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and Colin Quinn, has been kept firmly under wraps — but with this hot screen- ing, a full four months ahead of its July 17

sorts for Apatow, who premiered an un- finished cut of Knocked Up at the fest in 2007. The plot of the Universal comedy, which also stars Brie Larson, Bill Hader

FEBRUARY 4, 2015

Taking you inside the world of independent fi lm.

LIVE @ THR.COM/INDIE

Universal’s Trainwreck, written by and starring Amy Schumer, will screen at SXSW four months before its July 17 release.

By Seth Abramovitch

A “WORK-IN-PROGRESS” CUT

of Judd Apatow’s Trainwreck, written by and starring Amy

Schumer, plus the premiere of director Paul Feig’s upcoming Melissa McCarthy action-comedy Spy are among the block- buster titles set to bow at this year’s South by Southwest (SXSW) Film Conference and Festival.

Organizers of the 22nd edition of the annual Austin, Texas meet-up, set to run March 15-21, unveiled on Tuesday a diverse slate of 145 films — the most in SXSW history — including 60 from first-time filmmakers and 100 world premieres. The number of pics eligible for prizes in juried competition is up to 20 — four more than in previous years.

“We were trying to do the opposite and pare things down,” said SXSW film head Janet Pierson. “But we kept seeing stuff that was interesting to us.”

Trainwreck marks a homecoming of

SXSW Film Festival Announces 2015 Lineup

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Conferences: April 11–16, 2015 • Exhibits: April 13–16Las Vegas Convention Center, Las Vegas, Nevada USA

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MOVIE NEWS

release date, the cat will be out of the bag.Feig and McCarthy, meanwhile, arrive

in Austin at the peak of their artistic powers, as the actress prepares to strap on a proton pack for the director’s all- female Ghostbusters reboot, currently in pre-production. Also receiving world premieres in the festival’s star-studded Headliners category is Warner Bros.’ Will Ferrell-Kevin Hart prison comedy Get Hard (opening March 27) and Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine, a new doc- umentary from Alex Gibney about the late Apple founder.

Vying for a grand jury prize in the nar-rative feature competition are: 6 Years, directed by Hannah Fidell; The Boy, directed by Craig Macneill; Creative Control, directed by Benjamin Dickin-son; Funny Bunny, directed by Alison Bagnall; The Grief of Others, directed by Patrick Wang; Krisha, directed by Trey Edward Shults; Manson Family Vacation, directed by J. Davis; Quitters, directed by Noah Pritzker; Sweaty Betty, directed by Joseph Frank and Zachary Reed; and Uncle John, directed by Steven Piet.

The documentary feature competition includes Breaking a Monster, directed by Luke Meyer; Deep Time, directed by Noah Hutton; Frame by Frame, directed by Alexandria Bombach and Mo Scarpelli; Madina’s Dream, directed by Andrew Berends; Peace Officer, directed by Scott Christopherson and Brad Barber; Poached, directed by Timothy Wheeler; The Sand- wich Nazi, directed by Lewis Bennett; She’s the Best Thing in It, directed by Ron Nyswaner; Twinsters, directed by Saman- tha Futerman and Ryan Miyamoto; and A Woman Like Me, directed by Alex Sichel and Elizabeth Giamatti.

SXSW music badge-holders this year will be offered access to films programmed in the 24 Beats Per Second category, which features world premieres for All Things Must Pass, a documentary about the rise and fall of Tower Records, directed by Colin Hanks; Mavis!, a doc about singer Mavis Staples; and Made in Japan, which tells “the remarkable story of Tomi Fuji-

yama, the world’s first Japanese country music superstar,” among others. Nine sports-themed films will screen in con- junction with SXsports, the sports-related arm of the fest currently in its second year.

And George Miller will host a special screening of his 1981 classic, The Road Warrior, in anticipation of his Mad Max: Fury Road, due in theaters May 15. (Could a surprise screening of the Tom Hardy-starring sequel sneak its way onto the lineup? A similar rumor about last year’s Godzilla reboot never came to fruition — but one can always hope.)

Things kick off with the previously announced opener, Brand: A Second Coming, an Ondi Timoner-directed doc about rabble-rousing comic Russell Brand. Also scheduled to appear are a trio of keynote speakers — Ava DuVernay, RZA and Mark Duplass.

Click here to see the full fest lineup.

JONES TAPPED TO LEADSTAR WARS STAND-ALONE By Borys KitAFTER A SERIES OF HUSH-HUSH

readings and tests, Lucasfilm and Dis-ney have zeroed in on Oscar-nominated

actress Felicity Jones for the female lead in the Star Wars stand-alone film.

Jones is now in talks to star in the project, which Gareth Edwards is directing and Chris Weitz — who was

just hired last week — is writing. Weitz replaced Gary Whitta, who penned the first draft.

Actresses were meeting, reading and testing last week in Los Angeles for the role, with Tatiana Maslany and Rooney Mara among those in the mix.

The secrecy surrounding the project is thicker than the mists of Dagobah, and it is even unclear which character the stand-alone is focusing on. Sources say that Aaron Paul and Edgar Ramirez are on the interest list for the male lead.

Disney had no comment.

The pic is set for a Dec. 16, 2016 release.Jones is currently making the awards-

season rounds for The Theory of Every-thing, for which she snagged a best actress Oscar nomination for her portrayal of Jane Hawking, the first wife of physicist Stephen Hawking.

