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Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Postscript: More Fest for Beatles Fans photos


Neil Innes with Ken Simpson & Ken Thornton, costars in The Seventh Python

Neil Innes administers the Ego Warriors oath


Martin Lewis interviews Neil Innes

Jam session



Ronnie Spector makes her entrance while Martin Lewis prepares the crowd


Ronnie Spector

Neilfest fans

Victor Spinetti!

Brett and Mark Hudson interviewed by Martin Lewis


Burt Kearns and Brett Hudson of The Seventh Python

Earl Slick, Neil Innes, Brett Hudson, Greg Hawkes, Mark Hudson, Martin Lewis

Sunday, March 29, 2009

Brett Hudson stuns, inspires crowd at Fest for Beatles Fans, announces plans for cancer film, foundation project


A routine question-and-answer session about the making of The Seventh Python turned into a newsmaking and emotional highlight of The NY Metro Fest for Beatles Fans this afternoon, when producer Brett Hudson broke from the script to deliver a broadside against the American medical establishment and a call to arms in the fight against cancer.

The Seventies pop star-turned-Hollywood writer and producer, who's been performing at the Fest with his brother Mark Hudson, has received international attention and kudos since it was revealed early last year that he was battling throat cancer and had succeeded against great odds thanks to state-of-the-art treatment not widely available in the United States. His advocacy of other cancer patients and the crucial importance of individual determination of treatment and a positive attitude, displayed on a widely-circulated blog, has attracted a worldwide following and given Hudson a new mission that he pushed to the forefont today.

Well-attended

Hudson had earlier introduced The Seventh Python with director Burt Kearns and star Neil Innes at a well-attended afternoon screening, and had rushed from an autograph session to join Kearns was onstage at the Crystal Ballroom to discuss the making of the film.


The discussion had led to future Frozen Pictures projects, including a Hudson Brothers reunion and a film about Sixties rocker Chris Montez, when Hudson stopped the session to bring up the project that has been foremost on the Frozen Pictures agenda.

"On August 27, 2007, I was diagnosed with Stage 4 throat cancer. My doctors told me to get my affairs in order and that I wouldn't survive six months. I proved them wrong.

"I was headed toward a morbid operation to remove my larynx when my dear friend Cher, whom I've known for 35 years, led me to a doctor in Germany, and today I don't have cancer.


"Bottom line: You go to Germany, they'll cure your cancer. You stay in America, they'll cure you if you survive the treatment."

Help!

The crowd, there to hear the dishy show business behind the scenes stories and scandals, wastransfixed as Hudson, wrapped in a scarf that many assumed was worn in homage to the skiing sequence in Help! but which he explained he wore to protect his radiation-scarred neck from sunlight, took them down a dark alley that each and every one could relate to. He explained that Frozen Pictures is already at work producing a nonfiction film called The Klinik, which uses his own experience as the jumping-off point for a larger-themed story about innovations and obstacles in cancer treatment.

"I don't care if you see the film or buy the DVD, but go to the website The Klinik Movie dot com, Klinik spelled 'k-l-i-n-i-k' and spread the word."

Farrah

Hudson then detailed some of the most intimate details of his illness, spoke movingly about others who've sought him out for help and amazed the crowd as he told of the state-of-the art treatments that removed 14 tumours from Farrah Fawcett's liver-- not to mention his own throat cancer.

After revealing that his treatment has cost him more than $400,000-- despite insurance-- he broke the big news:

Foundation

"I will take my fee for this film-- with the exception of the Writers Guild payment, because I need their insurance, which is great-- and I will use it to start a foundation. I'm not going to put my name on it, I don't need that. I'm going to use it to help people who can't afford to get treatment. The way it is now, if you've got the money you can live, if you don't have money, you don't have the choice. I want to pay for transportation to treatment centers, for medicine. I want people to have the same choices I have."


(clockwise from top: Greg Hawkes, Martin Lewis,
Earl Slick, Brett Hudson, Neil Innes, Mark Hudson)

Hudson Brothers sing backup for Ronnie Spector


Last night at the NY Metro Fest for Beatles Fans.

