Did Beijing Olympics Rip Off Disney?

Sure sounds like it. Via the New York Times:

China lacks enough snow for the 2022 Winter Olympic Games, environmentalists said. China is too repressive to hold the Games, detaining hundreds of lawyers just in the past month, rights campaigners said. On Friday, despite those complaints, the International Olympic Committee awarded the Games to Beijing. Now some people are drawing attention to what may be a third early problem, one that could entangle China in a dispute with the Walt Disney Company or at least attract ridicule. An official song of the Games, “The Snow and Ice Dance,” they asserted, is suspiciously similar to “Let It Go,” the wildly popular ballad sung by Idina Menzel in the Disney animated film “Frozen.”

Landmarks Love Equality

Former Southern Baptists Head: Gays Are Stealing America's Cultural Icons

Todrick Hall - Beauty & The Beat Boots

Featuring cameos by RuPaul, Glozell, Lance Bass, Ross Mathews, Dan Franzese, and Frankie Grande. Plus a lot of beefcake. This is the sequel to the wildly popular 2013 Disney parody.

Disney Broadway To Host LGBT Families

Via Playbill:

Playbill will celebrate its second annual Playbill Pride initiative with Family Day OUT, a June 13 event that invites LGBT families and allies to attend special performances of Disney's The Lion King and Aladdin on Broadway. A partnership with Disney Theatrical Productions and Family Equality Council, Family Day OUT is sponsored by Amtrak and will bring together LGBT families, friends and allies who believe that all families are equal and deserve the same respect and protections under the law. The event is part of Playbill's second annual Playbill Pride initiative, a month-long celebration of the theatre world's LGBT community, which will return this June.

Family Day OUT kicks off at 11 AM with a pre-matinee party and lunch at Times Square's B.B. King Blues Club & Grill, where families have a chance to meet cast members from Disney’s Broadway productions of Aladdin and The Lion King, participate in hands-on activities hosted by Disney Teaching Artists, and celebrate Family Equality Council — the nation's leading advocacy group committed to securing family equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer parents. Family Day OUT will continue with select seating at the 2 PM matinee performances of Aladdin and The Lion King.

Get tickets here.

One Million Moms Vs Disney-ABC

Just in via press release:

Dear Joe, If you didn't know who Dan Savage is until today, it's probably a good thing. But right now we need you to familiarize yourselves with one of the cruelest, most vile political activists in America. Why? Because ABC and Disney announced their plans to air a sitcom Dan Savage developed loosely based on his life. A perusal of Dan Savage's work reveals a career built on advocating violence — even murder — and spewing hatred against people of faith. Savage has spared no one with whom he disagrees from his vitriolic hate speech. Despite his extremism, vulgarity, and unabashed encouragement of dangerous sexual practices, Disney-ABC is moving forward with this show, disgustingly titled "Family of the Year." TAKE ACTION: Sign our Petition to Disney-ABC, urging them to immediately cancel plans to air "Family of the Year." Then call Disney-ABC President Ben Sherwood at 877-660-5301. Urge him to cancel their pilot sitcom based on the life of hateful anti-Christian bigot Dan Savage.

RELATED: Emmy-winner Martha Plimpton has been cast to play the mother.

TRAILER: Tomorrowland

New trailer.

TRAILER: Frozen Fever

Media Matters: Right-Wing Rodeo

Another classic Alex Jones meltdown, Fox News host denies existence of bipolar disorder, and more of Fox News attacking Disney's Frozen.

Concernstipated Women: Disney's Frozen Is Totally A Threat To "Real Masculinity"

Via the Daily Beast:

‘Fox & Friends’ claims that Frozen empowers women by saying all men are fools and villains, and is therefore bad for society and harmful to little boys. For the love of god. There was a segment by the fearless thought leaders on Fox & Friends Wednesday morning, impressively delivered by all with a straight face, that claimed that the success of hit Disney animated film Frozen, a film about the love between sisters and a snowman who loves the beach, is a dire threat to masculinity as we know it. Yo, I get it. I’m a man. And as a man I know there’s nothing more manly than being afraid of a Disney Princess. In a timely segment airing 14 months after Frozen hit theaters, Fox & Friends host Steve Doocy wonders whether a film like Frozen is problematic, as it is “empowering girls but turning our men into fools and villains?”

(Tipped by JMG reader Larry)

Tony Perkins Has The Dan Savage Sadz

"Dan Savage says 'it gets better,' but don't be surprised if viewers get bitter after ABC's newest program. The Disney-owned network, for years a shill for the LGBT agenda, is taking their activism to amazing lows with its plans to bring the controversial 'sex therapist' to life in a regular feature. His dark and vile attacks on Christians have been well chronicled by Savage himself (so vulgar most are unprintable). Lately, though, the open atheist homosexual has taken a break from harassing high schoolers and Republicans to focus on this new fall sitcom, which, producers say, 'will follow the younger years of Savage's life and the experiences of his family following his decision to come out of the closet.' As desperate as the networks are to out-shock the competition, does ABC really want a pilot show based on an anti-Christian bully like Dan Savage?" - Hate group leader Tony Perkins, via email.