True Story, in which Jones stars with James Franco and Jonah Hill, just premiered at Sundance, and she is also shooting A Monster Calls, a family fantasy directed by J.A. Bayona that also stars Liam Neeson and Toby Kebbell.

Jones is repped WME.

STARGATE REMAKE SETS WRITING DUOBy Borys KitSTARGATE, THE RELAUNCH OF THE

1990s Roland Emmerich sci-fi film prop-erty from MGM and Warner Bros., has found its writers.

Nicolas Wright and James A. Woods are in final negotiations to pen the script for what is intended to be the first pic in a trilogy that Emmerich is slated to direct. Dean Devlin, who co-wrote the original movie with Emmerich, is producing.

Wright and Woods are relatively new writers who recently worked with Emmerich writing on Fox’s Independence Day 2, with the studio greenlighting the movie off their draft. Emmerich warmed up to the scribes when his Centropolis Entertainment banner picked up a secret action-thriller from the duo.

Stargate told of the discovery of a circular device that creates a wormhole allowing for scientists and military person to a distant world, where they discover an enslaved people who are descendants from ancient Egyptians.

The pic, which starred Kurt Russell and James Spader, launched several TV series.

Wright and Woods are repped by WME. Wright is additionally repped by Mel Mc- Keon and Laura Meyones at McKeon-Myones Management, while Woods is managed by Christina Karakasidis at Thruline Entertainment.

Jones

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@ H O L LYWO O D R E P O R T E R

ON INSTAGRAMFOLLOW

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MOVIE NEWS

BERLIN: HUNNAM TAKES LEAD ROLE IN LOST CITYBy Borys KitCHARLIE HUNNAM IS SET TO STAR

opposite Robert Pattinson and Sienna Miller in The Lost City of Z, Plan B Enter-

tainment’s adaptation of the book by David Grann.

MICA Entertainment has come on board to finance the drama, which James Gray is directing. Sierra/Affinity is continuing international

sales of the title at the European Film Market, which gets underway Thursday. CAA is handling domestic rights.

Hunnam is replacing Benedict Cumber- batch, who was previously set to star but will now topline Marvel’s Doctor Strange, among other projects.

In the true-life drama, Hunnam will portray British explorer Col. Percival Faw- cett, who disappeared in 1925 while search- ing for a mysterious city in the Amazon.

Brad Pitt, Dede Gardner and Jeremy Kleiner are producing via Plan B along with Dale Johnson and Anthony Katagas. Marc Butan is executive producing, as are MICA’s Julie B. May and Glenn Murray.

Hunnam is coming off the recent wrap- up of FX’s Sons of Anarchy and is building a busy film career. He is in production on Warner Bros.’ Knights of the Roundtable:

King Arthur and is part of the all-star cast of Guillermo del Toro’s Crimson Peak, a Gothic horror pic set to open this fall.

Hunnam is repped by CAA and Brill-stein Entertainment.

BERLIN: BROAD GREEN, IMAX BOARD VOYAGE By Scott Roxborough and Pamela McClintockBROAD GREEN PICTURES AND IMAX Corp. have come on board to complete financing of Voyage of Time, the nature documentary that The Tree of Life direc-tor Terrence Malick has been working on for the past 30 years.

Broad Green, the entity behind finan-cial drama 99 Homes and upcoming thriller Green Room, is back-stopping Voyage, meaning they have the option of releasing the film themselves in North American after an exclusive Imax release of the title. Broad Green recently closed a deal in Sundance for a reported high seven figures to take domestic rights to Robert Redford-Nick Nolte drama A Walk in the Woods.

Sophokles Tasioulis of Berlin-based Sophisticated Films is producing Voyage together with the Tree of Life production team, including Brad Pitt, Grant Hill, Dede Gardner, Nicolas Gonda, Sarah Green and Bill Pohland. Gabriel and Daniel Hammond of Broad Green are

executive producing along with Tanner Beard, Mary Bing, Yves Chevalier, Christos V. Konstantakopoulos, Jacques Perrin, Ryan Rettig and Donald Rosenfeld.

Pitt will narrate a 40-minute Imax version of Voyage, and Cate Blanchett will narrate a 35 mm feature-length version of the pic. Voyage is described as a celebration of the universe, from its beginning to its final collapse.

Blanchett co-stars in Malick’s latest pic, Knight of Cups, alongside Christian Bale and Natalie Portman. The drama will have its world premiere Sunday at the Berlin International Film Festival.

Voyage will be the first film backed by financing from Imax’s $50 million origi-nal film fund. The fund, announced last May, will go toward co-financing a port-folio of 10 original Imax documentaries.

“To be able to launch our film-fund portfolio with Malick and his imaginative style of filmmaking is capturing lightning in a bottle,” Greg Foster, senior executive vp of Imax Corp. and CEO of Imax Enter- tainment, said in a statement. “[Malick] has literally been designing and making this movie with large-format cameras for over 30 years.”

France’s Wild Bunch picked up world- wide sales rights for the film in Cannes last year and has pre-sold the project to multiple territories, including France (Mars), Japan (Gaga), Benelux (Lumiere) and Hong Kong (Edko).

Hunnam

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BUSINESS NEWS

FEBRUARY 4, 2015

By Alex Ben BlockDISNEY CEO ROBERT IGER SAID Tuesday during an earnings call that Shanghai Disney will open in the spring of 2016, and that major construction will be completed by the end of this year.

