Showtime at TCA: David Nevins' Job Is Not Killing Him (Analysis)

Showtime at TCA: David Nevins' Job Is Not Killing Him (Analysis)

You don't need to thoroughly understand the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator to take some guesses at the kinds of people who run cable channels or broadcast networks. But it's kind of a fascinating game nonetheless, particularly if you see the same people in the same structured psychological study -- the Television Critics Press tour, for example -- over a long period of time. OUR EDITOR RECOMMENDS 'Big Brother': Les Moonves Calls Racist Remarks 'Absolutely Appalling' CBS' Leslie Moonves: We Are Not the 'Bastard Step-Child' of the Industry Showtime's David Nevins on Risk, Anti-Heroes and Netflix's 'Interesting' Strategy Showtime Topper on 'Dexter' Spinoff: 'Draw Your Own Conclusions' Showtime Boss to Protesting 'Borgias' Fans: Try Kickstarter You will notice some trends. Early jubilance, for example. ("I'm going to take this moribund Content Provider and really do some exciting new things with it!") Measured optimism is also popular. ("We're not going to rebuild in a day, but we can start the process of change.") When these executives get on the Sisyphean treadmill and come up short more often than not, you often see a defensive retreat. ("Nobody said this was going to be easy and to not consider year-to-year flatness as a kind of victory is being naive about the business, I think.") And at some point, you get to witness defeat. It doesn't look pretty. Through day seven of the Television Critics Association press tour, we've seen a lot of different looks. Or, rather, the looks are there to be studied if you really care about such things, which I do. Even though seven days may seem short to you, three of those days were from the jam-packed cable portion and, besides, the TCA is kind of a dog-years type of operation. PHOTOS: Summer TV Preview: 51 New and Returning Series But I'm as fascinated at what I've seen recently as I am excited to see and evaluate those who have yet to come before us. Most remarkable was seeing CBS' Les Moonves get back in the game -- a game he not only loves, but one where he helped write the rules -- when he filled in for CBS entertainment president Nina Tassler, who lost a dear friend prior to the network's arrival and couldn't be here. For Moonves, the give-and-take from the stage was something he sort of perfected in the not-too-distant past. And you could tell from the critics who covered him back then (myself included) what fun it was to witness the original No Muffler Executive. He came out on fire -- informative, funny, honest and even blunt. This early question says it all: “Beverly Hills Cop seemed like a sure thing. What could possibly have gone so wrong with that pilot that you didn’t want to move forward?" Moonves: "We do a lot of pilots, and the best get on the air. And we felt we had better choices than that pilot." Or how about this beauty: "Les, question about Cote de Pablo. Just curious what happened there, why you weren’t able to hang onto her. And are you concerned about losing the leading lady on your No. 1 show?" Moonves: "I really want to clarify. We offered Cote de Pablo a lot of money. And then we offered her even more money (laughter) because we really didn’t want to lose her. We love her. We think she was she was terrific. And we, obviously, were in discussions. And the rest of the cast and the producers were aware what’s going on. And ultimately she decided she didn’t want to do the show. It was purely her decision. We’re, obviously, getting a lot of emails. There’s a lot of Twitter buzz about her, and rightly so. She’s a wonderful lady. Look, NCIS, the highest-rated show on television last year -- we don’t like losing anybody. But we did everything humanly possible. We feel like we exhausted every opportunity, and she just decided she didn’t want to do the show." There's a word for that: textbook. Of course, Moonves is way above the entertainment president label he held years ago, and CBS is crushing everything in its path, so it's not like he's losing much sleep. Bob Greenblatt, chairman of NBC Entertainment, was a little more beaten down by the end of his executive session, but he's been