MOVIE
Sinners director Ryan Coogler and composer Ludwig Göransson didn’t just read up on Mississippi Delta blues while making the music for the 2025 blockbuster film Sinners; they went to experience it for themselves. In an exclusive clip shared with Billboard on Wednesday (June 4), Coogler said he traveled to Mississippi for the first time while […]
Bad Bunny is continuing his acting streak, this time joining the cast of the forthcoming film Caught Stealing, alongside Austin Butler and Zoë Kravitz. The artist born Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio appears on the official movie trailer out Wednesday (May 21), where he is seen portraying a Puerto Rican gangster. “Either I get what I […]
Depeche Mode are gearing up to release a full-length feature film chronicling the band’s massive 2023 shows in Mexico City on their Memento Mori tour. Depeche Mode: M, directed by award-winning Mexican filmmaker Fernando Frias (I’m No Longer Here, Don’t Expect Anyone to Believe Me), is due out later this year. Explore Explore See latest […]
We still don’t know who will join Liam and Noel Gallagher on stage for Oasis‘ eagerly anticipated 2025 reunion tour. But even if you weren’t able to score tickets to the siblings’ upcoming first live shows since their acrimonious break-up in 2009, you will definitely be able to re-live it thanks to a just-announced live film chronicling the get-back nobody thought would ever happen.
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The band announced on Thursday morning (March 13) that a film documenting the Oasis Live ’25 tour will be created and produced by BAFTA- and Oscar-nominated writer/producer/director Steven Knight (Peaky Blinders, Spencer, Dirty Pretty Things) and directed by Dylan Southern and Will Lovelace (Meet Me in the Bathroom, Shut Up and Play the Hits).
No release date has been announced yet — and no further details were revealed about the content of the film — for the project that will be distributed by Sony Music Vision.
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Fans are starved for any information about the tour, including who will be performing alongside singer Liam and guitarist/occasional vocalist and songwriter Noel, though a report from the NME that purported to have the inside scoop on the rest of the band earlier this week was quickly rubbished by Liam.
After the British music mag claimed to have the line-up thanks to “sources working closely with the band and tour,” Liam slapped back in a post in which he demanded, “NME tell me who your source pots are that keep giving you info about OASIS and I’ll give you an exclusive interview about up n coming OASIS tour. You can have it all but how much do you want it.”
A short time later, he added, “It’s not the lineup reveal I’m bothered about I’ll reveal that to you in a minute I’m more bothered about the line where it says a source close to the band and tour that really causes me a great deal of concern.” Forever cheeky, Liam then confirmed who would be on stage with him and his brother, claiming it would be ““Tony Mc drums Alan white bass guitar Zak lead guitar Chris Sharrock keys.”
Fans in the know quickly surmised he was just kidding, since all four men served as drummers in the band at some point. “That’s a BANGING line up,” Liam joked.
Oasis have announced 40 dates so far for the Live ’25 tour, which will kick off on July 4 with the first of two shows at Principality Stadium in Cardiff, Wales, criss-crossing the U.K. before landing in Toronto on August 24 for a run of North American stadium dates, then moving on to Mexico City, South Korean, Japan, Australia and South America.
John Lennon and Yoko Ono were never shy about sharing their love story with the cameras. The late Beatle and his wife/Plastic Ono Band co-leader are center stage in the first trailer for One to One: John & Yoko, an upcoming documentary from Oscar-winning director Kevin Macdonald that tells the story of a life-changing, fast-moving 18-month period in the couple’s lives in the early 1970s.
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The two-minute clip opens with audio of Lennon calling someone named Howard, in which the woman on the other end begins to spell out the singer’s name only to realize who she’s talking to. “You’re a member of the Beatles?” she asks. “That’s right, yeah,” Lennon answers nonchalantly. From there, the footage explodes into a collage of images of bombs falling in the Vietnam war and the couple preparing for a charity show as Lennon says, “good morning, folks. Have you had your breakfast yet,” accompanied by, yes, footage of the pop icon having his bowl of morning cereal.
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We see a flip-book of footage of John and Yoko leaning into their new lives in the city, shopping for clothes and goofing around with friends as Yoko says, “the Flower Generation is over, but we can start all over again, right?,” which leads into a famous image of the couple from behind throwing up raised fists as the Statue of Liberty hovers on the horizon.
