Showbiz Sandbox 648: Judging This Year’s Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Nominees
February 20, 2024
The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame announced their 2024 nominees, including some musical acts previously shortlisted for inclusion. Musician and music writer Sal Nunziato joins host Michael Giltz to argue over which of these acts should be included in the Hall of Fame and why. Plus they give us a rundown of their favorite albums from the past year.
Meanwhile, “Oppenheimer” solidified itself as the obvious and only leader during this year’s awards season by winning seven BAFTA awards, including Best Film. At this point, the movie seems destined to top the upcoming Academy Awards.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including the math behind this year’s movie release schedule, how Microsoft is spreading some Xbox love and ESPN is going long on college football.
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Showbiz Sandbox 615: Warner Bros. Takes Streaming to the Max
April 18, 2023
Warner Bros. Discovery had long promised to merge its two major streaming services HBO Max and Discovery+ into a single, combined offering. This past week the media giant unveiled the name of the new service to the public; Max. Despite having decades of positive brand recognition, HBO will be dropped from the name. The company also announced a ton of new content for the service including a Harry Potter television series.
Meanwhile, the Writers Guild of America has authorized a strike against studios, networks and streamers. Producers believe that a strike is now inevitable after the writers’ current contract ends in May.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including the latest additions to the Library of Congress National Registry of Recordings, Latin music becomes a $1 billion industry and a proposal for new safety guidelines for film and TV productions.
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Showbiz Sandbox 552: Disney and the Great “Shang-Chi” Experiment
August 19, 2021
First Disney tried to shame Scarlett Johansson for daring to sue them over the studios distribution strategy on “Black Widow.” Then during an earnings call the company’s CEO described the upcoming Marvel “Shang-Chi and the Legend Of The Ten Rings” as an “interesting experiment.” Simu Liu, the star of “Shang-Chi,” was quick to push back on such thinking, saying “We are the underdog; the underestimated.”
Meanwhile, actor Johnny Depp believes he is an underdog as well these days, claiming in an interview with The Sunday Times that Hollywood is boycotting him. International film festivals are doing the exact opposite however, honoring Depp for his body of work.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including “Funny Girl” is headed back to Broadway, the television game show “Jeopardy” officially has two new hosts and production of “The Lord of the Rings” Amazon series moves from New Zealand to the United Kingdom.
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Showbiz Sandbox 490: The Future of Journalism After the Coronavirus
April 21, 2020
Long before the coronavirus pandemic, independent journalism was on life support, especially at the local level. After businesses around the world shut down advertising revenue at media outlets completely disappeared and may never fully return. This is especially true at newspapers and industry trade publications, which have begun cutting staff.
In a wide-ranging interview, Kelly McBride, a senior vice president at the Poynter Institute gives us her take on what journalism will look like after the pandemic. She also discusses her new role as the public editor of National Public Radio, as well as her work advising the Hollywood Reporter.
Of course we also cover some of the week’s top entertainment headlines including when we all might be able to attend a live event again, the latest on the Writers Guild contract negotiations and Netflix hits a new high.
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Showbiz Sandbox 151: Is It Time To Move Your Music To The Cloud?
June 11, 2012
If anyone is going to struggle with managing their digital music collection it’s Bob Boilen, the creator and host of NPR’s All Songs Considered, and a talented musician in his own right. Boilen created quite a stir a few weeks back when he announced he had just deleted all his music. Rather than keep tens-of-thousands of songs on his hard drive, Boilen has decided to move all his music to the cloud. He joins us for an in-depth conversation about the pros and cons of how we’ll all be listening to music in the future.
The 66th Annual Tony Awards were held over the weekend to honor this year’s best Broadway production and “Once”, based on the hit indie film, was the big winner this year taking home eight awards including Best Musical. Even host Neil Patrick Harris couldn’t liven up a lackluster show where the highlight was meant to be a number from a ten-year-old musical performed live from a Caribbean cruise ship.
When tickets went on sale recently for Justin Bieber’s upcoming tour they sold out all 48 shows in less than 60 minutes. Two concerts at Madison Square Garden sold out in 30 seconds. Yet, what might seem technically impossible at first becomes more understandable upon learning just how few tickets went on sale to the public.
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Showbiz Sandbox 96: Why Facebook Is Becoming Your Friendly Neighborhood Video Store
March 14, 2011
In their never ending quest to replace declining DVD revenue movie studios have begun renting movies on Facebook. Such partnerships are focused on more than just sales, or finding a Netflix competitor, they are also about marketing. As Facebook users rent and purchase movies they’ll be transformed into a social marketing army.
