Screening this week at Series Mania, “Doce” is a seven-part series about Portugal’s first major girl band. It is a musical odyssey in a country that was undergoing radical transformations in the wake of the 1974 revolution. “Doce” represented Portugal in the 1982 Eurovision Song Contest and were glitzy trailblazers of a new world of
Month: September 2021
Tom Llamas is ready to leap into an increasingly crowded field for evening news. The NBC News anchor, who previously led a streaming evening program at ABC News, is preparing for the launch of a digital evening endeavor for NBC News, a project he vows will have a kinetic feel and range a little further
HBO Max has finally come to Vizio’s SmartCast platform in the U.S., bringing the WarnerMedia streamer to one of the country’s best-selling TV brands. Consumers who have Vizio SmartCast-enabled televisions and who subscribe to HBO Max will be able to sign into the app to get access to the service’s 13,000-plus hours of premium content.
Billy Porter is following in Whitney Houston’s footsteps. The “Pose” star plays the Fairy Godmother in Amazon’s “Cinderella,” writer-director Kay Cannon’s new take on the classic fairy tale. It’s the same role Houston played in the 1997 TV-movie with Brandy in the title role. “My 14-year-old sissy self is doing backflips, spinning around like the
From the outset of Amazon Studios’ new “Cinderella” movie, writer-director Kay Cannon welcomes audiences into a fantasy unlike any before it, putting a glimmering girl-boss gloss on the oft-adapted fairy tale. In this heightened unreality, characters can break into song with a Janet Jackson chart-topper as easily as they belt out a new Broadway-style power
Effie T. Brown, Gabrielle Union and Taraji P. Henson are joining forces to bring the fantasy graphic novel “Sorcerority” to the big screen. Brown’s Gamechanger Films secured the rights to the fantasy novel by Mikhail Sebastian and George Watson earlier this year, and subsequently partnered with Union’s I’ll Have Another Productions and Henson’s TPH Entertainment
The BBC has evacuated a third of its staff and their families from Afghanistan with the help of U.K. government and military. The hundreds of evacuees are now being supported by the corporation and government in the U.K., where they are being processed as refugees. A senior BBC source told Variety last week that the
Reed Birney, the stage and screen veteran best known for his Tony-winning turn in “The Humans,” has joined the packed cast of Mark Mylod’s “.” The Searchlight Pictures dark comedy has already lined up an impressive ensemble of heavyweight talent, including the previously announced Anya Taylor-Joy and Ralph Fiennes. The rest of the cast includes
Celebrating its 48th edition, the Telluride Film Festival announced its official programming selections, which include world premieres of Kenneth Branagh’s “Belfast,” Mike Mills’ “C’mon C’mon,” Joe Wright’s “Cyrano” and Reinaldo Marcus Green’s “King Richard.” Also on the docket are Jane Campion’s “The Power of the Dog,” Maggie Gyllenhaal’s “The Lost Daughter,” Paolo Sorrentino’s “The Hand
“The Show,” as the Telluride Film Festival programmers refer to its annual feature program, is back this year with a wide array of documentary award season contenders. Muhammad Ali, Arthur Ashe, Jacques Cousteau, Anthony Fauci, Francisco Fellove and the Velvet Underground are the subjects of various docus in this year’s lineup. The nonfiction lineup also
With a busted lip and a bursting heart, an arm gone weirdly numb and pounding feet punishing a pair of pink Nikes throughout, Marija, as played by breakout Žygimantė Elena Jakštaitė, bears “Runner” aloft from frantic start to fraught finish like an Olympic torch. An 87-minute-long anxiety attack masquerading as a movie — but in
L.A.’s Rich and Successful Film Festival launches Sept. 4, starting at 1 p.m., at the Lumiere Music Hall in Beverly Hills. The festival spotlights work by independent filmmakers who live in Los Angeles County. Indie production company Sogbots, which is presenting the fest, said there were more than 100 submissions, and there will be 14
The summer of George may have passed them by, but at least “Seinfeld” arrives on Netflix well ahead of Festivus, or television fans may have had a lot of grievances to air this year. All 180 episodes of the classic 1990s sitcom are launching Oct. 1 on the streaming giant. “Larry [David] and I are
The television adaptation of the hit video game series “Life Is Strange” is enlisting music star Shawn Mendes and Anonymous Content. The TV version of the Square Enix games hails from Legendary Television and dj2 Entertainment, with Anonymous Content now also producing. Anonymous and Legendary will serve as co-studios, with Legendary as the lead studio.
