Month: April 2020

British actor and comedian Tim Brooke-Taylor, star of popular BBC series “The Goodies,” has died of coronavirus at 79. The actor’s agent confirmed to Variety that Brooke-Taylor died early Sunday from the virus. Brooke-Taylor’s career in comedy began at Cambridge University, where he was part of the renowned Footlights Club — a launchpad for such
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In the closing moments of the first-ever “Saturday Night Live From Home,” the show paid tribute to its longtime sketch-music maestro Hal Willner, who died on April 7 with symptoms consistent with coronavirus. Willner was renowned as a multi-talented producer of albums by Lou Reed, Marianne Faithfull, Lucinda Williams as well as elaborate multi-artist tribute
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Self-described “indentured android” turned acclaimed singer-songwriter (“Dirty Computer,” “The Electric Lady”) turned breakout blockbuster actor (“Hidden Figures,” “Moonlight,” the upcoming “Antebellum”) Janelle Monáe has splashed out just south of $3.9 million on her very own residential Wondaland, a characteristically eclectic and unmistakably unique midcentury compound tucked deep into the Hollywood Hills. The property’s seller was
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When something unfathomable happens, many try to make sense of it (or simply provide an escapist outlet from it) through humor. And that is exactly what “Saturday Night Live” did when returning with original material on April 11, producing content remotely amid the coronavirus pandemic. Tom Hanks, who went public with his own COVID-19 diagnosis
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Variety has compiled the latest series of first-person essays from across the entertainment industry for the Corona Chronicles about how the coronavirus is changing and disrupting lives. Joseph Gordon-LevittActor, founder of HITRECORD I’ve been doing something creative every day, well, five days a week. It was a commitment I made a couple weeks ago. While
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Music is risen — it is risen indeed — this holiday weekend, as scores of artists take to webcams to broadcast live-stream concerts, from the music of the angels to Angel Olsen. The big kahuna, if we may use so un-sacred a term, may be Andrea Bocelli’s Easter Sunday broadcast of “Ave Maria” and other
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With the coronavirus pandemic effectively slowing the music industry to a halt, countless musicians have attempted to entertain their fans by hosting live-streamed concerts, participating in virtual rap battles and even dropping surprise singles. However, some are taking it the extra mile by using their influence to raise money for those especially affected by the
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Coronavirus. It sounds like the title of a classic Bond movie, à la “GoldenEye,” “Moonraker” or “Octopussy.” April 10 was supposed to see the release of Bond’s latest adventure, “No Time to Die.” Instead, action fans are stuck at home, an invisible villain is threatening world domination, and 007 has done the unthinkable: He’s chickened
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Japanese director Nobuhiko Obayashi died Friday in Tokyo of lung cancer. He was 82. Born in Onomichi, a port on Japan’s Inland Sea, in 1938, Obayashi began making films as a child, using a projector and film owned by his physician father. A pioneering experimental filmmaker in the 1960s, Obayashi went on direct nearly 3,000 TV commercials
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The recently launched Hollywood Support Staff Relief Fund, aimed at providing assistants and support staffers financial aid amid the coronavirus-induced production shutdown, is now shutting down its GoFundMe and merging with the Actors Fund. It will continue raising funds under that banner. “Despite its name, the Actors Fund was created to assist all industry members
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This contains spoilers for the “Brooklyn Nine-Nine” Season 7 episode titled “Valloweaster.” To celebrate Detective Rosa Garcia’s third time winning “Brooklyn Nine-Nine’s” seasonal “heist” episode, Stephanie Beatriz — who has played Rosa for seven seasons — said her throaty, deadpan character would likely be eight beers in, egging on the rest of the zany members
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fRequa, FicarraIn today’s film news roundup, “Salem’s Lot” and “Hellraiser” draw directors, Tara Reid and Paul Mormando find new roles and zombie pandemic thriller “16 States” lands at Lionsgate. DEALS New Line has hired “It” writer Gary Dauberman to direct its adaptation of Stephen King’s 1975 horror novel “Salem’s Lot” from his own script. Dauberman
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Allegra Shaw remembers a time, three or four years ago, when packages from brands—clothes and beauty products sent in the hope that Shaw, a YouTuber with nearly a million followers, would dedicate a video to them—came equipped with confetti explosions and television screens. “When you get a TV in a package, how do you dispose
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An earnest, over-stuffed infomercial for the potential and benefits of practicing mindfulness, multi-hypenate Rob Beemer’s “The Mindfulness Movement” demonstrates the practice, offers an abbreviated history of its growth in the U.S., and cites examples of the therapeutic, scientific, corporate, academic and athletic benefits of living a more conscious life. After kicking off with celebrity endorsements
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Since mid-March, the coronavirus pandemic has upended every aspect of life in the United States, causing stay-at-home mandates in most states in an attempt to contain the spread of COVID-19. As a consequence, the entertainment industry — a multi-billion-dollar global business — has come to a grinding halt, with every television show and movie indefinitely
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Mariah Carey on Friday posted a version of her 1993 song “Hero,” dedicated to the “heroes who are making our daily lives possible: First respondersThe doctorsThe nursesThe midwivesThe store clerksThe janitorsThe postal workersThe pharmacistsThe delivery workersAnd so many more!” In the video, she gives an introductory speech (basically what was posted on YouTube below) and
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As “Killing Eve” enters Season 3, new head writer Suzanne Heathcote admits it’s getting tougher to sprinkle the show’s signature light-hearted moments into an increasingly darker storyline. “The temptation can be just to put a fun moment in just for the sake of it being a fun moment, as opposed to it being about the
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