Liev Schreiber to Star in Showtime Pilot 'Ray Donovan'

George Harrison, acclaimed singer, songwriter, guitarist and founding member of one of the world's most famous pop groups, the Beatles, died 10 years ago today at age 58.our editor recommendsPaul McCartney, Ringo Starr Hit London Premiere of Martin Scorseses George Harrison Doc'George Harrison: Living in the Material World': What the Critics Are Saying (Video)TRAILER: George Harrison: Living in the Material World Harrison lost a years long battle with lung cancer in 2001 but his life was also threatened in 1999 when he was stabbed by an intruder at his home in at Henley-on-Thames in Oxfordshire. STORY: George Harrison's Life Was Transformed By India, Says Olivia Harrison The former Beatle, who met his fellow band members John Lennon, Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr where they grew up in Liverpool, was just 27 when the band split in 1970.They managed to conquer the world musically, achieving 27 number one records in the UK and the US during their career.Their most recent album,1, compiling all of the band's number one hits, topped both the UK and the US charts in 2000. REVIEW: 'George Harrison: Living in the Material World' Harrison's post-Beatles career started with the critically acclaimed solo album All Things Must Pass. His role as a film producer took off when he launched HandMade Films with business partner Denis O'Brien in 1978, producing Monty Python's Life of Brian in 1979.He was also responsible for The Long Good Friday, Time Bandits, Mona Lisa and Withnail & I. This year, director Martin Scorsese made Harrison the subject of an HBO documentary, Living in the Material World, borrowing the title from the name of Harrison's 1973 solo album. In the 1980s Harrison teamed up with Jeff Lynne, Bob Dylan, Tom Petty and Roy Orbison as The Travelling Wilburys. The supergroup's debut album sold more than 3 million copies in the US. Watch the Wilburys' 1988 hit "Handle With Care" along with four more musical moments from the Harrison archive below. "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" (1968) Eric Clapton played the guitar solo on this Harrison-penned Beatles classic. It was inspired, Harrison said in interviews, by the I Ching, a book of eastern philosophy that he was immersing himself with at the time. The 2006 Love remix features a string arrangement by Beatles producer George Martin. "Here Comes The Sun" (1969) During a trying year during which Harrison was arrested for marijuana possession and the band was increasingly involved in business affairs came one of the Beatles most popular songs, "HereComes the Sun" from the albumAbbey Road. "My Sweet Lord" (1970) Harrison's first post-Beatles single, it reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in December 1970 and stayed there for four weeks. With references to Jewish, Christian and Hindu prayers, it features Eric Clapton on guitar,Billy Preston on piano,Klaus Voormann on bass andRingo Starr on drums. Shortly after it was released, a copyright infringement suit followed claiming that it lifted a melody from the Chiffons' hit "He's So Fine." The case dragged for10 years with a U.S. district court finding that Harrison had "subconsciously" copied the earlier song. The Concert for Bangladesh(1972) Harrison organized two benefit concerts and played to a total of 40,000 people at Madison Square Garden in NY City. The purpose: to fund relief efforts for refugees from East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) following the 1970 Bhola cyclone and atrocities during the Bangladesh Liberation War. Joining Harrison on the bill were performers Ravi Shankar, Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Billy Preston, Leon Russell, Badfinger, and Ringo Starr. "Handle With Care" (1988) In the late 1980s, Harrison was one-fifth of pop-rock supergroup Traveling Wilburys, which included legendary artists Bob Dylan, Jeff Lynne, Roy Orbison and Tom Petty, accompanied by drummer Jim Keltner. The band recorded two albums in 1988 and 1990, though Orbison died just after their debut was finished, and saw two modest hits, 1988's "Handle With Care" and "End of the Line." Twitter: @shirleyhalperin Related Topics The Beatles

Charlotte Church Says She Was 'Pressured' Into Waiving Fee for Singing At Rupert Murdoch's 1999 Wedding.

LONDON - Charlotte Church, the singer who was just thirteen when she sang Pie Jesu at Rupert Murdoch's 1999 wedding to Wendi Deng, told the Leveson Inquiry that she had been "pressured" into waiving her $165,000 fee in order to guarantee "good press" from News International in the future.our editor recommendsCNN's Piers Morgan to Be Called to Leveson Inquiry to Explain Comments on Phone HackingNew Shocking Details of 'News of the World' Hacking Operation Revealed At Leveson InquiryHugh Grant Accuses 'The Mail on Sunday' of Phone HackingCEO Rupert Murdoch Sells Block of Non-Voting News Corp. SharesAnother Investor Refuses to Support James Murdoch's Re-Election at BSkyB PHOTOS: News of the World's Top 10 Scandals Church, who gave evidence on oath at the Inquiry into press standards and behavior Monday, said she had been advised by her management and record company to sing for the media mogul for free because of Murdoch's power and influence. "I remember being told that [there would be] the offer of money or the offer of the favor, in order, basically, to get good press," she told the Inquiry, adding that she and her mother had been mystified as to why anyone would trade the offer of so much money for good press, she told the Inquiry. PHOTOS: Hollywood's Memorable Mea Culpas "I remember being 13 and thinking 'why would anyone take a favor over £100,000?' ...but I was being advised by my management and certain member of the record company that he was a very, very powerful man and could certainly do with a favor of this magnitude." In her witness statement Church had said "Despite my teenage business head screaming 'think how many Tamagotchis you could buy!' I was pressured into the latter option. But the strategy failed. In fact Mr Murdoch's newspaper's have since been some of the worst offenders, so much so that I have sometimes felt there has actually been a deliberate agenda." STORY: Daily Mail Accused of 'Intimidating' Hugh Grant After the Actor's Leveson Testimony News International has denied any suggestion that such an offer was made and said that the singer's appearance had been planned as a "surprise" for the News Corp CEO and his new bride. But Church told the Inquiry she had a different recollection and that the specifics of what she was to sing had been negotiated with Murdoch and that it was Murdoch who made the specific request for Pie Jesu. STORY: Steve Coogan Calls For Greater Rights of Privacy, Tells Leveson Inquiry: 'I Have Never Wanted to Be Famous' "When we raised the point that Pie Jesu was a requiem, it was a funeral song...he (Murdoch) didn't care. He liked that song and he wanted me to sing it, so I did." The singer told the Leveson Inquiry that child stars such as herself needed special protection because of their youth and said she wanted to be able to protect her family and children from further press intrusion. PHOTO GALLERY: View Gallery The Rise of Rupert Murdoch Related Topics Rupert Murdoch News Corp. News International

