Month: November 2020

While it was originally planned for a release at some point this year, Lana Del Rey‘s forthcoming album, Chemtrails Over the Country Club, wound up being pushed back to 2021. The reason? Production delays with its vinyl copies. While the delay was certainly a disappointment, it hasn’t stopped her from sharing content. Fresh off delivering a cover of “On Eagle’s Wings,” she’s returned with another, this time her spin on George Gershwin’s 1935 song “Summertime.”

Del Rey’s take on the Gershwin classic also arrives with an earthy video, which begins with her and a few friends making their way back from a coronavirus test in Beverly Hills. Once home, the group reconvenes in a gazebo. The singer also sent out a tweet asking fans to donate to art organizations. “I’m so grateful to have been asked to perform this version of summertime by George Gershwin — the legendary composer-pianist whose music the New York Philharmonic has premiered and with whom we performed,” she wrote, adding, “especially during a crisis faced by all performing arts organizations.”

The cover is one of several the singer will share in the lead-up to Chemtrails Over the Country Club. Speaking about the album, Lana said it has a “16-week delay on the vinyl process, so in the meantime, I’m going to give you a digital record of American standards and classics for Christmas because I can’t get the record plants to open until March 5. That probably goes for a lot of people out there.”

You can watch the video for her “Summertime” cover above.

The movie industry has been cautiously back to production, especially if they’re filming in nations that have handled the pandemic better than America. The movie theater industry is a different story. Not even a Christopher Nolan spectacular was able to reignite the theatrical box office, forcing major studios to make previously unthinkable moves. A day after Warner Bros. announced they’d be releasing Wonder Woman 1984 on their still newish streamer, HBO Max, a report from Deadline claims Disney is considering doing something similar with some of their big live-action remakes.

While no final decision has been made, Deadline reports that three of the company’s splashier titles may wind up taking a path similar to the one that befell their live-action remake of Mulan, as well as titles like Artemis Foul, the Hamilton movie, and Pixar’s forthcoming Soul: They’ll wind up on Disney+, their year-old streamer. Those films are Cruella, in which Emma Stone plays a more punkish version of the 101 Dalmatians baddie; Pinocchio, which reunites director Robert Zemeckis and Tom Hanks, who will play Gepetto; and Peter Pan and Wendy, from Pete’s Dragon’s David Lowery.

It’s unclear which version of the Disney+ path they’ll take. Artemis Foul, Hamilton, and Soul were/are being made free with a subscription. Mulan, however, was a rental for its first three months, with a steep price tag of 30 bucks. And again, this is far from a done deal. But one thing’s for certain: The pandemic is going to change the theatrical movie landscape in ways that will ensue long after this thing’s belatedly under control.

(Via Deadline)

Thursday is the night the entire hip-hop community has spent nearly a week waiting for: Gucci Mane and Jeezy will kick off the new season of Verzuz with a 20-song matchup of some of the best songs from their lengthy careers. The two rappers have not been face-to-face for the last fifteen years, so when news of the battle arrived, fans were surprised and quickly assumed it would be a bitter battle. While some are hoping that the two rappers will wind up burying the hatchet, Gucci’s latest move is leading others to believe that he is far from ending the beef.

Before the Verzuz matchup, the “Lemonade” rapper made the decision to re-upload his scathing Jeezy track “Truth” to DSPs as a lone single. The song is currently available to listen to on his 2011 project The Trap God, making the move from Gucci seem like even more of a jab at Jeezy. The song was released after Gucci allegedly shot one of Jeezy’s associates in self-defense and is best known for a line in which Gucci says, “Go dig your partner up, n****, bet he can’t say sh*t.”

This is not the first jab Gucci has taken at his fellow Atlanta rapper. Days before the battle, he taunted Jeezy over the death of his late associate. He also laughed at Jeezy’s outfit on the cover of his upcoming The Recession 2 album, saying, “Is fashion a part of the Verzuz? Because I’ma have that sh*t on tomorrow and if buddy have that same funny ass shirt and that dumb ass hat he had on that God damn album cover, I ain’t doing it.”

