Month: June 2021

Action Bronson may have lost 140 pounds since last year, but he’s still got that unmistakable Action grin. It comes paired with a “smiling eyes” brand of warmth that’ll make you feel like you’ve known the guy for years. His vibe has always been to live loud. Smoke what you want, eat what you want, do what you want, and give yourself over completely to life’s pleasures. It’s part of what makes his personality so infectious and why people flock to catch his show F*ck That’s Delicious, currently airing on YouTube, which is literally just about Action eating at the places he likes to eat (now with more kettlebell squats!).

But if you were worried that the new, healthier Action Bronson might live like a monk, fear not. He’s still the same dude with the same passion for food and life. He just felt like the fast life was catching up to him and he needed an adjustment.

“I put it out there for people to be free and fat and this and that, and eat what you like,” he says. “But unfortunately, some people have genetics like me where it just fucking sticks to your ass. I wanted to make amends… I realized that I was a fuckhead and I should stop doing these things and change shit up.”

That realization came while the multi-hyphenate was working on his new self-help book, Fuck It I’ll Start Tomorrow, which Action admits began as an attempt to get a check before morphing into a genuine journey of self-examination. We linked up last week over Zoom to talk about writing the book, getting fit, eating plant-based, and how it will all affect Fuck That’s Delicious going forward.

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Let’s talk a bit about your new book Fuck It I’ll Start Tomorrow. It’s positioned as a self-help book — what kind of lessons do you teach people in the book?

Deceit, lying, lying to yourself, coming to the realization that you’ve lied to yourself and you’ve lied to everybody else… you know all kinds of things. It’s experience-based, a lot of people can relate to some of the things I’m saying, but I wrote it with deceit in my mind. When I wrote the book I had no intention of putting my all into it, which is unfortunate because I only do things that I put my all into. This I did strictly because it was a check and a way to get to another cookbook, which I really wanted to do. I didn’t want to do a fucking self-help book because “I don’t fucking give a shit,” that was my attitude.

The bottom line is, this book was written with bad intentions but somehow it turned a mirror on me and I realized that I was a fuckhead and I should stop doing these things and change shit up. Never do anything that you don’t put your all into and this book taught me a lesson.

The book ended at the pandemic, it was a prequel to all the change that’s happened now, but it was a catalyst. The book was a catalyst unknowingly, I hated every second of it, you could ask Rachel Wharton the woman who wrote the book with me, James Beard award winner, two times New York best-selling author. She went through hell with me to do this shit, I feel terrible. At one point I called them up and was like “Yo, I’ll give you the money back I’m not fucking doing this.” It was a shit show, but I’m just glad everything worked out.

In the book, you could feel my pain and my joy.

This year has been a definite journey, you’ve totally changed your life and changed the way you eat. What has impacted you the most about transforming, not just the way you look physically, but your diet, which was originally built around excess?

I’ve always been able to eat right, I actually went to school and got a 100 in nutrition, I know what we’re supposed to eat. I know what we need to eat to be healthy, I know what not to eat, I know not to eat 10 desserts at one time, but I’m an addict.

You have to break through that addiction, but the mind is stronger than anything and I feel like my mind is ironclad. 140 pounds bro. That’s not easy, I was disgusted I had 140 to lose, I still got to lose another 20 to 30, it’s unreal. At least I’m at a normal weight now, before I was so abnormal, it was disgusting.

I caught some of the new episodes of Fuck That’s Delicious, and I noticed just because you’ve gotten healthy, you haven’t gotten soft, you’re rocking the kettle ball to the pizza joint, you’re still as passionate about food as you’ve always been. That’s particularly inspiring because you’ve changed your whole life around but you haven’t given up the joy, and I think that’s an important message to share with people. What was your thinking going into the new season?

My thinking going into it was pretty much trying to mix my new lifestyle with the show. Every time we do Fuck That’s Delicious, all this shit was made up because this is my life. It was chronicling my life with the homies, and that was it, we never put any stage shit on, it’s all just one take, put a camera on and we just lived. So I just put the camera on and lived again, and this is just the way I’m living now so we’re capturing this.

