Movies/TV category, Page 112
TV Talk: Fox returns to ‘Fantasy Island,’ FX introduces winning ‘Reservation Dogs’Video
Two series premieres over the next week show the strategic contrast facing TV network executives and viewers: Take the safe, easier path and order a new version of an existing show or dare to try something new. ‘Reservation Dogs’ FX still aspires to be the basic cable version of HBO...
TV Q&A: Didn’t Peggy Finnegan retire from WPXI-TV?
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen answers reader questions every Wednesday at TribLive.com in a column that also appears in the Sunday Tribune-Review. Q: What is the story with Peggy Finnegan? I thought that she had recently retired yet I see her back as an “Olympics commentator.” Was this...
TV Talk: Terry Bradshaw’s E! series returns this fall for season 2Video
The sophomore season of E! reality series “The Bradshaw Bunch,” starring former Steelers quarterback Terry Bradshaw, will premiere at 9 p.m. Oct. 6. The show’s first season averaged 2 million total viewers across all platforms, which E! says made the show the most-watched new series on the network among total...
Soap opera star Jay Pickett dies ‘suddenly’ on movie set
Longtime soap opera actor Jay Pickett has “passed away suddenly” while filming a movie in Idaho. Pickett, 60, was on the “Treasure Valley” set when he died Friday, director Travis Mills said Sunday in a statement online. “Everyone present tried as hard as they could to keep him alive,” Mills...
‘Jungle Cruise’ sails atop box office despite covid concernsVideo
LOS ANGELES — Despite growing concerns over the delta variant, “Jungle Cruise” still drew moviegoers out to theaters during the film’s opening weekend to sail atop the North American box office. The Disney film starring Dwayne Johnson and Emily Blunt exceeded expectations by pulling in more than $34.1 million over...
Pittsburgh native A.J. Ross back home to cover Steelers camp
National broadcast journalist and Pittsburgh native A.J. Ross has returned home to cover the Pittsburgh Steelers during training camp and preseason for KDKA-TV. Ross, of Highland Park, said she grew up playing sports at the Shadyside Boys and Girls Club and cheering for Pittsburgh’s favorite teams. Returning to Pittsburgh to...
TV Talk: Local TV news goes under the microscope in comedic HBO docu-seriesVideo
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen offers a viewing tip for the coming week. A local TV newsroom has been the setting for plenty of past series, whether fiction or non-fiction, but the six-episode “Small Town News: KPVM Pahrump” (9 and 9:30 p.m. Aug. 2, HBO and HBO Max)...
Scarlett Johansson sues Disney over ‘Black Widow’ releaseVideo
Scarlett Johansson is suing the Walt Disney Co. over its streaming release of “Black Widow,” which she said breached her contract and deprived her of potential earnings. In a lawsuit filed Thursday morning in Los Angeles Superior Court, the “Black Widow” star and executive producer said her contract guaranteed an...
Ron Popeil, inventor and king of TV pitchmen, dies at 86
LOS ANGELES — Ron Popeil, the quintessential TV pitchman and inventor known to generations of viewers for hawking products including the Veg-O-Matic, the Pocket Fisherman, Mr. Microphone and the Showtime Rotisserie and BBQ, has died, his family said. Popeil died “suddenly and peacefully” Wednesday at Cedars Sinai Medical Center in...
TV Talk: Where are these former Pittsburgh TV news anchors now?
While the dog days of summer TV no longer exist, I’m taking a break from the rushing river of new content this week to catch up with some former local TV personalities. Brenda Waters One of the most-liked Pittsburgh TV anchors/reporters of recent decades by both viewers and her newsroom...
TV Q&A: Why are there so many hours of local evening news?
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen answers reader questions every Wednesday at TribLive.com in a column that also appears in the Sunday Tribune-Review. Q: Once again news channels in Pittsburgh are expanding their coverage and starting earlier at 4 p.m. or adding a later edition at 7:30 p.m. Do...
Lawrenceville’s indie Row House Cinema set to reopen with themed film series
Lawrenceville’s indie movie theater, Row House Cinema, will reopen Sept. 3 after an 18-month, pandemic-driven closure. “Our whole staff is basically relearning how to run a movie theater this summer, and we’ve got some fantastic programming lined up for the remainder of 2021,” owner Brian Mendelssohn said. Film club members...
On a quiet weekend, ‘Old’ tops, ‘Snake Eyes’ sinks
M. Night Shyamalan’s “Old” easily won a slower weekend at the North American box office, while the G.I. Joe pic “Snake Eyes” lived up to its name. Although both fresh offerings from major studios, moviegoers turned out in modest numbers on a weekend where there was the notable distraction of...
