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Hugh Jackman delights fans at his broadway show by channeling Wolverine once again

Hugh Jackman might be Broadway’s Music Man, but he’ll always be our Wolverine.

After playing the iconic role of Logan for more than two decades (and possibly reprising it one day, one can dream!), Jackman traded his claws for tapping shoes to perform as Harold Hill. But that doesn’t mean he won’t be a good sport for his “X-Men” fanbase.

During the curtain call of a recent show, one audience member waved a foam Wolverine claw near the front row. Jackman saw it and, as to be expected from such a nationwide treasure, had the best reaction.


Jackman posted the video to his Instagram, which you can watch below. Two million others already have:

He’s still got it, baby! In the span of three seconds, Jackman happily took the claw and struck his famous pose. You know the one. Needless to say, the crowd went wild. And that marching band outfit he was sporting became about 1000x cooler.

Wolverine was a character Jackman embodied flawlessly, bringing both a primal, animalistic quality and deep internal conflict. Crazy to think that he was director Bryan Singer’s third choice for the role after Dougray Scott and Russell Crowe turned it down. Now he will be forever remembered as the quintessential Logan by loyal fans. And it’s sweet to see how Jackman still shows so much love for them.

We may never again get to hear him say “sorry bub,” but this is a nice consolation prize.

So, now the real question: When are we getting “X-Men: The Musical”?

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Disabled veteran gets a mortgage- free smart home from Gary Sinise Foundation

I remember watching “Forrest Gump” as a kid and I still quote Lieutenant Dan to this day, but I had no idea that Gary Sinise, the actor who played Dan in the movie, went on to do really cool things for veterans. In the movie, Lt. Dan is a disabled veteran who was once Gump’s platoon leader in the Vietnam War and later becomes his best friend and business partner. In life outside of the movies, it was Sinise’s character in “Forrest Gump” that became the catalyst for his work with veterans.

Sinise said in a video, “Shortly after the movie opened, I was contacted by the Disabled American Veterans Organization inviting me to their national convention where they wanted to present me with an award. I met hundreds if not thousands of people who were not playing a part in a movie.” This event was the motivation behind the Gary Sinise Foundation, an organization that provides mortgage-free custom homes for veterans.


On March 24, the Gary Sinse Foundation was fulfilling its mission once again, this time for retired Army Sgt. Christopher Kurtz in Adams, Tennessee. Sgt. Kurtz is a 101st Airborne Division veteran who was injured in combat, requiring him to now need a wheelchair. The foundation presented him with the keys to his custom smart home after being approved two years ago. The CEO of the Gary Sinise Foundation, Mike Thirtle, explained to Clarksville Now that everything is intentional in the home. “We help veterans and first responders through their healing process,” Thirtle said. “When Gary wanted us to execute providing these homes to veterans, he wanted us to make them customizable and tailorable for them and their families.”

The Kurtzes’ home has wheelchair accessible countertops and drop-down shelving. The home also comes with a garage filled with machinery for welding and crafting, gifted to Kurtz from friends at his job, PTL Fabricators. Sgt. Kurtz wants to use his shop to help others that may find themselves in his situation. He told Clarksville Now, “I want to develop products and make already-made products possibly better so that I can help others that are in similar situations.” He added, “It’s a bit overwhelming sometimes when you think about how much went into (building the house), how many people put their hands on it, and it’s very humbling. Now, I owe the world.”

The Gary Sinise Foundation has been building mortgage-free homes for veterans for 10 years, giving veterans their independence back. The program is making a real difference in the quality of life for America’s veterans and it seems so fitting that it was started by the man who played Lt. Dan. Sinise makes it a point to appear via video when the veterans receive keys to their new homes.

The Kurtzes will surely remember this day for the rest of their lives, and hopefully their story will spur the creation of new programs to improve the lives of veterans.

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Arlo Parks Announces The ‘Collapsed In Sunbeams’ North America Fall 2022 Tour

At the 64th Annual Grammy Awards, Arlo Parks garnered two nominations: One for Best New Artist and the other in the Best Alternative Music Album category for her stunning debut album, Collapsed In Sunbeams. Now, Parks will take her Mercury Music Prize-winning album on tour once again through North America, and this time, in much larger venues than her modestly-sized sold out tour from 2021.

Currently on tour with Clairo, Parks’ new dates will begin with two support slots for Florence + The Machine in Canada in September. The U.S. slate begins at Philadelphia’s Franklin Hall on September 6th and will see her hit rooms like New York City’s Webster Hall, Washington DC’s 9:30 Club, San Francisco’s The Warfield, and Los Angeles’ Fonda Theatre.

