News

Mario Van Peebles has been tapped to direct “That’ll Be the Day,” the story of how Buddy Holly and other musicians of the late 1950s helped give birth to rock ‘n’ roll and influence the wider societal and cultural landscape, including the civil rights movement.

Music has been central to much of Van Peebles’ work, from his 1991 gangster movie “New Jack City” to his work on “Wu-Tang: An American Saga,” which he co-executive produced for Hulu. Van Peebles is currently writing a musical stage tribute to his father Melvin Van Peebles, to be performed at New York City’s Lincoln Center later this year.

“America’s tumultuous cultural melting pot has produced transcendent musical talent, including Buddy Holly, who was our first bad ass rock ’n’ roll nerd,” Van Peebles said in a statement.

His 2003 docudrama “Baadasssss!” pays homage to his father’s groundbreaking film “Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song.” His latest film,...

Though it took far too many years to get a solo film for the titular character, Marvel's "Black Widow" finally arrived in 2021. Despite the fact that Natasha Romanov (Scarlett Johansson) had already died in the Marvel Cinematic Universe by that point, at least we got a proper send-off for the character and the introduction of Florence Pugh as Yelena Belova, the clear Mvp of the film.

We also got a really fun performance from David Harbour as Alexei Shostakov, aka Red Guardian, who, along with Melina Vostokoff (Rachel Weisz), acted as sleeper Russian agents living in Ohio with the young Yelena (Violet McGraw) and Natasha (Ever Anderson). At the beginning of the film, these four are living as a family undercover, but when they're made, they have to take off in a rush for a flight to Cuba, in fear for their lives. Harbour made a suggestion for that sequence...

With new head coach Deion Sanders at the helm, the Colorado Buffaloes head to Fort Worth to play against the No. 17 Tcu Horned Frogs. It’s Fox’s Week 1 opener on “Big Noon Kickoff,” and it comes to you live on Saturday, Sept. 2 at 12 noon Et. The game is happening at Amon G. Carter Stadium and is airing exclusively on Fox, which you can stream with a Live TV Streaming Service. Here’s everything you need to know about the game:

Tcu Horned Frogs vs. Colorado Buffaloes When: Saturday, Sept. 2, 2023 at 12 noon Et Location: Amon G Carter Stadium | Fort Worth, Texas 76109 TV Channel: Fox Where to Stream: Watch with a five-day free trial of Directv Stream. Watch Colorado vs. Tcu Free 5-Day Trial directv.com/sling Watch live college football games on Sling and save $30 on your first three months

While the Tcu vs. Colorado game will be streaming on...

The long-running VH1 series Behind the Music is making a return to the airwaves (or at least the Internet) with a new reboot airing exclusively on Paramount+.

Per the streaming service, the new 2021 Behind the Music will feature episodes with both new and legacy artists, who sit down for intimate conversations and interviews to reveal, “The moments they’ll never forget, the stories they’ve never told [and] the secrets they’ve never revealed.”

The first season of the Behind the Music reboot features Duran Duran, New Kids on the Block,...

The Golden Globe nominations nominations are announced today so there's no time to gaze fondly back. And yet we're so Ocd about doing this. Here are 5 things that happened on this day, February 3rd, in showbiz history...

1945 Walt Disney's The Three Caballeros opens in theaters 

1959 A plane crash kills three popular musicians Buddy Holly, Richie Valens, and "the Big Bopper" J.P. Richardson. This tragedy became known as "the day the music died" due to the classic song "American Pie" by Don McLean...

As is annual tradition, Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden has announced this year’s 25 film set to join the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress. Selected for their “cultural, historic and/or aesthetic importance,” the films picked range from such beloved actioners as “Die Hard,” childhood classic “The Goonies,” the seminal “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner,” and the mind-bending “Memento,” with plenty of other genres and styles represented among the list.

The additions span 1905 to 2000, and includes Hollywood blockbusters, documentaries, silent movies, animation, shorts, independent, and even home movies. The 2017 selections bring the number of films in the registry to 725.