shouldering the burden of rebuilding NBC, which is a little like rebuilding Versailles with a skimpy budget, impossible city codes and poorly trained craftsman. That session veered from positive to dubious to defensive to funny, pleading, dismissive and ended, with a laugh, when Greenblatt half-exasperatedly said, "I don't know what I'm saying anymore." Nevins? The guy's pulse seemed to be flowing like a quiet river, and I don't remember anyone seeming so calmly focused at one of these things in a while (FX's Zen-master John Landgraf excepted). And this after a group of angry fans trying to save the now-canceled Borgias buzzed the outdoor Showtime lunch presentation begging the channel to do right by its viewers. PHOTOS: The Faces of Pilot Season 2013 Rattled? Nope. It was the second question of the session, and Nevins said that creator Neil Jordan had come up with a two-hour wrap concept, but it didn't work out. "We looked hard at doing a two-hour finale. And the economics of it just didn’t make sense, so we didn’t move forward. And I think it came to a good stopping place at the end of Season 3. I know we all got buzzed at lunch by the airplane. I feel bad at the money that’s being spent. As I was pulling in today, there was one protester out there. And I opened my window and asked him what he thought of the finale. And he said, 'I haven’t seen it.' Apparently he was a paid protester." Nevins took the same "what are you going to do?" approach to critics who thought Homeland slipped last year. He understands this is all part of the business. You make a show that some people love but, after three seasons, maybe that's all you can do with it. If critics have qualms about your glossy key series, that's their right. He's not going to freak out and never speak to you. He listens. He doesn't have to agree. But he likes talking about Showtime, about the creative and business aspects of the industry, and he knows how to do it with intelligence and appreciation. That last part is key. It's a great job, this gig of his. Showtime just hit 23 million subscribers, up from 18 when he started. Homeland is established, new series Ray Donovan had the highest-rated premiere in the channel's history (6 million) and was an easy renewal for a second season. Longtime hit Dexter is going out strong, and the channel is currently creating buzz for its newest series, Masters of Sex (which was on Tuesday's panel), and building the buzz for Penny Dreadful, a "psychological horror series" from John Logan and Sam Mendes. The channel also signed Philip Seymour Hoffman to star in the comedy series Trending Down, which was a real coup. Beyond that, Dominic West and Ruth Wilson have signed on for the new drama series The Affair. The Ridley Scott-directed pilot, The Vatican, starring Kyle Chandler is also almost finished. Nevins reiterated at his TCA executive session that his "goal was to create a more varied and diverse schedule with no fallow periods, to find programming that was expansive that would allow our network to break through to a wider audience." He's done just that and barely seems to have broken a sweat, much less had a fever dream of desperation as so many programmers do. Doing battle with HBO, Netflix, Starz, Hulu and countless ad-supported cable channels churning out great scripted series would normally be the kind of thing that calls for the periodic Xanax tablet. But this is an interesting batch of modern programmers in that tangle of competition, and they all seem to have one common trait: They love what they do. Not because each might be doing well at any given moment. But because they like this period we're all living in, this Renaissance Age of fabulous dramas, and more precisely they like making them and having a hand in the creation and guidance of them. Will any of them get beaten down over time? Sure. It happens with alarming predictability. But a guy like Nevins doesn't seem to be guessing at a lot of the things that have made Showtime successful. It looks like he knows what he's doing. And it looks like he's having a good time doing it. We'll see how Fox's Kevin Reilly, FX's Landgraf, ABC's Paul Lee and PBS' Paula Kerger appear when they arrive on Thursday, Friday, Sunday and Tuesday, respectively.




