That recent clip of Laverne Cox on “The View” where she reminds viewers that it’s the “other 1%” of the population that people should be upset about instead of trans people has gone very viral, making its truth-telling way around the internet. She was on the show to promote her now-streaming sitcom “Clean Slate” but her next project is already readying itself for public consumption. It’s called “Outcome,” the latest film from director Jonah Hill (who also co-wrote with Ezra Woods), and it’s about an actor on a career slide, battling blackmail and his past actions. Starring Keanu Reeves as the actor in question, Cox has a specific and pivotal role in the film that also features a long list of big names: Hill, Cameron Diaz, Matt Bomer, Susan Lucci, David Spade, Kaia Gerber, comedians Roy Wood Jr. and Atsuko Okatsuka, and Martin Scorsese. Apple TV+ is readying its release this year, and there’s sure to be an unmissable marketing push. Set your reminders.
‘Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion’ reunion
Good news, gays of the ’90s, pop culture is going to cater to your needs in a big way very soon because there’s a sequel to 1997’s “Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion” in the works. Details are sketchy right now, but the next chapter in the story of two best friends re-inventing themselves 10 years after high school is getting a 30-year fast forward. It’s being produced by Lisa Kudrow and Mira Sorvino, who will also star, of course (we’d ignore it if they didn’t, obviously) and Robin Schiff (“Emily in Paris”), who wrote the first film, will write this one. Who goes to their 40th high school reunion? We have no idea, but we’re rooting for the return of sardonic Gen X queen Janeane Garofalo, who stole scenes in the first movie. We need her now more than ever.
‘Twinless’ stars Dylan O’Brien x2
If you’re a fan of “Maze Runner” and “Teen Wolf” star Dylan O’Brien, you probably remember his appearance on the sci-fi/comedy anthology series “Weird City,” where he found himself simultaneously heterosexual and also involved in a passionate romance with “Modern Family” patriarch Ed O’Neill. Now he’s the star of the equally unusual queer romance “Twinless.” The film played Sundance where it won the Audience Award and became the subject of a piracy attempt (Mr. O’Brien has at least one sex scene in the film and it was leaked online) but it also won its star the U.S. Dramatic Special Jury Award for Acting. It’s about two young men who form an intense relationship after meeting at a support group for people whose twin siblings have died, and it was written and directed by O’Brien’s co-star, gay filmmaker James Sweeney, featuring “Gilmore Girls” icon Lauren Graham as O’Brien’s mother. When do non-film-festival goers get a legit look? Stay tuned.
‘Rains Over Babel’ forecast to set the queer arthouse aflame
An oddball standout at Sundance, the debut feature from Colombian filmmaker Gala del Sol, “Rains Over Babel,” has been picked up for North American distribution by Latido Films. Welcome news it is, too, because inventive queer filmmaking feels more and more like an act of defiance in the U.S., and this one has invention to spare. Set in an afterlife dive bar called Babel, queer misfits gather for a surreal trip through Dante’s “Inferno.” Full of angels and demons, fight sequences, dance numbers and, we are told, talking lizards, they all await their fate. Sounds like “The Good Place” reboot we’ve been waiting for. It’ll probably float into your local arthouse theater later this year.
Romeo San Vicente is angelically devilish.
