Even weak critics reviews for “The Nun” couldn’t keep movie audiences away on a slow weekend at the box office. Box office analysts predicted a possible $36 million in domestic sales, but this latest “Conjuring” franchise addition topped all of them setting a new record.
Early September has become a fertile time for horror movies. Warner released “It” on the same weekend last year, and that movie arrived at $123.4 million in ticket sales, going on to gross more than $700 million worldwide.
The horror movie “The Nun” has topped the domestic box office in its first weekend, scoring a best for the “Conjuring” franchise and another win for Warner Bros.
Studio estimates on Sunday say the Demian Bichir and Taissa Farmiga-led film brought in $53.5 million from 3,876 North American theaters. Internationally, it banked $77.5 million for a massive $131 million global debut. The movie, a spinoff of a character seen in “The Conjuring 2” and set in 1952 Romania, cost only $22 million to produce.
Before “The Nun,” the largest opening in the “Conjuring” universe, which includes the “Annabelle” films, was “The Conjuring’s” $41.8 million launch.
“The subject in the title ‘The Nun,’ just gets a bigger broader audience,” said Jeffrey Goldstein, Warner Bros.′ president of domestic distribution.
Opening weekend audiences were heavily Hispanic (35 percent), according to exit polls, and significantly higher than other films in the series. “The Conjuring,” for instance, attracted a 17 percent Hispanic audience.
This marks the fifth consecutive weekend that a Warner Bros. movie has held first place domestically, following in the successful footsteps of “Crazy Rich Asians” and “The Meg.” It’s also the fourth that the studio has held the first and second place spots which is the first time this has happened in the industry in over 25 years. The last time was in 1989 when Universal Pictures had “Sea of Love,” ″Uncle Buck” and “Parenthood.”
“The calendar has 12 months and 52 weeks,” Goldstein said of the industry-leading streak. “We had gotten a fair amount of criticism for what our release schedule looked like in the summer, but I kept on saying it’s not about summer, it’s about the whole year.”
“The Nun” effectively scared “Crazy Rich Asians” into second place for the first time in its four-week run. The rom-com added $13.6 million, bringing its total North American earning to $136.2 million.
Third place went to the R-rated Jennifer Garner mother set on revenge movie “Peppermint,” from STXFilms, which debuted on par with expectations to $13.3 million. It was independently financed for nearly $25 million after taking tax incentives into account.
“‘Peppermint’ was a movie that was meant to give a completely different option to ‘The Nun,’” said Paul Dergarabedian, a senior media analyst for box office tracker comScore. “‘The Nun’ was just this overwhelming juggernaut.”
And holdovers rounded out the top five with “The Meg” in fourth with $6 million and “Searching” in fifth with $4.5 million.
Despite “The Nun’s” strong performance, the weekend is down nearly 30 percent from last year when “It” scored a record-breaking opening, but the year overall is still up 9.5 percent.
“Look out,” Dergarabedian said. “This could be the biggest box office year ever.”
The rest of the year also looks promising for Warner, which will roll out a hotly anticipated remake of “A Star Is Born” with Lady Gaga in October, the J.K. Rowling-written “Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald” in November and “Aquaman” in December.
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to comScore. Where available, the latest international numbers for Friday through Sunday are also included. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.
“The Nun,” $53.5 million ($77.5 million international).
2. “Crazy Rich Asians,” $13.6 million ($5.6 million international).
3. “Peppermint,” $13.3 million ($1.4 million international).
4. “The Meg,” $6 million ($11.3 million international).
5. “Searching,” $4.5 million ($7.5 million international).
6. “Mission: Impossible — Fallout,” $3.8 million ($38.6 million international).
7. “Christopher Robin,” $3.2 million ($2.5 million international).
8. “Operation Finale,” $3 million.
9. “BlacKkKlansman,“$2.6 million ($3.7 million international).
“Alpha,” $2.5 million ($6.3 million international).
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at international theaters (excluding the U.S. and Canada), according to comScore:
As President Donald Trump rampages the White House administration to find the anonymous New York Times op-ed writer, bookies are turning his lemons into financial lemonade. While everyone in Washington D.C. is playing the ‘who authored the op-ed’ game, gambling sites are getting into the action with Vice President Mike Pence in the lead.
Does the so-called “Senior Administration Official” really exist, or is it just the Failing New York Times with another phony source? If the GUTLESS anonymous person does indeed exist, the Times must, for National Security purposes, turn him/her over to government at once!
Pence is getting some attention as being in the lead at offshore bookmaking picks as the White House mole behind the anonymous bombshell New York Times op-ed blasting Trump. One specific word is putting attention in his direction “lodestar” as this is one of his favorite words.
White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said “the coward” who wrote the piece should step forward and resign, saying “he is not putting country first, but putting himself and his ego ahead of the will of the American people.”
Pence was listed at 2-to-3 odds on the site MyBookie as the fifth column official who claims to be working behind the scenes to stop some of Trump’s policies that they find wrongheaded.
The biggest favorite, at 1-3 odds, is “the field,” someone not listed among the 18 administration officials listed by the Costa Rica-based operation.
At 2-to-3 odds, a winning bettor investing $1 would profit 66 cents. At 1-to-3, a gambler wagering $1 would net 33 cents with a win.
“What tipped us off was ‘lodestar,’ “ MyBookie head oddsmaker David Strauss said of Pence. “When you search members of the administration (who have used that word) only one name comes up – and that name is Mike Pence. He’s used in multiple speeches this year.”
The other 17 named potential moles, listed by MyBookie, are: Education Secretary Betsy Devos (2-to-1), Secretary of State Mike Pompeo (4-to-1), Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin (4-to-1), chief of staff John F. Kelly (4-to-1), Defense Secretary Jim Mattis (5-to-1), Attorney General Jeff Sessions (5-to-1), Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke (6-to-1), Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue (6-to-1), Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross (7-to-1) Labor Secretary Alex Acosta (7-to-1), HHS Secretary Alex Azar (8-to-1), HUD Secretary Ben Carson (8-to-1), VA Secretary Robert Wilkie (8-to-1), Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen (10-to-1), Ivanka Trump (12-to-1) and Jared Kushner (12-to-1).
Hours after MyBookie posted numbers, Canada-based Bovada issued its own Trump-leak odds and listed embattled AG Sessions as its favorite at 5-to-2.
He was followed by Pence (3-to-1), Kelly (4-to-1), Mattis (4-to-1), UN Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley (10-to-1), “Javanka” (15-to-1), Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats (15-to-1), White House counsel Don McGahn (15-to-1), Melania Trump (50-to-1) and White House counselor Kellyanne Conway (50-to-1).
Bovada listed President Trump, himself, as the potential mole and Times writer at 25-to-1.
The site didn’t list a “field” option, and the bet is only good if the Times confirms its source by Dec. 31, 2020.
James Franco continues bombing at the box office with “Kin,” but John M. Chu’s “Crazy Rich Asians” continues dominating ticket sales for a third consecutive week. “Crazy Rich Asians” took in more than double the weekend earning of the number two film “The Meg,” and the studio has already greenlit a sequel.
The film has helped the summer box office recover from last year’s numbers.
“Crazy Rich Asians” isn’t slowing down at the box office even in its third weekend in theaters, and is helping to send a strong summer moviegoing season off on a high note.
Studios on Sunday say the romantic comedy has topped the domestic charts again. Warner Bros. estimates that the film added an additional $22.2 million through Sunday, down only 10 percent from last weekend. To date, the film has grossed nearly $111 million from North American theaters, passing the lifetime domestic total of 2015′s “Trainwreck,” one of the last big studio rom-com success stories.
Should the pace hold through Monday, “Crazy Rich Asians” could also have one of the biggest Labor Day weekends ever by the time final numbers are reported on Tuesday. The current four-day Labor Day record sits with 2007′s “Halloween” which opened with $30.6 million and some are projecting that “Crazy Rich Asians” could hit $30 million.
It easily won out over the holdovers and a few newcomers, like the Nazi war crime film “Operation Finale” and the sci-fi thriller “Kin.”
Warner Bros.′ shark pic “The Meg” took second place with an additional $10.5 million, bringing its global total to $462.8 million. “Mission: Impossible — Fallout” (Paramount) came in third, with an estimated gross of $7 million during its sixth weekend at the box office, bringing its domestic total to around $204.3 million.
While the film exceeded box-office expectations during its opening weekend, it has since consistently trailed “Crazy Rich Asians” — though not quite enough to lose its lead of about $10 million in cumulative North American earnings.
“Operation Finale” landed in fourth place with $6 million. The film starring Oscar Isaac and Ben Kingsley tells the story of how Mossad agent Peter Malkin captured Adolf Eichmann.
And the John Cho-led computer screen mystery “Searching” performed better than expected in its expansion to 1,200 screens, bringing in an estimated $5.7 million through Sunday and rounding out the top five.
The sci-fi thriller “Kin,” with Zoe Kravitz and Dennis Quaid, did not fare as well opening outside of the top 10 to only $3 million from over 2,100 theaters.
In limited release, Lionsgate and Pantelion’s Spanish-language “Ya Veremos” opened to $1.8 million from 369 locations. And Focus Features’ gothic thriller “The Little Stranger” launched on 474 screens to $420,000.
“Pretty much every summer ends with a whimper…that’s very typical,” said comScore senior media analyst Paul Dergarabedian. “But this is going to be a very strong Labor Day weekend.”
The weekend closes out the fruitful 2018 summer movie season. Box office tracker comScore is projecting that the 2018 summer box office will net out with around $4.39 billion, up over 14 percent from last year when the summer didn’t even hit $4 billion. Year to date, the box office is up 9.9 percent.
The success of “Crazy Rich Asians’” also propelled an especially lucrative August, up almost 30 percent from last year. But, Dergarabedian warns, September is likely to take a bit of a hit.
“We’re going to see a downturn in the year-to-date advantage. Last year ‘It’ propelled a record-breaking September,” he said. “I don’t think there’s anything of that magnitude this September.”
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to comScore. Where available, the latest international numbers for Friday through Sunday are also included. Final domestic figures will be released Tuesday.
Crazy Rich Asians
“Crazy Rich Asians,” $22.2 million ($10.4 million international).
2. “The Meg,” $10.5 million ($17.7 million international).
3. “Mission: Impossible — Fallout,” $7 million ($89.1 million international).
4. “Operation Finale,” $6 million.
5. “Searching,” $5.7 million ($5.9 million international).
6. “Christopher Robin,” $5 million ($4.7 million international).
7. “Alpha,” $4.5 million ($6.6 million international).
8. “The Happytime Murders,” $4.4 million ($1.5 million international).
9. “BlacKkKlansman,” $4.1 million ($4.8 million international).
10. “Mile 22,” $3.6 million ($6 million international).
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at international theaters (excluding the U.S. and Canada), according to comScore:
It really is hard to find original content nowadays, and while the movie industry has got us used to seeing flicks based on video games (Tomb Raider, Max Payne, Tron and, in a way, Ready Player One), it is also quite common to see examples of adaptations going the other way round.
Unfortunately, compared to the early 2000s, this tendency has significantly gone down, somehow shifting from big-budget console video games actually based on movies, to online games and betting apps loosely inspired by movie characters or themes.
It is fair to assume that investing in very ambitious projects bringing movies to your consoles or PC has not proven successful for producers in the last decade, forcing them to abandon such practice. And while this might be disappointing to nostalgic gamers, it opened the doors to websites who wanted to give a theme to their online games, events betting and gambling activities. It is now common to find things such as Psycho Slot, a slot game loosely based on the Alfred Hitchcock movie, not to mention the wide variety of movie-based games on popular gaming websites such as crazygames or miniclip.
Once again, another popular and beloved practice has moved online, becoming incredibly more accessible, but far less ambitious. Not to say the games are not fun or engaging, but they barely have anything to do with the source they’re based on, and don’t equal the experience we got used to when we were children, when, after seeing a movie, we all waited for the possibility of playing the game. It was just a matter of weeks, until we had a chance to become part of the movie ourselves, and tailor our personal experience in the same setting as the protagonists, perhaps making those choices we dreaded he/she hadn’t made in the movie.
It almost seems as if the one kind of adaptations we were really behind is the only one the industry has decided to do without, focusing on reboots, prequels, and sequels, leaving us without much to do, except maybe playing some of those online games, hoping for a chance to at least win a prize and feel better about the whole thing.
