Category: News

After releasing Father Of The Bride last year, Vampire Weekend spent some time touring in support of the album (back when touring was a thing). Now, they have chronicled a pair of Florida performances in a new EP, Live In Florida, which is available exclusively on Amazon Music.

The EP features performances of five songs: “Sunflower”, “How Long?”, and “2021” from Father Of The Bride, as well as “A Punk” and “White Sky,” recorded at shows in Miami and St. Augustine.

The band wrote in an Instagram post, “We went back to revisit some of our favorite shows from last year and put together a little something based around two beautiful nights in the Sunshine State.” Drummer Chris Tomson also said in a statement, “Vampire Weekend has had a long and healthy relationship with the Florida music fan, and last summer’s Miami/St. Augustine run was no different. These shows were a little sticky in the August humidity but I had so much fun playing and the really great crowd vibes always help (especially, but not limited to, Nick from Orlando’s inspired assistance on ‘A-Punk’). These shows stayed with me like the pepper sauce from O’Steen’s or a Cubano Doble from Enriqueta’s.”

Listen to the Live In Florida EP below.

One of the exceedingly few good things to come out of this year of COVID has been the reemergence of drive-in movie theaters. The worst things about theaters have been and always will be the proximity to random strangers (I got stories, believe me, folks).

This weekend also sees the release of Palm Springs, possibly my favorite movie of the year and maybe a whole lot more. It’s 88 minutes of perfection. I saw it at Sundance six months ago and snagged a screener to refresh my memory so I could write my review. I ended up watching twice, once for myself and once to show my fiancée. It’s the kind of movie you want to force your friends and significant others to see. Which is to say: perfect for a drive-in.

SNEAK SCREENINGS (JULY 9)