“The selection of a film to the National Film Registry recognizes its importance to American cinema and the nation’s cultural and historical heritage,” Hayden said in an official statement. “Our love affair with motion pictures is a testament to their enduring power to enlighten, inspire and...

Since 1989, the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress has been accomplishing the important task of preserving films that “represent important cultural, artistic and historic achievements in filmmaking.” From films way back in 1897 all the way up to 2004, they’ve now reached 725 films that celebrate our heritage and encapsulate our film history.

Today they’ve unveiled their 2017 list, which includes such Hollywood classics as Die Hard, Titanic, and Superman along with groundbreaking independent features like Yvonne Rainer’s Lives of Performers, Charles Burnett’s To Sleep with Anger, and Barbara Loden’s Wanda. Also making this list are a pair of Kirk Douglas-led features, Ace in the Hole and Spartacus, as well as Christopher Nolan’s Memento and more. Check out the full list below and you can watch some films on the registry for free here.

Ace in the Hole (aka Big Carnival) (1951)

Based on the infamous...

Go, Johnny, Go! (1959) screens Wednesday, May 3rd at 8pm at Schlafly Bottleworks Restaurant and Bar (7260 Southwest Ave.- at Manchester – Maplewood, Mo 63143) as part of Webster University’s Award-Winning Strange Brew Film Series. Admission is $5

In Rock Rock Rock! (1959), Rock-n-roll promoter Alan Freed holds a talent search to develop a new rock star, then must find the elusive, mystery contestant (Jimmy Clanton) who doesn’t know he has won.

St. Louis legend Chuck Berry, who passed away last month at age 90, co-stars as himself. Having previously appeared in Rock Rock Rock! and Mister Rock And Roll, Go, Johnny, Go! was the third-and final-appearance of Berry in a movie that also starred DJ Alan Freed. He and Freed actually act together in this one as they try to get singer Johnny Melody (Clanton) on his way to stardom. It will be quite a pleasure for his fans seeing Berry performing his hits “Memphis,...

Blu-ray Release Date: Sept. 9, 2014

Price: Blu-ray $29.95

Studio: Twilight Time

Lou Diamond Phillips is Ritchie Valens in La Bamba

The 1987 music-filled biographical drama La Bamba tells the brief, ultimately tragic, but uplifting story of pioneering rock star Ritchie Valens, born Ricardo Valenzuela in Southern California’s San Fernando Valley.

Portrayed in the movie by Lou Diamond Phillips, Valens would have three hit songs before dying at the shockingly young age of 17 in the infamous plane crash that also killed Buddy Holly and J.P. (The Big Bopper) Richardson. Valens’ short life—particularly with family and friends in a vibrant Mexican-American community—and obsessive love of music are the focus in La Bamba, directed with warmth by Luis Valdez (Zoot Suit). Valens’ music is performed with crackling energy by the sensational Los Lobos.

Twilight Time’s edition of the film, its Blu-ray debut, contains the following features:

Special Features:

-Isolated Score...

February 3, 1959 has become one of the most mythic days in rock 'n' roll history. It's the day the 1947 Beechcraft Bonanza 35 carrying Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and J.P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson crashed in an Iowa cornfield. To many, it's simply the day the music died. Buddy Holly was touring with Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper, on a jaunt that was scheduled to hit 25 Midwestern cities in three weeks. Angered by rough bus tours that left band members sick with the flu and one hospitalized with frostbite, Holly decided to charter a plane from Iowa to Minnesota. The official...

Thanks to the miracle of in-flight wi-fi, comedians Patton Oswalt and Marc Maron have been simultaneously entertaining the Internet today via Twitter after finding themselves on the same flight. After both comics tweeted a photo of one another waiting in an airport, Maron and Oswalt's Twitter feeds quickly became a ball-busting competition/narrative of the flight that was too funny to ignore.

Maron was ready with plenty of jabs at Patton for being in business class, not to mention his penchant for "layered metaphors of futility," and Oswalt imagined if Maron put his no-bullsh*t interview style to use on the flight ("Holy shit. @marcmaron just interviewed his complimentary airline pretzels and made them admit to being sellouts. Now they're crying").

