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16/07/04:
Be right back !
There will be no updates during the next 2 weeks as I am off on holiday.
Please post any latest news here and also check there for news updates.
Alternativley we reccomend:
abbaonspeakingterms.com
and
Raffem.com
Super Troupers – 30 years of ABBA : The Agnetha interview
Here is a press release from Iambic productions regarding Agnetha’s interview:
�Super Troupers � 30 Years of Abba�
In previous newsletters it was reported that Iambic Productions gained access to film
three of the four ex-members of Abba for their documentary �Super Troupers � 30 Years
of Abba�. Chris Hunt, Chief Executive of Digital Classics, is pleased to report that a new
interview with the fourth member of the group, Agnetha, has been incorporated.
Agnetha, known as the �new Garbo�, is a particular bonus to the film as she is a virtual
recluse.
The documentary shows the stars on and around their 30 th anniversary and also looks
back over their extraordinary careers. Footage includes the stars back-stage at smash
west end show �Mamma Mia�. Björn Ulvaeus, from Abba, is one of the producers of this
£3 million show which includes 27 Abba songs including �Dancing Queen�, �Take A
Chance On Me�, �Knowing Me Knowing You� and �Money Money Money�.
The documentary is currently scheduled for a prime-time slot, early October for ITV.
Furthermore, Chris Hunt will be meeting with his sales and marketing team in July to
preview the film and target all potential TV and DVD customers here and overseas.
Thanks to Gary, UK
Bjorn & Frida at Mamma Mia! Stuttgart Premiere
Various reports say that Bjorn and Frida will be at the Stuttgart Premiere of Mamma Mia! It is on the 18th July and will be the second production to open in Germany.
13/07/04:
Super Troupers 30 years of ABBA
Here is an update on the documentary taht is produced by Iambic Productions who also dod “The Winner Takes It All” in 1999. They are doing a second documentary for the 30th Anniversary. Here are soem details:
Overseas Business Chris Hunt attended the �Golden Prague� Festival in May to give a speech about music and arts on the internet, and to discuss ventures with potential partners. He has also been to New York, Vienna and Stockholm to sell programmes and talk to several channels about increasing their programme supply deals with us. While in Stockholm he also interviewed Princess Anni-Frid Reuss (Frida Lyngstad � the dark one) for Iambic’s Abba film (see below) and attended HBO’s celebrity launch of Iambic ‘s �Elaine Stritch at Liberty�, which premiered to much acclaim on May 29th .
�Super Troupers � 30 Years of Abba � Last month Iambic Productions gained exclusive access to film the ex-members of Abba for their documentary �Super Troupers � 30 Years of Abba �. Iambic filmed the stars around their 30 th anniversary for a programme that will also look back over their extraordinary careers. Fittingly, the celebrations took place at the show based on Abba’s hits �Mamma Mia�, as it was also their 5 th anniversary. Not surprisingly, healthy pre-sale commitments of well over half a million pounds are already in place from major TV and DVD buyers in Britain and overseas.
http://www.abbanews.web-log.nl/ also report that Agnetha has now also been interviewed for the program:
“Chris Hunt, Chief Executive of Digital Classics, is pleased to report that a new
interview with the fourth member of the group, Agnetha, has been incorporated.
Agnetha, known as the �new Garbo�, is a particular bonus to the film as she is a virtual
recluse.”….Read more http://www.abbanews.web-log.nl/
Agnetha hot news !
PLEASE NOTE: The following news comes from a reliable source but is not confirmed:
It has already reported that fan favourite; “Sometimes When I’m Dreaming” will be the third single from “My Colouring Book”, so far news of a Swedish release only. So what about “What Now My Love” another fan favourite and strong track on the album?
We have been told that it is currently under negotiation for “What Now My Love” to be used as a final theme song for a very well known coming movie. There is no futher info at this point.
It would be nice to have such a great track given this oppurtunity. We will see!
