As you may have heard, Tom Brady’s balls have been in the news quite a bit this week. Sadly, the story has nothing to do with a Gisele Bundchen sex tape and everything to do with the New England Patriots possibly getting caught cheating yet again. Did some rogue equipment manager doctor Tom’s balls on his own? Does Bill Belichick’s pseudo-scientific explanation pass muster? Is Brady pouting and whining about the whole situation? The answer to that last question is a resounding “yes,” but the other two remain mysteries. Fortunately, the patron Saint of football science, Drew Brees, is here to shed some light on the situation: Drew Brees Solves DeflateGate Brees tries to be diplomatic, telling Conan O’Brien he has “no idea” if Belichick and company are guilty, but he proceeds to basically prove that: It’s easy to detect if a football has been deflated. Softer footballs are easier to throw. Some big questions remain following Brees’ demonstration: Did he intend to blow up Brady’s spot by basically suggesting that any QB can tell if a ball’s been deflated the moment he touches it? Who’s gonna pay for that light he broke? And, most importantly, when will Brees finally get that thing on his face checked out? These are the issues we’re grappling with in the days leading up to Super Bowl XLIX. Meanwhile, of course, Tom terrific is focused on what really matters: finding a store that sells Uggs in the Phoenix area. Tom Brady Defends Use of Balls 1. Don’t rub my balls! Leave that to me, please.
As you may have heard, Tom Brady’s balls have been in the news quite a bit this week. Sadly, the story has nothing to do with a Gisele Bundchen sex tape and everything to do with the New England Patriots possibly getting caught cheating yet again. Did some rogue equipment manager doctor Tom’s balls on his own? Does Bill Belichick’s pseudo-scientific explanation pass muster? Is Brady pouting and whining about the whole situation? The answer to that last question is a resounding “yes,” but the other two remain mysteries. Fortunately, the patron Saint of football science, Drew Brees, is here to shed some light on the situation: Drew Brees Solves DeflateGate Brees tries to be diplomatic, telling Conan O’Brien he has “no idea” if Belichick and company are guilty, but he proceeds to basically prove that: It’s easy to detect if a football has been deflated. Softer footballs are easier to throw. Some big questions remain following Brees’ demonstration: Did he intend to blow up Brady’s spot by basically suggesting that any QB can tell if a ball’s been deflated the moment he touches it? Who’s gonna pay for that light he broke? And, most importantly, when will Brees finally get that thing on his face checked out? These are the issues we’re grappling with in the days leading up to Super Bowl XLIX. Meanwhile, of course, Tom terrific is focused on what really matters: finding a store that sells Uggs in the Phoenix area. Tom Brady Defends Use of Balls 1. Don’t rub my balls! Leave that to me, please.
Lest we ever forget, celebrities are regular people too. Sure, they have paparazzi stalking them, taking pictures as they do normal things like grocery shop and go to the doctor. And, yeah, they probably can’t use the bathroom without a tabloid reporting that they’re snorting lines of a toilet paper dispenser. But deep down they’re just regular people with hobbies and hidden talents. People who like to collect things and build stuff. They also happen to have the leisure time (sort of) and finances to support their pastimes. Also they make movies and look beautiful and walk red carpets and sing and dance! They also use their free time in unexpected, fun ways. From needlepoint to knitting to knife collecting, check out 13 odd celebrity hobbies below: 13 Unusual Celebrity Hobbies 1. Taylor Swift Does Needlepoint! In addition to dancing like nobody’s watching, Taylor Swift crafts by making her own snowglobes and doing needlepoint.
X-Men Days of Future Past star Ellen Page opened up about some of her recurring dreams on Conan last night and we think it’s safe to say this girl has more disturbing nightmares than anyone in the history of ever. Ellen Page Talks Justin Bieber Dreams Ellen apparently keeps a dream journal and has uncovered some recurring themes that may or may not have unsettling links to one another. Those themes? Pubic hair, Justin Bieber and Swedish meatballs from Ikea. Anyone who’s ever seen what happens when Bieber tries to grow facial hair knows that the link between the first two is obvious. But the Bieber-Ikea-meatballs connection has got us stumped. There are so many Freudian connections there it’s hard to know where to begin. Why is Ellen Page dreaming about the Biebs in the context of peg-in-hole furniture assembly? Conan was just as curious and asked Ellen point blank, but it turns out she doesn’t know either. Still, she’s surprisingly open about sharing the details of her dream: “We were in his childhood home in Canada and his mom came home with takeout from Ikea and we were like, ‘Yes our favorite!'” Having starred in Inception , Ellen surely knows how deep dreams can go, and this one is a bottomless pit: Ellen and Justin are both Canadian, they’re both in show business, and at what point… they were exact doubles!!! Perhaps Justin’s mission to have sex with beautiful women was inspired by his own reflection. 12 Tattoos Justin Bieber Thinks Make Him Look Hard 1. Justin Bieber Chest Tattoo Justin Bieber has another new tattoo. This one is hard to miss. What do you think?
