By Anthony D’Alessandro
July 6, 2022 2:49pm

Sony has decided to push Devotion to Wednesday, Nov. 23, as a wide release.

The Culver City studio previously planned an October rollout that included going limited on Oct. 14, an Oct. 21 expansion and wide break on Oct. 28.

On its new date, Devotion joins Disney’s animated Strange World, Universal/Amblin’s Steven Spielberg autobio pic The Fabelmans, an untitled movie from Neon and Luca Guadagnino’s Bones and All from United Artists Releasing. The weekend before, starting Nov. 18, brings Universal’s newsroom drama She Said and Searchlight’s The Menu.

The J.D. Dillard-directed aerial-war movie follows the harrowing true story of two elite U.S. Navy fighter pilots during the Korean War. Their heroic sacrifices ultimately would make them the Navy’s most celebrated wingmen. Jonathan Majors and Glen Powell star.

The pic’s screenplay is by Jake Crane & Jonathan A. H. Stewart, based on the book by Adam Makos. Molly Smith, Rachel Smith, Thad Luckinbill and Trent Luckinbill produce. EPs are Dillard and Powell. The film also stars Christina Jackson, Joe Jonas and Thomas Sadoski.

Source: DEADLINE

The war film based on Devotion: An Epic Story of Heroism, Friendship, and Sacrifice by Adam Makos tells the story of late Navy pilot Jesse Brown and hits theaters in October.

By Dana Rose Falcone
May 26, 2022 11:28 AM

Just ahead of Memorial Day, Jonathan Majors and his upcoming movie Devotion offer a reminder of the fight United States military veterans endured in battle.

The PEOPLE exclusive premiere of the trailer for Devotion introduces Jesse Brown (Majors), the first Black man to fly in combat for the U.S. Navy, during the Korean War.

“It’s a story about breaking through the limitations of society and breaking through the limitations of one’s own fear, and the legacy that leaves,” Majors, 32, tells PEOPLE of the war film based on Devotion: An Epic Story of Heroism, Friendship, and Sacrifice by Adam Makos.

Brown forms a bond that goes beyond friendship with fellow aviator Tom Hudner (Glen Powell), a clean-cut soldier from New England who passed up a chance to attend Harvard in favor of joining the Navy. Brown and Hudner find themselves in an unimaginable situation when one ends up shot down behind enemy lines and pinned in his burning plane, while the other attempts a seemingly impossible one-man rescue mission.

“Tom and Jesse are more soulmates than best friends, which is deep,” Majors says. “There’s no escaping each other. They are forever each other’s men, even in death.”

Majors says he and Devotion costars Powell, 33, Joe Jonas and Daren Kagasoff bonded off screen as well.

“Glen was really good at getting all the guys together,” the Lovecraft Country star says. “He and Joe, Daren — all the guys — they would get together and play at the park. And the park was right down the street from my house, so as I was walking my dogs or riding my bike, I’d see the guys, and we’d hang out and chat.”

Majors also liked to work out on set with Jonas, 32. “I would always bang my music, but Joe Jonas would also put his music and we would set up outside the trailers and we’d run, we’d do jump ropes, we’d do pushups, as a team,” Majors says of shooting in Savannah, Georgia. “We would work out and then go into the scene. We were a mixture of a boy band and a football team. We just held space for each other.”

Depicting a real person onscreen came with some pressure. But Majors made Brown’s family “a promise that I would do everything in my power, everything my talent will allow me to do, to do to bring this man’s story to the screen with as much integrity, and with the same moral fiber and humor that you all know he had,” he says.

Brown’s daughter Pam paid a surprise visit to the Devotion set and gave Majors some feedback on his portrayal. “After we shot a scene, I came out and she looked at me and she burst out crying,” Majors recalls. “She said, ‘I feel like I’m meeting my father for the first time.’ Because she was a baby when Jesse left us. That was a gift.”

Majors found similarities between Brown and late actor Sidney Poitier, who, in 1964, became the first Black man to win the Oscar for Best Actor. “No one thought Sidney would be able to do that,” the Yale School of Drama grad says. “I see a correlation between Jesse and Sidney’s fight, as they began to expand and exceed limitations. What Jesse is experiencing is such a universal thing in the same way as any trailblazer.”

