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There’s no stopping Tom Cruise from conquering Hollywood’s box office even in his 60s, and that’s all thanks to one movie he did when he was 20 – Paul Brickman’s Risky Business (1983). The film catapulted the actor to stardom and it paved the way for him to become a major leading man material.

Credits: Francis Ford Coppola via Jake’s Takes / YouTube

When he took the offer to do the movie, he was also working on another project with veteran director Francis Ford Coppola. To team up with such an esteemed filmmaker would be an honor, but Cruise shockingly left the rehearsals for Brickman’s movie.

Tom Cruise Left a Francis Ford Coppola Movie for Risky Business

Hollywood hunk Tom Cruise collaborated with Francis Ford Coppola in the 1983 crime thriller film The Outsiders, and at the time, the actor was not yet a big name. Still, the director...

Tom Cruise and Risky Business—the iconic pairing that put him on the map. But behind those scenes (and that unforgettable underwear dance) lies a sizzling chapter Cruise would rather it stay in the past. Turns out, the actor’s chemistry with Rebecca De Mornay wasn’t just for the cameras; their on-screen spark fired up a real-life romance—and let’s just say, it was way more intense than anyone could’ve guessed.

Tom Cruise and Rebecca De Mornay on the set of Risky Business (1983) | Credits: The Geffen Film Company

With Cruise’s rise to fame and a secret romance that burned through the Risky Business set, this off-camera fling was just as daring as the movie itself. Sure, Cruise may want fans to forget, but hey, the allure of 80s Hollywood drama’s impossible to resist—even for the most die-hard Cruise fans.

Curtis Armstrong Spills on Tom...

With things constantly being swapped out or deleted from your favorite streaming service, a commitment to physical media should be stronger now than ever before. And thankfully both big studios and smaller boutique labels understand how important physical releases are.

We are running down the very best 4K Blu-ray and DVD releases from July and August 2024.

“Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid” MGM

One of the most hotly anticipated home video releases of the year is here – and it was worth the wait. Sam Peckinpah’s highly contested western, about an older Pat Garrett (James Coburn) hired to track down and kill Billy the Kid (Kris Kristofferson), was taken away from the filmmaker in post-production and released in a truncated version that he and several of the cast and crew members outspokenly derided. This Criterion release acknowledges and engages with the various iterations of the movie, with 4K discs devoted...

On Wednesday September 4 2024, Vice broadcasts Icons Unearthed: Tom Cruise!

The Newcomer Episode Summary

The upcoming episode of “Icons Unearthed: Tom Cruise,” titled “The Newcomer,” promises to delve into a pivotal moment in Tom Cruise’s career. This episode will focus on the film “Risky Business,” which helped launch Cruise into stardom. The show will explore how this iconic role transformed his life and the film industry.

Viewers can expect to see insights into the creative process behind “Risky Business.” The episode will highlight how director Paul Brickman faced challenges while making the film. One key aspect of the story is how Brickman was forced to change the film’s ending, which could have altered its impact significantly. This change is likely to spark discussions about the importance of creative decisions in filmmaking.

As Tom Cruise steps into the spotlight, the episode will not only celebrate his talent but also...

On Wednesday September 4 2024, Vice broadcasts Icons Unearthed: Tom Cruise!

The Star Episode Summary

The upcoming episode of “Icons Unearthed: Tom Cruise,” titled “The Star,” promises to take viewers on an exciting journey into the world of filmmaking. This episode focuses on the collaboration between Tom Cruise and director Tony Scott, highlighting their work on iconic films that pushed the boundaries of storytelling and action.

In “The Star,” the spotlight shines on how Tony Scott challenged not only the Navy but also his actors to reach new heights in their performances. The episode explores the intense preparation and dedication required to bring Scott’s ambitious vision to life. With a focus on the high-stakes environment of military aviation, the episode delves into the risks and rewards of filming in such a demanding setting.

As Tom Cruise takes on daring roles, viewers will see how his commitment to authenticity and thrilling action...

