The 2023 Sundance Film Festival once again returned to Park City, Utah in-person, but it also had an online program that hosted the majority of its film slate. However, some titles, such as Celine Song’s Past Lives and John Carney’s Flora and Son, only played for in-person attendants. Showbiz Cheat Sheet only covered Sundance remotely for 2023, but here are the 10 films we saw that stood above the rest.
L-r: ‘Passages,’ ‘Rye Lane,’ ‘Shayda,’ and ‘A Thousand and One’ | Mubi, Searchlight Pictures, Courtesy of Sundance Institute, Courtesy of Sundance Institute 10. ‘Fairyland’ L-r: Cody Fern as Eddie Body, Scoot McNairy as Steve Abbott, and Nessa Dougherty as Younger Alysia Abbott | Courtesy of Sundance Institute
Fairyland marks the directorial feature debut for Andrew Durham, which follows a young girl who moves to 1970s San Francisco with her gay dad after her mom’s death. It’s based on a marvelous novel of the same name.
L-r: ‘Passages,’ ‘Rye Lane,’ ‘Shayda,’ and ‘A Thousand and One’ | Mubi, Searchlight Pictures, Courtesy of Sundance Institute, Courtesy of Sundance Institute 10. ‘Fairyland’ L-r: Cody Fern as Eddie Body, Scoot McNairy as Steve Abbott, and Nessa Dougherty as Younger Alysia Abbott | Courtesy of Sundance Institute
Fairyland marks the directorial feature debut for Andrew Durham, which follows a young girl who moves to 1970s San Francisco with her gay dad after her mom’s death. It’s based on a marvelous novel of the same name.
- 1/31/2023
- by Jeff Nelson
- Showbiz Cheat Sheet
Andrew Durham makes his directorial feature debut at the Sundance Film Festival with an adaptation of Alysia Abbott’s remarkably intimate memoir, Fairyland: A Memoir of My Father, shortening the title to just Fairyland. The story spans from her childhood to adulthood, capturing a longitudinal look into her relationship with her father in a city that became home. Fairyland is emotionally moving, but Durham’s screenplay trips a bit on bringing the source material to the silver screen.
‘Fairyland’ follows a father and daughter chasing a new life in San Francisco L-r: Cody Fern as Eddie Body, Scoot McNairy as Steve Abbott, and Nessa Dougherty as Younger Alysia Abbott | Courtesy of Sundance Institute
Alysia suddenly loses her mother in a tragic car accident. Her father, Steve (Scoot McNairy), sees an opportunity for a new start with his daughter, moving to San Francisco in the 1970s. There, he develops his skills...
‘Fairyland’ follows a father and daughter chasing a new life in San Francisco L-r: Cody Fern as Eddie Body, Scoot McNairy as Steve Abbott, and Nessa Dougherty as Younger Alysia Abbott | Courtesy of Sundance Institute
Alysia suddenly loses her mother in a tragic car accident. Her father, Steve (Scoot McNairy), sees an opportunity for a new start with his daughter, moving to San Francisco in the 1970s. There, he develops his skills...
- 1/26/2023
- by Jeff Nelson
- Showbiz Cheat Sheet
Andrew Durham’s Fairyland features Scoot McNairy as Steve Abbott, a single father who takes his daughter Alysia to San Francisco in the early 1970s after the death of his wife in a car accident. Adapted from a memoir of the same name by the real-life Alysia Abbott, Durham’s debut feature explores nearly two decades of this father-daughter relationship. About halfway through the film, Alysia jumps in age, going from a precocious, carefree child (Nessa Dougherty) to an edgy, isolated teenager (Emilia Jones). Steve, possibly as open as a father can be, is bisexual, and his fate becomes intertwined with the AIDS crisis; the film’s ending never seems to be in doubt.
Durham consistently places the camera from new perspectives. A photographer by trade, she decides to shoot early scenes from the view of a young Alysia, looking up at the wide-eyed world around her: a queer community...
Durham consistently places the camera from new perspectives. A photographer by trade, she decides to shoot early scenes from the view of a young Alysia, looking up at the wide-eyed world around her: a queer community...
