Tonight Hollywood Elsewhere will be attending a Michael B. Jordan tribute at the 2019 Santa Barbara Film Festival. The almost 32-year-old actor (his birthday is on 2.9) is being presented with the Cinema Vanguard award, which went last year to The Florida Project‘s Willem Dafoe.

Jordan broke out six years ago as the doomed Oscar Grant in Ryan Coogler‘s Fruitvale Station. His second big slam was the titular lead in Coogler’s Creed (’15), which costarred Tessa Thompson and Sylvester Stallone. His third high-impact role was Erik “Killmonger” Stevens in Coogler’s hugely popular Black Panther, which opened on 2.16.18. His next major role is real-life attorney Bryan Stevenson in the biographical drama Just Mercy (Warner Bros., 1.17.20), which costars Jamie Foxx.

I’ll be driving back to West Hollywood when the show ends at 9:30 pm. Thanks to festival honcho Roger Durling and all the staffers, publicists (principally Sunshine Sachs) and volunteers. I had a thrilling if demanding time, but that’s how we like it. It was somewhat chilly and rainy during at least half of the festival, although right now it’s 56 degrees and sunny. The weather had to wait until my final day to improve.

In a self-posted essay on medium.com, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos alleged today that reps for National Enquirer owner American Media Inc. (AMI) had tried to extort and blackmail him with compromising photos of himself and g.f. Lauren Sanchez.

AMI basically threatened to publish lewd or suggestive photos of Bezos and Sanchez if the Washington Post, which Bezos owns, didn’t back away from an investigation over leaked text messages that resulted in his marriage going south.

Bezos revealed the contents of an email sent to AMI execs this afternoon (2.7).

Bezos included copies of back-and-forth emails. One is an especially incriminating email from Dylan Howard, Chief Content Officer of AMI, to attorney Marty Singer, who is repping Bezos and investigator Gavin de Becker.

Excerpt: “In the interests of expediting this situation, and with The Washington Post poised to publish unsubstantiated rumors of The National Enquirer’s initial report, I wanted to describe to you the photos obtained during our newsgathering,” Howard writes. And then Howard describes the contents of nine photos. Howard concludes by saying “it would give no editor pleasure to send this email…I hope common sense can prevail, and quickly.”

Berlinale jury member Juliette Binoche on Harvey Weinstein: “I almost want to say peace to his mind and heart, that’s all. I’m trying to put my feet in his shoes. He’s had enough, I think. A lot of people have expressed themselves. Now justice has to do its work. I never had problems with him, but I could see that he had problems. As a producer he was wonderful, most of the time. I think he was a great producer. That we shouldn’t forget, even though it’s been difficult for some directors and actors and especially actresses. I just want to say peace to his mind and let justice do what it needs to do.”

Harvey Weinstein allegedly did what he did and has to face the legal music. I’ve read the New Yorker and N.Y. Times articles about his alleged misdeeds, and I saw Untouchable during Sundance ’19. But just imagine if Binooche’s words, shared this morning at a Berlinale press conference, had been spoken by any guy from any aspect of the film industry. That guy would be roasting on a p.c. spit. He would be in such hot water on Twitter right now that he’d be envying Liam Neeson.

Yep — they’re just calling it plain old Shaft (Warner Bros., 6.14). Obviously a tongue-in-cheek, wise-ass meta comedy — directed by Tim Story, cowritten by Kenya Barris and Alex Barnow. Jessie T. Usher is playing a sensitive, wimp-ass son of Samuel L. Jackson‘s Shaft (who was last seen 19 years ago). Richard Roundtree‘s original Blaxploitation-era Shaft (i.e., Jackson’s uncle and Usher’s grandfather) is also along for the ride. Costarring Regina Hall, Alexandra Shipp, Luna Lauren Velez. Straight paycheck project. Who remembers Shaft in Africa?

