Barbie The Movie: In Concert tour announced
Live Nation and Mattel, Inc have announced a North American film with orchestra tour of Barbie The Movie: In Concert.
Produced by Overture Global Entertainment, the live-to-film concert experience will see the smash-hit film projected onto a giant LED Screen, accompanied by live music from The Barbie Land Sinfonietta.
Starting on 2 July and visiting 37 cities including a previously announced 27 July date at Los Angeles’ Hollywood Bowl. The Barbie Land Sinfonietta – a special presentation from orchestrator and executive producer Macy Schmidt’s all-women and majority women-of-colour orchestra – will perform the film’s award-winning score.
The Barbie Land Sinfonietta is conducted by Tony Award-winning producer Macy Schmidt. who recently became the first woman of colour orchestrator in Broadway history.
“Music lends so much heart and excitement to the Barbie film; between the stunning and clever orchestral score and the upbeat iconic pop soundtrack, music is carrying us through the story,” adds Schmidt. “On top of getting to experience the film unlike ever before, Barbie The Movie: In Concert audiences will have the privilege of watching some of the world’s best musicians come together and do what they do best.
Barbie The Movie: In Concert will also include a touring road crew consisting of a lineup of all-women technical and production professionals
“Throughout this entire process, I’ve been so inspired by Mattel’s genuine commitment to everything this film stands for. I am particularly excited to be partnering with Mattel as I have long been inspired by Barbie’s purpose statement: ‘to inspire the limitless potential in every girl.’ It couldn’t be more aligned to have an all-women orchestra performing this film, bringing its message to life onstage.’”
Barbie The Movie: In Concert will also include a touring road crew consisting of a lineup of all-women technical and production professionals. In addition, it will feature special limited-edition merchandise, photo opportunities and more.
“We can’t wait for fans of all ages to join us in this immersive experience, celebrating the biggest movie of 2023 and bringing the magic of Barbie to life like never before.” says Josh Silverman, chief franchise officer at Mattel. “The incredible talents of Macy Schmidt and The Barbie Land Sinfonietta guarantee an unparalleled and unforgettable adventure.”
The highest grossing film of last year, the Greta Gerwig-directed Barbie was released worldwide on 21 July 2023. It received more than 450 industry nominations and 120 wins, including eight Academy Award nominations.
Music from Barbie was nominated for 11 Grammy Awards, with three wins in key categories including Song of the Year and Best Song Written for Visual Media (Billie Eilish’s What Was I Made For?), and Best Compilation Soundtrack for Visual Media.
Barbie: The Movie In Concert Dates:
July 2, 2024: Tampa, FL, MIDFLORIDA Credit Union Amphitheatre
July 3: Alpharetta, GA, Ameris Bank Amphitheatre
July 5: Raleigh, NC, Coastal Credit Union Music Park
July 6: Camden, NJ, Freedom Mortgage Pavilion
July 7: Bristow, VA, Jiffy Lube Live
July 8: Virginia Beach, VA, Veterans United Home Loans Amphitheater
July 9: Charlotte, NC, PNC Music Pavilion
July 10: Burgettstown, PA, The Pavilion at Star Lake
July 12: Milwaukee, WI, American Family Insurance Amphitheatre
July 13: St. Louis, MO, Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre
July 14: Noblesville, IN, Ruoff Music Center
July 15: Kansas City, MO, Starlight Theater
July 17: Denver, CO, Fiddler’s Green Amphitheatre
July 18: Salt Lake City, UT, Utah First Credit Union Amphitheatre
July 20: Ridgefield, WA, RV Inn Style Resorts Amphitheater
July 21: Auburn, WA, White River Amphitheatre
July 25: Mountain View, CA, Shoreline Amphitheatre
July 26: Wheatland, CA, Toyota Amphitheater
July 27: Los Angeles, CA, Hollywood Bowl
July 28: Chula Vista, CA, North Island Credit Union Amphitheatre
July 30: Phoenix, AZ, Talking Stick Resort Amphitheatre
July 31: Albuquerque, NM, Isleta Amphitheater
August 2: Houston, TX, The Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion
August 3: Dallas, TX, Dos Equis Pavilion
August 4: Rogers, AR, Walmart AMP
August 6: Birmingham, AL, Oak Mountain Amphitheatre
August 7: Nashville, TN, Ascend Amphitheater
August 8: Tinley Park, IL, Credit Union 1 Amphitheatre
August 9: Cincinnati, OH, Riverbend Music Center
August 10: Clarkston, MI, Pine Knob Music Theatre
August 11: Toronto, ON, Budweiser Stage
August 12: Cuyahoga Falls, OH, Blossom Music Center
August 14: Darien Lake, NY, Darien Lake Amphitheater
August 15: Hartford, CT, The XFINITY Theatre
August 16: Mansfield, MA, Xfinity Center
August 17: Holmdel, NJ, PNC Bank Arts Center
August 18: Wantagh, NY, Northwell Health at Jones Beach Theater
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Michael Gudinski doc to premiere at Oz film fest
A new documentary detailing the extraordinary life and career of Mushroom Group founder Michael Gudinski will make its premiere at the Melbourne International Film Festival on 10 August, three weeks before its theatrical release across Australia on 31 August.
