Among the performers being set for Wednesday’s “CMT Artists of the Year” telecast, “This Is Us” actress Chrissy Metz has been slated to perform a salute to one of the annual honorees, Luke Combs. Sam Hunt and Lady Antebellum will each do the same for an artist who’s getting a lifetime achievement award, Reba McEntire.
Music
October 10, 2019 7:53AM PT “MJ,” a musical based on the life and career of Michael Jackson, will open on Broadway in summer 2020. Preview performances will start July 6 before its official debut on Aug. 13. The stage show, which will include songs like “Beat It,” “Billie Jean,” “The Way You Make Me Feel,”
Ahead of the July 2020 opening of SoFi Stadium, the future home of the Chargers and Rams, it was announced today that PepsiCo has landed the exclusive contract to provide soft drinks and snacks at the stadium and Hollywood Park, the 298-acre global sports and entertainment complex adjacent to the venue in Inglewood, Calif. To celebrate
With a hip-hop theme and judges Cardi B, Chance the Rapper and T.I., Netflix’s “Rhythm + Flow” is hardly your ordinary music competition. Over 10 episodes staggered across three weeks, the judges scour the country for promising hip-hop artists who can also perform and produce their music. They take in auditions in four cities and
Songwriter and producer Teddy Geiger, recently best known as music superstar Shawn Mendes’ key behind-the-scenes collaborator, has renewed a global publishing deal with Big Deal Music Group and Family Affair Productions, the companies announced Thursday. Big Deal and Family Affair first signed Geiger five years ago, when she was first beginning to partner with Mendes
Elliot Grainge’s 10K Projects announced today that it has signed producer-songwriter Taz Taylor and his creative collective Internet Money to a joint venture label deal. The first track released under the new agreement is “Somebody,” by Internet Money featuring Lil Tecca and A Boogie Wit Da Hoodie, which is being released on all platforms tomorrow
The MTV Europe Music Awards (EMAs) have been a major platform for stars on the precipice of a career launch, among them Katy Perry, who hosted in 2008, Bebe Rexha (2016), Rita Ora (2017) and Hailee Steinfeld (2018). For the 2019 show, broadcasting live from Seville, Spain on Nov. 3, Becky G will handle emcee
October 10, 2019 12:01AM PT Showtime has picked up a feature length documentary about iconic British band New Order. Mike Christie (“Hansa Studios: By The Wall 1976-90″) produced and directed “New Order: Decades.” It follows the group’s preparations as they re-stage their collaboration “So It Goes” with the artist Liam Gillick and a 12-piece synthesizer
October 9, 2019 6:30PM PT Credit songwriter Ross Golan for the seamless quality of “The Wrong Man,” his mesmerizing musical about a good man who deserves a good life but seems to attract nothing but bad luck. The show’s inventive book, music, and lyrics were all penned by this multi-hyphenate talent who was named 2016
“Bear and a Banjo,” a new podcast from iHeartRadio, is a throwback to the time when families huddled around the living room radio to hear Orson Welles’ Mercury Theater, or “The Shadow,” with its famed come-on, “Who knows what evil lurks inside the hearts of men?” It’s a way of creating new folk tales for
Here’s another use for the word “duh,” outside of its repeated inclusion in Billie Eilish’s hit single, “Bad Guy”: There’s not a ticket left for her first American arena tour — surprising no one. That’s the case for most of her 2020 shows in the rest of the world, too. Pollstar reports that a half-million
In the entirety of its 33-year history, South by Southwest’s 2019 event had the greatest economic impact on businesses and residents in Austin, Texas, according to an analysis prepared by Greyhill Advisors in conjunction with SXSW. The study showed that this year’s conference brought $355.9 million of revenue into the Austin economy. “SXSW is a
Kristin Chenoweth doesn’t just want to star in Broadway musicals. She’s thinking about writing one, too. Listen to this week’s podcast below: “I think about it a lot,” Chenoweth said on the latest episode of “Stagecraft,” Variety‘s theater podcast. “I want someone to collaborate with me on a story I have, and it would be
It’s no secret. Netflix has what a lot of the broadcast networks want: creative freedom, no censorship and a seemingly endless pool of money for talent. But what the streaming giant has not had is a music competition series — until now. With hits like “The Voice,” “America’s Got Talent,” “American Idol” and “The Masked
Rihanna doesn’t do many interviews these days, but she didn’t hold back in her new cover story with Vogue, where the singer and entrepreneur talks about President Trump, her new album and why, even though her mentor Jay-Z has pacted with the NFL, she’d never headline the Super Bowl. Rihanna has been outspoken in her
Filmmaker Cameron Crowe has joined the lineup for Variety‘s second annual Music for Screens Summit, where he’s set for a keynote interview to discuss adapting his Oscar-winning “Almost Famous” into a newly premiered and already highly praised stage musical. Crowe, who’s also responsible for directing and/or writing such music-heavy films as “Say Anything” and “Fast
Hayley Kiyoko will be honored by the Trevor Project, a leading organization dedicated to suicide prevention and crisis intervention for LGBTQ youth. Kiyoko will receive the “Youth Innovator Award” at the TrevorLIVE LA event for her commitment to supporting lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and questioning young people. Previous honorees include Amandla Stenberg, Tyler Oakley,
Lana Del Rey has announced the next U.S. leg of her tour in support of her latest album, “Norman F—ing Rockwell,” with an additional run of shows across the U.S. this fall. Produced by Live Nation, the additional eleven-city outing will kick off November 3 in Albuquerque, New Mexico and make stops in Denver, Chicago, and more, before
Unlike most countries, terrestrial radio in the U.S. is not required to pay a performance royalty on the music it plays, a situation that the creator community has long railed against, and the commercial radio community has long worked to protect. Below, recording artist-actor Common and SoundExchange President/CEO Michael Huppe weigh in on the situation.