Flashback: I met Pryor at a Comedy Store press event sometime in the mid to late ’90s, when he was in a wheelchair and a thin, frail remnant of his former self. Pryor had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1986, and was confined to a wheelchair starting in ’93. We spoke for a few minutes but I could barely hear his voice. Mixed feelings, to say the least.

Just about every office-holding Democrat has called upon Virginia governor Ralph Northam to resign over a racist photo in his 1984 medical school yearbook, in which he apparently wore blackface. Then came an admission from Virginia’s Attorney General Mark Herring (who could become governor if Northam and Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax ** resign) that he wore brown makeup and a wig to look like a rapper at a party in 1980, when he was a 19 year-old University of Virginia student.

Hollywood Elsewhere is not suggesting that these two should be cut any slack, but it seems fair to ask what form of SJW punishment has been visited upon Billy Crystal. I’m referring to Crystal having impersonated Sammy Davis Jr. in brownface in a 1986 HBO Special “Don’t Get Me Started” as well as, according to the Christian Science Monitor, during a bit on the 2012 Oscars? (Note: Crystal’s impression works because he can “do” Davis’s voice just so.)

Not to mention Robert Downey, Jr.‘s blackface performance in Tropic Thunder, which opened a little more than a decade ago.

What Northam and Herring did in the ’80s was obviously icky, but their main crime, it seems, was having been college students instead of professional entertainers. Because the culture wasn’t freaking out about blackface impersonations as recently as ten or even seven years ago.

While reading this Bill McCuddy Twitter thread about Roma vs. Green Book, keep in mind that last year McCuddy said that Academy voters would never give the Best Picture Oscar to “aqua man” (aka Guillermo del Toro‘s The Shape of Water). Exact McCuddy quote: “I didn’t say it wouldn’t get nominated. [I said it] won’t win. Fantasy. LaLa Land.”

It was just over a year ago when Woody Allen offered his most recent denial of Dylan Farrow‘s accusation of his having allegedly molested her in August 1992. I seem to recall his also asserting, sometime within the last year or two, that he wouldn’t be denying the charge again, as all the evidence is behind him and that the #MeToo community will never consider the facts of the case even-handedly so what’s the point?

Well, that particular posture has been left at the wayside. Around 9 am this morning it was reported that Allen has filed a $68 million suit against Amazon Studios, alleging that the distributor has backed out of a four-picture deal due to “a 25-year-old, baseless allegation.” In fact Dylan’s charge was first aired a day or two after the alleged incident took place on 8.4.92, which was 26 and 1/2 years ago.

Allen is alleging that Amazon has refused to release A Rainy Day in New York, “though it has been complete for more than six months.” The suit states that Amazon “has given only vague reasons for dropping the project, and for reneging on a promise to produce three other movies.”

We all know why Amazon is reneging on the Allen deal. It’s because they’re terrified of angering the #MeToo community, and the facts and history of the Dylan Farrow investigation be damned.

Lawsuit excerpt: “Amazon has tried to excuse its action by referencing a 25-year-old, baseless allegation against Mr. Allen, but that allegation was already well known to Amazon (and the public) before Amazon entered into four separate deals with Mr. Allen — and, in any event it does not provide a basis for Amazon to terminate the contract. There simply was no legitimate ground for Amazon to renege on its promises.”

Indeed, there is no evidence to support Dylan’s claim. But there’s a fair amount of evidence and ample indications that an enraged Mia Farrow made it all up to “get” Woody during an early ’90s custody battle, and as part of this determination coached Dylan to make the claims that she did. I happen to personally believe this scenario. There’s simply no rational, even-handed way to side with the “I believe Dylan Farrow” camp.

If after reading Moses Farrow’s 5.23.18 essay (“A Son Speaks Out“) as well as Robert Weide’s “Q & A with Dylan Farrow” (12.13.17) and Daphne Merkin’s 9.16.18 Soon-Yi Previn interview…if after reading these personal testimonies along with the Wikipedia summary of the case you’re still an unmitigated Dylan ally…if you haven’t at least concluded there’s a highly significant amount of ambiguity and uncertainty in this whole mishegoss, then I don’t know what to say to you. There’s probably nothing that can be said to you.

