The life cycle of a season of Real Housewives is a beautiful thing to witness, especially all at once. This week, we saw one franchise barreling toward a dramatic finale as the ladies of The Real Housewives of Potomac realized the Grande Dame has double-crossed them all. Across the country, mid-season The Real Housewives of Orange County hit a turning point as COVID-19 swept into the U.S. and shut down production. And finally, The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City, still early in its season, picked up steam as — to paraphrase a Utah icon — 5,600 people died, and it made the best Met Gala of all time. Read on for the moments that made this week in ‘wives!

HIGH POINT: Out of the box, RHOC

Our weekly visit to Orange County came just hours after Braunwyn publicly came out as a lesbian, and watching the episode with the insight that she is now finally “comfortable in [her] own skin,” as she repeatedly said in the announcement, gave it new significance. Much of the episode was about the women entering quarantine, but before the toilet paper hoarding began in earnest, Braunwyn goes makeup shopping with her son Jacob and says in her confessional “I have never been authentically myself,” but “you can only box someone up for so long.”

LOW POINT: Bathtime, RHOP

This week’s hour in Maryland opened with Karen inviting Ray to join her in the bathtub, which played out like a horror film as Ray slowly walked upstairs and Karen delivered some nightmarish lines, better forgotten, about unplugging holes. Incredibly, Karen came back even from this later in the episode by blatantly lying about who she’s inviting to her haphazard strip-mall wig party, sneakily trying to force a Monique-Candiace encounter, and tossing around vague allusions about drunk Juan. We need more of this Karen, less of, ugh, that one.

WILDEST MOMENT: A midday Met Gala, RHOSLC

Heather is quite right: The Met Gala has a different theme every year. So what, pray tell, does a Met Gala-themed luncheon look like? As I was disappointed to learn, it does not look like a room full of people wearing Rihanna costumes. No, a Mary M. Cosby Met Gala has betta fish centerpieces and Louis Vuitton AirPods. It rolls out a red carpet at the stroke of noon MST. Lunch opens with a long, tearful prayer and continues with enforced personal confessions. But first and foremost, it has 2003 Dom Pérignon: “2003 was the heat wave. Fifty-six hundred people died, and it made the best grapes of all time.”

👑 QUEEN OF THE WEEK 👑 Karen, RHOP  

LOUDEST OFF-SEASON FRANCHISE: RHOBH really had a week, with Erika’s divorce getting interesting and a few of the ladies getting COVID. There’s no place like Beverly Hills.

REAL RELATABLE HOUSEWIFE: Heather, RHOSLC, making clear that there will be hell to pay if anyone clears the burger and the lollipop drumsticks, and also identifying herself as “a flapper with cankles.”

WORST QUARANTINE PREP: Shannon pointing out that baby wipes are not, in fact, antibacterial, RHOC  

MOST OMINOUS CLOSING LINE: “I don’t know what else you need to see, if you want to see Jesus Christ of Nazareth himself come down to tap you on your lace front. But I’m telling you: She is not your friend.” —Wendy, RHOP

Related stories:

• The Week in ‘Wives: RHOP domination, RHOSLC celebrations, and a RHOC hangover
• The Real Housewives of Potomac recap: The wig doctor will see you now
• The Real Housewives of Orange County recap: You can only box someone up for so long
• The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City recap: Jen on 10

This story originally appeared on: EW - Author:Mary Sollosi

“They call me the Queen of Christmas,” Mariah Carey says (needlessly, because of course we already knew that). “Notice I said they call me, ‘cause I never claimed that name. It is a pretty fun name, though.”

She’s more than earned it. It’s been over 25 years since Carey dropped her first Christmas album, 1994’s Merry Christmas, but on the power of its lead single, the unstoppable “All I Want for Christmas Is You,” her status as a festive icon has only grown over time. Last year, the irresistible holiday track finally hit no. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 — bringing her grand total of chart-toppers to 19, the most of any solo artist — and as it held onto that spot in the early days of 2020, she also became the first artist in the chart’s history to score a no. 1 in four different decades.

This year marked the 30th anniversary of Carey’s self-titled debut album, and she commemorated the milestone with the yearlong celebration #MC30, throughout which she shared previously unreleased recordings, compilation album The Rarities, and the instantly bestselling, emotionally raw memoir The Meaning of Mariah Carey.

She’s topping off her big year with one final yuletide release: Mariah Carey’s Magical Christmas Special, landing on Apple TV+ on Dec. 4. “I don’t always love the use of the word magic when it comes to Christmas,” admits Carey, chatting with EW over Zoom from a winter wonderland. “But for this… it is. It’s more like, here’s the spirit — what we want to feel right now. We really need to just feel Christmas, no matter if we can’t be with our loved ones.”

In the special, Santa faces a crisis of holiday cheer (how very 2020) so he calls on the only person who could possibly save the day: Mariah Carey, of course. Her spectacular adventure to bring merriment back to the world includes appearances from Ariana Grande, Jennifer Hudson, Tiffany Haddish, Billy Eichner, Snoop Dogg, Misty Copeland, Jermaine Dupri, Mykal-Michelle Harris, and Carey’s twins Moroccan and Monroe.

To assemble the all-star group, “I just made a wish and it happened,” Carey jokes. “I was so excited to work with so many incredible artists and just really try to bring [this] to life.” In a particularly magical development, Carey teamed up with Grande and Hudson for a brand-new version of her 2010 holiday bop “Oh Santa!” complete with harmonized whistle notes.

“It really was a special moment. I think people felt it in the room,” she says of their collaboration. “I enjoyed it as a producer and a songwriter. It was cool just to take a new approach with it, because that was always my [original] inspiration, for it to be a girls’ group type of thing. But I layered it and made it my own girls’ group when I first did it, and to reinvent that song with these incredible women was a very special moment.”

The moment happened amid chaos; though she first conceived of the special before the pandemic swept across the world, the production went ahead during quarantine, taking extreme safety measures to meet Carey’s high standards.