The movie is a chronicle of the couple’s new life in New York post-Beatles in 1972, following them as they move into an apartment in Greenwich Village and prepare for their One to One Concerts, a two-show all-star charity event for children with special needs that they threw at Madison Square Garden in August 1972. It was the only full-length performance by Lennon in the wake of the Fab Four’s split two years earlier and in addition to the Plastic Ono Band it featured sets by Stevie Wonder, Sha Na Na and Roberta Black, among others.
Asked by a reporter at the time why they were doing the free shows, Lennon said, “to change the apathy that the youth have.” The couple’s only child, musician Sean Ono Lennon — seen in clips as a toddler — produced and remixed the concert audio for the movie, with the trailer ending with footage of Lennon , wearing his signature tinted round eyeglasses, performing his signature hit “Imagine” at the concerts.
The film also features newly transferred and restored footage from that era along with previously unseen and unheard items from the couple’s personal archives, including phone calls and home movies recorded and filmed by Lennon and Ono during the 18 months the couple lived in a cramped Greenwich Village apartment in the early 1970s.
“How would you like to be remembered?” a reporter asks Lennon at one point. “Just as two lovers,” he responds. The movie will be released exclusively in IMAX on April 11 and in wider release on April 18 and then stream later this year on Max.
Watch the One to One trailer below.
A feature-length documentary chronicling heavy metal icon Ozzy Osbourne‘s six-year struggle to recuperate from a devastating 2019 fall, Ozzy Osbourne: No Escape From Now, will debut on Paramount+ later this year. The movie, currently in production, is described as an intimate look into the 76-year-old rock legend’s personal life since the injury that has colored much of his life in the years since.
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“This is Ozzy Osbourne like you’ve never seen before: an honest, warm and deeply personal portrait of one of the greatest rock stars of all-time, detailing how the singer’s world shuddered to a halt six years ago, forcing him to contemplate who he really is, confront his own mortality and question whether or not he can ever perform on stage for one last time,” reads a release announcing the project that is being directed by BAFTA-winner Tania Alexander (Celebrity Googlebox). “Addressing his health issues and impact of his Parkinson’s diagnosis, the film showcases the central role music continues to play in Ozzy’s life – also proving his mischievous sense of humor remains resolutely intact despite it all.”
In a statement, Osbourne added, “The last six years have been full of some of the worst times I’ve been through. There’s been times when I thought my number was up. But making music and making two albums saved me. I’d have gone nuts without music.”
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Osbourne released the albums Ordinary Man (2020) and Patient Number 9 (2022) before announcing in 2023 that he had been forced to permanently cancel the European leg of his No More Tours II outing and retire from touring after a cascading series of health problems following a 2019 fall at home in which he damaged his spine. That incident was followed by diagnoses of Parkinson’s disease — which has rendered him unable to talk — and emphysema.
According to the release, Alexander began filming the doc in 2022, during recording sessions for the double-Grammy-winning Patient Number 9 album, and the cameras will continue to roll into this summer as Osbourne prepares to take the stage for what he says will be his final performance with Black Sabbath on July 5.
“My fans have supported me for so many years, and I really want to thank them and say a proper goodbye to them. That is what the Villa Park show is about,” Osbourne said of the sold-out, all-star gig in his hometown of Birmingham that will feature support from Metallica, Slayer, Anthrax, Guns N’ Roses, Tool, Rival Sons, Pantera, Lamb Of God, Mastodon, Alice In Chains, Halestorm, Gojira and a supergroup featuring Smashing Pumpkins singer Billy Corgan, Rage Against the Machine’s Tom Morello, David Ellefson, Fred Durst, Jonathan Davis, Wolfgang Van Halen and more; actor Jason Momoa will host the event.
Ozzy recently revealed that due to his physical limitations and an inability to walk anymore he will not play a full Black Sabbath set at the final show. Profits from the mega-gig will go towards organizations including Cure Parkinson’s, a U.K. charity working to end the disease.