This is an update on what Iger said last year, when he predicted the park would open in 2015.

One reason for the delay may be timing. It is likely Disney wants to open its sixth theme park in the spring when the weather is good (possibly as early as around the Chinese New Year in February), rather than late in the year during the winter.

“I was in China the week before last and saw amazing progress,” Iger told stock-market analysts on the call. “We just topped off our signature Shanghai Disneyland Hotel, and we’re nearing completion on iconic features through-out the park, including the largest castle we’ve ever built, and we’re getting ready to start casting the hundreds of perform-ers we’ll need to entertain our guests. It’s thrilling to see Shanghai Disney Resort rapidly coming to life. The artistry, com- plexity, the magnitude and the detail — it’s all quite astonishing.”

“As you’ll recall,” continued Iger, “after we broke ground on this incredible resort, we announced an $800 million expansion, significantly increasing both the size of the park and the number of attractions available to our guests on opening day. Even with that expansion, we will complete major construction by the end of this calendar year, and we’re planning a spectacular grand opening in spring of 2016, which we believe is the optimal time to showcase the full gran-deur of this world class destination.”

The mayor of Shanghai said this week that he is unsure when the park will be ready to open.

The theme park is a joint venture of

Shanghai Shendi Group, a state-owned enterprise that will hold 57 percent, and Disney, which will own the rest. The scope of the project was expanded in April 2014 when Disney said it would add $800 mil-lion, mostly to expand the attractions.

After the problems in the months after Disney opened in Paris (1992) and Hong Kong (2005), among others, the delay is expected to be used to ensure the huge park will be ready for the extraordinary number of visitors expected each year.

The first phase of the $5.5 billion proj- ect expected to open includes two hotels and a Downtown Disney shopping center.

A centerpiece of the new theme park will be the largest Disney castle in the world. To be known as the Enchanted Storybook Castle, it will be technologically advanced and interactive and will feature a winding staircase that will take visitors on a “Once Upon a Time” adventure, a boat ride into an underground chamber.

“The park will take full advantage of advances in technology,” Disney said in a promo, “that will fully immerse our guests in our stories and attractions so that they will have happy experiences like never before.”

One of the major attractions will be Treasure Cove, the first Pirates of the Caribbean themed park in the world. It will be one of six themed parks.

To interweave the Chinese perspective, there will be an 11-acre park called the

Garden of The Twelve Friends, a green space with 12 massive mosaics that show the 12 signs of the Chinese Zodiac using Disney characters. It is described as having lush cherry-blossom groves.

The extra time may also be needed to complete the extensive transportation upgrades needed to get huge numbers of ticket buyers to and from the attrac-tion. That includes the construction of a high-speed rail system. An estimated 330 million potential guests live within a three-hour travel period of the park.

Shanghai Disneyland is the largest theme park being built in China, but far from the only one. There has been a building boom in the wake of the growth of a strong middle class in the country as the economy there has improved.

Universal Studios is also building a theme park in China. The planned $3.3 billion development in Beijing is scheduled to open in 2018.

Paul Bond contributed to this report.

MOCKINGBIRD AUTHOR LEETO PUBLISH SECOND NOVEL By The Associated PressTO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD WILL NOT BE Harper Lee’s only published book after all.

Publisher Harper announced Tuesday that Go Set a Watchman, a novel completed

Shanghai Disneyland OpeningPushed Back to Spring 2016

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The Shanghai Disneyland Hotel under construction is one of two new planned hotels at the resort.

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FEBRUARY 4, 2015

by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author in the 1950s and put aside, will be released July 14. Rediscovered last fall, Watchman is essentially a sequel to Mockingbird, although it was finished earlier. The 304-page book will be Lee’s second, and her first new work in more than 50 years.

The publisher plans a first printing of two million copies.

“In the mid-1950s, I completed a novel called Go Set a Watchman,” the 88-year-old Lee said in a statement issued by Harper. “It features the character known as Scout as an adult woman, and I thought it a pretty decent effort. My editor, who was taken by the flashbacks to Scout’s childhood, persuaded me to write a novel (what became To Kill a Mockingbird) from the point of view of the young Scout.

“I was a first-time writer, so I did as I was told. I hadn’t realized it (the original book) had survived, so was surprised and delighted when my dear friend and lawyer Tonja Carter discovered it. After much thought and hesitation, I shared it with a handful of people I trust and was pleased to hear that they considered it worthy of publication. I am humbled and amazed that this will now be pub-lished after all these years.”

Financial terms were not disclosed. The deal was negotiated between Carter and the head of Harper’s parent company, Michael Morrison of HarperCollins Pub-lishers. Watchman will be published in the U.K. by William Heinemann, an im- print of Penguin Random House.

According to Harper, Carter came upon the manuscript at a “secure location where it had been affixed to an original type-script of To Kill a Mockingbird.” The new book is set in Lee’s famed Maycomb, Ala., during the mid-1950s, 20 years after Mockingbird and roughly contemporane-ous with the time that Lee was writing the story. The civil-rights movement was taking hold by the time she was working on Watchman. The Supreme Court had

ruled unanimously in 1953 that segre-gated schools were unconstitutional, and the arrest of Rosa Parks in 1955 led to the yearlong Montgomery bus boycott.