For so long, it’s been just “blast yourself with 45 meals a day and desserts. It’s okay, just laugh, drink your face off, and smoke your life away.” Yeah, cool. There comes a point where it catches up and it caught up heavy to me. I had to chill out but the love of food is always going to be there. It doesn’t mean you have to stop eating, it just means you have to stop being an animal.

You gotta know when to hold them and you gotta know when to fold them. I learned when to fold them. Before, I didn’t know how to fold them.

Right now you’ve got a partnership happening with Field Roast and their show Make Taste Happen, what should we expect out of that partnership?

Big things man, it’s exciting, I love doing things where it’s something I use organically and it’s not just some bullshit. I was once a little bit intimidated by food that was mimicking real food but is made with plants, but these things, they’ve made in an approachable way. I understand sausage, I understand the way it is, I understand what’s going on in the world now.

It’s innovative and delicious and healthy. It’s this canvas that allows you to make unbelievable things, not just from a taste angle alone. It allows you to imagine and take the mind places you’ve been in the past — some real nostalgia stuff.

What makes Field Roast different? Why partner with them?

Just in my own opinion, I’ve tried plant-based sausage and plant-based burgers, and the texture usually isn’t there. It’s grainy or the flavor is off. There are only a couple of brands that seem like they’re doing the right thing, and in my estimation, Field Roast has been the best product I’ve tried so far. It’s very versatile, it browns up the way it should, it tastes amazing, it’s a vehicle for all kinds of flavors.

If you just have a couple of items in your pantry it’s really all you need — you can create masterpieces.

What are some of your favorite things to prepare? You sent me a photo of you doing apple sausage, broccoli, onions — what are we cooking here?

See that’s a classic Italian dish, I believe it’s a Roman dish, when you do the sausage with the orecchiette, the little ear pasta, with the broccoli. I decided that I’m going to mimic a dish that I have and I love and make it ethnic as well and take you around the world and give you flavors that go “mmm.”

I made this unbelieved pistachio pesto [full recipe here] to top it with, you could eat it every day. Use a little bit of Sambal. People submitted some items that I should be using and they tried to trick me on some Chopped stuff but I just created a masterpiece.

What’s your secret to a plant-based meal?

Not treating it as if it’s something different. You don’t put white gloves on like “ooh its plant-based” you just hit it with hard flavor like you normally would. It’s all about flavor, good olive oil, good products, it’s still all about the products. Make sure you keep it nice and fresh and creative.

An unfortunate aspect of 2020 was the inability to attend gigantic events in person. While some of these things — sporting events, concerts, etc. — are starting to return, it’s taking conventions and gaming tournaments a little longer to get back into the swing of normalcy. Most of them are still having events, but they’re digital-only with fans viewing in through streaming sites like Twitch.

One such event is EVO 2021. The PlayStation-owned fighting tournament is famous for large crowds coming together to witness some of the best players in the world battling on stage in games like Street Fighter, Dragonball FighterZ, and Super Smash Bros. However, another part of that fun was what was taking place away from EVO’s main stage. Fans would put together tournaments on the side with their own prizes and contestants. Others would just get together and play each other, because that’s what everyone else was doing. EVO is as much a fighting game convention as it is as a tournament.

PlayStation recognized this community aspect and, while EVO 2021 is going to be digital, it is making efforts to not miss out on the fan interactions that have taken place over the years. This is why it announced it’ll be hosting open-format community tournaments that fans can participate in alongside the main events of EVO 2021.

Starting next week, the Evo Community Series features more than 120 tournaments across the globe, $74,000 in total prizing, and more than 100 hours of broadcasts.

As part of this community celebration, PlayStation is hosting three tournaments from June 10 through August 3. Eligible PS4 players in select regions across the globe will be able to participate in these open-format competitions for a chance to vanquish rivals and win cash prizes (details below). Select matches will be broadcast on the PlayStation Twitch and YouTube channels, as well as Evo’s Twitch channel.