The Arlo Parks Tour artist presale begins on Tuesday, 04/05 at 10am local venue time. Register to receive the password here. Check out the full tour dates below.

09/02 — Laval, QC @ Place Bell++
09/03 — Toronto, ON @ Budweiser Stage++
09/06 — Philadelphia, PA @ Franklin Music Hall
09/08 — New York, NY @ Webster Hall
09/12 — Washington, D.C. @ 9:30 Club
09/14 — Boston, MA @ Roadrunner
09/16 — Detroit, MI @ The Majestic
09/17 — Cleveland, OH @ Agora Theatre
09/18 — Chicago, IL @ The Riviera Theatre
09/20 — Minneapolis, MN @ First Avenue
09/21 — Milwaukee, WI @ Pabst Theater
09/23 — Denver, CO @ Mission Ballroom
09/24 — Salt Lake City, UT @ The Complex
09/26 — Portland, OR @ Crystal Ballroom
09/27 — Seattle, WA @ The Showbox
09/29 — San Francisco, CA @ The Warfield
10/02 — Los Angeles, CA @ The Fonda Theatre
10/04 — Tempe, AZ @ Marquee Theatre
10/10 — New Orleans, LA @ The Joy Theater
10/12 — Atlanta, GA @ The Eastern

++ = with Florence + The Machine

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The 2022 Grammys’ TV Ratings Weren’t Much Better Than Last Year’s All-Time Low

Last year’s Grammy Awards ceremony wasn’t a major TV draw, or at least not as big as it has been in the past: The 2021 telecast had the lowest ratings in Grammys history. It turns out things weren’t much better this year, as the numbers were only a hair above last year’s dismal ratings.

Deadline reports Sunday’s broadcast, taking into account viewers on both CBS and those streaming on Paramount+, drew 8.93 million viewers, which is close to last year’s count of 8.8 million. Furthermore, The Hollywood Reporter notes these aren’t the final ratings, which will be out on Tuesday. CBS is expecting the final number to be at around 9.6 million viewers, just above last year’s 9.23 million.

For reference, all of these numbers are awful compared to just a few years ago: The 2020 show had 18.7 million viewers and the 2019 edition had 19.9 million. For further reference, Deadline notes that also last night, about 4.7 million people watched new episodes of both America’s Funniest Home Videos and American Idol.

Despite all this, last night’s broadcast had plenty of highlights and surprises, so check out our rundown of some of those most memorable moments here. Also find the full list of this year’s Grammy nominees and winners here.

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Netflix Heard The Plea From ‘SNL’ And Created An Actual, For Real ‘ShortAssMovies’ Category

After seeing Pete Davidson and Gunna team up for the “Short-Ass Movies” sketch on Saturday Night Live, which hilariously complained about movies having insanely long runtimes, Netflix decided the whole thing was a “good idea.” While quote-tweeting the now-viral sketch starring Davidson, Gunn, Chris Redd (and a solid cameo by Simon Rex), the streaming giant shared a link to its new “ShortAssMovies” category, which features 90-minute films like Zoolander and Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

In the sketch, Davidson, Gunna, and Chris Redd rap about how they just want to sit down and watch “short-ass movies” as the sketch runs through a freaking cornucopia of 90-minute films, including the Ernest movies, which is where Rex comes in. (The guy is practically a dead-ringer for the late Jim Varney.) Naturally, the sketch also takes a shot at Davidson for starring in The King of Staten Island, a film that ran for two hours and 17 minutes. Whoops. There’s also plenty of digs at The Batman for its nearly three-hour runtime.

Of course, keeping movies under two hours long has been a cause that Uproxx’s own Brian Grubb has championed for years. In fact, Grubb is so hell-bent on keeping runtimes tight, that he extended his argument to sporting events, and well, pretty much everything.

“Something needs to change,” Grubb wrote in 2018. “Your time is too valuable for these goons to just be taking it all up like this. We need a rule. A hard limit.”

Netflix has heard your cry, Brian. Rest your head, wearied defender of precious time.

(Via Netflix Is A Joke on Twitter)

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Harrison Ford Will Play A Therapist In Apple TV+’s New Comedy From The ‘Ted Lasso’ Crew

Harrison Ford is known for his iconic, big-budget action films like Raiders Of The Lost Ark, Blade Runner, and, of course, the most famous of all, his E.T. deleted scene. Now, Ford is going where he hasn’t gone before…television! Apple TV+, to be specific.

The veteran actor will star in a new series from Ted Lasso’s co-creator/showrunner Bill Lawrence and star/producer/ noted grouch Brett Goldstein. The series, titled Shrinking, will be written and executive produced by actor Jason Segel, who will star alongside Ford.

