Showing posts with label Lifestyle. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Lifestyle. Show all posts

A Minute With: Singer Trey Songz on new movie “Texas Chainsaw 3D”






LOS ANGELES, January2 (Reuters) – R&B and hip-hop artists have appeared in horror films before, but 28-year old singer Trey Songz tackles a brand new incarnation of the “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” franchise with “Texas Chainsaw 3D.”


The film, which opens in U.S. theaters on Friday, follows a young woman who inherits a lavish, isolated mansion. When she visits it for the first time with her three friends, one of whom is played by Songz, they realize there is horror awaiting them in the basement.






Songz, a Grammy-nominated artist with hits like “Say Aah,” “Can’t Be Friends” and “Bottoms Up,” took a break from his world tour to talk to Reuters about his first movie role as a lead actor.


Q: Is acting something you’ve had your eye on?


A: “It’s something I’ve always wanted to do, but music comes first. I wanted to make sure when I did choose a role, I had time to really get in to it. (Director) John (Luessenhop) came to the studio to meet me for the first time and I told him to give me 24 hours to figure it out. I had just come off tour, I was recording an album and the four weeks I was set to have for vacation would be the four weeks I’d be shooting the film.”


Q: What did you think about during that 24-hour period?


A: “Making sure I wouldn’t be carrying the weight of the film. My name means so much in the music world that I was worried I’d have to carry the film, but I think the franchise carries the weight of the film. Luckily, (my character) Ryan is a likeable guy. There wasn’t too much stress on me mentally and it didn’t take too much away from me as a person in order to be him … I couldn’t ask for a better stepping-stone as a first-time actor.”


Q: You’ve stated that you are the first black actor in the “Texas Chainsaw” franchise. What does that mean to you?


A: “I think it means something not only to me, but to the franchise. Ryan was originally envisioned as a white male. The fact that the studio, the producers and the director went out on a limb and put a black man in such a strong part in a classic movie first made in the 70s, when things were so different, speaks volumes too.”


Q: Your single “Heart Attack,” off your fifth and current album “Chapter V,” was nominated for a best R&B song Grammy, making it your third nomination. What would a win mean?


A: “Right now I feel like I’m in the Grammy club, but not in the V.I.P. I’m just looking at the V.I.P. going, ‘I got to drink. I want a bottle, just let me in the V.I.P. please!’ But all jokes aside, the Grammy is the most elite award you can win as a musician so it would mean so much.”


Q: You moved around a lot as child, partly because you had a stepfather who worked in the military and partly because of your mother’s work opportunities. What was that like?


A: “When you’re a young, single mother, you’re dependent on welfare. Your mother is struggling and we would move around a lot – Virginia, Florida, Kansas, New Jersey, Baltimore … I went to eight different schools before ninth grade.”


Q: How does that impact you today?


A: “I’ve never really been settled. I don’t think I’ve ever known what it was like to be a person that was used to sitting still. I think it’s given me the ability to detach from any situation. It’s so easy to remove myself from the closest of situations just because I’ve had to do it my whole life.”


Q: Do you ever want to know what it feels like to be settled?


A: “I do. I don’t know when it will happen. I don’t even know how to. When I sit still for a couple of days, I get fidgety. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”


Q: I suppose acting is another way to keep yourself from sitting still. Will there be more acting in store for you?


A: “I’ve set a goal for myself to land a couple of films a year. Recently, I shot a movie starring Paula Patton entitled ‘Baggage Claim.” It’s an urban film where I get to be comedic as well as sexy.”


Q: Comedic and sexy – it’s great that you see yourself that way. What confidence!


A: Some things just are what they are!


(Reporting by Zorianna Kit; Editing by Patricia Reaney and Jackie Frank)


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Playboy Hugh Hefner marries his ‘runaway bride’






LOS ANGELES (AP) — Hugh Hefner is celebrating the new year as a married man once again.


The 86-year-old Playboy magazine founder exchanged vows with his “runaway bride,” Crystal Harris, at a private Playboy Mansion ceremony on New Year’s Eve. Harris, a 26-year-old “Playmate of the Month” in 2009, broke off a previous engagement to Hefner just before they were to be married in 2011.






Playboy said on Tuesday that the couple celebrated at a New Year’s Eve party at the mansion with guests that included comic Jon Lovitz, Gene Simmons of KISS and baseball star Evan Longoria.


The bride wore a strapless gown in soft pink, Hefner a black tux. Hefner’s been married twice before but lived the single life between 1959 and 1989.


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Armstrong better, Green Day to resume tour in 2013






LOS ANGELES (AP) — Green Day is going back out on the road.


The Grammy-winning punk band announced new tour dates Monday.






The band canceled the rest of its 2012 club schedule and postponed the start of a 2013 arena tour after singer-guitarist Billie Joe Armstrong‘s substance abuse problems emerged publicly in September when he had a profane meltdown on the stage of the iHeartRadio Music Festival in Las Vegas.


Armstrong told fans in a statement Monday that he’s “getting better every day” and “the show must go on.”


The tour is scheduled to begin March 28 at the Allstate Arena in the Chicago area.


The band released its most recent album, “Tre,” on Dec. 11, more than a month ahead of schedule.


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Katie Holmes’ Broadway play ‘Dead Accounts’ closes






NEW YORK (AP) — Katie Holmes‘ return to Broadway will be much shorter than she would have liked.


The former Mrs. Cruise‘s play “Dead Accounts” will close within a week of the new year. Producers said Thursday that Theresa Rebeck‘s drama will close on Jan. 6 after 27 previews and 44 performances.






The show, which opened to poor reviews on Nov. 29, stars Norbert Leo Butz as Holmes’ onstage brother who returns to his Midwest home with a secret. Rebeck created the first season of NBC’s “Smash” and several well-received plays including “Seminar” and “Mauritius.”


