Award-winning writers, producers, and actors Donald Glover (Atlanta) and Phoebe Waller-Bridge (Fleabag) will create and star in Mr. and Mrs. Smith, a new Amazon Original series based on the 2005 New Regency film of the same title. Glover and Waller-Bridge will also serve as executive producers, with co-creator and executive producer Francesca Sloane (Atlanta, Fargo), who will serve as showrunner, and executive producers Yariv Milchan and Michael Schaefer (New Regency), and Jenny Robins (Wells Street Films).
From Amazon Studios and New Regency, Mr. and Mrs. Smith will premiere exclusively on Prime Video in more than 240 countries and territories worldwide.
“Talk about the dream team! Donald and Phoebe are two of the most talented creators and performers in the world. It’s truly a dream for us, as it will be for our global audience, to have these two forces of nature collaborating as a powerhouse creative team,” said Jennifer Salke, head of Amazon Studios. “Mr. and Mrs. Smith is an iconic property, and we can’t wait to see how Donald, Phoebe and Francesca make it their own. We’re thrilled to be working with them, and with such great partners at New Regency.”
Milchan and Schaefer of New Regency shared in a joint statement: “Having had the pleasure of successful collaborations with the incredibly talented Donald Glover, most recently on Guava Island, we all started talking about other projects to do together and when he suggested the idea of a new take and iteration on the New Regency film, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, we jumped at the chance to get going right away. Adding Phoebe and her company Wells Street Films as a collaborator and co-star takes everything up another level and makes the project worthy of a reimagining for both new audiences and past fans of the original film. We are so excited to be working with Donald, Phoebe, Francesca and the entire team at Amazon Studios.”
The 2005 feature film Mr. and Mrs. Smith, from New Regency and starring Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, grossed $487 million worldwide during its release.
Among Glover’s plaudits are 10 Emmy nominations, including two wins–Best Director and Best Lead Actor–for Atlanta in 2018, a pair of Golden Globe nods, including a win in 2017 for Best Performance by an Actor in a TV Series–Musical or Comedy on the strength of his work in Atlanta, a SAG Award nom for Atlanta, eight Writers Guild Award nominations including five wins (three for 30 Rock, two for Atlanta), and two DGA Award nods for Atlanta.
Waller-Bridge is a multi-award-winning writer and actor, known for the BBC 3/Amazon series Fleabag, in which she starred, created and produced. Waller-Bridge won three Primetime Emmy Awards for the second season, including Best Comedy Series, Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series and Outstanding Writing for a Comedy Series. She also won two Golden Globe Awards (Best Actress – Television Series Musical or Comedy and Best Television Series – Musical or Comedy), two Critics’ Choice Awards (Best Actress in a Comedy Series and Best Comedy Series) and the Screen Actors Guild Award (Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series), in addition to a BAFTA Television Award for Best Female Performance in a Comedy Program.
As a writer and producer, Waller-Bridge is known for her work on Season 1 of the critically acclaimed BBC America series Killing Eve. She contributed to the script of the latest James Bond film, No Time to Die, which will release later this year. On television, she has been seen in Crashing, which she also wrote, Broadchurch, and Run, which she executive produced with Vicky Jones. On film, Waller-Bridge has appeared in Solo: A Star Wars Story, Goodbye Christopher Robin, and The Iron Lady.
Francesca Sloane is currently under an overall at Amazon Studios, where she is also developing a series based on Anais Nin’s erotic fiction.
Vatican, Microsoft Create AI-Generated St. Peter’s Basilica–For In-Person and Virtual Visitors
The Vatican and Microsoft on Monday unveiled a digital twin of St. Peter's Basilica that uses artificial intelligence to explore one of the world's most important monument's while helping the Holy See manage visitor flows and identify conservation problems. Using 400,000 high-resolution digital photographs, taken with drones, cameras and lasers over four weeks when no one was in the basilica, the digital replica is going online alongside two new on-site exhibits to provide visitors -- real and virtual -- with an interactive experience. "It is literally one of the most technologically advanced and sophisticated projects of its kind that has ever been pursued," Microsoft's president Brad Smith told a Vatican press conference. The project has been launched ahead of the Vatican's 2025 Jubilee, a holy year in which more than 30 million pilgrims are expected to pass through the basilica's Holy Door, on top of the 50,000 who visit on a normal day. "Everyone, really everyone should feel welcome in this great house," Pope Francis told Smith and members of the project's development teams at an audience Monday. The digital platform allows visitors to reserve entry times to the basilica, a novelty for one of the world's most visited monuments that regularly has an hours-long line of tourists waiting to get in. But the heart of the project is the creation of a digital twin of St. Peter's Basilica through advanced photogrammetry and artificial intelligence that allows anyone to "visit" the church and learn about its history. The ultra-precise 3D replica, developed in collaboration with digital preservation company Iconem, incorporates 22 petabytes of data โ enough to fill five million DVDs โ Smith said. The images have already identified structural... Read More