the World and Huff. She's also done voice focus on American Father! and King from the Hill and regularly takes part within the comedy stage show Thrilling Adventure Hour. "I really like comedy. It is so enjoyable - not too [Minds] is not - but it is just different," she stated. "I would like to do a different one later on."Are you sad to determine Brewster go (again)? What type of send-off do you consider she'll get this time around?

Quibbling competition

Colin Firth and George Clooney Russell Crowe and Jean Dujardin Gillian Anderson and Judi DenchMark Coulier and Meryl Streep sophistication Grosvenor House. Tilda Swinton with Tom Hiddleston Crowds observed a galactic alignment of stars across the British Academy Films Awards' red-colored carpet on Sunday evening. The existence of best actor noms George Clooney, Kaira Pitt, Jean Dujardin, Gary Oldman and Michael Fassbender elevated the chilled London mercury with a couple of levels outdoors the Royal Opera House. Penelope Cruz, Octavia Spencer, Michelle Williams and Cuba Gooding Junior. had also all flown directly into attend the party, together with Hugh Jackman and Russell Crowe, who hit happens being an Aussie comedy double act. Faux rivalries were apparent, as Clooney poked light-hearted fun at Pitt, outing him because the noms' outcast. "We have all become quite good buddies. Well, everyone but Pitt. Nobody likes him, imaginable.Inch Visitors visited to the regular publish-kudos venue, Grosvenor House, where there is dining, consuming and dancing towards the dulcet tones of Emeli Sande. Contact the range newsroom at news@variety.com

Supreme Court upholds copyright law

The Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld Congress' ability to extent copyright protection to works by foreign artists and authors that were previously in the public domain. The high court ruled 6 to 2, with Justice Elena Kagan recusing herself. "Nothing in the historical record, congressional practice or our own jurisprudence warrants exceptional First Amendment solicitude for copyrighted works that were once in the public domain," Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote in the majority opinion. Orchestra conductors, educators and homevid distributors challenged the constitutionality of a 1994 act of Congress that restored the copyrights, bringing it in line with earlier trade agreements. Perhaps millions of works were covered, and they had argued that the "entry of a work into the public domain must mark the end of protection, not an intermission." According to the U.S. Copyright Office, after the law was passed, notices were filed to restore copyrights on almost 50,000 works, including such Alfred Hitchcock titles as "The 39 Steps" and "The Lady Vanishes," Carol Reed classic "The Third Man" and a host of musical works and Mexican and Latin American films. The content industry generally favored the restoration of copyrights. The MPAA filed an amicus brief in which it said that U.S. copyright holders could face "retaliatory measures" if the law was overturned, and the U.S. therefore did not honor the 1994 treaty and the Berne Convention, the international agreement in which countries recognize the copyright of works from other signatory countries. "In aligning the United States with other nations bound by the Berne Convention, and thereby according equitable treatment to once disfavored foreign authors, Congress can hardly be charged with a design to move stealthily toward a regime of perpetual copyrights," Ginsburg wrote. Contact Ted Johnson at ted.johnson@variety.com

Shed Media promotes five

ShanfieldSurovellSmithShed Media has upped Ted Smith, former exec producer at Mark Burnett Productions, to v.p. of development, along with four other promotions at the "Real Housewives of NY City" shingle.Jessica Surovell, who has been at the company since 2008, is now director of development, up from manager; Matt Shanfield, also a Mark Burnett alum, has been promoted to director of development as well.Arial Brozell and Emily Moffet are moving up the ladder to manager of development and associate producer, respectively. The pair have been with Shed since 2009 as development assistants. Smith has been at the company since 2010. Contact Sam Thielman at sam.thielman@variety.com

