The Weinstein Company seems to be on the brink of collapse. 

The company once run by disgraced executive Harvey Weinstein, and currently watched over by his brother, cofounder Bob Weinstein, is no longer planning to be renamed and operate independently, according to The Wall Street Journal.  

It was previously reported that the company was meeting with ad agencies to figure out how to rename the company and move forward, after allegations that Weinstein was sexually harassing and abusing women in Hollywood for the past three decades surfaced last week.

But the Journal says that plan is dead. However, TWC has had interested buyers approach its board to buy it, according to the Journal. The other option is TWC would shut down and its library of TV and movie titles would be sold off in pieces.

This news comes at a time when only three TWC board members are left — Bob Weinstein, Tarak Ben Ammar, and Lance Maerov — and numerous filmmakers and producers are try to get their projects back from the company, according to CNN.

TWC was supposed to go into production on a big-screen adaptation of "In The Heights," the hit Broadway Lin-Manuel Miranda wrote and starred in before "Hamilton," but reportedly Miranda and cocreator Quiara Alegría Hudes want the company to give it up. Apple has also pulled the plug on a planned Elvis Presley biopic series with TWC.

The company's big TV entities currently on air include "Project Runway" and MTV's "Scream." 

Business Insider contacted The Weinstein Company for comment but did not get an immediate response. However, Bob Weinstein released a statement following the Journal story that "business is continuing as usual."

SEE ALSO: Amazon Studios chief suspended amid sexual harassment claim and Rose McGowan denunciation

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We sat down with Anthony Bourdain of "Parts Unknown" and Danny Bowien of Mission Chinese to discuss Bourdain's new film, "Wasted!" and the ever-changing food landscape. Here, these culinary savants break down how they like to scramble their eggs. Following is a transcript of the video.

Danny Bowien: What is the food you’ve done the most? And you told me —

Anthony Bourdain: Omelettes.

Bowien: Probably omelettes, mostly. So, what’s your move?

Bourdain: Look, I go with the Jacques Pepin platonic ideal. Eggs, salt, pepper, cooked in butter. Not over-beaten. You want a little rippling in there — texture. And cooked baveuse meaning a little wet. A little wet. And just in a pan, figure eight pattern. Don’t over-scramble, don’t over-beat. Pull them off the heat just before they’re done. Finish as they sigh onto the plate and serve.

Bowien: I don’t know how I can answer that better than him, so I’m not gonna try. But one time I tricked Wylie Dufresne — they were having a wd~50 holiday party at Mission Chinese Food and we set up an induction burner in the corner, and we got some eggs and a pot and a whisk — ‘cause I knew Wylie was like — if anyone knows Wylie Dufresne, he’s the king of eggs, he loves eggs. He loves scrambled eggs.  So I was like, “Hey, chef! Can you help me? I don’t really know what I’m doing over here.” And this is in the middle of their holiday party. And we had a tin of caviar and all these eggs and I said, “Hey, can you help me? I just need to figure out how to do these eggs over here.” And he was like, “Oh you mean midtown eggs.” And I was like “What are midtown eggs?” And he said, “It’s how everybody wants their eggs cooked in midtown.” And he just showed me. He’d just butter, eggs, whisk. Whisk it really on and off the heat, slowly until you get these little tiny curds. And he finished it at the very last second, I wanna say he finished it with cream cheese and not crème fraîche. It gave it this really silky, luxurious texture.

Bourdain: Crème fraîche.

Bowien: And then yeah, he put it on top of toasted white bread, like white toast points and then we put caviar on it. That was the best scrambled egg I’ve ever had in my life, obviously. But even without the caviar, it was crazy because he had this technique. But I tried doing it with him and completely messed it up the first time, so, you know. Thing is about the eggs, it’s like, chefs nerd out ‘cause it’s the most unforgiving and most satisfying thing to make in the world. So, I can’t — but, his answer was the best. I don’t really scramble eggs at home that often.

Bourdain: I make a lot of omelettes still. I still. I hated cooking them professionally, but at home? You know, cooking an omelette for someone you care about –

Bowien: Yeah. Oh, it’s the best.

Bourdain: Unlike most of my career … that feels —

Bowien: Egg white omelettes ever? Have you done an egg white omelette for yourself ever?

Bourdain: You shouldn’t be intimate with anyone who just eats egg white omelettes. I mean, that’s the end of a relationship right there.

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It’s time to dive into the best horror movies currently on Netflix.

With Halloween around the corner, we’ve come up with the best on the streaming giant so you can enjoy the rest of the month scaring the heck out of yourself and your friends.

Check out the 27 scary movies below.

Note: Numerous Netflix titles drop off the streaming service monthly so the availability of titles below may change.

Brett Arnold contributed to an earlier version of this story.

SEE ALSO: 100 movies on Netflix that everyone needs to watch in their lifetime

1. "The ABCs of Death" (2012)

26 horror directors are each given a letter of the alphabet as a starting point to create a scary short.

2. "The Babadook" (2014)

A single mother struggling to keep up with her rambunctious son begins to lose it after a strange children's book comes to her doorstep.

3. "The Bad Batch" (2016)

Set in a dystopian future where the bad are thrown into a cannibal-filled wasteland in Texas, a girl (Suki Waterhouse) tries to survive. Movie stars Jason Momoa, Keanu Reeves, and an unrecognizable Jim Carrey. 

Fame can be quite fleeting.

As Heidi Klum would say, "One minute you're in, and the next minute you're out."

And the pressure of working in the competitive business can have an adverse effect, especially on child stars, USA Today reported.

The plight of Hollywood stars who achieved success, only to fall from grace due to drug use or erratic behavior, are well-documented.

So it's not surprising that some former celebrities simply moved on to other things after their brush with fame.

Some ex-stars who switched gigs stuck around the entertainment business and just gravitated toward behind-the-scenes jobs. Others went back to school to tackle a role in an entirely new industry.