October 9, 2019 2:41AM PT Becky G will host the 2019 MTV EMAs. The singer-songwriter and actress will also perform at the awards, which will take place in Seville, Spain. She is set for a busy night as she also has a nomination at the awards, taking on Ariana Grande, Camila Cabello, Halsey, the Jonas
Liza Womack, mother of Lil Peep, today filed a lawsuit accusing her son’s manager, Sarah Stennett, and employees of her company of negligence, breach of contract and wrongful death in connection with the rapper’s death from a drug overdose in November of 2017. The lawsuit, filed on Tuesday morning and obtained by Variety, says that
In today’s film news roundup, Lionel Richie’s Glastonbury concert gets a movie release, cat story “A Gift From Bob” is in the works, and “Bull” and “Cosmos” find homes. ONE-NIGHT RELEASE Fathom Events and Meteor 17 have set a one-night global theatrical release of “Lionel Richie at Glastonbury” for Nov. 19. The screening, a filmed
October 8, 2019 6:14PM PT ASCAP has slated Brothers Osborne for the Vanguard Award at the performing rights org’s 57th annual Country Music Awards, to be held in downtown Nashville two nights before the CMA Awards, on Nov. 11. “John and TJ Osborne successfully honor the past and the future with their passionate country rock sound,”
The smorgasboard of a lineup at this year’s Austin City Limits Festival featured artists such as Guns N’ Roses, Billie Eilish and the Cure. Throughout the weekend, performances revealed fresh sounds and sights. Here are the eight best developments from weekend one of ACL. Lizzo Land For the first time in ACL history, the entire
With a daily audience of over 10 million listeners tuning in to his syndicated iHeartRadio morning show, Elvis Duran has become a familiar, trusted voice for the lonely seeking connection. That may seem like a grand statement, but as the veteran radio host details in his just-released book, “Where Do I Begin? Stories (I Sort
SAG-AFTRA is honoring producers of “It’s Been a Minute With Sam Sanders,” Hulu’s TV series “Ramy” and the remix of “Old Town Road” with its American Scene Awards. The awards will be presented on Oct. 11 as part of the union’s biannual convention at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills, Calif. The awards honor
Record Store Day’s slate of exclusive Black Friday titles has been announced, to the tune of 177 new releases — almost all of them on vinyl only, although a few CDs, cassettes or books figure into the mix. As usual for the post-Thanksgiving LP-fest, the lineup consists of about half the number of releases that
October 8, 2019 10:44AM PT Has Katy Perry’s years-long pursuit to purchase a former convent in Los Angeles fizzled to an end? In 2015, the bubble-gum pop star agreed to pay $14.5 million — $10 million in cash and another $4.5 million in property — for the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary compound,
October 8, 2019 10:35AM PT Globe-trotting British music producer and international DJ Mark Ronson, one of the highest earning musician-producers on the planet, who splits his time between London, New York and Los Angeles, has his West Coast home on a busy street in a plum Los Feliz neighborhood up for sale at close to
October 8, 2019 10:21AM PT Just weeks after influential New Wave pioneer Ric Ocasek of the Cars was found dead by his estranged wife, 1980s supermodel Paulina Porizkova, the erstwhile couple’s Federal-style townhouse in New York City’s posh Gramercy Park area has returned to market at $13.9 million. The late Cars superstar and the veteran