A beak in to the future

Episode 100 of 'Robot Chicken''Robot Chicken' versions of Matthew Senreich and Seth GreenGreenSenreichFew shows are as suitable for a contemporary attention span as "Robot Chicken." Its sketches -- frequently but a couple of seconds lengthy -- are perfect online viewing and tap into the fanboy mind that enshrines "The Exorcist" as gospel and brought comicbook superheroes hand strikes office glory earlier this decade.But may be the show's rapid, ADD-style format an item from the culture's dwindling attention span or perhaps a leading cause of it?"It's both, and that is really something which we have a problem with,Inch states Seth Eco-friendly, co-creator, executive producer, author, director and voice actor for "Robot Chicken."Everything has been on your journey to shorter bursts of content for any very long time, Eco-friendly states, stating as precedent MTV's the nineteen nineties series "Liquid Television," short-film festivals or even a Comedy Central clip show known as "Short Attention Span Theater." With more youthful audiences progressively embracing cell phones for those their content, it will not change in the near future.InchWe simply like telling jokes, and that we like letting them know quick," he states. "We do not like putting things off."Adds co-creator, executive producer, author and director Matthew Senreich: "I would like to state that I'd the experience to understand the web might have skyrocketed the actual way it did and short-form content could be so readily available, so our show suits that perfectly."We simply understood we desired to keep sketches short so much that someone wasn't moving their eyes saying, 'I can't believe this sketch continues to be happening.A?InchGrownup Go swimming professional veep Keith Crofford states he thinks the rapid-fire format is really a product from the short-attention span culture and stacks when in support of the show finding a crowd.InchYou are churning through material so quick that you are certain to find a few things that you simply love even when there is a couple stuff that you hate," he states.Mind author and professional producer Doug Goldstein states the show needed to wait for a proper time to locate its audience. "I believe we have always aspired to be considered a short-attention-span society, it is simply media needed to get caught up and provide us what we should wanted," he states.But there is never an effort to create "Robot Chicken" fit such large-picture ideas."We'd items to say and items to poker fun at, however they were not stuff that really needed a very long time to discuss it," Goldstein states. "We desired to discuss how, 'Hey, would not it be funny if your Transformer got cancer of the prostate?A That isn't exactly a tale that can take twenty minutes to inform.InchNevertheless, that's a tale that creates YouTube, which released within times of the premiere of "Robot Chicken" and performed a substantial role in building its audience. The show may be the top-ranked original program on Adult Go swimming, in addition to a hit on DVD using more than 1.3 million models offered.The show's true impact goes beyond the amounts. Eco-friendly, Senreich and crew are as common as any actor or director at Comic-Disadvantage, and "Robot Chicken" has changed into a the comedy voice from the fanboy generation."Many of us becoming an adult felt just a little alienated, like misfits -- super-separated through the things we loved," states Eco-friendly. "And as you become a bit older, it becomes clear that everybody becoming an adult feels this way, and that we had exactly the same type of knowledge about this show. We simply felt these items was your own musings, our private, super-nerdy ideas, but, with time, that's grown tremendously."That can help explain why the show's fanboy-focused spontaneity has associated with so large a crowd and charmed George Lucas into lending his voice to some sketch and granting "Robot Chicken" rare permission to create three "The Exorcist"-designed special offers. An identical special centered on the heroes of Electricity Comics is next around the "Robot Chicken" docket.Striking the 100-episode marker without signs and symptoms of slowing down lower has transformed the perspective how lengthy the show may go on mining popular culture for comedy sketches."We are really attempting to evolve it, to not become different things than, but to become come a much better, more recognized version of what it's," states Eco-friendly."Whenever we began the show, all of us likely to be completed in a few years," adds Senreich. "However the more we all do it and also the more response we obtain, the greater we understand we are a sketch comedy show -- and that we lasts as lengthy as we are funny."'Robot Chicken' 100th EpisodeA beak in to the future Team reps rapid rise of nerd processors Fandom fodder for film-flam Initial production hurdles were absolutely nothing to cluck at Contact the range newsroom at news@variety.com

Ron Burkle acquires Relativity stake

BurkleSupermarket billionaire Ron Burkle has become the second-largest shareholder in Relativity Media, according to sources with knowledge of the deal.Burkle has agreed to buy out the majority of Elliott Management's stake in the company, as reported by Bloomberg News. But Elliott isn't totally out of the picture, according to a knowledgeable source, and some of the Burkle money will help fund Relativity's operations.Burkle's investment, while undisclosed, is said to be in the hundreds of millions of dollars.Reps for Relativity and Elliott Management declined comment. A rep for Burkle could not immediately be reached for comment.Relativity has been in discussions to raise new coin for months. Last summer, Relativity began discussions with JP Morgan Chase & Co. to help raising funds to buy out Elliott's share, but those talks stalled.Burkle already has ties to Relativity, having made a sizable loan to the company in November. Burkle, who made much of his money in the supermarket business, has made forays into Hollywood before. He backed Harvey and Bob Weinstein during their bid to buy Miramax from Disney in 2010. The indie shingle eventually went to a consortium of investors led by construction magnate Ron Tutor and Colony Capital.Elliott has backed Relativity-arranged financing deals both Sony and Universal. Friction mounted between Relativity and U, however, when the two began competitively dating similar "Snow White" projects. Contact Rachel Abrams at Rachel.Abrams@variety.com