NEW YORK
Orchard Beach
Bronx, NY

Nickerson Beach
Nassau Cty, NY

Murmrr
Montauk, NY

MIAMI
Hard Rock Stadium
Miami, FL

CALIFORNIA
Vineland Drive-In
City of Industry, CA

Rose Bowl
Pasadena, CA

TEXAS
AT&T Stadium
Arlington, TX

WEEK-LONG ENGAGEMENTS

CALIFORNIA
Van Buren Cinema 3 Drive-In
Arlington, CA

De Anza Mission Four Drive-In
Montclair, CA

De Anza Rubidoux Drive-In 3
Riverside, CA

Paramount Drive-In
Paramount, CA

Vineland Drive-In,
City of Industry, CA

Cameo Cinema
St. Helena, CA

De Anza South Bay Drive-In 3
San Diego, CA

Santee Twin
Santee, CA

Camelot Theatre 3
Palm Springs, CA

NEW YORK
Warwick Drive-In
Warwick, NY

Delevan Twin Drive-In
Delevan, NY

Transit Drive-In
Lockport, NY

Malta Drive-In
Malta, NY

Vintage Drive-In
East Avon, NY

Sunset Drive-In
Middleport, NY

Silver Lakes Drive-In
Perry , NY

Finger Lakes Drive-In
Aurelius (Auburn), NY

Elmira Bargain Drive-In
Big Flats, NY

Bay Drive-In
Alexandria Bay, NY

Black River Drive-In
Black River, NY

INDIANA
Tri Way Drive-In 2
Plymouth, IN

Tibbs Drive-In
Indianapolis, IN

IOWA
Blue Grass Drive-In
Blue Grass, IA

Superior 71 Drive-In
Spirit Lake, IA

MICHIGAN
Getty Drive-In
Muskegon, MI

NEW HAMPSHIRE
Weirs Drive-In
Laconia, NH

NEW JERSEY
Delsea Drive-In
Vineland, NJ

NORTH CAROLINA
Badin Road Drive-In
Albemarle, NC

Hounds Drive-In
Kings Mountain, NC

Eden Drive-In
Eden, NC

OHIO
Magic City Drive-In
Barberton, OH

Springmill Drive-In
Mansfield, OH

Midway Drive-In 2
Ravenna, OH

South Drive-In
Columbus, OH

Dixie Drive-In Theatre
Dayton, OH

Field of Dreams Drive-In
Liberty Center, OH

Field Dreams Drive-In
Tiffin, OH

Van-Del Drive-In
Middle Point, OH

Elm Road Drive-In
Warren, OH

Skyway Drive-In
Warren, OH

PENNSYLVANIA
Skyview Drive-In
Carmichaels, PA

Comet Drive-In
Dunbar, PA

Brownsville Drive-In 3
Brownsville, PA

Starlight Drive-In
Butler, PA

Dependable Drive-In
Coraopolis, PA

Evergreen Drive-In Theater
Mount Pleasant, PA

Garden Drive-In
Hunlock Creek, PA

Circle Drive-In
Scranton, PA

Pike Drive-In
Williamsport, PA

Carrolltown Drive-In
Carrolltown, PA

SOUTH CAROLINA
Highway 21 Drive-In
Beaufort, SC

TEXAS
Galaxy Drive-In
Ennis, TX

Showboat Drive-In
Hockley , TX

TENNESSEE
Stardust Drive-In
Watertown, TN

Summer Drive- In 4
Memphis, TN

WASHINGTON
Rodeo Drive-In 3
Pt. Orchard, WA

Orcas Island FF Pop Up Drive-In
Orcas Island, WA

WISCONSIN
Moonlight Outdoor Drive-In
Shawano, WI

And if you can’t make it to any of these places, well, there’s always Hulu. Happy millionth birthday, dipshits.

Back when the casting buzz for Captain Marvel was in full swing, Charlize Theron was a name that got bounced around a lot, and it made perfect sense. An A-list actress with proven action chops and supermodel looks? How do you lose?

However, while sitting down with Variety to promote her upcoming Netflix film The Old Guard, Theron made a shocking admission. She’s never once been approached by Marvel over the years, which seems like a serious omission on the MCU’s part. Theron has appeared in the Fast and the Furious films, the Alien prequel Prometheus, and the action films Aeon Flux and Ultraviolet, so it seems odd that Marvel studio head Kevin Feige hasn’t at least dropped her a call to discuss a future collaboration. But according to Theron, she hasn’t heard a peep, and she’s cool with it. She’s doing her own thing:

“I swear to God. I’ve never gotten anything,” the Oscar winner says during an appearance on Wednesday’s episode of the Variety and iHeart podcast “The Big Ticket.” “No, I’m not lying to you. But that’s okay. You know what? I am paving my own way. I’m creating my own opportunities. So it’s alright.”

Theron truly is paving her own way, and in an ironic twist, she’s actually poised to dominate the comic book movie conversation this weekend, since Marvel and DC delayed the releases of Black Widow and Wonder Woman 1984. With the chances of movie theaters reopening soon looking grimmer by the day, Theron’s The Old Guard has a wide-open chance to run the table and deliver the action blockbuster of the summer. If Theron didn’t have Marvel’s attention before, we’re guessing she will very soon.

The Old Guard starts streaming on Netflix on July 10.

(Via Variety)

Charlie Puth unveiled his latest sunny single just in time for summer. His first song of the year so far, “Girlfriend” displays Puth’s masterful ear for writing feel-good tunes. Now, Puth has followed the release with an equally-energetic visual.

Directed by Drew Kirsch, who has worked with Taylor Swift and Niall Horan in the past, the visual shows off Puth’s quirky side. Puth anxiously awaits a big date and spends the entire day preparing himself. The singer first attempts to make a home-cooked meal, but eventually gives up and opts for takeout. Find ways to calm his nerves, the singer pumps himself up by cleaning, toying with knickknacks around the house. Eventually, the singer gets so distracted that he doesn’t hear his date arrive at his door.

In a statement alongside the video, Puth said the visual shows his true colors: “I’ve never released a music video that wholeheartedly showed my personality. The video for ‘Girlfriend’ is the first time I’ve truly been myself in every aspect. I can’t cook and I’m an absolute nerd. It’s also meant to visually represent what I want people to do when they hear my music and that’s to have fun in their very own way.”

Watch Puth’s “Girlfriend” video above.

Charlie Puth is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Way before the rise of hazy New England-style IPAs (and other hazy contemporary beers) on the domestic beer scene, there were wheat beers. These brews are perfect for summer because they’re refreshing, full of flavor, and easy to drink on a hot, July day. Sessionable, in other words.

