Along with acting and being a new mom, Eva Mendesis also a fashion designer, and in an interview with Violet Grey she talked about her design aesthetics. On discussing her holiday collection for New York & Company, Mendes said she loves creating dresses that make “women feel beautiful.”
The photo shoot for the Violet Grey article took place at the Hollywood’s TCL Chinese Theater (previously known as Mann’s Chinese Theater), with Mendes wearing designs from her own collection.
“When I am designing with my partners I try to think about the woman I’m designing for, where she’s going, what her life is like,” said Mendes during the interview. “that’s why I don’t design jeans or many pants. I think the easiest way to make a woman look beautiful is to put her in a dress that fits her properly.”
The Coral Clusters Maria Dress worn by Eva Mendes is available for purchase and online the first week of December for $99.95.  To check out the Eva Mendes Collection for New York & Company, please go to their official site.
Filmmaker Richard Linklater (Boyhood, Before Midnight, Me and Orson Welles) will be honored with the Sonny Bono Visionary Award at the 26th annual Palm Springs International Film Festival (PSIFF).
Previous honorees include directors Quentin Tarantino, Danny Boyle, Tom Hooper, and Michel Hazanavicius. Mary Hart will host the Awards Gala on Saturday, January 3 at the Palm Springs Convention Center. The PSIFF runs January 2-12.
Boyhood, which Linklater shot over 12 years with actors Ethan Hawke, Patricia Arquette and newcomer Ellar Coltrane, centers on a youth’s (Coltrane) turbulent yet gradually revelatory childhood.
Linklater who has received Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar nominations for Before Sunset and Before Midnight, also directed Tape, School of Rock, Waking Life, Slacker, and Dazed and Confused. Along with his filmmaking career, Linklater is also the Artistic Director for the Austin Film Society, which he founded back in 1985.
For more info on the fest, please call 760-322-2930 or 800-898-7526. PSIFF’s official site is: www.psfilmfest.org.
Director Susan Seidelman‘s cinematic heyday, at least from an outsider’s perspective, were the 1980s, when she helmed such engaging narratives as Making Mr. Right, Cookie, She-Devil, and my personal favorite from her body of work – Desperately Seeking Susan.
But filmmaking is a continuing, ever expanding process, and it’s great to see Seidelman still working behind the camera (she directed 2013 release The Hot Flashes with Brooke Shields).
The DVD for Seidelman’s feature Musical Chairs is also available for purchase in all regions through Amazon.com.  The boilerplate for Musical Chairs is as follows:
“Set against the exciting backdrop of competitive ballroom dancing, MUSICAL CHAIRS is about Armando (E.J. Bonilla) a Bronx-bred Latino who aspires to be a dancer but whose only way in is as a handyman at a Manhattan dance studio, and Mia (Leah Pipes), an Upper East Side princess who is the studio’s star performer. Though worlds apart, their shared passion for dance promises to bring them together until a tragic accident changes Mia’s life forever, and she finds herself wheelchair-bound at a rehab facility, with her dreams of a dance career shattered. Fortunately, Armando has enough dreams for both of them and, when he hears about a wheelchair ballroom dance competition that will soon be held in NY, he sees a way to return something to Mia that she thinks is lost forever.”Â
To purchase the offical DVD of Musical Chairs via Amazon, please go to: http://amzn.to/1wvz0rC
Country duo Big & Rich will be honored with the 2014 AutoZone Liberty Bowl’s Outstanding Achievement Award. The award is given to artists who have excelled in the music/entertainment industry and have provided service to to the community.
The pair receive the award at the President’s Gala on December 28 at the Peabody Hotel (Memphis, Tennessee). Past honorees include Danny Thomas, Elvis Presley, B.B. King, Lou Rawls, Clint Black, Little Richard, Alabama, The Beach Boys, LeAnn Rimes, The O’Jays, KC & The Sunshine Band and The Temptations.
Years into their partnership Big & Rich  continue to flourish thanks to the smash success of their latest album Gravity. The album features a a bevy of catchy tracks, including my personal favorite from the collection – “Look At You.”