You can expect Hollywood to start pumping out a slew of films to copy “Crazy Rich Asians” as the film tops the box office charts for a second week improving upon last week. While it had a small slip, it rebounded again. So you know Hollywood studios will suddenly think it’s time to greenlight similar films.
The opening weekend for “Crazy Rich Asians” was historic. Its second weekend was even more impressive.
The romantic comedy sensation slid just 6 percent from its chart-topping debut to again lead the box office with $25 million in ticket sales, according to studio estimates Sunday. Almost as many people turned out over the weekend for “Crazy Rich Asians” as they did for its opening Friday-to-Sunday bow — an unheard of hold for a non-holiday release. Drops of close to 50 percent are common for wide releases.
But propelled by enthusiastic reviews and an eagerness for a major Hollywood film led by Asian stars, “Crazy Rich Asians” is showing almost unprecedented legs. After opening last weekend with $35.3 million from Wednesday to Sunday and $26.5 million over the weekend, the Warner Bros. release — the first Hollywood studio movie in 25 years with an all-Asian cast — has already grossed $76.8 million.
Ticket sales for “Crazy Rich Asians” have been less impressive overseas, where the film has only taken in about $7.1 million in a handful of smaller territories. Large countries like Britain will follow in the weeks ahead, although it is unclear whether China, the world’s second-largest film market behind North America, will grant Warner’s request to import the movie. China operates a quota system for foreign films.
The adaptation of Kevin Kwan’s bestselling novel, starring Constance Wu and Henry Golding, was helped by weak competition. STX Entertainment’s critically slammed R-rated puppet caper “The Happytime Murders” debuted with $10.1 million, a career-low wide release for star Melissa McCarthy. The robot-dog fantasy “A.X.L.,” from the beleaguered Global Road Entertainment, flopped with $2.9 million.
But the talk of the weekend was the sustained success of “Crazy Rich Asians,” which grossed approximately the same from one Saturday to the next.
“I’ve been telling my team that Big Foot sightings are more common than zero percent Saturday drops,” said Jeff Goldstein, distribution chief for Warner Bros.
Goldstein noted that after a 44 percent Asian-American audience over opening weekend, that percentage fell to 27 percent on the second weekend while Caucasian and Hispanic ticket buyers grew. “The audience is broadening,” he said.
The remarkable hold left many in Hollywood searching for comparisons. While such slim drops or second-week increases regularly happen over holiday weekends, you have to go back to the likes of “The Sixth Sense” (-3.4 percent in August 1999) and “The Fugitive” (-5.6 percent in August 1993) to find something similar.
There are a few other stray examples of movies that held so well without adding substantially more theaters like “Brother Bear,” ″Puss in Boots” and “Mother’s Day,” but that’s about it. Even “The Help,” which also opened mid-August, slid 23.1 percent in 2011 on its way to $169.7 million domestically and four Oscar nominations including best picture — a path that’s not out of the question for “Crazy Rich Asians.”
“There’s no greater indicator of the enthusiasm of an audience than a minimal drop in a second weekend,” said Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst for comScore. “This isn’t the product of opening-weekend hype. This is the product of a great movie resonating very strongly with all audiences. The movie has become a cultural phenomenon.”
“Crazy Rich Asians” also expanded internationally, though with a more muted effect. It grossed an estimated $6 million in 18 markets, including $1.8 million on 105 screens in Singapore, where much of the movie is set. “Crazy Rich Asians” hasn’t yet been granted a release in China, where Disney’s “Ant-Man and the Wasp” opened over the weekend and collected $68 million, pushing its global gross to $544.1 million.
“The Happytime Murders,” which cost approximately $40 million to make, came into the weekend with some of the worst reviews of the year (22 percent “fresh” on Rotten Tomatoes) despite the pedigree of the Jim Henson Company. Brian Henson, the chairman of the company and son of Jim Henson, directed the raunchy Los Angeles detective tale, a kind of “Who Framed Roger Rabbit” for puppets. This film has already gotten studios whispering that it looks like Melissa McCarthy’s career is continuing to cool off. McCarthy’s box office results have been on a downward slide. “Spy” arrived to $29 million in 2015, followed by “The Boss” with $23.6 million in 2016. “Life of the Party,” released earlier this year, had initial ticket sales of $18 million. As anyone knows, this happens in every actor’s career signaling it’s time to shake things up.
It’s the second straight disappointment for STX, which has also seen its Mark Wahlberg thriller “Mile 22″ underperform. With $6 million in its second week, it has been thoroughly trounced by “Crazy Rich Asians,”
In limited release, the low-budget John Cho-starring thriller “Searching” landed a $28,000 per-screen average with $250,000 in nine theaters.
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to comScore. Where available, the latest international numbers for Friday through Sunday are also included. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.
“Crazy Rich Asians,” $25 million ($6 million international).
“The Meg,” $13 million ($32.7 million international).
“The Happytime Murders,” $10 million ($1.2 million international).
“Mission: Impossible — Fallout,” $8 million ($13 million international).
“Christopher Robin,” $6.3 million ($5.9 million international).
“Mile 22,” $6 million ($5.7 million international).
“Alpha,” $5.6 million ($6.7 million international).
“BlacKkKlansman,” $5.3 million ($5.6 million international).
“A.X.L.,” $2.9 million.
“Slender Man,” $2.8 million ($5.8 million international).
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at international theaters (excluding the U.S. and Canada), according to comScore:
Like Apple, Samsung loves bringing out their latest Galaxy Note on the heals of their lastest S9 offering one of two things more to justify the price increase. Here are some pros and cons to help you make your choice.
For $1,000, the premium Galaxy Note 9 is a superb phone that showcases the best Samsung has to offer.
It’s also the phone most of you won’t need. That’s because you can get many of the same features in Samsung’s Galaxy S9 for a few hundred dollars less.
The Note 9, available Friday, is the Android smartphone for those who want the latest and the greatest. There’s a larger battery, with a 21 percent boost over last year’s Note 8 model. The Note 9 gets 128 gigabytes of storage, double what’s in the S9 and Apple’s iPhones. And of course, a large screen.
But there’s not much “wow” beyond that. Smartphone innovation has slowed down in recent years. It’s more noticeable with Samsung because the company spreads out those innovations between two major smartphones each year. One phone inevitably plays catch up with the other every six months.
So now we find that the Note 9 is getting the zippy processor and cellular speeds the S9 phones first offered earlier this year. It’s also getting the S9′s dual-aperture camera for better low-light shots as well as its gimmicky, but super-fun, ability to take video with super-slow motion.
And the S9 starts at just $720 through T-Mobile, and about $800 through Verizon, AT&T, and Sprint. A Plus version that’s closer in size to the Note 9 costs $840 to $930.
True, the Note 9 offers a little more wowness. Its camera uses artificial intelligence to optimize colors and lighting for what you’re trying to shoot, be it food, a sunset or flowers. Many low-light shots were even better than what the S9 produced, even though both share the second aperture designed to let in more light when needed.
Of course, you’re likely to see this feature in the S10 in about six months.
That brings us to one of the Note’s remaining distinctive features, its stylus. It’s useful for handwriting notes and signing documents on the screen. Now, it can control digital slideshows and music playback, too. The new stylus gets Bluetooth to double as a remote control. Selfies won’t look as awkward when you don’t have to reach for the on-screen button; just press the pen to snap the shutter.
Unfortunately, there isn’t a lot the remote feature can do yet. It’s a promising feature — but could remain mostly a promise if app developers don’t take advantage of it.
Many past Samsung features failed to gain traction because app developers couldn’t be bothered to make the tweaks needed. For instance, Air View was supposed to offer pop-up previews just by pointing to an email and calendar entry, but it mostly worked only with Samsung’s home-grown apps.
More recently, there’s Bixby, Samsung’s own digital assistant. While Samsung has worked directly with some services, including Uber and Spotify, on integrations, developers have largely prioritized Amazon’s Alexa and the Google Assistant. It comes down to a chicken-or-egg problem: People need to see compelling capabilities to use a feature; developers need to see a strong base of users to spend the time developing compelling capabilities.
The stylus remains the Note’s signature feature, with or without extensive remote capabilities. No doubt the new edition will appeal to die-hard Samsung fans, hard-core gamers and on-the-go executives who are on their phones constantly and need the battery and storage boost. Though the Note 9 uses the same processor as the S9, it has a new cooling system designed to let you use those faster speeds longer.
But if you’re not someone who needs all that power, you ought to take a second look at the cheaper, six-month-old S9.
Google names the Note 9 as the best phone for YouTube
The Note 9’s 6.4-inch Super AMOLED display is one of the best you’ll find on a smartphone in 2018, and thanks to this, Google’s deemed it as the best phone for binging YouTube on. YouTube’s Signature Devices list recently launched as a way to highlight Android phones that offer the best experience for all things YouTube, and as part of it, it’s noted that:
With this transition from TV screen to phone screen, YouTube has announced its Signature Devices for a best-in-class YouTube experience. Ranked against a variety of key attributes, YouTube endorsed a variety of devices as best-in-class for the platform.
Their top choice? The Samsung Galaxy Note 9
Here are all the specs you can look forward to.
Like past Notes before it, the Galaxy Note 9 is packed to the gills with all of the latest available tech. That means it has the latest processor, a massive battery, an insane amount of RAM, and much more.
Operating system
Android 8.1 Oreo
Samsung Experience 9.5
Display
6.4-inch Super AMOLED, 2960×1440 (18.5:9)
Processor
Qualcomm Snapdragon 845
Storage
128/512GB
Expandable
MicroSD up to 2TB
RAM
6/8GB
Primary rear camera
12MP Super Speed Dual Pixel, OIS, f/1.5 or f/2.4
Secondary rear camera
12MP, OIS, f/2.4, telephoto lens
Front camera
8MP, f/1.7, auto focus
Connectivity
Wi-Fi 802.11ac MIMO, 1.2Gbps (Cat-18) LTE, Bluetooth 5.0 LE
ANT+, NFC, GPS, Glonass
Here’s everything you need to know about buying the Note 9
There are a lot of reasons you may want to pick up the Note 9, and whatever those reasons may be, you’ve got a lot of options for deciding where to get it.
In the United States, pricing starts at $999.99 for the 128GB model and goes up to $1249.99 for the 512GB one. You can get the phone at Best Buy, Amazon, Samsung’s website, all of the major carriers, and more.
Facebook has pulled one of its own products from Apple’s app store because it didn’t want to stop tracking what people were doing on their iPhones. Facebook also banned a quiz app from its social network for possible privacy intrusions on about 4 million users.
The twin developments come as Facebook is under intense scrutiny over privacy following the Cambridge Analytica scandal earlier this year. Allegations that the political consultancy used personal information harvested from 87 million Facebook accounts have dented Facebook’s reputation.
Since the scandal broke, Facebook has investigated thousands of apps and suspended more than 400 of them over data-sharing concerns.
The social media company said late Wednesday that it took action against the myPersonality quiz app, saying that its creators refused an inspection. But even as Facebook did that, it found its own Onavo Protect security app at odds with Apple’s tighter rules for applications.
Onavo Protect is a virtual-private network service aimed at helping users secure their personal information over public Wi-Fi networks. The app also alerts users when other apps use too much data.
Since acquiring Onavo in 2013, Facebook has used it to track what apps people were using on phones. This surveillance helped Facebook detect trendy services, tipping off the company to startups it might want to buy and areas it might want to work on for upcoming features.
Facebook said in a statement that it has “always been clear when people download Onavo about the information that is collected and how it is used.”
But Onavo fell out of compliance with Apple’s app-store guidelines after they were tightened two months ago to protect the reservoir of personal information that people keep on their iPhones and iPads.
Apple’s revised guidelines require apps to get users’ express consent before recording and logging their activity on a device. According to Apple, the new rules also “made it explicitly clear that apps should not collect information about which other apps are installed on a user’s device for the purposes of analytics or advertising/marketing.”
Facebook will still be able to deploy Onavo on devices powered by Google’s Android software.
Onavo’s ouster from Apple’s app store widens the rift between two of the world’s most popular companies.
Apple CEO Tim Cook has been outspoken in his belief that Facebook does a shoddy job of protecting its 2.2 billion users’ privacy — something that he has framed as “a fundamental human right.”
