Latest news with #ThisBitterEarth
Yahoo
25-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
'80s Music Legend, 64, Looks Happy and Svelte in Rare Sighting
'80s Music Legend, 64, Looks Happy and Svelte in Rare Sighting originally appeared on Parade. Boy George is looking great these days! The legendary Culture Club frontman attended the press night after party for "This Bitter Earth" at The London EDITION on Tuesday in London, and he looked better than ever. Sporting a chic blue hat, the beloved singer wore a black suit and red shades. He looked happy, svelte, and healthy. We love to see it! For someone who has been through some serious ups and downs in the music industry, it's great to see the music legend thrive. 🎬 SIGN UP for Parade's Daily newsletter to get the latest pop culture news & celebrity interviews delivered right to your inbox 🎬 In the new documentary, Boy George & Culture Club, the band opens up about their rise to superstardom, including how the song "Karma Chameleon" ultimately was so successful that it became part of their downfall. It was a bit unlike the other songs on their biggest album, 1983's Colour by Numbers. 'We could have put out a fart in a bottle in [1983], it would've been No. 1, and that was it,' guitarist Roy Hay, 63, told PEOPLE at the doc's premiere. 'No, I'm kidding. Here's the thing: It's become a very iconic song, and when we close our concerts with it, and having people singing it back, it's amazing. But if you put it up against the rest of our catalog, it doesn't stand up as a song. But it's a great record.''80s Music Legend, 64, Looks Happy and Svelte in Rare Sighting first appeared on Parade on Jun 25, 2025 This story was originally reported by Parade on Jun 25, 2025, where it first appeared.
Yahoo
19-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
This Bitter Earth: Billy Porter reveals all about his West End directorial debut (EXCLUSIVE)
On a close June afternoon in southeast London, Attitude steps into a sparse, fluorescent-lit rehearsal space: four chairs placed in its centre, a refreshments table in dire need of replenishment in from the side, and the constant thrumming of an aged air conditioning unit dominating the room. This is an 'in-between' space, a space charged with the relentless emotional heavy-lifting of four people busy at work, building something raw and is here that Billy Porter's West End directorial debut is being constructed. This Bitter Earth, written by Harrison David Rivers, is a searing exploration of love, race and identity through the story of an interracial gay couple, Jesse (Omari Douglas), a Black playwright, and Neil (Alexander Lincoln), a white activist. 'It's nice to know… even when I haven't been in the director's chair for a long time, I still got it,' smiles Porter. The play may mark his debut on the London stage, but Porter is no novice when it comes to directing. 'The problem solving is my favourite part. The creation of something, from the page to the stage.' Porter contrasts the director's chair with having recently finished a stint as The Emcee, in Cabaret. 'I had an amazing time… it's also eight shows a week. It's more than an ocean, we are athletes. There's nothing outside of doing that, when that is happening, so you gotta really want to be doing it, and I really love Cabaret.' A world away from the glamour of the Kit Kat Club, our conversation halts briefly as we put the air conditioning unit out of its misery. 'The Brits are so quiet', Porter jokes, referencing this writer's own voice projection. When Billy Porter offers feedback, you act on throats cleared, conversation turns to the sanctity and emotional balm that the theatre has long provided for the LGBTQ+ community. Writer Harrison David Rivers reflects on the gift that theatre has offered him over the years. 'The theatre has always been a kind of church for me. It's always been a sacred space,' he says. 'When I write a play, it's a blueprint for whomever decides to engage with it… I want them to feel all the things that the characters feel, to leave having experienced something. Leave lighter, and/or encouraged, and/or empowered, raring to go, to change something, to tear something down.' Rivers has a definite idea of his ideal target audience – or mindset – of who he wants to be impacted by This Bitter Earth: everyone. Full stop. 'I want all. I want everybody. I think this story is for everyone.' Actor Alexander Lincoln – known for roles in rugby drama In From the Side and Emmerdale – reflects with disarming honesty. 'I mean, I come from Surrey… Growing up, there wasn't a lot of diversity, and I think that as open minded as a lot of people are that I grew up with – we, they, all of us – don't discuss the topics of this play as much as I think we should'.Lincoln also highlights the vulnerability at the heart of his performance. 