Eric Bana reveals what he almost took from Netflix's 'Untamed' set, talks Marvel future
"It was expensive," Bana, 56, says of the cost to transport a horse from British Columbia, where the show was filmed. "I'm not even sure if he was for sale, but I looked into it. I was going to smuggle him."
Bana jokes that his wife Rebecca would have had no issue with the addition to the household, "so long as it was (my) responsibility." The actor has two pets, a poodle and a Burmese cat, and confirms that both "live in harmony" together.
Bana tackles demons and a murder case in 'Untamed'
"Untamed" is set in Yosemite National Park. Bana stars as Kyle Turner, the special agent investigating the death of a woman in the park. As the case unfolds, so does Turner's past, which includes the death of his son, a struggle with alcohol abuse and a divorce.
"There's a shared trauma between the two of them," Bana says of the relationship between Turner and his ex-wife Jill (Rosemary DeWitt)." Their son's death "affects him, as it would any human. It's a very spiritual connection that he has with the park as a result and with nature. And we really try and tap into that."
Bana says he received the script of the pilot episode as early as 2018, but the COVID-19 pandemic and the Hollywood strikes delayed production. He also signed on as an executive producer, something he does, "when I really feel like I want to be extremely supportive of the original vision and not have it diluted at all. There's a version of this show that you could sell to someone and (the studio says), 'Yeah, we'll make this show. Do you really need to go to that location? Do you really need that much time in the forest?'" he says. "Luckily, in this case, we were all moving in the same direction."
Bana's succinct response to a Marvel return
Bana played the title character in the 2003 film "Hulk," but he wasn't asked to return to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. (Edward Norton also made a single appearance as the superhero, in 2008's "The Incredible Hulk.") Would he ever consider it, as fans speculate he might for "Avengers: Secret Wars," due in 2027?
The actor offers a firm "no."
"It was a one'er for me," he adds of the MCU experience. "I love doing what I'm doing (now)."
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USA Today
19 minutes ago
- USA Today
'Happy Gilmore 2' is absolutely wonderful
The legacy sequel has transformed itself into one of the ugliest reanimations in modern Hollywood, the crass puppetry of a once-beloved corpse dancing to the same song-and-dance that made it so cherished in the first place. Shame-soaked nostalgia dollars flutter about like ugly butterflies in a trash garden, destined to put on the same "dead dog and dead pony" show for fearful audiences afraid of any ounce of originality until the unforgiving entertainment machine runs out of caskets to mine and the whole movie world falls off a cliff. And then there's Happy Gilmore 2. Leave it to Adam Sandler, perhaps the most beloved American entertainer this side of Mickey Mouse and Tom Hanks, to putt the golf ball through the most byzantine mini-golf fun house from Hell and nail the shot to keep himself under par. Happy Gilmore 2 is just baked with too much love to reek of what dooms its colleagues. In one way, you could view Happy Gilmore 2 as a triumph of affable stupidity, a sequel so awash in the hallmark Sandler rage-man physical comedy that it manages to feel fresh... if only because Hollywood has practically abandoned the genre entirely for "comedic" superhero movies that smirk at the screen as if any insinuation of comedy at all is some sort of naughty cooke jar-snatching that big daddy corporation didn't see while reading the newspaper... the kind that would make even Wade Wilson blush. Last summer's Deadpool and Wolverine actually owned its identity of being a straight-up comedy as opposed to something dreadful like Thor: Love and Thunder (shutters in Zeus), but even then, it was still a Deadpool and Wolverine movie. Marvel putting out the biggest comedy of the decade so far just feels wrong, even if the movie was indeed funny. Yes, a Happy Gilmore Netflix movie in 2025 replete with countless cameos from golf professionals, Sandler regulars, podcast hosts and sportscasters plays to the broadest audience possible. The humor is wack-a-mole wide, the callbacks to the original so plentiful and obvious that you can almost count this as a double-bill on Letterboxd with just one sit on the couch. However, everything feels hand-stitched, as if an entire community of people who love Happy got together and crafted a big quilt to wrap themselves in nearly 30 years later. The warmth radiates from the screen. Unlike a big-budget Hollywood legacy blockbuster where nostalgia cuts the checks and the corporate "reverence" for what came before feels AI-generated to appeal to the most shameless part of our brains' art-processors, Happy Gilmore 2 feels pleasantly overstuffed out of adoration. Sure, most of the film is flatly ridiculous, the lowest-hanging fruit basket being passed around for everyone to take one and pass it down. Characters punch and choke each other out of sheer glee; another drinks hand sanitizer