Gawker: taye diggs

Spoiler Alert: The Winner in Monsters vs. Aliens is...Dreamworks!

John Cook — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 10:35:06 EDT

Chopping Block gets chopped, J.J. Abrams gets extended, and Ricky Gervais' next film will be unlike anything he's ever done before except for The Office.

NBC has killed the now-ironically named Chopping Block, a food competition featuring British chef Marco Pierre White after three episodes that grabbed a whopping 2% of 18-to-49-year-olds. It will be replaced by Law & Order: Department of the Health Inspector [Variety].

Paramount has extended its production deal with J.J. Abrams' production company Bad Robot through 2013. Abrams' latest film is Star Trek, due out in May; Morning Glory, a Rachel McAdams-Harrison Ford vehicle, starts production in June [Variety].

Paramount and Dreamworks' 3D cartoon Monsters vs. Aliens opens today on 7,000 screens, 2,000 of which will feature the 3D wizardry. Industry watchers are anxiously awaiting box office to see if anyone will really pay an extra $3 or $4 a ticket to be nauseated for an hour-and-a-half [Variety].

Sony has picked up Ricky Gervais' The Men at Pru, a "coming-of-age tale about a group of men working at an insurance company"—Prudential maybe?-"in the 1970s." Gervais will write, produce, and direct in collaboration with Stephen Merchant. It's unclear whether the pair will successfully be able to capture the essence of what it's like for young men to work in stultifyingly dull white-collar desk jobs [Variety].

Slumdog Millionaire screenwriter Simon Beaufoy will write Truckers, an animated feature for DreamWorks, and not Wolverine II, as the internet had hoped. No one knows what Truckers will be about, though if Beaufoy brings the Slumdog magic, we expect it will involve adorable young truckstop hookers [THR].

Bids are coming in high on Sumner Redstone's movie theater chain, which is good because he needs the money [Variety]. More than 60 actors cast in this year's pilots are foreigners. This will be on Lou Dobbs tonight [THR]. Taye Diggs will play a vampire in Dead of Night [THR].

Scratch 'N' Sniff The Sexiest Men Alive

Richard Lawson — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 16:46:00 EST

This year's edition of People magazine's hugely popular "Sexiest Man Alive" issue (Hugh Jackman takes top honors) will feature... um... scratch 'n sniff photos of famous dudes, like Gossip Girl actress Chace Crawford, TV show kryptonite Taye Diggs, Law & Order: SVU brute Chris Meloni, and young god swain of the oceans Michael Phelps. Each of the guys chose a scent that makes them feel sexiest, from fresh cut grass (Mr. Crawford) to L’Homme YSL parfum for Mr. Phelps. We'll take a look at each fellow's preferred odor and analyze what it's supposed to say about them and what it really says, after the jump.

Chris Meloni, "a day at the beach"
What It's Probably Supposed to Say: Meloni is really a fun lovin' guy! He's not that brooding, getting-too-close-to-the-case-all-the-damn-time Eliot Stabler he plays on SVU. He really is just like that funny man we've seen in Wet Hot American Summer and Gym Teacher.
What It Really Says: Aside from the obvious, you know, seafood jokes, that he's quietly sad and wishes he could have fun and stare at the ever-rolling waves rather than talk about rape and murder all day.

Michael Phelps, L'Homme YSL
What It's Probably Supposed To Say: That he's suave and classy.
What It Really Says: While People apparently denies this is product placement, we kinda doubt it isn't. So this means that lil' Neptune has become a total corporate shill since winning 1.5 million gold medals at the Chinalympics. I mean, we've known this for some time, and who can blame the kid for cashing in on his new-found fame. But you'd think that a young man as passionate about swimming as he seems to be would chose, like, "the smell of chlorine" or something. But he probably doesn't find that sexy anymore. No, that's work. The money is sexy. Giant swimming pools full of cologne-smelling money.

Taye Diggs, “vanilla, chocolate, sandalwood and musk essential oils"
What It's Probably Supposed To Say: These are pretty cliche! And sorta like sexy sexy. I guess this means that he's a just a smooth, sensual, lover brother who will give you the passionate time of your life when you're on vacation in Jamaica, escaping the grind with your friend, happy to be briefly away from your busy life being a single mom to your son back in San Francisco. Oh. Wait. That was just a movie. Um, I guess it just means that his wife, Broadway star Idina Menzel, is just a very, very happy woman.
What It Really Says: Actually, that's probably it.

Chace Crawford, "fresh cut grass"
What It's Probably Supposed To Say: Well apparently Miss Crawford says of the smell: "[I] grew up playing a lot of football and golf ... When I smell freshly cut grass I get this air of competition. It wakes me up, gets me going." So, he's a good clean all-American boy!
What It Really Says: That thinking of football and sweat and sports makes him feel sexy! That is totally normal! Lots of men feel like that. Big, strong manly men like Rock Hudson and Richard Chamberlain and Tab Hunter. Either that or he's just a young man who gets a bit peckish when thinking of balmy, breezy summer and, well, um, the neighbor boy who used to mow the lawn across the street in nothing but gym shorts.

Trade Round-Up: ABC Gives Taye Diggs Undisclosed Job On 'Grey's' Sequel

Mark — Thu, 22 Feb 2007 14:31:44 EST

· Jesse Jackson lets the industry know that it can't fool him with Oscar nominations (and likely wins) for Jennifer Hudson, Forest Whitaker, and Eddie Murphy, as he sees right through this obvious stalling tactic putting off an oft-promised dehonkification of Hollywood. [Variety]
· ABC might not be revealing exactly what their Grey's Anatomy spinoff will be about, but they're conceding this: Taye Diggs is going to be in it. We're sure they'll find something for him to do involving cradling the adorable, sickly babies Dr. Addison just saved from tragic demises. [THR]
· Fox plans on giving Steven Spielberg's On the Lot reality competition a leg up by premiering it after one of the last American Idol installments of the season, hoping that viewers will stick around even when they figure out that Ryan Seacrest won't be showing up to console the losers. [Variety]
· Today's evocative verb referring to what Idol did to its competition last night: "tramples." [THR]
· The stunt-casting of Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter as president and VP in a bit dramatizing every liberal's most disturbing nightmare helps the premiere of Fox News Channel's Daily Show knockoff The 1/2 Hour News Hour to big debut ratings. [Variety]