Scott MacDonough, a veteran unit publicist who worked on films including Annie Hall, Norma Rae and Diner, died Tuesday at his home in New York, his family announced. He was 81.
MacDonough did publicity for Woody Allen’s The Front (1976), Annie Hall (1977), Interiors (1978) and Manhattan (1979) and for the Martin Ritt-directed movies Conrack (1974), Casey’s Shadow (1978), Norma Rae (1979), Back Roads (1981) and Stanley & Iris (1990).
In interviews, Kevin Bacon has given MacDonough credit for helping get Barry Levinson’s Diner (1982) released after the film tested poorly and was put on a shelf at MGM/UA.
Scott Pearsall MacDonough was born on May 15, 1944, in East Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania. When he was 3, he and his sister, Jill, moved with their parents, Dorothy and Jack, to Maplewood, New Jersey, where he would attend Columbia High School.
After graduating from Middlebury College and earning his master’s degree in American Literature from Columbia University, MacDonough began his career as a writer for film and television publications before becoming a unit publicist.
His publicity credits included The Magic Garden of Stanley Sweetheart (1970), 40 Carats (1973), Summer Wishes, Winter Dreams (1973), Ciao maschio (1978), Chapter Two (1979), Gordon Willis’ Windows (1980), Robert Altman’s Streamers (1983) and The Prince of Pennsylvania (1988).
He was a unit publicist from 1970-90, with a lot of that time spent at MGM/UA.
“He will be remembered for his encyclopedic knowledge of movies, his skilled writing and his incredible sense of humor,” his family noted.
In addition to his sister, survivors include his nephew, Chris, and his niece, Noelle. Funeral services will be private.
The upcoming fourth film, “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” (which just revealed its first eight-second-long teaser) is not changing the team-up formula. The movie will face the challenge of trying to match the scale of “No Way Home” but it’ll face this head-on and at worst go down swinging like Peter Parker does. It’s already been confirmed that Jon Bernthal will be appearing as the Punisher in the movie, and he’s sure to be (at best) an uneasy ally for Spider-Man. Now, the Hollywood Reporter has confirmed two other MCU characters/actors joining the movie.
Mark Ruffalo will be appearing as Bruce Banner/the Hulk in “Spider-Man: Brand New Day.” Ruffalo last appeared as the Hulk in 2022 Disney+ series “She-Hulk: Attorney at Law,” where a blood transfusion turned Bruce’s cousin Jen Walters (Tatiana Maslany) into a new Hulk.
But that’s not all, because the report says that Michael Mando will be reprising his role as the gangster Mac Gargan from “Spider-Man: Homecoming.” Gargan was one of Adrian Toomes’ (Michael Keaton) arms-dealing clients, but he got busted by Spidey during a sale and sent to prison. In the “Homecoming” post-credits scene, Gargan met with Toomes in prison and suggested they get revenge on Spider-Man.
Peter better watch his back because Marvel fans know Gargan is no simple criminal; it’s his destiny to become a super-villain called the Scorpion.
What role can Hulk and Scorpion play in Spider-Man: Brand New Day
Marvel Comics
Back when “Spider-Man: Homecoming” first released, I walked out of the movie thinking Mando as Scorpion was going to be the villain of the next one. The stinger seemed like clear sequel bait and the “Spider-Man” movies hadn’t used Scorpion yet. Then, “Far From Home” pivoted to Spidey fighting Mysterio (Jake Gyllenhaal) on a European field trip. And then “No Way Home” became Crisis on Infinite Spider-Men. It seemed like Scorpion had fallen through the cracks. The new animated series “Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man” (which is MCU inspired but non-canon) even features Gargan (Jonathan Medina) becoming Scorpion, as if taking advantage of the movies dropping his story thread… until now. In the comics, J. Jonah Jameson is the one who funds Gargan’s transformation into the Scorpion. If they want to give J.K. Simmons a bigger part as JJJ again, there you go.
The bigger question mark is how the Hulk fits in. He and Spider-Man have been in some “Avengers” movies together, but to my memory, they’ve never even shared a word with each other. The one connection I see is that both heroes are scientists, so perhaps Peter can bond with Bruce like he previously did Tony. With where “No Way Home” left him, Peter Parker could also use a mentor like Bruce Banner who knows what it’s like to be all alone in the world.
Sadie Sink has also been cast as someone in “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” — speculation about her part has ranged from a “true” Mary Jane Watson to Gwen Stacy to the X-Men’s Jean Grey to the minor hero Sarah Ehret/Jackpot. We’ll see how well “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” can hold this growing web together soon.
“Spider-Man: Brand New Day” is scheduled for theatrical release on July 31, 2026.
Harrison Ford is a national treasure. He’s one of the most universally loved movie stars of his generation. He’s responsible for some of the most iconic franchises in cinema history, and he is also an Academy Award nominee. The man has literally done it all, and by “all,” I mean he’s even punched Ryan Gosling in the face.
Yes, if you’re not familiar with the story, during the production of the criminally underrrated Blade Runner 2049, Ford and Gosling were involved in a fight scene with each other, and somebody, generally agreed to be Gosling himself, missed his mark, resulting in Ford accidentally hitting one of America’s prettiest actors in the face. Variety recently brought up the incident during an interview with the Star Wars actor, and the veteran brushed it off, though he was sure to point out Ryan is no less pretty because of the incident. Ford said…
[We were rehearsing a fight] and we got too close and I hit him. I apologized right away. What more could I do? Can’t take back a punch. Just take it. He’s a very handsome man. He’s still very handsome.