Here's a look at some former stars who ended up in completely different careers:

SEE ALSO: 'It's not worth losing your job over': Bachelor, Amazing Race, and Survivor alums explain how reality stardom affected their careers

Jeffrey Allen "Skunk" Baxter — Guitarist for Steely Dan, The Doobie Brothers, and Spirit

Claim to fame: Baxter was a founding member of Steely Dan and later joined the Doobie Brothers. The guitarist has led quite a lengthy career in rock and roll, working with acts and artists like Dolly Parton, Ringo Starr, Rod Stewart, Eric Clapton, and others as a session guitarist.

What he does now: The storied guitar-for-hire now has top security clearances. In the 1980s, his interest in recording technology prompted him to research and become fascinated with military software and hardware. The Wall Street Journal reported that a paper Baxter wrote on missile defense attracted the attention of Congressman Dana Rohrabacher. He became a defense consultant for the US Department of Defense and other defense entities, Guitar Player reported.

Jeff Cohen — Lawrence 'Chunk' Cohen from 'The Goonies'

Claim to fame: Cohen shot to fame for his turn as clumsy, bad-luck-prone Chunk in the classic 1985 adventure film "The Goonies."

What he does now: Growing up, he was able to use his stint as a child actor to land roles at movie studios, according to the ABA Journal. He decided to go into law, earning his J.D. from UCLA after attending Berkeley. Cohen went on to cofound the entertainment-oriented law firm Gardner Cohen LLP.

Crystal McKellar — Becky Slater from 'The Wonder Years'

Claim to fame: McKellar acted alongside her sister Danica in the television series "The Wonder Years." Both sisters had been considered for the main role of Winnie, but Danica won out, and Crystal was brought on to play Becky Slater instead.

What she does now: During their time in show business, education was always a priority for the McKellars, according to Biography.com. McKellar went on to study at Yale and Oxford, and earned her J.D. at Harvard. Today, she's the managing director and legal counsel for Mithril Capital Management.

The Xbox One is a killer game console.

Not only is it a looker, but it's a powerful little box — the Xbox One "S" model seen above is the new standard for the console, replacing the original box that launched in 2013. It plays the same games, but looks better, does more, and costs less.

All of which means now is the best time there's ever been to buy a new Xbox One. Here's why:

SEE ALSO: 16 reasons why now is the perfect time to buy a PlayStation 4

1. It starts at just $250.

You can get a basic Xbox One S console, with 500 GB of storage, for $250. That said, you're just as likely to find a bundle with a mildly-aged game like "Battlefield 1" for the same price.

However, if you're willing to go a tad higher and drop $280, Microsoft has a bunch of different bundles this holiday that come with extra stuff that's more than worth your $30. There's a "Minecraft" bundle, with a ton of "Minecraft" stuff (including the game); there's a "Halo" bundle with a ton of "Halo" stuff (including the most recent game); etc.

Check out all the details on those bundles right here.

2. It’s backward compatible with a growing library of Xbox 360 games.

Microsoft, unbelievably, added this feature after the Xbox One launched. It's been a huge freebie to long-time Xbox owners — over time, more and more games from the Xbox 360 are supported on the Xbox One. So if you owned them for the 360, you already own them for Xbox One.

Any games you bought digitally on Xbox 360 automatically show up in your current collection, and all your progress and old save files will transfer over too. For physical Xbox 360 games, just slip the disc into your Xbox One and the game will download straight from Xbox Live. This also includes Xbox 360 game expansions, downloadable content, and achievements.

3. It’s a game console, plus a cord-cutting solution.

You don’t need an extra set-top box to enjoy TV and movies if you have an Xbox One.

It supports an array of video streaming apps like Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Video, Sling TV, ESPN, and Twitch. It can also play your Blu-ray discs and media from your storage devices via USB. You can even make Skype video calls over your Xbox if you have the Kinect accessory. And it’s super easy to switch back and forth between different content.

• The mission of leading Facebook's virtual reality business now falls on Hugo Barra who joined Facebook six months ago with the newly-created title "VP of VR."
• Despite lackluster consumer interest, early missteps and a lot of change in VR leadership, Facebook still has big plans to get a billion people into virtual reality.
• Barra sat down with Business Insider's Alex Heath and explained how he intends to accomplish such a lofty goal.

Despite tepid interest from consumers so far, Facebook still believes it can turn virtual reality into the next big thing.

"We want to get a billion people in virtual reality," CEO Mark Zuckerberg said onstage at the company's annual Oculus VR conference for developers this week in California.

The goal is an exceptionally ambitious one even for Facebook, which already boasts 2 billion users.

Consider the current state of VR: Research firm Canalys recently estimated that only two million VR headsets were shipped globally in 2016, with Oculus accounting for 400,000 of those shipments. (Facebook has yet to publicly disclose how many Oculus headsets it has sold.)

Facebook's latest VR bet is its Oculus Go headset, which will start at $199 when it ships in early 2018. The Oculus Go is intended to fill the "sweet spot" between expensive, higher-end VR systems like the Oculus Rift and lightweight headsets like Samsung's Gear VR, Zuckerberg said during his keynote earlier this week.

"It’s hands down the most accessible way to get into VR," Facebook's Oculus chief, Hugo Barra, told Business Insider in an interview after the keynote. "We’ve designed it with comfort as the most important target we wanted to hit."

Oculus Go represents just one of Facebook's multi-pronged efforts to grow its VR business, which currently lags behind competitors like Sony and HTC. Oculus is also starting to work directly with businesses and is developing an untethered version of its flagship, most expensive Rift headset called Santa Cruz.

New ways to sell VR

The task of leading Oculus now falls on Barra, who joined Facebook six months ago with the newly-created title "VP of VR" after serving stints at Xiaomi and Google's Android division.

One of Barra's recent announcements is the Oculus for Business Program, which allows enterprise customers to buy bulk orders of Oculus headsets for commercial use.

Oculus is already working with companies like Cisco and Audi to use its headsets in their workplaces, and expects to raise general consumer awareness of VR through the program.

That's because some of these businesses are creating VR apps for their own customers, often consumers, Barra said. For instance, Audi is using Oculus Rift headsets to give customers virtual car demos at some of its dealerships.

"We think that working with some of these business is going to create great consumer awareness for VR in general," Barra said.

Such plans are not unique. Microsoft is doing much the same by targeting its augmented reality headset, HoloLens, to businesses as well.