Whether you can perform frame-perfect inputs or simply enjoy watching the execution of a tricky combo, this culmination of fans’ commitment to the fighting game community brings together different scenes over a shared love for the genre. Look forward to a record-breaking number of upsets, underdogs, and unforgettable moments at these highly accessible events. Register today on the PlayStation Competition Center or the Events tab on your PS4 console.

This is really cool. PlayStation easily could have just run EVO as a regular tournament and waited until the convention aspect of it was back to bring back the popular side tournaments, but instead, they’re giving everyone a chance to participate in it in an organized fashion.

It will be interesting to see if this becomes the norm in the future. While everyone will, of course, want to see tournaments return to an in-person format in the future, it would be cool to see PlayStation use the EVO name to host even more online tournaments throughout the year. Maybe an eSports circuit of some kind is on the way? The sky is the limit for what PlayStation can do depending on how well this tournament performs.

There’s a good chance one of your favorite movie stars is in David O. Russell’s new movie. Your favorite pop star, too. The cast for the still-untitled drama from the Oscar-nominated writer and director of American Hustle includes Margot Robbie, John David Washington, Christian Bale, Rami Malek, Zoe Saldana, Anya Taylor-Joy, Chris Rock, Mike Myers, Robert De Niro, Michael Shannon, Timothy Olyphant, Andrea Riseborough, and according to Collider, Taylor Swift has also joined the ensemble.

As if David O. Russell hadn’t already cast enough major stars in his next movie, Taylor Swift has joined the A-list ensemble, an individual close to the project has confirmed to Collider… Like the plot of the film, Swift’s role is being kept under wraps.

One thing’s for sure: Swift will not be playing a cat. Beyond the cursed feline musical, the Fearless singer has appeared in Valentine’s Day, The Lorax, The Giver, and one episode of New Girl. Swift was also the subject of the Netflix documentary, Miss Americana, and her Folklore: The Long Pond Studio Sessions concert film was released on Disney+ last November. In it, she revealed that her boyfriend, Joe Alwyn, co-wrote many of the songs under the alias William Bowery. Alwyn doesn’t appear in The Long Pond Studio Sessions, but he was in Mary Queen of Scots with… Margot Robbie.

Am I grasping at straws, looking for easter eggs and tenuous-at-best connections? Yes. But that’s what us Swift fans do.

(Via Collider)

When Seth Rogen announced last year that he’s shepherding a CG-animated reboot of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the writer/actor said he wants the film to focus on the “teenage” part of the classic team’s name. He’s off to a good start.

On Tuesday, Rogen tweeted a piece of notebook paper filled with the type of doodles and margin notes you’d expect from a high school chemistry class, but it’s the name at the top that shows this is no ordinary teen. Written at the top is the name Leonardo along with the date August 11, 2023. There’s also plenty of little Easter eggs about his Turtle brothers and their human friend April O’Neill.

So, yes, the date on the notebook paper is a clever way to announce the reboot film’s release date, but Rogen added an extra tweet as confirmation just to be safe. “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles… Aug 11 2023 (Leo takes notes like I used to),” he tweeted.

While discussing his plans for the reboot back in August, Rogen said the “teenage” aspect of the Ninja Turtles would be a jumping-off point for the whole film, but he obviously won’t be “disregarding the rest” of the team’s unique qualities.

“As a lifelong fan of Ninja Turtles, weirdly the ‘Teenage’ part of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was always the part that stuck out to me the most,” Rogen told Collider, “and as someone who loves teenage movies, and who’s made a lot of teenage movies, and who literally got their start in their entire profession by writing a teenage movie, the idea of kind of honing in on that element was really exciting to us.”

(Via Seth Rogen on Twitter)

When Marina Mabrey pulled up from the logo with 11 seconds left on the shot clock in a tied game with just over three minutes to play in overtime against the reigning champion Seattle Storm to sink her sixth three-pointer of the night, we knew this year would be different for her. Now, more than three weeks into the 2021 WNBA season, Mabrey’s scoring at an All-Star level as the perfect complement to scoring champion Arike Ogunbowale in the backcourt.