Entitled Ego: The Michael Gudinski Story the film will feature archive footage and interviews with Gudinski, while artists such as Kylie Minogue, Dave Grohl, Ed Sheeran, Sting, Bruce Springsteen and Jimmy Barnes will talk about the late music mogul’s impact on their careers, as well as on the wider music industry in Australia and internationally.
The documentary will be part of Mushroom’s extended 50th-anniversary celebrations
The documentary will be part of Mushroom’s extended 50th-anniversary celebrations. Gudinski, who died in March 2021, founded Mushroom Records in 1972, with his group of companies firmly establishing itself as one of the foremost music and entertainment specialists across both Australia and New Zealand.
Indeed, such was Gudinski’s legendary status in his native country, that he was honoured with a state funeral in Melbourne, with superstars such as Elton John, Taylor Swift, Billy Joel, Rod Stewart, Bryan Adams and many more recording tributes to him, while Ed Sheeran attended the memorial service and performed an emotional version of his hit Visiting Hours to honour a man he referred to as his friend and mentor.
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Glasto’s Live at Worthy Farm gets cinema release
Glastonbury’s Festival’s upcoming Live at Worthy Farm live stream will also be broadcast at cinemas around the UK, organisers have announced.
Through a partnership with Trafalgar Releasing – the company behind record-breaking concert film releases by the likes of BTS and Coldplay, the latter of whom will play Live at Worthy Farm – the virtual festival, broadcast from Glastonbury’s Worthy Home site on Saturday 22 and Sunday 23 May, will screen in tandem at cinemas across the UK on Saturday.
Tickets for the cinema screenings, which go on sale today (12 May), are priced from £19.99.
Glastonbury Festival also today announced set times and new guests for the five-hour event, with a “unique spoken-word narrative” featuring PJ Harvey, Jarvis Cocker, Kae Tempest, George the Poet, Kurupt FM, Little Amal and festival founder Michael Eavis adding to previously announced sets from artists including Coldplay, Damon Albarn, Haim, Idles and Jorja Smith.
Live at Worthy Farm will be broadcast across four separate time zones (for EMEA; central, south and the east coast of North America; the west coast of North America; and Asia Pacific) on Saturday, with two global “encore” screenings on Sunday 23rd, at 2pm and 7pm BST. Tickets are priced at priced at £20, €23, US$27.50 & A$35.
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BTS smash own cinema record with Bring the Soul
Bring the Soul: The Movie, the latest film by K-pop superstars BTS, broke the admissions and box-office records for an ‘event cinema’ release, the band’s label, Big Hit, and the film’s distributor, Trafalgar Releasing, have announced.
Bring the Soul, which opened in a record 112 countries on 7 August, gained 2.55 million admissions across 5,000 cinemas, for a global box-office take of over $24m.
