As the eagerly anticipated
MÖTLEY CRÜE "Red White & Crüe Tour 2005 ... Better Live than Dead", presented by
VH1 and
VH1 Classic, launches in cities across the U.S. and around the world, it is advised that fans get to their seats in time for the start.
Each show on what
Pollstar has called the year's #1 tour, which has already sold out major venues in Chicago, Detroit and Los Angeles, among others, will begin with the specially created clay-animated short featuring members of the
CRÜE saving the world from imminent destruction, taken from
Dream Entertainment's upcoming clay-animated feature film
"Disaster! The Movie". Additionally, highlights of
Dream's full-length theatrical feature, in which the band appears in a cameo role, will be shown during intermission at each concert. The film is scheduled for worldwide release later this year, with several distributors in the U.S. and Europe currently bidding on the finished production.
Dream Entertainment, the L.A. based production company helmed by film veterans
Ehud Bleiberg and
Yitzhak Ginsberg, created the customized excerpt with the
CRÜE especially for the tour.
Roy Wood, who had a short stint at
MTV's popular
"Celebrity Death Match" series and as an animator at
"MAD-TV", directed the movie.
Ginsberg and
Bleiberg produced the film along with
John Glen,
Travis Wright and
Even Astrowski, while
Paul Benson and
Matt Sullivan wrote the screenplay.
The outrageously hilarious introductory short, which was voiced by the band members themselves, will be followed at intermission by "coming attractions" for the full-length feature about a group of unlikely heroes, led by vulcanoligist
Harold Bottoms, who aim to save the world from a runaway "planetoid" in a raunchy, no-holds-barred parody of such action movies as
"Armageddon",
"Twister",
"Star Wars" and
"Apollo 13".
The unusual pairing was cemented when
MÖTLEY CRÜE member
Nikki Sixx viewed the movie and invited the filmmakers to contribute footage to show at the start of the concert and during intermission, where coming attractions from the full-length feature will set the stage for the second half of the band's performance.
"These guys are f***ing brilliant," said
Sixx. "With their help, the
CRÜE is out to save the world from imminent disaster.
'Disaster! The Movie' just adds to the circus atmosphere surrounding this tour."
A series of radio and Internet promotions and contests to promote the film will take place as the
"Red White & Crüe" tour winds its way around the U.S. and the world, with a concentration on viral and grass-roots online marketing.
The
CRÜE is currently working with
MTV Films/
Paramount on a film based on their
N.Y. Times best-selling biography,
"The Dirt", whose screenplay was written by
Rich Wilkes. Several top directors in Hollywood have already expressed interest in the project.
For more information on
"Disaster! The Movie", go to
this location.