Holmes, who became a star in the teen soap opera “Dawson’s Creek,” made her Broadway debut in the 2008 production of “All My Sons.” She was married to Tom Cruise from 2006 until this year.


___


Online: http://www.deadaccountsonbroadway.com


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Ticket rush: Film fans hand Hollywood record cash






LOS ANGELES (AP) — The big deal for Hollywood is not the record $ 10.8 billion that studios took in domestically in 2012. It’s the fact that the number of tickets sold went up for the first time in three years.


Thanks to inflation, revenue generally rises in Hollywood as admission prices climb each year. The real story is told in tickets, whose sales have been on a general decline for a decade, bottoming out in 2011 at 1.29 billion, their lowest level since 1995.






The industry rebounded this year, with ticket sales projected to rise 5.6 percent to 1.36 billion by Dec. 31, according to box-office tracker Hollywood.com. That’s still well below the modern peak of 1.6 billion tickets sold in 2002, but in an age of cozy home theater setups and endless entertainment gadgets, studio executives consider it a triumph that they were able to put more butts in cinema seats this year than last.


“It is a victory, ultimately,” said Don Harris, head of distribution at Paramount Pictures. “If we deliver the product as an industry that people want, they will want to get out there. Even though you can sit at home and watch something on your large screen in high-def, people want to get out.”


Domestic revenue should finish up nearly 6 percent from 2011′s $ 10.2 billion and top Hollywood‘s previous high of $ 10.6 billion set in 2009.


The year was led by a pair of superhero sagas, Disney’s “The Avengers” with $ 623 million domestically and $ 1.5 billion worldwide and the Warner Bros. Batman finale “The Dark Knight Rises” with $ 448 million domestically and $ 1.1 billion worldwide. Sony’s James Bond adventure “Skyfall” is closing in on the $ 1 billion mark globally, and the list of action and family-film blockbusters includes “The Hunger Games,” ”The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn — Part Two,” ”Ice Age: Continental Drift,” ”Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted,” ”The Amazing Spider-Man” and “Brave.”


Before television, movies were the biggest thing going, with ticket sales estimated as high as 4 billion a year domestically in the 1930s and ’40s.


Movie-going eroded steadily through the 1970s as people stayed home with their small screens. The rise of videotape in the 1980s further cut into business, followed by DVDs in the ’90s and big, cheap flat-screen TVs in recent years. Today’s video games, mobile phones and other portable devices also offer easy options to tramping out to a movie theater.


It’s all been a continual drain on cinema business, and cynics repeatedly predict the eventual demise of movie theaters. Yet Hollywood fights back with new technology of its own, from digital 3-D to booming surround-sound to the clarity of images projected at high-frame rates, which is being tested now with “The Lord of the Rings” prelude “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey,” shown in select theaters at 48 frames a second, double the standard speed.


For all of the annoyances of theaters — parking, pricy concessions, sitting next to strangers texting on their iPhones — cinemas still offer the biggest and best way to see a movie.


“Every home has a kitchen, but you can’t get into a good restaurant on Saturday night,” said Dan Fellman, head of distribution for Warner Bros. “People want to escape. That’s the nature of society. The adult population just is not going to sit home seven days a week, even though they have technology in their home that’s certainly an improvement over what it was 10 years ago. People want to get out of the house, and no matter what they throw in the face of theatrical exhibition, it continues to perform at a strong level.”


Even real-life violence at the movie theater didn’t turn audiences away. Some moviegoers thought twice about heading to the cinema after a gunman killed 12 people and injured 58 at a screening of “The Dark Knight Rises” in Colorado last summer, but if there was any lull in attendance, it was slight and temporary. Ticket sales went on a tear for most of the fall.


While domestic revenues inch upward most years largely because of inflation, the real growth areas have been overseas, where more and more fans are eager for the next Hollywood blockbuster.


Rentrak, which compiles international box office data, expects 2012′s foreign gross to be about $ 23 billion, 3 percent higher than in 2011. No data was yet available on the number of tickets sold overseas this past year.


International business generally used to account for less than half of a studio film’s overall receipts. Films now often do two or even three times as much business overseas as they do domestically. Some movies that were duds with U.S. audiences, such as “Battleship” and “John Carter,” can wind up being $ 200 million hits with overseas crowds.


Whether finishing a good year or a bad one, Hollywood executives always look ahead to better days, insisting that the next crop of blockbusters will be bigger than ever. The same goes this time as studio bosses hype their 2013 lineup, which includes the latest “Iron Man,” ”Star Trek,” ”Hunger Games” and “Thor” installments, the Superman tale “Man of Steel” and the second chapter in “The Hobbit” trilogy.


Twelve months from now, they hope to be talking about another revenue record topping this year’s $ 10.8 billion.


“I’ve been saying we’re going to hit that $ 11 billion level for about three years now,” said Paul Dergarabedian, a box-office analyst for Hollywood.com. “Next year I think is the year we actually do it.”


___


Online:


http://www.hollywood.com


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Britain’s Queen Elizabeth goes 3D for Olympics tribute






LONDON (Reuters) – Britain‘s Queen Elizabeth will use her traditional Christmas Day message, filmed in 3D for the first time, to pay tribute to the world’s athletes for delivering a “splendid summer of sport” at the London Olympics.


In her personal address to the nation, the monarch will pay tribute to the competitors’ “skill, dedication, training and teamwork”, her office said on Monday.






The 86-year-old head of state provided an Olympic highlight when she made a surprise comic turn with James Bond actor Daniel Craig in a short film for the opening ceremony.


“In pursuing their own sporting goals, they gave the rest of us the opportunity to share something of the excitement and drama,” she will say, according to advance extracts.