Ford will play Dr. Phil Rhodes, a seasoned shrink who has recently been diagnosed with Parkinson’s, which forces him to rethink his life and career. Segel will play a grieving therapist who begins to break his patient’s rules and tell his clients exactly what he thinks, which sounds like a nightmare for those patients.

The 10-episode series will be produced by Warner Bros. Television for Apple TV+, which makes Ford’s first major TV credit, not counting 1978’s Star Wars Holiday Special. Segel recently starred alongside Jesse Plemmons and Lily Collins in Netflix’s Windfall, which premiered last month.

Bill Lawrence is known for creating the hit medical sitcom Scrubs, and 2020’s breakout comedy Ted Lasso starring Jason Sudeikis. The third season just began filming early last month. Maybe they can secure a Harrison Ford cameo in the upcoming season.

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Glass Animals’ ‘Heat Waves’ Continues Its Streak With A Fifth Week At No. 1 On The Hot 100 Chart

There’s been no stopping Glass Animals since their hit “Heat Waves” first claimed the top spot on the Billboard Hot 100 chart a few weeks ago. The song has remained at No. 1 since then, a position it still holds today, as on the new chart dated April 9, it’s still on top for a fifth total week.

The song continues to make history for British groups as it’s now tied for the sixth-most weeks spent at No. 1 on the Hot 100. It’s currently behind only The Beatles’ “Hey Jude,” The Police’s “Every Breath You Take,” Bee Gees’ “Night Fever,” UB40’s “Can’t Help Falling In Love,” and The Beatles’ “I Want To Hold Your Hand.”

The band’s Dave Bayley previously told Uproxx of the song, “With ‘Heat Waves,’ it was coming to terms with the fact that it’s OK to understand, appreciate, and know that you’re missing someone — that it’s actually probably quite healthy. That you should let yourself do that, you shouldn’t try to bury it the whole time. It’s kind of like a eureka, euphoric moment. Or it can be.”

Elsewhere on the chart, Latto had a major week as “Big Energy” became her first top-10 hit, rising from No. 11 all the way up to No. 3. This chart is a big one for JID, too, as he lands his first-ever top-5 song thanks to his Imagine Dragons collaboration “Enemy,” which rose from No. 7 to No. 5 this week.

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Kevin Smith Paid Tribute To ‘Chasing Amy,’ The Movie That ‘Saved’ His Career, On Its 25th Anniversary

Kevin Smith has directed over a dozen films since Clerks came out in 1994, but his career nearly came to an end after his second feature bombed at the box office. That would be Mallrats, which is a certified cult hit now, but in 1995, it made $2.1 million on a $6.1 million budget. “Believe it or not, Mallrats had been so reviled and ignored that I was nearly exiled from the movie biz,” Smith wrote in a tribute post on Instagram to the movie that “saved my career,” Chasing Amy, which came out 25 years ago today.

Amy saved my career – but even better, it helped me mature as an artist and a person in the process. A quarter century’s gone by since these ancient indie film kids, then in their 20’s, all felt they all had something to prove,” Smith wrote before praising the cast, including Joey Lauren Adams, Jason Lee, and Ben Affleck with some serious facial hair.

“The surprise sleeper was a tiny hit, earning $12 million, Independent Spirit Awards for me and Lee, and a Golden Globes nomination for Joey. Amy elevated the cast to the attention of storytellers outside of #viewaskew, so it was amazing to see my friends fly. @adamsandler put Joey in #bigdaddy, and @jerrybruckheimer was such a fan, he hired Ben for #armageddon, #jasonlee for Enemy of the State, and me to do a #coyoteugly rewrite.”

If not for Chasing Amy, there would be no Affleck on the Armageddon commentary.

For that alone, it’s a classic. You can read the entire post below.

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Tracy Letts On The Greek Tragedy Of Jack McKinney In ‘Winning Time’

The base notes about Magic, Kareem, Pat Riley, and the Showtime era Lakers are carved into lore to such a degree that even non-basketball die-hards have some awareness. But of all the characters brought into fuller view by HBO’s Winning Time, none is as compelling and, ultimately, tragic as Jack McKinney, the man who supplied the team with its high octane gameplan only to be sidelined right before takeoff. If you’ve read up on McKinney or seen last night’s fifth episode (hey, stop now if you haven’t because of spoilers, friend), then you know about the brutal tragedy that befell McKinney, but while things don’t look great, don’t assume that the McKinney storyline is finished.

