Aurelia Butler

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    The Beatles’ ‘Let It Be’ Film Will Stream After 54 Years on Disney+

    Michael Lindsay-Hogg’s unloved — or misinterpreted? — 1970 documentary, the source for Peter Jackson’s “Get Back,” will stream on Disney+.In 2021, the director Peter Jackson’s sprawling and vibrant Beatles docuseries, “The Beatles: Get Back,” streamed on Disney+ to nearly universal acclaim. The three-part epic, which ran nearly eight hours, captured the drama and frenzy as John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr recorded, over the pressure-filled month of January 1969, what would become the last album that the Beatles released, “Let It Be.”As fans were well aware, Jackson’s series was culled from nearly 60 hours of behind-the-scenes footage originally shot by the director Michael Lindsay-Hogg for “Let It Be,” his little-seen, though often dismissed, 1970 documentary about those recording sessions.After its initial theatrical run, Lindsay-Hogg’s film largely disappeared for more than a half-century with the exception of low-quality VHS versions and bootlegs. Fans tend to remember it as an intriguing historical document capturing the late-stage creative flights of a seismic musical force, but also as a divorce proceeding of sorts, with stark moments of internal discord as the band hurtled toward a nasty split.By that view, “Get Back,” with its abundant moments of jokey banter and on-set clowning, was seen by some as an overdue corrective to “Let It Be.”Little surprise but Lindsay-Hogg, 83, has a very different view. The acclaimed director had a hand in inventing the music video, with his promotional films for the Beatles and the Rolling Stones in the mid-1960s, and went on to win plaudits for the 1980s British mini-series “Brideshead Revisited.” He has fought for a half-century for “Let It Be” to get a second look and, in his mind, a fair shake.On May 8, he will get his wish, when “Let It Be,” meticulously restored by Jackson’s production team, begins streaming on Disney+ in collaboration with Apple Corps, the company that oversees the Beatles creative and business interests. Lindsay-Hogg spoke to The New York Times about the culmination of a long crusade. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    ‘Man’s Castle’: Free Love, Hard Times

    Restored to its original length and screening at the Museum of Modern Art, this 1933 movie starring Spencer Tracy feels at once surprisingly frank and disquietingly coy.A celebrant of redemptive love, Frank Borzage (1893-1962) was the most romantic of classic Hollywood directors and, however unconventionally, perhaps the most religious as well. “Man’s Castle” (1933) conflates an economic crisis — namely the Great Depression — with a spiritual one. The movie also represents premarital pregnancy as salvation rather than sin, and scenes were consequently cut for its post-Production Code rerelease in the late 1930s.Restored to its original length of 78 minutes, screening at the Museum of Modern Art (April 18-24), “Man’s Castle” feels unique — at once surprisingly frank and disquietingly coy.A leading director of silent films, Borzage (Bor-ZAY-ghee) left the Fox studio and went independent in 1932. His first production was an adaptation of Hemingway’s World War I novel “A Farewell to Arms.” “Man’s Castle” also concerns love in extremis with the starving innocent Trina (20-year-old Loretta Young) falling for and shacking up with an older if equally indigent man of the world, Bill (Spencer Tracy).Their meet-cute on a park bench, with Bill feeding the pigeons as ravenous Trina looks longingly on, proceeds to a nice restaurant (where Bill gets out of paying the check) and winds up back at his jerry-built hovel in a homeless encampment near the East River. A natural man, Bill amazes Trina (and possibly the viewer) by diving naked into the water. She more discreetly follows. Cut from Edenic skinny-dipping to radiant Trina at the washboard happily scrubbing Bill’s clothes.A brash roughneck with a golden heart, Bill inspires Trina’s puppy-like devotion. In his New York Times review, Mordaunt Hall praised the stars’ “thoroughly efficient portrayals” — an odd choice of words to describe their evident mutual attraction. Indeed, the chemistry was real. Young’s daughter would later detail the pair’s guilt-ridden love affair. (Both were Catholic; Tracy was married.)For Trina, Bill’s Hooverville home is “heaven,” with various down-and-out denizens adding to the allegorical flavor. Bragg (Arthur Hohl) is not only a lech and a thief but a leftist loudmouth. His alcoholic companion, Flossie (Marjorie Rambeau), is both a fallen woman and a salvation project tended to by a former minister (Walter Connolly). Dismissive of all three, the cynical Bill is tempted by the fun-loving cabaret star Fay La Rue (a reliably sassy Glenda Farrell, here mimicking Mae West).We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    How They Pulled Off the Ending to ‘Civil War’

