BlackBook

Something peculiar happened to the die-hard, old-school Christopher Guest fans around the release of For Your Consideration: suddenly, they didn’t seem to enjoy the trailblazing comedic filmmaker’s style. As the characters got weirder, from Waiting For Guffman to Best in Show, the tone became more deadpan, until FYC dropped the “mockumentary” conceit completely. In other words, he’d crossed over to straight fiction.

I find it altogether unfortunate that the second season of Veep is a bit lost in the Sunday-night shuffle of Mad Men and Game of Thrones and, hell, even Bob’s Burgers. With so much appointment TV, you might decide life is too short for political satire. But oh, how wrong you would be. Veep is better and sharper than ever, and here’s why:

Charli XCX is no newbie to the music scene, though her age might indicate otherwise to those not in the know. The 20-year-old Brit, born Charlotte Aitchison but recognized by her hotly debated stage name, has been making people move since she was an adolescent.

Ryan Murphy, who is currently represented on television with three scripted shows (American Horror Story, Glee, and The New Normal), is added an HBO series to his roster. Open, which is described as "a modern, provocative exploration of human sexuality and relationships," has gotten a pilot order from the network. Collaborating with Dexter co-executive producer Lauren Gussis. This will be his second project with the cable network, as his adaptation of Larry Kramer's The Normal Heart is also being produced by HBO. 

This past Saturday I had the great pleasure of watching Steven Soderbergh moderate a Q&A with Shane Carruth after a sold-out mid-afternoon screening of his incredible new film Upstream Color. Of course, Soderbergh, "retired director" asked a sprinkling of serious questions about the film but also went on to question such things as: for all the pigs in the film, why were there no cats? And so on. But when not interviewing beloved young directors for awestruck audiences, Soderbergh is currently putting out the highly-anticipated Liberace drama for HBO, Behind the Candelabra. In an interview back in January, he said that the film was, "really fun. The world of it was just bananas. It was great to see Michael [Douglas] and Matt [Damon] jump off the cliff together. Nobody can accuse them of being shy. They just went for it. It’s pretty gay." 

What's funnier than a pair of feuding paleontologists? Nope, I can't think of anything either. Bone Wars, which already wins an accolade from me for funniest / dumbest title, tells the tale of Edward Drinker Cope and Othniel Charles Marsh (played by Steve Carell and James Gandolfini, respectively), two rival fossil hunters whose personal war led to the discovery of more than 160 dinosaurs. That's a pretty productive feud! No such feats were on display in Bride Wars, I must say. The film will be produced by HBO Films, which means, unfortunately, it'll just be on the small screen and likely won't have any CGI dinosaurs (you know, in case you don't get your fill after seeing Jurassic Park 3D this weekend). Although, it will have Gandolfini playing a dude named Othniel, which sure is somethin'.

Nora Ephron, the brilliant journalist, essayist, playwright, screenwriter, and director, died last June after a battle with leukemia. She has been remembered fondly in recent months with a reprinting of her classic essay collections Scribble, Scribble and Crazy Salad as well as the current Broadway production of her final play, Lucky Guy, starring Tom Hanks. It seems appropriate that her son, Jacob Bernstein, take the reins of an HBO documentary about her life. Titled Everything is Copy, the documentary will be "an intimate portrait" of Bernstein's mother, with Nick Hooker signed on as co-director and Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter as executive producer. If you can't wait for the finished product, check out Bernstein's tribute to his mother in the New York Times from last month. 

Welp, so much for that Marnie and Charlie reconciliation we saw in the season two finale: Christopher Abbott has abruptly left Girls. The actor was apparently at odds with creator and star Lena Dunham. “He didn’t like the direction things are going in, which seems a bit odd since the show put him on the map,” a source told Page Six. (Abbott's publicist confirmed his departure with the tabloid.) Perhaps Abbott found his character's actions and storyline to be as ridiculous as I did! Of course, Abbott had a pretty good role in an episode of Enlightened (RIP!) this year, as well as a role in the star-making Martha Marcy May Marlene (which didn't hurt the careers of Elizabeth Olsen and Simon Killer's Brady Corbet), so I think Abbott will do just fine without Girls.

Last month we were all aflutter about the potential for HBO’s Phil Spector, starring Al Pacino as the bizarre music legend and Helen Mirren as the ailing attorney defending him on a murder charge, to be something so ridiculous that we couldn’t look away. Actually, it’s an okay if surprisingly unambitious film—and certainly not the worst thing for which writer/director David Mamet can claim credit.

Mark V. Olsen and Will Scheffer, the duo behind HBO's brilliant polygamy dramedy Big Love, are returning to the network with a new comedy series. Getting On, which is based on a British show of the same name, will take place in the geriatric wing of a run-down hospital. Yes, this is supposed to be a comedy: "it follows anxious doctors and administrators as they struggle with the darkly comic, brutally honest and quietly compassionate realities of caring for the elderly in an overwhelmed healthcare system." Roseanne's Laurie Metcalf, Family Guy and Mad TV's Alex Borstein, and Reno 911's Niecy Nash, who are all very funny people, are set to star. Let's hope this trio of women who are not twenty-four years old have more success on HBO than Laura Dern did.