Category: News

The Philadelphia 76ers started Game 4 with a hot start, taking a healthy lead early on at 20-12 and it looked like they were well on their way to a sweep of the Wizards. However, with four minutes to play in the first quarter, Joel Embiid got blocked on a drive by Robin Lopez and crashed hard to the floor, causing him to get up holding his lower back/tailbone area and getting up gingerly.

Embiid would stay in for a bit, playing 11 minutes in the first half, but later left the game for the locker room with what most assumed was an issue from that fall. As the second quarter wore on and Embiid did not re-enter the game, there was concern about what he was dealing with, and the official diagnosis from the Sixers was not what anyone expected. At halftime, the team announced that the All-NBA center would not return to Game 4 with right knee soreness.

It isn’t clear whether the knee soreness was an issue from the way he landed — he did have his right leg land just before his left prior to falling — or if it happened at another point after that, but it is clearly bothering him enough to keep him out of action. Without Embiid, the Wizards were able to rally back to take the lead briefly before a Danny Green three gave Philadelphia a one-point halftime edge. Ben Simmons likewise played sparingly in the first half due to foul trouble, but the load will now shift heavily onto Simmons and Tobias Harris to create offensively as they will have to look to close out the Wizards without the services of their MVP candidate, who everyone hopes is being held out for caution and not with an issue that will linger long-term.

The rise of Rico Nasty has been one of the most interesting happenings in rap over the last few years, and the screamo rapper is by no means done breaking down barriers. Covering everything from pop-punk to trap on her debut album, last year’s Nightmare Vacation, Rico let fans know this weekend that they could expect something new by summer of 2021. With a cryptic Instagram post of two prescription bottles in a glowing hand, with the RX made out to Rico herself with “unlimited refills,” the rapper captioned the image: “Rx . This summer ” and tagged the artist, Karli Fetz.

For her part, the artist re-shared the post on Instagram with the following caption: “Dream come true for me. this summer, @riconasty x karlifetz,” they wrote on Instagram. “I can’t tell you much but just know we haven’t even started.” When a fan commented asking it his meant an album was on the way, the artist responded with the eyes emoji, an indication that Fetz knows more than they can say right now.

If you’re still unfamiliar with exactly who Rico Nasty is and what she has up her sleeve as an artist and performer, check out our mini-doc on Rico right here. And keep an ear out for more music coming this summer, which is just around the corner.

Things aren’t so great for Matt Gaetz right now. Since March, it’s been public knowledge that he’s under federal investigation for his ties to an alleged sex trafficking ring. He also claimed he got scammed while buying a pricey boat. But on Memorial Day, he added another ignominious honor to his CV: He, and some other noted Republicans, got tricked into honoring the military service of JFK murderer Lee Harvey Oswald.

It’s all thanks to Intercept reporter Ken Klippenstein, who occasionally likes to troll noted rightwingers by asking them to retweet an image of one of his ancestors in uniform. Sometimes he claims it’s his grandpa, sometimes it’s his uncle. But it’s actually Oswald, who served in the Marines before perching inside a Dallas book depository and firing three shots at John F. Kennedy, making him one of four American presidents who’ve been assassinated.

On Monday, Klippenstein did it again, tagging a group of conservatives, writing, “My grandpa’s a big fan of yours and is a veteran, he would be thrilled if you could RT this photo of him for Memorial Day,” seeing who would fall for it. This time his victims were Gaetz, pundit and pardoned ex-con Dinesh D’Souza, and lobbyist Matt Schlapp.

Gaetz was quick to realize his error and delete the tweet. But it had already been screengrabbed and disseminated.

After Gaetz re-tweeted the image of Oswald, Klippenstein changed his handle to “Matt Gaetz is a pedo,” which for a while sat near the top of his Twitter feed.

But Gaetz wasn’t the only one who bit.

To add insult to injury, people pointed out that none of the people retweeting a picture of JFK’s killer actually served in the military themselves.

Candace Owens also got in on it. She didn’t fall for it. Rather, she accused Klippenstein of “photoshopping” Oswald into a uniform, evidently not knowing about his military service.

Again, Klippenstein does this a lot. According to Raw Story:

In 2019, he tricked former Rep. Steve King (R-IA) into wishing a happy Independence Day to his “uncle,” fictional Marine Col. Nathan Jessup from “A Few Good Men,” and then for good measure, changed his Twitter name to “Steve King is a white supremacist” so that phrase would show up on the congressman’s page. And in 2020, he fooled former acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell into bidding a happy Veterans Day to his “grandpa” Bill Calley, the war criminal behind the Mỹ Lai massacre.