news sours  www.hollywoodreporter.com

'The Fosters' to air TV's first gay wedding since DOMA

'The Fosters' to air TV's first gay wedding since DOMA

On the historic day this summer that Paul Katami and Jeff Zarrillo were married in Los Angeles and Kristin Perry and Sandy Stier exchanged vows in San Francisco, a similar wedding took place in the backyard of a house in Long Beach, Calif. The third nuptials belonged to fictional characters Stef Foster and Lena Adams of “The Fosters”—TV’s first gay characters to say “I do” since the Supreme Court struck down the Defense of Marriage Act. The ABC Family drama’s creators, Bradley Bredeweg and Peter Paige, credit “universal synergy” with the impeccable timing of the filming of the garden ceremony on June 28, the same day two of the couples challenging Prop 8 in California (which bans gay marriage) became legally wed. The wedding is part of the show’s first season finale, which airs on Aug. 5. “I will never forget that day when Peter and I were sitting behind the monitors in our directors’ chairs, just looking at the wedding on screen and looking at each other realizing what happened here on this day,” Bredeweg said. “There were tears, there were hands being held. It was just quite a celebration of the show, of what was happening historically for gay and lesbian couples. It was beautiful.” Stef and Lena's is certainly not the first same-sex marriage on television. Although NBC's "Friends" received a lot of kudos for its lesbian wedding in 1996, two other sitcoms had already broken that ground. The first show to feature a gay wedding was Fox's "Roc" which showed a ceremony between two men; "Roseanne" followed suit in 1995. Video: ABC Family's 'The Fosters' is making history with the first gay marriage since the Supreme Court struck down DOMA. In anticipation of the Supreme Court ruling in June, the script for "The Fosters" finale called for a wedding — no matter what the higher court decided, said Paige, who is best known for his role on Showtime's “Queer as Folk," which also featured two gay weddings. But it was “an incredible moment,” Paige said, to shoot Stef’s (Teri Polo) and Lena’s (Sherri Saum) wedding within the context of real marriages taking place in the state for the first time in five years. “From our earliest conversations, we were going to have a wedding,” Paige said. “We thought if Prop 8 goes the way of the Fosters, it would be fantastic to be the first legal wedding in California on television after the decision. If it doesn't go our way, then it’s an opportunity to make a statement that no matter what anybody says we won’t be bowed.” But that’s not the only statement “The Fosters” is making. The family drama also stands out in the TV landscape as the first show to depict foster care from the point of view of the parents, the children already living in the house and the new ones joining the family. Stef and Lena are raising Stef’s biological son from a previous marriage, two Latino children they fostered and later adopted; and two new siblings they have taken into their home. With other shows, like "Modern Family" and "The New Normal," paving the way in terms of portraying gay parenting, Bredeweg and Paige decided their non-traditional family would be headed by a lesbian couple instead of two gay men. They chose to set it in the world of foster care after Paige participated in federally funded study about LGBT youth in foster care. “It’s sort of amazing to me that it hasn’t been done,” Paige said, who sits on the board of the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center. “Being a kid is so difficult but being a kid who is completely unmoored, I don’t know how you survive. Certainly, it’s been done before as far as having foster kids as characters, but it’s always backstory. I don’t think we’ve ever truly explored in the moment what it’s like to be a foster child. Usually, the foster kid in Hollywood is the bad seed. We’ve just been so moved and impassioned by what we’ve heard from these foster kids, that it has to be told.” Executive producer Joanna Johnson, a white lesbian mother with a Latino wife and two adopted biracial children, runs the show and mines her life for story ideas. It seems to be working. With 2.5 million total viewers, “The Fosters” is summer’s top cable series among 12-to-34-year-olds. (The network's core demographic is 14-34). It’s also shaping up as the network’s fourth highest-rated series of all time. The show will return in January with new episodes, ABC Family announced on Tuesday. “When we go online and we read the tweets and we listen to the way kids are responding to the show and their parents are responding to the show, they’ve just embraced the family more than we ever expected,” Bredeweg said. “Yes, we have two women standing at the front of our household, but we’re dealing with the exact same issues like any other family in America or most of the world. People are accessing our family just as their family. For us, it’s such a joy to see that happening.” That sense of satisfaction will increase exponentially when the wedding episode airs, said the show’s creators who are both gay. “When I was 15, the age of what probably makes up the bulk of our viewing audience, I didn’t believe there was any possibility — it didn’t even enter my frame of reference — that one day I would be able to get married,” Paige said. “For me, it was a profound healing moment.” Bredeweg got married in Los Angeles before Prop 8 passed five years ago. “I had a backyard wedding much like Lena and Stef amongst friends and family, and it was one of the most important days so far in my life,” he said. “To sit there with Peter next to me and watch this happen and to know we can all do this again, it was such a real thing. It was hard to wrap our head around at first. But then it just became a celebration because, to me, it was a day that we never thought would come so quickly and now that it’s here, it was overwhelming.”



