Annelise Cepero is anticipating a harmonious holiday…
The Latina actress will star in the Christmas-themed romantic drama Holiday Harmony, directed by Shaun Paul Piccinino.
Hailing from producers Ali Afshar, Lauren Swickard and Daniel Aspromonte, the film follows singer-songwriter Gail, who lands an opportunity to compete for a once-in-a-lifetime shot at the big time, and heads cross country—only getting as far as Harmony Springs, Oklahoma when her ride, her budget and all her hopes are stalled. With just two weeks to get to the iHeartRadioChristmas Eve performance of her dreams, she takes the advice of local Jack-of-all-trades, Jeremy, and takes on a group of misfit kids hoping to perform in a Christmas Eve gala of their own. Gail and Jeremy grow close, but if she’s going to fulfill her lifelong dream, she may have to leave him and the town she’s grown to love behind.
In addition to Cepero, the cast also features Jeremy Sumpter, Carla Jimenez, Sisanie, Amy Brown, Michael Wiseman, Seth Colton, Sophia Reid-Gantzert, Jordyn Curet, Richard Perrie, Kayden Franco, Ryder Franco and Brooke Shields.
HBO Max will release Holiday Harmony on November 24.
Cepero’s previous credits include West Side Story and appearances on Blue Bloods, Pose, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit and Chicago P.D.
The 21-year-old Latina actress has been cast in the horror thriller Your Lucky Day, while hails from writer and director Daniel Brown.
The Penny Dreadful: City of Angels and The Purge star will star alongside Angus Cloud, Elliot Knight and Jason O’Mara in leading roles.
Spencer Garrett, Mousa HusseinKraish, Jason Wiles and Sebastian Sozzi round out the cast.
Your Lucky Day is a morality tale set on Christmas Eve in a small convenience store near the bottom of the socioeconomic food chain where a hostage situation breaks out over a $156 million lottery ticket. When things inevitably spiral, the film becomes a hardboiled look at how the poisonous heart of the American dream is actually a nightmare.
Luke Barnett is producing along with Adam Baxter. Jessica Sherman is the casting director.
Amazon has released the first trailer for Gloria Calderón Kellett’s series With Love, starring the 32-year-old half-Mexican American actress.
The 5-episode series, which features multigenerational and multicultural cast of characters, will premiere on Prime Video on December 17.
Season 1 follows the Diaz siblings, Lily (Toubia) and Jorge (Mark Indelicato), who are on a mission to find love and purpose. Lily recently split with her longtime love and is keeping the faith that a special kind of spark awaits her. Plus, she has the support of her Latino family who are determined to find her the perfect match. What could go wrong?
Jorge has seemingly found his person but will he and Henry (Vincent Rodriguez) be able to compromise?
The duo cross paths with seemingly unrelated residents during different holidays throughout the year: Christmas Eve/Nochebuena, New Year’s Eve, Valentine’s Day, the Fourth of July, and Dia de los Muertos.
Costars include Rome Flynn, Desmond Chiam, Isis King, Todd Grinnell, Constance Marie, Benito Martinez, Andre Royo, Renée Victor, and Pepe Serna.
All episodes are written and executive produced by Calderón Kellet. The pilot episode is directed and executive produced by Meera Menon.
With Love is produced by Kellett’s production company, GloNation and Amazon Studios.
It’ll be a wickedChristmas for Helena Bonham Carter.
The part-Spanish actress will star opposite her The Crown co-star Olivia Colman in a socially distanced, virtual staging of pantomime classic Cinderella for BBC Two, with Richard Curtis executive producing.
Bonham Carter and Colman will perform from the safety of their homes for the Comic Relief special, which airs on Christmas Eve and will be brought to life with illustrations from iconic children’s illustrator Quentin Blake.
Colman plays the fairy godmother, while Bonham Carter features as the wicked stepmother Lady Devilia. Meanwhile, the breakout star of Netflix series The Queen’s Gambit, Anya Taylor-Joy, will play the title role.