Agnetha DVD content
Here is some info on what we can expect to see on the Agnetha DVD which Warner have already confirmed.
The DVD will include all the videos from “My Colouring Book” in full. The tracks that were shot in the studio, they are:
“If I Thought You’d Ever Change Your Mind”
“When You Walk In The Room”
“Sometimes When I’m Dreaming”
“Fly Me To The Moon” was also planned to be shot in this way but it was put on hold and never completed.
The DVD will also include the documentary and extra material.
12/07/04:
A re-release of “My Colouring Book”
abbaonspeakingterms.com report that there will be a re-release of Agnetha’s album “My Colouring Book”. It will be presented with a new cover, in a card “book” style case (like the recent “ABBA The Story” release). They have no news on any bonus material yet but it has been confirmed that Warner will release the TV special/documentary “Agnetha” so this could have a DVD also much like the Universal Sound&Vision releases.
abbaonspeakingterms.com at the moment only know of a Scandinavian release.
PLEASE NOTE: Info on a new green sleeve was false. The cover was created by image manipulation.
Agnetha’s “Sometimes When I’m Dreaming” single number 3 ?
abbaonspeakingterms.com report that a third single will be released from “My Colouring Book”; “Sometimes When I’m Dreaming”. They comment on “When You Wlak In The Room” only notching up success in UK and Sweden. There is no official comfirmation yet.
“Agnetha” TV special to screen in Denmark
Agnetha.se reports screening information for the “Agnetha” TV special in Denmark:
It will appear in Denamrk on DR1 twice. The first date is:
Tuesday August 3rd Time: 23:10
and
Sunday August 8th Time: 15:30
11/07/04:
The latest charts in Sweden:
There has been a big drop in sales of BOTH Agnetha singles. “When You Walk In The Room” seems to have reached its peak at number 11 after falling 14 places to number 26 in it’s 4th week. “If I Thought You’d Ever change Your Mind” also drops 18 places from 22 to number 40 in its 12th week, this is the first time in it’s 12 week run that it has left the Top 30 in Sweden.
The album “My Colouring Book” drops one place to number 6 in it’s 11th week, This is only the albums 2nd week outside the Top 5.
After entering at number 2 last week Benny Anderssons Orkester: BAO! also drops one place to number 3. Check out all four of the above releases’ chart run:
Agnetha
Fältskog – “My Colouring Book” (Album) –
1>1>3>6>5>5>3>4>4>5
Agnetha Fältskog – “If I Thought You’d Ever Change Your Mind” (single) – 2>7>9>11>14>24>25>29>22>26>22>40
Agnetha Fältskog – “When You Walk In The Room” (single) –
25>11>12>26
Benny Andersson’s Orkester – “BAO!”
2>3
Mamma Mia! in Germany
Weblink
This is the latest news at mamma-mia.com :
The first foreign language cast recording of MAMMA MIA! is now available. The live-recording is in German and is available in stores from Monday 21st June 2004. MAMMA MIA! is currently playing in German at Hamburg’s Operettenhaus and a second German production opens at the Palladium Theater in Stuttgart, on 18 July 2004.
09/07/04:
The latest German releases
Mamma Mia! – The second cast recording CD ever released and the first to be in a different language. This recording is of a real show in Hamburg. It features 23 tracks in total, all in German aswell as some dialouge. Over all this has got a much better reception than the original London cast recording.
Order from Amazon.de
ABBA Forever – Another great release from Germany. This is a 2-CD set and features cover versions of ABBA songs. It includes many famous artists such as Erasure, Westlife, Mike Oldfield, Peter Cetera and many more, plus some german artists. see the full track list below:
1.Westlife I Have A Dream
2.Erasure Take A Chance On Me
3.The Ten Tenors Dancing Queen
4.Mike Oldfield Arrival
5.Men Without Hats S.O.S.
