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It’s Not ‘Diversity’ To Have Black Actors In Westerns

It's just history. - Washington Post

An Indigenous Filmmaker From Canada Creates Art From Childhood Trauma

The chair for the Canada Council for the Arts says, "What you’re seeing is maybe an industry that is so ravenous for stories that it’s realized it has to open the gates beyond its usual suspects." - The New York Times

There’s A New Film Musical About A Musical About The Process of Writing A Musical

Wait, what? Yes. And, perhaps unsurprisingly, it involves Lin-Manuel Miranda. - The New York Times

The Armorer For ‘Rust’ Was Set To Earn A Whopping 7,913 Dollars

That's a normal budget for an indie, but it does bring home grim realities of the industry. "The producers of the movie Rust earmarked $650,000 to pay themselves, $7,913 to pay their armorer and $350,000 as a contingency in case anything went wrong." - The Hollywood Reporter

England’s South West Region Gets A Big Boost From Bridgerton

The Netflix series revives the always-popular with Austenites tourism industry in Bath, but then there's David Attenborough's Our Planet and other productions that, said one mayor, "help put our area on the map." - BBC

CNN’s Online Video Is Much More Divisive Than What It Airs On TV, And Here’s Why

Yes, of course, it's ultimately to make more money, but here's a glimpse of just how different the content is and a look at the structural reason for that difference. - Columbia Journalism Review

New Marvel Film “Eternals” Banned In Saudi Arabia And Kuwait

Sources report that the decision is because Disney's Marvel Studios refused the request to cut a male-male kiss. Eternals is the first film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe to feature an LGBTQ+ superhero. - Variety

How Shondaland Became An Empire

In Shonda Rhimes’ renewed pact, the bullet points specify that Shondaland will now be, as Rhimes puts it, a “one-stop shopping” source for Netflix for movies as well as a wide variety of other types of content. - Variety

How Did 21st-Century TV Comedy Get So Dark?

"BoJack Horseman, Fleabag, Veep, and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend are among the comedies that have left the traditional sitcom form in the dust. … The laughs come with much higher emotional stakes, often juxtaposed with grief, shame, addiction, … and questions about the very meaning of life." - BBC

The Cultural Revisionism Industry

Over the past few years, a certain genre of media has found opportunity in debunking false conceptions of the semi-recent past and meditating on the cultural factors which contributed to their initial spread. - Gawker

What Happened To Tony Soprano In The End? “Sopranos” Showrunner David Chase Finally ‘Fesses Up

Okay, it's not really a surprise, but we finally get confirmation from the guy who made the decision, along with his feelings about the brouhaha around the show's finale, what led him to make the prequel, and how he feels about film versus TV. - The Hollywood Reporter

AI Is Figuring Out Ancient Board Games — And Letting Us Play Them Online

Those games go back as far as cilivization does. Yet when archaeologists discover game boards and pieces, of course, they never find rule books. So we haven't been able to play them — until now. - Wired

Netflix Is A Drug, Its Algorithms Are Dealers, And David Foster Wallace Predicted It All

Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos "recognized that viewers were addicts, and that his role was to supply what they wanted" whenever they wanted it. The predictive analytic software that makes recommendations lets users imagine they're in control — just as depicted in Infinite Jest back in 1996. - Literary Hub

Study: More Diversity on Screen Boosts Viewership

The study found that ratings and social media engagement for most groups, including white audiences, peaked for shows that featured casts that were at least 31% minority, while viewership among adults between the ages of 18 and 49 often peaked when a show had a majority minority cast.  - Time

Can This New Movie Pass Save Art House Theatres?

Mubi, which caters to cinephiles seeking an eclectic mix of films, has begun offering a membership program: A well-stocked streaming service that movie lovers can flip on from home, bundled with a weekly ticket they can use to go see a handpicked film at their favorite theater. - The New York Times

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