“Scout (Jean Louise Finch) has returned to Maycomb from New York to visit her father, Atticus,” the publisher’s announcement read. “She is forced to grapple with issues both personal and political as she tries to understand her father’s attitude toward society, and her own feelings about the place where she was born and spent her childhood.”

Lee herself is a Monroeville, Ala., native who lived in New York in the 1950s. She now lives in her hometown. According to the publisher, the book will be released as she first wrote it, with no revisions.

Mockingbird is among the most beloved novels in history, with worldwide sales topping 40 million. It was released in 1960, won the Pulitzer Prize and was adapted into a 1962 movie of the same name starring Gregory Peck in an Oscar-winning performance as the courageous attorney Atticus Finch. Although occa-sionally banned over the years because of its language and racial themes, the novel has become a standard for reading clubs and high schools. The absence of a second book from Lee only seemed to enhance the appeal of Mockingbird.

Lee’s publisher said the author is un- likely to do any publicity for the book. She has rarely spoken to the media since the 1960s, when she told one reporter that she wanted to “to leave some record of small-town, middle-class Southern life.”

Harper publisher Jonathan Burnham said in a statement: “This is a remarkable literary event. The existence of Go Set a Watchman was unknown until recently, and its discovery is an extraordinary gift to the many readers and fans of To Kill a Mockingbird. Reading in many ways like a sequel to Harper Lee’s classic novel, it is a compelling and ultimately moving narrative about a father and daughter’s relationship, and the life of a small Alabama town living through the racial tensions of the 1950s.”

The new book will also be available

in an electronic edition. Lee has openly stated her preference for paper but sur-prised fans last year by agreeing to allow Mockingbird to be released as an e-book.

SPOTIFY SCRAPS PLANSTO LAUNCH IN RUSSIABy Vladimir KozlovMOSCOW — Sweden-based music streaming service Spotify has canceled plans to launch in Russia amid the slow-ing economy, the falling ruble and new personal-data protection legislation.

Bloomberg reported that Alexander Kubaneishvili, head of Spotify’s Russian office, stated that the company is not going ahead with its launch, which had been planned for the first half of 2015. He added that he was set to leave Spotify due to the canceled start.

Meanwhile, Russian business daily RBK quoted a source close to Spotify as saying that the main reasons for canceling the Russian launch were the economic down- turn and a new personal-data law, which is to come into effect in Russia on Sept. 1. Under the law, Russians’ personal data will have to be stored in Russia only.

“Spotify is a cloud service, and it couldn’t operate in such a way that Russians’ data are stored in Russia and Swedes’ data are stored in Sweden,” the source was quoted as saying.

Spotify’s Russian office was opened in early 2014, and the company originally planned a Russian debut the same year, but later moved it to 2015 as negotiations with potential local partners took longer than expected, the Russian news agency TASS reported.

Currently, the only foreign player in Russia’s streaming music segment is Australia-based Guvera, which launched last year and is competing with local companies Yandex.Music and Zvooq.

According to PwC, Russia’s total digital music market amounted to $32 million in 2013, the most recent data available. iTunes, which launched in late 2012, is the main foreign player.

Lee

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TV NEWS

FEBRUARY 4, 2015

By Michael O’ConnellTURNER ENTERTAINMENT IS TAKING

big steps in a new direction with Kevin Reilly. Under the new TNT and TBS president and chief creative officer of the cable group, leadership teams of TNT and TBS are being sepa-rated and restructured, with Reilly’s first big execu-tive hires revealed.

Reilly will preside over both teams, with film producer Sarah Aubrey coming on board as TNT’s new executive vp origi-nal programming and exec Brett Weitz taking on the same role at TBS. Sandra Dewey was promoted to president of TNT and TBS Productions and business affairs. The latter’s move signals a clear desire for both of the Turner networks to own more of their original content.

“Over the next couple of years, we will continue to sharpen and evolve our brands by doubling down on original program-ming and being tenacious about our networks’ value proposition,” said Reilly. “These leadership appointments are the important first step in that direction. With Sandra overseeing business affairs and our growing slate of in-house pro-ductions, Sarah joining us to make TNT originals even more distinct and valuable and Brett focusing on both growing and further defining TBS originals, we have a great team of stewards to shepherd this transformation.”

Reilly’s TV taste might be most evi-denced by Aubrey’s hire. The Peter Berg collaborator, who has been at production company Film 44 for the last decade, has had her hand in such critical darlings as Friday Night Lights and The Leftovers. “I have personally known and worked with Sarah since we collaborated on Friday Night Lights at NBC almost nine years ago,” said Reilly. “Sarah has that rare

instinct with material and talent alike and will be a friend to the creative community. I cannot imagine a better person to bring a fresh new perspective to TNT.”

Shortly after taking the job in Decem-ber, Reilly told The Hollywood Reporter that adjusting the content on both of the net- works would be a “slow turning of the ship.” “I’m not going to come in and pull the rug out of anything,” he said. “We have a lot of shows that are actually performing.”

Weitz’s move is an internal one, previ-ously serving as senior vp development at both TBS and TNT. Series under his pur- vey have included TNT flagship Rizzoli & Isles and sci-fi drama Falling Skies. “I knew of Brett’s excellent reputation in the creative community prior to joining the company, and it didn’t take long for me to validate that first hand,” said Reilly.

