The Gotham Group, one of Hollywood’s leading management and film and television production firms, has formed a strategic partnership with 1stAveMachine, the Cannes Lion and Clio Award-winning mixed media production company. The deal formalizes a close relationship between the two companies that dates back over a decade and will allow 1stAve to segue its roster of commercial directors into other platforms including film and television. Ross Siegel, who heads up the recently formed 1stAveMachine Management, will oversee this new relationship for 1stAve; Peter McHugh for The Gotham Group. The companies, with offices in New York, London, Hong Kong and Los Angeles, draw considerable benefit from the relationship. 1stAve will now have the ability to extend its reach into the entertainment industry through Gotham’s enormous client base and wealth of high-quality intellectual property. The Gotham Group will deploy 1stAve’s roster of directors and other creatives in the film and television sectors.
PHOTOPLAY has signed comedy performance director Frazer Bailey for representation in Australia and New Zealand. Winning Gold for Direction at the BADC Awards for the hilarious Air Asia escapism campaign “Come Back Refreshed” via Publicis and Silver for Millionaire’s Run “Prince of Nigeria” through Brainheart, Bailey has also delivered laughs for Samsung with “Shade Dwellers” along with attracting over 4 million YouTube views for Flight Centre with his “What If” campaign. Bailey has collaborated with Aussie agencies including Clemenger BBDO, Leo Burnett, Y&R, Publicis, Ogilvy and Grey Melbourne….
Review: Writer-Director Coralie Fargeat’s “The Substance”
In its first two hours, "The Substance" is a well-made, entertaining movie. Writer-director Coralie Fargeat treats audiences to a heavy dose of biting social commentary on ageism and sexism in Hollywood, with a spoonful of sugar- and sparkle-doused body horror.
But the film's deliciously unhinged, blood-soaked and inevitably polarizing third act is what makes it unforgettable.
What begins as a dread-inducing but still relatively palatable sci-fi flick spirals deeper into absurdism and violence, eventually erupting — quite literally — into a full-blown monster movie. Let the viewer decide who the monster is.
Fargeat — who won best screenplay at this year's Cannes Film Festival — has been vocal about her reverence for "The Fly" director David Cronenberg, and fans of the godfather of body horror will see his unmistakable influence. But "The Substance" is also wholly unique and benefits from Fargeat's perspective, which, according to the French filmmaker, has involved extensive grappling with her own relationship to her body and society's scrutiny.
"The Substance" tells the story of Elisabeth Sparkle, a famed aerobics instructor with a televised show, played by a powerfully vulnerable Demi Moore. Sparkle is fired on her 50th birthday by a ruthless executive — a perfectly cast Dennis Quaid, who nails sleazy and gross.
Feeling rejected by a town that once loved her and despairing over her bygone star power, Sparkle learns from a handsome young nurse about a black-market drug that promises to create a "younger, more beautiful, more perfect" version of its user. Though she initially tosses the phone number in the trash, she soon fishes it out in a desperate panic and places an order.
The one rule to follow is that... Read More