One scene in the 1983 Tom Cruise movie Risky Business made his co-star, Joe Pantoliano, decide to get a nose job, after seeing an image of himself next to the lead actor. The '80s teen comedy follows Joel Goodsen (Cruise) as he hires a sex worker, Lana (Rebecca De Mornay), after being left home alone for a few days. However, his mother's Steuben glass egg falls into the hands of Lana's boss, Guido (Pantoliano), with Joel forced to find a way to get the egg back, and pay for damages when his father's car crashes.

Speaking with Empire Magazine about the film, Pantoliano revealed how a particular image of him and Cruise from Risky Business made him decide to get a nose job. The actor explained how much bigger his nose was contrasted with his co-star's, making him fear he'd be typecast as a villain because of the way it looked.

On Wednesday, September 4, 2024, at 8:00 Pm, Vice presents an engaging episode of “Icons Unearthed: Tom Cruise,” titled “The Newcomer.” This episode delves into the early career of Tom Cruise, focusing on his breakthrough role in the iconic film “Risky Business.” Viewers will see how Cruise stepped into the spotlight, showcasing his charm and talent in a performance that would launch him into stardom.

The episode also explores the challenges faced by director Paul Brickman, who had to navigate unexpected changes in the film’s narrative. As the story unfolds, audiences will learn about the creative decisions that led to a revised ending, shaping the film into a cultural touchstone. The behind-the-scenes insights provide a fascinating look at the dynamics of filmmaking during this pivotal moment in Cruise’s career.

“The Newcomer” promises to be an entertaining and informative look at Tom Cruise’s rise to fame, highlighting the pivotal moments...

Film critic Roger Ebert used to say that a movie wasn’t about what it was about — it was about how it was about what it was about.

That’s why, when someone told him that they weren’t interested in “Raging Bull” because they didn’t like boxing, he immediately dismissed that person as an idiot. Few directors prove Ebert’s thesis as definitively as Paul Brickman, whose “Risky Business” is newly available in an exquisite 4K Uhd edition from Criterion. While this 1983 comedy is unquestionably “about” a lot in the traditional literary sense — even on the page, it’s an exceptionally accomplished piece of satirical storytelling filled with razor-sharp irony, fertile metaphors, and clever structural conceits — what elevates it to true greatness is a style no one but Brickman would have thought to apply to the subject matter.

That subject matter — a sexually inexperienced teenager partners with a...

In Paul Brickman’s Risky Business, Tom Cruise and his character, ambitious teenage virgin Joel Goodson, appear to be going on the same journey toward the status of killer shark—the good-looking guy with the money and confidence and limitless future. When Cruise flashes that iconic smile in those sunglasses near the end of the film, while Joel is at the height of his freeing, enterprising euphoria, the journey is complete. In 1983, you wouldn’t have been wrong if you thought a legend was being minted on celluloid.

Risky Business created “Tom Cruise” and the subgenre that drove his career for the following 15 years: the capitalist redemption fable. Cruise’s Reagan-era films—particularly Top Gun, Cocktail, and the accurately titled The Color of Money—are most obviously intoxicated with the theme that a neurosis must be transcended so that ideals of money and respect can be attained, while his...

It was a movie with a questionable title. A lot of critics were rough on it. Gene Siskel even called it one of the worst movies of the year. It came and went in theatres with few movie-goers paying any attention. But in the years since its release, it has become a beloved cult classic, with a legion of fans that love quoting its memorable lines. Some of its youngest viewers were drawn in by what they saw as a wish fulfillment concept: What would you do if the babysitter croaked on the first day of your mom’s vacation… so you had the house to yourself for two months straight? We get to see what the Crandall kids would do in the 1991 comedy Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead – and it’s time for this one to be Revisited.

Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead wouldn’t exist if...

by Eric Blume

One of our great screen icons, Jessica Lange, celebrates a big birthday this weekend: 75 years, and thankfully still going strong. Lange is one of only 24 actors to win the Triple Crown of Acting.