Smashing Pumpkins' Billy Corgan Starts Wrestling Company

Shareif Ziyadat/ABC On a quiet Thanksgiving evening, specials, movies and repeats ruled the roost on Thursday evening. The highest-profile program airing on primetime was Lady Gaga's much-anticipated (and hyped) 90-minute Thanksgiving special, which the singer conceived and directed herself. Featuring a slew of performances (one with Tony Bennett) and an interview wtih Katie Couric, A Very Gaga Thanksgiving (5.5 million total viewers, 1.6 rating in adults 18-49 demographic) proved to be beneficial for ABC, boosting the network's time period performance from last year (when it aired a Beyonce music special) by 23 percent in the core adults 18-49 demo and drew more than 1 million more viewers. The 90-minute special helped ABC post its best Thanksgiving ratings since 2007. Charlie Brown Thanksgiving drew slightly more viewers at 8 p.m., luring 5.7 million and averaging a higher 1.8 rating. But, A Very Gaga Thanksgiving was not the highest-rated or most-watched program of the night. That honor goes to CBS, which dominates even with reruns of top-rated and most-watched The Big Bang Theory (11.2 million, 3.6) and Rules of Engagement (7.9 million, 2.4). An encore of Person of Interest (8 million, 1.7) topped the 9 p.m. hour and a rerun of The Mentalist (7.8 million, 1.5) also helped the network win in the demo (2.1) and total viewers (8.4 million). Fox followed CBS in the demo with a 1.7 demo average. ABC placed third with a 1.6 in primetime. NBC, airing Horton Hears a Who (3.7 million, 1.1), placed fourth. The CW followed. PHOTO GALLERY: View Gallery Lady Gaga's Fashion Forward Style TV Ratings

Casting Standout: 'The Girl Using the Dragon Tattoo'

