Three remarkable actress – Academy Award-winners Meryl Streep and Dianne Wiest, and Emmy Award-winner Candice Bergen – share the screen in a new film by director Steven Soderbergh, “Let Them All Talk,” an exercise in improvisation, in which its actors were required to create much of the dialogue themselves. Correspondent Rita Braver talks with the trio about the rarity of starring in a major Hollywood film about three women in their 70s.

Meryl Streep, Nicole Kidman James Corden, and Andrew Rannells are prepared to be “the biggest thing to happen in Indiana” in the star-studded trailer for Ryan Murphy’s Netflix film, The Prom. Murphy released the first full trailer for the movie musical on Thursday, announcing that “everyone is invited to the celebration of a lifetime!” The movie follows the story of high school student Emma Nolan, played by Jo Ellen Pellman, who’s been banned from attending the prom with her girlfriend Alyssa (Ariana DeBose). Once Emma shares her story on Twitter, stars from Broadway (Streep, Corden, Rannells and Kidman) head to small-town Indiana to help Emma find a solution – in an attempt to gain good press following their Broadway show flop. The Netflix film also includes a supportive high school principal, played by Keegan-Michael Key and the PTA head, played by Kerry Washington. “The Prom” arrives on Netflix on Dec. 11.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Meryl Streep is among the Hollywood stars nominated for best spoken word album at the 63rd Grammy Awards, revealed by the Recording Academy on Tuesday. The actress received a nod on Friday for her reading of E.B. White’s Charlotte’s Web. Among the other nominees are Ronan Farrow for his nonfiction thriller Catch and Kill, which explored the decades of sexual misconduct by imprisoned media mogul Harvey Weinstein, and Jeopardy veteran Ken Jennings for Alex Trebek — The Answer Is … Rachel Maddow is also nominated for Blowout: Corrupted Democracy, Rogue State Russia, and the Richest, Most Destructive Industry On Earth; while Flea is nominated for Acid for the Children: A Memoir. Nominees in the comedy album category include Tiffany Haddish for Black Mitzvah, Patton Oswalt for I Love Everything, Jerry Seinfeld for 23 Hours to Kill, Bill Burr for Paper Tiger and Jim Gaffigan for The Pale Tourist. Trevor Noah is hosting the Grammy Awards on Jan. 31 at 8 p.m. on CBS. Many thanks to Glenn and Alvaro for the heads-up.

As if the film didn’t already have a star-studded roster, Adam McKay’s upcoming meteorite satire pic Don’t Look Up has expanded its cast with the additions of Emmy winner Tyler Perry, Melanie Lynskey and Golden Globe winner Ron Perlman, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The film, which is being written and directed by McKay (Vice, The Big Short), will center on two low-level astronomers who have to embark on a media tour around the globe in an effort to warn mankind of an approaching asteroid that is going to destroy Earth. The cast for the film will be led by Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence as the central astronomers alongside Meryl Streep, Jonah Hill, Himesh Patel, Timothée Chalamet, Cate Blanchett and Rob Morgan. In addition to this ensemble roster, the Netflix film will feature a number of cameos including Ariana Grande, Kid Cudi, Matthew Perry and Tomer Sisley. McKay has had a successful run in the satire genre over the past few years, earning one Oscar nomination and one win for 2016’s The Big Short and three Oscar nominations for 2018’s Vice, including Best Picture. The 52-year-old filmmaker will produce the project alongside partner Kevin Messick via their productions banner Hyperobject Industries. Don’t Look Up is set to begin filming in Boston next week.

According to Variety, Netflix’s “The Prom” is another awards season hopeful that could crack multiple acting categories. In an exclusive to Variety, Netflix has confirmed the acting submissions for the upcoming Academy Awards. Three-time Oscar winner Meryl Streep and newcomer Jo Ellen Pellman will be submitted for lead actress, while Emmy winner James Corden will seek consideration in lead actor. Keegan-Michael Key and Andrew Rannells will be submitted in the supporting actor categories. Ariana DeBose, Oscar-winner Nicole Kidman and Emmy-winner Kerry Washington will look for love in supporting actress. Adapted from the Broadway musical, “The Prom” tells the story of a troupe of self-obsessed theater stars who swarm into a conservative Indiana town to support a high-school girl who wants to take her girlfriend to prom. The acting category submissions for “The Prom” match the Broadway production, which was nominated for seven Tony awards in 2019. It garnered three acting nominations for Caitlin Kinnunen and Beth Leavel in best leading actress in a musical, which mirror Pellman and Streep’s roles, along with Brooks Ashmanskas for best leading actor, which Corden portrays. The best actress race is very competitive this year, with many former winners delivering outstanding performances, like Viola Davis (“Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom”), Sophia Loren (“The Life Ahead”) and Frances McDormand (“Nomadland”). With Pellman campaigned alongside her in her feature film debut, she’s likely to face an uphill climb. Double nominations in the best actress category have only happened five times in Academy history. Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon, who were both nominated for “Thelma and Louise” in 1991, was the last occurrence. A similar arduous path seems likely for Corden, although the HFPA may bite for this picture in a big way. Directed by Ryan Murphy, the film is written by Chad Beguelin and Bob Martin, who also co-wrote the musical book. “The Prom” will be released on Netflix on Dec. 11.

