Mornin! This is Sean McNulty and here’s the Hollywood + Media news to know on TUESDAY October 12, 2021.

Where it’s totally possible I had “newsletter brain” last night while writing and looking up at commercials during “The Voice” but… is Brad Pitt crashing with Jamie Foxx and his daughter? Or does he just swing by to use their fancy coffee maker? 🧐

ALSO: The HFPA announced they’re still gonna give out GOLDEN GLOBE AWARDS this Winter even without a TV ceremony - because if there’s anybody who knows how to read a room, it’s the HFPA.

OTHERWISE: This’ll be a relatively quick read today.

📽 THE SILVER SCREEN

DISNEY’S “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3” adds Will Poulter as “Adam Warlock”

That’s the character teased at the end of “Vol 2” credits by Elizabeth Debicki’s character “Ayesha”.

James Gunn returning to direct, shooting starts in November. Poulter’s had a busy 2021, was in AMAZON’s “The Underground Railroad” and now in HULU’s “Dopesick”. /Deadline

DISNEY+ doing movie about the creation of DISNEYLAND direted by David Gordon-Green

I guess going from directing 2 “Halloween” movies to DISNEYLAND has it’s own logic to it. Evan Spiliotopoulos (“Hercules”, “Snow White & the Huntsman”) has signed on to write it. /Deadline

Paul Bettany starring in a movie he co-wrote at MIRAMAX

Called “Harvest Moon”, a dramedy about a young boy who sees an opportunity to reunite his separated parents when the pandemic hits.

Mark Waters (“Mean Girls”, “He’s All That”) directing, no distributor as of yet. /Deadline

ALSO IN MOVIES

• Anthony Hopkins joins SPC’s “The Son” - director Florian Zeller’s thematic-sequel to “The Father”. Anthony playing a different character than his “Father” character that he won the Oscar for this year. Hugh Jackman, Laura Dern and Vanessa Kirby are the main leads. /THR

IN THE HOLLYWOOD EXECUTIVE SUITE

• DISNEY Studio Chief Creative Officer Alan Horn is retiring at the end of the year along with Bob Iger. No plans to replace him, Chairman Alan Bergman will run the studio solo. /THR

• Slight adjustment in the AMAZON STUDIOS org chart: Albert Cheng is now full COO, and Vernon Sanders is sole Head of US & Global TV (he was previously co-head with Albert). /Deadline

  • Also: AMAZON now letting individual departments set their own work location policies going forward vs. AMAZON corporate setting a blanket return to office policy for all employees. /CNN

📺 THE TV SET

FX sets Emma Corrin to star in new limited series “Retreat”

Emma’s going from Princess Di in “The Crown” to playing an amateur sleuth who’s invited by a reclusive billionaire along with 11 others for a retreat at a remote location.

Someone dies, Emma’s character’s gotta figure it out. If there’s not a character with a Mustard-themed name or a lead pipe joke I’ll be a little disappointed.

From the creators of “The OA”, Brit Marling and Zal Batmanglij. /Deadline

ALSO IN TV

• AMAZON PRIME doing another year-ending “Yearly Departed” comedy special in late December. Yvonne Orji (“Insecure”) will host, guest comics lineup TBA. /THR

• Since everyone now loves “Jeopardy!” news - reigning champ Matt Amodio lost last night, saying “sorry, without Mike Richards the show just isn’t the same”. Well either that or he lost Final Jeopardy. He won the 2nd most games behind Jennings, and is 3rd highest on the $$ winnings chart. /Variety

• CBS gives full season orders to “FBI: International” and “NCIS: Hawai’i”. /THR

💻 THE MEDIA BIZ

I swear this section is gonna get super busy next week 🥸. #NETFLIXearnings #HBOMAXsubscriberUpdates So… enjoy the silence?

Although if you haven’t seen this NY TIMES piece that led to the resignation last night of LAS VEGAS RAIDERS coach and former ESPN talent Jon Gruden, his casual use of homophobic and racist language in emails would even make a bad outdated 80s movie villain blush.

Gotta imagine this language wasn’t limited to just written emails when he was working as commentator talent at ESPN through the 2010’s, that is when he wasn’t shooting CORONA beer commercials of course.

🏦 STOCK NOTES:

A slightly down day for most, unless you were CINEMARK movie theaters, which was down 8%.

👩‍💻 NEW TO WATCH:

ESPN - NHL Season begins at its new broadcast home (also streaming on ESPN+):

• TAMPA BAY vs PENGUINS at 730p

• SEATTLE KRACKEN vs VEGAS at 1015p 

USA“Chucky” the TV series - Premieres at 10p

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🎥 TRAILER HOUSE

NETFLIX “Narcos: Mexico” Season 3 trailer. This final season premieres on Fri Nov 5

🎧 PLAYING ME OFF

Let’s dip into this banger from the “Rocknrolla” soundtrack, “I’m a Man” from BLACK STROBE. Perfect for morning apartment strutting around your kitchen. So I’m told.

If you need new tunes:

THE WAKEUP Spotify playlist

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-Sean McNulty

@theseanmac on TWITTER

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