With a Record $200 Million in Production Incentives, Can Texas Become a Prime Filming Destination?

Zack Sharf Digital News Director Jack White is taking aim at celebrities such as Mark Wahlberg and Mel Gibson for “normalizing” Donald Trump by meeting him at public events. The two actors, along with Joe Rogan and Guy Fieri, were photographed interacting with Trump at the UFC 290 event in Las Vegas over the weekend. White shared photos of the interactions on his Instagram account while calling out the four men. “Anybody who ‘normalizes’ or treats this disgusting fascist, racist, con man, disgusting piece of shit Trump with any level of respect is ALSO disgusting in my book,” White wrote in his post. “That’s you Joe Rogan, you Mel Gibson, you Mark Wahlberg, you Guy Fieri. This is a statement from me, not a discussion/debate. -Jack White III”

Hayden Pedigo is a leading light in fingerstyle guitar, but his chief aspiration has always been to excel in a different area. “I never wanted to be a guitar player,” he tells me over the phone from Amarillo, the mid-sized Texas panhandle town where he was born and raised.

The Animation Guild, IATSE Local 839, has been voluntarily recognized as the bargaining representative of 129 artists and production workers at Powerhouse Animation in Austin, Texas. The guild called it an “historic voluntary agreement.”

EXCLUSIVE: Texas Monthly, the magazine that has been chronicling life in the Lone Star State since 1973, has continued its expansion into film and TV by setting its first-ever feature documentary, to be made in partnership with Peabody and Critics’ Choice Award-winning filmmaker Deborah Esquenazi (Southwest of Salem: The Story of the San Antonio Four).

of people with a uterus (and are two to three times more likely to occur in Black women)—and uterine fibroids symptoms tend to be “loud and obnoxious,” says , D.O., an OB-GYN and fibroid specialist in Texas. While it's possible to have asymptomatic fibroids, “they make their presence known if they’re symptomatic,” Dr. Arumala says.

Offset and Quavo reunited for a surprise performance during this year's BET Awards, the Georgia-born rapper is reflecting on how it all came together in memory of their late groupmate, Takeoff, who was fatally shot on Nov. 1 in Houston, Texas.On Thursday, Offset — born Kiari Kendrell Cephus — took to Instagram Live to share with his followers how the touching tribute to Takeoff came to be. The performance was the duo's first together since they disbanded their hip-hop trio, Migos, after releasing their fourth and final studio album,  in 2021.

Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour is forever keeping Us on our toes!

EXCLUSIVE: Phoebe Tonkin (Babylon) is among the cast leading the indie crime drama And On The Eighth Day from debut feature filmmaker Alexandra Chando, which has just wrapped production in New Mexico.

Naman Ramachandran The 2023 Glastonbury Festival has broken previous digital audience records for viewing and listening on the BBC, with content streamed a record 50.3 million times across BBC iPlayer and BBC Sounds, up 47% on 2022. On BBC iPlayer, viewers streamed Glastonbury programming a record 47.5 million times, up 49% on 2022. On BBC Sounds, listeners played Glastonbury content 2.8 million times, up 26% on 2022. On BBC iPlayer, the Glastonbury live channel was the most popular, with Elton John‘s farewell U.K. performance on Sunday topping the charts after it was streamed 4.3 times. Saturday’s live channel came second, with 3.8 million streams and Friday’s third with 3.2 million streams. Live coverage from the Pyramid and The Other Stage followed with 2.1 million and 1.9 million streams.

Offset and Quavo reunited for a surprise performance to honor their late groupmate, Takeoff, who was fatally shot on Nov. 1 in Houston, Texas, with a touching tribute during this year's BET Awards. The duo performed together for the first time since they disbanded their hip-hop trio, Migos, after releasing their fourth and final studio album  in 2021.

Offset and Quavo reunited for a surprise performance to honor their late groupmate, Takeoff, who was fatally shot on Nov. 1 in Houston, Texas, with a touching tribute during this year’s BET Awards.

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic When Bobbie Nelson, longtime pianist for her brother, Willie Nelson, died in March 2022 at age 91, she left behind a recently completed posthumous album, recorded collaboratively with singer Amanda Shires. That record, “Loving You,” is finally seeing the light of day and shedding additional daylight on Nelson’s supreme talent as a player, which wasn’t always the main point of focus in the Nelsons’ family band, for obvious reasons. As a happy byproduct, this beautiful labor of love also casting sunshine on Shires’ skills as a vocal interpreter, as they both take on Willie songs, standards (“Over the Rainbow” and “Summertime,” the latter with a guest vocal from Bobbie’s brother) and other shared favorites.

