Tag Archives: LA Film Festival

Steven Canals Developing Drama Series “In The End” for ABC

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It’s the beginning of The End for Steven Canals…

ABC has put in development In The End, a drama from the 39-year-old Afro-Puerto Rican screenwriter, producer and Pose co-creator and his Story Ave. Productions, and 20th Century Fox Television, where Canals is under a deal.

Written and executive produced by Canals, the project centers on Kiona Brown, who, incapable of living life to the fullest, makes the only logical choice – to embrace death as an end-of-life doula. With an eclectic list of patients – including cancer survivor Mariana Cortez – Kiona soon discovers the secret to a new beginning is to embrace what happens…in the end.

Steven-Canals


In The End is among the first projects for Canals under his overall deal with 20th Century Fox Television.

Canals co-created and executive produces the Emmy– and Golden Globe-nominated and Peabody Award-winning drama series Pose, named one of the Best TV Programs of the Year by the American Film Institute in 2018 and 2019. It will return for a third season in 2020.

A 2015 graduate of UCLA’s MFA Screenwriting program, Canals began his journey as a storyteller in high school, producing the documentary short Turf Violence: What’s It All About?co-funded by HBO Family. He went on to earn a BA in Cinema, and a Masters in Student Affairs & Diversity from Binghamton University. While attending UCLA, Canals served as a Research Assistant at Hungry Jackal Productions. In 2016 Canals was a staff writer on Freeform’s Dead of Summer, the same year his short film, Afuera, premiered at the LA Film Festival.

He made his TV directorial debut with the eighth episode of the second season ofPose titled “Revelations.”

Longoria Signs First-Look Deal with Universal Pictures

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Eva Longoria is going universal…

The 41-year-old Mexican American actress, producer and activist and her production company UnbeliEVAble Entertainment have agreed to a two-year, first-look deal with Universal Pictures.

Eva Longoria

Universal president of production Peter Cramer made the pact.

First up is Universal’s acquisition of rights to My Daughter’s Quinceañera, a pitch from Lauren Iungerich, creator of the MTV series Awkward.

Longoria and producing partner Ben Spector will produce.

It’s the first crack at features for Iungerich, who’s attached to write, direct and co-produce the film that centers on an overwhelmed single father who is faced with the prospect of planning the quinceañera of his daughter’s dreams.

On the Universal deal, Cramer said: “While audiences have identified with Eva through her iconic television roles, she is also an extremely savvy producer with a keen eye for projects that appeal to a broad range of diverse audiences. We are fortunate that Eva has a found a home with Universal, sharing with us her creative instincts and passion for storytelling.”

Longoria, whose deal was made by CAA and Brillstein Entertainment Partners, is filming BBC Two’s high-end comedy miniseries Decline and Fall, an adaptation of Evelyn Waugh’s classic social satire. She’ll next be seen in Ricardo de Montreuil’s Lowriders, which premiered at this year’s LA Film Festival. The film is produced by Imagine Entertainment’s Brian Grazer and Blumhouse Production’s Jason Blum.

“Building upon our continued success as producers in television, we were seeking a home to expand the UnbeliEVAble brand into features,” said Longoria. “There’s simply no better place I could think of than Universal Pictures, whose diverse portfolio of releases is inspirational. Jeff, Donna and Peter’s passion was instrumental in keeping us in the Comcast family, and, beginning with My Daughter’s Quinceañera, we look forward to a long relationship with all our partners at the studio. Lauren’s pitch was so brilliant and funny, and to bring this experience to life is like reliving my 15th birthday.”

A Band of Bitches Releases Desierto-Inspired Single “El Diablo Güero,” feat. Victoria Morales

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A Band of Bitches is getting political…

The masked Mexican alternative group has released the single “El Diablo Güero,” a pro-immigrant, anti-Donald Trump song, featuring singer/songwriter and studio owner Victoria Morales.

A Band of Bitches

The funky pop-punk track was recorded to coincide with the current run in Mexican theaters of director Jonas Cuaron’s “migrant thriller,” Desierto, which will be the closing film at this year’s LA Film Festival.

The film, about Mexican workers trying to cross the border to the United States who are pursued in the desert by a murderous American vigilante (Jeffrey Dean Morgan). It stars Gael Garcia Bernal, well-known to American viewers from the Amazon series Mozart in the Jungle.

Morales wrote the bilingual song inspired by the film with Latin Grammy-nominated A Band of Bitches’ member Ushka at Cuaron’s request. “El Diablo Güero” is not, however, part of the film’s original soundtrack, whose layers of ominous and sublime music were composed by Woodkid.

“[Cuaron] sort of felt the need for [another] song that could really capture the entire film,” Morales told Billboard. “El Diablo Güero” was written and recorded in a few days, with production supervised by Cuaron at Morales’ Victoria Records Studio in Monterrey.

A Band of Bitches announced the debut of the new track alongside Cuaron and Morales at the Vive Latino festival in Mexico City; it was released to Mexican radio during the second week after the film premiered in theaters in April. The movie is still playing in Mexico.

The track samples lines from the film that Morales says had the most impact on her, particularly the words “welcome to the land of the free” spoken during one chilling scene.

Although journalists in Mexico have pointed out that the title could be a reference to Trump and his statements about Mexican immigrants, Morales maintains that it was the film’s American killer who inspired the song.

“In the end everyone is going to hear what they want to hear and make their own interpretation,” Morales says. “I think that it could become sort of an anthem, because of the relation of what’s happening in the United States and with the elections.”

Desierto is set for a commercial run on the U.S. sometime before the elections. A trailer for the film used an audio clip of Trump’s infamous Mexican “rapists” comment.

Cuaron, the son of Oscar-winner Alfonso Cuaron (Gravity), will next write and direct the Zorro sequel Z, also starring Garcia Bernal.