News

Turn a true auteur like Alfonso Cuarn loose on his first major TV project, and its no surprise audiences are eating up his Apple TV+ series Disclaimer. A slow burn of a show combining mystery, psychological thrills, and a complicated narrative, the five-time Oscar-winning director keeps ratcheting up the secrets and lies throughout. Disclaimer's all-star cast includes Cate Blanchett as journalist Catherine Ravenscroft, who learns shes the lead character in a new book that somehow exposes the darkest deed of her past.

As highlighted in the reviews for Disclaimer, the show plays with viewer expectations throughout, mixing truth and perception into a time-hopping story that doesnt reveal all of its cards until its final episode. Disclaimer cleverly dices up how personal biases, murky pasts, and even the modern media landscape shape how people view their own reality. Once audiences have digested all of Disclaimer's seven episodes and its shocking end,...

The cast and creators of the FX on Hulu limited series “Mrs. America” sought to bring the ’70s feminist movement and the fight surrounding the Equal Rights Amendment to the screen through exploring the personal motivations of its key players.

Now with 10 Emmy nominations, the show has struck a chord by revealing little-known truths about the women on both sides of the argument, including Phyllis Schlafly, Gloria Steinem, Shirley Chisholm, Jill Ruckelshaus, Brenda Feigen, Bella Abzug and Betty Friedan.

After a screening of the series’ third episode, “Shirley,” Variety‘s Kate Aurthur discussed the importance of portraying these figures with accuracy and empathy with executive producer Cate Blanchett, who played Schlafly; creator, showrunner and executive producer Dahvi Waller; producer Tanya Barfield, who wrote the episode; Margo Martindale, who played Abzug; Uzo Aduba, who played Chisholm and Tracey Ullman, who played Friedan. (All of whom have been nominated for Emmys.)

Blanchett...

Watching even a minute of “Mrs. America” makes it obvious which network it belongs to. It follows, to the letter, in the grand tradition of FX dramas that have long cultivated a brand of meticulous precision and prestige. From its stacked cast, to its impressive production design and array of wigs, to casting Sarah Paulson in a part seemingly tailored to her, “Mrs. America” is truly the über FX drama — a slightly ironic designation now that it’s one of the network’s first productions to instead premiere on Hulu.

What sets “Mrs. America” apart, then, is its didactic mission and unabashedly bleeding heart. Each of its nine episodes feature several moments that try, with palpable urgency, to make its audience feel some pang of recognition, resentment, regret at how history hasn’t just shaken out, but repeated. Tracing the rise and fall of the Equal Rights Amendment’s momentum through the 1970’s,...

FX has added 11 cast members to Cate Blanchett’s upcoming limited series for FX “Mrs. America,” including Sarah Paulson, John Slattery and James Marsden.

Others added to the series include Uzo Aduba, Rose Byrne, Kayli Carter, Ari Graynor, Melanie Lynskey, Margo Martindale, Jeanne Tripplehorn and Tracey Ullman. Paulson and Carter are playing fictional creators created for the series, while everyone else will portray historical figures including Gloria Steinem (Byrne), Betty Friedan (Ullman), Shirley Chisholm (Aduba), and Bella Abzug (Martindale).

“Captain Marvel” directors Ryan Fleck and Anna Boden will helm the first two episodes and serve as executive producers. The nine-episode series will debut in 2020. The series was created and written by “Mad Men” alum Dahvi Waller and executive produced by Waller, Blanchett, Stacey Sher and Coco Francini. Waller will serve as showrunner.

Also Read: Cate Blanchett to Star as Anti-Feminist Activist Phyllis Schlafly in FX's 'Mrs. America' Limited Series

“Mrs. America...

Evangeline Lilly, who stars as the Wasp in Marvel’s upcoming Ant-Man and the Wasp, revealed that she flayed the skin off both of her forearms during a stunt that went wrong several years ago on the set of Lost. “There were open wounds, pus-y and oozing,” she said during a panel discussion Wednesday night on the Fox lot about women in the stunt business. “I looked like a mutant. My mom said, ‘You’ll never be able to wear an evening gown again!’”

Lilly also made it clear that the accident was no accident, accusing an unnamed stunt coordinator — who she described as “misogynistic” — of punishing her for defying his wish to have a stuntwoman do the stunt. It involved rolling off a thick tree branch high above the ground and hanging on for dear life, though there was no risk of falling because she was safely harnessed to the branch.