*By Conor White*
"Mad Men" creator Matthew Weiner's new anthology series for Amazon, "The Romanoffs," is about far more than Russia's last royal family, according to one of its stars.
"As I said to Matthew when I was doing this, I have to bone up on the Romanoffs," actor Aaron Eckhart said in an interview on Cheddar.
"And he said, 'Well, not really, because it really has nothing to do with the Romanoffs.'"
The family consisted of Tsar Nicholas II, his wife, and five children. After Russia's February Revolution of 1917, Nicholas II abdicated the throne and was later executed with the rest of his house. Within the last 30 years, all the bodies have been discovered and identified through DNA testing. Despite that evidence, whispers remain that one of his children, most likely Anastasia, escaped the killings. (The tsar's youngest daughter inspired the popular animated film, "Anastasia," which was recently turned into a musical.)
The Amazon ($AMZN) series features a different cast in each of its eight episodes, which are all linked by some sort of connection to the famous family ー be it real or fabricated.
Eckhart said it's the relationships between the show's characters ー whether directly linked to the royals or not ー that makes the show special.
"The magical part of the show is that it has thematics, and it has through lines with the Romanoffs," the Golden Globe nominee said. "But it's all these different scenarios with different people all over the world."
The series is creator Weiner's return to television after his seven-season run with "Mad Men" ー the highly-acclaimed show garnered two Golden Globes for "Best Drama Series" and eight Primetime Emmy awards.
It was Eckhart's first time working with Weiner, and he said the experience was "educational, interesting," and "fascinating,"
"It's very surprising and striking and bold. It takes a real genius to figure this all out," Eckhart added.
In the age of binge-watching, Amazon has made the choice to release one episode per week after releasing the first two episodes simultaneously on Oct. 12.
Eckhart is a fan of the move and called it "more traditional." But he admitted he has binged his way through at least one classic series.
"I did binge-watch 'Friends'," he said.
"'Friends' is a very good show."
For full interview [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/meet-the-romanoffs).
Facebook has failed to properly address its “black people problem,” a former employee told Cheddar Wednesday. Earlier this month, former partnerships manager Mark Luckie sent a searing memo criticizing the company’s lack of racial diversity to Facebook employees shortly before he left his post. He recently published the memo, which quickly went viral.
TOMS Founder Blake Mycoskie told Cheddar in an interview he decided after the recent shooting in Thousand Oaks, Calif., near his home, that it was incumbent on businesses to act where lawmakers could not.
Venezuela, once a vibrant economy with some of the richest oil reserves in the world, is now in economic crisis. Brian Price, executive producer of a new documentary "Venezuela: State of Disaster," explores how a country with so much promise devolved into utter economic disaster, where hospital patients are now told to "bring their own lightbulbs" to surgery so the doctor can see.
Logitech may eye a Turtle Beach acquisition as it turns away from a Plantronics deal. "Logitech has a great history as far as making very smart M&A transactions," said Tom Forte, a senior research analyst at D.A. Davidson. "I do see a potential longer term for Turtle Beach to be acquired. Logitech is one potential suitor ー Microsoft's ($MSFT) another," he added.
These are the headlines you Need 2 Know for Wednesday, Nov. 28. 2018.
Columbus, Ohio, may not have won the bid for Amazon's HQ2, but the city isn't ready to retire its proposal quite yet. Mayor Andrew Ginther said the city's leaders plan to use their application as a road map to transform Columbus from a Midwestern destination into a national one.
A bill to legalize recreational marijuana use in New Jersey passed a panel vote, and now heads to a full vote and governor's desk. State Sen. Gerald Cardinale of New Jersey, explains why he's against it when it comes to traffic accidents and youth usage in this week's episode of Cannabiz.
Paper Magazine's latest cover, featuring actress Amanda Bynes, is 'breaking the internet.' Paper's first internet-breaking cover featured a booty-bearing Kim Kardashian in 2014. NIcki Minaj's provacative photo shoot in 2017 was a close second. Paper's Executive Editor, Abby Schreiber, stops by to talk about the buzzy interview with the former Nickelodeon star, and why the magazine decided that a fully-clothed redemption tale would break the internet this year.
When Asha Curran helped New York-based cultural center 92nd Street Y dream up Giving Tuesday in 2012, she hoped at least 100 nonprofits would participate. She never could have imagined that six years later, it would become a global day of giving and charitable acts across more than 150 countries worldwide. Curran spoke with Cheddar this Giving Tuesday to discuss just how far the day has come and why it manages to feel authentic across borders.
The cannabis industry's go-to packaging supplier KushCo Holdings is taking full advantage of the green rush. And when marijuana finally goes fully legal in the U.S., the company plans to re-emerge as the leader in ancillary products.
