Casting director and producer Don Phillips, who helped launch the careers of such actors as Sean Penn, Matthew McConaughey and Mary Steenburgen, passed away on Thanksgiving Day from natural causes. He would have turned 81 on Dec. 21.
Phillips received his first break when he landed an entry-level job in the casting department of filmmaker Otto Preminger’s 1971 movie Such Good Friends. Impressed by Phillips, Preminger took an ad in Variety and Backstage to praise the novice’s work on the film.
The acknowledgement led to Phillips getting hired to do extras casting on Sidney Lumet’s Serpico starring Al Pacino with his job subsequently expanding to casting the entire film. Lumet then tapped him as casting director on his next film, Dog Day Afternoon, also starring Pacino. Phillips is credited with holding out for actor John Cazale to be cast opposite Pacino as Sal.
Phillips went on to cast the cult...
Phillips received his first break when he landed an entry-level job in the casting department of filmmaker Otto Preminger’s 1971 movie Such Good Friends. Impressed by Phillips, Preminger took an ad in Variety and Backstage to praise the novice’s work on the film.
The acknowledgement led to Phillips getting hired to do extras casting on Sidney Lumet’s Serpico starring Al Pacino with his job subsequently expanding to casting the entire film. Lumet then tapped him as casting director on his next film, Dog Day Afternoon, also starring Pacino. Phillips is credited with holding out for actor John Cazale to be cast opposite Pacino as Sal.
Phillips went on to cast the cult...
- 11/27/2021
- by Nellie Andreeva
- Deadline Film + TV
Joan Micklin Silver, who forged her own way as a female director in the 1970s and ’80s and helmed seven features including “Crossing Delancey” and “Hester Street,” died Thursday in Manhattan. She was 85.
Her daughter, Claudia Silver, told the New York Times the cause was vascular dementia.
The 1975 independent film “Hester Street” was the story of a Jewish immigrant couple in the 1890s. The low-budget black and white film, in Yiddish with English subtitles, proved a hard sell to studios, and was eventually financed by her husband, real estate developer Raphael D. Silver. It won rave reviews and earned $5 million at the box office, an impressive amount at the time. The 21-year old Carol Kane was nominated for a best actress Oscar for her role as the wife, Gitl.
The 1988 romantic comedy “Crossing Delancey” was also set in Manhattan’s Lower East Side Jewish community. Starring Amy Irving, Sylvia Miles and Peter Riegert,...
Her daughter, Claudia Silver, told the New York Times the cause was vascular dementia.
The 1975 independent film “Hester Street” was the story of a Jewish immigrant couple in the 1890s. The low-budget black and white film, in Yiddish with English subtitles, proved a hard sell to studios, and was eventually financed by her husband, real estate developer Raphael D. Silver. It won rave reviews and earned $5 million at the box office, an impressive amount at the time. The 21-year old Carol Kane was nominated for a best actress Oscar for her role as the wife, Gitl.
The 1988 romantic comedy “Crossing Delancey” was also set in Manhattan’s Lower East Side Jewish community. Starring Amy Irving, Sylvia Miles and Peter Riegert,...
- 1/2/2021
- by Pat Saperstein
- Variety Film + TV
Joan Micklin Silver, the director of films like “Crossing Delancy,” “Hester Street,” and “Between the Lines” died on Thursday at the age of 85, The New York Times reports. Her daughter, Claudia Silver, told the paper that the cause of death was vascular dementia. In addition to Claudia, Silver’s survivors include two other daughters, Dina and Marisa Silver; a sister, Renee; and five grandchildren. Her long-time husband, Raphael D. Silver, died at age 83 in 2013 after a skiing accident in Park City, Utah.
An indie pioneer who first got her start writing a series of educational films for companies like Encyclopedia Britannica and the Learning Corporation of America in the 1970s, Silver was long aware of the barriers that would likely prevent her from entering into the male-dominated filmmaking milieu.
And yet the Omaha native soon made her own opportunities, including writing and directing her first film, the low-budget drama 1975 “Hester Street.
An indie pioneer who first got her start writing a series of educational films for companies like Encyclopedia Britannica and the Learning Corporation of America in the 1970s, Silver was long aware of the barriers that would likely prevent her from entering into the male-dominated filmmaking milieu.
And yet the Omaha native soon made her own opportunities, including writing and directing her first film, the low-budget drama 1975 “Hester Street.
