Lore in my wife’s family says that her mother, a beautiful Jewish immigrant fleeing grief in the Ukraine about a century ago, ran into someone named Carl Laemmle on a ship crossing the Atlantic. As the story goes, Laemmle asked her to check in with his still-young Universal film company, as she might have a future in…

DreamWorks, Universal Pictures and VStar Entertainment Group will bring the animated franchise Trolls to life with a 60-city-plus tour of large theaters and venues later this year, the companies announced today. Trolls Live! will mark the first original touring production featuring such characters as Poppy, Branch and…

EXCLUSIVE: Universal Pictures has picked up The Creeps, a horror film based on a pitch from Horrible Bosses and Spider-Man: Homecoming screenwriters Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley (Bones alum). Goldstein and Daley are on board to write, direct and produce the pic through their GoldDay banner. Details on the…

Preteenage madness and in-between sadness collide in Good Boys, a youthful comedy that has its world premiere tonight at SXSW. Two weeks into sixth-grade, three best buds experience some highs and lows in the redband trailer. Check it out above (keyword: redband). Here’s the synopsis: After getting invited to their…

“What if I just showed you four episodes of This Is Us without explanation?” said Jordan Peele at the Paramount Theater in Austin before his film Us made its world premiere at SXSW. After the screening, the film received an uproarious ovation, and Peele took the stage again with the cast, including Lupita Nyong’o, Wins…

Best Picture Oscar winner Green Book has driven past $200M global. The Participant Media and DreamWorks Pictures film from director Peter Farrelly hit the milestone with Wednesday’s updated grosses. That includes $77.3M domestically via Universal Pictures and $126.9M at the international box office through Amblin and…

Some Ohio teenagers ask a random woman to buy them booze. Harmless kid stuff, right? Not when the askee is Sue Ann, a loner who sees an opportunity to make some new friends. Here’s the first trailer for Ma, a Blumhouse starring Oscar winner Octavia Spencer as the woman who agrees to purchase alcohol for the group and…

The first look at Jordan Peele’s forthcoming horror Us freaked us out with doppelgangers, a pair of scissors and Lupita Nyong’o‘s creepy laugh. The newest trailer, which debuted during the Super Bowl, slathers on the creepiness and gives us a bigger peek — but not much — into what Us is really about. The trailer…

With Tuesday’s numbers included, Illumination and Universal Pictures' The Grinch steered the sleigh across the half-billion mark worldwide. The split is $270M domestic and $231M at the international box office for $501M global. This is the 6th title from the folks at Chris Meledandri’s animation powerhouse to reach…

Even before the people chose Green Book at the Toronto Film Festival and anointed Peter Farrelly's film a surprise Oscar contender, the film survived a road trip as overflowing with twists and turns as the story onscreen. Green Book recreates the concert tour of piano virtuoso Dr. Don Shirley (Mahershala Ali), a black…

Universal Pictures has set Jane, a drama that Sheldon Turner will write, with Jennifer Klein producing through their Vendetta label. The African-set action thriller has a strong role for an actress. When well-trained and well-financed professional poachers begin to target a conservationist ranch in Tanzania, it falls…

After collaborating with Damien Chazelle on La La Land to the tune of three Oscar nominations, sound editors Ai-Ling Lee and Mildred Morgan embarked on a transformative odyssey with First Man, which defied their preconceptions of how sound might manifest in a big-budget space drama. Scripted by Josh Singer, Chazelle's…