Entertainment
How far will Philomena Cunk go to get a laugh? 'If he breaks my nose, it'll heal'
Some kids aspire to be doctors, astronauts, teachers or firefighters. Growing up in Bolton, a former mill town in the north of England, Diane Morgan was interested in one thing: comedy. She watched a lot of it, mostly British. Peter Sellers, “Fawlty Towers,” Monty Python.
When she landed in drama school, she told the head of the program, “‘Look, I’m not here for the Shakespeare’ — so they gave me Lady Macbeth, all the big roles,” she recalled in a video chat from her London home. “All these lovely, beautiful girls who wanted to play the ingenues — they hated me because they were like, ‘Why is she getting these parts? She wants to be the stupid maid.’”
Several decades later, Morgan’s commitment to playing the fool has paid off. Since 2013, she has starred as Philomena Cunk, a know-nothing TV pundit, in a series of mockumentaries about history, philosophy, art and science (including “Cunk on Earth”). As she strides through picturesque locations, dressed in tweed, and sits down with distinguished experts from the world of academia, she looks every bit the part of a BBC presenter. Then she does things like ask an Oxford professor, “What was more culturally significant, Beyoncé’s hit ‘Single Ladies’ or the Renaissance period?” and the illusion of gravitas is (hilariously) ruptured.
The latest volume in the “Cunk” canon, “Cunk on Life,” premieres Thursday on Netflix. Cunk remains as deadpan and ill-informed as ever, asking great philosophers and physicists “some of the most significant questions you can ask with a mouth.” In one particularly absurd scene, she tells a renowned British surgeon that only 40% of people have skeletons. Everyone else, she says, is “solid meat.”
Morgan has a remarkable ability to maintain a straight face throughout these interviews. It’s all about the pressure, she says. “I know that as soon as I laugh, it’s not funny.” She admits she does “corpse” — or crack up — on occasion, particularly with certain experts, like Douglas Hedley, a professor of the philosophy of religion at Cambridge University who has become a recurring talking head in the “Cunk” universe. “He talks very slowly, but he’s brilliant. I think the straighter and more serious they are, the more it tickles me,” she says.
Ricky Gervais and Diane Morgan in “After Life.”
(Natalie Seery)
The academics who appear in “Cunk” may be aware that Morgan is doing a bit for a comedy program, but they still react to her character’s idiotic questions with genuine shock and exasperation. In the early days, before Cunk became well-known, there was more confusion.
“We had some real eggheads, and famously, they don’t watch comedy. Then you trample all over their favorite topic” and things can get tense, she says. One expert grew so irritated they had to pause filming while he calmed down. “I said, ‘Don’t stop if that happens again.’ I was willing for him to punch me, because I thought it would make great TV. If he breaks my nose, it’ll heal.”
“I think they genuinely feel a bit defensive of their subject matter,” says “Cunk on Life” creator Charlie Brooker, who is also the force behind the techno-dystopian anthology series “Black Mirror.” He is usually not physically present when Morgan is filming the interviews because, he says, “I find it too cringe. I would die.”
Brooker says Morgan “doesn’t mind an awkward silence, which comes in really handy when she’s doing the interviews, because sometimes they will last an hour, 70% of which is awkward silence.”
The experts, some of whom have become recurring favorites, “seem to really enjoy the fact that they’re there,” Brooker says. “The sad thing is, experts don’t get interviewed on mainstream TV very often anymore.”
Over time, Cunk has grown more antagonistic toward the talking heads she interrogates, and more willing to counter their arguments with dubious anecdotal evidence. (“My mate Paul” is one of her most frequently cited sources.)
“That feels like a modern-day thing,” Brooker says. “People are less shy these days about saying to an expert, ‘Yeah, whatever, you may have studied this subject for 25 years, but I just watched a video on YouTube which tells me your life’s work is bulls—. I’ll tell you why we didn’t land on the moon, or vaccines don’t work. There’s an arrogant swagger to a lot of the alternative truth crowd.
“There’s something funny about watching her attack their professions, things they care passionately about, from her position of slightly bored detachment,” he adds.
Diane Morgan in the Max comedy “Frayed.”