Bring the Soul: The Movie, which finds BTS at the end of their Love Yourself tour of Europe, also reached No 10 in the US in its opening weekend, and number nine in the UK.
The film follows the boy band’s debut, Burn the Stage: The Movie, based on the 2017 Wings tour, which sold more than 1.4m tickets – then a record for an event cinema (ie music, sport, comedy, etc.) release – and follow-up Love Yourself in Seoul, released in January.
BTS fans spent a collective €3.5m on livestreaming the group’s Wembley Stadium shows when the Love Yourself tour visited London in May.
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Widest-ever event cinema release for BTS’s Bring the Soul
Bring the Soul: The Movie, the third BTS feature film, has had the widest-ever release for an ‘event cinema’ film, as management company Big Hit Entertainment and film distributor Trafalgar Releasing bet on another record-breaking release for the K-pop phenoms.
The film, which opened in cinemas on Wednesday (7 August) and finds the boy band at the end of their Love Yourself tour of Europe, will open in a record 112 countries through Sunday 11 August.
It follows debut film Burn the Stage: The Movie, based on the 2017 Wings tour, which sold more than 1.4m tickets – a record for an event cinema (ie music, sport, comedy, etc.) release – and follow-up Love Yourself in Seoul, released in January.
Tickets to see the film, which is showing at most local cinemas, is available from Bring the Soul’s website, bringthesoulthemovie.com.
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Coldplay: A Head Full of Dreams sells 300k tickets in one night
Mat Whitecross’s new Coldplay film, A Head Full of Dreams, sold more than 300,000 tickets for a global gross of over US$3.5m for Wednesday’s one-night-only cinema screening.
Charting the band’s 20-plus-year journey towards stadium-filling superstardom, Coldplay: A Head Full of Dreams combines live footage from the recent A Head Full of Dreams stadium tour – the third highest-grossing of all time – with archive material captured over the past three decades.
The film was shown at 2,650 cinemas globally on 14 November, reaching the number-one spot on the Dutch film chart, No2 in the UK, Australia and Italy and No5 in the US.
“It was fantastic to launch the documentary with the one-night-only cinema release,” comments Coldplay manager Dave Holmes. “We saw Coldplay fans from every corner of the globe heading to cinemas to experience the film together, and the feedback has been incredibly positive.
“We saw Coldplay fans from every corner of the globe heading to cinemas to experience the film together”
It’s been great working alongside Trafalgar on such a well-received global event.”
Trafalgar CEO Marc Allenby adds: “It’s been an exciting 2018 for Trafalgar Releasing and we are so pleased to see A Head Full of Dreams achieve such a fantastic record-breaking box office. Collaborating closely with Warner Music, Parlophone and Dave Holmes Management, we were able to talk directly to fans of Coldplay around the world, who came out to support the film’s release in cinemas.”
Trafalgar’s next release is Burn The Stage: the Movie, the first film from K-pop sensations BTS, which plays from yesterday (15 November), with coordinated encores over the weekend.
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Live Nation Productions hires two producers
Live Nation Productions, Live Nation’s film and television production division, has announced two senior hires.
Experienced producer and studio exec Matthew Stein will be the company’s new head of scripted development and production, while Emmy Award-winning TV producer Ryan Kroft becomes head of unscripted development and production. Both will report to Heather Parry, Live Nation Productions’ president of production, film and television.
Stein joins Live Nation Productions ahead of the release of the company’s first scripted films, A Star is Born, starring Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper in the latter’s directorial debut, and the After Party, starring Wiz Khalifa, French Montana, Teyana Taylor and Kyle. He joins from Sony Pictures International Productions, where he was vice-president.
“We’re ready to ramp up even more amazing projects”
Kroft, meanwhile, joins from Viacom, where he was senior VP, events and specials, for MTV, VH1 and Logo. Recent Live Nation Productions television and documentary projects include Gaga: Five Foot Two, Eagles of Death Metal: Nos Amis and Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop: A Bad Boy Story, which chronicles the career of Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs.
