Month: May 2021

While the pandemic has been an unusual experience that’s been equal parts frustrating and terrifying for over a year now, Late Night host Seth Meyers decided to spend Tuesday night highlighting some of the positive changes society has made that we should definitely keep doing even when this whole thing is over.

In a segment titled “COVID Keepers,” Meyers unveiled a pretty solid list of items that should stick around for a while starting with elbow bumps, which he feels should permanently replace handshakes. “I don’t know where we got the idea that the best way to greet people was with one of the three or four parts of out body that are reliably damp,” Meyers effectively argued. Via The Wrap:

“Elbow bumps get the point across just as well,” Meyers continued. “And they kind of look cool. And, I can be 100% certain that you didn’t have your elbow down your pants five minutes before this meeting.”

As for the other items on the list, Meyers was a big fan of people having time for weird personal hobbies that they keep to themselves, wearing masks on the subway, putting more scientists on TV, and the biggest one of them all, working from home.

“It’s better for the environment, it cuts down on traffic, and if you think coming into the office means you’re more productive, then you have not visited my writer’s room,” Meyers joked. “Your computer at home works great. You know what doesn’t work? The office printer, the office copy machine and the office fridge.”

Channing Tatum hasn’t been shirtless in every movie he’s appeared in. For instance, here he is wearing a jaunty sailor’s suit in Hail, Caesar! But he has been shirtless in many of the movies he’s been in, including She’s the Man, Step Up, Magic Mike, and Magic Mike XXL, a masterpiece. Tatum doesn’t mind showing off his abs (and the people (me) watching his movies don’t mind seeing them), but it’s not easy being ripped.

“As someone who works out for a job, I promise you I would not look like this unless I had to be naked in most of my movies mostly,” he told Kelly Clarkson on Tuesday’s episode of The Kelly Clarkson Show. “At some point I have to get better at acting so I don’t have to be naked in all of them.” Someone get this man a wool sweater ASAP:

“I literally get to work out as a job and it’s still hard,” he said. “I can’t imagine people who have a 9-5 job, who have kids at home, and where do they get the energy and the time to actually focus on themselves?”

To be fair, Tatum wasn’t naked in This is the End. He’s wearing a gimp suit.

As the Facebook Oversight Board commission prepared to announce its decision on whether or not Donald Trump can return to the social media platform (UPDATE: The commission has decided that Trump will remain banned), Twitter CFO Ned Segal made it clear that Trump will remain permanently banned regardless of what Facebook decided. While talking to Yahoo! Finance Live on Tuesday, Segal affirmed that there have been no changes to their decision to keep Trump off of his platform of choice where his tweets routinely wreaked havoc several times a day, including his incitement of the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol building. Via Mediaite:

“When you step back and think about our policies, we want to work hard to be consistent, to be transparent so people know exactly what to expect from us. We don’t have an oversight board like that. Our team is accountable for the decisions that we make,” Segal continued, and reiterated that “There is no changes to anything we have talked about in the past.”

Of course, banning Trump has become an even easier for Twitter. With the former president gone, the social media platform saw it’s revenue jump 28% in the first quarter, which was almost entirely Trump-free. According to The New York Times, “The company saw a 20 percent jump in daily active users who see ads, to 199 million. It also added new advertising formats, leading to a 32 percent increase in ad revenue in the quarter.”

Predictably, Trump has said that he doesn’t even miss Twitter, and now calls the platform “very boring” after being one of its most habitual power users for the better part of a decade. He’s now resorted to blogging to pass the time.

(Via Mediaite)

Piers Morgan may have left Good Morning Britain following his on-air temper tantrum over Meghan Markle, but he’s still got his Daily Mail column, and when he’s not popping off over frozen yogurt, he’s gotta keep his anger-bear brand alive. Piers’ latest rager of an article sees him aghast at Meghan daring to write a children’s book, called The Bench, that’s timed for a Father’s Day release. The book, which was inspired by Prince Harry’s relationship with their son, Archie, also contains drawings of a “red-headed soldier,” which is all too much for the pro-Monarchy Piers.

