Danny Boyle To Oversee 2012 Olympic Ceremony
Guy Hedgecoe
LONDON (AP) — Danny Boyle, the Oscar-winning director of “Slumdog Millionaire,” will oversee the opening ceremony of the 2012 London Olympics.
Boyle was introduced Thursday as the artistic director of the ceremony to be held on July 27, 2012. The announcement was made in the shadow of the new 80,000-seat Olympic stadium in east London that will host both the opening and closing of the games.
Boyle won the best-director Academy Award in 2009 for “Slumdog Millionaire,” a film that won a total of eight Oscars. His other films include “Trainspotting,” ”28 Days Later” and “Sunshine.”
“It’s a fantastic responsibility,” Boyle said. “When they offered us the job, they said, ‘Do you want to think about it?’ I said, ‘No, I want to do it.'”
Another director, Stephen Daldry, will be one of the executive producers of the opening and closing ceremonies. Daldry directed “Billy Elliott,” ”The Reader” and “The Hours.”
London will have a hard act in trying to top the extravagant opening ceremony of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, which was designed by Chinese movie director Zhang Yimou and drew a worldwide television audience of 1 billion people.
“It’s not going to be like Beijing in terms of this overwhelming scale,” Boyle said.
London organizing committee chairman Sebastian Coe said the ceremony would focus on “what we need in London, which is a games for our times.”
Mickey Mouse’s Mean Makeover Erased From Wii Game
Derrik J. Lang, Entertainment Writer
GLENDALE, Calif. (AP) — Mickey Mouse won’t be bad in the upcoming “Epic Mickey” video game. He was just drawn that way.
Warren Spector, creative director of Disney Interactive Studios’ Junction Point, said the beloved international icon won’t transform into a snarling rat as originally planned for the game when players make mischievous choices, such as pilfering treasures from a store or erasing characters with thinner. Instead, Mickey will take on a smudgy look if he’s naughty.
“We’re not going to change Mickey’s image so much,” said Spector.
During a recent demonstration of the latest iteration of the upcoming Wii game that will be on display at this week’s Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles, Spector said the decision to scrap the malevolent-looking Mickey was made following negative feedback during focus testing of the game, which features Mickey trekking through a cartoon wasteland.
“People don’t like it when you mess with Mickey,” said Spector. “We did a focus test that was really eye opening for me. There was a biker dude saying, ‘Oh, I’d never play a Mickey Mouse game,’ and then we showed him images of a changed Mickey. I was sitting there thinking, ‘You’re gonna love what we do,’ but he said, ‘No! Don’t mess with my childhood.'”
“Epic Mickey” is set in a virtual world of wayward renditions of Disney locales, such as Adventureland and Skull Rock. Throughout the game, players will be faced with moral dilemmas about whether to help other characters. For example, should Mickey persuade a lovelorn pirate to give a bouquet of flowers or an ice cream cone to a lactose intolerant Henrietta Cow?
“Mickey constantly gets himself into trouble, not just in this game but in his films as well,” said Spector.
After “Epic Mickey” appeared on the cover of Game Informer magazine last fall, several fans were outraged over Mickey’s makeover. Others were later miffed that images of the game did not resemble the concept art. Spector said the images and art were never intended to show the final version of the game and that it was part of the “normal creative process.”
“Sometimes you go too far to find out where too far is,” he said.
Spector insisted that Mickey will maintain his traditional retro ensemble — yellow shoes, red shorts — throughout the game but will be surrounded by levitating little guardians that will glow a different color whether players employ more paint or thinner. He also teased there are a “cloud of possibilities” that will lead to multiple endings of “Epic Mickey.”
Online: http://junctionpoint.com/ http://disney.go.com/disneyinteractivestudios/
Music publishers sue LimeWire after labels’ Win
LOS ANGELES (AP) — On the heels of a major court win by the recording companies against file-sharing software company LimeWire, eight major music publishers said they filed their own suit on Wednesday.