“We had so many strict guidelines to be COVID-compliant,” says the singer, a self-professed lifelong germophobe to begin with. “Everybody did their best. You’ve got to follow the rules, that’s the thing. Every day it’s something new.” It was worth the extra effort, though, to make the show go on for 2020: “I’m so thankful that this exists for this year.”

Carey’s early vision for what the special would represent certainly would not qualify as COVID-compliant, but it’s all the more resonant now that we do find ourselves in such difficult times. “From the onset of this, pre-COVID, pre-everything that’s happened this year, we were all talking about and inspired by kind of like a candlelight vigil moment,” she says. “That’s had to be adjusted because obviously, we’re not standing shoulder to shoulder with people right now around the world. But the whole point was to have this kind of feeling of, it’s the light within you and it’s the spirit of Christmas. We know it’s hard, but I believe this happened for a reason — not to get too whatever about it, but it really did. And I’m very thankful for this moment.”

During our Zoom, Carey slyly alludes to the chapter in The Meaning of Mariah Carey wherein she recalls her ex-husband Tommy Mottola yelling, in a moment of fury, that “Thanksgiving is canceled.” (This year, “it kind of is,” she admits.) She spends much more ink in the book, however, on the holiday she’s best known for. “Christmas was always ruined for me as a kid,” she says, citing the memoir. “That’s part of the whole drive behind this push that I have every year, of ‘what exactly are we doing to enhance this already incredible moment?’”

For a year that needs it, she’s doing the most, in hopes that Christmas spirit won’t be added to the list of things we missed out on in 2020. “I just hope that this year people don’t give up and say, ‘Oh, forget it, it’s canceled,’” she says. “Never can be canceled for me. I’m going to enjoy it. Even if I’m the onliest one, sitting in front of my screen, looking at it with the kids, wearing onesies — we’re getting festive. And that’s what we’re doing.”

Mariah Carey’s Magical Christmas Special is now available to stream on Apple TV+, and the new version of “Oh Santa!” is out now. The full soundtrack is now available on Apple Music and will be everywhere Dec. 11.

Related stories:

• See the spangly, sparkly, star-studded trailed for Mariah Carey’s Magical Christmas Special
• The Meaning of Mariah Carey is a compelling account of suffering and survival: Review
• Mariah Carey on the ‘once-in-a-lifetime’ success of ‘All I Want for Christmas Is You’

This story originally appeared on: EW - Author:Mary Sollosi

The Real Housewives of Orange County

• TV Show

• Bravo

• Reality

It’s been a big news day in the Housewives-verse, my friends. Huge! The biggest and happiest story of the day, though, has to be Orange County’s own Braunwyn Windham-Burke coming out as a lesbian.

“I like women. I’m gay,” she shared in an interview with GLAAD. “It has taken me 42 years to say that but I am so proud of where I am right now.” As we know from watching this season of RHOC, this year has been a time of enormous growth and change for Braunwyn as she navigates sobriety; based on tonight’s midseason teaser, it seems like the remainder of season 15 will provide some glimpses of this other side of her incredible personal journey this year as well. “I’m just now starting to feel like I’m becoming the woman I’m supposed to be,” she said in the GLAAD interview.

Tonight’s episode took on a new resonance coming so soon after this announcement; in a confessional alongside a scene of her taking her son Jacob makeup shopping, she says, “Jacob’s journey inspires me because I have never been authentically myself. And seeing him just glow from the inside out makes me realize that, at the end of the day, the only thing that matters is that we’re true to ourselves.”

That shopping day happened nine months ago. In another confessional — which I suspect might have been quite recently filmed, based on her having posted a picture of herself in this exact, previously unseen (I think) confessional look two days ago and geotagged at a Christmas-decorated Evolution Media — she says, “You can only box someone up for so long before eventually they just have to break that damn box and turn it into confetti.”

It might be better if she can somehow recycle the box into toilet paper since that’s what everyone’s really looking for at the moment in 2020 history during which tonight’s episode takes place. The end of the ladies’ desert weekend — destined to be their last group vacay in some time — is demarcated by a now-vintage (a.k.a. from March) MSNBC clip announcing that the coronavirus has been declared a global pandemic.

Much of the episode follows the cast as they try to prepare for quarantine. I have been wondering how this moment would unfold on RHOC, and it gave me vivid flashbacks to those early days in, of course, the frantic shopping as well as in the attitudes, all evolving rapidly as the news rolled in. Gina goes from cheerfully buying spaghetti and mascarpone at the Italian market to realizing she should have been hoarding toilet paper the whole time. (“You can’t get toilet paper! It’s like getting a Birkin bag!” Kelly cries.)

The phone call between Kelly and Shannon should be taught in history classes as a document of this unique moment, expertly illustrating how widely attitudes differed in the early days of the pandemic. Kelly silently laughs at a panicked Shannon saying, “I get my meat every day!” and then reassuring her, after Shannon expresses her fears due to being immunocompromised, that the disease should only be a problem for “old people and babies. And then there’s you.” On second thought, maybe nobody should present Kelly and Shannon as a teaching tool in any classes, history or otherwise.

The hour brought me back to when we all called and texted everyone we’ve ever known (Kelly telling a friend in San Francisco “it’s not that bad here in Corona Del Mar”) and to the moment we resigned ourselves to a lot of indoor time, when — in yet another example of our friends the Bravo editors playing the long game to a rewarding payoff — Gina observes, “I just feel like the 1,700 square feet just got a hell of a lot smaller.” How much you want to bet Shannon never again denies calling that small house “sad”?

The prospect of quarantine adds new stress for Braunwyn, who we also see earlier in the episode visit her therapist to talk about her anxiety. She and Sean dump all the tequila they have in the house down the drain, and she shares in her confessional, "I feel like I need to escape, but I don't know where to go. Because what I'm trying to escape is myself."

The arrival of coronavirus dwarfs a secondary growing conflict, as Elizabeth learns from Kelly and Braunwyn that the other ladies think her story — about her divorce, her money, her relationship, and her feelings about all of them — doesn’t quite add up. (Based on what we’ve seen on the show, it definitely doesn’t, but personally I’m willing to cut the new girl some slack.) What upsets her, though, is the implication that she’s annoyed them with how much she talks about money, alternating with her insistence she really doesn’t care about money at all. We’ll see how that develops as they’re all left to sit with their feelings, and their mountains of toilet paper, in the coming weeks.

