Category: News

Fresh off a massive pop-punk collaboration with her own inspirations, Avril Lavigne and Travis Barker, Willow is in a pretty punk mode herself. This past Friday she released that joint track “Grow,” and now she’s reinventing one of her own earliest singles. While performing “Whip My Hair” live — an electrifying, spruced up version of it, no less — the young star called a barber onstage during the middle of a wicked guitar solo. She pulled up a stool, sat down, and continued playing while the barber began to razor Willow’s hair off mid-song.

Given the lyrics of the song double down on whipping your hair “no matter if it’s long or short,” she’s definitely acting out her own words with the move. If it seems like Willow has been everywhere lately, well that’s because she has been. “Grow” was just one of the biggest and newest singles off her new project, Lately I Feel Everything, and the album also features plenty of other artist cameos, like Tierra Whack and Cherry Glazer, along with Barker on not one, not two, but three songs. She shaved her hair during the revitalized version of “Whip My Hair” that came out the end of a live set she produced to showcase the new music, deftly proving she’s an artist who knows how to learn and grow as she matures. Check out the epic clip above.

Earlier this year, Soulja Boy was sued for sexual battery, sexual assault, and false imprisonment by his former assistant who filed the lawsuit under the name Jane Doe. She claims to have started working with the rapper at the end of 2018 where things quickly turned for the worst after she began he position. While the two would escalate their relationship to a romantic one, which resulted in her moving in with him, a string of alleged assaults would occur afterward. The woman claims she was pushed out of a moving vehicle by the rapper in January 2019 and physically assaulted just a month later. Now the rapper must stay away from her thanks to a new order.

According to legal documents obtained by TMZ, Soulja Boy must stay away from his former assistant for the next three years thanks to a restraining order that a judge signed off on. The order was filed back in January, and while the lawsuit is still pending, the rapper agreed to the domestic violence restraining order, which expires on July 16, 2024.

Four months after the lawsuit from Soulja Boy’s former assistant was filed, the rapper’s ex-girlfriend filed a separate lawsuit against him while lodging sexual battery and domestic abuse allegations against him. She claims that she met the rapper in 2007 and was involved in a serious relationship with him from 2014 to 2019. She states the abuse dates back to 2015 and worsened to the point that she ended the relationship with him because she could “no longer stand the abuse.”

For some actors, getting out from under your biggest and best-known role can be difficult after that project ends. Sometime it’s as simple as hearing an infamous line from that movie or TV show from adoring fans on the street. But other times it can actually impact your career and typecast you into a certain kind of character.

For Jenna Fischer, who played Pam on The Office, the enduring success the show has seen on TV and streaming services has certainly been a blessing. But being known as Office Pam has apparently impacted her career in at least one particularly negative way.

As Deadline detailed, the subject came up on the ‘Office Ladies’ podcast, which features Fisher and fellow Office alum Angela Kinsey. As Fischer described it, she had been cast as Matt LeBlanc’s wife in a sitcom called Man With A Plan. But when it came to audience testing, the people watching apparently couldn’t see her as anything but Pam. And LeBlanc as, of course, his also wildly popular character, Joey, from Friends.

“They said — this is a literal quote, they said, ‘I don’t believe Pam would marry Joey. The chemistry doesn’t work between these two,’” Fischer told her Office Ladies co-host Angela Kinsey. “That was the feedback they got.”

“They could only see you as Pam and Joey?” asked Kinsey, who played Angela Martin on The Office.

“Yeah,” Fischer said. “So it wasn’t working for them that we got married and had a family.”

As Fischer told it, she actually found out in a pretty horrible way as well: just before upfronts in New York to introduce the show to the public.

“The first thing I said was, ‘Is [Man with a Plan] not getting picked up?’ And they said, ‘It’s worse than that, hun.’ And I was like, ‘What’s worse than that?’ They said, ‘It’s getting picked up, but without you.’ And I was like, ‘Wow, I guess I’ll unpack my suitcase.’”

Without Fischer, Man With A Plan ran for four seasons on CBS. And despite Fischer playing the role in the pilot, Liza Snyder was opposite LeBlanc during that run. It was disappointing to say the least, and Fischer hadn’t really detailed what went wrong on the show until now. But after nine seasons as one of the most notable secretaries (and love stories) on television, apparently fans just couldn’t see her as anything but Pam at that point in time.

[via Deadline]

LeBron James is no stranger to being in movies, but his most recent release on the silver screen is a little bit different. James starred in Space Jam: A New Legacy, which hit theaters and streaming services on Friday. While not a direct sequel to the original movie, James and the Looney Tunes team up to play a basketball game against Don Cheadle, James’ son in the film, and video game versions of NBA and WNBA players.

The critical response to the movie hasn’t exactly been great, but regardless, James couldn’t be more excited that this is a reality. In a video he posted on Saturday, James reacted to the release of the film, which has been in development in some form or fashion since 2014.

