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Taylor Swift and AMC may have miscalculated adding previews tonight at the last minute for The Eras Tour movie.
According to the AMC website, most theaters are only a quarter full with advance sales — or not sold at all.
The reason is “The Eras Tour” is three hours long. Tonight is a school night. Even if kids went at 6pm, that means being at the theater by 5:30pm and staying until 9pm. In the suburbs, that means an entire evening. Homework? Sleep?
Most of these tween girls have already bought tickets for the weekend. Unless there’s a big Walk Up energy tonight, tomorrow’s numbers may not reflect that predicted $100 million weekend.
Keith McNally, owner of hot spots like Balthazar and Pastis, says in a new post “Lies have been spread about me on Social Media causing my restaurants to lose a big chunk of their business.’
McNally reveals he’s head death threats, including one to “chop my head off.”
McNally misspoke in the heat of the moment on Saturday when he wrote on Instagram: “The more Utterly Repugnant the facts, the Greater the responsibility to Listen to the other side.”
McNally made a mistake. No one wants to listen, and he should have stayed out of it. We are in the heat of rhetoric now because the retaliation for hideous crimes is just as bad if not worse than what has already happened.
He’s right about his business. You can see it on Resy. Reservations are being cancelled at his places, particularly Morandi. Only the Minetta Tavern seems to be thriving, which is too bad– I was hoping it would be quiet for a change. You need the cone of silence to eat in there!
Seriously, McNally really stepped in it, as they say. He writes: “I did Not equate Palestine with Hamas. I was crystal clear in today’s post that my reference was to the Palestinians. “SILENCE GIVES CONSENT.” Plato.”
McNally is smart, he doesn’t need my advice. But I would make a big donation to UJA right now, and contribute supplies to organizations sending care packages to Israel. He’s got to look at the bigger picture, and fast, before the Balthazar Salad is a thing of the past!
SAG AFTRA says the studios have walked away from negotiations. The word is that the studios don’t want to ante up on a percentage of streaming profits for the actors. Streaming is so unlike regular TV and movies. The content is available 24/7, not just when offered officially.
SAG is right. The streamers are learning the same lesson that has faced music streaming and downloading for years. The people who created the content want to be paid every time someone uses it.
Hollywood is in limbo. We are three months out from awards season in January. We’re two months out from a holiday break which begins around December 15th and lasts two to three weeks. The studios must come to a reasonable agreement and get Hollywood back to work — especially as all streamers are raising subscription prices as we speak.
It is with profound disappointment that we report the industry CEOs have walked away from the bargaining table after refusing to counter our latest offer. (1/11) pic.twitter.com/nd2PfpDH4F
Taylor Swift is a mistress of manipulation, that’s for sure.
She can play her fans like a fiddle, Stradivarius style.
For weeks AMC Theaters insisted there would be no previews of Swift’s “Eras Tour” movie. They said the concert film would open on Friday only. I can show you the emails.
Then, suddenly, around 7pm Wednesday night. AMC announced the movie would start playing on Thursday night.
The Eras Tour film will launch tonight at 6pm on the east coast, everywhere in the country, and with multiple showings. This was not spur of the moment. This was a decision already known but held til now.
This is like Swift saying a piece of merchandise is only available for 48 hours. This is a concoction of the Swift marketing team to get the teenage girls frenzy buying up more and more crap.
But this whole approach may backfire for AMC and Swift. Since the fans already bought seats from Friday going forward, the Thursday tickets so far are not selling very well. I see mostly empty theaters Thursday at 6 and 7pm. Thursday preview numbers may come in lower than hoped for.
PS Swift turned up at her “premiere” in LA Wednesday night, spoke to the audience in the theater but didn’t take press questions and said nothing about the massive violence against women and children in Israel. She dare not for fear of push back from fringe wokesters.
Drake’s new album, “For All the Dogs,” is expected to end the week with 420,000 copies sold.
That will be the only album to sell more than 100,000 copies this week as record sales are generally way down this summer and fall.
The Pet Shop Boys will be happy since their “West End Girls” is sampled in one of the Drake songs but was never cleared or paid for. The better Drake does, the more they can ask for. Or demand.
The record biz is really looking for a smash hit this fall. Next up is the Rolling Stones’ “Hackney Diamonds” on October 20th. It’s a great record. Hopefully young people who want to hear the genuine deal will scoop it up, as well as older fans.
I’m told Taylor Swift will not walk a red carpet tonight at her movie premiere. She’s avoiding taking a stand on Israel.
Taylor Swift has 274,000,000 followers on Instagram and tens of millions of fans.
