‘Never Rarely’
makes the grade
Critic Justin Chang
calls Eliza Hittman’s
new film (with Sidney
Flanigan, above)
“exquisite.” E4
Disney’s toe in
LGBTQ waters
Pixar’s “Onward”
features the studio’s
first gay character.
But it feels like a
token gesture. E2
What’s on TV........E10
Comics...............E12-13
Focus Features
CALENDAR
FRIDAY, MARCH 13, 2020:: LATIMES.COM/CALENDAR
E
Just before Noah Cyrus walked onstage at
the Roxy on Tuesday night, Gogo Morrow
showed off how she was preparing for concerts
in the age of coronavirus.
“We figured out a whole new way to greet
each other,” the 28-year-old said and extended a
foot to tap toes with her friend Tayler Green, 27.
Both live in L.A. and are big live music fans.
They had decided not to let the spread of
COVID-19 stop them from enjoying their
nightlife. As Cyrus played her trap-pop single
“Live or Die” to the sold-out crowd, the virus was
on their minds, but it hadn’t kept them barri-
caded at home. Not yet at least. “I’m definitely
washing my hands a lot more,” Green said. “But
it’s not like ‘OMG I’m never going out again.’ ”
They might have felt differently just a couple
of days later. After a week when most travel from
Europe was banned, Coachella was postponed
until October, the NBA season was suspended
and the country finally accepted that a pan-
demic is truly spreading, going out to concerts
was both a way to cling to normalcy and, per-
haps, a pleasure that should stop immediately.
Over two nights, The Times went to various
local shows to see how music fans were reacting
to the pandemic and to get a glimpse of how the
city’s live music scene may change as the reality
of coronavirus sets in.
Some fans seemed cavalier about it all, mak-
ing jokes with friends and pressing the flesh in
crowds from Highland Park to West Hollywood.
Now those nights feel like a last gasp before
the music stopped.
On Wednesday, California Gov. Gavin New-
som recommended that all gatherings of over
250 people should be canceled. The following
day, Live Nation and AEG, North America’s
largest concert promoters, announced that
they were suspending all of their tours currently
on the road, domestically and internationally.
Andrew Odom is a member of the Los Ange-
les Nightlife Alliance, an activist group that
works with nightlife promoters to improve ven-
ue safety. Usually, its work is more focused on
things like fire prevention and training staff how
to intervene in a suspected drug overdose. But
coronavirus is a whole new worry, one that even
seasoned promoters are trying to get a grasp on.
“Our community’s
NIGHTCLUBSincluding the Roxy were open Wednesday. Concertgoers reacted to coronavirus concerns with humor and pragmatism.
Gary CoronadoLos Angeles Times
Will nightlife dim?
L.A.’s clubs were open this week, but the industry and fans
are braced for coronavirus closures, which would rock finances
By August Brown
and Randall Roberts
[SeeNightlife, E11]
Looking out of his office
window out to the big sky
and Sangre de Cristo moun-
tains that surround New
Mexico’s Tesuque Pueblo,
Timothy J. Brown recalled
movies that used the arrest-
ing landscape as a backdrop,
from James Stewart’s 1955
western “The Man from Lar-
amie,” to this year’s “News of
the World.”
The 75,000-square-foot
facility north of Santa Fe
was used as a location for the
Universal Pictures movie
featuring Tom Hanks. After
it wrapped last year, Brown,
who heads economic devel-
opment for the Tesuque
Tribe, moved to repurpose a
casino building the tribe had
built on the pueblo’s 17,500
acres and make it a perma-
nent production facility,
with an initial investment of
$50 million. Billed as the first
studio owned by a Native
American tribe, Camel Rock
Studios officially opens Fri-
day.
“They’ve been in the
movie business since 1955
and about 20 movies and TV
shows have been filmed on
the pueblo,” said Brown.
“The tribe is committed to
expanding their business
and to create jobs for the
tribe and to create more self-
sufficiency.”
Named after the nearby
40-foot pink sandstone
Camel Rock, the studio
gives the community a stake
in a production boom taking
place locally and nationally.
Studios including Comcast’s
NBCUniversal and Netflix
are investing billions of dol-
lars in New Mexico, lured by
lucrative state tax incen-
tives.
Although New Mexico’s
native people have been cap-
tured on film since the 19th
century, tribal leaders felt
that native people haven’t
always benefited from Holly-
wood. The new studio is in-
tended to address that by
creating more jobs and
training for the community
as the industry pushes to di-
versify its ranks.
“The more facilities we
have the better it is for our
region,” said Jennifer
LaBar-Tapia, film liaison of-
ficer for the Santa Fe film of-
fice. Two local studios,
Santa Fe and Garson Stu-
dios, are already full up, she
[SeeCamel Rock,E10]
New
film
studio
augurs
change
Native Americans
open their first studio,
Camel Rock, in a
booming New Mexico.
By Anousha Sakoui
The best thing that ever
happened to the under-
whelming genre exercise
that is “The Hunt” was Uni-
versal’s decision to cancel its
planned September 2019
release in the face of protests
about its putative “elites
hunt down deplorables”
plotline.
For one thing the delay
until now gave the studio’s
publicity team the opportu-
nity to craft a crackerjack
marketing campaign with
the tagline “The Most
Talked About Movie of the
Year Is One That No One’s
Actually Seen,” a promotion
that has more going for it
than the actual film.
More than that, the delay
disguised that this middling
film is less transgressive and
more by the numbers than it
would have you believe.
Written by Nick Cuse and
Damon Lindelof (whose
television collaborations in-
clude HBO’s “The Left-
overs” and “Watchmen”)
and directed by Craig Zobel,
“The Hunt” lacks the
courage of its presumed con-
victions, displaying no more
than a determination to
make as much cash as pos-
sible by exploiting national
divisions less covetous indi-
viduals are despairing of
rather than monetizing.
Toothless and obvious as
AT THE MOVIES: REVIEW
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Controversial ‘Hunt’ loses its way
HILLARY SWANK, left, and Betty Gilpin battle it out in “The Hunt,” written by
Nick Cuse and Damon Lindelof and directed by Craig Zobel.
Patti PerretUniversal Pictures
The liberals-versus-
conservatives
exploitation thriller
ultimately disappoints.
KENNETH TURAN
FILM CRITIC
[See‘Hunt,’E9]
The arts and more on hold
The Pantages suspends “Hamilton” for
March, plus more cancellations. E11