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Demolition will soon begin on a resort once favored by Elvis Presley and other Hollywood royalty before it was heavily damaged by a hurricane three decades ago.
The Coco Palms Resort on the island of Kauai will be torn down for a new 350-room hotel, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported.
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The resort is best known in movie lore as the location where Presley and Joan Blackman’s characters married in the 1961 movie Blue Hawaii.
It’s also the site of other key scenes in the movie, including the last where Presley sings the “Hawaiian Wedding Song” and holds Blackman’s hand while they board a raft to cross a lagoon.
In its heyday, it was famed for being frequented by other Hollywood stars like Frank Sinatra, Rita Hayworth and Bing Crosby.
The 46-acre grounds were also once home to Kauai’s last queen, Deborah Kapule, who died in 1853.
The resort opened in 1953 next to a historic coconut grove and an ancient Hawaiian fishpond. The property fell into disrepair after being damaged when the powerful Hurricane Iniki hit the island in 1992.
Several attempts to restore the property have failed over the years.
The $250 million project will take three years to complete, said Patrick Manning, a managing partner of Reef Capital Partners from Utah.
Reef Capital served as the lender to a previous developer and took over the property in 2018 when they defaulted on a loan. Manning said the plan was to sell the property, but that changed after he investigated its history.
“I called my partners, and I said, ‘This property is too important to sell,’” Manning said.
The new hotel and a cultural center to honor the property’s history will be built on about 10 acres of the property.
At one time, the community wanted the resort rebuilt, but those sentiments have changed, said Kauai Council Chairman Mel Rapozo. “They don’t want to see a resort built,” he added.
At a state Board of Land and Natural Resources meeting Friday, some spoke in opposition to the development, citing a number of ancestral bones buried on the property.
Cultural practitioner Joseph Kekaulike Kamai said his great-grandmother is buried there, and others are buried under the hotel, driveway and tennis courts.
“I really don’t want them to be digging anymore. I don’t want them grubbing our land,” Kamai said.
Manning said something needs to be done or the site will be an eyesore for another 30 years.
“Even though we know there are many that don’t want it rebuilt, we intend to be viewed and earn a reputation for doing everything we can to honor its past and respect the people of Kauai and guests of Kauai and how we manage its future,” Manning said.
While the BTS members are focusing more time on their solo careers, the pop icons are keeping their promise to deliver special group projects in the meantime.
Korean animated film Bastions announced on Friday, April 14, that BTS sings the theme song to its upcoming 3D superhero movie. According to a Korean media report shared by BIGHIT MUSIC, the single features BTS as a full group. Other reports shared the track was recorded before Jin enlisted in his mandatory South Korean military service last December.
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Bastions also shared a 30-second preview of the track alongside clips from the flick described as a “K-pop action hero 3D animation” to tell a story of superheroes fighting environmental-pollution villains. Jung Kook and Jimin‘s unmistakable vocals were featured prominently in the clip of the bouncy K-pop song that sounds like it should fit nicely alongside bright BTS hits like “Boys With Luv” or “Butter.”
The Bastions soundtrack will be a star-studded K-pop affair with songs also by BTS’ HYBE label mates LE SSERAFIM, chart-topping female troupe Brave Girls, American Song Contest winner AleXa, soul-pop songbird Heize, rising K-R&B star P.Cassady and more.
The official Bastions websites shares the song’s release is “coming soon,” pointing to a May 12 release date, with the movie premiering on the public Korean TV channel SBS on May 14 at 7:30 a.m. local time. Bastions has shared plans to broadcast the film worldwide as well.
The new Bastions single will be BTS’ first song credited to the full group after last year’s “Bad Decisions” from August with Benny Blanco and Snoop Dogg. The track peaked at No. 10 on the Hot 100 and No. 26 on Pop Radio. Worldwide, the star-studded collab reached No. 6 on the Billboard Global 200 and No. 7 on the Billboard Global Excl. US chart.
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Cardi B is taking her talents back to Hollywood. This time she will work with her family to voice the Baby Shark’s Big Movie! movie.
As spotted on Variety Magazine the South Bronx, New York native is getting her clan involved on her next project. The industry trade magazine is reporting that she, Offset and all of their kids have been casted for roles on Baby Shark’s Big Movie!. Cardi will play Sharki, her husband will play Offshark, their daughter will be Kulture Sharki and their baby boy Wave will be Wavey Shark.