The publishers are seeking relief and damages from LimeWire for facilitating copyright infringement.
Publishers are paid royalties for songwriters, while recording companies work with the artists who perform the songs. Several of the publishers, including EMI Music Publishing and Warner/Chappell Music Inc., are owned by the parents of the recording companies that won.
National Music Publishers’ Association CEO David Israelite said songwriters and publishers were hurt as well as performers by LimeWire, which provides software that allows users to swap songs over the Internet for free.
“The pervasive online infringement facilitated by LimeWire and others like them has consequences for everyone in the music chain,” Israelite said in a statement.
Last month, a U.S. District judge in New York ruled that LimeWire and its chairman, Mark Gorton, were liable for inducing copyright infringement. The case began in 2006.
The recording companies have yet to reach a deal that could settle the case before penalties are determined. But for each song that was downloaded with a willful intent to infringe on copyrights, the court could award $150,000.
Last week, the recording companies sought a preliminary injunction to freeze Gorton’s assets, alleging that he had attempted to shield LimeWire assets and its proceeds from the courts.
A LimeWire spokeswoman said in a statement that the company was attempting to relaunch itself as a legitimate music service with a business model “that will compensate the entire industry.”
“Publishers are absolutely a part of that solution, and we’re hopeful that this action will serve as a catalyst to help us get to there,” she said.
‘Eat Pray Love’ Offers Lush Scenery and Tasty Cast
Sandy Cohen, Entertainment Writer
MALIBU, Calif. (AP) — The big-screen adaptation of the beloved best-seller “Eat Pray Love” treats viewers to a visual feast that includes the cafes and countrysides of Italy, the color and chaos of India and the lush warmth of Indonesia.
Sony showed 21 minutes of footage from the anticipated film Friday at a private ocean-view estate and introduced reporters to a range of licensed products timed to its Aug. 13 release.
Producer Dede Gardner introduced the clips, which began with frustrated recent divorcee Liz Gilbert (Julia Roberts) complaining to her colleague (Viola Davis).
“I have no pulse,” she says. “I want to go someplace where I can marvel at something.”
Next, we see her in Rome, where she navigates a noisy cafe to befriend a fellow ex-pat and learns to abandon her daily calorie count on her “no carb left behind experience.”
From there, she’s off to India, where we see her drinking in the crowded street scene — bikes, cars, donkeys — with wide, thirsty eyes. She goes to an ashram in hopes of finding peace, but all she can think about is how she’ll decorate her meditation room back at home. Then she meets Richard from Texas (a bearded Richard Jenkins) and shares a powerful moment with a painted elephant escaped from a nearby carnival.
Finally, she arrives in Bali, where she’s happily bicycling along until a distracted driver accidentally runs her off the road. The handsome stranger (Javier Bardem) offers to take her to a doctor and becomes her de-facto tour guide, charming her with his knowledge of local customs and delicacies. (He shows her a fruit she has never seen, purring that it tastes “like an orange made love to a plum.”)
Beautifully photographed, the scenery invites fans of the book deep into the exotic locales Gilbert visited.
Gardner said the film’s cast and crew followed the author’s path in order during the four-and-a-half month shoot and experienced a bit of their own personal growth along the way.
“I think this story is a hard one to duck. In some way, it’s going to stick with you,” she said. “Even if it’s just as simple as reminding you to get outside your comfort zone … It permeated a lot of people.”
“Eat Pray Love” was co-written and directed by Ryan Murphy, creator of TV’s “Glee.”
Gardner said a new trailer for the film will play ahead of “The Twilight Saga: Eclipse,” which opens June 30.
Online: http://www.letyourselfgo.com/
Pixar Wizards Lend a Hand to ‘Toy Story 3’ Game
Lou Kesten
“Movie-based games seem like they’re destined to fail,” says Jason Katz, story supervisor for Pixar’s latest animated film, “Toy Story 3.” ”It’s like putting a giraffe in human clothes.”
