LR NINE SERIES The creator of "Family Guy," "American Dad!" and "A Million Ways to Die in the West" has teamed with the star of "Black Panther" and "42" to bring the story of the Little Rock Nine to television.
Variety reported last week that writer-producer-director Seth MacFarlane and actor Chadwick Boseman are joining forces as executive producers of a limited-run series based on "A Mighty Long Way: My Journey to Justice at Little Rock Central High" the bestselling memoir by Carlotta Walls, now known as Carlotta Walls LaNier, who was the youngest member of the Little Rock Nine and the first Black female graduate of Central.
Obie-Award-winning playwright and actress Eisa Davis, niece of civil-rights activist Angela Davis, will write for the series and is also an executive producer. Walls LaNier will consult on the as-yet-untitled project.
According to Variety, the show will be "set in 1957 after the landmark Supreme Court decision of Brown v. Board of Education. [Fourteen-year-old] Carlotta Walls is among the first black students to attend the all-white Central High in Little Rock ... . She walks into an unexpectedly violent struggle against integration, which suddenly turns her and the other black students into civil rights icons."
We'll confess that MacFarlane, who voiced (often hilariously, of course) maniacal child-man Stewie and other characters on "Family Guy," would not have been the first name that came to mind as producer of a show about the Little Rock Nine, but we are eager to see the series.
ELTON LOVES ERIN It's been a heady few weeks for singer-songwriter Erin Enderlin.
The Conway native, who now lives in Nashville, Tenn., won four Arkansas Country Music Awards -- Country Artist, Album, Songwriter and Song of the Year -- during an online ceremony Aug. 3.
And then there was this little surprise.
[Video not showing up above? Click here to view » https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCUxEy6RK9Q]
On Aug. 15, Elton John, during his weekly "Rocket Hour" radio show on Apple Music Beats 1, played "The Queen of Marina del Rey," a song from Enderlin's 2019 ACMA-winning album, "Faulkner County."
Enderlin namechecks the rock legend -- "Pink sunglasses on/like a young Elton John" -- and Rosanne Cash in the track, a vivid, tender character study about a fading LA singer reflecting on her incandescent youth.
Cash told John about it, and he was impressed by both the song and the record, which was produced by Jamey Johnson.
"Wow," he said on the program as the track faded out. "I do love her voice and that whole album is very, very special. We will play Erin Enderlin again on the 'Rocket Hour.'"
Check out the video for "The Queen of Marina del Rey" above.
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