- 1/24/2023
- by Michael Frank
- The Film Stage
Scoot McNairy is going to break your heart in Andrew Durham’s debut feature “Fairyland,” produced by Sofia Coppola and adapted from Alysia Abbott’s “Fairyland: A Memoir of My Father.” McNairy stars as Steve Abbott, a writer and widower who packs up his battered red Volkswagen bug and moves his young daughter Alysia (Nessa Dougherty) to San Francisco in the 1970s after the tragic death of his wife in a car accident.
In San Francisco, Steve can pursue his writing career and a queer lifestyle, all while providing Alysia with a free-wheeling, bohemian and highly independent childhood, one that is creative, honest and lived without shame, in a setting that’s more glam-rock than Summer of Love. However, like most kids and young adults, it will take years for Alysia to come to terms with the unique benefits of growing up in such an unconventional manner.
Durham takes care...
In San Francisco, Steve can pursue his writing career and a queer lifestyle, all while providing Alysia with a free-wheeling, bohemian and highly independent childhood, one that is creative, honest and lived without shame, in a setting that’s more glam-rock than Summer of Love. However, like most kids and young adults, it will take years for Alysia to come to terms with the unique benefits of growing up in such an unconventional manner.
Durham takes care...
- 1/21/2023
- by Katie Walsh
- The Wrap
When Andrew Durham was searching for financing for “Fairyland,” his film adaptation of Alysia Abbott’s memoir about growing up in San Francisco with her gay single father and the impact that the AIDS crisis had on the community of LGBTQ Bohemians who populated her world, he received a shocking rejection.
“In a meeting, somebody told me verbatim that AIDS is passé,” Durham remembers. “I had to keep reminding people that stories about AIDS have been told, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t keep talking about that time and offering different perspectives.”
After years of struggle to bring the movie to life, “Fairyland” will have its premiere on Friday at the Sundance Film Festival with a cast that includes Scoot McNairy, Geena Davis and “Coda” breakout Emilia Jones. And the finished film does exactly what Durham said it would — tell the story of those plague years not...
“In a meeting, somebody told me verbatim that AIDS is passé,” Durham remembers. “I had to keep reminding people that stories about AIDS have been told, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t keep talking about that time and offering different perspectives.”
After years of struggle to bring the movie to life, “Fairyland” will have its premiere on Friday at the Sundance Film Festival with a cast that includes Scoot McNairy, Geena Davis and “Coda” breakout Emilia Jones. And the finished film does exactly what Durham said it would — tell the story of those plague years not...
- 1/20/2023
- by Brent Lang
- Variety Film + TV
Exclusive: Maria Bakalova (Bodies Bodies Bodies) has joined the casts of Andrew Durham’s feature directorial debut Fairyland for American Zoetrope, and Jerry Seinfeld’s first film Unfrosted: The Pop-Tart Story for Netflix. Details as to the roles she’ll be playing in the features have not been disclosed, though we hear she’ll only be making a cameo in the latter.
Fairyland is a father-daughter coming-of-age story that Durham adapted from Alysia Abbott’s Fairyland: A Memoir of My Father. The book originally published by W. W. Norton & Company in 2012 is set against San Francisco’s vibrant cultural scene of the 1970s and ’80s, both before and after the AIDS epidemic — a crisis that would ultimately claim the life of Abbott’s father, the widowed poet and gay activist, Steve Abbott. Bakalova joins an ensemble led by Emilia Jones and Scoot McNairy, which also includes Geena Davis, Cody Fern,...
Fairyland is a father-daughter coming-of-age story that Durham adapted from Alysia Abbott’s Fairyland: A Memoir of My Father. The book originally published by W. W. Norton & Company in 2012 is set against San Francisco’s vibrant cultural scene of the 1970s and ’80s, both before and after the AIDS epidemic — a crisis that would ultimately claim the life of Abbott’s father, the widowed poet and gay activist, Steve Abbott. Bakalova joins an ensemble led by Emilia Jones and Scoot McNairy, which also includes Geena Davis, Cody Fern,...