Big & Rich will also perform at the AutoZone Liberty Bowl’s halftime show, which takes place December 29 (the game starts at 1 pm). For more info on the AutoZone Liberty Bowl President’s Gala and the AutoZone Liberty Bowl Football Classic, please call  (901) 795-7700 or head to http://www.autozonelibertybowl.org/.
A teaser trailer for Jurassic World has been released by Universal Pictures. The project, starring Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard, Judy Greer, and Jake Johnson, hits theaters June 12, 2015. Johnson, who starred this year in the hit film Let’s Be Cops, previously worked with Jurassic World director Colin Trevorrow in the first rate 2012 feature Safety Not Guaranteed.
The movie’s full length trailer debuts on Thanksgiving during an NBC night of football (6 pm pt) as the Seattle Seahawks take on the San Francisco 49ers.
Thought it runs barely twenty seconds, the teaser gives us a foreboding tone, as evidenced by its haunting sampling of John Williams‘ score and the somber visages of Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard.
You can watch the teaser trailer by checking out today’s Tweet from Universal Pictures:
Although it’s accurate to describe The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part I as a disappointment, those expectations should be tempered considering it is: A) The #1 movie in this weekend and B) It made a whopping $123 million!
The first two Hunger Games films opened up substantially better with a weekend debut take of $152 and $158 million, and maybe the oft-used phrase “sequel fatigue” may apply to the franchise. Still, Mockingjay dominated the rest of the competition, with Big Hero 6 a million miles behind with a $20.1 million haul. Here’s the top 10:
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 –Â Katniss Everdeen’s arrows still hit the mark. $123 million
Big Hero 6 – One of this year’s finest films, Big Hero 6 took in $20.1 million. Domestically, it’s reached over $135.7 million.
Interstellar – Dad and daughter space opera from Christopher Nolan makes $15.1 million. To date, it’s grossed $120.69 million stateside.
Dumb and Dumber To – $13.8 million
Gone Girl – $2.815 million
Beyond The Lights – $2.63 million
St. Vincent – $1.9 million
Fury – $1.9 million and with just $79.15 earned domestically, this WWII tank film has been a slight disappointment for Sony.
Birdman – $1.855 million
The Theory of Everything – $2.79 million, but it’s per screen average of $10,700 bodes well for the film’s theatrical longevity.
Bree Turner’s role as Rosalee Calvert was initially set for a couple of episodes, but thankfully Rosalee has been an integral member of Grimm’s diverse and unpredictable universe.
One of the main focuses of this season has been the loss of Nick’s (David Giuntoli) powers, but Turner also hinted at darker elements that may affect the marriage between Rosalee and Monroe (Silas Weir Mitchell).
During the interview, Turner also gave a preview tonight’s episode, “Cry Luison,” which features a pretty dapper Wesen. Grimm airs Fridays on NBC at 9 pm et/pt.
How have the fans reacted to Nick losing his powers?
I think the fans are ready for him to get his powers back – for sure. Grimm Nick (David Giuntoli) is a badass Nick. I think it’s been a really cool twist to start off the season in a more internal drama fashion. Rather than last year’s zombies craziness – it’s been more of a slow burn. It felt very appropriate for season four.
But tonight’s episode kicks off the old school Grimm energy and from tonight on, each week it gets more and more intense and dramatic. And serious.
We are getting back to dark, serious, season one Grimm which I think fans will be really excited about.
On your Twitter handle (@RealBreeTurner), you mentioned how much you love tonight’s episode.
Yes. We sink back into what Grimm’s really good at, which is getting the gang together (laughs) and Monroe’s out in the field tonight with the boys. I’m more in the spice shop doing what I do best and the Wesen tonight is a very smooth, sophisticated Wesen. Most of (them) are pretty aggressive and pretty gnarly (but) tonight’s Wesen has a smooth element. It’s more of a GQ Wesen tonight.
GRIMM — “Cry Luison” Pictured: Mark Bloom as The Wolf — (Photo by: Scott Green/NBC)
Are you excited to see where Rosalee and Monroe are headed with their relationship?