Queen Elizabeth missed a church service at her country retreat on Sunday due to a cold, Buckingham Palace said. Her message was pre-recorded and will go out as expected.


It comes at the end of a landmark year for the royal family.


Queen Elizabeth marked 60 years on the throne with the Diamond Jubilee celebrations and her grandson Prince William and his wife Kate are expecting their first baby.


Prime Minister David Cameron issued his own Christmas message in which he talked of Britain’s “extraordinary year”.


“We cheered our queen to the rafters with the Jubilee, showed the world what we’re made of by staging the most spectacular Olympic and Paralympic Games ever and – let’s not forget – punched way above our weight in the medals table,” he said.


The first Christmas broadcast was given by Queen Elizabeth’s grandfather George V in 1932. It has become a Christmas Day tradition for many families to watch it together after lunch.


(Reporting by Peter Griffiths; Editing by Stephen Powell)


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Ben Stiller’s Red Hour sells two more comedies to ABC Studios






LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – Ben Stiller‘s Red Hour Television is continuing to pump out comedies for ABC Studios.


Following the sale of “Complikated” in October, the production company has sold network’s production division two new series – “You’re Not Doing It Right” and “Between Two Kings” – a rep for Red Hour told TheWrap on Monday.






Comedian Michael Ian Black writes, stars and produces in the former, a half-hour single-camera comedy based on his book of the same name that explores his childhood, marriage, children and career. Set “in the wilds of Connecticut,” the show takes a hard look at what happens when you wake up, look around and don’t recognize the life you’re living as your own, Red Hour said.


“Between Two Kings” is written and executive-produced by Jeff Kahn, who has written for series like “Drawn Together” and “The Ben Stiller Show.” It follows the hardships of a divorced father raising an 11-year-old son while living in his elderly father’s home.


Both are being executive-produced by Stiller, along with Red Hour’s Debbie Liebling and Stuart Cornfeld.


Since signing an overall deal with ABC Studios at the end of 2011, Red Hour also has sold “Please Knock,” written by Kevin Napier, and “The Notorious Mollie Flowers,” written by Adam Resnick.


The sale of “You’re Not Doing It Right” and “Between Two Kings” were first reported by Deadline.


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TV network aimed at millennials set for summer






NEW YORK (AP) — Participant Media plans to launch a cable network aimed at viewers 18 to 34 years old with programming it describes as inspiring and thought-provoking.


The as-yet-unnamed network is set to start next summer with an initial reach of 40 million subscribers, the company announced Monday.






Targeting so-called millennials, Participant is developing a program slate with such producers as Brian Graden, Morgan Spurlock and Brian Henson of The Jim Henson Company.


Evan Shapiro, who joined Participant in May after serving as President of IFC and Sundance Channel, will head the new network.


Parent company Participant Media has produced a number of fiction and nonfiction films including “Charlie Wilson’s War,” ”An Inconvenient Truth” and Steven Spielberg’s current biopic “Lincoln.”


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As Conn. story unfolds, media struggle with facts






NEW YORK (AP) — The scope and senselessness of the Newtown, Conn., school shooting challenged television journalists’ ability to do much more than lend, or impose, their presence on the scene.


Pressed with the awful urgency of the story, TV, along with other media, fell prey to reporting “facts” that were often in conflict or wrong.






How many people were killed? Which Lanza brother was the shooter: Adam or Ryan? Was their mother, who was among the slain, a teacher at the school?


Like the rest of the news media, television outlets were faced with intense competitive pressures and an audience ravenous for details in an age when the best-available information was seldom as reliable as the networks’ high-tech delivery systems.


Here was the normal gestation of an unfolding story. But with wall-to-wall cable coverage and second-by-second Twitter postings, the process of updating and correcting it was visible to every onlooker. And as facts were gathered by authorities, then shared with reporters (often on background), a seemingly higher-than-usual number of points failed to pan out:


— The number of dead was initially reported as anywhere from the high teens to nearly 30. The final count was established Friday afternoon: 20 children and six adults, as well as Lanza’s mother and the shooter himself.


— For hours on Friday, the shooter was identified as Ryan Lanza, with his age alternatively reported as 24 or 20. The confusion seemed partly explainable when it was determined that 20-year-old Adam Lanza, the shooter who had then killed himself, was carrying identification belonging to his 24-year-old brother.


This case of mistaken identity was painfully reminiscent of the Atlanta Olympics bombing case in 1996, when authorities fingered an innocent man, and the news media ran with it, destroying his life. Such damage was averted in Ryan Lanza’s case largely by his public protestations on social media, repeatedly declaring “It wasn’t me.”


— Initial reports differed as to whether Lanza’s mother, Nancy, was shot at the school, where she was said to be a teacher, or at the home she shared with Adam Lanza. By Friday afternoon, it was determined that she had been shot at their home.


Then doubts arose about whether Nancy Lanza had any link to Sandy Hook Elementary. At least one parent said she was a substitute teacher, but by early Saturday, an official said investigators had been unable to establish any connection with the school.


That seemed to make the massacre even more confusing. Early on, the attack was said to have taken place in her own classroom and was interpreted by more than one on-air analyst as possibly a way for Adam Lanza to strike back at children with whom he felt rivalry for his mother’s affection.


— Lanza’s weapons were listed as two pistols (a Glock and a Sig Sauer) as well as a .223-caliber Bushmaster rifle, but whether that rifle was used in the school or left in the trunk of Lanza’s car remained unclear.


— There were numerous versions of what Lanza was wearing, including camouflage attire and black paramilitary garb.


With so many unanswered questions, TV correspondents were left to set the scene and to convey the impact in words that continually failed them.


However apt, the phrase “parents’ worst nightmare” became an instant cliche.


And the word “unimaginable” was used countless times. But “imagine” was exactly what the horrified audience was helpless not to do.


