As we say goodbye to 5781, JBN looks back at the ten biggest stories about Jews in entertainment over the past year.
Mila Kunis and Hubby Ashton Kutcher Do Super Bowl Ad
Married couple Mila Kunis and Ashton Kutcher worked together again on screen for the first time in more than a decade. The former “That 70s Show” stars reunited professionally in a new Super Bowl commercial for Cheetos.
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The adorable commercial used Shaggy’s famous song “It Wasn’t Me.” Poor Ashton Kutcher keeps on finding out that someone in the house finished all of the Cheetos. The culprit was of course Mila Kunis. But when asked by her husband about it she just answers, “It wasn’t me.”
Mila Kunis Cheetos Super Bowl Commercial
William Shatner Has A New Blues Album
Better known as Captain Kirk, Shatner is not new to singing.
William Shatner is singing the blues. His Star Trek co-stars would cite the irony here as they have maintained that Shatner made them sing the blues over the years.
Most known for playing Captain Kirk on the original Star Trek, William Shatner grew up in a Jewish family in Montreal. But after the original show went off the air the actor tried his turn at singing, appearing frequently on TV variety shows. But with the success of the Star Trek movie franchise starting in 1979, he stuck to acting for the next four decades.
Here you can see William Shatner perform Elton John classic Rocket Man at the 1978 Science Fiction Film Awards. The performance is a great example of his feature “talk-singing” style.
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Bob Iger Is Leaving Disney
Bob Iger served at the top of the Walt Disney Company in one job or another for the past 22 years. He was the company’s president for twelve years and last year he stepped down from the role of Disney CEO after fifteen years to become the company’s chairman. In March word that came he will be leaving the company entirely at the end of the year after transforming it into the behemoth which it has become.
Sarah Silverman, Chelsea Handler, Others, Join Naked Video For Voting
Comedians Sarah Silverman and Chelsea Handler have stripped off their clothes and joined a public service announcement video to encourage voting. Handler is used to this as she is frequently naked in her social media posts.
They did this because 16 states have so called “naked ballot” laws. These laws require that mail in voted be placed in separate envelopes to maintain voter privacy. As such, people must place their ballot in an unnamed envelope which goes inside of another envelope with their name and information so that the states can record that they voted. Many see this as confusing and an attempt to discount many votes by mail because the Republicans believe that these will come overwhelmingly from Democratic voters. Republicans counter that this is needed to counter possible fraud.
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We made a PSA to help you make sure your mail-in vote counts!
(Said in the cadence of “or am I being obtuse”)
… Or are we “singing Imagine” https://t.co/eLYFs9uwd2— Sarah Silverman (@SarahKSilverman) October 7, 2020
Scarlett Johansson Launching Her Own Beauty Brand
Scarlett Johansson is not only finally getting to see the long anticipated, and long delayed, release of her very own Marvel super hero movie, “Black Widow,” but the recent double Oscar nominee is also starting her own beauty line. Johansson will make her first venture into entrepreneurship with a skincare brand expected to come to market in early 2022. The new brand was developed together with co-founder, entrepreneur and beauty/fashion executive, Kate Foster, and was funded by The Najafi Companies.
Scarlett Johansson as Black Widow (movie screen shot)
Gal Gadot Gets Tsuris For Supporting Israel
Wonder Woman Gal Gadot came out in support of Israel during the ongoing crisis with countless missiles being launched at civilian targets out of the Gaza Strip by the terrorist group Hamas. But apparently expressing concern for family and friends in Israel, or any support of Israel, is unacceptable to some.
As a result of a deluge of negative comments, Gadot was forced to disable future comments on her Tweet.
Gal Gadot (Facebook)
Jerry Seinfeld Has a New Book Out
Is This Anything? came out last October 6.
Jerry Seinfeld came out with his first new book in 25 years. “Is This Anything” is a collection of bits that he wrote down over the years and comes out next week.
From Simon & Schuster, the Illustrated Edition is 480 pages long and has a list price of $35.
Boy oh boy do people need this sort of thing these days. Please Jerry Seinfeld take us away from our Covid-19 nightmare. How about a free online Seinfeld reunion like so many other shows have done lately? Or it could just be you, Julia Louis Dreyfus, Larry David, Jason Alexander and Michael Richards talking about what you had for breakfast that day. We don’t care.
Natalie Portman Regrets Being Made a Lolita and Sexualized as a Child
Jerusalem born Natlaie Portman feels that she was made into a “Lolita” and had her personal sexuality harmed as a result of her first movie “Leon: The Professional.” The Oscar winning actress made shocking revelations when a guest on actor Dax Sheppard’s podcast called “Armchair Expert With Dax Shepard,” last December.
“I was definitely aware of the fact that like, I was being portrayed,” explained Portman, “like mainly in the kind of journalism around when the movies would come out — as this Lolita figure and stuff.”
Portman said that she dealt with his by putting on a more serious persona in public.
Hillary Clinton Teams With Steven Spielberg On Women’s Suffrage TV Show
Steven Spielberg and Hilary Clinton have collaborated on a new television program for the CW network called “The Woman’s Hour.” About the fight to get women the right to vote in America, it will be produced by Spielberg’s Amblin Entertainment. Clinton will serve as an executive producer on the anthology series.
The new show is based on Elaine Weiss’ book “The Woman’s Hour: The Great Fight to Win the Vote.”
Bob Dylan Sells His Entire Song Catalogue
Robert Zimmerman, AKA Bob Dylan, has sold his entire song catalogue to Universal Music Publishing Group last December. The amount of the sale not yet been revealed, but it can be sure to outdo the $100 million Stevie Nicks got when that singer sold her catalogue to Primary Wave.
Some are speculating that the Bob Dylan song catalogue could be worth as much as $300 million. It also includes songs written by Bob Dylan for which he owns copyrights, but performed by other groups like “The Weight” made famous by The Band,
Bob Dylan’s catalogue includes more than 600 songs, from “The Times They Are A-Changin’” and “Like a Rolling Stone” to “Blowin’ in the Wind” and “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door.” No one over thirty can say that his or her childhood as not in some way influenced by his music. His songs moved generations of adults and have been used to educate generations of schoolchildren.
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