Joseph Patel: Last News

A new documentary on the legendary Detroit producer and rapper J Dilla is in the works from executive producer Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson, drummer for The Roots and director of the Oscar-winning Summer of Soul. The film is based on the book Dilla Time: The Life and Afterlife of J Dilla, The Hip-Hop Producer Who Reinvented Rhythm by Dan Charnas. Questlove will team up once more alongside Joseph Patel, his co-producer on Summer of Soul, with a producing team of Zarah Zolhman, Shawn Gee, Tariq Trotter, Rodrigo Bascuñán, Darby Wheeler, and Anupa Mistry (both Patel and Mistry are former employees of The FADER).

Jem Aswad Executive Editor, Music The new documentary “Sly Lives, aka the Burden of Black Genius,” which focuses on the life and career of the brilliant but troubled musician Sly Stone and his group Sly and the Family Stone, is both a conventional documentary and an extremely unconventional one. Like its predecessor, the Oscar and Grammy-winning “Summer of Soul” — which was also directed by the Roots’ Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson and produced by Joseph Patel — “Sly Lives” works to incorporate the main story with a larger theme, in this case, as the subtitle indicates, the pressures that come with being both Black and a genius — pressures that have brought down more than one such genius and have led many of them toward self-destruction.

The first time Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson had a film at the Sundance Film Festival, The Roots co-founder never got to share it with a live audience due to the Covid lockdown that saw the 2021 gathering go virtual only. Tonight, with the 9:30 p.m. MT premiere of Sly Lives! (aka The Burden of Black Genius) at Park City’s sure to be sold out Eccles Theatre, it’s going to be a whole new Sundance for the Summer of Soul director and Academy Award winner.

EXCLUSIVE: Peacock is stocking up on more true-crime docuseries.

Onyx Collective has landed a pair of documentaries including Questlove’s upcoming Sly Stone film.

Oscar-winner Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson has lined up his next project – a documentary on the late groundbreaking hip hop producer J Dilla (James Dewitt Yancey).

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorRepublic Records has announced the promotion of Chris Blackwell to EVP of A&R and Content Strategy, as announced today by label president Wendy Goldstein.According to the announcement, in this new role, Blackwell will continue to shepherd the creation and development of content for the entire Republic Records roster. Additionally, he will work with new artists to identify and maximize content opportunities at the onset of their careers. Blackwell played a major role in Coi Leray’s rise by producing her viral “Cooking With Coi Leray,” and also collaborated with Ka$hdami, Lil Wayne, Benee and Kash Doll on upcoming programming.

Thania Garcia On the heels of winning an Oscar for best documentary feature and a Grammy for best music film, Questlove’s “Summer of Soul (… Or When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised)” continues to make an impact — this time with festival organizers.Harlem Festival of Culture, a reimagined version of the weeks-long festival at the center of the film, will take place in the summer of 2023 at Marcus Garvey Park, the site of the concerts in the film (it was called Mount Morris Park at the time of the original 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival). Like the original, the festival will be a multi-day outdoor event.According to Billboard, Ambassador Digital Magazine editor-in-chief Musa Jackson (who attended the original 1969 fest and is also featured in the doc), Nikoa Evans, and Yvonne McNair are the festival’s co-founders.

Clayton Davis Will Smith, Chris Rock and the Academy may feel they can turn the page on this dramatic chapter following the announcement that Smith would be banned from the ceremony for 10 years. But there’s too much reliance on written statements and not enough acknowledgment that multiple apologies are missing from all parties.   For Smith, who won best actor for his performance as Serena and Venus Williams’ father in “King Richard,” an Instagram post saying he “accepts and respect the Academy’s decision” is not the type of penance the general public, the industry, your colleagues and co-stars are expecting.

On March 27, the Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson-directed Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised) won the Oscar for Best Documentary. A week later, the film won the Grammy for Best Music Film, becoming only the third documentary to achieve the feat, following 20 Feet from Stardom and Amy.

Back up! One week after Will Smith slapped Chris Rock at the Oscars, Questlove poked fun at the incident as he presented a Grammy Award.