The screen was mostly occupied by grim or tearful faces, sparing everybody besides law enforcement officials the most chilling sight: the death scene in the school, where — as viewers were reminded over and over — the bodies remained while evidence was gathered. But who could keep from imagining it?


Ironically, perhaps the most powerful video came from 300 miles away, in Washington, where President Barack Obama delivered brief remarks about the tragedy. His somber face, the flat tone of his voice, the tears he daubed from his eyes, and his long, tormented pauses said as much as his heartfelt words. He seemed to speak for everyone who heard them.


But TV had hours to fill.


Children from the school were interviewed. It was a questionable decision for which the networks took heat from media critics and viewers alike. But the decision lay more in the hands of the willing parents (who were present), and there was value in hearing what these tiny witnesses had to say.


“We had to lock our doors so the animal couldn’t get in,” said one little boy, his words painting a haunting picture.


In the absence of much hard information, speculation was a regular fallback. Correspondents and other “experts” persisted in diagnosing the shooter, a man none of them had ever met or even heard of until hours earlier.


CNN’s “Piers Morgan Tonight” scored an interview with a former classmate of Lanza’s — with an emphasis on “former.”


“I really only knew him closely when we were very, very young, in elementary school together,” she said.


Determined to unlock Lanza’s personality, Morgan asked the woman if she “could have ever predicted that he would one day flip and do something as monstrous as this?”


“I don’t know if I could have predicted it,” she replied, struggling to give Morgan what he wanted. “I mean, there was something ‘off’ about him.”


The larger implications of the tragedy were broached throughout the coverage — not least by Obama.


“We’re going to have to come together and take meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this, regardless of the politics,” he said, which may have gladdened proponents of stricter gun laws.


But CBS correspondent Nancy Cordes noted, “There’s often an assumption that after a horrific event like this, it will spark a fierce debate on the issue. But in recent years, that hasn’t been the case.”


Appearing on “The O’Reilly Factor” Friday night, Fox News correspondent Geraldo Rivera voiced his own solution.


“I want an armed cop at every school,” he said.


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“X Factor” judge L.A. Reid quitting TV talent show






LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – L.A. Reid, “The X Factor” judge, says he is leaving the TV talent show next season after two years on the panel.


Reid, 56, chairman and chief executive of Epic Records, told “Access Hollywood,” the television program and website, he has decided to leave the Fox reality singing show to return to the record label full time.






“I have decided that I will not return to ‘The X Factor’ next year,” Reid told “Access Hollywood” late Thursday. “I have to go back and I have a company to run that I’ve kind of neglected, and it saddens me a little bit, but only a little bit.”


He added that the show was “a nice break, it was a nice departure from what I’ve done for the past 20 years, but now I gotta go back to work.”


Fox declined to comment on Reid’s departure on Friday.


Reid joined “The X Factor” when Cowell introduced the show in the United States in September 2011. Reid sat alongside Paula Abdul, former Pussycat Dolls singer Nicole Scherzinger and Cowell.


Cowell fired Abdul and Scherzinger after a disappointing first season and brought in pop stars Britney Spears and Demi Lovato.


But “The X Factor” audiences have dropped this year to an average 9.7 million from about 12.5 million an episode in 2011.


The show broadcasts a two-part finale next week with the winner earning a $ 5 million prize and record contract.


Epic Records, a unit of Sony Music Entertainment, which commands a roster of artists including Avril Lavigne, will sign the winners of “The X Factor.”


(Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy; editing by Jill Serjeant and Jeffrey Benkoe)


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“Lincoln” leads Golden Globe movie nominations






LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – “Lincoln,” the tale of U.S. President Abraham Lincoln‘s battle to end slavery, ruled at the Golden Globe nominations on Thursday, while a very different movie take on slavery – “Django Unchained” – got a big boost in Hollywood’s crowded awards season.


Steven Spielberg’s portrayal of one of America’s most revered presidents won a leading seven nominations, including best drama, best director, best screenplay and best actor for Daniel Day-Lewis in the title role.






But “Lincoln” faces stiff competition at the Golden Globes from Ben Affleck’s Iran hostage drama “Argo” and Quentin Tarantino‘s dark and quirky slavery-era Western, “Django Unchained.”


The best drama nominees were rounded out by thriller “Zero Dark Thirty” about the hunt for Osama bin Laden, with four mentions, and the shipwreck tale, “Life of Pi,” with three.


The Golden Globe Awards, which will be given out by about 80 members of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA) on January 13, are among the most widely watched honors programs leading up to the Oscars in February, although their ultimate choices for best movie rarely coincide.


‘LINCOLN’ SEEN AS OSCAR FRONTRUNNER


“Lincoln” is already regarded as an Oscar frontrunner after picking up multiple accolades from U.S. critics’ groups and the Screen Actors Guild (SAG).


Producer Kathleen Kennedy said the film’s portrayal of Lincoln’s battles in Congress to get slavery abolished had struck a chord with Americans at a time of political gridlock in Washington.


“People have become frustrated with the political process, and the movie takes you on a journey that shows the democratic process is difficult but the end result is a very satisfying process…I think that’s what people are excited about after watching ‘Lincoln,’” Kennedy told Reuters on Thursday.


Tarantino’s violent and sometimes comic “Django Unchained,” starring Jamie Foxx, has fared less well – until now.


“This was a huge boost. ‘Django Unchained‘ was very much SAG snubbed. But now they are really back in the game,” Thelma Adams, contributing editor at Yahoo! Movies, told Reuters.


“It’s very gratifying to get this many nominations from the HFPA for a film I worked so hard on and am so passionate about,” Tarantino said in a statement.


Unlike the Academy Awards, the HFPA has separate categories for film dramas and comedies.


