The Weeknd Addresses 'Bumpy' Road to Release Controversial MAX Show 'The Idol'

Rebecca Rubin Film and Media Reporter Over a single weekend, 28-year-old Toronto resident Daniel Konikoff will experience two life-changing events. On July 23, he’s getting married. Two days before, he’s going to the movies with his bride-to-be and their entire wedding party for a double feature of Greta Gerwig’s very pink romp “Barbie” and Christopher Nolan’s extremely dark historical drama “Oppenheimer.” “It stemmed from a joke, and then we started to actually create a plan,” Konikoff says. “So, the double bill is a little wedding-adjacent party.” As soon as the second movie lets out at 1 a.m. — “it’s bed!” he adds. “And then we drive to the venue. There’s not a lot of sleep, but you gotta do what you gotta do.”

The Weeknd‘s recent gigs at the London Stadium broke an all-time attendance record for the Stratford venue.As part of his ‘After Hours Til Dawn’ stadium tour, Abel Tesfaye played two gigs at the stadium, built for the London 2012 Olympics, on July 7 and 8.Over the two nights, he played to a huge 160,000 people, breaking the attendance record for both a two-night stand and a single-night event at the stadium.A post shared by Abel Tesfaye (@theweeknd)Reviewing the tour’s stop in Manchester, NME wrote: “The Weeknd’s knack for dominating the charts with hit-after-hit-after-hit means that there might’ve been some debate over which track should end his main set tonight, but ‘Blinding Lights’, off 2020’s ‘After Hours’, is the obvious choice: a stadium-uniting force that prompts the kind of mass singalong you’d probably be able to hear over at Old Trafford on the other side of Manchester.”Elsewhere, The Weeknd has confirmed that he’s currently “finishing” up his new album. The singer, who recently announced his plan to retire the moniker and record under his birth name Abel Tesfaye, has long teased a trilogy of albums that has so far featured the LPs ‘After Hours’ and ‘Dawn FM’.“I’m finishing the third part of this saga, of this trilogy,” he revealed in a new interview.

Reese Witherspoon is opening up about her life.

At just 27, Timothée Chalamet has played a wide range of characters already in his career. There’s plenty of precocious and/or troubled youths in his filmography, like the upstart Henry V in “The King,” Frank Herbert‘s hero Paul Atreides, or the cannibal drifter Lee in “Bones And All.” But this winter, Chalamet plays an altogether different type of young man in the first musical of his career: Willy Wonka in Paul King‘s “Wonka.” READ MORE: The 100 Most Anticipated Films Of 2023 King’s prequel to Roald Dahl‘s 1964 novel “Charlie And The Chocolate Factory,” “Wonka” sees Chalamet don the eccentric candymaker’s top hot and cane after Peter Sellers and Johnny Depp.

The Idol, the HBO series from The Weeknd and Euphoria's Sam Levinson, brought its first season to an end last week. I thought it was quite bad, but found the internet pile-on was exaggerated, as they usually are.

Zack Sharf Digital News Director Timothée Chalamet’s Bob Dylan movie, “A Complete Unknown,” is supposed to kick off filming in August, but don’t call it a Bob Dylan biopic. During a recent appearance on the “Happy Sad Confused” podcast (via IndieWire), the film’s director, James Mangold, said “A Complete Unknown” is “not really a Bob Dylan biopic” but a movie about “a very specific moment” in the 1960s folk scene of New York City. The film’s specificity is one reason the real Bob Dylan “has been so supportive of us making it,” the filmmaker reasoned. “The best true-life movies are never cradle to grave but they’re about a very specific moment,” Mangold said. “In this case, it might be presumptuous to call it Altman-esque, but it’s a kind of ensemble piece about this moment in time, the early ’60s in New York, and this 17-year-old kid with $16 in his pockets hitchhikes his way to New York to meet Woody Guthrie who is in the hospital and is dying of a nerve disease. He sings Woody a song that he wrote for him and befriends Pete Seeger, who is like a son to Woody, and Pete sets him up with gigs at local clubs and there you meet Joan Baez and all these other people who are part of this world.”