Lange is a personal favorite actor of mine, and I’ve written about her on the site numerous times, so I thought for her three-quarter-century mark, I’d hold a moment for one of her less-heralded, lesser-known performances, a bit of a departure from her usual delivery: her soft, lightly comic, and sweetly sad performance in Paul Brickman’s 1990 film Men Don’t Leave...

The 1983 classic Risky Business is getting the Criterion Collection treatment with an upcoming 4K Uhd and Blu-ray release – and the list of special features reveals that this release will feature both the theatrical cut of the film as well as writer/director Paul Brickman’s director’s cut, which has the original, darker ending. That ending was available as a bonus feature on a previous Blu-ray release of Risky Business, but these Criterion discs will be the first to actually have a full, official “director’s cut” of the film on them.

Risky Business has the following description: A sly piece of pop subversion, this irresistible satire of Reagan-era materialism features Tom Cruise in his star-is-born breakthrough as a Chicago suburban prepster whose college-bound life spirals out of control when his parents go out of town for the week and an enterprising call girl (Rebecca De Mornay) invites him...

Tom Cruise has finally entered The Criterion Collection. While technically, “Cocktail” has been available on the Criterion Channel in the past, in announcing its July titles today, Criterion made Cruise’s inclusion with a DVD/Blu-Ray title official today with the addition of 1983’s classic comedy, “Risky Business,” the actor’s breakthrough film. Directed by Paul Brickman, the coming-of-age comedy film, sometimes said to be modeled after a more risqué, “The Graduate,” centers on a Chicago teenager (Cruise) and his sexual exploits while his parents are away on vacation, including spending time with prostitutes.

Continue reading Criterion Adds 4-Disc ‘Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid’ 50th Anniversary Edition & ‘Risky Business’ To July 2024 Releases at The Playlist.

Cruise. Criterion. Just a matter of time, really, until the world’s premier movie star made his way into the collection. Smart money might not have been on Paul Brickman’s Risky Business, a great film mostly known for one or two sequences but which will now be seen in 4K when released this July, a month that brings 2,160-pixel releases for Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (featuring an essay from the great novelist Steve Erickson), Perfect Days, Farewell My Concubine, and the stunning-looking Le Samouraï restoration.

Don’t sleep, however, on maybe the best film to get a release in July: Glauber Rocha’s Cinema Novo masterpiece Black God, White Devil, which recently received a 4K restoration that looks so good I envy anybody who saw it for the first time like so.

Find artwork below and more details at Criterion:

The post The Criterion Collection’s July...

Tom Cruise's breakout role in Risky Business helped him become a true movie star by showcasing his comedic talents and charm to a larger audience. Risky Business remains one of Cruise's best non-action movies, representing a period of cinema that was less serious and more willing to have fun. The iconic dance scene in Risky Business has become a pop culture moment and exemplifies Cruise's willingness to get goofy and have fun, which resonated with audiences and helped solidify his popularity.

Tom Cruise is frequently cited as one of Hollywood’s last remaining movie stars, with an extensive career that spans multiple decades and several successful projects within a variety of different genres. The actor first rose to fame in the 1980s with a series of teen comedies and action flicks that allowed him to easily build a name for himself and quickly climb the ranks of Hollywood...

In 1983, audiences watched Tom Cruise dance in his parents’ living room in Paul Brickman’s adolescent drama “Risky Business.” The film became a cultural touchstone — with Cruise’s dance often imitated but never duplicated — that has endured for 40 years. Cruise took that success and has now become the biggest, if not the last, global movie star. But when this author watches “Risky Business,” it’s the story of Lana, the teenage sex worker who propels Cruise’s Joel on his quest towards running a brothel, that sticks out.

Actress Rebecca De Mornay was in her early twenties when she made “Risky Business” and has never truly gotten her flowers for it. It’s even more frustrating to consider that the actress went on to star in hits in her own right, including the 1992 thriller “The Hand That Rocks the Cradle” and Disney’s 1993 adaptation of “The Three Musketeers.” De Mornay...

