Friday, October 26

• Palm Springs Film Festival to honor Penn, Hirsch, Blonsky and Cotillard

  The powers that be in Palm Springs are announcing this year's honorees. Sean Penn will receive the Director of the Year award for his work on Into the Wild. Previous director honorees include Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu and Ang Lee, which means that acknowledgement of this sort heavily favors Penn for getting a Best Director nod come Oscar time.

  Marion Cotillard will be receiving the Breakthrough Performance Award for La Vie en Rose, and Nikki Blonsky (Hairspray) and Emile Hirsch (Into the Wild) will be receiving the Rising Star awards.

  The 19th annual Palm Springs Film Festival will take place from Jan. 3-14, 2008. The awards will be given out at a gala on January 5.

  
  
  

  Into the Wild trailer

  Sean Penn directs this true life adventure.

  Posted 10/26/2007 by Heather

  Related: Marion Cotillard | Sean Penn | Emile Hirsch | Nikki Blonsky | Into the Wild

Tuesday, July 31

• Casting newz: Blonsky's next project and Reynolds to star in Sandra Bullock rom-com

  Nikki Blonsky, the zaftig star of Hairspray, has chosen her first post-Tracy-Turnblad role. Blonsky will join Cuba Gooding Jr., Ally Sheedy, Colin Quinn, and Spencer Breslin in Harold, a comedy about a prematurely aging highschooler, written and directed by SNL writer T. Sean Shannon. In it, Blonsky will play Harold's nerdy best friend Rhonda.

  In other news, Ryan Reynolds (Van Wilder, Smokin' Aces) is getting set to star in the upcoming Sandra Bullock romantic comedy, The Proposal. In it, Bullock will play a woman who has a greencard marriage to her assistant (Reynolds) to keep from being deported to Canada. Irony of ironies: Reyolds is actually Canadian.

  Source: The Hollywood Reporter.

  
  

  Posted 07/31/2007 by Heather

  Related: Nikki Blonsky | Harold | The Proposal