Mel Gibson made headlines again last week accepting a plea deal in his spousal battery case. Whether moviegoers will forgive Gibson for recent ethnic slurs and racist comments will be tested when his next film, “The Beaver”, premieres at the South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas. Meanwhile, Carlie Sheen, in between streaming his wacky behavior on the Internet, was also headed to court to file a $100 million lawsuit against Warner Bros. and sitcom producer Chuck Lorre.
Julie Taymor joined Sheen on the unemployment line. After spending nine years bringing the Broadway musical “Spider-Man Turn Off The Dark”, Taymor was replaced as the director of the expensive, beleaguered musical.
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Showbiz Sandbox 93: A Film Festival Fit For An iPhone
February 21, 2011
Innovative filmmakers have taken a liking to iPhones and Flip cameras that can record HD video. They’ve begun churning out creative pieces shot entirely on the tiny devices. Ruben Kazanstev co-founded the iPhone Film Festival to promote some of this new work. He is surprised at how popular the festival has been explains how the project has taken on a life of its own.
Maybe in the future big theater chains such as AMC and Regal will wind up playing movies shot on iPhones. They are taking on the studios by forming a joint venture to acquire and distribute independent films, but is such a move legal?
Charlie Sheen continues to make headlines for his erratic behavior. Many industry watchers are questioning the decision to allow the actor to return to work on “Two And A Half Men” before he tackles his substance abuse problem.
We discuss all the top entertainment news, including this year’s Bonnaroo lineup, Borders’ bankruptcy filing and plans for a Robocop statue in Detroit. During Inside Baseball we discuss how LCD Soundsystem hopes to beat scalpers selling tickets to their upcoming farewell concerts.
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Showbiz Sandbox 76: Taking On The Hobbit And Ticketmaster Down Under
October 25, 2010
Our friends Down Under generated a lot of entertainment news this past week. In New Zealand a union boycott of “The Hobbit” may cause Warner Bros. to relocate the production to another country. Director Peter Jackson has publicly opposed such a move, but as the Hollywood Reporter’s Jonathan Handel explains, this may just be Warner Bros. way of negotiating better government tax subsidies.
Over in Australia, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. has launched Foxtix, a live event ticketing service aimed at capturing a share of Ticketmaster’s business. Taking on Ticketmaster is a difficult and expensive fight, but Adam McArthur, the head of Foxtix, fills us in on how the company will differentiate itself in the market.
Former Australian native and current Hollywood pariah Mel Gibson was all set to make a comeback with a cameo in “The Hangover 2”, but Warner Bros. decided he was just too much trouble and opted for Liam Neeson.
Meanwhile, in television news the Fox network pulled its programming from Cablevision’s channel lineup over a retransmission fee dispute. Don’t worry, Cablevision’s customers were still able to follow the baseball playoffs through Twitter posts from the Federal Communications Commission. Read more
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Showbiz Sandbox 13: Hooliganism At Comic-Con (Or Lack Thereof)
July 28, 2009
We had a plethora of panelists this week, all of whom were in San Diego over the weekend to experience Comic-Con first hand. KPBS’ Cinema Junkie blogger Beth Accomando covered the event for National Public Radio, Todd Gilchrist was there for Cinematical, SciFi Wire‘s news editor Patrick Lee made the trip, as did Phillip Nakov from MovieSet.com and Harry Medved, who helped out with Fandango’s coverage of the event as their director of public relations. Also joining in on this week’s fun is New York Daily News writer and Huffington Post blogger, Michael Giltz.
If you weren’t one of the 126,000 people attending Comic-Con, this episode will fill you in on what you missed. There was whole day devoted to 3D movies, which apparently isn’t just a gimmick anymore. The big hits of Comic-Con were “District 9”, “Avatar”, “Kick Ass” and “Iron Man 2” and the biggest miss was Roland Emerich’s next movie “2012” which is either so bad it’s good, or so bad it’s just plain bad. Irrelevant whether it wowed people at the convention or not was “Twilight: New Moon”, because fans just wanted to see Robert Pattinson . Hundreds of young girls, their moms and a bunch of sensitive men camped out overnight to get into a jam packed “Twilight” panel. The festival was “the redemption of “New Moon” director Chris Weitz, who was clearly adored by his cast. It was definitely the panel with the most security.
This year marked the first appearance by Tim Burton (as a presenter), Peter Jackson and Terry Gilliam. Johnny Depp stopped by to say two words (literally) in promotion of Burton’s “Alice in Wonderland.” Read more
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