Other cast includes The Night Managerstar Tom Hollander and Guz Khan as Baron Hardup and Buttons respectively. Daisy May and Charlie Cooper, the stars and creators of This Country, have been cast as the evil step-sisters. The pair are siblings in real-life.
Written by the Dawson Brothers, and based on an original script by Ben Crocker, Cinderella: A Comic Relief Pantomime for Christmas will be a retelling of the timeless panto classic. It is made by Crook Productions.
Curtis said: “It’ll be very funny and merry — and also a great seasonal opportunity to raise crucial funds for the projects that will help the most vulnerable people, at home and abroad — especially now when Covid has made things harder than ever for many.”
The BBC has promised other starry cameos, including an “incredibly famous person wearing an incredibly unconvincing horse costume.”
Pablo Larraín is taking on the portray of another legend…
The 43-year-old Oscar-nominated Chilean filmmaker will direct Kristen Stewart in the drama Spencer about Princess Diana.
The Steven Knight-scripted film covers a critical weekend in the early ‘90s, when Diana decided her marriage to Prince Charles wasn’t working, and that she needed to veer from a path that put her in line to one day be queen. The drama takes place over three days, in one of her final Christmas holidays in the House of Windsor in their Sandringham estate in Norfolk, England.
“I’ve always been intrigued and fascinated by the Royal Family and how things are in that culture, which we don’t have where I come from,” Larraín said. “Diana is such a powerful icon, where millions and millions of people, not just women, but many people around the world felt empathy toward her in her life. We decided to get into a story about identity, and around how a woman decides somehow, not to be the queen. She’s a woman who, in the journey of the movie, decides and realizes that she wants to be the woman she was before she met Charles.
The film won’t deal with Diana’s tragic death after she left that palace life, but will examine the fraying of the relationship with her husband, and her ferocious love for her sons Prince William and Prince Harry.
“It’s about finding herself, about understanding that possibly the most important thing for her is to be well, and to be with herself and by herself,” Larraín explained. “That’s why the movie is called Spencer, which is the family name she had before she met Charles. It’s very contained, set over a few days in Sandringham. They spent Christmas there for many years and that’s where we set the movie in the early ‘90s, around 1992, we’re not specific. It’s Christmas Eve, Christmas and Boxing Day, three days, very contained. We get to understand what it is she wants and what she will do.”
“How and why do you decide to do that? It’s a great universal story that can reach millions and millions of people, and that’s what we want to do. We want to make a movie that goes wide, connects with a worldwide audience that is interested in such a fascinating life,” he adds.
Production is expected to begin in early 2021 on the film, which Larraín will also produce.
Larraín previously directed Natalie Portman in Jackie. The film follows Jackie Kennedy in the days when she was First Lady in the White House and her life immediately following the assassination of her husband, U.S. President John F. Kennedy in 1963. The film earned Portman an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress.
Larraín’s other credits include Neruda, about poet Pablo Neruda, as well as the Spanish-language film No, Oscar-nominated for Best Foreign Language Film, and The Club.
The 36-year-old half-Mexican American actress is starring the dark comedy El Camino Christmas.
Directed by Dave Talbert, the film features an ensemble cast that includes Alba, Luke Grimes, Tim Allen, Dax Shepard and Vincent D’Onofrio.
It’s also the next film from Hidden Figuresfilmmaker Ted Melfi. The Netflix film will start streaming on December 8.
The project, 10 years in the making, was produced by Melfi and scripted by him and Chris Wehner.
The story follows a young man (Grimes) who seeks out a father he has never met and, through no fault of his own, ends up barricaded in a liquor store with five other people on Christmas Eve. The story takes place in the fictitious town of El Camino, Nevada.
Alba’s latest project follows her appearances in the films Mechanic: Resurrection andThe Veil.