Piers, who is obviously still very salty about Meghan “ghosting” him after a pub date several years ago, promoted his newest thanking-the-haters sentiment with a tweet, in which Piers reveals that he’s still very angry about Meghan and Harry discussing why they fled to the U.S. and alleging racist statements from Royal family members.

“How the hell can Meghan ‘I hate royalty but call me Duchess’ Markle preach about father-child relationships,” Piers ranted in a tweet. “[W]hen she’s disowned her own Dad, and wrecked her husband’s relationship with his?”

Within the column, Piers doesn’t appear to have read Meghan’s book, only the promotional announcement, to which he “laughed out loud” and scoffed at her description of the book as “through an inclusive lens”:

Ms Markle proudly informed us that her debut literary tome captures ‘the warmth, joy and comfort of the relationship between fathers and sons from all walks of life.’ She added: ‘This representation was particularly important to me … and I worked closely to depict this special bond through an inclusive lens. My hope is that The Bench resonates with every family, no matter the make-up, as much as it does with mine.’

This doesn’t seem like someone overly keen to operate ‘an inclusive lens’ to me. In fact, it seems a singularly EX-clusive lens.

As for Harry, he trashed his father Prince Charles in the same interview, moaning about how Daddy had stopped taking his calls or giving him cash, sounding like some needy spoiled brat teenager rather than a 36-year-old multi-millionaire doormat who ditched his family, country and duty because his chillingly controlling and ambitious wife wanted him to.

And unforgivably, he did this as Charles was desperately worried about HIS father, Prince Philip, who was lying seriously ill in hospital and later died.

Let’s just say that people find Piers’ ongoing, anger-fueled obsession with Meghan to be quite amusing. Yes, it really does seem like Meghan deciding not to speak to Piers after having a drink is his “villain origin story,” and now, she’s truly “living rent free in his head.” The fact that he’s looked the other way from Prince Andrew’s well-documented association with Jeffrey Epstein also got some airtime from Twitter users, and the term “restraining order” surfaced as well.

And Meghan’s still living her life in Montecito with her family while Piers rages.

In the year-plus since releasing The Main Thing in February 2020, Real Estate has given their fans even more new material to sink their teeth into. Just a couple months ago, they followed up the album with the Half A Human EP, which the band made remotely during the pandemic. Now they’re back with another EP and this time, it’s all covers.

The five-track collection comes via Aquarium Drunkard’s The Lagniappe Sessions series, for which Real Estate covered Parsley Sound’s “Ocean House,” My Bloody Valentine’s “You Never Should,” John Cale’s “Please,” Roger Miller’s “Little Green Apples,” and Jawbone’s “Java Jelly.”

The band’s Julian Lynch says of the My Bloody Valentine cover, “‘You Never Should’ is one of my favorite tunes off of My Bloody Valentine’s Isn’t Anything. I had wanted to cover this song for quite some time. I even considered it for my own Lagniappe Session a while back. I’m glad I kept it tucked away until now, though, because I’m so happy with how the cover sounds with the full band.”

In an interview with Uproxx about The Main Thing, Martin Courtney described his mindset while making the album, saying, “I’ve got three kids now. My wife was pregnant through a lot of the process of writing [The Main Thing]. So, just on the level of, is this a responsible thing to do, to be a guy in an indie-rock band? I was really struggling with that, and also feeling like, the world is kind of in a bad state. […] Is there something more useful I could be doing with my life? I feel a little bit useless writing these songs. So, that was kind of what went into writing this record, those types of doubts. […] I think for me it was just like, ‘Obviously I’m going to do this because this is where I’m at in my life. I can’t just not do it. And I want to make a record. I love making music.’ It was never a question of whether or not I wanted to do it. So yeah, I think it just came down to, we need to work that much harder and just make it feel worthwhile, basically.”

Check out Real Estate’s The Lagniappe Sessions covers here.

After more than a year of massive closures and several months of carefully social-distanced screenings, movie theaters across the country are slowly coming back to life. If you’ve been to an indoor movie theater in recent months, you’ve probably seen a handful of employees decked out in PPE milling about to set off foggers and wipe down every surface in each cinema between screenings. But that sight could soon become a thing of the past.