news sours www.nbcnews.com

With a Following Abroad, Woody Allen Banks His Laughs in Euros

With a Following Abroad, Woody Allen Banks His Laughs in Euros

Woody Allen had one of his best openings ever last weekend when Blue Jasmine made $612,064 in six locations—a staggering take of $102,011 per theater. Given strong reviews and a likely Oscar campaign for lead actress Cate Blanchett, the film is likely to do strong business in the coming weeks. It’s also virtually guaranteed to make its money back, since Allen’s films generally cost $15 million to $25 million. That indie budget range has become rare in recent years, but Allen has somehow continued to work within it, and with amazing consistency, making roughly a movie a year for the past four decades. Just days before Blue Jasmine’s big opening, Spike Lee—another stalwart and respected indie filmmaker—announced he was turning to Kickstarter to help finance his next film, saying the studios’ obsession with “Tent Pole Enterprise[s]” had made it difficult for directors like him to continue working independently on their own smaller films. This sentiment is also shared by Steven Soderbergh, who in April gave an infamous State of the Cinema speech bemoaning the way Hollywood does business: “You’ve got fewer studio movies now taking up a bigger piece of the pie, and you’ve got twice as many independent films scrambling for a smaller piece of the pie,” he observed. (Putting his money where his mouth is, Soderbergh publicly pledged $10,000 to Lee’s Kickstarter last week.) So how is it that Allen can still do it? Recently, Letty Aronson, the director’s sister and producer, explained to Fast Company that the financing for Allen’s films has increasingly come from overseas investors. It’s no secret that the larger film industry has become more reliant on international financing and audiences in recent years: Outspoken producer Lynda Obst points to foreign moviegoers as one reason for the lowest-common-denominatorization of Hollywood product. “Broad comedies play because falling on a banana peel is funny in every culture,” Obst told the Huffington Post last month. “But … so-called ‘writing’—wit and nuance—doesn’t travel.” And yet, Allen continues to churn out witty and nuanced films with a sizable international audience. In 2010, You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger made only $3 million in the U.S., but $31 million abroad. 2007’s Cassandra’s Dream, a complete dud with a U.S. take that didn’t even break a million, made more than $21 million abroad. And those are just the flops. When a Woody Allen movie succeeds at home, it’s even bigger overseas: 2011’s Midnight in Paris made $56.8 million in the U.S. and $94 million internationally. 2008’s Vicky Cristina Barcelona made $23 million domestically, $73 million abroad. Allen has accomplished this over the years by building himself into a recognizable brand overseas, especially in Spain, France, and Italy, which have been among his biggest markets. In a fascinating scholarly article about the way these films are marketed in France, author Frédérique Brisset points out that Allen’s name is given a lot more prominence there than it is at home. In France, “Allen’s work has almost become,” Brisset observes, “a genre by itself.” That’s one reason why the director has been filming more and more away from his native New York—not just because it’s cheaper to shoot abroad, but also because that’s where his audience is. Admittedly, Allen, with his 45-year back catalog and iconic presence, is a unique case. However, his success suggests—contrary to popular belief—that there’s hope for America’s independent filmmakers on the foreign stage. As Allen himself told Britain’s Daily Telegraph newspaper last year, “I have to assume there are many millions of people in the world who are educated and literate and want sophisticated entertainment that does not cater to the lowest common denominator and is not all about car crashes and bathroom jokes.”




news sours  www.businessweek.com

Hollywood, Shootings, and ‘2 Guns’: When Is Stylized Violence Obscene?

Hollywood, Shootings, and ‘2 Guns’: When Is Stylized Violence Obscene?

