The idea of “the tortured artist” is a familiar one. People often think of Van Gogh cutting off his ear, or Hemingway shooting himself as proof that a “true” artist needs to suffer in order to be “a genius.”
While I don’t necessarily agree with that sentiment, I will say that sometimes, suffering does create true art, and Brian Wilson, who unfortunately passed away recently at the age of 82, could be considered both a genius, as well as somebody who suffered. I say this because Wilson had schizoaffective disorder, which he battled for many years.
With his recent passing, which stars like John Cusack and Stephen King recently paid tribute to, I was reminded of one of the greatest music movies of all time, that being Love & Mercy. So, here’s why Wilson’s death makes me remember what a masterful and thoughtful biopic that movie was.
a Steely Dan biopic, but my caveat was that I don’t think Donald Fagen would want people digging into his past or putting it up on a big screen.
I get it. Most people likely wouldn’t be comfortable with a dramatization of their lives knowing that both the good, but also the bad, would be laid bare for all to see. For instance, even though I’m highly anticipating Antoine Fuqua’s Michael Jackson biopic, I honestly don’t know just how in-depth it’s actually going to get, especially when it comes to the more controversial issues in Jackson’s life.
So, it was greatly refreshing to watch a biopic that truly digs deep into Brian Wilson, and not just one period of his life, but two very separate times in the musician’s existence. At one end, we have young, Pet Sounds-era Wilson, played by Paul Dano. In these sections of the film, we see his creative genius at work, but also the mental illness that is slowly creeping into his brain and making him both scared, but also depressed.
As a huge Beach Boys fan, I love seeing moments with Wilson’s brothers, Carl and Dennis (played by Brett Davern and Kenny Wormald, respectively), or his cousin, Mike Love (Jake Abel) just not understanding the creative direction Wilson was taking at the time. Because Pet Sounds is one of my favorite albums, this was all really informative and interesting to me.
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However, I also really love the other section of the movie, which sees a much older, highly drugged up version of Wilson, played by John Cusack. In these scenes, we see him with his domineering and controlling therapist and legal guardian, Dr. Eugene Landy (played by Paul Giamatti). By melding these two very important moments in his life together to tell one story, it’s almost like Wilson was two completely different people throughout his life, which is a really interesting approach!
20 honest movies about mental illness. And, while there are a lot of great picks on there, I would like to add Love & Mercy, since the film tackles Wilson’s mental illness thoughtfully and with tact.
While it doesn’t exactly spell out just what mental illness Wilson has, we watch his torment as he hears auditory hallucinations and struggles with trying to make his art, but also the war that is going on in his head, which isn’t helped by his use of drugs, like LSD.
We then see him in a later period of his life, and what mental illness has done to him by the ‘80s. Elizabeth Banks gives a wonderful performance as Wilson’s then-girlfriend-later-wife, Melinda Ledbetter, and she helps get him away from his doctor, who is using his power to be Wilson’s legal guardian.
All of this is woven expertly into the story. Sure, this could have been a musical biopic that simply went into the music itself, but it’s more than just that. It’s about Wilson’s mental struggles, and it does it in a way that is both open and honest.
I’m actually surprised that Wilson was okay with showing himself to be so vulnerable, but I really shouldn’t be, given how vulnerable he always allowed himself to be in his music. Speaking of which…
one of the greatest, because the story seems like it’s less about the music, and more about what the music is actually doing to the man who is making it.
It’s an approach that I hope to see from other upcoming music biopics as well. However, there’s one last thing that I want to talk about when it comes to this movie.
(Image credit: Lionsgate)
Seeing Brian Wilson Himself In The End Credits Will Really Hit Differently Now That He’s Gone
I, of course, was sad when I heard that Brian Wilson died, but the first thing I did was go onto YouTube and play the clip of Wilson that is in the end credits of this film, as it features him singing“Love & Mercy,” which is off of his 1988 self-titled album.
When I originally saw the film in the theater, this was the first time I had ever heard this song. I remember buying the Brian Wilson PresentsSmile album years prior, so I was familiar with this similar, and yet different sounding Wilson from his later years. But, the look on his face really struck home for me, as he looked like a man who had seen his fair share, but somehow made it out to the other side.
Now that he’s gone, that scene and song hit differently.
It honestly looks like Wilson had spent his whole life searching for love and mercy, not just from others, but also from himself. Whenever I think of Wilson now, I’ll think of this song and scene, and fondly remember all the hours I spent staring up at my ceiling, listening to The Beach Boys.
Don’t talk to me; I’m entering my “dragons era” once again.