This upcoming project will also feature other high profile stars including Ashley Tisdale (High School Musical), Aparna Nancherla (Mira, Royal Detective); Ego Nwodim (Saturday Night Live); Chloe Fineman (Saturday Night Live, Father of the Bride); K-Pop group Enhypen. The film will follow Baby Shark as he is forced to leave the world he has known and loves behind after his family moves to the big city. In the midst of adjusting to his new life Baby Shark encounters an evil pop starfish named Stariana who plans to steal his gift of song in order to dominate all underwater music, he must break her spell to restore harmony to the seas.
Baby Shark’s Big Movie! will be released later this year and will exclusively stream on the Paramount+ platform.
Photo: Prince Williams
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Disney is engaging the services of the award-winning musician and producer Questlove as a director for their upcoming film.
According to reports, Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson has been picked by Walt Disney Studios to be the director for the live-action hybrid reimagining of their animated classic from 1970, The Aristocats. Questlove will also oversee the musical score of the film and serve as an executive producer through his Two One Five production company. His bandmate and co-founder of The Roots, Tariq “Black Thought” Trotter will also be a producer of the film along with Shawn Gee and Zarah Zohlman.
The Aristocats follows a family of Parisian felines who learn that they’re about to inherit the fortune of their owner, a retired operatic diva. Her butler, who gets wind of the bequeathment, plots to get rid of the cats so he can get the fortune. The movie then follows the cats as they are befriended by an alley cat who works to help them get home. It would go on to be one of Disney’s more lucrative films at the time, earning $191 million at the box office.
This project will be the first feature film that Questlove will direct. The six-time Grammy Award-winner began his foray into film as a producer and director of the 2021 documentary Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised). The film, which unearthed the backstory of the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. It would go on a tear winning awards culminating in it winning the Academy Award for Best Documentary in 2022. The win placed Questlove in rarified air as one of a few Black directors to win an Oscar–all of them in the documentary field.
The news comes as fans are eagerly anticipating Disney’s latest edition of their series reimagining their classic animated features with The Little Mermaid, featuring singer & actress Halle Bailey in the iconic role of Ariel and Melissa McCarthy portraying the villain, Ursula. Will Gluck and his production company, Olive Bridge, will also produce on the film in addition to writing the script along with Keith Bunin.
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A new movie set in the Bronx, featuring rising young star Asante Blackk, turned heads at the SXSW festival this past week.
This year’s edition of the South By Southwest Festival (SXSW) held in Austin, Texas was a stage for a slew of new films to make their debut. One film, Story Ave, became a favorite of those who got to see the drama set in The Bronx. The film stars Asante Blackk, who recently captivated audiences with his role in Ava DuVernay’s When They See Us dramatic series for Netflix on the exonerated Central Park Five.
Story Ave is the debut film from writer-director Aristotle Torres based on an award-winning short film of his and counts Jamie Foxx as one of its producers. The movie shows Kadir (Blackk), a young high-school student with a striking talent for art who’s part of a crew of taggers known as Outside The Lines along with his friend Moe (Alex Hibbert from Showtime’s The CHI). The crew is run by Skemes (Melvin Gregg from FX’s Snowfall) who puts Kadir in a position to rob an MTA conductor named Luis (Luís Guzmán). But Luis and Kadir wind up befriending each other, setting off a chain of events that pushes Kadir to fight to see if there is a life for him outside of the streets.
Blackk spoke about his experience in filming Story Ave in a recent interview. “I didn’t realize at the time that my life was changed after reading [the script for ‘Story Ave’],” Blackk said. “But once the [filming] process started and we really became a family, I understood exactly what those words on that page were making me feel. And it was connection, it was love, it was fear, guilt — it was all of these emotions that I wrestled with my whole life wrapped so beautifully into this portrayal of a young man.”
The film was co-written by Bonsu Thompson, a veteran journalist who has produced digital series for BET and the feature-length documentary Can’t Stop Won’t Stop: A Bad Boy Story in addition to serving as the Editor-In-Chief of The Source magazine and as Music Editor for XXL magazine [Ed. Note: he penned a Cassius cover story on Bel Air star Jabar Banks, too]. Chuck Inglish, one-half of The Cool Kids, serves as a composer on the film along with Pierre Charles.
After a pandemic period marked mostly by retrospective projects, U2 is moving forward once again.