Casting Standout: 'The Girl Using the Dragon Tattoo' By Jessica Gardner November 18, 2011 Photo by Columbia Pictures Director David Fincher and casting director Laray Mayfieldcollaborators on "The Social Networking," "The Curious Situation of Benjamin Button," "Fight Club," and "Zodiac"have partnered once again to tackle Fincher's much-anticipated adaptation from the novel "The Lady Using the Dragon Tattoo."Mayfield, who won an Artios Award in the Casting Society of America this past year for "The Social Networking," began speaking with Fincher concerning the casting from the new film in May 2010. "I had been both excited and overcome," she states about dealing with the highly anticipated project. To organize, she read all of the books in Stieg Larsson's trilogy. Then, to possess a reason for reference, she viewed this year's Swedish film version from the novel. "There's always a concern when there's pre-existing material," Mayfield states. But she highlights that Fincher was basing his film around the book, this is not on the prior movie: "David is really honorable towards the books, figures, and Sweden, and so i wasn't worried."Their central challenge was casting the primary character Lisbeth Salander, referred to within the books like a small-in-stature 24-year-old computer hacker having a photo taking memory, past violence, along with a tragic past. The role visited Rooney Mara. Apparently, nearly every female actor in Hollywood desired to play Lisbeth. However, producer Scott Rudin states Fincher's idea right from the start ended up being to cast a family member unknown, to ensure that audiences would take their own ideas about Lisbeth onto whomever was playing her. Fincher wanted "someone who we did not have history with," Rudin describes. "Brilliant people examined for this. I am talking about, lots of stars examined for it, and were fantastic, but there is something about Rooney. She am exciting inside it, and thus fresh, and completely unpredictable. The truth that we simply have no idea her that well managed to get, gave it a type of kinetic souped up that I believe most likely wouldn't have happened with someone else."Mayfield introduced Fincher to Mara throughout auditions for "The Social Networking," by which he cast her as Erica Albright. "David loved her on 'Social Network,' " states Rudin. "From the moment we began focusing on 'Dragon Tattoo,' I believe David always really wanted Rooney to experience it. In deference towards the scale from the decision, he experienced a really lengthy process and labored with lots of people and several times of shooting film teststests with sets, tests with costumes, hair, makeup, the entire deal. And That I think back in internet marketing now and i believe, 'Why did we all do all that whether it was going to become Rooney?' "Additionally to Lisbeth, Mayfield states, there have been a number of other casting challengesmainly the generational casting of countless roles cheap most of the figures are based on one another. "We required to make that credible," she states. Another challenge was casting the role of nasty Nils Bjurman, Lisbeth's legal protector, who terrible items to her. Nederlander actor Yorick van Wageningen ("The Way In WhichInch) submitted an audition tape from Europe. "He was fantastic," states the Compact disc. Later she was surprised to locate out how different van Wageningen was from his character. "After I met him personally, I melted. He's a stuffed animal."Mayfield states she's thrilled with the way the film switched out: "I'm always excited for audiences to determine everything David does." Casting Director: Laray MayfieldDirector: David FincherWriter: Steven Zaillian, in line with the novel by Stieg LarssonStarring: Difficulties, Rooney Mara, Stellan Skarsgrd, Christopher Plummer, Robin Wright, Yorick van WageningenThe Pitch: Journalist Mikael Blomkvist (Craig) seeks out a youthful computer hacker named Lisbeth Salander (Mara) to assist him in his visit a missing lady. Casting Standout: 'The Girl Using the Dragon Tattoo' By Jessica Gardner November 18, 2011 PHOTO CREDIT Columbia Pictures Director David Fincher and casting director Laray Mayfieldcollaborators on "The Social Networking," "The Curious Situation of Benjamin Button," "Fight Club," and "Zodiac"have partnered once more to tackle Fincher's much-anticipated adaptation from the novel "The Lady Using the Dragon Tattoo."Mayfield, who won an Artios Award in the Casting Society of America this past year for "The Social Networking," began speaking with Fincher concerning the casting from the new film in May 2010. "I had been both excited and overcome," she states about dealing with the long awaited project. To organize, she read all of the books in Stieg Larsson's trilogy. Then, to possess a reason for reference, she viewed this year's Swedish film version from the novel. "There's always an issue when there's pre-existing material," Mayfield states. But she highlights that Fincher was basing his film around the book, this is not on the prior movie: "David is really honorable towards the books, figures, and Sweden, and so i wasn't worried."Their central challenge was casting the primary character Lisbeth Salander, referred to within the books like a small-in-stature 24-year-old computer hacker having a photo taking memory, past violence, along with a tragic past. The role visited Rooney Mara. Apparently, virtually every female actor in Hollywood desired to play Lisbeth. However, producer Scott Rudin states Fincher's idea right from the start ended up being to cast a family member unknown, to ensure that audiences would take their own ideas about Lisbeth onto whomever was playing her. Fincher wanted "someone who we did not have history with," Rudin describes. "Brilliant people examined for this. I am talking about, lots of stars examined for this, and were fantastic, but there is something about Rooney. She am exciting inside it, and thus fresh, and completely unpredictable. The truth that we simply have no idea her that well managed to get, gave it a type of kinetic souped up that I believe most likely wouldn't have happened with someone else."Mayfield introduced Fincher to Mara throughout auditions for "The Social Networking," by which he cast her as Erica Albright. "David loved her on 'Social Network,' " states Rudin. "From the moment we began focusing on 'Dragon Tattoo,' I believe David always wanted Rooney to experience it. In deference towards the scale from the decision, he experienced a really lengthy process and labored with lots of people and several times of shooting film teststests with sets, tests with costumes, hair, makeup, the entire deal. And That I think back in internet marketing now and i believe, 'Why did we all do all that whether it was always likely to be Rooney?' "Additionally to Lisbeth, Mayfield states, there have been a number of other casting challengesmainly the generational casting of countless roles cheap most of the figures are based on each other. "We required to make that credible," she states. Another challenge was casting the role of nasty Nils Bjurman, Lisbeth's legal protector, who terrible items to her. Nederlander actor Yorick van Wageningen ("The Way In WhichInch) submitted an audition tape from Europe. "He was fantastic," states the Compact disc. Later she was surprised to discover how different van Wageningen was from his character. "In him personally, I melted. He's a stuffed animal."Mayfield states she's thrilled with the way the film switched out: "I'm always excited for audiences to determine everything David does." Casting Director: Laray MayfieldDirector: David FincherWriter: Steven Zaillian, in line with the novel by Stieg LarssonStarring: Difficulties, Rooney Mara, Stellan Skarsgrd, Christopher Plummer, Robin Wright, Yorick van WageningenThe Pitch: Journalist Mikael Blomkvist (Craig) seeks out a youthful computer hacker named Lisbeth Salander (Mara) to assist him in the visit a missing lady.

'Star Trek 2' To Feature Klingons, No Khan?

