The “Uniqueness” of the 2021 Grammy’s

Everyone looks forward to the Grammy Award Show this year on CBS on March 14. Of course, there had to be some adjustments made in order for the show to be put on—and the show must go on in spite of who won’t attend.

Some of these modifications include:

1. Because of the on-going pandemic, the original air date had to be changed from the end of January to mid-March.

2. A sudden increase in cases of COVID-19 made producers changed home base from California to Georgia

3. Also, because of the above restrictions, there won’t be an audience in the auditorium.

Performers appearing in person will have to encourage each other. Some performing bands will prerecord themselves from other locations. A list of performers can be found here. A list of nominees can be found here.

4. Bar tenders and ticket managers will present awards to those performers in the Independent category.

No show can go on without some form of trouble. It’s a shame when good artists’ work gets ignored by Grammy voters. That’s exactly why Justin Bieber won’t be attending the Grammy’s this year. Hold on, there is more to the story. While Bieber’s name has been placed four times, no doubt making him happy, he fumes because his album, “Changes”, was placed under the wrong label. It makes me wonder why it couldn’t be placed under both Pop and R&B?

Someone needs to offer Zayn Malik a bar of soap, not a basket of sweets, for his F-bomb tweeted to the Grammys. He is not even listed as a possible award winner in this year’s show. His album, “Nobody’s Listening”, missed the cut off date. Cool it dude. Your daughter might be listening. Let’s hope she doesn’t inherit your filthy mouth.

There is good news, though, viewers will have more than one way to watch the Grammys this year. CBS and Paramount Plus will air the Grammy’s at 8 pm EST.

Paramount Plus Debuts March 4

Add another streaming service, Paramount Plus, formerly CBS All Access, to the growing number of networks that have joined the “streaming wars”.

According to an article written March 1, the renamed network will include:  live news and sports as well as on-demand shows and movies, including originals — all of which belong to parent company ViacomCBS’ other channels, like CBS, MTV, BET, Comedy Central, Nickelodeon  and Paramount Network, as well as its Paramount Pictures movie studio.

“Yellowstone” will not be part of this service, mainly because it is currently streaming on another   network, but there will be prequels to this series added later in the year. In addition to the above,. Paramount + will also have: a library of more than 30,000 episodes and 2,500 movies, plus 36 original series debut this year. Among those originals will be a reboot of the 90s sitcom  “Frasier” an update of Nickelodeon’s Rugrats  and a new studio dedicated to the Avatar: The Last Airbender idea, founded by the original cartoon’s creators who will come up with a variety of programming, including a new animated movie.

This makes it harder to choose what service to get because Disney Plus has their library of films and television shows as well as Harry Potter, Pixar, Marvel, National Geographic and The Chronicles of Narnia. Some of what  Discovery Plus has been: HGTV, Food Network, TLC, Animal Planet, OWN, Discovery, Discovery+ Originals, Investigation Discovery, Magnolia Network, A&E, Lifetime, History,  and The Science Channel.

One thing that surprised me in the ads for this new network was that they will have some shows with Charles M Schultz’s “Peanuts” characters. Late last year, there was a public uproar when Apple iTV+ took over the right to stream the holiday specials that once aired free on CBS. PBS tried showing these specials, but the air times were out of sync. Viewers like myself, watched them on YouTube.

Coming To America 2 has a few ‘surprises’

The long-awaited sequel of Coming To America starts March 5, with some surprises. The first is that Akeem finds out he has a son and goes back to Queens, New York to find him and get to know him.

As a blogger, it might not be any big surprise that, like Arsenio Hall’s character, Semi, Akeem forgot himself during a weak moment. Hopefully, he can explain himself to his queen, Lisa Joffer. That should be interesting to say the least. It makes me wonder how Princes William and Harry took the news that they had a half sister? Better yet, how did the late Princess Diana take it?

Another big surprise is Eddie Murphy’s daughter, Bella Murphy stars in this sequel with her father. Not only did Eddie Murphy break a l family rule of his children  being ‘of age’, meaning she had to be 18 when entering acting as a career, also  had to try out  for the role like everyone else. A lot of stars do this to their children. Bella’s character is Princess Omma, the second of three daughters of Zamundan Prince-turned-King Akeem, has with wife, Queen Lisa Joffer (Shari Headley) in the sequel to the 1988 classic Coming to America.

The trailer to this movie looks promising. It is my hope that the cloud of copyright infringement doesn’t follow along like it did the 1988 film. However, the headlines are saying now that the movie studio ‘coerced’ Eddie Murphy to cast a white actor in the first movie while they say nothing about Samuel L. Jackson’s stereotypical role of playing a street thug that rips off Mac Dowell’s. At least there is more than one.

This movie premieres March 5 and can be streamed via Amazon Prime. It might be well worth the cost.