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Films about Billie Eilish and The Velvet Underground and the acclaimed Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised) are on the shortlist of 15 films vying for the Oscar for documentary feature.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences released shortlists in 10 categories on Tuesday (Dec. 21). Members of the documentary branch voted to determine the shortlist for documentary feature, which was drawn from 138 eligible films. They will vote again to determine the five nominees in the category, which will be announced on Feb. 8. All Academy voters will vote to determine the winner, which will be announced at the 94th annual Academy Awards on March 27.
R.J. Cutler wrote and directed Billie Eilish: The World’s a Little Bleary, which tells the story of the teen phenom’s life on the road, on stage and at home, while creating her blockbuster debut album.
Todd Haynes wrote and directed The Velvet Underground, about the legendary underground New York rock band. This would be the first nomination for Haynes, 60, who has directed such acclaimed features as Far From Heaven and Carol.
Questlove, 50, made his film directorial debut with Summer of Soul, about the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival, which featured performances by Stevie Wonder, Gladys Knight & The Pips, The Fifth Dimension, Sly and The Family Stone, Nina Simone, Mahalia Jackson, Mavis Staples, B.B. King, and many other top artists of the era.
Summer of Soul won both the U.S. grand jury prize and the audience award for documentary at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival. The film is also nominated for a Grammy for best music film.
Eilish is also nominated in that Grammy category, but with a different film: Happier Than Ever: A Love Letter to Los Angeles.
Eilish got more good news from the motion picture academy on Tuesday. “No Time to Die,” which she and her brother and collaborator Finneas co-wrote for the James Bond film of the same name, is shortlisted for best original song.
Brian Wilson got mixed results in the shortlists. Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road was passed over for the documentary feature shortlist, but a song from the doc, “Right Where I Belong,” is shortlisted for best original song.
Other music docs that were passed over for the shortlist for documentary feature include Ennio (about film composer Ennio Morricone), The Jesus Music (about the rise of the contemporary Christian music genre), Fire Music (about the free jazz movement of the 1960s and ’70s), Like a Rolling Stone: The Life & Times of Ben Fong-Torres (about one of the top writers and editors for Rolling Stone from shortly after the magazine’s inception in 1967 until 1981), The Sparks Brothers (about Russell and Ron Mael who comprise Sparks) and Tina (about the indomitable Tina Turner).
Also passed over in the shortlist: Dave Chapelle Live in Real Life and Rita Moreno: Just a Girl Who Decided to Go For It, about the performer who in 1977 became the just the third person ever – and the first Latina — to complete the EGOT.
The shortlisted films, listed in alphabetical order by title, are:
Ascension
Attica
Billie Eilish: The World’s a Little Blurry
Faya Dayi
The First Wave
Flee
In the Same Breath
Julia
President
Procession
The Rescue
Simple as Water
Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised)
The Velvet Underground
Writing with Fire
OnlyFans founder Tim Stokely has stepped down as chief executive and will be immediately succeeded by Amrapali “Ami” Gan, the company said on Tuesday.
Gan was most recently the chief marketing and communications officer for OnlyFans and will now “assume the day-to-day leadership” of the London-based company from Stokely, who is leaving to “pursue new endeavors,” OnlyFans said.
Stokely will remain on as an adviser to assist with the leadership transition. A company spokesperson declined to comment further on Stokely’s reason for leaving the company.
“Ami has a deep passion for OnlyFans’ business and I’m passing the baton to a friend and colleague who has the vision and drive to help the organisation reach its tremendous potential,” Stokely said in a statement. “OnlyFans is still a new company and Ami brings a fresh energy and reflects who we are as a business.”
Stokely founded OnlyFans in 2016 and the creator-focused subscription service has since become most well-known for allowing sex workers and other adult content creators to charge fans for content.
But over the summer, the platform faced widespread backlash from users when the company said it would ban “sexually explicit conduct” from its platform, which would target adult creators who rely on the platform for a bulk of their income. OnlyFans later reversed course.
Gan has been with OnlyFans since 2020. She previously led communications and marketing for Quest Nutrition and Cannabis Cafe, a cannabis restaurant in West Hollywood.
In a separate statement, Gan said she was committed to making OnlyFans the “safest social media platform in the world.”
“I look forward to continuing to work closely with our creator community to help them maximize control over, and monetise, their content,” Gan said. “I will be leading an exceptionally talented team at OnlyFans that is delivering a unique experience for our creators and fans.”
Bloomberg first reported the leadership change.
This article was originally published by The Hollywood Reporter.
Lorde released a new music video for “Leader of a New Regime” on Tuesday morning (Dec. 21).
In the clip, the New Zealand native appears alone on a tropical island, her hair plaited in a complicated dual braid as two young women ride a pair of horses out of the sea. “Wearing SPF 3000 for the ultraviolet rays/ Made it to the island on the last of the outbound planes/ Got a trunk full of Simone and Céline, and of course, my magazines/ I’m gonna live out my days,” she declares in harmony with herself on the track as she wanders the isle’s rocky shores and wades in tide pools.