Earlier this week, we spoke with actor Tracy Letts, who has been given the rare opportunity on this show to flesh out someone whose story is near totally revelatory to the audience. Here, he gives us a broad strokes view of what comes next, some insight into the challenge of building this character, and that pivotal accident at the end of the latest episode.

The way you said “Doritos” in Lady Bird has somehow stuck in my brain, and I say it all the time and my wife is annoyed by it. But I wanted to share that with you. It’s a very specific compliment that I don’t know that you’ve received before.

If anything, I’ve gotten a little grief from people in my life for the way I pronounce Doritos or Fritos, the fact that I put the medial T. I guess Greta [Gerwig] enjoyed it, and so didn’t correct me on it or change my pronunciation. Yeah, it seems to have landed with people, so that’s nice.

What a wonderfully weird way for me to start this interview with you. Sorry. So I was reading about your basketball fandom in your life. I’m curious if this has sort of reactivated that.

Not really, not really. I haven’t found it especially compelling in the last couple of years, and God knows I’m not, nor have I ever been a Lakers fan. There are people in my life who would disown me if I became a Lakers fan. In fact, the producers of the show were very nice when our baby was born during the shooting of the series, and they sent a little Lakers onesie to the baby. Which we put the baby in, and of course took photos of the baby, and we had some disgruntled family members upon seeing the baby in a Lakers jersey.

What is it about this guy that just connected with you?

Well, I didn’t know the story. I guess I was probably 14 years old when this story begins, so I remember the Showtime Lakers very well. But I didn’t remember Jack McKinney at all, if I ever knew who he was, and I found this guy’s story not only really compelling but just the fact that it was this kind of lost history, forgotten history. And not just a coach who had an accident and had some bum luck, but there’s something kind of Greek about the idea that he’s actually this innovator who changes the game, perhaps. I suppose it’s somewhat a matter of opinion, but within the telling of our story, a guy who changes the game only to suffer this accident 13 games into the season. It almost seems fated in a way. It has the inevitability of Greek tragedy. So I found that a really compelling thing.

When they sent me the pilot … Because they had shot and completed the pilot and then they had shut down for the pandemic. And then they sent me the book of scripts and it was all done. It was all so beautifully laid out and polished. I couldn’t believe the condition of these scripts. Television scripts normally don’t have that kind of polish to them. But as they explained, they’d had a year because of the pandemic to really get them right. So I was able to track this guy’s story over the whole course of the season. Which was, I don’t know, it was not only a beautifully written part, beautifully wrought character on the page, but also so clearly delineated from the other players in the story. He was not like Paul Westhead, he was not like Pat Riley, he was not like Jerry Tarkanian, not like Jerry West. He was very much his own individual. So [for] all those reasons, it was not a difficult decision to say yes to do this show.

The tone of one word specifically that I keep coming back to was just the way that you uttered “again!” Going through the training montage, all those processes, there’s such an intensity to it, an impatience to it. Can you tell me a little about developing the exact right way to say that word and how important it was?

Everybody talked about what a nice guy Jack McKinney was. People still say he was a very nice guy, and that he was a very smart coach. Clearly, he was very smart, he was well-liked by his players, and all of that was on the page. But it’s also true that in the time period in which this is set, coaches were not soft. That’s just not part of the makeup of those guys.

A couple of the actor-players came up to me after we’d done it for a while and said, “Man, have you ever coached before? Because you sound a lot like coaches we’ve had in the past.” And I said, “Well, no. I’ve never coached before, but I’ve been coached before,” and I remember the manner of those guys. Coming out of the time period they came out of, there was … Well, again, not a lot of softness. So those “against,” there’s a certain bark behind those coaching moments that I think is just appropriate to the time, to the period.

Can you tell me a little about the working relationship and the chemistry developed between you and Jason Segel and Jason Clarke?

Well, Jason Segel and I met, I think it was his first day on the set and maybe it was my second day on the set when we were shooting those training camp scenes. I had never met Jason before, and we just took an immediate, instant liking to each other. It was really bizarre. Within an hour we were having some pretty personal conversations. It works for the show obviously, but chemistry is kind of overrated. As an actor, your job is to create that chemistry, whether you do it organically or artificially. It doesn’t matter. But Jason and I just really hit it off and it really worked for the show.

It was also funny, too, when the show was over and we got to see each other out of our wigs, we kind of didn’t recognize each other. We only dealt with each other when we were on the set shooting the show. So to see him in his real hair, and for him to see me getting out of my wig, and my bald, white head sort of glaring out from under my wig. It was like, oh, that’s the real you underneath there. We had a great time. Jason Clarke, I love his work on this show. I think he’s got one of the more challenging jobs on the show with Jerry West, the way that Jerry West has been dramatized. He’s just a superb actor.

