What's Up - Your guide to what's happening in Fayetteville, AR this week!
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T22 WHATS UP! January 22 - 28, 2023 The Late Show With Stephen Colbert Pantone has revealed that their 2023 color of the year is 'Viva Magenta,' which they say "merges the richness, warmth and strength of natural matters with the rich, open horizons of the digital world." Also known as "red." French president Emmanuel Macron has announced that France will make condoms free in pharmacies for anyone up to age 25. Wow. They are really celebrating that World Cup win. In museum news, the Ripley's Believe It or Not museum in Atlantic City [N.J.] is about to close. Apparently, the muse- um's founders failed to antici- pate how many people would choose "Or Not." On Tuesday [Dec. 6], Joey Chestnut dominated the Cleve- land Cavaliers' pierogi-eating competition. There's a lot to unpack. First of all, Joey Chest- nut is a competitive eater, most famous for the Nathan's Hot Dog Championship. And the Cavaliers are an NBA basket- ball team, and a pierogi-eating contest is a cry for help. The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon I saw that Instacart is now of- fering same-day delivery for Christmas trees. So remember to tip, because your delivery guy definitely has an axe. New York just passed a law that makes all gift cards purchased in the state valid for at least nine years. You know you got someone the perfect gift card when it takes them eight and a half years to use it. A new study found that people who wake up with an alarm clock are more tired than peo- ple who wake up naturally. An- other reason people who use an alarm clock are tired: they have jobs. Jimmy Kimmel Live! We've learned that the official White House holiday ornament is for sale. This is a gingerbread White House ornament, it's $24.95, and I find it refreshing to see a White House encour- aging people to hang some- thing other than the vice-presi- dent. Elon Musk announced that Twitter will soon increase their character limit from 280 char- acters to 4,000, and he'll be changing the name of the com- pany to Facebook as well. According to the National Re- tail Federation, most people would rather get a gift card than an actual gift. Fifty-four per cent of Americans say they prefer gift cards as a gift, which is a nice way of saying that last year 54 per cent of us blew it with the gifts. Late Night With Seth Meyers The House voted last week to pass legislation protecting same-sex marriages, because everyone deserves the right to be secretly unhappy. Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass yesterday officially resigned from the House of Representa- tives, which means she's the only person in Los Angeles who doesn't have at least two gigs. New York Mayor Eric Adams spoke today at the National Mathematics Improvement Project, but this is sad: he used the opportunity to promote di- vision. A cow in Virginia recently es- caped from a trailer and crashed through the glass doors of an office ... oh, sorry, I read the punch line first. What's black and white and red all over? The Late Late Show With James Corden Earlier today [Dec. 12], Elon Musk relaunched Twitter Blue, where users pay a monthly fee for a blue checkmark, but this time, iPhone users are going to have to pay extra. ... The service will cost $8 a month on the web, or even $11 a month if pur- chased through the Apple app store. Or if you're a completely sane person, it will cost you zero dollars. LATE LAUGHS BY MICHELLE ROSE TV Media New comedy 'Standing By': Fresh off the success of his HBO Max competition series "The Big Brunch," Emmy win- ner Dan Levy ("Schitt's Creek") has teamed up with former "Schitt's Creek" story editor Ally Pankiw ("The Great"), and both are now headed to Hulu for their next TV project. Levy and Pankiw are the cre- ators of "Standing By," an up- coming angel-themed, animated comedy that has been ordered to series by Disney-run streamer Hulu. Levy also leads the stacked voice cast, which in- cludes Glenn Close ("Fatal At- traction," 1987), Poppy Liu ("Hacks"), Samira Wiley ("The Handmaid's Tale"), Natalie Palamides ("The Powerpuff Girls") and "Doctor Who" star David Tennant, who is no stranger to sassy angel types af- ter starring in Amazon Prime's "Good Omens" series. (Tennant played a demon opposite Mi- chael Sheen's angel.) And Dani- elle Uhlarik ("Solar Opposites") has been tapped as showrunner. In a joint statement, Levy and Pankiw had this to say about the series order: "'Standing By' is about the hilarity, embarrass- ment and melodrama of every- day life as observed by a team of judgmental, gossip-starved guardian angels. We are very ex- cited to bring this world to life with the help of Hulu, 20th Tele- vision Animation and Bento Box Entertainment. Not to mention an insanely brilliant cast of ac- tors." Hulu will now be the stream- ing home for at least two Levy productions, since it also holds the streaming rights to "Schitt's Creek." As for "Standing By," the ani- mated comedy has reportedly been in development for a few years now, having originated un- der Levy's three-year overall TV deal with ABC Studios/ABC Sig- nature. Levy signed that deal in 2019 just as "Schitt's Creek" was wrapping up its run on Pop TV, and before its big Emmy haul. That agreement has since ex- pired, and last year Levy signed a multiple-year overall film and TV deal with Netflix, where he'll make his directorial debut with the upcoming film "Good Grief." Order up: CBS is eyeing the future — specifically its 2023-24 programming lineup. The network recently handed a series order to the drama "The Never Game," starring and exec- utive produced by Justin Hartley of "This Is Us" fame. Based on author Jeffery Deaver's bestsell- ing novel, the series is produced by Disney's 20th Television and falls under the overall deals signed by both Hartley and fel- low executive producer Ken Olin ("Brothers and Sisters"), who also directed the pilot. Hartley plays the lead charac- ter of Colter Shaw, "a lone-wolf survivalist who roams the coun- try as a 'reward seeker,' using his expert tracking skills to help pri- vate citizens and law enforce- ment solve all manner of mys- teries, while also contending with his own fractured family," according to CBS. Hartley leads a cast that includes Robin Wei- gert ("Deadwood"), Abby McEnany ("Work In Progress"), Eric Graise ("Locke & Key"), Fiona Rene ("I Know What You Did Last Summer") and Mary McDonnell ("Dances With Wolves," 1990). CBS has already signaled its intention to include the new drama in its 2023-24 lineup. The timing isn't all that surprising given that the project was hand- ed a pilot order in September 2021, and there were suggestions that the network was looking to develop it for this current sea- son, until scheduling conflicts delayed production. But that's all in the past, and now the Hartley-led series can look forward to its inaugural run as part of the network's fall/win- ter lineup. Be kind: Netflix has dealt Blockbuster yet another fatal blow, by canceling the original series "Blockbuster" after just one season. Inspired by the last remaining Blockbuster store in Bend, Ore., the 10-episode comedy series humorously reimagined staff an- tics and the goings-on in the last store of the once-mighty video store chain. It starred Randall Park ("Fresh Off the Boat") as store manager Timmy and Me- lissa Fumero ("Brooklyn Nine- Nine") as his friend/employee Eliza. Olga Merediz ("In the Heights," 2021), Tyler Alvarez ("American Vandal"), Madeleine Arthur ("Devil in Ohio"), JB Smoove ("Curb Your Enthusi- asm"), Kamaia Fairburn ("Holly Hobbie"), Leonard Robinson ("Wild 'n Out") and Keegan Connor Tracy ("Z," 2019) also starred. Expectations were high going in, but "Blockbuster" didn't have the strongest debut. It didn't do too badly in Australia and Cana- da, but it never managed to crack Netflix's weekly Top 10 rankings in the United States — not upon its debut, and not a full week later, when word-of-mouth might have brought in some ad- ditional viewers. And that might have been part of the problem: critics didn't love what they saw on screen, and the show has a paltry 22 percent approval rating on popular ratings aggregate Rotten Tomatoes. Former "Schitt's Creek" star Dan Levy is behind a new Hulu animated series STARS ON SCREEN