Thursday, December 18, 2025
Home Blog Page 1015

Madonna’s Madame X Tour Ends Early as Singer Cancels Last Two Shows, Blames it on Convenient Coronavirus

0

Madonna is free at last!

She’s cancelled the last two dates of her Paris run on “Madame X,” thus bringing this long international nightmare to an end. She got to blame the sad ending on the coronavirus, which struck in the nick of time!

On her website: “Following official notification from the Office of the Police this morning prohibiting all events with an audience attendance of over 1000, Live Nation regrets to announce the final two Madame X performances previously re-scheduled to 10-March and 11-March are forced to be cancelled.”

Madame X doesn’t end with a bang, but a whimper. Since the tour began last September in Brooklyn, Madonna has cancelled show after show, claiming intense pain and injury. I don’t doubt a bit of it. She’s 61, and she turned out to be human. That’s a lot to deal with.

But Madonna made the show rigorous, and also insisted on performing it after 10:30 at night instead of 8pm, like a regular musical. That’s what “Madame X” was, in fact, a musical with no real book, A revue. But it’s done. Soon we’ll hear numbers– record breaking this and that– but it hasn’t been easy.

As for the “Madame X” album, it was released last June 14th, and it was pretty much of a dud. To date, it’s sold 125,000 copies (paid downloads, CDs) and another 40,000 in streaming. Most of the copies sold were bundled with concert tickets, so that’s not good if the total concert tickets sold was 165,000.

Madonna is a fighter, and a survivor. She keeps trying new things. Some work, some don’t. But she’s hanging tough. She doesn’t have to: she’s loaded. She could just bed young men all year and adopt a lot of kids. But I’ll bet she’s back with a new project soon enough. First things first: knee replacement!

One two, cha cha cha.

Weekend Box Office Update: Actual Numbers for “Onward” and “The Way Back” Were Lower Than Reported

0

I hate to say it, but I knew it.

Yesterday’s guesstimates for weekend numbers on “Onward” and “The Way Back” were inflated to make things look better than they were.

Disney said “Onward” made $40 million. As it turns out, the Pixar film made just $39.1 million. That’s big difference. Disney was trying to avoid headlines about “worst Pixar showing since 2015.” But that’s what it was. Now they wait for “Mulan” on March 27th.

That extra $900,000 that didn’t happen– those were children whose parents didn’t want to risk exposure to illness. It had nothing to do with the movie’s relative qualities.

Also: Warners wanted “The Way Back” to be at $8.5 million. It was really $8.1 million. It was still Ben Affleck’s worst showing in two decades. And it was another disaster for Warner’s marketing films to adults. That makes “The Way Back” the 12th or 13th in a row over the last year and few months.

And that, folks, is entertainment.

 

Exclusive: White House Planning Surprise Event for NEW Presidential Medal of Arts and Humanities Winners on March 20th — Second in Six Months

0

EXCLUSIVE It was only last November that Donald Trump handed out Medals of Arts and Humanities to an eclectic crowd that included his movie star pal Jon Voight, musician Allison Krauss, and ad man turned thriller writer James Patterson.

Now, less than six months later, Trump is going to hand out more awards on March 20th. Invitations have gone out for a 2pm ceremony at the White House on March 20th. It’s unclear who the recipients will be this time.

All I know is that everyone has been sworn to secrecy.

Just recently, Trump plopped an award on radio host Rush Limbaugh, purveyor of hate, because he announced he had Stage 4 lung cancer.

Trump has already given awards to many of his financial backers including the wife of Republican fundraiser Sheldon Adelson.

There aren’t many people in the arts who will accept an award from Trump, who doesn’t come to the Kennedy Center Honors because he’s boycotted by most of the recipients. There are joke candidates like Ted Nugent and Scott Baio. D List actor Antonio Sabato Jr. just announced he can’t get work because he’s a Trump supporter. But I’m told we’ll see actor Gary Sinise, an arch conservative and an Oscar nominee from “Forest Gump.” Whoever gets it, they will be unqualified, that’s for sure. Should be interesting!

“Grey’s Anatomy” Remaining Star Ellen Pompeo Throws Justin Chambers Under the Bus and Moves On, As Always

0

I don’t know much about what goes on at “Grey’s Anatomy.” But I’m continually impressed with star Ellen Pompeo’s ability to move on when another actor is fired or leaves in a contract dispute. She’s a survivor, that’s for sure. In an Instagram post she has no tears for Justin Chambers, a co-worker for 15 years. She doesn’t even refer to Chambers by name, just his character, Alex Karev, as if Karev were the real person. It’s very touching in a Hollywood way. Is there any Emmy for this? Patrick Dempsey, Eric Dane, Katherine Heigl would all like to present it. This really is a Shonda!