But this show, again, because of the quality of the writing… People talk about how loaded up the cast is. The only reason the cast is loaded like this, it’s not that they paid us so much Goddamn money, or promised us the world or anything. The only reason that cast looks like that is because the writing is so good. It’s because people said, “I want to be part of this thing.” Not only is the writing really good, but the show is fun, and everybody wants to be part of something fun.

The bicycle scene is just brutal, just really amazingly portrayed, but brutal. Obviously, there’s a lot of stagecraft involved, stunt performers and everything like that, but what does it feel like to see that end result and see yourself in that way? Also, I saw Deep Water recently, you and transportation modes may not be a good fit right now…

[Laughs] Well, it’s such a key point of the story. The truth is that when you just tell people what happened to Jack McKinney, “Oh, he coached 13 games and then he was in a bicycle accident and didn’t come back to coach the Lakers,” it just doesn’t do justice to the actual physical trauma that that guy suffered as a result of that thing.

Yeah, I know from the personal experience of going over the handlebars as an adult once and getting a concussion that when you tell people “bike accident,” they start to assume, “Oh, a dirt bike?” No, just a regular bike.

Yeah. Wasn’t it Mark Eaton, who played center for the Utah Jazz, who died in a bicycle accident while we were filming this? He was in his sixties, but people die on bicycles every day.

Yeah, definitely.

It was a really brutal accident, and the fact that it looks that brutal is not my doing for the most part. It’s really a credit to not only the way, the scene is written, but as you say, the camera operators, the stunt performers, the editors. A lot goes into creating a scene like that. I do know that, man, you hear actors bragging about how they do their own stunts. That will never be me. I’m always a guy who’s like, “Well, can the stunt performer do it?” I want the stunt performer to do it because they’re going to do it better than I can do it.

So I kind of did the bare minimum. In fact, there were a couple of times where they came to me and they said, “We want you to come out of here, and then you go down this hill,” and I was like, “Yeah, without a helmet on I’m not doing that.” I’m not about to tempt fate by riding around doing anything on this bicycle without a helmet on. Wouldn’t that make for a great little click-bait story, right? That the actor playing Jack McKinney busted his head open while riding a bicycle. So I was like, no, no, no. I left it up to the stunt performers to do that.

An extra bit of Greek tragedy on top of the Greek tragedy.

[Laughs] That’s right.

Some of the best work that you do on the show comes up with the recovery. I don’t know how much we can say, but I’m curious if you want to give a little preview of what’s to come.

Well, what’s to come is the drama that unfolds as a result of the accident. If all you know about the Lakers’ history is that Jack McKinney coached 13 games, and had a bike accident, and didn’t come back to coach, then you don’t know about all of the twists and turns of that particular branch of the story, the coaching branch of the story. Which is, my God, how many coaches are in this first season of the Lakers? Four head coaches? So there’s a lot of drama to come, and I think some of it is unexpected. Some of it is hard. Some of it is hard to watch, I mean in the best sense. It’s the stuff of drama.

Again, man, I was so delighted to take part in this. If anything I probably had some feelings of jealousy that the real Jack McKinney might have had as I realized, “Oh, this show is going to go on without me.” Right? Showtime doesn’t go on with Jack McKinney, and I’m sad about that because I had such a great experience. I loved it so much. But I’m proud to have played this guy. Jack has been dead a few years, but I hope his family is pleased if nothing else to see that he’s starting to get some of the credit that he’s been due for a long, long time.

‘Winning Time’ airs Sundays at 9PM ET on HBO

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SZA Explains The Injury That Left Her Using Crutches At The 2022 Grammys

SZA and Doja Cat picked up a Grammy for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance last night, for “Kiss Me More.” Their acceptance speech was an absolute event, as Doja Cat had to run back into the venue from the bathroom, which she wasn’t afraid to say into the mic once she got on stage. Then, she got super emotional and started crying as picking up that win meant a great deal to her.

SZA played a role in the moment’s oddity, too, as she hobbled up on stage walking on crutches. After the show, she explained how she sustained her injury, saying in a backstage media room (as Billboard notes), “It’s very funny because I fell out a bed right before it was time to leave and get ready for this. Like the day before, but that’s the way it goes. Everything awesome in my life has always come with something like very random, but it just adds to the energy.”

She went on to speak about her next album, saying, “It’s probably my most unisex project yet, if that makes sense. It’s for everyone.” She also noted of Doja, “She’s a star. I think she’s so masterful… I’ve just been able to learn from her.”

Find the full list of last night’s Grammy winners and nominees here.