The poster that is original ‘The Gambler’ starring James Caan and Lauren Hutton; Mark Wahlberg will be playing this role in the remake.
Modern audiences often capture the classics of literature via their film versions; take Victor Hugo’s ‘Les Miserables’ or Charles Dickens ‘A Christmas Carol’. Mention Fyodor Dostoevsky to a more youthful generation of Internet-raised intelligentsia, and you could get nothing but a stare that is blank and the 1974 film variation, loosely in line with the prolific writer’s novella, may not resonate far more either. But that film’s original cult success has now spurred movie giant Paramount Pictures to attempt a remake of the classic movie (which in addition is not related in almost any way to the Kenny Rogers classic country song of the identical title) with an all-star cast that can hold a unique against the initial.
Too much to Real Time Up To
The remake has some iconic performances to complement up to, that’s for sure; not to mention quite a bit of Hollywood lore that went on during the production that is original recording. For example, a then-very-young James Caan (who from 2003-2007 played the casino magnate lead in the hit TV series ‘Las Las vegas’), was reportedly grappling with his very own real-life cocaine addiction during shooting; he was also nominated for a Golden Globe for his role as Axel Freed, an English professor in New York City whose gambling addiction overtakes his life. In some sort of art-imitates-life-imitates-art affect, in the film, Freed is teaching his pupils Dostoevsky, but in his life that is personal massive gambling addiction has, needless to say, left him saddled with debt; become specific, $44,000 owed to his bookie Hips that he cannot come up with on their own.
Freed gets your debt compensated by his own mother, and heads off with his girlfriend Billie (played within the film that is original gap-toothed model Lauren Hutton) to Sin City, where he pulls an Archie Karas-style rise and fall of gambling fortunes move. Billie has to bear the brunt of his wrath at losing his amassed fortune back again, when she expresses her displeasure at loan sharks turning up at all hours of the night and day to get their due. And while Axel believes his grandfather that is own will him out of hot water this time, he’s sadly disappointed if the guy will not have anything to do with him.
Debt Repayment Arrange
Up against a wall surface with no way to pay back his debts and bookies hounding him, Axel recruits one of his pupils who’s a black colored basketball star to take a bribe from a single of their bookies to shave points in an upcoming game. When that stunt is taken off, Axel goes confidently to the ghetto together with his student friend, ignoring warnings from his main bookie it’s a dangerous area.
Of course, he ends up fighting a pimp when he refuses to pay a hooker, and Axel gets the best of that match, only to be slashed across the face by the unhappy prostitute. In the scene that is final he stares at his bloody face in a mirror, and smiles as if knowing that that is where life has brought him.
The version that is original Paul Sorvino as Hips, Caan’s ingratiating bookie, among an all-star cast that included a young James Woods; additionally the remake promises no less in its recasting of this classic. Mark Wahlberg is taking on the role of Axel Freed, with an aging Jessica Lange best known to current audiences for her starring role in American Horror Story on television as Axel’s wealthy and mother that is over-the-top. Brie Larson is apparently cast in the Lauren Hutton/girlfriend role of Billie this go-round.
No word yet on when production will start, or when the remake is expected to hit theaters.
New Players in American Gaming Association Set to Lobby Congress Hard
Getting ready for a lobbying that is major in Congress, the United states Gaming Association has had five new seasoned veterans on board (Image: AFP/Robert Sullivan)
It’s a new year, and the winds of change continue to blow, in Washington, D.C. especially. And the casino industry’s most trade that is prominent which really is a low-key means of saying ‘lobbying group’ is arming for battle, it seems, by bringing in some new senior staff to make their case to lawmakers, an instance that includes continuing to hound Congress for federal oversight of online gaming.
Not that Congress has been particularly receptive to that bid yet, but hope springs eternal.
Ready for Battle
The American Gaming Association (AGA) announced the latest staff members early this week, noting that their primary functions will be to amp the group up’s marketing efforts and also to clarify their policy functions. That will be fun, thinking about the AGA’s very own membership is at major odds as far as what that policy ought to be; while most members heartily endorse or at least are using an approach that is wait-and-see online video gaming and its legalization, one prominent and long-time user nevada Sands Corporation’s Sheldon Adelson stays vehemently compared, and is investing an incredible number of his own bankroll into anti-Internet gambling campaigns and his own army of lobbyists to promote that agenda.
Nonetheless, AGA president Geoff Freeman who so far has pretty diplomatically skirted the internal wars among his casino industry constituents issued a generically worded statement on the hirings that hinted at a strongly pro-internet lobbying agenda.
‘Through groundbreaking research, aggressive outreach and on-the-ground activities, this team of experts will position the AGA to champion gaming’s value as being a driver of innovation and economic growth,’ Freeman’s media quote reads. You can only assume that ‘innovation and economic growth’ refer mainly to your expansion of legalized online poker and gambling over the United States; as everyone surely knows by now, Nevada, Delaware and nj happen to be ready to go, and California is looking like maybe it’s next.