The protesters were chanting “Trayvon Martin! Trayvon Martin!” on their march to Times Square as they chanced to pass beneath a jumbo video screen showing Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg brandishing handguns. 2 Guns Universal The clip was from the movie 2 Guns, and at this instant on this Saturday after George Zimmerman’s acquittal this trailer seemed to me to be more obscene than any fuck film shown on West 42nd Street during the bad old days. Few of those marching appeared to notice it, much less take any offense. Their minds were focused on the 17-year-old who had been shot to death by a man with a handgun while out buying candy and a soda. “Don’t shoot me, don’t hurt me! Just Skittles and iced tea!” they chanted. At the march’s end, many began the journey home by going down into the subway, where there was a still image of Washington and Wahlberg with guns. Next to this poster for 2 Guns was one for another movie, R.I.P.D., also put out by Universal Pictures, also showing two men with guns. The muzzles of the R.I.P.D. weapons glowed. Nearby stood yet another two men with guns, a real-life pair of police officers, looking watchful but profoundly bored, service weapons holstered. Zimmerman was repeatedly called a wannabe cop during the trial, but he did not likely fantasize directing traffic in the rain and cleaning puke out of the back of a radio car after transporting a drunk. Or, like these two actual cops, sweating under a bulletproof vest while keeping a lookout for fare beaters in a subway station. He more likely yearned to be a hero like the men in the movie posters. At the '2 Guns' premiere in New York City, the cast spoke about the movie's influence on gun culture in America. The good news for those who think such movies at once glorify and trivialize gun violence is that R.I.P.D. bombed. The bad news is that 2 Guns may be a hit and thereby perpetuate the genre. 2 Guns seemed to be well received by almost everybody save me when it was screened last week at a theater on the same stretch of the “Deuce” where the Trayvon Martin demonstrators had matched, just across from the where the jumbo video screen showed the trailer. Nobody else appeared to be offended by the title in a time of the Aurora movie-house massacre and the slaughter of the school kids in Sandy Hook and the killing of Trayvon. The actors were good. The dialogue was snappy. But I couldn’t help but think that the bravado and banter that make the two heroes so appealing are exactly the stuff that makes a guy like George Zimmerman want to be like them and hold one of those guns in his hot, living hand. Wahlberg‘s character is right out of a lost soul’s fantasy when he winks at a diner waitress and then later winks at a bad guy after besting him with some fancy shooting. “I did wink at him because he’s my bitch now,” he says afterward. The bravado and banter that make the two heroes so appealing are exactly the stuff that makes a guy like George Zimmerman want to be like them. And there are not just 2 Guns. There are many guns along with much shooting. The relationship between the Washington character and the Wahlberg character is cemented during the big gun battle at the end, when they kill every bad guy in sight. “You good?” Denzel asks after the carnage. “Never better,” Wahlberg says. They are now family. “All right, brother,” Denzel says. The screening audience applauded. Washington then notes that his new brother shot and wounded him earlier in the film. The next line is a line for our times. “I shot you before I knew how you were,” Wahlberg says. Washington evens it up by shooting Wahlberg in the leg, then throws an arm around him as they set off together. 2 Guns concludes with a final, resonating gunshot that probably bothered nobody but me. *** Nearly a half century and more than 250,000 gun killings ago, my father rode in a car with Robert F. Kennedy past the marquee of a movie theater that was showing Bonnie and Clyde, which had been nominated for the Oscar for Best Picture of 1968. Another passenger remarked that it was supposed to be terrific. “I hear it’s the most immoral movie ever made,” Kennedy said in the quiet voice of somebody who had too much personal experience with gun violence. That year’s Academy Awards ceremony was supposed to be held on April 8, but it was postponed for two days due to the assassination