It’s hard to overstate how impressive Mabrey’s been. In her third year, she’s averaging a career-best 21.2 points per game on 52.8 percent shooting, including hitting 19-of-37 three-point attempts. The 5’11 guard is also grabbing 6.2 rebounds per night with 3.2 assists, 1.8 steals, and 3.2 turnovers, as she is giving a complete performance on a nightly basis.

Even the fancy stats appreciate what Mabrey’s accomplished so far. ESPN’s Kevin Pelton’s WARP (wins above replacement player) ranks Mabrey second at .269/game. That number means she’s more than twice as impactful to winning games than the average WNBA player, and she only ranks behind MVP frontrunner Jonquel Jones.

It’s early, but Mabrey’s leading the Most Improved Player of the Year conversation.

How has Mabrey improved her game so much?

Mabrey’s been known as a sharpshooter since her days at Notre Dame, but as a rookie, she struggled with the Los Angeles Sparks creating looks for herself. Shooting off-the-dribble didn’t come as naturally for her at the next level (she made just 7-of-33 attempts, per Synergy Sports), and she only ever attempted five shots in isolation. Fast-forward two seasons and she’s added tools to her bag that allow her to take defenders head-on, and her improved mobility shooting is taking her game to another dimension.

The Wings have only played five games, but Mabrey’s made 13-of-28 shots off-the-dribble this season, according to Synergy Sports, and she’s made 3-of-5 attempts in single-covered isolation situations. Rather than waiting for opportunities to come to her, Mabrey’s become a creator, working to find mismatches and advantages to get her own shot off.

Mabrey showed tremendous progress last season expanding her offensive game, but now she looks more comfortable using those skills. So much so that she’s taking 7.4 three-point shots per game, which is more than half the amount the entire Las Vegas Aces team tries on any given night. Only teammate Ogunbowale is attempting more per game.

Mabrey sure doesn’t look anything like the player who the Sparks dealt for a second-round pick before the 2020 season, and the Wings are reaping the benefits.

Where can Mabrey’s game go from here?

It’s unfair to expect Mabrey to continue shooting 53/51/92 splits for an entire season, but even as her efficiency numbers regress, she can maintain her status as an integral piece of Dallas’s offense. Teams will change their scouting reports on her and apply more pressure to the perimeter, and even if Mabrey plays nothing more than a decoy for spurts, the court could open for Ogunbowale, Satou Sabally, and whoever else emerges from the Wings’ young core.

Her passing ability will be important, too as she continues to serve more as an on-ball creator. Can she find cutters when the defense rotates to stop her from shooting? Will she utilize the screener in more pick-and-roll situations?

Having a second elite scorer, who is also a capable facilitator, in the backcourt could open everything up on the offensive end for Dallas.

What does Mabrey’s breakout mean for the Dallas Wings?

Wings fans have a lot to look forward to with four top-13 picks from this year’s draft on the roster including the top two overall choices in center Charli Collier and forward Awak Kuier. They also have three first-round picks from last season. The team is just 1-4 to start this year, but 2020 No. 2 pick Satou Sabally hasn’t played a game yet due to overseas obligations, and starter Allisha Gray has only played in one game after competing for Team USA in the 3×3 competition to qualify for the 2021 Olympics. Still, the Wings have the second-best offense in the league, scoring 105.9 points per 100 possessions.

New head coach Vickie Johnson has a lot of talent to work with, and once everyone returns, it’s reasonable to think Dallas can compete for a playoff spot. All four of the team’s losses have come by seven or less points including a three-point loss to the Storm, and that’s with Ogunbowale shooting below expectations. When she inevitably finds her shot again, Dallas will be a tough out.

And Mabrey will let any opponent hear about.

Coachella is officially happening — next year. The juggernaut festival will occur from April 15 to 17 and April 22 to 24, 2022, according to an announcement from its promoter, Goldenvoice.

