Names and faces

Friday, March 28, 2014

It’s tough to get writer-director Christopher Nolanto divulge details about the plot of his sci-fi movie Interstellar. “We’re right in the thick of the first cut of the film,” he said on stage during a question-and-answer session Wednesday at the annual movie-theater convention CinemaCon in Las Vegas. “So I can’t really say much about it right now.” However, he did say that the tone of the time travel-focused project, of which scientist Kip Thorne is a producer, is very different from any of his previous films. “For me it’s about harking back to films I saw when I was a child,” he said. “I grew up in an era that was the golden age of the blockbuster, where something being a family film could be very broad and universal. I feel like that is something I want to see again. Something that looks at where we are as people and where we might go.” Matthew McConaughey, along with Anne Hathaway and Jessica Chastain, stars in the film. Nolan said he “needed someone who was very much an everyman” to play the male lead. McConaughey, he added, was an ideal choice. “He is experiencing extraordinary events in the film, and we are seeing them through his eyes. I didn’t know how much potential Matthew had until Mud. It showed me a side of his capabilities that I never knew was there. It’s a transformative performance.”

Columbus Short, a lead actor on the television series Scandal, was arrested Wednesday on a felony charge, accused of seriously injuring a man during an altercation at a restaurant earlier this month. Short was arrested by police in Claremont, Calif., on a warrant issued in a case that alleges he committed a battery that caused serious bodily harm. The actor was involved in a dispute with a man at a West Los Angeles restaurant March 15 before Short hit the man and knocked him out, according to Los Angeles police and prosecutors. Further details about the altercation were not released. Short, 31, plays attorney Harrison Wright on ABC’s hit series Scandal. Records show he was released Wednesday after posting $50,000 bond. If convicted, Short faces up to four years in state prison. A date for his initial court appearance has not yet been set. Short was charged Feb. 14 with misdemeanor spousal battery and has pleaded innocent in that case. A judge ordered him to stay away from his wife, Tuere Short, at a March 5 hearing. Records show she filed for divorce last year but dismissed her petition earlier this year.

Front Section, Pages 2 on 03/28/2014