Month: September 2021

BBC director general Tim Davie has said that the government’s shock cabinet reshuffle on Wednesday, which saw the ousting of yet another Culture Secretary, points to a dire need for a “really serious, grown-up” dialogue with government to discuss the future of the creative industries. Davie, whose Thursday morning keynote opened the second and final
0 Comments
Sky’s outgoing director of drama Cameron Roach has launched Rope Ladder Fiction, a Manchester-based independent production company. The company’s focus will be on providing training and development opportunities to new talent and to create scripted content. It is already working with some of the industry’s most prolific broadcasters and commissioners on a range of projects,
0 Comments
Helsinki International Film Festival – Love & Anarchy’s return to live, in-person screenings is an occasion for national celebration, says Anna Möttölä, the executive director of the event, now marking its 34th edition. While cinemas in Helsinki must still be limited to 50% capacity for pandemic precaution reasons, screenings of hot new titles such as
0 Comments
Kevin Mayer, chair of live sports streaming service DAZN, has confirmed his ambitions of acquiring rights to the globally popular English Premier League (EPL) soccer championship. In May, rights to the EPL, worth £5 billion ($7 billion) remained with the existing trio of Sky, Amazon, and BT Sport and DAZN was not permitted to participate
0 Comments
Japanese stars Ito Hideaki (“Tokkai”), Kasamatsu Sho (“Flowers and Rain”) and Yamashita Tomohisa (“The Man from Toronto”) have joined the cast as series regulars on “Tokyo Vice.” The series is backed by streaming service HBO Max, Japanese pay-TV leader Wowow and Endeavor Content. The Japanese and English-language crime drama series boasts a previously announced headline
0 Comments
“The Activist,” a CBS series that had itself become the target of online activism in recent days, is being reconfigured in response to the firestorm of criticism, and will now become a one-time documentary special instead of a five-episode competition series, Variety has learned. Although footage for the original incarnation of the series had already
0 Comments
Hillary Clinton and Chelsea Clinton have outlined the strategy behind their nascent film and TV company HiddenLight Productions, revealing that they have optioned a number of books, including Jacqueline Winspear’s “Maisie Dobbs” series. Speaking at the Royal Television Society conference in Cambridge on Wednesday, the Clintons appeared via a virtual live-link, in conversation with British
0 Comments
Regional Australian funding body Screen Queensland has set up two projects, one a feature film, one a TV series, emanating from its relationship with fan-driven literary platform Wattpad Webtoon. Both will enjoy further input from super-fans before heading into production. Writer Dominic Morris and producer Nadine Bates from Brisbane production company Like A Photon Creative have been chosen to adapt “The
0 Comments
Since launching her YouTube channel in 2009, Claudia Sulewski has taken the digital world by storm. At 18, the then-beauty vlogger was named the host of Teen Vogue’s official YouTube channel in 2015. Since then, she’s transitioned into acting. Sulewski recently landed her biggest acting role to date, playing Becca in writer-director James Morosini’s “I
0 Comments
Stacey Snider has run major movie studios and a very well-heeled independent production company over her long career in Hollywood. Now for the first time, she’s working for herself as a partner with Elisabeth Murdoch and producer Jane Featherstone in Sister. The executive, who has steered Universal Pictures, DreamWorks and 20th Century Fox is now
0 Comments
“Forget My Name,” “Life” and “Stolen Kids” proved some of the big winners at the 2021 Conecta Fiction awards ceremony in Pamplona, northern Spain on Wednesday night as the Europe-Latin America co-production forum reached its climax. A female spy drama-thriller charged emotionally by an effective mother-daughter relationship, “Forget My Name” won one of the most
0 Comments
“Boys State,” “Dick Johnson Is Dead,” The Social Dilemma,” and “76 Days” all won Emmys last weekend during the Creative Arts ceremonies, but they share another distinction: They are the last documentaries able to win a statuette from the Television Academy for the same nonfiction film that successfully qualified for Academy Award consideration. The Television
0 Comments
Maija Isola, who died in 2001, was a Finnish designer of printed textiles. She created more than 500 patterns, including home furnishings and fashion company Marimekko’s most iconic print, “Unikko” (“Poppy”), in 1964 – ironically enough, right after the company’s founder Armi Ratia declared a ban on flower patterns. But a new Finnish-German production tries
0 Comments
Disney’s “Shang-Chi” is heading for a box office three-peat. The Marvel superhero adventure, starring Simu Liu and Awkwafina, is projected to generate roughly $17 million between Friday and Sunday, which would represent a decline of around 50% from the weekend prior. Though two new movies — Clint Eastwood’s “Cry Macho” and “Copshop” with Gerard Butler
0 Comments
Finnish writer-director Khadar Ayderus Ahmed, born in Mogadishu, continues to enjoy his first feature’s successful festival run. Screening this week in Toronto, “The Gravedigger’s Wife” premiered at Cannes Critics’ Week in July. “We finished the shoot in 2019. We were invited to Cannes last year, but decided to wait for better times,” explains the helmer.