Before you crack one open though, a few notes on the category. Wheat beers include Weissbier (the German style) and Witbier (the Belgian style). There are also Berliner Weisse and lambic-style beers in this category. No matter which you select, you can bet it will be well suited for warm weather drinking — these aren’t heavy and they’re never overly bitter.

We asked a handful of well-respected bartenders to tell us which wheat beers they’ll be drinking this summer. Check their answers below.

Sierra Nevada Kellerweis

Sondre Kasin, principal bartender at Cote in New York City

Sierra Nevada is one of my all-time favorite beer brands and their Kellerweis is an excellent wheat beer. Fresh, crisp without too many spice notes. Wheat beer sometimes has a tendency to be too heavy on the banana notes, this one is not.

Bell’s Oberon

Ian Campbell, assistant general manager at Gansevoort Hotel Group in New York City

I’d go with the Oberon from Bell’s Brewery – It’s a great beer as it begins with light citrusy notes, and ends with a rather spicy finish, so it’s like the best of both worlds.

Rahr & Sons Summertime Wheat

Nancy Conaway, bartender at Cassidy’s in Fort Worth, Texas

Rahr & Sons Summertime Wheat. It’s refreshing and light bodied with full flavor. These guys won a gold medal in Germany for their beers, so I’m pretty confident in what they put out on a constant basis. After all, it’s name is “Summertime Wheat”!

Blue Moon Belgian White

Larry Day, beverage manager at Fort Lauderdale Marriott Harbor Beach Resort and Spa in For Lauderdale, Florida

Well in Florida, spring, summer and winter are the same, so we pretty much drink the same beers in every season. But as wheat beers go, Blue Moon can’t be beat. It’s hazy, sweet, and endlessly refreshing.

St. Clair Brown Honey Wheat Ale

Sammy Norris, bartender at EVO Entertainment in Schertz, Texas

St. Clair Brown Honey Wheat Ale is the perfect combination of fruity ale. It is the perfect summer drink – you get the taste of grapefruit and apricot with nectarine right at the back end of your first sip.

Golden Road Mango Cart

Eva Al-Gharaballi, bartender at Datz Restaurant Group in Tampa, Florida

Golden Road Brewing’s Mango Cart Wheat Ale has come with me every time I’ve gone to the beach. Inspired by the fruit vendors in Los Angeles, this beer is light and refreshing with mango flavors throughout.

Upland Wheat Ale

Sarah Fackler, bartender and manager at Upland Brewing Co. in Bloomington, Indiana

Upland Wheat Ale for sure. It’s made in the traditional Belgian-style and brewed with coriander and orange zest. The perfect refresher on a hot day, after a bike ride or a dip in the pool.

Avery White Rascal

Hayden Miller, head bartender at Bodega Taqueria y Tequila in Miami

Avery Brewing makes White Rascal and it has always been a summer favorite. Nice hazy pour with a medium body and some great banana and clove notes. Perfect for an afternoon at the beach.

Allagash White

Billy Cox, bar chef at Ocean Prime in Boston

My go-to wheat beer is Allagash White. It’s #1 on the Beer Advocate’s Belgian Witbier rankings for a reason. It’s cloudy, refreshing, a summer classic that never disappoints.

Weihenstephaner Hefe Weissbier

Thomas Nesselhauf, manager of Datz Restaurant Group in Tampa, Florida

Weihenstephaner Hefe Weissbier. It is the best wheat beer for any season, or the best wheat beer to bridge the gap between any seasons, or… just the best wheat beer altogether! Anyone that disagrees hasn’t had one. It’s pretty much the most classic, old-world, full-flavored wheat beer you can buy.

“‘Til death do us part” takes on a whole new meaning in Kehlani’s latest video from her It Was Good Until It Wasn’t album. The somber, black-and-white video for “Bad News” casts Kehlani in a bridal photoshoot that plays up the gangster culture of her native Bay Area as she poses in a white gown and veil with a pistol, bounces in a lowrider, and twirls on a dancer’s pole.

The video, according to Kehlani, is self-directed with photography by her close friend Brianna Alysse and edited by both. She expressed her pride in the video — the fifth from the album so far — on Twitter, writing, “Y’all gotta understand… The first video off the album was some wine drunk sh*t on iMovie at 12 pm.” She also shouted out Adobe Premiere Pro editing software, which she said was used on the computer in her garage to create the video.