Coming in at just 1:33, “Leader of a New Regime” is a near-interlude from the pop singer’s 2021 album, Solar Power. The surprise visual, which arrived with little to no fanfare ahead of its unveiling, follows videos for singles “Solar Power” and “Mood Ring,” as well as album cut “Fallen Fruit.”
After a more than four-year wait in the wake of 2017’s Melodrama, Lorde’s long-awaited third studio effort bowed at No. 5 on the Billboard 200 upon its Aug. 20 release with 56,000 album equivalent units. Since then, she’s followed the album up with a Maori-language sister EP titled Te Ao Mārama as well as bonus tracks “Hold No Grudge” and “Helen of Troy.”
While the singer has postponed her planned Australia and New Zealand tour dates to 2023 amid concerns about COVID-19, she’s next set to headline the first-ever Primavera Sound LA in September alongside Arctic Monkeys and Nine Inch Nails.
Watch Lorde’s “Leader of a New Regime” video below.
LONDON – When Will Hutton was appointed Beggars Group’s inaugural head of sustainability in September of last year, his first task was tackling “low hanging fruit” at the indie powerhouse, which includes labels 4AD, Matador, Rough Trade, XL Recordings and Young labels.
That included calculating the businesses’ carbon footprint and identifying areas where action could be taken quickly, such as reducing business travel, installing solar panels at Beggars Group’s London offices and improving the sustainability of products.
“Now the conversation moves onto what we need to do as an industry,” says Hutton.
This month, the global music business took a significant step towards a greener, more sustainable future when all three major record companies — Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment and Warner Music Group – plus independent labels BMG, Beggars, Partisan, Warp, Ninja Tune and the Secretly Group — signed up to the Music Climate Pact, a new wide-ranging commitment to “decarbonize” the global record business.
Under the terms of the agreement, the companies will sign up to one of two existing schemes: the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) or the UN-backed Race to Zero program, both of which set signatories on a path towards reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 50% by 2030.
The pact, which is primarily aimed at record companies and was initiated by the U.K. Association of Independent Music (AIM), also requires businesses to work in partnership with streaming platforms to measure carbon emissions across the digital music industry. Signatories agree to communicate openly with fans about the environmental impact of the music industry. Supporters include IFPI, the Worldwide Independent Network (WIN) and U.K. labels trade body BPI.
Organizers hope that hundreds more labels and music companies will sign up in the coming months and help tackle the climate crisis.
“No single business can solve this global threat on their own and it has been inspirational to see so much of the global music sector come together to take action,” says AIM CEO Paul Pacifico.
Compared to other industries, the music business has been slow to react to the climate emergency but is now investing large amounts of resources into tackling environmental pollution. Regulatory changes in the U.K. requiring companies to annually report on their global energy use have introduced a more pressing need for reform.
Global touring is the industry’s biggest contributor of carbon emissions, leading many artists, festivals and live-event companies to modify touring practices.
In October, Coldplay announced that its upcoming Music of the Spheres world tour, scheduled to begin in Costa Rica on Mar. 18, would cut emissions by 50% compared to its previous world trek and will be partly powered by fans jumping on a kinetic dance floor. The group, which played to 5.4 million people on its 2016-17 world tour, according to Live Nation, has pledged to plant a tree for every ticket sold. (Lead singer Chris Martin acknowledged to the BBC in October that the band expects a “backlash” over some of their activities, like continuing to fly on private planes.)
Other high-profile touring artists taking steps to reduce their carbon footprint include Billie Eilish, The 1975, Massive Attack, U2, Pink, the Dave Matthews Band, Jack Johnson and Radiohead. Live Nation launched its Green Nation Touring Program in April, helping artists take up sustainable touring practices, including sourcing environmentally responsible merch, catering and vendor supplies.
Festivals have similarly implemented a wide range of green initiatives over the past decade, including eliminating plastic waste, banning plastic confetti, providing water refill stations, encouraging the use of carpools and public transportation for ticket holders and encouraging artists to request “green riders.”
Recognizing the importance of green issues to millennial and Gen Z music fans, record labels are adapting how they do business. This year saw Universal Music and Warner Music establish dedicated Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) departments, which focus on reducing greenhouse gas emissions and supply-chain footprints.
Sony Music’s parent company, Sony Corp., has committed to expanding renewable energy use and reducing carbon emissions across its supply chain as part of its Green Management 2025 targets. (Sony Corp. topped The Wall Street Journal’s 2020 list of the most sustainably managed companies in the world.)
“The scale of the global climate crisis demands that we work together to make real impact,” says Lou Dickler, Warner Music Group’s acting chief financial officer. Warner is due to publish its first annual ESG report next year and is developing a platform and roadmap that Dickler says will move the company “into a more environmentally sustainable future.”
BMG plans to become the first carbon-neutral major music company. The label says it offset the 3,000-plus tons of carbon dioxide it produced in 2019 — in large part through the reforestation of degraded land in Brazil — and is working with suppliers to further reduce emissions.
At the same time, Beggars Group says it is transitioning to becoming carbon negative (removing more carbon dioxide from the environment than it emits) and plans for U.K.-managed operations to hit that target by the end of next year, and global operations by the end of 2024.