As for Dewey, she will continue to head business affairs across the portfolio — not just at TNT and TBS, but Cartoon Network, Tru TV and Turner Classic Movies as well. Positioning her at the top of TNT and TBS Productions is a move to push the networks further into owning their own original series. “I can’t imag-ine a leadership team without Sandra,” added Reilly. “She has a well-deserved reputation as a skilled negotiator with incredible business instincts who is both tough and fair. She will be a key archi-tect going forward as producing more of our own content becomes a key element in our networks’ business model.”

TV RATINGS: BACHELORREGISTERS SEASON HIGHBy Michael O’ConnellABC TOPPED POST-SUPER BOWL Monday with a slightly improved episode of The Bachelor. The two-hour reality show improved two-tenths of a point from last

week, hitting a season-high 2.5 rating among adults 18-49. A steady Castle (1.4 adults) followed.

CBS’ 2 Broke Girls (2.4 adults) was also up two-tenths of a point, ahead of a steady Mike & Molly (2.2 adults). Despite Scorpion being an encore, NCIS: Los Angeles (1.7 adults) was up two-tenths of a point at 10 p.m.

Dropping two-tenths of a point from last week, Fox’s Gotham logged a series low in live-plus-same day ratings with a 1.9 in the key demo. Sleepy Hollow (1.4 adults) was in line with the previous episode.

Jumping three-tenths of a point, NBC’s The Celebrity Apprentice (2.1 adults) led into an even State of Affairs (1.1 adults).

And The CW saw steady outings for The Originals (0.7 adults) and Jane the Virgin (0.5 adults).

SHOWTIME PILOT BILLIONS ADDS AKERMAN TO CASTBy Bryn Elise SandbergMALIN AK ERMAN HAS FOUND HER next TV gig.

The Trophy Wife star has been cast in Showtime’s new drama pilot Billions, opposite Damian Lewis and Paul Gia-matti. Her character, Lara Axelrod, is a former nurse who, once from humble beginnings, is now married to billionaire Bobby “Axe” Axelrod (Lewis).

Written and executive produced by Brian Koppelman, David Levien and Andrew Ross Sorkin, Billions is a tale set in the world of high finance, exam-ining what happens when a brilliant, ambitious hedge-fund king collides with a hard-charging, whip-smart U.S. Attorney (Giamatti). The pilot, directed by Neil Burger, is shooting in New York.

Akerman recently wrapped produc-tion on The Final Girls, starring opposite Taissa Farmiga and Adam Devine; The Ticket, starring with Dan Stevens; and I’ll See You in My Dreams, which premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Akerman is repped by Sanders Arm-strong Caserta and WME.

Reilly

Reilly Splits TNT, TBS Programming Teams

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TV REVIEWS

FEBRUARY 4, 2015

BETTER CALL SAULBy Tim GoodmanONE OF THE EXCITING THINGS ABOUT Better Call Saul is looking at it as a tele-vision experiment. It might blow up in everybody’s face or we might be hailing it years from now as a great second act in Vince Gilligan’s brilliant and strange foray into New Mexico.

But nobody knows what will happen with Better Call Saul or how it will be received. We do know the stakes are high — probably higher for AMC than for either Gilligan or Peter Gould, his Breaking Bad vet and friend who co-created it. They’ll be fine regardless. AMC is hoping light-ning strikes twice or, barring that, that Saul is just a different kind of magic.

And it certainly could be. But what’s fascinating early on is the birth of it, and the ceremony of the unknown that surrounds it.

First and foremost, AMC, Gilligan, Gould and star Bob Odenkirk need to hope that everybody got the memo — because early drafts of that memo were a bit confusing — that Saul really isn’t much of a comedy. It’ll be funny — there are parts of the first two episodes that certainly are — but this is the familiar ground of black humor and, for those who just want a clean and clear descrip-tion, more drama than comedy.

It’s essential to know that going in.It’s also not Breaking Bad, nor was it

ever intended to be. Spinoffs are tricky. But they can certainly work — Frasier from Cheers, for example. But spinoffs come with lots of baggage, and it can take multiple episodes to erase that baggage in the brain of viewers. As we should all know quite well by now, multiple episodes are not a right. Viewers are loyal if you’ve earned it — and few series have earned it like Breaking Bad — but viewers are also fickle beasts. If they come to your shop for a specific flavor of ice cream and you don’t have it — or even if you’re out of choc- olate but you have Mexican chocolate — the specificity of their desires may lead them elsewhere.

Saul should be able to overcome the initial feeling-out period Breaking Bad fans may have with it. But the success of Breaking Bad has also led Gilligan and Gould to perhaps feel less obliged to make a show that may have been hinted at, or bantered about like an idea in a brain-storming session. They made a show they clearly love — both said that recently while at the Television Critics Association winter press tour promot-ing it. But they also reiterated that the freedom to tell a different kind of story, to tinker with familiar characters and to set whatever tone which strikes them, was part of the allure of a new series. So Saul is very much its own beast, a fairly clear departure stylistically from Break- ing Bad and a drama with wholly differ-ent roots as well.

The first hour moves slower than people might be expecting, but builds to and ends on a wonderful cliff-hanger that is partly but not fully solved in the second episode (luckily airing only a day after the pilot).