The documentary will feature Ozzy and wife/manager Sharon Osbourne and the couple’s children, as well as many of the singer’s musical compatriots, friends and bandmates, including: Tony Iommi (Black Sabbath), Duff McKagan (Guns N’ Roses), Robert Trujillo (Metallica), Billy Idol, Maynard James Keenan (Tool), Chad Smith (Red Hot Chili Peppers), guitarist Zakk Wylde, producer Andrew Watt and friend/musician Billy Morrison.
“This film is an honest account of what has happened to Ozzy during the last few years. It shows how hard things have been for him and the courage he has shown while dealing with a number of serious health issues, including Parkinson’s,” said Sharon Osbourne in a statement. “It’s about the reality of his life now. We have worked with a production team we trust and have allowed them the freedom to tell the story openly. We hope that story will inspire people that are facing similar issues to Ozzy.”
Frank Ocean has begun filming his directorial debut in Mexico City with Alien: Romulus and Industry star David Jonsson. According to Variety, the rising British actor will have top-billing in the currently untitled independent film whose plot has not yet been revealed.
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No other information is available about the latest project from the enigmatic Ocean, who has been mostly out of the public eye since he pulled out of the second weekend of Coachella in 2023 after suffering a leg injury during his first weekend headlining set.
At the time a rep said, “After suffering an injury to his leg on festival grounds in the week leading up to weekend 1, Frank Ocean was unable to perform the intended show but was still intent on performing, and in 72 hours, the show was reworked out of necessity. On doctor’s advice, Frank is not able to perform weekend 2 due to two fractures and a sprain in his left leg.”
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The singer — whose most recent album was 2016’s Blonde — added in a statement at the time, “It was chaotic. There is some beauty in chaos. It isn’t what I intended to show but I did enjoy being out there and I’ll see you soon.”
Since then, he’s released the 48-page booklet Mutations, a 2023 project featuring photos taken by Ocean that was printed on tissue-weight paper, and, in November of that year, a minute-long preview of an unnamed moody track. The latter was the first new music from the enigmatic performer who had not issued any new music since he surprise-dropped two singles, “Dear April” and “Cayendo” in 2020, followed by a never-released, untitled nine-minute song on the Christmas special on his Apple Music 1 Blonded Radio show in December 2021.
Ocean also dropped another unnamed snippet in December 2023, accompanied by a 24-second video in which he enthusiastically danced to a mid-tempo R&B jam. Producer Michael Uzowuru revealed in an interview last year that he’d been in the studio with Ocean in Miami working on new music, after collaborating with him on both Blonde and 2016’s visual album Endless. The singer described their relationship thusly: “Me and Michael’s careers exist post hip-hop — that genre, that culture, informs both of us greatly, but his appetite has grown; his vocabulary, musically, has grown so much over the time that I’ve known him.”
The Jonas Brothers are proof you can go home again. Nick, Joe and Kevin Jonas announced on Tuesday (Jan. 28) that they will return to their early home at Disney for an upcoming holiday movie tentatively called Jonas Brothers Christmas Movie.
The trio revealed the news in a promo video posted by Disney+ (which will stream the film), in which the siblings pay homage to Love Actually with a bit in which they show up unannounced at someone’s home as schmaltzy holiday music plays in the background. They are, of course, holding a series of poster boards explaining their intentions, beginning with “Hi, we are the Jonas Brothers.”
After Joe reads the card aloud, Nick snaps at him, “No! Don’t say it! The whole point is you don’t say… you just let it… let them read it.” As the snow keeps falling, they try another take in which they smile and start dropping the news after reminding viewers which brother is which.
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“Sorry to bother you,” they explain. “But we’re making a Christmas movie… coming out this holiday season. Only on Disney+.” At press time the streamer has only said that the film is due out “later this year.” According to a description, the movie will find the brothers facing a “series of escalating obstacles as they struggle to make it from London to New York in time to spend Christmas with their families.”
The brothers will co-produce alongside writers/producers Isaac Aptaker and Elizabeth Berger (This Is Us), with Oscar winner Jessica Yu (Quiz Lady) slated to direct.
