Bring Me the Rakes

Contunuing the sometimes-successful trend of late of movies made from books getting now stretched out to multi-episode prestige miniseries' length -- think Dead Ringers, Presumed Innocent, Ripley et cetera -- we now have a third filmed version of John D. MacDonald's 1957 novel The Executioners coming our way... which we all know better by its adapted title of Cape Fear. Previously there's been the 1962 movie with Gregory Peck and Robert Mitchum, and then of course there is Martin Scorsese's 1992 remake with Nick Nolte and Robert De Niro -- and now, landing on June 5th, we have Patrick Wilson and Javier Bardem tackling the roles of the good family man lawyer and the evil criminal who comes back to torment him. Plot twist, though -- in 2026 it's not just one but two prosecutors in the family, and so the wife character (previously played by Polly Bergen and Jessica Lange) is now co-responsible for the bad dude's imprisonment. All the better to give Amy Adams something to do in the role. Here, just watch the trailer:

The excellent news about this series is it's coming to us -- well yes it was executive produced by both Scorsese and one Steven Spielberg. That's sort of a big deal. But the actual person running this show is Nick Antosca, and we LOVE Nick Antosca thanks to a couple of series he ran several years back -- specifically the horror anthology Channel Zero as well as the too-too-short-lived series Brand New Cherry Flavor on Netflix. Channel Zero in particular is my beloved, and cemented Antosca as a person I will follow forever. That said -- hypocrisy alert -- I still haven't gotten around to watching his last project A Friend of the Family starring Jake Lacy. I kept forgetting it existed -- repeat with me my favorite refrain, "There are too many damn shows." 

Anyway. I'm a really over-the-top fan of Scorsese's film Cape Fear -- it's for real a Top 5 Scorsese movie for me, even while he himself isn't really a fan of it. It barely figured into his recent career-retrospective documentary, which irritated me. I adore how operatic and purple it goes -- I find it riveting, with Lange fluttering her hands in every direction madly and De Niro literally chomping chunks out of the scenery. This 2026 version seems to be aping a lot of that film visually -- there are shots taken straight from it in this trailer. I guess we'll see. I know I'll be watching. And I have to say I wouldn't be angry if Bardem's terrifying flirtations landed on Patrick Wilson this time. Just a thought!

Good Morning, World

Did y'all see the news that our boy Alexander Ludwig was the first official name dropped into the fourth season of The White Lotus over the holiday? Mike White loves a big dumb blonde type, it would seem -- from Jake Lacy (and Lukas Gage) to Leo Woodall to Patrick Schwarzenegger, there's always at least one of them hanging about every season. Anyway we've been a long time fan of Alexander's and we love this for him. This season will be set in the south of France -- apparently they're also trying to get Helena Bonham Carter, and she sounds like dream casting for this series. Cannot wait!

Jay Ellis Eleven Times

A couple of weeks ago I shared a photoshoot of actor Jake Lacy that was promoting his series All Her Fault -- it's only right I also share these Jay Ellisphotos that dropped today (via) too then, since they're both on that same show. I mean I was going to share these photos anyway because LOOK AT HIM, but then I looked up what he's promoting and realized it was the same series -- which I have not watched -- and here we are. I suppose I should ask if anybody's watching this show then? It's stuffed fulla hotties apparently so at least one of you must be. For now we'll stuff out hotties here though, or rather after the jump...

Jake Lacy Twelve Times

What a nice surprise treat -- Jake Lacy content! The White Lotus and Carol actor is in a new streaming series called All Her Fault opposite Succession star Sarah Snook and so he's now being featured as Bustle magazine's cover-boy this month -- there's an interview with him that I have not read right here,. But there are also twelve photos of him to go along with the unread interview and those, those I have stared at. Stared at and gathered up for our communal lunch-time consumption. So hit the jump for those...

Good Morning, World

I am going to run for President this year, and my platform is going to be "There are too many damn TV shows!" That's a winner of a platform I think, especially since I am just today hearing about a show called Apples Never Fall that stars Annette Bening, Sam Neill, and our beloved Jake Lacy? And it's about men's tennis aka the only sport I can stomach watching??? (No offense to women's tennis but... I wanna look at the men; it's a -- perhaps the -- vital ingrediant of my enjoyment.) I should be watching this show. I guess it's on Peacock, which I think I have? Anyway I made some gifs from the 5th episode for reasons that should already be clear; hit the jump for several more...