At one point in the episode’s second half, as we check in with all the women trying to prepare for what promises to be a lot more time inside than they could ever expect, it comes up that Tom Hanks had the virus. Hanks announced that he and his wife Rita Wilson tested positive on March 11; a title card at the end of the episode shares that production on the season shut down on March 14. The whole world can change in 72 hours.

Related content:

• The Real Housewives of Orange County recap: Shannon is still haunted by the vow renewal curse
• Quarantine divides the ‘wives in exclusive RHOC midseason teaser
• Shannon Beador teases RHOC in quarantine, and without Vicki and Tamra

This story originally appeared on: EW - Author:Mary Sollosi

The Real Housewives of Orange County

• TV Show

• Bravo

• Reality

So far in this season of The Real Housewives of Orange County, one woman’s sobriety journey, another’s introduction, and yet another’s smallish home have overwhelmed the narrative. There's another, grander drama on the horizon, though, that will hit the Housewives (like it did everyone else) harder than they ever could have imagined.

The arrival of the coronavirus pandemic is not far off in this season’s timeline, and the midseason trailer, which EW can exclusively reveal, teases what the lockdown will bring for the ladies.

“Quarantine didn’t just separate us,” Braunwyn ominously says in the clip. “It divided us.”

The teaser also offers glimpses of the cast’s self-shot, at-home confessionals; Shannon finding out she tested positive; Emily struggling to take care of a sick Shane; and a few of the ladies cooking together while wearing face shields.

After quarantine restrictions lifted, the cast resumed filming together and in (mostly outdoor) public places, so there’s room for more typical Housewives conflicts, too, like Elizabeth admitting to having a lifelong secret, Braunwyn apparently having a girlfriend, and what appears to be one particularly explosive beach day. Better stock up on tequila, because the rest of season 15 promises to be a wild ride.

Check out the clip, which will air following this week’s episode, above. The Real Housewives of Orange County airs Wednesdays at 9 p.m. ET/PT on Bravo.

Related stories:

• Shannon Beador teases RHOC in quarantine, and without Vicki and Tamra
• The Real Housewives of Orange County recap: Shannon is still haunted by the vow renewal curse
• The Week in ‘Wives: RHOP domination, RHOSLC celebrations, and a RHOC hangover

• CoNic wedding first look! The Resident stars Matt Czuchry and Emily VanCamp tease season 4 premiere
• Quarantine divides the ‘wives in exclusive RHOC midseason teaser
• Hear Audra McDonald in A Streetcar Named Desire clip from the Williamstown Theatre Festival
• The Masked Singer's latest guest panelist makes quite the entrance in semi-finals sneak peek

This story originally appeared on: EW - Author:Mary Sollosi

The Prom opens with an announcement that’s become familiar to us all in recent months: An event (specifically, the one of the title) has been canceled.

Even worse, it’s not even for a good reason, like invisible death at every corner: The villainous president of the PTA (Kerry Washington) says she must call off the local high school’s dance entirely because one of the students, Emma (talented newcomer Jo Ellen Pellman), wishes to attend it with her girlfriend, Alyssa (Ariana DeBose), and the rules clearly state that same-sex prom dates are forbidden. Rather than get in trouble about “civil rights” or whatever other liberal nonsense, better to just cancel the rite of passage entirely.

Based on the 2018 Broadway musical of the same name and directed by small-screen razzle-dazzler Ryan Murphy, The Prom was absolutely never going to be just the heartfelt tale of a girl finding courage and teaching acceptance in the face of intolerance. No, we must now journey to New York City to meet a quartet of completely unrelated musical theater actors: Dee Dee, an aging diva (Meryl Streep); Barry, an established but unsatisfied star (James Corden); Trent, a pretentious Juilliard grad bartending between gigs (Andrew Rannells); and Angie, a Fosse-worshiping showgirl too often relegated to the chorus line (Nicole Kidman).

After Dee Dee and Barry get ruinous reviews for their latest show, the four struggling thespians read about Emma on Twitter and decide to adopt her fight as their own cause célèbre to drum up some good publicity. They hop on a Godspell tour bus to Indiana, where they try to help Emma get her inclusive prom. Over the course of a big mess of a “plot” — for lack of a better word — the humble Hoosiers remind the New Yorkers of who they are deep down under all the Broadway sparkle, and the showfolk teach the small-minded small-towners that the world is big enough for all kinds of different people.

The Prom is narratively sloppy, emotionally false, visually ugly, morally superior, and at least 15 minutes too long (a strong case can be made for 30). It has good intentions, though; or at least it wants to have good intentions. Obviously — and positively! — the film preaches tolerance and inclusion, both of which the world needs more of. What the world does not need more of are lines like, “There must be a way to rid this community and by extension the nation of this cancer of intolerance,” which are real words that poor Andrew Rannells was forced, I would guess at gunpoint, to utter on-camera. At what point does preaching tolerance become so preachy that it's intolerable? (My vote goes to a cheesily staged viral-video musical number, but The Prom has many great candidates.)

Regrettably, much of the film's humor comes in the form of musical theater in-jokes. In addition to being merely unfunny, however, those winking, meta allusions to showbiz types and Broadway moments also invite us to read into the casting, too (not that there was ever any danger of these stars “disappearing” into their characters, who bear too little resemblance to real human people to credibly blend into any actor portraying them). We are supposed to recognize that these people are played by Streep and Kidman and, most bafflingly, Corden. This is oddly depressing in the case of Kidman, game and glamorous though she is, who deserves so much better. It's also disorienting to see Rannells, noted Broadway believer, sing a lyrically clumsy song about hypocrisy in the Bible — is that reminder of a much better tune supposed to be another reference?