You can find the “Truth” single on DSPs here.

Gucci Mane is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Well, it’s finally here, the video we’ve been waiting for! A first collaboration between Miley Cyrus and Dua Lipa, and maybe the start of many more? Because these two look like they were made to be on screen together. The “Prisoner” video follows the two of them through a careening sprint of driving their tour bus, to partying in the back, dancing and canoodling — Dua even licks Miley’s face at one point — and breaking into a can of bright red maraschino cherries. We learned in the teaser yesterday that the “blood” that seemed to make this video so spooky was actually just cherries, but it still adds a whole hell of a lot of dramatic effect.

The two get about as close to making out as humanly possible without actually doing it, but the possibility lingers. After getting off the bus, they play at what looks like an old graffiti’d Brooklyn venue, and close out the set with Dua flipping the bird. Then a small, heart-shaped graphic comes up on screen that says: “In loving memory of all my exes. Eat sh*t.” There’s also a floating mouth that follows them around through most of the video, presumably Miley’s! It’s a joyride for sure, and if it doesn’t quite “break” the internet, it’ll at least jostle it.

As far as the song, musically it feels like a mash between Dua and Miley’s respective styles. A little more in the glittering ’70s rock lane than Dua usually goes, and a bit more disco-pop than Miley’s been until her “Nothing Breaks Like A Heart” and “Midnight Sky” singles. And if this is what the rest of Plastic Hearts sounds like, I’m definitely optimistic.

Dua Lipa is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Thursday is World Pancreatic Cancer Day, and for Jeopardy! fans, it’s a day that serves as an opportunity for remembrance. Earlier this month, longtime host Alex Trebek passed away following a battle with the disease at age 80. He was diagnosed with Stage IV pancreatic cancer in early 2019 and battled for more than a year, and through Christmas Day, Jeopardy! will broadcast episodes that were aired with Trebek as host from before his passing.

It’s unclear exactly when Thursday evening’s episode was shot, but before things kicked off, Trebek spoke to those watching at home about World Pancreatic Cancer Day. While donning a purple tie, shirt, and ribbon on his jacket — purple is the color used to honor those who have battled pancreatic cancer, and the show’s official Twitter account encouraged people to wear it on Thursday — Trebek urged people to take this seriously.

“Before we get into today’s match, a word about today,” Trebek said. “Today is World Pancreatic Cancer Day, and if you or anyone you know has developed some of the symptoms that I have talked about in the past, then by all means, get to a doctor, get yourself tested, I want you to be safe. This is a terrible, terrible disease.”

For more information on pancreatic cancer and the symptoms associated with it, here’s a link with more information via the Mayo Clinic. And for more on World Pancreatic Cancer Day, click here.

Even Donald Trump and Rudy Giuliani’s most trusted friends are finally starting to see the damage the president is causing by not conceding the 2020 presidential election. And they’re doing their best to plead to the president on his once-favorite network to give up the ghost.

Geraldo Rivera is the latest Fox News personality to claim Trump’s attempt to undo election results is giving people, including himself, “false hope.” As news spread Thursday that Trump had invited Republican lawmakers from Michigan to the White House in an alarming attempt to somehow decertify election results that actual people cast earlier this month, Rivera appeared on The Five to torpedo any vast conspiracy theories that somehow Trump had the election stolen from him.

“I love the president. I wanted him to win this election. What I saw with Rudy Giuliani, who I’ve known for decades, was bizarre, was unfocused, there was conspiracy theory this or that,” Rivera said. “When you have evidence, that you suggest, what’s the lawsuit that that evidence attaches to? What’s the action? You can’t go to a court and say ‘It’s fraud. Judge… prove it for me.’ Or ask the FBI to prove it for me.”

It’s an unfocused segment, as the camera whirled around between Rivera and another host, Jessie Watters, trying to defend the failing lawsuits and Giuliani’s sweaty, meme-explosion of a press conference from earlier in the day. But perhaps Rivera saved his most accurate line for the end of the conflict.