But, on a real note, the live-action How To Train Your Dragon has finally happened, guys. It’s finally here. It feels like just yesterday that the 2025 movie release was confirmed, and we started to get casting news, story updates, filming posts, and so much more. Now it’s dropped, and honestly…I think it’s the best live-action adaptation I’ve ever seen.
Before we delve into that, however, we need to address the actual concern I had going into this film and how the movie addressed it in a matter of seconds. Let’s talk about it.
How To Train Your Dragon movies, you’re going to enjoy this film. It’s essentially the same story, and it feels like it was ripped right out of the animation and brought to our eyes in live-action form, which is something that I am so freaking happy about.
It’s not even just that which made this good – the characters’ mannerisms were there, the dragons were there – Toothless looked so good, and I literally felt tears come to my eyes when John Powell’s score swelled as he and Hiccup took their first real flight together. It was like a blast to the past.
This is what a lot of Disney live-action remakes are missing – the heart of the story, the fact that we all love the original – so if you’re going to remake it, keep it relatively the same. We don’t need flashy changes, or at the very least, I don’t. And, this movie had everything you could want and more.
However, like I said, there was one concern I had going into it.
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Halle Bailey’s Ariel from The Little Mermaid, who is literally just a made-up fantasy character and could look like anyone. However, with the Vikings – the group this is based on – it is historically accurate that most of them were white, and Nico Parker is not.
Again, I don’t care about race 99% of the time as long as you give a compelling performance. However, Parker’s casting did turn some heads, and then when I saw that there would be more characters of that race within Berk, I started to wonder how they would explain this.
Then I saw the movie, and everything fell into place.
Mulan remake, I couldn’t tell you how many times it repeated the phrase “Mulan can’t fight because she’s a woman” over and over. We get it. We don’t need to hear this explanation time and time again when that premise was clear the first time we heard it.
This movie did it right – where the explanation was just said, very quickly, so we don’t really have to even think about it – and then we move on to the main story. You know, fighting dragons and stuff, cementing this as one of my favorite fantasy movies ever because yes, it’s so much fun.
It’s a great time to be a Conan O’Brien fan, between his podcast Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend still going strong, his travel series Conan O’Brien Must Go being available to stream with a Max subscription, and March seeing him both host the 97th Academy Awards and receive the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor (the latter of which can be watched with a Netflix subscription). However, many still remember him best from his late night talk show days, starting with his 16-year stint hosting Late Night after being a writer on Saturday Night Live and The Simpsons.
While there were plenty of popular sketches from his Late Night tenure (where Sarah Silverman bounced back after being fired from SNL), O’Brien recently spent some time going over the more obscure offerings he and his writers created. Additionally, he recalled the time he wanted to change the name of the show to something wild, yet I’m not surprised at all it came out of that mind of his.
What Conan O’Brien’s Favorite Obscure Late Night Sketches Are
Late Night with Seth Meyers, his first time revisiting the show since he left in 2009, he dedicated some time to the lesser-known sketches, starting with:
the streaming hit Conclave involving the The Always Disappointing FedEx Pope. Conan O’Brien then mentioned a take on one of the most famous X-Men characters who’s way less useful than the real deal:
I love ‘Shoe-verine’ by Andrew Weinberg. It was Wolverine, but he had shoes on his hands. So, those were the ones I liked.
Yeah, I’ll take adamantium claws over shoes for hands every time, although at least Shoe-verine’s punches would pack a little extra oomph. These characters exemplify O’Brien’s sense of humor when it comes to the visual medium, which he described thusly:
I’ve always had a cartoonish sense of humor, and I like things to be visually silly. I always thought, ‘I want people to laugh at this show if the sound is off.’
Wacky fits Conan O’Brien to a tee, but those kind of antics are a key reason why he remains popular. Even in Conan O’Brien Must Go, he finds hilarious ways to visually amuse, oftentimes just by donning a costume or silly outfit. So while the aforementioned Late Night characters are obscure, it’s understandable why he still thinks fondly of them.
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What Conan O’Brien Wanted To Call His Show Instead Of Late Night
Conan O’Brien succeeded David Letterman on Late Night, who’d been hosting the series for 11 years before moving over to CBS to start The Late Show after being passed over for The Tonight Show. Between Letterman’s lengthy run and O’Brien basically being an unknown, there was a lot riding on him to stand out as the new Late Night host. Later on in his conversation with Seth Meyers, O’Brien recalled how he and original writer Robert Smigel felt a good way to do this was to change the title of the show.