If this rains, it flows. Or at best such may be the situation with "Star Trek 2" gossips. After several weeks of silence around the approaching follow up, an entire slew of production particulars -- together with a shooting start date -- hit the net the 2009 week. Now comes a juicy new plot rumor from Think McFly Believe that the Klingons will have a prominent role within the follow up like a nomadic group of players leading to difficulties for the Federation while battling Tribbles. (Yes, Tribbles!) Also, they are saying there will not be any Khan within this flick. Obviously, none of the is proven by J.J. Abrams' camping, to help you either go or let it rest. Browse the relaxation of present day film news following the jump! John Williams Reteams With Steven Spielberg For "Lincoln subsequently" Great news, film score fans! Based on Variety, John Williams is going to be creating Steven Spielberg's approaching biopic "Lincoln subsequently." Williams and Spielberg have lengthy been creative partners, and also have lately teamed on "The Adventures of Tintin" and "War Equine." It will likely be exciting to determine whatever Williams handles to develop for "Lincoln subsequently" along with the other two films. Keira Knightley Never Heard About "Pride And Prejudice And Zombies" Though Keira Knightley has clearly heard about Jane Austen's classic "Pride and Prejudice" -- she starred within the 2005 Joe Wright adaptation from the novel -- she apparently has skipped the boat on "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies." Vulture questioned the "A Harmful Method" celebrity, who accepted she'd never heard about the novel coupled with no clue they'd be making it a film. When requested if she'd every considered on set that "Pride and Prejudice" can use more undead figures, she chuckled and stated, "It never happened in my experience. That clearly just proves which i don't have a very good enough imagination." Can Be Offered Role In New Clint Eastwood Film Clint Eastwood is planning his triumphant go back to acting, and that he plans to possess a strong leading lady alongside him. Variety is confirming that Can Be continues to be offered a job in "Challenge with the bendInch as Eastwood's onscreen daughter. She requires a journey to Atlanta together with her father, a maturing baseball scout, to look at a possible player. The film may be the directorial debut of Eastwood's friend Robert Lorenz. Illumination Entertainment Developing Woodsy Woodpecker Film Well, why don't you? Based on Warmth Vision, "Rotor blades of Glory" authors John Altschuler and Dork Krinsky are creating a potential feature film starring Woodsy Woodpecker for Illumination Entertainment. It should be a up-to-date version from the character and apparently has franchise potential. Again, why don't you? Inform us your ideas on present day Dailies within the comments section below or on Twitter!

German film industry can get boost

BERLIN -- Germany's film industry has reason to celebrate carrying out a contract involving the country's Finance Ministry and congress round the 2012 federal budget. This program includes a 50 million ($67.5 million) increase -- a rise of 5.1% -- for the federal government Commissioner for Culture as well as the Media, work held by Bernd Neumann that runs, among other activities, federal film funding initiatives. An upswing is predicted to be certain the continuation of federal-level film funding initiatives, like the $80 million yearly German Federal Film Fund (DFFF). Just like 2011, the Culture and Media office will again allocate $5.4 million for your digitization of film theaters. Funding for your Deutsche Kinemathek, worldwide film promotion as well as the German Film Institute also remains stable. A lot of the budget increase, however, would go to non-film-related projects, such as the protection of national monuments. Neumann recognized fellow cabinet people and congress for supporting the country's cultural heritage. Furthermore to saying because of the Bundestag's budget committee, Neumann stressed that "the fact the folks in the coalition government are not only found not making cuts, but they're growing your financial allowance for culture no matter the economical and financial crisis is exemplary much more comparison together with other European government government bodies." Contact Erection dysfunction Meza at staff@variety.com

WGA East Cuts Deal With Daily Show And Colbert Producer

NY — The Writers Guild of America, East has negotiated improvements to its collective bargaining agreements with Hello Doggie, Inc., the production company which produces the hit cable shows The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Stephen Colbert Report. The agreements significantly improve the formula for calculating residuals paid to WGAE members for basic cable replays. The WGAE estimates that residuals payments will increase approximately 20% in 2012, despite a reduction in the number of replays which began in September 2011. It makes a real difference when Guild members are actively engaged in negotiations and when the employer recognizes how integral writing is to the shows success, said WGAE Executive Director Lowell Peterson, who was the unions chief negotiator. The members working on The Daily Show and The Colbert Report ratified the new agreements on November 9th and 10th. The employer had already implemented improvements that were part of the industry-wide Minimum Basic Agreement (MBA) negotiated by the WGAE and the Writers Guild of America, West earlier this year. The 2012-2015 MBA includes increases to minimum compensation and increased contributions to the Producer-Writers Guild of America Pension Plan.