PS She must be getting tips in diplomacy from “cousin” Mike Pompeo!

View this post on Instagram

Hi here I go again … Thank YOU! You are truly the best most passionate most loyal fans anyone could ever ask for. Because of you we got to make great tv… because of you we got to make television history! I say often life is hard and thank God it is because like I tell my kids… it shows us what we are made …of how strong we really are and let’s face it… without the lows there would be no dancing it out or celebrating this incredible experience we call life. Thanks to our national treasure @therealdebbieallen and the writers for giving Alex Karev the best send off. Thanks to @shondarhimes for creating the most amazing character. For me personally for Karev to go back to the beginning…. was the best possible storyline. It pays homage to those incredible first years and the incredible cast …that created a foundation so strong that the show is still standing. So let’s not be sad. As our fearless leader DA always says let’s PULL UP and celebrate the actors the writers and the fantastic crew who make this show come to life every week. No matter what the challenge or how tired we all are in the end… you keep us going…..That is worth dancing it out over! So much love and gratitude to you all. Xo E

A post shared by Ellen Pompeo (@ellenpompeo) on

Pete Davidson Punished? “Saturday Night Live” Actor is MIA from Show After Slagging Cast, Saying He Wanted to Leave

Where was Pete Davidson tonight on “Saturday Night Live”? Absent. Completely missing in action.

Davidson was in the opening credits but clearly not on the show tonight. He wasn’t even on stage at the end.

It’s just about 10 days since Davidson gave an interview in which he slagged off the cast and said he was probably leaving the show.

Oddly, last week– right after the interview– he turned up in bunch of sketches on the show hosted by John Mulaney. But Mulaney and Davidson are pals, so that might have had something do with it.

Davidson’s absence is glaring because he has a movie debuting next week on Hulu called “Big Time Adolescence.”  He also has a feature film coming in June.

But Pete’s time at “SNL” may be at an end. In the interview with Charlamagne Tha God he said he’s ready to quit the show because he believes his cast mates think he’s “f–king dumb … I don’t know … if I’m the joke or I’m in on the joke.”

Now the joke may be on him.

Otherwise “SNL” was pretty good tonight. Musical guest The Weeknd was excellent. Guest host Daniel Craig parodied himself as James Bond losing it in a casino, also very funny. But the best part of the show was the cold opening with Kate McKinnon as Laura Ingraham and as Elizabeth Warren. The latter Senator appeared as herself.

The Real Story NY Media Doesn’t Tell About Jennifer Farber Dulos, Missing Since Last May: Tragedy in a Very, Very Wealthy Wall Street, Fashion World Family

0

EXCLUSIVE The New York Times, New York Magazine, Vanity Fair, even the Hartford Courant– not one of them has written an actual story about Jennifer Farber Dulos, missing and presumed dead since last May. Her husband, Fotis Dulos, is presumed to have killed her up in really ritzy New Canaan, Connecticut. But he’s recently committed suicide while in custody. The Connecticut police list Jennifer as missing and have not been able to solve the case, locate her body, anything.

Jennifer’s five children, say all the media, are living with Jennifer’s mother, Gloria, in New York in her Fifth Avenue apartment. But who is Gloria Farber? Recently, Gloria filed papers to get child support from Fotos Dulos’s estate. But the estate of her dead son in law was revealed to be worth less than $300. He owed millions, including to Gloria’s late husband.The Farber-Dulos house is for sale for $2.9 million.

Gloria, however, does not need child support to raise her five grandkids.

Indeed, Gloria Farber, 80 years old, is living in an apartment on Fifth Avenue in the East 70s appraised at around $7 million. She also owns a comparable estate in Pound Ridge, New York that’s of architectural significance. So hold on just a minute.

In the old days, those journals I mentioned would have been all over the Dulos-Farber story. For some reason, it remains untold.

When Jennifer’s father, Hilliard Farber, died in 2017 at age 83, he was a very rich man. In 2008 he’d sold the Wall Street firm he founded, Hilliard Farber & Co. Inc., a voice brokerage company, “which was known for its reputation and industry expertise,” according to Wikipedia, to TradeWeb for undisclosed sum in the millions. A published SEC report figured the firm was worth $10 million in 2009.

According to his obituary: “He started his career at the Chase Manhattan Bank and quickly rose to be their youngest Senior Vice President, heading their bond trading desk. While at the bank, he was invited to serve as a Brookings Fellow in Washington, DC in 1964.” He left Chase in 1974 under the cloud of a scandal, and started his own company in 1975.