So you’ll just have to wait and see who falls for this the next time Klippenstein does it.

(Via Raw Story)

One Direction might be over, well, for now at least, but the Directioners live forever. The avid fanbase have mostly turned their attention to the blossoming career of Harry Styles, who has emerged as the de facto star of the beloved boy band, and it was an eagle-eyed fan who first spotted what might be massive news in the greater Styles universe. According to a filing document first noticed by fan account Harry Styles Updates (@TheHarryNews) the British star is liking in the process of launching his own fragrance line.

Harry is listed as the director of the new company, and the account shares the name as “PLEASED AS HOLDINGS LIMITED,” though that title isn’t shared on the paperwork they posted, Page Six did confirm it and noted that Harry’s long-time assistant, Emma Spring, is listed as the co-director. Again, that information isn’t shared in the initial screenshot.

As for the nature of the business, “wholesale of perfume and cosmetics” is on the screenshot, indicating that a Styles perfume, along with, potentially, makeup (!) is going to hit stores soon. As for the title the tweet shared, it also kind of sound slike a placeholder to me, so who knows if we’re going to be getting “Watermelon Sugar” lipstick or “Sweet Creature” eyeliner sometime soon. Oh and while you’re busy jumping in the beauty game, Harry, mind giving us a new song or two as well? Check out the screenshot above and keep an eye out for more news on the Harry Styles Industrial Complex very soon.

Over its mere seven episodes, Mare of Easttown has been praised — even mocked, in good humor — for its gritty realism. The HBO murder mystery found Oscar-winning English actress Kate Winslet throwing herself into the role of a Philly burb detective with stringy hair and a yen for Wawa coffee and sad cheesesteaks. In a kind of exit interview with The New York Times’ Maureen Dowd, published the morning after the season finale, Winslet elaborated on not dolling her titular character up — which included not allowing the director to touch up an early sex scene.

Winslet told Dowd that after the scene — which appears in the first episode and features her canoodling on a couch with an out-of-town writer/professor played by Guy Pearce — director Craig Zobel assured her he would cut what she referred to as her “bulgy bit of belly.” But Winslet wasn’t having it, telling him, “Don’t you dare!” She also took issue with a poster that touched up her face too much. “They were like ‘Kate, really, you can’t,’ and I’m like ‘Guys, I know how many lines I have by the side of my eye, please put them all back.’”

She even talked them out of lighting her face so that it looked extra beautiful. “We tried to light it to make it look not nice,” she said. Even her clothes were meant to look rumpled and unflattering. The costume designer would dress her in inexpensive T-shirts and Ocean City sweatshirts and what she called “bad jeans,” and Winslet would leave them in piles on the floor. “Whenever we’d find something unflattering,” she said, “we’d be jumping up and down like, ‘Yes! We’re wearing this.’”

It was all part of Winslet’s plan to present an honest look at not only her character, but of her body in middle age:

“Listen, I hope that in playing Mare as a middle-aged woman — I will be 46 in October — I guess that’s why people have connected with this character in the way that they have done because there are clearly no filters. She’s a fully functioning, flawed woman with a body and a face that moves in a way that is synonymous with her age and her life and where she comes from. I think we’re starved of that a bit.

You can now watch all of Mare of Easttown on HBO Max.

(Via NYT)

When it comes to getting scoops on industry news, Variety is one of the best, and the storied magazine has an interview with soon-to-be Warner Records president Joe Kentish (formerly head of A&R for the label), that will make Dua Lipa fans as happy as Dua was when Ginger Spice sent her flowers. According to Kentish, Dua is already in a space where she’s thinking about what her third record will be like, and she’s ready to shift gears.

“She was talking about album No. 3 when we barely had No. 2 done,” Kentish told Variety. “You’re half-expecting that she might want to take a break or go about things differently but she’s like ‘Right, what’s next?’ Her interests, her knowledge, her thirst to learn new things and to be in control of what she does just grows and grows. She’s taking time to fully realize the album conceptually, but her belief in herself and the belief that she can pull off something completely different and at scale has only grown.”

He also spoke to the seeming unstoppable force of Future Nostalgia, which just picked up a handful of awards at the Brits a few weeks ago, and is still going strong with the “Moonlight Edition.”

“It’s ‘The Terminator’ of albums, it just cannot be stopped!” Kentish said of the record. “Every time we think it’s down, another single pops off in another territory or on another platform. And her work ethic is legendary. We use her as an example to other artists at the label and I know her management company, Tap Music, do the same.”

Check out the full interview here — and hopefully look out for a new, left-field Dua Lipa single sooner than we thought.