Saul is about Jimmy McGill, who will later become the ethically-challenged Saul Goodman. His journey to that point is the focus of the new show. As Gilligan and Gould shared in the press notes: “We’re telling a different story here — one with its own rhythm, its own look, its own tone ... Jimmy’s not yet Saul Goodman: he’s his own man, and he’s messy and struggling to still find himself. One day he’ll transform into Albuquerque’s favor-ite criminal lawyer, but right now he’s

more or less a law-abiding underdog at the bottom rung of the legal system.”

The first episode certainly lets Gilli-gan (who directed it) and Gould (who co-wrote it with Gilligan) tweak viewers’ shared history and remind people that their attention to detail, love of nuance and resistance to convention make for interesting television. It opens in black and white in what is essentially the present day — Saul Goodman in exile. After joyously marinating in that, the series reverts six years before Breaking Bad started (it’s a prequel, after all) and we pick up the sad-sack life of Jimmy McGill, or James McGill Esq., “A Law Corporation” as the printer-paper sign on his ramshackle office door notes.

Saul will bring back certain Breaking Bad characters as Gilligan and Gould so desire (one fan-favorite pops up in the first two episodes), but the main char-acter from the original series to share space with Jimmy is Mike (Jonathan Banks). When we meet Mike, he’s not the menacing fixer we know from Breaking Bad, he’s a new resident trying to find some peace, working in the parking lot of the courthouse where Jimmy toils. New, important characters include: Jimmy’s brother Chuck (Michael McKean), a successful (good and clean) lawyer now suffering from an unusual illness that confines him to his house (where he can’t practice law, or make money); Kim (Rhea Seehorn), a lawyer with a relation- ship history with Jimmy; Hamlin (Patrick

Bob Odenkirk tries to keep up appearances on Better Call Saul.

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Fabian), a successful partner at Chuck’s old firm; and Nacho (Michael Mando), a rising criminal in Albuquerque.

Getting to know these new players (and even Mike, since we see a new side of him here), will take some time. And taking time, it’s clear, is what Gilligan and Gould intend to do. “We’re slow burning everything,” Gilligan said when he met critics. That’s a calculated risk, since the first two episodes move at a slow creep for long stretches and viewers will have to be patient and trust the story-telling (and thus the pace).

What can’t be known early on is whether Jimmy McGill, this confused, searching bottom-feeder, will be as imme- diately interesting to Breaking Bad fans as Saul Goodman, who’s desperate and often hilarious advice fueled much of the chaos (and humor) of the original series.

Odenkirk, for his part, is superb here. He proves yet again what a fine, grounded actor he is. Sure, he gets to unleash him- self in fits and starts, but he’s primarily seen as introspective, still mostly inno- cent, as the series starts. Showing com-passion and lost-lamb desperation are the qualities that illustrate Odenkirk’s range. He’s in pretty much every scene, so coming to love his character (as well as understand him in these early days) is essential.

That brings us back to the audience and this intriguing experiment. What’s arguably unheard of with Saul is that it’s a spinoff from one of the greatest dramas in TV history, a feat not attempted by The Sopranos, The Wire or (to this point) Mad Men. That’s a risk that’s fascinating and bold. Whether it’s one that’s worth watching will be settled in the weeks and months (and maybe years) ahead.

But there’s no question that Gilligan and Gould have earned the right to attempt this. So going along for the ride, no matter how it unspools, seems absolutely essential.

Premiere date: Sunday, 10 p.m. ET/PT (AMC).

FRESH OFF THE BOATBy Tim GoodmanABC’S PUSH TO HIGHLIGHT DIVERSITY in its programming already has yielded one funny show, Black-ish — and the net-work again hits the sweet spot with Fresh Off the Boat, one of the better freshman broadcast sitcoms in a while.

The series, based on the memoir by Eddie Huang, is winningly hilarious and has enormous and evident potential. On top of that, it’s that rarest of things: a show with a vast Asian-American cast. But like Black-ish, the show scores not just for novelty or for effectively addressing, and sometimes spoofing, issues of race; its main draw is that it’s genuinely funny.

Adapted by executive producer Nah-natchka Khan (creator of Don’t Trust the B---- in Apartment 23), Fresh Off the Boat is about how Huang and his family (of Taiwanese descent) moved in 1995, when Huang was 11, from Washington, D.C.’s Chinatown to suburban Florida. The series focuses on the clan’s misad-ventures, as eternally optimistic father Louis (Randall Park) uproots his cynical wife, Jessica (Constance Wu), and their kids so he can buy the Cattleman’s Ranch Steakhouse in Orlando and dream big-ger than he could in Washington, where he worked for Jessica’s family.

The couple and their three boys, Eddie (Hudson Yang), Emery (Forrest Wheeler) and Evan (Ian Chen), start a new life in a lily-white neighborhood, where the local school only has one African-American student (who’s happy to see Eddie so he’s no longer the lowest person on the school’s social totem pole).

Fresh Off the Boat’s story and themes revolve around trying to fit in, if not com- pletely assimilate. The hip-hop-loving Eddie is just a kid trying to survive child-hood, cultural identity issues aside, and his experiences have a bit of that univer-sal The Wonder Years-ish vibe that fellow ABC comedy The Goldbergs also taps into so effectively. The series also gets mileage out of its flashback structure, in which a character recalls a scenario

and then we see that scenario playing out (a la Family Guy).