“Les Miserables,” the movie version of the worldwide hit stage musical, earned four Golden Globe nominations in the comedy/musical category, as did “Silver Linings Playbook,” about an unlikely romance between a man suffering from bipolar disorder and a young widow.


The stars of both films – Hugh Jackman and Anne Hathaway for “Les Miserables,” and Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper for “Silver Linings Playbook,” – will be among those competing for acting awards.


FROM STAGE TO SCREEN


“Les Mis” director, Tom Hooper, who failed to get a nomination for his work on the movie, acknowledged the challenge of translating the beloved musical to the big screen.


“Millions of people hold this musical so close to their heart. I had to make a film that honors that experience…and I needed to find a way to work, which is why I chose to do all live singing,” Hooper told Reuters.


The HFPA also opened the door to smaller, sometimes overlooked movies and performances, while largely snubbing high profile contenders such as the James Bond film “Skyfall,” which got just one mention, for Adele’s best original song.


Wes Anderson’s “Moonrise Kingdom” and admired British senior ensemble film, “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel,” were both nominated in the best musical or comedy category.


“They are precious little films that now have to be taken seriously,” said Tom O’Neil of awards website Goldderby.com.


In the acting race, Jessica Chastain’s CIA agent in “Zero Dark Thirty” will square off against Helen Mirren in “Hitchcock,” British actress Rachel Weisz in period drama, “The Deep Blue Sea,” France’s Marion Cotillard for “Rust and Bone,” and Naomi Watts in tsunami survival tale “The Impossible.”


Chastain said that aside from being a true-life thriller, “Zero Dark Thirty” also aimed at asking questions about society.


“To be involved in a movie that does that – the 9/11 hunt for Osama bin Laden pretty much defined this decade for us – and to be playing the woman who sacrificed so much to find him is such an honor,” the actress told Reuters.


Day-Lewis’s performance as Lincoln will compete against Denzel Washington’s alcoholic airline pilot in “Flight,” Richard Gere’s role as a corrupt financial executive in “Arbitrage,” John Hawkes as a severely disabled man in “The Sessions,” and Joaquin Phoenix’s drifter in the cult tale, “The Master.”


The Golden Globes also honor the year’s best TV shows. “Game Change,” the HBO film about Sarah Palin’s 2008 bid to become U.S. vice-president, led the nominations with five, followed by post-9/11 psychological thriller, “Homeland,” with four.


(Additional reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy and Eric Kelsey; Editing by Paul Simao and David Brunnstrom)


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Why Netflix’s future is in “House of Cards,” “Arrested Development” – not Disney






LOS ANGELES/NEW YORK (TheWrap.com) – Netflix hailed as a “game-changer” its landmark deal last week to bring Disney movies to the streaming service. But while that deal may be significant, it pales in importance next to another looming development – the February debut of its original series “House of Cards.”


The economic benefits of the Disney deal, which gives the company streaming rights to much of Disney‘s catalog and straight-to-DVD movies as well as the exclusive rights to the studio’s new movies from 2016 to 2018, won’t be felt for years.






But the rollout of new, made-for-Netflix shows, which moves the company into a game owned by broadcast and cable – and follows a model set by everyone from HBO to AMC – will be a near-term bellwether of the company’s future success, analysts and observers say.


“You don’t identify a movie you watch on TV with a channel, but you definitely identify an original series with a channel,” Michael Pachter, an analyst with Wedbush Securities, told TheWrap. “What Netflix is doing with its original series is getting something exclusive that makes you have to go to Netflix if you want to see it. It’s branding.”


They include the long-awaited rebirth of cult favorite “Arrested Development” and original pieces like Eli Roth’s “Hemlock Grove,” Jenji Kohan’s “Orange Is the New Black” and “House of Cards,” from director David Fincher and starring Kevin Spacey.


Like “Lilyhammer,” all episodes of the shows’ first seasons will be released at once, allowing for binge viewing by Netflix subscribers.


The Disney deal is momentous in that it marks the first time a digital pay-TV distributor has earned exclusive rights to a major studio’s new releases. Both analysts and studio executives say Netflix will pay more than $ 300 million a year for those rights, a startling sum for a company that has minimized the importance of films. Netflix has declined to discuss any figures.


Some analysts argue the Disney deal is a positive development, but one that will not move the needle when it comes to attracting new members.


Netflix customers will like it when Disney movies show up, but not many people will want to sign up for Netflix because they have 15 new movies a year I want to see,” Pachter said.


That’s why Netflix bankrolled “Arrested Development,” a show canceled by Fox in 2006 that still has a small but loyal audience, one that will assuredly watch the new season on Netflix. That’s also why it has invested in so many new shows from established artists like Kohan, who created “Weeds,” and Roth, a successful horror filmmaker.


While the company’s first foray into original programming – Steven Van Zandt’s “Lilyhammer” – didn’t make much of a splash, the new shows debuting next year look far more promising.


It also has committed a reported $ 100 million for two seasons of “House of Cards,” as well as offering complete creative freedom to Fincher and his team.


The money the streaming service spends on its own shows is a pittance compared to what it shells out in licensing deals, but that original content will distinguish Netflix from competitors in broadcast, like HBO, and in digital, like Amazon.


“Everybody is trying to get their brand to the top of people’s minds, and sometimes that requires a substantial expenditure and doing something different, like original production,” Bill Carroll, vice president and director of programming at Katz Television Group, told TheWrap.


More than any of its competitors in the streaming-video market, Netflix is attempting to transform itself into a digitized form of HBO, which began by airing studio movies.


HBO later added lower-cost programming, such as stand-up comedy shows, and eventually original series and films. Showtime, Starz and others soon followed.


Because it is not locked into a schedule, Netflix can host an unlimited amount of programming and owns a wealth of information about its subscribers to tailor its offerings to specific viewers and track their success.