'There's a lot of white guilt that stops a lot of people engaging in the discussion and the discourse. Billy and Harrison have allowed us to talk, and really get into the basis of what is being said. I think that's been a really beautiful aspect of the rehearsal process.' On his character Jesse, Omari Douglas says he's simply trying to make sense of his existence – while also being a Black gay person in America. 'He's making sense of stuff and he's trying to survive.' Douglas goes on to acknowledge that the African American experience is not his own, yet the existence of intersectionality and 'the justification that you have to make for yourself, time and time again' is something that is entirely familiar. 'The play is just truth, through and through.' In thinking of a single image or scene that might stay with an audience long after watching This Bitter Earth, Porter reflects emotionally on the characters' arcs. 'It's a very simple image. It's just sitting at the foot of the stage…' Porter takes a long pause as the scene flashes before him. 'Even those of us who sort of revel in this idea that we're fine alone, that we're independent… that we can do it by ourselves… to have the courage to be vulnerable enough to say, 'I can't do this by myself. And I don't want to actually'. That, for me, is the transformational nature of this story'.As we wrap our interview, a silence lingers. The air shifts, and the room slowly exhales. The spell cast by these four artists in their rehearsal space – thick with honesty and heat – is potent. On stage, in the intimate walls of Soho Theatre, you'll feel it. Deeply. And then some. This Bitter Earth is at Soho Theatre on 18–26 July 2025. The post This Bitter Earth: Billy Porter reveals all about his West End directorial debut (EXCLUSIVE) appeared first on Attitude.
The Guardian
19-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘What are you trying to incite?' Billy Porter asks thorny questions with This Bitter Earth
When Billy Porter talks, people listen. They have no choice. The actor, fresh from a stint as Emcee in the London run of Cabaret, and about to reprise the role on Broadway, speaks in a poised, purposeful, regal fashion. Each word is selected with care and weighed in his hand as if it were an avocado in the fruit and veg aisle, the gaps between words so lengthy that it isn't always clear when he has finished speaking. Seated around the table in the south London studio where Porter is overseeing rehearsals for This Bitter Earth, which marks his UK directorial debut, are the playwright Harrison David Rivers and the actors Omari Douglas (It's a Sin) and Alexander Lincoln (Emmerdale). Everyone maintains an attentive silence while Porter is speaking, until there can be no doubt that he has completed his thought. The Guardian's journalism is independent. We will earn a commission if you buy something through an affiliate link. Learn more. 'The … beautiful … part of this play,' he says, easing his feet out of a pair of marshmallow-soft cream-and-ebony moon boots and nudging them to one side, 'is we get to watch two people who love each other try … time … and time … and time … and time again … and they never give up … on themselves … or on love. There is hope … We don't have to be divided. Having conversations that are complicated is what makes the healing happen … without blame … without shame.' This Bitter Earth is a fragmentary, non-linear portrait of the passionate but strained relationship between two queer men in their late 20s and early 30s. The action ricochets back and forth across the years between 2012, when Barack Obama was still in the White House, and 2015, when Donald Trump (who goes entirely unmentioned) announced his own presidential campaign. Neil, played by Lincoln, is a white Black Lives Matter activist described in the dramatis personae as 'an enthusiast [who] means well', while Jesse (Douglas) is a Black playwright upbraided by Neil for his apparent lack of political engagement. Protest, though, can take many forms. As Jesse argues: 'I'm living my fucking life! What else do you want from me?' Once the actors have read through a scene in which Neil expresses disappointment because Jesse gave only a passing greeting to his white activist friends, Porter turns to his actors: 'Great. So what is this about? What bug is up your ass and what are you trying to incite?' While they debate the characters' intentions, Rivers looks on. His play premiered in 2017, and he isn't usually involved in new productions of it. 'It's fun for me to re-meet the play after eight years of living and the world shifting,' he says. Or not shifting. 'I wish it felt different now. You write a play and you hope that you've solved all the problems. The dream is that people will pull out what you wrote and be, like, 'Remember when we didn't respect people and there was violence and we didn't know how to talk with one another?' The play is important now because we can step out of this room and into a very similar world. That's sad. But let's speak to it anew and try again to make a change.' 