Last year, September’s San Sebastian worked a minor miracle, staging a safe on-site festival as second-wave COVID-19 built up in Spain. This year, on-site attendance will be up, though travel problems, caution and costs in Latin America, the U.S and Asia will prevent a full attendance. That said, this year’s festival, running Sept. 17-25, will
Although Dua Lipa had the misfortune of dropping a party album just as the pandemic was starting, “Future Nostalgia” became one of the biggest albums of the past 18 months — and she’s finally announced North American arena tour in support of the album, for next year. The tour makes 28 stops across the U.S., including
Over the past 11 days, stars descended on Venice, Italy for the city’s annual international film festival. With them, they brought plenty of fashion that rocked social media to the core (cue Zendaya in liquid-leather Balmain, Timothée Chalamet in sparkly Haider Ackermann, and Anya Taylor-Joy in Mattel pink Dior couture). And while the silver screen
Leading French podcast production company Paradiso Media has completed a Series A round of financing to pursue its international development, build its workforce and continue producing more film and TV adaptations. Although Paradiso Media did not disclose the amount of the financing round, a source close to the company said a total of €5 million
Fast-rising independent music company Reservoir Media has announced a deal with legendary singer-songwriter and eight-time Grammy winner Joni Mitchell that will see the company becoming the worldwide administrator of her publishing catalog. It should go without saying that Mitchell is one of the most important, influential and innovative songwriters of the past 60 years, with
Credit rating giant TransUnion announced a deal to acquire Neustar, an identity resolution company — which tracks and aggregates consumers’ digital activity for marketing and anti-fraud applications — for $3.1 billion in cash. The deal is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2021, subject to customary closing conditions and regulatory approvals. TransUnion is
Live Nation has resumed its acquisition of a 51% controlling interest in Ocesa Entretenimiento, a leading promoter in Latin America and owner of Ticketmaster Mexico, for an aggregate purchase price of $8,835,000,000 in Mexican dollars, or approximately $444 million U.S. The acquisition was first announced back in 2019 for a reported $480 million but delayed
COMPENSATION Visual effects and animation studio DNEG, whose credits include “Dune” and “No Time to Die,” will pay enhanced overtime to its U.K. employees. From October, DNEG will pay overtime at 1.5x rate to all U.K. staff in non-management positions for all incremental time that they are asked to work beyond the standard 40-hour week.
“America Strong” has been a long-running segment on ABC’s “World News Tonight.” Now it has become an editorial initiative across the news division. ABC News expects to take the segment, which showcases Americans who confront and persevere against obstacles, often in small towns and less covered spaces, to more of its programming across September, with
Spain’s Borja González Santaolalla, who co-penned Jaume Balagueró’s movie “Way Down,” and Ángel Agudo, a scribe on Atresmedia’s “Luimelia,” have boarded the family TV series project “Harrogate Detective Agency” as its director and co-scribe respectively. Inspired by Agatha Christie novels, the TV series project has been created by C.J. Navas and Juan Galonce at Alicante-based
“Line of Duty” star Vicky McClure is co-producing a new drama with Left Bank Pictures, the makers of hit Netflix series “The Crown,” Variety has confirmed. McClure, who played detective Kate Fleming on “Line of Duty” for nine years, will also star in the new show, which is tentatively titled “Redemption” and is scheduled to
“Burning,” Amazon’s first original feature-length documentary from Australia, about the devastating ‘Black Summer’ of 2019-20 Australian bushfires makes its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival. There is every chance it will spark a political response. Co-produced by Propagate Content and Dirty Films (in which Cate Blanchett is executive producer) “Burning” is produced and
The BBC and Amazon have released new images of Christopher Walken (“Severance”) and “Poldark” star Eleanor Tomlinson in upcoming Stephen Merchant production “The Outlaws.” The show, which is written and directed by Merchant (“Jojo Rabbit”), marks Walken’s first role in a British television series. In one of the first images from the show, (above) he
Play video content TMZ.com Ja Rule‘s clapping back after Fat Joe said he’s going to drag him for their “Verzuz” battle … essentially saying Joey Crack’s threat is music to his ears. The “Put It On Me” rapper tells us he’s practically salivating at the idea Fat Joe’s been talking (friendly?) smack ahead of their
Chile’s Matías Bize, the multi-prized director of “In the Bed,” “The Life of Fish” and “The Memory of Water,” is attached to direct “The Stolen Kids” (“Niños de Contrabando”), a family drama straddling Chile and Europe set up at María Wood Producciones and MegaMedia, the latter part-owned by Discovery Networks Latin America. A true-life inspired