Brown didn’t see himself as a trailblazer, though, simply a pilot who wanted to do his best and serve his country. Majors understands wanting one’s performance to speak for itself — and facing adversity.

“I’m proud to be a Black man, but you’re not going to minimize my experience by trying to make it a monolithic movement. I’m an individual,” Majors says. “And as that’s understood that you’re proud to be a Black man, you understand that the hardships you experienced were not because you wanted to be an aviator, it’s because you’re a Black man that wanted to be an aviator. It wasn’t because I wanted to be an actor, it’s because I was a Black man who wanted to be a leading man. That’s where the conflict comes in.”

Majors acknowledges “it’s a big conversation that we’re having” with Devotion’s approach to race and male friendship, but “we try to put some levity in it.”

“I know it’s difficult, but I hope something that people take away from it is this idea of friendship, it’s something we all have as human beings,” he continues. “It is what pushes us forward as a species, a devotion to one’s family, a devotion to one’s calling. I hope people feel uplifted and inspired to continue down their journeys to achieve whatever heights they hope to achieve.”

Devotion opens in theaters in limited release on Oct. 14 and wide on Oct. 28.

Source: PEOPLE

J.D. Dillard dug into his own family history to chronicle the unlikely bond between pioneering Navy airman Brown (played by Jonathan Majors) and Tom Hudner (Glen Powell) during the Korean War.

BY REBECCA FORD
MAY 23, 2022

J.D. Dillard’s earliest childhood memory is of burning his hand on the nose of an airplane after an air show when he was about three years old.

His father was a Naval aviator, and so Dillard’s early years are peppered with memories of hanging out in airplane hangars and watching his father soar through the sky as a Blue Angel. “It’s always kind of stayed with me, and it’s been such a part of his identity,” he tells Vanity Fair.

There was even a moment growing up when he thought maybe he’d follow in his father’s footsteps, but he took a different route—into filmmaking. He released his first film, the well-received sci-fi drama Sleight, in 2016 and his follow-up, Sweetheart, starring Kiersey Clemons, in 2019. He was well on his way to building a path as a genre director when a script landed on his desk that took him in a very different direction—into his past.

“It was the first time in forever I had cried while reading a script,” he says of the Devotion screenplay by Jake Crane and Jonathan Stewart. “It’s rare when the thing that you’re working on so deeply reaches into your own life, your own history, your own family.”

Devotion is the story of Jesse L. Brown (played by Jonathan Majors), a pioneering Black Naval aviator who flew during the Korean War, and built an unexpected bond with fellow Naval aviator Tom Hudner (Glen Powell). As can be seen in these exclusive images debuting here, the ambitious war film, which Sony will release in October, features incredible flight sequences with awe-inspiring aerial acrobatics—but it’s primarily a story about Brown’s determination, and the partnership that was forged along the way. “The goal was always to make this more kind of classic story,” says Dillard, “A dramatic friendship with a massive backdrop was always our North Star.”

Dillard wasn’t the only one with family history looming over him on Devotion. Majors says when he was playing Brown he thought often of his two grandfathers, who both served in the Korean War. “The Korean War kind of follows me,” says the 32-year-old actor, whose star has been steadily rising in recent years with roles in Da 5 Bloods, The Harder They Fall, Lovecraft Country, and an appearance in Loki that will lead to more appearances as Marvel supervillain Kang.

For Devotion, Majors saw in Brown a man carrying a great deal of weight on his shoulders as the first and only Black man at that level in his field. “It’s interesting, the juxtaposition between imposter syndrome and legacy, him understanding that he’s built for greater things,” he tells Vanity Fair. A moment in which Brown says, “I can’t tell you how many times someone has told me to give up” was especially moving for Majors: “That’s a conversation that sometimes it’s said to you, sometimes society is presenting you with that.”