Figuring out just what constitutes a “hit,” however, will be difficult. As it has with previous original shows like “Lilyhammer,” Netflix will not release viewing numbers for its upcoming shows. The company stresses that immediate viewing is less important than developing a loyal following over time.


As for the Disney deal, Netflix already had rights to films from that studio and Sony under an agreement with Starz, which in September 2011 opted not to renew its deal.


“They got something they used to have and had to pay a lot more money for it,” Seth Willenson, a library-valuation expert, producer and former studio executive told TheWrap.


So what changed? Exclusivity.


Disney’s new releases will appear on Netflix during the same window when they would have been showing on an HBO or another pay channel. It also means that new rivals, such as Amazon and Hulu Plus, won’t be getting the latest “Avengers” sequel at the same time – or the upcoming series of new “Star Wars” films.


“The argument is that what they are getting now from Disney will only be on Netflix,” Vasily Karasyov, an analyst with Susquehanna told TheWrap. “What they were getting before was only on Starz. It’s more exclusive. They are trying to do what Starz did in the ’90s and buy up rights and put it on the map.”


At the UBS conference last week in New York, Chief Creative Officer Ted Sarandos teased the possibility of pursuing exclusive deals with more studios as well.


This new attraction to movies represents a change of tune for the Los Altos, Calif.-based company. After all, Netflix has been publicly dismissive in recent months of film’s importance to its service, stressing its viewers’ penchant for binge-watching television shows, like AMC’s “Breaking Bad” and “Mad Men.”


About 60 percent of Netflix viewing time is spent on TV, a number that has only grown in recent years. Exclusivity increasingly motivates its decision-making on the TV side as well, which is one reason it allowed its deal with A&E Networks to expire in September, taking shows like “Storage Wars” and “Hoarders” off Netflix.


And nothing is more exclusive than content you fund yourself.


“It wants content unique to its platform,” Karasyov said. “No one says, ‘Come to my website because we have the same stuff everyone else does.’”


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FX orders “Tyrant” from “Homeland” producers






NEW YORK (TheWrap.com) – FX has ordered the Middle Eastern drama pilot “Tyrant” from “Homeland” producers Howard Gordon and Gideon Raff, as well as “Six Feet Under” and “Lost” producer Craig Wright.


The pilot follows an American family drawn into the troubles of a turbulent Middle Eastern nation. The series, written and created by Raff, was developed by Gordon and Wright. The pilot comes from Gordon’s shingle at 20th Century Fox Television, Teakwood Lane.






Gordon, Raff and Wright are executive producers in association with Keshet Broadcasting. If “Tyrant” becomes a series, Wright will serve as showrunner.


“We are thrilled to bring ‘Tyrant’ to FX,” said Nick Grad, FX’s executive vice president of original programming. “The brilliant and wholly original concept just blew us all away. It’s pretty amazing when you read a script and can instantly imagine it becoming one of the best shows on television. We’re grateful to the producers for choosing to bring it to FX and look forward to continuing our partnership with our friends at Fox 21.”


“‘Tyrant’ is exactly the type of project we aim to do at Fox 21 – working with extremely talented writer/creators to create provocative material with big, breakout characters and themes,” said Bert Salke, president of Fox 21. “This script has excited everyone who’s read it and it’s particularly gratifying to be back working with FX, with whom we have had such a successful partnership on the fantastic ‘Sons of Anarchy.’”


Production is tentatively slated to begin in the spring.


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Australian DJs break silence over UK royal prank tragedy






CANBERRA (Reuters) – Two Australian radio announcers who made a prank call to a British hospital treating Prince William‘s pregnant wife Kate broke a three-day silence on Monday to speak of their distress at the apparent suicide of the nurse who took their call.


The 2DayFM Sydney-based announcers, Mel Greig and Michael Christian, said the tragedy had left them “shattered, gutted, heartbroken”.






Greig and fellow presenter and prank mastermind Christian have been in hiding since nurse Jacintha Saldanha‘s death and the subsequent social media outrage at their prank.


Their show, “Hot 30,” has been terminated, the station’s parent company, Southern Cross Austereo (SCA), said in a statement on Monday. SCA also announced a company-wide suspension of prank calls.


Greig told Australian television her first thought when told of Saldanha‘s death was for her family.


“Unfortunately I remember that moment very well, because I haven’t stopped thinking about it since it happened,” she said, amid tears and her voice quavering with emotion. “I remember my first question was ‘was she a mother?’”


“I’ve wanted to just reach out to them and just give them a big hug and say sorry. I hope they’re okay, I really do. I hope they get through this,” said a black-clad Greig when asked about mother of two Saldanha’s children, left grieving their mother’s death with their father Ben Barboza.


Saldanha, 46, was found dead in staff accommodation near London’s King Edward VII hospital on Friday after putting the hoax call through to a colleague who unwittingly disclosed details of Kate’s morning sickness to 2DayFM’s presenters.


British Prime Minister David Cameron said news of the Saldanha’s death was “shocking”.


“I just feel incredibly sorry for her and her family. It’s an absolute tragedy this has happened, and I’m sure everyone will want to reflect on how it was allowed to happen,” he said.


The hospital at which Saldanha worked told the BBC it had not disciplined her for taking the prank call. Police said a post-mortem examination would be conducted on Tuesday.


FIRESTORM


A recording of the call, broadcast repeatedly by the station, rapidly became an internet hit and was reprinted as a transcript in many newspapers.


But news of Saldanha’s death sparked the Internet firestorm, with vitriolic comments towards the DJs on Facebook and Twitter.


Christian said his only wish was that Saldanha’s grief-stricken family received proper support.


“I hope that they get the love, the support, the care that they need, you know,” said Christian, who like Greig struggled to talk about the tragedy.