In February, a clip went viral of Steven Spielberg telling Tom Cruise at an Oscars luncheon that he “saved Hollywood’s ass.” Spielberg was referring to the explosive success of Cruise’s return to the pilot seat in “Top Gun: Maverick.” Released in May 2022, the long-awaited sequel was the top earner at the domestic box office last year, raking in over $700 million in the United States. It was the shot in the arm that cinemas needed after the pandemic, and proof positive of Cruise’s enduring appeal as both a marquee movie star and skilled actor — two bona fides not always packaged together so successfully.

Cruise has been leveraging looks and charm, and flexing his blockbuster muscles, for decades. Going all the way back to the early 1980s, his appeal never seems to age, even at 61 years old. He’s skillfully shepherded original movies as a star and producer, never...

Take those old records off the shelf because Risky Business is turning 40 this year. And not only is Tom Cruise – who played high schooler Joel Goodsen, who gets mixed up with a prostitute and her pimp – amazed by that, but he admits that he still dances around the house in his underwear as he famously did in Risky Business.

At the premiere of Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One, Tom Cruise remembered where so much of his fame began, calling working on 1983’s Risky Business a “formative” experience. “He gave me the opening frame of that shot and he goes, ‘I want to start here, I want to move here,’ and he and I – Paul Brickman, great filmmaker – he and I talked about it, he said, ‘Here’s the choreography.’ Look, I grew up dancing in my underwear in my house, who didn’t? So I was like, I got this!

Hollywood actor Tom Cruise jokes that he “still” dances in his underwear 40 years after the iconic scene in ‘Risky Business’. Cruise, who is currently promoting his new film, ‘Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One’, said that the 1983 film ‘Risky Business’ helped him on the path to action stardom.

As per People, in an interview to Access Hollywood, the actor reminisced about the popular scene in ‘Risky Business’ in which he danced in only a shirt, briefs, and socks.

Cruise, 60, joked: “Look, I grew up dancing in my underwear in my house. Who didn’t?”

Asked if such dancing continues 40 years later, he responded with a smile: “Yeah, I still (do).”

In the scene in ‘Risky Business’, Cruise plays the teenaged character of Joel Goodsen who is celebrating a house to himself, and struts and dances to Bob Seger’s rendition of ‘Old Time Rock & Roll’.

Cruise expressed awe that the film turns 40 this year.

Warner Bros. has already celebrated its centennial with a segment during the Academy Awards, the publication of a studio-supported book (Warner Bros.: 100 Years of Storytelling) and, most recently, a barrage of festivities emanating from Turner Classic Movies. TCM’s programming for all of April is being devoted to Warners films, and at the 14th annual TCM Classic Film Festival in Hollywood, running April 13-16, many studio masterpieces, some recently restored and remastered, will be shown on big screens around town. Here are 10 that this THR Hollywood history buff highly recommends.

Footlight Parade (1933)

Ninety years ago, during the depths of the Great Depression, Americans sought escape from their troubles with light movies like this backstage musical. Directed by Lloyd Bacon, starring James Cagney, Joan Blondell, Dick Powell and Ruby Keeler and highlighted by some of choreographer Busby Berkeley’s most kaleidoscopic dance numbers, it was a giant hit at the box office.

Chris O’Donnell has signed with Gersh for representation.

The Hollywood film and TV actor currently stars as G. Callen in the CBS police procedural NCIS: Los Angeles, now in its 14th and final season.

Last year, O’Donnell and NCIS: LA cast member LL Cool J teamed to executive produce the reality dance competition series Come Dance With Me at CBS. The show features talented young dancers from across the country who invite one inspirational, and untrained, family member or other adult who has supported their dance dreams, to become their dance partner for a chance to strut their stuff for a grand prize.

In 2015, O’Donnell earned a star on The Hollywood Walk of Fame for his entertainment career. His TV credits include The Company and Grey’s Anatomy, and O’Donnell made his Broadway stage debut in Arthur Miller’s play The Man Who Had All the Luck, opposite Samantha Mathis.