Cook sharpened his criticism following the Cambridge Analytica scandal. He emphasized that Apple would never be caught in the same situation as Facebook because it doesn’t collect information about its customers to sell advertising. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg fired back in a separate interview and called Cook’s remarks “extremely glib.” Zuckerberg implied that Apple caters primarily to rich people with a line of products that includes the $1,000 iPhone X.
Late Wednesday, Facebook said it moved to ban the myPersonality app after it found user information was shared with researchers and companies “with only limited protections in place.” The company said it would notify the app’s users that their data may have been misused.
It said myPersonality was “mainly active” prior to 2012. Though Facebook has tightened its rules since then, it is only now reviewing those older apps following the Cambridge Analytica scandal.
The app was created in 2007 by researcher David Stillwell and allowed users to take a personality questionnaire and get feedback on the results.
“There was no misuse of personal data,” Stillwell said in a statement, adding that “this ban appears to be purely cosmetic.” Stillwell said users gave their consent and the app’s data was fully anonymized before it was used for academic research. He also rejected Facebook’s assertion that he refused to submit to an audit.
Facebook, Twitter and Google routinely squabble for users, engineers and advertising money. Yet it makes sense for these tech giants to work together on security threats, elections meddling and other common ills.
Such cooperation was evident Tuesday when Facebook announced that it had removed 652 suspicious pages, groups and accounts linked to Russia and Iran. This was followed by similar news from Twitter. On Monday, meanwhile, Microsoft reported a new Russian effort to impersonate conservative U.S. websites, potentially as part of an espionage campaign.
Cooperation makes it easier for tech companies to combat fraudulent use of their services. It also makes them look good in the eyes of their users and regulators by showing that they take the threats seriously enough to set aside competitive differences.
They have little other choice if they want to avoid regulation and stay ahead of — or just keep up with — the malicious actors, who are getting smarter and smarter at evading the tech companies’ controls.
Case in point: While Facebook said there was no evidence that Russian and Iranian actors cooperated with each other in the latest efforts to create fake accounts to mislead users, the company said their tactics were similar. In other words, if the bad guys are learning from each other, the companies fighting them would need to do the same.
Facebook has significantly stepped up policing of its services since last year, when it acknowledged that Russian agents successfully used Facebook to run political influence operations aimed at swaying the 2016 presidential election.
Other social media companies have done likewise and continue to turn up fresh evidence of political disinformation campaigns. While some of the 2016 disruptions seemed to support certain candidates, more recent campaigns appear aimed at sowing discord and driving people to more extreme sides of the political stage.
Tech companies already share information to fight terrorism, child pornography, malware and spam. They are now adding global political threats from nation-states. In congressional hearings earlier this year, Facebook General Counsel Colin Stretch said Facebook, Twitter and Google have a “long history” of working together on such threats. He expressed hope that sharing information becomes “industry standard practice.”
Understanding the threat requires understanding how the malicious actors communicate, operate and move among various services, Facebook said in a blog post on Tuesday. “To help gather this information, we often share intelligence with other companies once we have a basic grasp of what’s happening,” the company wrote.
Even with all the cooperation, disagreements exist. The companies don’t always agree on when and how to go public with threats they uncover, for example. And while critics have called for a formal industry body to address issues such as elections meddling, misinformation and hate speech on social networks, no such broad-reaching organization exists.
The closest is the Cybersecurity Tech Accord, which Microsoft, Facebook and other companies formed to protect businesses and users from internet crime. But bigshots such as Google and Twitter were noticeably missing. (Those companies did not respond to messages Wednesday asking if they have joined since).
Nonetheless, cooperation has helped other industries stave off regulation. For example, the movie industry banded together to develop its own ratings system in the 1960s to ward off government censorship.
Jeff Bardin, chief information officer at the security firm Treadstone 71, said cooperation is one way to combat fake accounts without imposing tighter verification when users sign up. Of course, if Facebook started asking potential members for a government-issued ID and a home address, it would drive people away.
“There is no way they will do that upfront,” he said. So, what’s left is to continue to play the cat-and-mouse game, catching and removing the enemy and then learning its new tactics as it changes them.
I’ve been a fan of TheHillywood Show since I discovered their parody videos with their first Supernatural video several years ago. Hannah and Hilly Hindi, the sisters behind The Hillywood Show, were kind enough to chat with me about that video and to also contribute some insights to the documentary film on fandom I co-wrote, Squee! I’ve been eagerly awaiting their second Supernatural parody with high expectations, but the reality surpassed them when it was released last week – Supernatural Parody 2 is a loving tribute to the show, its amazing cast, and its incredible fandom. As I took some notes on why I was enjoying it so much, I realized it’s because once again, they totally got it right – even for someone like me, who adores Supernatural and has written five books on the show and the fandom!
I was at the Supernatural convention in Denver last weekend, and there was quite a bit of talk about the new parody, which both fans and Supernatural stars Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles had high praise for. Jensen, in particular, was impressed with the production value and the professionalism of the set and the shoot, and especially with the realistic proton packs that he and Jared got to wear – they sometimes had to take them off between takes because Jared kept bumping into the door and other things. Jensen seemed excited that the blasters really worked too, which I think means they were having a lot of fun playing with them! I shared those reactions with Hannah and Hilly when we chatted.
You can check out the Supernatural Parody 2 video here.
Hilly: He did keep bumping into the door, we can confirm that one. Hannah: I just know that Jared really likes to push buttons!
Lynn: Boys…
Hilly: The pack, though, really was the coolest toy. They were like the real deal, so it’s the ultimate toy and Jared was like, yes! I could just see his eyes light up.
Images: Hillywood Show
[There’s a great moment on the behind the scenes feature where Osric Chau shows Jensen how to pull out his blaster, and he does. Then Jared pulls out his, with significantly more flourish, and Osric grins and whispers to the camera.
Osric: The gentle giant…
Jared makes the blaster light up and then asks, with his eyes all hopefully lit up, “do you want this on?”
Hilly: No, cuz that means you’re killing us…]
I laughed out loud at that.
Hilly: We haven’t been able to talk about it or hear from them since the shoot. They asked, “When can we mention it?” I told them you can’t until the video is out. So, weeks down the road now, it’s really cool to hear them talk about it.
Lynn: They definitely enjoyed it. So, after thinking about this a bit, I’ve identified ten things you got very right. I’m gonna go through them one by one, and you can comment, okay?
Number 1. One of the things that makes your parodies so brilliant and so loved by fans is that you really GET the show you’re parodying, maybe Supernatural more than even the other shows you’ve parodied. You were able to reproduce the show itself with the level of detail that fandom relishes – the kitchen set from Changing Channels, the library in the Men of Letters bunker, the proton packs with Dean’s little army man and the Colt and Sam’s with Ruby’s knife. Some of the scenes looked so eerily similar, like that iconic moment when Dean fires the Colt and kills Azazel in slow motion. How do you decide what scenes and what details to include and how much detail to put into it? It must take so much time!
Hannah: That’s kind of a question for you Hilly, because you’re the creative one, and then I do all the organization of making it happen.
Hilly: It’s kind of hard to say how the details come in… because whenever I go into conceptualizing….sorry I’m speaking slowly because I’m thinking about this…
Lynn: That’s okay, that will make it a lot easier to transcribe – I’m not that fast!
Hilly: I basically see a movie in my mind. It plays out for me as I’m hearing the music and I don’t really force it, so it’s not like oh, we have to be really detailed with this scene or we have to make sure that this particular thing is there, because it’s already visualized in my head. I’m a very strong visualizer. I can’t really say where it comes from besides that God made me maybe a little too creative and he poured too much creativity into my poor little brain.
Everyone: (laughing)
Hilly: I just see it, and then I tell Hannah about it and we do it. It’s not like okay, we have to give Richard an angel tie, because that will be funny. It just happens. Or when we were creating the proton packs, I knew we wanted them to look like the inside of the trunk of the Impala. So, Sam and Dean would have the weapons on their backs. I knew we wanted the symbol there and certain weapons, but then it came down to, which weapons will fit? How does it look aesthetically, is it aesthetically pleasing? And does it make sense? Which weapons would Dean choose and which weapons would Sam choose? I’m sorry I can’t answer more. It’s just in my mind and Hannah puts it into action.
Lynn: That makes sense to me, you both are just very detail oriented. And one of the things that makes fandom such a unique community is that fans are also often very detail oriented – the details matter to fans. So it’s a wonderful meshing considering you’re making things for fandom.
Hannah and Hilly: Awww.
Number 2. It’s not just the details of scenes that you get right – you also get the characters right, especially Sam and Dean. Because if Hilly and Osric weren’t believable as Sam and Dean, it wouldn’t really work. There are little quirks and personality traits that make them recognizable as Sam and Dean, like Dean in the dead guy robe going back to get his food, for example. What things did you pull in, from both a directing standpoint and an acting point, to make sure that it really felt like Sam and Dean?
Hannah: OMG, that’s a deep question.
Lynn: (laughing) I’m a psychologist, I can’t help it!
Hannah: We’re going deep, this is fun! We’ve only done one interview, you’re the second one. We haven’t gone to cons or anything, so I’m like ooh new questions, yay! A lot goes to Hilly with regard to the acting. I can’t say, Hilly, just so you know, Dean furrows his brows a lot.
Everyone: (laughing)
Hannah: I can’t tell her that, that’s not really my job. It’s on Hilly and Osric. Before we started filming, we said study Jared and Jensen, study those characters and look in the mirror at yourself, see how your face is going to be able to portray that. Because everyone’s faces are different and everyone’s facial expressions are different, so to mimic that you have to practice. And they both did their jobs. Mainly, what I did as a director, was to watch the scene and think, is it feeling right? Do the facial expressions look the same? Is there chemistry between the two of them? Does it feel right behind the camera? Then I can say okay, we have five good takes that we can choose from.
On top of that, I sit behind Hilly as she edits, so I know exactly how many takes she’s gonna want to work with. I know her vision – she’s my sister – I can’t explain it, it’s one of those things where I just know what scene is going to work. So for me as a director, it was more thinking about, this is a scene that we ’re recreating from Supernatural or Ghostbusters. For example, the hallway scene with the Slimer, that was challenging because it was a mix of both Supernatural and Ghostbusters.
Lynn: Right, that one very much was.
Hannah: So obviously we’re paying homage to Ghostbusters, but does it feel like Venkman and also, does it feel like Dean?
Lynn: Which is tricky, because you were meshing them. I haven’t watched a ton of directors at work, but I’ve watched a few — Hannah, what I thought was so interesting was that your instincts are so good about when a scene didn’t play right, even down to asking, can you run a little differently because that’s not the way Dean would run?
Everyone: (laughing)
Lynn: And I was like OMG she’s totally right. I don’t know how she knows that, but she’s right.
Hannah: Well, we’ve done parodies for a very long time. When we shot Suicide Squad, I encouraged Hilly that she was doing great, but for that parody she didn’t feel like I was directing her enough. I told her that it was because she was playing a female, this is much easier. However, she kept asking me, if she was doing a good enough job. But she was — if you’re playing a male character, that’s when more directing takes place between the two of us, like how you’re running or how you’re standing.
Lynn: And it’s those little subtle things that make the character believable as Dean.
Hilly: Aww thank you. I will say, from my and Osric’s perspective, we had it a lot easier because we had already done the characters. So we felt like we were back where we were supposed to be in regards to acting. Last time, every take Osric would have to get into Jared. I could see him turn it off and on, because he’s known Jared for so long that he can reflect the expressions. The first one, he was nervous about it, but this one I was like, show me and then I was like yep, you’re fine. For me, it was hard to get back into being Dean during the first two days, when we were filming in Kansas with the Impala. It was a little difficult to revisit the facial expressions because they were sort of rusty. I was in the Impala posing for photos, and I was like, dude, I’m trying to remember, how does my face go?
Lynn: (laughing)
Hilly: But by the time we were doing close-ups the following day, my muscles found themselves again. If you don’t use those certain muscles, you’ll lose the character’s facial expression. It’s like when you go to an exercise class and they tell you to squeeze your abs, and you’re like, where’s my abs? For example, if you asked me to do a Harley Quinn smile now, I’d have a hard time finding it, because that was not my smile. So for Dean, it took me a while to find my little Dean muscles again.
