Month: June 2021

When Rufus Wainwright was asked to write a closing theme song for “Rebel Hearts,” a documentary about a renegade order of socially activist nuns that opens this weekend, he didn’t require the preamble that virtually any other singer-songwriter would have. It was intergenerationally personal for him, as he was already intimately familiar with the subject
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Universal Music Group and Snap announced a multiyear global agreement that will let Snapchat’s users incorporate UMG’s catalog of recorded music and content into creative tools, including Sounds on Snapchat and augmented reality Lenses. Under the terms of the deal, UMG’s entire recorded music catalog is available on a global basis in Snapchat’s Sounds tool,
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Tracee Ellis Ross and Michaela Angela Davis will executive produce and narrate a new docuseries about Black women, beauty and identity through the distinctive lens of Black hair. “The Hair Tales” hails from the Onyx Collective, Disney’s recently launched content brand for creators of color and underrepresented voices on Hulu. The docuseries, produced by Joy
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Colman Domingo, known for “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” “Fear the Walking Dead” and “Zola,” is adapting his award-winning play “Dot” as a dramedy entitled “West Philly, Baby.” The series, a co-production between AMC Studios and the AMC Networks-owned streamer ALLBLK, is one of the first projects from Domingo’s Edith Productions to be developed under its
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SPOILER ALERT: Do not read if you have not yet watched the Season 5 premiere of “The Good Fight,” streaming now on Paramount Plus. The fourth season of “The Good Fight” was cut short because of the COVID-19 pandemic, running for only seven episodes last spring instead of its planned 10. Yet, it ended perfectly, with
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Lauren Jarvis, formerly Spotify’s head of content partnerships for North America, has joined subscription book club startup Literati as chief business officer. At Spotify, Jarvis managed the audio streamer’s catalog of more than 2 million podcasts. She also oversaw Spotify’s major exclusive deals like “The Joe Rogan Experience” and Dax Shepherd’s “Armchair Expert.” Before joining
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On September 24, an previously unreleased 1968 live album by Johnny Cash that was recorded by Owsley “Bear” Stanley, the Grateful Dead’s legendary concert documentarian (and lysergic sherpa), will be issued by the Owsley Stanley Foundation and Renew Records/BMG. “Bear’s Sonic Journals: Johnny Cash, at the Carousel Ballroom, April 24 1968,” is a 28-song concert
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Great British soccer star Jamie Vardy has teamed up with Love Productions USA on a new documentary series, “Rhino Reboot,” that will see him attempt to rebuild underdog soccer team The Rochester Rhinos. Vardy, a Premier League soccer player who has also played for England, co-owns the Rhinos along with Sacramento Kings co-owners David and
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Despite an unprecedentedly difficult year, the Chinese film industry has come roaring back. In August 2020, China became the first country in the world to achieve “full box office recovery,” according to the U.K.-based industry analytics firm Gower Street. Remarkably, Chinese box office data as of mid-June 2021 is tracking 1% ahead of the same
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As Europe’s summer film festivals restart after taking a year of COVID-prompted pause — the notable exception being Venice — the Cannes Film Festival shift into July has caused an August overload. But the disruption hasn’t dampened enthusiasm on the circuit. With no shortage of movies to launch and vaccinated local audiences keen to get
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It’s a face off between Jonathan Majors, Idris Elba and Regina King in “The Harder They Fall,” and if the western’s trailer is any indication, audiences need to get ready for a dirty, dusty and dangerous ride. On Thursday, Netflix released the first full look at the highly-anticipated western starring Majors, Elba, King, Zazie Beetz
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To what lengths will a desperate mother go to recover her kidnapped daughter? That’s the central question posed in Belgian-Romanian director Teodora Ana Mihai’s first fiction feature “La Civil,” which is set to debut at the Cannes Festival in the Un Certain Regard section. “La Civil” was produced by Hans Everaert’s Menuetto with the assistance
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The Locarno Film Festival will open this year’s 74th edition on Aug. 4 with the world premiere of Italian director Ferdinando Cito Filomarino’s latest thriller “Beckett,” starring John David Washington, Boyd Holbrook, Vicky Krieps and Oscar-winner Alicia Vikander. After the film’s Locarno premiere, Netflix will launch the film worldwide on Aug. 13. “Beckett’s” presence marks
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The Match Factory has released the trailer for feature “Amparo,” which marks the return to the Cannes Festival of Colombia’s Simón Mesa Soto, a Palme d’Or winner in 2014 for his short “Leidi.” Playing Cannes Critics’ Week, Mesa Soto’s jump from short to long feature is produced, alongside with cinematographer Juan Sarmiento G., by Colombia’s
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Wattpad, a top user-contributed fiction app, is combining its TV, film and books division with the studio operations of digital comics platform Webtoon. The combo comes a month after South Korea-based Naver, Webtoon’s owner, closed the $600 million acquisition of Wattpad. Naver said it will fund the newly merged Wattpad Webtoon Studios with a commitment
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The Cannes Film Festival has unveiled the jury for the competition, which will be powered by a majority of women, including American actor-filmmaker Maggie Gyllenhaal, French actor-helmer Mélanie Laurent, French-Senegalese actor-director Mati Diop, Austrian director Jessica Hausner and cult French singer Mylene Farmer. Spike Lee will presider over the jury which will also include French
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On Tuesday, David Crosby declared to Howard Stern’s listeners that filmmaker Robert Zemeckis would be directing a documentary on Crosby, Stills & Nash, making possible use of “10,000 hours” of existing footage as well as fresh interviews. On Wednesday, that announcement got walked back a bit, with word that the tantalizing prospect of a full-on
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Justin Timberlake is sending a public message of support to his ex-girlfriend Britney Spears, just hours after she made a passionate statement in court, pleading with a judge to end her controversial conservatorship. “After what we saw today, we should all be supporting Britney at this time,” Timberlake tweeted on Wednesday evening. “Regardless of our
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