Hollywood Rediscovers Jazz, From Billie Holliday to Ma Rainey to ‘Soul’ (Guest Blog)

Luke Combs is back with new music.

Among the country's preeminent dramatists, Suzan-Lori Parks has won a 2002 Pulitzer Prize for her play Topdog-Underdog and a 2012 Tony for an adaptation of Porgy and Bess. Along the way Parks, 57, has dipped a toe in Hollywood, as far back as 1996's Girl 6, which she wrote for Spike Lee.

Andra Day gained fame as a singer thanks to her hit anthem “Rise Up”, but she’ll soon be seen making her acting debut in the role of legendary jazz singer Billie Holiday in the Lee Daniels-directed biopic “The United States vs. Billie Holiday”.

Jared Leto has revealed that he contemplated signing up Billie Eilish and Finneas before their rise to fame.Leto spoke about the opportunity during an interview with James Corden on The Late Late Show in the US yesterday (January 26).Recalling how he was introduced to the sibling superstars by the film producer Emma Ludbrook and the US agent Tom Windish, Leto explained that his first encounter with Eilish and Finneas took place some years ago prior to them being signed.“They weren’t signed, and

Andra Day takes her first acting role very seriously. The Grammy-nominated singer did everything it took to resemble and sound like Billie Holiday in Hulu’s new biopic,  The United States Vs.

Andra Day “abused” her body while getting ready to play Billie Holiday.

Andra Day is opening up about how she prepared to play Billie Holiday in Hulu’s upcoming movie, The United States vs. Billie Holiday.

“When I thought of Billie Holiday, I just thought of her as a jazz singer, maybe a troubled artist, you hear about drugs, a little bit of trouble with the law,” says Lee Daniels, director of the upcoming biopic The United States vs. Billie Holiday. With all that Holiday accomplished during her storied career, rarely highlighted is her work in the civil rights movement of the 1930s and ’40s, which was why Daniels was inspired to tackle this project.

Ramin Setoodeh New York Bureau ChiefGrammy-nominated singer Andra Day had never starred in a movie before she channeled Billie Holiday in a new biopic directed by Lee Daniels.In “The United States Vs. Billie Holiday,” which will be released by Hulu on Feb.

boyfriend Michael Polansky, the 43-year-old Parker Group CEO, for a rehearsal at the Capitol. Wearing a Givenchy custom cape dress, Gaga held hands with Polansky as they made their way through the building.

For a while, it looked like Ryan Reynolds was always going to be stuck in (forgettable) rom-com land, thanks to his turns in the likes of The Change-Up, Definitely Maybe and Just Friends. While it was never a problem landing roles, for years the Canadian-American actor always seemed to be on the periphery of the big time and bonafide household name status.

The United States vs Billie Holiday, starring Bird Box's Trevante Rhodes and Russian Doll and Orange is the New Black actress Natasha Lyonne, has landed and it promises to be a moving watch. The film tells the story of the life and career of iconic singer Billie Holiday, who is considered one of the greatest jazz and swing musicians of all time.

Andra Day hesitates in singing a song on stage as police officers wait to arrest her in the trailer for Hulu’s upcoming movie, The United States vs. Billie Holiday.

On a list of Civil Rights movement leaders, few people would think to name Billie Holiday. But in his new movie, The United States vs Billie Holiday, starring Andra Day, Lee Daniels shines a light on that facet of the jazz singer’s story, in which Holiday’s 1939 song about lynching, "Strange Fruit," made her a target of the FBI.

The trailer for Lee Daniels’ Billie Holiday biopic “The United States vs. Billie Holiday” has officially dropped.

Eli Countryman The first trailer for Paramount’s “The United States vs. Billie Holiday” explores the tragic story of singer Billie Holiday, the racial inequalities of 1940s America and her encounters with the Federal Bureau of Narcotics.The jazz singer, portrayed by Andra Day, came under fire by the agency after performing the song “Strange Fruit,” which condemns the U.S.

Billy Connolly 's hilarious verdict on what he thought would happen if Donald Trump ever ended up as president.