Lynn: It’s kind of sense memory. That makes sense. Oh, sense sense. Everyone (laughing again)
Number 3. You include not just the obvious well-known moments from the show, but little fan favorite bits. For example, Ruth Connell as Rowena ‘bopping’ Dean’s nose. Or Sam and Dean on the tandem bike from Changing Channels, or Dean terrified on the plane, or Sam terrified of the clown in the elevator.
Number 4. Some of the favorite things you included are more of a thing for the fandom than the show itself, so they’re not even bits on the show necessarily but something that’s talked about alot in the fandom, almost like fandom private jokes. For example, the fact that poor Adam is still in hell – it was brilliant to get Jake Abel to play him too! Or the way that Sam and Dean are constantly calling out for each other – the iconic Sam! Dean! Sam! Dean! Or even that Sam and Dean wearing glasses to kill the invisible hellhound, because fandom loves them in glasses, that’s for sure! How are you able to have such good instincts about what to include?
Hannah: I remember shopping for those glasses was a nightmare, I can say that! (laughing)
Hilly: We started by going through the lyrics, that’s when we were building the theme. In Ruth’s scene, for example, the original lyrics of the song are, “An invisible man sleeping in your bed”…so I thought what’s invisible in Supernatural? Oh, a hellhound. If Sam and Dean come to Rowena’s rescue, there would be a cute scene of Ruth bopping Dean’s nose just because I know that’s a special moment between them that stood out to fans. I wanted to include that, but then I thought oops, if they’re hunting a hellhound, they need glasses! I can’t forget that!
Lynn: Yes! See, you get it – they’d need the glasses!
Hilly: It was one of those moments where we had to make sure we weren’t leaving any details out. If they showed up without glasses, I’m not sure that it would have made sense that they were hunting a hellhound.
Lynn: And fandom would have noticed.
Hilly: It was just a matter of reviewing everything. With Adam in the cage, we thought what does the cage look like in hell? So, we found episodes of when Lucifer is in the cage. We noticed torches in the background, lightning etc. so we incorporate what we saw and hopefully the message came across clearly enough that fans could recall it.
Lynn: It did, it did.
Number 5. Some of those favorite things you included aren’t even from the show itself, but from promo shoots that were popular with the fans, or from the gag reel, which fans adore. You had that promo set with the chains, and the gag reel moment of Jared carrying Jensen through the woods, for example. Oh, and the Harlem Shake bit with the giant devil’s trap even!
Hilly: We don’t try to force in the gag reels, it’s more about the overall vision in my head and how those things just happen to pop up. In other words, I have a crazy brain that does its own thing (laughing) I’m sorry, I can’t answer why my brain functions how it does!
Lynn: Hey, I’m a psychologist, and that’s totally a valid answer. I’m not a filmmaker, but I guess a lot of it is tapping into that creativity and your own instincts and maybe that’s why it works so well.
Number 6. The songs you chose for the first parody and this one are both great, but this parody is also distinctive because it’s a fusion of two beloved properties, Supernatural and Ghostbusters. They’re both fan favorites for some of the same demographics. I loved Baby with the Ghostbusters topper, and I loved Misha playing Janine so perfectly. Why and how did you decide on Ghostbusters for this parody?
Hannah: Again, that’s Hilly. At the same time as the original Supernatural parody, this was her original vision for a Supernatural parody. Back then, we didn’t have the connections we’re blessed to have now, so it was impossible. At that point, we didn’t know if people would ever commit that sort of time. For this one, they had to be on set for like three or four hours – Jared and Jensen had to be there for two hours. So, for the first Supernatural Parody, we thought, there’s a con in Vegas, maybe they’d be willing to do something for it. We just sat in a room and hoped someone would come in. With this one, Hilly had this idea a long time ago and I loved it and I’m super excited that it worked out. Jared and Jensen were the first we had to ask to see if they would be a part of it, because Hilly said that’s the finale, it ends with them, that’s how I see it, that’s the only way it is gonna end. Luckily, we texted Clif and pitched a second Supernatural Parody just to see if they’d be interested to be a part of it. We didn’t even tell him the idea; we just said we’re reaching out, thinking about doing another one and that we have a number of actors who are interested, but number one question is, do they want to be a part of it? A couple days later, Jensen texted him back and said, “Hell yeah!”
Lynn: I’m not surprised, because they loved the first one. And really, this is a cast that relishes making fun of themselves so it’s like right up their alley to do this.
Hannah: It was such a huge blessing. They’re all good people – we call it our little God story, it’s very supernatural.
Lynn: It is!
Hannah: It’s just amazing, and we can’t thank all of them enough. Hilly and I have said the same thing forever, but we’re just two creators on YouTube. There’s a team behind us when we film, obviously, but they’re mostly friends and volunteers who have known us for years. They show up and say hey, what am I doing? You’re moving this, the camera goes here, we’re setting this scene up, okay. They literally have no clue what’s happening until that morning when they show up. We’re nobodies, we’re two sisters on Youtube, and here are a whole bunch of people who are professionals and their time is valuable. It’s mind-blowing and very humbling.
Lynn: I think part of the reason they all wanted to do it is that they trust you. When I put together Family Don’t End With Blood, I was just as humbled and shocked that all the actors wanted to be involved, all wanted to write a chapter themselves for the book. They said it was because they trusted me, and I think they also trust you guys to put something together that will be a loving tribute to their show, that they will love, that the fans will love.
Hannah: Yeah, it’s amazing. It’s humbling and still feels like a dream. We can’t thank them enough. So many people jumped on board with this one. Obviously, we pitched everybody the idea and explained what their scenes entailed, but the majority of them, when we asked are you even interested, they just said “yes.”
Lynn Zubernis continues her interview with The Hillywood Show and their latest Supernatural Parody 2 film. Part 1 is here.
Number 7. The incredible number of cameos and the enthusiasm and talent that all the actors put into making the parody. I loved Alaina Huffman with the suicidal teddy bear, and Ruth Connell with the invisible hellhounds and bopping Dean’s nose. Jim Beaver looking terrified and trying to drag ‘Dean’ back from the mirror. Alex Calvert being the “new guy” willing to believe whatever to be a part of all this. And Mark Pellegrino was perfect as Slimer with all that disgusting looking pea soup dribbling out of his mouth – he’s a real trooper! And you pulled in some fan favorites from the past too – Chad Lindberg, Samantha Ferris, Lauren Tom, Adam Fergus, Adam Rose, Tyler Johnston, Tahmoh Penikett, Jake Abel, Julian Richings, Kim Rhodes and Briana Buckmaster. Even Curtis Armstrong, and of course Rob Benedict and Richard Speight, Jr. And you again proved you understand fandom, because you even included some fan favorites who aren’t even on the show – Billy Moran, Mike Borja and Stephen Norton of Louden Swain, Jason Manns. Even Clif Kosterman! I’ll say more about Misha Collins, Jared and Jensen later, but Hannah, what are some of your favorite directing moments with the cast?
Images: Hillywood Show
Hannah: Oh my goodness, there are so many. Well, I’m the main director, but seriously without Hilly there… she was part director as well. I asked, should you be listed as Assistant Director as well? She said, oh, it doesn’t matter, but it was really cool to be able to have her by my side with Jared, Jensen, and Misha because she wasn’t technically in the scene with them the entire time. That was pretty surreal for us. It felt like a dream. It was super fun to have her vision come to life and it was like OMG this is actually happening for the fans, I can’t believe we’re doing this.
Lynn: I can imagine!
Hannah: Another person that stood out – obviously everybody was great – Jake was hilarious on set, Ruth was adorable, her and Osric kept giggling with Hilly…
Lynn: I loved that in the behind the scenes video, the Osric floating head scene. I love that you included some bloopers in that!
Hannah: For me, personally, I think it was Curtis Armstrong who stood out for me, because in the middle of filming he complimented me. He said, this is so organized, and he was saying how professional the crew was. And I mean, we are doing our best to be professional, but we never went to film school, we couldn’t afford it, we are self-taught. So, that stood out to me and made me feel really good as a director.
Hilly: I remember one of the actors I was really nervous to direct was Mark Pellegrino. Hannah was monitoring the scene watching more of the camera movement, and because she was multi-tasking, she said if Mark needs to change something, you need to go tell him. We switch off director roles and different aspects. If it’s something with acting, I’m usually the one who says something. If it’s something with the camera, she usually says something. So, with Mark, I had to tell him to run a certain way, to growl, to put his arms out, and demonstrate it to him. And I remember standing across the hall from him, trying to be professional and trying to portray what I wanted him to do and while I was in the moment I was thinking to myself, I must look so stupid!
Lynn: (laughing)
Hilly: Here’s this tiny, tiny little Dean telling Mark Pellegrino how to be scary! I was running and growling and showing my teeth and I just walked away thinking, I hope he got the message because I just look stupid.
Lynn: And yet it came through because he looked really scary.
Hilly: Well when he did it, it looked good! But I looked so silly, and I remember when I came back I told Hannah, I felt so stupid, I don’t know how to act scary like him – he was probably like oh, look at this girl trying to be intimidating!
Lynn: It’s true that you guys are really tiny next to Mark or Jared or Jensen…
Hilly: But Mark took my direction like a pro, and he mimicked everything I said, but he just looked so much better than I did!
Lynn: Well, that’s effective directing. What was it like directing some of the people who aren’t actors? Louden Swain, Jason Manns, Clif Kosterman…
Hilly: Well Clif is an actor…
Lynn: That’s true. Oops, sorry Clif!
Hilly: I think they were very talented, they got the rhythm for sure since they’re musicians. You would think that they were professional actors as well because they all had fun, they smiled, they were camera aware, they were great! Everyone was super professional. We never had to help them with rhythm or say that someone’s out of time. Everyone on set took Hannah’s direction so well, had fun and looked so natural. We were so happy that it turned out so well.
Hannah: Yeah, I was really surprised that everyone had rhythm, I was like, yes! It was a surprise. There’s usually someone off, and you’re like oh, bless their heart.
Lynn: It’s a good thing you didn’t have me there because I would’ve been that one. Hannah and Hilly: (laughing)
Lynn: I love that you included some fan favorites from the past too …. Was there anybody you would have loved to include but weren’t able to because of scheduling or something?
Hilly: There was a point where we had so many actors and I wanted to bring on more, but unfortunately we no longer had the resources to afford flights or hotels, we were at our max. Before that though, we tried to schedule Felicia Day. She got on the phone with us and was so excited, but unfortunately, with her schedule she wasn’t available the days we were filming. And at a point, we were really hoping that someone had a connection to Jeffrey Dean Morgan.
Lynn: That would’ve been awesome!
Hilly: But every person that we asked within the cast, were like, yeah I don’t even know a way to contact him. That would’ve been cool, but he’s on The Walking Dead, and he hasn’t been home in a few days…
Lynn: (laughing)
Hilly: Even if we’d been able to reach him, I don’t think it would have happened because they were filming.
Lynn: Yeah, he can barely make time for conventions. Although I do think he would’ve had a freaking glorious time being on the parody if he could have.
Number 8. One of the things I really loved is that a lot of the cameos had a sort of nudge nudge wink wink to their characters, referring back to the show. Curtis Armstrong as an Angel Radio reporter, Richard Speight Jr. as “T. Rickster” in an angel tie and with a literal wink, Rob Benedict saying “I’ve even told a few stories myself”. And Julian Richings delivering pizza in a “Rest In Pizza” shirt – to Kim Rhodes and Briana Buckmaster, who of course are home together. The nudge nudge wink winks provided a lot of humor – was that a conscious decision?
Hilly: I think when we featured them in their roles, especially the three of them – Curtis, Richard, and Rob – for them, specifically, we wanted them all connected in the news segment. We called them our celestial news team. We wanted to give everyone a wink to their character, because we didn’t want them to just pop in without any sort of reference. So, I had a reference for everybody so that it would come across as a cohesive production, that everyone was there for a purpose, it wasn’t just a hey I’m here okay bye and you’re like, why were they there? Who is he supposed to be?
Lynn: Oh yes, I see what you mean.