6.James Last Fernando
7.Dagmar Hellberg & Angelika Milster Ich Kann Ihn Versteh’n
8.Marianne Rosenberg Nur Sieger Steh’n Im Licht
9.Nana Mouskouri Ich Leb Im Traum
10.Hilton McRae Knowing Me, Knowing You
11.B*Witched Does Your Mother Know
12.Tanita Tikaram The Day Before You Came
13.Steps I Know Him So Well
14.The Black Sweden The Winner Takes It All
15.Stephen Gately Chiquitita
16.Nils Landgren Funk Unit Summer Night City |
Disc 2
1.Peter Cetera With Ronna Reeves S.O.S.
2.Steps Lay All Your Love On Me
3.Pallast Orchester & Max Raabe Super Trouper
4.Angelika Milster Jeder Gegen Jeden: Allein
5.Wind Fernando (…Und der Hinmel War Zum Greifen Nah)
6.Nils Landgren Funk Unit Voulez-Vous
7.Beverley Craven The Winner Takes It All
8.Blancmange The Day Before You Came
9.Madness Money Money Money
10.Dr. & The Medics Waterloo
11.The Leather Nunn Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!
12.Hilton McRae & Siobhan McCarthy I do, I do, I do, I do,
13.Martine McCutcheon Mamma Mia
14.S Club 7 Dancing Queen
15.Dune One Of Us
16.E-Rotic Thank You For The Music |
Order from Amazon.de
Agnetha on the radio
On the 5th of this month Agnetha appeared on local Swedish radio station, Radio Viking. The station is based in
Ekerö where Agnetha lives.
Agnetha spoke on the programme and even answered questions from callers. There is no futher news on what was asked or any more information.
06/07/04:
ABBA stars sue tribute show
Weblink
Co-creators of the hit musical Mamma Mia! and ex-Abba stars Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson are suing the producers of a smaller-scale tribute touring show of the same name.
Producers of the $145.8 million-grossing show want the tribute concert to change its name and have accused it of infringing their trademarks.
Mike Taylor of Mamma Mia! – The Concert says, “It’s a David and Goliath battle.
“I’ve owned the website (www.mammamia.co.uk) since 1999 but I haven’t got the money to challenge them.
“It’s in the hands of my lawyers.”
03/07/04:
Update !
The July 2004 calendar has been updated. Do you have a date to add? email us: info@abbafeatures.com
Benny and Agnetha on Swedish chart
This week the new Benny Andersson’s Orkester with Helen Sjoholm “BAO!” entered the chart at number 2. Agnetha’s album “My Colouring Book” drops 1 place from number 4 to number 5 in it’s 10th week on the chart.
Agnetha’s new single “When You Walk In The Room” drops 1 place to number 12 in it’s third week struggling to dip in to the top 10. Meanwhile in it’s 11th week “If I Thought You’d Ever Change Your Mind” climbs again to number 22 from number 26. Here is the pattern of Agnetha’s chart success in Sweden so far:
“My Colouring Book” (Album) – 1>1>3>6>5>5>3>4>4>5
“If I Thought You’d Ever Change Your Mind” (single) – 2>7>9>11>14>24>25>29>22>26>22
“When You Walk In The Room” (single) – 25>11>12
02/07/04:
New Benny interview
Weblink
Here are just a few quotes from an interview in Expressen (28/06/04). the quotes are from Raffem.com who also has the FULL translation – Click Here !
Being 57 years old Benny does not have to do something he does not want to do. He does what he likes to do. That’s why his new record sounds like it had been recorded in 1925. Benny laughs: – If you have an orchestra with all classical instruments and if you want to write music for such an orchestra so it have to sound like this.
The end of ABBA was not planned in this way:
-Björn and I wanted to write a musical and we met Tim Rice who had a big experience on this field. But it was thought that after the musical ABBA would continue.
-It took 2,5 years before we had the musical written and than one more year before the musical came on stage. It was for long time and it was difficult to come back.
According to Benny there are no problems between the former ABBA members today:
-There are no hard feelings.
