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Good weather sent people to the movies on Christmas Eve, mostly.
“Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker” did $20 million, a drop off from Monday’s $29 million but not bad. When you think that that’s versus church attendance, the rebels did okay.
As I keep saying, Clint Eastwood’s “Richard Jewell” has a steady following. It pulled in $545,000 last night, down just 1 percent from Monday. The attendance is steady, which means word of mouth is very good. Adults looking for something not in space, and not animated, are enjoying this film.
Meantime, “Cats” is pussyfooting around. On Monday the take was $1,370,000, which brought the total close to $8 million. Last night’s numbers are late coming in. But today the competition for eyes ratchets up with “1917,” “Little Women,” and “Just Mercy” all excellent, all demanding our time.
Tributes are pouring in this morning for Allee Willis, the famed and beloved songwriter of many pop hits. She was 72, and died of a heart attack suddenly.
Willis collaborated on many Earth, Wind & Fire hits including “September” and “Boogie Wonderland.” She also co-wrote the “Friends” theme song, “I’ll Be There for You.” She was nominated for a Tony Award for working on “The Color Purple” on Broadway.
Willis’s connections through the music industry were vast. She wrote songs with and for dozens of famous artists, and was a bit of an icon in that world. She also had Grammy and Emmy awards, and was a recent inductee into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. On her Instagram page, she’s smiling broadly in every photo. This is a big loss for the music community.
Madonna is still on her theater tour, and it’s not going so well. On Sunday she cancelled her final show in Miami because she’s in “indescribable” pain, she says on Instagram. “[Doctors] have made it very clear to me that if l’am to continue my tour— I must rest for as long as possible so that I don’t inflict further and Irreversible damage to my body.”
That didn’t sit too well with fans. She only cancelled two hours before showtime.
Madonna’s next stops are in Europe: Lisbon, Paris, and London. The Lisbon run will start January 12th, but the Paris and London dates are all moved back and moved around according to her website.
Madonna has domestic issues as well: ex husband Guy Ritchie won’t leave her alone on custody of their kids. It’s hard to imagine they’re still fighting over son Rocco, who’s 19 already. But it could be over the adopted son David Banda, from Malawi, who’s 13. Madonna has been including her younger, adopted kids in her shows.
In Miami, Madonna had other problems: one fan sued her for starting her show at 10:30pm, two hours late, saying he couldn’t re-sell the tickets. She actually started the shows later than that, at 11pm, and played til 1:30am. (Is she a bat? Why can’t she start a show on time?) She also banned air conditioning from the theater, which caused the audience to yell out pleas to restore it. This was Miami, not Boston, after all (which she didn’t play any way). The fans were dripping in sweat. But the AC aggravated Madonna’s injuries, she said. Reportedly she told the fans to “take your clothes off” if you’re hot.
At 61, the pain thing seems reasonable. But Madonna is supposed to be in better shape than almost anyone, and that’s according to her. The show is stressful, truly, but the dancers do most of the work.
Fans are angry. Madonna cancelled her Boston shows completely a few weeks ago. Imagine the bad luck for those in Boston who re-scheduled for Miami.
Here’s her statement:
As I climbed the ladder to sing Batuka On Saturday night in Miami
I was in tears from the pain of my injuries,
Which has been indescribable for the past few days
With every song I sang, I said a prayer that I would make it to the next and get thru the show.
My prayers were answered,
And I made it.
I consider myself a warrior
I never quit, I never give in, I never give up!! However this time I have to listen to my body
And accept that my pain is a warning
I want to say how deeply sorry I am to all my fans. For having to cancel my last show
I spent the last two days with doctors
Scans, ultra sounds, Xrays
Poking and probing and more tears.
They have made it very clear to me that if l’am to continue my tour— I must rest for as long as possible so that I don’t inflict further and Irreversible damage to my body. I have never let an injury stop me from performing but this time i have to accept that there is no shame in being human and having to press the pause button………….. I thank you all for your understanding, love and support. As the Words to Batuka go……….. It’s a Long Road……….Lord Have Mercy🙏🏼. Things have got to change.
And they will because
MADAME ❌. is a fighter!! Happy Holidays to Everyone ♥️🎄
On the fourth day in release, “Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker” made $29 million and passed the $200 million mark. It’s at $206 million. Sure, no one likes it but they keep going back to see why. LOL. Movie is up to $434 million worldwide. In four days.
