Media

The Warner Bros. musical generated a wane $11.4 million from 3,456 U.S. theaters in its first four days of release, below earlier expectations suggesting the feel-good film would reach $20 million. – Variety

Filmmaker Jim Mickle: “I started asking questions like, ‘What if you could make an apocalyptic story where you actually want to go to that world?’ What does that look like? And you start asking, ‘What happens if humans just disappear for 10 years and nature is suddenly allowed to thrive?’ It would probably be one of the most beautiful places you could go to.” – Slate

That’s what season 2 – and sophomore novels – are all about. Overwhelming numbers for a TV series or book can scare artists off. So what’s going to happen in series 2 of Lupin? – The New York Times

In the Heights might have opened to disappointing box office numbers this weekend, but those who did see it had the chance to learn about second-generation immigrants’ dreams – and, through an elderly character, reality. “The classic peril of assimilation in America is that a perceived greater belonging demands a partial loss of self,” but Abuela Claudia’s character offers more. – The Atlantic

Take Netflix’s new High on the Hog as an example: “The narrative about Black food is often one of resilience—a history of dishes and cooking passed down from one generation to the next as Black people survived subpar and inhumane conditions. While part of that is true, High on the Hog is not afraid to complicate that narrative by reconsidering Black cooking through a lens of abundance, and even luxury: It provides context around the lives that were lived before enslavement.” – Vice

And it’s not just Hollywood. In recent USC study, the researchers “combed through 200 popular films from the U.S., the U.K., Australia and New Zealand from 2017 to 2019. They found that only six of them had a Muslim in a co-leading role, and only one of those was female. Of the nearly 9,000 speaking parts, fewer than two percent were Muslim. And there none in animated movies.” – NPR

When Kids came out in 1995, it won awards, had incredible box-office success for a film so raunchy, and essentially took the film world by storm. But “the film’s legacy is more complicated. Many of the young men and women … tapped to play key roles struggled to find work after the film premiered, and grew frustrated that they’d been paid a pittance while the director and the Weinstein brothers scored major paydays.” – Variety

To make In the Heights work as a movie, the playwright and scriptwriter Quiera Alegría Hudes had to make painful cuts, and so did songwriter Lin-Manuel Miranda. How to keep it faithful to the feel of the stage show? Director Jon Chu: “What they had created is not just a show. It is a life force.” – The New York Times

“[The Indian Prime Minister’s Hindu nationalist government] is using powerful tools to curtail the creative freedom of Bollywood — in particular the influence of Muslims, who have an outsize presence in the industry. The measures pushed by the Modi government include indiscriminate tax investigations, trumped-up accusations against actors and directors, intimidation and harassment in response to certain movies and TV shows, and the chilling rap of law enforcement at the door.” – The Atlantic

The just-announced project They Are Us, to be written and directed by New Zealander Andrew Niccol (writer and co-producer of The Truman Show, writer-director of, among others, Gattaca and Good Kill) and starring Rose Byrne, focuses on the aftermath of the 2019 mass shooting and the national campaign led by Prime Minister Ardern to ban assault rifles in the country. Within a day of the news arriving, many Kiwis reacted with fury to the focus on white politicians rather than the Muslim victims and survivors, with some calling the movie “a White Saviour narrative” and launching a #TheyAreUsShutdown campaign to boycott all work on the project. (It’s not clear how many people have actually seen the script.) – The Hollywood Reporter

A virtual YouTube is a channel that follows an animated or virtual character instead of a real-life person. These virtual YouTubers (VTubers for short) first became popular in Japan in the mid-2010s, and now have spread around the world. – Slate

Making Crazy Rich Asians and In the Heights helped Chu figure out what he’s trying to say with his films. Through them, he’s arguing for telling fresh stories via beloved, old-school Hollywood styles. But he also wants to do more than entertain; he wants to help audiences reflect on their own connections to what’s happening on screen. – The Atlantic

With Cannes on the verge of reigniting international festival activity and Telluride keen on reclaiming the Oscar influencer throne, festivals are mobilizing to become the frontlines for an industry that must assess an uncertain future. – IndieWire

“It was an issue, if not the big issue, that writers across Hollywood had to face: how to plan a season amid an evolving crisis. Would their universe feature COVID-19, see it in the rearview mirror or pretend it never even happened? And if featured, what would that world even look like? It’s not as though any of them had a crystal ball. … But quickly the choice — a decision made in writers’ rooms [throughout the industry] — became clear: They had to work the ever-changing real world into [their shows’] universe.” – Los Angeles Times

“I do feel proud that as a woman in the film industry in her mid-40s, having been doing this job since I was 17, that I’m being given this space to fully embrace all of these changes that life’s years have left my face and body with.” – BBC

“Revenues of public television and radio stations declined by $147 million, or 5%, in fiscal year 2020, which included the first months of the coronavirus pandemic, according to CPB’s latest State of the System analysis. The steepest losses in fiscal 2020 were in underwriting, foundation funding and investment income, … [while] individual giving revenue was the only income source that grew.” – Current

Michaela Coel’s I May Destroy You did win two awards – best mini-series and leading actress, which Coel dedicated to the production’s intimacy director: “Thank you for your existence in our industry, for making the space safe for creating physical, emotional, and professional boundaries so that we can make work about exploitation, loss of respect, about abuse of power, without being exploited or abused in the process.” – Variety

The show, whose third season, and run, ended on Sunday night, was set at the height of the AIDS epidemic in the gay and trans subcultures in New York. And yet, it wasn’t about Capital-T Tragedy. – Slate

The movie has been in development since 2008. “The project stalled for many years between different directors and studios, because executives wanted more well-known Latino actors to star, such as Shakira or Jennifer Lopez. They also wanted more stereotypical storylines for the characters, such as pregnancies and gang violence.” But Hamilton changed all that. – NBC

The newspaper crisis – and be assured, for small, local places, it is a crisis – means that areas where people need the most are getting covered the least. – LitHub

Choose your own adventure – couch or theatre? Crowded or distanced? Popcorn or not? (That’s a trick question: Always get the popcorn.) – The Atlantic