Tom Grennan secures his second Number 1 album with What Ifs & Maybes.

Zoe Hewitt When a state’s gross domestic product is the second-largest nationally and ranks within the top 10 worldwide, its government must be innovative when it comes to keeping the population employed. For Texas, this means enticing productions to set up shop not just through the use of tax incentives and grants, but by devising innovative ways to support filmmakers as well. Since Texas communities are spread across a vast landscape, the Film-Friendly Certified Community Program was developed in 2007 to metaphorically connect the state. Its goal was to lock in a blueprint of standardized filming guidelines while providing filmmakers with a contact to pave the way for them locally, thus creating a seamless process for productions.

Paul Plunkett Texas offers vast, open spaces and is beefing up its industry infrastructure to attract production not only across the state but in several pockets that have become hubs for all types of media production. From the central regions in and around Austin and Waco to the western panhandle near Amarillo, the Lone Star State is positioning itself for a production boom, aided by the Texas Moving Image Industry Incentive program, recently passed by the state legislature. “We were able to receive such great funding and have such support from the legislators across the board on both sides of the aisle, from rural areas to the cities,” says Mindy Raymond, communications director for the Texas Media Production Alliance, noting the leap in funding from the previous legislative session ($45 million) to this one ($200 million).

Andrew Barker Senior Features Writer Things have always been bigger in Texas. And thanks to some recently passed legislation, Texas film production is finally primed to take on a role befitting the state’s reputation. After years of watching productions opt for more incentive-rich states, Texas has been home to an immense amount of film and TV shooting over the past two years, with HBO’s “Love and Death,” Paramount’s “Yellowstone,” Apple TV+’s “The Last Thing He Told Me,” the CW’s “Walker,” Netflix’s “Hypnotic” and the Houston-set series “Mo” all setting up shop in the Lone Star state. And the floodgates look set to open even further with the recent legislative passage of $200 million in state shooting incentives, a sharp increase from the $45 million the state offered previously.

Maggy Chan Guest Contributor As advertising market Cannes Lions kicks off, NBCUniversal’s managing director and executive VP of global advertising and partnerships, Maggy Chan, talks about the importance of creating global partnerships. This coming month, children all over the world will be released from school for the summer, and eventually lodge an age-old complaint: “I’m bored.” I know this one well. Summer travel was at the bottom of my parents’ budget list, which meant I found my own entertainment—pre-programmed, on the television. My sisters and I grew up in France, with two parents from Mauritius, East Africa. Just like our parents encouraged us to try every new food, I developed an after-school TV palette for all cultures. I devoured French children’s cartoons, but also Chinese movies, Bollywood musicals and all-American classics like “Grease” and “The Sound of Music.” In short, I became part of an international fandom.

Tom Grennan leads the race for this week’s Official Number 1 album with What Ifs & Maybes. 

NME and Bose have announced details of the limited edition, hand-numbered vinyl release of the ‘Bose x NME: C23’ mixtape.The mixtape was originally released on digital formats and cassette back in March, marking the first entry in the C-Series since 1996. C23 followed on from the tastemaking compilations C81 and C86, both of which altered the landscape of British music forever by launching the careers of such artists as Primal Scream.This year’s C23 mixtape featured 15 exclusive tracks by 15 of the world’s most exciting and innovative emerging artists, including Jockstrap, 070 Shake and Blu DeTiger.

Marc Malkin Senior Film Awards, Events & Lifestyle Editor The new Max dating series “Swiping America,” from “We’re Here” creators Stephen Warren and Johnnie Ingram, follows a diverse group of New Yorkers who try dating in other cities throughout the U.S. “The beautiful thing about this show is we are the most inclusive, nonjudgmental dating show out there,” Warren told me Tuesday night at the show’s premiere at NeueHouse in Hollywood. “We have queer people, lesbians, we have trans, we have nonbinary. There are no judgments because love is love.” Calling the show a “rom-doc,” Ingram explained during his intro to the screening that “Swiping America” is not a competition show and “is not about manufactured drama.”