Over the years, there have been several launching-pad movies, where the casting edict is to find as many fresh young faces as possible rather than lean on established star power. In 1955, "Rebel Without a Cause" assembled a number of exciting performers in James Dean, Natalie Wood, Sal Mineo and Dennis Hopper. Nearly 30 years later, Francis Ford Coppola's "The Outsiders" served up a smorgasbord of rising stars in C. Thomas Howell, Matt Dillon, Ralph Macchio, Diane Lane, Patrick Swayze, Rob Lowe and Tom Cruise. And in 1993, director Robert Mandel brought together a company of future stars via the crackling drama "School Ties."

Though many of the actors in "School Ties" had popped up here and there in smaller roles, Mandel's drama about a Jewish student contending with antisemitism at a Massachusetts boarding school in 1959 was the movie where they got to show off their considerable chops. Ben Affleck, Cole Hauser...

The winners for the 34th Annual Santa Barbara International Film Festival were announced Saturday, with Sam Friedlander’s Babysplitters and Kasper Torsting’s In Love and War picking up awards.

The winners were revealed during a breakfast held in their honor at Belmond El Encanto in Santa Barbara. The jury that selected the winners included Anthony and Arnette Zerbe, David and Sandy Wasco, Joe Medjuck, Katharine O’Brien, Leslie Zemeckis, Margaret Lazarus, Olivia Hamilton, Paul Brickman, Roger Avary, and Tamara Asseyev.

“We’re so grateful to all of our honorees, filmmakers, attendees, sponsors, press and volunteers for making the 34th edition our best yet, Sbiff Executive Director Roger Durling said in a press release.

Next year’s festival will shift earlier in the year to accommodate the Academy Awards, with the 35th edition of Sbiff running from January 15 – 25, 2020.

Below is the list of 2019 winners.

Audience Choice Award sponsored by The...

Max Winkler has mastered both sides of TV and film as director of such comedy series as Brooklyn Nine-Nine and New Girl as well as indie films like 2010 Ceremony starring Uma Thurman and Michael Angarano. He comes to the Tribeca Film Festival this year with Flower, a sexually charged teenage comedy that not only is a nod to Paul Brickman’s earlier work, but also turns the 1980s teenage dramedy genre inside out. Zoey Deutch plays Erica, a 17-year-old who performs sexual…...

More so than ever it seems, we've become increasingly obsessed with acknowledging the anniversaries of beloved movies, TV shows and music. Not that there's anything wrong with celebrating our pop culture past, mind you. In fact, for someone as nostalgic as myself, I completely embrace it. Which brings me to a little milestone of my own. This one, though, doesn't simply focus on a particular piece of celluloid, but instead, revolves around a certain actor whose work has been an enduring presence throughout my movie-going life.

For the last 30 years, not only have I sat and watched every single Tom Cruise film that has come out since 1986, I have done so in an actual, honest-to-goodness movie theater. That's a total of 33 silver screen experiences (34 if you count his Austin Powers in Goldmember cameo), including the latest, Jack Reacher: Never Go Back. Yeah, you might say I'm a fan.

However, prior to the start of this streak -- and...

Iconic American musician Prince, whose death was announced yesterday, made memorable contributions to cinema through his music and performances.

Prince (Prince Rogers Nelson), who rose to fame in the 1980’s with records such as ‘1999’, ‘Sign o’ the Times’ and ‘Parade’ and went on to sell more than 100 million albums, died aged 57 at his home in Minnesota.

The pioneering musician provided soundtracks to a number of productions including the 1989 Tim Burton directed Batman and Spike Lee’s Girl 6 – which played in Un Certain Regard at Cannes in 1996.

His songs were used in dozens of films during his nearly 40-year career, including Baz Lurhmann’s Romeo and Juliet and Paul Brickman’s Risky Business.

In 1985, he won an Oscar for his score of Purple Rain. ‘When Doves Cry’ from the same film was also nominated for the Golden Globe for best original song, an accolade that Prince picked up twenty years later for ‘The Song of the Heart...