- 1/1/2021
- by Kate Erbland
- Indiewire
The great Saul Bass—to my mind the greatest graphic designer of the 20th century—was born 100 years ago today, on May 8, 1920. In over a decade of writing about movie posters I’ve only really written about Bass once—in an article about the evolution of designs for Vertigo—which is surprising because he was undoubtedly the first poster designer I ever knew the name of, and of the six movie posters hanging in my apartment two are by Bass: those for Seconds and The Man With the Golden Arm. Saul Bass is just too well known, and has been written about so widely, that I never felt I had much to add to the discussion. And when Jennifer Bass and Pat Kirkham’s extraordinary Saul Bass: A Life in Film & Design was published in 2011 there seemed little more left to say.But I can’t let this centenary pass unremarked.
- 5/21/2020
- MUBI
By Todd Garbarini
Laemmle’s Royal Theatre in Los Angeles will be presenting a DVD screening of the 45th anniversary of Herbert Ross’s 1973 thriller The Last of Sheila. The 120-minute film, which stars Richard Benjamin, Dyan Cannon, James Coburn, Joan Hackett, James Mason, Ian McShane and Raquel Welch, will be screened on Wednesday, November 28th, 2018 at 7:00 pm.
Please Note: At press time, actress Dyan Cannon, who plays Christine, is scheduled to participate in a Q&A after the screening. Please Check Back With The Royal Theatre’S Website For Updates Of Additional Guests Who May Be Added To The List.
From the press release:
The Last Of Sheila (1973)
45th Anniversary Screening
Q&A with Co-Star Dyan Cannon
Wednesday, November 28, at 7 Pm
Laemmle’s Royal Theatre
Following our sold-out screening of 'Death on the Nile,' Laemmle Theatres and the Anniversary Classics Series present another treat for mystery lovers.
Laemmle’s Royal Theatre in Los Angeles will be presenting a DVD screening of the 45th anniversary of Herbert Ross’s 1973 thriller The Last of Sheila. The 120-minute film, which stars Richard Benjamin, Dyan Cannon, James Coburn, Joan Hackett, James Mason, Ian McShane and Raquel Welch, will be screened on Wednesday, November 28th, 2018 at 7:00 pm.
Please Note: At press time, actress Dyan Cannon, who plays Christine, is scheduled to participate in a Q&A after the screening. Please Check Back With The Royal Theatre’S Website For Updates Of Additional Guests Who May Be Added To The List.
From the press release:
The Last Of Sheila (1973)
45th Anniversary Screening
Q&A with Co-Star Dyan Cannon
Wednesday, November 28, at 7 Pm
Laemmle’s Royal Theatre
Following our sold-out screening of 'Death on the Nile,' Laemmle Theatres and the Anniversary Classics Series present another treat for mystery lovers.
- 11/26/2018
- by nospam@example.com (Cinema Retro)
- Cinemaretro.com
Two weeks ago I wrote about Film Forum’s retrospective of New York in the 70s and collected all the Polish posters I could find for the best known films in the series. This week I want to concentrate on the films which are less well known and whose one sheets are maybe less iconic yet no less interesting. The 70s was a great period in American movie poster design. The illustrative style of classic Hollywood was out and instead a new reliance on photographs and, especially, type. The one thing that strikes me about the posters below is how heavily they rely on explanatory text and taglines (“Watch the landlord get his”...“Their story is written on his arm”...“If you steal $100,000 from the mob, it’s not robbery. It’s suicide”...“The tush scene alone is worth the price of admission”). The only two posters here that feature...
- 6/30/2017
- MUBI
Olive Films releases classics old and new (but mostly old) on a monthly basis, and it’s not uncommon to find pockets of a theme at times — same actors, similar genre, etc. — and their selection of titles that hit shelves this week are no different. The seven films can be broken into two groups as four of them are film noir examples from the late ’40s and early ’50s, and the three more recent titles are all directed by Otto Preminger. My exposure to both is not nearly as deep as I’d like, so these offered up a great sampling of the noir genre and Preminger’s resume. Three of the films are genuinely fantastic, but none of the seven seem to enjoy wide popularity — this is somewhat baffling when you look at the powerhouse casts including the likes of Alan Ladd, Charlton Heston, Burt Lancaster, William Holden, Michael Caine and others. Keep...
- 12/24/2014
- by Rob Hunter
- FilmSchoolRejects.com
New Year's Potpourri week continues at Trailers from Hell with screenwriter Larry Karaszewski introducing cult director Curtis Harington's "What's the Matter with Helen?" Writer Henry Farrell ushered in the horror-hag genre with Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?, but this later iteration went into production with the title The Best of Friends, only to be changed when judged too close to the Otto Preminger movie Such Good Friends. Cult director Curtis Harrington's stylish period production suffered from the usual studio interference, but its gothic black humor has earned it a place in the hearts of diva fans.