“worst sex scenes in history.”“Continue to push the vision no matter how bumpy the journey,” Tesfaye, 33, told his fans in an Instagram post, seemingly referring to the show’s poor reception. Upon premiering at Cannes, “The Idol,” which Tesfaye created with Sam Levinson of “Euphoria” fame, was widely derided for its nudity, sex and directionless plot. “‘The Idol,’ or 50 SHADES OF TESFAYE: A Pornhub-homepage odyssey starring Lily-Rose Depp’s areolas and The Weeknd’s greasy rat tail,” a critic for the Gray Lady sneered after a viewing.“The show heavily exploits Lily … I hope she’s okay with it all because it comes off very exploitative,” another critic worried. The plot followed troubled pop princess Jocelyn (Lily-Rose Depp, 24, daughter of Johnny Depp) as she became involved in a weird and sex-filled relationship with self-help guru, club owner and cult leader Tedros (Tesfaye). The show regularly scandalized audiences, who cringed at its “nasty” sex scenes.Levinson doubled down after “The Idol” was criticized, defending his work as “revolutionary,” while others noted that the show is actually a lot tamer than earlier efforts, such as “True Blood.” “I think we live in a very sexualized world,” Levinson said.Depp also defended the show, telling Vogue Australia, “We know that we’re making something provocative and we are not shying away from that. That’s something I knew I was setting out to do from the beginning.

Is The Idol just a sick, twisted ex-girlfriend revenge fantasy for one of its stars?!

The Idol wrapped up its controversial first season on Sunday night, and The Weeknd took to social media to celebrate the bow of the HBO drama, which he starred in, co-created and produced with Euphoria creator Sam Levinson.

wrapped up its controversial first season on Sunday night, and The Weeknd took to social media to celebrate the bow of the HBO drama, which he starred in, co-created and produced with creator Sam Levinson.«The finale. grateful to share this moment with you all as the season comes to an end,» The Weeknd, known by his real name, Abel Tesfaye, in his acting work, captioned the slideshow of behind-the-scenes pics from the series.

Note: This story contains spoilers from the “The Idol” episode 5.HBO’s “The Idol” wrapped up its five-episode season Sunday night with a surprise ending — that was evidently spoiled to The Weeknd fans who attended his Los Angeles concert this fall.On the finale: As the twisted relationship between rebounding pop star Jocelyn (Lily-Rose Depp) and shady nightclub owner Tedros (Abel “The Weeknd” Tesfaye) sunk even deeper into dangerous territory as Tedros attempts to control every part of Jocelyn’s life and career, Jocelyn decides to get rid of Tedros once and for all by bringing her manager Chaim into the mix. When Tedros refuses to take a check for half a million dollars to stay away from Jocelyn, Chaim moves to Plan B — tipping off a Vanity Fair journalist to write a scathing exposé of Tedros’ past exploits that would ruin him forever.Weeks later, in an unexpected turn of events, Tedros shows up at Jocelyn’s concert at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles, and the pop star takes him back.

Without a doubt the Lake District is one of the most beautiful landscapes you’ll find in the country. It has rugged mountains, green valleys, and of course, breathtaking lakes.

A.D. Amorosi “The Idol” has been the TV season’s spite-watch de rigueur – a mess of untenably dated misogyny, homophobia, angry interpersonal sexual violence and traumatic hair styles, all of it was justified in the service of reminding the world: Never trust a dude with a rat tail. However, for all of the menacingly off-putting storylines, visceral physical assaults and mawkish dialogue that made up “The Idol,” the show’s icily epic music — made by its creators and actors, in and out of character — has been mesmerizing… thrillingly so, even, through the program’s bad, brief run. The music was initially broken down as a series of EPs released between June 9-30, and now those weekly teasers are captured in full on “The Idol (Music from the HBO Original Series),” a soundtrack that stands as a far more rewarding and cohesive document than its televised counterpart.