Meanwhile, Facebook will also try to raise awareness for VR in other ways. Oculus will run ad campaigns for its forthcoming Go headset and the lowered cost of its higher-end Rift system.

While Facebook currently has no plans to open retail stores, that idea isn't out of the question either, Barra said. "I think it’s plausible, but certainly not something we’re thinking about discussing at this point. It’s not a bad idea at all.” 

In fact, Facebook tested the retail idea a bit last winter, when it showed off its Oculus Rift technology in various short-term pop-up stores around the country.

Missteps and hardships

While Oculus faces mounting pressure from competitors like Sony and HTC, the VR division has also undergone its own string of hardships since it was acquired by Facebook for $2 billion in 2014.

Prominent VR evangelist and Oculus cofounder Palmer Luckey was forced out of the company earlier this year after it was discovered that he secretly funded anti-Hillary Clinton advertisements around the 2016 election.

Aside from Luckey's departure, Oculus's top leadership has been through a lot of other changes. CEO Brendan Irbe stepped down in December 2016. Its head of mobile VR, Jon Thomason, left for Uber in September 2017 after less than a year on the job.

And back in February, Oculus was ordered to pay game maker ZeniMax $500 million in damages for a lost lawsuit. Facebook is in the process of appealing the ruling.

For now, Oculus has to battle increasingly fierce competition from higher-end, gaming-focused headsets like Sony's PlayStation VR. Its untethered Santa Cruz headset, while impressive during a brief demo, doesn't have a ship date or price point yet. And Oculus Go won't ship in time for this year's holiday season.

Barra points to the 2,000 apps, including titles from the likes of Pixar, and over 100 million downloads on the Oculus platform as evidence that VR is already catching on outside of the early-adopter crowd. Zuckerberg has said Facebook plans to spend billions of dollars over the next several years on developing VR along with paying developers to create apps and games.

"Awareness comes with having a wide product portfolio," said Barra. "Amazing things take time to build."

SEE ALSO: Facebook has Wall Street under its love spell, and a Russian scandal isn't changing that

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: Playing this virtual reality game was the scariest thing I’ve ever done

Love it or hate it, Rotten Tomatoes has completely shifted how movies are marketed.

Over the summer, the review aggregator website proved just how much of an influence it has on general audiences as Sony strategically lifted the review embargo on “The Emoji Movie” so close to when it opened in theaters that its eventual rotten score didn’t completely destroy the movie’s opening weekend box office figures.

And recently, Martin Scorsese wrote a scathing guest column in The Hollywood Reporter about the site, saying that Rotten Tomatoes "set a tone that is hostile to serious filmmakers."

Rotten Tomatoes has been a thorn in the side of studios and directors for years, as they feel a low score on the site unfairly gives the perception that it’s a bad movie. But Avi and Joshua Stern think they’ve come up with an app that’s both a personalized online movie recommendation service while also a modern tool studios can use to drill-down how to spend advertising dollars.

MovieGrade is an app that gives its users a more personalized selection of movie titles to see compared to others like Rotten Tomatoes and IMDb. After answering a few questions about your likes of movies, genres, and actors, you are instantly given movies that the app believes you’d like to see. You can then begin grading and sharing grades with your friends.

It’s been out of Beta for a few months, and in that short time has gained a loyal following by cinephiles, but what the brothers are really focused on currently is grabbing the attention of studio marketing departments, believing their app (available on iOS, Andriod by end of November) can offer better personalized data.

“We just kind of got sick and tired of seeing all these rating platforms like Rotten Tomatoes that just gave us average percentages and we thought to ourselves, in this day and age, with technology being so advanced and so fast, how does something not exist that learns my actual tastes and take that into consideration when recommending movies for people to see,” Joshua Stern told Business Insider.

Joshua, who founded two apps before creating MovieGrade, and Avi, a movie producer, teamed with Boris Rabinovich as their CTO to build the algorithm in the app, which also lets you do a filtered search on all the titles available on major streaming services — a rare find on most apps and sites.

The startup has found in a short amount of time in the business that studios are starving for better data on what audiences want. As the general thinking for decades in Hollywood has been to spend millions to blanket the world with marketing on its blockbuster releases, the Sterns are trying to get the marketing heads to understand that, in today’s world, getting the loyal fans leads to a groundswell.

“We’re ready to disrupt the market,” Avi Stern said. “For advertising it's all personalization, so why should you market a movie to me that I have no inclination of seeing. Joshua loves Matt Damon, I'm going to market him Matt Damon movies, I'm not going to market him a scary clown movie knowing that he hates horror movies.”

This is not to say that all movie studios and distributors don’t do targeting marketing. They do. But the Sterns believe with MovieGrade they can specialize while also expanding the marketing. In the case of “mother!,” which received an “F” grade through CinemaScore — a company that conducts exit polling of wide releases during opening weekends — MovieGrade can go into its database and instantly target not just people who love “Rosemary’s Baby”-like horrors or Darren Aronofsky movies, but also fans of Jennifer Lawrence, Javier Bardem, Ed Harris, and Michelle Pfeiffer. 

“Right now studios are kind of just walking in the dark and it’s not a knock on them, it’s because the platforms don’t have any targeting data for users,” said Joshua.

MovieGrade will soon be able to prove itself to the Hollywood big wigs. The Sterns say numerous studios and independent distributors have asked if they can use their app at upcoming preview screenings. With the use of the app, marketers will instantly know the tastes of the people in the theaters, instead of combing through piles of written cards (which are usually passed out to audience members at the start of these kind of screenings).

The latest feature MovieGrade is pushing out is less business-to-business and more for the general consumer. It’s called “Blend.” The idea is that this will be a remedy to the indecision that often comes when friends or significant others try to agree on something to watch.

“It allows users to add different friends into their group on the app, they then just hit a button that says ‘Blend,’ and it automatically starts analyzing all the taste profiles in that group and shows you movies in theaters and on demand that you collectively would want to see,” said Joshua.

Here’s how Blend works:

Jeff Bock, senior box office analyst at Exhibitor Relations, says the movie business needs to take on more services that are attractive to the next generation. And something that can compete with Rotten Tomatoes isn’t bad, either.