That first video she alludes to above was the racy “quarantine style” video for “Toxic,” which she followed up with “Everybody’s Business,” “F&MU,” and “Open,” for which she was recently sued after reportedly damaging the Ferrari she used as a prop.

Watch Kehlani’s “Bad News” video above.

It Was Good Until It Wasn’t is out now via Atlantic Records. Get it here.

Kehlani is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

The sports documentary boom is upon us after the success of The Last Dance, and that means we may finally get a detailed account of the rise, fall, and rise again of one Tiger Woods. HBO announced it has acquired a two-part documentary film called Tiger, based on the best-selling biography on Woods by Jeff Benedict and Armen Keteyian.

The film will air in December across HBO platforms over the span of two weeks, premiering on Dec. 13 with the second installment on Dec. 20. It is directed by Matthew Heineman and Matthew Hamacheck, and has reportedly been in the works for at least two years.

“Since his introduction to the world at the age of two, Tiger Woods has inhabited our collective consciousness as a prodigy, a pioneer, a champion, a global icon, and then a tabloid headline,” said directors Heineman and Hamachek. “After months of research and countless hours of revelatory conversations, we discovered that he has always been a projection of outsized expectations. His father, his sponsors, and his fans all made Tiger Woods into whom they wanted him to be. Our goal was to dive deeper and create an unflinching and intimate portrait of a man, who like all of us, is imperfect and inherently human.”

After the controversy over the extent to which Michael Jordan was involved in the making of The Last Dance and how much his interviews dictated the direction of the film, this doc will take a different tact, orbiting around Woods without directly taking his perspective or creative oversight.

The key interview subjects for the documentary include long-time former caddie Steve Williams, golf legend Nick Faldo, Pete McDaniel (friend and biographer of Tiger’s father, Earl Woods), and Rachel Uchitel, the woman who was at the center of Tiger’s sex scandal in her first ever public interview.

We’re now looking at a month-long span in which Woods will defend his Masters title at the rescheduled event at Augusta National in mid-November, and then a doc centered about his life will hit screens less than a month later, so surely there will be a ton of Woods talk among sports fans this winter.

Steve McQueen’s 2018 heist-thriller Widows earned $76 million at the box office on a $42 budget, so while it was “technically” a success, it should have made a lot more. Widows rules. Look at the cast alone: Viola Davis, Michelle Rodriguez, Cynthia Erivo, Colin Farrell, Brian Tyree Henry, Daniel Kaluuya, Jacki Weaver, Carrie Coon, Garret Dillahunt, Jon Bernthal, Robert Duvall, Liam Neeson, and Elizabeth Debicki, who was so good in the movie that it almost prevented her from being cast in Tenet.

In the Chicago-set Widows, Debicki plays one of the titular widows after her bank-robber husband is killed; the actress is Australian, while her character is American. Her accent was so convincing that according to Variety, “Debicki was almost too good an actor for Nolan to consider… Having seen her work in Widows, he assumed she was American”:

“I was looking for a very, very British characterization, an English Rose kind of character,” Nolan reveals. So when Emma Thomas, Nolan’s wife and producing partner, suggested Debicki, she had to inform him the actor wasn’t from the States. “Elizabeth’s one of these great actors who, when they’re brought to your attention, you realize you’ve seen them in a lot of things but not realized it’s the same person,” he says.

The moral of the story here is: if you want to be in a Christopher Nolan movie, be good at acting, but don’t be too convincing. Tenet is scheduled to come out on August 12.

(Via Variety)

A few weeks ago, Anthony Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease, gave an exceedingly rare positive bit of news during a testimony to the House Energy and Commerce Committee. Fauci works in a field that is in inherently pessimistic, but when discussing a potential vaccine for COVID-19, he painted a relatively rosy picture about what the future might hold.

“We feel cautiously optimistic, based on the concerted effort and the fact we are taking financial risks — not risks to safety, not risks to the integrity of the science, but financial risk to be able to be ahead of the game — so that when, and I believe it will be when and not if, we get favorable candidates with good results, we will be able to make them available to the American public,” Fauci said, per Vox. “It would put us at the end of this calendar year and the beginning of 2021.”

