Scott Mescudi to Star in Disney+’s Sci-Fi Adventure “Crater”

Scott Mescudi is preparing for a crate(r) experience…

The 37-year-old part-Mexican American actor/singer, known as Kid Cudi in the music world, has joined the ensemble of sci-fi adventure Crater for Disney Plus.

Kid Cudi

Mescudi will star opposite Isaiah Russell-Bailey, Billy Barratt, Orson Hong, Thomas Boyce and Gifted’s Mckenna Grace in the film.

Kyle Patrick Alvarez is on board to direct.

The film will be overseen by Disney’s live-action team with hopes to shoot in the spring. Shawn Levy and Dan Levine will produce through their 21 Laps Entertainment banner.

Crater is described as a coming-of-age story about a boy growing up on a lunar colony who takes a trip to explore a mysterious crater with his four best friends. Mescudi will play Russell-Bailey’s dad.

John Griffin penned the script. The film was originally set up at 20th Century Fox with Levy circling the directing chair, but after it moved to Disney Levy chose to focus on producing duties as the film gained momentum.

Mescudi has been busy in the past year most recently seen in HBO and Luca Guadagnino series We Are Who We Are, earning some of the best reviews of his career. On the film side, he was last seen in Bill & Ted Face The Music. He can be seen next in the drama Dreamland opposite Gary Oldman. He most recently finished production on the Ti West horror pic X

Kid Cudi Launches Production & Music Management Company ‘Mad Solar’

Kid Cudi is expanding his entertainment empire…

The 36-year-old half-Mexican American Grammy-winning recording artist and actor, whose real name is Scott Mescudi, has partnered with Dennis Cummings and Karina Manashil to launch the production and music management company Mad Solar with the backing of Bron, which provides corporate back office and production support, including financing, marketing, and sales.

Kid Cudi

“Beyond excited to be launching my production company Mad Solar and partnering with Bron, whose creative vision and storytelling has transformed the industry,” Mescudi said. “I am so very proud of the slate that we are developing and can’t WAIT for you all to see what we got cookin’.”

Mad Solar is producing the upcoming Netflix animated series Entergalactic, which Mescudi co-created alongside Kenya Barris. Based on original music by Mescudi, the series, which Mescudi writes, executive produces and stars in, follows a young man on his journey to discover love.

Additionally, Mad Solar has teamed with A24 and Bron Studios on the horror film X. Written and directed by Ti West, X stars Mia Goth, Mescudi and Jenna Ortega. Mescudi is an executive producer on the film, which will begin production early 2021.

“Scott Mescudi’s growth as a creative and an entrepreneur has been impressive,” said Aaron L. Gilbert, Bron chairman. “For Bron, the strategic relationship with Mad Solar is key in our efforts to support the entertainment industry’s top creatives, as well as expand Bron’s access to the best in class music and sports talent through Mad Solar’s management division.”

Mescudi can be seen in Season 3 of HBO’s Westworld and Nick Jarecki’s indie feature Dreamland opposite Gary Oldman. He also had a key supporting role in MGM’s Bill & Ted Face The Music and played one of the leads of Luca Guadagnino’s HBO series We Are Who We Are.

Jenna Ortega In Talks to Star in the Horror Thriller “X”

X marks the spot for Jenna Ortega.

The 18-year-old Puerto Rican and Mexican American actress is in final talks to star opposite Scott Mescudi (aka Kid Cudi) and Mia Goth in X, the next horror thriller from director Ti West.

Jenna Ortega

The film will be a co-production between A24 and BRON Studios, who will also co-finance.

West will write and direct the pic with A24, Jacob Jaffke, Kevin Turen, Sam Levinson, and Ashley Levinson producing through their Little Lamb Productions. Mescudi will executive produce.

Plot details are being kept under wraps but the film is expected to bare similarities of West’s past films that put him on the map.

Production is expected to start at the top of 2021.

Ortega was most recently seen in the Netflix sequel, The Babysitter: Killer Queen, and several films she has coming out in 2021 including Paramount and Spyglass’s Scream 5, which has her as one of the leads.

Mescudi was most recently seen in HBO and Luca Guadagnino series We Are Who We Are, earning some of the best reviews of his career. On the film side, he was last seen in Bill & Ted Face The Music. He can be seen next in the drama Dreamland opposite Gary Oldman.

Aimee Garcia to Star In & Executive Produce the Rom-Com “Match Me If You Can”

Aimee Garcia has met her match

The 41-year-old Puerto Rican and Mexican American actress and Lucifer star will executive produce and star in Match Me If You Can, a romantic comedy about the world of dating in today’s geek culture. 

Aimee Garcia

Marian Yeager is directing the film from a script by Betsy Morris.

