Sarah Palin Chosen Out of 'Desperation'

And Julianne Moore as Sarah Palin is still pretty scary: reactions

(NEWSER) - If you thought Julianne Moore's Sarah Palin was terrifying in the first Game Change teaser , wait until you see her in the full trailer, where she utters lines such as, "We have to win this thing. I so don’t want to go back to Alaska." Watch below, then read on for some reactions:

• This will clearly be "a Frankenstein-esque story about McCain’s staffers coming to regret the choice they made in bringing a little-known governor into the limelight," writes Jon Bershad at Mediaite . "The full trailer ... gives us even more famous actors getting their turn to stare in horror at the 'monster' they’ve created."

HBO debuts first teaser

(NEWSER) - For all of you who have spent the past nine months wondering how Julianne Moore’s Sarah Palin impersonation will stack up against Tina Fey’s , you finally have your answer. HBO debuted its first teaser trailer for Game Change, the film due in March that's based on the Mark Halperin-John Heilemann book about the 2008 presidential election. Neither Ed Harris as John McCain nor Woody Harrelson as top adviser Steve Schmidt sound much like their real-life counterparts, notes David Jackson in USA Today , but Moore’s Palin is spot-on: Numerous publications including People , New York , the Huffington Post , and Jezebel are fairly impressed. More»

Heilemann and Halperin drop plenty of 'spicy' bombshells

(NEWSER) - From Bill Clinton’s rumored affair to Harry Reid’s “negro voice” quote, John Heilemann and Mark Halperin’s Game Change is already making headlines. The book delivers a “spicy smorgasbord of observations, revelations, and allegations,” writes Michiko Kakutani of the New York Times . Some parts of it reveal “impressive legwork and access,” while others are essentially gossip or spin from particularly cooperative sources, many of whom are unnamed. More»

Bill Clinton enraged Kennedy, lost endorsement for Hillary

(NEWSER) - John McCain and Sarah Palin had their well-publicized differences on the campaign trail, but things were no better over in Camp Obama-Biden, reports Politico in a look at further details emerging from Mark Halperin and John Heilemann's new book. Game Change reports that the prez and his veep were barely speaking, and that Obama aides hid conference calls from Biden, while others "kept a tight rein on him." Elsewhere in political gossip emanating from the book: More»

An average of 2.1M viewers watched premiere

(NEWSER) - Love it or hate it , you can't argue that Game Change was a good move for HBO: The movie debuted Saturday to an average of 2.1 million viewers, the largest audience for an original-film premiere on the channel in nearly eight years. A total of 3.6 million viewers watched its four showings over the weekend, BusinessWeek reports. The film, which charted Sarah Palin's rise, was based on portions of Mark Halperin and John Heilemann's book of the same name. More»