Month: October 2021

Nearly two years ago, Summer Walker blew the world away with the release of her debut album, Over It. The release amassed 154.7 million on-demand streams, earning her the largest streaming week for an R&B album by a female artist. People have grown impatient for her second full-length work, and while she’s been tight-lipped about it, she finally revealed some new details.

Walker shared the news outside Friday night’s 2021 BET Hip-Hop Awards. “I was super excited to go to the BET Hip Hop Awards today but they wouldn’t let me in due to COVID restrictions,” Walker explained in the video. “I had such a pretty dress and everything, but it’s fine. BET love me, I still love BET. I was gonna talk about some stuff on the red carpet, so I decided to pull up anyway and let you guys know some things.”

Next, the camera turns to a building where the following message can be seen: “Summer Walker album #2 coming November.” In an Instagram post a short time later, the singer added that she would share more details about the upcoming album on the two-year anniversary of Over It, which arrives on October 4.

The announcement comes after Walker teamed up with Sam Smith for “You Will Be Found” from the soundtrack for the film Dear Evan Hansen.

You can watch Summer Walker share the news in the video above.

The damning Trump books are coming fast and furious these days, each with their own truckloads of unique dirt. Reporters had finally picked Bob Woodward and Robert Costa’s Peril clean when there was another juicy book to devour: Stephanie Grisham’s I’ll Take Your Questions Now: What I Saw at the Trump White House, by the least remembered White House press secretary. Grisham was also Chief of Staff to the First Lady, so she has tons of Melania stories. Among them are that she went out of her way to humiliate her husband after the Stormy Daniels affair — and its subsequent illegal payoff — went public.

But there’s also this more Trumpian detail: The former First Lady was reportedly dubbed “Rapunzel” by the Secret Service. Why? Because she so rarely left her “tower,” aka the White House. While her husband gallivanted about, she stayed in the executive mansion, usually with her parents or with her son Barron.

This shouldn’t be surprising. Melania was surely one of the least active First Ladies in U.S. history, rarely involving herself with her husband’s cuckoo business, rarely performing her duties with any vim or vigor. She even infamously wore a jacket that seemed to air her general indifference to everything. Her only passion appeared to be creating surreal holiday decorations or destroying longtime gardens.

There’s more Melania dirt in Grisham’s book, which doesn’t hold back in lambasting the author’s former bosses. She had Google alerts set up so she could obsess over the press as much as her husband did. Speaking of, she also didn’t condemn the insurrectionists on Jan. 6, calling them “patriots” — and on the day Grisham finally quit in disgust, ready to craft a novel form of revenge.

(Via Yahoo! News)

It’s hard to believe it’s closing in on a year since Rudy Giuliani and other Trump loyalists started making wild and baseless claims of voter fraud in the 2020 election. But their actions are still biting them in the butt. In a deposition in August, the Fox News-less Giuliani admitted, under oath, that he didn’t have much time to investigate the claims he made on that fateful day. But he did log onto Facebook.

As per Insider, the onetime “America’s Mayor” was testifying on August 14 about the lawsuit filed against him by former Dominion Voting Systems employee Eric Coomer. (This is a separate lawsuit from the one filed against Giuliani by Dominion itself.) In an infamous presser on November 19, Giuliani claimed that Coomer had told members of Antifa that he’d rigged the election. Of course, there was no proof of this.

Transcripts of Giuliani’s deposition were finally made public, and Rachel Maddow made sure to read the most incriminating/embarrassing passages on her show.

During the deposition, Giuliani claimed he couldn’t remember where he saw the “evidence” of Coomer’s fictitious transgressions. But it was definitely social media, not somewhere with actual proof.

“I don’t remember if it was Facebook. Those social media posts get all one to me,” Giuliaini testified. “I think it was Facebook”

Giuliani admitted he didn’t do much investigating into the claim’s veracity. Nor did he interview anyone, though he hazily claimed, “I think somebody interviewed him.” But he couldn’t’ be sure. Besides, he said, it’s not like he should have done some probing before airing evidence-free allegations. “It’s not my job in a fast-moving case to go out and investigate every piece of evidence that’s given to me.”

He then claimed it would have been incompetent of him to actually check in on the tall claim, which came from right-wing podcast host Joe Oltmann. “Why the heck wouldn’t I believe him?” he said “I would have been a terrible lawyer.”

