‘David Byrne’s American Utopia’ Film Review: Byrne and Spike Lee Burn Down the House With Style

Brenda Edwards' Loose Women colleagues have rallied around her after it was revealed on Sunday night that her son Jamal, 31, had passed away.MORE: Coleen Nolan reveals the reason she didn't invite Brenda Edwards for Christmas DayWhilst Brenda is yet to publicly confirm the news and break her silence, friend Denise Welch was one of the first to react, revealing her heart ached for her.WATCH: Denise Welch asks fans for sympathy during 'horrible' health battle"My heart aches for my friend Brenda. I can't bear it.

Albion Rovers boss Brian Reid says it was a disappointment to his squad that they couldn’t keep their momentum going against Stirling Albion due to bad weather.

Boxing coach Barry Clark says Mark McKeown has been hailed a ‘future world champion’, as the Coatbridge fighter prepares for his biggest stage yet.

A fed-up resident claims the council are allowing his neighbours to abuse the recycling system and leave their bins overflowing.

Keith Jackson: That squeaky-bum time is going to come into play for the first time in more than a decade. Rangers played well at Tannadice but malfunctioned in front of goal. Celtic still can’t defend set-pieces. It’s almost becoming too hard to call.

Lewis Spence was delighted to mark his Accies return with the winner against Morton on Saturday, and hopes that means he's over his injury nightmare.

The seventh episode of Euphoria season two featured Lexi’s play and fans are shocked by the budget the high school gave to the theater department!

Coming off a three-month break, Last Week Tonight host John Oliver wasted no breath in his ninth season opener and devoted almost a half-hour to one of the most controversial topics swirling around schools today: the education of critical race theory.

What better way to celebrate a (literal) birth day than with a little 50 Cent? For Usher, nothing could be more classic, and he made sure to pull out all the stops for his son Sire’s special day, and played an extra special song for the big moment when his son Sire, 1, was born. Opening up to Ellen Degeneres on a preview of his latest visit to the show, Usher revealed the sweet way he welcomed his son into the world. Ellen called the song choice “amazing.”

Dua Lipa has parted ways with her management team and she reportedly has hired her father Dukagijn to be her new interim manager.

Actor, model and socialite Christian Wilkins has slammed media coverage of his dress at the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Fair Day event on Sunday.Trigger Warning: This story has details of homophobic media coverage and homophobic slurs, which might be distressing to some readers. For 24 hour crisis support and suicide prevention call Lifeline on 13 11 14. For Australia-wide LGBTQI peer support call QLife on 1800 184 527 or webchat.Christian, son of veteran Channel Nine reporter Richard Wilkins, was dressed in a fabulous, pink halter neck mini dress for a Fair Day event at Victoria Park, Sydney. Christian Wilkins (left) calls out the Daily Telegraph’s homophobic headline (right).The experience was however marred, when on Monday Daily Telegraph’s Sydney Confidential section featured Christian’s photos with a homophobic headline.“Dude looks like a lady! Richard Wilkins’ flamboyant son Christian flaunts his VERY toned figure in a skin-tight pink mini dress with daring cut-outs”, the headline screamed. Christian, who came out as gay in public in March 2018 on the front cover of a magazine, did not mince his words when calling out the publication over its homophobic coverage.   A post shared by CHRISTIAN WILKINS (@theprincewilkins)In 2021, Christian had made his acting debut in the Stan Original series Eden, in an LGBTQI role, playing a twin named Leander. Christian has previously been a fashion correspondent for E News and starred in shows Dancing With The Stars and Filthy Rich and Homeless. In his coming out interview, Christian had said that he had “taken it upon myself to become the best damn gay I can be!”  A post shared by CHRISTIAN WILKINS (@theprincewilkins)Christian had in an interview said that he had never come

Bolton Wanderers now have other options to turn to in central midfield and there may well be times now where they are not as reliant on MJ Williams starting as they once were, Ian Evatt believes.

Bruno Fernandes is delighted Manchester United have finally been able to score from a set-piece in the Premier League this season.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau ChiefNetflix has set a mid-year release date for “Thar,” a revenge thriller film starring and produced by Anil Kapoor.Marking the feature directorial debut of screenwriter Raj Singh Chaudhary, the 1980s-set film follows the story of a man who moves to a big town to seek a job and to avenge his past.Alongside Kapoor (“Slumdog Millionaire,” “Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol”), the film also stars Harsh Varrdhan Kapoor, Fatima Sana Shaikh and Satish Kaushik.The screenplay is credited to Chaudhury, with dialog by Chaudhary and Anurag Kashyap. Cinematography is by Shreya Dev Dube and music direction by Ajay Jayanthi.“The genre itself – a noir thriller set in Rajasthan that pays tribute to the genre of the classic Western is a first for Indian cinema and audiences.

Putting it all out there! Kody Brown and Christine Brown didn’t mince words while discussing their relationship during the third part of the Sister Wives: One on One tell-all special on Sunday, February 20.

Priyanka Chopra and Nick Jonas are enjoying a night on the town, one month after they welcomed a baby girl into their lives.

Clayton Davis As the early rumblings of the Oscar race begin with the conclusion of Toronto and the kickoff of NYFF, Netflix is starting to set their chess pieces up for a strategic and boastful awards season. In an exclusive to Variety, Netflix has confirmed the decision to campaign, Delroy Lindo, the star of “Da 5 Bloods” from Spike Lee, in lead actor for the upcoming Academy Awards.The 67-year-old actor has been a fixture of film and television for four decades, counting more than 40 screen credits to his name.