Saturday, March 28, 2009

Hudson Brothers dazzle Beatles Fest


Followers of the inspiring and often harrowing Brett's Blog on The Klinik Movie website know that Seventies pop star turned TV and film producer Brett Hudson has been battling hard in a winning fight against throat cancer, and also would not be surprised to hear him warbling tonight before a packed house at the NY Metro Fest for Beatles Fans.


He and brother Mark kept the crowd laughing with anecdotes of their halcyon days as music and TV stars and pals of John Lennon before their version of a fave Beatles tune suddenly had a hushed house singing along.


Festival emcee and Beatles-connected pop culture everywhere man Martin Lewis stirred the pot of memories with his Frostlike interviewing style and after the set filled in for Bill in the Hudson Brothers reunion photo.

Fest for Beatles Fans: Saturday afternoon


Neil Innes, genius satirist and songwriter, and star of The Seventh Python.


Tabloid Baby pal Victor Spinetti.


Legendary promoter Sid Bernstein, who brought The Beatles to America.


The marketplace.


Greg Hawkes, formerly of The Cars, has a new album of Beatles songs played on the ukulele.


Barbara Poudrier, Neil Innes superfan, with autograph.




In the marketplace. Ronnie Spector appears tonight. Phil Spector may go away next week.


Exclusive video! The Seventh Python brings down the house at the NY Metro Fest for Beatles Fans!


Hundreds of people and Neil Innes himself got up early for the East Coast premiere of The Seventh Python at the NY Metro Fest for Beatles Fans in the NJ Meadowlands this morning. The 11 am showing of the Innes biopic from our pals at Frozen Pictures was introduced by a freshly-roused Innes, director Burt Kearns and producer Brett Hudson, and drew loud laughs, applause and a sustained ovation at its conclusion (see video below) in a packed Grand Ballroom of the Crowne Plaza Hotel.



"If this screening did one thing, it reaffirmed what the Chicago Beatlefest screening showed-- that this is one crowd-pleasing flick!" said our Sam Peters, who was there. The Fest continues with a second screening and panel discussion including Innes, Kearns and Hudson-- himself a Fest favorite as performer and personality with his brother Mark, two-thirds of the legendary Beatlesque and Lennon-palling Hudson Brothers.

Friday, March 27, 2009

NY Metro Fest for Beatles Fans gets underway as countdown to The Seventh Python begins


Neil Innes is there, and so are out pals from Frozen Pictures who made The Seventh Python, the movie about him that's being shown in less than twelve hours at the New York Metro Fest for Beatles Fans at the Crowne Plaza Meadowlands Hotel on the other side of the Lincoln Tunnel. Above, brothers Mark and Brett Hudson signed autographs along with Neil and legendary actor Victor Spinetti (more on them tomorrow). Mark Hudson is introducing his long-awaited first solo album, The Artist (Five stars (out of five)! A pop rock masterpiece!"-- Sam Peters, Tabloid Baby), while Brett is waiting for American Airlines to bring him his luggage.



(Above: Impresario extraordinaire Martin Lewis -- in suit-- hosts the festivities in the Grand Ballroom, where The Seventh Python plays in the morning.)

Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Flashback: Party like it's 1999


That's because it was 1999 when this photo was taken at the Tabloid Baby West Coast book launch party at the late and legendary Bel Age Hotel's Diaghilev Bar. Identify all six people in this photo and win an autographed copy of a Tabloid Baby first edition hardcover.

Send your entries here.

Sunday, March 22, 2009

The Seventh Python selected for Pacific Palisades Film Festival; Beatlesfest adds second screening


The Seventh Python has picked up another accolade-- named just hours ago as an official selection in the prestigious 2009 Pacific Palisades Film Festival. The nonfiction film about legendary pop satirist and Monty Python cohort Neil Innes-- produced by our pals at Frozen Pictures-- will be a highlight of the film fest in the town at the end of Sunset Boulevard that's home to Hollywood heavyweights like Steven Spielberg, Tom Hanks, Ray Liotta, Larry David and Kate Hudson (niece of Seventh writer-producer Brett Hudson)-- not to mention the film's director and several other members of the crew.