On Friday (March 17 – St. Patrick’s Day, appropriately enough), the Irish quartet brought forth Songs of Surrender, its first new album in six years — a companion of sorts to frontman Bono’s 2022 memoir — that finds the band reimagining 40 songs from throughout its career. It is accompanied by Bono & The Edge: A Sort Of Homecoming, With Dave Letterman, a documentary that is now streaming on Disney+. U2 also unveiled a U2SOS40 video series that will eventually feature 60-second clips, by different creators, for each of the songs, while the band’s return to live performing will take place this fall as the inaugural concerts at the MSG Sphere in Las Vegas.
And if that isn’t enough, bassist Adam Clayton has also partnered with Fender for a new amplifier, the ACB 50. “It feels like a bonus the whole way, just because this is at a time in your life where you don’t expect to be this busy,” Clayton, who turned 63 last week, tells Billboard via Zoom from Dublin. “I guess we’re very lucky that we get to do the thing that we’ve always loved doing and we’re still doing it, and somehow we’re still getting better at doing it. At some point I suppose the arc changes, but I don’t feel like we’re at that point yet. I think we’ve got a lot of extra knowledge along the way that we’ve picked up and we can make better and better records from here on out.”
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Songs of Surrender is certainly a project that came as a surprise. That album, according to Clayton, was spurred directly by Bono’s best-selling Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story, in which the singer used 40 U2 songs as a narrative vehicle for his story. The album, according to Clayton, “was one of the more organic processes that U2 engaged in. We started to talk about what we could be doing while (Bono) was busy making this book. Edge said, ‘Let me have a look at those titles. Let me see if I can come up with a different space for those songs so we can present them in a way where the narrative of the song in some way is associated to the arc of the book.’” The Edge began creating drastically different arrangements, mostly stripped down and more intimate, sometimes changing lyrics and even vocalists; The Edge, in fact, stepped up to sing several of the tracks himself.
“We started to see that a lot of the early songs that had felt incomplete or unfinished or naive, when one looked at them now, those were songs with a lot of DNA and intuition on them,” Clayton explains. “From the position of being in our sixties, those lyrics and those songs meant something, and it meant Edge could slow them down. He could bring the key down. Bono could deliver the vocals in a different way. And suddenly there was a personality that had much more of the gravitas of a story that Johnny Cash or Willie Nelson might tell. It engaged with you in a different way. It stopped you thinking about that big ol’ 80s rock band that had this big, stadium-filling sound.”
The bassist has some favorites amongst the 40, including “Stories For Boys,” which Clayton calls “a beautiful insight into Edge as an artist and a singer,” and “All I Want Is You,” which allowed him to do some acoustic bass playing where “I can really hear the air moving and I can hear my fingers on the strings, and I just like that intimacy.”
While each grouping of 10 songs is consigned to one member of the band, that’s more of a packaging element than anything symbolic, he says. “It was after everything was recorded,” he says, “so it wasn’t that I curated the tracks that were gonna be on my (side of) the record. I’m not gonna say it’s random, but it’s not premeditated as such. It’s open to whatever interpretation the listener might want to make. But I think I made out pretty well because I have a lot of good, melodic material but I also have some of the heavy-hitting rock tunes. And I get ‘Electrical Storm,’ which is one of my favorites, I have to say. And I think the version of ‘The Fly’ that makes it onto my record is interesting as well; it shows that we weren’t averse to using a little bit of electronica whenever the color demanded it.”
The big surprise in his batch, Clayton adds, is spectral “Desire” from 1988’s Rattle and Hum, sung by The Edge in falsetto. “It’s quite odd and challenging, and I accept that, because it’s got a very, very heavy keyboard bass, which is nice. It’s not really the way I would’ve expected to hear ‘Desire,’ but I’ll certainly take that bass keyboard part. I loved that.”
Songs of Surrender and the Disney+ documentary were generated by U2’s prominent frontline, Bono and The Edge, In fact, a note during the end credits of A Sort of Homecoming finds them thanking Clayton and Mullen for “letting us go rogue” with that project. Clayton says he has no objections to them taking the reins. “How can you be pissed off with people that you’ve done really well by for such a long time,” he explains. “I’m a big fan of Bono and Edge, and of Larry. I love to see Bono and Edge do interesting things.” He proclaims “big respect” for Bono’s book and for the series of solo concerts he’s been performing around it, and for The Edge taking the reins with Songs of Surrender. “I’m grateful to be in a band with those two extraordinary talents and hard-working people. They’re great songwriters, great artists but they’re great humanitarians and they’re really great people. I need to be inspired and I need to be led by that kind of thinking. I believe in music as a higher art, a higher form, and you don’t have to be dumbed down by it. You can change the world with a guitar — that’s what I signed up for.”
U2 will be looking to do just that later this year in Las Vegas. Dates have not yet been announced but rehearsals will be starting soon, and while the shows will feature 1991’s Achtung Baby album in its entirety, Clayton says “that’s only gonna be about an hour of the show, so we’re gonna have to find a way of going other places as well.” The shows will also be the first U2 has performed without Mullen, who’s taking the year off to treat and recuperate from various injuries he’s accumulated over the years; Bram van den Berg from the Dutch band Krezip will be filling the void.
“I don’t know what it’s going to be like,” Clayton says. “I haven’t played with anyone else before. I know playing with Larry Mullen, he always made me sound good, and that was half the job done. So it might just keep us on our toes. I’m sure we’ll find our groove. I think Bram is a great player. He’s got a great reputation. He’s a lovely man. If the musician’s heart is in the right place, the music follows without too much difficulty.”
There’s plenty on the U2’s agenda as well. The band members have recently spoken about new music, and that they’ve put a planned Songs of Ascent on the back burner in favor of something louder and more aggressive. “That’s the intention,” Clayton acknowledges. “I think we’re feeling that music has kind of got stuck a little bit. We’re feeling that probably with modern processing and modern production techniques and the use of digital that it’s lost some of its spontaneity and some of its rawness, and I think we’re hoping that we can kind of connect back to that rawness that we were excited by as teenagers.” That said, Clayton adds that only “some very, very minimal” recording has been done so far.
“Edge is always working on stuff,” Clayton notes, “but until we get the Sphere shows out of the way and we know what’s going to be happening with Larry, it’ll be very hard to organize what we’ve got and figure out what the plan will be.”
Also on U2’s plate is some archival documentary work. “We’re amazed by the amount of out there on the Beatles or whatever, and there’s some real value to that material,” Clayton says. “During this whole lockdown period we kinda started to go back through our archive and develop some stuff…and put together some sort of a narrative on the history of the band. It will tell a different story of U2. I think everybody thinks they probably know the U2 story reasonably well at this point…and of course it’s only one version of the story. There are other things to our story that we’re excited to be bringing to people.”
As for his new amplifier, Clayton considers it “another one of those once in a lifetime experiences.” He was inspired to pursue it when Fender did a signature guitar amp with The Edge — “I got a little jealous, I guess. I thought, ‘Well, if Edge can have an amp, I’m gonna have an amp!’” — and took the idea to the company, which has not routinely done signature bass amps. He worked with technicians to develop an all-in-one combo amplifier he describes as “the loudest 50 watts you’re ever gonna need,” noting it also has more mid-range than Fender bass amps had previously produced. “You can fit it in a smart car and carry it up the stairs on your shoulder as well,” he notes. “It’s the kind of amp you can take anywhere. You can do anything with it, and it just keeps on giving.” Clayton plans to use several of the ACB 50s during U2’s live dates, positioned under the stage. Details about the amp can be found via fender.com.
Rihanna slayed at the 2023 Oscars on Sunday with a classy performance of her soulful ballad “Lift Me Up” from Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. She didn’t win the Oscar for best original song – the award went to “Naatu Naatu” from RRR – but RiRi will likely have more chances to win for the song at next year’s Grammy Awards.
“Lift Me Up,” which Rihanna co-wrote with Tems, Ryan Coogler and Ludwig Göransson, is a front-runner for a nomination for best song written for visual media.
“Lift Me Up” could also wind up with record and/or song of the year nominations. Rihanna has been nominated for record of the year three times, for “Umbrella” (featuring Jay-Z), “Work” (featuring Drake) and as featured artist on Eminem’s “Love the Way You Lie.”
If “Lift Me Up” is nominated for song of the year, it would mark Rihanna’s first nod in that category. Her only songwriting nods to date are for “Run This Town,” which won best rap song, and “Kiss It Better,” which was nominated for best R&B song.
“Lift Me Up” will also probably be nominated in a performance category – either best R&B performance or best traditional R&B performance. (The final decision on where to slot performances that seem to be on the border between two categories is made by a large screening committee. They base their decision on the sound of the performance, as they perceive it, not chart position or the artist’s image.)
Rihanna has been nominated in R&B performance categories twice, for “Needed Me” and “Hate That I Love You,” a 2007 collab with Ne-Yo. She has yet to be nominated for best traditional R&B performance.
“All the Stars,” from the first Black Panther, was nominated for Grammys in four categories (though it didn’t win in any of them). The smash by Kendrick Lamar featuring SZA was nominated for record and song of the year, best rap/sung performance and best song written for visual media.
The Recording Academy announced earlier this month that the eligibility year for the 66th annual Grammy Awards will end on Aug. 31, one month earlier than usual. So the eligibility “year” will consist of just 11 months.
Rihanna may or may not release her long-awaited ninth studio album by Aug. 31 – she has another “project” in the works just now – which would change the Grammy conversation around her. Rihanna’s best year at the Grammys in terms of nominations was 2016, when she amassed eight nods. (Alas, she lost them all.)
The early front-runners for record of the year nominations, in addition to “Lift Me Up,” include Taylor Swift’s “Anti-Hero,” SZA’s “Kill Bill” and Miley Cyrus’ “Flowers.”
This wouldn’t be the first time “Anti-Hero” and “Lift Me Up” have tangled. By holding at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 for a second week last November, Swift’s smash kept Rihanna’s ballad from debuting in the top spot and becoming her 15th No. 1 single. Instead, “Lift Me Up” debuted and peaked at No. 2. “Anti-Hero” went on to log eight total weeks at No. 1 – the record for a Swift single.
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On a standout night for the Academy Awards, Ruth E. Carter became the first Black woman to win two Oscars for her work on Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.
At the 95th Academy Awards held on Sunday night (March 12th), the iconic costume designer won the Oscar for Best Costume Design for her work on the smash Black Panther sequel film. After accepting the award from presenters Paul Dano and Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Carter began her speech by dedicating the award to her late mother, who she revealed passed away at the age of 101.
“Thank you for recognizing the superhero that is a Black woman. She endures. She loves. She overcomes. She is every woman in this film. She is my mother. This past week Mable Carter became an ancestor. This film prepared me for this moment,” she said.
Carter mentioned the late Chadwick Boseman next, asking him to “please take care” of her mother. She continued, thanking director Ryan Coogler and executive producer Nate Moore: “Thank you both for your vision. Together, we are reshaping how culture is represented.” She would close by thanking those at Marvel Studios and the “many dedicated artists whose hands and hearts helped manifest the costumes of Wakanda and Talokan.”
The win made Carter the first Black woman to win multiple Oscar awards – she previously won for her work on the first Black Panther in 2019. She also became part of a premium category of multiple Academy Award winners in competitive categories who are Black, joining actors Denzel Washington and Mahershala Ali and sound mixers Willie D. Burton and Russell Williams II. The 62-year-old has enjoyed an illustrious career, having been previously nominated for her work on Spike Lee’s Malcolm X and Steven Spielberg’s Amistad.
She reflected on her win and her career to reporters backstage after receiving the award. ” I wanted to be a costume designer,” she began.”I studied. I scraped. I dealt with adversity in the industry that sometimes didn’t look like me and I endured. I feel that this win opens the door for other young costume designers that may not think that this industry is for them and hopefully they’ll see me, and they’ll see my story and they’ll think they can win an Oscar, too.”
The official trailer for Disney’s live-action The Little Mermaid, starring Halle Bailey, has arrived. It was introduced by Bailey and co-star Melissa McCarthy during the 2023 Oscars on Sunday night (March 12).
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Bailey stars as Ariel in the reimagining of the Disney animated classic, with an ensemble including McCarthy as Ursula, Javier Bardem as King Triton and Jonah Hauer-King as Eric.
Following a recent 30-second teaser and a clip focused on Bailey’s beautiful rendition of “Part of Your World” from D23, this extended preview — with a runtime of two minutes and twenty seconds — gives viewers a cinematic look at Ariel’s world and the characters that surround her, from life under the sea to life newly on land.
The Little Mermaid hits theaters on May 26.
Watch the trailer for the The Little Mermaid below.
If “Lift Me Up” from Black Panther: Wakanda Forever wins the Oscar for best original song on Sunday March 12, Ryan Coogler will become just the second person in Oscar history, and the first in 45 years, to win an Oscar for writing or co-writing a song from a film he directed. The first was Joe Brooks, who wrote “You Light Up My Life,” the 1977 winner.
Just by being nominated in this category, Coogler has joined an exclusive (and rather eclectic) club. Fourteen people have received Oscar nominations for writing or co-writing songs for films that they directed. Coogler is the first person of color to achieve the feat. Other club members include Barbra Streisand, Mel Brooks, Spike Jonze, Seth MacFarlane and Trey Parker.
Most of these people wrote the lyrics, not the melody. This suggests that the directors know what their film is trying to say, and can help put that message across in a song. Only four of the 14 – Coogler, Parker, Streisand and Brooks – contributed both music and lyrics. None solely wrote the music.
“Lift Me Up” is viewed as one of three front-runners in this year’s Oscar race for best original song, along with “Hold My Hand” from Top Gun: Maverick (music and lyric by Lady Gaga and BloodPop) and “Naatu Naatu” from RRR (music by M.M. Keeravaani; lyric by Chandrabose). The other nominees are “Applause” from Tell It like a Woman (music and lyric by Diane Warren) and “This Is a Life” from Everything Everywhere All at Once (music by Ryan Lott, David Byrne and Mitski; lyric by Ryan Lott and David Byrne).
Here’s a complete list of everyone who has been nominated for best original song for writing or co-writing a song from a film they directed. The list is in reverse chronological order.
Ryan Coogler
Film: Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022)
Nominated Song: “Lift Me Up”
Notes: Coogler directed and co-wrote the film, which stars Letitia Wright, Lupita Nyong’o and Oscar nominee Angela Bassett, among others. He co-wrote the melody with Rihanna, Tems and Ludwig Göransson; he co-wrote the lyrics with Tems. Rihanna’s single debuted and peaked at No. 2. The superstar, fresh off her halftime performance at the Super Bowl, is set to perform the song on the Oscar telecast.
Spike Jonze
Film: Her (2013)
Nominated Song: “The Moon Song”
Notes: Jonze directed, wrote and co-produced the film, which starred Joaquin Phoenix, Amy Adams, Rooney Mara, Olivia Wilde and Scarlett Johansson. In addition to best original song, Jonze was nominated for best picture (as a producer of the film) and won for writing. He co-wrote the lyric with Karen O, who also composed the melody. She and Ezra Koenig performed the song on the telecast.
Seth MacFarlane
Image Credit: Mark Davis/WireImage
Film: Ted (2012)
Nominated Song: “Everybody Needs a Best Friend”
Notes: MacFarlane directed and co-wrote the comedy, in which he starred alongside Mark Wahlberg and Mila Kunis. He wrote the “Best Friend” lyric, while Walter Murphy composed the melody. Murphy topped the Billboard Hot 100 in 1976 as an artist with the disco instrumental “A Fifth of Beethoven.” Norah Jones performed “Best Friend” on the telecast, which MacFarlane hosted.
Christophe Barratier
Film: The Chorus (2004)
Nominated song: “Look to Your Path” (“Vois Sur Ton Chemin”)
Notes: The Frenchman directed the musical drama, known as Les Choristes in French. He wrote the lyric. The composer was Bruno Coulais. Beyoncé performed the song on the telecast, in tandem with American Boychoir. Beyoncé performed three of the five nominated songs that year. She also did the honors on “Learn to Be Lonely” from The Phantom of the Opera and “Believe” from The Polar Express – the latter in tandem with Josh Groban.
Sylvain Chomet
Film: The Triplets of Belleville (2003)
Nominated Song: “Belleville Rendez-vous”
Notes: The multi-platform French artist wrote and produced the animated comedy film. In addition to best original song, he was nominated for animated feature film. He wrote the lyric. Benoît Charest composed the melody. Charest also performed the song on the telecast, in tandem with Béatrice Bonifassi.
Julie Taymor
Film: Frida (2002)
Nominated Song: “Burn It Blue”
Notes: Taymor directed the film, which starred Salma Hayak. Taymor wrote the lyric. Elliot Goldenthal composed the melody. Lila Downs and Caetano Veloso performed the song on the telecast.
Lars von Trier
Film: Dancer in the Dark (2000)
Nominated Song: “I’ve Seen It All”
Notes: The Danish multi-hyphenate directed and wrote the film, which starred Björk, Catherine Deneuve and Joel Grey, among others. He co-wrote the lyric with Sjon Sigurdsson. Björk composed the melody and performed the song on the telecast.