The least off-putting piece of casting might be Keegan-Michael Key as Tom, the school’s principal standing with Emma to fight for a prom for everyone (which the film treats as little more than him doing his job). His scenes with Dee Dee are a breath of fresh air amid the soggy musical mania filling the rest of the movie. One of The Prom's grossest ironies, however, is that Tom serves the thread of the plot that is the diva’s reformation; he leads Dee Dee to discover the joy and healing that can be found in helping others rather than glorifying oneself, and reminds her of the true service that her work can provide. He loves musical theater. It’s an escape from the cruelties of reality. It’s our world, but better and brighter and braver. She gives that to people. That, in itself, is heroic.

That’s a nice sentiment. We all value the arts, or we wouldn’t be optimistically watching The Prom. But let’s recap: Kind, thankless Tom — an inevitably underpaid high school administrator who is Black, who lives in a town that we know nothing about except that it’s hateful, and who is the only person in that community publicly advocating for a scared and lonely teenage lesbian to retain the small dignity of attending her own prom — exists in this narrative primarily to teach a wealthy white celebrity that she has something to offer, and to emotionally enable her to be a hero of this story.

The way Murphy’s film fails Tom is emblematic of how much it misses the point of its own message. The Prom claims to celebrate courage, being true to oneself, standing up for what you believe in, blah blah blah. Those are all lovely ideas when presented with a bit of nuance or insight, but they’re undercut by the fact that the movie belongs not to the people with the painful problem, who actually overcome something difficult, but the quartet of invaders. There’s no people like show people, right? It’s hard to be moved by something so deeply self-congratulatory.

Some of the songs have charm. The cast is undeniably talented. But ultimately, the film has way too much in common with the egomaniacs at its center: It poses for an undeniably good cause, but its greater purpose is to collect the credit for having done it. D

The Prom hits Netflix Dec. 11.

Related stories: 

• It's time to dance because The Prom trailer is here
• Hear Meryl Streep rap (!) on new original track from The Prom

This story originally appeared on: EW - Author:Mary Sollosi

HIGH POINT: The trials of motherhood, RHOSLC

What a joy it's been to get to know this sextet of Utah queens. We dig a little deeper into their snow-capped lives this week with a few scenes of motherhood, which are as illuminating as they are enjoyable: Lisa gives her son a driving lesson and then, as a reward for a Range Rover well-parked, allows him to fetch her a Diet Coke. Meredith takes orders from her instantly iconic son Brooks, who does not approve of Jen's high kicks. Mary tries to separate her son and his girlfriend by shipping him off to boarding school in L.A. Finally, Heather throws a party for all her pregnant twentysomething employees (comprising 25 percent of her workforce) by giving them all their very own tiny Range Rovers — and makes some realizations about her own life along the way.

LOW POINT: Various afflictions, RHOC

Braunwyn, as we know, is an alcoholic — but the hard-won success in her ongoing sobriety journey has been a high point this season, frankly. We're talking about different afflictions this week: Braunwyn's children (and subsequently, possibly an affectionate Kelly) have head lice. Shannon is consumed by some toxic mix of grief, shame, and Casamigos, reflecting drunkenly on her own vow renewal and the disastrous divorce that followed soon after. Most painfully, though, Elizabeth reveals that she is afflicted with a complicated case of regret regarding her ongoing divorce. Meanwhile, viewers know (while the 'wives willfully dismiss the signs) that something even worse is on the way…

WILDEST MOMENT: Dominatrix party, RHOP

Everything was going great. It was just another day in the Housewives universe, with six women gathering in a hotel suite in a foreign country to wear bustiers and toss around a dildo like any normal dominatrix party on any normal night, until two truth-bombs were dropped that can never be rescinded: First, Karen opens up about her favorite pillow and her least-favorite favor. Second, Ashley finally tells a cat-masked Candiace about writing a statement about her character — butter knife, etc. — for Monique's case. Portugal will never be the same after these women are done with it.

👑 QUEEN OF THE WEEK 👑 Ashley, RHOP

HOLIEST COMMUNION: Mary's service, and Whitney's father's sincere appreciation of it, RHOSLC

DRUNKEST GIRL AT THE PARTY: Shannon, RHOC

MUSICAL MOMENT OF THE WEEK: Candiace's "I See You" remix feat. G from Backyard Band, Bravo's Real Housewives of Potomac, and unidentified Madeira vacationers, RHOP

FIERCEST FOOTWEAR: Jen's baby-shower-planning gladiator stilettos, RHOSLC (runner-up: Jen's baby-shower-attending gladiator stilettos, RHOSLC)

Author:Mary Sollosi - Source: EW

The most festive time of the year will feel a little different in 2020, but the legendary singer is serving up even more sparkle than usual (if you can imagine!) in the form of a star-studded Christmas special as a holly-jolly antidote to the tough year we've had. "I just feel very fortunate to be able to have this moment," Carey tells EW of the special, which hits Apple TV+ on Dec. 4. "And [I'm] hoping, in my own humble way, that this moment becomes its own healing thing, just bringing a little bit of light to people at the holidays."

In the Hamish Hamilton- and Roman Coppola-directed special, when a crisis of holiday cheer hits the North Pole, Santa calls on the one person who can possibly restore it: the elusive chanteuse herself, naturally. Carey's mission to bring back brightness and merriment incorporates music, dance, and animated sequences, and features appearances from Tiffany Haddish, Ariana Grande, Jennifer Hudson, Billy Eichner, Snoop Dogg, and Carey's twins, Moroccan and Monroe, among others.

The first trailer for the special, above, dropped Friday and features glimpses of Haddish introducing the magical tale, Misty Copeland appearing in a ballet sequence, and Carey performing alongside Grande and Hudson; the dream trio joined forces for a new version of Carey's 2010 holiday bop "Oh Santa!"

"That was amazing," Carey says. "to reinvent that song with these incredible women was a very special moment."

The single and video for the super-girl-group version of the tune will also come out Dec 4., and the full soundtrack (featuring Snoop Dogg and Jermaine Dupri, and including a brand new version of "Sleigh Ride") will be available on Apple Music the same day and other streaming platforms a week later, on Dec. 11.