Vacation, All I Ever Wanted

The fact that half of the cast got an Emmy nomination yesterday wasn't the only good news that we got about Mike White's great The White Lotus -- and I've seen some people grumbling about all of the praise being heaped on it, saying its overkill, to which I say pooh, pooh on you! Mike White is finally having his moment after years upon years of delivering weird-ass delight into our lives, we will cherish all of this run dammit. Anyway Emmy pile-up aside the other good news is that the show is getting released onto physical media! Weirdly only DVD not blu-ray, but we'll take what we can get since we're physical media + Mike White obsessives. The six-episode set will hit on September 13th and the press release says it will include "bonus content" but they're not specific as to what that means. Well if it's an hour of set-footage of Steve Zahn trying on boner prosthetics we all win. I'll update this post with a link once it's actually on Amazon, but for now below is the DVD's box-art - set your darn calendars!

Austin, Formerly of Swallow Fame

Some might say that two posts about the menfolks of Mike White's show The White Lotus in a row might be too much, but to those people I say fuck you. Git atta he', see!! Sorry don't know why Edward G. Robinson just took over my body, but the sentiment remains. Git! Especially since as seen above we're talking about Swallow actor Austin Stowell -- and yes no matter what Austin does for the rest of his career he will be forever referred to by this site as "Swallow actor" -- this time, as shown in the teaser for this weekend's finale (watch it below), and that's an extra special little gift. And I want to have a post at the top of the site for y'all to tell me your thoughts and feelings on the finale, when it happens. And since it's now time for my three-day weekend, y'all can do that in the comments here. Austin Swallow I mean Stowell approves!

More Lotus Please

Tremendous news today that we must celebrate with THAT SPECIFIC PHOTO of actor Murray Bartlett -- Variety's just reported that Mike White's HBO show The White Lotus will be getting a second season! Huzzah upon huzzah! The second season will take place at a different resort location -- clearly Mike White has figured out how to travel luxuriously on somebody else's dime! -- but there might, he says might, be overlap with some characters from this first season showing up at the new location. If you had your choice which characters would you want to see show up again? I'd be fine with any of them honestly, but the one that would surprise me the least -- in that I really think it will happen -- would be Jennifer Coolidge's Tanya. White had written that other show for Coolidge that HBO didn't pick up, so he's clearly smitten. As are we all. Anyway here's my review of The White Lotus over at AwardsWatch, in case you missed it -- the season (not series!) finale airs this Sunday at 9pm!

Quote of the Day

Top tier human, MNPP longstanding beloved, and creative genius Mike White has been enjoying some well-earned success this summer thanks to his HBO series The White Lotus, which y'all know I loved -- I wrote about it at AwardsWatch -- but that usually means nothing; I always love things that flop! So I am pleased as pleased punch that this one seems to be a hit! I mean I have no idea what its ratings are but I've seen people talking about it, with enthusiasm, all over the internet the past few weeks, and that's as important a metric as any now right? Whatever, let me have this. So with good buzz comes write-ups, and White's given a big interview to The New Yorker this week (thx Brad) that I can't recommend highly enough if you've ever been a fan. He talks Lotus, he talks being on Survivor, he talks future projects and then about how he's been putting off doing a third season of Enlightened even though HBO has expressed interest (I KNOW). But my favorite section comes when he describes the gloriously-deranged-sounding show he wanted to make with Aubrey Plaza, and what he then says about the current state of TV alongside it, so that's today's quote:

"O.K., so, I wrote a script that I was really into, for Aubrey Plaza and for me to be in. We were playing ourselves, but it was this weird sex comedy set in Sweden. My character was basically a very predatory version of myself. There were some MeToo elements. The script was definitely poking the bear. And so we went around to all of these streamers, and I could tell people really liked the script. But everybody was kind of afraid to do it. There are all these streamers right now, and there’s all this business. It does feel like there’s a lot of places to go and take the meeting. But then, when you go into the rooms to have the meeting, you realize they all want the same thing. There’s not a lot of incentive for them to try something that feels like they might get criticized for it. There’s a very corporatized thing going on. There’s not that big of an upside to taking on something that would cause more problems than it’s worth. 

 It was always hard to make stuff for me. But, back in the early two-thousands, I just felt like there were more people running places who were individuals and had their own individual taste and would take different types of risks. It’s not to say there aren’t cool, risky things being made. But, when they type my name into the algorithm at Netflix, it must come out zeroes or something. When I go to their offices, I get no sense that they have any idea who I am or what I’m doing there. You really feel like it’s some kind of Terry Gilliam “Brazil” version of futurist entertainment."

Good Morning, World

Yesterday I devoted our "Good Morning" post to Jake Lacy (and his bum!) on Mike White's glorious new show The White Lotus, and that was great, truly great, and all, but I'd be remiss not to also devote a moment to model and actor Kekoa Kekumano. He plays the local dude who works at the hotel and who hooks up with one of the teenagers -- you might also recognize him from his stint playing Young Jason Momoa in the first Aquaman. Anyway his Instagram is a lovely treat, I recommend you follow him, and for a few more treats (including that glimpse of his bum also out of this week's truly bum-full episode) you can hit the jump...

