"Even in the world of podcasting, Google Podcasts … stands alone among major platforms in its tolerance of hate speech and other extremist content. A recent nonexhaustive search turned up more than two dozen podcasts from white supremacists and pro-Nazi groups, offering a buffet of slurs and conspiracy theories. None of the podcasts appeared on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or...
Producers and engineers have come to rely on specialized apps, and they’ve developed workarounds for the shortcomings of Zoom’s recording functions, among other solutions. - Current
The country is already one time zone ahead of where it should be geographically (Spain is on Central European Time rather than GMT), so after clocks spring forward an hour this weekend, the sun won't go down until almost 8:30 pm. That's not enough time to show a movie and get the audience home before the 10 pm curfew,...
But the window between theatre debut and release to streaming will be shortened. The shortened theatrical window matches recent changes from other studios instigated by the COVID-19 pandemic’s devastating effects on the film business. - The Verge
"While the pandemic overturned the lives of workers industrywide, those just beginning to establish their careers in an industry that is notoriously difficult to break into were disproportionately impacted. The production shutdowns in L.A. and New York eradicated on-set gigs that PAs and extras rely upon, while furloughs and layoffs at agencies decimated entry-level office jobs." - The Hollywood...
"With more people home and glued to their streaming services, many of which don't allow advertising, companies are finding they need to be creative about the ways they get in front of audiences no longer seeing 30-second commercials. More are turning to traditional Hollywood production companies like Imagine to partner on feature films like The Day Sports Stood Still,...
" the results of an industrywide survey we conducted to answer one simple question: who are the most memorable character actors working today? To find out, we polled nearly 60 directors, showrunners, casting directors, and critics — and when we tallied the results, 32 names had emerged from a field of more than 300 suggestions." (The only problem: anyone...
"'People are fooling themselves if they think we're going back to a pre-pandemic work lifestyle,' says Arianna Bocco, president of IFC Films. … To get a sense of the new contours of a business that has been battered by the pandemic, Variety spoke with dozens of entertainment industry players, almost all of whom predicted that the nature of office...
"The loss of broadcast exclusivity is going to accelerate cord cutting as younger viewers gravitate toward the streaming platforms. The loss of coveted younger viewers will reduce total local TV viewership. Still worse, as local TV stations fall into an inescapable vortex toward irrelevance to advertisers, it will become tougher and tougher for them to negotiate with their cable...
How "democratic" are these streaming Oscars when they're almost impossible to find, and expensive to subscribe to, in the UK? The coronavirus, and attendant openings and lockdowns, is mostly to blame, of course, but also: "Streaming infrastructure in the UK is less well-established than in the US, so outside major players such as Netflix, Amazon, Disney+ and Apple, distributors do...
At Netflix, Bridgerton (at least the first season) succeeded beyond executives' wildest dreams. But the Shondaland production team wants a lot more than just Netflix success. No surprise, they need a lot more content, at all times. Podcasts, articles, behind the scenes snippets, TikToks, Instagram Stories, rebranded books (since the series comes from a book series). Welcome to 2021.-...
It's not easy for film and TV production location scouts at the moment. There's a lot of digital photography, and a lot of after-the-big-Zoom-meetings adaptation. One location manager "wonders if she’ll soon be using her new iPhone 12, which has Lidar light detection and ranging capability, to scout locations." - Variety
The final pre-9/11 Oscars (can that be real?), the Oscars where Gladiator beat Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and where Marcia Gay Harden won (deservedly! but perhaps cursedly?) for Pollock ... what else should, or could, have happened? - Los Angeles Times
The intense responses to the R. Kelly, Britney Spears (who, unlike the others on the list, is not portrayed a predator but rather a woman much preyed upon), Michael Jackson, and Woody Allen documentaries have surprised filmmakers - after all, most of the info was already part of the public record. One producer: "The loudest and most impactful documentaries...
Even weeks after the Golden Globes, Hollywood isn't relenting; this reckoning has been a long time coming. "Now, with the very survival of the Globes hanging in the balance, some in Hollywood remain unconvinced that the insular and notoriously fractious group has the capacity, or perhaps even the self-awareness, to undertake the sort of transformational reforms it has vowed." - Los...