So you better not pout! We're mere days away from a huge dose of holiday cheer to brighten up a dark December. "It's not just [for] people who are gung-ho festive like me," Carey says of the seasonal spectacular. "It's for everybody. It really is."

Author:Mary Sollosi - Source: EW

If you thought you used to spend long winters at home on the couch, this year is about to give you a whole new definition of a holiday in. To while away the wintry hours, Netflix has got you covered with festive entertainment options, from Christmas classics to its own recent string of straight-to-streaming films (no, A Christmas Prince did not make our list). Stock up on cookies and cocoa, because you’ve got one long movie marathon ahead of you.

How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000)

The 1966 animated TV special of Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas is great and iconic and rhyming and all, but it is barely half an hour long. Excuse me, but this is America. We need something feature-length. It needs to be live-action, with a visibly furry, tangibly gross chartreuse antihero. It needs to be packed to the grinchy gills with weird hairstyles and wacky foods and outlandish costumes. In short: We demand more. We demand most. We demand Ron Howard’s insane 2000 Grinch. Thanks.

EW grade: B– (read the review)

Talent: Jim Carrey, Christine Baranski, Jeffrey Tambor, Molly Shannon, Bill Irwin, Taylor Momsen

Related reading: The 25 best holiday movies since Home Alone

Carol (2015)

Okay, no more messing around. Christmas isn’t just a time for stupid movies (not that The Knight Before Christmas is stupid! We would never say that!); it’s also for actual masterpieces. Look no further than Todd Haynes’ gorgeous romantic drama, based on Patricia Highsmith’s The Price of Salt, about two women from very different backgrounds in 1950s New York who connect, quietly but desperately, in a world that refuses to let them. Carol received six Oscar nominations but no wins, which is a travesty. Also, for the record, it takes place during the holidays but is not technically about the season, though Rooney Mara does wear a Santa hat, and lends it much distinction.

EW grade: A– (read the review)

Talent: Cate Blanchett, Rooney Mara, Sarah Paulson, Kyle Chandler, Jake Lacy

Related reading: Carol stars Cate Blanchett, Rooney Mara, and director Todd Haynes on the film’s forbidden love story

A Bad Moms Christmas (2017)

One way to make Christmas Bad: Add more moms. The central trio of 2016’s surprise hit Bad Moms are joined by their own mothers for Jon Lucas and Scott Moore’s second R-rated woman-powered romp, this time with 100% more tinsel (mostly courtesy of Christine Baranski, on a mission) and probably 150% more sexy Santas.

EW grade: B+ (read the review)

Talent: Mila Kunis, Kristen Bell, Kathryn Hahn, Christine Baranski, Susan Sarandon, Cheryl Hines, Justin Hartley

Related reading: Holly-jolly holiday movie superlatives

A Very Murray Christmas (2015)

Sofia Coppola took a break from elegant theatrical features five years ago for this moody, meta Netflix holiday special, in which Bill Murray (playing himself) struggles to shoot his own holiday special, which has been snowed out. Wandering through the Carlyle Hotel, he encounters a parade of celebrity guests, who join him in yuletide duets as he realizes his lonely Christmas isn’t completely lost. What, you thought Coppola and Murray would just make some cheery cheesy Christmas drivel? Do you know who they are?

EW grade: B (read the review)

Talent: Bill Murray, Michael Cera, George Clooney, Chris Rock, Miley Cyrus, Jenny Lewis, Amy Poehler, Maya Rudolph, Rashida Jones, Jason Schwartzman

Related reading: A Very Murray Christmas: Sofia Coppola talks Bill Murray, Lost in Translation, and more

Holidays (2016)

May your days be merry and frightful with a nice disturbing viewing of this horror anthology comprising eight segments, each revolving around a different annual celebration. It includes some seasonally appropriate Christmas and New Year’s Eve terrors, but why not retroactively observe Easter, Mother’s Day, Halloween — all the celebrations denied us this year — with these tales of how hideously, nightmarishly wrong they could possibly go? Doesn’t that sound like a pleasant way to celebrate the season?

Talent: Seth Green, Ashley Greene, Kevin Smith, Harley Quinn Smith, Scott Stewart, Lorenza Izzo, Michael Gross

Related reading: Seth Green talks horror anthology Holidays

White Christmas (1954)

In Michael Curtiz’s (yes, the director of Casablanca) time-honored classic, two WWII-vet Broadway superstars meet a pair of song-and-dance sisters with whom they travel to snowless Vermont, where they are reunited with an old boss for whom they decide to stage a musical which may or may not be televised, upon which decision the film’s central romance hinges. It’s great! People eat liverwurst sandwiches and pretend it’s romantic. George Chakiris is a background dancer in the film’s worst musical number! If you’ve somehow never seen it, a very merry Christmas surprise awaits you indeed.

Talent: Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye, Rosemary Clooney, Vera-Ellen, Mary Wickes

Related reading: These are the top 20 Christmas movies ever

This Christmas (2007)

‘Tis the season for big-family drama, and few movies do it well as Preston A. Whitmore II’s music-filled, feel-good holiday flick, in which the Whitfield family’s secrets crisscross through its imperious matriarch’s house over the course of one eventful holiday. In a year when so many families will be prevented from gathering together, watching this well-cast crew go through their seasonal dramas is the next best thing.

EW grade: B (read the review)

Talent: Delroy Lindo, Idris Elba, Regina King, Chris Brown, Loretta Devine, Columbus Short

Related reading: Idris Elba’s 10 hottest roles

Let It Snow (2019)

The Netflix Christmas oeuvre expanded last year with this charming teen ensemble rom-com, a relatively understated entry in the streamer’s catalogue (compared to, say, the very sparkly musical Dolly Parton’s Christmas on the Square). When a snowstorm hits a small midwestern town, romance sparks and secrets spill among its teenage population. Also, Joan Cusack plays an infamous local eccentric and a fictional pop star shows up! We did only say relatively understated.

