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Originally posted on www.thefancarpet.com

Bale May Join Oldboy

It looks as though Christian Bale is on the look out for his next big film project and has Oldboy in mind.

With filming on the next Batman film, The Dark Knight Rises coming to an end, Variety has reported that one of Bale’s potential next film roles is the villain in Spike Lee’s remake of Oldboy.

Based on the Korean original, the film would see Bale playing a fiend who locks the film’s hero in a hotel room for 15 years. Which is a definite change from his role as the caped crusader.

This isn’t the only option for Bale, as he has apparently taken a shine to Clint Eastwood’s remake of A Star is Born and Michael Mann’s Gold, a treasure hunt thriller.

Bale is seriously in demand at the moment, which probably has something to do with his Academy Award win earlier this year, as he’s also been linked to Out Of The Furnace and Noah.

However Bales has another project to complete before considering these, as he is apparently appearing in Terrence Malick’s currently unnamed next project.

Wolverine Pushed Back

X-sequel The Wolverine has hit problems, resulting in filming being pushed back from autumn 2011 to some time in early 2012.

One theory behind the filming delay is that it will allow the film’s star Hugh Jackman to begin work on Les Miserables, however there is still the big question of where the filming will take place.

The original plan was to shoot most of the movie in Japan, but with the recent earthquake disaster many of the planned locations have had to be compromised.

A compromise was made with filming to commence in Vancouver in November, but Jackman’s commitments have made these plans highly unlikely.

With Fox reportedly planning on pulling out of Japan all together (which would prove difficult for filming as the majority of the film is set there), this looks like another hurdle for the film after the planned director Darren Aronofsky pulled out.

But with James Mangold now at the helm, and with the success of the original Wolverine film and the recent success of X-Men I doubt Fox will be closing this project anytime soon.

Icons: Judy Garland

Originally posted on www.differentscene.co.uk

As a new feature for Different Scene we will be profiling icons in the gay world. These people are often cited as being huge gay icons for numerous different reasons, whether it be because of their political stance, the way they’ve helped change the gay landscape or just because they have been adopted by the gay community for another reason, either way they are all extremely well known to members of the gay community.

For our first feature we look at a woman who is regularly cited as the greatest gay icon of all time, Judy Garland. Through her pain and suffering and ups and downs in both her personal and professional life, Judy is a huge star of times past and still in many people’s opinions, the greatest gay icon of all time.

Starting her life off as Francis Ethel Gumm, Judy started performing at the tender age of two and would do so for the remainder of her life. After years of performing on the stage with her sisters she was soon snapped up by MGM where she joined their roster of young talent. While here she forged a name for herself whilst staring alongside Mickey Rooney in a hand full of films, but it was a little film she made in 1939 that would cement her fame and ensure that she would forever be remembered.

That little film was The Wizard of Oz, a film that everyone around the world knows, and it was this film that provided Judy with her signature song for which she will always be remembered, Over the Rainbow.

It was this film that many consider to be the reason why Garland has become synonymous with the gay community. Her escape over the rainbow from the drab darkness of reality to a place full of colour and different people who didn’t fit society’s norms reflected the feeling of the gay community at the time, who were being repressed as homosexuality was still illegal, and for many years gay men were known as friends of Dorothy.

The film has become a lasting success and even won Judy a Juvenile Academy Award. But it was after this that things started to go bad for the young Garland.

After years of being over worked by the studios things started to take their toll on her, and she was dropped from the studio in 1946 following accounts of bad behaviour on film sets, drug use, suicide attempts and her fluctuating weight. These problems would go on to plague the former child star for the remainder of her days.

However through the pain and suffering Garland continued to bounce back, with sell out concert performances around the world and an Academy Award nomination and a Golden Globe win for her role in A Star Is Born. It was in the early 1960s when Garland truly bounced back with her performance at Carnegie sHall that is often cited by many to be the greatest night in show business history. The live recording of her performance spent week at the top of Billboard album charts and won Garland numerous Grammy awards, the album has not been out of print since.

Things looked good for her but through the success her failed marriages and other personal problems, which still included suicide attempts and drug and alcohol abuse continued to plague her, and after the cancellation of her television show, many regarded this to have been the final devastating blow to her.

Then in 1969 after years of torment and anguish Garland was found dead in her bathroom at her rented Chelsea home in London, where she had died of an overdose.

Like the 1960s version of Amy Winehouse, Garland was a true talent whose star burnt bright but burnt out ever so quickly.

Looking back on it now you can see why Judy has become such a prolific gay icon, her suffering and torment as a woman in a mans world emulated the suffering that gay men at the time were experiencing for not fitting the norm, and it has often been widely rumoured that Garland’s death was one of the triggers to the Stonewall riots back in 1969, but that is still just a myth.