- 8/11/2022
- by Matt Grobar
- Deadline Film + TV
Exclusive: Greg Lauritano (Big Gold Brick) today announced the launch of his Brooklyn-based production company, Black Magic, at the same time offering details as to its upcoming slate.
Lauritano is an indie producer who was behind Brian Petsos’ directorial debut, Big Gold Brick, starring Andy Garcia, Emory Cohen, Megan Fox, Lucy Hale and Oscar Isaac, which was released via Samuel Goldwyn Films and Arclight Films earlier this year.
The producer’s new company is developing projects including stage and film adaptations of Englund’s book The Way It’s Never Been Done Before, in which he reminisces on his friendship with Marlon Brando. Black Magic has also optioned Kelly Gardiner’s Goddess—a gender-bending novel about a swashbuckling female opera singer and fencer in France, which is to be adapted into a limited series with Vera Bulder and Clara McGregor’s Deux Dames Entertainment.
“After almost a decade in the industry,...
Lauritano is an indie producer who was behind Brian Petsos’ directorial debut, Big Gold Brick, starring Andy Garcia, Emory Cohen, Megan Fox, Lucy Hale and Oscar Isaac, which was released via Samuel Goldwyn Films and Arclight Films earlier this year.
The producer’s new company is developing projects including stage and film adaptations of Englund’s book The Way It’s Never Been Done Before, in which he reminisces on his friendship with Marlon Brando. Black Magic has also optioned Kelly Gardiner’s Goddess—a gender-bending novel about a swashbuckling female opera singer and fencer in France, which is to be adapted into a limited series with Vera Bulder and Clara McGregor’s Deux Dames Entertainment.
“After almost a decade in the industry,...
- 6/28/2022
- by Matt Grobar
- Deadline Film + TV
Close to a decade after American Zoetrope announced that the company had acquired the screen rights to Alysia Abbott’s “Fairyland: A Memoir of My Father,” the film adaptation has finally been made with the help of Safe Space Pictures Foundation.
The newly-launched funding entity was founded by producer Nicole Shipley to champion women and underrepresented voices in the entertainment industry by providing support to issue-driven documentary and narrative projects via equity, debt, and grant funding. Safe Space is currently working on ten nonfiction and narrative projects at various stages in production. The foundation’s investments in film or television projects range between 250,000 and 2 million.
“We take risks just like other investors, but our returns are measured in lasting, positive change,” says Jeff Sobrato, the foundation’s co-founder, and board chair. “Our model gives our collaborators the latitude to tell stories no one else will.”
Shipley and Sobrato will serve as executive producers on “Fairyland,...
The newly-launched funding entity was founded by producer Nicole Shipley to champion women and underrepresented voices in the entertainment industry by providing support to issue-driven documentary and narrative projects via equity, debt, and grant funding. Safe Space is currently working on ten nonfiction and narrative projects at various stages in production. The foundation’s investments in film or television projects range between 250,000 and 2 million.
“We take risks just like other investors, but our returns are measured in lasting, positive change,” says Jeff Sobrato, the foundation’s co-founder, and board chair. “Our model gives our collaborators the latitude to tell stories no one else will.”
Shipley and Sobrato will serve as executive producers on “Fairyland,...
- 6/22/2022
- by Addie Morfoot
- Variety Film + TV
Click here to read the full article.
Coda star Emilia Jones and Scoot McNairy have nabbed lead roles in producer Sofia Coppola’s Fairyland adaptation for American Zoetrope, with director Andrew Durham having just wrapped production on his debut feature.
Coppola and American Zoetrope acquired the screen rights to Alysia Abbott’s Fairyland: A Memoir of My Father, a coming-of-age account of Abbott growing up with her single father — widowed poet and gay activist Steve Abbott — amid the AIDS epidemic in 1970s and 1980s San Francisco.
Geena Davis, Adam Lambert, Cody Fern, Bella Murphy and newcomer Nessa Dougherty round out the cast for the movie adaptation. Veteran fashion and commercial photographer Durham penned the feature, which he directed and produced along with Coppola, Megan Carlson, Siena Oberman, Greg Lauritano and Laure Sudreau.