If you’re a fan of the show Friends, then all the recent reunion content has really been a welcome return to form for the show’s cultural impact, or maybe just a chance to zone out this holiday weekend. Aside from ranking seventeen of the best episodes of the show last year, we’ve also been following along with all what’s come about these past few days, like Lady Gaga filling in for an iconic “Smelly Cat” performance, and those Justin Bieber and BTS cameos — that got cut in China — along with the fact that ratings for the reunion have been incredibly high, like Wonder Woman 1984 high.

But this weekend’s hilarious recreation of Monica and Ross’ dance routine from the episode appropriately named “The One With The Routine” might just take the cake. Enlisting none other than global pop star Ed Sheeran to play the part of Ross, Monica had Ed help her get the retired routine back out of retirement once more. You’ll remember on the show, Ross and Monica were trying to attract the attention of the cameras when they were extras on Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve. In this case, her and Ed are out in a field on their own, but those classic moves are funnier than ever with Sheeran hamming it up alongside her. “Just some routine dancing with a friend…” Cox casually captioned the post, adding the hashtag #ReRoutine and tagging Ed’s account.

For his part, Ed is gearing up to start a new album cycle with a massive new single looming on the horizon for the “next stage” of his career. Keep an eye out for more new music from Ed very soon and check out the hilarious dance routine above.

Rightwingers didn’t have a very chill Memorial Day weekend. Fox News tried to turn an innocuous tweet by Kamala Harris into a culture war firestorm. Texas Republicans stayed up late Saturday pushing through legislation to make voting more difficult. There was even a QAnon conference. Then there’s congressional hopeful Omar Navarro, who got really, really mad when a Disney spin-off dared feature an out-and-proud gay character.

Navarro isn’t that well-known. He is, in fact, what one calls a “perennial candidate,” which is to say a politician who frequently runs for office and rarely, if ever, wins. Indeed, Navarro’s claim to fame is that he has thrice been defeated by 15-term California representative Maxine Waters, who is also the most senior of the 12 black people serving in Congress. But on Memorial Day itself, he became better known as the guy who got mocked for dropping some old school homophobia about a Disney movie.

“The new Disney Cruella with Emma Stone just ruined my childhood with an openly flamboyant gay in the movie,” wrote Navarro. “Disney persist shoving the LGBT agenda down our throat.”

This isn’t the first time Navarro has clutched his pearls over an LGBTQ+ character in Disney content. According to Pink News, in 2019 he came for the Disney Channel show The Owl House after it introduced a bisexual character.

“I don’t agree with this crap being pushed down our throats,” he wrote, using similar language. “What people do at home is there business but publicly I shouldn’t have to be forced.” He added, “Will Christians please stand up?”

He also served six months in prison after violating a restraining order against an ex-girlfriend, who claimed he was stalking her.

Navarro’s tweet was quick to earn the scorn and mockery of social media.

Some pelted him with the far right’s favorite insult: snowflake.

Some pointed out that Cruella De Vil is not exactly a role model whose reputation can be sullied.

Others dwelled on his weird use of sexual imagery.

And others were newly enraged at the wing of Star Wars and Ghosbusters fans who introduced the words “ruined my childhood” into the cultural lexicon.

That said, Navarro’s tweet did make some people actually want to watch Cruella.

Cruella is now in theaters and can now be streamed, for about $30, on Disney+. Navarro, meanwhile, is planning to run against Maxine Waters, again, in 2022. Maybe fourth time’s the charm!

(Via Pink News)

For outfielders, there is nothing more unnerving than chasing a deep fly ball to the wall and trying to find the balance between selling out to possibly make a key play to save a home run or extra bases and protecting yourself from a collision with the padded, yet still painful immovable object. The danger of the wall is the entire reason the warning track exists, an effort to alert fielders to the impending pain that awaits them if they don’t change course once they hit that dirt.

Most will start putting a hand out as they get close to the wall, an extra feeler to find it so they don’t suffer the fate of poor Minnesota centerfielder Rob Refsnyder on Monday afternoon in Baltimore. In the bottom of the fifth inning, Ryan Mountcaste hit a deep fly ball to centerfield that put Refsnyder on his horse to try and go get it. However, Refsnyder failed to put out an arm and failed to heed the warning of the track and ran smack into the wall as the ball sailed over it for a solo home run to tie the game.

The close-up angle really shows how hard he hits the wall, although he at least wasn’t at a full sprint when he got there.

Happily, he was alright and remained in the game in what became a 3-2 Twins victory, but his tumble after slamming into the wall will serve as a lasting memory and a sure reminder to get that off hand out to find the wall before it finds him.