“Richard Jewell” made $550,000 and crossed the $10 million mark. Go go go! This movie has a consistent audience. See it today or tomorrow. It’s worth it. Merry Xmas, Clint Eastwood.
Starting to pick up steam: “Bombshell.” Great movie, Jay Roach did a wonderful job. Acting is top notch.
Justin Bieber released a video announcement today for new music and tour dates. His single, “Yummy,” comes January 3rd. He says, “As humans we are imperfect. My past, my mistakes, all the things I’ve been through…I believe I’m right where I’m supposed to be. God has me right where he wants me.”
Bieber left the comfort of his gated community McMansion in Calabasas, and found an abandoned gas station to deliver this message. His authenticity just keeps growing.
The lyrics to “Yummy” already sound spiritual. “When you come around me/Do me like you miss me.” So well put.
This is sad. We gave Kevin Spacey two Oscars and a Tony Award some other other stuff. He was always creepy. And then he became accused of sexual harassment and pedophilia. He won’t go away. He persists. Now here’s his Christmas message to us: if someone accuses you of something bad, don’t retaliate. Kill them with kindness. And yes, his father was a neo-Nazi. We can’t un-remember that.
Overlooked in this awards season but a must see film of astonishing beauty and integrity: Francois Girard‘s “The Song of Names.” The stars are Clive Owen and Tim Roth in sensational appearances, with a gorgeous score by Oscar winner Howard Shore.
“The Song of Names” is an epic post-Holocaust drama of two men who grow up as brothers. The film defies clichés about the Jewish dead, in simply naming names: in this case, the murdered at Treblinka; miraculously, the Canadian filmmakers, producer Robert Lantos (Sunshine, Barney’s Version) and director Girard (The Red Violin, Thirty-two Short Films about Glenn Gould) were permitted to film there, a memorial site with an unforgettable field of boulders, each representing a town evacuated to this death camp.
Opening on Christmas Day, the movie, based on the novel by Norman Lebrecht, was a standout at the recent Hamptons International Film Festival, where I sat down with the filmmakers to talk about music, the Holocaust, and the stars Clive Owen and Tim Roth.
RW: The cantor intoning “Song of Names” alters the lives of the two central characters, Dovidl (Clive Owen) and Martin (Tim Roth). How did you create that powerful moment from a mere line in the book and script?
FG: The title scene is the center of gravity, the DNA of the whole story. In the film, Clive Owen as grownup Dovidl performs a song on violin after he hears a song in a synagogue. Until Howard Shore came on board there was no idea of how to do this. Howard Shore worked more on that two minutes of singing than anything else in the film. Musically, it is very simple; the work was digging out the truth of that singing. Howard’s wife, Elizabeth Cotnoir, is an expert in choral Jewish music. She and Howard brought the cantor from Central Synagogue to Budapest. The man never saw a camera before, just walked in and sang. We did nine takes and you hear four and seven. Dovidl then plays the song in Treblinka.
RW: Most unusual is that you had permission to film in Treblinka. You were the first film given permission to film there. How?
FG: I wrote them a long letter why they should say yes. The atrocity and engineering of murder! It was hard for me to go there; I went almost against my will. I found that memorial is a masterpiece: a kind of a celebration of the spirit. The first thing I see is hundreds of kids on a pilgrimage. 300 young Jews celebrating life. Our Polish actress’ boyfriend took us around but then we walked for two hours ourselves. This became our only real Holocaust contact. We are the first to shoot there. We spent half a day. Now I could cut a half hour documentary about Treblinka.
RL: I was struck by a ribbon that runs around the trees has the names of the killed. It’s an endless ribbon.
RW: How close to your own history does this film come?
RL: My history is not at Treblinka, but Auschwitz. The Hungarians came late to Auschwitz. My parents avoided it, but my aunt was there. My mother had Christian papers, fake ID. She never reported to the roundup. She was a swimming champion. Her coach and his wife had a daughter who had died years earlier. They made up fake papers during the German occupation, with their daughter’s name and my mother’s picture. They were not Jewish. They were evacuating the ghetto and she walked over and saw Jews being marched out in columns. My mother watched her sister being taken away to Auschwitz from the other side of the street. They saw each other but they didn’t wave. Both my mother and her sister survived; they had learned German in school and were fluent. My aunt had secretarial skills so the camp commander at Mauthausen made her his secretary so she could type in German. She went from there to Auschwitz where she got a job in the office, and was liberated by the Americans. My mother lived till 100, and left me 20 hours of audio tapes. I started to write about her.