“We’re giving false hope to people,” he said. It’s certainly true for those who still believe that Trump can somehow remain president, which includes a good number of people watching Fox News — among them the current president.

The sports calendar is in full swing, with the NFL and college football pressing forward and the NBA raging into a wild offseason with the Draft and free agency back-to-back. Overseas, most attention is being paid to the goings on in the soccer world, with the EPL, La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga, and the rest all off and running in their seasons.

As such, you probably aren’t watching an awful lot of snooker — or probably know what snooker even is — but have no fear, social media will always ensure you find out about viral and hilarious snooker content. Yes, the billiards game that calls for immense strategy that is foreign to most of us here in the states — played on a giant table with 15 red balls, six colored balls and the cue ball — can produce viral moments, and on Thursday we were treated to an incredible one.

Ronnie O’Sullivan was facing Matthew Stevens at the Northern Ireland Open, trailing 2-1 in the match, when he stepped to the table and an incredibly loud fart rang out, causing a hilarious scene in the room with players and referees all laughing — and O’Sullivan would see his shot after trying to compose himself rattle in and out of the pocket.

Most thought it was the ref, who turned beet red, who had ripped one, but after the match O’Sullivan took ownership of the fart, saying he’s been dealing with “stomach problems,” via EuroSport.

“I dropped my guts,” admitted O’Sullivan after his 4-2 comeback win. “I’ve had bad stomach problems for the last three months, I’ve been having tests in the hospital.

“I said to the ref, ‘was that you?’ We had a laugh out there. But I’m taking full ownership of that one.”

O’Sullivan did come back to win that game and the match overall, and hopefully he finds a way to take care of his stomach issues. “I dropped my guts” is an all-time line though and everyone in the room had a laugh in the aftermath.

An Oregon, Ohio police dispatcher and the daughter of a domestic abuse victim are being lauded for their response to a violent situation. Dispatcher Tim Teneyck was manning the phone lines when a curious call came in that he first assumed was a prank.

“I would like to order a pizza,” the 911 caller said, giving a residential address.

“You called 911 to order a pizza?” a bemused Teneyck asked. “This is the wrong number to call for a pizza.”

“No, no, no, no, you’re not understanding,” the woman insisted.

“I’m getting you now,” Teneyck quickly replied. “We’ll get ’em going.”

“Is the other guy still there?” Teneyck asked

“I need a large pizza,” the woman said.

“How about medical, do you need medical?” Teneyck replied. “No,” the woman replied.

“With pepperoni,” the woman continued.

“We’ll get ’em going,” Teneyck stated before asking if the woman can stay on the phone.

“No,” the woman replied before the call ends.

Why This Woman Called 911 to Order Pizza

www.youtube.com

Teneyck realized she needed emergency assistance because of her persistence. “She stuck right to it,” he told Inside Edition. “I knew there was something else going on.”

The dispatcher told police to go to the house with their sirens off saying “there’s domestic violence going on.” When police arrived, they saw the call was from a young woman whose mother was assaulted by her boyfriend, 56-year-old Simon Lopez.

According to the young woman, Lopez came home drunk saying he was going to “beat her ass” before punching her and throwing her into a wall.

“I was thinking to myself ‘I need to call 911 but how do I get him to stay in the house so he will be taken out in handcuffs’ and I just thought, ‘Pizza!'” the woman told Inside Edition.

Simon Lopez, 56, was arrested by police and charged with misdemeanor domestic violence. Lopez also had a warrant out for failure to appear.

“I thank him from the bottom of my heart,” the woman said of Teneyck.

via Inside Edition / YouTube

The next day, Oregon Police Chief Mike Navarre praised Teneyck as well.

“He utilized his training and his experience to recognize that a woman was in distress,” Navarre told NBC News. “We have no way of knowing what would have happened if she didn’t get through.”

After the incident, the dispatcher and police chief learned that some support groups teach people to report domestic violence surreptitiously to 911 by pretending to order Chinese food or pizza.