Jackie Mason, comic who perfected amused outrage, dies at 93
NEW YORK — Jackie Mason, a rabbi-turned-comedian whose feisty brand of standup comedy led him to Catskills nightclubs, West Coast talk shows and Broadway stages, has died. He was 93. Mason died at 6 p.m. Saturday at Mt. Sinai Hospital in Manhattan after being hospitalized for over two weeks, the...
Mosser Casting is looking for paid extras on the film ‘Cha Cha Real Smooth’
Wanted: children ages 11-14 and adults, 18 and older who want to have a part in a movie. Nancy Mosser Casting is seeking the individuals to portray bar and bat mitzvah guests for the film “Cha Cha Real Smooth” starring Dakota Johnson, directed by Cooper Raiff, who is also starring...
TV Talk: Showtime releases new ‘American Rust’ trailerVideo
After debuting a teaser in June, Showtime has released a trailer for the nine-episode first season of “American Rust,” which is set and currently filming in Western Pennsylvania in advance of the show’s 10 p.m. Sept. 12 premiere. This new trailer leans more into the story involving Del Harris (Jeff...
TV Talk: Locast now offers free streaming of Pittsburgh TV stations
Cord-cutters take note: Locast is offering free, local broadcast television signals via streaming in Pittsburgh. In Pittsburgh, Locast delivers more than 40 local channels, including all the major broadcast channels (KDKA, WPXI, WTAE, WQED, WPGH, WPCW) and their digital subchannels, including StartTV (2.2), Cozi (4.2), MeTV (11.2), Comet (22.3) and...
TV Talk: Ming-Na Wen’s Mt. Lebanon ties may have kept her ‘Mandalorian’ character aliveVideo
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen offers a viewing tip for the coming week. She’s been an animated princess warrior in “Mulan,” part of the Marvel universe on ABC’s “Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D” and now actress Ming-Na Wen is tearing up that galaxy far, far away in two “Star Wars”...
TV Talk: Won’t you be Ted Lasso’s neighbor?Video
It’s perhaps unsurprising that Apple TV+’s “Ted Lasso” became a critical hit two years after a Mister Rogers renaissance and a few months after the final episode of “Schitt’s Creek” premiered. “Ted Lasso,” returning for its second season July 23, filled a goodness void. Not treacly, sitcom-y, audience-goes-“awwwwwww” banality but...
Maria Taylor leaving ESPN after failing to reach contract extension
Maria Taylor is leaving ESPN after the two sides were unable to reach an agreement on a contract extension. Taylor had been with ESPN since 2014 but her contract expired Tuesday. Her last assignment for the network was Tuesday night at the NBA Finals, where she was the pregame and...
TV Talk: Netflix’s filmed-in-Pittsburgh ‘The Chair’ releases trailer
The trailer for Netflix’s filmed-in-Pittsburgh “The Chair,” which premieres on the streaming service Aug. 20, introduces Sandra Oh’s Pembroke University English department leader and some of the challenges she faces, including her relationship with another professor (Jay Duplass) who’s gotten himself into a “serious reputational matter” (what he did is...
TV Talk: Peggy Finnegan returns to WPXI-TV temporarily
In November when she announced her retirement, WPXI-TV anchor Peggy Finnegan said she’d potentially return to the air at Channel 11 for special coverage. This week she’ll be back on TV as part of the station’s coverage of NBC’s broadcast of the Tokyo Olympics. Tuesday night Finnegan posted a photo...
TV Q&A: Did Ricki Wertz host ‘Romper Room’?Video
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen answers reader questions every Wednesday at TribLive.com in a column that also appears in the Sunday Tribune-Review. Q: Great piece about Ricki Wertz’s career in Pittsburgh television. I also believe she hosted our local production of “Romper Room,” also on WTAE, if I...
9-year-old ‘America’s Got Talent’ opera singer from Unity honored by Westmoreland commissionersVideo
Unity’s Victory Brinker might have been on a bigger stage last week when she wowed the judges during her appearance on “America’s Got Talent.” But her smile was nearly as wide this week during an appearance at the Westmoreland County Courthouse when she was honored for her performance, which pushed...
TV Talk: CMU grad Patina Miller stars in ‘Power Book III: Raising Kanan’Video
On TV, 2006 Carnegie Mellon University musical theater grad Patina Miller is best known for playing a press secretary on CBS’s “Madam Secretary.” On Broadway, she won the Tony for lead actress in a musical in 2013 for a revival of “Pippin.” In Starz’s “Power Book III: Raising Kanan” (8...
