A convenient way to print that LOLcat book.
You may have heard a few years back (See: Highbrow-Brilliant) about a neat device that can pump out made-to-order books while you watch. But in 2006, the Espresso Book Machine was better in theory than in practice — fifteen feet long and achingly slow. Well, EBM 2.0 is three times smaller, three times faster, and half as expensive. And as of this fall, we have it on good authority, New York's first permanent machine will be cranking out paperbacks at Soho's McNally Jackson Books.
But wait, isn't the printed page done for?
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Reynolds Down Under: Ryan Reynolds, whom we guess is now actually a movie star with the box-office success of both The Proposal and Wolverine, will follow those up with the indie flick Buried. He'll play a civilian contractor in Iraq who is kidnapped and wakes up in a coffin in the desert with only a cell phone, a candle, and a knife. Just to be safe, Sandra Bullock and Hugh Jackman will be in the coffin also. [Variety]
Cowell and Green Is the Power Team: Simon Cowell and Topshop honcho Philip Green are in talks to do something together … although what, exactly, is not clear. The team-up is being described as "a possible business combining television and entertainment," which sounds pretty genius to us. [HR]
Plus: Jim James, a.k.a. Yim Yames.
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Photo: Courtesy of Paramount
For a movie that features Decepticon testicles, a "lap dance by a Decepticon posing as a nymphomaniacal freshman," and John Turturro in a G-string, we're not surprised that Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is currently saddled with a 20 percent fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes. That said, the newest opus from director Michael Bay (Armegeddon, Playboy Video Centerfold: Kerri Kendall) will likely prove itself to be the very definition of a "criticproof" movie; it pulled in some $16 million at midnight screenings last night and industry estimates have it headed toward an opening 5-day weekend in the $160 million to $175 million range. However, Michael Bay is coming under a bit more fire than usual from critics for this film, and it's not just because it's big and dumb and loud (which, by all accounts, it is). Some are alleging that two of the robots in the film, twin Autobots bearing the name Skids and Mudflap, can be viewed as racist stereotypes.
Michael Bay's response? "Listen, you're going to have your naysayers on anything."
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Photo-illustration: Everett Bogue; Photos: Getty
Images, flickr
Transformers grossing $700 billion internationally last summer didn’t just guarantee a sequel — as you may be aware, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is out this week — but another, more unique, Hollywood development: the optioning of a bewildering string of childhood-entertainment entities. The list of utterly plotless board games, toys, and comic strips at some stage of feature-film development now includes Battleship, Monopoly, Stretch Armstrong, Ouija, Hot Wheels, Candyland, Magic 8-Ball, and Bazooka Joe (seriously). Eventually, professional Hollywood screenwriters will have to pluck a few arbitrary elements from their assigned properties and conjure up a plot from thin air. Since that sounds like fun, we decided to give a few of them a try ourselves.
When King Kandy (Oliver Platt) is dramatically abducted ...
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"I'm so used to having them on set when Anna and I are having a love scene that when we get home and we're in bed by ourselves, I kind of miss them." —Stephen Moyer wants to invite the True Blood crew back to his and Anna Paquin's bedroom [Pop Candy/USAT]
"Never work with a raccoon or Audra McDonald, they will always steal the show." —Raúl Esparza has some tips for aspiring stage performers [WNYC]
"I got a phone call from my father, who said, 'That's way too fucking sick. You can't have dark win over light ... You're the sickest bitch I know.'" —Jennifer Lynch, daughter of David Lynch, on her father's reaction to her new movie, Surveillance [Hollywood & Fine]
Plus: Harold Ramis on the first-ever circumcision.
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Photo-illustration: Everett Bogue; Photos: Getty
Images, Courtesy of Nikki Finke
When news first began circulating yesterday that Vulture buddy Nikki Finke had sold her influential Deadline Hollywood Daily website to an entity called the Mail.com Media Corporation, the first thing that popped into our heads was "How much did she take home?" Your friendly Vulture editors batted the idea around over Instant Messenger for a few minutes, finally landing on the (wholly arbitrary) assumption that the deal probably made her a millionaire (but just barely). Shortly thereafter, Nikki wrote a braggadocious email to her new MMC compatriots (competitors?) over at Movieline that she "received the equivalent of the GNP of a small country" in the sale, which exacerbated the situation and prompted a slew of showbiz journalists to start prying into the heretofore undisclosed terms of the deal. What resulted was a hilarious chain of reports that read like they were filed by a bunch of drunk auctioneers.
I hear $10 million. I hear $14 million. Do I hear $15 million? SOLD!
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Photo: Courtesy of X-initiative
Last night at No Soul for Sale, a makeshift four-day art fair ending this Sunday, I caught an enticing, exciting glimpse of one of the ways the near future may look. The intrepid X-initiative, housed for the next nine months in the former Dia building on West 22nd Street, is staging what it calls an exercise in “radical hospitality,” inviting more than 30 respected not-for-profit centers, alternative institutions, artist collectives, and independent enterprises from New York, the U.S., and around the world to exhibit whatever they want in blocks of space that have been marked out on the floor, spread out over three floors and the roof. The spaces are free. X says these participants form “a convention of individuals and groups who have devoted their energies to keeping art alive.”
Art is no longer fashion.
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