    The action thriller from Alex Garland concludes with an explosive sequence in the nation’s capital. A behind-the-scenes look at how it was done.This article contains spoilers for the film “Civil War.”When Alex Garland was writing the script for “Civil War,” he started with the ideas in the last moments. “In some ways the film was kind of reverse engineered from the ending,” he said during an interview in New York.The path to that ending finds the rebel Western Forces reaching Washington, D.C., laying siege to the White House and cornering the president (Nick Offerman), all while the journalists at the center of the film capture it through their own lenses. It’s a relentless, loud 20 minutes of screen time, during which the Lincoln Memorial is blown up. Garland said he wanted the audience to feel “aversion to it and to feel dismayed.”It also was an intricate production challenge, which involved digitally recreating Washington, shooting on sets throughout the Atlanta area, and executing detailed choreography that Garland likened to “football plays.” (Garland is British, but he noted that “football” could refer to soccer or American football. “It’s like little circles and triangles and arrows,” he added.)From the start of “Civil War,” two journalists at the center of the story — Lee (Kirsten Dunst), a photographer, and Joel (Wagner Moura), a correspondent — want to get to the White House for an audience with the president. They reach it alongside Jessie (Cailee Spaeny), a younger, novice photographer who idolizes Lee. In the end it’s Jessie who gets the most important shot.But before that, they have to navigate a treacherous military operation on Pennsylvania Avenue and the surrounding streets.The process of designing the sequence began with a trip to Washington with crew members including Garland, the cinematographer Rob Hardy and the visual effects supervisor David Simpson. The team walked the route of the invasion, Simpson said, mapping out how the troops would move from the memorial to the White House.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    A Pathbreaking Singer Arrives at the Met, With Pearls and Tattoos

    Dav­óne Tines, who stars in the oratorio “El Niño,” is challenging traditions in classical music and using art to confront social problems.The bass-baritone Dav­óne Tines, wearing Dr. Martens boots, a sleeveless black shirt and six vintage pearl rings, stood on a rehearsal stage at the Metropolitan Opera in Manhattan the other day and began to sing.“My soul’s above the sea and whistling a dream,” he sang, a passage from the Nativity oratorio “El Niño” by John Adams, in which Tines makes his Met debut this month. “Tell the shepherds the wind is saddling its horse.”Tines, 37, known for his raw intensity and thundering voice, has quickly become one of classical music’s brightest stars. He has won acclaim for performances of Bach, Handel and Stravinsky, and he has helped champion new music, originating roles in operas like Adams’s “Girls of the Golden West” and Terence Blanchard’s “Fire Shut Up in My Bones.”Tines has also used his art to confront social problems, including racism and police brutality. In 2018, he was a creator of and starred in “The Black Clown,” a searing rumination on Black history and identity inspired by a Langston Hughes poem. In 2020, he released a music video after the police killing of Breonna Taylor, calling for empathy and action.During a rehearsal break at the Met, he described his art as cathartic, saying his aim was to “pick apart the complicated, contentious existence that is knit into the American landscape.”“It’s a blessing to be a performing artist because you get an explicit place to put your feelings,” he said. “It’s the blessing of having a channel.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Maurice El Medioni, Jewish Algerian Pianist, Dies at 95

    He fused the music of his Sephardic roots with Arab traditions, incorporating boogie-woogie and other influences, to create a singular style.Maurice El Medioni, an Algerian-born pianist who fused Jewish and Arab musical traditions into a singular style he called “Pianoriental,” died on March 25 in Israel. He was 95.His death, at a nursing home in Herzliya, on Israel’s central coast, was confirmed by his manager, Yvonne Kahan.Mr. Medioni was a last representative of a once vibrant Jewish-Arab musical culture that flourished in North Africa before and after World War II and proudly drew from both heritages.In Oran, the Algerian port where he was born, he was sought after by Arabs and Jews alike to play at weddings and at banquets, in the years between the war and 1961, when the threat of violence and Algeria’s new independence from France drove Mr. Medioni and thousands of other Jews to flee.With his bounding octaves, his quasi-microtonal shifts in the style of traditional Arab music, his cheeky rumba rhythms learned from American G.I.s after the 1942 Allied invasion and his roots in the Jewish-Arab musical heritage called andalous, Mr. Medioni had honed a distinctive piano style by his early 20s. The singers he accompanied often alternated phrases in French and Arabic in a style known as “Françarabe.” His uncle Messaoud El Medioni was the famous musician known as Saoud L’Oranais, a leading practitioner of andalous who was deported by the Germans to the Sobibor death camp in 1943.The Medioni style remained buried and nearly forgotten for four decades as he pursued his trade as a men’s tailor. He kept it alive in private, performing at weddings and bar mitzvahs after he was forced to flee to France, until he released a breakthrough album, “Café Oran,” in 1996 at the age of 68. That led to a belated second life as a star of so-called world music — concert tours in Europe, appearances in documentary films and a major role as mentor to a new generation of Israeli musicians anxious to recover the musical heritage of their Sephardic heritage. In 2017, he published an autobiography, “A Memoir: From Oran to Marseilles (1938-1992),” which reproduces Mr. Medioni’s cursive scrawl, with a translation from the French.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    15 Looks That Did the Most at Coachella