Oh yeah. Tonight’s episode 5 and we’re in the middle of shooting episode 12 – so we’re quite a bit ahead. Where Rosalee and Monroe’s (Silas Weir Mitchell) storyline is going – (it’s) predominantly focused on (the events surrounding) the Wolfsangel brick through our window and those two men in masks from last week. That storyline gets so crazy and so scary.
It’s some of the most satisfying character stuff we’ve been able to do on the whole series. I’m really excited to get in all that.
Four seasons in, it’s great to know that Grimm is still going in unexpected and surprising directions creatively and thematically.
I’ve never done a fantasy show like this before, and what’s so fun about it is we get our scripts very close to when we shoot them. So I don’t know what’s happening (for Rosalee). It’s like real life – I get the script and “oh, this is happening” or “oh, I hadn’t realized that had happened in my past!”
I think we’re able to get away with a lot of social commentary on our show without being heavy handed. The issues between Rosalee and Monroe, having it be an inter-species marriage – that can touch upon interracial marriages, inter-belief marriages. We can really talk about things without actually having to talk about them which is cool. You can really get away with a lot.
http://youtu.be/0YdljSGj3gk
GRIMM — Season: 4 — Pictured: Bree Turner as Rosalee Calvert — (Photo by: Chris Haston/NBC)
This Friday’s @NBCGrimm is one of my favorite scripts. It begins the bullet train of momentum to our mid season finale. #GetReady
As evidenced from his work as Reggie Ledoux in True Detective or Chas in Constantine, Charles Halford is an actor who fills the room. Presence is something you’re born with and is probably hard to develop even after years of scene study, and Halford brings those innate talents to Constantine.
Comic book fans know the ins and outs of Chas Chandler from the Hellblazer comics, but initiates to the TV series simply know the protagonist as Constantine’s loyal (and apparently hard to kill) right hand man.
We’ll get into what Halford said about Chas’ development in a future post, but for now here is what he had to say about the show’s state of the state and tonight’s “hands on deck” episode, ‘Danse Vaudou’ (airing on NBC, 10 pm et/pt).
CONSTANTINE — “Danse Vaudou” Charles Halford as Chas  — (Photo by: Tina Rowden/NBC)
Note:Â Charles Halford will also be live tweeting during tonight’s episode – his Twitter handle is: @Charlie_Halford.
Can you talk about the quality of the writing on the show ? The characters definitely leap off the page.
I’m having a great time. And I think the show’s developing really, really well. The characters are interesting to me because a lot of it is based on Constantine (Matt Ryan). It’s a show about the man and the myth and the legendary magician. In the Hellblazer comics, the property that the show’s based on, he’s on every panel of every issue.
In this show, Matt Ryan has such an amazing workload and he’s just been really impressive to work with. And all the surrounding characters bring different aspects to John’s (world). As the season develops, we get into everybody else’s back stories and it’s this slow rollout of these characters. You’re thrown into a world that you’ll soon find out about.
Tonight’s episode is really action packed. Last week’s (installment) was one of my favorite episodes.
There’s bad stuff going down in New Orleans and not the normal bad stuff that goes down in New Orleans (laughs) – (it’s) the unnatural sort.
Another cool thing about tonight is you meet Jim Corrigan (Emmett Scanlan)Â who, as comic book fans know, eventually becomes a character named The Spectre. He’s a law enforcement officer who John ends up allying (with) in our story because he’s sentimental to the supernatural world – which he also becomes exposed to tonight.
So we head down there and the only way for John to solve the case, especially with the push back from the law, is to (team up) with Papa Midnite who two weeks ago left him to bleed out, tied to a bench, in a warehouse (laughs).
That’s a really cool relationship too, as well as in the comics – these guys would just as soon slit each other’s throats but they have respect for each other’s magical abilities. They operate in the same world – but differently. There are times when they have to play nice, but the second they have the chance to take the other one out – they probably would.
You get a little bit of that team effort – that’s another thing that’s cool about tonight’s episode is that it requires all hands on deck to get the job done and save the most lives as possible. It’s a fun episode and there’s some pretty good spins on urban legends.