They say that April showers bring May flowers, but this month is bringing a veritable downpour of excellent things to stream. The eagerly anticipated second seasons of Netflix's Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt and Amazon's Catastrophe top the list of new arrivals; on the film front, we've got a high-school thriller for the ages and a gangster saga worthy of The Godfather. Here are our picks for the 10 best things to queue from your couch this month.

Breathe (Netflix, 4/1)

American viewers might know her best as the girl who burned down the...

Risky Business was not only one of the most popular movies of the 1980s it also catapulted Tom Cruise to international stardom. One individual whose career actually stalled instead of erupting following the 1983 romantic comedy.s release was its writer and director Paul Brickman. But, just under 33 years after Risky Business originally hit cinemas, Paul Brickman has explained that this was all of his own doing, admitting that he found the success of Risky Business uncomfortable to deal with. Produced for $6.2 million, and ultimately going on to gross $63.5 million, Risky Business was also met with huge critical acclaim. In fact, Roger Ebert even compared it to The Graduate. Because of this success Paul Brickman was soon inundated with follow-up offers. But Brickman couldn.t handle the visibility, and he became a recluse instead. In an interview with Salon, he revealed what happened. The success of Risky Business was strange because...

Two film franchises, both just now reaching their fifth film, but nothing alike in overall execution. What makes "Mission: Impossible" so rich and robust as a series, and why is "Vacation" such a drag? The answer to the first part of that question has to do with Tom Cruise and Paula Wagner, and anyone looking to understand how to build a 21st century franchise would be wise to closely study the model that they've established. Not only has it proven incredibly limber, it seems like they're still just picking up steam. All they have to do now is figure out how to keep Tom Cruise alive and looking exactly like he does right now for the next 100 years. Since it's the Imf we're talking about, I assume they will succeed. When you look at Tom Cruise's career, he came out of the gates really strong. He made his screen debut in "Endless Love,...

Genre mash-ups may be commonplace these days, but it took a mad genius to even consider combining film-noir and teen sex comedy back in 1983. Paul Brickman’s wildly successful experiment, Risky Business, not only launched the career of Tom Cruise, it set a new benchmark for substantive sex comedies. Here, we had an observant and erotic satire that always entertained and never sermonized. Through the use of film-noir conventions and evocative symbolism, Brickman’s classic takes the teen movie into shadowy territory while still remaining accessible. It’s a masterful script that warrants closer analysis.

Risky Business towers above its 80’s contemporaries because writer/director, Paul Brickman, was less concerned about the loss of virginal innocence than the loss of moral innocence. Our hero, totally unprepared for the shady inner-workings of the adult world, tumbles deeper into chaos with each new indulgence. Instead of letting Joel Goodsen (Tom Cruise) off...

The Film Society of Lincoln Center announced today that they will host An Evening with Tom Cruise on Monday, December 17th, taking a look at some of Cruise.s most iconic character work in a conversation with moderator and New York Film Festival Director of Programming, Kent Jones. The event will be followed by a sneak preview screening of Cruise.s new film Jack Reacher, in which he plays a tough ex-military investigator out for justice . a character that audiences have come to love from the three-time Academy Award® nominated actor. Tickets are $50 and $35 and all proceeds from the event will go to the Film Society of Lincoln Center.s 50th Anniversary Fund, which supports the new education program and emerging filmmaker initiatives. Tickets go on sale Monday, December 10th. The event will be held at the Rose Theater, (5th floor of the Time Warner Center, Broadway and 60th street). Visit Filmlinc.

Jennifer Garner and Alfred Molina star in Serena, a short film written and directed by Rodrigo Garcia, a co-founder of Wigs along with Jon Avnet and Jake Avnet. Garner plays Serena, a woman who makes a series of shocking confessions to her Priest (Molina).

“Serena,” the first Wigs short film, is premiering now on youtube.com/wigs.

“Jennifer and Alfred were perfect,” remarked Rodrigo Garcia. “They elevated the script and found feeling and laughter where I had not seen it. I wish everything was this easy and fun.”

