Photos by © Billy Bennight for The Los Angeles Beat
This year the 2015 MTV Movie Awards will run live at 8:00PM ET/PT Sunday April 12th. This years’ edition will feature a re-designed award and a newly designed set by graffiti artist team Dabs and Myla that has a retro “1930’s Bubble Art” styled animation feel to the new set. The scale of the stage design is immense with a whimsical vibe that is close to Roger Rabbit with hints of street-ish graffiti aesthetic. This years’ host will be Amy Schumer replacing last years’ host Conan O’Brien. I think that Amy is going to bring her “Bad Girl” comedy to this year’s MTV Movie Awards with a different kind of edge. My opinion is predicated on some of the stand up I’ve witness by her. This years’ MTV Movie Awards appears from this preview to be as whacky as ever with a few new twists.
I was privy to the behind the scenes look at the 2015 MTV Awards stage and gift bags content with this pre-celebratory press junket at the Nokia Theater. MTV delighted the press with tasty donuts made by Tiana Ramos, who is co-owner Naughty Girls Donut. Her pin-up inspired Naughty Girl Donuts will be served to those attending the backstage gifting suite. I was offered the whisky and maple bacon donuts. How could I refuse a double bender offering of these exotic deep-fried pastries?! The whisky donut had a softened whisky flavor with a massive marshmallow top off and the bacon donut was surprisingly delicious with a blend of savory and sweet that worked well together using the gate-way meat. I found it’s another delicious treat with a hole in it that I can wrap my lips around for a “I feel good” moment. This should prove delicious, salacious and festive enough to keep the hosts, honorees and winners engaged with the tasty treats with that little extra bump in the backstage action at this MTV Movie Awards.
It was a natural flow from donut tasting to a rather large table of goodies displayed for the gift bag contents being awarded to those who are part of the MTV Movie Awards proceedings. The high points of the gift bag goodies were Diplomático rum, a Naughty Girl Donuts’ t-shirt and #LoveMyBounce boy briefs and I think you’ve got a party! There are a host of things that make up the MTV Movie Awards gift bag like: M&Ms, MTV Awards caramel corn tin, a dino-head of Indominus Rex from forthcoming Jurassic World (the fourth installment of the franchise), Mulia Trip with a stay at the Mulia Resorts for a 5 night to Bali Indonesia and an Earnest Alexander bag among other treasures will be apart of the gifting experience for this year’s MTV Movie Awards.
I had a few moments to speak with executive producer Jesse Ignjatovic and graffiti artist team Dabs and Myla. Jesse enlightened me about what was going to happen and what going to be different at this MTV Movie Awards: “It’s going to be definitely different this year! We have the fabulous Amy Schumer. So she’s going to bring her brand of comedy to the show. Whats she’s doing for the film shorts are hilarious and what she does onstage is incredible. She’ll affect the tone and tenor of the show and that makes it unique already because she hasn’t done the show before. The performances this year are different this year because we have 2 artist doing collaborations, that’s very exciting and very current this year. We have crazy huge talent! You get some crazy moments with presenters and even when winners goes up there.” Jesse responded to my query about any expectations about any unexpected situations by saying, “I do the VMA’s. I’ve done that for 8 years. You never know! It depends who you have in the room. Who ever expected Kanye/Taylor thing to happen. When you are asking me for unusual, that unusual! But I can’t begin to tell you how or when that would happen. When it does you have to follow it and stay on it or not stay on it depending on what going on and manage the situation. That’s live television! It’s terrifying and exciting when it happens.
From there I moved on to have a pow-wow with Dabs and Myla who did the set design for the show and revamped the award itself. I asked of Dabs’ thoughts on Futura 2000 and Dabs shared what came to mind by saying, “I have lots of thoughts of Futura 2000. I think he’s amazing! He’s been around for a long time and he did innovative graffiti and he changed things for graffiti that graffiti to become what it became. I then as if they had heard of The Container Yard yet? “Yes, I’ve heard of the Container Yard.” Myla responded, “Isn’t downtown?” Dabs, “I thing someone approached us to paint something down there one time. We couldn’t at the time because we were busy. Do you follow Anthony Ausgang? Dabs, Yeah, I know Anthony Ausgang!” Myla, “His artwork is amazing!” Now talk about your thing here: I heard diorama? Dabs, “Yeah, it’s kind of the way we create art installations. When we do an exhibition we try to create a gallery into another world. A lot of time we approach our work like an oversize theater set. That’s what we’ve done with this.” I mentioned, Is this the first time you’ve blown up something this large? Myla,”We done a lot of large-scale murals, but this is the first time we made a set or installation this big. We love that old traditional set design. We just have a love for it. So we just put into our artwork. We are inspired by it. To turn something into a different world.” In a nutshell these behind the scene tips by Jesse, Dabs and Myla offers a perspective on how the MTV Movie Awards will be vibing in this year’s installment.
Other things to look forward to for this installment of the MTV Movie Awards will be all the stellar talent to check out, like: Like Channing Tatum, Joe Manganiello, Matt Bomer, Zac Efron, Emily Ratajkowski, Michael B. Jordan, Kate Mara and Miles Teller. Kelly Osborne, Jess J and Josh Horowitz will be running down the hot looks to flow on the red carpet. There are huge branding opportunities for movie franchises and television show. There will be sneak peeks of Marvel’s Avengers: Age of Ultron presented by Robert Downey Jr., Scarlett Johansson, Chris Evans, Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo and Jeremy Renner. Robert Downey Jr. will receive the Generation Award from the Avenger’s cast as a high point to the show. Shailene Woodley will be receiving the Trailblazer Award and Kevin Heart will receive the Comedic Genius Award. Pitch Perfect 2 will be represented by Rebel Wilson, Brittany Snow, Anna Camp and Hailee Steinfeld (True Grit and Ender’s Game). Papertown and Catfish will get little pat on the bottom too. Lastly, there will be performance by Charli XCX with special guests Ty Dollla $ign and Tinashe: Rapper Fetty Wap will appear during a performance during the telecast. Fall Out Boy will have their moment on stage too. With all of this in mind get ready to expect MTV to drop the bomb and blow up everything movies this Sunday for one hellz of a crazy ride provided free like no others!
