The It List: 'Quiet on Set' shows darker side of Nickelodeon, 'Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire' blasts into theaters, 'Road House' gets a remake
The It List is Yahoo's guide to what's new in pop culture. Each week, we share staff picks for the latest releases that we can't wait to watch, stream, listen to, read and binge.
What's new this week: Fire up your proton packs for the new Ghostbusters movie, take it outside with Jake Gyllenhaal's Road House and travel back in time with Kristen Wiig's Palm Royale.
What to watch
🎥 Jake Gyllenhaal's Road House remake is ready to stream
When: Road House streams March 21 on Prime Video.
What to know: Jake Gyllenhaal stars as ex-UFC fighter Elwood Dalton in the remake of the 1989 Patrick Swayze action film.
Gyllenhaal honors his late friend and mentor in the movie. "I didn't feel pressure," he said. "I did wear a tattoo in dedication to [Patrick] because I wanted to bring him along with me and bring the energy of the whole character along with me."
Road House is receiving positive reviews thus far. Critics love Gyllenhaal's performance.
Director Doug Liman got a standing ovation when the film premiered at SXSW.
Liman initially vowed to boycott the premiere, as he was upset over the film not getting a theatrical release. The creative differences were ultimately worked out. — Taryn Ryder, entertainment reporter
🎥 Welcome the tundra in Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire
When: Ghostbusters: Frozen Empireis in theaters March 21.
What to know: Get your proton packs ready. The Ghostbusters are back.
In Frozen Empire, which is a sequel to 2021’s Ghostbusters: Afterlife, the “discovery of an ancient artifact unleashes an army of ghosts that casts a death chill upon the city,” the film’s synopsis says. “Ghostbusters new and old must join forces to protect their home and save the world from a second Ice Age.”
The film stars Paul Rudd, Carrie Coon, as well as McKenna Grace and Finn Wolfhard, who play the grandchildren of Egon Spengler, the character played by the late Harold Ramis.
Original Ghostbusters Bill Murray, Ernie Hudson and Dan Aykroyd – who appeared in Afterlife – will also return.
“It’s fun that we’ve made something that’s lasted this long, that’s really kind of the best part of it,” Murray said of the films on CBS Mornings. — Garin Flowers, entertainment reporter
Who you gonna call? Delight in Bill Murray, Ernie Hudson, Ray Parker Jr. playing the Ghostbusters theme on classroom instruments.
What to read
📚 Memory Piece asks what it means to live a worthwhile life
When: Memory Piece is available for purchase March 19.
What to know: The novel, by Lisa Ko, follows the story of three friends — Giselle Chin, Jackie Ong and Ellen Ng — from the 1980s to the 2040s, spanning alienating teenagerdom, disjointed adulthoods and difficult elderly years.
The women take different paths: Giselle becomes a sought-after performance artist, Jackie builds community as a coder and Ellen grows into a pivotal activist.
Along the way, the trio contends with spaces where they don't feel welcome, increasing reliance on technology and surveillance, and questions surrounding what it means to be "successful" in a changing world.
Want to read more from Ko? She also wrote 2017’s critically acclaimed The Leavers, which which was a National Book Award finalist. — Lily Herman, The Yodel newsletter writer
What to binge
▶️ Nickelodeon wasn’t all that
When: Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV, a four-part docuseries, airs March 17 and 18 on Investigation Discovery (ID) and streams on Max.
What to know: Nickelodeon was the place for kids TV in the '90s and '00s and propelled many young talents (Amanda Bynes, Ariana Grande, Jamie Lynn Spears, Miranda Cosgrove) to superstardom.
Behind the scenes, it was a deeply toxic work environment under teen TV creator Dan Schneider, where child actors weren't protected.
In the doc, Drake Bell (Drake & Josh, The Amanda Show) reveals for the first time he was the minor John Doe who was sexually abused by All That and The Amanda Show dialogue coach and actor Brian Peck.
Peck pleaded 'no contest' to performing a lewd act with a 14- or 15-year-old and to oral copulation with a minor under 16 in 2004.
Actors, writers and crew who worked under Schneider on shows including iCarly, Zoey 101, Sam & Cat and Victorious detail inappropriateness, which led to his firing from the network amid #MeToo.
Schneider also sexualized the minor stars in his shows, which rewatching clips of now is horrifying. — Suzy Byrne
Read more:Quiet on Setdirector hopes Amanda Bynes will share her Nickelodeon experience "in her own words" one day.
▶️ Climb the social ladder with Palm Royale
When: The first three episodes of Palm Royale stream March 20 on Apple TV+. New episodes stream weekly on Wednesdays through May 8.
What to know: Kristen Wiig plays Maxine Simmons, a woman trying to break into Palm Beach, Fla., high society and its exclusive Palm Royale club.
Set in the summer of 1969, the 10-episode series is loosely based on Juliet McDaniel’s novel Mr. And Mrs. American Pie.
The ensemble cast includes Laura Dern, Allison Janney, Leslie Bibb, Ricky Martin, Kaia Gerber, Josh Lucas and Carol Burnett.
Wiig says joining the project was a no-brainer. "From getting a call from [executive producer] Laura Dern to reading the scripts and meeting everyone involved, it was really just, yes, across the board," she told CNN.
Get ready for '60s fashion! Beehives, head scarves, feathers, pastels are a feast for the eyes. — David Artavia, entertainment reporter
We’ll be back next week with our latest picks. Want more It List? Click here.