Garcia, who’ll reprise her role as Ella Lopez in the sixth and final season of Netflix’s Lucifer, will play Kip Parsons, a talented computer nerd who is rejected by an online dating service as “unmatchable.” After her online blog about her humiliating status goes viral, Kip quickly becomes the reluctant spokesperson for all the frustrated singles out there. There’s just one problem: the dating service swears they didn’t reject her and she becomes the target of a kangaroo court.

Production is slated to commence Spring 2021 in Texas.

Garcia, who can be heard in the forthcoming Marvel M.O.D.O.K. animated series at Hulu, has previously appeared in Showtime’s DexterThe George Lopez ShowRoboCop, opposite Gary Oldman and Michael Keaton, Lorenzo DiBonaventura’s superhero movie El Chicano, and MGM’s The Addams Family with Charlize Theron and Oscar Isaac.

Antonio Banderas to Receive International Star Award at the Palm Springs International Film Festival

Antonio Banderas is a shining star… 

The 59-year-old Spanish actor will receive the 31st annual Palm Springs International Film Festival’s International Star Award, Actor for his performance in Pedro Almodovar’s Pain and Glory

Antonio Banderas

“Throughout his career Antonio Banderas has garnered international acclaim and world recognition from his memorable performances,” said Festival Chairman Harold Matzner. “In his latest film Pain and Glory, Antonio Banderas gives another deeply moving performance as aging film director Salvador Mallo going through a creative crisis as he reflects on the choice’s he’s made throughout his life.”

Past recipients of the International Star Award include Javier BardemNicole KidmanHelen Mirren, Gary Oldman and Saoirse Ronan

Banderas, who recently earned a Goya Award nomination for his performance in Pain and Glory, will join the previously announced honorees Jennifer Lopez (Spotlight Award), Joaquin Phoenix (Chairman’s Award), Martin Scorsese Sonny Bono Visionary Award), Charlize Theron( International Star Award, Actress) and Renée Zellweger(Desert Palm Achievement Award, Actress).

From Sony Picture Classicsand presented by El DeseoPain and Glory tells of a series of reencounters experienced by Salvador Mallo, a film director in his physical decline. Some of them in the flesh, others remembered.

The award will be presented at the festival’s Film Awards Galaon Thursday, January 2 at the Palm Springs Convention Center.

The festival runs January 2-13, 2020.

Banderas’ next project is Dolittle

Kid Cudi to Star in Nicholas Jarecki’s Opioid Thriller “Dreamland”

Kid Cudiis living in a dream(land)…

The 35-year-old part Mexican-American actor and Grammy-winning recording artist, whose real name is Scott Mescudi, has been cast in Nicholas Jarecki’s opioid thriller, Dreamland.

Kid Cudi

Kid Cudi joins new additions Sam Worthington and Indira Varma. They join a solid cast that includes Gary Oldman, Armie HammerEvangeline LillyGreg KinnearMichelle Rodriguezand Lily-Rose Depp.

Currently filming in Montreal, the film follows three colliding stories: a drug trafficker (Hammer) arranges a multi-cartel Fentanyl smuggling operation between Canada and the U.S.; an architect (Lilly) recovering from an OxyContin 

addiction tracks down the truth behind her son’s involvement with narcotics; and a university professor (Oldman) battles unexpected revelations about his employer, a drug company with deep government influence bringing a new “non-addictive” painkiller to market.

Kid Cudi is an FDAinvestigator delving deep into prescription safety.

His previous credits include a series regular role on the HBO series How to Make It in America and appearances the films Drunk Parents, Entourage and Two Night Stand.

Michelle Rodriguez to Star in the Dramatic Thriller “Dreamland”

Life is but a dream(land)for Michelle Rodriguez

The 40-year-old Puerto Rican and Dominican American actress will star in DreamlandNicholas Jarecki’s dramatic thriller revolving around the opioid crisis that is being toplined by Gary OldmanArmie Hammer and Evangeline LillyGreg Kinnear, Veronica Ferres and Lily-Rose Depp also star.

Michelle Rodriguez

The film, which was unveiled at the European Film Market earlier this month, is now shooting in Montreal.

The film written and being directed by Jarecki follows three colliding stories: a drug trafficker (Hammer) arranges a multi-cartel Fentanyl smuggling operation between Canada and the U.S.; an architect (Lilly) recovering from an OxyContinaddiction tracks down the truth behind her son’s involvement with narcotics; and a university professor (Oldman) battles unexpected revelations about his employer, a drug company with deep government influence bringing a new “non-addictive” painkiller to market. 

Rodriguez plays a DEAsupervisor who clashes with Hammer’s drug trafficker. 

Rodriguez’s credits include starring as Letty Ortiz in the Fast & Furious franchise, as well as roled in Resident EvilS.W.A.T.and Avatar.