TRAILER: Cinderella

You'll recognize Cinderella as Downton Abbey's Lady Rose.

(Via Towleroad)

iTunes Issues 2014 Year-End Charts

Today iTunes issued its year-end bestsellers chart. Above is this year's top ten for digital singles. The soundtrack to Disney's Frozen tops the list for downloaded albums, followed closely by Taylor Swift's 1989 and Coldplay's Ghost Stories. The top three downloaded movies: Frozen, The Lego Movie, and The Wolf Of Wall Street. The top three downloaded television shows: Game Of Thrones, The Walking Dead, and Downton Abbey. Billboard Magazine's definitive 2014 recap of physical and digital music sales will come later this month.

Disney Reveals Star Wars VII Subtitle

Via the Verge:

Star Wars Episode: VII finally has a subtitle: The Force Awakens. Disney quietly announced the title on Twitter this morning — a somewhat strange approach to what is easily the most anticipated film in production right now. The title feels like a very classic Star Wars name, and it manages to create that feeling even without directly mimicking a prior title. That's no surprise given that director J.J. Abrams has made it clear that Episode VII is meant to feel like an extension of the original trilogy. He's said to be leaning heavily on practical effects, and the fact that he's brought back much of the original cast should help a good deal too.

Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens has a December 2015 release date.

TRAILER: Into The Woods

(Tipped by JMG reader Jeff)

Lana Del Rey - Once Upon A Dream

Via Stereogum:

Way back in January, before we’ knew anything at all about Ultraviolence beyond its title, Lana Del Rey’s eerie cover of the Disney classic “Once Upon A Dream” appeared in the trailer for Maleficent on Grammys night. Now the song from the trailer, which is actually a remix by Young Ruffian, has its own video built entirely out of footage from the movie.

TRAILER: Bears

Disney Sues DJ Deadmau5

Disney has filed a trademark claim against popular DJ and EDM artist Deadmau5, alleging that his famed headpiece logo is too Mickey Mouse.

According to Deadmau5’s lawyer, Dina LaPolt, the DJ’s logo is already a registered trademark in 30 countries, including the UK, Ireland and Germany. But not in America: Deadmau5 applied to the US patent and trademark office in June 2013, and Disney’s 171-page opposition papers were submitted this month, according to TMZ. “Given that the mau5head, and other identifying deadmau5 trademarks, have been used in the US and around the world for almost a decade, we wonder why Disney is only now coming after Deadmau5,” LaPolt said in a statement. Deadmau5 was much less polite: “Disney thinks you might confuse an established electronic musician/performer with a cartoon mouse,” he tweeted. “That’s how stupid they think you are.”

According to Forbes, Deadmau5 is earning $16M annually from merchandising and DJ gigs.

TRAILER: Into The Woods

From the recap:

“Into the Woods” is a modern twist on the beloved Brothers Grimm fairy tales, intertwining the plots of a few choice stories and exploring the consequences of the characters’ wishes and quests. This humorous and heartfelt musical follows the classic tales of Cinderella (Anna Kendrick), Little Red Riding Hood (Lilla Crawford), Jack and the Beanstalk (Daniel Huttlestone), and Rapunzel (MacKenzie Mauzy)—all tied together by an original story involving a baker and his wife (James Corden & Emily Blunt), their wish to begin a family and their interaction with the witch (Meryl Streep) who has put a curse on them.  Rob Marshall, the talented filmmaker behind the Academy Award®-winning musical “Chicago” and Disney’s “Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides,” helms the film, which is based on the Tony®-winning original musical by James Lapine, who also penned the screenplay, and legendary composer Stephen Sondheim, who provides the music and lyrics. Produced by Marshall, John DeLuca, “Wicked” producer Marc Platt and Callum McDougall. Starring Meryl Streep, Emily Blunt, James Corden, Anna Kendrick and Chris Pine, “Into the Woods” is a humorous and heartfelt musical that follows the classic tales of Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Jack and the Beanstalk, and Rapunzel—all tied together by an original story involving a baker and his wife, their wish to begin a family and their interaction with the witch who has put a curse on them.

The film opens on New Year's Day.

(Tipped by JMG reader Brad)

RELATED: Last month Sondheim revealed that he had agreed with Disney's requests for some fairly major plot changes.

Viral Video Of The Day

160K views in just a few hours. He's pretty great.

(Tipped by the Irish Atheist)