Hilly: We wanted it all to make sense and come together so fans could rewatch it and find little Easter eggs like, T. Rickster, the angel tie etc. For example, we knew that Death likes his casual junk food, so we thought it would be cute if the lyrics were ‘if Death is at your door, unless you have a settled score’ — I thought what if Julian was at their door delivering pizza? So, it’s a link to his character, but it also goes with the lyrics. It makes each of their cameos special so fans can recognize, point it out and enjoy it – not like, why was he a bus driver, that makes no sense!
Lynn: I knew that I loved it and it was funny, but you’re right, that’s what makes it cohesive. And fans of those people would’ve been kinda disappointed if they were in some random role – instead you tied it into their characters, which made the whole parody an organic thing.
Hilly: For Richard, that’s why we had him on the TV because of Changing Channels and what he put the boys through. And Curtis, because he’s an angel, of course, he’s on Angel Radio. And Rob is like basically the person speaking the news but he’s telling a story, which is a call back to how Chuck tells a story. It’s just little tiny things that people are hopefully noticing – so I get excited when they notice, all that time and effort!
Lynn: Well I’m noticing – maybe I’m the only one who’s breaking it out like this, but even if people aren’t consciously aware of how important those things are, those are the things that make the whole parody effective.
Hilly: We like to leave little Easter Eggs here and there and see if fans catch them. It makes it exciting. We like to hide things because it makes it even more fun to watch.
Lynn: It does.
Number 9. Casting Hilly and Osric as Sam and Dean – because their chemistry is so much like Sam and Dean’s (or Jared and Jensen’s). That comes through just like it comes through in the show (complete with lots of fart jokes), which is one of the things that I think has made it so long-lasting and successful. It really enriched the parody too, just like the show.
Hilly: We are where we’re at today because of Osric. It’s been like four years… Hannah: No like five years…
Hilly: No like four because we did the Walking Dead the year we met him. Lynn: (laughing, because sisters…)
Hilly: I remember, when we first met, I was downstairs in the Hotel getting breakfast and he approached me. His eyes were all excited and he said OMG I just watched your Doctor Who Parody, why didn’t you tell me you guys were so talented? You did such a good Jack Sparrow! I turned so red and was so embarrassed. Outside of The Hillywood Show, it’s embarrassing when a guy you just met tells you that you did a really good Jack Sparrow. It’s an odd comment.
Lynn: (laughing)
Hilly: But Osric was a sweetheart and he asked, do you guys ever have people do cameos in your videos? And I said no….and Hannah was like, is that a thing? Would that ever happen for us? And he said well if you ever do a Supernatural one, think about it. So we took that with a grain of salt. We were working on The Walking Dead Parody and me and Hannah considered Osric for a cameo. I approached him by basically saying, hey would you want to be in our next production? And Osric was like, it’s not Supernatural?
Lynn: Excellent question!
Hilly: I said not yet. And he was like okay! So, by the time we were in production for the first Supernatural Parody, he’s the one who went to Richard and approached him with our concept and how we’d like to feature possible cameos. So, Richard spoke to us on the phone. He then sent an email to the cast that would be at the Vegas Con and then let us know who was interested. He said, there’s no guarantee but hopefully they’ll go in and do a little cameo for you guys. So, for four days, we sat in a room with a closed door and just prayed that someone would come in. It was one after another! We’d be counting saying OMG we got three people, we got eight people! A year later, Osric had a cameo in our Sherlock Parody and then came Supernatural Parody 2. When approaching him with the concept, I told him that, the only thing is he’d be in it way more. It’s Sam and Dean 100% of the time in my vision and that he’d have to take, how many days, Hannah?
Hannah: It was 17 days of filming but that didn’t include the travel, to Kansas and everything, so it was roughly 20 days out of his schedule. And he was just like yeah, I’m down, I’m good.
Hilly: Some people may think that, just because we know Osric, he’d do anything for us, but he is an actor and he has so much going on. Currently, he’s working on “Empty By Design” in the Philippines as a producer and an actor. He has a busy career and we’re just The Hillywood Show, we’re not some major TV network. So, when approaching him, I thought, is this too many days to ask for? But, he was so awesome about it and was like, I’m here whenever you need me, I’ll tell people that I’m working with you and that’s that, I’m in. It’s funny, when you just keep zooming out, you understand how God brings people into your life and you don’t know why at the time but as you reflect back, you realize there was a reason for everything.
Lynn: That’s such a great story, from Osric’s first comment of do you ever include cameos to now when there are so many in this one!
Hilly: It’s such a huge blessing, and I’ve told Osric before, he’s one of the few people who get me, and who understand what me and Hannah’s goals are. It’s so good to just be myself around him without being judged or like this is weird, or I don’t understand why you’re doing it this way. Osric is the most encouraging person I’ve met and I can be 100% creative around him, and 100% myself around him. it’s such a good thing to know someone who only wants the best for you and wants to see your vision come to life. Me and Hannah can’t thank him enough for what he’s done for The Hillywood Show. He’s awesome.
Lynn: I totally agree. He also wrote a chapter for Family Don’t End With Blood, so I know how wonderful he is to work with and how encouraging. Osric Chau fan club right here!
Number 10. You included two behind the scenes videos as well, which are priceless. Those include some bloopers, so you have your own gag reel of sorts – Richard running out of air for his lines, Ruth cracking up about Osric’s floating head, Osric dancing with a wedgie and not knowing it. So funny! And a lot of the behind the scenes are of Jared and Jensen, which lets
fans have a rare glimpse into what they’re like during filming – their process, how they respond to direction, how they interact and goof off with each other in between takes even.
[For those who haven’t seen it, I loved Jared’s reaction when he puts the proton pack on for the first time –
Jared: I’m a (bleeping) ghostbuster!
The first time Jensen kicks the door in, Hannah gives him a little direction. Hannah: You can actually kick it harder.
Jensen: Oh, I will…
There are priceless little moments – a J2 fist bump after a scene, their shared joking around, even Jared unable to resist exploring the back of Jensen’s proton pack as he stands behind him waiting for the busting in of the door.]
Lynn: I’ve watched them film on Supernatural, and this was like a glimpse of that, which is gold. When you love a show, it fascinates you to see that, and you gave that to the fans. Were Jared and Jensen on board with that from the get go?
Hannah: With the first parody, when we had those cameos, we wanted to respect whoever came in. And because it was our first time working with them, we didn’t want them to feel like there was a camera up their face. With this next one, obviously, mostly everyone had met us before, but we told our behind the scenes camera operator, if you can, try to keep your distance, don’t be in their face or ask them a whole bunch of questions, just stay back and let them feel comfortable that the cameras are rolling so that they can be themselves and have a good time. We informed everyone that we had a behind the scenes camera and that it was for the fans. It wasn’t footage for Hilly and Hannah, it was for the fans to see how they are on set and the fun that they’re having. Because for them — obviously we treated it like a job, we wanted our set to be professional – but for them, it was play time. We wanted them to have a good time with playing another character, but know that it’s still within the SPN Family. Some of the cast members were there when other cast members were filming and they’d stay and watch, giggle and laugh. It was fun and laid back. They were aware of the camera the entire time, but we just kept our distance and let them do what they wanted to do and it was hilarious.
Lynn: It felt very much like their own set, they’re playful there too and professional as well. That was such a gift to the fans.
Hilly: We had sooooo many hours of footage from all the days – he just had that camera rolling the whole time – but I knew fans would like to see Misha, Jared and Jensen in their element and I didn’t want to cut too much from it when editing the Behind The Scenes feature. So what you see is a lot of the raw footage, I didn’t edit too much of it. I left most of it in because I thought it was really cool to see these guys, do what they do best. They were so professional, and we were so thankful to have them on board. It was really cool to see them act and to be in their element – this is what they do for a living and it’s amazing to watch. So it was really fun for me when editing it, to show that side – because there’s not a lot of behind the scenes with them.
Lynn: No there’s not, and it was wonderful.
Hilly: So, as another actor, it was really cool for me to see how they respond to direction, how they take it, how they’re so alert. We were very nervous that we wouldn’t be up to their professional standards, but they were just so cool, they made us feel very comfortable and we all just had a good time. I’m so happy that you watched that, it was super long to edit – I was like dang, this is two hours! This one was 17 days and if I had to make it into an hour, I’d be cutting out like 7 days. So I asked the fans, are you guys cool with a 2 hour feature? And they were like, we want it all!
Lynn: It was very well edited. I wanted to watch it last night because we were chatting today and I thought well, I’ll put it on and then I’ll work on some other things while I’m watching – but then I put it on and just watched the whole damn thing and didn’t get any other work done!
Hannah: (laughing)
Hilly: Yay! Thank you so much.
Lynn: I also thought Misha deserves a big shout out, especially because he’s playing a totally different character and he got it so right! From the moment he opened his mouth, I was laughing hysterically.
Hilly: Misha watched the scene with Janine, we sent it to him a few weeks before our film shoot, but he was busy filming on Supernatural so we weren’t sure how many times he had been able to study it. On our set he asked to watch Janine’s scene again. We showed it to him and he was like, one more time? And we showed it to him again. After that, it was like, he installed it, downloaded it and done! We were like wow, Misha, that was great! Before working with us, I’d only seen what he has done on Supernatural, so it was really amazing to see how well he can impersonate! That’s very hard.
Lynn: He did, he embodied that part! Hilly: He did!
Hannah: I think the thing that really stood out to us about Misha — obviously there are points where, for example, we in our minds see a shoot go a certain way. I thought there might be times when we’d have to tell him how to sit at the desk like Janine or how to hold the phone like Janine, because we’re recreating scenes and we’re really, really picky with how we want it to look. So I was nervous and wasn’t sure how much direction I really wanted to give him. I didn’t want him to think I was saying, you’re doing this wrong. It’s not that, it’s just that we’re being this picky because we know fans of Ghostbusters are gonna pick up on it.
Lynn: Absolutely they will.
Hannah: So I remember thinking, how much direction can we give him without him feeling like, oh god these girls… Unless you’re familiar with how Hillywood recreates scenes, it might become confusing. So, I was so nervous. I remember I had demonstrated it for him and I said okay, it’s in the right hand, she grabs the pencil with the left hand, and like I don’t know how he did it, but he embodied her body movements and mimicked her positioning perfectly – it was crazy! We didn’t have to tell him anything, he just did it. We didn’t have to correct him or say oh well, she’s a little more like this or that, he just knew how to impersonate – I had no idea he was so good as impersonating because I’d never seen him do it!
Lynn: OMG I know, it was amazing. Do you have a favorite moment with Jared and Jensen during filming too?
Hannah: I remember two things that stand out. The first thing we did was the door busting down. We did the first take, and I was like, that looks so good. It was better than what I’d thought. Jensen knows how to kick down those prop doors!
Everyone: (laughing)
Hannah: He’s only done it a couple dozen times…. So that really excited me to continue with the filming, because I thought, if the first shot is looking that good, I can’t wait to get the rest! I really liked the running through the fog scene too, the ending. All they kept doing was giggling. It looked great, but they were all asking each other, why are you sprinting? Or, were we all in time? And, why aren’t we all on the same leg? Well, I’m trying to follow him! (laughing) It was just so funny to hear them trying to figure it out amongst themselves.
Everyone was very comfortable by that point and Jared and Jensen were trusting the footage that we were filming by then because they could see what we were capturing and it excited them. So everyone was more loose and having a good time, because it was the last shot.
Hilly: I think one of my favorite moments was just working with them. Seeing them in their costumes was incredible.
Lynn: (silently) Yes it was. Mmmm, was it ever…
Hilly: And FYI for people who want to know details, we had to buy three of what I’m gonna call ‘the big jumpsuits’. Clif gave us their jacket sizes but we weren’t quite sure how they were gonna fit. And I asked Hannah, what would happen if Jared or Jensen put it on and it won’t zip up?!
Lynn: Oh yeah, not good
Hilly: So little Hillywood had three giant jumpsuits on hold in case they didn’t fit. (laughing) And the original sizes worked, so one jumpsuit kind of went to waste.
Lynn: But better to be prepared
Hilly: They looked great. A cute moment was when Hannah was setting up the last shot and I was talking to Osric, just making small talk, and Osric asked me when my birthday was. And I said it’s March 2, and I heard Jensen behind me go, when? I told him, then he said mine is March 1 and we started giggling at that. Then Osric asked, Jared when’s your birthday? And he said I’m July 19, and Osric goes I’m July 20!
