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Yahoo
27-07-2025
- Automotive
- Yahoo
Frankie Muniz latest actor-turned-driver out to prove he can compete in high-level racing
Frankie Muniz may be the only actor who has been nominated for an Emmy award and driven in a NASCAR event at Daytona. But if Muniz had been old enough to get a driver's license before he moved to Hollywood, there may never have been a "Malcolm in the Middle." 'When I'm in that race car and I put my visor down and I drive out of that pit lane, I feel like I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be,' he said. 'That's what I'm supposed to do and that's what I'm doing.' And acting? 'I don't feel like I'm a good actor,' he said. 'I know I can act. But when I look at good acting, I go 'dang, I could never do that'.' That's not true, of course. Muniz, who started acting when he was 12, has been credited in 26 films and 37 TV shows, including the title role in 'Malcolm in the Middle,' which earned him two Golden Globe nominations and one Emmy nod during its seven-year run on Fox. But acting was a profession. Racing is a passion. 'Excitement and all the emotions. That's what I love about racing,' he said. 'The highs are so high and the lows are unbelievably low. It's awesome.' Muniz placed 28th in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race at Indianapolis Raceway Park on Friday. He is 23rd among the 64 drivers listed in the series points standings, with his one top-10 finish coming in the season opener at Daytona. Muniz, 39, isn't the first actor to try racing. Paul Newman was a four-time SCCA national champion who finished second in the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1979 while Patrick Dempsey ('Grey's Anatomy,' 'Can't Buy Me Love') has driven sports cars at Le Mans and in the Rolex 24 at Daytona, in addition to other series. But driving isn't a side hustle for Muniz, who last October signed with North Carolina-based Reaume Brothers Racing to be the full-time driver of the team's No. 33 Ford in the truck series. Muniz also raced twice last year in the NASCAR Xfinity Series. 'When I originally started racing, I was kind of at the height of my [acting] career. I had tons of offers to do movies and shows and all that,' said Muniz, who made his stock-car debut in the fall of 2021 in Bakersfield, then accepted an offer to drive full time in the ARCA Menards Series in 2023. 'Very easily could have stayed in that business. But I wanted to give racing a try. And to compete at the top level, you have to put in the time and effort that professional race car drivers are doing, right? You can't do it halfway.' Muniz was into racing before he even thought about acting. Growing up in North Carolina, he remembers waking early on the weekend to watch IndyCar and NASCAR races on TV. No one else in his family shared his interest in motorsports, so when his parents divorced shortly after Muniz was discovered acting in a talent show at age 8, his mother moved to Burbank, where he made his film debut alongside Louis Gossett Jr. in 1997's 'To Dance With Olivia.' Two years later he was cast as the gifted middle child of a dysfunctional working-class family in the successful sitcom 'Malcolm in the Middle.' Motorsports continued to tug at him so after running in a few celebrity events, Muniz twice put his acting career on hold to race, first in 2007 — shortly after 'Malcolm' ended after seven seasons and 151 episodes — when he started a three-season run in the open-wheel Atlantic Championship series. Read more: NASCAR announces race on U.S. Navy base in Coronado scheduled for 2026 Still, Muniz, who lives with his wife Paige and 4-year-old son Mauz in Scottsdale, Ariz., is dogged by criticism he is little more than a weekend warrior who is using his substantial Hollywood reputation and earnings to live out his racing fantasies. 'I don't spend any of my money going racing,' he said. 'I made a promise to my wife that I would not do that. So I can kill that rumor right there.' But those whispers persist partly because Muniz hasn't completely cut ties with acting. Because the truck series doesn't run every weekend, racing 25 times between Valentine's Day and Halloween, Muniz had time to tape a 'Malcolm in the Middle' reunion miniseries that is scheduled to air on Disney+ in December. He has also appeared in two other TV projects and two films since turning to racing full time. But his focus, he insists, is on driving. 'If I wanted to go racing for fun,' he said, 'I would not be racing in the truck series. I'd be racing at my local track or I'd be racing some SCCA club events. I want to be one of the top drivers there are. I want to make it as high up in NASCAR as I can. And I'm doing everything I can to do that.' Fame outside of racing can be a double-edged sword in the high-cost world of NASCAR. It can open doors to a ride and sponsorships others can't get, but it can also cause jealousy in the garage, with drivers crediting that fame and not talent for a rival's success. And Muniz isn't the only rookie driver who has had to deal with that. Toni Breidinger, who finished 27th in Friday's race and is one place and eight points ahead of Muniz in the season standings with nine races left, is a model who has posed for Victoria's Secret and been featured in the pages of Glamour, GQ and Sports Illustrated's swimsuit edition. She's also a good driver who has been going fast on a racetrack far longer than she's been walking slowly down a catwalk. 