(Lisa Tomasetti / HBO Max)
Morgan’s Bolton accent somehow adds to the character’s dry comedic affect. When Morgan was studying at the East 15 Acting School, she was told the way she spoke would be an obstacle to getting work.
“It’s madness, because every part I’ve had since then, it’s the accent that’s got it,” she says. “In drama school, they always want to stamp out the interesting bits about you and build you back up into an actor that they think people want. But actually, people want weirdness. They want individuality, don’t they? They want humps and lumps and weird eyes.”
Morgan spent nearly 10 years performing stand-up in London, an experience that was at least as valuable as drama school. “You learn a lot very quickly about how not to bore people,” she says.
During those lean years, she made ends meet by working a string of miserable jobs. There was a stint as a telemarketer, cold-calling people to ask if they needed a new accountant, and a particularly grim gig packing worming tablets for dogs for 10 hours a day, with no talking or sitting allowed. “It was the worst experience, but it made me think, ‘I’ve really got to make this work. I’ve really got to pull my socks up and do something with my life, because I don’t want to end up here,’” Morgan says.
She had landed a few small parts in TV when she got the audition for Philomena Cunk, which originated as a character on the satirical news show “Charlie Brooker’s Weekly Wipe.” Comedian Al Campbell played a dim-witted commentator with the ludicrous name Barry Shitpeas. The show was looking for his female counterpart, someone they originally envisioned as “a yummy mummy cupcake blogger who’s vacuous and drives a Range Rover,” Brooker says.
To complete the stereotype, the character was supposed to sound more posh. But Morgan insisted on asking for additional time in her audition to play Cunk in her own voice. “I’d never had the balls to do that,” she says. “It was just funnier, because my own accent is quite flat, and it lends a sort of misery to everything.”
Brooker was “absolutely floored” by the audition. Morgan brings “an odd comic unknowability” to Cunk, he says. “There’s something very curious about the character, where she is sort of alien and otherworldly but simultaneously vapid in a cosmic way,”
“Everyone was quite nervous about it — would this new character work or not?” Morgan recalls. “If it hadn’t, I’d have been axed immediately and taken off and shot around the corner. But it worked.”
Morgan, right, with Paul Ready in “Motherland.”
(Sundance Now / BBC Pictures)
Cunk became a breakout character, appearing in recurring segments and then anchoring standalone specials, including “Cunk on Britain” and — yes — “Cunk on Shakespeare.” (Standout quote: “School in Shakespeare’s day and age was vastly different to our own. In fact, it was far easier because he didn’t have to study Shakespeare.”)
Meanwhile, Morgan became a reliable scene stealer in acerbic British comedies, often playing bluntly profane characters with little regard for social niceties. In the Ricky Gervais vehicle “After Life,” she starred as a newspaper employee obsessed with Kevin Hart’s oeuvre. In “Motherland,” a sitcom co-created by Sharon Horgan, she played a foul-mouthed single mom who chafes at the bourgeois parenting standards of her middle-class social orbit. (She lets her son pee in the street and makes sandwiches by hacking cheese from a hunk in her freezer, severing a finger in the process.)
“It’s nice to have someone like that, who just doesn’t give a toss,” she says of her “Motherland” role. “I used to get moms running up to me in the street every day: ‘Thank God for this. I thought I was the only one.’”
She also wrote, directed and starred in the defiantly weird comedy “Mandy,” which follows an unemployable woman as she skips from one odd job to the next.
Morgan occasionally thinks it would be nice to do something a bit grittier and more dramatic. “But I’ve still got no interest in Shakespeare.”
Movie Reviews
MOVIE REVIEWS: “Mercy,” “Return to Silent Hill,” “Sentimental Value” & “In Cold Light” – Valdosta Daily Times
“Mercy”
(Thriller/Crime: 1 hour, 39 minutes)
Starring: Chris Pratt, Rebecca Ferguson, Kali Reis
Director: Timur Bekmambetov
Rated: PG-13 (Violence, bloody images, strong language, drug content and teen smoking)
Movie Review:
“Mercy” is a science fiction movie based on one of the more common themes of moviedom lately, artificial intelligence (AI). This crime thriller cleverly creates an intriguing story using technology and the justice system, yet it fails to be consistently interesting and intelligent throughout. The conclusion is less significant than the initial setup, as the concluding scenes become typical action sequences.
