Category: Trending

Some bozos think Hubie Halloween is the “so bad on purpose” movie that Adam Sandler threatened to make if he wasn’t nominated for an Oscar for Uncut Gems (he wasn’t), but those people are wrong. Hubie Halloween is much-needed dumb fun with one joke that I still think about daily. In a follow-up interview about his comments, Sandler explained, “I said, ‘If I don’t get a blah blah blah, I’m gonna make the worst movie,’ a payback, whatever, right? Just said it as a joke. But what would the worst movie entail? I have no idea, I’m game to be in it.” It probably won’t be either one of his next two Netflix movies.

There’s the previously-announced Hustle, where he plays a basketball scout “who discovers a player abroad with a rocky past,” and now, The Spaceman of Bohemia, both of which are coming to Netflix. Directed by Chernobyl helmer Johan Renck and based on the science-fiction novel by Jaroslav Kalfař, Spaceman “follows an astronaut (Sandler) sent to the edge of the galaxy to collect mysterious ancient dust,” according to Deadline. “He soon finds his earthly life falling to pieces and he turns to the only voice who can help him try to put it back together. It just so happens to belong to a creature from the beginning of time lurking in the shadows of his ship.”

If the voice doesn’t sound like this…

… I’m demanding a refund from Netflix. I will accept space dust as payment.

(Via Deadline)

The Alchemist has a roster of artists with whom he regularly collaborates, and among them is Action Bronson. The Alchemist put out a new project today, The Food Villain, so naturally, Bronson put his stamp on it.

The rapper actually appears all over the project, which is experimental in its structure and contains a lot of musical sketches as opposed to traditional verse-chorus-verse-chorus songs. While Bronson’s voice can be heard through the full 24-minute project, he got a feature credit on “I Hate Everything,” and he kicks off his verse, “Been around the world, I’m not impressed / I’ve been around the world, I’m not impressed
Three Michelin stars, I’m not impressed / I hate everything / I’m the food villain.”

The project as a whole got a shout-out from Eminem, who shared it on Twitter and wrote, “My concert DJ and cohort @Alchemist just dropped his new project The Food Villain – hit up ALC Records to pick it up!”

This is just the latest from what has been a productive year for the producer. Aside from his own album A Doctor, A Painter & An Alchemist Walk Into A Bar, he also dropped collaborative projects with Boldy James (The Price Of Tea In China), Conway The Machine (Lulu), and Freddie Gibbs (Alfredo).

Listen to “I Hate Everything” above and stream The Food Villain in full below.

On Sunday night, we witnessed one of the rarest moments in sports: an attempt to steal home plate. In the fourth inning, Manuel Margot of the Rays found himself as the tying run on third base with no outs after stealing second and then advancing to third on a fielding error by Chris Taylor on the throw down from the catcher. However, three batters later — a walk and two non-productive outs — Margot was still standing there with Kevin Kiermaier at the plate and two outs in the inning.

Clayton Kershaw’s first pitch to Kiermaier was a strike but before his second pitch, Margot decided to try to take advantage of the left-hander’s long stretch delivery and steal home plate. It nearly worked out, but he was out by mere inches.

After the game we learned that it was Margot’s decision to steal home, not a call from manager Kevin Cash, and both in the moment and after the decision was widely panned. How could someone make the final out of the inning at home on such a brazen attempt and ruin the opportunity for a Rays rally? Why take such a wild gamble in a pivotal moment? Why would he cost his team the game?

The last point was one that became a popular refrain but, quite frankly, is a bit absurd. Margot may have cost the Rays a run, that’s very possible, but they lost 4-2, not 3-2, and, while they put Kershaw in some pressure spots by getting the first batter on in each of the first five innings, they weren’t exactly scalding at the plate. There’s a very real math argument to be made for Margot trying this steal given the incredible jump he got before Kershaw was alerted to what was happening by first baseman Max Muncy.