The team-up with Disney is a full-circle moment for the guys, who signed with Disney’s Hollywood Records in 2007 and made their TV debut that year on the Disney Channel’s Hannah Montana alongside Miley Cyrus. Their film debut came a year later in the Disney Channel music movie Camp Rock, in which they co-starred with Demi Lovato; they were back in 2010 for Camp Rock 2: The Final Jam. They also had their own show on the channel called Jonas and released three albums on Hollywood Records, their 2007 self-titled debut for the label, followed by 2008’s A Little Bit Longer and 2009’s Lines, Vines and Trying Times.
The group split in 2013 and went on hiatus until their reunion in 2019 for the album Happiness Begins, which featured the Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 single “Sucker,” which was their first chart-topping song. The trio released their sixth studio album, The Album, in 2023.
Grammy-nominated Justin Tranter will be the executive music producer and will write original songs for the movie.
Check out the Jonas Brothers holiday movie promo bit below.
All products and services featured are independently chosen by editors. However, Billboard may receive a commission on orders placed through its retail links, and the retailer may receive certain auditable data for accounting purposes. Fresh off the heels of Timothée Chalamet channeling Bob Dylan on the red carpet, fans can now also dress like the […]
When Cuban actor Héctor Medina read the script for Los Frikis, he immediately knew he wanted the leading role of Paco. Initially contacted as a sort of consultant for the film, Medina was familiar with the story about a group of punk rockers in early ’90s Cuba who, in search of freedom, deliberately injected themselves with HIV to live in a government-administered rural treatment retreat and create their own utopia.
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“I was born in 1989. It was the year the socialist wall fell and in 1990, what is called in modern Cuban history the Special Period, began, which is a deep energetic, economic food crisis,” explains the actor in an interview with Billboard Español. Additionally, it was forbidden to listen to rock and roll and having long hair could get you arrested, he adds. “So, the Frikis were very marginalized. It’s a story that even in Cuba is very little known.”
Written and directed by American filmmakers Tyler Nilson and Michael Schwartz, Los Frikis, an independent film inspired by true events, arrives this week in theaters in the United States after making the rounds in the festival circuit, where it has received a variety of awards.
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Medina, who left the island about eight years ago and lives in Miami with his wife and two children, not only ended up landing his dream role, but also a credit as a co-producer thanks to his contributions to the film, which was shot in the Dominican Republic (as it could not be done in Cuba).
The movie also stars Eros de la Puente as Gustavo, Paco’s younger brother; and Adria Arjona (daughter of Guatemalan singer-songwriter Ricardo Arjona) as María, the sweet caretaker at the retreat. The cast also includes Luis Alberto García and Jorge Perugorría, among others.
Produced by Academy Award winners Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, Los Frikis received an R rating from the Motion Picture Association of America for language, sexual content, some graphic nudity and drug use. It premieres on Friday, Dec. 20 in New York and Los Angeles, and on Dec. 25 in markets including Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, San Francisco and Miami.
Below, Medina details his rigorous physical and emotional transformation process to bring Paco to life, the role music plays in the film and the reception this work has had so far.
Los Frikis
Courtesy of Wayward/Range
How did this project come to you?
The project came to me through producer Rebecca Karch Tomlinson, who contacted me to ask some questions about the dialogues and some events that happen in the script. It was more or less something like a review. Of course, I read the script and I [was] totally impressed by how two Americans have written a script about Cuba, such a believable story about my country, and how they want[ed] to do it — and also want to do it with Cubans. And of course, I also fell in love with the story and my character, Paco. From there, I said: “I want to be here, and I want to be Paco.”
Did you have to audition for the role?
Well, yes. They told me, “If you want to be Paco, you have to fight like everyone else and do the casting.” I remember that I did the last scene in the movie, and as soon as they saw the scene, they called me and said, “Are you ready? You’re going to be Paco.” From there began a very tough process of character construction and transformation that was truly a most beautiful experience, because Michael and Taylor have a very particular and very strong method of working with the actors and creating this atmosphere, and get to the point that you are not trying to play the character, but you are the character. And that allows you, once you are on set, to feel confident, to be able to improvise, because they also give you that freedom. It is a very substantial work process; there are many scenes in the film that were not in the script.