to get a buzz. One man on a beach thinks he's watching a Happy Gilmore golf match on television, but in reality, it's just a rock in a makeshift box. One character goes to the bathroom in a mailbox. Like all of Sandler's movies, the cheap joke is the best joke, and the school cafeteria belly laughter is real and wonderful. Think about the star for a moment and where he is now. After years and years of pushing it away, Sandler's recent forays into auteurism have fulfilled the tantalizing promise of Punch-Drunk Love and Funny People. Even in his screwiest of comedies, he showed off the volcanic range and crestfallen heart of a truly generational actor. Uncut Gems in particular felt like an answered prayer. Watching the Sandman getting sandbagged down with heartless 2010s Netflix comedies made you question if he had finally just settled. The grand pleasure is that Happy Gilmore 2 shows that even a new Sandler Netflix comedy can make you scream-laugh to the point of waking up your dog and bothering your neighbors. By plowing shamelessly into the original film beat-for-beat but still awakening something oddly profound on the passage of time with how so many of the 1996 film's actors have departed from this golf course for the other, Happy Gilmore 2 plays as both a Happy Madison fan convention smorgasbord and a group hug for the past, present and future. Happy Gilmore 2 also arrives like a godsend in a world where studio comedies have fallen to the wayside. Consider that modern comedy has mainly shifted into other genres and into the indie space, where witty banter and situational ironies tend to rule the day. They're incredibly funny, but the other side of the spectrum, the kind that studios used to pump out in the summer with the Sandlers of the world for mass appeal, have nearly gone extinct. Perhaps that makes a big, doofy Happy Gilmore sequel all the more commendable with its themes of mourning the people we've lost and saving the traditions we care about while we have them. The film's villain is a tech-bro who wants to turn golf into a glitzy rizz-fest with color-run fireworks and brash stunts to appeal to the TikTokers and Twitch streamers who don't have time for the love of the game. As much as you absolutely cannot read any supremely deep text in a movie where a honey-drenched Travis Kelce gets attacked by a bear in Bad Bunny's "happy place" dream, you feel the Sandler-dad wisdom trying to slap around the young'uns a bit to appreciate the old ways and cherish the familial bonds that keep them aflame. Happy Gilmore 2 is the funniest movie of the year so far by default, if only because no other movies really try to go for laugh-a-minute comedy like this any longer. The new Naked Gun movie will surely challenge it, but why can't the audiences of today get their own Happy Gilmores and Frank Drebins to cherish anew? It's an unfortunate irony that the surest bet at getting a major comedy project off the ground in 2025 is to dust off an old character and put a new shine on them to appeal to nostalgic business sense. No, Happy Gilmore 2 can't stand shoulder-to-shoulder with its predecessor because that's outright impossible. However, it can bundle in the laughter in equal measure and mess around so much with the very nature of a legacy sequel that some of its most shameless callbacks feel inspired, almost a parody of its serious brethren. Yes, there is infinitely more integrity with Chubbs Peterson having a son who works at a mini-golf course who also has a fake hand than whatever the Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning hook was with Shea Whigham being Jon Voight's kid out of nowhere. Those two movies mirror each other. Tom Cruise's sacrifice-for-the-movies adrenaline and Christopher McQuarrie's James Cameron/Brian De Palma-tinged set-piece excellence go blow-for-blow with Sandler's ageless comedic timing and immaculate facial expressions and his and co-writer Tim Herlihy's masterful ability to mine nonstop gags out of the most ludicrous visuals. Watching Cruise's underwater submarine ballet in the latest Mission: Impossible is incredible; watching golfer John Daly try to drink booze out of an antique cuckoo clock is, too. Where Happy Gilmore 2 succeeds and the latest Mission: Impossible fails all has to do with the approach. The latter is bound to sincerity in its most cringey throwbacks because it's downright, well, impossible to wink a bit at the audience at how silly this all is. A Sandler comedy has the freedom to have its nostalgia cake and throw it across the room to instigate a food fight. During a scene at a graveyard, headstones of characters long gone from the original start popping up in spades. A few of those would have induced eye-rolls; a bunch of those, even of the most random side characters, makes for great meta-humor. Comedies give you the ability to check yourself a bit, as the wedgie-giving ombudsman comes in to readily acknowledge a lot of this is looney tunes. A streak of sadness dyes the current, as the reason Happy falls off the golfing map is the kind of shock revelation a Happy Madison production probably doesn't aim for 10 years ago. The world kept spinning while Gilmore was swatting golf balls with a hockey