The Playlist

The obsessives' guide to contemporary cinema via film discussion, news, reviews, features, nostalgia, movie music, soundtracks, DVDs and more.

Interviews

'Hugo' Writer John Logan To Adapt Broadway Smash 'Jersey Boys' For GK Films

By Oliver Lyttelton
|
January 11, 2012 9:41 AM
|
0 Comments

News

For a man whose first big-screen credit came with the Dina Meyer-starring B-movie "Bats," John Logan isn't doing too shabbily. Thanks to script work on "Any Given Sunday" and "Gladiator," he's been one of Hollywood's most in-demand writers for a decade, winning a second Oscar nomination for Martin Scorsese's "The Aviator." And, off the back of his Tony-winning play "Red," had a banner year in 2011, with his name stamped on Ralph Fiennes' "Coriolanus," Gore Verbinski's "Rango" and Scorsese's "Hugo," the latter two of which look set to win him further awards plaudits.

By Kevin Jagernauth
|
August 15, 2011 2:19 AM
|
1 Comment

It's pretty much impossible to talk about the burgeoning 1970s punk movement in New York City without mentioning Patti Smith, the power of her music and the influence it would have on a generation of artists. But talent and passion isn't created in a vacuum and during Smith's most formative years, she found an emotional and artistic soulmate in photographer Robert Mapplethorpe, and together they rose through the early stages of their respective careers together. Smith recently chronicled that relationship in a National Book Award-winning memoir "Just Kids," and now, that story is making the transition to the big screen with some pretty big talent to lend a hand.

By Oliver Lyttelton
|
June 8, 2011 1:02 AM
|
7 Comments

'Hugo Cabret' Writer John Logan Polishing Script The success of "Black Swan" -- $300 million dollars, a brace of Oscar nominations, including a victory for Natalie Portman as Best Actress -- has finally given Darren Aronofsky serious cache in Hollywood. Not that he hadn't been hotly tipped before -- "The Fountain" was originally a big-budgeted production with Brad Pitt and he'd been courted for the likes of 'Batman,' "Superman," and was even attached to "The Wolverine" until he bailed earlier in the year, no longer needing to do "one for them," having already succeeded in a big way on his own terms.