CONSTANTINE — “Danse Vaudou” — Pictured: (l-r) Emmett Scanlan as Jim Corrigan, Matt Ryan as John Constantine, Charles Halford as Chas, Angelica Celaya as Zed Martin — (Photo by: Tina Rowden/NBC)
One of the advantages of Constantine is being able to sift through a ton of excellent material from the comics.
That’s another thing I really like about the writing on the show. We have this incredibly rich source material with the Hellblazer comic books and every person on board is a fan (of the comics). Our end desire is to have a proper, serialized arc.
We’re just trying to get our feet wet and get the characters and the world established right now. But what’s great about it is that you can have these urban legend stories (as well as) just a lot of human stories. We can tap into that Hellblazer world.
Last week’s episode (“A Feast of Friends”) was issues #1 and #2 of Hellblazer. (It) was my first experience with the comics and to see it come to life – it’s just so cool in the vein of the comics to see Gary Lester (Jonjo O’Neill) in the flesh . . . it’s a bit of a dream come true to get to play in this world on a weekly basis.
Paramore will release Paramore: Self-Titled Deluxe on November 24, and the expanded digital edition contains a new version of “Hate To See Your Heart Break.” The track contains duet vocals from former The Civil Wars member Joy Williams.
Also included is the never before released 2012 demo “Tell Me It’s Okay”, two bonus tracks “Escape Route” and “Native Tongue”, and 8 live tracks that were performed this summer at Denver’s Red Rocks Amphitheater.
Paramore’s Hayley Williams was recently named the first winner of Billboard’s “Trailblazer Award,” an honor that spotlights an artist who breaks from convention and inspires new talent to carve their own path. The Trailblazer Award is presented next month at the ninth annual Billboard Women in Music Awards, which takes place December 12 in New York City.
The track listing for Paramore: Self-Titled Deluxe is below:
Fast In My Car
Now
Grow Up
Daydreaming
interlude: Moving On
Ain’t It Fun
Part II
Last Hope
Still Into You
Anklebiters
interlude: Holiday
Proof
Hate To See Your Heart Break
(One Of Those) Crazy Girls
interlude: I’m Not Angry Anymore
Be Alone
Future
BONUS MATERIAL
18. Â Hate To See Your Heart Break (feat. Joy Williams)
19. Â Escape Route (Bonus Track)
20. Â Native Tongue (Bonus Track)
21.  Tell Me It’s Okay (Self-Titled Demo)
22. Â Still Into You (Live at Red Rocks)
23. Â Decode (Live at Red Rocks)
24. Â The Only Exception (Live at Red Rocks)
25. Â Â Brick by Boring Brick (Live at Red Rocks)
26. Â Â Let the Flames Begin (Live at Red Rocks)
27. Â Â Part II (Live at Red Rocks)
28. Â Â Proof (Live at Red Rocks)
29. Â Â Ain’t It Fun (Live at Red Rocks)
Opening December 5, Wild stars Oscar winner Reese Witherspoon (Walk the Line) as Cheryl Strayed, a woman who hikes over a thousand miles on the Pacific Crest Trail on a journey of self-discovery. Laura Dern co-stars on as Cheryl’s mother Bobbi.
The picture, based on Cheryl Strayed’s bestselling memoir, is directed by Dallas Buyers Club filmmaker Jean-Marc Vallee. This should be the second year of awards consideration for Vallee, as Wild is getting tons of Oscar buzz, especially for Witherspoon’s performance.
Fox Searchlight
Still, Wild isn’t just about a virtuoso performance from Witherspoon, as the actress talks about the joys of collaborating with her fellow filmmakers:
“That’s the thing about making a film. It’s not about one artist and what they want to accomplish. It’s a collaborative medium. We are only as good and connected as we feel to the central idea of what we’re trying to accomplish.
But (it’s) also what we bring to the table as our life experiences. It’s what enhances your work and it’s what connects you to the people you’re working with. So I think it’s hard when you don’t connect with people, which I’ve had that experience before and it’s really hard.”
Click on the media bar below to hear the audio version of Witherspoon’s answer:
