The 23 Best Film & Television Performances Of 2023

(minus the Emmys, rescheduled for early January), the always glamorous , and, of course, the , there were several other events that had celebs going all out. From on-theme and dramatic—hi, Barbie!—to surrealist and unexpected, find our editors’ best looks of the year ahead.“I’m a big, big Greta Lee fan (if you haven’t seen Past Lives, get to renting because it is one of the best movies of 2023) and especially of her intentional styling.

Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor Who says you can’t laugh and win Oscars, too? In a stunning year for cinema, the candidates for the coveted best picture category are overflowing with prime comedic endeavors that surpass their dramatic counterparts. From a toy doll to an author with a triumphant “Black book” to a reverse Frankenstein tale that shows a whole lot of sex, the Academy has an opportunity to invite the softer side of cinema to its ceremony.

Margot Robbie’s Barbie exposed all of his “blond fragility” on the big screen in the summer blockbuster that brought the iconic Mattel doll to life, it’s “the man behind the tan” — as memorably Kenoughed by Ryan Gosling — who is having the last laugh in 2023.“I’m Just Ken (Merry Kristmas Barbie)” — a new holiday rendition of his signature number in Greta Gerwig’s box-office smash — dropped from the hunky heavens on Wednesday.The Yuletide twist arrives just five days before Santa will be delivering Barbies and Kens to little girls and boys all around the (snow) globe.The “Kristmas” makeover of “I’m Just Ken” puts a sweeping, Phil Spector-esque spin on the song that was written by “Barbie” music supervisors Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt. And the string-laden setting decks the ditty in seasonal splendor as Gosling ever-so-earnestly sings lines such as “Am I not hot when I’m in my feelings?”Clearly still hopelessly devoted to his dream doll — who leaves him behind for the real world at the end of the film — Gosling ends with, “Merry Kristmas, Barbie / Wherever you are.”The “I’m Just Ken” revamp comes ringing in with a video of the song featuring Ronson and Wyatt.

entertainment industry had a weird year. Faced with evolving technologies and outdated studio systems, actors and writers united for a strike that ran for nearly four months. It’s a symptom of a much larger problem, challenging the current streaming system which produces hundreds of TV shows a year.

Oppenheimer”).During the simultaneous Screen Actors Guild and Writers Guild of America strikes, the sagging box office was boosted, like NFL ratings and the economy of East Rutherford, New Jersey, by Taylor Swift.Marvel Studios, which used to be the surest thing in Hollywood, began to underperform (“Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania”) and then downright flop (“The Marvels”).And DC was revealed to actually stand for Dud Central, with all of the studio’s comic-book films of 2023 (“Shazam! Fury of the Gods,” “The Flash” and “Blue Beetle”) turning out to be financial failures.In a win for Gen Z, studio execs determined Zendaya’s star wattage is so huge now that two of her movies — “Dune: Part 2” and “Challengers” — were delayed a year due to the strikes, so she can promote them to her hoards of fans. And baby boomers were dinged by the big-time tanking of the nostalgic “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny,” starring a now 81-year-old Harrison Ford who schlepped around New York and Europe.Despite all the madness — and a sea of schlock — some excellent films hit theaters this year.

a lot of shows out there — but these are the series that managed to hit a home run week after week without any letdowns in their story arcs or performances.A serial killer, a mysterious writer (played by “The Crown’s” Emma Corrin), a sinister billionaire (Clive Owen), the unique setting of a luxury hotel in Iceland and a multi-layered mystery: this Hulu show was full of juicy ingredients, and it used them well. It also mixed prescient big-picture topics (AI, the climate crisis) with more intimate relatable character drama (Corrin’s character, Darcy, having unresolved feelings for her ex-boyfriend, played by rising star Harris Dickinson).

Prime Video has set February 23 for the premiere of The Second Best Hospital in the Galaxy (fka The Hospital), its adult animated sci-fi comedy from Cirocco Dunlap and Maya Rudolph, Danielle Renfrew Behrens and Natasha Lyonne‘s Animal Pictures. Additionally, Oscar nominee Stephanie Hsu (Everything Everywhere All At Once) has joined the cast as a series regular.