“Rotten Tomatoes oversimplifies reviews, and sometimes that does a disservice to the film and film community,” Bock told Business Insider. “That said, studios have no problem blasting their advertising campaigns with positive reviews from Rotten Tomatoes, but maybe MovieGrade can offer an alternative.”

“We’re here to reinvent the word-of-mouth screening,” Avi said. “When studios complain to us and vent how Rotten Tomatoes can literally ruin a movie before it even comes out based on reviews where those reviewers just hate the genre that movie is in, we want to help them find the people who do love that genre so they can get their movies in front of those people.”

SEE ALSO: The director of Kate Winslet and Idris Elba's new movie recounts the grueling shoot at 11,000 feet — and how the crew almost revolted in the snow

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The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences voted on Saturday to oust Harvey Weinstein, the Hollywood mogul who has faced dozens of accusations in recent days of sexual harassment and rape.

The Academy's board of governors met Saturday and voted "well in excess of the required two-thirds majority to immediately expel him," a statement said.

"We do so not simply to separate ourselves from someone who does not merit the respect of his colleagues but also to send a message that the era of willful ignorance and shameful complicity in sexually predatory behavior and workplace harassment in our industry is over," the statement said.

"What's at issue here is a deeply troubling problem that has no place in our society."

The academy's board is comprised of 54 members, including major Hollywood names such as Steven Spielberg, Tom Hanks, Whoopi Goldberg, and Kathleen Kennedy.

Weinstein has denied that the alleged encounters were nonconsensual, but has apologized for causing "a lot of pain" to colleagues.

The allegations came to light in several bombshell reports from The New York Times and the New Yorker, which documented multiple women's experiences with Weinstein going back decades. Dozens of women have now stepped forward in news outlets or on social media to accuse Weinstein of sexual misconduct to varying degrees.

Most of the alleged encounters detail "business meetings" that occurred in Weinstein's hotel suites that turned into scenes of sexual harassment or assault. These accusations stretch back as far as the 1980s and include a variety of film industry figures, including actresses, assistants, and other employees.

After the stories broke, Weinstein was fired from the Weinstein Company, which he co-founded. The British Academy of Film and Television Arts also suspended Weinstein's membership, releasing a statement on Wednesday that called his alleged behavior "completely unacceptable and incompatible with BAFTA's values."

SEE ALSO: All the women who have accused Harvey Weinstein of sexual harassment or assault

Join the conversation about this story »

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Mayim Bialik, one of the stars of the popular sitcom "The Big Bang Theory," attracted sharp criticism on Saturday over an op-ed she penned for The New York Times about the multiple allegations of sexual assault and harassment made against Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein. 

In the op-ed, Bialik wrote that although she was "shocked and disgusted" by the allegations against Weinstein, she was not surprised by them.

"I quickly learned even as a preteen actress that young girls with doe eyes and pouty lips who spoke in a high register were favored for roles by the powerful men who made those decisions," Bialik wrote. 

Bialik went on to note the choices she makes today that she deems to be "self-protecting and wise."

"I have decided that my sexual self is best reserved for private situations with those I am most intimate with," she wrote. "I dress modestly. I don't act flirtatiously with men as a policy."

The op-ed drew immediate backlash from critics who said Bialik was insinuating that modesty and a conservative wardrobe can guard one against sexual assault. 

 Several observers pointed out that Bialik had missed that the central motive behind sexual assault and harassment is about power, not sexual desire. 

 "I have to say I was dressed non provocatively at 12 walking home from school when men masturbated at me," tweeted actress Patricia Arquette. "It's not the clothes."

Bialik's op-ed came on the heels of designer Donna Karan's comments over whether women today are "asking for it" by dressing and acting provocatively. 

"How do we present ourselves as women?" Karan reportedly said at an awards ceremony Sunday evening in response to a question about the accusations against Weinstein. "What are we asking? Are we asking for it? By presenting all the sensuality and all the sexuality? What are we throwing out to our children today? About how to dance, how to perform and what to wear? How much should they show?"

The New York Times broke the first bombshell report detailing several allegations against Weinstein, and The New Yorker followed up with a separate report which included several accounts of sexual harassment and assault, as well as some allegations of rape. Dozens of women, including Gwyneth Paltrow and Angelina Jolie, have now stepped forward to accuse Weinstein of sexual misconduct to varying degrees.

Most of the alleged encounters detail "business meetings" that occurred in Weinstein's hotel suites that turned into scenes of sexual harassment or assault. These accusations stretch back as far as the 1980s and include a variety of film industry figures, including actresses, assistants, and other employees.

After the stories broke, Weinstein was fired from the Weinstein Company, which he co-founded. The British Academy of Film and Television Arts also suspended Weinstein's membership, releasing a statement on Wednesday that called his alleged behavior "completely unacceptable and incompatible with BAFTA's values."

On Saturday, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences also voted to oust Weinstein.

Michelle Mark contributed reporting.

SEE ALSO: The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences voted to 'immediately expel' Harvey Weinstein

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: Roger Stone explains what Trump has in common with Richard Nixon

At 80 years old, Morgan Freeman is as active as he's ever been in film and television. 

From his numerous upcoming film credits, to his role as the executive producer and star of National Geographic's new docu-series "The Story of Us," Freeman keeps a hyperactive work schedule that would find most other octogenarians — or any working-age adult, for that matter — in a consistent state of fatigue.

In a recent conversation centered on "The Story of Us," Freeman told Business Insider about how his approach to self-discipline has allowed him to achieve longevity in his life and career. 

Freeman's passion to enlist in the US Air Force as a teenager appears as a touchstone throughout "The Story of Us," and his views on discipline have a certain military-like strictness to them.

When asked what his secret to longevity has been, Freeman responded, "Discipline," and then elaborated:

"Exercise, part of your discipline. How you eat, part of your discipline. I try not to overeat," he said. "One of the things that I discovered somewhere back down the line was that eating, for us particularly here, has become a habit, not necessarily a need. So if you try to keep it down to need, it's going to be much better for you."