“Serena” is the first of 10 short films planned for Wigs, and comes on the heels of the channel’s first series, “Jan.” The first six episodes of “Jan,” which stars Caitlin Gerard, Virginia Madsen, and Stephen Moyer, are available on youtube.com/wigs.

Over the coming weeks and months, Wigs will continue to release content produced with a renowned group of writers and filmmakers,...

For the first time, YouTube is about to launch an entertainment network with real programming and real stars. The Wigs channel is being debuted today by Hollywood filmmakers on Avnet and Rodrigo Garcia at Google's Brandcast event today in New York. Wigs is described as "a digital channel featuting original series and short films exploring female characters. The name actors already involved include Virginia Madsen, Stephen Moyer, Caitlin Gerard, Jennifer Garner, Alfred Molina, Julia Stiles, Sarah Paulson, and Jeanne Tripplehorn appear in the first three series. Directors include Betty Thomas, Paul Brickman, Lesli Linka Glatter, Walter Salles, and Amy Lippman." Basically, it's Lifetime, on your computer.

So this part of YouTube's big new rollout of channels with plenty more to come. The question is, Will people watch their computer screens instead of their big screen TVs. They're already doing it with NetFlix. But the success of original programming on the...

YouTube just announced that Hollywood filmmakers Jon Avnet and Rodrigo Garcia will be among the talent featured in the upcoming YouTube Brandcast this afternoon. Wigs, the new channel from Avnet (Black Swan, Fried Green Tomatoes, Risky Business) and Rodrigo Garcia (Albert Nobbs, In Treatment, Mother and Child), will feature scripted shows and short films with female leads—basically the Oxygen Network online. The new channel features name actors Virginia Madsen, Stephen Moyer, Caitlin Gerard, Jennifer Garner, Alfred Molina, Julia Stiles, Sarah Paulson, and Jeanne Tripplehorn. Directors include Betty Thomas, Paul Brickman, Lesli Linka Glatter, Walter Salles, and Amy Lippman. "Wigs offers our writer, director, and actor friends and colleagues an enormous amount of freedom to tell stories that they connect with intimately," said Avnet. "The excitement in the creative community surrounding the productions has been palpable. We hope and believe the audience will enjoy these very diverse voices that explore women of all ages,...

The Teen Comedy edition of the Twitch-presented Back To The 80's series continues at the Tiff Bell Lightbox tonight with Paul Brickman's Risky Business. If you want to relive your highschool crush on Rebecca De Mornay or ogle a young, pre-crazy Tom Cruise in his underpants, this is the film for you!The screening begins at 9pm tonight at the Tiff Bell Lightbox in Toronto at the corner of King and John. Get your tickets here!...

The new comedy "Take Me Home Tonight" celebrates the 1980s and all its excesses, from Mercedes-worship to Frankie Goes To Hollywood telling us all to relax.

The '80s was a time of rampant materialism and mohawks, and the only way people got through it -- like WWII -- was with laughter.

In honor of Topher Grace's nostalgic comedy, we're celebrating the 25 most-uniquely only-in-the-80's comedies, the ones where the hair was froofy, Eddie Murphy still brought the funny, and the geek inherited the Earth.

25. 'The Naked Gun' (1988)

The same team that made "Airplane!" decided to bring their anarchic brand of humor to the small screen with "Police Squad" (In Color), but the satire of TV cop shows only lasted a measly six episodes. After the show gained a cult following, the trio decided to resurrect Leslie Nielsen's accident-prone Lieutenant Frank Drebin to surprising success and a comedic trilogy,...

The Santa Barbara International Film Festival announced its 2011 prize winners earlier today.

The highly-coveted Audience Award went to Morgan Neville’s “Troubadours,” an engaging doc about the rise of singer-songwriters — most notably Carole King and James Taylor, who feature prominently in the film alongside other headliners of the period — in Los Angeles, generally, and at the Troubadour Club, specifically, in the late 1960s and early 1970s. (The film premiered at last month’s Sundance Film Festival and will air nationally on PBS on March 2 at 8pm Est.)