Tulsa: The Fire and the Forgotten (PBS, 9:00pm) — HBO and Damon Lindelof’s Watchmen (2019) brought the Tulsa Race Massacre into mainstream consciousness. This Greenwood-district event — the total decimation of what Booker T. Washington dubbed as “Black Wall Street” and one of the most horrific instances of racially-motivated violence in U.S. history — was excised from the books, and this documentary (directed by Emmy-winning Jonathan Silvers) contextualizes the tragedy alongside systemic racism that persists today. During the massacre, a violent white mob killed up to 300 Black Tulsa residents and left thousands without homes and businesses; and this documentary charts a search for mass graves and ongoing efforts for renewal, justice, and reparations. The project features interviews with Greenwood descendants and several local leaders, including current Tulsa Mayor G.T. Bynum, along with civil rights activists, including Greg Robinson II, who we spoke with about his hopes for justice.

In case you missed these top streaming picks from the weekend:

Mare Of Easttown (HBO series streaming on HBO Max) — It’s finale time! Kate Winslet returns not only to TV but to HBO (a decade after her award-winning Mildred Pierce turn) to star as a hard-vaping detective in a small town where she both portrays and elevates the “complicated” cop trope. She’s captivating while digging into a murder mystery that has rocked her small town and caused the community to feel utterly claustrophobic. This show will suck you in, and you won’t mind one bit. Also you’ll be wondering about this: what the heck was in that picture?

Cruella (Disney movie on Disney+) — Yes, Cruella de Vil is finally getting her origin story. Even if you don’t agree that she needed one, no one can argue that Emma Stone is the actress who could deliver a damn good time in this role. Granted, the film starts out slow (the runtime’s over two hours) with a protracted childhood era that doesn’t illustrate much about why she villained out and murdered puppies. Yet it does speed up, with lots of mayhem and a cackling Emma hanging off a truck in a billowing dress. Fashion can be evil! Also, the soundtrack feels like a character in its own right.

Plan B (Hulu film) — Oh boy, does this story ever hit home for countless ladies who find themselves driving from drug store to drugstore in the heartland. That’s exactly what happens in this film, after a regrettable sexual encounter sends a high school student (Kuhoo Verma) and her best friend (Victoria Moroles) on a bit of a road trip with the clock ticking to find Plan B in America’s heartland. It’s actually a twist on the teen sex comedy, and it arrives by way of Cobra Kai and Harold & Kumar producers.

Lucifer: Season 5B (Netflix series) — The Devil is still up to no good. Even worse, Lucifer is still plagued by his twin brother, Michael, who’s trying to take his place, and Lucifer also decides that he wants to be God? Alright. Well, God’s apparently retiring, so there’s an opening for that gig. Heaven help us all if this show ever starts to make sense (and Tom Ellis has so much swaggering fun with his lead role), but Netflix’s synopsis promises that “God himself comes to Earth. Secrets will be revealed, heroic sacrifices will be made, and the world will never be the same.” Season 6 will be the show’s final run, and I’m secretly rooting for Chloe to shake off her destiny and ditch the Devil.

Friends: The Reunion (HBO Max feature-length special) — The whole O.G. gang is back in one place, which means that Rachel (Jennifer Aniston), Monica (Courteney Cox), Phoebe (Lisa Kudrow), Chandler (Matthew Perry), Ross (David Schwimmer), and Joey (Matt LeBlanc) are all here. Sadly, Paul Rudd is not on the scene, but there’s a buffay (get it?) of guest stars here to reinforce why this pop-culture phenomenon remains popular to this day, and why, oftentimes, friends can become your family.

Panic: Season 1 (Amazon Prime series) — This show’s a bit like The Purge in concept, only it revolves around a dangerous game that takes place over the course of a summer for graduating seniors in a tiny Texas town. They compete for a pot of money (while hoping to escape their tiny-town lives, of course), but the stakes are high and risky as players must confront their deepest fears. The story, which is based upon the bestselling novel by Lauren Oliver, will likely hook you, so be ready to binge.

Hacks (HBO Max series premiere) — Jean Smart’s not-so-quiet domination of recent prestige TV shows (Fargo, Watchmen, Mare of Easttown, Legion) and other popular shows of late (Big Mouth, Dirty John) has finally culminated with this leading-lady turn in a role she was arguably meant to play. Hacks hails from executive producer Michael Schur and has three Broad City alums in the writers’ room, so get ready for a (Las Vegas) buffet of complex female characters. Smart portrays a legendary comedian who forges a “dark mentorship” to a 20-something newcomer in town. Don’t miss this one.