Amazon will almost certainly settle this case out of court, as there is virtually no evidence to support Allen’s alleged guilt in the Dylan Farrow matter, and therefore any reluctance on Amazon’s part to fulfill the Allen deal. In the unlikely event that they decide to argue the case in court, the proceedings will be an absolute humdinger with every last scintilla of evidence regarding the original 1992 allegation examined and cross-examined ad infinitum. But who believes this will happen?

Camilla Gibb‘s “Sweetness in the Belly“, a culture-clash love story, was initially published 12 years ago. It’s a tantalizing title for a book — right away you want to know what it means. But it’s not a movie title. The producers are asking for trouble by sticking with it. Your average megaplex bruh or couch surfer is going to mutter “maybe the girlfriend but not me” and move on. The British-made drama has been directed by Zeresenay Berhane Mehari. The cast includes Dakota Fanning, Wunmi Mosaku, Kunal Nayyar and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II. It’s debuting at the Berlinale.

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Three or four days ago director Rod Lurie (The Outpost) stated on Facebook that his love for Warren Beatty, Buck Henry and Elaine May‘s Heaven Can Wait (’78) hasn’t faded. Lurie saw it at age 16, and said that no other film since has made him feel so good.

He’s referring, of course, to the last 20 or 25 minutes. Specifically from the moment that Jack Warden‘s Max Corkle bolts out of the Leo Farnsworth mansion for the Super Bowl game at the USC coliseum, and until Beatty (playing Rams’ quarterback Joe Pendleton as well as billionaire Leo Farnsworth, so to speak) and Julie Christie (i.e., Betty Logan) walk off to share a cup of coffee.

Before those final 20 or 25 Heaven Can Wait is diverting as far as it goes. The applicable terms are “chuckly, pretty good, deft, likable, lively remake,” etc. It’s an amusing, vaguely meta thing by way of a reincarnation plot. And not especially deep or mystical at that. The humor is dry and deadpan. Beatty, Christie, Jack Warden plus Charles Grodin, Dyan Cannon, James Mason, Vincent Gardenia and everyone else — the schtick they’re working with is turned way down.

But there is a scheme in mind, and you just have to wait for the payoff.

The first 75 minutes of Heaven Can Wait are, of course, a set-up for the final 25. And during that final 25 HCW sells the audience on two great notions — (1) people who’ve fallen for a certain someone in actuality can somehow sense or recognize them in a subsequent incarnation, and (2) there’s a celestial system in place, and rule #1 is that nobody really dies, or certainly not in the sense that most of us recognize it (i.e., eternal lights-out without dreams).

I was reading Alex Ben Block’s short Los Angeles hit piece on Netflix and Lisa Taback. As soon as I finished I flashed on a chat I had last night with a knowledgable hotshot — a guy who knows everyone and everything:

HE: “And I really think Rami Malek is going to win Best Actor. Don’t you? I really believe that’s locked at this stage.”
Hotshot: “He’s got it, yes. Ditto Glenn Close.”
HE: “Agreed. And Alfonso [Cuaron], for sure, is winning Best Director.”
Hotshot: “Yep.”
HE: “But I’m not entirely sure Roma will win the Best Picture Oscar. It might win, but I don’t know.”
Hotshot: “It’ll be Roma or Green Book.”
HE: “I suspect voters will probably feel better about themselves the morning after, and certainly six months or a year after, if they give it to Roma. People love Green Book‘s feel-good vibes — I felt them last September in Toronto — but Roma is a higher arthouse achievement, and more of a ‘2018 film’ than Green Book. They both address Trump’s racial ugliness, but Roma addresses the wall thing besides.”