60 | AUGUST 11 • 2022
Mack & Rita, which opens
in theaters on Aug. 12, has a
very weird plot: Mack Martin,
a woman, is a 30-year-old
buttoned-up homebody.
She reluctantly goes to Palm
Springs with her best friend.
In Palm Springs, Mack is
“magically” transformed into
Aunt Rita (Diane Keaton), a
70-year-old version of herself.
At 70, Rita feels free of con-
ventional norms and says and
does what she wants. Her
candid talk turns her into a
social media sensation.
Simon Rex, 47, has a large
supporting role as Luca, but
advance publicity doesn’t
spell out who Luca is. What
is clear is that this film marks
the second step in Rex’s
amazing career comeback.
In 2000, he was a top model
and the co-star of the TV
series Jack & Jill. His career
had faded away to nothing
when the director/writer of
the film Red Rocket contacted
him in 2020 and asked him
to play the lead in his film —
about a washed-up porn star.
Red Rocket won a major
award at the 2021 Cannes
film festival and Rex got great
reviews for his performance
(see Rocket on pay-per-view
services). He has big roles
in two more “mainstream”
films that will open this year
or next.
A League of Their Own,
(1992), got great reviews and
was a huge hit. It is a com-
edy/drama movie about a
(real) all-female pro baseball
league founded during WWII.
In 2017, Abbi Jacobson,
47, and Will Graham began
“pitching” the idea that a
reboot of the film as a TV
series would work. In 2020,
Amazon “greenlighted” an
eight-episode first season.
League of Their Own, the TV
series, begins streaming on
Friday, Aug. 12.
Jacobson was the co-cre-
ator and co-star of Broad
City, the hit Comedy Central
series. She has a leading
role in the League series as
Carson Shaw, a top pitch-
er. Jacobson and Graham
co-wrote the pilot episode.
The TV series will dif-
fer from the film in several
respects. The movie cen-
tered on a male team coach
(memorably played by Tom
Hanks). The series will focus
on the players, not the coach-
es. Also, unlike the film, the
series will pay attention to
the lives of lesbian and black
players.
The recurring cast includes
Molly Ephraim, 36 (Last
Man Standing on ABC),
as Maybelle Fox, a player,
and Nat Faxon, 46, in a yet
“unclear” role.
The premiere of League, a
sports series, and a just-pub-
lished article that gave an
update on last year’s “scan-
dal” involving well-known
ESPN sportscaster Rachel
Nichols, has prompted me to
(finally) write up the following
item. It has a “Jewish sur-
prise” not in any other article.
Here’s a brief Nichols bio:
Now 48, Nichols was born
Rachel Alexander. She grad-
uated from Northwestern
University’s top-notch jour-
nalism school. In 1996, the
Washington Post hired her
to cover hockey, but pretty
soon she was covering varied
sport stories, including the
Olympics.
In 2004, she was hired by
ESPN. She was given import-
ant assignments and became
a fan and TV critic favorite.
CNN lured her away in 2013.
For CNN (and its affiliates
TNT/TBS), she reported on
“marquee” sports and did
tough, informative interviews.
In 2016, she returned to
ESPN where, among other
jobs, she hosted The Jump,
a highly praised basketball
program.
In 2001, she married Max
Nichols, now 49, in a Jewish
ceremony in a historic Venice,
Italy, synagogue. The couple
have twin daughters. Max
is the son of the late Mike
Nichols, the highly respected
film and stage director.
In July 2020, while in her
hotel room, Nichols made
a private cell phone call to
a sports agent. Someone
working for ESPN intercepted
and recorded her call (which
was illegal under the relevant
state laws). Here’s the gist
of what Nichols said: She
was upset that ESPN report-
er Maria Taylor, an African
American with far less experi-
ence, got a reporting job she
(Nichols) wanted. Taylor got
it, Nichols believed, because
ESPN was on a “diversity
push.”
An edited version of the
recording was released in
July 2021. A flood of media
coverage led ESPN, which
had a spotty diversity record,
to fire Nichols. Nichols sued,
got a big settlement and left
ESPN in January 2022. Taylor
went on to a big job at NBC.
Nichols was replaced
(July 2021) as the host of
The Jump (now called NBA
Today) by Malika Andrews,
now 27. Andrews is black,
and Jewish and had a bat
mitzvah.
I wonder if ESPN thought it
politic to hire a black Jewish
woman to replace a white
Jewish woman fired for
privately criticizing a black
woman. Barring more illegal
call taping, we probably will
never know.
CELEBRITY NEWS
NATE BLOOM COLUMNIST
ARTS&LIFE
Rex’s Kingly
Comeback, League
of Their Own (the TV
Series), Rachel Nichols
Simon Rex
WIKIPEDIA
WIKIPEDIA
WIKIPEDIA
Abbi Jacobson
Rachel Nichols