He went on to contrast American society's current dietary habits with the "time in history" when obesity was rare and more physically demanding labor made eating a form of fuel.

"You know there are more obese people in the US than probably anywhere else? Because we can feed them," he said. "In the time in history when everybody had a job, an actually physical job to do — you get up in the morning, and you get your hoe or your axe or your saw, or whatever the tool it is that you're using, and you use it. And then at noon, you stop using it and refuel. And then you use it some more, and then you go home, and you refuel. 

"Now, let's say you get up in the morning, and you brush your teeth, you comb your hair and put on a suit," he continued. "And you go and sit down at a desk. You haven't used up anything, comparatively."

Freeman's six-episode series, "The Story of Us," finds the actor traveling the globe to interview a diverse multitude of people, including famous public figures like Bill Clinton and Nadya Tolokno of Pussy Riot.

In our interview, Freeman described the series as an attempt to "on some level, reduce the amount of tension between people who don't know each other."

Watch the show's trailer below:

SEE ALSO: Morgan Freeman talks Pussy Riot, the keys to longevity, and his new National Geographic show

DON'T MISS: How Andy Serkis went from playing Gollum to directing his first movie — and the pressure of making a non-Disney 'Jungle Book'

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: 9 details you might have missed from the trailer for 'Stranger Things' season 2

Jason Blum's Blumhouse Productions has teamed up with Universal to shake up the box office once again.

After having two of the biggest box office hits of early 2017 with M. Night Shyamalan's "Split" and Jordan Peele's "Get Out," Blumhouse has resurfaced from the fog of the summer movie season with another box office hit, "Happy Death Day."

Mixing the company's patented low-budget scary movie model with the classic plot of "Groundhog Day," the movie dominated the competition, which included Warner Bros.'s big-budget "Blade Runner 2049," to win the domestic weekend box office with an estimated $26.5 million, according to Variety.

The unique $4.8 million-budgeted scary movie, which follows a college student as she constantly relives the day of her murder until she can figure out the person behind it, was perfectly placed in the release schedule as the movie had little competition among other new releases this weekend and capitalized on the poor opening of the $150-million "Blade Runner 2049" had last weekend.

"2049" took in $15.1 million over the weekend on more than 4,000 screens ("Happy Death Day" was released on 3,149), which cements its future as being a high-priced cult classic like the original, as the movie hasn't even made $100 million domestically yet (at $60 million). But the weekend also showed once again that outside of some blue-chip IPs, most audiences want to spend their money on non-sequels these days.

Blumhouse proved that earlier this year as it surprised Hollywood with monster earners. "Split," made for $9 million and opening with $40 million domestically in January, went on to earn $278.3 million worldwide. A month later, "Get Out," made for $4.5 million and opening with $33.3 million, earned $253.1 million worldwide.

We'll keep an eye on "Happy Death Day" to see if it continues to build steam as we get closer to Halloween (the next major release is Marvel/Disney's "Thor: Ragnarok" on November 2), but it's getting to a point now where other studios and distributors will think twice before going up against a Blumhouse release.

SEE ALSO: The 27 best scary movies on Netflix

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: Jaleel White played Steve Urkel on 'Family Matters' for 9 years — here’s what he’s up to now

Netflix's new animated comedy "Big Mouth" follows seventh graders experiencing — or about to experience — puberty. Their bodies are changing, and they're developing sexual desires they just don't know what to do with it. 

"Big Mouth" has been a huge hit with critics, receiving a 100% on Rotten Tomatoes to become Netflix's highest-rated animated show.

Business Insider recently talked to Andrew Goldberg, a former “Family Guy” writer who co-created “Big Mouth” with comedian Nick Kroll (his best friend since childhood), Jennifer Flackett, and Mark Levin.

The main characters on the show, Nick (voiced by Nick Kroll) and Andrew (voiced by John Mulaney), are based on Nick Kroll and Andrew Goldberg. This means that a lot of the things that happen to Nick, Andrew, and the other teenage characters on the show are drawn from real life puberty stories.

"A lot of it is exaggerations and embellishment of stuff that really did happen to us," Goldberg said. And you might be surprised which storylines are actually based on true events. 

Here are some of the stories from "Big Mouth" that were inspired by real life, according to creator Andrew Goldberg:

SEE ALSO: We talked to the creator of Netflix's wickedly funny new show about puberty, which has a 100% on Rotten Tomatoes

Andrew c---- in his pants while he's dancing with his crush at a dance — Episode 1

The real story:

"I did in fact c--- in my pants at a bar mitzvah. So that was based on reality. My mother was very upset because she was upset that I didn't come to her afterwards and tell her that. 

Jessi gets her period while wearing white shorts on a school field trip to the Statue of Liberty — Episode 2

The real story:

"Nick and I had a very good friend growing up who later told us that she did in fact get her first period at the Statue of Liberty on a school trip."

Jay pokes a hole in his pillow and uses it to pleasure himself — Episode 6

The real story:

"We actually did have a friend who used to f--- his pillow. That was one that I was mesmerized by in real life."

President Donald Trump had made Twitter a defining part of his public relations style even before the 2016 presidential campaign, but now that he has been in office for over 8 months, many of his tweets from before the election have come back to haunt him.

As many on Twitter have noted, there seems to be an old Trump tweet for every current situation, ranging from Trump's firing of his communications chiefs to his handling of Hurricane Maria.

Here are the 9 of the best ones:

SEE ALSO: 'Policy didn't work!': Trump tweets of North Korea after hinting at war

SEE ALSO: The ruble dives after Trump tweets 'Was Obama too soft on Russia?'

On White House chiefs of staff:

This Trump tweet from 2012 criticized former President Barack Obama for having three chiefs of staff in three years, but so far, Trump's White House has had a much faster turnover rate at two chiefs of staff in less than seven months.

On loyalty to directors of communication:

After throwing Sen. Ted Cruz under the bus for firing his "capable" communications director in early 2016, Trump did the same thing — twice — after becoming president himself.

On golfing too often:

Trump lashed out at Obama for golfing too much during his presidency — and then went golfing himself 67 times since his inauguration amid numerous national crises.