Everything being relative, the 2021 MTV VMAs represented a big rebound from the all-time low point of last year’s show, which ended up being pre-recorded without an audience due to pandemic conditions, yet which had everyone involved weirdly trying to pretend that the show was going out live, complete with canned laughter and applause. This
“Shang-Chi And The Legend of The Ten Rings” held on the top place at the South Korean box office for the second weekend. But it failed to sustain overall cinemagoing in what used to be, pre-COVID, the world’s fourth largest theatrical market. “Shang-Chi” earned $2.63 million in its second weekend for a market share of
Aidan Gillen, star of “The Wire” and Petyr “Littlefinger” Baelish in “Game of Thrones,” is attached to play one of the leads in “The O’Neill,” a Gaelic Ireland epic turning on its greatest hero, Hugh O’Neill. Stephen Saint Leger, director of “Vikings,” “Vikings: Valhalla” and the climactic “The Battle” episode of “Barbarians,” is also on
Doja Cat exemplified the “host with the most” maxim at the 2021 MTV Video Music Awards, not only pulling double duty as MC and performer (she presented “Been Like This” and “You Right” from her new album “Planet Her” with an elegant display of sound and movement), but also cycling through a procession of wacky
In “The Eyes of Tammy Faye,” Andrew Garfield and Jessica Chastain play Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker, the self-styled Christian TV personalities who did more than anyone else to mold televangelism into a game-changing, culture-shaking, credit-card-maxing industry/cult/diversion. The movie, which is a ticklishly fascinating rise-and-fall saga, was directed by Michael Showalter, who almost always makes
Oscars voters have always loved seeing actors whose startling physical transformations come after countless hours in the makeup chair. After Renée Zellweger (“Judy”), Marion Cotillard (“La Vie en Rose”) and Charlize Theron (“Monster”) won Oscars for their impressively-altered looks, Jessica Chastain could be on a similar path for her role as the media-loving televangelist Tammy
Oscar-winning songwriters Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez won their first primetime Emmy Sunday night for their popular “Agatha All Along” song from Marvel Studios and Disney Plus’ limited series “WandaVision.” The collaborators, whose Academy Award wins include Disney’s “Frozen” and “Coco” movies, won in Emmy’s music and lyrics category, beating out tunes from “The Queen’s
Matt Long, who plays Zeke Landon on “Manifest,” has confirmed that he will return for the fourth and final season of the show on Netflix. He revealed the news during the Sept. 12 Creative Arts Emmys, where he was asked about the series in the press room. “I don’t know what’s coming,” Long said. “I
Maya Rudolph has picked up a second consecutive guest comedy actress Emmy for “Saturday Night Live,” just hours after she picked up her second consecutive character voice-over performance Emmy. With these wins, Rudolph also becomes only the second woman of color and the fourth person of color overall to pick up back-to-back acting wins in
Dave Chappelle won the guest comedy actor Emmy for hosting “Saturday Night Live.” This was one of four Emmys for which he was nominated this year. The other three were all for his Netflix stand-up comedy special “8:46.” While he lost the variety special directing and variety special writing awards to Bo Burnham for “Bo
MRC has tapped NBCUniversal alum Adam Stotsky as president of the newly created MRC Live & Alternative, which will absorb the operations of Dick Clark Productions. MRC has slowly been phasing out the Dick Clark Prods. moniker. Stotsky will oversee a division that produces major awards franchises including the American Music Awards, Academy of Country
Machine Gun Kelly and UFC Champ Conor McGregor got into a scuffle just before the broadcast of the MTV Video Music Awards at Brooklyn’s Barclays Center, according to multiple reports on social media. Photos snapped online show both men being pulled apart, with McGregor’s drink hurled at Kelly. Kelly, wearing a red glittered suit, shielded
David Nevins, longtime Showtime chief, is poised to take on oversight of Paramount Television as the studio undergoes a restructuring and leadership change as Brian Robbins takes the reins as studio chief. The shakeup means that Robbins will not oversee TV production for the studio as did his predecessor Jim Gianopulos, sources close the situation
Courtney B. Vance adds another Emmy to his mantle after picking up the guest drama actor statue for “Lovecraft Country,” but he used his acceptance speech not to celebrate his own achievement, but instead to pay tribute to his co-star Michael K. Williams. After thanking his children when accepting the award during the third Creative
Claire Foy has once again been crowned queen at the Emmys, but this time in the guest drama actress category. She took home the that trophy at the 73rd annual Primetime Emmy Awards’ Creative Arts ceremony on Sunday for her return to Netflix’s “The Crown.” Foy, who won the lead drama actress race in 2018