Javier Bardem to Present at This Year’s Oscars

Javier Bardemhas a date with Oscar…

The 49-year-old Spanish actor has been added to the list of presenters for the 91st Oscars show later this month.

Javier Bardem

Bardem, won the Academy Awardfor Best Supporting Actorfor his role as the psychopathic assassin Anton Chigurh in the 2007 Coen Brothersfilm No Country for Old Men, joins a roster of new additions that includes Angela BassettChadwick BosemanEmilia ClarkeLaura DernSamuel L. JacksonStephan JamesKeegan-Michael KeyKiKi LayneJames McAvoyMelissa McCarthyJason Momoa and Sarah Paulson.

They join previously announced AwkwafinaDaniel Craig,Chris EvansTina FeyAllison Janney,Brie LarsonJennifer LopezFrances McDormandGary OldmanAmy PoehlerSam RockwellMaya Rudolph,Amandla StenbergCharlize TheronTessa Thompson and Constance Wuat the show, set for February 24 live on ABC.

The presenters have added interest in a year in which the Oscars is going host-less, with Academy president John Bailey saying as late a week ago the show remained “in flux.”

“The array of talent anchoring the show this year has brought some of the most indelible moments in recent cinematic memory to audiences around the world,” said producer Donna Gigliotti and co-producer and director Glenn Weisson Monday in the announcement. “They join together to reconnect us with the nominees, their tremendous movies, and outstanding performances.”

Netflix to Finance & Release Antonio Banderas-Starrer “The Laundromat” About the Panama Papers Scandal

It’s Laundry day for Antonio Banderas

Netflix has committed to finance and release The Laundromat, the Steven Soderbergh-directed drama about the Panama Papers scandal starring the 58-year-old Spanish actor.

Antonio Banderas

Banderas is part of a stellar cast that includes David Schwimmer, Gary Oldman and Meryl Streep. Other cast circling include Will Forte and Riley Keough.

The film has a script by Scott Z. Burns, based on the Jake Bernstein book Secrecy World: Inside the Panama Papers Investigation of Illicit Money Networks and the Global Elite.

Schwimmer will play Matthew Quirk, an attorney who speaks on behalf of one of the insurance companies after twenty elderly passengers die on a boating excursion. The boating company learned its insurance isn’t the large company it thought it was, but merely just a P.O. box in Nevis. Quirk would eventually kill himself after seeing no way out of the liability situation, but the incident triggers lawyers, government officials, and more to track down these shell companies. Those investigations lead to the laundering geniuses at the Panama-based law firm Mossack Fonseca, who created hundreds of thousands of ‘companies’ to help the wealthy avoid paying taxes. Reams of documents were leaked from Mossack Fonseca in April by an anonymous whistleblower that bared embarrassing details on investments and money trails from politicians the world over, meant to evade taxes.

The scandal drew in several world leaders, including former UK Prime Minister David Cameron and Iceland Prime Minister Sigmunder Gunnlaugsson, the latter of whom resigned on April 5, 2016, after it was revealed he and his wife set up an offshore shell company in 2007 in the British Virgin Islands; he then sold his half of the company to his wife for $1 on the last day of 2009 to shield them from a new law that would have required him to declare his ownership as a conflict of interest. Among the swarms of famous people named in the leaked documents was current President of the United States Donald Trump— already embattled over charges his empire was built by avoiding taxes — and director Pedro Almodovar, Jackie Chan and Emma Watson.

Bernstein was part of a team of journalists who formed the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists to break the Panama Papers story. The leak of data — 11 million records revealed — was the largest in corporate and government history.

Antonio Banderas Circling Steven Soderbergh’s Panama Papers Drama “The Laundromat”

Antonio Banderas may be on paper duty soon…

The 57-year-old Spanish actor is reportedly circling The Laundromat, a Steven Soderbergh-directed drama about the Panama Papers scandal.

Antonio Banderas

The film, written by Scott Z. Burns, is based on the Jake Bernstein book Secrecy World: Inside the Panama Papers Investigation of Illicit Money Networks and the Global Elite.

Banderas isn’t the only high-profile actor circling the project. Gary Oldman and Meryl Streep are reportedly interested as well.

Netflix is among those considering the project, which is produced by Burns, Lawrence Grey, Soderbergh, Michael Sugar and First Look Media’s Topic Studios.

Netflix previously set a movie on the scandal by German journalists Frederik Obermaier and Bastian Obermayer, who broke the story and wrote the book Panama Papers: Breaking the Story of How the World’s Rich and Powerful Hide Their Money. John Wells is producing that film.

The drama is the story of the revelations of reams of documents leaked from Panama-based law firm Mossack Fonseca in April by an anonymous whistleblower that bared embarrassing details on investments and money trails from politicians the world over, meant to evade taxes.