I remembered we were so afraid of being compared to Letterman, because he’s a genius. He invented this time slot and this sensibility. And we kept thinking, ‘We don’t want to be associated [with that.] We want people to think we’re doing something different. Let’s not use the name Late Night.’ And Robert and I became convinced that we should change the name to Nighty Night. I’m not kidding. We were convinced that it should be Nighty Night with Conan O’Brien.
Nighty Night With Conan O’Brien does have a nice ring to it, but it would have been a huge mistake to go through with retitling. Fortunately, this got the kibosh after O’Brien and Smigel with NBC executive Rick Ludwin, with O’Brien joking that he saw “four blood vessels burst” in the man’s head. Ludwin informed the men that Late Night was a “proven franchise” that would “long outlive” them, so they just dropped the idea and “ran away.”
Conan O’Brien’s late night TV days might be behind him, but it’s still easy to find him interviewing people and entertaining the masses on the small screen in multiple ways. Looking ahead, Conan O’Brien Must Go was renewed for Season 3 in March, he’ll be back to host the Oscars in 2026, and he’s voicing Smartypants in Toy Story 5.
At this point, it’s hard to imagine anyone but Chris Evans playing Steve Rogers (a.k.a. Captain America) in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Back in the early aughts though, Evans had to vie with other actors for the gig. There were a few notable names in the running, including Scott Porter, who’s still known for his work on Friday Night Lights. Porter recently recalled his audition and shared honest thoughts about what it was like losing the part to Evans. Based on the way he described it, it was a painful experience.
Scott Porter has forged a solid career for himself, having landed roles in various TV shows and movies. Nevertheless, losing the opportunity to play the leader of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes really stung at the time. Porter discussed it all during his appearance on Watch What Happens Live, where host Andy Cohen and others listened with intrigue as he shared his recollections. The Ginny & Georgia actor recalled being in the final four and, as he explained in the clip shared to TikTok, he prematurely bought into the hype around him:
Yeah, you said a punch in the gut earlier, yeah, that was a kick in the nuts. That was a big like, I’m bent over sobbing, heaving – yeah, it was bad. Well, because all these press outlets had put my head on Captain America’s body, and I started to buy in – ‘I can do this.’
(Image credit: Amanda Matlovich/Netflix)
Steve Rogers takes a lot of hits, but I’m sure the comic book hero has never felt the sting of losing an acting job to someone. It’s hard not to empathize with Scott Porter, as I can certainly understand why he’d want to play the MCU’s Sentinel of Liberty. However, despite having that freakout years ago, Porter now has a very tempered and reasonable take on not landing the role:
Under the Dome and Sex/Life fame). Bethel has been open about losing out on Cap and, in hindsight, it’s ironic that he was in contention since he was later cast as the MCU’s Bullseye. Other notable stars auditioned before the top four were selected. John Krasinski tried out for the part, though he opted against it after seeing the muscular Chris Hemsworth in costume as Thor. Comedian Dane Cook even apologized to Marvel for his audition after the fact.
Chris Evans may not have been everyone’s first choice for the role of Cap, given his prior role as Johnny Storm/The Human Torch in the Fantastic Four films of the 2000s. However, Evans ultimately embodied the role perfectly, playing Steve Rogers in various MCU films between 2011 and 2019. The star’s winning performance is a major reason why a number of fans would like to see him reprise his role in the upcoming Avengers: Doomsday and/or Secret Wars. Evans had denied rumors of a reprisal (though some fans remain skeptical).
Scott Porter should, at the very least be proud to have made it as far through the auditions as he did. Not only that, but Porter went on to voice heroic characters in animated productions like Marvel Anime: X-Men, Ultimate Spider-Man and Avengers Assemble. And, based on his MCU fandom, I’d imagine that he’d be seated if Chris Evans does actually return as Captain America. Fans can check out Cap’s exploits in the MCU by streaming the films of the Infinity Saga on Disney+.
It’s been three months since the Severance Season 2 finale was part of the 2025 TV schedule, but I know I’m still emotionally recovering from everything that took place during it. While I’m not surprised it took a toll on the series’ star Adam Scott, it’s interesting to hear him talk about one scene he was worried about, because he clearly crushed it. SPOILERS are ahead!
There are a lot of standout scenes from the finale, particularly how the season ends with Mark and Helly running away from Gemma after all that time when his outie thought his wife was dead and wanted to reunite with her. One moment from the episode that Scott’s friend and fellow actor Kristen Bell asked him about during an interview with Variety was when Innie and Outie Mark talk to each other over a camcorder. Here’s how he said he reacted to seeing that scene on paper:
If you read something like that, you just immediately start dreading [it].
upcoming award shows for later this year, I will still be thinking about the Severance finale and what it means for Season 3 and potential Severance spinoffs.