Smith tearfully explained his actions as those of a man seeking to protect his family from abuse – Rock had referred to his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith’s baldness, even though she had recently made public a diagnosis of alopecia. Backstage, Rock declared himself “fine” and declined to pursue the matter. The Academy apparently asked Smith to leave the auditorium, but seemed satisfied by his refusal.

Afternoon all, Max Goldbart here looking back on quite a week. Lots to digest so the Insider has you covered. Read on.

One person has a serious bone to pick with Chris Rock after the Oscars — and not exactly for the reason you might guess.

Joseph Patel criticized Will Smith and Chris Rock for the events that led up to "Summer of Soul" winning the Oscar for best documentary feature Sunday night. The "Summer of Soul" producer accused Smith of robbing the category of its moment after he slapped Rock on stage before the comedian announced the award. "It robbed the category of its moment," the producer wrote in since-deleted tweets, People magazine noted.

When Will Smith stepped on stage and slapped Chris Rock for joking about his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith, at this year's Oscars the fallout was immediately huge. Arguably the first to suffer from the whole debacle were the winners of Best Documentary Feature award Rock was on stage to present. That prize went to Summer Of Soul, the excellent documentary about the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival directed by Questlove of The Roots.

Summer Of Soul producer Joseph Patel has said that Will Smith “robbed” Questlove of his winning moment and last week’s Oscars.Questlove was handed the Best Documentary statue by Chris Rock at this year’s ceremony, just moments after Smith slapped Rock onstage over a joke he made about wife Jada Pinkett Smith’s shaved head. In 2018, Pinkett Smith revealed she has alopecia.Smith has been widely criticised for his outburst. While accepting the Best Actor award for his performance in King Richard, he apologised to the Academy as well as his fellow nominees in the category.He later issued a formal apology to Rock, admitting: “I was out of line and I was wrong.” The Oscars, meanwhile, launched a formal review into the incident while condemning Smith’s actions.Today (March 31) Joseph Patel posted a lengthy thread on Twitter to share “some thoughts and feelings on what happened Sunday night”, adding that he’s “still sort of processing” everything.“I think what Will did was selfish,” he continued.

Oscar-winning producer Joseph Patel has shared his experience from Sunday night, accepting the award for Best Documentary Feature in the immediate aftermath of Will Smith slapping presenter Chris Rock across the face. In a long Twitter thread, the Summer Of Soul (Or, When The Revolution Could Not Be Televised…) producer called Smith’s actions “selfish,” but reserved harsher criticism for Rock who he says was “an absolute f***ing dick.”

J. Kim Murphy Joseph Patel, a producer on the Oscar-winning documentary “Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised),” has blasted Chris Rock for his presentation of the category during Sunday’s ceremony, in which Rock introduced Patel and the producers other than Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson as a group of “four white guys.”“The reason that makes me SO SO VERY ANGRY is because I was so proud to be one of a handful of South Asians to have ever won an Oscar in the history of the award,” Patel wrote in a Twitter thread airing his frustrations on Wednesday evening.

Will Smith smacking presenter Chris Rock’s face just moments before the musician’s win for Best Documentary Feature for “Summer of Soul.“Questlove now says he had no idea the altercation between the two men had even occurred because he was practicing Transcendental Meditation before the winner was announced to get into the zone.“When the commercial break was happening, I was just in my [space],” first-time director Questlove said on Monday’s “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.” “So when I opened my eyes, I didn’t realize — why is everyone so quiet? Like, I literally was not present for that whole entire moment,” the 51-year-old musician, whose group is the house band on the talk show, told Jimmy Fallon. Questlove’s win was announced by a shaken Rock, 57, immediately following the incident.“As I’m walking to the stage, I’m kind of putting two and two together, and I realized that that was a real moment, like, maybe three seconds before I spoke words,” the filmmaker added.

There was a time during the pre-pandemic when zeitgeist documentaries like RBG and Won’t You Be My Neighbor were bright spots at the box office.