The Bearded Trio

Here's a TV commercial from 2002 for Toys "Я" Us celebrating 20 years of E.T. The Extra Terrestrial.  In the commercial we see our friend E.T. getting confused over the giraffe's name.  It's Geoffrey by the way. The Bearded Trio - The Site For Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, John Williams and a whole lot more.

A Q & A With Jeff Commings, Host of the Podcast John Williams, A Musical Journey Happy Holidays everyone, Brad here. At some point in our lives, we have all been dazzled, calmed, thrilled and moved by the music of John Williams, perhaps the finest film score writer/conductor who has ever lived. If you're like me, you grew up with his themes for Yoda, Superman, Indiana Jones and many other iconic characters on your record/CD/tape/mp3 players on a fairly constant basis. However, I never studied music in any kind of formal way. But I wanted to learn more about the construction and meaning of those themes that have been such a soundtrack of my life. Thus, my discovery of Jeff Commings' podcast The Baton: A John Williams Musical Journey . A couple years ago, Jeff set out to build a podcast on analyzing, one by one, every musical score Williams has written dating back to the start of his career in 1959. It was an ambitious project, but one that comes to a conclusion tomorrow (Dec

The year hasn’t ended yet, but we lost two more Star Wars icons in December with Dave Prowse and Jeremy Bulloch . I never had the pleasure of meeting Dave Prowse, but got his autograph quite a while back when OfficialPix had done a signing with him. I did however, have many opportunities to meet Jeremy Bulloch and got his signature on action figures, 8x10’s and what not. He was always very kind and pleasant and was a joy to be around. Back in November of 2017, there was a convention in the Chicagoland area called “Days of the Dead”, which is primarily a horror-themed con, but Jeremy Bulloch was appearing there, and they were offering a rare chance for a photo-op with him IN the Boba Fett armor, with Han Solo in carbonite as a backdrop. Everyone got two pictures with him, one with the helmet on, and one with it off. I was so glad to have had that opportunity. The other photo-op I did with him was back at “Star Wars Celebration Anaheim” in 2015. It was a group pic of him along with Dan

Rare video showing Spielberg on set directing the visitor centre sequence and the Brachiosaur sequence. We also get a very rare glimpse at a deleted scene, and some unused footage.

The Mandalorian Season 2 Chapter 16 Review I'M WARNING YOU RIGHT NOW, SPOILERS FOR THE LATEST OF THE MANDALORIAN ARE BELOW. I SHIELD YOU FROM NOTHING!  OK, YOU'RE WARNED! IF YOU HAVEN'T WATCHED THE EPISODE YET, STOP HERE, GO WATCH IT AND COME BACK FOR MY REVIEW. WE GOOD? OK, those are the formalities officially out of the way. Each week, I'll be posting a quick recap/review of each new episode of The Mandalorian. I'll give a basic play-by-play with some thoughts and speculation about how each episode could figure into the larger picture of this season, and Star Wars as a whole. So let's get after it. SEASON 2: CHAPTER 16 : "THE RESCUE" EPISODE PREMIERS ON December 18, 2020 DIRECTOR : PEYTON REED EPISODE LENGTH : 47 MINUTES Wow. What a finale. Director Peyton Reed, writer Jon Favreau and company didn't mess around in the final episode of season 2 of The Mandalorian. They went there, and by "there" I mean "THERE!"  We begin in sp

We would like to take this opportunity to wish Steven Spielberg a very happy 74th Birthday. Thank you for all the wonderful movie memories over the years. Thank you for deciding to pursue a career in film so you could bring us wonderful journeys such as Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Raiders of the Lost Ark, E.T. The Extra Terrestrial, Jurassic Park and Schindler's List. I could go on, and that's just the movies. On the small screen you help bring some classic such as Duel, Animaniacs, Taken, Falling Skies, Tiny Toons, Band of Brothers, ER and like the movie classics you brought us, so many more. We hope you don't retire for many years and continue to enlighten our lives with your magic on the big and small screens. Thank you for inspiring us, along with George Lucas and John Williams who are your long term collaborators to create this web site. Happy Birthday Steven. The Bearded Trio - The Site For Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, John Williams and a whole lot

SUPERMAN: THE MOVIE “I’M HERE TO FIGHT FOR TRUTH, JUSTICE, AND THE AMERICAN WAY.” - Superman  U.S. Release Date: December 15, 1978 Starring: Marlon Brando, Gene Hackman, Christopher Reeve Music by: John Williams  Directed by: Richard Donner Oscar win: Best Visual Effects This week is the 42nd anniversary of what most people consider to be the greatest superhero film of all time. It also happens to be my all-time favorite film. It started the superhero genre on the big screen, and to this day is the gold standard on how superhero films are made or ought to be made. The director of 2017’s WONDER WOMAN used this film as a template, and the president of Marvel Studios has stated that they use it as inspiration in their films.  Much has been documented about the making of this great blockbuster that almost wasn’t. Both director Dick Donner and executive producer Ilya Salkind have gone on record about the trials and tribulations of trying to make a man fly, because many special effects had t