Michael Emerson Took a Long Time to get Where He is Today

Michael Emerson Took a Long Time to get Where He is Today By Daniel Holloway November 9, 2011 Photo by Sebastian Piras Michael Emerson Michael Emerson is sitting in Trattoria Dopo Teatro, an Italian joint tucked between Broadway and the Stephen Sondheim Theatre on 44th Street, nursing a glass of water while his manager and twotwo!publicists eat a schmancy pizza a few tables away. It took him a long time to get here. Not to "here" as in the restaurant but "here" in the metaphysical sensebig city, big career, big group of 10 percenters structuring their days around his interviews and photo shoots. For an actor who waited until he was nearly 40 to go to conservatory, it's not a bad place to be. Not that he didn't want to get here sooner. Emerson has been feted on the NY stage, has become recognizable to millions as a fan-favorite villain on "Lost," and is now the co-lead in his own new show, CBS's "Person of Interest." But decades ago he was a 21-year-old kid from small-town Iowa who came to NY wanting to be an actor. Things went badly. "The city just knocked the wind out of me," he says, his voice eerily, inevitably calling to mind Benjamin Linus, the character he played for five seasons on "Lost." "I didn't know where the auditions were or how you got into them or anything like that. So I lost track of my dream, which is a bad thing to do."It certainly is. And if you've ever been to Jacksonville, Fla., you know that moving there is usually a bad thing to do, too. Emerson did it anyway, and it turned out to be the first step on a long road to success. Not that it seemed like it at the time. Emerson was working as a magazine illustrator until "that career sort of went up in flames, and I thought, 'Well, here I am. There's nowhere to go but up, and I might as well do what I please, since I was at the bottom of things.' " He started doing community theaternot just acting but also designing scenery, building sets, and directing. He was able to make "half of a sensible person's living" as a jack-of-all-trades in the local scene. If there was a role he wanted to play, he would mount the production. "A lot of times I would sleep in the theater at night, just trying to keep body and soul together," he says. "But it was a good apprenticeship in the theater. I found out I had a knack for it, and I grew in confidence."Eventually he branched out, working a circuit of regional theaters in the Southeast. He played the Arkansas Repertory Theatre in Little Rock and New Stage Theatre in Jackson, Miss. He traveled to Montgomery, Ala.; Chattanooga, Tenn.; and Savannah, Ga. And he grew as an actor. "I reached a point where I thought, 'I'm too good at this now to keep doing obscure plays in obscure towns,' " he says. "I either needed to go back to NY or I needed to get into a conservatory program. I chose the latter."Roll Tide Emerson enrolled in the Alabama Shakespeare Festival's MFA program at the University of Alabama. He was 39 and looking to check out of the world for a couple of years, lead "a sort of monastic experience," and focus on acting. "I guess I would have said then that I meant to commit my life to playing the classics, which isn't a bad commitment to make," he says. "It's taken me a lot of different places."The Alabama program focused, unsurprisingly, on Shakespeare and classical verse. In the mornings, Emerson and his classmates would study movement, voice, and text. In the afternoons, they had rehearsals. Occasionally students would be cast in small parts on ASF's main stage. Emerson was something of an anomaly, being middle-aged and having years of experience under his belt. The same qualities that made him stick out from his peers also made him a commodity for the main-stage productions. "I was useful," he says.Alabama proved useful to him as welland not just for the training he received. He met his wife, the actor Carrie Preston, while working in an ASF production of "Hamlet." After he graduated, he followed her back to NY. His second run in NY didn't start off much more auspiciously than his first. His training had sharpened his skills, and he had a wealth of experience performing in some of the greatest plays ever written. But his rsum was filled with names that no one in the city had ever heard ofSouthern names."I thought surely, for the love of God, someone wants a grown man who can speak the verse, just to carry a spear, or deliver a message, or something," Emerson says. "But it's not as easy as that. I still had some illusions about that kind of thing." Preston, in contrast, was working steadily, having already established herself in NY. (She has, like her husband, built a strong on-camera career; she is now best known for playing the high-strung waitress Arlene on HBO's "True Blood.") Emerson knew that if she continued to book work while he foundered, they would feel the resulting pressure. He gave himself two years to catch traction in NY, after which he would return to the South, where he still had contacts in the theater community. He and Preston would manage a long-distance relationship.Then, shortly before the two years were up, Emerson became involved in playwright Moiss Kaufman's "Gross Indecency: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde," then still nascent. The play draws on the three real-life courtroom trials concerning Wilde's relationship with his lover Lord Alfred Douglas. In readings and workshops, Emerson played Wilde's attorney. But just before the play was set to open Off-Off-Broadway, Kaufman fired the lead actor. Emerson asked if he could audition for the roleand won it. He had fewer than three weeks to prepare.Emerson drew on his training at Alabama, where instructors had drilled into him the importance of making not just psychological choices but also choices about the carriage of the body, the quality of the voice that a character lives in. He felt he had watched the previous Wilde make choices that were logical but ultimately incorrect. Emerson knew he could make better ones.In his review of "Gross Indecency" for the NY Times, Ben Brantley, who called the play "the must-see sleeper of the Off Off Broadway season," wrote, "[T]he Wilde of Mr. Emerson, making his NY debut, is stunning as he progresses from epigrammatic assurance to a public role for which he is no longer writing the script. By the production's end, he is majestically pathetic, a man who is still unable to understand completely what happened to him."The play was a hit and enjoyed an Off-Broadway run and stints in San Francisco and Los Angelesall with Emerson in the lead. "We got a good review in the NY Times, and we were off to the races," Emerson said. "I guess I have made my living as an actor since that time."Act 2 Over the next few years, Emerson appeared in enough impressive plays to make him a bona fide NY theater actorincluding Broadway productions of "The Iceman Cometh" and "Hedda Gabler," as well as "Le Misanthrope" and "Give Me Your Answer, Do!" Off-Broadway. In 2000, he booked a part on ABC's "The Practice," playing a man who confesses to being a serial killer but whose guilt is in doubt. The role recurred, and Emerson won an Emmy for outstanding guest actor. When Emerson's life-changing job came, it didn't at first look like that kind of role. He was not a loyal viewer of "Lost," but his wife was. "We always had it on," he says. "Sometimes I'd be doing the dishes or something, and I'd look over and go, 'Oh, that's preposterous.' "The part of Benjamin Linusthe villain who became one of the series' definitive characterscame