Mmmmmmmm. He’s great. Jason Momoa aka Khal Drogo was on Conan O’Brien last night getting Betty White and Conan all hot and bothered. These clips are pretty funny. If you want to watch the full video it’s below:
The cool thing about genuinely funny people is that they can get laughs out of doing the same thing over and over and over again. When mere mortals are intentionally repetitive, they usually get punched in the face. On Tuesday night, Paul Rudd appeared on Conan O’Brien’s TBS talk show with what he claimed was a clip from the highly anticipated Anchorman 2 . “This is going to go crazy viral,” said Conan, setting up what has been a running joke between the two men for a while now. Instead of a glimpse into the world of Ron Burgundy and Brian Fantana , viewers at home were treated to the runaway wheelchair scene from Mac and Me , a clip that Rudd has used before on Conan’s show as a substitute for whatever movie he’s actually promoting. The best part: after Rudd apologized for belaboring the running gag, he did show an Anchorman 2 clip. Or did he? Rudd’s Running Gag In case your Anchorman 2 itch still needs to be scratched, here’s the teaser trailer, which is still funny all these months later. Anchorman 2 Teaser Follow Frank DiGiacomo on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
” I consider myself the Bo Jackson of entertainment .” Martial arts cinema and actual mixed martial arts collide in the form of pro fighter/actor Cung Le, who continues his rising Hollywood action career with a furious turn as Bronze Lion in RZA ‘s The Man With The Iron Fists . But his wild-maned, lethal work as the Lion clan henchman (who finds his toughest opponent in Lucy Liu’s Madam Blossom) is just Le’s “part time” job, of course; on November 10, a week after Iron Fists debuts in theaters, Le will face off against UFC fighter Rich Franklin in one of the biggest fights of his career. The kickboxing and sanshou champion, now fighting in the UFC, built up his Hollywood resume in recent years with supporting appearances in Fighting , Pandorum , Bodyguards and Assassins , Tekken , and True Legend . He’s also increasingly in-demand as an actor who can ably, and believably, fight; while filming RZA’s Iron Fists on location in China, Le was simultaneously filming Wong Kar-Wai’s Yip Man biopic under the tutelage of legendary choreographer Yuen Woo-Ping and shooting Dragon Eyes with Jean-Claude Van Damme, which he also choreographed. Le stopped by the Movieline/ENTV studio for a new recurring Movieline video series to discuss RZA’s martial arts epic, his childhood Bruce Lee obsession (and the unfortunate homemade nunchucks mishap that set him on the course to non-weapons based fighting), and his burgeoning second career as a martial arts action star and fight choreographer. As for his Franklin fight, broadcast by Fuel TV 6 on Nov. 10 from Macau, Le hints that his Iron Fists persona may make it into the octagon, and vice versa: “You will see a Bronze Lion with a Cung Le flair in action. Watch the Movieline interview on YouTube! You had multiple choreographies in your head at the same time while shooting Iron Fists , Dragon Eyes , and Grandmasters pretty much at the same time – how hard was that to keep straight? And does your fight training help somehow? Because I’m a professional fighter and I train all year round, I was probably the most in-shape on set, endurance-wise. The only thing that was tough was the weather, it was so cold. But I was excited to come to set and I was ready to put in extra hours – I did whatever it took. But martial arts, fight-wise, going from one movie to another didn’t really bother me. I felt like the transition was so natural and it came so easy to me, so everything was smooth, from one character to another, from one style to another – no problem. I think it’s so easy because my real job is stepping inside the octagon, looking up at my opponent pacing back and forth, who’s looking to take me out. That’s probably more nerve-wracking and more dangerous than what I’m doing in the movies part time. When I’m on a movie set it’s like, let’s do this ! When I’m inside the octagon, oh, man – he’s got the look and he wants to kill me . Doing both actual fighting and movie fighting, does it ever get confusing? Do your fight instincts ever take over during a fake fight, or do blows accidentally land here and there as you’re performing rather than fighting? Of course my natural instinct is to connect with my punch or my kick or my knee, but I’ve been doing martial arts so long that it’s natural for me. I can pull the punch at the last minute, I can make it look big or small, I can shorten my punch – it’s just years of training. So that part, I don’t need to think about it. On The Man With The Iron Fists , when Corey Yuen broke down a fight scene I could almost see what was going to come next. With Dragon Eyes I choreographed all the fight scenes, and I knew working with Van Damme was going to be a bit limiting because he wants to do so many of his own kicks and punches. So I let him do all his stuff, but of course