Along with roasting one another, Maron and Oswalt may have also set up an excellent interview for Maron's "Wtf" podcast. After Henry Winkler responded to their tweets about an ice cream social,...

By Lee Pfeiffer

1950s Radio in Color: The Lost Photographs of Deejay Tommy Edwards(Kent State University Press)  is an extraordinary book on several levels. First there is the physical look of the book: it's an over-sized coffee table hardback that does full justice to the photos so beautifully reproduced therein. This brings us to the second point: the book is a priceless historical record of incredible candid photos taken by a man named Tommy Edwards. Who was he? Largely unknown today, Edwards was one of the top early deejays in the Cleveland Ohio market, where he helped make station Were-am a major force in popularizing the new music format known as rock 'n roll. Edwards had the foresight to photograph virtually every up-and-coming music star he was introduced to - and there were few who escaped his sphere of influence. Fate was unkind to Edwards and, due to a...

HollywoodNews.com: Buddy Holly might have been celebrating his 75th birthday Sept. 7, had the iconic rock ‘n’ roll pioneer not lost his life at age 22 in the infamous “day the music died” Iowa plane crash along with Richie Valens and J.P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson. This year, Holly’s birthday will be celebrated in a huge way, with events including the unveiling of his star on the Hollywood Blvd. Walk of Fame, and the release of “Listen To Me: Buddy Holly” an all-star tribute album that will also serve as the basis of the “Ultimate Buddy Party,” a VIP concert event that will be filmed as a PBS special.

Legendary record producer Peter Asher is the man behind “Listen To Me,” and he’ll be on hand to speak at the star unveiling as well as the concert. He tells us the first performer lined up for the album was Stevie Nicks.

At the Minneapolis, Minn., stop on their record-shattering "360 Tour," U2 dedicated “Stuck In A Moment You Can’t Get Out Of” to the late Amy Winehouse, who passed away Saturday at the age of 27. "We wrote this next song for Michael Hutchence, but you will understand tonight if we play it for Amy Winehouse,” Bono said before playing the song.

“Stuck In A Moment” was written for Hutchence, the lead singer of Inxs who committed suicide in 1997. The singer was a close friend of the members of U2.

The gesture is the latest of many that have flooded in since Winehouse’s passing. On Saturday night, just hours after the news broke, M.I.A. released the demo “27” on her Soundcloud in the “Back to Black” singer’s honor. “I recorded this song B4 vickileekx and never put it out,” M.I.A. said on Twitter. “It's a unfinished demo.

Jackson Rathbone ("Jasper Hale") is certainly one of the Twilight Saga's most talented, as he can act, sing, and play several musical instruments. In addition to his film and television work (his new web series Aim High begins in less than a month, by the way), he's been a loyal member of the 100 Monkeys all these years.In a recent interview with the Chicago A.V. Club, promoting the band's show tonight at the House of Blues, he talked about his start in the various arts.My very first performance, I was in kindergarten. I was living in Norway at the time, in a place called Stavanger, going to Iss international school. My family lived there for like four years when I was a kid.Anyway, I lip-synced and danced to The Big Bopper’s “Chantilly Lace” all by myself, and I brought the roof down. I don’t …...

"Sopranos" star Drea De Matteo has given birth to a baby boy.

The actress, who also appeared in "Friends" spin-off "Joey alongside Matt Le Blanc, and her musician fiance Shooter Jennings welcomed their second child into the world this week.

Hierophant rocker Shooter announced the happy new on his twitter account on Thursday, April 7, and revealed he and Drea had decided to name the tot after his late father, country music star Waylon Jennings.

He tweeted, "Waylon Albert 'Blackjack' Jennings has arrived folks!"

Lots of the couple's friends took to the micro-blogging site to congratulate them, with one well-wisher being Samantha Ronson.

And the DJ - the ex-girlfriend of Lindsay Lohan, is already making plans for the baby when he gets older.