'We have to keep trying!' booms Porter in his distinctively husky battle-cry. Back to the scene. Lincoln, wearing a grey singlet that shows off his tats, clearly comprehends what his character cannot: 'Neil doesn't see that simply stepping out of your house in the morning can be your protest.' It is an argument with which Porter can readily empathise. 'Living is a protest,' he says. 'Or walking down the street … wearing … a hat. When David Bowie does it, he's a genius. When Kiss do it, they're rock stars. Because they're white.' He peers over the top of his glasses with a disdainful look. 'But it's just a hat. It's … just … a hat. Now shut the fuck up!' In the space of one monologue, Porter has apparently slipped between the roles of director, memoirist and actor, his final admonition addressed to the fictional Neil rather than to anyone in the room. As a directing style, you might call it cubist. Rivers commends Porter for being 'present' and for living 'now, now, now'. He explains: 'I think Billy's urgency is being directed into the play.' When I ask whether the two actors recognise the sort of 'whitesplaining' comments that Neil makes to Jesse, Douglas rolls his eyes: 'Oh God, yes. If I told you about them, we'd be here all day.' I confess that I was wincing too, hearing echoes of myself in Neil's patronising liberalism. 'Why 'wince'?' Porter demands across the table. 'I would encourage you – and I'm not interviewing you here – to take the 'wince' out of it. The openness to having the conversation is the point. 'When you know better, do better,' is what Maya Angelou always said. Now, when you know better and you don't do better – that's when I'm comin' at you!' This Bitter Earth is at Soho theatre, London, until 26 July
San Francisco Chronicle
23-04-2025
- Entertainment
- San Francisco Chronicle
Charles Burnett on the never-ending battle of 'Killer of Sheep'
NEW YORK (AP) — Charles Burnett has been living with 'Killer of Sheep' for more than half a century. Burnett, 82, shot 'Killer of Sheep' on black-and-white 16mm in the early 1970s for less than $10,000. Originally Burnett's thesis film at UCLA, it was completed in 1978. In the coming years, 'Killer of Sheep' would be hailed as a masterpiece of Black independent cinema and one of the finest film debuts, ever. Though it didn't receive a widespread theatrical release until 2007, the blues of 'Killer of Sheep' have sounded across generations of American movies. And time has only deepened the gentle soulfulness of Burnett's film, a portrait of the slaughterhouse worker Stan (Henry G. Sanders) and his young family in Los Angeles' Watts neighborhood. 'Killer of Sheep' was then, and remains, a rare chronicle of working-class Black life, radiant in lyrical poetry — a couple slow dancing to Dinah Washington's 'This Bitter Earth,' boys leaping between rooftops — and hard-worn with daily struggle. A new 4K restoration — complete with the film's full original score — is now playing in theaters, an occasion that recently brought Burnett from his home in Los Angeles to New York, where he met The Associated Press shortly after arriving. Burnett's career has been marked by revival and rediscovery (he received an honorary Oscar in 2007), but this latest renaissance has been an especially vibrant one. In February, Kino Lorber released Burnett's 'The Annihilation of Fish,' a 1999 film starring James Earl Jones and Lynn Redgrave that had never been commercially distributed. It was widely hailed as a quirky lost gem about a pair of lost souls. On Friday, Lincoln Center launches 'L.A. Rebellion: Then and Now,' a film series about the movement of 1970s UCLA filmmakers, including Burnett, Julie Dash and Billy Woodberry, who remade Black cinema. The Mississippi-born, Watts-raised Burnett is soft-spoken but has much to say — only some of which has filtered into his seven features (among them 1990's 'To Sleep With Anger') and numerous short films (some of the best are 'When It Rains' and 'The Horse'). The New Yorker's Richard Brody once called the unmade films of Burnett and his L.A. Rebellion contemporaries 'modern cinema's holy spectres.' But on a recent spring day, Burnett's mind was more on Stan of 'Killer of Sheep.' Burnett sees his protagonist's pain and endurance less as a thing of the past than as a frustratingly eternal plight. If 'Killer of Sheep' was made to capture the humanity of a Black family and give his community a dignity that had been denied them, Burnett sees the same need today. The conversation has been edited for brevity and clarity. AP: The most abiding quality in your films seems to me to be tenderness. Where did you get that? BURNETT: I grew up in a neighborhood (Watts) where everyone was from the South. There was a lot of tradition. It was a different culture, a different group of people living there — people who had experienced a great deal and kept their humanity. And they had