Quick Takes: ‘Glee’ star Lea Michele cast in animated ‘Dorothy of Oz’
“The Wizard of Oz” is getting a modern spin.
Lea Michele, star of the Fox hit “Glee,” has signed on to voice the lead character in an animated 3-D film called “Dorothy of Oz.”
The film, which is being produced by independent company Summertime Entertainment, is based on a book by L. Frank Baum’s great-grandson, Roger S. Baum, and continues the iconic adventures of the early 20th century book series.
Hugh Dancy and Patrick Stewart are also new additions to the cast, while producers have announced that pop-singer Bryan Adams will write music and lyrics for the production.
“Dorothy of Oz” continues a trend of Hollywood developing Oz-related material; producers are also moving forward on, among other Oz films, “The Great and Powerful Oz,” a new twist on the title from the Walt Disney Co.
—Steven Zeitchik
Music fans flood into Nashville
Country music fans are flooding downtown Nashville where water flowed just over a month ago.
The CMA Music Fest is always an important event for the city, but especially this year, since flooding that began May 1 caused more than $2 billion in damage.
“I think everybody is really conscious about the flood relief and stuff like that that’s going on,” Carrie Underwood said. She performed on Music Fest’s opening night Thursday at LP Field, one of the many structures that suffered extensive flood damage. There will be concerts there every night through the festival’s closing on Sunday.
“This year I just think it’s so much more important,” Miranda Lambert said. “It’s everybody coming together in a city that really needs support right now, and it’s people that all have one thing in common, which is country music and the love of country music.”
—Associated Press
‘Breaking Dawn’ will be 2 films
Summit has confirmed what every Twihard and her cousin already knew: The company will pull a Harry Potter and split “Breaking Dawn” into two films, with Bill Condon directing both (and shooting them consecutively).
The first will come out in November 2011, but no release date was given for the second one.
Summit said that in addition to stalwarts Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner, other cast members will be returning, “including Peter Facinelli as Carlisle, Elizabeth Reaser as Esme, Jackson Rathbone as Jasper, Nikki Reed as Rosalie, Ashley Greene as Alice and Kellan Lutz as Emmett.”
—Steven Zeitchik
Bob Hope’s jokes go on display
Bob Hope’s long career spoofing presidents and politicians from Franklin D. Roosevelt through Bill Clinton traces the ever-evolving link between entertainment and politics in an exhibit that opened Friday at the Library of Congress in Washington.
For the first time, the library is placing Hope’s joke file of 85,000 pages on public view, arranged by topic in digital kiosks.
Comedian Stephen Colbert greets visitors to the exhibit, “Hope for America: Performers, Politics and Pop Culture,” in a video tribute.
The exhibit draws on Hope’s extensive collection of personal papers, films and radio and television broadcasts, which he donated to the library in 1998.
—associated press
Getty focuses on Greek theater
A play’s an interdisciplinary thing at the Getty Villa, which will launch a major exhibition, “The Art of Ancient Greek Theater,” to coincide with the September run of “Elektra,” the revenge tragedy by Sophocles that will be staged in the Villa’s outdoor theater.
The art show, Aug. 26 to Jan. 3, 2011, is heralded by the Getty as “the first exhibition in the United States in over 50 years to focus on the artistic representation of theatrical performance in ancient Greece.”
While the Villa has a permanent gallery on the theme “Dionysos and the Theater,” the coming temporary exhibition includes just four objects from the Getty’s own collection. It will borrow 93 others from 25 collections, including the British Museum, the Louvre, the state museums of Berlin, the Metropolitan Museum and several institutions in Italy, including the Vatican Museums.
—Mike Boehm
Kodak donates Colorama shots
Eastman Kodak Co. is turning over its archive of panoramic Colorama images to the George Eastman House International Museum of Photography and Film in Rochester, N.Y.
The collection includes original negatives and prints of the 565 gigantic Coloramas displayed in New York’s Grand Central Terminal from 1950 to 1990. Those backlit prints, promoted by Kodak as the “world’s largest photographs,” measured 60 feet long and 18 feet high.
—Associated Press