Talent: Kiernan Shipka, Shameik Moore, Joan Cusack, Isabela Moner, Odeya Rush

Related reading: Kiernan Shipka and Isabela Merced dish on Netflix’s new teen holiday flick Let It Snow

The Knight Before Christmas (2019)

We know what you’re thinking: It is sacrilege to choose, out of the entire Vanessa Hudgens Netflix Christmas canon, anything other than 2018’s iconic, unimpeachable The Christmas Switch or even its sparkling brand-new double-switching sequel. But hear us out: The Knight Before Christmas is even better, maybe. Hudgens plays a young woman who is sad and single until she meets an actual Medieval knight who has been magically transported to her small Christmas-movie town at Christmastime! She teaches him about modern life, including how to navigate actual Netflix on her TV. Extremely festive!

Talent: Vanessa Hudgens, Josh Whitehouse, Emmanuelle Chriqui

Related reading: Vanessa Hudgens felt the spirit (and the skunk of it all) on The Knight Before Christmas

The Christmas Chronicles (2018)

In compiling this roster of holiday entertainments, I first had The Christmas Chronicles listed simply as That Kurt Russell Santa Movie, which is probably what you call it, too. That is because Christmas Chronicles pretty much means nothing — the headline of this very list could probably be The Christmas Chronicles and nobody would blink an eye — but the phrase Kurt Russell Santa conjures an entire world of roguish yuletide possibilities. You watch The Christmas Chronicles only to see Kurt Russell as Santa Claus, which is more than enough to recommend it. Keep an eye out for its sequel this year, The Christmas Chronicles 2, more commonly known as The Kurt Russell Santa Movie Plus Goldie Hawn This Time.

EW grade: N/A (read the review)

Talent: Kurt Russell, Judah Lewis, Darby Camp, Kimberly Williams-Paisley, Lamorne Morris

Related reading: Kurt Russell’s Santa beard was ‘80 percent’ natural in Netflix’s Christmas Chronicles

About Time (2013)

Even when Love Actually filmmaker Richard Curtis isn’t making good cheer-stuffed ensemble rom-coms that are as much about Christmas as they are about love, actually, he can’t help but at least tangentially touch on the holidays. In this heart-tugging, slightly supernatural romantic comedy, a young man discovers that the men in his family have the ability to go back in time, a skill which he uses to navigate his own messy love life — in part on New Year’s Eve.

EW grade: B (read the review)

Talent: Domhnall Gleeson, Bill Nighy, Rachel McAdams, Tom Hollander

Related reading: 18 rockin’ New Year’s Eve movies

Ghosts of Girlfriend Past (2009)

Mark Waters’ snowy romantic comedy is not a classic Christmas Carol, but it’s the next-next-next-best thing: A moderately offensive late-aughts Matthew McRom-Com-Conaughey vehicle featuring Michael Douglas! Oscar winner Matthew McConaughey plays a sexist, racist, homophobic hotshot photographer who, on the eve of his brother’s wedding, is visited by three ghosts who show him the error of his womanizing ways — past, present, and future tense. It’s a gimmick, yes, but it’s a festive gimmick.

EW grade: B– (read the review)

Talent: Matthew McConaughey, Jennifer Garner, Michael Douglas, Breckin Meyer, Lacey Chabert, Emma Stone

Related reading: From Dazed and Confused to True Detective, Matthew McConaughey’s 15 best roles

The Nutcracker and the Four Realms (2018)

This fairly recent release didn’t, um, attract accolades, but that doesn’t mean it can’t help your holidays along splendidly. As our hearts ache for live entertainment, get a little taste of what it would be like to go to the ballet this season with Disney’s riff on the classic Nutcracker, full of whimsical costumes and inventive new CGI-assisted additions to the story (some of which are better than others). The true star of the show — whatever Keira Knightley’s pink wing tries to tell you — is Misty Copeland, stepping in with a breathtaking display of the beautiful art form.

EW grade: C (read the review)

Talent: Keira Knightley, Mackenzie Foy, Misty Copeland, Morgan Freeman, Helen Mirren, Eugenio Derbez, Richard E. Grant, Matthew Macfadyen

Related reading: 12 ballet movies that are en pointe

Hugo (2011)

If all you want for Christmas is a little Scorsese, then Hugo is your best bet. Not explicitly a holiday film, it still has all the ingredients — orphan children! Snowy Paris! Mechanical constructions! Artful cinematography! The love of cinema! — of a truly magical seasonal adventure. It may have crashed and burned at the box office, but as we all know, true holiday spirit isn’t about money; it’s about solving mysteries in a French railway station in the 1930s. 

EW grade: A– (read the review)

Talent: Asa Butterfield, Sacha Baron Cohen, Ben Kingsley, Chloë Grace Moretz, Jude Law, Ray Winstone, Emily Mortimer

Related reading: Hugo, Georges Méliès, and silent cinema

Related content:

Author:Mary Sollosi - Source: EW

Dolly Parton has had a busy few months: She released a holiday album, casually funded a COVID vaccine, and now, she produces and stars in the Netflix musical Dolly Parton’s Christmas on the Square — for which she also wrote 14 festive tunes.

“I love all the Christmas shows on TV, all the Christmas specials — and especially any Christmas musical, and this is my first Christmas musical,” Parton tells EW. “I had the chance to write 14 original new songs, and hearing all these wonderful artists sing them was a real joy for me.”

Among them is Christine Baranski, who stars as Regina Fuller, a Scroogeian figure set on selling her small midwestern town, Fullerville, to make way for an enormous mega-mall. As Regina distributes a pile of eviction notices right before Christmas, her former best friend (Jenifer Lewis), high school boyfriend (Treat Williams), and the town’s pastor (Josh Segarra) protest, while her harried assistant (Jeanine Mason) scrambles around after her, trying to apologize to every freshly served citizen of Fullerville.

After Regina sets her plan into motion, a fabulously sparkly, sassy angel (Parton, naturally) begins haunting our ungenerous heroine, reminding her of what the town once meant to her and how much she’s changed from the girl who grew up in Fullerville.