'I was definitely a racer before anything. That was definitely my passion,' said Breidinger, who started driving go-karts in Northern California when she was 9. 'I've been lucky enough to be able to do modeling to help support that passion. But at the end of the day, I definitely consider myself a racer. That's what I grew up doing and that's the career I've always wanted do to.' Still, she sees the two pursuits as being complementary. When Breidinger appears on a red carpet, as she did before this month's ESPY Awards in Los Angeles, it helps her modeling career while at the same time giving the sponsors of her racing team — which includes 818 Tequila, Dave & Buster's and the fashion brand Coach — added value. 'It's all part of the business. It all goes back into my racing,' said Breidinger, 26, who is of German and Lebanese descent. 'The side hustles, I like to call them. I don't think that takes away from me being a race car driver.' Breidinger, who won the USAC western asphalt midget series title as a teenager, raced in the ARCA Menards Series for five years before stepping up to truck series in 2021, making NASCAR history in 2023 when she finished 15th in her first race, the best-ever debut by a female driver. That helped her land a full-time ride this season with Tricon Garage, Toyota's flagship team in the truck series. Like Muniz, Breidinger sees the truck series, the third tier of NASCAR's national racing series, as a steppingstone to a seat in a Cup car. 'I want to climb the national ladder. That's what I'm here to do,' she said. 'I wouldn't be doing this if I didn't have long-term plans and long-term goals. I'm a very competitive person, especially with myself.' Kyle Larson, who climbed to the top of that ladder, running his first NASCAR national series race in a truck in 2012, then winning the 2021 Cup championship nine years later, said the path he took — and the one Muniz and Breidinger are following — is a well-worn one. Read more: NASCAR figuring out if building new track in Fontana is the 'right thing to do' 'Anybody racing in any of the three series has talent and ability enough to be there,' he said. Funding, Larson said, and not talent and ability, often determines how fast a driver can make that climb and that might be a problem for Muniz since Josh Reaume, the owner of the small three-truck team Muniz drives for, has complained about the price of racing. It can cost more than $3.5 million a year to field one competitive truck in the 25-race series — and that cost is rising, threatening to price many out of the sport. But having drivers like Muniz and Breidinger in NASCAR will help everyone in the series, Larson said, because it will bring in fans and sponsors that might not have been attracted to the sport otherwise. 'I just hope that he can get into a situation someday where you can really see his talent from being in a car or a truck that is better equipped to go run towards the front,' Larson said of Muniz. 'You want to see him succeed because if he does succeed, it's only going to do good things for our sport.' And if it works out the way Muniz hopes, perhaps he'll someday be the answer to another trivia question: Name the NASCAR champion who once worked in Hollywood. Get the best, most interesting and strangest stories of the day from the L.A. sports scene and beyond from our newsletter The Sports Report. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Geek Tyrant
27-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Geek Tyrant
MALCOLM IN THE MIDDLE Series Reboot Gets a New Subtitle Name LIFE'S STILL UNFAIR — GeekTyrant
The Malcolm in the Middle limited series reboot wrapped production last month, and we are just hearing about the new name the episodes will go by - Malcolm in the Middle: Life's Still Unfair , a reference to the show's theme song, 'Boss of Me,' by They Might Be Giants, which concludes with the words, 'Life is unfair…' It's a great throwback title, and not only does it get that song stuck in our heads, but it brings back memories of the show, and gets us excited to revisit these characters. The reboot will follow Malcolm (Frankie Muniz) and his daughter (newcomer Keeley Karsten) as they are drawn back into the boisterous family's chaos when Hal (Bryan Cranston) and Lois (Jane Kaczmarek) demand his presence at their 40th wedding anniversary festivities. Also reprising their roles are Christopher Masterson and Justin Berfield, who portrayed Malcolm's older brothers, Francis and Reese, respectively. Caleb Ellsworth-Clark is taking over the role of genius Malcolm's younger brother, Dewey. Additional newcomers include Kiana Madeira as Malcolm's girlfriend; Anthony Timpano, cast as Malcolm's youngest brother, Jamie, who was seen as a baby and toddler on the original series; and Vaughan Murrae as Malcolm's youngest sibling, Kelly (who, like the character's actor, is nonbinary), whose existence was revealed in the series finale when Lois revealed her positive pregnancy test. Stay tuned for the announcement of the release date of the new episodes of Malcom in the Middle: Life's Still Unfair .
