Top Story
After some disagreement as to which film won the box office this weekend, 20th Century Fox’s Minority Report has emerged as the victor, but not by much. Steven Spielberg‘s sci-fi thriller eked by Buena Vista’s animated Lilo & Stitch by a mere $400,000 to claim the No. 1 spot. According to final numbers issued Monday, Minority Report opened with $35.7 million, while Lilo & Stitch debuted at a close second with $35.3 million, Disney’s best summer opening ever for an animated film since The Lion King ($40.9 million).
Celebs
American Pie actress Natasha Lyonne, who was arrested in August 2001 after her rental car crashed while rounding a curve in Miami, is expected to enter a plea agreement in a drunken-driving case against her, The Associated Press reports. Under the agreement, Lyonne‘s driver license will be suspended for six months and her car impounded for 10 days. She will also have to perform 50 hours of community service and pay about $1,000 in fines and court fees.
Bobby Brown has been released from Mary Washington Hospital in Fredericksburg, Va., and is recuperating at his New Jersey home, a family spokeswoman told the AP. The 33-year-old singer was treated for a fever related to an infection and released from the hospital Friday.
Actress Pam Grier, best known for her role in ’70s action pics like Foxy Brown and Sheba Baby, will present her 1975 blaxploitation film Friday Foster July 10 as part of the 28th annual Newark Black Film Festival. The festival runs from June 26 through Aug. 8, and admission to all screenings is free, the AP reports.
Movies
The script and preparation details for filmmaker Stanley Kubrick‘s long-planned project Napoleon are to be released in a book next year, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Titled Stanley Kubrick’s Napoleon–His Greatest Film Never Made, the book would be a tribute to a project that fixated the director, who died in March 1999.
It looks like another franchise for Bruce Willis. Willis is set to reprise his role as a hit man in a sequel to the 2000 crime comedy The Whole Nine Yards. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Matthew Perry, Natasha Henstridge and Amanda Peet are also in talks to return. Production is set to begin in Los Angeles on Oct. 4.
Jennifer Lopez will produce and co-star in a film based on the life of salsa legend Hector Lavoe, who died in 1993 at the age of 43, Variety reports. Singer Marc Anthony is in talks to star as Lavoe, from a script to be written by the salsa star’s former manager David Maldonado.
Director John Woo, who helmed the World War II drama Windtalkers, said Tuesday his next film will be about foreign railway workers in the United States during the 19th century, Reuters reports. Woo also said he plans to ask Windtalkers star Nicolas Cage and Chow Yun Fat to star in the film.
Principal photography for the live-action feature Peter Pan is set to begin in the fall in Queensland, Australia. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the P.J. Hogan-directed picture will be produced through an equal financial partnership among Universal, Columbia and Revolution studios and is slated for a Christmas 2003 release.