Ryan Gosling in such a way that he actually wasn’t handsome anymore, a legion of fans would probably be more concerned with the incident.
laughing after being punched by his co-star, which resulted in the take being unusable. And to be fair, how many people have been punched by Harrison Ford? The La La Land actor is in very limited company.
Ford has said before that he apologized for the punch and has also previously taken some of the blame, saying he didn’t pull his punch as well as he should have. Though ultimately, it seems most of the blame was laid on Ryan Gosling’s face being in the wrong place at the wrong time. The Shrinking actor seems to blow off the whole incident now. It happened, he can’t take it back, move on.
Blade Runner 2049 was a fantastic sequel to the original Blade Runner, one of the best science fiction movies ever. Unfortunately, the new movie followed its predecessor a little too closely, as both movies were financial flops. Blade Runner‘s ultimate quality was only found years later, and the same has largely happened with Blade Runner 2049.
Ryan Gosling may still be a very handsome man, but Harrison Ford does have one significant advantage in that department over his Blade Runner 2049 co-star. Gosling has never been named the Sexiest Man Alive by People Magazine, while Harrison Ford received that honor back in the 1990s. Gosling still has plenty of time to achieve that, as long as nobody damages his good looks.
The Fantastic Four movies from two decades ago ended prematurely.
Ioan Gruffudd starred as Reed Richards/Mister Fantastic in 2005’s Fantastic Four and the 2007 sequel, Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, and with the new Fantastic Four film recently hitting theaters, he’s reflecting on how there was supposed to be a third film in the early ’00s series and why it didn’t happen.
“The mindset was that we were going to do three,” he told Vulture. “I think the second movie was equally successful as the first and equally enjoyable for the fans. I particularly loved working with Doug Jones [as the Silver Surfer] on that movie, who’s just a terrific artist and an expert in the field of movement. If you want to witness somebody bringing a character to life physically, he’s just untouchable.”
He added, “So there was definitely that sort of momentum, and the plan was to do three movies, but these decisions are beyond my control.” The films were distributed by 20th Century Fox.
In the two movies, Jessica Alba portrays Sue Storm/Invisible Woman, Chris Evans is Johnny Storm/Human Torch and Michael Chiklis plays Ben Grimm/The Thing. The late Julian McMahon played villain, Victor von Doom/Doctor Doom. He died last month at age 56.
Elsewhere in the interview, Gruffudd also reminisced on working with co-star Evans and shared his thoughts on the actor’s cameo in Deadpool & Wolverine.
“I absolutely loved working with him. I just remember laughing with Chris every single day on set, almost like giddy teenagers,” he said. “It was a true delight to see Chris reprising Johnny, and that’s such an iconic sequence in that film. I was laughing out loud and just overjoyed by it, and it’s a beautiful homage to what Chris did as Johnny.”
Since then, the superhero team was rebooted for 2015’s bomb The Fantastic Four, which starred Miles Teller, Michael B. Jordan, Kate Mara and Jamie Bell. The Fantastic Four: First Steps, a new iteration, hit theaters on July 25 and stars Pedro Pascal, Joseph Quinn, Vanessa Kirby and Ebon Moss-Bachrach.
I’ve watched a lot of crappy movies this year. While the 2025 movie schedule has given us some unforgettable flicks we’ll be talking about for years to come, there’s also been a lot of garbage. War of the Worlds, the latest and possibly strangest adaptation of H.G. Wells’ iconic sci-fi novel about aliens invading Earth, might be the worst movie I’ve seen all year. However, though the movie feels like a 90-minute ad for an Amazon subscription (a membership is required to watch it, by the way), I think I actually like it in a weird way.
Yeah, the movie is schlocky, flat, filled with more plot holes than Amazon references, and features too many death fake-outs to count, but I can’t sit here and say I didn’t enjoy myself watching Ice Cube take on alien forces from behind a computer screen. Hear me out!
(Image credit: Prime Video)
This Movie Is Objectively Bad, But I Couldn’t Stop Watching
the War of the Worlds trailer with a block of text reading “It’s worse than you think,” and they’re not kidding. This is one of the worst movies I’ve ever watched, and that’s coming from a guy who was once part of a group called “The Shitty Movie Crew,” where we’d watch gems like Transmorphers and Slappy and the Stinkers. Even without the constant barrage of Amazon product placements used to propel the plot, this movie sucks. However, I couldn’t stop watching.
pretty much a computer screen movie, with everything being seen through the computer of Ice Cube’s character, DHS surveillance expert Will Radford. Whether he’s spying on his kids (played by Henry Hunter Hall and Iman Benson) or speaking with other government officials (played by Eva Longoria and Clark Gregg), Radford is always seen through his computer screen.
This creates a campy and cheesy effect that looks like something out of a bad FMV computer game in the ‘90s, where you watch terrible cutscenes before solving various puzzles. It’s not good and looks awful at times, but it added a certain charm to the experience.
(Image credit: Prime Video)
However, The Amazon Product Placement Is A Bit Much
I am a forgiving man. I can overlook the phoned-in performances, I can handle the obvious plot holes and things that don’t make sense, and I can forgive the cheesy computer-generated visual effects found throughout War of the Worlds, but what I can’t handle are all the product placements for Amazon services that take over the final act.
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They are few and far between in the beginning (talk of spying on people’s Amazon carts, a supporting character is a Prime delivery driver, etc.), but by the end of the movie, things go to a ridiculous level. I won’t spoil everything for those who haven’t seen it yet, but Amazon’s Prime Air (a drone delivery service) plays a major role in the fight to save humanity. I think I can feel the collective groan from everyone who’s watched so far.
Again, I don’t think War of the Worlds is a good movie; far from it. But I can’t sit here and act like I didn’t have a good time watching this utterly absurd retelling of one of the best sci-fi stories of all time.