of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Bonnie and Clyde lost out to In the Heat of the Night, which was about race and justice in the South. Two months later, on June 6, Kennedy himself was shot to death, with a revolver that had originally been bought by a senior citizen for self-protection after the 1965 Watts Riots, even though he was nowhere near the trouble. This 1 gun was subsequently stolen and ended up in the hand of an assassin who was tackled immediately after firing the fatal shot. One observer noted that he fought to hold onto the gun despite great efforts to pry it from his fingers, as if it were his entire identity. The movie that Kennedy had heard described as the most immoral ever made became known as one of the best ever made. Bonnie and Clyde was among the first 100 films preserved by the newly established National Film Registry in 1988. The movie’s many defenders insist that it simply reflects a violent culture, and there is little denying that in a country of 350 million guns, more than two guns for every two people. But the violence in Bonnie and Clyde is idealized, even stylized at the end. It is a glamorizing mirror whose reflection subverts any reflection upon the insanity of a society of guns. Not that the producers of Bonnie and Clyde or, for that matter, 2 Guns had any priority other than to sell tickets. And the paying public seems to like simulated gunplay now as much as it did back in 1968. One thing that has changed is that box-office totals somehow became newsworthy, reported by news outlets as if determined the worth of a movie. Nobody reported Bonnie and Clyde’s first-weekend ticket sales as a matter of great public interest. You can bet they will with 2 Guns. And it will probably do pretty well. But I have to wonder how it would do in that movie theater in Aurora where a dozen people were shot to death. Or before the parents of the 20 school kids who were shot to death in Sandy Hook. After that schoolhouse massacre, which also claimed the lives of six adults, President Obama finally found his voice regarding gun control. He asked Vice President Joe Biden to help formulate ways to curb gun violence. On a day that began with a contentious sit-down with the NRA, Biden had a meeting with representatives of the film, TV, and cable industry that was much more pleasant, likely in part because he is old friends with the president of the Motion Picture Association of America, former senator Chris Dodd. Other participants included a lobbyist for Comcast, parent of Universal. Much of the talk was about ways to keep kids from seeing what is described as "entertainment meant for adults," not to be confused with adult entertainment. “The entertainment community appreciates being included in the dialogue around the administration’s efforts to confront the complex challenge of gun violence in America,” read a collective statement by the various representatives. “This industry has a longstanding commitment to provide parents the tools necessary to make the right viewing decisions for their families. We welcome the opportunity to share that history and look forward to doing our part to seek meaningful solutions.” The entertainment community now brings us 2 Guns, with an R rating that only bars unaccompanied kids under 17, if it’s enforced at all. Nobody can righty say that 2 Guns is a bad movie by the criteria that hold Bonnie and Clyde to be a good or even great one. But I have a pretty good idea what Bobby Kennedy would think of it, most particularly of the title and of the jocularity about shooting people and of that final, reverberating gunshot. To my ears, all the really good, crowd-pleasing movie-making preceding that gunshot did not make it sound any less like the one that signaled the end of Trayvon Martin’s life. And when I passed the refreshment stand on the way out of the theater, I could not help but think of Skittles. Like The Daily Beast on Facebook and follow us on Twitter for updates all day long. Michael Daly is a special correspondent with Newsweek and The Daily Beast. He was previously a columnist with the New York Daily News and a staff writer with New York magazine. He was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for commentary in 2002 and has received numerous awards. He is the author of Under Ground and The Book of Mychal. His third book, Topsy, will be released this summer.



