22 Established 1961 Sunday, February 16, 2020 Lifestyle Fashion eenage pop iconoclast Billie Eilish The song was written with her primary eight years as agent 007. Trailers feature also brought a generation of young rap- Tdropped her James Bond theme tune creative collaborator-and brother-Finneas the Bond staples that have made the fran- pers to fame. Interscope signed her at age on Friday, racking up 2.2 million O’Connell. Her Facebook page said Eilish chise so successful over the decades: car 14 — making the Californian a rare inter- views in just six hours as the teenage would perform the world premiere of the chases, gun fire, gadgets and femmes net-age pop star to win big online and prodigy continues her stunning rise. new track at next Tuesday’s Brit Awards in fatales. But Eilish’s track will guarantee then see a label invest time and money in Sharing the same name as the upcoming London alongside O’Conner, movie score interest from a younger demographic. cultivating her talent over the long term. movie “No Time To Die”, the ballad fea- maestro Hans Zimmer and former Smiths The biggest globally renowned musi- Last year she dropped a number one tures the grungy melancholic feel that has legend Johnny Marr. The 25th installment cian to emerge from Generation Z, the can- album entitled “When We All Fall Asleep, propelled Eilish to star status and caps a of the British spy saga, due out in April, did Eilish draws young fans with a personal Where Do We Go?”, led the hot songs remarkable few weeks for the teenager. sees Bond drawn out of retirement in social media presence and internet-speak chart with her single “Bad Guy” and played Last month Eilish was the breakout star at Jamaica by his old friend and CIA agent fluency. Her signature style features over- a set on a prime stage at the Coachella the Grammys, sweeping five awards Felix Leiter. sized sweatshirts and baggy pants, often music festival. — AFP including the “big four” prizes: Album of Rami Malek, who won a best actor paired with sunglasses and the garish the Year, Song of the Year, Record of the Oscar for his depiction of Queen frontman extra-long nail extensions more often Year and Best New Artist. Freddie Mercury in “Bohemian Rhapsody”, associated with rapper Cardi B. At just 13, US singer-songwriter Billie Eilish attends the The Los Angeles-born singer, who plays the villain. Craig, 51, who had to she unveiled her debut bedroom-produced 2020 Vanity Fair Oscar Party following the 92nd only turned 18 in December, is the undergo minor ankle surgery after an single “Ocean Eyes” on SoundCloud, the Oscars at The Wallis Annenberg Center for the youngest artist to record a Bond track. injury on set, is expected bow out after do-it-yourself streaming platform that has Performing Arts in Beverly Hills. — AFP rance’s Cesar Academy, which awards its version of Fthe Oscars, was in crisis Friday after its entire board resigned, overwhelmed by a series of rows that eclusive pop phenom Justin Bieber took baby steps through-line is tenderly-articulated treatise on the have infuriated both women’s activists and industry back into public life Friday with the release of Canadian singer’s desire to evolve. R insiders. The mass resignation came two weeks ahead of “Changes,” a mellow, lovelorn album that is his first “Sometimes I’ll go to sleep early / Sometimes I can’t the their gala awards ceremony and just days after more since 2015. The R&B-tinged offering is less a defiant close my eyes / Sometimes I smile like it’s all good / Even than 200 leading film actors, producers and directors comeback than a tentative toe-dip back into the public life though there’s pain underneath it,” he breathes softly on demanded “profound reform” of the industry. “To honor the 25-year-old has largely shunned since cutting short his the title track. The vocals, at times overwhelmed by heavy those men and women who made cinema happen in last tour in 2017, weighed down by the pressures of fame. deployment of auto-tune, mark a departure from the bub- 2019, to find calm and ensure that the festival of film blegum, EDM-laced pop that fans will remember from remains just that, a festival, the board... has unanimously Bieber’s teenage years. decided to resign,” the academy said in a statement. He enlisted a cohort of of-the-moment stars to collabo- “This collective decision will allow complete renewal rate on “Changes,” which features cameos from rappers of the board,” it added. The move, which has been wel- Post Malone, Quavo and Travis Scott, and singer Kehlani. comed by feminist groups, follows weeks of controversy Roman Polanski Justin Bieber Discovered by talent