goon's might, and it wasn't always kind to our favorite golfer like we might have hoped. Dad-Sandler has always been the most sentimental version of himself, and his kids aging right in front of his eyes and starting to leave the nest seems to weigh on him and his renewed take on Gilmore. This and Wes Anderson's excellent The Phoenician Scheme both dive into similar subject matter with equal gusto, of a father reckoning with his children and his place in providing for them. There's a world-weariness to Happy this time around in the way Sandler carries him that both compels the film's most jarring narrative choice and grounds some of the film's far, far sillier antics. That approach gives Sandler's performance added gravitas and the entire film around him a paternal watchfulness that would've played as unearned earlier in his filmography. There is no doubting Sandler's commitment to the project as you might could have in the past; he's all in, and so is everyone around him. The older Sandler has gotten, the more his traveling-theater approach to making movies has taken on new meaning. Even in his biggest comedic misfires, the community Sandler keeps with him on his Happy Madison projects has always endeared. He takes care of his own, and that love shows through here more so than in any other project he's ever worked on. The rampant cameos would be gratuitous if the people staffing them didn't seem so genuinely thrilled to be there. Christopher McDonald's Shooter McGavin getting dragged back into the fold would feel forced if McDonald didn't treat the role like it was the true opportunity of a lifetime. There's no way in heck Verne Lundquist wears that blazer in the film's third act if he's not tickled to be back in this world. Heck, all of the brand-name golfers in the cast seem to relish the chance to act with Sandler and actually buy into the material. Do you know how much of a comedic achievement it is that three of the funniest people in this movie are Daly, Scottie Scheffler and Will Zalatoris? Daly plays with the kind of comedic fire that we sometimes praise to the extent of pushing them into awards talk; he's really that inspired with his fearlessness to be as zany as possible. Sure, Happy Gilmore 2 is still a legacy sequel at its core, replete with brand endorsements and adorned with Super Bowl-commercial rascality. However, it's the rare legacy sequel that feels purposeful and human-driven. The film reaches for real profundity, as much as you can find in a Happy Madison movie. It's a movie with a good soul, as affably crude and dingy as Sandler's landmark works and operating with the same level of zeal. Does all of it work as well as it could? Nah. Does every joke land? Probably not. Is it messy? Most certainly; all of Sandler's comedies have been to a degree. However, it's still so much better than so many other films like it. The world is a better place when Sandler is making comedies like this. Hubie Halloween felt like a nice change of pace, and Happy Gilmore 2 feels like the grand return to that high-wire fire hydrant style of Sandler funny business. It's painfully fully and surprisingly wistful for its place in time. We need Sandler to keep tapping into his dramatic potential; it's why his decision to work with Noah Baumbach again on Jay Kelly is so encouraging. However, we also need Sandler firmly planting his feet in the comedic worlds where he's the smartest idiot in the room with a heart of gold, and we all love him for it. Watching Sandler succeed with everyone cheering him on as those signature Happy Gilmore needle drops hit might make you just a wee bit misty... and not because it's an uncaring algorithm programming "Nostalgic Feelz" for the most basic audience possible. When it's earned and it's real, there's nothing like going back to your happy place with the people you love.
Yahoo
22 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Former 'Bachelor' Star Faces Backlash Over Upcoming Age-Gap Dating Show
Nick Viall is one of the most polarizing Bachelor stars, not only for his time on the franchise, but for the relationship advice he offers on his podcast, The Viall Files. Now, he and his wife, Natalie Joy, are capitalizing on their 18-year age gap marriage with a new Netflix dating show, Age of Attraction. The news was announced on July 18 by the streaming network, revealing that the show will launch in 2026. More from SheKnows Bachelor in Paradise Spoilers Reveal Who's Engaged & Who's Still Together After Season 10 The logline for the series reads, 'Age is thrown out the window as singles search for their soulmates with help from hosts Nick Viall and Natalie Joy. Is love truly ageless, or will the years come between them?' The eight-episode series will feature contestants ranging in age from 22 to 59 years old. This age-gap idea is not much different from the reality star's relationship — Viall is 44 and Joy is 26 years old, and they share one child, daughter, River, 1. His decision to marry a much younger woman has gotten him in hot water quite a few times. On his March 26 podcast, Viall joked, 'Age gaps are in. I always say, when it comes to age gaps, looks matter.' Even though he made the statement in jest, the internet criticism reached a boiling point because Bachelor Nation fans take issue with his casual approach to his May-December affair. 