Both Greig, 30, and Christian were relatively new to the station, with Greig joining in March and Christian having been in the job only a few days before the prank call after a career in regional radio.


Greig said she did not think their prank would work.


“We thought a hundred people before us would’ve tried it. We thought it was such a silly idea and the accents were terrible and not for a second did we expect to speak to Kate, let alone have a conversation with anyone at the hospital. We wanted to be hung up on,” she said.


Christian drew headlines only two weeks before the royal prank call by angering fellow passengers with a harmonica playing stunt aboard pop star Rihanna’s private jet.


SCA, 2Day’s parent company, has received more than 1,000 complaints from Australians over the actions of the popular presenters, who have both been taken off air during an broadcasting watchdog investigation.


“SCA and the hosts of the radio program have also decided that they will not return to the airwaves until further notice,” SCA said in a statement.


Shares in SCA fell 5 percent on Monday after two major Australian companies pulled their advertising with the radio station in protest and other advertising was suspended.


The station said it had tried to contact hospital staff five times over the recordings.


“It is absolutely true to say that we actually did attempt to contact those people on multiple occasions,” said SCA chief executive Rhys Holleran.


“No one could have reasonably foreseen what has happened. I can only say the prank call is not unusual around the world,” he said.


The fallout from the radio stunt has brought back memories in Britain of the death of William’s mother Diana in a Paris car crash in 1997 and threatens to cast a pall over the birth of his and Kate’s first child.


Australia’s Communications Minister Stephen Conroy sought to deflect calls for more media regulation, telling journalists that a looming investigation by Australia’s independent regulator should be allowed to happen without political interference.


(Additional reporting by Mohammed Abbas in London; Editing by Michael Perry)


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Cablevision to raise Internet prices by $5 a month






(Reuters) – Cablevision Systems Corp, the New York-based cable operator, said on Thursday it would raise its Internet prices by $ 5 in January, representing an average hike of 3.2 percent for customers’ total monthly bills.


The company said in a statement that prices for its video and phone services will not be affected and that prices for promotional packages, which generally last one year, will not rise.






But all customers who have Internet service as part of their video or phone package will see prices rise.


Cablevision said it had not raised Internet prices in a decade. It raised video prices in 2011, which saw customer bills rise by 2.88 percent on average.


The company said it has invested $ 140 million in improving its Internet network, deployed more than 50,000 WiFi “hotspots,” and puts no usage caps on its service, unlike some cable competitors.


Canaccord Genuity analyst Tom Eagan downgraded his Cablevision rating from “buy” to “hold” on November 27 and said that Cablevision would lose customers if it were to decide to raise prices not long after Superstorm Sandy.


“Given the massive service outages among its subscribers (after Sandy), we don’t believe the company can raise rates … without incurring material customer churn,” Eagan said.


The cable provider, which is controlled by the Dolan family, said in early November that costs from Sandy, which knocked out service for as many as half its customers, would be substantially higher than its $ 16 million bill from Hurricane Irene in 2011.


Like bigger operators Comcast and Time Warner Cable, Cablevision has been losing customers to rivals such as satellite television provider DirecTV and telephone operator Verizon Communications.


Cablevision shares closed up 2.6 percent, at $ 14.16, on Thursday.


(Reporting By Liana B. Baker; Editing by Steve Orlofsky and Leslie Adler)


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Rolling Stones hit NY for 50th anniversary gig












NEW YORK (AP) — “Time Waits for No One,” the Rolling Stones sang in 1974, but lately it’s seemed like that grizzled quartet does indeed have some sort of exemption from the ravages of time.


At an average age of 68-plus years, the British rockers are clearly in fighting form, sounding tight, focused and truly ready for the spotlight at a rapturously received pair of London concerts last month.












On Saturday, Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Ronnie Wood and Charlie Watts hit New York for the first of three U.S. shows on their “50 and Counting” mini-tour, marking a mind-boggling half-century since the band first began playing its unique brand of blues-tinged rock.


And the three shows — Saturday’s at the new Barclays Center in Brooklyn, then two in Newark, N.J., on Dec. 13 and 15 — aren’t the only big dates on the agenda. Next week the Stones join a veritable who’s who of British rock royalty and U.S. superstars at the blockbuster 12-12-12 Sandy benefit concert at Madison Square Garden. Also scheduled to perform: Paul McCartney, the Who, Eric Clapton, Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, Alicia Keys, Kanye West, Eddie Vedder, Billy Joel, Roger Waters and Chris Martin.


The Stones‘ three U.S. shows promise to have their own special guests, too. Mary J. Blige will be at the Brooklyn gig, as well as guitarist Gary Clark Jr., the band has announced. (Blige performed a searing “Gimme Shelter” with frontman Jagger in London.) Rumors are swirling of huge names at the Dec. 15 show, which also will be on pay-per-view.


In a flurry of anniversary activity, the band also released a hits compilation last month with two new songs, “Doom and Gloom” and “One More Shot,” and HBO premiered a new documentary on their formative years, “Crossfire Hurricane.”


The Stones formed in London in 1962 to play Chicago blues, led at the time by the late Brian Jones and pianist Ian Stewart, along with Jagger and Richards, who’d met on a train platform a year earlier. Bassist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts were quick additions.


Wyman, who left the band in 1992, was a guest at the London shows last month, as was Mick Taylor, the celebrated former Stones guitarist who left in 1974 — to be replaced by Wood, the newest Stone and the youngster at 65.


The inevitable questions have been swirling about the next step for the Stones: another huge global tour, on the scale of their last one, “A Bigger Bang,” which earned more than $ 550 million between 2005 and 2007? Something a bit smaller? Or is this mini-tour, in the words of their new song, really “One Last Shot”?


