Inside the groove: The surprise music connection between ‘The Color Purple’ and Madonna

On this morning’s Crew Call, we talk with The Color Purple producers Oprah Winfrey and Scott Sanders on blazing a path for their Broadway musical to the big screen.

After spending 30-plus years honing his craft for stage and screen, Colman Domingo is more than ready for his close-up. Considering the actor’s versatile resume, which includes memorable performances in Selma, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, Fear the Walking Dead, or his Emmy-winning role on Euphoria and a handful of Tony nominations, it’s bewildering that his recent portrayal of civil rights activist Bayard Rustin, in Netflix’s Rustin, marks his first leading role and Golden Globe nomination. Also, this year, Domingo features in another highly acclaimed film, The Color Purple, where he plays the dastardly Mister.

Director Steven Spielberg’s 1985 version of Alice Walker’s classic, “The Color Purple,” has always been heavily debated. Many knock it for being too tidy and toning down the lesbian love story at its heart. Others, though, consider it a classic and a film that has withstood the test of time a lot better than the movie it lost the Best Picture Oscar to, “Out of Africa.”

Since launching on our screens back in 2017, BBC’s The Repair Shop has become known for its sentimental stories and wholesome transformations as everyday people have some of their most personal items restored back to their former glory. Among those working on The Repair Shop to make it the success that it has become is Steve Fletcher who has appeared on the show since day one.

The 1619 Project, which has been praised for reframing our understanding of American history but attacked by conservatives who brand it as “woke-ism,” won the Outstanding Documentary or Nonfiction Series Emmy on Sunday at the Creative Arts ceremony.

during a live Q&A session on Friday with the film’s cast. According to the actress, they also were not given any food. “You corrected it for us,” Brooks told Winfrey, 69, who said she heard about the situation from Henson, 53.

Zoe Hewitt When you’re not a minority, role models are everywhere, particularly in mainstream movies. Heterosexual cis-gender people and their relationships are the basis for romcoms and featured in actioners. If you fall outside of that mainstream definition, it becomes harder to see yourself represented by the media in the embodiment of a fully-realized person who exists beyond tokenism and stereotype.

Hello and welcome to the Scene 2 Seen Podcast. I am Valerie Complex, an associate editor and film writer at Deadline.

Danielle Brooks and Taraji P. Henson pose together on the red carpet at the 2024 Palm Springs International Film Festival Awards.

Nick Clement The way an actor approaches and prepares for a role can be different with each project, and in some instances, the material presents specific obstacles that make the experience even more personally fulfilling or transcendent. This is true for actors of any age but is especially notable for a trio of younger talent in this awards season. One of the year’s best performances arrived in last summer’s coming-of-age dramedy, “Are You There, God? It’s Me Margaret,” from the now-15-year-old Abby Ryder Fortson.

Carrie Bernans was left critically injured after a hit-and-run in New York City.

After a presumably very busy Christmas, the Radford family have headed to Disneyland Paris to see in the New Year, marking their 23rd holiday in two years. Parents-of-22 Sue, 48, and Noel, 52, who star in hit TV show 22 Kids & Counting, have whisked their brood off to Paris to end 2023 on a high, with Sue sharing some sweet photos of the getaway on the family's Instagram account.

Usher and H.E.R. stripped down to just their underwear for the new music video set to their song “Risk It All“!

Steven J. Horowitz Senior Music Writer Nestled amid a tale of hardship and torment, “Keep It Movin'” is a bright spot in the newly released adaptation of “The Color Purple.” Just as sisters Nettie and Celie (Halle Bailey and Phylicia Pearl Mpasi) are about to be torn from one another, they find a brief moment of respite and optimism as they sing to one another on the beach. “Nothing’s gonna take you down, oh / Just let it go / Life can never break your soul,” sings Nettie, instilling a feeling of hope that flickers and wanes in Celie as the film endures.

, their courtship and subsequent marriage have been the focus of interest for a vast amount of people living on Earth. The impeccable style has only added to her appeal, leading to an entourage of fans dedicated to of the future Queen of England.

Angelique Jackson Turning 30 is always a memorable moment, but “The Color Purple” actor Phylicia Pearl Mpasi rang in her third decade with a birthday serenade from Oprah Winfrey. Coincidentally, Mpasi’s birthday (November 16) fell on another special occasion: the first screening of the musical reimagining of “The Color Purple.” The atmosphere was charged with anticipation since this was the debut of the film before critics and press, but the mood backstage was particularly jovial since it was the first time the cast — Fantasia Barrino, Danielle Brooks, Taraji P.

When Harry Met Sally fans! This Wednesday, Meg Ryan makes a rare TV appearance to honor her WHMS costar, Billy Crystal, when he is feted at the Kennedy Center Honors. The televised ceremony—which always airs during the last week of the year—recognizes artists who have made profound contributions to American culture through the arts.When Harry Met Sally is over 30 years old, but it is arguably the most quoted film in Ryan's and Crystal's movie careers, so it only makes sense that Ryan would want to pay homage to one of the greatest romcoms—and films—of our time.

The Color Purple often succeeds as a thoughtful fusion of two other adaptations of Alice Walker’s landmark novel that still confidently hums its own tune.In shakier moments, though, confidence gives way to nostalgia, when the film hammers home its reinterpretations of quotable scenes and dialogue from the Quincy Jones-produced, Steven Spielberg-directed 1985 adaptation with an insistence that borders on flashing “Hey, remember this?” in bold type onscreen.Creating and saying something new with such proven material, while also purposely coaxing audience sentiment for a beloved original, surely posed a formidable challenge for Bazawule and company. And having Jones, Spielberg, and Oprah Winfrey — the big guns and big breakout from the 1985 film — onboard as producers must have eased and complicated the gig in unfathomable ways.Oprah and Jones also had a hand in the original Broadway musical adaptation, which has spun off its own lore and legacy, and adds another meta layer of pop-lit gloss to what this film aims to freshly reinterpret.The stage musical — with a book by Marsha Norman, and lyrics and music by Brenda Russell, Allee Willis, and Stephen Bray — has amassed its own roster of breakout stars, including American Idol winner Fantasia Barrino, who made her 2007 Broadway debut stepping into the lead role of Celie, and Orange Is the New Black‘s Danielle Brooks, Tony-nominated for playing Sofia opposite Cynthia Erivo in the 2015 Broadway revival.Barrino and Brooks reprise their respective roles here with a lived-in grace and fortitude that does freshly illuminate Walker’s moving narrative, the lifeblood that courses through every iteration.

A column chronicling events and conversations on the awards circuit.

Fantasia Barrino, “The Little Mermaid” star Halle Berry and five-time Grammy winner H.E.R. to bring the belting in “The Color Purple,” the new movie musical adaption of Alice Walker’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel that opens in theaters on Christmas Day.But Oscar and Emmy-nominated actress Taraji P. Henson also flexes some surprise vocal chops as blues singer Shug Avery.And Executive Music Producer Stephen Bray already envisioned the former “Empire” diva in the role when she came to see the “Color Purple” musical on Broadway in 2005.“We were sitting together, and at intermission I said, ‘You know, you’d make a great Shug Avery,’ ” Bray — who co-wrote the songs for both 2005’s original stage production and its 2015 revival — told The Post.