When I say that Agnetha Fältskog was missing in London on the 30th anniversary in April Benny says that he has a good relation with Agnetha. But they haven’t seen each other since her 50th birthday 4 years ago.
-I think that she should write songs herself. I have always said this to her. She wrote great songs in the past.
01/07/04:
Agnetha & Bjorn : Highlights in Entertainment History !
Weblink
This article lists Agnetha and Bjorn’s marriage as a highlight in Entertainment history
during
the week of July 4-10
:
Entertainment Highlights in History
Entertainment highlights during the week of July 4-10:
1950: The music show “Your Hit Parade” premiered on NBC-TV.
1968: Guitarist Eric Clapton announced the break up of Cream. The band played a farewell concert in London later in the year.
1971: Jim Morrison of The Doors was buried in Paris, six days after he was found dead in a bathtub.
1971: Bjorn Ulvaeus and Agnetha Faltskog of ABBA were married in Verum, Sweden.
1980: The original members of Led Zeppelin give their final performance. The show was in West Germany, at the end of their European tour.
1995: The Grateful Dead gave their last concert with Jerry Garcia, at Chicago’s Soldier Field.
2000: The remainder of a Supremes reunion tour was canceled. The tour suffered after it was revealed that Mary Wilson and Cindy Birdsong, who had performed with Diana Ross in the 1960s, refused to join because they felt they weren’t being paid enough.
2001: The Backstreet Boys announced they were postponing their tour because singer A.J. McLean was entering rehabilitation for depression and alcohol abuse.
2002: Julia Roberts married cameraman Daniel Moder at her 40-acre estate outside Taos, N.M.
2002: Michael Jackson made a bizarre appearance at a rally in New York City to denounce the recording industry as racist and Sony Music chairman Tommy Mottola as devilish.
Agnetha falls in UK chart
Agnetha’s latest single “When You Walk In The Room” has dropped to number 59 on the UK singles chart. After charting at number 34 it lasted just one week inside the Top 40.
Thanks to
Justin Bindley
Hootenanny Singers reunion ?
Weblink
In this article Bjorn suggests a Hootenanny Singers reunion:
ABBA: Mamma mia, here I go again
Monday, June 28, 2004
John Soeder
Plain Dealer Pop Music Critic
Bjorn Ulvaeus has not ruled out a reunion for his old band.
Don’t stop the presses just yet, however. He isn’t talking about ABBA.
“There might be the odd little gig for the Hootenanny Singers in the future,” Ulvaeus says, referring to the folk group he fronted in the 1960s, before ABBA conquered the world a decade later.
“But I can tell you: ABBA is never going to reunite,” he hastens to add in perfect, read-my-lips English.
It seems fans of Sweden’s most famous purveyors of pop-music perfection simply will have to make do with “Mamma Mia!” The megamusical features 20-plus classic ABBA tunes.
It returns to Playhouse Square’s State Theatre in Cleveland for a two-week run starting Tuesday. “Mamma Mia!” made its local debut there two years ago, taking in $3 million in three weeks.
Besides Ulvaeus, ABBA included Agnetha Faltskog (the blond one), Benny Andersson (the bearded one) and Anni-Frid “Frida” Lyngstad (the not-blond one). The quartet took its name from the first letter of each member’s first name.
Ulvaeus and Faltskog were married. Ditto Andersson and Lyngstad.
The men wrote the songs. And the women belted them out, often in rapturous two-part harmony.
ABBA disbanded in 1982. But its music lives on in “Mamma Mia!” – and beyond.
“Mamma Mia!” is “basically a happy musical with lots of hits,” the 59-year-old Ulvaeus says by phone from his home in Stockholm.
“It really has gone global on a scale I never believed it would,” he says. “My guess is the timing was right. The big hits of the ’80s – ‘Les Miserables,’ ‘Phantom of the Opera,’ ‘Miss Saigon’ – were quite a lot darker than ‘Mamma Mia!’ Everyone was ready for something uplifting, light and happy.”
