Scandinavian Creatives Emerge With Powerful Voices

David Crosby has offered young creatives a stark message, saying “don’t become a musician”.In a new interview with Stereogum, Crosby was asked what message he would give to new musical creatives. He replied: “Don’t become a musician.”The reason he gave was largely due to streaming royalties.He continued: “I don’t like Spotify. I don’t like any of the streamers, because they don’t pay us properly.

Sony Pictures, Filmocracy, the Lantos Foundation and OUT.LI.ER, introduce the 8th Annual Women’s Voices Now Film Festival. The festival will take place on March 24, 2022 and the keynote Speaker is Jaina Lee Ortiz. Like the previous year, the festival will again take place virtually. 

The Broadway revival of Ntozake Shange’s for colored girls who have considered suicide/ when the rainbow is enuf, directed and choreographed by Tony Award nominee Camille A. Brown (Once On This Island, Choir Boy) has announced its full cast and creative team, with performances set to begin at the Booth Theatre on Friday, April 1 and opening night on Wednesday, April 20.

Watford goalkeeper Ben Foster admitted he "didn't have a lot to do" during their goalless draw with Manchester United on Saturday.

EXCLUSIVE: Berlanti Productions, run by Greg Berlanti and Sarah Schechter, has promoted Eliza Weiss to Creative Executive.

Todd Gilchrist The NAACP Image Awards ceremony celebrates its 53rd year on February 26, commemorating more achievements by people of color than ever before: in addition to its multiple Outstanding Motion Picture, Television, Recording and Literary awards, the organization selected Nikole Hannah-Jones as its second-ever Social Justice Impact Award recipient, and has also added five new categories recognizing podcasts and social media.  After last year’s ceremony, which like many other awards shows was held remotely due to the pandemic, the prospect of packing a live stage with honorees while Anthony Anderson hosts for his eighth time felt like an exciting, overdue balm — not just for the show’s audience, but for Karen Boykin-Towns, Vice Chair of NAACP’s Board of Directors. But the latest and most aggressive strain of the Covid-19 virus led to the sensible decision to not endanger the lives of the people that made some of the most inspiring accomplishments of the last year, and instead to try and capitalize on the discoveries made both during the weeks and months of quarantining as well as in the adjustments implemented during the 2021 Image Awards that seemed to resonate most strongly with the community that they were conceived in order to honor.  “I think like most, we thought that in 2022 we would be back in person at the Dolby but that’s not where we are,” Boykin-Towns tells Variety.

Netflix is joining forces with Creative UK, the independent network for the country’s creative industries, on an initiative that will develop and fund debut feature films.

ITV Studios Strikes Major CBC Content Deal

Manori Ravindran International EditorEntertainment One has hired Left Bank executive producer Sharon Hughff to serve as creative director of scripted television out of the U.K.In her new role, she will oversee the scripted team and pipeline from the U.K., while spearheading efforts to expand the slate into buyers in the U.K. as well as Europe and Asia.

Jazz Tangcay Artisans EditorThe Visual Effects Society will present Guillermo del Toro with VES Award for Creative Excellence on March 8.del Toro will be honored for his consummate artistry and expansive storytelling that blends iconic visual effects and unforgettable narrative. Harnessing his intuitive vision, del Toro has created a distinctive cinematic style mixing the world of monster movies, comic books and exuberant visuals straight from his imagination.“Guillermo is a fiercely inventive storyteller, who has pushed the boundaries of filmmaking,” said VES Board Chair Lisa Cooke.

Holly Jones Karlsson: It’s also the expectations they put on themselves. Harry’s constantly torn between what he feels is good music and what is just making money, a concern he shares with his father.

Molly-Mae Hague announced she was the creative director of PrettyLittleThing and the nation had questions?Well, the Love Island 2019 star has FINALLY spoken out about what her new job actually entails and honestly? It sounds dreamy.It turns out Molly has kind of been doing the job ever since she launched her first collection with PLT following her time on Love Island.She told us, "For the last three years I sort of naturally developed more of a lead in the business, in terms of when I was coming in for meetings to talk about the collections that I was producing, I'd be giving out ideas and talking to the teams about things that I saw with the brand and they really appreciated my ideas."It was just an organic natural flow for me to just take on this role, because I was kind of already doing it anyway."PLT do collections with other girls but for me, I was taking the lead with [my collections], everything was controlled by me. I approved everything.

Todd Spangler NY Digital EditorSnap hired ad-industry veteran Resh Sidhu to lead Arcadia, the Snapchat parent’s global creative studio for branded augmented reality.Sidhu joins Arcadia as global director, based in New York, heading up the AR business and managing the team globally. Most recently, she served as chief creative officer for Barbarian, working with clients including American Express, Samsung, Fenty and Joe Biden’s presidential campaign.Previously, Sidhu served as group creative director for digital agency AKQA, where she executed AR experiences for Volvo and Coca-Cola.

Elsa Keslassy International CorrespondentNordic production powerhouse Miso Film, which looks to make a splash at the Berlinale Series with its daring HBO Max show “Lust,” is developing high-end international dramas with Scandinavian creatives such as Pilou Asbæk (“Borgen”), Ole Bornedal (“Nightwatch”) and Fenar Ahmad (“Darkland”). The company is part of Fremantle.Ahead of the Berlinale, Miso founders Peter Allen and Jonas Bose discussed with Variety their ambition to find new voices and original ways to tell stories.The banner, which just started shooting the third season of “Those Who Kill” and is about to begin filming Season 3 of “Face to Face” with Lars Mikkelsen, recently shot Norwegian sci-fi comedy “Blasted,” for Netflix.

Parallel Mother and Bardem was nominated for portraying Cuban Desi Arnaz in Being the Ricardos. Javier Bardem and Cruz, who have been married since 2010Bardem’s casting was widely criticized — many felt Arnaz should’ve been played by a Latinx, ideally Cuban, actor. Bardem responded by stating, “We should all start not allowing anybody to play Hamlet unless they were born in Denmark.

Elsa Keslassy International CorrespondentFrançois Ozon, the prolific and provocative French director who won the Berlinale’s 2018 Golden Bear Award with “By the Grace of God,” is returning to the festival with “Peter von Kant” which will world premiere on opening night. A twist on Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s cult film “The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant,” Ozon’s movie has Denis Menochet playing the tormented filmmaker, opposite Isabelle Adjani, who stars as his muse. Like the original film, “Peter von Kant” is about a film about love, jealousy and domination.

BritBox North America has struck a deal for three Agatha Christie adaptations and is to double its creative and investment output.

K.J. Yossman Komplizen Film, the German studio behind Princess Diana biopic “Spencer,” have joined The Creatives, an alliance of independent production companies.The alliance was formed to increase the companies’ “collective power in the face of the changing landscape.”Film and TV production outfit Komplizen, which was founded in 1999 by Janine Jackowski and Maren Ade, joins eleven other companies from across the world including Razor and Haut Et Court, the latter of which initiated the collective.The companies work closely together in a number of ways, from sharing information, combining talent and networks and negotiating with common rules to co-production and partnerships.