{"id":2194021,"date":"2025-12-10T21:06:53","date_gmt":"2025-12-10T21:06:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2194021"},"modified":"2025-12-10T21:06:53","modified_gmt":"2025-12-10T21:06:53","slug":"letter-from-the-editor-highlights-from-our-dec-11-issue","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/letter-from-the-editor-highlights-from-our-dec-11-issue\/","title":{"rendered":"Letter from the editor: Highlights from our Dec. 11 issue"},"content":{"rendered":"

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It may not be signaled by white smoke at the Academy Museum<\/a>, but with the arrival of the first big year-end prizes<\/a> and our annual Envelope Roundtables, Oscar season is well and truly here. <\/p>\n

Over the next three weeks, keep an eye out as we unveil in-depth conversations with some of this year\u2019s most-talked-about actors, actresses and directors \u2014 starting with this week\u2019s cover story.<\/p>\n

Read on for a sneak peek at our 2025 Oscar Actors Roundtable, plus more highlights from our Dec. 11 issue. <\/p>\n

Cover story: The Envelope Actors Roundtable<\/h2>\n
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(Jason Armond \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/figure><\/div>\n

On a rainy Saturday afternoon at The Times newsroom last month, actors Will Arnett (\u201cIs This Thing On?\u201d), Benicio Del Toro (\u201cOne Battle After Another\u201d), Jacob Elordi (\u201cFrankenstein\u201d), Wagner Moura (\u201cThe Secret Agent\u201d), Jesse Plemons (\u201cBugonia\u201d) and Stelland Skarsg\u00e5rd (\u201cSentimental Value\u201d) joined moderator Yvonne Villarreal to discuss balance in all its forms \u2014 between work and family, preparation and spontaneity, expectation and ambition. <\/p>\n

In other words, the participants brought the same depth to the conversation as they did to their acclaimed roles, and an abiding respect for their peers around the table. I had the privilege of watching it live, and you can trust me when I say you won\u2019t want to miss it. Keep an eye out for the premiere tomorrow on latimes.com, our YouTube channel<\/a>, Spectrum and, of course, in your mailboxes. <\/p>\n

Laura Dern<\/h2>\n
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\"Laura <\/picture>\n
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(Bexx Francois \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/figure><\/div>\n

It\u2019s never easy navigating the death of a parent, but doing so amid the release of two prominent films requires special resolve. And after the death of her mother, Diane Ladd<\/a>, last month, Laura Dern initially worried about having to talk about her parents while promoting \u201cIs This Thing On?\u201d and \u201cJay Kelly.\u201d But if there were one actor with the poise to get through it \u2014 as evidenced by the lyrical reflections on the loss of David Lynch<\/a> she published in The Times earlier this year \u2014 it would be Dern. <\/p>\n

\u201cI thought, \u2018This is going to be hard because I\u2019m going to have to talk about my parents,\u2019\u201d she told Margy Rochlin, whose profile of Dern<\/a> features co-stars Will Arnett and George Clooney singing her praises. \u201cThen I thought, \u2018They are my muses, my guides, my teachers. I\u2019ve never done an interview without talking about my parents, and that will be the case for the rest of my life.\u2019\u201d <\/p>\n

\u2018The Smashing Machine\u2019s\u2019 brutal fight scenes<\/h2>\n
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\"Dwayne <\/picture> <\/figure>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

When I stepped out of my first viewing of \u201cThe Smashing Machine\u201d<\/a> earlier this fall, I made a beeline for director Benny Safdie<\/a> at the post-screening reception. Having spent a significant chunk of the runtime wincing and grimacing at the mixed martial arts sequences, I had to know: How did they get those thuds and thwacks to sound so… real<\/i>?<\/p>\n

Bob Strauss has the answer to that question and many more in the story that conversation inspired<\/a>, which goes inside the making of \u201cThe Smashing Machine\u201d with Safdie, actor Ryan Bader, cinematographer Maceo Bishop and sound mixers Skip Lievsay and Paul Urmson. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe fingerless grappling gloves MMA fighters use made for sharper, more painful impact noises than padded, puffier boxing gloves do. These were enhanced by hours of recordings of hands striking skin,\u201d Strauss writes. \u201cAnd double Oscar-winning prosthetic makeup artist Kazu Hiro designed a lifelike silicone dummy of Johnson\u2019s upper body for knee-to-head shots, which everyone agreed was fun to punch \u2014 and sounded authentic when they did.\u201d<\/p>\n

More coverage from our Dec. 11 issue<\/h2>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.latimes.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It may not be signaled by white smoke at the Academy Museum, but with the arrival of the first big year-end prizes and our annual Envelope Roundtables, Oscar season is well and truly here. Over the next three weeks, keep an eye out as we unveil in-depth conversations with some of this year\u2019s most-talked-about actors, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2194022,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2194021","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Letter-from-the-editor-Highlights-from-our-Dec-11-issue.com2F4f2F542Fbd5c077849ebba716810935b.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2194021","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2194021"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2194021\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2194023,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2194021\/revisions\/2194023"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2194022"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2194021"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2194021"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2194021"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}