Geek Tyrant
13-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Geek Tyrant
Bryan Cranston Explains Why His Youngest MALCOLM IN THE MIDDLE Co-Star Decided Not to Return for the Revival — GeekTyrant
The Malcom in the Middle revival has wrapped production, and fans are ready for the new episodes to head our way. The story sounds like it will be fun, and it will be cool to see the cast reunite onscreen. All but one returned, Erik Per Sullivan, who played Dewey in the show's original run. Sullivan has not appeared in any of the show's reunions, and he turned down the offer to return to the role in the Disney+ revival project. Fans didn't know what to make of the recasting, with some wondering if there was bad blood between Sullivan and his cast mates, but Malcolm in the Middle dad Bryan Cranston has cleared the air. In a recent interview on the Fly on the Wall podcast, Cranston talked about returning to the series with his TV kids all grown up, stating, "It's amazing how these boys who were my boys on that show are now around the same age I was when we first started, and they've got children of their own." When host David Spade asked about Erik Per Sullivan, who played youngest son Dewey on Malcolm , Cranston lamented that he was "the only one who didn't come back to act in the show." He added, "I talked to Erik and I said, 'Hey, we got the show! It's going to come back.' He goes, 'Oh, that's fantastic!' And I go, 'Yeah, so we're looking forward to having you back.' He goes, 'Oh, no, no, I don't want to do it. But it's fantastic.'" Cranston then confirmed that Sullivan gave up acting after the run of the show, and gave an update on the impressive path Sullivan chose, saying, "He's actually going to Harvard. He's really, really smart, and he's getting his master's at Harvard right now. He said, 'Oh God, no, I haven't acted since I was 9 or something. So I'm not into it.'" Not only is it honorable that a child actor would choose a different career, but it sounds like Sullivan is thriving going the route of education. It's also very cool to hear that he and Cranston are still in touch. They spent many years in each other's lives, and it's awesome that they have been able to keep up a relationship. There is still no released date set for the new episodes of Malcolm in the Middle , but it's rumored to be shooting for a late 2025 release. via: EW
Newsweek
12-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Newsweek
Bryan Cranston Reveals Why Original Dewey is Not Returning for 'Malcolm in the Middle' Revival
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. Entertainment gossip and news from Newsweek's network of contributors Millennials across America are ecstatic about the upcoming "Malcolm in the Middle" sequel mini-series coming to Disney+. First look at the 'MALCOLM IN THE MIDDLE' revival series. Coming soon to Disney+ — DiscussingFilm (@DiscussingFilm) April 22, 2025 One of the most popular sitcoms of the 2000s, the sequel will bring back multiple cast members from the original show, including Frankie Muniz, Bryan Cranston, Jane Kaczmarek, Justin Berfield, and Christopher Masterson. More Entertainment: 'Malcolm In The Middle' Revival Recasts Dewey However, one member of The Wilkerson Family won't be returning: Erik Per Sullivan as Dewey. Instead, the intelligent younger sibling will be played by Caleb Ellsworth-Clark of "The Expanse." Now, we know the reason why. The entire cast of "Malcolm in the Middle" The entire cast of "Malcolm in the Middle" Fox Network During an appearance on Dana Carvey's and David Spade's "Fly on the Wall" podcast, Cranston stated that Per Sullivan had no interest in returning for the revival since he has retired from acting. "I talked to Erik and I said, 'Hey, we got the show! It's gonna come back,'" Cranston said, per Tony Maglio of The Hollywood Reporter. "He goes, 'Oh, that's fantastic!' And I go, 'Yeah, so we're looking forward to having you back.' He goes, 'Oh, no, no, I don't want to do it. But it's fantastic that you are.'" Erik Per Sullivan is not returning as Dewey for the 'MALCOLM IN THE MIDDLE' sequel series because he is going to Harvard. (Source: — DiscussingFilm (@DiscussingFilm) June 12, 2025 Additionally, it was revealed that Per Sullivan would be getting his masters at Harvard instead. "He's actually going to Harvard," Cranston said. "He's really, really smart, and I think he's getting his master's at Harvard right now. He said, 'Oh God, no, I haven't acted since I was nine or something. So I'm not into it.'" More Entertainment: Dept. Q Ending Explained: Who Shot Morck? Despite this, Cranston couldn't be prouder of the actors who are like actual children to him. "It's amazing how these boys — who were my boys on that show — are now around the same age I was when we first started," Cranston said. "They've got children of their own." Now, the award-winning star of "Breaking Bad" is excited to get most of the family back together again, something he has been working on for a long time. "It's something I was pushing for for the last 10 years," Cranston said. "I just started wearing [series creator Linwood Boomer] down until he said, 'I've got an idea.' I said, 'Good.'" More Entertainment: 'Star Trek: Strange New Worlds' Canceled 'A Minecraft Movie' Hits HBO Max for Free Streaming in June: What to Know Best Films to Stream in Summer 2025 on Netflix, Paramount+, Prime Video For more television and entertainment news, head on over to Newsweek Entertainment.