news sours  www.thedailybeast.com

'Most embarrassing Fox News interview ever' sends Reza Aslan's biography of Jesus to number 1 in the Amazon book charts

'Most embarrassing Fox News interview ever' sends Reza Aslan's biography of Jesus to number 1 in the Amazon book charts

Not Found The requested URL /embed/AQhMllQ-ODw was not found on this server. Apache/2.2.3 (Red Hat) Server at www.youtube.com Port 80 A car crash television interview during which a Fox News host asked the author of a new biography about Jesus, why he, as a Muslim, feels able to write about the Christian Messiah, has had an unexpectedly positive outcome - with sales of the author's book increasing by 35 per cent in just two days. The excruciating 10-minute interview, during which broadcaster Lauren Green was left with egg on her face after she tried to pin down respected scholar Reza Aslan, who just happens to be Muslim, on why he felt capable of writing a book about the life of Jesus, went viral at the weekend after it was posted on Buzzfeed. Ms Green asks: “You’re a Muslim, so why did you write a book about the founder of Christianity?” To which a visibly surprised Mr Aslan responds: “I am a scholar of religions with four degrees, including one in the New Testament, and fluency in biblical Greek, who has been studying the origins of Christianity for two decades, who also just happens to be a Muslim.” "It's not that I'm just some Muslim writing about Jesus," he continued. "I am an expert with a PhD in the history of religions." But all publicity is good publicity, as they say, and this embarrassing episode for Fox News has had an extremely positive outcome for Mr Aslan whose controversial biography of Jesus, Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth, has now reached number 1 in the Amazon books charts. Publishers Random House had to rush to meet a surge in demand for the book, ordering an additional 50,000 copies to be printed on Monday, bringing the total copies in print to 150,000. The biography, published on 16 July, had already been selling well prior to Mr Aslan’s appearance on Fox News, having reached number 8 in the Amazon book charts on Friday, but Mr Aslan is “thrilled” at the increased exposure on the back of the viral interview. “I’ll be perfectly honest — I’m thrilled at the response that people have had to the interview,” Mr Aslan told the New York Times. “You can’t buy this kind of publicity.” The Fox News interview has been watched nearly 4.5 million times on Buzzfeed, which posted the video under the title "Is this the most embarrassing interview Fox News has ever done?", and Mr Aslan has gained an additional 5,000 Twitter followers since it went out. The book is to be published in the UK by The Westbourne Press with the ebook available from today and the hardback in bookstores from 15 August.




news sours  www.independent.co.uk

Hollywood’s in need of a superhero - to recover its money from China

Hollywood’s in need of a superhero - to recover its money from China

China is likely to become the world’s biggest film market within the next five years, making it a potential source of vast profits for Hollywood studios – but only if the Chinese decide to pay them. And, according to reports this week in the US trade papers Variety and The Hollywood Reporter, China stopped paying Hollywood for its movies months ago. Remarkably, it seems that the studios have continued to send their big releases to Chinese cinemas, despite not having received a penny of their box-office takings since the end of last year. In several cases, the withheld payments are thought to total tens of millions of dollars, and all because of a dispute over a new tax. Last year, the US Vice-President Joe Biden and China’s then Vice-President Xi Jinping, who has since become the country’s President, negotiated a landmark World Trade Organisation deal, relaxing strict restrictions on foreign film releases in China. Under the agreement, Beijing agreed to allow more overseas movies to be screened in Chinese cinemas than in previous years, and raised to 25 per cent the share of box-office takings to be returned to US studios. Towards the end of 2012, however, the state-run China Film Group told studios that it intended to levy a 2 per cent value-added tax on each film release. Studios are refusing to pay the VAT, claiming it breaches the WTO deal. The ongoing dispute means Western studios have seen none of their agreed 25 per cent of Chinese box-office earnings for some of this year’s biggest releases. Warner Brothers is probably owed more than $31m (£20m) for blockbusters including Man Of Steel and The Hobbit, while Sony has supposedly seen nothing for its James Bond movie Skyfall. Disney could be more than $30m out of pocket for Iron Man 3 alone, which made more than $121m in China, and 20th Century Fox has said it is still waiting for an estimated $23m return on its Chinese success with Life Of Pi. Historically, dealing with China has been difficult for Hollywood film-makers, who must contend with the whims of Chinese censors. Many films have been banned with little or no explanation, others have been withdrawn from screens at a moment’s notice. Yet Chinese audiences are fast becoming so crucial that US studios are more anxious than ever to please them, and the censors who control what they see. Several Hollywood blockbusters, including Iron Man 3, specifically altered their content to make them more attractive to the Chinese market. Chris Dodd, a former US Senator who now chairs the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), is working to resolve the dispute, which has reportedly reached the US Trade Representative. A source at the USTR told Variety that the agency was working with the MPAA and “counterparts within the Chinese government to resolve the issue”.




news sours  www.independent.co.uk

Careful, It Jiggles!