“Our desert homecoming is officially set for April 2022,” said the release. “Our advance sale begins this Friday, June 4th at 10 am PT. More time to plan and more time to pay for your passes over time with our flexible payment plan options. Information about flexible payment plans and more at coachella.com.”

Coachella’s sister festival, the country-themed Stagecoach, also announced that it will take place next year, from April 29 to May 1. “Stagecoach is back in the saddle!” said the announcement. “Be the first to find out about the advance sale right around the corner at stagecoachfestival.com.”

Artists playing at the festivals won’t be revealed until the beginning of the new year, per Variety. Coachella’s 2020 headliners included Travis Scott, Rage Against The Machine, Frank Ocean, Lana Del Rey, and Megan Thee Stallion. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2020 program was rescheduled several times before getting cancelled altogether.

Variety noted that YouTube will partner with Goldenvoice to live stream the festival for the 10th year. “We’re back and thrilled to be partnering with Goldenvoice,” YouTube said in a statement. “As the world’s biggest virtual stage, we are more excited than ever to celebrate live music and to bring two weekends of extraordinary performances to music fans around the world.”

See the announcement below.

Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

You know what’s fun? Awards. Everyone loves awards. They are, by and large, a chance to be really positive about something and celebrate achievements. They can also lead to some interesting debates about if the correct awards were given out or if a different nominee should have won them. In video games, they’re also an opportunity to show trailers of upcoming titles, thus creating further excitement. But what if the entire awards show was about upcoming titles though?

That concept is what the Entertainment Software Association is going to test out at this year’s upcoming digital-only E3. In a press release, the ESA announced it planned to host an awards show to celebrate some of the most anticipated upcoming games at the event. The ones choosing the awards will be editors from outlets such as Gamespot and IGN.

This is an interesting idea from the ESA to potentially try and garner more interest from E3. The truth of the event is that interest in it has been waning from the developer side for quite a few years now. Large developers like Sony and EA are choosing to not have a physical presence there, with EA, in particular, hosting their own event around E3 time, because they feel they can better showcase themselves on their own. In the digital age, it’s a hard sell to developers to buy floor space so they can show off their games, or hold a major press conference when it can easily be done through a series of trailers– similar to the way Nintendo handles their Directs.

However, there’s always been a certain charm to being the most anticipated game of E3. When games release they’ll frequently feature box art medals stating how many “E3 Awards” they have won and the excitement around a game can lead to it getting top marketing from publishers. For example, a large part of why No Man’s Sky became such a highly marketed game for Sony was because of the excitement around it following its E3 trailer.

This awards show could be a great opportunity to showcase those moments and convince developers to continue using E3 as a platform to springboard themselves to a more noticeable point. However, anyone that does this will come at a potential cost. With excitement comes fan interest and with fan interest comes expectations. It can be hard to meet those expectations sometimes, especially when E3 trailers are typically nowhere close to the finished game. Devs come to these events and usually show off games that are nowhere close to completion. This means they could change a lot before release, but it also means that a lot of the time the code that’s in these trailers is dummy code, existing only for the event itself. It’s a heavy ask to tell a game developer to devote a month of work on their game to create a product that is going to accomplish nothing more than marketing.

All that said, an awards show is an interesting idea to create more excitement around E3. Celebrating games is never a bad thing and at the end of the day that’s what this is, an opportunity to celebrate some fun looking video games.

Cobra Kai recently (and already) wrapped shooting on Season 4 following an infuriatingly good third season and all signs pointing toward more seasons to come for The Karate Kid revival. Last week, the show revealed (in a teaser) that the return of Terry Silver was definitely happening, so we know that John Kreese called in help for his dojo to go up against the combined efforts of Daniel LaRusso and Johnny Lawrence’s charges. That those two are working together is really something, all those years after the questionable crane kick changed Johnny’s life forever.