he didn’t want to take any punches or kicks – but in the movie we came real close, and sometimes we did connect, just to make it more realistic. We wrapped Jean-Claude and brought in my trainer and Jean-Claude’s stunt double and I unleashed on him, so it looks like a great fight inside the jail cell, but before then it was all him trying to throw hook kicks and he was really trying to knock me out. For some reason I see the whole fight scene, then I write it on paper. Most people will write it on paper then try to piece it together, but I see not just fight scenes but action, how it plays out, before I can write it. Bronze Lion, like all the characters in Iron Fists , has a distinct martial arts style – what sort of discussions did you and RZA have about his form and how much additional research did you have to do? Bronze Lion’s is not as popular as the Tiger Style, so we were open to using things like the claw from Tiger to Lion, but there were also the weapons. They didn’t just want Bronze Lion to use Lion technique because my specialties are my kicks and scissor kicks. Corey Yuen wanted to incorporate all my strengths into the movie so he let me do a lot of kicks – I did the jumping side kick back kick without landing, the spin-around wheel kick, the running up the wall and grabbing someone by the head, scissor kicking the other guy’s neck and flipping him… so I got to do not just the Lion technique, I also got to put the Cung Le flair in there. So Bronze Lion got a chance to use Cung Le’s technique! Working with Corey Yuen and acting as Bronze Lion, did you pick up anything you think will help you in your actual fighting career? Working with high level martial artists, you see how they work and put things together, how things are planned out and how things come naturally. It gives me my own flavor and variety and the more variety I have, the more I can pull from. When I’m in a fight and I need to use a different technique, the transition is much quicker. But I can’t say that it does or it doesn’t, I can just say that with the years of being a student and a teacher and a fan I feel I can adapt to any situation with the training that I’ve had. Who’s your favorite martial artist of all time, the one you grew up watching? I grew up watching Bruce Lee. Enter the Dragon , Game of Death , Chinese Connection . I think hands down now, since I got a chance to work with Donnie Yen he’s one of my favorites now because he’s so open to doing different things. Not just the same kung fu, but he’s open to doing MMA in his movies and a lot of other things. I kind of look at what he does to mold my own style. Were you one of those kids growing up doing Bruce Lee moves in the mirror? When I was growing up I was really into nun chucks, and since my mom didn’t buy me any, this old broom that broke, I cut it in half and cut that half piece in half and drilled a hole through it with one of those hand drills. I tied it with some rope and I was working and doing pretty good, but I must have not tied it good enough so when I flipped it, it came around and hit me in the head. I had this big knot – and after that I just figured I’d do things with my hands and legs. [Laughs] Continued on next page…
May the farce be with you! In the wake of news that Disney will be producing more Star Wars movies as a result of its acquisition of George Lucas’ LucasFilm on Tuesday, the geniuses at Conan O’Brien’s Team Coco have posted some very funny parody posters of what the interstellar franchise will look like under the influence of the House of Mouse. I’m partial to the Boba Fett-meets-Buzz-Lightyear hybrid, but the image of the Jawas taking over for the Seven Dwarfs and spiriting off a comatose Snow White is a keeper, too. The full Boba poster and a third featuring the characters from Peter Pan silhouetted against the Death Star can be found at the Team Coco website . There’s such great material for satire here that I have a feeling that this is just the beginning. Walt Disney as Darth Sidious, anyone? Follow Frank DiGiacomo on Twitter. Follow Movieline on Twitter.
The roster of actors in the world who could reduce megastar George Clooney to rubble with a single withering look is short, but add newcomer Shailene Woodley to the top of the list. As Alex, the acerbic 17-year-old daughter of Clooney’s Hawaiian landowner and family man in Alexander Payne’s The Descendants , Woodley (of ABC Family’s The Secret Life of the American Teenager ) makes an auspicious film debut that could land her in the Oscar race — not that Woodley, perhaps the most well-adjusted young star on the rise in Hollywood, would take awards razzle-dazzle too seriously.
Lots of movie business to tweet about this weekend: Breaking Dawn, Part I made more money than is right for our national health, The Descendants scored a great opening in limited release, Happy Feet Two happened, and everyone is pretending to know who Natalie Wood is. Time to narrow down Twitter’s commentary to five of the weekend’s best movie-related quips. Robert Wagner, you are not culpable for the hilarity herein.
