A musical you might actually want to watch, like the silver lining in a big dark cloud. Rolling Stone reports: “Eighty years after it was first put on film, and 41 years after a turbulent but hugely successful remake starring Barbra Streisand and Kris Kristofferson, the latest version of A Star Is Born is headed to movie theaters once again. Also a starring vehicle for Judy Garland in 1954, the oft-told tale of a show-business couple at opposite ends of their fame, returns to the big screen with a wide-ranging soundtrack featuring song on which the film’s star, first-time director Bradley Cooper collaborated with Jason Isbell, Lukas Nelson, Mark Ronson and Lady Gaga, who co-stars with Cooper.
The tale of singers Jackson Maine (Cooper), and Ally, a talented unknown played by Gaga, who’s credited by her real name, Stefani Germanotta, A Star Is Born is due next spring with an original soundtrack and scenes which like last year’s Oscar-winning La La Land, feature music that was performed live on set. Cooper also notes, in a feature for Entertainment Weekly, that other writers from Music City were involved in crafting the original songs for the project.
“The song Jason Isbell wrote for Jackson became the staple, the sword with which a lot of the music spawned from me,” says Cooper. “And he sent that early on in the demo through Dave Cobb, who’s a producer out of Nashville I worked with, who was fantastic – especially in creating the aesthetic of Jackson’s instruments.”
A Star Is Born, which also includes members of Lukas Nelson’s band Promise of the Real backing Cooper’s character onstage, was previously slated to be directed by Clint Eastwood with Beyoncé in the lead. After the singer’s 2011 pregnancy delayed production, she dropped out and Eastwood directed Cooper in American Sniper. A Star Is Born will be in theaters May 18th.