When the operator says “you have the wrong number” the person reporting the violence is supposed to say, “no.”

Navarre is using the call to train other dispatchers on how to realize if someone is in trouble and can’t express it in words.

“A good dispatcher is going to recognize that this is a person who wants to talk and needs help. That is exactly what happened here,” he said. “Some dispatchers might hang up on this person, but it’s worth a try to give it your best shot. That’s what she did, and it worked out extremely well.”

To get support, resources, and hope for anyone affected by domestic violence in the U.S. call 1.800.799-SAFE (7233).

Being labeled as “difficult” because you refuse to accept a bad situation is almost a rite of passage for women. Unfortunately, that difficult label – whether deserved or not – can make or break a woman’s success. A study conducted at the University of Hamburg’s Department of Economics found, “[D]islikability hurts women] more than likeability helps” and “women significantly suffer from the variation in likability and achieve overall worse outcomes than men.”

The drama between Will Smith and Janet Hubert (aka the O.G. Aunt Viv) behind the scenes on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air has been the subject of copious nostalgia-themed click-bait articles. Hubert was reportedly fired for being “difficult” and replaced with Daphne Maxwell Reid after season three, but the real story behind Hubert’s departure is sadly too familiar to many women in the workplace where likeability sometimes factors into a woman’s performance more than competence or fairness.

During the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air Reunion Special on HBOMax, Hubert sat down with Smith to talk about what really happened for the first time in 27 years. Hubert revealed she grappled with a challenging personal life during her time on the show, which affected her behavior on set. While Hubert was never unprofessional, she was just withdrawn, which is for some reason a problem? “I was no longer laughing, smiling, joking because there were things that were going on that nobody knew about. The cast had no idea what was going on,” Hubert said.

In a weird way, it almost makes it worse. Hubert wasn’t punished for histrionics or harassing her co-stars. She was punished for not being affable at a time when she shouldn’t even be expected to be affable.

Hubert also put to bed rumors that she was fired from the show for that “bad” behavior. “They offered me this really bad deal in the third season. They said, ‘You’ve got two months and two weeks of work, and you cannot work anywhere else.’ That meant my salary was cut. I had a new baby and a husband who was out of work, so I said no. I did not accept their offer,” Hubert explained.

Hubert revealed she felt Smith was responsible for pushing her off of the show, and he hurt her career when he branded her with a scarlet difficult. “But you took all of that away from me — with your words. Words can kill. I lost everything. Reputation. Everything. And I understand you were able to move forward, but you know those words, calling a Black woman difficult in Hollywood, is the kiss of death. And it’s hard enough being a dark-skinned Black woman in this business,” Hubert said.

Smith acknowledged his own part in the way Hubert was treated, and is able to see how he “made things very difficult” for Hubert. At the time, Smith was 21-years-old and felt as if “everything was a threat,” saying he was neither “sensitive” nor “perceptive” to what Hubert was going through in her personal life. “I was so driven by fear,” Smith admitted. Smith also said he felt as if Hubert hated him.

Now, Smith knows better. “I have children. I’ve been divorced and I have a second marriage, and I can see now the level of pain and the level of struggle that it was just for you to show up every day.”

Huber and Smith hugged and made up, forgiving each other for the mistakes of the past. Smith said, “You’re still my Aunt Viv” and Hubert was reunited with the rest of the cast, meeting Reid for the first time.

A lot has changed in the 30 years since the show first aired. Transparent conversations, such as the one between Hubert and Smith, are more commonplace and accepted. By having conversations like this, more people can understand some of the misogyny involved in earning a “difficult” label, and how sometimes the person who bears it isn’t difficult at all.

I’ve never been a fan of politics. I’ve always made conscientious decisions when I vote and engaged in discussions about challenges facing society, but the world of politics itself has always been a turn off. The partisan bickering, the power of expensive lobbyists to sway leaders who are supposed to work for the people, the mudslinging and inherently divisive nature of our two-party system—it’s all just felt gross to me.

