58 | AUGUST 15 • 2024 J
N

RUDOLPH IS HARRIS, AGAIN; 
A CHILDREN’S MOVIE, A 
GAME SHOW AND A POLICE 
SHOW
Maya Rudolph, 52, has agreed 
to appear as Vice President 
Kamala Harris on SNL for all of 
2024. Rudolph played Harris in 
many SNL skits that aired during 
the first impeachment trial of 
Donald Trump and during the 
2020 presidential campaign. 
Most thought her depiction 
was very funny without being 
mean (you can view the skits on 
YouTube). 
No word yet if Martin 
Short, who played Doug 
Emhoff, Harris’ Jewish husband, 
in a 2020 skit, will reprise this 
role. (The 50th season of SNL 
premieres on Sept. 28, 2024). 
Opening in theaters on Aug. 
16 is Ryan’s World, The Movie: 
Titan Universe Adventure. It is a 
Japanese-American live action/
animated film based on Ryan’s 
World, a hit YouTube channel 
series. The Ryan’s World series, 
and the movie, are primarily for 
children and teens. 
Here’s the premise: twin 
sisters Emma and Kate get 
sucked into a mystical comic 
book. Ryan, their older brother, 
jumps in after them. What 
follows is a lot of adventures 
(some dangerous). Eventually, 
Ryan navigates the Titan 
Universe, and he brings 
everyone home before their 
parents miss them. 
Albie Hecht is making his 
debut as a film director with this 
film. Hecht is 71, an uncommon 
age for freshman directors. 
But he has tons of relevant 
experience. Here’s just part 
of it: from 1997-2003 Hecht 
oversaw the development and 
approval of every series and 

film on Nickelodeon. More 
recently, he has been the 
head of a company that has 
created many YouTube series 
for young people. He has 
overseen 50 series (including 
Ryan’s World). His YouTube 
channels have over 100 million 
subscribers. 
This year, the game show Who 
Wants to Be a Millionaire? has 
been re-booted. Now two pairs 
of two celebrities compete to 
win the game and earn a 
$1 million prize for their favorite 
charity. On Aug. 21, Brad 
Garrett, 64, and Ray Romano 
(former stars of Everybody 
Loves Raymond) vie with the 
team of comedian Natasha 
Leggero, 50, and actor Jason 
Ritter (John’s son) for the 
$1 million prize (ABC, 8 p.m.). 
Homicide: Life on the Street 
was an NBC series that ran from 
1993-1998. The Boston Globe
noted: “It added grit, wit and a 
dose of realism to the network 
police procedural.” For decades, 
a dispute about the rights to 
the show’s music prevented any 
“encore” showings. That dispute 
finally ended, and all seven 
seasons will begin streaming on 
Peacock on Aug. 19. 
Homicide was based on 
reporting by David Simon, 

then a Baltimore newspaper 
writer. Simon, now 64, went 
on to create and write the hit 
HBO series The Wire. His wife, 
Laura Lippman, 65 (who had a 
Jewish grandfather), was also a 
Baltimore news reporter and her 
novel, Lady in the Lake, is now 
an Apple TV+ series of the same 
name. It stars Natalie Portman. 
The large Homicide cast 
included Yaphet Kotto (1938-
2021) and Richard Belzer (1944-
2023). Kotto, who played police 
lieutenant Giradello, was an 
African American Jew. Kotto’s 
father was born Jewish, and his 
mother converted to Judaism. 
Belzer played police detective 
John Munch (a Jewish cop). 
After Homicide, Belzer played 
Munch in 15 seasons of Law and 
Order: SVU.
The trailer for A Complete 
Unknown, a bio-pic about Bob 
Dylan, was released a couple 
of weeks ago. The film, which 
covers Dylan from 1961-65, will 
open in December. Timothée 
Chalamet, who plays Dylan, 
sang part of the famous Dylan 
song “A Hard Rain’s Gonna Fall” 
in the trailer. Like most critics, I 
thought Chalamet did as good 
as anyone has done imitating 
Dylan’s singing voice. Also, 
some very good make-up was 

done on Chalamet. He looks 
more like Dylan than Chalamet 
“really” does — but the make-up 
is subtle, not something weird 
like Bradley Cooper’s “Bernstein 
nose” in Maestro. 
A few weeks ago, it was 
reported that Chalamet, 27, 
was in final negotiations to play 
Marty Reisman (1930-2012), 
a top professional ping-pong 
player, in a film titled Marty 
Supreme. Josh Safdie, 40, 
co-wrote the film and he is set 
to direct. (Like Dylan, Reisman 
was quite quirky, but not 
meshugah.)
More Chalamet news: He 
was the central subject of a 
long article in the Telegraph, a 
Brit paper (Aug. 2). Right now, 
top fashion companies have a 
lot more money to spend on 
advertising than movie studios. 
They are hiring top directors to 
direct “mini-movie” slick ads, 
and they are hiring top actors to 
appear in these ads. 
Chalamet was just paid 
$35 million(!) to appear in a 
90-second Chanel “mini-movie” 
ad directed by Martin Scorsese. 
The Telegraph says $35 million 
was more than all the fees, 
combined, that Chalamet has 
received for his film roles. 

NATE BLOOM COLUMNIST

CELEBRITY NEWS
ARTS&LIFE

MINGLEMEDIATVNETWORK 

Maya Rudolph
Natasha Leggero

PINECONEWAR206 

Timothée Chalamet

YOUTUBE.COM/@HOLLYWOODFILMACADEMY