Detective Chris Raven (Pratt) of the LA Police Department is a huge supporter of the city’s new judicial courtroom. Crimes are now judged by an AI program (Ferguson) in the Mercy Court. The court is run by an artificial program that makes decisions based on all of the evidence before it without any prejudice. Detective Raven is all for this system until he is convicted of killing his wife. Now he must use all of the data, including the AI‘s ability to tap into everyone’s electronic devices, security cameras, and even into government files, within reason, to prove he did not murder his wife.
Mercy is an interesting movie. It entertains throughout, even when the story gets sloppy and characters’ actions are irrational. This mainly occurs during the final scenes. The movie tries too hard to insert unneeded narrative twists. This is disappointing because the story is interesting. What makes it fascinating is that it happens in real time. This is the most brilliant facet.
All the other theatrics are unnecessary. Director Timur Bekmambetov (“Profile,” 2018; “Wanted,” 2008) and “Mercy’s” producers should have just kept the ending simple, no plot twists or superfluous action sequences.
Grade: C (This flick needs some mercy. Let the trial begin.)
“Return to Silent Hill”
(Horror: 1 hour, 46 minutes)
Starring: Jeremy Irvine, Hannah Emily Anderson and Robert Strange
Director: Christophe Gans
Rated: R (Bloody violent content, strong language and brief drug use.)
Movie Review:
“Return to Silent Hill” is about one man’s quest to return to the love of his life. The problem is she has moved on to the afterlife. Meanwhile, audiences lose part of their life watching this movie, which is unlike any of the two prequels in this series. This one is a psychological horror that bores.
Artist James Sunderland (Irvine) decides to return to Silent Hill, a place where many people died during a devastating illness that nearly enveloped the entirety of the city’s population. What is left there is a horror show of freakish creatures, all with violent intent. Still, Sunderland searches for the love of his life, Mary Crane (Anderson).
Think of this movie as a slow suicide, where a guy goes back to retrieve his dead girlfriend. To do so, he must travel to the modern land of the dead that Silent Hill has become. This one is a type of swan song by the main character, and the movie becomes less scary while lackluster romantic notions wander aimlessly.
Grade: D (Do not return to see this.)
“Sentimental Value”
(Drama: 2 hours, 13 minutes)
Starring: Renate Reinsve, Stellan Skarsgård, Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas and Elle Fanning
Director: Joachim Trier
Rated: R (Language, sexual reference, nudity and thematic elements)
Movie Review:
“Sentimental Value” is a Norwegian film that won the Grand Prix in France’s Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for nine Academy Awards, including Best Motion Picture. It is a solid drama filled with symbolism and family connections. It is brilliant performances by a talented cast under the direction of Joachim Trier (“The Worst Person in the World,” 2021).
This screenplay is about Gustav Borg (Skarsgård). He is a father, grandfather and a famed film director. He stayed away from his two daughters, actress Nora Borgwhile (Reinsve) and historian Agnes Borg Pettersen (Lilleaas), while he was creating works as a filmmaker. The director comes back into the lives of his daughters after the death of their mother. Their reunion leads to a rediscovery of their bond at their family home in Oslo.
Stellan Skarsgård is always a solid actor. He takes his roles and makes them tangible characters that seem like you know them, even when they’re speaking a foreign language. That is the quality of his act and why he gets nominated for multiple awards each season.
“Sentimental Value” is a valuable movie filled with enriching sentiment. It is an enjoyable film for those who value a good drama. The acting and original writing alone make the movie worth it. “Sentimental Value” starts in a very simple way, but everything in between, even when low-key, remains potent. Joachim Trier and writer Eskil Vogt have worked together on multiple projects such as “The Worst Person in the World” (2021). Their pairing is once again worthy.
Grade: A- (Any motive valuable movie.)
“In Cold Light ”
(Crime: 1 hour , 36 minutes)
Starring: Maika Monroe, Allan Hawco and Troy Kotsur
Director: Maxime Giroux
Rated: R (Violence, bloody images, strong language and drug material)
Movie Review:
“In Cold Light” sticks to a very straightforward story, primarily taking place over a short period. The problem is the story leaves one in the cold. Audiences have to guess what is being communicated because this movie uses American Sign Language (ASL) without subtitles. For those moviegoers who do not know ASL, they are left deciphering characters’ actions and facial expressions during some pivotal scenes.