Known for being the master of the motion-capture performance following his roles as Gollum, King Kong, Caesar (in the “Planet of the Apes” movies), and currently Supreme Leader Snoke (“The Force Awakens,” “The Last Jedi”), Andy Serkis is throwing a major curveball on all of us for his feature directorial debut.

“Breathe,” about the life of Robin Cavendish — who became paralyzed from the neck down from polio — and his wife Robin, is a traditional biopic that is fueled by the performances of its leads Andrew Garfield as Robin and Claire Foy (Netflix's "The Queen") as Diana. The intimate love story is a departure from the usual CGI-focused work Serkis is known for. The movie was made through his production company, The Imaginarium, which mostly focuses on mo-cap projects.

But this is only a brief departure.

The opportunity to make “Breathe” came to Serkis while he was in post production on an extremely ambitious project: A live-action “The Jungle Book” movie for Warner Bros. that will feature a lot of big name actors doing mo-cap of the legendary characters that were brought back to the zeitgeist after Disney's CGI blockbuster release of its own "Jungle Book" movie in 2016.

Business Insider chatted with Serkis in New York City about finding the time to make “Breathe,” why he’s completely okay with movies resurrecting deceased actors through CGI, the status of “Jungle Book,” and how he created the Snoke voice.

Jason Guerrasio: You run The Imaginarium with Jonathan Cavendish, the son of the main characters of "Breathe," Robin and Diana. How did you meet him?

Andy Serkis: Jonathan had seen a film I had made called "Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll" about Ian Dury, who was a polio sufferer, and a punk rocker first and foremost, and he loved it and began telling me the story about his father. And then he told me he had been developing the script for five years. So we started The Imaginarium.

Guerrasio: So basically you were like, good luck with all of that with your family script.

Serkis: Yeah, it wasn't really the idea I was looking for. We were looking for other directors to direct it. And then I took the script home and I was just floored by it. It was just so incredibly powerful and emotional and you never read scripts like this in terms of the emotional content of it. So I was like, "S---, I'm having lunch with him tomorrow and I think I'm going to pitch me directing his parent's life story." So I did.

Guerrasio: At this point it's just script stage, no talent attached.

Serkis: Right. None. And he said, "Yeah, let's do it." So we started developing it and then "Jungle Book" came along and we started working on that and then that became a long preproduction. We shot "Jungle Book," principal photography, worked on it for a year and a half, and then this weird opportunity came up in the long post production we've had. Andrew and Claire became available and we raised the money in seven weeks and we shot the whole thing in seven weeks.

Guerrasio: Was that a nice time to shut off the part of your brain that was focused on "Jungle Book" or while making "Breathe" are you juggling that as well?

Serkis: Juggling lots of plates.

Guerrasio: But was it fun to shoot something that wasn't going to be as heavy motion-capture as "Jungle Book" is?

Serkis: I was so looking forward to it. This joy of seeing the performance at the end of the day rather than waiting a year and a half to see how a character is going to turn out eventually was a joy.

Guerrasio: Is that the big difference of directing "Breathe" versus "Jungle Book," the immediacy of it?

Serkis: In many ways it's the least complicated shoot I've ever done. On "The Hobbit" for Pete Jackson I was his second unit director, so that was my first grand scale experience as a director. Stepping onto a set with 150 crew and working for 200 days straight. The technical side of it was a huge education. So I felt prepared when I went into "Jungle Book."

Guerrasio: Was it nice to go back to basics, so to speak, of traditional filmmaking with "Breathe?"

Serkis: The simplicity was tied together with the brief shooting days. On those big projects you have nothing but time, this was like we have to get all of this in seven weeks. There was pressure. I didn't want to just make a film that felt like a drama-documentary that's handheld and not lit well. I always wanted to make it cinematic. It's based on truth but I wanted it to feel like a fairy tale which gradually gets stripped away towards the end of the movie.

Guerrasio: What did Jonathan think of the movie?

Serkis: He was by my side every day.

Guerrasio: But it's one thing if you make a biopic and the person it's based on is still alive, you may meet them briefly and maybe they'll come out and do press. This is the son of the main characters right next to you. Was it more pressure?

Serkis: We're such close friends, it was a joy. And he's so objective about his life. He wanted to see it from the outside. That was a gift.

Guerrasio: So you found the right guy to be your business partner.

Serkis: [Laughs] That's true. It could have gone horribly wrong.

Guerrasio: What's the latest on "Jungle Book?"

Serkis: We're in a really good place with it. We shot the performance capture, it's live-action, so we shot in South Africa with this amazing young actor named Rohan Chand. Our version is darker in tone to the Disney one. Which I loved.

Guerrasio: So you have seen it?

Serkis: Oh, yeah.

Guerrasio: You didn't feel like, "I can't see it, I have to go in fresh with mine."

Serkis: No. No. Because I just wanted to make sure we weren't covering similar ground and I don't think we are. There was a point where we were neck and neck, these films were potentially going to come out within months of each other.

Guerrasio: Could you sit back and enjoy Jon Favreau's movie and not analyze the heck out of it?

Serkis: When we were shooting at the same time there was a bit of that worry, but I knew our script was for a PG-13 audience. It's a story about identity and we're using performance-capture as opposed to the whole jungle being CG. So, honestly, you can't think about the other one, you focus on what you're doing. I love where it is. We have designed these animals that you can very much see the actors' faces we have — Cate Blanchett, Christian Bale, Benedict Cumberbatch — in them.

Guerrasio: So you're just deep in post right now?

Serkis: Yeah. The animation is flowing. I think it's in good shape.

Guerrasio: I would like your thoughts on motion-capture in general. We've now had CGI versions of living people — Michael Douglas in "Ant-Man," Robert Downey Jr. in "Captain America: Civil War" — but also people who have passed away — Peter Cushing and Carrie Fisher in "Rogue One" — is there a certain line the industry should not cross in regards to using the tools we have?

Serkis: You mean digital resurrection?

Guerrasio: Exactly.

