00:00Trump targets Oscar winner Parasite, Julia Roberts is set to lead the star-studded cast
00:05of a new TV series, and Ben Affleck is opening up about his struggles with alcoholism.
00:10I'm Tiffany Taylor and right now I've got the top stories you need to know today from
00:13The Hollywood Reporter News.
00:15First, President Donald Trump is taking aim at Parasite's best picture win at this year's
00:19Oscars.
00:20THR's Neha Joy has more.
00:22During Thursday's campaign rally in Colorado, President Trump criticized the Oscar-winning
00:26satire thriller stating how bad the Academy Awards were this year.
00:29Speaking out in front of his supporters, he stated,
00:32And the winner is...a movie from South Korea. What the hell was that all about?
00:36We've got enough problems from South Korea with trade. On top of that, they give them the
00:40best movie of the year. Was it good? I don't know. Let's get gone with the win back please.
00:44Sunset Boulevard, so many great movies.
00:46Trump continued,
00:47I thought it was best foreign film, no? As a reference to how the category was previously
00:52referred to before it became known as best international feature film.
00:55Meanwhile, Neon, the U.S. distributor for the pick, responded mere minutes later in a tweet saying,
01:00Understandable. He can't read.
01:01And speaking of controversial presidents, Julia Roberts, Sean Penn, Armie Hammer and Joel Edgerton
01:06are teaming up to star in Gaslit, a modern take on Watergate that will focus on the untold
01:11stories and forgotten characters of the scandal.
01:14The star-studded series comes from Universal Content Productions and is an adaptation of the
01:18Slate podcast, Slow Burn. The show hails from Mr. Robot duo Sam Esmail and Robbie Pickering.
01:23A network is not yet attached. The drama will be shopped to premium cable networks and streaming services.
01:29Esmail said,
01:30Now more than ever, truth is absolutely stranger than fiction.
01:34When Robbie first told me about the Slow Burn podcast, I devoured it instantly.
01:38The second I finished it, I felt compelled to bring this story to television, especially
01:42after watching the cowardice on display during the recent impeachment hearings.
01:46To help realize this important chapter in our country's history, my first call was to the brilliant Julia Roberts.
01:52He continued,
01:53After her captivating performance in Homecoming, I knew Julia was the only person who could tackle the complex role of
01:59Martha Mitchell
02:00and lead our stellar cast in adapting this bizarre and controversial narrative.
02:04Roberts will star as Martha Mitchell, an Arkansas socialite and the wife to Nixon's loyal attorney general, John Mitchell.
02:10Despite her party affiliation, she's the first person to publicly sound the alarm on Nixon's involvement in Watergate,
02:16causing both the presidency and her personal life to unravel.
02:19And finally, Ben Affleck opened up in a revealing new interview with GMA about what, or who, inspired him to
02:25stay sober.
02:26Neha Joy has more on that story, too.
02:27The actor spoke candidly in a two-part interview with Diane Sawyer that aired on Good Morning America.
02:32In the Thursday segment, the actor revealed that alcoholism runs in his family.
02:37For me, seeing my dad, she was drunk every day and that was just life.
02:41And as that got worse, that was really, really painful.
02:44While he said that he wished his father had been sober during his childhood,
02:48seeing his father's alcoholism is how the actor says he learned how important it was for him to stay sober
02:53during his kids' formative years.
02:55Affleck credited his children for his decision to go to rehab two times over the past three years.
03:00I really don't want my children to pay for my sins or to be afraid for me, which is one
03:04of the hard parts of being the child of an alcoholic.
03:07During the second part of Affleck's interview on Friday, the actor credited some famous friends for helping him stay sober.
03:12He shared that fellow actors Bradley Cooper and Robert Downey Jr. were helpful and supportive during his sobriety and called
03:19them wonderful men.
03:20For much more on all these stories and the latest Hollywood news, head to THR.com and be sure to
03:24subscribe to our THR News YouTube channel.
03:27Until next time, for The Hollywood Reporter News, I'm Tiffany Taylor.
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