عربي English Türkçe اردو فارسى
Logo
Latest News
Entertainment

'Gladiator 3' Already in Works, Say Director And Star

Paul Mescal says he would be "massively down" to appear in Gladiator III. Photo: AP PHOTO
Paul Mescal says he would be "massively down" to appear in Gladiator III. Photo: AP PHOTO
TT
TT

'Gladiator 3' Already in Works, Say Director And Star

Paul Mescal says he would be "massively down" to appear in Gladiator III. Photo: AP PHOTO
Paul Mescal says he would be "massively down" to appear in Gladiator III. Photo: AP PHOTO

Ridley Scott's long-awaited "Gladiator" sequel has not even hit US theaters yet, but the veteran director is already hard at work on a third installment.
"Gladiator II," which arrives in North American cinemas Friday, stars Irish actor Paul Mescal ("Normal People") as Lucius, the son of Russell Crowe's Maximus from the multiple Oscar-winning original, AFP said.
A bloody, blockbuster epic of revenge, treachery and -- yes -- gladiators, it has drawn positive reviews and already hauled in a muscular $87 million at the global box office since opening in several countries last week.
"Given the performance in the rest of the world that we've seen yesterday, there's certainly going to be a 'Gladiator III,'" said Scott, in Los Angeles on Monday for the movie's glitzy US premiere.
"Because it also becomes financial, and you'd be insane not to consider a third version," said the British director of seminal films such as "Blade Runner" and "Thelma & Louise."
The plot of "Gladiator II" was also "planned to leave it wide open to a sequel," added Scott, a famously prolific filmmaker who is still directing roughly a film per year at the age of 86.
The second film opens with Lucius -- sent into exile by his mother to avoid certain death in Rome -- battling in vain to defend his adopted North African home city from the arrival of seemingly unstoppable Roman soldiers.
Captured as a prisoner of war, he is brought back to the imperial metropolis, where he must prove his worth in the Colosseum in order to exact revenge on invading general Marcus Acacius, played by Pedro Pascal.
Danish actress Connie Nielsen reprises her role as Lucilla from the 2000 original, while Denzel Washington is already earning Oscar buzz for his conniving, mercurial and highly flamboyant ringmaster, Macrinus.
"Jewelry, sandals and everything -- I just looked like a Roman pimp... I couldn't put on enough rings," joked Washington on Monday.
'Political'
Mescal -- whose character battles bloodthirsty baboons, rhinos and sharks in addition to humans in "Gladiator II" -- also expressed excitement about returning for another film.
But he said Scott had discussed a new direction for the plot that would not simply "go back to the arena as we know it."
"The last time I spoke to (Scott) he said he had nine pages. Yesterday, he said he had 14," Mescal told journalists.
"I would be excited for it to go into a more political sphere," with Lucius thrust into a world of court intrigue that he does not want to inhabit, like Michael Corleone in "The Godfather," added Mescal.
Asked how the second film's themes tackled power and politics differently, some 24 years after the original Scott said: "They're exactly the same."
"A super-rich man thinks he can take over the Empire. Is that familiar?" he said, just days after billionaire Donald Trump's re-election as US president.
"We don't learn anything historically. We keep repeating the same mistakes. We're going through exactly the same thing right now in several parts of the planet," he added.

Most Viewed

 
 
Entertainment

Composer of Piaf's 'Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien' Dies Aged 95

Charles Dumont wrote a classic song for Edith Piaf. CHRISTOPHE ARCHAMBAULT / AFP/File
Charles Dumont wrote a classic song for Edith Piaf. CHRISTOPHE ARCHAMBAULT / AFP/File
TT
TT

Composer of Piaf's 'Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien' Dies Aged 95

Charles Dumont wrote a classic song for Edith Piaf. CHRISTOPHE ARCHAMBAULT / AFP/File
Charles Dumont wrote a classic song for Edith Piaf. CHRISTOPHE ARCHAMBAULT / AFP/File

Songwriter and singer Charles Dumont, who composed the song "Non, je ne regrette rien" ("No, I do not regret anything") made world famous by Edith Piaf, has died aged 95, his partner told AFP Monday.
Dumont, who had also collaborated with American singer Barbra Streisand and French-Italian 1960s star Dalida, died at home after a long illness.
French Culture Minister Rachida Dati called Dumont "a towering figure of French chanson".
A trumpeter by training, Dumont saw his career transformed at the turn of the 1960s when he convinced the star singer Piaf to perform one of his compositions, after having been forcefully refused several times.
"We turned up at her home, and she let us in," Dumont told AFP in 2018 about the day in 1960 when he managed to see Piaf together with his lyricist, Michel Vaucaire.
"I played the piece on the piano, and ... we became inseparable," he said, adding that the song -- which he had written in 1956 aged 27 -- revived Piaf's career that he said had been flagging.
"Non, je ne regrette rien" has since become an unforgettable classic of Piaf, who died in 1963.
"My mother gave birth to me, but Edith Piaf brought me into the world," Dumont told AFP in a 2015 interview.
"Without her, I would never have done everything I did, neither as a composer nor as a singer," he added.
For Dumont, this meeting marked the beginning of a fruitful working relationship with Piaf, resulting in his writing more than 30 songs for her.
'Goodbye young man'
On occasion she straightened him out, like one night after a concert when he complained to her that the audience had not been good.
"She looked me straight in the eye and said: 'It's not them who are bad. It's you who was no good'," he remembered.
The collaboration with Piaf gave Dumont the confidence to approach Streisand, who was already a star in the 1960s and well on her way to becoming one of the biggest-selling recording artists ever.
A music publisher suggested he should offer her his services, advice he later described as "destiny" giving him "a kick in the behind".
He went to New York, and played for her on a piano in her dressing room in a Broadway theater. "She said to me 'I like this very much. I'll make the record. Goodbye young man'," he said.
Streisand released a single with Dumont's "Le Mur" sung in French on the A side, and its English version "I've Been Here" on the B side, in 1966.
Dumont's last appearance on stage was in 2019 in Paris.
"When you come back in front of an audience, who come to see you as they came 20, 30 or 40 years ago and give you the same welcome, then they give you back your 20s," he said.