The other top honors were determined by a jury that included actor Billy Baldwin (“Gossip Girl”), writer/director Paul Brickman (“Risky Business”), director Andy Davis (“The Fugitive”), producer Frank Donner (“Deliver Us from Evil”), actor Christopher Lloyd (“Back to the Future”), and actor Anthony Zerbe (“The Matrix”), among others, and went to the following films…

The Panavision Spirit Award for Independent Cinema (given...

Confessions of a Bad News Bear

by Jon Zelazny

The Reverend David Stambaugh is the Pastoral Associate at Hollywood United Methodist Church. He earned his BA from Messiah College, a Masters of Divinity from Alliance Theological Seminary, and a Masters of Sacred Theology from Drew University.

Prior to entering the ministry, he portrayed infielder Toby Whitewood in The Bad News Bears (1976), The Bad News Bears in Breaking Training (1977), and The Bad News Bears Go to Japan (1978).

Dave Stambaugh: I was actually playing Little League at that time, so it was a world I really knew. I remember one time I couldn’t make it to a callback audition because our team was in the area play-offs. I like to think that helped me get the job: “Hey, that kid can’t come in for our movie today— because he’s playing baseball!”

The first auditions were readings in NYC casting offices,...

Today, in conjunction with Entertainment Weekly's 20th anniversary, I'm kicking off a semi-regular series of columns in which I look back, every few weeks, at some of the movies I reviewed for EW two decades ago. (I'll peg each column to the week, 20 years before, that the review appeared.) I'm intensely eager to see how those movies play now -- whether they hold up, feel dated, look as fresh as they did the day they came out, or maybe, in some cases, even fresher. And I want to do the same thing with the reviews I wrote. I want to...

Trailer for I Love You, Beth Cooper in which a nerdy valedictorian proclaims his love for the hottest and most popular girl in school – Beth Cooper (Panettiere) – during his graduation speech. Much to his surprise, Beth shows up at his door that very night and decides to show him the best night of his life.

Chris Columbus (Home Alone) directs and teh film stars Hayden Panettiere (Heroes) and Paul Rust (Inglourious Basterds).

This is probably going to be rather cheesy teen nonsense. However I have a soft spot for this genre from teh 80's with films like Rob Reiner's The Sure Thing, John Hughes films (Sixteen Candles, Weird Science, Ferris Bueller's Day Off) and Paul Brickman's Risky Business. Luke Greenfield's 2004 movie The Girl Next Door captured the right vibe, showing it is possible to make quality movies of this kind post 2000. Larry Doyle who has written for...

Joel Goodson (Tom Cruise) has the usual fantasies. With the house to himself, he might even get the chance to try and live a couple of them out, but when sexy escort Lana (Rebecca De Mornay) arrives at his doorstep things don't exactly go as planned. That's okay, as the nights grow longer and the daylight vanishes these two quickly start coming up with a plan, and if Joel plays his cards right everything he's always dreamed of might only be a kiss on the cheek away from materializing. If Top Gun was the movie that made Tom Cruise an international superstar, Risky Business was the film that got him that opportunity. Seldom has there been a star-making roll offered a young up-and-coming actor like Joel Goodson, and no matter what you want to say about the man's couch-jumping antics or pharmaceutical lunacies the one thing you cannot dispute is just how engaging,...

Paul Brickman's 1983 comedy Risky Business has a fair number of iconic scenes—star Tom Cruise dancing in his underwear, Cruise and Rebecca De Mornay making love "on a real train," etc.—but the key scene is quieter. After Cruise listens to high-school friends talk about test scores as a means to getting into the colleges that will give them the earning power they want, he asks, "Doesn't anyone want to accomplish anything, or do we just want to make money?" Everyone gives him a look that suggests he's the only one thinking about anything other than cash. Then he spends the rest of the film learning what making money's all about. A coming-of-age film that turns Cruise's high-school senior into an accidental pimp after he nervously hires a call girl (De Mornay), Risky Business is partly about how teens grow up, discover desire, and move past the little-kid images that.