The promotion for “The Prom” is slowly starting – and while we’re still waiting for a full trailer, posters etc., Variety makes the start with an interview with director Ryan Murphy, who talks about shooting during the pandemic and discovering Jo Ellen Pellman and Ariana DeBose. Murphy saw a January 2019 Broadway production of “The Prom” at the Longacre Theatre, and he knew right away that he wanted to make a film adaptation under his production deal at Netflix. Very quickly, it received the green light. By early February he had all the actors, producers and a plan to begin filming in December. By shooting time, the Broadway production had already closed, not recouping its investment of $13.5 million, but still, Murphy wanted to bring its positive message to the Netflix global community. In an interview with Variety, Murphy spoke about the journey of getting the musical adaptation to the screen. In his third directorial feature, Murphy, a six-time Emmy winner, has found the perfect vehicle that marries all his creative expressions with this musically moving material. After he saw the Broadway show, Murphy reached out to his first choices, which included James Corden, Nicole Kidman, Meryl Streep and Kerry Washington, and pitched the idea to them. Within one week, the four actors were on board. The full article can be read Variety – don’t miss Murphy’s quote on a new song written especially for Meryl Streep.

We wrote a song that was a sad song, but it didn’t fit with the tone of the movie. And then we got to the end of the movie, with the end-credit design sequence. When I saw that, I think we needed an end-credit song that’s about the women. It’s about the female power in the film. I told the songwriting team and the composer, “Let’s do something upbeat, that we can send people out in a celebratory fashion, and let’s have all the women do the vocal tracks. Furthermore, let’s have Meryl Streep rap.” They were like “What?” I said, “I want her to rap. I need her to rap.” They laughed, and they went off and wrote the song “Wear Your Crown,” and it’s optimistic and makes you feel good. It has a message of fighting intolerance and being proud of who you are. We wanted to leave young people with that feeling. I think Meryl fans are going to go crazy for it. I have a video of Meryl rapping. She was so good that we used her first take, which just goes to show you there’s nothing that Meryl Streep cannot do. (Ryan Murphy, Variety, November 16, 2020)

Early December will be early Christmas for all Streep fans – not that we don’t deserve an extra dose of blessings this year. HBO Max has finally released the trailer for “Let Them All Talk”, which will premiere, wait for it, on December 10, a day before Netflix releases “The Prom”. Steven Soderbergh’s film stars Meryl Streep as Alice, an award-winning author whose two oldest friends (Candice Bergen and Dianne Wiest) join her on a voyage across the Atlantic. As the three actresses revealed to EW earlier this year, the film was shot in just two weeks aboard the Queen Mary 2 in 2019, with the actors improvising almost all of their dialogue. “They would give us the outlines of a situation, and then we knew where we had to end up,” Streep explained. “But they didn’t tell us how to get there.” “When it was over, I thought for a while that I had dreamt doing the movie,” Bergen added. “It was over so quickly.” “Let Them All Talk” also stars Lucas Hedges as Alice’s nephew and Gemma Chan as her agent. The gabfest is the first in a series of projects for HBO Max and HBO from the prolific Soderbergh, who has already begun shooting his next movie for the streaming service, a crime film titled No Sudden Move. You can watch the trailer above and in the video archive. Screencaptures, along with the film’s poster, have been added to the photo gallery.