Lynn: Which is so weird!
Hilly: And we stood back for a moment and I said, me and Osric are your shadow selves! And we all started laughing. Hannah called us over to set and Jensen said, March’s in front, July’s in back, here we go! It was such a creepy and strange coincidence.
Lynn: I love that you included you all lining up by birthdays in the behind the scenes.
Hilly: Yeah, that was right after we had that conversation. You just don’t think about it. We knew our birthdays were close but I didn’t know me and Osric were literally a day after both of them.
Lynn: That’s got to be statistically improbable, so it must be some weird meant to be thing.
Hilly: It made us laugh. I’d also just like to add that for Jensen to even say ‘that the shoot was so professional’, I mean, our set wasn’t even that great – our little set had seams and it’s not at all up to par with what they deal with, so we were a little shy about that.
Lynn: But I think, yes of course it’s not the same as a film set, but the way you make it work and your attention to detail and the way you keep a sense of humor, it does remind me of their set.
Hilly: Thank you so much. Me and Hannah, we’re really nobodies. We have no company behind us, and we hope that a Network will pick us up or someone will want us to appear on something else outside of Hillywood to help us take that next step. I think the biggest misconception people may think is that oh, Hillywood have made it, and that we’re a big company and a big team, and we’re not. It’s just me and Hannah. Whenever you receive merchandise, it’s because we’re sending it out and packaging it ourselves. That’s the biggest misconception about us, people think oh they’re good, they’ve got their own thing. We’d really like to come to a point where we don’t have to ask fans for donations – when we’re sponsored by Netflix or we get invited on to this show or that show and spread our wings.
We’re really hoping for that, but for now, we’re just thankful to the Supernatural cast for being a part of our little production. We hope they look back on it and feel like, it was worth it.
Lynn: You’re clearly ready for that next step – you can see in the behind the scenes, it’s you guys doing it all. And doing it right.
Hilly and Hannah: Aww thank you.
Lynn: Jensen mentioned something about he and Jared watching it over skype – will we ever see that?
Hilly: No, we just wanted to make sure they liked it. We had little skype sessions with everyone who was a part of it. We just wanted to be sure that everyone liked their cameo and hear what their thoughts were afterwards. We skyped with Jensen, Clif, Richard and Osric for the first one so we asked if we could do another session with this one too. Their reaction was amazing, it was so fun – because if anyone is gonna get the references, it’s them. They were just cracking up at every little reference, laughing and enjoying it. Hopefully we can speak more about it if it’s ever brought up in a panel, because they were a joy to skype and talk with. They’re the sweetest guys and I just don’t know why they support us so much. We feel so blessed. They’re a blessing in our lives and I hope that this is a blessing for them in return.
Lynn: I think it is, they love being a part of this. It’s mutually lucky.
Hilly: We’d like to say a special thanks to our Patreons. We can’t do anything without them. It’s a misconception that Hillywood has the funds because they’re sponsored, but no. This is only possible because of the Patreons. We are nothing without our fans and nothing without our Patreons. We want to make sure that our Patreons know how grateful we are. I hope they can see the magic that they’ve put into this production, because everything you see – a shoe, a sock, a tee shirt – was funded by the Patreons. A napkin on a table, the tablecloth – all those little things that people don’t think of when we going into production – they helped us. That’s why this production took a while, we were saving up for a few months before and right now we’re still recouping. We’re totally grateful to them, this wouldn’t have happened without them.
[If you’d like to join Hillywood’s Patreon, here’s a link – some of their patreon supporters even got to visit the set and watch filming, as you can see in the behind the scenes videos!]
Hilly: Hopefully one day we’ll be able to meet you and hang out at a convention. Lynn: I think the fans would love to have you at a con!
Hilly: If enough fans send e-mail requests, then they might consider having us out. We’d love to come!
[If you agree, contact Creation Entertainment, who run some wonderful Supernatural and other genre show conventions, and let them know!]
Hilly: Thank you so much for doing this – we should be thanking you for retweeting and spreading it around.
Lynn: I love it so much, the creativity of it, and I know the actors do too. So my pleasure! Check out the Supernatural Parody 2 here.
It didn’t take President Donald Trump too long before he responded to Michael Cohen and Paul Manafort’s day in court on Tuesday making it one of his worst days in the White House.
Republicans and diehard supporters are swearing everything is “fine,” but many others feel this is a foreshadowing of things to come.
In a New York courtroom, Trump’s former personal lawyer and “fixer,” Michael Cohen, pleaded guilty to campaign-finance violations. Cohen said Trump directed him to arrange the payment of hush money to two women who claimed they had affairs with Trump, porn star Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal, acknowledging the payments were made to influence the election.
In Virginia, a jury found former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort guilty of eight financial crimes unrelated to the campaign. It was the first trial victory for prosecutors in the office of special counsel Robert Mueller, whose investigation Trump has derided as a witch hunt.
So what do these developments mean for the president? Here are some of your biggest questions answered.
DOES COHEN’S GUILTY PLEA MEAN TRUMP VIOLATED THE LAW?
Cohen said in court that he made one payment “in coordination and at the direction of a candidate for federal office” and the other “under direction of the same candidate.” The amounts and dates all line up with the payments made to Daniels and McDougal.
Prosecutors did not go as far as Cohen did in open court in pointing the finger at the president, saying Cohen acted “in coordination with a candidate or campaign for federal office for purposes of influencing the election.” Legal experts said there could be multiple reasons for government lawyers’ more cautious statements.
Daniel Petalas, former prosecutor in the Justice Department’s public integrity section, said the issue of whether Trump violated the law comes down to whether Trump “tried to influence an election, whether he knew and directed it and whether he knew it was improper.”
But Trump’s attorney Rudy Giuliani said in a statement: “There is no allegation of any wrongdoing against the President in the government’s charges against Mr. Cohen.”
Trump denied to reporters in April that he knew anything about Cohen’s payments to Daniels, though the explanations from the president and Giuliani have shifted multiples times since.
DOES COHEN’S PLEA MEAN TRUMP COULD BE FORCED TO SUBMIT TO QUESTIONS?
Trump’s lawyers have been negotiating with Mueller about whether the president would submit to an interview as part of Mueller’s Russia investigation. Now Daniels’ attorney Michael Avenatti says he’ll renew efforts to get Trump to submit to a deposition in a lawsuit Daniels filed to invalidate a nondisclosure agreement she signed ahead of the 2016 election.
Avenatti tweeted that the Cohen pleas should “permit us to proceed with an expedited deposition of Trump under oath about what he knew, when he knew it, and what he did about it.”
Daniels’ case is currently on hold, but Avenatti said he’ll be looking to get that hold lifted.
The Supreme Court in 1997, ruling in a sexual harassment lawsuit brought by Paula Jones against President Bill Clinton, held that a sitting president could be made to answer questions as part of a lawsuit. But that ruling did not directly address whether a president could be subpoenaed to testify in a criminal investigation, a question the Supreme Court may have to confront if Mueller tries to compel Trump’s testimony in his probe.
Which one is a bigger deal — Manafort or Cohen?
They’re both big deals, but the Cohen plea deal — especially his testimony that he negotiated payments to women alleging affairs with Trump at the candidate’s direction — is the bigger deal. Of the eight charges Cohen plead guilty to as part of the plea deal, two of them were about breaking campaign finance laws. He testified that “in coordination and at the direction of a candidate for federal office” he made payments to hush former porn star Stormy Daniels about an alleged affair with Trump through a shell company named Essential Consultants LLC that he set up to disguise the transactions.
Those transactions are a violation of campaign finance law, which limits contributions to a candidate from any single person to $2,700 per campaign. Cohen paid Daniels $130,000 and urged the National Enquirer to make a similar payment to former Playboy model Karen McDougal for $150,000 in exchange for their silence. That Cohen was willing to testify that he did so at the direction of Trump suggests that the President of the United States in an unindicted co-conspirator in a felony. Which is a very big deal.
IF THERE IS EVIDENCE OF WRONGDOING, CAN TRUMP BE INDICTED?
The Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, which provides legal advice and guidance to executive branch agencies, has held that a sitting president cannot be indicted.
Trump’s lawyers have said that Mueller plans to adhere to that guidance, though Mueller’s office has never independently confirmed that. There would presumably be no bar against charging a president after he or she leaves the White House.
Sol Wisenberg, who conducted grand jury questioning of Clinton as deputy independent counsel during the Whitewater investigation, said he still wanted to see more details of Cohen’s plea deal. But he said: “Obviously it’s not good for Trump. The stuff on Stormy Daniels is not good for Trump.”
“I’m assuming he’s not going to be indicted because he’s a sitting president,” Wisenberg said. “But it leads him closer to ultimate impeachment proceedings, particularly if the Democrats take back the House.”
Will Trump be impeached?
That is a much more interesting — and relevant — question. Impeachment is a political process whereas indictment is a legal one. Even before what happened on Tuesday, impeachment was always more likely than an indictment for Trump.
The chances of Democrats pursuing articles of impeachment against Trump if they win back control of the House this November definitely increased on Tuesday, but it’s very hard to say how much. It’s definitely below 50-50 at this point as even unapologetic Trump critics like Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D) were unwilling to use the “i word” following the Cohen and Manafort news. “What Congress needs to do right now is we need to make sure that special (counsel) Mueller is fully protected from being fired by Donald Trump,” Warren told MSNBC’s Ali Velsher on Tuesday morning when asked whether impeachment should now be on the table.
Why was Donald Trump’s name not mentioned in the Cohen plea deal?
The plea documents don’t mention Trump by name; they only refer to an Individual-1 who by January 2017 “had become the President of the United States.” CNN’s Kara Scannell notes that it’s Southern District of New York practice (as well as the practice of the rest of the Justice Department) not to identify individuals or entities that they don’t charge with crimes.
Why didn’t prosecutors make Michael Cohen agree to be a cooperating witness in the Mueller probe?
A good question, with no obvious right answer.
But here are a few things to consider:
The Cohen case is being prosecuted not by the special counsel but by the Southern District of New York. While it seems unlikely that if Mueller really wanted a cooperation deal he wouldn’t make that clear to SDNY, it’s worth noting they are separate entities.
Mueller already has any and all documents considered relevant to his investigation that were seized in the FBI’s raid of Cohen’s home, office and hotel back in April. Given that, all he would need Cohen for is to confirm that “yes, that is my email address” or “yes that is my handwriting” as opposed to deliver a bunch of secrets on Trump or the Trump inner circle. In short: Mueller might not need Cohen’s cooperation.
Just because there is no stated cooperation deal in the plea agreement Cohen signed doesn’t mean that he can’t or won’t cooperate with Mueller. Cohen lawyer Lanny Davis told CNN’s Chris Cuomo on Tuesday night that “Michael Cohen is committed to telling the truth. … If asked by any authority … he will tell the truth.”
HOW DOES COHEN’S PLEA RELATE TO THE MUELLER INVESTIGATION?
While the Manafort case was part of Mueller’s investigation, the Cohen case was not. It was handled by prosecutors in New York. Still, it could give Mueller a boost.
Laurie Levenson, a former federal prosecutor and professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, argued that Cohen’s plea knocks back the argument that the investigations swirling around Trump are a “witch hunt,” as the president has called Mueller’s Russia investigation.
“No longer can you say Mueller is on a witch hunt when you have his own lawyer pleading guilty to things that were designed to impact the election,” she said.
What does any of this have to do with the Russia investigation?
On Tuesday afternoon, Matt Schlapp, the head of the American Conservative Union and a prominent Trump supporter, tweeted this: “So all this legal activity strange I see no ‘Russian collusion’ in any breaking news. Odd.”
Which, on one level, is sort of accurate. The Manafort conviction deals with crimes committed well before he came into Trump’s orbit in April 2016. It deals with financial malfeasance in Ukraine. And of the eight counts that Cohen pleaded guilty to on Tuesday, only two have any tie at all to the Trump campaign.
Here’s where Schlapp’s point breaks down: Both the Cohen and Manafort convictions come directly as a result of the Mueller investigation. And, in the document establishing the Mueller special counsel probe, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein makes crystal clear that Mueller is “authorized to prosecute federal crimes arising from the investigation of these matters.”