'Their obsession with trying to justify their very concerning age gap is just gross,' wrote one Reddit user in The Bachelor forum. 'Ew to Netflix for greenlighting this. Hope their show is a monumental wreck and tanks so hard. And so fast,' another account added. Of course, some viewers are definitely going to hate-watch the series just for research. 'I'm gonna get judged so hard for watching this,' admitted another user. Viall and Joy began dating in July 2020 after she slid into his DMs on Instagram with a simple, 'You're unreal' comment. It was love at first DM. They soft-launched their relationship on social media in October 2020 when they posted pool snapshots from the same location. It took them until January 2021 to go Instagram official. The former Bachelor contestant addressed the age-gap controversy in June 2022 on the Call Her Daddy podcast. 'At first, it was something I think I was having a lot of anxiety about,' Vial said. 'You know, like, 'Are we going to be compatible?' And I think early on, that was part of the things I would worry about. But just the more I got to know her, the more I was just going to her for advice or just checking in with her, I just felt like we just met each other on the same wavelength, and I always felt like she was my equal.' Joy contributed her thoughts on the situation, 'We realized we were on the same stages of life, and we were ready for the same things … I'm in a place where I want to get married and have children, and he's also in that same place. We both have big careers and aspirations and jobs and stuff that we both love.' Viall and Joy got engaged in January 2023, welcomed their daughter in February 2024, and were married in April of SheKnows Everything We Know About Carolyn Bessette's Life Before JFK JR 29 Times Gisele Bündchen's Red Carpet Fashion Proved She's the Ultimate Supermodel 68 Celebrities Who Share a Famous Ex Solve the daily Crossword
Yahoo
39 minutes ago
- Yahoo
How Adam Sandler Paid Tribute to Late Cameron Boyce in Happy Gilmore 2
Originally appeared on E! Online Adam Sandler will always keep Cameron Boyce close to his heart. Six years after the Disney Channel actor—who costarred as the comedian's onscreen son in the Grown Ups franchise—died in his sleep, Sandler included a sweet nod to Boyce in his latest film Happy Gilmore 2. As eagle-eyed fans pointed out, in one scene of the movie released on July 25, Boyce appears on a TV within the background while a character works the check-in booth. Some have speculated the footage playing stems from an episode of the Disney Channel show, Jessie. 'Adam Sandler including Cameron Boyce in #HappyGilmore2 as a cameo is so heartwarming,' one social media user shared on X. "He really loved that kid and i'm so glad he keeps his memory alive.' Another added, 'Adam Sandler honoring Cameron Boyce in Happy Gilmore 2 melts my heart.' This isn't the first time that Sandler has paid tribute to the Descendants star. In fact, the 58-year-old included a touching message within the credits scene of his 2020 Netflix film Hubie Halloween. More from E! Online How Bryan Kohberger's Mom and Sister Reacted in Court to Idaho Murder Sentencing Brooke Hogan's Husband Addresses 'Challenging Time' After Hulk Hogan's Death Chris Martin's Ex Gwyneth Paltrow Jokes About Coldplay Scandal as New Astronomer Spokesperson "In loving memory of CAMERON BOYCE," the tribute, alongside of a photo of Boyce, read. "Gone way too soon and one of the kindest, coolest, funniest, and most talented kids we knew. You live on forever in our hearts and are truly missed every day." In July 2019, Boyce died at the age of 20 due to a seizure, which was a result of an ongoing medical condition for which he was being treated, his family confirmed to E! News at the time. Shortly after Boyce's death, Sandler also opened up about the actor's legacy and their close relationship. 'Too young,' he wrote on Twitter. 'Too sweet. Too funny. Just the nicest, more talented, and most decent kid around." Sandler continued, 'Loved that kid. Cared so much about his family. Cared so much about the world. Thank you, Cameron, for all you gave us. So much more was on the way. All our hearts are broken." For a closer look at more notable Disney Channel stars, keep reading... Clayton Snyder, Lizzie McGuireAdam Lamberg, Lizzie McGuireLalaine, Lizzie McGuireJake Thomas, Lizzie McGuireCamilla Belle, Rip GirlsJake T. Austin, Wizards of Waverly PlaceDavid Henrie, Wizards of Waverly PlaceJennifer Stone, Wizards of Waverly PlaceMia Talerico, Good Luck CharlieBridgit Mendler, Good Luck, CharlieKiely Williams, Cheetah GirlsSabrina Bryan, Cheetah GirlsRyan Merriman, Smart HouseKirsten Storms, Zenon: Girl of the 21st CenturyErik von Detten, Brink!Raviv Ullman, Phil of the FutureKimberly J. Brown, HalloweentownMitchel Musso, Hannah MontanaJason Earles, Hannah MontanaKyle Massey, That's So RavenA.J. Trauth, Even StevensChristy Carlson Romano, Even StevensBrandon Baker, Johnny TsunamiAlana Austin, Motocrossed For the latest breaking news updates, click here to download the E! News App Solve the daily Crossword