EXCLUSIVE: Olivia Williams (The Crown) and Jodhi May (The Witcher) have joined the cast of the Max Original series Dune: The Sisterhood (w/t).

“Back To The Future” on Broadway.The highly-anticipated musical, which begins previews on Friday, June 30 at New York City’s Winter Garden Theatre, has tickets available for all upcoming performances.And some showings have prices that would make Doc Brown himself exclaim “Great Scott!”At the time of publication, we found tickets going for as low as $75 before fees on Vivid Seats.Most showings of the Olivier Award winning production have seats starting in the $80 to $120 range.Want to see Marty McFly (portrayed by Casey Likes) travel back to 1955 with the help of Doc Brown (Roger Bart) live on the Broadway stage?Here’s everything you need to know and more, “BTTF” fans.All prices listed above are subject to fluctuation.“Back To The Future” officially opens at the Winter Garden Theatre on Thursday, Aug. 3.In previews, the show will curiously go dark on Sundays and go up on Mondays.Matinees on Wednesdays and Sundays start at 2 p.m.If you want to find the show that makes the sense for your schedule, take a look at “Back To The Future’s” complete calendar including all dates, show start times and links to buy tickets here.“Back To The Future” runs two hours and 40 minutes, including a 20 minute intermission.Who’s filling in for Michael J.

The Weeknd has shared two new songs from The Idol ahead of this Sunday's season one finale. "Like A God" and Lil Baby collaboration "False Idols" are streaming below.

EXCLUSIVE: Fox is to adapt Dutch physical quiz show The Floor.

The Weeknd has confirmed that he’s currently “finishing” up his new album.The singer, who recently announced his plan to retire the moniker and record under his birth name Abel Tesfaye, has long teased a trilogy of albums that has so far featured the LPs ‘After Hours’ and ‘Dawn FM’.Now, in a new interview with Variety he has shared an update on the project and discussed how fan theories on the album’s title are incorrect.“I’m finishing the third part of this saga, of this trilogy,” he revealed. “The name of it will come out soon, but it’s not called what some fans think it’s called… what they think it’s called is actually a song on the album, but that’s not what the actual album is called.

The Weeknd has shared a cover of John Lennon’s ‘Jealous Guy’ that’s been used in HBO’s new show The Idol.Ahead of the show’s fourth episode, The Weeknd, real name Abel Tesfaye, shared a version of Lennon’s classic song that appears in the show. The Idol is made by Euphoria-creator Sam Levinson and follows the plot of a pop star (Lily-Rose Depp) who develops a controversial relationship with self-help guru and cult leader Tedros (Abel Tesfaye).The cover was first teased back in April and the musician performed it in Norway earlier this week.You can check out the song here:Last week, The Weeknd and BLACKPINK‘s Jennie shared a new song that appears in The Idol – listen to ‘One Of The Girls’ below.Depp also appeared on two new The Weeknd songs ‘World Class Sinner/I’m A Freak’ and ‘The Lure’ from the show’s soundtrack, which were released earlier this month.The first single taken from the HBO drama was titled ‘Double Fantasy’, and hears The Weeknd (now going by his birth name Abel Tesfaye) team up with Future.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Vice Studios had a new hit on its hands with the late May launch of “Bama Rush,” which the studio’s co-founder and chief content officer Danny Gabai says was Max’s most-streamed doc feature debut. But with that large viewership also came a significant discourse surrounding the extent to which “Bama Rush” director Rachel Fleit is present in her own doc about college students “rushing” to get into the sororities at the University of Alabama. That choice didn’t sit well with people who avidly followed the #BamaRush phenomenon that first swept TikTok in the summer of 2021 and again last “season” and would have preferred more behind-the-scenes content about the rush process, rather than portions devoted to Fleit’s reaction to the situation.