Nicole Shipley, Michael Musante, Laure Sudreau, Alysia Abbott, Jeff Sobrato, Jesse Ozeri, Sasha Shapiro, Anton Lessine, Gale Harold,...
Coda star Emilia Jones and Scoot McNairy have nabbed lead roles in producer Sofia Coppola’s Fairyland adaptation for American Zoetrope, with director Andrew Durham having just wrapped production on his debut feature.
Coppola and American Zoetrope acquired the screen rights to Alysia Abbott’s Fairyland: A Memoir of My Father, a coming-of-age account of Abbott growing up with her single father — widowed poet and gay activist Steve Abbott — amid the AIDS epidemic in 1970s and 1980s San Francisco.
Geena Davis, Adam Lambert, Cody Fern, Bella Murphy and newcomer Nessa Dougherty round out the cast for the movie adaptation. Veteran fashion and commercial photographer Durham penned the feature, which he directed and produced along with Coppola, Megan Carlson, Siena Oberman, Greg Lauritano and Laure Sudreau.
Nicole Shipley, Michael Musante, Laure Sudreau, Alysia Abbott, Jeff Sobrato, Jesse Ozeri, Sasha Shapiro, Anton Lessine, Gale Harold,...
- 6/6/2022
- by Etan Vlessing
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
The Wade Williams Collection yields another ’50s sci-fi notable, Monogram Pictures’ ambitious space travel movie filmed in glorious green-challenged Cinecolor. Cameron Mitchell and Arthur Franz sign up for a semi-suicidal space expedition, but instead of murderous Bat-Rat-Spider-Crabs, waiting for them on Mars is the glamorous, mini-skirted Marguerite Chapman. It’s core sci-fi fun from early in the Golden Era. The Film Detective adds a commentary, two new featurettes and an insert booklet; the film itself is lovingly restored to its original Cinecolor brilliance.
Flight to Mars
Blu-ray
The Film Detective
1951 / Color / 1:37 Academy / 72 min. / Street Date July 20, 2021 / Available from The Film Detective / 24.95
Starring: Marguerite Chapman, Cameron Mitchell, Arthur Franz, Virginia Huston, John Litel, Morris Ankrum, Richard Gaines, Lucille Barkley, Robert Barrat, Russ Conway, Edward Earle, Everett Glass.
Cinematography: Harry Neumann
Production Designer: Ted Haworth
Film Editor, Associate Producer: Richard Heermance
Special Effects: Jack Cosgrove, Irving Block, Jack Rabin
Original Music:...
Flight to Mars
Blu-ray
The Film Detective
1951 / Color / 1:37 Academy / 72 min. / Street Date July 20, 2021 / Available from The Film Detective / 24.95
Starring: Marguerite Chapman, Cameron Mitchell, Arthur Franz, Virginia Huston, John Litel, Morris Ankrum, Richard Gaines, Lucille Barkley, Robert Barrat, Russ Conway, Edward Earle, Everett Glass.
Cinematography: Harry Neumann
Production Designer: Ted Haworth
Film Editor, Associate Producer: Richard Heermance
Special Effects: Jack Cosgrove, Irving Block, Jack Rabin
Original Music:...
- 7/17/2021
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Festival Award Winning Doc Melody Makers The Bible of Rock ‘n Roll Featuring Eric Burdon (The Animals), Ian Anderson (Jethro Tull), Yes, Dave Cousins (The Strawbs), Judy Dyble (Fairport Convention), Nazareth (Pete Agnew & Dan McCafferty) and Steve Abbott (UK Decay) In tandem with the theatrical and home entertainment …
The post Icymi: Apple ibook of Rock Music doc Melody Makers Now Available appeared first on Hnn | Horrornews.net.
The post Icymi: Apple ibook of Rock Music doc Melody Makers Now Available appeared first on Hnn | Horrornews.net.
- 1/14/2020
- by Adrian Halen
- Horror News
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