to Emerson as an offer. It was initially a guest spot. The story line called for a meek-tempered man to be captured and held prisoner by the suspicious island castaways around whom the show was centered. Eventually, the character was revealed to be the leader of the Others, the mysterious group that terrorized the show's heroes for most of its run. Between filming sessions in those earlier days, Emerson would cool his heels in a hotel in Hawaii, where the series was shot, missing Preston and NY, and waiting to find out whether his character would survive to the next episode. Around the time of his fourth episode, Emerson realized something big might be happening."One day a director came to me and said, 'When you talk about the leader of the Others, he must be terrifying to you,' " Emerson says. "I said, 'Okay, that's cool. I can play that. But wouldn't it be a gas if it turned out that I was the leader of the Others?' And he said, 'I can't talk about that.' I thought, 'Are you kidding me? Is that where we're going to go? Because that could be fun.' "For "Lost" fans, it certainly was, and Emerson's career reaped the benefits. He won a second Emmy in 2009, this time for outstanding supporting actor. But he always kept one eye eastward."I never stopped being the gypsy actor in my mind," he says. "I would never buy property in Hawaii or get settled too comfortably, because that just seems to invite the theater gods to pull it out from under you. I always thought of it as temporary. It was never home to me."Home was still NY, and Emerson settled back there after "Lost" ended in 2010. His first thought was to lay low for a time, knowing that whatever his next project was, it would be overscrutinized, thanks to the hype generated by his last job. He figured that a theater project would arise and spark his interest, and he tinkered with a pilot idea that he and "Lost" co-star Terry O'Quinn had developed. But the right play never came, and the pilot never matured into script form.Emerson spent close to a year out of work. With pilot season nearing, he approached Bad Robot, the company that had produced "Lost," and asked if there was anything he might be suited for. "They had this nice script at Bad Robot that I liked for a lot of reasonsnot least of which was that it was set in and had to shoot in NY City," he says. "If you start looking around at pilots, you dig deep and you find that not very many of them will be shot in NY or L.A. I had already done my time on the other side of the earth. It was important to me to have a family life again."The script was for "Person of Interest," in which Emerson stars as Harold Finch, an eccentric billionaire and tech genius who has developed a machine that anticipates terrorist acts. Jim Caviezel co-stars as an exCIA agent who, with Finch's voice in his ear, tries to stop those events before they happen. The character has been compared to Benjamin Linus, and Emerson admits that there are similarities. But the actor is comfortable with the overlapwhich is good, because the show has proved a solid ratings draw and recently received a full-season commitment from CBS."Maybe Ben Linus worked so well for me because it tapped into some core aesthetic I have as an actor," Emerson says. "I prefer mystery over obviousness. I prefer ambiguity to definition. And the only way I'm ever going to be able to put that aside is to do a completely different kind of material, probably on the stage."What type of material? He would love to do Shakespeare in the Parkwhich would bring him back to his roots in the classics at Alabama. Or maybe a comedy. "I was always a funny guy," he says, "before I got these frightening roles." And you know what? Emerson is a funny guy, because after talking to him for an hour, you forget that he sounds exactly like Benjamin Linus. Michael Emerson Took a Long Time to get Where He is Today By Daniel Holloway November 9, 2011 Michael Emerson PHOTO CREDIT Sebastian Piras Michael Emerson is sitting in Trattoria Dopo Teatro, an Italian joint tucked between Broadway and the Stephen Sondheim Theatre on 44th Street, nursing a glass of water while his manager and twotwo!publicists eat a schmancy pizza a few tables away. It took him a long time to get here. Not to "here" as in the restaurant but "here" in the metaphysical sensebig city, big career, big group of 10 percenters structuring their days around his interviews and photo shoots. For an actor who waited until he was nearly 40 to go to conservatory, it's not a bad place to be. Not that he didn't want to get here sooner. Emerson has been feted on the NY stage, has become recognizable to millions as a fan-favorite villain on "Lost," and is now the co-lead in his own new show, CBS's "Person of Interest." But decades ago he was a 21-year-old kid from small-town Iowa who came to NY wanting to be an actor. Things went badly. "The city just knocked the wind out of me," he says, his voice eerily, inevitably calling to mind Benjamin Linus, the character he played for five seasons on "Lost." "I didn't know where the auditions were or how you got into them or anything like that. So I lost track of my dream, which is a bad thing to do."It certainly is. And if you've ever been to Jacksonville, Fla., you know that moving there is usually a bad thing to do, too. Emerson did it anyway, and it turned out to be the first step on a long road to success. Not that it seemed like it at the time. Emerson was working as a magazine illustrator until "that career sort of went up in flames, and I thought, 'Well, here I am. There's nowhere to go but up, and I might as well do what I please, since I was at the bottom of things.' " He started doing community theaternot just acting but also designing scenery, building sets, and directing. He was able to make "half of a sensible person's living" as a jack-of-all-trades in the local scene. If there was a role he wanted to play, he would mount the production. "A lot of times I would sleep in the theater at night, just trying to keep body and soul together," he says. "But it was a good apprenticeship in the theater. I found out I had a knack for it, and I grew in confidence."Eventually he branched out, working a circuit of regional theaters in the Southeast. He played the Arkansas Repertory Theatre in Little Rock and New Stage Theatre in Jackson, Miss. He traveled to Montgomery, Ala.; Chattanooga, Tenn.; and Savannah, Ga. And he grew as an actor. "I reached a point where I thought, 'I'm too good at this now to keep doing obscure plays in obscure towns,' " he says. "I either needed to go back to NY or I needed to get into a conservatory program. I chose the latter."Roll Tide Emerson enrolled in the Alabama Shakespeare Festival's MFA program at the University of Alabama. He was 39 and looking to check out of the world for a couple of years, lead "a sort of monastic experience," and focus on acting. "I guess I would have said then that I meant to commit my life to playing the classics, which isn't a bad commitment to make," he says. "It's taken me a lot of different places."The Alabama program focused, unsurprisingly, on Shakespeare and classical verse. In the mornings, Emerson and his classmates would study movement, voice, and text. In the afternoons, they had rehearsals. Occasionally students would be cast in small parts on ASF's main stage. Emerson was something of an anomaly, being middle-aged and having years of experience under his belt. The same qualities that made him stick out from his peers also made him a commodity for the main-stage productions. "I was useful," he says.Alabama proved