The festival will take place May 14th to 16th. We'll have information on screenings as they become available (we only got this information when one of our loyal readers sent us a tip from Facebook).


The Seventh Python is being featured later this week at the New York Metro Fest for Beatles Fans in the New Jersey Meadowland. We've also just learned that a second screening has been added to the much-anticipated "early bird" screening at 11 a.m. on Saturday, March 28th. The film will be shown at 1:45 p.m next Sunday-- followed by a Q&A with Hudson, director Burt Kearns and the film's star, Neil Innes.

Next stop: Las Vegas, where the filmmakers will pick up the Golden Ace Award from the Las Vegas International Film Festival on April 12th. The Vegas screening time will be announced soon.

Stay tuned...

Jade Goody dies on Mother's Day


Well, at least it's Mother's Day in the UK where Jade Goody is (was) a big deal. The reality TV figure left the way she entered the spotlight, managing to hold on just long enough to avoid being overshadowed by Natasha Richardson. The News of The World had the above splash ready to go. They must have thought long and hard to come up with that headline.

Saturday, March 21, 2009

She was the link between Hitchcock and Disney

Dorothea Holt Redmond has died in at her home in the Hollywood Hills at age 98. She was an illustrator and production designer who helped visualize seven Alfred Hitchcock films, including Shadow of A Doubt, Rear Window and To Catch A Thief. She also played a key role in Disneyana, joining what's now known as Walt Disney Imagineering in 1964 and helping envision elements of Disneyland and Disney World, including working with Walt Disney himself to design a private apartment in Disneyland's New Orleans Square.


Walt Disney died in 1966 before the elaborate New Orleans Square hideaway could be completed. For decades, the space was used as a gallery, but following Redmond's original renderings, the park recently restored the apartment above Pirates of the Caribbean and turned it into the Disneyland Dream Suite, where randomly chosen park visitors can stay overnight.

Redmond also designed the interior and exterior settings of many restaurants and shops in New Orleans Square.

Thursday, March 19, 2009

Garotas Show de Bola! Cloud 9 a hit in sexy Brazil!



Garotas Show de Bola!

Congratulations to our pals at Frozen Pictures! A little more than a week before they bring their acclaimed nonfiction musical film The Seventh Python to the New York audience at the New York Metro Fest for Beatles Fans comes word that their classic Oscar®-connected motion picture comedy Cloud 9 has conquered yet another international territory!

Brazil is the latest nation to embrace the sexy beach volleyball stripper comedy starring Burt Reynolds, D.L. Hughley, Paul Rodriguez, Angie Everhart, Kathryn Winnick, Tony Danza, Tom Arnold Jeff Altman, Rick Overton and Gary Busey and written and produced by Frozen's Brett Hudson and Burt Kearns along with Academy Award® winner Albert S. Ruddy.

And the Brazilians wax enthusiastic, describing Garotas Show de Bola like this:

Sinopse: Quando o fracassado Billy Cole vai almoçar em um lugar nada convencional - um clube de strippers- ele não vai apenas pelo show e sim para se divertir com as belas e sensuais garotas! Mas ele acerta em cheio quando resolve montar um time de vôlei com essas meninas! Conforme a popularidade delas vai crescendo, Billy quer atrair a multidão não pela beleza e sim pelas suas habilidades. Ele concorda que as beldades também merecem um momento de gloria e respeito, enquanto ele enche o bolso de dinheiro!!! As super estrelas Burt Reynolds e D.L. Hughley estão hilariantes nesta comédia.

The film struck gold domestically when it was released 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment in early 2006, became a massive hit in India and, under the name Mell Bedobás, warmed up Eastern Europe.

"Thanks for the news! You guys are fast! You reached me before our production partners did!" said writer-producer Brett Hudson when reached tonight.

"But I must say I'm not surprised that Cloud 9 continues to bring money in from all over the world on a continual basis. It's a testament to the international starpower of Burt Reynolds, one of the last of the classic movie stars and heroes-- and I must say, the script.

"The story of aspiration and triumph over prejudice and adversity, speaks to peoples the world over. And it's really funny, too!"