Jane Lynch
Photo: Shutterstock.com
By: Romeo San Vicente*/Special to TRT–
The sun’ll come out tomorrow for Jane Lynch
And that sun will stay out for exactly eight weeks. That’s how long Glee’s mercurial Sue Sylvester, aka Jane Lynch, will star as fearsome orphanage meanie Miss Hannigan in the ongoing Broadway revival of Annie. She’ll take the boards beginning May 16 and will end her temp run in July, just in time to shoot more Glee episodes and begin her stint as host of Sean Hayes’ new primetime game show, Hollywood Game Night. Lynch will oversee contestants as they make their way through Hollywood cocktail parties, mingling with celebrities and competing for cash. We’re still not sure how this game will work, or how knocking back martinis with Dancing with the Stars-level celebs constitutes a heated battle for game show dominance, but the unknown is enticing, isn’t it? Meanwhile, it’s just good to see Lynch diversifying and looking past Glee, lest that tracksuit become a corset.
Matt Bomer heats up Winter’s Tale
Every time a hot young actor comes out and keeps working in high-profile projects it further destroys the perception that openly gay men can’t succeed on screen without the closet. So here’s to Matt Bomer and his next movie, a little thing called Winter’s Tale, co-starring nobodies with names like Will Smith, Russell Crowe and Colin Farrell. The fantasy feature is based on Mark Helprin’s novel set in both 19th century and present day Manhattan and it involves a young thief, the dying visionary girl he loves and a flying white horse named Athansor that helps him ride into the future through a cloud wall. Or something like that. Anyway, it’s to be directed by screenwriter/producer Akiva Goldsman (A Beautiful Mind, The Da Vinci Code) and also stars Jennifer Connelly, William Hurt and screen legend Eva Marie Saint (On The Waterfront).
Kelly McGillis rides into a different kind of danger zone
Kelly McGillis is back, both the 1986 and the 2013 versions of her. With a 3D IMAX re-release of Top Gun drawing the retro-minded curious (and diehard Kenny Loggins enthusiasts) back into a smattering of theaters, McGillis is currently popping off screens nationwide. But the older and wiser McGillis (she made news for refusing to comment on fellow lesbian thespian Jodie Foster’s recent Golden Globes speech) is also back in acting action in a creepy new film that just hit the Sundance Film Festival. It’s called We Are What We Are and it’s based on a 2010 Mexican film of the same name. This version, from filmmakers Jim Mickle and Nick Damici, is transplanted to New York state but the key disturbing elements remain the same: It revolves around the adventures of a family of ritualistic cannibals. Fun! Picked up at the festival by eOne Distribution, it should hit indie and arthouse-minded theaters later this year. And who knows, with this and last year’s unnerving Ti West horror film The Innkeepers, McGillis may become a middle-aged scream queen. There are much worse career paths.
Jonathan Groff’s Untitled career move
We’ve already reported that Jonathan Groff (Glee, Spring Awakening) will star in C.O.G., the indie feature based on a David Sedaris story from his bestselling book Naked. And later this year Groff will voice the male lead in the latest Disney animated feature, Frozen, based on a Hans Christian Andersen tale, which co-stars Kristen Bell and his fellow Glee colleague Idina Menzel. But it’s the project with the least – and yet most intriguing – amounts of information that has us the most excited right now. Groff is starring in what is now known only as the Untitled Michael Lannan Comedy, which wouldn’t be of interest unless you already knew that Lannan is one of the producers of the buzz-making James Franco Sundance entry Interior. Leather Bar. (the half-real, half-fake documentary about finding the missing footage from William Friedkin’s Cruising). And the soon-to-be-actually-titled project has found a director in Andrew Haigh, the man behind the acclaimed (as in the Criterion Collection has already included it in their DVD release roster) gay indie feature Weekend. We figure it’ll be about something gay. But that’s just an informed hunch.
*Romeo San Vicente’s own weekends are always acclaimed. And sometimes filmed. He can be reached care of this publication or at DeepInsideHollywood@qsyndicate.com.