“I literally got a movie that dropped today,” James said. “Space Jam: A New Legacy, oh my goodness. It finally just hit me, I can’t believe it. I’m so honored, I’m so humbled, this is crazy. It doesn’t make sense to me, but I’ve got so much energy today, I hope everybody goes out, check it out at the movie theaters, HBO Max. Wherever it’s around you, please check it out, I promise you won’t be disappointed. I’m just super hype right now, I can’t even control my energy right now. I’m watching my son right now playing his basketball game in Augusta, Georgia. My wife is right next to me, she’s looking at me crazy because it’s like 8 o’clock in the morning.”

James then had one final message, saying, “And let me not forget the most important: My haters. I just wanna say, I love you guys.”

James spent all day on Friday posting about the movie (and also how he does not like Almond Joys), so it’s probably safe to say he was in a pretty good mood over the face that he is now the second NBA player to star in a Space Jam.

ESPN’s coverage of the NBA Finals will look a little different between now and the end of the series. In a video posted to his Twitter account, Jay Williams, who is part of the NBA Countdown crew, revealed that he tested positive for COVID-19. As a result, he’s quarantining in a hotel room for the foreseeable future while the Milwaukee Bucks and the Phoenix Suns play for the Larry O’Brien trophy.

“The last couple of days for me have been challenging,” Williams said. “But I wanted to be the first to tell you guys that you will not see me at Game 5, Game 6, or a potential Game 7 of the NBA Finals, because I have tested positive for COVID. I have received both my shots, I am fully vaccinated, but this is our new normal, this is the difficulty of navigating a different type of terrain here, like we all are.”

Williams mentioned that his daughter, who is 2.5, is immunosuppressed, and that as a result, he and his loved ones have been “overly-diligent, hyper-sensitive to COVID.” But regardless, he caught the novel coronavirus, which he hopes people take as a warning.

“This serves as a great reminder to me, my family, and hopefully all of you that we have to continue to be as diligent as possible,” Williams said.

There is no word on whether or not the Countdown crew will look to replace Williams for the remaining two or three games, or if they’ll roll with the three-person team of Jalen Rose, Maria Taylor, and Adrian Wojnarowski.

This past Friday, Pop Smoke’s team released the late rapper’s second posthumous album, Faith. It arrived a little over a year since his first effort, Shoot For The Stars, Aim For The Moon, was released for fans. Altogether, Faith presents 20 songs with a boatload of guest acts, those being Pusha T, Kanye West, Rick Ross, The-Dream, 42 Dugg, 21 Savage, Rah Swish, Travi, Beam, Bizzy Banks, Takeoff, Lil Tjay, Swae Lee, Future, Chris Brown, Dua Lipa, Pharrell, Kid Cudi, Quavo, and Kodak Black.

The project also sees an appearance from the late rapper’s mother, Audrey Jackson, who shared some words on the project’s intro track, “Good News.”

During a recent interview with Power 105.1 radio host Angie Martinez, Jackson admitted that “it’s easier” to hear her son on Faith. “He does sound different on this, his sound, his style, it’s different,” she said. Jackson also confessed that she has not listened to Shoot For The Stars, Aim For The Moon yet. She later expressed that she’s “grateful” law enforcement arrested the individuals responsible for her son’s death.

“They’re off the streets, they’ve been caught,” she said. “They need to serve some time. Throwing them under the jail isn’t going to bring him back, taking their lives isn’t going to bring him back but as long as there’s a real consequence.”

The rapper’s brother, Obasi Jackson, also shared his gratitude for the arrests.

“I feel like they didn’t have to do what they did,” he said. “Now, you deserve the ultimate penalty.”

You can watch the full interview above.

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

While promotion has been in full swing for Dwayne Johnson’s Disney movie based on a theme park ride, he’s been all-in on filming Black Adam for the DC Universe. The superstar actor has hyped the movie up in a big way, and provided a number of updates about filming through social media messages from the set.

While many of his updates have essentially been extremely jacked photos of him with some teases of the costume he will wear, Johnson announcing that filming had wrapped included a different kind of tease fans of the larger DC Universe will certainly be interested to weigh.

On Friday, Johnson announced that Black Adam had wrapped filming, sharing a video of a speech he made to the cast and crew as things wound down on set. Johnson called it the “hardest undertaking of my entire career” both physically and mentally, but stressed that the experience was worth it in the end.

Interestingly, he teased that the “balance” of power in the DC Universe is about to change.

“The hierarchy of power in DC Universe is changing,” he wrote.

What that means for the actual story of the movie is about as vague as Johnson’s other posts about the movie because the source material is, well, complicated. But it’s the latest big tease from Johnson about a project he’s clearly excited about.

We’ll have to see what all that actually means when Black Adams hits theaters, which is currently scheduled for July 29, 2022.