Yahoo
02-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Aaron Paul Shares The Relentless Prank Bryan Cranston Would Pull On The Set Of ‘Breaking Bad': 'He Would Get Everybody In On It'
In spite of the often dark and grueling material of AMC's seminal crime drama Breaking Bad, it's nice to know stars Bryan Cranston and Aaron Paul had a little fun on set — in the former's case, perhaps a bit too much fun. During a recent appearance on Sean Evans' popular Hot Ones series, on which Cranston has previously appeared, Paul relayed a hilarious behind-the-scenes tidbit, a relentless hallmark of production in which his co-star would repeatedly prank him about his character's death. More from Deadline Mark Johnson Re-Ups AMC Deal, Sets 'Black Vault' Drama As He Talks Anne Rice Universe Expansion, 'Great American Stories' Plan & Industry Correction Bryan Cranston Teases 'Malcolm in the Middle' Physical Comedy: "I'm, Of Course, Naked Again" Bryan Cranston Says Filming 'Malcolm In The Middle' Revival Was "So Rewarding" Since The "Whole Family" Is "Back Together" 'He's the hardest worker in the room, the most lovable — I mean, he's my best friend, my son's godfather, I adore him, I spoke to him for an hour on the phone last night. I really am obsessed with the guy, but he's also the most immature person I've ever met in my life, and I say that with just love and respect,' the Ash star prefaced. Paul then recalled an instance where The Studio actor came out of the production office and solemnly beckoned him to come over, a seeming harbinger of bad news. 'He goes, 'Come here, it's OK,' and he gives me this long hug,' the Black Mirror actor recounted. 'I'm like, 'What are you doing?' He's like, 'At least you go out in a big way, huh?' And I'm like, 'What are you talking about?' He goes, 'Did you read the latest script?' I go, 'No.' He goes, 'Oh, well, just read it, and I'm here if you need me.'' As such, Paul said he 'sprinted' into the office and asked to read the script — but upon perusing the final pages, he found his Jesse Pinkman alive and (mostly) well. 'He just made it seem like I died,' he said of his Dos Hombres Mezcal co-founder, 'but he would not stop, and he would get everybody in on it, like the costume designers said, 'Hey we gotta do your measurements for the casket, so if you could stay after work, that would be great.' I'm like, 'What are you talking about?'' In fact, his character was originally scripted to die at the end of Season 1, but the writers opted to keep Jesse alive as a result of Paul's chemistry with Cranston and the thematic foil his character offers Walter White; his character notably returns in the 2019 film El Camino. Paul certainly had the last laugh, turning to the camera and triumphantly declaring, 'But I made it!' (And, as we all know, a certain former teacher of chemistry did not.) A juggernaut of the prestige television era, Breaking Bad would go on to be nominated for 58 Emmys throughout its five-season run from 2008 through 2013, winning 16 statuettes, including three consecutive wins for Cranston (who also won a fourth as a producer on the show) and three total wins for Paul. The Vince Gilligan-created series also spawned the equally beloved Bob Odenkirk vehicle Better Call Saul, which clinched 53 Emmy nods but did not receive any awards during its run from 2015 to 2022. Watch Paul's episode of Hot Ones below: Best of Deadline Sean 'Diddy' Combs Sex-Trafficking Trial Updates: Cassie Ventura's Testimony, $10M Hotel Settlement, Drugs, Violence, & The Feds 'Poker Face' Season 2 Guest Stars: From Katie Holmes To Simon Hellberg 2025-26 Awards Season Calendar: Dates For Tonys, Emmys, Oscars & More