Ulvaeus and Andersson composed the “Mamma Mia!” score. Catherine Johnson wrote the book for the musical, weaving “Dancing Queen,” “SOS,” “Take a Chance on Me” and other ABBA favorites into a feel-good tale set on a Greek island, where a bride- to-be hopes to meet the father she never knew by sending wedding invitations to three of her mother’s ex-lovers.
Even back in ABBA’s heyday, Ulvaeus and Andersson had theatrical aspirations. The band’s 1977 album “The Album” closed with a suite of three songs (including “Thank You for the Music”) from a “minimusical” titled “The Girl With the Golden Hair.”
“It definitely was a harbinger,” Ulvaeus says. “It was the start of our fascination with putting music and drama together.”
The duo’s latest project is “Kristina From Duvemala,” a musical about Swedish immigrants.
“We’ve just translated it into English,” Ulvaeus says. “The ultimate goal is to take it to America, because it’s really an American epic.”
A big break in song contest
ABBA got its big break 30 years ago, when the band’s bouncy “Waterloo” won the Eurovision Song Contest.
The group’s impeccable pop instincts peaked on the 1976 single “Dancing Queen.” The ode to a mirror-ball monarch was a No. 1 international hit. Legend has it Lyngstad was moved to tears when she first heard the song’s backing track.
“I cannot recall Frida crying,” Ulvaeus says. “But I do remember there were some tears when I came in with the lyric for ‘The Winner Takes It All.’ It’s the only time I can remember any moist eyes.”
Ulvaeus and Faltskog divorced in 1979. Two years later, Andersson and Lyngstad did the same.
“The Winner Takes It All,” “Knowing Me, Knowing You” and other ABBA songs seemed to address the ups and downs of the personal relationships within the group, shades of “Rumours”-era Fleetwood Mac.
“I love Fleetwood Mac – one of my all-time favorites, along with the Beatles, the Beach Boys and the Eagles,” Ulvaeus says. “I haven’t studied Fleetwood Mac’s lyrics too closely. But I imagine they’re partly drawn from their private lives and partly fiction.”
The same holds true for many ABBA tunes, he says.
After the group broke up, Faltskog and Lyngstad pursued solo careers, while Ulvaeus and Andersson collaborated with Tim Rice on the musical “Chess.”
Ulvaeus doesn’t pay much attention to contemporary pop music, although he could detect echoes of ABBA on the radio in the 1990s, when the likes of Britney Spears, ‘N Sync and the Backstreet Boys turned to ABBA’s homeland for inspiration and enlisted the services of Swedish hit maker Max Martin.
“I certainly think ABBA opened the gates, which were closed before,” Ulvaeus says. “There was absolutely nothing coming out of Scandinavia, nothing at all. When suddenly we showed it was possible, it influenced a whole generation of writers, of which Max Martin is one.
“His music sounds very Euro- pop, which in the ’70s was not very popular in America. But it came back with a vengeance in the ’90s.”
So did ABBA.
A greatest-hits compilation, “ABBA Gold,” has sold more than 25 million copies since it was re leased in 1992. The band’s music also was featured prominently in a pair of ’90s films, “Muriel’s Wedding” and “The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert.”
Musical has made
$750 million
Then came “Mamma Mia!”
It premiered in London in 1999 and on Broadway two years later. The musical has been seen by 10 million theatergoers, grossing more than $750 million along the way.
ABBA was nominated on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ballot in 2002, although the group failed to get enough votes for induction.
“Then again, we’re not quite rock ‘n’ roll,” Ulvaeus says. “We’re much more pop. So I can understand if some people don’t think we belong in there, however many records we’ve sold.”
For the record, ABBA has sold more than 350 million records worldwide.
Faltskog recently released her first solo album in 17 years. On “My Colouring Book,” she takes a crack at “Fly Me to the Moon” and oldies by the Shangri-Las and the Searchers.