Good Morning, World

Happy Monday, everyone. Alright so we're halfway through Mike White's show The White Lotus on HBO -- three episodes of six down -- and I'm curious 1) if y'all are watching, and 2) what you're thinking. You might be aware I wrote up my thoughts at AwardsWatch before the show began -- I haven't been re-watching it alongside the episodes airing since, you know, I literally just watched the entire thing a couple of weeks ago, but I know well enough what's going on each week. I knew this week was the episode Jake Lacy showed his bum anyway! (PS tthere's a new chat with Jake at Vulture today and y'all should read it -- the part where he talks about how WL character is "allowed to be an asshole" is terrifically astute.) ) So y'all tell me what you think of the show in the comments and after the jump the full bum of which I speak...

Forget it, Jake, It's Lacy

First and fore-obvious, here are some photos of the actor Jake Lacy (currently seen on Mike White's HBO program The White Lotus) for InStyle magazine -- you can read the chat with him over here, if you like. You should since this is a chat that only made me love him more -- he says he loves Everything Bagels, Radiohead, and his favorite villain is "Vigo the Carpathian" from Ghostbusters 2; is Jake Lacy actually my perfect man??? Well he also says that Pine is the best Chris so I guess not. We were fleeting, Jake Lacy, but it was good while it lasted! If you missed my piece on The White Lotus, which I doubt you did since I've linked to it one thousand times by now, click here. 

Now for the second and final thing on my list of things for this post -- I'm going away for my birthday tomorrow (don't get too excited, I'm just visiting my family upstate... but feel free to wish me a Happy Birthday, dammit) and I will be gone for a few days. So you'll be staring at Jake Lacy here from now til Tuesday. Y'all enjoy that, and I'll see you a year older but not a whit wiser. Hit the jump for three more photos...

Jake Lacy Six Times

Thank goodness, I was hoping a photo-shoot of an attractive gentleman would appear before the end of the day so it could be the top post on the site as I head off for the three-day weekend, and here right under the wire is Jake Lacy for Esquire Mexico -- I don't actually have a link to the magazine, as I got the photos via here after Mr. Lacy shared them on his Insta. These are of course timely though, what with Mike White's show which features Mr. Lacy -- and psst I mean a lot and I do mean a lot of Mr. Lacy, wink wink nudge nudge -- called The White Lotus premiering this weekend on HBO. Didja see my review of The White Lotus I posted earlier? It's right here. Spoiler alert: the show is friggin' amazing. So watch the show, have a great weekend, and hit the jump for more Mr. Lacy...

Paradise Loused

I hope you all know by now that a new Mike White project is a thing to savor -- they don't come nearly as often as they should, and they never last as long as we want them to, but every second of every one has been a blessing and a gift. And that score ain't changing with his new limited-series The White Lotus, which is premiering on HBO Max this weekend. (Watch the trailer here.) And so, out of sheer thirst I had intended to plow through my screeners of the show in the span of an afternoon when I first sat down with them a few weeks back... but couldn't, I just couldn't. The show was again too good, too much to rush through, and I took my time with it -- and I'm glad to see that HBO is similarly doling out the series on a weekly basis, because it benefits from that breathing space. Anyway I only finally finished watching the entire series last night and I wasn't sure I'd write anything, but as it does when it wants to be said the words just came pouring out of me today -- head on over to AwardsWatch for my review of the show. It's as great as anything Mike White has ever done, which is, uhh, some high praise I'd say.

The White Lacy

This week I've had a lot of Jake Lacy on the brain -- that's a real condition, look it up on Web MD --because I am (whispering so the Feds don't hear me) watching my screeners of the new Mike White show The White Lotus that's airing on HBO come July 11th (here's the trailer) and, uhhh, there is a lot of Jake Lacy on this show. Mike White is not letting us down, you guys. Anyway with my serious medical condition know as Jake Lacy Brain really acting up I thought I'd re-tweet out the photos of Jake shooting The White Lotus on the beaches of Hawaii last fall, only to discover, to my shock and awe, that I never posted these photos? Anywhere? I never tweeted them, I never Tumblr'd them, I never did anything with them. I must've been distracted? It was 2020 after all. And I know 600,000 people have died because of the pandemic but we need to talk about the other very important things that we lost, y'all. (Too soon?) Anyway there's no time like the present, after the jump that is...

Jake Lacy Five Times

Among the many things to be excited about with a brand new show from Enlightened genius Mike White being just a measly and mere twenty-seven days away you cannot under-count the promise of brand new Jake Lacy photoshoots! Like this one for Jon magazine (via) I have for you today! The show if you missed it is called The White Lotus and it hits HBO Max on July 11th (just in time for my birthday by a couple of days!) -- I showed you the trailer back here. And now I show you more Jake Lacy! (Sidenote: I love that the photographer Leigh Kelly actually put Jake LACY in LACE -- amazing.) Hit the jump for it...