The Farbers were no slouches in society. It didn’t hurt that Gloria’s brother, Arthur, was married to designer Liz Claiborne, with whom he created a fashion empire beginning in 1957. Liz Claiborne died in 2007, Arthur Ortenberg in 2014. The lack of media attention about the Farbers is most unusual, too, since Arthur Ortenberg’s girlfriend after Claiborne died was Cathy Horyn, the long time fashion editor of the New York Times.

With her husband, brother, and now daughter gone, Gloria Farber has been left to deal with the unthinkable on her own. (She has another daughter, Melissa.) But she’s up to the challenge. According to Hilliard Farber’s obit, the couple were longtime benefactors of St. Ann`s School in Brooklyn Heights, where Hilliard served on the board for 31 years. The St. Ann’s Lower School building,opened in 2003, is named in his and Gloria’s honor. The Farbers also supported CARING at Columbia, a program to assist at risk children. At the time of Hilliard’s death, Gloria served as chairperson.

So the five Dulos children — Petros, Theodore, Christiane, Constantine, and Cleopatra Noelle — have lost their parents in the worst possible ways, but they are insulated from the very grim realities of real life. Gloria Farber lives in a massive aerie at 980 Fifth Avenue. With spectacular views of the city and Central Park, Farber’s home is said to be worth north of $7.5 million. The apartment above sold most recently for $6.1 million. Three floors above went for $8.1 million.

Out of the apartment, the Farbers also ran a 501 c(3) called the Gloria and Hilliard Family Foundation. In the year ending June 2016, before Hilliard died, total assets were listed at just over $1 million. That was down from $1.3 million in 2014.

The Fifth Avenue spread is not the only Farber home. More suited to five rambunctious children would be their Pound Ridge estate. From reading lists it looks like Gloria put it up for sale after Hilliard’s death, but it’s off the market now. They bought the property in 1998 for just under $3 million. It’s a modern lakefront home that looks pretty spectacular from the videos on YouTube. (See below.)

Fotis Dulos must have thought a dead wife would cancel his loans to his in-laws, and reap him a whole new life with his girlfriend. It didn’t work out that way. But at least the kids can concentrate on grief for their mother. They will never have to worry about having a roof– or roofs– over their heads.

Got any info on the Farbers? Email me at showbiz411@gmail.com. Until Jennifer Farber Dulos is found, and the mystery of her death is solved, her tragic story remains an unfinished saga.

UPDATE: “Onward” and Downward as Disney-Pixar’s Latest Release Has Box Office Collapse Despite Good Reviews

0

SUNDAY AM UPDATE: Disney says “Onward” made exactly $40 million. At least that’s the number for now. They had to avoid that $39 million! 

SATURDAY AM: It’s Onward and downward for Disney and Pixar this weekend.

“Onward,” which has great reviews, is heading to a Pixar low number thanks to the Virus Panic.

“Onward” made just $12 million yesterday. If it can’t break $39 million, “Onward” will be the lowest Pixar opening weekend since “The Good Dinosaur” in 2015. If it does even less than $45 million, we’ll go all the way back to 1998 and “A Bug’s Life.”

It’s not the movie, of course. Ordinarily, theaters would be full this afternoon and tomorrow with grade school kids and crying babies. Disney would be raking it in. But panic about the virus may be keeping audiences out of theaters — in a big way.

If that’s the case, Disney may have to re-think launching their live action “Mulan,” coming on March 27th. They’ve already postponed its release in China.

UPDATED Ben Affleck Has Lowest Opening in 20 Years with “The Way Back” Even After Baring Soul in Dozens of Interviews

0

SUNDAY MORNING UPDATE: Somehow, not quite sure how, “The Way Back” made its way to $8.5 million. That’s 1 million more than its multiple. Hmmmm…word of mouth between Friday and Saturday must have had the phone lines buzzing. We’ll see if that stands up when the hard numbers are counted tomorrow.

 

SAT AM: Ben Affleck’s soul baring publicity tour for “The Way Back” didn’t work, as it turns out.

The well reviewed story of a basketball coach with addiction problems made just $2.6 million last night. A $7 million weekend is hoped for but not certain.

Was it worth it? I know more about Ben Affleck’s personal problems now than I ever did, or wanted to. In the past couple of weeks he’s spilled his guts about being an alcoholic, about divorcing Jennifer Garner, his kids, his parents, and so on. I now know that he has a full color back tattoo. This is all TMI.