But Pixar’s collaboration with Avalanche Software on the “Toy Story 3” video game, released this week by Disney Interactive, demonstrates a fresh approach to the typically dreadful movie tie-in. Like most offerings in the genre, the game includes an interactive retelling of the film’s plot. But Avalanche has also taken Buzz, Woody and the rest of the cast and put them in an open-world playground, called the Toy Box, that feels even truer to the spirit of the franchise.
The Toy Box, in which supporting characters like Hamm the Piggy Bank, Rex the Dinosaur and Slinky Dog help build a thriving Wild West town, “embraces how a kid plays,” Katz says.
“Avalanche didn’t try to remake the movie,” he says. “Instead, they riffed off the movie.”
The game studio was on board early in the production of “Toy Story 3.” ”They saw the first pitch in 2007, when we were still fleshing it out,” Katz says. “They could always plug in and see where we were at, and while we were actively improving the story we could give them hot-off-the-presses adjustments. It was very fluid.”
Even with all the give-and-take, Katz was confident from the start that Avalanche’s designers had the right idea. “We saw the enthusiasm they brought to the project,” he says. “They were making a game like we make movies.”
Maryland ‘Blair Witch’ Town To Auction Sign
BURKITTSVILLE, Md. (AP) — The town of Burkittsville will test the market for memorabilia from the film “The Blair Witch Project” by auctioning off a welcome sign similar to those shown in the 1999 thriller.
Mayor Debby Burgoyne said Tuesday that voters in the western Maryland town approved selling all four metal signs in an election last week.
One of the signs will likely hit eBay this weekend, with a reserve price of $1,500.
The others also may be auctioned, but Burgoyne says voters expressed interest in having at least two sold locally.
Film studio Artisan Entertainment had the heavy metal signs made after souvenir hunters stole the original wooden ones. That didn’t stop the thievery, so the town recently replaced them with versions that don’t resemble those seen in the movie.
House Dems Try To Rally Allies on Disclosure BillDavid Espo, Special Correspondent
WASHINGTON (AP) — House Democratic leaders sought support from organized labor and other traditional allies Wednesday for legislation requiring tougher disclosure on campaign advertising, hoping to overcome political fallout stirred by a blanket exemption for the National Rifle Association.
Unmoved, 45 civil rights, environmental, gun control and other groups wrote Speaker Nancy Pelosi vowing to oppose the legislation unless it is changed. As drafted, they said, it would establish a “two-tiered system of campaign finance laws and First Amendment protections, one for the most powerful and influential and another for everyone else.”
Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., the bill’s chief backer, met with members of the Democratic rank-and-file during the day, but given the unusual disagreement between Democrats and normally supportive interest groups, it was unclear whether the legislation would come to a vote later in the week in the House.
Under the bill, any nonprofit organization — businesses, unions or other independent groups — that runs political ads or conducts other political activity would have to disclose its top five donors. The measure also requires any individual or group paying for independent campaign activities to report any expenditure of at least $10,000 made more than 20 days before an election. Expenditures greater than $1,000 would have to be disclosed within 24 hours in the final 20 days of a campaign.
Over the weekend, House Democrats agreed to an exemption from the disclosure requirements for organizations that have been in existence for a decade, have at least 1 million dues-paying members and do not use any corporate or labor union money to finance their campaign-related expenditures.
The specifications were drawn with the NRA in mind, according to numerous officials, who said Democrats had concluded the bill would fail if the gun owners’ organization opposed it. Other groups meeting the same criteria also would be exempt, but Democrats have not named any.
Democrats designed the bill in reaction to a precedent-shattering Supreme Court ruling earlier this year that freed corporations and unions to spend their own funds on attempts to sway presidential or congressional elections.
Currently, independent groups are free to run often-critical television advertisements without disclosing the names of their donors. Supporters of the bill argue that businesses will soon do the same without the new disclosure requirements, but Republican opponents argue the measure is unconstitutional because it infringes on free speech rights.