As Variety reports, the National Association of Theatre Owners recently updated its “CinemaSafe” guidelines to do away with its mandate that each theater be thoroughly disinfected between screenings. Which doesn’t mean that they no longer care about the health of their patrons; the new rules simply stipulate that theater owners should be following current CDC, state, or local guidelines when it comes to cleaning up. At the moment, the CDC recommends giving theaters a thorough cleaning once a day.

Before you start screaming and vow to never visit a movie theater again, it’s worth noting that the big show made of disinfecting each theater likely didn’t make much of a difference anyway: The CDC has put the odds of contracting COVID through surface transmission at one in 10,000—or roughly the same as being struck by lightning. Even so, many theater owners know that peace of mind is now just as important as popcorn to the theatrical experience, so most theaters are continuing to be overly cautious.

“We’re still spraying between shows,” Jeff Logan, president and CEO of the South Dakota-based Logan Luxury Theaters Corporation told Variety. “We’ve got to maintain public confidence.”

Whether this trend will continue into the summer—when many studios are planning to mount their big theatrical comebacks, and theaters hope to recoup much of what they’ve lost, revenue-wise, in the past year—remains to be seen. For now, says Logan, “We’re just going to make darn sure everyone feels safe.”

(Via Variety)

I won’t go so far as to call Paul Verhoeven “underrated,” but we, collectively, don’t talk enough about how many must-see movies he’s made. Soldier of Orange, The Fourth Man, RoboCop, Total Recall, Basic Instinct, Showgirls, Starship Troopers, Elle — Verhoeven directed them all, and they’re all great. His new film, Benedetta, must be great, too, because it’s an official selection at this year’s Cannes Film Festival.

Based on the non-fiction book Immodest Acts: The Life of a Lesbian Nun In Renaissance Italy, Benedetta is about a nun in the 17th century, played by Virginie Efira (she was in Elle, but more importantly, she’s the French voice of Mavis in the Hotel Transylvania movies), who has an affair with another nun. The drama also stars Charlotte Rampling, Daphné Patakia, Lambert Wilson, and Olivier Rabourdin.

Verhoeven’s long-time co-writer, Gerard Soeteman, distanced himself from the project, believing it was too focused on the more lurid aspects of the story. “She is a lesbian and knows how to get a lot of people behind her with her machinations,” he said. “For me, it was not about the sexual relations of this genius woman, but about the political constellation in which she moved. If you omit that element and just think, ‘Hmmm, lesbian, how nice,’ then I’ll serve you, I don’t find that acceptable. I am so against what Paul wants to make of it.” Watch the (slightly NSFW) trailer above.

Here’s the official plot synopsis:

In the late 15th century, with plague ravaging the land, Benedetta Carlini joins the convent in Pescia, Tuscany, as a novice. Capable from an early age of performing miracles, Benedetta’s impact on life in the community is immediate and momentous.

The Cannes Film Festival runs from July 6-17.

Longtime Giant Bomb team members Vinny Caravella, Alex Navarro, and Brad Shoemaker have announced that this Friday will be their last at the popular gaming website. The trio broke the news yesterday on a live podcast recording on Twitch alongside Giant Bomb founder Jeff Gerstmann. In the tweets that followed, none of the men further elaborated on why they were leaving the company or their next ventures, but did express gratitude towards the site these formative members helped create.

This Friday will be my last day with Giant Bomb as per the announcement on the Bombcast today. I’m so proud of everything we’ve accomplished over the years and so thankful for everyone that has been a positive part of it. It has shaped who I am.

— Vincent Caravella (@VinnyCaravella) May 4, 2021

in case you didn’t happen to tune into this week’s Bombcast, I should probably say publicly that I have given my notice, and this Friday will be my last day @giantbomb. It’s been an incredible 10 years, but I made the difficult decision that it was time to move on.

— Yeet Takeshi (@alex_navarro) May 4, 2021

Today was my last episode of the Giant Bombcast. Friday is my last day with the company. After spending a third of my life helping to build this thing, it’s tough to make my fingers even type that out. (Seriously, what?)

