Lori Acken, Author at StayTuned Magazine

‘Dirty Dancing’: Colt Prattes is Johnny Castle For a New Generation

May 13, 2017 Lori Acken

For Colt Prattes, playing bad boy dance instructor Johnny Castle in ABC’s musical reimagining of the beloved 1987 film Dirty Dancing isn’t just a dream come true but a coming full circle. As a kid growing up in rural Georgia, Prattes watched the film with his stepmom whenever it appeared on TV and admired Patrick Swayze’s cool, but didn’t yet realize the impact the actor and role would have on his life. “Eventually she told me that Patrick’s mom owned a dance studio and he’d been dancing his whole life. All of a sudden this world opened up to […]

Jackson Impersonator Navi Plays the King of Pop in Lifetime’s ‘Michael Jackson: Searching for Neverland’

May 1, 2017 Lori Acken

Navi remembers the very moment he knew Michael Jackson would change his life. It was 1983 and the grade-schooler’s parents let their music-loving boy stay up to watch Don Mischer and Suzanne de Passe’s Emmy-winning documentary Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever — the first time Jackson displayed his signature moonwalk dance move, during a thrilling performance of “Billie Jean.” “I taped the performance and ran upstairs, woke up my parents and played it for them,” the mononymous Londoner recalls. “I played it maybe 20 or 30 times that night. I couldn’t believe this performance … and this man.” As a […]

‘The Wizard Of Lies’: HBO Reveals the Human Toll of the Madoff Scandal

April 27, 2017 Lori Acken

In a pivotal scene in HBO’s The Wizard of Lies, disgraced financier Bernie Madoff (Robert De Niro) and his devoted wife Ruth (Michelle Pfeiffer) don their pajamas and climb into bed — just as the couple did most every night of their 49-year marriage. A Judy Garland film flickers on the television and a bowl rests on the nightstand. It doesn’t contain a late-night snack. It holds every pill the pair could scrounge up in their opulent Manhattan apartment. “Our last night on earth will be you, me and Judy Garland. How romantic,” Pfeiffer drones in Ruth’s distinctive Queens accent, […]

National Geographic’s ‘Genius’: Meet the Two Mrs. Einsteins

April 24, 2017 Lori Acken

• RELATED: ‘Genius’ — Geoffrey Rush Plays A Deliciously Human Einstein on Nat Geo • RELATED: ‘Genius’ — Geoffrey Rush and Johnny Flynn Talk Playing Einstein on National Geographic Framed by a monitor on the Prague set of National Geographic Channel’s Genius, Emily Watson’s face is a mask of quiet fury. Portraying Elsa Einstein, Albert’s first cousin and longtime lover, she is newly aware that his impending fame will expose the truth of their adulterous relationship. “Do anything,” she seethes, “to get free of Mileva.” They say that behind every great man, there is a great woman. In Einstein’s case, there were […]

Killing Richard Glossip: Investigation Discovery’s Two-Night Event is a Matter of Innocence, Life and Death

April 12, 2017 Lori Acken

In late fall of 2014, Denver defense attorney Don Knight had just pulled up to a barbecue joint when his cellphone rang. On the line: Sister Helen Prejean. The same Sister Helen whose tireless work to end the death penalty made her the subject of 1995’s critically acclaimed feature film Dead Man Walking. Prejean was calling about Richard Glossip. And the makings of Investigation Discovery’s chilling two-night event, Killing Richard Glossip, were set into motion. (See the first hour here.) In 1997, Glossip — an Oklahoma City motel manager and father of four with no felony record — was named the […]

‘The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks’: HBO and Oprah Turn the Bestseller into a Must-See Film

April 9, 2017 Lori Acken

You may not know of her, but your life has been directly, enormously impacted by Henrietta Lacks. Henrietta, a stout and pretty rural Virginian born in 1920, was the devoted mother of five, including a disabled eldest daughter on whom she doted. She looked after friends and neighbors, too. Henrietta accepted the hard work of tobacco farming, though she knew she might have accomplished much more. She loved to dance and tended her looks, particularly her nails, which were perfectly polished nearly to the day she died at age 31. And Henrietta suffered an agonizing and possibly preventable death from […]

‘Genius’: Geoffrey Rush and Johnny Flynn Talk Playing Einstein on National Geographic

April 7, 2017 Lori Acken

Geoffrey Rush done up as Einstein and killing time on bench outside the enormous Prague soundstage where National Geographic’s Genius filmed begs an instant double take. For actor/musician Johnny Flynn, embodying the younger Albert proved a bit more challenging. • RELATED: ‘Genius’: Geoffrey Rush Plays A Deliciously Human Einstein on National Geographic • RELATED: National Geographic’s ‘Genius’: Meet the Two Mrs. Einsteins! “All the footage that exists of him is after he came to America,” Flynn explains of the man he calls “quite maverick and punk.” “The exciting thing about the potential in this show is to create an idea of […]

‘Better Call Saul’: Is This the Season Jimmy Goes “Saul” in? We ask Bob Odenkirk!

April 3, 2017 Lori Acken

When Better Call Saul debuted more than a year after its iconic predecessor Breaking Bad ended, fans were itchy to see prankster Jimmy McGill (Bob Odenkirk) morph into Bad’s shameless shyster Saul Goodman — pronto. Then something unexpected happened. We all fell for Jimmy — loving, loyal, funny, fumbling Jimmy — and his kooky (and sometimes genius) resourcefulness and joie de vivre. And yet, we knew the honeymoon couldn’t last. Both shows’ producers, Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould, confirmed that this is, indeed, the season that Jimmy begins to break Goodman, as an angrier-than-ever Chuck (Michael McKean) seeks revenge for […]

‘Genius’: Geoffrey Rush Plays A Deliciously Human Einstein on Nat Geo

March 31, 2017 Lori Acken

Think “genius” and your next thought is probably “Einstein.” Think “Einstein” and your next thought is probably “E=mc2.” And after that? For most of us, not too much. National Geographic, in conjunction with Ron Howard and Brian Grazer’s Imagine Entertainment, aims to change that with Season 1 of its planned anthology series Genius, which profiles the German-born physicist. • RELATED: We talk Einstein with ‘Genius’ stars Geoffrey Rush and Johnny Flynn • RELATED: National Geographic’s ‘Genius’: Meet the Two Mrs. Einsteins! The true genius of Genius is how it turns its source material, Walter Isaacson’s 700-page Einstein: His Life and […]

‘The Leftovers’: The End is Near for the Thought-Provoking HBO Chiller

March 30, 2017 Lori Acken

The Leftovers fans are a hearty lot. The spooky HBO drama’s first season — based on Tom Perrotta’s 2011, rapture-esque bestseller — drew mixed critical response, middling ratings and a whole lot of “What on (or off) Earth was that?” But the network — and viewers who obsessed over the Justin Theroux starrer’s thought-provoking supernatural bent — hung on, resulting in a second season that defied description, but made for one of 2015’s most satisfying television experiences. Then the wait began anew. Though the Season 2 finale suggested a (mostly) satisfying series finale, too, fans hoped that there might be […]