Dillard says Majors brought to the role an emotional weight and authenticity needed for that character. “The role of Jesse is so difficult because there’s a power, there’s a restraint, there’s a vulnerability,” says Dillard. “What I love about him is that he’s kind of like a canary in the mines of honesty. What he looks to bring to his scene is so based in emotional reality that it breathes a different kind of life into the scenes that he participates in.”

Devotion follows Brown as he and a team of aviators—among them Joe Jonas and Daren Kagasoff—train to fly the F4U-4 Corsair fighters in the Korean War. Together they faced incredible risks with each mission, while Brown alone battled systemic racism at the same time. Majors peels back Brown’s stoic exterior and exposes the inner struggle that swirls within him. He remembers in particular shooting a scene early on that reveals how Brown uses the terrible things that have been said to him to motivate him to carry on. “I remember after that, I just sat in the locker room and just boo-hooed my eyes out,” he says. “You can’t shake it—you can’t just walk off from that. It costs you something.”

Glen Powell was on a fishing trip with his family several years ago when they realized they were all reading the same book, Adam Makos’s 2014 book, Devotion: An Epic Story of Heroism, Friendship, and Sacrifice. The book is about Brown’s pioneering history but also the deep friendship he built with Tom Hudner, the Massachusetts-born airman whose life story became forever entwined with Brown’s during a mission in December 1950. “We all got to talk on that fishing trip about why this book could be a movie and what an incredible story [it could be],” Powell says.

Powell teamed with Black Label Media to acquire the rights to the book, even meeting with Brown’s and Hudner’s families to explain why he wanted to tell this story. “This event has really defined their lives in so many ways, both of them, and so they hold it with such reverence, and the legacy of their fathers with such reverence that, I told them, ‘I promise you, I will do this right if you guys give me the opportunity to make it.’”

Powell was especially interested in exploring the unlikely bond between Brown and Hudner, who arrived from vastly different backgrounds to serve together. “I feel like this movie just resonates as so much more honest than most movies about being an ally and a friend and a wingman, and how far you’re willing to go for a friend—and it’s not going to be in a cheesy way. It’s always grounded in reality,” he says.

Dillard says the connection between the two pilots is “much more honest and a much more modern story about two men really fighting for mutual understanding.” He and the two actors worked together to make sure the friendship never fell into the many dangerous tropes that surround so many cinematic depictions of friendship between white and Black characters. “There’s no white savior, we were adamant about that,” adds Majors. “These men didn’t like each other; they were forced together by fate. The thing that these two men had inside of them that connected them was that idea of devotion.”

Once they were all on the same page with the emotional core of the film, there was still the flying to contend with. Majors and Powell needed to look confident enough in the planes to play some of the best pilots in the world in that era. Powell had gotten his pilot’s license for his work in Top Gun: Maverick, and Majors jumped into lessons as well, completing all but 10 hours needed for his own license (he says he’s definitely going to finish those up to get his license even though the film is complete). They learned from aviators who were passionate about planes from that era, including private collectors of planes from the ’50s that were brought in for the shoot. And they got into planes with real pilots who could show them the physical and emotional intensity that comes with being in those planes. “Everybody does throw up,” says Majors, but it was worth it to get the real experience. “When you pull Gs, you pull Gs…. And I wanted to feel that. I wanted to push it, because you’re playing Jesse Brown, and Jesse Brown’s a bad motherfucker. He’s a maverick. He’s a trailblazer. That’s who he is and we have to take it there.”

Dillard felt extra responsibility to make sure the aerial work read authentically. “My dad has been nudging me in the ribs for 30-some-odd years while we watch movies saying, ‘Oh, that’s not how planes move. That’s not how it works. That’s not what they say,’” he says. He consulted his father every step of the way, even having him on set for several weeks, but says it wasn’t the technical wizardry needed to create the big, bold aerial fight scenes that intimidated him. His focus was always on telling the story of Brown and Hudner, which is held in such high-esteem by airmen, in the right way. “When you visit our set on all of my monitors, I keep a little piece of gaff tape that just says, ‘what do you want them to feel?’” he says.

And though audiences won’t get to see the film until it comes out in the fall (it opens in limited release on October 14 and wide on October 28), Dillard has already heard from his most important critic: his father. “He loves it,” says Dillard with a smile, before adding, “I’m also bracing myself for the probability that I’ll never make anything that he will like as much as this.”