HOME ALONE “I MADE MY FAMILY DISAPPEAR!” - Kevin U.S. Release Date: November 16, 1990 Starring: Macaulay Culkin, Joe Pesci, Daniel Stern Music by: John Williams  Directed by: Chris Columbus Last month saw the 30th anniversary of one of the highest grossing comedies of all time. Little eight-year-old Kevin is left behind to defend his home from burglars after his family hastily flies to Paris without him.  John Hughes got the idea for the script while working on his previous film UNCLE BUCK with John Candy and Macaulay Culkin. Hughes loved Culkin’s performance so much that he wrote the part of Kevin for him, though he’d only be cast after hundreds of other kids auditioned first, including the actor who would play Kelvin’s brother Buzz.  Hughes chose Chris Columbus to direct after backing out of his previous project, CHRISTMAS VACATION, due to clashing with its star Chevy Chase. Hughes wanted to give Columbus another shot because of his love for Christmas. Columbus had previously written

The Mandalorian Season 2 Chapter 15 Review I'M WARNING YOU RIGHT NOW, SPOILERS FOR THE LATEST OF THE MANDALORIAN ARE BELOW. I SHIELD YOU FROM NOTHING!  OK, YOU'RE WARNED! IF YOU HAVEN'T WATCHED THE EPISODE YET, STOP HERE, GO WATCH IT AND COME BACK FOR MY REVIEW. WE GOOD? OK, those are the formalities officially out of the way. Each week, I'll be posting a quick recap/review of each new episode of The Mandalorian. I'll give a basic play-by-play with some thoughts and speculation about how each episode could figure into the larger picture of this season, and Star Wars as a whole. So let's get after it. SEASON 2: CHAPTER 14 : "THE BELIEVER" EPISODE PREMIERS ON December 11, 2020 DIRECTOR : RICK FAMUYIWA EPISODE LENGTH : 38 MINUTES The penultimate episode of season 2 of The Mandalorian dropped Friday morning, just hours after the massive announcement of 10 future Star Wars projects at the Disney Investor Day. Similar to chapter 7, this episode served mostl

The Walt Disney Company had its Investors Day event Thursday evening, and an absolute deluge of news for Star Wars/Lucasfilm/Indiana Jones was revealed. INDIANA JONES Kathleen Kennedy announced the fifth - AND FINAL (emphasis mine) - Indiana Jones film, slated for release in July 2022. Kennedy confirmed that Harrison Ford would return in the iconic role of Indy, with James Mangold stepping in to direct the final installment of our favorite whip-cracking hero.  I have been in the camp of feeling that, with all the delays, maybe we'd be better off without Indy 5. Ford will be nearly 79 years old when the movie starts production in late spring of 2021. Will John Williams return to score the film? Will Steven Spielberg's touch be missed as much as I suspect it will? How much of an action hero can a 78-year-old Ford realistically be? Regardless of these questions, Lucasfilm is plowing ahead with Indy 5. STAR WARS The sheer volume of content coming out for the Star Wars franchise, as

What do you do when you need to produce a movie trailer for The Empire Strikes Back but don't have any film footage?  Easy, use Ralph McQuarrie concept paintings throughout the trailer.  That'll do the job. Well, why wouldn't it worked?  See for yourself in this original trailer for ESB.

The Mandalorian Season 2 Chapter 14 Review I'M WARNING YOU RIGHT NOW, SPOILERS FOR THE LATEST OF THE MANDALORIAN ARE BELOW. I SHIELD YOU FROM NOTHING!  OK, YOU'RE WARNED! IF YOU HAVEN'T WATCHED THE EPISODE YET, STOP HERE, GO WATCH IT AND COME BACK FOR MY REVIEW. WE GOOD? OK, those are the formalities officially out of the way. Each week, I'll be posting a quick recap/review of each new episode of The Mandalorian. I'll give a basic play-by-play with some thoughts and speculation about how each episode could figure into the larger picture of this season, and Star Wars as a whole. So let's get after it. SEASON 2: CHAPTER 14: "THE TRAGEDY" EPISODE PREMIERS ON December 4, 2020 DIRECTOR: ROBERT RODRIGUEZ EPISODE LENGTH: 34 MINUTES This episode of The Mandalorian, more than any that came before it, combined elements of different eras of the Star Wars mythology together in an action-packed and tense chapter, the sixth one of the second season. We had strong vi

Real air-traffic controllers were used in the opening sequence. The synthesizer technician/performer was the actual engineer sent by ARP Instruments to install the synthesizer equipment (ARP 2500) on the set. Steven Spielberg watched his expert playing of the equipment and immediately cast him for the role. The name of the ARP engineer is Philip Dodds and he is actually mentioned in the credits.