Trey Parker
Film: South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (1999)
Nominated Song: “Blame Canada”
Notes: Parker directed, co-wrote and co-produced this film and was one of the voice actors. He co-wrote the music and lyric with Marc Shaiman. Robin Williams, who had won an Oscar two years previously for his role in Good Will Hunting, performed the song the telecast.
Barbra Streisand
Image Credit: TriStar/courtesy Everett Collection
Film: The Mirror Has Two Faces (1996)
Nominated Song: “I Finally Found Someone”
Notes: Streisand directed, co-produced and starred in the film alongside Jeff Bridges and Oscar nominee Lauren Bacall. She co-wrote the music and lyrics to this song with Bryan Adams, Marvin Hamlisch and Robert John “Mutt” Lange. She was the first female director to receive an Oscar nomination for a song she wrote or co-wrote for her film. The single by Streisand and Adams reached No. 8 on the Hot 100, but Streisand declined to perform the song on the telecast. Her future duet partner Celine Dion filled in for her, joined by Arturo Sandoval.
Arne Glimcher
Film: The Mambo Kings (1992)
Nominated Song: “Beautiful Maria of My Soul”
Notes: Glimcher directed and co-produced the film, which starred Armand Assante, Antonio Banderas and Cathy Moriaty. Glimcher wrote the lyrics. Robert Kraft was the composer. Plácido Domingo and Sheila E performed the song on the telecast.
Joe Brooks
Image Credit: Frank Edwards/Fotos International/Hulton Archive/GI
Film: You Light Up My Life (1977)
Nominated Song: “You Light Up My Life”
Notes: Brooks single-handedly wrote, directed and produced You Light Up My Life, which starred Didi Conn. He also wrote both music and lyrics for its title song, which Debby Boone turned into a megahit. Her recording was the first to log 10 weeks at No. 1 in the history of the Billboard Hot 100 (which dates to 1958). Kacey Cisyk, who sang the song on the soundtrack, reached No. 80 with her original version. Boone was chosen to sing the song on the telecast — a rare instance of the Oscars booking an artist who performed a cover version over the artist who performed the film version. The song won a Grammy for song of the year. In 1997, LeAnn Rimes cracked the top 40 with her interpretation. While Brooks’ song has brought hope and inspiration to millions, his own life was troubled. He took his own life in 2011.
Mel Brooks
Film: Blazing Saddles (1974)
Nominated Song: “Blazing Saddles”
Notes: The EGOT recipient directed, co-wrote and appeared in the film, which also starred Cleavon Little, Gene Wilder, Slim Pickens, Alex Karras, Harvey Korman and Madeline Kahn. In addition to best original song, Brooks was nominated for best adapted screenplay that year – but for another picture, Young Frankenstein, on which he collaborated with Gene Wilder. Brooks wrote the lyrics to “Blazing Saddles.” John Morris was the composer. To sing the song, Brooks advertised in the trade papers for a “Frankie Laine–type” singer; to his surprise, Laine himself offered his services. Laine, who had a series of hits in the 1940s and ’50s including “High Noon (Do Not Forsake Me” and “I Believe,” got the job — and also sang the song on the Oscar telecast.
Jacques Demy
Film: The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1965)
Nominated Song: “I Will Wait for You”
Notes: The Frenchman directed and wrote the film, which starred Catherine Deneuve. In addition to best original song, Demy was nominated for best original screenplay and best music score – substantially original, for collaborating with Legrand. Demy wrote the original French lyrics. Norman Gimbel wrote the English lyrics. Legrand composed the song, which also received a Grammy nod for song of the year. Steve Lawrence’s version “bubbled under” the Hot 100 in 1965. Legrand and Jane Morgan (the wife of Jerry Weintraub, a top manager and producer) performed the song on the Oscar telecast.
Leo McCarey
Film: An Affair to Remember (1957)
Nominated song: “An Affair to Remember”
Notes: McCarey directed, co-wrote and co-produced the film, which starred Cary Grantand Deborah Kerr. (The film is referenced in 1993’s Sleepless in Seattle.) McCarey teamed with Harold Adamson to write the lyrics. Harry Warren composed the melody. Vic Damone had a big hit with the song in 1957, the year before the introduction of the Hot 100. The crooner also sang the song on the Oscar telecast. McCarey won three Oscars over the course of his career – for directing The Awful Truth (1937) and writing and directing Going My Way (1944).