The Milwaukee Bucks took care of business on their home floor in Games 3 and 4 of the NBA Finals. After the Phoenix Suns took the opening two games of the series in their building, things shifted to Milwaukee, where the Bucks picked up wins in both games and made the NBA Finals a best-of-3 series to determine a champion.

The two teams will square off on Saturday night in the first of those tilts, a Game 5 matchup at Phoenix Suns Arena, a building where the Suns have only lost twice this postseason. Perhaps this will make it easier for Phoenix to contain Giannis Antetokounmpo, who has been magnificent during the Finals, or perhaps it will help Chris Paul, who struggled mightily in Game 4, to find his form and help get the Suns one win away from a championship. Then again, if the Bucks can carry their recent play to an opposing building, it’s very easy to imagine them returning to their home court for Game 6 with the chance to life the Larry O’Brien trophy in front of their home fans.

Game 4 TV Info

Tip Time: Saturday, July 17; 9 p.m. ET
TV Network: ABC

Game 4 Betting Lines (via DraftKings Sportsbook)

Series Prices: Suns (-145), Bucks (+125)
Spread: Suns -3.5 (-110), Bucks +3.5 (-110)
Total: Over 219 (-115), Under 219 (-105)
Money Line: Suns (-165), Bucks (+145)

Game 4 Player Scoring Props (via DraftKings Sportsbook)

Bobby Portis O/U 6.5 (Over -105, Under -115)
Brook Lopez O/U 10.5 (-115, -105)
Cameron Johnson O/U 9.5 (+100, -120)
Cameron Payne O/U 7.5 (+100, -120)
Chris Paul O/U 21.5 (-105, -115)
Deandre Ayton O/U 15.5 (-115, -105)
Devin Booker O/U 28.5 (-110, -110)
Giannis Antetokounmpo O/U 33.5 (-110, -110)
Jae Crowder O/U 11.5 (-105, -115)
Jrue Holiday O/U 18.5 (-120, +100)
Khris Middleton O/U 24.5 (-120, +100)
Mikal Bridges O/U 10.5 (-110, -110)
P.J. Tucker O/U 4.5 (-120, +100)
Pat Connaughton O/U 8.5 (+105, -125)

Shohei Ohtani has taken over baseball this season, putting forth the kind of performance as a hitter and a pitcher that we’ve never seen before en route to being the frontrunner for the American League Most Valuable Player award. He parlayed this into a cameo in the Home Run Derby, and while he did not advance past the first round, Ohtani took his winnings and gave them back to the people in the Los Angeles Angels organization who make his life easier.

According to Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register, Ohtani, who lost in a swing-off in the first round to Juan Soto, took the $150,000 he won and split it evenly among 30 members of the Angels’ support staff. This wasn’t only because he pocketed the lowest-possible amount: Fletcher reports this was his plan regardless of where he finished.

Ohtani apparently decided that he was going to use the money in this way no matter what the outcome was. The Derby winner received $1 million, while the runner-up received $500,000.

Ohtani entered the Derby as the No. 1 overall seed, but fell in a thrilling first-round matchup to Soto — the pair were tied at 22 home runs each after the first round, then 28 after the first tiebreaker round. Soto went on to go 3-for-3 in the tiebreaker swing-off, while Ohtani failed to go yard with his first swing of the round. Currently, Ohtani leads Major League Baseball with 33 home runs.

Britney Spears scored a win in a court hearing this past week when a judge allowed her to retain a new lawyer of her choice, that being former federal prosecutor Mathew Rosengart. While the singer’s conservatorship stating that her conservator, her father Jamie Spears in this case, needs to approve any moves the singer attempts to make, Rosengart argued that it’s the singer’s constitutional right to have the lawyer of her choice and the judge agreed. It’s a small win in what will be a long journey for the singer as she hopes to remove her father from his conservator role and eventually end the conservatorship altogether.

As we wait for the next hearing in the conservatorship battle, Britney took a moment to call out some of the people closest to her in an Instagram post. Under an image that read, “Never forget who ignored you when you needed them and who helped you before you even had to ask,” the singer shared a piece of her mind in a lengthy caption.

“There’s nothing worse than when the people closest to you who never showed up for you post things in regard to your situation whatever it may be and speak righteously for support … there’s nothing worse than that!!!!” she began. “How dare the people you love the most say anything at all … did they even put a hand out to even lift me up at the TIME !!!??? How dare you make it public that NOW you CARE … did you put your hand out when I was drowning ????”

She continued her point further into the caption.

Again … NO … so if you’re reading this and you know who you are … and you actually have the nerve to say anything about my situation just to save face for yourself publicly !!! If you’re gonna post something …. Please stop with the righteous approach when you’re so far from righteous it’s not even funny …. [middle finger emojis] and have a good day !!!!! and have a good day !!!!! PS if you’re reading this today and you can relate …. I’m sorry because I know what it’s like … and I send you my love.

You can check out Britney’s post above.