Patrick Hipes Executive Managing EditorThe Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences said Tuesday it has voted 18 students as winners of the 47th Student Academy Awards. Medal placements in the seven categories will be revealed in a virtual program October 21.The winning films are eligible to compete for 2020 Oscars in the Animated and Live Action short film and Documentary Short Subject categories.

Jonathan Majors is joining the Marvel Cinematic Universe, having landed a key role in the third “Ant-Man” movie.Variety has confirmed that Majors will take on an unknown role in the Marvel film opposite “Ant-Man” stars Paul Rudd and Evangeline Lilly. Peyton Reed is returning to direct the third entry in the superhero series.Majors has already had a standout 2020, starring in Spike Lee’s “Da 5 Bloods” opposite Delroy Lindo and taking on the lead role of Atticus in the HBO’s hit series “Lovecraft Country” from Misha Green and producers Jordan Peele and J.J.

Yep, festival season is a little weird this year, but if the currently-ongoing Venice Film Festival and just-started Toronto International Film Festival are any indication, the 58th New York Film Festival is going to be just as good, albeit enjoyed from a safe distance. The festival has a terrific line-up that includes movies from Steve McQueen (three films from his “Small Axe” anthology, Chloe Zhao‘s “Nomadland” starring Frances McDormand, “David Byrne’s American Utopia” from director Spike Lee, “The Human Voice” from Pedro Almodóvar, Orson Welles’ doc “Hopper/Welles,” “On the Rocks” from Sofia Coppola,” and so much more.

Mike Fleming Jr Co-Editor-in-Chief, FilmEXCLUSIVE: Producer/financier QC Entertainment has sealed a multi-year first look deal with Paramount. The company — QC stand for Quality Control — has credits highlighted by  the Jordan Peele-directed Get Out and the Spike Lee-directed BlackKklansman, both of which were Best Picture nominees.

Despite the countless technological innovations in the 36 years since the release of Jonathan Demme's Stop Making Sense, that iconoclastic time capsule of a 1983 Talking Heads show is still considered by many to be the greatest rock concert film ever made. So it's both miraculous and entirely fitting that director Spike Lee teams with the former frontman of that influential new wave band to deliver an immersive movie experience arguably equal to its illustrious predecessor in David Byrne's American Utopia.

Spike Lee and David Byrne aren’t an obvious pairing. While the former’s oeuvre, for the most part, features unflinching stories about Black life in America, the latter became a hero to white college-educated teens everywhere.

Owen Gleiberman Chief Film CriticWhen you watch the filmed version of a show like “Hamilton” or “Springsteen on Broadway,” it can feel like the next best thing to being there. But Spike Lee’s playful and entrancing big-screen version of David Byrne’s “American Utopia” is better than the next best thing — it feels more like a whole new thing.Byrne’s spiky and exuberant 21st-century rock-concert-on-Broadway jamboree, which opened at New York’s Hudson Theatre on Oct.

Marta Balaga Filmmaker Luca Guadagnino, attending the Venice Film Festival with “Salvatore: Shoemaker of Dreams,” a documentary about Ferragamo, and documentary short “Fiori, Fiori, Fiori!” (pictured), popped by the festival and Mastercard’s “Life Through a Different Lens: Contactless Connections” talk earlier this week. But he didn’t want to talk about lenses at all.

Terence BlanchardVariety Artisans AwardThe Grammy-winning composer has been working with director Spike Lee for more than three decades, starting as a trumpet player on “Do the Right Thing,” graduating to composer on “Jungle Fever” and scoring all of Lee’s films since — earning an Oscar nomination for 2018’s “BlacKkKlansman” and acclaim for “Da 5 Bloods” now playing on Netflix.But he’s not only “Spike Lee’s composer,” as the rest of his 70-plus film and TV credits attest.

If there ever was a year for the Toronto Film Festival to open with a musical pep talk for Americans, surely 2020 is it. American Utopia, the concert film of David Byrne’s 2019 Broadway show, directed by Spike Lee, provides a spark of optimism in the era of COVID-19 and civil unrest.

In 1963, the FBI began wiretapping Martin Luther King Jr. with the aim of “neutralizing King as an effective Negro leader," as an FBI memo put it at the time.

coronavirus pandemic, with a programme of 58 films from around the world — 50 of which will be premiering online.Steve McQueen’s Mangrove will be opening the festival, and the new film from God’s Own Country director Francis Lee Ammonite will be the closing night gala.Further films that are set to premiere include Spike Lee’s filmed take on David Byrne‘s smash-hit Broadway show American Utopia, as well as Miranda July’s new film Kajillionaire and Josephine Decker’s Shirley Jackson biopic Shirley.A selection of titles will be premiering in cinemas exclusively – including Mangrove, Ammonite, the new Pixar title Soul and Chloé Zhao’s Nomadland — while several others will offer viewers both virtual and in-cinema options.Other films to look out

Between images of past and present civil rights protests and footage of violent police encounters, singer Teyana Taylor shows support of the Black Lives Matter movement in her music video for “Still.” Introduced as “A Spike Tey Joint" — a reference to the credit regularly seen at the beginning of director Spike Lee's films — the self-directed video combines archival footage of Black civil rights leaders and protests with footage of modern Black Lives Matter protests and victims of police brutality. The five-minute video opens on a clip of Malcolm X during a 1962 speech.

Clarke Peters (above, inset) has changed his opinion of Chadwick Boseman in the wake of the late actor’s shocking death.