Margot was out, but by the slimmest of margins. Kershaw delivered a perfect throw and catcher Austin Barnes got the tag down just in time to get Margot before his hand got to the plate. As Joe Buck and John Smoltz noted on the broadcast, the play by Kershaw was, truly, spectacular. He had to step off the rubber to avoid balking (a very real possibility that would’ve advanced the runner on first to second and given Margot home) and fire a strike from an awkward spot on the mound stepping partially onto the slope but not in the way he would to throw a pitch. He did those things just about perfectly, the throw was a touch high and wide but on target, and still barely got Margot at the plate.

If there had been no outs or one out, then yes, Margot is taking away the chance for a sac fly or a grounder up the middle for an out that may have scored him, but with two outs, they had to have a hit to score him. At the plate was Kevin Kiermaier, who has had a nice World Series, but entered that at bat as a .240 hitter this postseason (the same average he had with runners in scoring position on the season). Overall this year, he was a .217 hitter and that dropped to a rather hideous .158 average against left-handed pitching, per Fangraphs.

Clayton Kershaw isn’t just any left-hander, so with two outs, the likelihood of Kiermaier getting a hit to score Margot was somewhere in the 15-20 percent range. Given everything Kershaw and Barnes had to do right — not balk, deliver a strike from behind the rubber, catch it clean and get the tag down quickly — I have to think that, at the very least, the likelihood of success with the jump Margot got had to be pretty close to 20 percent just from all the things that could’ve gone wrong on the Dodgers end, which is to say, it wasn’t really any riskier than letting Kiermaier continue hacking away at the plate against a Hall of Famer.

Even moving beyond all of that and the actual analytics of the play, stealing home in the World Series is cool as hell. Jayson Stark of The Athletic dove into this in his roundup from Game 5, but in World Series history there have been TWO straight steal attempts of home plate. The first is Jackie Robinson’s iconic steal in 1955. The second was a failed attempt in 1982 by Lonnie Smith.

Two other men have “stolen” home successfully since Robinson as well, Tim McCarver in 1964 and Brad Fullmer in 2002, but both were on double steals, going home after a throw down to get a runner stealing second. That’s it. Stealing home is, by far, the rarest offensive feat one can pull off in the World Series, and to try it and come as close as Margot did and force a near perfect defensive play by the pitcher and catcher is pretty incredible.

The results didn’t work out but you can make a strong analytical case for the process behind the move in that situation as well as simply noting that it’s unbelievable cool to try and steal home plate in the World Series.

Joe Biden’s campaign hosted the virtual I Will Vote Concert over the weekend, and the event’s final performer was Cher. She decided to make her presence known by modifying a decades-old song, “Happiness Is Just A Thing Called Joe,” to better suit the presidential candidate. Following the performance, she shared a studio version of the song as well.

The song was originally written by Harold Arlen and Yip Hapburn for the 1943 musical Cabin In The Sky, and Cher changed the lyrics some for her rendition. The first verse was kept mostly the same, as Cher sang, “It seems like happiness is just a thing called Joe / He’s got a smile that makes the lilacs want to grow / He’s got a way that makes the angels heave a sigh / When they know, President Joe’s passin’ by.”

She took more liberties with the chorus, though, on which she sings, “Right now, our country’s gloomy, fear is in the air / But when Joe’s president, hope is everywhere / Trouble’s fly away and life will easy flow / Joe will keep us safe, that’s all I need to know.” The original chorus goes, “Sometimes the cabin’s gloomy and the table’s bare / But then he’ll kiss me and it’s Christmas everywhere / Trouble’s fly away and life is easy go / Does he love me good, that’s all I need to know.”

Watch the performance above and stream the studio version below.

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

After months of speculation, Marvel is reportedly close to locking down a lead actor for its upcoming Moon Knight series on Disney+. While casting rumors have been all over the map since the project was announced over a year ago — both Harry Potter‘s Daniel Ratcliffe and Keanu Reeves were believed to be contenders at one point — Star Wars actor Oscar Isaac is in talks for the role, according to Variety, which offers a brief description of the Marvel Comics character:

“Moon Knight” tells the story of Marc Spector, an elite soldier and mercenary who decides to fight crime after he becomes the human avatar of Khonshu, the Egyptian god of the moon.