a work ethic. It was a nice atmosphere. People looked after you. I grew up with people who were very gentle. There were the Watts riots when you couldn't walk down the street without police harassing you. Police would stop me and do this forensic search and call you all kind of names while doing it. But in the riots, it wasn't that people got braver. They just got tired. When people got together, they always had the perspective of: Let the kids eat first. AP: In 'Killer of Sheep,' like your short 'The Horse,' you seem to be giving a great deal of thought to the future of these children, and their preparation for the cruelty of the world. BURNETT: In 'Killer of Sheep,' kids were learning how to be men or women. The changing point was when Emmett Till and his picture was being shown everywhere in Jet magazine. All of a sudden, it was no longer this fantasy. You were now aware of the cruelty of the world. I remember a kid who had come home abused, who supposedly fell down the stairs. You learned this dual reality to life. AP: When you watch 'Killer of Sheep' again, what do you see? BURNETT: Life going by. A life that should have been totally different. In high school, I had a teacher who would go walking down the aisle pointing at students saying, 'You're not going to be anything, you're not going to be anything.' He got to me and said, 'You're not going to be anything.' Now, (Florida Gov. Ron) DeSantis wants to destroy Black history. It's always a battle. AP: What could have been different? BURNETT: Young kids were capable of so much more. We were all looking for a place where you felt like you belonged. America could have been so much greater. The whole world could have been better. AP: In thinking about what could have been different after 'Killer of Sheep,' would you include yourself in that? You're acknowledged as one of the most groundbreaking American filmmakers yet the movie industry often wasn't welcoming. BURNETT: You do the best you can with what you have. There are so many things you want to say. What you find is that sometimes you work with people that don't see eye to eye. Even though I didn't do more, it's still more than what some people made, by far. I'm very happy about that. On the flip side, a lot of times you hear, 'Your films changed my life.' And if you can get that, then you're doing good. One of the things that I found is that people will take advantage of you and make you make the film that they want to make. You need to be somehow independent where you can tell them, 'No, I'm not doing this.' I had to do that a number of times. So you don't work that often. AP: To you, what's the legacy of 'Killer of Sheep'? BURNETT: One of the reasons I did 'Killer of Sheep' the way I did, with kids in the community working in all areas of the production, was to show them that they could do it. I made the film to restore our history, so young people could grow from it and know: I can do this. Even when I was in film school, there was a film production going on in my neighborhood. I was on my bike and I rolled over to see. I asked a guy, 'What set is this?' and he acted like I wouldn't understand. It's changed a bit but there's still this attitude. You look at what Trump and these guys are doing with DEI. It's this constant battle. It can never end. You have to constantly prove yourself. It's a battle, ongoing, ongoing, ongoing.
The Independent
23-04-2025
- Entertainment
- The Independent
Charles Burnett on the never-ending battle of 'Killer of Sheep'
Charles Burnett has been living with 'Killer of Sheep' for more than half a century. Burnett, 82, shot 'Killer of Sheep' on black-and-white 16mm in the early 1970s for less than $10,000. Originally Burnett's thesis film at UCLA, it was completed in 1978. In the coming years, 'Killer of Sheep' would be hailed as a masterpiece of Black independent cinema and one of the finest film debuts, ever. Though it didn't receive a widespread theatrical release until 2007, the blues of 'Killer of Sheep' have sounded across generations of American movies. And time has only deepened the gentle soulfulness of Burnett's film, a portrait of the slaughterhouse worker Stan (Henry G. Sanders) and his young family in Los Angeles' Watts neighborhood. 