And so Giuliani, the once beloved NYC mayor who came out of retirement to destroy his reputation for a former president who refuses to help him now that he’s in deep legal and financial stuff, has dug himself even further into an ever-deepening hole.

(Via Insider)

Those who attended Megan Thee Stallion‘s set at Austin City Limits on Friday got a surprise: Miley Cyrus crashed the set. Cyrus shared a video of the moment on her Instagram page and it shows her running to join Megan from stage left before briefly dancing the day away. “Dreams DO come true! Me & @theestallion doing hot girl shit!,” Cyrus captioned the post, with Megan replying, “Love youuuu.”

Cyrus’ appearance was quite brief, as she quickly ran backstage after busting out a few moves. It was later revealed that Billie Eilish was also backstage, but unlike Cyrus, she decided against running out there and hoofing up a storm. Cyrus later returned to the stage for a headlining set of her own, which closed out the night.

The Austin City Limits festival will continue throughout the weekend before returning next weekend. Those who attend will catch performances from Billie Eilish, Duran Duran, Tyler The Creator, St. Vincent, Doja Cat, Tierra Whack, Jack Harlow, Phoebe Bridgers, Erykah Badu, Polo G, and many more.

You can watch a video of the moment in the posts above.

Megan Thee Stallion is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Both WNBA semifinal series are tied at one game a piece and find themselves onto a Game 3 in their best-of-5 series. On Sunday, the Chicago Sky will play hosts to the Connecticut Sun at 1 p.m. ET in one series, while the Phoenix Mercury will take on the Las Vegas Aces in the other right after.

Both of Phoenix’s professional basketball teams, the Mercury and the Suns, play in the same venue, the Footprint Center. And one member of the NBA side wants to make sure folks in the city get out to Sunday’s game, as Chris Paul has bought 500 tickets for fans to pick up on a first come, first serve basis for Game 3.

After narrowly losing Game 1 in Las Vegas, the Mercury were able to steal home court advantage from the reigning WNBA Finals runners-up via a 117-91 blowout in Game 2. As has so often been the case over the years, the team was powered by a gigantic performance by Diana Taurasi, who scored a season-high 37 points in 27 minutes of action in the win. Taurasi, who also pulled in six rebounds, went 10-for-13 from the field, 8-for-11 from three, and made all nine of her attempts from the free throw line.

All 180 episodes of Seinfeld hit Netflix on Friday, allowing a new generation to discover one of the ’90s most beloved and unique sitcoms. They’ll also discover, as they did with Friends, that there’s definitely some…shall we say, questionable stuff. Blackface jokes. Dated mores. And the general way the four anti-heroes often wallow in their own crapulence. (The latter, of course, is what makes it great.) And though co-creator/co-star Jerry Seinfeld isn’t going to go back and change anything, he would if he was forced to.

As per Deadline, Seinfeld spoke at a press event about the show that made his name. And he acknowledged that he would do things a bit differently if he was making it today.

“There’s a number of them that I would love to have a crack at, but I don’t really believe, philosophically, in changing or even thinking about the past,” Seinfeld said. “My philosophy of life is that [it] happened the way it happened, and we’re going to go from here. And that’s the best way to … live.”

He went on, saying, “I think regret is a philosophical position that I disagree with. It kind of assumes you could have changed the past, so I wouldn’t even think of that. But if you forced me or you gave me a time machine, yeah, there’s a few — I would fix some things.”

Seinfeld didn’t go into specifics. Maybe he meant some of the more dated aspects of the show. Maybe he meant it more creatively. One thing he should never regret, though, is that controversial series finale. It’s the only way Seinfeld could have ended.

(Via Deadline)

Britney Spears and her team had a big win at the end of last month when a judge ruled that her father Jamie Spears was suspended from his role as her conservator. While Jamie has not been permanently removed from the position, it is a step in the right direction. But those who hoped the news would result in the singer returning to the stage, that, according to TMZ, is not happening any time soon.

Sources close to Britney told the publication that she’s in no rush to get back to performing, a stance she’s held for a long time. Instead, for now, she plans to enjoy her freedom from her father as well as her new engagement to Sam Asghari, whom she’s dated for the last four yeras. Sources claim that it will be quite a while before she returns to the stage, if she returns at all. Others say that she may never do it again at all.