- 1/2/2013
- by Trailers From Hell
- Thompson on Hollywood
Moviefone's New Release Pick of the Week "Brave" What's It About? Pixar's latest feature tells the story of Princess Merida, a headstrong- archery-loving teenager, living in feudal Scotland, whose desire to carve out her own fate and go against her parent's wishes for betrothal sets her on a magic adventure. See It Because: "Brave" is rich in both visual splendor and charming characters. And despite it being a completely new story, it sits perfectly alongside other timeless childhood fairy tales. Merida is an adorable and plucky heroine for young audiences, and the movie's simple message of responsibility makes this a great viewing experience for the entire family (but especially mothers and daughters). (Also Available on Amazon Instant Video | Netflix ) Moviefone's Blu-ray Release of the Week "Lawrence of Arabia" What's It About? Peter O'Toole's most iconic role -- as the real-life famed British army office -- sets him in the...
- 11/13/2012
- by Eric Larnick
- Moviefone
"Margot Benacerraf, now in her 80s, only ever made one feature-length film," begins Josef Braun, "but that film remains so extraordinary, so very nearly singular, that it merits an admiration on par with many more prolific and esteemed bodies of work. After studying and gathering numerous influential allies in France and elsewhere, Benacerraf returned to her native Venezuela, specifically to an island no one had heard of, though when was discovered by the Spanish 450 years earlier it was deemed a sort of paradise on account of its abundance of one resource: salt, as valuable back then as gold. We can see the ruins of colonial fortresses erected to protect the island and its salt marshes, once the center of piracy in the Caribbean, during the prologue of Araya (1959). But historical context quickly gives way to the seeming timelessness of hard labour, to Benacerraf's lyrical approach to depicting the life of a community that was,...
- 5/17/2011
- MUBI
A couple of weeks ago there was a lot of buzz about the fact that this rare teaser poster (the only one known to be in existence) for the 1935 The Bride of Frankenstein was poised to break the world record for the sale of a movie poster. The record, held since 2005, was for one of four known copies of a 1927 German poster for Metropolis, which sold at London’s Reel Poster Gallery for $690,000. Prior to that the record had been held for 8 years by a poster for the 1932 The Mummy sold in auction at Sotheby’s in New York for $453,500. (The third highest selling poster of all time, for the record, is also Metropolis). It was hoped that the Bride poster would fetch over $700,000 at Heritage Auctions in Beverly Hills (Heritage, based out of Dallas, handles 70 percent of the world's movie poster auction sales) but it failed to reach its...
- 11/26/2010
- MUBI
By Aaron Hillis
Journalist, novelist, essayist and all-around elegant wordsmith Joan Didion won the National Book Award in 2005 for "The Year of Magical Thinking," a memoir and instant classic about the year following the death of her husband John Gregory Dunne. With her late partner, Didion co-wrote such screenplays as "True Confessions," "Up Close & Personal" and "A Star is Born" (the Babs version, naturally), as well as the best of the lot, an adaptation of James Mills' novel "The Panic in Needle Park." Released in 1971, director Jerry Schatzberg's stark, moving, gorgeously photographed drama refers to the triangular Manhattan intersection at Broadway and 72nd Street -- now dubbed Sherman Square, but then a hotbed for heroin junkies. A brilliant but at the time unknown Al Pacino stars as a small-time pusher who falls for smacked-out Midwesterner Kitty Winn (who won the Best Actress award at Cannes for her role...
Journalist, novelist, essayist and all-around elegant wordsmith Joan Didion won the National Book Award in 2005 for "The Year of Magical Thinking," a memoir and instant classic about the year following the death of her husband John Gregory Dunne. With her late partner, Didion co-wrote such screenplays as "True Confessions," "Up Close & Personal" and "A Star is Born" (the Babs version, naturally), as well as the best of the lot, an adaptation of James Mills' novel "The Panic in Needle Park." Released in 1971, director Jerry Schatzberg's stark, moving, gorgeously photographed drama refers to the triangular Manhattan intersection at Broadway and 72nd Street -- now dubbed Sherman Square, but then a hotbed for heroin junkies. A brilliant but at the time unknown Al Pacino stars as a small-time pusher who falls for smacked-out Midwesterner Kitty Winn (who won the Best Actress award at Cannes for her role...
- 1/28/2009
- by Aaron Hillis
- ifc.com
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