“I’ve heard a couple of tracks,” Ulvaeus says. “She sounds in very good voice. But I don’t know how well it will do when it’s compared in the charts to people who record new songs.”
A new DVD, “ABBA in Concert,” captures the group on tour in North America and Europe in 1979.
Four years ago, a consortium of concert promoters offered $1 billion to ABBA for a 100-date reunion tour. The group declined.
Ulvaeus says the former members of ABBA are on “very good terms indeed” these days. Nonetheless, the foursome has no plans to work together again.
“It’s purely to do with our musical motivation,” Ulvaeus says, “and, on my part, the unwillingness to go out there and disappoint a lot of people, because we don’t look like we did.”
Hong Kong Mamma Mia! review
Weblink
SHOWTIME!: Sweet Swede sounds
Subhaddra Devan
June 27: |
| The Dancing Queens were there at their best in Hong Kong and SUBHADRA DEVAN came away as thrilled as when she first heard the original Swedish mammas and the other two.
MAMMA MIA! is such a hoot! When the Australian production opened in Hong Kong recently, it seemed as if the Abba hit Money, Money, Money struck a resonant chord with the audience, who clapped and cheered.
It was delivered by Silvie Paladino who sang it full throated, and what a voice.
So who would’ve thought the lyrics of such disco darlings as Dancing Queen were so profound, hmmm? “I was a little worried ‘cos the audience was quiet at the start of the show, unlike in Australia and New Zealand, where they were up on their feet and clapping in time with Honey, Honey,” said young Kellie Rode, who plays the daughter, Sophie Sheridan, in an interview the next day.
“But the show went really well.” It is a simple tale centring around a mother and her daughter on a Greek island, with three “fathers” invited to the wedding of the lass. The end has a fun twist. The story is loosely based on the 1968 film Buona Sera Mrs Campbell starring Gina Lollobrigida, but MAMMA MIA! gains body and depth through the songs of Abba. The show marks Kelli’s professional debut on stage. It has been two years since she took on the second lead role, but she is still happy to break out into an Abba song when not on stage.
She started as a swing performer with the show when it opened three years ago Down Under. (A swing performer steps in when the actress cannot perform that night).
The Melbourne-born five-foot-tall Kellie said she never expected to actually get the second biggest part in MAMMA MIA! but when the actress had to “leave for some reason I cannot remember now”, she was more than excited. It was a dream come true.
Said Silvie: “The audience seems to react in different places in different cities. In Hong Kong, the reaction of the audience other than Money Money Money was at the finale. “They were up and dancing except for the front row; it was so different from the reaction in the earlier part of the show.
“That’s part of the excitement of doing a live theatre show.” The young Kellie has her eye on film or Shakespearean roles in future. For now, she admits that there have been times when lines have been forgotten on stage in MAMMA MIA! but the rest of the cast cover up so well, no one really notices. How does this young thespian prepare for the show?
“I am always pacing, or talking to another cast member, doing something. I have a lot of nervous energy to expend. But when I get on stage, I am all right.
“Doing MAMMA MIA! is fun. There’s a lot of energy in the show. The music is loud and upbeat. So we have to match it, every night. It’s not so hard though.” What’s her favourite song in MAMMA MIA!?
“The Winner Takes It All. Silvie (Sophie Sheridan) sings it with such conviction and her voice is truly a wonder.” And powerful. Silvie is one of Australia’s most versatile and talented entertainers and her vocal range has her doing contemporary and jazz to opera. Although a terrific singer, the show stealer must be six-foot-tall Jennifer Vuletic who plays “at last my own gender” as Tanya, one of the other Dancing Queens (along with Silvie and Emma Powell).
The audience applauded her main song in MAMMA MIA! which she danced and sang with the only Asian cast member, Aaron Jackson Mendoza, the Filipino who plays fiesty Pepper. Their Does Your Mother Know elicited whistles and much applause as the song got a twist when young Pepper is smitten by the older Tanya. Does it bother you to play men?