0 Comments
The Hamptons Intl. Film Festival will open with the world premiere of Matthew Heineman’s “The First Wave” on Oct. 7 and buzzy titles including Pablo Larrain’s “Spencer” as the Saturday centerpiece film and Jane Campion’s “The Power of the Dog” in the additional spotlight selection. The in-person festival ends Oct. 13 with Wes Anderson’s “French
0 Comments
Jellysmack, a company that optimizes the distribution of creator videos and other content, has tapped Sean Atkins as president. Atkins has served as an official adviser to Jellysmack since 2019. He brings more than two decades of experience to Jellysmack after previous stints as CEO of RTL Group’s Digital Video Group, president of MTV, chief
0 Comments
Negotiations between the studios and the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees have reached a “critical juncture,” the union’s president told members on Wednesday. The union’s 13 West Coast locals appear to be headed toward a strike authorization vote, as negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers have dragged on with little
0 Comments
Check out an Official Behind the Scenes Featurette for The Eyes of Tammy Faye starring Jessica Chastain and Andrew Garfield! Let us know what you think in the comments below. ► Buy tickets for The Eyes of Tammy Faye: https://www.fandango.com/the-eyes-of-tammy-faye-2021-224881/movie-overview?cmp=MCYT_YouTube_Desc Want to be notified of all the latest movie trailers? Subscribe to the channel and
0 Comments
Actor and singer-songwriter Inigo Pascual has joined the cast of Fox’s upcoming musical drama “Monarch.” Previously announced cast members include Beth Ditto, Trace Adkins, Susan Sarandon, Anna Friel and Joshua Sasse. The series follows America’s “first family” of country music, including mother Dottie Cantrell Roman (Sarandon), father Albie Roman (Adkins) and daughters Gigi Taylor-Roman (Ditto)
0 Comments
Fresh off Juho Kuosmanen’s win at Cannes – where his “Compartment No. 6” was awarded the Grand Prix in July, sharing the prize with Asghar Farhadi’s “A Hero” – Finland’s Aamu Film Company will focus its attention on Tia Kouvo’s “Family Time,” scheduled to shoot in February and March 2022. Produced by Jussi Rantamäki and
0 Comments
A who’s who of some of the most famous faces among the Hollywood’s Asian diaspora turned out to support writer, director and actor Justin Chon at the Los Angeles premiere of his buzzed-about new film “Blue Bayou,” including Awkwafina, Benedict Wong, Jimmy O. Yang, Harry Shum, Jr., Manny Jacinto and George Takei. Chong told Variety
0 Comments
This is the third installment of a five-part series examining the transformation of television as the industry prepares to celebrate the Primetime Emmy Awards on Sept. 19. The pandemic has transformed the casting process – for now, at least – with Zoom actor tryouts largely replacing in-person sessions and self-taped auditions supplementing those as many
0 Comments