This was all in service of selling “The Way Back,” which I haven’t seen but has decent reviews. On Rotten Tomatoes, “The Way Back,” directed by Gavin O’Connor, has an 88 among reviewers, and an 88 for audience interest. That second number should be worrisome. Not many people want to see a bloated Affleck mired in self-pity trying to earn the respect of high school kids. After all, this man used to be Batman.

Affleck’s career is far from over. But it’s going to take a lot to get him back on track. It’s not like “Batman” hurt him. He’s directed some great movies, like “Argo,” “The Town,” and “Gone Baby Gone.” He lost his way with “Live by Night.” Later this year we’ll see him Adrian Lyne’s comeback film, “Deep Water,” which is already getting a PR push. (The PR is trying to push a “thing” with co-star Ana de Armas, of “Knives Out” fame.)

I’d clamp down on the “Woe is me” thing, frankly. It’s not worth it, financially. Or emotionally.

You Read it Here First: Justin Bieber Tour Tanking as Stadium Dates Are Cancelled for Lack of Sales, Downsized to Smaller Arenas

0

update: It seems that all of the stadium shows are being moved to smaller arenas for lack of sales.

I’ve been telling you for weeks that Justin Bieber’s “Love” tour was in trouble. Now the Beebs has had two dates at stadiums– in Houston and Cleveland– cancelled. This is for lack of sales, not because of the corona virus.

Bieber’s ticket sales are tied to his skimpy album sales of “Changes,” his first record in four and a half years. This past week, “Changes” sank again, selling just 17,000 CDs and paid downloads, and another 30,000 in sales equivalent streams. After three weeks, “Changes” sits at number 5 on the chart monitored by hitsdailydouble.com and Buzz Angle. In its second week, “Changes” dropped about 90%.

The album and its individual  tracks, with the exception of “Intentions,” featuring Quavo, is not generating much buzz.

The lack of ticket sales is alarming. The apathy toward Bieber’s tour started before the Virus Panic, but of course, it can be used now as an explanation. Of course, other shows are still doing fine, so that explanation may be hard to rationalize.

The first stop on the tour is Seattle on May 14th, where there are still hundreds of seats for sale at the CenturyLink Field. The lowest price is $49. Three nights later in Portland, only the floor sections are booked up for secondary sales. The rest of the Moda Center is for sale, again with hundreds of seats.

As the summer goes along, things just get worse. Atlanta on July 18th is the same as the others. As with all Bieber’s dates, the size of the arenas has been cut by at least a third, with venues shutting off big sections from sales rather than risk embarrassment. Ticketmaster has stopped selling tickets for Nashville date on July 11th. But StubHub is offering hundreds of seats again in every section down to $41 if you’re so inclined.

The frightening part there: StubHub is running ads on Yahoo and other places for their hundreds of cheap Bieber seats. See below.

Again, stay tuned. There may be more cancellations.

South by Southwest Festival Cancelled After City of Austin Shuts It Down Over Virus Panic: Are Tribeca, Cannes Next?

0

The South by Southwest Music and Film Festival has been shut down. The festival tweeted a short time ago that the City of Austin cancelled their March dates. This is all about virus panic. Will the Tribeca or Cannes Film Festivals be next? Never say never. What a shame. Stay tuned for more…

from their website:

City of Austin Cancels SXSW March Events

The City of Austin has cancelled the March dates for SXSW and SXSW EDU. SXSW will faithfully follow the City’s directions.

We are devastated to share this news with you. “The show must go on” is in our DNA, and this is the first time in 34 years that the March event will not take place. We are now working through the ramifications of this unprecedented situation.

As recently as Wednesday, Austin Public Health stated that “there’s no evidence that closing SXSW or any other gatherings will make the community safer.” However, this situation evolved rapidly, and we honor and respect the City of Austin’s decision. We are committed to do our part to help protect our staff, attendees, and fellow Austinites.

We are exploring options to reschedule the event and are working to provide a virtual SXSW online experience as soon as possible for 2020 participants, starting with SXSW EDU. For our registrants, clients, and participants we will be in touch as soon as possible and will publish an FAQ.

We understand the gravity of the situation for all the creatives who utilize SXSW to accelerate their careers; for the global businesses; and for Austin and the hundreds of small businesses – venues, theatres, vendors, production companies, service industry staff, and other partners that rely so heavily on the increased business that SXSW attracts.

We will continue to work hard to bring you the unique events you love. Though it’s true that our March 2020 event will no longer take place in the way that we intended, we continue to strive toward our purpose – helping creative people achieve their goals.