“I don’t mind doing gender-bender roles at all. To me, it’s a challenge,” said Jennifer, a pyschologist by profession. “But it’s always nice to play my own sex!” And it showed in the performance, given by one of 11 production groups all around the world. For the Hong Kong show, the entire set created by Mark Thompson was carted to the island in a jumbo jet. “It took five months to build it in Adelaide,” said resident director Darren Yap. It’s a simple set, even with a wooden pier that moves up and forward which took six days to set up. The slanting stage can move up 25 metres.
Everything is controlled by computers, including the cues for the nine musicians who sit in the pits. Only the head of musical director, Stephen Amos, can be seen by the audience! And the cast members, all 26 of them, have very tiny microphones at the top of their heads, hidden in their hair but these are enough to give that reach to fill the 1,734-seat Grand Theatre at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre in Tsim Sha Tsui.
Abba probably didn’t realise that one of their songs could be the anthem for divorce. But that’s what it seemed when Bruce Roberts (Sam Carmichael) sang Knowing You, Knowing Me. Best known as Nick in the television soap Home & Away, this handsome man (as one reporter descibed to the chagrin of the other leading men present) liked the finale the most in MAMMA MIA! “I’d like to put a picture of the finale on a Christmas card. It has this feel-good quality about it.” And that aptly describes the show which music and lyrics are by the original ABBA group members Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus.
“It was so nostalgic,” said the Malaysian winner of the MAMMA MIA! contest, Ong Cheng Leng, and her husband Tay Siew Chin from Kuantan. “I wouldn’t mind seeing the show again,” said the former nurse.
A simple tale with music we all could sing before the show even started.
And the end of the two-hour, 20-minute show, the audience was on their feet, jiving. Everyone left the hall with happy faces. For sheer entertainment, MAMMA MIA! how can we resist you?
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Thanks to
Bernard Danker Penang, MALAYSIA.
Details on “The Last Video” DVD content
Weblink
ABBA’s sensational puppet video will soon be available on DVD, featuring behind-the-scenes material.
June 29, 2004
On July 19, THE LAST VIDEO will be released on DVD in several European countries (including Germany and Sweden), with other territories to follow.
Speculation on an ABBA reunion during the current 30th Anniversary celebrations culminated in a most unexpected way at the Eurovision Song Contest in May. All four former members of ABBA teamed up exclusivly for the humorous film THE LAST VIDEO, sharing the stage with their look-a-like dolls along with a great crew of comedy actors.
Apart from the doll-size versions of Agnetha, Björn, Benny and Frida, the film is starring Rik Mayall, Robert Gustafson, Sissela Kyhle, Cecilia Frode, Loa Falkman, Michael Nyqvist and Per Svensson, with special appearances by Benny Andersson, Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvaeus, Anni-Frid Lyngstad, Cher and Eddie.
THE LAST VIDEO is written and directed by Calle Åstrand and produced by Radical Media UK.
The DVD of THE LAST VIDEO contains the film, as well as the four original videos of the songs featured in the film: Take A Chance On Me, Dancing Queen, Waterloo and The Winner Takes It All. In addition, there is an exclusive behind-the-scenes film, The Making Of The Last Video with Director’s Comments, plus a picture gallery.
Technical formats:
Running Time: Approx. 40 minutes
Region: All (0)
Menu Screens: English
Disc Format: DVD5
Playback Mode: Colour
Picture Format: PAL 4:3
Audio Format: Dolby Digital Stereo
PAL and NTSC
Storyline:
THE LAST VIDEO is the film about four hopeful musicians in search of a record contract. They pay a visit to the Big Record Company Boss and his oily assistant, performing one hit after the other, cheered on by their manager. But things don’t really work out as planned�
Agnetha, Björn, Benny and Frida look just like they did back then � or perhaps not, after all. Is memory playing tricks with us? Were they really this� small?
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