Written By Luis Reyes
Disney Pays Lin Manuel Miranda $75 Million for worldwide film rights to his hit musical Hamilton
Lin Manuel Miranda’s phenomenal hit Broadway show Hamilton which won two Tony awards and a Pulitzer Prize for Drama will be distributed theatrically by Disney. The theatrical production was filmed and Disney dished out a cool $75 million for the exclusive worldwide distribution rights. The staged performances will release in theaters in the fall of 2021.
The original show and cast was filmed over three days with an audience much in the same way that the groundbreaking film version of Luis Valdez’s classic musical play Zoot Suit was filmed by Universal way back in 1981. Lin Manuel Miranda stars in the title role that made him a star, much like Edward James Olmos was catapulted to stardom with his Tony Award nominated role as El Pachuco in Zoot Suit. Miranda next will be seen in the big screen version of his musical play In The Heights, directed by Jon Chu and released by Warner Bros on June 25, 2020.
Emilio Estevez returns to The Mighty Ducks for Disney + series
Emilio Estevez (Young Guns, St. Elmo’s Fire) will be reprising the role of Coach Gordon Bombay from the original 1992 The Mighty Ducks hit movie in a new Mighty Ducks Disney + series. In the original movie, Estevez played attorney Bombay who’s arrested for DUI and ordered to coach a youth hockey team as part of his court ordered community service and leads them to a championship. The series will run for 10 half hour episodes that will connect the new show to the original movie trilogy. In recent years Estevez, the son of actor Martin Sheen and brother to Charlie Sheen has steered away from acting to concentrate on a behind the scenes career as a feature film director (Men at Work, Bobby, The Way).
Sandra Cisneros’ The House on Mango Street To Be Made Into a TV Series
Gaumont Television, the producer of the hit series Narcos, is developing Sandra Cisneros‘ classic novel The House On Mango Street into a television series with Cisneros attached as executive producer. Published in 1984, The House on Mango Street is a best-selling novel made up of a series of vignettes about the characters that populate a blue-collar Chicago neighborhood as seen through the eyes of a Mexican-American teenager who acts a narrator.
JLO and Shakira Music Sales go right through the roof right after their explosive Super Bowl Halftime Show
Due to their rock the house performances at the Super Bowl LIV Halftime show this past Sunday, both Jennifer Lopez and Shakira saw major sales gains for their entire catalog of songs according to Billboard reports from Nielsen Music/ MRC data. Music sales and streaming figures have continued to spike since Sunday’s show. It’s no surprise that both artist’s biggest selling songs were the ones performed during the halftime show. Shakira’s top three biggest sellers were Whenever, Wherever (4,000; up 1,264%), Hips Don’t Lie (3,000; up 1,201%) and Waka Waka (This Time for Africa) (2,000; up 1,456%). As for Lopez, her top three sellers were On the Floor (2,000; up 1,193%), Let’s Get Loud (1,000; up 861%) and Waiting for Tonight (1,000; up 1,266%). All songs sold a negligible sum on Feb. 1, the day before the game.
The first All Latino Super Bowl halftime show headlined by Latinas, certainly brought Latino music and culture center stage to a national and worldwide viewing audience.
Many viewers may not have been familiar with either JLo or Shakira’s music. Their show stopping dance and music performances introduced them to a new audience segment. Shakira’s curves and sexy gyrations and JLo’s sliding down the pole in her shimmering body hugging outfits are some of the memorable moments that also included Lopez wrapped with a Puerto Rican flag in recognition of her heritage and a subtle reminder of the border crisis where children are imprisoned in cage-like cells when she was joined in song by her young 11 year old daughter with a children’s all girl chorus.
SuperBowl Sunday has become a yearly American family tradition and it garnered the highest ratings in five years watched by over 140 million people nationwide and another 50 to 65 million worldwide. Elevating Latinos on a worldwide level.