UPDATE (Jan. 9): The Society of Composers & Lyricists (SCL) announced Monday that composer Justin Hurwitz and director Damien Chazelle will receive the 2023 Spirit of Collaboration Award at the fourth Annual SCL Awards on Feb. 15 at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles. The award, considered the SCL’s most distinctive and perhaps most meaningful, is presented to a composer and filmmaker who maintain a distinguished creative partnership. Hurwitz has scored each of Chazelle’s five films as a director — Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench (2009), Whiplash (2014), La La Land (2016), First Man (2018), and Babylon (2022). Previous recipients of the award are Thomas Newman and Sam Mendes, Carter Burwell and the Coen Brothers, and Terence Blanchard and Spike Lee.

In addition, the SCL will present two 2023 Jury Awards in recognition of the increasing number of ways music is used in an audiovisual context. The Jury Awards, voted on by the SCL board of directors, will be presented to the opera Omar, co-composed by Michael Abels and Rhiannon Giddens, and the audiovisual concert experience Women Warriors: The Voices of Change, for which Amy Andersson is musical director.

PREVIOUSLY (Dec. 22, 2022): Less than 24 hours after Alexandre Desplat was shortlisted for Academy Awards for best original song and best original score for his work on Guillermo Del Toro’s Pinocchio, the French composer emerges as the top nominee for the 2023 SCL Awards for his work on that same film.

Desplat is nominated for outstanding score for a studio film and outstanding song for a musical/comedy for “Ciao Papa,” which he co-wrote with Del Toro and Roeban Katz.

The awards by the Society of Composers & Lyricists, now in their fourth year, will be presented on Feb. 15, 2023, at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles. Actor-musician Darren Criss is set to host.

Many of the SCL nominees were shortlisted for Oscars on Dec. 21, but some who were left off received nods here, including Michael Giacchino (nominated for scoring The Batman), and Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross (nominated for co-writing the song “(You Made It Feel Like) Home” from Bones and All).

The Society of Composers & Lyricists is a leading organization for professional film, television, video game, and musical theater composers and lyricists. The 77-year-old organization is focused on education and addressing the creative, technological and legal issues affecting the music for visual media community.

Next month, the composer and director recipients of the SCL Spirit of Collaboration Award will be announced. The SCL Awards ceremony will feature a presentation of that award and a performance.

Here are the nominees for the 2023 SCL Awards:

Outstanding score for a studio film

Outstanding score for an independent film

Outstanding song for a musical/comedy:

Outstanding song for a drama/documentary:

Outstanding score for television

Outstanding score for interactive media

David Raksin award for emerging talent

Paul Mescal is replacing Blake Jenner in the decade-spanning production of the movie musical of Stephen Sondheim’s Merrily We Roll Along, The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed.

Richard Linklater will be directing the project, which is being backed by Blumhouse, and will shoot over a 20-year span. (The director shot his Oscar-winning Boyhood over 12 years.)

The much-beloved musical, based on the 1934 play of the same name by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart, follows Franklin Shepard, a talented composer of Broadway musicals who abandons his friends and career to become a producer of Hollywood movies. The story begins at the height of his Hollywood fame and moves backwards in time, showing important moments in Frank’s life.

Mescal will play the lead role of Broadway composer Franklin Shepard, which was previously meant to be played by Jenner. After being cast, Jenner was embroiled in allegations of domestic abuse.

In November 2019, actress Melissa Benoist posted a 14-minute Instagram video during which she spoke of being a survivor of domestic violence. At the time, Benoist did not name her abuser. In October 2020 Jenner, who was previously married to Benoist, took to social media where he apologized for an abusive relationship, writing that he took “full responsibility and accountability for the hurt that I inflicted during my relationship with my past partner — emotionally, mentally, and yes, physically.” (Jenner, who also lodged claims of abuse against his former partner, also did not name the partner he was referring to in his post.)

Mescal will join a previously announced cast that includes Beanie Feldstein and Ben Platt. The project, announced four years ago, completed its first segment of filming in August 2019. Ginger Sledge will produce with Jason Blum for Blumhouse, along with Jonathan Marc Sherman and Linklater.

Mescal, who broke out in Hulu series Normal People, was recently cast in Ridley Scott’s Gladiator sequel. He has earned acclaim this past year for his work in Cannes standout Aftersun.

Above the Line first reported this news.

This article was originally published by The Hollywood Reporter.

Lizzo took a moment on a Sunday morning to share her concerns about cancel culture.

“This may be a random time to say this but it’s on my heart.. cancel culture is appropriation,” Lizzo tweeted on Sunday (Jan. 8).

“There was real outrage from truly marginalized people and now it’s become trendy, misused and misdirected,” she wrote.

Lizzo continued: “I hope we can phase out of this & focus our outrage on the real problems.”

Just days before, the “About Damn Time” singer had taken to social media to shut down the “tired” “discourse around bodies.”

 “I’ve seen comments go from, ‘Oh my gosh, I liked you when you were thick. Why did you lose weight?’ ‘Oh my gosh, why did you get a BBL? I liked your body before.’ ‘Oh my gosh, you’re so big. You need to lose weight but for your health’ to ‘Oh my gosh, you’re so little. You need to get a– or titties or something.’ ‘Oh my gosh, why did she get all that work done? It’s too much work,’” she said in a TikTok video on Friday.

She continued, “Are we OK? Do you see the delusion? Do you realize that artists are not here to fit into your beauty standards? Artists are here to make art. And this body is art. I’mma do whatever I want with this body. I wish that comments costed y’all money so we could see how much time we are f—ing wasting on the wrong thing. Can we leave that s— back there please?”

See Lizzo’s latest message to her fans below.