useful to him as welland not just for the training he received. He met his wife, the actor Carrie Preston, while working in an ASF production of "Hamlet." After he graduated, he followed her back to New York. His second run in NY didn't start off much more auspiciously than his first. His training had sharpened his skills, and he had a wealth of experience performing in some of the greatest plays ever written. But his rsum was filled with names that no one in the city had ever heard ofSouthern names."I thought surely, for the love of God, someone wants a grown man who can speak the verse, just to carry a spear, or deliver a message, or something," Emerson says. "But it's not as easy as that. I still had some illusions about that kind of thing." Preston, in contrast, was working steadily, having already established herself in NY. (She has, like her husband, built a strong on-camera career; she is now best known for playing the high-strung waitress Arlene on HBO's "True Blood.") Emerson knew that if she continued to book work while he foundered, they would feel the resulting pressure. He gave himself two years to catch traction in New York, after which he would return to the South, where he still had contacts in the theater community. He and Preston would manage a long-distance relationship.Then, shortly before the two years were up, Emerson became involved in playwright Moiss Kaufman's "Gross Indecency: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde," then still nascent. The play draws on the three real-life courtroom trials concerning Wilde's relationship with his lover Lord Alfred Douglas. In readings and workshops, Emerson played Wilde's attorney. But just before the play was set to open Off-Off-Broadway, Kaufman fired the lead actor. Emerson asked if he could audition for the roleand won it. He had fewer than three weeks to prepare.Emerson drew on his training at Alabama, where instructors had drilled into him the importance of making not just psychological choices but also choices about the carriage of the body, the quality of the voice that a character lives in. He felt he had watched the previous Wilde make choices that were logical but ultimately incorrect. Emerson knew he could make better ones.In his review of "Gross Indecency" for the NY Times, Ben Brantley, who called the play "the must-see sleeper of the Off Off Broadway season," wrote, "[T]he Wilde of Mr. Emerson, making his NY debut, is stunning as he progresses from epigrammatic assurance to a public role for which he is no longer writing the script. By the production's end, he is majestically pathetic, a man who is still unable to understand completely what happened to him."The play was a hit and enjoyed an Off-Broadway run and stints in San Francisco and Los Angelesall with Emerson in the lead. "We got a good review in the NY Times, and we were off to the races," Emerson said. "I guess I have made my living as an actor since that time."Act 2 Over the next few years, Emerson appeared in enough impressive plays to make him a bona fide NY theater actorincluding Broadway productions of "The Iceman Cometh" and "Hedda Gabler," as well as "Le Misanthrope" and "Give Me Your Answer, Do!" Off-Broadway. In 2000, he booked a part on ABC's "The Practice," playing a man who confesses to being a serial killer but whose guilt is in doubt. The role recurred, and Emerson won an Emmy for outstanding guest actor. When Emerson's life-changing job came, it didn't at first look like that kind of role. He was not a loyal viewer of "Lost," but his wife was. "We always had it on," he says. "Sometimes I'd be doing the dishes or something, and I'd look over and go, 'Oh, that's preposterous.' "The part of Benjamin Linusthe villain who became one of the series' definitive characterscame to Emerson as an offer. It was initially a guest spot. The story line called for a meek-tempered man to be captured and held prisoner by the suspicious island castaways around whom the show was centered. Eventually, the character was revealed to be the leader of the Others, the mysterious group that terrorized the show's heroes for most of its run. Between filming sessions in those earlier days, Emerson would cool his heels in a hotel in Hawaii, where the series was shot, missing Preston and NY, and waiting to find out whether his character would survive to the next episode. Around the time of his fourth episode, Emerson realized something big might be happening."One day a director came to me and said, 'When you talk about the leader of the Others, he must be terrifying to you,' " Emerson says. "I said, 'Okay, that's cool. I can play that. But wouldn't it be a gas if it turned out that I was the leader of the Others?' And he said, 'I can't talk about that.' I thought, 'Are you kidding me? Is that where we're going to go? Because that could be fun.' "For "Lost" fans, it certainly was, and Emerson's career reaped the benefits. He won a second Emmy in 2009, this time for outstanding supporting actor. But he always kept one eye eastward."I never stopped being the gypsy actor in my mind," he says. "I would never buy property in Hawaii or get settled too comfortably, because that just seems to invite the theater gods to pull it out from under you. I always thought of it as temporary. It was never home to me."Home was still NY, and Emerson settled back there after "Lost" ended in 2010. His first thought was to lay low for a time, knowing that whatever his next project was, it would be overscrutinized, thanks to the hype generated by his last job. He figured that a theater project would arise and spark his interest, and he tinkered with a pilot idea that he and "Lost" co-star Terry O'Quinn had developed. But the right play never came, and the pilot never matured into script form.Emerson spent close to a year out of work. With pilot season nearing, he approached Bad Robot, the company that had produced "Lost," and asked if there was anything he might be suited for. "They had this nice script at Bad Robot that I liked for a lot of reasonsnot least of which was that it was set in and had to shoot in NY City," he says. "If you start looking around at pilots, you dig deep and you find that not very many of them will be shot in NY or L.A. I had already done my time on the other side of the earth. It was important to me to have a family life again."The script was for "Person of Interest," in which Emerson stars as Harold Finch, an eccentric billionaire and tech genius who has developed a machine that anticipates terrorist acts. Jim Caviezel co-stars as an exCIA agent who, with Finch's voice in his ear, tries to stop those events before they happen. The character has been compared to Benjamin Linus, and Emerson admits that there are similarities. But the actor is comfortable with the overlapwhich is good, because the show has proved a solid ratings draw and recently received a full-season commitment from CBS."Maybe Ben Linus worked so well for me because it tapped into some core aesthetic I have as an actor," Emerson says. "I prefer mystery over obviousness. I prefer ambiguity to definition. And the only way I'm ever going to be able to put that aside is to do a completely different kind of material, probably on the stage."What type of material? He would love to do Shakespeare in the Parkwhich would bring him back to his roots in the classics at Alabama. Or maybe a comedy. "I was always a funny guy," he says, "before I got these frightening roles." And you know what? Emerson is a funny guy, because after talking to him for an hour, you forget that he sounds exactly like Benjamin Linus.