— Brad Shoemaker (@bradshoemaker) May 4, 2021

For those unfamiliar with Giant Bomb, the site was founded back in 2008 by a group of former GameSpot employees burned out by traditional games journalism, Caravella and Shoemaker being among them. In 2010, another former GameSpot worker, Navarro, joined the team as well. For over a decade, these three — along with numerous others — contributed towards creating innovative and personality-driven content for Giant Bomb, a site which has served not only as a source of entertainment and knowledge, but as a place that has fostered some of the games media’s well-known reporters, critics, and content makers.

For those a bit shaken up over the news, rest assured that Gerstmann intends to stick with the company, and has stated he will have more to say on the future of the site –Giant Beastcast presumably included — in the coming week.

We’ll have some stuff to say about where Giant Bomb goes from here a little later this week or next. Kind of a lot going on over here right now!

— Jeff Gerstmann (@jeffgerstmann) May 4, 2021

If anyone has ever earned the right to mutter “I’m too old for this sh*t!,” it’s Dr. Anthony Fauci. After regularly having his expertise called into question by a reality TV show host-turned-president, Fauci is finally free of the unnecessary noise and nonsense. Well, most of it. When the 80-year-old doctor isn’t busy debunking bonkers conspiracy theories, he’s dealing with the fact that an estimated 25 percent of Americans won’t receive the COVID vaccine. On Tuesday night, Fauci spoke with Jimmy Kimmel about these disappointing statistics.

Kimmel didn’t waste any time in asking the question that’s on many people’s minds right now: After all the time and effort that Fauci and his colleagues have put into finding, testing, and approving a trio of vaccines for immediate use, is he frustrated that there are still people who refuse to be vaccinated? Even as we near a domestic death toll of 600,000? The ever-professional Fauci was both measured and honest in his response:

“Yes, it is very frustrating. Not only because you care about everyone in the country—you care about the health and the safety of individuals—but also, there’s a societal responsibility that we should all have to put an end to this outbreak. And if you have a group of people who understandably may think that they’re invulnerable because they’re young and healthy… and therefore, it doesn’t make any difference if they get infected because they likely would do well. That’s really not the right attitude.”

Fauci went on to explain how while the numbers might be in the favor of these healthy little whippersnappers, they’re absolutely not exempt from getting a devastating case of COVID. But more importantly, according to Fauci:

“If you let yourself get infected, it isn’t just you in a vacuum. You may inadvertently and innocently infect someone else who could really get in trouble. That could be someone’s grandmother or grandfather, someone’s wife who’s on chemotherapy for breast cancer. So you can’t think about yourself in a vacuum; you have to think somewhat about your societal responsibility.”

Also likely annoying? That it’s been more than a year and Fauci is still having to explain the concept of transmission. But his point is still an extremely valuable one. So if you won’t get vaccinated for Dr. Fauci, maybe do it for your grandma?

You can watch the full interview above.

In recent months, Pete Davidson has found himself a new recurring character on Saturday Night Live: Eminem. He played the rapper in a pair of memorable sketches from December and March. That gave Davidson the opportunity to get on the phone with Eminem, a conversation that he described to Seth Meyers on yesterday’s Late Night.

Davidson spoke about the call and explained why he hung up on Eminem “as quick as possible,” saying:

“It went I think as good as it could go. Those [sketches] were written by the great Dan Bulla and Steven Castillo, great SNL writers, and [Chris] Redd. Eminem said a couple nice things about me and I of course heard them. I reached out, I was like, ‘I would just like to say thank you.’ And I just hit him up and said thanks and he was like, ‘Yeah man, you really did that. When I saw Stu on script, I was like, I don’t know how it was going to go, but after you did that, it was fire.’ I was like, ‘Oh thank you so much, you’re the coolest,’ and then I just hung up as quick as possible. That’s all you need, you don’t want anything more.”

Meyers elaborated on Davidson’s point about hanging up, adding, “When you talk to a hero, you don’t want to extend it. If you’re good, get out,” and Davidson agreed. Davidson also briefly touched on playing Joey Ramone in the upcoming movie I Slept With Joey Ramone, describing the decision to get him involved with the film as “either a really great or horrible choice by a studio and we will find out.”

Watch the full interview above.