Bringing together Parton, Baranski, and Lewis in a film written, directed, choreographed, and produced by Debbie Allen, Christmas on the Square boasts an incomparable lineup of industry icons. “Truly, to watch the four of them work — they are all legends, and they have such unbelievable careers, and they are really well matched,” Mason tells EW. “They are in the same rhythm. They are such consummate professionals, such optimists.”

For Baranski, “it was the privilege of a lifetime,” she says. “When I heard this project was being done and then they wanted to send me a script, I said, ‘I don’t need to read the script, it’s Dolly Parton, I just want to be on a set with Dolly Parton!” The country queen responds: “Well, I have been a big fan of Christine’s for years, so getting a chance to work with her was really wonderful.”

“I was so proud of everybody,” Parton says of the cast performing her original songs. Of the 14 tracks she wrote for the film, she loves the holiday tunes “Christmas Is” and “Christmas on the Square” (both of which also recorded herself and included on her album Holly Dolly Christmas, the former with Miley Cyrus), but also names “Can You Forgive Me?” sung by Baranski at the end of the film, as a particular favorite. “I think it also has a real message in it for a lot of people — but she just delivered it so well.”

Upon Baranski’s urging, Parton says she may record the song herself as well — but asks Baranski to sing it with her. She’s considering recording a few of the tracks that aren’t explicitly holiday-themed in the future, and repeats her famous line, “I’ve always said my songs are like my children, and I expect them to support me when I’m old.”

For Allen and Lewis, working together was a happy reunion: “It was just like family, music, having the best pot of gumbo you can ever have,” Allen enthuses. “I’ve loved her forever.”

“Debbie gave me my first job in Hollywood on A Different World, so when she calls, I answer,” Lewis adds. “I was in Antarctica when she called. I said, ‘I’m down here with 400,000 penguins.’ She said ‘I don’t care, you get to Buenos Aires and then you get to Los Angeles’ — 18 text messages! — ‘Get to Debbie Allen Dance Academy and learn to vogue!’ [demonstrates voguing] Girl, so there was Dolly Parton in rhinestones [puts on rhinestone face shield, rings jingle bells], 85 Christmas songs, and baby we went!”

Lewis (whom Parton describes as “crazy in a good way”) does have one small criticism for the director, however: “I will say that Debbie snatched my wig off at one point.” Allen protests, “We were trying to shoot a shot, and she had the whole cast in the corner singing one of her songs! I’m like, girl, we don’t have time for this mess. And she kept singing — I snatched that wig. I snatched it.”

Laughing as they recollect the wig-snatching, it comes as no surprise that the joyous Christmas musical sounds like it was as much fun to make as it is to watch (“I was honestly dazzled,” says Mason of the production). Shooting took place in Atlanta in summer of 2019 — long before any of the cast or creative team might have dreamed of how the world would look upon its release, at the end of pandemic-stricken 2020.

“Thank god,” Baranski says. “Thank god we did it and thank god we waited to release it an extra year. I think the world needs it so badly. This year it’s going to be a real gift to people.” Reflects Allen: “There was no COVID when we shot this movie, but we knew we were doing something that was going to be important. It has so much joy, but it also has some really hard lessons learned — there’s a morality to it, there’s a moral spine to it.”

“The coming-together!” Lewis adds. “The importance of us all coming together, human beings around the world right now, for a common good, and as John Lewis said, good trouble. We’ve all got to stand up and evolve, consciously, into this new behavior, which is, and I’m not joking [puts bedazzled face shield back on]: stay safe! Stay safe this holiday season! And wear many rhinestones like Dolly Parton! That’s my message.”

After a year like this, there’s even more to learn from the legendary singer. “She is so about making people’s day a little brighter. That is truly her essence, and it’s the messaging of our film, and god — we need it now more than ever,” Mason says. “One of my last days on set, she said to me, ‘you’ve got to remember that, at the end of the day, as entertainers, what we’re here to do is to lift people out of our sadness, even if it’s just for that hour or two. That makes it all worth it.'”

Dolly Parton’s Christmas on the Square is now streaming on Netflix.

Related stories:

• The best new holiday music of 2020: Dolly Parton, Kelly Clarkson, Carly Rae Jepsen, and more
• Dolly Parton is angelic in first Christmas on the Square trailer
• Here are all the Netflix holiday movies, specials, and shows coming in 2020

Author:Mary Sollosi - Source: EW

Sex and the City (Movie)

• Movie

"The idea of being single on New Year's Eve has always been treacherous for everybody," says Michael Patrick King, who wrote, directed, and produced the first film installment of Sex and the City (as well as its sequel and the original TV series).

"There's something about that bullseye of midnight that makes almost an imperative that you check in with yourself," King continues. "You're supposed to be in love at midnight. You're supposed to be in a couple. Which is why it's so great for Sex and the City, because anytime we could underline what society says vs. the reality of where people are was always powerful."

After six seasons of memorable New York nights, Sex and the City got its first New Year's Eve moment in the 2008 movie — but all our heroines are staying in. Having been jilted by Mr. Big, Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) watches Meet Me in St. Louis alone in her apartment before going to bed early. She's awakened by a call from Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) who, separated from Steve, is emotional from spending her evening "alone with Chinese food." After hanging up, Carrie knows what she has to do: She throws on a fur coat and a pair of unreasonable shoes and races downtown, so neither of them will be alone at midnight.

"I love that sequence," Parker tells EW. "I loved it because it wasn't about words, it was just about this desperate need to connect to somebody that actually matters to you."

I couldn't help but winter…

Dec. 31 may seem like the perfect backdrop for SATC, but "we always [kept the show in] something we used to call eternal spring, somewhere between spring and summer, and occasionally we would touch fall for story line," King says. "We really never did winter in the series until the last season, when Carrie goes to Paris."

It took a lot of work to make the New York scene winter-ready. Carrie navigates a snowstorm to get to Miranda, but "we were filming in [warm weather], so everything you see is false," King recalls. "All the snow is fake, it's all fake. We asked all the neighbors on Perry Street to let us go in and decorate all their houses with Christmas, and they were like, 'Okay!' And it's a lot to be Sex and the City on your street all the time, but they were really charming and lovely."