Fans will realize that Moon Knight also suffers from multiple personalities, which he employs knowingly and unknowingly in his war on crime. It’s exactly the kind of role that an actor like Isaac can really sink his teeth into. (Think James McAvoy’s character work in Split.) Isaac’s involvement would also be a huge casting coup for Disney as it transitions into putting more of its weight behind its streaming service offerings, which are looking less sparse in 2021.

Of course, this information should be taken with a grain of salt until an official confirmation. Marvel fans recently watched news of Tatiana Maslany being cast as She-Hulk seemingly fall apart after the actress denied the casting reports in an interview. Granted, that could just be a simple matter of waiting until the ink is dry on a deal, but it also could be sources jumping the gun. Hopefully, that isn’t the case for Isaac who’d be an exciting fit for the unusual Marvel hero.

(Via Variety)

Rodney Scott is the pitmaster we all long to be in our wildest barbecue dreams. The widely-acclaimed chef has spent his entire life nailing down the art of whole hog BBQ in the small hamlet of Hemingway, South Carolina. Over the years, his ability to create a truly transcendent culinary experience with pork, a little spice, and a dialed-in list of sides has made him part of the food world elite — even without the trappings of fine dining.

But when Chef’s Table came knocking it brought the pitmaster a whole new level of renown. Watching Scott’s episode of the recently released Chef’s Table BBQ, it quickly becomes clear that this is a man expressing his life’s purpose through the food he cooks. He works by feel and yet… there’s an undeniable precision to every move he makes. It’s the fine balance between artist and artisan; freethinker and technician.

We caught up with Scott last week to talk about his abiding love for whole hog. The conversation touched on what it’s like getting featured on the acclaimed Netflix show, running a restaurant in the COVID age, and, of course, all things BBQ — sauces, rubs, sides, and best bites. In every answer, you can see the passion and joy of a man lucky enough to have found his true calling.

Let’s talk a little bit about the genesis of you becoming a pitmaster.

My pitmaster skills started way back, as early as a teenager. My very first hog was at eleven-years-old. When I got into my teens — 13, 14-years-old — it was more hands-on, more regular. It was a day-to-day routine, a day-to-day chore. We were a small family business that did whole hogs three days a week. We would cook anywhere from six to ten hogs a week on average.

It was mostly whole hog and chickens. This went on continuously. It was every week. At least three times a week, I was cooking whole hogs. I was learning and cooking the entire time in this tiny town, Hemingway, and that’s where I got recognized for barbecue. Our family business got recognized for barbecue, and I would always be the one person that they would hold conversations with about what we’re doing and how we’re doing it. Eventually, it led to some press and eventually led to doing different events, going mobile, and people liking our styles and the way that we did our barbecue. Here we are.

One of my favorite scenes in the new season of Chef’s Table is you out in the woods chainsawing wood and chopping wood. How important is the right wood?

Man, the wood that we use for barbecue is very important. For example, you can’t use certain woods, like pine. You don’t ever want to use that. Hardwoods are very important. You always want to get oak and hickory, pecan or pea-can, depending on wherever you’re from. You always want to use a hardwood to make sure you got a good flavor on it.

For me personally, I like the hickory and the oak. That’s important to me.

Your spot in Charleston — Rodney Scott BBQ — has a special smoker where the top comes up and down on a pulley. Did you design that yourself or was that something you found?

The pits that we have in Charleston currently, I did not develop alone. I had some input on it. Me, the architect, Rich Gibson, and the welders, we all got together and we had this question of, “where do you put the lids when it’s time to flip the hogs?”

The idea of the counterweights came in and they go up and the exhaust on the pits and telescope through the roof to let the smoke out of the room. That was just us brainstorming at a table with some architects and welders, and there came these pits.