But if Fresh Off the Boat works almost immediately, it’s above all thanks to the breakout, star-making performance of Wu as Eddie’s mom. Wu’s hysterically harsh strictness is delivered via a wide expressive range, from blatantly angry to dubiously befuddled, disapproving but supportive to flat-out bizarre. The actress manages to take funny lines and make them three times funnier.

Meanwhile, Park invests Louis’ jubi-lant embrace of America, its people and its potential with both believability and pitch-perfect comic timing. The stakes are high where his character is concerned: If we don’t like Louis, we probably won’t get into the series, and the actor’s ability to simultaneously celebrate and send up “white” culture is a thing of comic beauty.

In one ingenious scene, Louis explains to Jessica that perhaps the reason their restaurant lacks customers is that people want to see a Caucasian greeting them at a steakhouse rather than an Asian. “Oh hello, white face. I am comfortable,” he explains to Jessica.“Nice, happy white face like Bill Pullman.”

Having watched the first three episodes, I’d say ABC’s foray into telling stories focused on people of color is paying off — and that Wu, like Gina Rodriguez on The CW’s wonderful Jane the Virgin, may be the magnetic force that keeps bringing viewers back.

Premiere date: Tonight, 8:30 p.m. ET/PT (ABC)

Randall Park and Constance Wu play a Taiwanese couple

navigating white America on Fresh Off the Boat.

F R O M PA G E 9

FEBRUARY 4, 2015 PAGE 11 OF 11

R=Repeat D=Debut S=Special most viewers in time period

18-49 RATING/SHARE Title of Show MILLIONS OF VIEWERS

TV RATINGSWeek 19Feb. 4 ABC CBS NBC FOX CW

MON8:008:309:009:3010:0010:30

1.8/5 6.92.2/7

The Bachelor2.3/6 8.0

8.42.3/6 7.82.3/6 7.82.2/6 7.70.9/3 Castle

0.8/3 4.7 R4.8

0.7/2 4.6

1.5/5 8.82.1/6 Super Bowl’s Greatest Comm.

2.1/6 10.8 S10.8

2.2/6 10.91.5/4 Scorpion

1.4/4 8.6 R8.8

1.4/4 8.31.1/3 NCIS: Los Angeles

1.1/3 6.9 R7.0

1.0/3 6.9

1.6/5 5.71.8/5

The Celebrity Apprentice 1.8/5 6.3

6.31.8/5 6.31.8/5 6.41.9/5 6.31.1/3 State of Affairs

1.0/3 4.44.5

1.0/3 4.3

1.8/5 5.22.1/6 Gotham

2.1/6 6.06.2

2.0/6 5.91.5/4 Sleepy Hollow

1.5/4 4.44.5

1.4/4 4.3

0.7/2 1.60.8/2 The Originals

0.7/2 1.71.8

0.7/2 1.60.6/2 Jane the Virgin

0.6/2 1.61.6

0.6/2 1.5

TUE8:008:309:009:3010:0010:30

1.1/3 4.41.4/5 Shark Tank

1.4/4 5.6 R S5.8

1.4/4 5.41.4/4 Agent Carter

1.3/4 4.64.9

1.2/4 4.30.7/2 Forever

0.7/2 3.0 R3.1

0.6/2 2.8

1.6/5 11.71.6/5 NCIS

1.6/5 12.9 R12.7

1.6/5 13.11.6/5 NCIS: New Orleans

1.6/5 11.7 R11.9

1.6/5 11.61.6/5 CSI: Crime Scene Investigation

1.6/5 10.4 S10.6

1.5/5 10.1

1.0/3 3.11.4/4 Parks and Recreation 3.51.3/4 Parks and Recreation 3.00.8/2 Marry Me 2.30.8/2 About a Boy 2.80.8/2 Chicago Fire

0.8/3 3.6 R3.6

0.9/3 3.6

1.2/4 3.51.7/5 MasterChef Junior

1.7/5 5.15.1

1.7/5 5.20.8/2 New Girl R 2.10.7/2 The Mindy Project R 1.7

1.0/3 3.11.3/4 The Flash

1.3/4 4.14.0

1.3/4 4.10.8/2 Supernatural

0.7/2 2.12.3

0.7/2 1.9

WED8:008:309:009:3010:0010:30

1.2/4 4.31.3/4 The Middle R 5.61.3/4 The Goldbergs R 4.61.5/4 Modern Family R 5.31.1/3 Black-ish R 3.81.1/3 Black-ish R S 3.40.9/3 Black-ish R S 2.9

1.7/5 9.41.3/4 The Mentalist

1.3/4 9.29.0

1.4/4 9.32.2/6 Criminal Minds

2.1/6 10.710.9

2.1/6 10.61.6/5 Stalker

1.5/5 8.38.6

1.4/5 8.0

0.7/2 3.90.7/2 The Mysteries of Laura

0.7/2 4.1 R4.2

0.7/2 4.00.6/2 Law & Order: SVU

0.7/2 3.6 R3.5

0.7/2 3.70.7/2 Chicago P.D.

