Showbiz Sandbox 128: Have Yourself A Movie Little Christmas
December 5, 2011
Tis the season for holiday movies and there is no shortage of Yuletide titles to choose from. Thankfully film critic-at-large Alonso Duralde comes to the rescue by sifting through decades of Christmas movies in his book “Have Yourself A Movie Little Christmas
It’s also the time of year when acclaimed movies and music from the past 12-months begin picking up nominations for annual awards. Last week nominees were announced for the Independent Spirit Awards and the Grammys with many more to come.
Over on Broadway ten shows earned more than $1 million during Thanksgiving week as the theater going season kicks into full gear. The hit musical “Book of Mormon” even turned a profit thanks in part to high ticket prices.
We also cover the week’s top entertainment news stories, including Madonna’s Super Bowl gig, the end of Napster and why musician Elvis Costello doesn’t want you to buy his new boxed set.
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Showbiz Sandbox 126: Foot In Mouth Disease Sweeps Through Hollywood
November 14, 2011
Getting publicity in Hollywood can be a very difficult task. If you are an A-list director like Brett Ratner or a hot actor like Ashton Kutcher however, all you need to do is make a bigoted statement or fire off an ignorant Twitter post and you’ll get more ink than you ever wanted. Ratner’s homophobic slur forced him to resign as producer of next year’s Oscars, while Kutcher’s uninformed opinion on current events caused him to rethink his social media participation. Has the entertainment industry become overly sensitive or do its inhabitants just have no class? We try to figure out what all the fuss is about.
The other big news of the week was the sale of record label EMI to Universal Music Group and Sony. EMI’s owner, Citibank, decided to split the record label from its publishing arm in an effort to get the deal passed antitrust regulators. As the music industry contracts from four major record companies to three, what will it mean for indie artists and their fans?
Broadway may also be undergoing some changes soon. Long running musicals such as “Mamma Mia!”, “Chicago” and “Mary Poppins” seem to be fading fast and may need to make way for new productions such as a revival of “Porgy & Bess”, “Evita” featuring Ricky Martin and a stage version of “Bonnie & Clyde”.
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Showbiz Sandbox 125: Are Radio D.J.’s A Thing Of The Past?
November 7, 2011
Radio listenership has eroded over the past several years as consumers have adopted streaming music services such as Spotify and Pandora. To stay competitive and survive, Clear Channel, the nation’s largest radio station operator, shocked the industry this past week by firing dozens of local D.J.’s and replacing them with a national programming team. Indie-label artists and music fans are sure to suffer as radio playlists become more homogenized and less relevant.
Google has no plans to get into radio, however rumors have surfaced that they might be trying to add a cable television operation to their broadband project in Kansas. Launching and maintaining a cable television service is not exactly like running a search engine; it can be expensive, take years and ultimately lead to a lot of red ink.
Comedian Louis C.K. has shunned traditional cable altogether. He’s decided to broadcast his upcoming comedy concert directly to fans via the Internet, bypassing traditional television distribution.
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Showbiz Sandbox 124: UltraViolet Is A Solution In Search Of A Problem
October 31, 2011
More than 75 companies have teamed up to form UltraViolet, a new service that promises to give consumers the freedom to watch movies and television shows wherever and whenever they want. However, early adopters have discovered that untethering content from physical media such as DVDs can be a tedious and confusing process. As the entertainment industry experiments with rapidly evolving technologies, viewers seem hard pressed to find any benefits in moving to the cloud.
When it comes to music though, fans have already migrated to online services such as Pandora, iTunes and Amazon. Now Google is preparing to launch its own music offering which is rumored to allow users to share music with their friends and family.
And if you thought digital technology was a tough racket, so is trying to copy the success of the hit television series “Mad Men”. NBC failed with it’s 1960s drama “The Playboy Club” and ABC isn’t fairing much better with “Pan Am”, a similar knock-off. They could have picked up Charlie Sheen’s new sitcom, “Anger Management” as a replacement, but FX scooped it up before anyone had a chance.
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Showbiz Sandbox 113: Hollywood Studios Think Twice About Comic-Con
July 25, 2011
Attendance at this year’s Comic-Con was higher than ever. Geoff Boucher of the Los Angeles Times and Alex Billington of First Showing were in San Diego last weekend sitting in on, if not moderating, panel discussions with the likes of Steven Spielberg, Peter Jackson, Francis Coppola and “Game of Thrones” cast members. In filling us in on all the highlights they explain why some studios skipped this year’s festivities and why next year’s convention is set to be the biggest Comic-Con yet.
There was also some sad news this past weekend as we learned about the untimely death of soul singer Amy Winehouse at the age of 27. The troubled young singer battled with drug addiction since rising to stardom in 2006 and her death raises the question over what responsibility the entertainment industry has in helping artists with drug or alcohol problems.
There was better news on Broadway where at least three recent shows turned a profit with even more shows about to follow suit. Even the much-hyped disaster “Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark” is shaping up to be a financial success.
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Showbiz Sandbox 106: A Tony Awards Preview Of Broadway’s Billion Dollar Year
June 6, 2011
Even without all the news surrounding the troubled production of “Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark”, Broadway gave us plenty to talk about over the past year. This season brought more critically acclaimed (and financially successful) productions than during any time in recent memory. Brian Scott Lipton, editor-in-chief of TheaterMania.com, tells us who he thinks will win the year’s top Tony Awards on Sunday evening.
Movie box office is also on the rise after a disappointing first half of the year. Even so, the film grosses being earned in North America are being dwarfed by international box office. We’ll explain why.
Meanwhile, Lady Gaga ruled the album charts with her new release thanks to some help from Amazon.com. A number of artists are finding new and innovative ways to sell their music. In fact, the Kaiser Chiefs are allowing fans to create and sell their own albums with the band’s music.
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Showbiz Sandbox 87: The Oscars Have A Mommy Complex
January 10, 2011
It seems as if this year’s supporting actress awards are being overrun by a handful of horrible mothers. “The Fighter” and “Animal Kingdom” feature just the kind of evil matriarchs Oscar voters have reward in the past. Stephen Farber of the Daily Beast and Hollywood Reporter discusses the evolution of flawed movie mommies from “Mildred Pierce” to “Precious”.
Ben Fritz of the Los Angeles Times tells us that Hollywood studios are hoping to make selling films online a bit easier and explains how Academy members may soon be able to download awards screeners from iTunes .
Last week during the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas it seemed as if television manufacturers were on the defensive over the lackluster sales of 3D televisions. The music industry isn’t fairing much better as Nielsen reported album sales Fell 12.8% in 2010 and digital downloads were flat.
Of course we also review the week’s top entertainment headlines including a new film version of Gypsy starring Barbara Streisand, the return of “Jersey Shore”, Quentin Tarantino’s flawed top 20 list and Broadway’s record setting box office.
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Showbiz Sandbox 69: The Emmys Shine In Google TV’s Shadow
August 30, 2010
Host Jimmy Fallon helped pump some energy into this year’s Emmy Awards where a lot of new names and shows walked away with trophies. Rick Porter, staff editor at Zap2it, provides some details about who won and who lost. And the Emmy telecast received rave reviews. One of the shows writers was David Wild, a contributing editor at Rolling Stone, and he gives us all the dirt on what went on behind-the-scenes.
In the future, the shows that win Emmys may not air on television, but instead be found online. Alex Ben Block, a senior editor for the Hollywood Reporter and author of “George Lucas’s Blockbusting
As always, we review the week’s top entertainment headlines during Big Deal or Big Whoop. Our Inside Baseball topic focuses on the news that video retailer Blockbuster may soon file for bankruptcy.
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