scouts as a young teenager after over the academy’s attitude to women and its lack of posting videos on YouTube, Bieber became an overnight transparency. In mid-January there was anger after the sensation who would eventually wobble-and then col- academy refused to let two young actresses invite their lapse-under the weight of his colossal celebrity. mentors, film-makers Virginie Despentes and Claire In tandem with his work on “Changes,” Bieber has Denis, to a dinner organized to honor the up-and-com- been releasing his 10-episode “Seasons” YouTube ing actors. Despentes and Denis are outspoken feminists. docuseries that offers a glimpse into his musical process, The academy came under fire again at the end of his desire to shun tabloid scrutiny, and reflections on bad January after Roman Polanski’s film “An Officer and a boy shenanigans that have included accidentally striking a Spy” topped the list of nominations for this year’s Cesar Bieber-whose run-ins with the law, drug abuse and photographer with his car and throwing eggs at a neigh- awards, due to be handed out on February 28. Polanski is other celeb antics have sent his reputation into free-fall- bor’s house. Recounting stories of substance abuse, the already persona non grata in Hollywood over the 1978 returns in introspective mood, opening up about his singer reveals how close he came to gravely endangering statutory rape of a 13-year-old girl. More recently he has depression, newfound joy in marriage and battle with his health. “Bro, I was like dying. My security and stuff denied new rape allegations from photographer Lyme disease. Over 17 bite-size, eminently streamable were coming into the room at night to check my pulse,” Valentine Monnier, who says he raped her at his Swiss tracks, “Changes” announces itself as an auditory comfort he says. “Like, people don’t know how serious it got. Like he Cesar film awards, France’s version of the chalet in 1975. blanket that offers love as a refuge in the all-consuming it was legit crazy scary.”— AFP TOscars, have been thrown into turmoil after the entire academy board resigned amid calls for crucible of superstardom. Stuffed with schmoopy valen- Growing pressure tines to his wife Hailey Baldwin Bieber, the album’s reform and a row over the long-running Roman France’s equality minister, women’s groups and some Polanski scandal. Here are some key facts about the film critics condemned the inclusion of Polanski’s film annual highlight of the French movie industry and one on the Cesars’ shortlist. But president of the academy of the most high-profile national film awards around Alain Terzian said it could not be expected to take the world. “moral positions” when evaluating films. The open letter from leading film industry figures, published late Inspired by the Oscars Monday in the French daily Le Monde, called for UK rapper The US Oscars were the inspiration behind the reform of the academy’s statutes, “which have not creation of the Cesar awards in 1975, the idea of Stormzy igh Fidelity,” the series, is out-a quarter of a changed for a very long time”. century after the book and 20 years after the French producer Georges Cravenne to acknowledge “H It protested that its 4,700 members had no say on those working in France’s film industry. It takes its film, transporting author Nick Hornby’s vinyl how the academy, or even its awards ceremony, was name from the French sculptor Cesar Baldaccini, a enthusiasts into the modern realm of Spotify. Between run. It attacked its lack of transparency and the under- the book and the series-released Friday in the US on the friend of Cravenne and the designer of the Cesar tro- representation of women. Signatories included many of phy. The first award ceremony took place at the now- online platform Hulu-the music world central to “High French cinema’s brightest and best: actors Mathieu Fidelity” has undergone a revolution. Still, the London shuttered Theatre de l’Empire in Paris on April 3, Almaric and Elodie Bouchez; directors Bertrand 1976, with some 1,700 people attending the three- record shop at the heart of Hornby’s book seems to fit Tavernier and Jacques Audiard; and producer Michel comfortably in 2020 Brooklyn, even if the CDs so popu- hour event broadcast live on French television. Hazanavicius, who picked up the 2011 Best Picture More recently the glitzy ceremony has been held lar at the time have gone the way of the dodo. Oscar for The Artist. Screenwriters Sarah Kucserka and Veronica West, and at the central Paris Chatelet theatre, attracting the In response, Terzian announced reforms were on the most glamorous figures from French cinema.