The other thing to keep in mind is that we simply don’t know what Mueller knows — and how Manafort and Cohen tie into what he knows. Both men were in Trump’s inner circle for critical moments during the campaign. It may turn out that neither one had anything to do with Russia or the broader Russia probe. But to conclude they didn’t when we still haven’t seen a single word of Mueller’s report is like leaving a basketball game in the second quarter and declaring that the team that was ahead when you departed “won.”
Will Trump pardon Cohen or Manafort?
I can answer that question in two tweets from Trump on Wednesday morning.
On Cohen: “If anyone is looking for a good lawyer, I would strongly suggest that you don’t retain the services of Michael Cohen!”
On Manafort: “I feel very badly for Paul Manafort and his wonderful family. ‘Justice’ took a 12-year-old tax case, among other things, applied tremendous pressure on him and, unlike Michael Cohen, he refused to ‘break’ – make up stories in order to get a ‘deal.’ Such respect for a brave man!”
Trump does have broad and unchecked pardoning power. And he’s already shown he’s willing to wade into controversial situations and use it — as he did earlier this year when he pardoned ex-Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio. Lanny Davis said Wednesday morning that Cohen wasn’t looking for a presidential pardon and wouldn’t accept one if offered.
COULD TRUMP PARDON HIMSELF?
Trump has already shown he’s not afraid to use his pardon power, particularly for those he has viewed as unfair victims of partisanship. He pardoned Joe Arpaio, the former Arizona sheriff who clashed with a judge on immigration, and I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, a Bush administration official convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice in a leak case.
As for whether a president can pardon himself, not surprisingly, courts have never had to answer that question. Giuliani, Trump’s lawyer, has said it won’t come to that anyway.
“Pardoning himself would be unthinkable and probably lead to immediate impeachment,” Giuliani told NBC’s “Meet the Press” in June. “And he has no need to do it; he’s done nothing wrong.” Still, Giuliani argued that Trump “probably does” have the power to pardon himself.
Right on the heels of Donald Trump’s former campaign manager Paul Manafort being convicted of 8 felony counts and his fixer Michael Cohen pleading guilty to 8 counts, Facebook announced it had pulled hundreds of accounts linked to Russia and Iran. It was interesting that on Monday Trump stated that it was “very dangerous” for companies like Twitter and Facebook to silence voices on their services.
Facebook has identified and banned more accounts engaged in misleading political behavior ahead of the U.S. midterm elections in November.
The social network said Tuesday that it had removed 652 pages, groups, and accounts linked to Russia and, unexpectedly, Iran, for “coordinated inauthentic behavior” that included the sharing of political material.
Facebook has significantly stepped up policing of its platform since last year, when it acknowledged that Russian agents successfully ran political influence operations on Facebook aimed at swaying the 2016 presidential election.
The social network said it had not concluded its review of the material and declined to say how or why the state-backed actors were behaving the way they did. But it said it has informed the U.S. and U.K. governments as well as informed the U.S. Treasury and State departments because of ongoing sanctions against Iran.
“There’s a lot we don’t know yet,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on a hastily called conference call with reporters Tuesday afternoon.
Facebook said the actions to remove the pages, groups, and accounts Tuesday morning were the result of four investigations — three involving Iran, and one involving Russia.
The first involved a group called “Liberty Front Press” that set up multiple accounts on Facebook and Instagram that were followed by 155,000 other accounts. The group was linked to Iranian state media based on website registrations, IP addresses, and administrator accounts, Facebook said. The first accounts were created in 2013 and posted political content about the Middle East, the U.K., and the U.S., although the focus on the West increased starting last year, Facebook said.
FireEye, a cybersecurity firm that alerted Facebook to the “Liberty Front Press” group, called it an influence operation apparently aimed at promoting Iranian political interests “including anti-Saudi, anti-Israeli, and pro-Palestinian themes” and support for the U.S.-Iran nuclear deal.
President Donald Trump withdrew the U.S. from that agreement earlier this year.
While that group did not appear to be attempting to influence the U.S. midterms, FireEye said its analysis “does not preclude such attempts being made.” Several social media personas it found related to the group masqueraded as liberal U.S. activists who supported Sen. Bernie Sanders.
The second group also had multiple accounts and 15,000 followers. The group was linked to “Liberty Front Press” and attempted to hack people’s accounts to spread malware. Facebook said it disrupted those attempts.
A third group also operated out of Iran had as many as 813,000 followers, and also shared political content about the Middle East, the U.K., and U.S.
In all the Iranian-linked groups spent some $12,000 in advertising and hosted 28 different events.
A fourth group that attempted to influence politics in Syria and the Ukraine was connected to sources that Facebook said the U.S. had linked to Russian military intelligence.
“We’re working closely with U.S. law enforcement on this investigation,” Facebook said in a blog post.
Intentionally or not, Microsoft has emerged as a kind of internet cop by devoting considerable resources to thwarting Russian hackers.
The company’s announcement Tuesday that it had identified and forced the removal of fake internet domains mimicking conservative U.S. political institutions triggered alarm on Capitol Hill and led Russian officials to accuse the company of participating in an anti-Russian “witch hunt.”
Microsoft stands virtually alone among tech companies with an aggressive approach that uses U.S. courts to fight computer fraud and seize hacked websites back. In the process, it has acted more like a government detective than a global software giant.
In the case this week, the company did not just accidentally stumble onto a couple of harmless spoof websites. It seized the latest beachhead in an ongoing struggle against Russian hackers who meddled in the 2016 presidential election and a broader, decade-long legal fight to protect Microsoft customers from cybercrime.
“What we’re seeing in the last couple of months appears to be an uptick in activity,” Brad Smith, Microsoft’s president and chief legal officer, said in an interview this week. Microsoft says it caught these particular sites early and that there’s no evidence they were used in hacking.
The Redmond, Washington, company sued the hacking group best known as Fancy Bear in August 2016, saying it was breaking into Microsoft accounts and computer networks and stealing highly sensitive information from customers. The group, Microsoft said, would send “spear-phishing” emails that linked to realistic-looking fake websites in hopes targeted victims — including political and military figures — would click and betray their credentials.
The effort is not just a question of fighting computer fraud but of protecting trademarks and copyright, the company argues.
One email introduced as court evidence in 2016 showed a photo of a mushroom cloud and a link to an article about how Russia-U.S. tensions could trigger World War III. Clicking on the link might expose a user’s computer to infection, hidden spyware or data theft.
An indictment from U.S. special counsel Robert Mueller has tied Fancy Bear to Russia’s main intelligence agency, known as the GRU, and to the 2016 email hacking of both the Democratic National Committee and Democrat Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.
Some security experts were skeptical about the publicity surrounding Microsoft’s announcement, worried that it was an overblown reaction to routine surveillance of political organizations — potential cyberespionage honey pots— that never rose to the level of an actual hack.
The company also used its discovery as an opportunity to announce its new free security service to protect U.S. candidates, campaigns and political organizations ahead of the midterm elections.
But Maurice Turner, a senior technologist at the industry-backed Center for Democracy and Technology, said Microsoft is wholly justified in its approach to identifying and publicizing online dangers.
“Microsoft is really setting the standards with how public and how detailed they are with reporting out their actions,” Turner said.
Companies including Microsoft, Google and Amazon are uniquely positioned to do this because their infrastructure and customers are affected. Turner said they “are defending their own hardware and their own software and to some extent defending their own customers.”
Turner said he has not seen anyone in the industry as “out in front and open about” these issues as Microsoft.
As industry leaders, Microsoft’s Windows operating systems had long been prime targets for viruses when in 2008 the company formed its Digital Crimes Unit, an international team of attorneys, investigators and data scientists. The unit became known earlier in this decade for taking down botnets, collections of compromised computers used as tools for financial crimes and denial-of-service attacks that overwhelm their targets with junk data.
Richard Boscovich, a former federal prosecutor and a senior attorney in Microsoft’s digital crimes unit, testified to the Senate in 2014 about how Microsoft used civil litigation as a tactic. Boscovich is also involved in the fight against Fancy Bear, which Microsoft calls Strontium, according to court filings.
To attack botnets, Microsoft would take its fight to courts, suing on the basis of the federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and other laws and asking judges for permission to sever the networks’ command-and-control structures.
“Once the court grants permission and Microsoft severs the connection between a cybercriminal and an infected computer, traffic generated by infected computers is either disabled or routed to domains controlled by Microsoft,” Boscovich said in 2014.
He said the process of taking over the accounts, known as “sinkholing,” enabled Microsoft to collect valuable evidence and intelligence used to assist victims.
In the latest action against Fancy Bear, a court order filed Monday allowed Microsoft to seize six new domains, which the company said were either registered or used at some point after April 20.
Smith said this week the company is still investigating how the newly discovered domains might have been used.
A security firm, Trend Micro, identified some of the same fake domains earlier this year. They mimicked U.S. Senate websites, while using standard Microsoft log-in graphics that made them appear legitimate, said Mark Nunnikhoven, Trend Micro’s vice president of cloud research.
Microsoft has good reason to take them down, Nunnikhoven said, because they can hurt its brand reputation. But the efforts also fit into a broader tech industry mission to make the internet safer.
“If consumers are not comfortable and don’t feel safe using digital products,” they will be less likely to use them, Nunnikhoven said.
It comes as no surprise that Donald Trump was unable to contain himself Tuesday after his former campaign chairman Paul Manafort was found guilty on 8 counts while his former ‘fixer’ lawyer pleaded guilty to 8 counts. Cohen admitted to arranging payments for Stormy Daniels aka Stephanie Clifford and Karen McDougal under Trump’s direction.
This brings it up to five of his associates with the 2016 campaign pleading guilty or being found guilty including Rick Gates, Michael Flynn and George Papadopoulos.
Naturally, Republicans and supporters of the president are remaining quiet, but as his circle continues to be found guilty, his attacks on Mueller and the FBI will get louder.
Trump faced one of the most perilous moments of his presidency on Tuesday after two onetime members of his inner circle simultaneously faced the words “guilty.” The back-to-back legal blows in a pair of courtrooms in different states came as Trump tore into the prosecution as he headed to a rally with supporters in West Virginia.
Trump declared that the conviction of his former campaign chairman Paul Manafort on financial crimes was “a disgrace.”
But he largely ignored his former personal attorney Michael Cohen’s guilty pleas to felonies, including campaign finance violations that Cohen stated he carried out in coordination with Trump. The president did say he felt “badly for both” men.
Manafort was convicted Tuesday in Virginia on charges brought by special counsel Robert Mueller, who is investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election and potential obstruction of justice. Cohen pleaded guilty in New York, saying he and Trump had arranged the payment of hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels and a former Playboy model to influence the election.
Trump told reporters in West Virginia ahead of a rally that Manafort’s conviction “has nothing to do with Russian collusion.” Of Manafort’s crimes, he said, “It doesn’t involve me.”
But it is the Cohen case that places Trump in the most jeopardy, legal experts said, as Cohen acknowledged his role in a scheme to pay off women who accused the future president of sexual misconduct. Cohen pleaded guilty to two counts of campaign finance violations that he said he conducted in coordination with Trump.
Manafort’s conviction is a vindication of Mueller’s work as investigators continue to probe potential misdeeds by the president and those in his orbit. Mueller’s team also had referred evidence in the Cohen case to federal prosecutors in New York.
Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani sought to cast the blame solely on Cohen in a Tuesday statement, saying: “There is no allegation of any wrongdoing against the President in the government’s charges against Mr. Cohen.”
Paul Manafort, former campaign manager for Donald Trump
Paul Manafort, the longtime political operative who for months led Donald Trump’s successful presidential campaign, was found guilty of eight financial crimes Tuesday in the first trial victory of the special counsel investigation into the president’s associates.
A judge declared a mistrial on 10 other counts the jury could not agree on.
The verdict was part of a stunning one-two punch of bad news for the White House, coming as the president’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, was pleading guilty in New York to campaign finance charges arising from hush money payments made to two women who say they had sexual relationships with Trump.
The jury returned the decision after deliberating four days on tax and bank fraud charges against Manafort, who led Trump’s election effort during a crucial stretch of 2016, including as he clinched the Republican nomination and during the party’s convention.
Manafort, who appeared jovial earlier in the day amid signs the jury was struggling in its deliberations, focused intently on the jury as the clerk read off the charges. He stared down blankly at the defense table, then looked up, expressionless, as the judge finished thanking the jury.