She wrote, "Congratulations to @ShooterJennings on the arrival of his new baby boy!! Can't wait to take him to a casino! (sic)"

Drea, 39, and Shooter, 31, already have a...

Golden Globe-winning moviemaker Charles Jarrott has died in Los Angeles, aged 83. The British director was best known for his period dramas "Mary", "Queen of Scots" and "Anne of a Thousand Days", for which he won a Globe.

Reports suggest Jarrott died on Friday, March 4 after a lengthy battle with prostate cancer. He also directed acclaimed films like "The Doves" and "The Other Side of Midnigh"t. His final movie was 2002's "Turn of Faith".

Another sad news, singer Johnny Preston has died a year after undergoing heart bypass surgery. He was 71.

Born in Texas, he was discovered by rock 'n' roll icon The Big Bopper and found chart success in the 1950s. He topped the U.S. pop charts in 1959 with "Running Bear", which was written by his mentor.

The song is one of the few songs to hit the top of the charts in every English-speaking nation. His other...

It is the anniversary of the day Don McLean dubbed ‘The Day the Music Died’, in his world famous song American Pie. The sudden loss of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and J.P ‘The Big Bopper’ Richardson in 1959 was catastrophic, and each became immortalised in film keeping their music alive and forever young.

Steve Rash’s The Buddy Holly Story, 1978, with Gary Busey received wide acclaim and condemnation alike and the 1987 La Bamba starring Lou Diamond Phillips, was a timely reminder to all of us eighties kids of the wonder of the music that was created by those legends and which affected rock and roll from the 1950’s onwards; from Little Richard, Bob Dylan to The Beatles and beyond.

I believe that films about musicians have a thrall to them unlike that of ordinary stories. Many films and television series have been successful because of their musical scores (I am...

We can't guarantee the presidential seal of approval, but as far as July 4th playlists go, these songs promise to bring out the red, white and blue in you. Spin these tracks at your Independence Day celebration and party like a patriot. • Miley Cyrus's "Party in the U.S.A" The perfect anthem for your party in celebration of the U.S.A., this song will have you noddin' your head like yeah and movin' your hips like yeah - just try to keep it tame. • Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers's "American Girl" Tom Petty's tribute to the...

I can't remember if I cried When I read about his widowed bride But something touched me deep inside The day the music died. --Don McLean, American Pie (1971) The snow was heavy that night. The only alternative to riding all night long in a dirty, unheated bus to his next concert date was a tiny airplane. Shortly after takeoff, however, the plane carrying Buddy Holly, along with Ritchie Valens and J.P. Richardson, disappeared into a snowy cloud. Holly's torn, mangled body was found a few hours later in a frozen Iowa cornfield a little past midnight on February 3, 1959. I was a 12-year-old kid at the time. For Buddy Holly fans like me, it seemed that all was lost -- a feeling immortalized in Don McLean's classic song. As an artist, Buddy Holly was only with us for 30 months -- between 1957 and...

History Theatre partners with McNally Smith College of Music to produce Buddy - The Buddy Holly Story a show that is part biography, part rock 'n' roll concert which follows the bespectacled musician on this meteoric rise from a rebellious country singer to a rock 'n' roll icon and pioneer in the 1950s, ending with the unforgettable concert with Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper in Clear Lake, Iowa - the day the music died.

History Theatre partners with McNally Smith College of Music to produce Buddy - The Buddy Holly Story a show that is part biography, part rock 'n' roll concert which follows the bespectacled musician on this meteoric rise from a rebellious country singer to a rock 'n' roll icon and pioneer in the 1950s, ending with the unforgettable concert with Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper in Clear Lake, Iowa - the day the music died.

History Theatre partners with McNally Smith College of Music to produce Buddy - The Buddy Holly Story a show that is part biography, part rock 'n' roll concert which follows the bespectacled musician on this meteoric rise from a rebellious country singer to a rock 'n' roll icon and pioneer in the 1950s, ending with the unforgettable concert with Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper in Clear Lake, Iowa - the day the music died.