Source: VANITY FAIR

By Matt Grobar
September 30, 2021 9:00am

EXCLUSIVE: Domenick Lombardozzi (The Irishman), Karl Glusman (Greyhound), Matilda Lutz (Revenge), Owen Teague (Montana Story) and Catherine Dyer (The Morning Show) will round out the cast of Netflix’s Reptile.

They’ll appear in the crime thriller alongside previously announced cast members Benicio Del Toro, Justin Timberlake, Alicia Silverstone, Michael Pitt, Ato Essandoh, Frances Fisher and Eric Bogosian.

The first feature from director Grant Singer picks up following the brutal murder of a young real estate agent, following a hardened detective (Del Toro) as he attempts to uncover the truth in a case where nothing is as it seems. In doing so, he finds himself dismantling the illusions in his own life.

Molly Smith, Trent Luckinbill and Thad Luckinbill are producing for Black Label Media with Black Label’s Seth Spector co-producing. Del Toro and Rachel Smith are serving as exec producers.

Lombardozzi is perhaps best known for his turn as Det. Thomas ‘Herc’ Hauk in HBO’s The Wire, and as Ralph Capone in the premium cabler’s crime drama, Boardwalk Empire. He’ll next feature in HBO miniseries We Own This City, and in John D. Eraklis’ animated film, Pierre the Pigeon-Hawk. Lombardozzi has also previously appeared in series including Billions, Mrs. Fletcher, Magnum P.I., Power, The Deuce and Rosewood, along with films such as The King of Staten Island, The Irishman and Bridge of Spies. He is represented by Gersh and Leverage Management.

Glusman found his breakout role in Gaspar Noé’s Cannes title Love, going on to appear in films including Greyhound, Nocturnal Animals, and The Neon Demon, in addition to series such as Devs and Gypsy. The actor will next appear in Nick Cassavetes’ crime drama God Is A Bullet; in the Amanda Kramer pic Please Baby Please, alongside Andrea Riseborough, Demi Moore and others; and in Chloe Okuno’s Watcher, also starring Maika Monroe. He is repped by WME, Ilene Feldman Management and Ziffren Brittenham.

Lutz’s film credits include F. Javier Gutiérrez’s horror pic Rings and Coralie Fargeat’s horror-thriller, Revenge. She’s also appeared in the series Medici and Fuoriclasse for Italy’s Rai 1, and in Canal+’s They Were Ten, among others. She is repped by Gersh, Time-Art (France), and Jackoway Austen Tyerman.

Teague currently stars as Harold Lauder in Paramount+’s Stephen King series The Stand. He’s also starred on the TV side in HBO’s Mrs. Fletcher, alongside Kathryn Hahn, and in Netflix’s Bloodline. His film credits include It and It Chapter Two, as well Scott McGehee and David Siegel’s upcoming Montana Story, among other titles. He is repped by CAA, Brevard Talent Group and Myman Greenspan Fox.

Dyer is an Emmy-nominated actress who can currently be seen in the second season of Apple TV+’s The Morning Show. She’s also featured on the small-screen in The Haves and the Have Nots, The Resident, Stranger Things, Army Wives and more, along with such films as Nappily Ever After, The Darkest Minds, I, Tonya, Megan Leavey and The Founder. She is with Atlanta Models and Talent, HRI Talent and Huxley Entertainment Management.

Source: DEADLINE

By Justin Kroll
September 24, 2021 10:30am

EXCLUSIVE: Oscar-nominated actor Stanley Tucci has been tapped to play Grammy-winning producer Clive Davis in the biopic I Wanna Dance With Somebody, the upcoming feature film about the late musical icon Whitney Houston.

Naomi Ackie will play Houston in the musical biopic, which is based on Houston’s epic life and music. Kasi Lemmons is directing, with Anthony McCarten penning the script. Davis was the lawyer-turned-music producer and executive who had an extraordinary eye for spotting talent. That ability to find a star before they erupted on the scene led him to the wildly talented Houston before anyone knew who she was and, and he guided her to becoming a star.