Serkis: I think if it's handled with taste and it honors actors who have passed and their families are happy, the estates are happy, if it's done in a respectful way, I think that's perfectly fine. But there has to be a good reason for doing it. Dramatically. Storywise. I mean, I think digitally resurrecting any character from history, Abraham Lincoln could have been performance-captured or Winston Churchill for that matter, it's a way of doing it. It's so funny because we love real stories and bringing people back to life through them. Think of how many actors have done an impersonation of somebody else. Wouldn't it be great to have the real Elvis Presley or someone through 3D imagery?

Guerrasio: The recent "The Last Jedi" trailer has Snoke’s voice prominently featured. How did you come up with the voice?

Serkis: When I first worked on it with ["The Force Awakens" director] J.J. [Abrams] there was an evolving design of the character. It was going through lots of changes. But it's all about where a character carries his pain, or aggression, or emotional centers and with Snoke it was very much there [putting his hands to the back of his head]. And his skull has got this big scar in the front, so for me it was a fracturing. He's got this cleft in his head and I think it's very painful for him to speak and yet there's an imperiousness about him. He's severely damaged but there's a vulnerability that's he's trying to cover so that was sort of what I was trying to do.  

Guerrasio: I'd like your thoughts on the recently news about Harvey Weinstein's alleged sexual harassment and assault. Weinstein was an executive producer on all the "Lord of the Rings" movies. What's your reaction to the revelations?

Serkis: I think there's no excuse for a culture that allows for any kind of bullying or coercion on predatory behavior and I think we are behoove not just in this industry but across all industries to be vocal about that and to encourage and help and support people who are brave enough to come out and to challenge people who are in positions of authority if they behave badly. That's it. 

SEE ALSO: Morgan Freeman talks Pussy Riot, the keys to longevity, and his new National Geographic show

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NOW WATCH: SCOTT GALLOWAY: Facebook could screen its advertisers, but it doesn't want to hurt profits

Larry Flynt, the founder of Hustler Magazine, bought out a full-page ad in The Washington Post on Sunday, offering $10 million to anyone with information that could lead to President Donald Trump's impeachment.

The ad said there was a strong reason to believe the 2016 election was "illegitimate in many ways" because Trump lost the popular vote, and was voted in because of an Electoral College "quirk" and Republican gerrymandering.

"Trump has proven he's dangerously unfit to exercise the extreme power accrued by our 'unitary executive'," the ad read.

Best known for founding the sexually graphic Hustler Magazine, Flynt has used his fame to influence politics before, according to The Washington Post. He endorsed Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton in 2016, and took out similar ads offering monetary rewards worth millions of dollars for information on Mitt Romney's tax returns, and for evidence that members of Congress or government officials had illicit sexual encounters.

Apparently one of the ads led to the resignation of Republican Congressman Bob Livingston in 1998 after he admitted he had extramarital affairs, according to CNN.

Flynt's ad went on to say there were several reasons Trump warrants impeachment, including his decision to fire former FBI director James Comey, his controversial response and "racial dog-whistling" following the white nationalist riots in Charlottesville, the risk that he might launch a nuclear war with North Korea, and his decision to pull the US out of the landmark Paris climate deal.

Comey's firing is currently the basis of an obstruction-of-justice case that special counsel Robert Mueller is investigating as part of his probe into Russia's interference in the 2016 election. Mueller also looking into whether the Trump campaign colluded with Moscow to tilt the election in Trump's favor.

Trump has also in recent weeks significantly ramped up his rhetoric against North Korea, which in turn has increased its nuclear aggression against the US.

The ad conceded that while impeachment would be a "messy, contentious affair," the alternative — another three years of a Trump presidency — was worse. Flynt also called for the release of Trump's tax returns, as well as other financial and business records, arguing that "there may be a smoking gun" and that "impeachment requires unimpeachable evidence."

The ad ended with Flynt saying that while he did not expect Trump's wealthy allies to turn on him, he believed that "there are many people in the know for whom $10 million is a lot of money."

Flynt said he could easily spend the $10 million on other things, "but what good would that do me in a world devastated by the most powerful moron in history?"

SEE ALSO: Trump's legal team is reportedly considering offering Mueller an interview with the president

DON'T MISS: Jake Tapper presses Rex Tillerson to answer whether he called Trump a moron

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: Columbia Law School professor explains exactly how impeachment works, and what it takes for a president to be impeached

After staying mum on the Harvey Weinstein sexual assault scandal last week, "Saturday Night Live" took on Hollywood's fallen figure in this season's third episode, hosted by Kumail Nanjiani.

Kate McKinnon, Leslie Jones, Cecily Strong, and Aidy Bryant appeared in a sketch of actresses discussing sexual harassment in Hollywood.

McKinnon, playing fictional Hollywood legend Debette Goldry, told a story about visiting Weinstein in his hotel room, where she found him naked, "hanging upside down from a monkey bar."

"He tried to trick me into thinking his genitals were actually his face. It almost worked — the resemblance is uncanny," she said.

Goldry finished the panel with a call to action.

"Violence against women, it doesn't just happen to famous actresses, it's everywhere, dammit. It's about time we take it seriously," she said. "Well, Pandora's box is open now, and Pandora's pissed!"

On Weekend Update, Colin Jost said Weinstein should go to prison instead of rehab for sex addiction.

"This is a tough spot for a comedian, because it's so hard to make jokes about sexual assault," Michael Che said, "but it's so easy to make jokes about a guy that looks like this! I mean, he looks like chewed bubblegum rolled in cat hair."

The cold open and monologue steered clear of Weinstein jokes, focusing instead on President Donald Trump and Nanjiani's backstory.

Alec Baldwin returned to play Trump, appearing at the rally to announce his tax plan with truckers, and calling Vice President Mike Pence (played by Beck Bennett) to tell him to ditch a Pacers game because a player knelt for the national anthem, a Starbucks because the Pumpkin Spice Latte cups didn't say "Merry Christmas", and a gay wedding.

Pence left last Sunday's game between the Indianapolis Colts and San Francisco 49ers after some players took a knee during the national anthem. Critics claimed the move was a political stunt.

Baldwin also brought up the president's reported feud with Rex Tillerson after the secretary of state allegedly called him a "moron", which the White House has strongly denied. In an interview with Forbes published Tuesday, Trump said he and Tillerson could compare IQ tests to settle who's smarter.