In response to the changes related to the NRA, the AFL-CIO has also pressed for changes, according to several officials familiar with private negotiations, one of whom said labor wanted a carve-out similar to the one the gun owners’ organization secured over the weekend. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly.
A spokesman for the labor federation, Eddie Vale, declined to provide specifics. “We do have issues with the bill, and we’re discussing them with Congress and haven’t taken position yet on it,” he said.
A spokesman for the Sierra Club, David Willet, said the environmental group was seeking “a more democratic solution” than the bill would establish.
Among the organizations urging Pelosi to change the legislation were the Alliance for Justice, the League of Conservation Voters, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and the United Church of Christ.
Gun control groups, in particular, clash frequently with the powerful NRA, which generally opposes legislation to limit the possession or use of firearms.
DirecTV to Sell Local Ads for First Time
Deborah Yao, Business Writer
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — DirecTV Inc. is joining forces with a company owned by its cable rivals to sell local advertising spots coast-to-coast for the first time.
The nation’s largest satellite TV company on Tuesday unveiled a partnership with NCC Media, an advertising sales firm owned by cable companies Comcast Corp., Time Warner Cable Inc. and Cox Communications Inc.
NCC compiles and sells local advertising spots for nearly all cable TV companies as well as Verizon Communications Inc. DirecTV is NCC’s first satellite TV customer.
“It’s the first time we’ll have access to the local advertising market,” said Robert Riordan, DirecTV’s senior vice president of national advertising sales. As for using a company owned by cable rivals, “on the advertising sales level, this makes perfect sense.”
Previously, DirecTV could sell only national ads because satellite TV streams the same commercial to every market. But with new software, DirecTV can air different commercials in different cities. That means DirecTV now can sell spots to advertisers who want to buy commercials that would air only in certain cities.
Ads are pushed down from the satellite and new software in customers’ digital video recorders will store the right ads and air them at the right breaks.
DirecTV expects to start selling local ads next year, starting in the 25 largest metro areas.
IBM Buying Coremetrics; Company Helps Target AdsARMONK, N.Y. (AP) — IBM said Tuesday it would buy Coremetrics Inc., an Internet research company company that helps businesses better target their online marketing campaigns.
IBM didn’t say how much it is paying for the privately held company, which is based in San Mateo, Calif.
Coremetrics customers include Bank of America Corp., Holiday Inn, and Petco among others, IBM said.
Forget the VJ: MTV is Looking for a Twitter JockeySandy Cohen, Entertainment Writer
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Remember the MTV VJ? That’s so two decades ago. Now the network is looking to hire its first TJ, or Twitter Jockey.
MTV officials say the search is on for a new social media maven who will engage with the MTV audience and serve as a liaison between viewers and network honchos.
MTV General Manager Stephen Friedman called the TJ position “a natural evolution of how we connect with our audience.”
The network has identified 18 potential candidates and is asking its audience to find two more. The 20 hopefuls will compete in a series of online challenges this summer designed to reveal their personalities and demonstrate how they connect with Twitter followers.
Five finalists will ultimately compete on a live show on Aug. 8, when fans will pick who gets the new job.
“The hope is that this person will be dynamic, engaging and energized, an enthusiast within the social media world,” said Dave Sirulnik, the executive overseeing the contest. “Somebody who will represent the audience by taking their thoughts and questions and … through an ongoing dialogue with them, be able to bring those questions inside the walls here to the people who make MTV.”
The new Twitter Jockey will report on MTV events, such as the Video Music Awards in September, and appear on-air periodically.
“While they won’t be on TV the way VJs were,” Sirulnik said, “they will always be on.”
Insight MTV executives gain through the new online representative’s interaction with fans could influence programming and network decisions, Friedman said.
“Twitter and Facebook enable us to make smarter decisions,” he said. “This will benefit us hopefully as much as it benefits the audience.”
Viewers can nominate themselves or their favorite Facebook friends for the position online beginning Monday. The MTV TJ will be based in New York and earn a six-figure salary.
Online: http://zync.mtv.com