The weather isn't the only series first that the scene brings. "It is the only time, in the entire series or either of the movies, that we saw Carrie come up out of the subway or go into the subway," King says (Miranda quite rightly points out on the phone that there's no way she'll be able to get a cab on New Year's Eve). "That was a major thing for me as a writer: Carrie's on the subway — that's how much she's trying to get someplace for her friend."

She emerges from an actual subway station on the Lower East Side — shot right in the neighborhood Miranda was supposed to be living in — where they also had to dress up the street for the scene, including with a neon clock (integrated into the shot, with great difficulty, through special effects) in the window of a shop behind Carrie's head. "I wanted to find a way to let the audience know how close time is now," King says. As the minutes tick away, Carrie races past a drag queen and some drunken bros blowing horns; "There's a lot of New York in that moment when she comes out of the subway."

And how she looks when she does it! The series and films' legendary costume designer, Patricia Field, dressed Carrie with care, as always, even though it might not have looked like it: "I loved that it felt hurried, because that was important" King says. "But even in a hurry, Carrie chose to be in a moment. She still recognized what day it was."

The fur coat thrown over her pajamas was her coat from the series, and "the director in me loves the sparkle hat," King says. But this is Carrie Bradshaw, after all; there's no question which piece of the outfit was her favorite. "I remember those boots so well," Parker tells EW. "I don't know if they were goat or lamb, [but] they were these Chanel boots that obviously we borrowed, and I knew what I was going to do to them; I knew how hard I was going to run. That was all real."

A new lang syne

The entire montage plays out against a haunting version of "Auld Lang Syne" from Scottish duo the Cast, the choice of which ended up changing the scene significantly. When King originally conceived of the sequence, he had it taking place a week before New Year's against "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas," since Carrie would have been watching Judy Garland sing it in Meet Me in St. Louis.

"I realized that too many people had already cashed in on that emotion for that holiday," he says. "I said to Sarah Jessica, As much as I want something emotional about Christmas, I don't think we can do 'Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.'"

Luckily for him, Parker had just the fix. "My husband had been a participant in the Kennedy Center Honors, and that year they honored Sean Connery," she says. "He came home and he said to me, I heard a cover of 'Auld Lang Syne.' This Scottish singer stood on the stage and sang it, and he said it was the most heartrending thing he'd ever [heard]. I can't remember how we somehow got our hands on that CD, [but] I was undone by that. I could not get over that. I said to Michael, I want you to listen to something and I don't know that we can get it and I don't know if it's available and I don't know if it's what you're thinking, but I think you need to use this music in that sequence."

"She played it for me and I was like, Oh yeah," King says. "It's just spectacular, because it's more emotional than any other version of 'Auld Lang Syne.' It's not quite as sad, it's more female. It is magical and mystical and emotional and weird, and it just is so much better because you've never heard it before." The scene was moved to New Year's Eve, with all its drama of midnight and romantic significance.

Should auld acquaintance be forgot

As another New York classic teaches us, the tune is all about old friends, so the montage checks in with the rest of the cast, too: A pregnant Charlotte (Kristin Davis) spends the holiday at home with her family, while Samantha (Kim Cattrall) and Smith (Jason Lewis) ring in the new year on New York time from L.A. (and if you look closely, "there's a bottle of champagne for her, and a bottle of Pellegrino for him," King points out, because Smith is in AA). Big (Chris Noth) eats dinner at a restaurant alone while people celebrate around him; meanwhile, Louise (Jennifer Hudson), at a party in St. Louis, makes meaningful eye contact across the room — "That's romance that's working," King notes.

Miranda is alone because Steve (David Eigenberg) has Brady (Joseph Pupo) for the night, and King also included a shot of father and son asleep next to each other, lying in the exact same position. "That was something that [Pupo] chose to do," King recalls. "David chose to sleep like that, and the little kid looked over and thought, Oh, that's what we do, and then he did that."

And then there's Stanford (Willie Garson) and Anthony (Mario Cantone) finding each other at a huge party and kissing — reluctantly, after glancing around for other options and chugging their Champagne — when the clock strikes 12. Though the pair had always previously hated each other, "they went through a healing, or a connecting, when Carrie's disastrous wedding didn't happen; they were sort of in that same emotional bubble there," King assesses. Of course, they would go on to get married in 2010's Sex and the City 2 (Liza Minnelli officiates!), which was also written and directed by King, though he insists he hadn't yet envisioned that when he staged their New Year's kiss.

"Oh God no!" he says. "It was just the target of, okay, how many types of New Year experiences can we [fit] in this montage? And that was the awkward, bad party, kiss-the-person-standing-next-to-you moment that everybody's sort of experienced, I think."

Maybe we could be each other's soulmates

The real heart and soul of the scene, however, is Carrie dashing across town for Miranda — which you might also say was the heart and soul of Sex and the City all along. "What we always said in the series was that the girls are the significant relationships for each other, you know: We'll be each other's soulmates," says King. "In the series they were always there to save each other. You could almost draw a direct line [to this scene] from the fact that when Miranda's mother died [in the 2001 episode 'My Motherboard, My Self'], she had no one to walk down the aisle with and Carrie showed up for her. It's a very potent thing."

They had originally shot dialogue for Miranda and Carrie as they hung out after midnight, eating Chinese food, but King ended up using the footage as the final shot in the montage, as the song ends. "I was just like, We're never gonna top 'Auld Lang Syne,'" he says. "I just put it over the end of that scene and that's them just laughing. That's all you need to see." So the last audible line in the sequence is Carrie, as she rushes to Miranda's door right at midnight, telling her friend she's not alone. "It was like nothing else mattered except connecting and finding home," Parker says. "I just loved it."

—Additional reporting by Samantha Highfill.

To read more on holiday film favorites, order the December issue of Entertainment Weekly or find it on newsstands now. Don't forget to subscribe for more exclusive interviews and photos, only in EW.

Related stories:

• 18 rockin' New Year's Eve movies
• A holiday diamond in the rough: An oral history of The Family Stone
• Sex and the City: An oral history

Sex and the City (Movie)

Author:Mary Sollosi - Source: EW