Careful, It Jiggles!

Let's pretend it's summer and it is really hot and you tend to wear those little sleeveless cotton stretch-tops or even a dress with spaghetti straps the way you always did, all your life. Without a bra! Because you are of the sixties generation. Except you are 50 plus now, in terrific shape -- for your age, as impolite people like to add -- and can't see no harm. And then a girlfriend, a really good one, otherwise she wouldn't dare, says to you "Your upper arms jiggle!" Which is just another way of saying, "If I were you, I'd stop wearing sleeveless tops and not show the world my naked arms -- at your age! And while you're at it, wear a bra!" That kind of hurts -- but it's worth investigating this summery topic that invites all kinds of fashion-trouble. Trim, athletic upper arms are a dream that doesn't come true for many (including myself -- but excluding Madonna), certainly not when you are over 50, when untamable flesh appears in all kinds of places you didn't even know you had. In younger years it's luscious, firm and silky from head to toe, the breasts sit proud and high -- but then, all of a sudden it seems, the flesh is jiggly and moves about like Jell-O pudding. Especially the flabby upper arms that are so un-Michelle-Obama-like that it's tragic. But it is the truth -- and it seems sometimes unfair -- women have more loose flesh on their body than men. Which is really nice as long as it wraps itself in perfect proportion around a trim body. (And I don't mean like Lady Gaga's real beefsteak-dress of last year!) Nora Ephron, the late, very funny American writer and author of the bestseller "I feel bad about my Neck" knew a thing or two about the older body that seems to betray you whenever you look away. She sometimes felt as bad about other body parts because everything goes south when you hit 50. She opted not only for turtleneck sweaters but also long sleeves. It is also safe to say that she was never spotted bra-less at her fabulous New York lunches. In my informal fashion-quiz which I do often for fun with girlfriends, I ran by them the question, "How long can you go sleeveless and bra-less in public?" At the very most until your late 50s was the answer. Because no matter how fit you are, there are not only jiggling parts on your upper arms but strange and scary wobbly hills and fatty deposits right under your arm that don't need to be exposed freely to strangers anywhere. And certainly not without a bra. We all know the older lady-hippies, don't we? They are still around, and either beloved or ridiculed by onlookers. Once adorable super skinny flower children and budding feminists who banned not only the bomb, but bras as well, they still have flowing grey hair, comfy shapeless dresses over natural bosoms, Birkenstocks and recycled shopping bags. I love hippies, I was one myself, and the idea of liberation on all fronts is always appealing. But while your mind and animals should run wild and free, bosoms of a certain age should not. Who decides what is beautiful and fits the bill of propriety? Naturally, it is very important that only you yourself decide what is permissible at what age -- it is an individual question of comfort and aesthetics. Of course, you should have a relaxed and loving relationship with your body and allow it some freedom, no need to wrap it in "Spanx" like a wounded knee. But there's nothing wrong with being a little critical and in control when it comes to exposure. I found that a good way to test one's tolerance is to recall what is a real turn-off when looking at other people's bodies in public. Sadly, too many older women have an uninhibited streak when it comes to nakedness. As for me: I don't like to stare at aging armpits -- it's creepy. Sorry. Therefore I wear sleeveless stuff without the bra only at home or with close friends. But fashionable life goes on in the outside world. So, here's the plan for a cool and pretty summer without exposing flabby flesh. First, get hold of a comfortable bra and consider these tips. 1. If you must wear a sleeveless dress -- and it better be gorgeous -- wrap a beautiful, feather light silk scarf or stole around the shoulders. 2. Layers are life-savers! Wear a slightly transparent long-sleeved stretchy shirt under the dress. Alternative: a flimsy long-sleeved chiffon blouse. 3. Get a short little silk or cotton cardigan (waist length), that you also can just hang casually over your shoulders if it gets too warm.




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