The New York Times has an in-depth article on Hollywood’s recent revival of musicals, with a focus on the upcoming “The Prom”. The complete artcile can be read over at their website: On a sun-nuzzled February morning earlier this year, “The Prom,” Ryan Murphy’s film adaptation of the Tony-nominated musical, prepared for a location shoot in a high school gym on the eastern edge of Hollywood. Basketball hoops kissed the ceiling. Rubber matting and webs of cables carpeted the floor. Beside the snack tables, James Corden, Kerry Washington and Meryl Streep, in a wig the red of a cocktail cherry, practiced a dance number, sashaying through the same steps at not quite the same time. The filmmaking, Corden said, once he had spun his final spin, had been amazing, joyous, nearly as much fun as “Cats,” particularly these song and dance rehearsals. “You feel like you might be in the greatest touring production of all time,” he said. The stage version of “The Prom,” a story of a young woman who wants to take her girlfriend to a school dance and the Broadway stars who debatably come to her aid, has scheduled an actual tour for January, Covid-19 permitting. That’s a little more than a month after Netflix releases Murphy’s film, which tells the same tale with a starrier cast, fancier sets, delirious wigs and an orchestra that includes four French horns, four more than the Broadway pit could afford.

The first trailer for Ryan Murphy’s “The Prom,” the star-stuffed movie musical adaptation of the beloved Broadway musical, has landed from Netflix. Meryl Streep, Nicole Kidman, Kerry Washington, James Corden, Andrew Rannells, Keegan-Michael Key, and many more headline this flashy song-and-dance movie, which arrives on the streaming platform December 11. Watch the new look at the film below. The Broadway musical comedy follows a group of washed up Broadway actors who help a lesbian go to prom as part of a PR stunt. Dee Dee Allen (Meryl Streep), a two-time Tony Award winner, pairs up with Barry Glickman (James Corden) in a musical about First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt that’s a total flop. They each receive career-killing reviews, and decide to revive their reputations by throwing their weight behind a charity cause. They’re joined by veteran Broadway chorus girl Angie Dickinson (Nicole Kidman), along with out-of-luck actor Trent Oliver (Andrew Rannells), in boosting Emma Nolan (Jo Ellen Pellman), a high-school senior barred from bringing her girlfriend to the prom. Production was halted on the film on March 12, but resumed on July 23. The Broadway edition, with music by Matthew Sklar, lyrics by Chad Beguelin, and a book by Bob Martin and Beguelin, bowed in New York on October 2018 after launching in Atlanta in 2016. The musical was nominated for six Tony Awards in 2019, including Best Musical, though it didn’t win any of them. “The Prom” premieres on Netflix December 11. Screencaptures from the teaser trailer have been added as well.

Entertainment Tonight has a fantastic interview with Meryl Streep, Candice Bergen and Dianne Wiest for Steven Soderbergh’s December-confirmed HBO Max film “Let Them All Talk”: Dianne Wiest sits demurely, a bookshelf behind her, broadcasting from her computer. Meryl Streep leans against a white brick wall, her iPhone at arm’s length. Candice Bergen reclines on her couch, holding her iPad over her head. For his latest film Let Them All Talk, director Steven Soderbergh put the three acting legends on a ship and, well, let them all talk. So it only made sense for EW to do the same — albeit over Zoom, rather than at sea. The ensuing conversation will mark their first extended discussion of the mysterious movie, which arrives on HBO Max in December. Scripted (sort of; more on that in a minute) by beloved short-story writer Deborah Eisenberg, Let Them All Talk stars Streep as an acclaimed novelist who’s summoned to the U.K. to receive an award. She invites two of her oldest friends (Bergen and Wiest) and her nephew (Lucas Hedges) to join her on a voyage aboard the Queen Mary 2 ocean liner, setting up a gabfest filled with reminiscence, regret, and repartee. As it happens, that also describes EW’s roundtable with the actresses. But at first, they’re just giddy to see each other again, discussing vacation spots and the California wildfires before Bergen gets things back on track. “You’re trying to get things started here,” she says with a chuckle. And so we do.

Meryl, how does playing, for lack of a better word, a regular person like this character differ from some of your more transformative roles?
I didn’t think she was so regular. I mean, to me, she was a rara avis. She’s a really weird bird. A real intellectual, which I am not. People like that sort of intimidate me, and so it’s great fun to imagine what it’d be like to have those standards of thought, and those aspirations, and to have a poetic soul, which I think she did, and the selfishness of real, true artists. People that don’t have kids and concerns that pull them into the real world. People that have been able to just live in the sort of miasma of their own imagination and anxieties and terrors. That’s her, and at this particular moment of her life, especially so. Her regrets and her desires to figure things out — it’s stuff you can relate to after 70, certainly, if you’re lucky enough to get there.

The complete interview can be read over at Entertainment Weekly and in our press archive.