“The music industry has a great opportunity to learn from other sectors that have been doing these things a lot longer,” says Hutton, who held sustainability jobs in the fashion, sports and finance industries prior to joining Beggars.
Empowering artists to speak about environmental issues, he says, is the biggest opportunity music companies have to help achieve systemic change.
Hutton worked closely with AIM, which already runs a sustainability group, to produce the Music Climate Pact, which he hopes will help address long-standing structural issues around the distribution and manufacturing of physical products, particularly the pressing of vinyl records, which are largely sent by sea, but also by air.
“As supporting industries, it’s essential that we get our own houses in order,” Hutton says, “and the Pact sets us all up on a path towards doing this.”
Jonny Greenwood and Hans Zimmer each have two scores on the Oscar shortlist for best original score. Greenwood is listed with The Power of the Dog and Spencer; Zimmer with Dune and No Time to Die.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences released shortlists in 10 categories on Tuesday (Dec. 21). Members of the music branch voted to whittle the initial eligibility list of 136 scores down to the 15 that are shortlisted. They will also determine the final nominees, which will be announced on Feb. 8. All voters will determine the final winner, which will be announced at the 94th annual Academy Awards on March 27.
Greenwood, the lead guitarist and keyboardist in Radiohead, received his first Oscar nod for best original score for Phantom Thread four years ago. ,
Zimmer, who has received Oscar nominations in each of the last four decades, could extend that streak to five decades if either or both of his films are nominated. No Time to Die is vying to become the third Bond score to be nominated, following The Spy Who Loved Me (Marvin Hamlisch, 1977) and Skyfall (Thomas Newman, 2012).
If Greenwood and/or Zimmer have two of the five nominees, they will become the first individual first individual film scorer with two nods in the same year since Alexandre Desplat doubled up seven years ago with The Grand Budapest Hotel and The Imitation Game. A scoring collaboration, Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, had two of the five nominees at the 93rd annual Academy Awards in April – Soul (the winner, on which they teamed with Jon Batiste) and Mank.
Desplat is shortlisted for The French Dispatch, which the Academy is referring to by its full title, The French Dispatch of the Liberty, Kansas Evening Sun. Desplat has amassed 11 best original score nods since 2011, the second-most by any composer in this century. (John Williams leads with 14 nods since 2000.) Desplat won for The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014) and The Shape of Water (2017).
Alberto Iglesias could be headed for his fourth nomination in this category with Parallel Mothers. The Spanish composer was nominated for The Constant Gardener (2005), The Kite Runner (2007) and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011).
Nicholas Britell could be headed for his third nod in the past six years for Don’t Look Up. He was nominated for Moonlight (2016) and If Beale Street Could Talk (2018). Carter Burwell could be headed for his third nod in the past seven years with The Tragedy of Macbeth. He was nominated for Carol (2015) and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017).
Kris Bowers is shortlisted for scoring King Richard. Bowers was nominated last year for documentary (short subject) for A Concerto Is a Conversation. This would be his first scoring nomination.
All but one of the scores that were nominated for best original score at the Golden Globes and/or Critics Choice Awards were shortlisted here. The sole exception was Nightmare Alley (Nathan Johnson), a Critics Choice nominee that failed to make the cut here.
Dune and The Power of the Dog were both nominated for best original score at both of those other shows. The three other nominees for best original score at the Golden Globes were The French Dispatch, Encanto (Germaine Franco) and Parallel Mothers. The three other nominees at the Critics Choice Awards were Don’t Look Up, Spencer and Nightmare Alley.
Highly-touted scores that failed to be shortlisted include Annette, Ron Mael, Russell Mael (Amazon Studios); Cyrano, Aaron Dessner, Bryce Dessner (United Artists Releasing/MGM); Last Night in Soho, Steven Price (Focus Features); Nightmare Alley, Nathan Johnson (Searchlight Pictures) Stillwater, Mychael Danna, Nathan Johnson (Focus Features).
Here’s a list of the 15 shortlisted scores, listed alphabetically by film title:
Being the Ricardos (Amazon Studios)
Daniel Pemberton
Candyman (Universal Pictures)
Robert A.A. Lowe
Don’t Look Up (Netflix)
Nicholas Britell
Dune (Warner Bros.)
Hans Zimmer
Encanto (Walt Disney Pictures)
Germaine Franco
The French Dispatch of the Liberty, Kansas Evening Sun (Searchlight Pictures)
Alexandre Desplat
The Green Knight (A24)
Daniel Hart
The Harder They Fall (Netflix)
Jeymes Samuel
King Richard (Warner Bros.)
Kris Bowers
The Last Duel (Walt Disney Studios)
Harry Gregson-Williams
No Time to Die (United Artists Releasing/MGM)
Hans Zimmer
Parallel Mothers (Sony Pictures Classic)
Alberto Iglesias
The Power of the Dog (Netflix)
Jonny Greenwood
Spencer (Neon)
Jonny Greenwood
The Tragedy of Macbeth (A24/Apple Original Films)
Carter Burwell
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