The office of the presidency, oddly enough, has not felt that way. Though a president brings their partisanship with them, of course, the office itself is non-partisan. The fact that it is a job held by a single individual has always humanized it for me, prompting me to feel some sympathy even for presidents I wasn’t a fan of. “President of the United States” is an inarguably difficult position to be in, with impossibly hard choices to make. When unexpected crises land in your lap—the world’s worst terrorist attack, a classroom full of first graders gunned down, the arrival of a global pandemic—it’s your responsibility to handle it with care and wisdom. Every decision you make will be examined through the lens of history. Every statement you make becomes historical record. That’s no small thing.

The weight of the office is unmatched in our country, and the status of the U.S. as a superpower makes it unlike any other position in the world. Everything U.S. presidents do and say matters, not just to Americans, but to people and governments all over the world.

Up until four years ago, I felt like every president understood that.

For some beautiful proof, consider this story of President-elect Obama’s asking President Bush if he could meet the former presidents during his transition. A Facebook post from Sebastian Copeland shared an excerpt from Jean Edward Smith’s biography of George W. Bush that reads:

“As part of the presidential transition, Barack Obama asked Bush if it would be possible for him to meet all the ex-presidents. Bush was happy to oblige, and organized a White House luncheon in the Oval Office on January 7. Bush and Obama were joined by Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, and George H. W. Bush. The luncheon lasted over two hours, each former president ordered his lunch à la carte from the White House mess, and the tone was convivial and friendly. ‘All the gentlemen here understand both the pressures and possibilities of this office,’ said Obama before the meeting. ‘For me to have the opportunity to get advice, good counsel and fellowship with these individuals is extraordinary, and I just want to thank the President for hosting us.’

Bush was equally effusive. ‘We want you to succeed,’ he replied. ‘Whether we’re Democrat or Republican we care deeply about this country. And to the extent we can we look forward to sharing out experiences with you. All of us who have served in this office understand that the office transcends the individual.'”

What a stunning contrast to where we are today.

Right now we have a President-elect not only being denied the most basic transition protocols, but being accused of crazy global conspiracies to to cheat in order to get elected. Nevermind that the pre-election polling from practically every respected polling firm had him ahead the whole time, making his win not remarkable in any way. Nevermind that the DHS cybersecurity head issued a statement saying, “There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised.” Nevermind that that official was subsequently fired by the president for fact-checking him and that the president’s legal team is next-level cuckoo bananapants. Nevermind that that legal team is currently 1–30 in post-election court cases, proving that the claims of widespread fraud are not based in reality.

It’s as embarrassing as it is baffling. And on top of that, the dignity and decency we see in the Obama transition story is gone. The current occupant of the White House has shat upon the office of the presidency. It’s going to have to be hosed down, disinfected, and saged in a hazmat suit before President-elect Biden takes the reins.

I exaggerate—but only slightly—because I’m frustrated that I can’t do much else. It’s a helpless feeling to watch the country you love having its foundations sledgehammered by a malignant narcissist who wouldn’t recognize decency and dignity if they slapped him across the face, knowing that you can’t personally do anything about it. While I’m hopeful for the future, I mourn for what we’ve lost these past four years and weep over the fact that tens of millions of Americans appear to not care that the office of the presidency has been befouled beyond recognition by this man’s ongoing behavior.

There is plenty to criticize in every president’s time in the Oval Office, and some certainly had moments which were neither decent not dignified. But when their terms were over, when it was time to pass the baton to the next person in line, they did it. They didn’t try to undermine a free and fair election with criminal accusations of their opponent. They didn’t lie constantly to the American people in a desperate attempt to cling to power. They recognized that the office was bigger than they were, that the safety and security of the country was more important than they were, that even though their party was passing power to the opposing team, the person elected deserved a chance to govern because the will of the people said so.

Politics is ugly, but not like this. This is far beyond partisan squabbles and typical mudslinging. For the first time in modern history, our peaceful transfer of power is being threatened by the delusions of an egomaniac who can’t admit defeat. I just hope and pray that this nightmare ends soon so we can bring dignity and decency back to the White House, for all our sakes.