Names and faces
■ Mads Mikkelsen will replace Johnny Depp as dark wizard Gellert Grindelwald in “Fantastic Beasts 3,” Warner Bros. confirmed Wednesday. The casting news comes just weeks after Depp was pushed out of the role and resigned at the studio’s request. Danish actor Mikkelsen, 55, appeared as Dr. Hannibal Lecter for three seasons on TV’s “Hannibal,” Kaecilius in “Doctor Strange” and Galen Erso in “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story,” to name just a few of his many credits. Speaking about the Grindelwald role earlier this month to IGN, he said it was “on the rumor basis as we speak. So I know as much as you do from the newspapers. So I’m waiting for that phone call.” He didn’t have to wait long. The latest installment in the series, based on books by “Harry Potter” author J.K. Rowling, is currently in production at Warner Bros. Studios Leavesden outside of London. It has been rescheduled for a July 2022 release, postponed from the original November 2021 plan. Depp played Grindelwald in 2016’s “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them” and 2018’s “Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald,” both of which starred Eddie Redmayne as quirky “magizoologist” Newt Scamander. Depp, the “Pirates of the Caribbean” star, had filmed only one scene for the newest “Beasts” movie before the casting upheaval. Depp lost the franchise gig in early November after losing a U.K. libel case involving ex-wife Amber Heard. Lurid personal details were revealed during the course of the case, which Depp filed against a British tabloid that labeled him a “wife beater” in a 2018 article. He intends to appeal the court’s decision.
■ George Clooney last week accused the “propaganda machine” of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban of lying about him, adding that he would be ashamed if he didn’t speak out against Hungary’s “authoritarianism” and listing illiberal measures taken by the European Union member state. “The Orban regime owns all the media, forces all the companies to comply by draconian taxation policies, silences the free press, requiring permits to photograph their razor wire fences, demonizes the disenfranchised, and winks at far right extremists,” Clooney said in a statement. Clooney’s criticism of Orban’s government came after Hungarian officials slammed the actor for “foolish” remarks about Hungary and suggested that he was repeating the talking points of George Soros, a Hungarian-born U.S. billionaire and Orban foe. The dispute between the American actor and the Hungarian state was sparked by a brief remark Clooney made in an interview with GQ Magazine that was posted Nov. 17 on YouTube.