\n\tThe upcoming film awards season has its first official entry.<\/p>\n
\n\tVariety has learned exclusively that Paris Barclay\u2019s documentary \u201cBilly Preston<\/a>: That\u2019s the Way God Planned It\u201d is the first film uploaded to the Academy Screening Room. On the members-only platform, Oscar voters can stream movies for awards consideration for the 99th Academy Awards.<\/p>\n \n\tThe upload serves as the unofficial starting gun for a race that will unfold over the next eight-plus months. A new wave of titles is expected to arrive in the coming weeks, with films added every Friday through the end of the season across all categories, including best picture, specialty races, documentary feature, animated feature, international feature and short film categories.<\/p>\n \n\tThis is the earliest date that the Academy has made the first screener available to its approximately 11,000 members. Typically, the initial slate of films is uploaded in August. The first wave of films will give industry voters a head start on watching movies for consideration for the upcoming Academy Awards.<\/p>\n \n\tDistributed by Abramorama, the film currently holds a 90% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. It was released in select theaters Feb. 20, beginning with a run at New York City\u2019s Film Forum, after premiering at SXSW in Austin, Texas, in 2024. Reviewing the film for Variety<\/a> following its SXSW debut, chief film critic Owen Gleiberman wrote that \u201cas the documentary reveals, Billy Preston was an elusive figure \u2014 ebullient and all there, and also hidden and mysterious.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tAlso adding: \u201cJust when you think you\u2019re watching an upbeat pop doc, the dark side of Billy Preston\u2019s life comes crashing in. And is it ever dark.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThe film, which overcame a legal challenge on the eve of its SXSW premiere, chronicles the life of the legendary keyboardist and Grammy winner, who performed alongside The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, Barbra Streisand, Little Richard and many others. <\/p>\n \n\tDirected by Barclay, who co-writes with Cheo Hodari Coker, the documentary features interviews with Billy Porter, Ringo Starr, Merry Clayton and Preston\u2019s longtime friend Eric Clapton, alongside an original score by Robert Glasper. Producers include Stephanie Allain, Coker, Jeanne Elfant Festa and Nigel Sinclair.<\/p>\n \n\tPreston enjoyed a successful solo career, scoring No. 1 hits with \u201cOuta-Space,\u201d \u201cWill It Go Round in Circles,\u201d \u201cNothing From Nothing\u201d and \u201cYou Are So Beautiful.\u201d His breakthrough single, \u201cThat\u2019s the Way God Planned It,\u201d was recorded in 1969 for The Beatles\u2019 Apple Records and produced by his friend George Harrison. Preston died in 2006 and was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2021.<\/p>\n \n\tThe documentary marks Barclay\u2019s first feature-length film and is by one of television\u2019s most acclaimed and accomplished directors. Across a career spanning nearly 200 episodes on TV, he has helmed series such as \u201cNYPD Blue,\u201d \u201cER,\u201d \u201cThe West Wing,\u201d \u201cLost,\u201d \u201cThe Good Wife,\u201d \u201cCSI,\u201d \u201cSons of Anarchy,\u201d \u201cHouse,\u201d \u201cGlee\u201d and more. <\/p>\n \n\tBarclay won two Emmy Awards for directing \u201cNYPD Blue\u201d and has earned eight additional Emmy nominations for producing and directing, including three for \u201cGlee,\u201d one for \u201cThe West Wing\u201d and one for \u201cMonster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story.\u201d He remains one of the few directors in Emmy history to receive directing nominations in all three television formats: drama, comedy and limited series.<\/p>\n \n\tThe upcoming Oscar season brings lots of anticipated titles from auteur filmmakers such as Christopher Nolan (\u201cThe Odyssey\u201d), Denis Villeneuve (\u201cDune: Part Three\u201d), Martin McDonagh (\u201cWild Horse Nine\u201d) and more. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced on Wednesday that it will present Honorary Oscars<\/a> to veteran actress Glenn Close, legendary director Ridley Scott and Disney\u2019s first Black animator Floyd Norman, while producers Christine Vachon and Pamela Koffler, longtime champions of independent film, will receive the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award.<\/p>\n \n\tThe penultimate Academy Awards for Disney platforms will be hosted by Conan O\u2019Brien and will air live on ABC and Hulu from the Dolby Theatre at Ovation Hollywood on Sunday, March 14, at 7 p.m. ET\/4 p.m. PT.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The upcoming film awards season has its first official entry. Variety has learned exclusively that Paris Barclay\u2019s documentary…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":696713,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[172460,88,206,29506],"class_list":["post-696712","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-billy-preston","tag-entertainment","tag-movies","tag-oscars"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/696712","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=696712"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/696712\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/696713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=696712"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=696712"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=696712"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}