“Mr. Manafort is disappointed of not getting acquittals all the way through or a complete hung jury on all counts,” said defense lawyer Kevin Downing. He said Manafort was evaluating all his options.
The jury found Manafort guilty of five counts of filing false tax returns on tens of millions of dollars in Ukrainian political consulting income. He was also convicted of failing to report foreign bank accounts in 2012 and of two bank fraud charges that accused him of lying to obtain millions of dollars in loans after his consulting income dried up.
The jury couldn’t reach a verdict on three other foreign bank account charges, and the remaining bank fraud and conspiracy counts.
The outcome, though not the across-the-board guilty verdicts prosecutors sought, almost certainly guarantees years of prison for Manafort. It also appears to vindicate the ability of special counsel Robert Mueller’s team to secure convictions from a jury of average citizens despite months of partisan attacks, including from Trump, on the investigation’s integrity.
The verdict also raised immediate questions of whether the president would seek to pardon Manafort, the lone American charged by Mueller to opt for trial instead of cooperate. The president has not revealed his thinking but spoke sympathetically throughout the trial of his onetime aide, at one point suggesting he had been treated worse than gangster Al Capone.
The president Tuesday called the outcome a “disgrace” and said the case “has nothing to do with Russia collusion.”
The trial did not resolve the central question behind Mueller’s investigation — whether Trump associates coordinated with Russia to influence the election. Still, there were occasional references to Manafort’s work on the campaign, including emails showing him lobbying Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner on behalf of a banker who approved $16 million in loans because he wanted a job in the Trump administration.
Manafort urged Kushner to consider the banker, Stephen Calk, for Secretary of the Army. Though Kushner responded to Manafort’s email by saying, “On it!” Calk ultimately did not get an administration post.
For the most part, jurors heard detailed and sometimes tedious testimony about Manafort’s finances and what prosecutors allege was a years-long tax-evasion and fraud scheme.
Manafort decided not to put on any witnesses or testify himself. His attorneys said he made the decision because he didn’t believe the government had met its burden of proof.
His defense team attempted to make the case about the credibility of longtime Manafort protege Rick Gates, attacking the government’s star witness as a liar, embezzler, and instigator of any crimes as they tried to convince jurors that Manafort didn’t willfully violate the law.
Gates spent three days on the stand, telling jurors how he committed crimes alongside Manafort for years. He admitted to doctoring documents, falsifying information and creating fake loans to lower his former boss’ tax bill, and also acknowledged stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars without Manafort’s knowledge by filing fake expense reports.
Beyond the testimony, prosecutors used emails and other documents to try to prove that Manafort concealed from the IRS, in offshore accounts, millions of dollars in Ukrainian political consulting feeds. Overall, they said, he avoided paying more than $16 million in taxes.
Central to the government’s case were depictions of an opulent lifestyle, including a $15,000 ostrich jacket, luxury suits and elaborate real estate that prosecutors say was funded through offshore wire transfers from shell companies in Cyprus and elsewhere.
U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III repeatedly grew impatient with prosecutors as they sought to demonstrate Manafort’s garish tendencies. The clashes between the judge and the prosecutor became a sideshow of sorts during the weeks-long trial, with the judge at one point appearing to acknowledge that he had erroneously scolded them.
After the trial, Ellis complimented lawyers on both sides for “zealous and effective representation.” He also remarked on his surprise at the level of attention the case has received and the criticism he received for his management of the trial.
“We all take brickbats in life,” Ellis said.
The trial in Alexandria, Virginia, is the first of two for Manafort. He faces a trial later this year in the District of Columbia on charges of conspiracy against the United States, conspiracy to launder money, making false statements and acting as an unregistered foreign agent for Ukrainian interests. He is also accused of witness tampering in that case.
Michael Cohen pleads guilty to eight counts
Michael Cohen, President Trump’s former personal lawyer and fixer, has pleaded guilty to eight counts in federal court in New York, federal prosecutors announced Tuesday evening.
They include five counts of tax evasion, one count of falsifying submissions to a bank and two counts involving unlawful campaign contributions.
Cohen’s conduct “reflects a pattern of lies and dishonesty over a significant period of time,” said Robert Khuzami, deputy U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, outside the federal courthouse in Manhattan.
The counts related to campaign finance violations involved payments that were made to keep two women quiet during the campaign, Khuzami said, noting that Cohen was “repaid at the direction of the candidate.”
Khuzami noted that Cohen was repaid by the campaign with invoices for “services rendered.” Those “invoices were a sham,” Khuzami said. They were “merely reimbursement for illegal campaign contributions.”
With Cohen’s admission, he is implicating the president of the United States in what would be a major violation of campaign finance law. Trump admitted in May to reimbursing Cohen — after first denying any knowledge of at least one payment. But he noted that the reimbursement to Cohen had “nothing to do with the campaign.”
The blockbuster set of guilty pleas from Cohen comes on the same day Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort was found guilty by a jury in Virginia of eight federal counts as well. The twin events mark what could be a consequential day in the Trump presidency. Trump continues to face pressure from the special counsel investigation, led by Robert Mueller, into Russian interference in the 2016 campaign that was intended to help Trump win the presidency.
After the Manafort verdict, Trump again referred to the Mueller investigation as a “witch hunt.” But there are now seven people who have either pleaded to or been found guilty of charges stemming from the investigation. (Cohen’s case was prosecuted by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, but Mueller referred the case to that office.)
“There is no allegation of any wrongdoing against the President in the government’s charges against Mr. Cohen,” Rudy Giuliani, counsel to the president, contended in a written statement, despite the potential campaign finance violation. “It is clear that, as the prosecutor noted, Mr. Cohen’s actions reflect a pattern of lies and dishonesty over a significant period of time.”
Lanny Davis, Cohen’s attorney, had a different perspective.
“Michael Cohen took this step today so that his family can move on to the next chapter,” Davis said in a statement. “This is Michael fulfilling his promise made on July 2nd to put his family and country first and tell the truth about Donald Trump. Today he stood up and testified under oath that Donald Trump directed him to commit a crime by making payments to two women for the principal purpose of influencing an election. If those payments were a crime for Michael Cohen, then why wouldn’t they be a crime for Donald Trump?”
Cohen said in court that he made the excessive contributions in the summer of 2016 and in October 2016 — at the direction of a federal candidate. While Cohen did not name President Trump, it is clear that is who he is referring to given the timeline and circumstances.
One of the unlawful campaign contributions involved a corporation. Cohen said he and the CEO of a media company made a payment to stop an individual from releasing information damaging to a federal campaign in the summer of 2016.
While Cohen did not name them, this matches up with the circumstances around former Playboy model Karen McDougal, who settled a lawsuit with American Media Inc., the parent company of the National Enquirer. McDougal sued AMI for allegedly purchasing exclusive rights to her story for $150,000 in August 2016. McDougal says she had a 10-month affair with Trump a decade ago, which the White House has denied.
The other excessive contribution Cohen pleaded guilty to appears to be a payment to adult film star Stephanie Clifford, whose stage name is Stormy Daniels. Cohen said the payment was later repaid to him by the candidate. While he didn’t mention Trump, the president has acknowledged repaying Cohen for a $130,000 payment to Daniels to keep an alleged sexual relationship, which Trump denies, private.
“He worked to pay money to two women who he believed would be detrimental to the 2016 presidential campaign,” Khuzami said.
It was unclear what, if any, cooperation Cohen might offer as a result of Tuesday’s plea or what punishment he might finally face.
Cohen — who worked for Trump on a range of real estate, political and personal matters — knows as much as or more than anyone in the president’s inner circle.
After it was revealed that the White House counsel, Don McGahn, had spoken to Robert Mueller for 30 hours, Donald Trump went into defensive mode sending Rudy Giuliani out on the Sunday talk shows. It only became more evident that the story was true, and Trump’s lawyers have no idea how much was told to the special counsel’s investigators.
Mr. McGahn’s lawyer, William A. Burck, gave the president’s lawyers a short overview of the interview but few details, and he did not inform them of what Mr. McGahn said in subsequent interactions with the investigators, according to a person close to Mr. Trump. Mr. McGahn and Mr. Burck feared that Mr. Trump was setting up Mr. McGahn to take the blame for any possible wrongdoing, so they embraced the opening to cooperate fully with Mr. Mueller in an effort to demonstrate that Mr. McGahn had done nothing wrong.
Legal experts and former White House counsels said the president’s lawyers had been careless in not asking Mr. McGahn what he had planned to tell Mr. Mueller’s prosecutors. The experts said Mr. Trump’s lawyers had the right to know the full extent of what Mr. McGahn was going to say.
Robert F. Bauer, a White House counsel under President Barack Obama, said Mr. McGahn’s lawyer might have taken the most prudent course for his client by not addressing “each and every detail about the questions that were specifically asked and the specific answers given.”
John Dean
President Trump insists that his White House counsel isn’t a “RAT” like the Watergate-era White House attorney who turned on Richard Nixon, and he is blasting the ongoing Russia investigation as “McCarthyism.”
Trump, in a series of angry tweets, denounced a New York Times story that his White House counsel, Don McGahn, has been cooperating extensively with the special counsel team investigating Russian election meddling and potential collusion with Trump’s Republican campaign.
“The failing @nytimes wrote a Fake piece today implying that because White House Councel Don McGahn was giving hours of testimony to the Special Councel, he must be a John Dean type ’RAT,’” Trump wrote, misspelling the word “counsel. “But I allowed him and all others to testify – I didn’t have to. I have nothing to hide …”
The New York Times said it stands by its story.
Dean, a frequent critic of the president, was the White House counsel for Nixon during the Watergate scandal. He ultimately cooperated with prosecutors and helped bring down the Nixon presidency in 1974, though he served a prison term for obstruction of justice.
Dean tweeted Saturday night in response to the Times story: “Trump, a total incompetent, is bungling and botching his handling of Russiagate. Fate is never kind to bunglers and/or botchers! Unlike Nixon, however, Trump won’t leave willingly or graciously.”
He added Sunday in response to Trump’s tweets that he doubts the president has “ANY IDEA what McGahn has told Mueller. Also, Nixon knew I was meeting with prosecutors, b/c I told him. However, he didn’t think I would tell them the truth!”
Trump’s original legal team had encouraged McGahn and other White House officials to cooperate with special counsel Robert Mueller, and McGahn spent hours in interviews.
Trump’s personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, said in an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that Trump didn’t raise executive privilege or attorney-client privilege during those interviews because his team believed — he says now, wrongly — that fully participating would be the fastest way to bring the investigation to a close.
“The president encouraged him to testify, is happy that he did, is quite secure that there is nothing in the testimony that will hurt the president,” Giuliani said.
McGahn’s attorney William Burck added in a statement: “President Trump, through counsel, declined to assert any privilege over Mr. McGahn’s testimony, so Mr. McGahn answered the Special Counsel team’s questions fulsomely and honestly, as any person interviewed by federal investigators must.”
Trump on Sunday continued to rail against the Mueller investigation, which he has labeled a “witch hunt.”
“So many lives have been ruined over nothing – McCarthyism at its WORST!” Trump tweeted, referencing the indiscriminate and damaging allegations made by Sen. Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s to expose communists.
“Study the late Joseph McCarthy, because we are now in period with Mueller and his gang that make Joseph McCarthy look like a baby! Rigged Witch Hunt!” he later wrote.
Giuliani, in his interview, also acknowledged that the reason for the June 2016 Trump Tower meeting between Trump campaign aides and a Russian lawyer, arranged by Trump’s son Donald Trump Jr., was that they had been promised dirt on Trump’s 2016 Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton.
“The meeting was originally for the purpose of getting information about Clinton,” he said, adding that the Trump team didn’t know that Natalia Veselnitskaya was Russian — even though emails later released by Trump Jr. show that she had been described as a “Russian government attorney.”
Giuliani also tried to make the case that having Trump sit down for an interview with Mueller’s team wouldn’t accomplish much because of the he-said-she-said nature of witnesses’ recollections.
“It’s somebody’s version of the truth, not the truth,” he said, telling NBC’s Chuck Todd: “Truth isn’t truth.”
Todd appeared flummoxed by the comment, responding: “This is going to become a bad meme.”
