Fantasia Barrino is one of many celebs heading to reality television
TV
VH1 revives the career of another fading celebrity via, recruiting ex-American Idol champ Fantasia Barrino to headline her own reality series, set to debut sometime next year. According the network, the show will follow the singer’s “life as a recording artist and a young single mother.” If you’re calling yourself a recording artist don’t you have to actually, you know, record an album?
Michael Vick isn’t letting a little thing like being behind bars stop him from plotting out his post-football career. The convicted dogfighting aficionado is shopping a reality series that would chronicle his life after prison, specifically focusing on his attempts to make up for his checkered past. Here’s our pitch: an Animal Planet series called Michael Vick Hugs Puppies.
The reality parade continues as ousted Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich joins the cast of NBC’s second attempt to make a U.S. hit out of the British series I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here. The first version was broadcast in 2003 and featured such D-list celebs as Joan and Melissa Rivers, Robin Leach and J.Lo’s-ex Cris Judd. This new one strands 10 contestants—so far Blagojevich is the only announced participant—in the Coast Rican jungle. Fortunately, the ex-governor is well positioned to survive in the wild: in case of floods, he can use his hairpiece as a flotation device.
A recent spate of box-office disappointments aside, Will Ferrell isn’t in any danger of having to pick up a paycheck from a reality TV gig anytime soon. Nevertheless, the Saturday Night Live veteran is putting his own survival skills to the test by appearing on an episode of the hit Discovery Channel series Man vs. Wild. Ferrell will follow host Bear Grylls into a remote area of Sweden, where they rappel down frozen waterfalls and drink their own urine. That sounds funnier than anything in Semi-Pro.
Movies
Megan Fox knows a thing or two about fighting gigantic, transforming robots. But what about Mexican drug cartels? Brian Austin Green’s on-again, off-again gal pal has joined the cast of The Crossing, which revolves around a married couple who runs afoul of a gang on the way back from Mexico. While the dealers hold her husband hostage, Fox has to smuggle heroin across the U.S. border. Where’s Bumblebee when you need him?
It hasn’t even been shot yet, but Date Night already sounds like 2010′s must-see comedy. To begin with, it stars comedy dream team Tina Fey and Steve Carell as a husband-and-wife who set out on a rare date night that ends up going horribly wrong. The supporting cast includes such heavy-hitters as Oscar-nominee Taraji P. Henson as a sympathetic cop, rapper-turned-actor Common and James Franco as crooks who make life difficult for the couple, Kristen Wiig as Fey’s best buddy, and Mark Wahlberg as a securities expert.
The Veronica Mars movie ain’t happening anytime soon, but Kristen Bell wisely isn’t sitting around waiting for the phone to ring. She’s taken a part in the Disney-produced film You Again, about a girl who can’t tolerate the idea that her brother is about to marry the woman that made her high-school days a living hell.
