In a week heavily marked by awards season announcements including the Golden Globes, Screen Actors Guild and American Film Institute nominations, Kristen Stewart and The Runaways,Stargate: Universe's Ming Na, Emmy Rossum and Rene Russo lead this installment of the Hollywood Trade Roundup, a collection of hotties making headlines in The Hollywood Reporter and Daily Variety.
Disney's first princess of color in The Princess and the Frog opened the week at the top of the boxoffice with $25 million, besting awards season hopefuls The Blind Side — which finished second with $15.5 million for the weekend — and the Morgan Freeman-Matt Damon starrer Invictus, which collected $9.1 million in its opening frame. The Natalie Portman, Tobey Maguire and Jake Gyllenhaal Iraq War themed Brothers continues to underwhelm at the boxoffice.
Syfy's Stargate: Universe, which features one of few lesbians on TV this season in a character played by Ming Na, has been renewed for the "second half" of its freshman season. Another 20 episodes have been ordered for the Friday night drama that recently concluded with a fall finale that left Dr. Rush (Robert Carlyle) stranded on a planet. The cable network said the second half of the season will become more serialized and build on fractures within the show's group of spaceship-trapped castaways.
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ABC's Ugly Betty continued to make a comeback in the ratings as its most recent episode collected its largest audience since the season premiere, which is great news for fans of the America Ferrera series that was on the bubble this time a year ago.
The Runaways, the Joan Jett biopic starring Twilight's Kristen Stewart as the rocker, finally has a release date and distributor. Apparation will distribute the film in the U.S., and has set a March 19 release date. And in case you missed the hot lezbo goodness that was the trailer that also hit the interwebs this week.
The Writers Guild of America jumped on the nominations bandwagon and announced its TV noms this week. Favorites 30 Rock, The Office and Mad Men were joined by rookies Modern Family and Glee.
Emmy Rossum (The Phantom of the Opera) has been cast as the lead in Shameless, the John Wells drama pilot for Showtime. Allison Janney also has been cast for a recurring role. The series revolves around the Gallaghers, a working-class Chicago family dealing with the recession. Macy will play the alcoholic father, while his 18-year-old daughter (Rossum) takes care of her five younger siblings. Janney will play a love interest for Macy.
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More than 120 million viewers watched Susan Boyle's Britain's Got Talent debut on YouTube, making it the most-watched online video of 2009. The popular J.K. Wedding Entrance Dance came in third.
Breaking Bad's Krysten Ritter will star in the indie feature Killing Bono, which chronicles the early days of U2 from a rival band's perspective. Production begins next month in London. Ritter will next be seen in She's Out of My League.
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NBC has set an airdate for its long-delayed drama Parenthood: March 1. The drama, which was slated for fall and pushed to midseason after star Maura Tierney revealed that she was fighting breast cancer, will premiere the night after the Winter Olympics' Closing Ceremonies.
Rene Russo has joined the cast of Thor, where she will play Frigga, the mother of the Norse hero. Natalie Portman has already been cast as Thor's (Chris Hemsworth) love interest.
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Looking to the weekend at the boxoffice, it's all about the "king of the world" as James Cameron (Titanic) bows his decade-in-the-works technical masterpiece Avatar, starring Sigourney Weaver, Zoe Saldana and Michelle Rodriguez in Imax and 3D. In massive counter-programming, Sarah Jessica Parker and Hugh Grant star in the romantic comedy Did You Hear About the Morgans?
Three Oscar hopefuls bow in limited release this weekend: The Jeff Bridges-Maggie Gyllenhaal country romance Crazy Heart; the Penelope Cruz, Kate Hudson musical ensemble Nine and the Emily Blunt period piece The Young Victoria.
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