Every generation rolls their eyes at the one after (who inevitably roll theirs back), but the striking thing about Dina Duma’s “Sisterhood,” which plants its eerily atmospheric growing-pains drama deep into Macedonian Gen-Z culture and lights it up with phone screens and insta posts, is how depressingly little the pressures of coming of age have
Michael B. Jordan’s upcoming college basketball showcase, spotlighting men’s teams from Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) added Turner Sports and Invesco QQQ as partners. The newly named Invesco QQQ Legacy Classic will take place on Saturday, Dec. 18, at the Prudential Center in Newark, N.J. TNT will televise the doubleheader competition between Hampton University
A month ahead of his 70th birthday, Sting has unveiled his 15th solo studio album, “The Bridge,” and its first single, “If It’s Love.” The 10-track album was recorded during the pandemic and will be released Nov. 19 via A&M/Interscope/Cherrytree Records. Says the former Police frontman of the lead track, which is reminiscent of a
In “The Last Socialist Artefact,” businessmen Nikola and Oleg travel to a rusted-out town in the Balkans to convince its citizens to restart the factory which once employed so many of them. This sparks a journey both individual and collective, and over six episodes their character is revealed, tested, and changed. Each episode is named
Netflix released a trailer for “The Circle” Season 3, which premieres Sept. 8. The four-week reality competition series will begin with eight new players as they compete to become a top social media influencer and win $100,000. Over the course of the season, as original players are eliminated from the titular circle, a few new
Selena Gomez’s ice cream endeavor is expanding. A year after launching a line of ice cream flavors with Serendipity3, the iconic New York City restaurant now offers the Selena Sundae on its menu. Created by Gomez, the $29.95 dessert features Cookies & Cream remix ice cream covered in hot fudge, cream-filled cookie crumbles, pink sugar
The legacy of 9/11 and America’s response will be remembered on the 20th anniversary of the terror attacks by country stars taking part in a series of TV specials on the Circle Network, hosted by the Grand Ole Opry and in partnership with the veterans’ group the Wounded Warrior Project. Running on Sept. 11 between
New Europe Film Sales has closed several deals for “Leave No Traces,” from Polish director Jan P. Matuszyński (“The Last Family”), which has its world premiere in competition at the Venice Film Festival. Variety has been given exclusive access to the film’s trailer. Produced by Aurum Film, the production house behind Jan Komasa’s Oscar-nominated “Corpus
British Asian actor and newly established writer Anjli Mohindra is set to adapt BBC journalist Anita Anand’s biography on Princess Sophia Duleep Singh under a development deal with “War of the Worlds” producer Urban Myth Films. Urban Myth has snapped up television rights to Anand’s book on the fascinating Duleep Singh, who was of Sikh
European arms industry corruption, forbidden love in 1920s Berlin and the impact of public outrage on the justice system are some of the themes explored by upcoming Germans TV productions showcased on Aug. 30 on the opening day of the Series Mania Forum in Lille, France. In collaboration with German Films, the presentation offered a
“Fauda,” “False Flag” and “No Man’s Land” producer Maria Feldman is teaming with Israeli director Dror Shaul on “The Collective,” an epic drama series set against the background of the early history of one of Israel’s best known institutions: the kibbutz. Created, written and to be directed by Shaul, “The Collective” is set up at
Former “Good Morning Britain” host Piers Morgan has been cleared by British regulator Ofcom over comments he made about Meghan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex. Speaking the morning after Markle and husband Prince Harry’s interview with Oprah Winfrey aired in March, Morgan said he didn’t “believe a word” of Markle’s claims, including that she was
One moment, Julie, just 18, a fashion influencer, 159,258 followers, is swanning down a street in Copenhagen, with her BFFs Constanze, Micke and Sofia. The next, her parents and big brother are dead, killed in a plane crash in Africa. Julie gets the family mansion, but can’t think of any good reasons for living. There’s
Keshet International (KI) has closed its first international pre-sale for ZDF and Viaplay’s upcoming nationalist domestic terrorism thriller “Furia” to Australian broadcaster SBS, announcing the sale on the occasion of the show’s world premiere at Lille’s Series Mania. “Furia (“The Furies”)” was inspired by, but not based on, real events of domestic terrorism in Norway
L.A.’s Whip Media, a leading international enterprise software platform and aggregator of entertainment-related data, has appointed Jaime Otero to the newly created role of VP of business development and content strategy. The company also announced that Brazil’s Globo – the largest media group in Latin America, Univision’s VIX AVoD platform and Spain’s Onza are joining
Leonine Studios has picked up six-part event series “Herzogpark,” one of the first big-budget offerings commissioned by German broadcast giant RTL’s streaming service TVNOW. Leonine will handle worldwide sales, and is set to launch global distribution at next month’s Mipcom market in Cannes. The show, from “Bad Banks” producer Letterbox Filmproduktion, is directed by Jochen