Alongside McCarten’s Muse of Fire Productions, the film is being produced by Pat Houston on behalf of the Houston Estate; Davis; Larry Mestel on behalf of Primary Wave Music; Denis O’Sullivan (Bohemian Rhapsody) and Jeff Kalligheri for Compelling Pictures; Matt Jackson of Jackson Pictures; and Molly Smith, Trent Luckinbill and Thad Luckinbill for Black Label Media. Primary Wave Music is a partner of the Houston estate.

Houston is the most awarded female music artist of all time and one of the bestselling recording artists of all time, selling more than 200 million records worldwide. She won six Grammy Awards, 16 Billboard Music Awards, 22 American Music Awards and two Emmys among many others. Houston made her acting debut with the romantic thriller The Bodyguard, which she recorded six songs for the film’s soundtrack, including “I Will Always Love You.” The song won the Grammy Award for Record of the Year and became the best-selling physical single by a woman in music history. The soundtrack album won the Grammy Award for Album of the Year and remains the bestselling soundtrack album in history.

Houston, who died in 2012 at age 48, was posthumously inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and became the first Black artist to have three RIAA Diamond Awards.

Tucci can currently be seen in Max Borenstein’s Worth opposite Michael Keaton. Up next, he will be seen in The Kings Man opposite Matthew Goode and Gemma Arterton, and Lionsgate’s Moonfall directed Roland Emmerich.

Tucci is repped by CAA, Anonymous Content and Curtis Brown.

SOURCE: DEADLINE

By Justin Kroll
Senior Film Reporter
September 20, 2021 3:30pm

EXCLUSIVE: Ashton Sanders has joined the cast of the biopic I Wanna Dance With Somebody, the upcoming feature about the late musical icon Whitney Houston. Sanders will play Bobby Brown, and sources also tell Deadline that Black Label Media is coming on board to co-finance the film with Compelling Pictures and Primary Wave Music.

Naomi Ackie is set to play Houston in the Kasi Lemmons-directed film. The screenplay is written by Academy Award nominee Anthony McCarten, and will take audiences on an emotional, energetic journey through Houston’s career and music.

Alongside McCarten’s Muse of Fire Productions, the film is being produced by Pat Houston on behalf of the Houston Estate, Grammy-winning music producer Clive Davis, Larry Mestel on behalf of Primary Wave Music, Denis O’Sullivan and Jeff Kalligheri of Compelling Pictures, and Matt Jackson of Jackson Pictures. Molly Smith, Trent and Thad Luckinbill will produce for Black Label Media, with Black Label’s Rachel Smith and Seth Spector executive producing. Primary Wave Music is a partner of the Houston estate. Stella Meghie will also exec produce.

Houston is the most awarded female music artist of all time and is one of the bestselling recording artists of all time, selling more than 200 million records worldwide. Houston won six Grammys, 16 Billboard Music Awards, 22 American Music Awards and two Emmys, among other honors. Houston made her acting debut with the romantic thriller film The Bodyguard and recorded six songs for the film’s soundtrack, including “I Will Always Love You.” The song won the Grammy for Record of the Year and became the bestselling physical single by a woman in music history. The soundtrack album won the Grammy for Album of the Year and remains the bestelsling soundtrack album in history. In 2020, Whitney was posthumously inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and became the first Black artist to have 3 RIAA Diamond Awards.

Sony and TriStar Pictures will release the film in theaters on December 23, 2022.

Best known for his breakout role in Barry Jenkins’ Moonlight, Sanders will soon reprise his role as RZA in Season 2 of Wu-Tang: An American Saga. Most recently, Sanders appeared in the Oscar-nominated film Judas and the Black Messiah, and he is also set to produce and star in A More Unbending Battle under his 1237 Production banner.

Sanders is represented by Hyperion, and Felker Toczek Suddleson Abramson.

Next on the Black Label slate JD Dillard’s Devotion starring Glen Powell and Jonathan Majors, Derek Kolstad’s Time Agent and Grant Singer’s Reptile starring Benicio Del Toro and Justin Timberlake.

SOURCE: DEADLINE