'Breaking Dawn' Cast Solutions Important Questions Within The Yes/No Show

Do Taylor Lautner's buddies call him up "Sharkboy"? Is Taylor Lautner maintaining using the Kardashians? Has Peter Facinelli ever wiped out a guy? Fundamental essentials burning questions that MTV News has fearlessly requested the cast of "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Beginning -- Part 1" within the latest edition from the globally beloved worldwide phenomenon referred to as Yes/No Show. Cast faves like Pattinson, Lautner, Elizabeth Reaser, Facinelli, Nikki Reed, Jackson Rathbone, Julia Johnson and Booboo Stewart all took part in what has to be our greatest contestant pool up to now. The same is true Lautner only eat Slim Jims and drink Fanta? Has Pattinson seen Kristen Stewart's early film "Zathura"? Can Rathbone title two Attacking Young Boys tunes? Discover by watching the above mentioned video, and tell us that which you think about the "Breaking Beginning" special within the comments section below or on Twitter!

Henry Cavill Talks New Superman On Leno

Immortals star confirms on The Tonight Show that he almost became the new James Bond (“down to Daniel and me”) and was Stephenie Meyer’s first choice for Twilight (“she apparently was very keen on me playing it but by the time it came around to casting I was too old”). InMan Of Steel, Russell Crowe plays his father. But 11 years ago Cavill appeared as an extra in the Crowe pic Proof Of Life. Cavill walked up to Crowe and asked what it was like to be an actor. And 2 days later received a photo of Russell in Gladiator signed, ‘A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step’. Cavill says he trained 2 hours a day for 8 months to play Superman and talks about the new look here:

Disney reups Mayhem Pictures deal

Ciardi GrayDisney has reupped its first-look deal with Mayhem Pictures producers Mark Ciardi and Gordon Gray, the duo most broadly noted for feel-good sports films like "Secretariat," "Invincible," "Miracle" and "The Rookie."Mayhem is constantly develop sports photos, including an uplifting tale about Greek marathoner Stylianos "Stelios" Kyriakides, who played inside the 1936 Olympics baseball project "Big Arm," and "McFarland," of a California secondary school track and area coach. Nevertheless the producers may also be branching out into other genres while using Reese Witherspoon comedy "Wish List" and fantasy series "Fallen," good youthful adult book series by Lauren Kate, along with an adventurous undertake Disneyland's Tomorrowland, all for your Mouse House.There is also the Chuck Russell-helmed actioner "Arabian Nights" inside the works at FilmDistrict, as well as the Dwayne Manley actioner thriller "Protection" with IM Global. Mayhem also labored with with Manley round the CBS Films thriller "Faster" and comedies "Your Tooth Fairy" for Fox and Disney's "The General Strategy."Mayhem showed up its deal at Disney in 2002, right after the wealth of "The Rookie." Their shingle had formerly been situated at Revolution Art galleries, where they produced "The Completely New Guy." Contact Marc Graser at marc.graser@variety.com

Zooey Deschanel, Husband Split

First Published: November 1, 2011 6:43 PM EDT Credit: Getty Images LOS ANGELES, Calif. -- Caption Ben Gibbard and Zooey Deschanl arrive at the 2011 BAFTA Brits To Watch Event at the Belasco Theatre in Los Angeles on July 9, 2011New Girl star Zooey Deschanel may be in the market for a New guy. Zooey and husband Ben Gibbard have split, a rep for the actress confirmed to Access Hollywood on Tuesday. Zooey, 31, and Ben the 35-year-old frontman for the band Death Cab for Cutie tied the knot in September 2009, in a ceremony near Seattle, Wash. According to Us Weekly, the split was mutual and amicable. This was the first marriage for Zooey, who stars in FOXs freshman hit comedy New Girl, which was the first fall TV show to be picked up for a full season back in September. In the show, Zooey stars as Jess, who moves into an apartment with three guys after a bad breakup. Copyright 2011 by NBC Universal, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.