The Envelope - LA Times - Contender Q&A

'Freeheld' director takes up the fight

Thu, 14 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Oscar-nominated short doc chronicles the last weeks of a gay woman trying to secure pension for partner.

Back in 2005, Det. Lt. Laurel Hester learned she was dying from lung cancer. A 25-year veteran of the Ocean County, N.J., police force, Hester had no idea of the hurdles she would have to overcome to transfer her pension to her domestic partner, auto mechanic Stacie Andree. After all, it was an automatic given for heterosexual married couples to inherit pensions; why not same-sex partners? But the county's elected officials -- the Ocean County Board of Chosen Freeholders -- denied her request to have her pension transferred to Andree after she died.

One stand-up coward

Wed, 6 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Casey Affleck's performance in 'The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford' is one of the surprises of last year.

STARTING right off with its title, "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford" puts people off-balance. Does it follow the gun-slinging exploits of the legendary Wild West outlaw or does it place unexpected emphasis on the sidekick who forced his way into history?

Halle Berry is always up for a challenge

Mon, 14 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0800

From "Jungle Fever" to "Things We Lost in the Fire," the actress reflects on her career.

AFTER a string of critical and commercial disappointments that followed her 2002 Oscar win for "Monster's Ball," Halle Berry drew accolades for her dramatic performance in this year's "Things We Lost in the Fire," including an NAACP Image Award nomination for outstanding actress in a motion picture.

Ruby Dee's big break

Wed, 30 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0800

The 83-year-old actress talks about the Oscar nomination -- her first -- for 'American Gangster.'

Who says there are no decent film roles for women over 40? Ruby Dee found one at 83.

Christina Applegate is serious about comedy

Mon, 14 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0800

The star (and producer) of the hit sit-com "Samantha Who?" knew the right project when she saw it.

Christina Applegate made her television debut at the age of 3 months with her mother, Nancy Lee Priddy, in the soap opera "Days of Our Lives." But she hit TV stardom playing Kelly Bundy, the dumber-than-dumb blond daughter on the long-running series "Married ... With Children."

Chris Cooper finds what made the traitor tick

Mon, 14 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0800

The actor is considered a dark-horse candidate for an actor nod for "Breach."

Though most of the films with Oscar dreams were released during the holiday season, a startling performance can be found in one of the movies released early last year -- Chris Cooper's terrifically nuanced turn as the traitorous FBI agent Robert Hanssen in "Breach."

Javier Bardem takes a vacation

Wed, 9 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Chameleon actor Javier Bardem pulls away from his 'boring' real life to inhabit his disparate roles.

JAVIER BARDEM seems an unlikely chameleon. The handsome, muscular former Spanish national rugby team player with the broken nose should be easy to pick out of a lineup. But perhaps the most remarkable thing about the widely acclaimed actor is his staggering versatility. After establishing hunky leading man credentials in his native Spain, he earned an Oscar nomination in 2001 for his portrayal of a fey Cuban dissident in "Before Night Falls" and was a prematurely aged, highly articulate quadriplegic in the Oscar-winning "The Sea Inside." Now, in the Coen brothers' adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's novel "No Country for Old Men," Bardem is a psychopathic killer, while in Mike Newell's adaptation of Gabriel García Márquez' s "Love in the Time of Cholera," audiences watch him age more than 50 years as an almost invisible man who can't give up on the love of his life.

Casey Affleck gives us the willies -- and we like it

Sat, 23 Feb 2008 11:35:42 -0800

Ben's little brother talks about his kills in "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford."

" The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford ," adapted by writer-director Andrew Dominik from the novel by Ron Hansen, tips its intentions straight from the title.

Without fear

Wed, 2 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Tilda Swinton isn't drawn to glamorous roles, just the authentic ones. Like in 'Michael Clayton.'

FROM a distance, Tilda Swinton is a refugee from "The Matrix" or the third member of the Eurythmics in her black trench coat and stylish red bob swept behind her ears. She is tall, slender and commanding as she gracefully strides into L'Ermitage restaurant. She has played a gender-switching pseudo-immortal, a housewife scrambling to cover up a murder her son may have committed and is now stirring award buzz as an overwhelmed corporate attorney sailing into uncharted moral darkness in "Michael Clayton."

'Dexter:' On a new kind of spree

Wed, 2 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Michael C. Hall, star of Showtime's "Dexter," says next season is wide open for his serial killer character.

AFTER playing the flamboyant emcee in "Cabaret" on Broadway, Michael C. Hall was cast as closeted mortician David Fisher on HBO's "Six Feet Under," which ended in 2005. As critically acclaimed and different as that series was, last year he landed a role that stood out even more -- as the eponymous serial killer in Showtime's "Dexter," based on the books by Jeff Lindsay and which immediately gained a rabid following. Now the nominations are rolling in: With the second season wrapped up, Hall is up for both a Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild award for his role as killer who moonlights for the Miami Police Department. We caught up with Hall, 36, soon after the explosive season finale aired.