The daily gossip: November 14, 2019

1. Joaquin Phoenix is down for a Joker sequel

Joker is nearing the fabled threshold of $1 billion at the global box office, which can only mean one thing: Sequel time! But while Warner Bros. would no doubt greenlight pretty much any movie with the word "Joker" in the title right now, star Joaquin Phoenix is being a little more selective about a possible followup, merely saying he feels the character offers "too much to explore" in a single movie — so he'll no doubt be relieved to hear there were literally four other movies featuring the Joker before his Joker arrived.

Los Angeles Times

2. Robert Pattinson is a Method acting skeptic

Method acting has often been deemed a necessary cost of great art, because the only thing more obnoxious than then being a jerk to your coworkers is coming up with a pretentious excuse to justify it. But if you need a welcome sign that Method acting is going out of vogue, look no further than Robert Pattinson, a very good actor who has no patience for bad behavior disguised as Method acting. "You only ever see people doing Method when they're playing an a–hole," observed Pattinson. Which isn't entirely true: Tom Hanks spent his whole career immersed in the persona of a super-nice guy before he was cast to play Mr. Rogers.

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Variety

3. Kate Beckinsale says her first kiss was horrible

Even at the best of times, first kisses can be pretty awkward, but Kate Beckinsale's memory of her "horrible" first kiss includes a particularly nauseating extra ingredient: Meat. The actress recalled a first kiss with a boy who had just eaten a meat lovers' pizza — and when they locked lips, she realized "there's all that kind of wet activity inside the other person's mouth, with lots of bits of sausages in as well." We know it's probably too late, but man, if you're out there, a little friendly advice: Finish chewing and swallowing before you plant one on a future actress who will someday need a hilarious anecdote for a late-night show.

Fox News

4. Mark Wahlberg shifts to a supporting role in the Uncharted movie

Ah, the ever-changing winds of Hollywood. One decade, you're the hot young star at the center of your own action franchise; the next, you're the grizzled old mentor paired with the new hot young star. That's exactly what happened to Mark Wahlberg, who was slated to star as the main character in a big-budget adaptation of the PlayStation video game series Uncharted in 2010. After languishing in Hollywood purgatory for a while, Uncharted is back on… with Spider-Man: Homecoming star Tom Holland set to play the hero, and with Wahlberg set to play his older, cigar-chomping mentor Sully. (To be fair: If anyone can appreciate a new kid on the block, it's Wahlberg.)

Entertainment Weekly

5. Rod Stewart spent 23 years building a model train set

Plenty of celebrities have their vices, but Rod Stewart is hooked on a particularly expensive and addictive habit: Model trains. In a recent interview, the rocker revealed he's spent the past 23 years building an elaborate model train set, which weaves through a large fictional city of his own creation, in the attic of his Los Angeles mansion. As Stewart explained, he's so dedicated to realistic detail that he has ensured each stone in the pavement is a slightly different color — retroactively calling the title of his album Never a Dull Moment into question.

TMZ