Negromancer News Bits and Bites from January 19th to 25th, 2020 - Update #24

by Leroy Douresseaux a.k.a. "I Reads You"

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MUSIC - From RollingStone:  54 years after moving to the U.S., Canadian-born rock legend and musician, Neil Young, is official a U.S. citizen.

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SUNDANCE - From Variety:  Director Justin Simien ("Dear White People") says that his film "Bad Hair," which opened at the Sundance 2020 is a tribute to exploited black women everywhere.

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STAR TREK - From THR:  President Trump has initiated a new branch of the military, the "Space Force."  The new logo for the "Space Force" looks strikingly similar to the insignia for Star Trek's "Starfleet Command."

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DISNEY - From THR:  The latest Walt Disney animated classic feature film to get a live-action remake is one of its all-time greatest and certainly its most stories, "Bambi" (1942).

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MOVIES - From THR:  Columbia Pictures wants to reboot its 1997 "Anaconda" film, which starred Jennifer Lopez, and Ice Cube, and Jon Voight, among others.

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GRAMMYS - From Variety:  The "Recording Academy," which hands out the music industry's "Grammy Awards" are denying that the nomination process is rigged... which everyone has suspected... like forever.

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MOVIES - From GamesRadar:  Bill Murray says that he is reprising his "Ghostbusters" role as "Peter Venkman" for the summer release, "Ghostbusters: Afterlife."

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STREAMING - From Newsarama:  On the Wed., Jan. 22nd episode of ABC's talk show, "The View," guest Patrick Stewart surprised co-host Whoopi Goldberg by asking her to reprise her "Star Trek: The Next Generation" role as "Guinan" on Season 2 of "Star Trek: Picard."  Stewart, of course, stars in the title role of "Picard," which just launched on the streaming service, CBS All Access

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STREAMING - From THR:  Leslie Jones talks about how she got "Game of Thrones" writers-producers, David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, to direct her Netflix special, "Time Machine."

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DISNEY - From YahooMovieUK:  Actor Warwick Davis says that there is "a lot of work going on" n the planned Disney+ spin-off of the 1988 film, "Willow."  Made by Lucasfilm and directed by Ron Howard, the film starred Davis as an aspiring sorcerer trying to protect the child of an ancient prophecy.

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STREAMING - From Deadline:  Netflix explains its rating methods, talks viewership stats for two shows, and announces how a big a debut "The Witcher" made.

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MOVIES - From THR:  Universal Pictures and director Davie Leitch ("Deadpool 2") are developing a film based on the old ABC TV series, "Kung Fu," which starred the late David Carradine and ran from 1972 to 1975 (and I loved it!).

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SCANDAL -From Deadline:  In March of 2018, Universal marketing chief, Josh Goldstine, was fired for unspecified inappropriate behavior.  Today, Goldstine's name is cleared and he will be nearly 20 million dollars richer.

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BOX OFFICE - From BoxOfficeMojo:  The winner of the 1/17 to 1/19/2020 weekend box office is "Bad Boys for Life" with an estimated take of 59.17 million dollars.  The film will also win the "Martin Luther King Jr. Day" four-day holiday weekend with a take that is currently estimated at 68 million dollars.

From Variety:  "Bad Boys for Life" debuts with an estimated worldwide box office near 100 million dollars.

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AWARDS - From Variety:  Here is a complete list of winners at last night's (Sun., Jan. 19th) 2020 Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Awards.

From Variety:  “Parasite” wins "best motion picture cast" at the 26th Screen Actors Guild Awards.  It is the first foreign language film to win the SAG Awards' top prize.

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MOVIES - From Variety:  Writer Chris Bremner who worked on "Bad Boys for Life," the third film in the "Bad Boys" film franchise, will pen a script for a fourth installment.  Bremner is also working on a script for "National Treasure 3."

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AWARDS - From Deadline:  The winners of the 2020 Producers Guild Awards were announced last night (Sat., Jan. 18th).  The top prize went to director Sam Mendes' "1917."

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MOVIES - From Deadline:  Creator Julian Fellowes says that he will begin work on a sequel to the hit 2019 "Downtown Abbey" film after working on his HBO drama, "The Gilded Age."

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STAR TREK - From YahooEntertainment:  Producer Alex Kurtzman explains how "Star Trek: Picard" (from streaming CBS Access) connects unites the "Star Trek" timelines.

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TELEVISION - From Deadline:   NBA legend and Hall of Fame basketball player, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, and cable network, History, have teamed for "Black Patriots."  This one-hour documentary chronicles the role of African-Americans and Black people during the Revolutionary War.

OBITS:

From Deadline:  Broadcast journalist, Jim Lehrer, has died at the age of 85, Thursday, January 23, 2020.  Lehrer is best known for joining Robert MacNeil to create "The Robert MacNeil Report" for WNET, before moving to PBS shortly afterwards.  The show became known as the "The MacNeil/Lehrer Report" a year later.  MacNeil retired in 1995, and Lehrer continued to host or co-host the show, which is currently known as "PBS NewsHour."

From Deadline:  One of the co-founding members of the UK comedy troupe, "Monty Python," Terry Jones, has died at the age of 77, Tuesday, January 21, 2020.  Jones directed or co-directed three of the "Monty Python" films and worked on several films outside of Python.  He wrote several goblin and fairy-related books that artist Brian Froud illustrated.  Jones was born in Wales.

From Deadline:  The character actor, Jack Kehoe, died at the age of 85, Tuesday, Jan 14, 2020.  His film and TV career lasted about 30 years, and Kehoe was known for his appearances in such films as "Serpico," "The Sting," "Car Wash," and "The Untouchables" (1987).  Kehoe apparently began studying acting in the 1950s and he began appearing on stage sometime afterwards.