Fauci repeated his optimism a little less than a week ago when he did a Q&A with the Journal of the American Medical Association and said the hope is for 100 million doses of a vaccine by the end of 2020 and “a couple hundred million doses” that could be made available “by the beginning of 2021.”

You did not click on this story to read some doofus talk about vaccines, nor did you click on it to get brought up to date on stuff Fauci said, although it’d be cool if these updates brought you some sort of sense of relief amid the myriad of extremely bad news that comes on an hourly basis. No, you clicked on this because you want to read about college football. What I would like to say is that is you consider the previous couple of statements from the head of the NIAID as you read the next sentence, which we will get to right now.

This upcoming college football season should not happen as it is currently scheduled. This does not mean getting rid of non-conference games, nor does it mean delaying the start of the season until, say, October. No, this means moving the college football season to the spring.

The next however many hundred words I write all come with a caveat: I am not a person whose livelihood is directly tied to college football happening. I am a season-ticket holder for my alma mater’s football program, and I am someone who likes watching college football a lot. I am not a coach, or a comms person, or a member of an event staff, or a concessions person, or anyone else whose bills are paid because of this multi-billion dollar industry generating the revenue it has to generate. There’s, of course, a problem within that, because the athletes are not getting a fair cut of what comes in that industry, but I digress. The main point is that it is very easy for me to make this proclamation without having to worry about whether I can survive if there is no college football.

Take a look at our current moment. As of this writing, there are more than 50,000 cases of COVID-19 and numerous deaths are being reported on a daily basis. As Jane McManus put it, sports are a sign of a highly functioning society. In no way, shape, or form can the United States be viewed as a highly functioning society right now. It is hard to imagine an immediate path forward to achieve that “highly functioning society” distinction unless a whole lot of masks, PPE, tests, and checks that incentivize staying home as the virus spreads pop up out of nowhere.

Beyond that, the idea of professional sports right now in America are tenuous at best — it is important to stress “in America,” because in Europe and Asia, leagues have started back up due to the way their countries made it a point to get a handle on this virus as quickly as possible. The NBA and MLS literally need to have bubbles for their leagues to go on as planned, and MLS already canceled games and had two teams pull out of said bubble due to outbreaks. MLB seems like a ticking time bomb as teams travel from city to city. The NFL plans on going full-steam ahead, but even they seem to be recognizing potential pitfalls as they remove preseason games.

All of these sports have the benefit of employing professionals, many of whom make a whole lot of money and all of whom have collectively-bargained health insurance plans. College athletes, meanwhile, are amateurs. If they get sick and are unable to continue their careers as a result, they would not be able to fall back on a big contract and endorsement deals and the connections that are built up by being in the world of professional athletics. There is a legitimate moral peril to playing college football while the virus is still raging on with no vaccine or reliable therapeutics to help individuals who fall ill. Even if younger individuals and those in good health generally tend to avoid the worst outcomes from COVID-19, the possibility of even a single athlete falling seriously ill or dying makes the entire endeavor not worth the risk. This doesn’t even mention that the coaches — always older, frequently in a more risky age groups — risk falling ill, too. Alabama fans: Would college football Saturdays with Bryant-Denny Stadium at greatly reduced capacity be worth it if they lead to 68-year-old Nick Saban laying comatose in an ICU with a ventilator helping him breathe and his kidney getting ripped to shreds by this virus? Of course not.

The moment that Fauci expressed his belief that a vaccine could come by the end of this year, it only made sense to start seriously considering the spring. Again, there would be financial ramifications to this move that I cannot even begin to fathom, and perhaps this renders this entire column bunk in your eyes. The way I see it, there are four ways this college football season can go. The most improbable, based on where we are right now, is the season goes off without a hitch. Perhaps equally improbable is to not have a season at all, which accomplishes the extremely bad goal of making everyone unhappy and has brutal financial ramifications for essentially every school across the country.

Far more likely is what is behind door number three: The season includes canceled games, perhaps a lengthy stoppage in play as the virus makes its way through numerous members of a team. This would be an unmitigated disaster, something that exists right at the intersection of “extremely foreseeable and avoidable situation,” “all-out PR nightmare,” and “financial catastrophe.” And the worst part is the likelihood is that this would impact multiple college football programs and magnify just how bad of an idea all of this is.