Ava Bly (Monroe) attempts to start a legit life after prison. Her life changes when Ava’s twin, Tom Bly (Jesse Irving) is murdered while seated next to her. As her brother’s killers pursue her, Ava must evade law enforcement, which contains some crooked cops led by Bob Whyte (Hawco).
For a brief moment, this movie hits its exceptional moment when Oscar-recipient Helen Hunt enters the picture as a motherly Claire, a crime boss who seems more like a social worker/psychologist. Her long scene is wasted as it arrives too late.
French Canadian director Maxime Giroux’s style has potential in his first English-language film, but it does not fit a wayward narrative. A rarity, this crime drama has characters commit many dumb actions at once.
Moreover, Giroux (“Félix et Meira,” 2014) and writer Patrick Whistler forget to let their audiences in on their story. They allow much to get lost in translation, especially during heated conversations between Monroe’s Ava and her father, Will Bly, played by Academy Award-winning actor Troy Kotsur (“CODA,” 2021).
Grade: C- (Just cold and dark.)
More movie reviews online at www.valdostadailytimes.com.
As the media industry took stock of Paramount Skydance’s startling acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, one question lingered on the minds of many in the news business and beyond: What will this mean for CNN?
The iconic 24-hour cable news network is among the various Warner Bros. assets that would be scooped up by Paramount in a deal announced Thursday that could transform the media landscape.
Paramount has undergone a swift transformation under Chief Executive David Ellison following his family’s acquisition of the company last summer. These changes reached CBS News almost immediately with the appointment of Bari Weiss, the controversial Free Press co-founder, as its new editor in chief.
Bari Weiss moderated a town hall with Erika Kirk, widow of slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
(CBS via Getty Images)
Weiss’ tenure so far has been rocky.
Her decision to pull a “60 Minutes” story about conditions inside an El Salvador prison that housed undocumented Venezuelan migrants from the U.S. received widespread criticism and accusations of political motivation. The network said the story was held for more reporting, and the segment eventually aired.
There was more upheaval last week at the news magazine, when “60 Minutes” correspondent and CNN news anchor Anderson Cooper announced that he’d be leaving to spend more time with his family.
And earlier this year, a veteran producer at “CBS Evening News With Tony Dokoupil” was fired after he expressed disagreement about the editorial direction of the newscast.
Now, the concern is that similar changes could be in store for CNN, which has long been a target of President Trump’s ire. He has personally called for the ouster of hosts at the network who have questioned his policies.
CNN Worldwide Chief Executive Mark Thompson tried to quell some of those fears, particularly inside his own newsroom.
In an internal memo dated Thursday and obtained by The Times, Thompson urged employees not to “jump to conclusions about the future” and try to concentrate on their work.
“We’re still near the start of what is already an incredibly newsy year at home and abroad,” he wrote in the note. “Let’s continue to focus on delivering the best possible journalism to the millions of people who rely on us all around the world.”
Chairman and CEO of CNN Worldwide Mark Thompson and media editor for Semafor, Maxwell Tani, speak onstage.
(Shannon Finney / Getty Images for Semafor)
CNN declined to comment beyond Thompson’s memo.
Ellison has said his vision for a news business is one that is ideologically down the middle.
“We want to build a scaled news service that is basically, fundamentally in the trust business, that is in the truth business, and that speaks to the 70% of Americans that are in the middle,” he said during a Dec. 8 interview on CNBC, shortly after Warner said it had chosen Netflix as the winning bidder for its studios, HBO and HBO Max. “And we believe that by doing so that is for us, kind of doing well, while doing good.”
Ellison demurred when asked whether Trump would embrace him as CNN’s owner, given the president’s past criticisms of the network.
“We’ve had great conversations with the president about this, but … I don’t want to speak for him in any way, shape or form,” he said.
First Amendment scholars have raised concerns about press freedom and free speech rights under the Trump administration, particularly after last month’s arrest of former CNN journalist Don Lemon and the Federal Communications Commission’s pressure on late-night hosts like Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert.