White, Boys, Summer

When I posted last October about Enlightened creator and beloved MNPP hero Mike White developing a new show for HBO and then I didn't hear another whisper I figured it was a thing delayed by, you know, the world. Fuck the world! But wait, unfuck the world! Because it's not delayed, it's here, really here -- HBO just dropped the trailer for The White Lotus, White's limited series about the residents of a wellness type resort in Hawaii (god he's smart, writing himself into a vacation in Hawaii during a goddamned pandemic), which will premiere on HBO and HBO Max on July 11th. The show stars... well a lot of people, but most importantly Murray Bartlett (seen up top) of Looking, adorable Jake Lacy and Steve Zahn... 

... oh and Molly Shannon and Jennifer Coolidge and Connie Britton, oh my! Britton in particular looks to be doing a hysterical variation on the clueless privileged white lady character she played in White's brilliant and underrated 2017 film Beatriz at Dinner (White wrote the script; his oft co-conspirator in cringe Miguel Arteta directed). And now for the trailer! Watch, live, laugh... but seriously WATCH. I am so tired of everything White does being called "underrated" and then being canceled.

I Love Lacy

This post was almost just a tweet but then I realized I could title a post the above title, and a post was born -- you just know there will be magazine-spreads stealing it when this movie comes out and I wanted to plant my flag first dammit! So, the actual news: Variety's reporting that MNPP-fave Jake Lacy has signed on to play the I Love Lucy head-writer Bob Carroll Jr. in Aaron Sorkin's movie Being the Ricardos, about Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball which already has Javier Bardem and Nicole Kidman in the leads. Do I have some confusion about this movie's need to exist? I do! It seems like a minefield right off the bat. But Jake Lacy is always a heck yeah, and...

... I am in love with the look he'll presumably be rocking for this, to boot. (Every picture of Bob Carroll Jr is exactly like that so I have to assume they'll go for that.) Anyway a ton of other cat-members have been announced -- Alia Shawkat will be playing Bob's writing partner Madelyn Pugh; Tony Hale is playing the show's executive producer; J.K. Simmons and Nina Arianda are playing William Frawley and Vivian Vance (that is amazing casting); also on board (although we don't know who as) are Clark Gregg and Linda Lavin! Aka Alice! I don't know if this movie's a good idea but it's an idea I will put the hell in front of me.

Jake Lacy Getting Lei'd By Mike White

Oh this is some hot damn happy news for a Monday afternoon wasteland -- HBO is getting back in the Mike White business! They've just given the Enlightened creator slash genius the green-light for six episodes of The White Lotus, a "social satire" (I mean it's Mike White, what else would it be?) set at a Hawaiian resort that follows a big bunch of guests and employees. Names attached already via Deadline (thx Mac) are here at the start the great and somehow still under-utilized Jake Lacy seen up top (not to mention in all of MNPP's many Jake Lacy posts), Connie Britton (who was really terrific in White's 2017 film Beatriz At Dinner), the wonderful Steve Zahn, Jennifer effing Coolidge (!!!!!), and Looking hunk Murray Bartlett, he of the hirsute Butt-hued queerness seen below. Unless a helicopter crashes on Donald Trump's head (fingers crossed) this is the best news we'll hear this week! 

Good Morning, World

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It took me a couple of extra days to get around to it but I watched the finale of Fosse / Verdon last night --which gifted us with this scene here of Jake Lacy (who played Gwen Verdon's long long long suffering partner Ron) -- and boy are my wings tired! Sorry the vaudevillian aspects of the show took me over for a second there. No in all seriousness Michelle Williams, a terribly gifted actress, did her finest work so far on the series, if you ask me...

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Finally watched the finale of Fosse Verson and my god, what Michelle Williams accomplishes in those last few seconds on the sidewalk - the show did her a disservice cutting away to flashback life moments; she was showing it all right there in her eyes

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) May 30, 2019

... which you did, ask me that is, by clicking over here to my site. So there. I told you. I was a little less enamored with Rockwell's work, although to lay it all bare I had a chip on my shoulder towards him because of how bad I thought he was in Three Billboards and how he cruised to an Oscar for that, so my head very well might not've been screwed on generously towards his favor. I will say that his dancing scene with his daughter during the finale was one of my favorite scenes on the entire series -- he went out on a high note. But Michelle, Michelle was transcendent, really and truly. If you haven't watched the series it's worth it to watch her work alone. Jake Lacy in his boxer shorts is just a bonus! A big one. Hit the jump for a dozen more gifs...