    There was no shortage of celebrities onstage last weekend at the first installment of this year’s Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in Southern California, where Doja Cat, Billie Eilish and even Will Smith performed.Ms. Eilish surprised spectators by joining Lana del Rey for the folk-rock singer’s first Coachella set since 2014. Mr. Smith, who started his career as a rapper, also shocked many in the audience by performing a rendition of his song “Men in Black” with dancers dressed as aliens during the reggaeton singer J Balvin’s set.But some of the highest-profile performers at the festival weren’t there to work: Rihanna and ASAP Rocky, along with Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce, came as spectators, even if neither couple could exactly blend in with the crowd.At Coachella — an orgy of brand activations, parties and musical performances — celebrities are but one reliable component. Another is fashion, which typically tends toward the ostentatious. That was mostly the case last weekend, during which these 15 looks stood out — some for being opulent, others for being over-the-top and a couple for being surprisingly simple.Doja Cat: Most Harebrained!Hair with boots to match.Valerie Macon/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesOf the many outfits worn by the singer and rapper during her set, this get-up involving few clothes and strategically arranged extensions might have stolen the show — if only by a hair.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Philharmonic Sidelines 2 Players It Tried to Fire for Misconduct

    The New York Philharmonic said the musicians would not perform for now, after a magazine article brought new attention to allegations of misconduct. They have denied wrongdoing.The New York Philharmonic said on Monday that two players it had tried to fire in 2018 — but was forced to rehire after the musicians’ union challenged their dismissal — would not take part in rehearsals or performances for the time being after a magazine article detailed the allegations of misconduct that had been made against them.The Philharmonic said that the players — the principal oboist, Liang Wang, and the associate principal trumpet, Matthew Muckey — would not appear as the orchestra deals with the fallout from a New York magazine article published on Friday.In the article Cara Kizer, a former Philharmonic horn player, came forward for the first time to publicly discuss an encounter that occurred when she was on tour with the Philharmonic in Vail, Colo., in 2010. She told the Vail Police Department then that she had been sexually assaulted after spending the evening with the two players and was given a drink she came to believe was drugged, according to police records.No charges were filed against the men and both have denied wrongdoing; their lawyers said they expect to return to the ensemble soon.In 2018 the Philharmonic moved to dismiss Mr. Wang and Mr. Muckey, who both joined the orchestra in 2006. It said at the time that it had received reports that the two players had “engaged in misconduct,” which it declined to describe, and that it had decided to fire them after commissioning an investigation. But the players’ union, Local 802 of the American Federation of Musicians, challenged their dismissals.The orchestra was forced to reinstate them in 2020 after an independent arbitrator found that they had been terminated without just cause.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    ‘The Stranger’ Review: Somewhere Over the Freeway

    In this tense thriller on Hulu, Maika Monroe plays Clare, a Kansas transplant in Los Angeles who parallels Dorothy in Oz.“The Stranger” is a tense if tidy thriller that chronicles a ride-hail driver’s journey to surveillance hell and back. Her survival against all odds mirrors that of the movie itself: The film’s footage originally premiered in 13 short-form episodes in 2020 on the streaming service Quibi, several months before it shut down.The recut version (on Hulu) bears little trace of its earlier form, although its life span across algorithm-driven streaming companies does cast the villain’s tech preoccupations — “whoever figures out the mathematical formula determining the losers and the winners in life will rule” the world, he declares — in a new, meta light.Written and directed by Veena Sud (“The Killing”), the film follows Clare (Maika Monroe), a recent transplant to Los Angeles who falls into a freeway nightmare after her ride-hail passenger, Carl (Dane DeHaan), identifies himself as a serial killer. He claims he will murder her unless she tells him a good story.If this opening sounds cliché, the film at least seems aware of the pitfalls. Sud creates parallels between Clare in Hollywood and Dorothy in Oz, assigning Clare a Kansan back story, a yapping terrier and a guileless attitude. And DeHaan embodies the tech-savvy Carl as a pasty, smirking male chauvinist who is sillier than he is scary.It follows as something of a surprise, when, over the course of the second act, the film builds to a deeply agitated mood. Sud pulls off the tonal shift by keeping Carl largely offscreen; his looming absence, alongside Monroe’s knack for portraying paranoia, simmers with menace.The StrangerNot Rated. Running time: 1 hour 37 minutes. Watch on Hulu. More