The TV industry’s shiniest night of the year, a.k.a. the Primetime Emmy Awards, looked much different this year, given the never-ending pandemic. The ceremony’s host, Jimmy Kimmel, was literally fired up to emcee the festivities again, this time from the mostly vacant Staples Center in L.A., with winners accepting awards remotely, virtually, and digitally. If you tuned in just for Toni, there wasn’t much to see. She was nominated as Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Limited Series or Movie for “Unbelievable” alongside Holland Taylor (Hollywood), Margo Martindale (Mrs. America), Tracey Ullman (Mrs. America) and Jean Smart (Watchmen), but “lost” to Mrs. America’s Uzo Aduba, and wasn’t featured by camera during the nominations. The category segment can be watched below and in the video archive.

For today’s Netflix release of Charlie Kaufman’s “I’m Thinking of Ending Things”, Backstage Magazine blesses us with a cover story on Toni Collete’s ever-fascinating career, accompanied by a fantastic new editorial: Let’s talk about Toni Collette’s face. Few actors working today have such exacting control over their varied expressions, nor such a distinct capability to reflect every emotion under the sun. But Collette has long proven that in matters of performance, she can often do what others can’t. Who else can claim, for instance, to have their visage embossed on enamel pins decorating film buffs’ backpacks, caps, and collars? (More than just a meme, her mama wolf–like snarl over the dinner table in “Hereditary” is a popular kitsch item in this writer’s Brooklyn neighborhood.) But beyond that horror flick’s wildfire of contorted grief and rage, Collette is a master at capturing all manner of emotions: frenetic shock and joy (her toothy smile and side-eyed tongue bite in “Muriel’s Wedding”), awe and heartbreak (her wide-eyed gasp and quivering chin in “The Sixth Sense”), no-bullshit world-weariness (her furrowed brow and hard-lined jaw on “Unbelievable”), airheaded self-righteousness (her pursed lips and unmoving brow in “Knives Out”), and now, in Charlie Kaufman’s new film “I’m Thinking of Ending Things,” violent neuroticism and unsparing maternal attachment. That’s not to mention her uncanny embodiment of various split personalities on “United States of Tara,” a feat that earned her an Emmy and a Golden Globe for the series’ first season. The list truly goes on and on. You can read the complete article over at Backstage Magazine.

Big congratulations to Toni Collette for receiving a Primetime Emmy Award nomination earlier today as Outstanding Supporting Actress In A Limited Series Or Movie for “Unbelievable”. She shares the category with Holland Taylor for “Hollywood”, Uzo Aduba for “Mrs. America”, Margo Martindale for “Mrs. America”, Tracey Ullman for “Mrs. America” and Jean Smart for “Watchmen”. The response to “Unbelievable” was a bit of a snub – it has received 4 nominations for Outstanding Limited Series, Outstanding Writing and Outstanding Casting – but it was overlooked in the Lead Actress category with nominations for either Kaitlin Dever or Merritt Wever – both would have been equally deserving – or any directing nominations. Still, 4 nominations and a spotlight on Toni’s fantastic performance is more than we should be asking for. This is Toni’s fourth Emmy nomination – she was nomiated in 2007 for “Tsuanmi: The Aftermath”, won Best Actress in a Comedy Series for “United States of Tara” in 2009 and received a consecutive nomination for the show’s second season in 2020. The Emmys will be handed out on September 20, 2020.

Charlie Kaufman always takes his viewer on a ride, but I’m Thinking of Ending Things — his first live-action film in more than a decade — raises his obsession with subjective experience to bracing new levels. “I don’t set out to do a mindf—,” the Oscar-winning filmmaker says. “I’m not setting out to do something that ‘tops’ some sort of brainteaser I might have done before. But there’s no question that I’m trying to build on the stuff that I’ve already done.” Indeed, fans of the Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind scribe and Synecdoche, New York director should pick up traces of his past work here. Ending Things begins as a sort of moody couple’s road trip, in which Jake (Jesse Plemons) and his girlfriend (Jessie Buckley) drive out to his (slightly haunted) childhood home for her to meet his parents (David Thewlis and Toni Collette). On the way there, the sense slowly builds that things aren’t quite what they seem; upon arrival, the pair are thrust in directions that bend the laws of reality, memory, and love. “Loneliness and hopelessness and regret — these are things that are part of the fabric of this film,” Kaufman says. The complete article can be read over at Entertainment Weekly.

Here comes an insightful article by The Hollywood Reporter on Toni’s upcoming film “Stowaway”. Almost exactly a year ago, in what seems now a distant universe — pre-novel coronavirus pandemic, pre-lockdown — I was crouched next to a monitor as Anna Kendrick and Daniel Dae Kim floated past me and above my head. As I watch, director Joe Penna calls out to the wire technicians to adjust the cables — nearly invisible — that hold Kendrick and Kim dangling in their harnesses, 30 feet in the air. “We’re used to seeing weightlessness in space in a certain way but I think I’ve found a few new takes,” Penna says. “Throughout the film the amount of gravity shifts, from 1 G all the way down to 0 G, or completely weightless. At each stage they’re going to move differently, each stage will look different.” It’s July 12, 2019 and we’re on a soundstage at the MMC Studios in Cologne, Germany. Penna is in the home stretch shooting Stowaway, a space drama he co-wrote with his frequent collaborator, and editor, Ryan Morrison. They had the idea for the movie — a morality play set on a spaceship traveling to Mars — long before coronavirus. But with their story of a small group in isolation, cut off the rest of the world, and worried about the dangers that lurk just outside, the two may have inadvertently made the ultimate film for the pandemic. “It’s stranger than fiction,” says Aram Tertazakian from XYZ Films, which produced Stowaway and, together with CAA Media Finance, is presenting it to buyers at the Virtual Cannes Market this week. “Joe and Ryan didn’t predict the pandemic, but the themes of the movie have a particular resonance right now.” Actually, Joe and Ryan did predict the pandemic. At the Tribeca Film Festival last year they debuted a short web series, Release, about a deadly virus outbreak in the United States. “It was scary how close we got to the real thing,” says Morrison, speaking from his office in Los Angeles on June 10. “I actually had to visit a hospital at the peak of the outbreak and it looked exactly like the sets we designed for Release.” The complete article can be read over at The Hollywood Reporter.

The Peabody Awards has named 30 programs as the most compelling and empowering stories released in broadcasting and digital media during 2019. The organization also announced “FRONTLINE” and “The Simpsons” as recipients of Institutional Awards. This distinctive honor goes to programs that have made a significant impact on media programming and the cultural landscape. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this year’s Peabody Awards Ceremony—originally slated to take place in Los Angeles for the first time on June 18—is canceled. In lieu of the live event, many recipients recorded acceptance speeches (almost all of which were recorded prior to the protests over the George Floyd killing). You can watch the acceptance speeches recorded by Ayelet_Waldman and Michael Chabon, Kaitlyn Dever, Merritt Wever, Sarah Timberman and Susannah Grant on Dropbox.

Drawing from a true story, Susannah Grant, Ayelet Waldman and Michael Chabon expertly pen a rape investigation for the #MeToo era, showing not just what police work should look like, but what a mediated account of rape should entail. With standout performances from Toni Collette, Merritt Wever and Kaitlyn Dever, the series serves as a model for how storytellers can implore society to believe women but also how to shift the ways we talk about rape.

Timberman-Beverly Productions, Sage Lane Productions, Escapist Fare, Katie Couric Media, and CBS Television Studios for Netflix (Netflix)