Tonight she’s launching her “Eras Tour” movie in 7,500 theaters around the world. Estimates say the film could earn over $100 million this weekend.
And yet she’s one of the dozen top social media celebrities who have not said a word about the horrific attack on Israel this week.
Swift is on a list that includes Kim Kardashian, Justin Bieber, Christian Ronaldo, and other “influencers” who are too cowardly to speak up lest they offend antisemites.
No one expects Bieber, who’s not a bright lightbulb, to take a political stand. And if he does, you know it will be the wrong one.
But Swift’s silence is loud. She speaks up about her own rights all the time. We all know how she’s been screwed by the music business and won’t take it.
So how about offering at least condolences for the women who’ve been murdered, raped, beheaded, and kidnapped by Hamas since Saturday? So far she’s only offered a Blank Space.
Tonight Swift is supposedly walking a red carpet in Los Angeles to promote “The Eras Tour” movie. But if she’s celebrating in the face of all this, it could be a sobering moment as well, one in which her fans might question their devotion.
No one I spoke to today has any idea about a “Seinfeld” reunion.
These are people who know Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David. If something’s happening, it’s a surprise.
“No one has mentioned it,” says a source.
Seinfeld brought this up at a comedy show in Boston over the weekend when asked about the much reviled actual of “Seinfeld.” All the characters went to jail for being bad people. The audience hated it.
A new ending would have to involve picking up where that left off and undoing it. But Jerry and the gang already had that chance There was a “Seinfeld” reunion back in 2009 on “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” All the main players were on including Jerry, Julia Louis Dreyfus, Jason Alexander, Michael Richards, and even Wayne Knight.
It was the 10th episode of season 7 of “Curb.” The cast got a second shot at a series finale. George was trying to get back together with his wife. Jerry donated sperm so Elaine could hae a child. George invented an iPhone app for finding public toilets.
So it’s unlikely that another reunion would occur on “Curb,” but you never know. Anything is possible.
I think we’re just as happy that Black Lives Matter has posted support tonight for the Palestinians, and referred to Israel using the word ‘apartheid.’
BLM Chapters in Los Angeles and Chicago are satisfied to see beheadings, kidnappings, torture, and wholesale murder of Jews by the Palestinians.
But this is one time that might ok. Black Lives Matter is a fraud organization that has frittered away tens of millions of dollars on their own executives.
There are many lawsuits from outside and within the organization wondering where the $90 million donated to them in the last couple of years has gone.
On their recent Form 990 tax filing, BLM listed under Revenue Less Expenses MINUS $8.5 million. The previous year, they reported $76 million in donations. Another almost $10 million came in in 2022.
The LA Times reported on one of their gross inside jobs in 2022. Shalomyah Bowers was accused of stealing $10 million.
Here’s an Associated Press report on their internal lawsuits over fraud.
“I would have made it crystal clear that I could not have supported any resolution calling for Black separatism or calling for a condemnation of Israel and an unqualified endorsement of the policy of the Arab powers.”
“Israel’s right to exist as a state is incontestable,” Dr. King wrote. He then added, almost prophetically, “At the same time the great powers have the obligation to recognize that the Arab world is in a state of imposed poverty and backwardness that must threaten peace and harmony.”
Are you feeling the sunlight? Because a Beatles “reunion” is coming at midnight Thursday night.
I’ve just heard the song Paul McCartney wrote and produced for Ringo Starr which Ringo is releasing on his four track EP this week.
The EP is called “Rewind Forward” and the McCartney song is “Feeling the Sunlight.”
Ringo has said in an interview that Paul made the track in the UK and sent it to him even playing the drums.
“We took those off,” Ringo says cheekily because, of course, we want to hear the best drummer in rock history on the skins. Ringo doesn’t disappoint. It’s his trademark sound, both vocally and instrumentally.
“Feeling the Sunlight” sounds at first very frothy and upbeat, just one of McCartney’s good time songs like “Silly Love Songs” or “Hello Goodbye.” Or even Ringo’s “Octopus’s Garden.”
But play it a couple of times and you hear the depth of it. McCartney is the most clever melodist of all time, and knows his way around a catchy hook. But he’s also singing background and playing guitar with his trademark sound.
The “Rewind Forward” EP has three other terrific songs including the title track. Ringo’s been releasing EPs, which is very smart, rather than issue full albums. But now he’s got enough songs to put out an EP box set if he wants. Ringo’s drums are unique, so take a listen. And his energy is infectious!
Check back here as Friday strikes 12am to hear the song.