The Ivy League — which, to return to money for a moment, has fewer financial questions than most other institutions of higher learning — did this calculus and determined the best move is to cancel fall sports for now. It is unknown if winter or spring sports will be able to go on, or if they’ll be able to move fall sports to spring.

“With the information available to us today regarding the continued spread of the virus, we simply do not believe we can create and maintain an environment for intercollegiate athletic competition that meets our requirements for safety and acceptable levels of risk, consistent with the policies that each of our schools is adopting as part of its reopening plans this fall,” the conference said in a statement.

The Ivies famously canceled their postseason basketball tournament before any other league back on March 10, before Utah Jazz center Rudy Gobert tested positive for the virus and things began to rapidly unfold. There is no guarantee that other leagues will follow their lead this time, and again, the Ivy financial situation is less dire, but at the absolute bare minimum, listening to the how and why that led to this decision would be wise for decision makers at every other university in the United States.

With all of that said, there are obvious questions about what college football would look like in the spring. The thought of a beautiful April day leading into a highly-anticipated nighttime tilt between Alabama and LSU or Ohio State and Penn State is, obviously, extremely fun to imagine, especially if you’re the kind of person who believes the closest thing there is to heaven on earth is drinking crappy beer and eating grilled meats in a parking lot for eight consecutive hours on a Saturday. The NFL wanting to do NFL stuff during the spring — i.e. the combine and the draft — could get in the way, and administrators would assuredly (and, candidly, reasonably) be leery of playing a full, 12-game regular season schedule before conference title games and bowls, and then only giving players a truncated offseason before rolling into a full 2021 season in the fall.

Pressing pause right now gives them the opportunity to buy time to make a comprehensive plan to figure all of this out, regardless of whether there is a vaccine and/or reliable treatments by then (although, so I am on the record here, college sports should not happen if there’s nothing that can fight the virus in general). Schools need football to happen. It is a crappy reality of this entire situation — the money that college football generates is necessary for athletic departments to survive as they currently exist, and as Stanford recently reminded us, major revenue losses can lead to literal life-altering decisions being made.

But at the end of the day, while the money behind all of this is important, the risking of the livelihoods of 18-22 year olds who have decades worth of experiences — marriage and fatherhood and a career — ahead of them is not worth it. The second that cautious optimism became the norm about a vaccine being available by the end of the year, wheels should have been put into motion. Time has been wasted since that moment, but the opportunity to do the right thing is still on the table.

“Too late” comes when, not if, a player falls ill. College football needs to shift its focus to the spring before that day comes.

Ahead of HBO’s Watchmen debut last year, Tim Blake Nelson told us about a trauma that would reveal much about his Looking Glass character. Sure enough, showrunner Damon Lindelof gave us one hell of an origin story in the “Little Fear Of Lighting” episode, which titled itself after a Jules Verne quote (from 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea) about a giant sea squid. What unfolded was the story of how young Wade was in New York City when Ozymandias unleashed his giant squid hoax upon the metropolis.

Needless to say, Wade’s trauma had plenty of layers, including sexual humiliation, and the effects of the psychic blast led him to build a safety bunker, wrap his head in that reflectatine mask, and closely monitor the squid rain for his entire adulthood. As a result, Looking Glass ended up being the glue (and audience POV) that fastened the story’s more fantastical elements with a more grounded reality, but Lindelof originally planned a different story, as Nelson revealed to Entertainment Weekly:

“”[I]t involved an interracial relationship that Wade had had that had ended very badly. And I loved that notion. I’m in an interracial marriage myself in my own real life and have three children in that marriage, and so these are issues that are very close to me. And although my interracial marriage has a very happy present — and, I think, future and past — Wade’s was really tragic and really dark and really just changed the course of his life.”

Nelson loved this story, but he also believes that the Looking Glass origin story that made it into the series was “a better decision” for the course of the show. Indeed, that was when sh*t got real for comic book fans, who realized that Lindelof was gonna put the pedal to the metal, so to speak, on weaving choice elements from Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ graphic novel into the show. Also, we got a really good “Careless Whisper” cover out of the whole thing, so yes, HBO’s Watchmen was a success on several fronts.

(Via Entertainment Weekly)