Martin Sheen to play dad in ‘Traveling’ - new romantic comedy

Martin Sheen will play Aaron Eckhart’s father in the upcoming romantic comedy “Traveling,” the Hollywood Reporter trade paper has said on its Web site.

Directed by Brandon Camp, “Traveling” follows a widowed self-help author (Eckhart) who rediscovers love and happiness after meeting a hotel florist (Jennifer Aniston). The 68-year-old Sheen will play the author’s father, who has a strained relationship with his son.

The Writers Strike Explained

As you may have heard, there’s a big brou-ha-ha going on in Hollywood with the Writers Guild of America (WGA) picketing the big studios for a fairer wedge of the almighty dollar.

As the protest rolls into its third month, production has halted on a huge number of top-rated TV shows and hotly-anticipated flicks - forcing us to face the very real possibility that 2009 will be a very bad year for films.

What’s The Strike All About Then?

The WGA is basically calling out for more money and a fairer deal from their paymasters, the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP). The trouble stems from major changes in the industry for which the WGA claims they are not being adequately compensated.

Since the rise of “new media” (that’s the Internet, in case you were wondering) and the boom in DVD sales, the scribes are calling out for royalty payments to be brought into line. The studios, however, don’t agree, hence 12,000 hacks downing pens and picking up placards on November 5, 2007. Read the rest of this entry

The Golden Globes won’t be so Golden (Updated!)

Reuters has just reported : “The traditional gala ceremony for Hollywood’s annual Golden Globe Awards for film and television will be scrapped in favor of a “press conference” carried live by NBC News, organizers said on Monday.

Cancellation of the usual three-hour-plus show sponsored by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association marks the latest casualty of the nine-week-old strike by screenwriters against the major film and TV studios.

Jorge Camara, president of the roughly 90-member HFPA said the group was “very disappointed” about the change.

“We take some comfort, however, in knowing that this year’s Golden Globe Award recipients will be announced on the date originally scheduled,” Camara said in a statement.

The Writers Guild of America has said it would picket the Golden Globes unless the studios returned to the bargaining table to resume contract talks that collapsed last month in a labour dispute that hinges on how writers should be paid for work distributed over the Internet.

The WGA’s sister union for performers, the Screen Actors Guild, has said nearly all of its members would boycott the Globes rather than cross picket lines to attend the ceremony, often a key indicator of possible contenders for Hollywood’s top film awards, the Oscars. Read the rest of this entry