Press freedom groups have long asked questions in other countries about how authoritarian regimes use their power and “oligarchical alliances to belittle, silence, and punish independent journalistic voices, or to steer media ownership toward … a preferred version of the truth,” said RonNell Andersen Jones, a 1st Amendment scholar and distinguished professor in the college of law at the University of Utah, in an email.
“We see them asking at least some of these questions about the U.S. today,” she wrote.
Apprehension about the merger also extends beyond its implications for CNN and the media business.
Lawmakers such as Rep. Laura Friedman (D-Glendale), Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) and Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) have raised concerns about how the consolidation of two major Hollywood studios could affect industry jobs and film and television production — which has significantly slowed since the pandemic, the dual writers’ and actors’ strikes in 2023 and corporate cutbacks in spending.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) called the deal an “antitrust disaster” that she feared could raise prices and limit choices for consumers.
“With the cloud of corruption looming over Trump’s Department of Justice, it’ll be up to the American people to speak up and state attorneys general to enforce the law,” she said in a statement.
Already, California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta has said the merger isn’t a “done deal,” adding that he is in communication with other states attorneys general about the issue.
“As the epicenter of the entertainment industry, California has a special interest in protecting competition,” he posted Friday on X.
The deal is subject to approval by the U.S. Justice Department. Bonta and other state attorneys general are expected to file a legal challenge to the mega-merger on antitrust grounds.
Ellison addressed some of these concerns in a statement Friday.
“By bringing together these world-class studios, our complementary streaming platforms, and the extraordinary talent behind them, we will create even greater value for audiences, partners and shareholders,” he said. “We couldn’t be more excited for what’s ahead.”
Times staff writer Meg James contributed to this report.
NEW YORK (OSV News) – “Goat” (Sony) is an animated underdog sports comedy populated by anthropomorphized animals. While mostly inoffensive, and thus suitable for a wide audience — including teens and older kids — the film is also easily forgotten.
The amiable proceedings center on teen goat Will Harris (voice of Caleb McLaughlin). As opening scenes show, it has been Will’s dream since childhood to play for his hometown team, the Vineland Thorns.
The inhabitants of Vineland and the other areas of the movie’s world, however, are divided into so-called bigs and smalls, with professional competition dominated, unsurprisingly, by the former. Though Will stoutly maintains that he’s a medium, those around him regard him as too slight and diminutive to go up against the towering bigs.
Despite this prejudice, a video showing Will more or less holding his own against a famous and arrogant big, Andalusian horse Mane Attraction (voice of Aaron Pierre), goes viral and inspires the Thorns’ devious owner, warthog Flo Everson (voiced by Jenifer Lewis), to give the lad a shot. Though Will is understandably thrilled, his path forward proves challenging.
Will has idolized the Thorns’ sole outstanding player, black panther Jett Fillmore (voice of Gabrielle Union), since he was a youngster. But Jett, it turns out, is not only frustrated by her situation as a star among misfits but scornful of Will’s ambitions and resolute in helping to deprive her new teammate of playing time.
Given such divisions, the Thorns’ fortunes seem destined to continue their long decline.
“Roarball,” the invented game featured in director Tyree Dillihay’s film, is essentially co-ed basketball by another name. As produced by, among others, NBA champion Stephen Curry, the movie — adapted from an idea in Chris Tougas’ book “Funky Dunks” — is an unabashed celebration of hoop culture both on and off the court.
Viewers’ enthusiasm may vary, accordingly, depending on the degree to which they’re invested in the real-life sport.
Moviegoers of every stripe will appreciate the fact that the script, penned by Aaron Buchsbaum and Teddy Riley, shows the negative effects of self-centeredness as well as the value of teamwork and fan support. Plot developments also showcase forgiveness and reconciliation.
Will’s story is, nonetheless, thoroughly formulaic and most of the screenplay’s jokes feel strained and laborious. Still, while hardly qualifying as the Greatest of All Time, “Goat” does provide passable entertainment with little besides a few potty gags to concern parents.
The film contains brief scatological humor and at least one vaguely crass term. The OSV News classification is A-II — adults and adolescents. The Motion Picture Association rating is PG — parental guidance suggested. Some material may not be suitable for children.
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