You completely disappear into the role, to the point that at the beginning of the film I was looking for you, I didn’t recognize you. How was your transformation, physically and emotionally, into this character? I know you lost weight, you have the mohawk, you lose a tooth in a scene…
It was a very intense, rigorous process. From the first day I had to give up everything gluten and sugar; I only had seltzer water as a reward and one meal a day, which was a little bit of chicken and a little bit of spinach. It included heavy training, running and walking more than four or five miles a day. Then came the process of learning to play music. Mike and Taylor are so specific that they knew every detail. For example, at that time in Cuba there were no American electric guitars, there were only Japanese guitars, Russian amplifiers, Russian basses, and the drums were made with what was found, sometimes even drawers, and they had those specific types of instruments sent to us so we [could] learn how to play them. We got to a point where we even started playing our own music and putting lyrics to it and giving concerts, like in the movie.
Music plays a fundamental role in this story, with Paco as the guitarist in his rock band. Did you play before or did you have to learn for the film?
I played acoustic guitar, but I remembered like two or three chords that they taught me in my neighborhood, back in Cuba, when I was a child, so I didn’t remember very well. In other words, working with the guitar was the most difficult for me, because on top of that, I have no musical ear, I admit. What I do have is a rock and roller spirit and being bold. And also this thing [where] I don’t like to give up, I like obstacles and I like to transform and work hard. I like a challenge.
Did you know about the real Frikis story before getting involved in this project?
Yes, I knew vaguely. I was born in 1989. It was the year the socialist wall fell and in 1990, what is called in modern Cuban history the Special Period, began, which is a deep energetic, economic food crisis. There were shortages of all types of products. In addition, there were also prohibitions: listening to rock and roll music was frowned upon, and for having long hair you could be imprisoned. So, the Frikis were very marginalized. It’s a story that even in Cuba is very little known.
I had an uncle who was a rock and roll lover, and when I was a teenager he took me to a place called Pista Rita, where they played exclusively rock and roll. Going to those places with him at 13, 14 years old, I was able to see Nelson, who was like an urban legend that we had in that town, of course with the spiked mohawk, black boots, tattoos — a very transgressive image. And yet, when I got to know him well, I remember that he handed me a cigarette and he had a great sense of protection with all the boys there. In other words, he greatly encouraged that family spirit, not a gang spirit, but music and family spirit. There was nothing illicit or illegal. It was a feeling that united us with a passion for music, for rock and roll.
From what you say, he sounds a lot like Paco, doesn’t he?
Yes. Paco’s character is not specifically based on a real character, but on several, like all the characters in the film. Paco has a lot of Papo La Bala, one of the leaders and singers of the punk rock band Eskoria in Cuba, who has since died; and he has a lot of that from my personal side, having known him [Papo La Bala].
What made you say “this role has to be mine” when you read the script?
First, the transformation I had to undergo. Second, that he was a difficult character and had a lot of energy; I wanted to do something like that, different. And also, perhaps most importantly, that as a Cuban artist I wanted to say many things that Paco also says — and feels. Feeling that almost kamikaze spirit of freedom above all else, I wanted to share that. I think that was what drove me the most.
You’re not only the leading actor, you are also credited as co-producer. What was your role in that regard?
I think what I did the most was contribute. I mean, I wanted this movie to happen so badly, I wanted this dream to come true so much, that without realizing it I began to contribute to the casting, to writing the lyrics of the songs, changing them and a little bit [of] the scenes. I got involved a lot. In fact, I even designed the logo that appears at the beginning, the Lord Miller logo. I have done so many things. And I feel so grateful and so good that I have always done that. Every time I go into a project I give my all, but the truth is that it is the first time that they have recognized me not only for doing my job as an actor. I think it says a lot about the producers and directors of this film. I am very grateful to them.
Now that Los Frikis will reach a wider audience after its festival run, what do you hope people take away from it?
I really don’t expect anything. I have a very nice feeling about this film through the different screenings we have been to. It is a tremendous delight to turn around and see people’s faces. I believe that it is not an educational film or one that has a specific verbal message for people, but rather a management of a bundle of emotions, a journey of various emotions that in the end stirs your soul and leaves you thinking and perhaps doing what I call the movie after the movie. I think that is the greatest achievement of this film. More important than a verbal message, is that of an emotion, and it shows.
Héctor Medina
Carlos Eric Lopez