“In just two short years, Live Nation Productions has brought fans closer to live music through a diverse slate of projects, and with this stellar team in place we’ll be able to continue successfully exploring content for screens of all kinds,” says Parry. “Between Matt’s extensive film experience and Ryan’s expertise with live TV, we’re ready to ramp up even more amazing projects.”
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MSG launches Natalie Portman-curated film festival
Boston Calling Events, the promoter of Massachusetts festival Boston Calling, has announced plans for its first film festival, to be held in the run-up to the 2018 event.
Boston Calling Film Festival, curated by Oscar-winning actress Natalie Portman, will take place from Tuesday 22 to Thursday 24 May at the Brattle Theatre (235-cap.) in Cambridge, Mass., and showcase a series of films that “explore similar themes told from the perspective of either male or female directors”, including Lolita, Diary of a Teenage Girl, the Exorcist and I Am Not a Witch.
Portman will additionally curate and host a series of “special programming”, details of which are still to be announced, in the Boston Calling Music Festival’s indoor arena throughout the weekend of 25–27 May.
“I’m so excited to show films that I love that explore the female gaze,” says Portman (pictured). “I don’t think there is anything inherently different between male and female artists, but these are examples of great works of art in which similar storylines have female tropes that play out quite differently depending on who is telling the story.
Portman will additionally curate and host a series of special programming in the music festival’s indoor arena
“I’m looking forward to sharing these with an audience and hearing their reactions. It makes it an even more special opportunity to watch these incredible films on the big screen at one of my favourite movie theatres.”
Boston Calling Events is jointly owned by Crash Line Productions and Madison Square Garden Company, the latter of which acquired a controlling interest in the company June 2016.
Now in its ninth year, Boston Calling Music Festival will take place for the second consecutive year at the Harvard Athletic Complex in Allston, Boston, on 25–27 May 2018. Headliners are Eminem, the Killers and Jack White.
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Beatles’ Apple Corps win Shea Stadium lawsuit
A New York judge has thrown out a lawsuit by the estate of Sid Bernstein, the late promoter of the Beatles’ 1965 show at Shea Stadium, alleging the band’s Apple Corps company had infringed on its copyright by including footage from the concert in documentary film Eight Days a Week.
The suit – which was in October criticised as “frivolous” and “entirely meritless” by Apple Corps’ lawyers – sought ownership (or joint ownership) of the master tapes by Bernstein’s company, Sid Bernstein Presents, arguing that, “[w]ithout Sid, the mastermind of the event, this film would never have been made”.
Copyright to the film – originally shown in 1966 as The Beatles at Shea Stadium – was later acquired by Apple Corps and the band’s film-distribution outfit, Subafilms, from their management company, Nems Enterprises.
In a ruling yesterday (26 July), judge George B. Daniels, of the US district court for southern New York, said the company could not claim ownership of the footage as Bernstein did not himself film the concert, instead signing over the rights to do so to Nems.
“The relevant legal question is not the extent to which Bernstein contributed to or financed the 1965 concert,” reads the judgment. “Rather, it is the extent to which he ‘provided the impetus for’ and invested in a copyrightable work: eg the concert film.
“The complaint and relevant contracts clearly refute any such claim by Bernstein. By the express terms of the Nems-Bernstein contract, Bernstein had no control over the filming of the concert.”
Sid Bernstein Presents’ lawyer, Donald Curry, tells Reuters his client intends to appeal the decision.
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Australians prefer films to live music: study
Cinemas are the most popular arts venues in Australia, with concerts lagging behind films as the way in which most Australians get their cultural fix.
That’s according to new data from the Australian government, which has released figures on the proportion of people aged 15 and over who attended arts events from June 2013–14 (the newest available data).
Drawing on data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the Australia Council for the Arts found 66% of people went to the cinema that year, compared to 33% for popular music events and 20% for classical music or opera, for an “any music” total of 42%.
Live music was, however, the second most-popular cultural pursuit, outperforming libraries and archives (35%), performing arts (32%), museums (28%) and art galleries (27%).
The Australian live entertainment industry contracted in 2015, with revenue and attendances falling 6.7% and 0.9%, respectively.
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