Variety asked writers and editors to suggest their lesser-seen favorite films of the year. And while you’re desperately searching for new content, check out Nida Manzoor’s jaw-dropping, action flick “Polite Society” or the tear-inducing animated feature “Robot Dreams.” Do not sleep on the middle-of-nowhere Australian crime documentary “Last Stop Larrimah,” centered around the mysterious disappearance of the local favorite, thus making everyone a suspect.

all over again…. On December 14, Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone proved they still hold the title of Hollywood’s most supportive exes, with Garfield attending of Stone’s latest film, .In case you forgot, began dating while filming The Amazing Spider-Man in 2011, despite being mixing work with romance. Though the pair ultimately split in 2015, they have remained ever since.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief “Oppenheimer,” followed closely by “Barbie” and “The Killers of the Flower Moon,” collected the most nominations for the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts (AACTA) International Awards. The AACTA International awards recognize global, not only Australian-made, film and TV productions from the current year and are voted on by Australian professionals. The separate AACTA Awards focus on Australian-made content. The winners of the AACTA International Awards will be announced on Feb.

Zack Sharf Digital News Director Anne Hathaway appeared on the latest “Happy Sad Confused” podcast and called it “lucky” that her iteration of the “Barbie” movie never got off the ground considering the phenomenon that Margot Robbie and Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie” became over the summer. Back in July 2017, Hathaway was announced as the star of Sony’s “Barbie” movie. Comedian Amy Schumer was originally cast, but Hathaway took over the role after Schumer departed.

Barbie has topped a list of the top-trending Google searches across the year in movies.Greta Gerwig’s film, which is the highest-grossing movie of the year, came out on top of Google’s year-in-review 2023 lists for movie search data in the US and globally.The lists, released on Monday (December 11), track queries that had the highest spikes in traffic over a sustained period this year as compared with 2022.Unsurprisingly, due to the Barbenheimer phenomena, Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer placed in second across both lists.

Matthew Perry on Monday while receiving his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Efron, 36, and Perry, who unexpectedly died in October, starred together in 2009’s “17 Again.” It was one of Efron’s first films outside of Disney’s “High School Musical.” “I want to mention someone that’s not here today, and that’s Matthew Perry, who was so kind and generous with me when we worked on ’17 Again,'” Efron said during his star ceremony. “Collaborating with him — it was so much fun and it really did propel me and motivate me in so many ways.

Zac Efron is being honored!

We’re taking a look at how rich the cast of The Morning Show is!

Meryl Streep was not everyone’s first choice when it came to casting for “The Devil Wears Prada.”The actress has received a record-breaking 21 Academy Award nominations and played impeccably dressed boss-from-hell Miranda Priestly expertly in the 2006 fashion comedy, but according to the film’s producer Wendy Finerman, Streep wasn’t a shoe-in for the role. “And Meryl, people thought we were crazy.

What To Watch. This week’s column is different; as we near the end of the year, we’ve compiled our seven favorite movies of 2023 and how to watch them.‘Society of the Snow’ is Spain’s Oscar entry, exploring the true story of a horrifying plane crashAriana DeBose plays an astronaut in new Sci-Fi film set on spaceMartin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon” is based on the conspiracy behind the 1920’s murders of the Osage Nation, a tribe that were labeled as the richest people on Earth after the oil boom in America. It stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert DeNiro, two of Scorsese’s most frequent collaborators, and explores topics that he’s well versed in.

So many celebrities walked the red carpet at The Hollywood Reporter’s Women in Entertainment Gala on Thursday (December 7) in Los Angeles.

Variety’s two chief film critics agree that Christopher Nolan’s portrait of the man behind the Manhattan Project is one for the ages — a “Lawrence of Arabia”-level feat about a turning point in human history, as seen through the haunted blue eyes of one of our finest actors. At the same time, some of the year’s best movies flew under the radar. Consider this a guide to the top cinematic achievements, large and small, whether shot on Imax cameras or hand-drawn by an artisanal French couple.

Oppenheimer and Matthew Perry are among the most viewed Wikipedia pages of 2023.This year alone, the English language version of the website had 84billion views, with celebrity deaths and Christopher Nolan’s epic biopic about the creation of the atomic bomb ranking as two of the highest searches.The list of celebrity deaths, which includes the late Friends star Perry, has been viewed 42,666,860 times, while Oppenheimer has 28,348,248 pageviews.J. Robert Oppenheimer, the American theoretical physicist on which the film is based (played by Cillian Murphy), also ranked high with 25,672,469 pageviews.Perry, who starred as Chandler Bing in Friends, was found dead in his Los Angeles home on 28 October, aged 54.