'Killer of Sheep' was then, and remains, a rare chronicle of working-class Black life, radiant in lyrical poetry — a couple slow dancing to Dinah Washington's 'This Bitter Earth,' boys leaping between rooftops — and hard-worn with daily struggle. A new 4K restoration — complete with the film's full original score — is now playing in theaters, an occasion that recently brought Burnett from his home in Los Angeles to New York, where he met The Associated Press shortly after arriving. Burnett's career has been marked by revival and rediscovery (he received an honorary Oscar in 2007), but this latest renaissance has been an especially vibrant one. In February, Kino Lorber released Burnett's 'The Annihilation of Fish,' a 1999 film starring James Earl Jones and Lynn Redgrave that had never been commercially distributed. It was widely hailed as a quirky lost gem about a pair of lost souls. On Friday, Lincoln Center launches 'L.A. Rebellion: Then and Now,' a film series about the movement of 1970s UCLA filmmakers, including Burnett, Julie Dash and Billy Woodberry, who remade Black cinema. The Mississippi-born, Watts-raised Burnett is soft-spoken but has much to say — only some of which has filtered into his seven features (among them 1990's 'To Sleep With Anger') and numerous short films (some of the best are 'When It Rains' and 'The Horse'). The New Yorker's Richard Brody once called the unmade films of Burnett and his L.A. Rebellion contemporaries 'modern cinema's holy spectres.' But on a recent spring day, Burnett's mind was more on Stan of 'Killer of Sheep.' Burnett sees his protagonist's pain and endurance less as a thing of the past than as a frustratingly eternal plight. If 'Killer of Sheep' was made to capture the humanity of a Black family and give his community a dignity that had been denied them, Burnett sees the same need today. The conversation has been edited for brevity and clarity. AP: The most abiding quality in your films seems to me to be tenderness. Where did you get that? BURNETT: I grew up in a neighborhood (Watts) where everyone was from the South. There was a lot of tradition. It was a different culture, a different group of people living there — people who had experienced a great deal and kept their humanity. And they had a work ethic. It was a nice atmosphere. People looked after you. I grew up with people who were very gentle. There were the Watts riots when you couldn't walk down the street without police harassing you. Police would stop me and do this forensic search and call you all kind of names while doing it. But in the riots, it wasn't that people got braver. They just got tired. When people got together, they always had the perspective of: Let the kids eat first. AP: In 'Killer of Sheep,' like your short 'The Horse,' you seem to be giving a great deal of thought to the future of these children, and their preparation for the cruelty of the world. BURNETT: In 'Killer of Sheep,' kids were learning how to be men or women. The changing point was when Emmett Till and his picture was being shown everywhere in Jet magazine. All of a sudden, it was no longer this fantasy. You were now aware of the cruelty of the world. I remember a kid who had come home abused, who supposedly fell down the stairs. You learned this dual reality to life. AP: When you watch 'Killer of Sheep' again, what do you see? BURNETT: Life going by. A life that should have been totally different. In high school, I had a teacher who would go walking down the aisle pointing at students saying, 'You're not going to be anything, you're not going to be anything.' He got to me and said, 'You're not going to be anything.' Now, (Florida Gov. Ron) DeSantis wants to destroy Black history. It's always a battle. AP: What could have been different? BURNETT: Young kids were capable of so much more. We were all looking for a place where you felt like you belonged. America could have been so much greater. The whole world could have been better. AP: In thinking about what could have been different after 'Killer of Sheep,' would you include yourself in that? You're acknowledged as one of the most groundbreaking American filmmakers yet the movie industry often wasn't welcoming. BURNETT: You do the best you can with what you have. There are so many things you want to say. What you find is that sometimes you work with people that don't see eye to eye. Even though I didn't do more, it's still more than what some people made, by far. I'm very happy about that. On the flip side, a lot of times you hear, 'Your films changed my life.' And if you can get that, then you're doing good. One of the things that I found is that people will take advantage of you and make you make the film that they want to make. You need to be somehow independent where you can tell them, 'No, I'm not doing this.' I had to do that a number of times. So you don't work that often. AP: To you, what's the legacy of 'Killer of Sheep'? BURNETT: One of the reasons I did 'Killer of Sheep' the way I did, with kids in the community working in all areas of the production, was to show them that they could do it. I made the film to restore our history, so young people could grow from it and know: I can do this. Even when I was in film school, there was a film production going on in my neighborhood. I was on my bike and I rolled over to see. I asked a guy, 'What set is this?' and he acted like I wouldn't understand. It's changed a bit but there's still this attitude. You look at what Trump and these guys are doing with DEI. It's this constant battle. It can never end. You have to constantly prove yourself. It's a battle, ongoing, ongoing, ongoing.