In the event that Golden State does legalize at least on-line poker, it’ll be a game-changer, provided their 38-million-ish in-state populace, which dwarfs next-largest currently online, New Jersey, by almost 29 million prospective players.
Bringing Plenty of Ammo to the Fight
Freeman claims the newest hires all have gaming industry backgrounds, along with experience in both the sector that is private with other trade associations. Translation: they discover how to schmooze, no matter the setting or agenda. After all, that is basically what lobbyists do, besides delivering implied promises of financial support to those who promise to back their organizations’ agendas.
The new group has pretty impressive resumes: i.e., connections garnered over a long time of previous schmoozing. They add a vice that is former of public affairs, Sara Rayme, whom helped push through MGM Resorts’ move into the Maryland land casino market; a former vice president of government relations, Chaka Burgess, who brings 20 years of coalition building, lobbying and ally development experience with him: that ability should be tested utilizing the AGA’s factional membership base. Burgess previously worked with Amgen, Inc. a biotech manufacturing firm as a director inside their international government affairs division.
Then there’s a previous senior manager of communications for the U.S. Travel Association (Freeman’s previous workplace before joining AGA in 2013), Allie Barth; Overseas Game Technology (IGT) former director of gaming policy Elizabeth Cronan, and finally a brand new basic counsel, Virginia Hurt Johnson, who will come in with 30 years of private and sector background that is public.
Freeman himself has only seven months because of the group under his belt; he took over from the lobbying organization’s first and only CEO that is previous and Frank Fahrenkopf, Jr. when the latter retired in June 2013.
The latest hires mirror a momentum that is renewed the AGA: industry leaders Steve Wynn of Wynn Resorts Ltd. and Frank Fertitta III of Stations Casinos, along with Kentucky’s Churchill Downs racetrack and casino, all recently signed up as well. Wynn and Fertitta will be on the AGA’s Board of Directors to boot.
CoinYe West Enters Cryptocurrency Market with New Brand of Coins
There is gold in them thar hills or at least, a fresh type of cryptocurrency called CoinYe West hopes there is when it launches January 11.
Branding your name onto an endless selection of items is nothing new for major celebrities, but some new digital currency creators have undoubtedly pushed the envelope this time. Because a new knockoff of Bitcoins that is set to launch on January 11 utilizing the cringe-worthy name of CoinYe West hasn’t even received Kanye West’s papal blessing for the play on words.
CoinYe Oh CoinYe
Obviously, Kanye isn’t the mastermind behind the technology here either, and nobody is revealing whom is. But in an interview that is recent Vice.com an online pub that encompasses all thinks hipster artsy-fartsy the secretive creators said that ‘Coinye West is just a cryptocurrency for the masses. Bitcoin is for hardcore money-hoarders, and Dogecoin was more for the Internet-meme https://myfreepokies.com/indian-dreaming-slot-review/ crowds … Coinye West to our goal is to make it easier for people to use cryptocurrency.’
If you’ve been residing in a cave and are nevertheless unfamiliar with cryptocurrencies, they are essentially decentralized, unregulated, difficult-to-trace economic systems whose values are based solely on peer-to-peer market perceptions. These currencies’ appeal has been the privacy that accompanies their usage; and as they may have some legitimate online locations, they’ve become infamous as the only transaction currency for sites like Silk Road a site that specializes in all things nefarious and illegal, from drugs to tools to illegal services for hire. Although turn off and seized a months that are few by the Feds, Silk Road quickly reemerged ‘under brand new management,’ and was back again to business as always, apparently with tighter encryptions and more secrecy than ever.
Because of their perception-only-based values, there happen wild swings for other existing cryptocurrencies; most notably the market frontrunner Bitcoins, which has seen values veer from because low as $60 final Spring to over $1,000 in November, so when of this writing, rests at about US$953 but that may change at any 2nd.
A pronouncement that is recent the Chinese government that their banks would no longer be allowed to carry away transactions with the digital currency saw U.S. exchange rates drop in to the $600s, and then mysteriously bounce back up again perhaps not long after.
Plenty of Competition
There now look like somewhere in the neighborhood of 60 Bitcoin knockoffs, so CoinYe would hardly be Bitcoins’ first competitor, if it requires down. Brands with names like Peercoin, Namecoin, Litecoin, Dogecoin and Ripple all are attempting to drive the digital gravy train, which for Bitcoin has ended up being largely based on sales of the gear utilized to ‘mine’ the money an ironic nod to the original silver miners in California, where people who sold miners’ supplies typically made the fortunes that eluded the majority of the miners themselves.