The Stones won’t say. But in an interview last month, they made clear they felt the 50th anniversary was something to be marked.


“I thought it would be kind of churlish not to do something,” Jagger told The Associated Press. “Otherwise, the BBC would have done a rather dull film about the Rolling Stones.”


__


Associated Press writer David Bauder contributed to this report.


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mtvU honors Frank Ocean, wounded Pakistani teen












NEW YORK (AP) — The mtvU network is honoring a rap superstar who detailed his love for another man and a Pakistani girl shot for her education advocacy as its Man and Woman of the Year.


Frank Ocean, who earned six Grammy nominations Wednesday, published a letter online about his first love, a man, just as his “channel ORANGE” disc was being released. MtvU on Thursday called it “an incredibly brave move for an artist on the verge of superstardom.”












Fifteen-year-old Malala Yousufzai (mah-LAH’-lah YOO’-suf-ZAY’) blogged about her support of education for girls in Pakistan. For that, Taliban militants stormed her school bus and shot her in the head and neck, but she survived.


The mtvU network is geared toward college students and is seen on more than 750 campuses.


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Longtime editor at DC’s Vertigo imprint leaving












PHILADELPHIA (AP) — DC Entertainment says its executive editor and senior vice president of Vertigo — a groundbreaking imprint whose titles have included “Hellblazer,” ”DMZ” and “Sandman” — is leaving early next year.


Karen Berger will step down in March after nearly 20 years at the helm, saying in a statement released by DC late Monday that she is ready for a professional change.












During her tenure at Vertigo, the imprint saw a wide range of writers and artists — Neil Gaiman, Jill Thompson, Becky Cloonan and Brian Wood, among them — who produced titles beyond the traditional superhero and villain archetype.


Gerard Way of My Chemical Romance and writer of “The Umbrella Academy” tweeted that Berger gave “us weird kids in high school a Sub Pop Records for comics.”


___


Online:


http://www.vertigocomics.com


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Show sheds light on Handel’s hidden “Messiah” helper












LONDON (Reuters) – Anyone dusting off their copy of George Frederic Handel‘s “Messiah” in the run-up to Christmas this year might spare a thought for the unsung hero of the piece.


Without Charles Jennens, experts argue that the 18th century oratorio would never have been created, robbing Western choral music of one of its greatest works.












Handel House Museum, located in the cozy London home where the German-born composer spent much of his life, is seeking to put the record straight about a man who, for many reasons, has been passed over by history.


“The Messiah would not have been written without him,” said the museum’s director Sarah Bardwell of Jennens, who lived from 1700 to 1773.


For landowner and patron of the arts Jennens, the words to the Messiah were an expression of deeply held Protestant beliefs, and he was determined that Handel, a composer he had long championed, set it to music.


The words, famously opening with “Comfort ye”, are not Jennens’ own but carefully selected verses from the Bible as well as a small number of psalms from the Book of Common Prayer.


“If you listen to the words it’s all to do with your relationship with God as in the individual, there’s none of the big theological questions,” Bardwell told Reuters.


“Everyone can relate to the Messiah, even beyond Christianity on some level,” she added. “I think that’s why Jennens is so instrumental.”


FRIEND AND BENEFACTOR


Jennens, whose family fortune came from iron, was a friend of Handel and a major backer, subscribing to his music and providing the texts for “Saul”, “Belshazzar”, “L’Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato” and probably “Israel in Egypt”.


So important did Handel consider Jennens that he referred to “your oratorio Messiah” in a letter to the librettist and made a detour on his way home from its premiere in Dublin to visit Jennens and tell him of its success with audiences.


The exhibition, “The Man Behind Messiah”, includes Handel’s autographed score of Saul which Jennens also annotated, suggesting changes to the composer’s work including a different entry point for the words “impious wretch”.


Yet Jennens’ name never appeared on scores, helping to explain why his contribution is largely unknown. An intensely private man, Jennens had reasons for remaining anonymous.


As a “non-juror”, or someone who did not endorse the Hanoverian royal dynasty that succeeded the House of Stuart, he was effectively barred from holding positions of authority.


And when, late in life, he published groundbreaking single-volume editions of some of Shakespeare’s most famous plays, he was attacked by a rival, Shakespearean commentator George Steevens (Eds: correct), and, thus, once again overlooked.


“It’s another reason he becomes kind of cut out of history,” Bardwell explained. “It’s been a fascinating insight into how people can just be written out of history.”


Ironically, despite his fundamental role in the Messiah and some of Handel’s other great oratorios, Jennens was not the biggest fan of a work that took less than a month to compose.


“He just thought Handel maybe rushed it off too quickly,” said Bardwell. Ruth Smith, the curator of the exhibition, believes Handel had the manuscript for about 18 months before he started work on it.


“For it to be rattled off in three weeks, I think Jennens felt that maybe he hadn’t done himself justice.


“I don’t think he ever quite got over his opinion that it wasn’t as good as he had hoped it was going to be. I think that also doesn’t help his reputation. I’m not sure he ever quite recovered from that.”


The Man Behind Messiah runs until April 14, 2013.


(Reporting by Mike Collett-White)


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No charges against Chris Brown in Fla. phone grab












MIAMI (AP) — Grammy-winning singer Chris Brown won’t be charged with a crime after a woman claimed he snatched her cell phone when she tried to take his photo outside a Miami Beach club.


A memo released Friday by the Miami-Dade County State Attorney‘s office concludes there is no evidence that Brown intended to steal the phone in February or that he deleted the photo. One or the other is necessary for him to be charged.












Prosecutors say that Brown tossed the phone from his limo and that it was picked up by security.


A felony charge against the 24-year-old might have triggered a violation of his probation for his 2009 assault on singer Rihanna, who was his girlfriend at the time. The two have recently collaborated on a new duet.


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