RW: Did Francois’ background in opera make you want to work with him?
FG: Actually, I came to opera from film not the other way around.
RL: I wanted to work with Francois Girard. I did not want this film to be made by a Jew. He could discover this story from a more distant perspective from the outset.
FG: I never heard you say that.
RL: It’s the truth. Your first time in synagogue was when we went on Yom Kippur.
FG: That was my first time and we went to all the service together. I have many Jewish friends so I am not a stranger to those stories. In the book, Martin is Jewish but in the course of making the film we changed him to non-Jewish. Martin became me. It made my work more comfortable. It made my life easier. We were the outsiders looking into Jewish culture. Most of the audience for the film is with us. We opened the door wider for the film, with the same truth to the subject.
RL: I am surrounded by Jews: the writer is Jewish, screenwriter Jewish, Howard Shore Jewish, I am Jewish. It was essential that the central creative person not be Jewish. People don’t want to know about the horrors. The way to not repeat them is never to forget. Clive says to Tim, what is the greatest fear? That there is no one left to remember. Using music to tell this story gave me the chance to attract non-Jews.
FG: It has to move you whether you are Jewish or not. we are on the outskirts of the main theme, taking a walk with two characters on a volcano of six million dead.
RW: Speaking about your characters, tell me about casting Clive Owen and Tim Roth. I see Dovidl as catalyst, Martin as Everyman.
FG: Adult Dovidl shows up ¾ of the way into the film; if you are teasing an audience for an hour and half, you have to show someone, and Clive is the champion of charisma. I saw his play in NY. It was easy to get him. He saw the challenge and embraced the role. If you want Everyman, you need Tim Roth. His nervous energy. We discussed details with him. It’s all about Clive, but we are following Tim.
RL: Tim’s Martin is only liberated by the end of the film. After the betrayal when they were 20, finally at the end he is free when he, a non-Jew says the prayer for the dead for his brother. Otherwise he would still be searching.
Justin Bieber is lookin’ tuff. He’s all inked up for Christmas on Instagram. He’s got leather and chains, and he’s pouting in front of a piano he’s wrecked with graffiti. He’s so cool. He’s Mad Max After Thunderdome.
Still campaigning for Most Irrelevant Person in the Universe, Bieber is now threatening us with not one but three new singles, spaced a week apart, starting tomorrow, Christmas eve. That’s right, he refuses to let the year end a new one begin in peace.
Will these songs have bird calls again? Or will they reflect his shopping mall Christianity? Bieber has also posted audio clips on his Instagram account from Chelsea Smith, a Hillsong church pastor from Seattle and Los Angeles. It’s more homilies with home fries. So no more songs about getting laid or spitting on fans– it’s all spiritual now?
Spiritual guide, psychedelic pioneer, and massively influential author Ram Dass has died at age 88 in Malibu.
Born as Richard Alpert, Ram Dass‘s seminal book. Be Here Now, turned on generations of people in the Timothy Leary era who looked for ways to expand their minds. The Beatles’ George Harrison was so influenced by him that he wrote and recorded a song called “Be Here Now” for his 1971 album “Living in the Material World.” It’s been covered by dozens of artists. Ram Dass’s influence extended to popular culture right up til his death. The TV series “Lost” even named a character for him. The character was extremely popular, a time traveler who existed in many instances. He never aged.
His foundation issued this statement:
“The Love Serve Remember Foundation is planning a worldwide BE HERE NOW moment in celebration of Ram Dass’s extraordinary life. Additional details on this event forthcoming. In the meantime, if anyone would like to share their reflections on Ram Dass, please email remember@ramdass.org, or post on social media using #lovingramdass. For more information on Ram Dass’s life and teachings, please visit www.ramdass.org.”
Here is his official obit:
For more than 50 years, Ram Dass was a key influence on American spiritual culture. His monumentally influential and seminal work BE HERE NOW – part graphic novel, part introduction to yoga and inner transformation – is an enduring classic that has sold over two million copies. BE HERE NOW still stands as a centerpiece of western articulation of eastern philosophy. In the 1970s it was the hippies’ bible; today it continues to be the instruction manual of choice for generations of spiritual seekers.
