Month: March 2021

Drummer Don Heffington died Wednesday at age 70. He is best remembered by most music fans as a member of  Lone Justice from 1983-86, along with Maria McKee, Ryan Hedgecock, Marvin Etzioni and (as a part-timer) Benmont Tench. But Heffington’s legacy before and long after that stint includes recording or touring with dozens or  hundreds
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While more than half of all LGBTQIA+ adults in the U.S. identify as bisexual, less than a third of LGBTQIA+ characters on scripted television are bi — a statistic that has remained stagnant for five years, GLAAD president and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis tells Variety. “You’re talking about the largest community within our community,” Ellis
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Say you’re a wild, wayward but ultimately gold-hearted teen who gets busted for attempting to steal a cop car, and your weary, exasperated but ultimately on-your-side counselor offers you a choice of correctional penalty: an extended spell in juvenile hall, or one summer of singing, swimming and mild soul-searching at a Christian youth camp. Which
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Brazil’s “The Life That’s Left,” Costa Rica’s “Crono-Capsulas” and Chilean drama series “Silver Bridge” and “La Vida de Nosotros” ran out as four of the big winners at a vibrant and packed online 2021 Sanfic Industria that also underscored the depth of new talent in Latin America. Running March 18-25, Sanfic Industria, the constantly expanding
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Westbrook Studios, cofounded by Jada Pinkett Smith and Will Smith, is going into business with the family of Nastya, the hugely popular 7-year-old YouTube personality. Under the deal, Westbrook will partner with Nastya to develop a slate of animation projects, ranging from shows aimed at preschool-age kids to “four-quadrant family” programming. Terence Carter and David
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Having just pitched at the Sanfic-Morbido Lab, Chilean slasher flick project “Matria” will head to South Korea’s Bucheon (Bifan) in June on behalf of Ventana Sur’s Blood Window, where the project pitched to great success in late 2020. In the midst of its pandemic online market run, “Matria” has added two new key castings in
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Larry McMurtry, the Pulitzer Prize-winning writer whose novels, such as “The Last Picture Show,” “Terms of Endearment” and “Lonesome Dove,” were turned into award-winning films and who won an Oscar for co-adapting “Brokeback Mountain,” has died, according to The New York Times. He was 84. A spokesperson for McMurtry’s family confirmed his death to The
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As WWE Network is set to move exclusively to NBCUniversal’s Peacock streaming service next month, the media company is removing objectionable material from the wrestling franchise’s archives. WWE is shutting down WWE Network as a standalone service in the U.S. as of April 4, when customers will need to have a Peacock subscription to access
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AT&T and WarnerMedia have launched a multi-platform campaign to create awareness in support of #StopAsianHate, unveiling the campaign as part of “A Day of Action,” a national day of mourning and remembrance of communities affected by social injustice. Additionally, AT&T and WarnerMedia have announced a $7 million pledge to aid in the fight for social
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Hotly anticipated pan-European drama “Leonardo” bowed in Italy Tuesday (March 23) to stellar ratings, scoring a more than 28% prime time audience share on pubcaster RAI’s flagship RAI-1 station and prompting plaudits from Italy’s Culture Minister Dario Franceschini, as well as a huge sigh of relief from its creators, according to showrunner Frank Spotnitz. The
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John Farrar has succeeded long-time Barcroft exec Alex Morris as chief creative officer of U.K. specialist factual producers Barcroft Studios. Farrar was formerly creative director at Barcroft, the TV and digital video division of Future plc, and will also continue to lead Future Studios. Future acquired Barcroft for $30 million in 2019. Morris is departing
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A larger number of Chinese celebrities expressed support on Thursday for a nationalistic backlash against foreign-owned consumer goods brands that have expressed concern over the human rights situation in China’s Xinjiang Province. At least 40 Chinese stars canceled high-profile, lucrative sponsorship contracts. Among them were Zhou Dongyu and Jackson Yee, the stars of the best
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It’s a romantic comedy cliché: Boy goes on outrageous quest to win back the girl of his dreams, an adventure fueled by derring-do and impassioned speeches that gain urgency as the violins swell. Onscreen, those manic you-complete-me moments make audiences swoon. But in reality, they’d look like “Bad Trip,” a squirm-worthy exercise in vicarious humiliation
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Inspired by the real history of Bexhill-on-Sea’s Victoria-Augusta-College, a 1930s finishing school for the daughters of the Nazi elite, “Six Minutes to Midnight,” helmed by Andy Goddard, wants to be a Hitchcockian thriller, but merely manages a familiar pastiche peopled with stock characters that should divert less-discriminating viewers. The clunky plot, set circa August 1939,
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For most singer-songwriter types, advancing to the wizened age of 31 and then thinking about recording something you wrote as a high school student and didn’t think was strong enough to release then would seem about as agreeable as volunteering for a waterboarding demonstration. But then, most singer-songwriters are not Taylor Swift, who did win
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