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FILM/TV BITS: ‘Rush Hour 3’; Whitaker goes ‘Wild’; TV One’s 30 million; Oprah on ‘The View’; Dog Whisperer sued; Tracy Morgan DVD.
*“Rush Hour 3” will begin production this fall with returning stars Chris Tucker and Jackie Chan, announced New Line Films Thursday. Brett Ratner will direct the latest installment featuring Tucker and Chan as LAPD detective James Carter and Chinese Chief Inspector Lee. The storyline puts them in Paris this time to battle a wing of the Chinese organized crime family, the Triads. With a screenplay by Jeff Nathanson ("Catch Me If You Can," "The Terminal"), the film is due for release next year.
*Forest Whitaker and Benicio Del Toro are among the actors who will lend voices to writer-director Spike Jonze's film adaptation of the classic children's book "Where the Wild Things Are." The Warner Bros. movie will mix voice performances, live-action puppetry and computer animation to dramatize the adventures of Max, a rebellious young boy who runs away from home after a fight with his mother and finds himself in a forest where the wild things roam.
*TV One has just surpassed the 30 million household subscriber mark, according to the May Nielsen Media Research universe estimates. The entertainment and lifestyle network for African American adults is now available in more than 30.1 million U.S. households, making it one of the fastest-growing new networks this decade. "With all of the focus on VOD, broadband and other non-traditional services, it's rare for a linear network to grow so quickly these days, but our distributors have seen what we've seen, that the adult African American audience is one that has been tremendously underserved,” said TV One Executive Vice President of Affiliate Sales and Marketing Brad Samuels.
*Oprah Winfrey is scheduled to visit the ladies of “The View” on May 12 to promote her ABC primetime special "Oprah Winfrey's Legends Ball," due to air May 15 at 8 p.m. As previously reported, the Legends Ball was held as a tribute to African American women and featured such invited guests as Diana Ross, the late Coretta Scott King, Cicely Tyson, Alicia Keys and Tina Turner.
*Cesar Millan, better known as the Dog Whisperer, is being sued for five million dollars by his former publicist Makeda Smith of Jazzmyne Public Relations and her partner, Foster Corder, of Daughters 2 Feed Films. Both black-owned operations say they conceived, produced and directed the original pilot for his current National Geographic Channel series “The Dog Whisperer” in 2001 with Tichina Arnold and her pooch as the guest. The lawsuit claims Millan abandoned Smith and Corder, and went behind their back to negotiate the terms of the show, “which is substantially similar to and in violation of the copyright owned by Corder and Smith in the pilot,” said a statement. The plaintiffs are claiming copyright infringement, breach of contract and breach of confidential relationship.
*Tracy Morgan's debut comedy DVD, “Life, Love & Lust,” will be released on Tuesday (May 9) via UrbanWorks Entertainment. The “Saturday Night Live” vet’s standup act discusses his views on sex as it relates to dating, marriage and public displays of affection. The DVD includes a 100 minute bonus CD soundtrack featuring every line from the performance.
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