The reputation of the Johnny Lawrence character carried over into William Zabka’s life, too. At the very least, it affected his experiences at Comic-Con events, where (as Zabka told Marc Maron on the WTF Podcast) things went a lot better for Ralph Macchio, whose character was long considered the definitive “good guy” of the franchise. Those fan interactions are much friendlier now for the man who portrays Lawrence (good guys come in many varieties, as it turns out), as Zabka told Maron:

“It’s a trip,” Zabka said of getting used to the experience. “I love it now because up until [Cobra Kai] I was the table that the dads would walk up and go, ‘I just want my kid to meet you. This guy was the biggest a**hole. Nice to meet you.’ And they would walk away.”

He continued, with Maron in hysterics, “Now, I got people coming up and going, ‘Hey, I love you on the show. Johnny is cool now.’”

Hell yeah, Johnny is cool now, especially after we’ve seen Martin Kove continue to remind us how terrible he was (and still is) as a sensei. By the way, Zabka also told Maron that he’s the guy who told Kove about the revival series, and that led to Kove “immediately want[ing] in.” And thank goodness for that development. Now, I’m still rooting for the show to answer one significant question. Fingers crossed!

(Via WTF Podcast & Hollywood Reporter)

Last week, John Mayer started teasing something called Sob Rock. He asked, “What is Sob Rock” and shared a handful of different answers to that questions, with modern images filling in the blank of the sentence, “Sob Rock is [blank] rock.” Now, we know what Sob Rock is: It’s a new album that’s set for release on July 16 via Columbia.

Mayer shared the news today by posting the retro-styled cover art on social media. Ahead of that reveal, he shared a mock-up of a vintage-looking magazine cover that reveals Mayer will share music and “details” (presumably about the upcoming album) this Friday, June 4. Furthermore, Mayer’s new sobrock.net website includes links to pre-save the album and reads simply, “It’s time to love an album again.”

Sob Rock is set to be Mayer’s eighth album overall and his first since 2017’s The Search For Everything. Mayer has released some singles in the years since that album, and it’s not yet clear if any of the three — the Platinum-certified “New Light,” “I Guess I Just Feel Like,” and “Carry Me Away” — will be included on the release.

Aside from the album, Mayer has been busy lately, as he has reportedly been in talks to host his own talk show.

Sob Rock is out 7/16 via Columbia. Pre-order it here.

The first two games of the Hawks-Knicks series were close fought battles that saw each team pick up a win in New York, but when the series shifted to Atlanta, things turned dramatically in favor of the Hawks. Back home, Atlanta won both games at State Farm Arena to take a 3-1 lead back to New York, winning the two games by a combined 28 points to take firm control of the series.

In those games, the Knicks’ offensive issues have continued to stand out, as their All-Star Julius Randle has struggled mightily from the field and the lone continuous bright spot has been the play of Derrick Rose, but that simply hasn’t been enough to keep pace with a Hawks team finding its stride. New York’s frustration is also starting to show in the form of some chippy play, most notably a shove Julius Randle gave Danilo Gallinari in Game 4.

On Tuesday, the Hawks met with the media after shootaround and Clint Capela was asked about the Knicks getting physical and trying to get the Hawks off of their game, and responded that Atlanta is embracing that type of play and is more than prepared to give it back to them — while making sure to note they can do so and get wins in the process.

“They are trying to play tough, push our guys around and talk sh*t,” Capela said. “But we can do that too. We showed them as soon as we came back here that we can do that too. We can push guys around too. We can talk sh*t as well, so what you gonna do about it? Oh, and we can get a win with it. So what you gonna do about it? Game 4, you’re coming back again, well it’s going to happen again. We win the game, we talk sh*t, and we push around. So what you gonna do about it? That’s what happened. We can do it too. We can be physical, but we can win games as well. Now we’re coming to your home to win this game again, and send you on vacation.”

On the other side, Randle and Rose shrugged off questions about Capela taking issue with his play in Game 4.

It adds yet another layer to a series that has already been feisty from the start when Trae Young heard it from the MSG crowd and gave it right back after hitting the game-winning shot in Game 1. Game 5 on Wednesday night in New York will surely have more tension and drama — although hopefully no more fan incidents — as the Knicks are desperate for a win to stay in the series while, as Capela says, the Hawks are looking forward to sending the Knicks on vacation.