What is the classic South Carolina spice mix to use on a whole hog?

Oh, man. Cayenne and black pepper are the main two things that I’m always tending to find in a lot of Carolina mixes. I do have a hog seasoning with the cayenne, the black pepper, some crushed peppers in there, and some salt. Pretty much your basic everyday seasoning for the hog.

Right — keeping it simple and letting the hog shine.

Yep, less is more.

How did your episode of Chef’s Table come about? Was it the sort of thing where you got a call one day and you’re like, “Nah, this can’t be real”…?

That’s exactly how it came to be. We were cooking out in San Francisco and we had a conversation with these guys — and I had no clue who they were — and I’d already been out there cooking all night and serving all day, and it escaped my memory and I didn’t really remember it. Before you knew it, I had a call saying, “Chef Table’s wanting to come over.” And I’m like, “Yeah, right.”

I thought to myself, “That’s huge. That’s Netflix. They don’t want to talk to me!” But apparently, word of mouth got out. The producers got in touch with us and we discussed the time and the date. Then we filmed.

Was there a bit of nostalgia talking through your life story out in Hemingway?

I’m used to it because I’m always out in Hemingway. But the nostalgic feel … You know, just the opportunity to be able to tell the story of barbecue — which is such a huge part of the South and very mainstream down here — to the world and to be recognized on the same level as white-tablecloth restaurants is amazing. It was amazing just to get that point across and tell our version of that story from this tiny town, Hemingway, through Charleston and to the entire world. It was super exciting.

This is a year that is obviously very different for everyone. It seems like you were already set up for carryout with a drive-through and so on. How have you had to adapt otherwise?

We adapted very carefully, very slowly. The first thing was safety. We wanted to make sure all of our staff was in the best shape that we can keep them in: Checking temperatures, washing hands, constantly on the phone with the family at PRG — our restaurant group — discussing safety measures, CDC rules, and regulations, and making sure that all of our staff was kept up and well-fed. This is a struggling time and a lot of them had kids at home. Having the drive-through was a big help that helped us to adapt to make sure that we’re just dealing with the drive-through and no hands-on in the beginning.

And as we move forward, we continue to follow CDC rules, constant cleaning, constant wiping down, temperature checks, checking on employees, and people see that. Our consumers see that we’re doing the best that we can, and that’s all we could do. And that’s for everybody. All we can do is the best that we can. So we adapted pretty well by staying on top of things and staying in communications and conversations every day with everybody to make sure that we can adjust through this pandemic safely.

That’s great to hear, man. Let’s talk about the food a little bit more. The pork is obviously the star of the show, but for you, what are the side dishes you can’t go without?

Side dishes? Man, mac, and cheese, can’t do without it. French fries always catch my eye. Baked beans. Wow. Every now and again, I grab a couple of hush puppies and the pork skins, man. Pork skins in the bag — that we have, yes.

Anything that doesn’t “catch your eye?”

I’m a little hesitant on the collard greens.

I also noticed you were making a banana pudding there at the end of the episode. What do you feel is the key to a good banana pudding?

Lots of cookies. As a kid, my mom made banana pudding on Sundays and I would get all the broken vanilla wafers at the end of the box. Now, when we make the banana pudding, I make sure we have lots of vanilla wafers in there because that’s my thing, man. I love me some vanilla wafers.

When you’re pulling apart a hog, what’s the one morsel that you want for yourself?

That one morsel I love to have for myself is right under the rib, just before the belly starts I like to go right in there, right in between. That’s my favorite little grab.

Are you ready for the “Chef’s Table Effect?” Are you bracing yourself for the onslaught that’s going to come after things open up and the episode gets seen more?

I’ve been trying to brace myself. We’re very excited, nervous. I’m getting a little bit more sleep on certain nights, but I’m super excited just to tell our story, to get it out there and let the world see what we do.

I think I’m ready.