All of this comes as the FBI reportedly launched an investigation against Jamie Spears for illegally bugging Britney’s home, as revealed in The New York Times‘ documentary, Controlling Britney Spears. These allegations led to Britney’s lawyer demanding that Jamie be removed from the conservatorship.

Like any major star worth their salt, Will Smith has made choices good and bad. An unqualified success can be followed by an unmitigated disaster. In a recent interview with GQ (as caught by The Hollywood Reporter), the rapper-turned-Oscar-nominated thespian frankly discusses the highs and lows of his long career. And while his picks for favorite films are no surprise, neither is his choice for his worst.

“For the best, I think it is a tie between the first Men in Black and The Pursuit of Happyness,” Smith said. “For different reasons, those are the two almost perfect movies.” The first, of course, is a blockbuster that spawned a franchise. The second is a tense drama that netted him his second Academy Award nomination (after Ali).

As for his nadir? “Wild Wild West is just a thorn in my side,” Smith admitted, laughing. “To see myself with chaps. … I don’t like it.”

Released in 1999, Wild Wild West was the first dink in Smith’s newly shiny armor, his maiden critical and commercial flop after first becoming a big screen superstar with Independence Day, Men in Black, and Enemy of the State. The take on a long-forgotten hit TV show was supposed to be a no-brainer grand slam. It even reunited him with Men in Black director Barry Sonnenfeld. Alas, people weren’t in the mood for a bloated Western with Kenneth Branagh as a legless racist spouting slurs. Nor were they into a climactic battle with a giant robot spider.

Of course, one could argue that Wild Wild West was ahead of its time, or that it paved the way for better movies about Black cowboys, like Django Unchained, the 2016 take on The Magnificent Seven, or the forthcoming Netflick The Harder They Fall. Or you could argue that it remains bad and that moviegoers of the late ’90s were right the first time.

Still, it could have been worse. Smith could have chosen Collateral Beauty, the 2016 drama in which he plays a grieving widower whose friends trick him into talking to what he believes are mystical beings…who actually are mystical beings. Or something. Now that movie is a trainwreck.

(Via THR)

Ben Simmons continues to exist in a state of limbo. The battle lines have been draw in his effort to get a trade out of Philadelphia — Simmons wants out as soon as possible, the Sixers want to get a whole heck of a lot back for him — and for all the escalations of things that have occurred in recent weeks (Simmons’ camp expressing that he’s done playing with Joel Embiid, Embiid’s response, the Sixers withholding his salary), the basic fact remains that neither side is willing to budge.

If a trade does pop up in the coming days or weeks, though, perhaps it will come from one of the teams mentioned in a new report by Keith Pompey of the Philadelphia Inquirer. According to Pompey, six teams are still doing their due diligence on whether or not it’d make sense to bring him on board.

“A league source said the Minnesota Timberwolves, Indiana Pacers, Cleveland Cavaliers, Detroit Pistons, Toronto Raptors and San Antonio Spurs are still inquiring about Simmons’ availability,” Pompey wrote.

Two of these teams, the Wolves and the Cavs, have been linked to Simmons for essentially the duration of the offseason. The Pacers, Raptors, and Spurs have been mentioned on and off as potential destinations, while the Pistons would be a fascinating landing spot, if only because one would assume they’d want to put the ball in the hands of back-to-back lottery picks Cade Cunningham and Killian Hayes as much as possible.

Kawhi Leonard’s health status is at this point a constant mystery, but after suffering a partially torn ACL in his right knee during last season’s playoffs, Leonard is believed to be ahead of schedule in his recovery, according to a report from Farbod Esnaashari of Sports Illustrated Fan Nation’s All Clippers blog.

Even based on a speedy timeline, Leonard would still not be due back until the spring from his July 13 surgery, leaving him and the Clippers very little time to get back into rhythm before the playoffs. Coming off a freshly signed big-money contract extension and with a history of significant injuries in both knees, Leonard has no reason to rush his return.

Still, Leonard has still not made it to the Western Conference Finals since joining the Clippers, as he was injured and unable to join the team in their bout with the Suns this summer. There’s likely some internal pressure to finally put together a real push for a championship, and Los Angeles will need Leonard healthy to do that.

Despite the injury, Leonard has been seen at the Clippers’ recent arena unveiling as well as at media day and other recent Los Angeles sporting events. That’s a good sign, but of course the real deciding factor for how quickly Leonard can return will be how his body responds once he gets back on the court to test the knee.