As a psychologist, Richard Alpert – along with his cohort, Timothy Leary – played a pivotal role in the psychedelic movement of the 1960s, lecturing on the healing effects of psychedelics at college campuses across the country. At the time, Alp
ert and Leary influenced a generation to “turn on, tune in, and drop out” with psychedelics, providing the inner fuel during a turbulent era of social change, sexual liberation, and political unrest.
In 1967-68, Alpert journeyed to India, where he met the famed Indian saint, Neem Karoli Baba (Maharaj-ji), whose central teaching is to love everyone, serve everyone, and remember God.
After learning yoga and meditating in the Himalayas for six months, he returned to the West as Ram Dass, meaning “Servant of God.” For decades, Ram Dass crisscrossed America, lecturing on an eclectic spiritual path. He was a guide for thousands seeking to discover or reclaim their spiritual identity beyond or within institutional religion.
In early 1997, Ram Dass had a hemorrhagic stroke that left him with paralysis and expressive aphasia. He recovered his speech and went on to continue his teachings online, at retreats in Maui, and through film and music, inspiring the next generation of seekers.
The Love Serve Remember Foundation is planning a worldwide BE HERE NOW moment in celebration of Ram Dass’s extraordinary life. Additional details on this event forthcoming.
In the meantime, if anyone would like to share their reflections on Ram Dass, please email remember@ramdass.org, or post on social media using #lovingramdass. For more information on Ram Dass’s life and teachings, please visit www.ramdass.org.
Kanye West’s “opera” at David Geffen Hall, aka Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center was supposed to start at 8pm last night. “Mary,” named for the virgin mother, began instead at 9:15pm. But okay, we know it’s Kanye.
“Mary” is not an opera. It’s maybe an oratorio, or just a piece of eccentric entertainment. It does not meet the minimum requirement for an opera. The characters aren’t delineated and it has no songs. It has no actual dialogue, either.
Last night, “Mary” played to a full house nonetheless. People paid $300 to sit in the orchestra, $200 to sit upstairs. It lasted exactly one hour. When it over, I have never seen a theater clear out so quickly in all my life. Poof! they were gone. Gone.That was a lot of money for one hour.
“Mary” retells the story of Jesus’s virgin conception and birth. Kanye narrated, reading the libretto aloud. It sounded like he’d never seen the words before at all. He stumbled over them, mispronouncing several including the word “Israel.” He called “Is-rah-eel.” Yikes.
At one point, Kanye shouted over the music: “No trumpet here.” The audience broke into laughter.
Most of the music– none of which Kanye wrote– was provided by a very large, enthusiastic choir. They actually provided a lovely harmonic background to the proceedings. But that is not an opera. In an opera, characters emerge to tell a story. They have songs, there are musical themes. “Mary” lacked all of that. So we were basically left with Kanye’s awkward reading of the libretto, and the choir’s repetitive harmonic underpinning.
The orchestra, I was told later, combined three local bands, none of whom had played together before last night. That said, they meshed together for a kind of interesting interweaving of jazz, gospel, and Broadway. The horn section plays with Celine Dion, I was told.
You must take this seriously. Even though Kanye didn’t write or direct the show, or write the music, he is its impresario. He gave away 300 tickets to a children’s charity to fill the room. He may have given away more than that to other groups. Let’s say he sold 2,000 seats at $300 a pop. That’s not enough to pay for this extravaganza. Did he underwrite it? Unclear.
Some notes: It was the first time I’ve ever smelled pot in Avery Fisher Hall. I asked an usher who agreed, it was a first. The smell was pungent. Even though the show was scheduled for 8pm officially, people were wandering in after 9:15. Did they just guess? Good for them. There were at least 4 long, long lines for beverages, mostly alcoholic, in the orchestra lobby. They were still serving guests when the show started. The only celebrity I saw was Michael Che from “Saturday Night Live.” Maybe there were others.
When the lights went down, West’s small children — North and Saint– were apparently seated in the front row. They began shouting at the darkened stage, prompting people near them in the audience to shout back. This went on for some time.
Will Kanye offer an album of his various operas? Or videos? He should. The cumulative effect can only be dealt with that way. But again, if his fans want to pay for the tickets, why not try this and a lot of other stage presentations? They take a leap of faith and a lot of chutzpah. He has the capacity for mountains of each.