I want to dive into your expertise a little bit more. You’ve been doing whole hogs pretty much your whole life and, now, all over the country. What do you think the one thing people misunderstand the most about what you do?

The physical timing. It’s very physical. You’re moving an entire animal around. That’s work that’s heavy.

And the timing, a lot of people lose patience with how long it takes. The one thing you do have to have is patience when you’re cooking a whole hog because you’re going to go a minimum of anywhere from eight to 12 hours depending on the size of the animal. Usually, folks tend to lose patience with the timing and the physical labor of it, getting the wood ready, burning it down, putting that entire animal on the pit. Then you got to just stay there for the rest of this cook time because it’s all manual.

When it comes to saucing your pork, whether it’s on a bun or on a plate, do you go sweet, spicy, tangy? All of the above?

If I’m in our restaurant, I will go definitely with a little bit of a tangy and spicy. If I’m somewhere else and I feel a little wild, like living on the edge, I’ll add a little sweet to it. I love them both.

You can check out Rodney Scott’s ‘Chef’s Table’ episode on Netflix right now.

A month ago, Daniel Lopatin announced his newest Oneohtrix Point Never project, Magic Oneohtrix Point Never. Instead of sharing singles to promote the record, Lopatin seems to be taking a different approach. The announcement arrived alongside the album’s three opening tracks (one of which featured Caroline Polachek), and today he has returned with another new batch of songs. He has five tracks in tow this time, and one of them, “No Nightmares,” features vocals from The Weeknd.

The song leans more in the direction of Lopatin’s experimental approach than it does the straightforward catchiness of The Weeknd’s chart-topping music. Lopatin and The Weeknd both contributed to the movie Uncut Gems, with Lopatin providing the score and The Weeknd portraying himself in the film. “No Nightmares” is part of the five-song Midday Suite, which Lopatin shared today as an EP.

This isn’t the first time The Weeknd and Lopatin have collaborated. The Weeknd released a deluxe edition of his After Hours, and the expanded record included new remixes from artists like Oneohtrix Point Never, Chromatics, and The Blaze.

Listen to “No Nightmares” above and stream the full Midday Suite below.

Magic Oneohtrix Point Never is out 10/30 via Warp. Pre-order it here.

One of the most-anticipated shows to premiere this winter is Selena: The Series. The nine-episode Netflix series stars The Walking Dead‘s Christian Serratos as Selena Quintanilla Perez, the Queen of Tejano Music who released increasingly popular albums (Dreaming of You sold over 175,000 copies on its first day of release, a then-record for a female vocalist) before she was murdered in March 1995, just shy of her 24th birthday.

“I can’t tell you exactly the time frame we will cover, but I can say we have a lot of special surprises coming up,” creator Moisés Zamora told Entertainment Weekly (the trailer above mostly focuses on Selena’s rise to fame, not her tragic ending). “Fans can expect to see us go into the depths of this family’s journey, including their early days going from gig-to-gig. Selena was on the road since she was like 11 or 12 and it was truly a family affair. You’ll see her coming of age as she transforms into the incredibly confident superstar everyone knows and loves.” Here’s the official plot synopsis:

Before she became the Queen of Tejano Music, Selena Quintanilla was a young girl from Texas with big dreams and an even bigger voice. Selena: The Series explores her journey from singing small gigs to becoming the most successful female Latin artist of all time — and the years of hard work and sacrifice the Quintanilla family navigated together.

Selena: The Series part one premieres on Netflix on December 4.

50 Cent is looking to set the record straight on his political alignments after his offhand joke was taken as a literal endorsement of Donald Trump. When 50 posted about Joe Biden’s proposed tax plan and said he would be voting for Trump on Instagram, not only were fans quick to criticize him but so was his ex Chelsea Handler, who offered to pay off his taxes if only he’d reverse course and endorse Biden instead. After Handler was invited onto The Tonight Show to talk about the incident, 50 clarified his feelings on Trump and made a cryptic accusation.