0.6/2 4.1 R4.1

0.6/2 4.0

3.6/11 11.32.7/9 American Idol

2.9/9 11.310.7

3.1/9 11.74.4/13 Empire

4.3/13 11.411.6

4.3/12 11.1

0.8/2 2.21.1/4 Arrow

1.1/3 2.93.0

1.1/3 2.90.5/2 The 100

0.5/2 1.51.5

0.5/1 1.5

THU8:008:309:009:3010:0010:30

3.2/10 9.52.7/9 Grey’s Anatomy

2.8/9 8.78.7

2.8/9 8.83.6/11 Scandal

3.6/11 10.510.3

3.7/11 10.73.3/10 How to Get Away With Murder

3.1/10 9.29.7

2.9/10 8.7

2.3/7 10.24.5/15 The Big Bang Theory 17.22.8/9 Mom 11.82.3/7 Two and a Half Men 9.71.6/5 The McCarthys 7.11.3/4 Elementary

1.3/4 7.77.8

1.3/4 7.6

1.5/5 5.41.2/4

The Biggest Loser1.4/4 5.4

4.81.3/4 5.01.5/4 5.61.6/5 6.11.7/5 Parenthood

1.7/5 5.55.4

1.7/6 5.6

1.8/6 7.32.1/7 American Idol

2.2/7 9.48.7

2.4/7 10.01.4/4 Backstrom

1.4/4 5.35.7

1.3/4 5.0

0.5/2 1.20.8/3 The Vampire Diaries

0.7/2 1.51.6

0.7/2 1.40.4/1 Reign

0.4/1 1.01.0

0.4/1 1.0

FRI8:008:309:009:3010:0010:30

1.5/5 6.91.3/5 Last Man Standing 7.51.0/4 Cristela 5.71.8/6 Shark Tank

1.9/7 7.97.8

1.9/7 8.01.5/5 20/20

1.5/5 6.06.1

1.4/5 5.9

1.4/5 10.21.2/5 Undercover Boss

1.3/5 8.17.8

1.4/5 8.51.5/5 Hawaii Five-0

1.5/5 10.510.4

1.5/5 10.61.3/5 Blue Bloods

1.3/5 11.911.9

1.3/4 11.8

1.1/4 4.20.9/3 Constantine

0.8/3 3.33.5

0.8/3 3.11.2/4 Grimm

1.3/4 4.94.8

1.3/4 4.91.1/4 Dateline

1.2/4 4.54.3

1.2/4 4.7

0.9/3 2.51.1/4 World’s Funniest Fails

1.1/4 3.13.1

1.1/4 3.00.7/2 Glee

0.7/2 1.82.0

0.6/2 1.7

0.3/1 0.90.4/1 Hart of Dixie

0.3/1 1.01.1

0.3/1 1.00.3/1 Whose Line Is It Anyway? R 0.90.3/1 Masters of Illusion 0.9

SAT8:008:309:009:3010:0010:30

0.8/3 3.20.7/3

Saturday Movie of the Week:“Despicable Me”0.9/3 3.3 R S

2.90.8/3 3.01.0/3 3.51.0/4 3.60.7/2 20/20

0.7/2 3.13.0

0.7/2 3.2

0.6/2 4.50.5/2 Hawaii Five-0

0.5/2 3.7 R3.7

0.5/2 3.790.6/2 Criminal Minds

0.7/2 4.3 R4.2

0.7/2 4.40.8/3 48 Hours

0.8/3 5.65.4

0.8/3 5.8

1.1/4 4.40.9/3 SNL’s NFL Saturday

0.9/3 3.8 S3.8

1.0/3 3.821.1/4 4.31.2/4 4th Annual NFL Honors 4.51.3/5 1.2/4 4.7 S 5.01.2/4 4.9

0.4/2 1.80.4/2 Backstrom

0.4/1 1.7 R1.8

0.4/1 1.60.5/2 Red Band Society

0.5/2 1.8 S1.7

0.5/2 1.9

NO PROGRAMMING

SUN7:007:308:008:309:009:3010:0010:30

0.6/1 2.50.4/1 America’s Funniest Videos

0.4/1 2.4 R2.4

0.4/1 2.40.5/1 America’s Funniest Videos

0.5/1 2.5 R S2.5

0.5/1 2.40.5/1 Shark Tank

0.5/1 2.0 R S2.0

0.5/1 2.00.7/2 Shark Tank

1.0/2 3.2 R S2.6

1.2/3 3.9

0.4/1 3.20.3/1 60 Minutes Presents

0.3/1 2.8 R2.5

0.4/1 3.00.3/1 NCIS

0.3/1 2.8 R S2.6

0.4/1 3.00.4/1 CSI: Crime Scene Investigation

0.4/1 3.0 R S3.0

0.4/1 3.10.6/1 Criminal Minds

0.7/2 4.2 R S3.5

0.8/2 4.8

35.8/73 103.937.0/80

Super Bowl XLIX:New England Patriotsvs. Seattle Seahawksat Glendale, Ariz.39.1/79 114.4 S

109.739.4/81 116.640.9/81 118.540.6/79 118.140.4/77 116.941.3/78 119.228.4/60 Super Bowl XLIX Postgame S 78.411.3/29 The Blacklist 32.9

0.5/1 1.20.3/1 Bob’s Burgers R S 1.00.5/1 The Simpsons R 1.30.6/1 The Simpsons R 1.70.3/1 Brooklyn Nine-Nine R 1.00.5/1 Family Guy R 1.20.5/1 Bob’s Burgers R 1.2

NO PROGRAMMING

WK. AVGSSN. TO DATE

1.4/4 5.22.1/7 7.7

1.3/4 8.12.4/8 11.6

7.5/22 22.52.9/9 9.8

1.4/4 4.52.1/6 6.2

0.7/2 1.80.8/2 2.1