"By the way, I'm the only guy who even knows what I.Q. means," Baldwin said. "Most people don't even know what it stands for — in-quedible. A lot of people don't know that."

SEE ALSO: Ronan Farrow says he was 'threatened with a lawsuit personally' by Harvey Weinstein, and that NBC passed on his story

DON'T MISS: Alec Baldwin returns as Trump attacking San Juan's mayor and the NFL in 'SNL' premiere

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NOW WATCH: A Dungeons & Dragons master shows us how to play the classic game featured in 'Stranger Things'

Most people don't have the time to watch everything on TV, but this fall that's not a huge problem, since there aren't too many standouts.

This fall, HBO and Netflix scored hits with critically acclaimed new shows "The Deuce" and "American Vandal." But unfortunately there have been some stinkers, too (especially on CBS and ABC).

If you've run out of good TV to watch, or just want to catch up on new shows people are talking about, we took to ratings aggregator Rotten Tomatoes to rank the best (and worst) shows of fall 2017. 

Along with the critic ranking, we included the Rotten Tomatoes audience ranking, and show descriptions courtesy of IMDB. 

Here are the best (and worst) TV shows of fall 2017 so far, ranked according to Rotten Tomatoes:

SEE ALSO: Every HBO show ranked from worst to best, according to critics

20. "Marvel's Inhumans" — ABC

Critic score: 8%

Audience score: 51%

Description: An isolated community of super humans fight to protect themselves.

19. "9JKL" — CBS

Critic score: 17%

Audience score: 16%

Description: "9JKL" follows a time in Mark Feuerstein's adult life when he lived in apartment 9K in the building he grew up in, sandwiched between his parents' apartment, 9J, and his brother, sister-in-law, and their baby's apartment, 9L, and his attempts to set boundaries with his intrusive, but well-meaning family.

18. "The Orville" — Fox

Critic score: 20%

Audience score: 91%

Description: "The Orville" follows the crew of the not-so-functional exploratory ship in the Earth's interstellar fleet, 400 years in the future.

Marvel Studios has released the official trailer for "Black Panther". The film features Chadwick Boseman and Michael B. Jordan. Boseman plays T'Challa, who after the death of his father, must succeed to the throne of the technologically advanced African country of Wakanda. The movie is part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and is set to hit theaters on February 9, 2018.

Join the conversation about this story »

Director Woody Allen told the BBC on Saturday that the sexual assault and harassment allegations against Harvey Weinstein were "very sad for everybody involved."

"Tragic for the poor women that were involved, sad for Harvey that [his] life is so messed up," Allen said.

Allen's comments regarding the director came the same day that Weinstein was ousted by the Motion Picture Academy. 

Allen said he had never heard of any "horror stories" about Weinstein while working with him. Allen and Weinstein worked on several films together, including his Oscar-winning film "Mighty Aphrodite." 

"But you do hear a million fanciful rumours all the time. And some turn out to be true and some — many — are just stories about this actress, or that actor," Allen said.

Allen later clarified in a statement to Variety that he meant he felt "sad" for Weinstein because Weinstein is a "sad, sick man.”

Allen continued to say that he didn't think that the allegations against Weinstein should "lead to a witch-hunt atmosphere."

Allen has faced his own sexual abuse accusations. Allen's adopted daughter Dylan Farrow alleged he abused her when she was seven years old, in an open-letter for the New York Times in 2014. Allen denied Farrow's claims.

Dylan Farrow is also the sister of Ronan Farrow, who wrote the bombshell report published by The New Yorker that provided further insight into the sexual assault and harassment allegations against Weinstein. 

SEE ALSO: What 33 Hollywood stars have said about the Harvey Weinstein sexual harassment and assault allegations

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NOW WATCH: The full 'Black Panther' trailer is here — and it's amazing

Last Sunday,"Last Week Tonight" host John Oliver became the first late-night host to address the sexual harassment and assault accusations against Harvey Weinstein. And on Sunday night, Oliver continued to fire at Weinstein.

This time, however, he also took aim at The Academy of Motion Pictures, which kicked Weinstein out over the weekend, declaring "the era of willful ignorance and shameful complicity in sexually predatory behavior and workplace harassment in our industry is over.”

While Oliver agreed with the Academy's decision to kick Weinstein out, he said it's also hypocritical considering who's still in the Academy.

Weinstein is only the second person ever kicked out of the Academy. The first was actor and "The Godfather" star Carmine Caridi, who was kicked out for sharing screeners.

“Yes, finally the group that counts among its current members Roman Polanski, Bill Cosby, and Mel Gibson had found the one guy who treated women badly and kicked him out,” Oliver said sarcastically. “So, congratulations, Hollywood. See you at the next Oscars where – and this is true – Casey Affleck will be presenting Best Actress.”

Here's a quick summary of the accusations against the Academy members Oliver pointed to:

• Director Roman Polanski ("Chinatown," "The Pianist") fled the United States after he was convicted of statutory rape, on the day before his sentencing in 1978. As a French citizen, he is protected from extradition and has lived mostly in France ever since. His charges are still pending in the US.
• Comedian Bill Cosby has been accused by more than 60 women of rape, drug facilitated sexual assault, sexual battery, child sexual abuse, or sexual misconduct, with the incidents allegedly starting in the mid-60s. 
• Actor and director Mel Gibson made anti-Semitic comments, revealed in a 2006 arrest report, such as, "The Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world."
• Casey Affleck, who won the Oscar for best actor for his work in "Manchester by the Sea" in 2017, has been accused of sexual harassment by two employees on the set of "I'm Still Here" in 2010. One of the women alleged that Affleck crawled into bed with her without her consent while she was asleep. The other woman alleged that Affleck pressured her to stay in his hotel room and "violently" grabbed her arm when she refused. Affleck has denied the accusations. The claims were settled out of court.

It is worth noting that Oliver did not mention director Woody Allen, who's been accused of sexually abusing his adopted daughter Dylan Farrow (he's denied the accusations). Allen is not in the Academy. 

SEE ALSO: All the women who have accused Harvey Weinstein of sexual harassment or assault

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: The full 'Black Panther' trailer is here — and it's amazing