After a quick explainer for host Jimmy Fallon, the comedian explained that the 62% tax rate 50 posted to Instagram wasn’t actually a part of Biden’s tax plan — instead, it represented the maximum tax a New York resident could pay in total before deductions and so forth — and further extended her offer beyond just paying off 50’s tax bill to giving their relationship another shot. However, 50 posted a clip of her appearance on The Tonight Show and seemingly backtracked on his previous position.

“F*ck Donald Trump,” he wrote. “I never liked him. For all I know, he had me set up and had my friend Angel Fernandez killed but that’s history.” 50 also posted an updated screenshot of his first Instagram post, which was blurred and flagged by the service for sharing political content that was missing context. “If Trump lose this election he is going to jail,” 50 mused.

See 50 cent’s posts above.

The college basketball season is set to begin in just over a month, but a number of the opening tournaments that were expected to be played in Orlando — but had yet to be finalized — will not be taking place.

Seth Davis of The Athletic brought word on Monday that ESPN was no longer pursuing their planned bubble tipoff tournaments in Orlando as ESPN Events and the various schools were unable to agree on health and safety protocols for the tournaments. The 10 events, which featured more than two dozen programs, will no longer work towards being finalized to allow the teams to seek new scheduling options with a month to go before the season.

According to Clint Overby, the VP of ESPN Events, the issues arose from a few key sticking points in negotiations about testing protocols, namely ESPN’s insistence on following CDC guidelines while the schools wanted to go by their conference guidelines, which in some cases were more relaxed, as he told Davis.

“We’ve decided to redirect our efforts to be sure the teams have enough time to make other plans,” Clint Overby, vice president of ESPN Events, told The Athletic. “At the end of the day our bias was toward safety and making sure that what we pulled off was in the best interests of the sport. In the absence of those things, we decided we’re better off letting schools do their own thing.”

…

The plans broke down mainly because ESPN was trying to abide by guidelines handed down by the Centers for Disease Control and the NCAA, which are more restrictive than the protocols many conferences are planning to implement. The biggest point of contention was ESPN’s desire to stick by the guideline stating that anyone who has tested positive for coronavirus must be re-tested after that person has been clear for 90 days. Several schools balked at the idea of retesting players that soon. “The 90-day testing protocol became the key sticking point,” Overby said. “Once we laid that out there were individual schools who couldn’t agree because their conference rules are more open-ended with respect to when you test someone again who has contracted the virus.”

There were also issues of how they would proceed with contact tracing after a positive test, but what became clear was they would not be able to find common ground to play the tournaments with all of the teams and, as such, they felt it was best to leave the schools to their own devices to tipoff the season. The difference in the NCAA and CDC protocols and those of each conference also show how there are already cracks in the plan to begin the college hoops season, with each conference creating its own guidelines and trying to navigate playing an indoor sports season for the first time.

We have already seen numerous postponements and cancellations of games in college football due to internal outbreaks on teams, and college basketball will surely face similar hurdles. What remains to be seen is how they handle tracing and testing given the exposure risk for an indoor sport is even greater than an outdoor sport, especially given the consistent proximity and contact of players on the basketball court — even moreso than in football. That ESPN wasn’t comfortable running events in Orlando with the guidelines some conferences have in place isn’t a ringing endorsement, given ESPN has plenty of financial incentive to run these tipoff tournaments and pit the best teams against each other. But they also recognized the liability in running events without following CDC protocols, particularly with amateur athletes, and decided to pass, and now we’ll see what schools come up with for their own season-opening games and events.

Per Davis, ESPN does still hope to put on the Champions Classic and Jimmy V Classic at other locations, but those discussions are ongoing. Michigan State, Kansas, Gonzaga, Duke, Kentucky, Baylor, Rutgers, and Tennessee are the teams still potentially playing in those two events, but other major programs like Texas Tech and Virginia are now among those in need of a new plan to open their season.

Jon Rothstein has indicated Indianapolis may serve as the new host site for those two tournaments.