Category: Worldwide

Iggy Azalea and Tinashe — two artists bouncing back after drawn-out bouts of label drama — linked up this week to release the new single “Dance Like Nobody’s Watching.” Over a funky, uptempo bassline, the two freshly independent artists share an empowering message of carefree self-reliance. The song’s message hits even harder in light of both Iggy and Tinashe’s struggles through the past few years and independent success once they secured their artistic freedom.

Iggy, who was initially signed to T.I.’s label Grand Hustle, saw her debut album released through Def Jam, debuting at No. in 2014 after her fourth single, “Fancy” with Charli XCX, saw massive success and peaked at No. 1 on the Hot 100. However, despite the album’s success, Azalea’s follow-up album, Digital Distortion, was pushed back several times while her contract was shuffled from one subsidiary of UMG to another. Eventually, she was able to secure a release from her deal (or was dropped), establishing her own record label and signing a distribution deal with Empire to release the defiant comeback album, In My Defense. “Dance Like Nobody’s Watching” will serve as the lead single for her upcoming third studio album End Of An Era.

Meanwhile, Tinashe released her own independent album, Songs For You, in November 2019 after being released from her 2013 RCA Records contract. Although her own debut album Aquarius was one of the most solid debuts for a new female artist in years, the label was unable to define her sound, pushing for more pop-oriented records while Tinashe herself wanted to pursue the original, moody R&B sounds that garnered her fans in the first place. While the partnership produced two more albums, Nightride and Joyride, her fans celebrated her release from the label as the return of her creative control was obvious in the reception to Songs For You.

Watch the lyric video for Iggy Azalea and Tinashe’s “Dance Like Nobody’s Watching” above.

Have mercy? Doesn’t sound like it’s happening with Operation Varsity Blues.

Back in May, Lori Loughlin and husband Mossimo Giannulli pleaded guilty in the college admissions scandal, but they surely did not want to end up with prison time as a part of that deal. It was fully on the table, however, given that they pleaded guilty to the federal crimes of wire and mail fraud. There will be fines, and at least for Giannulli (Lori’s sentencing will come later today), an actual sentence of time behind bars.

As USA Today reports, U.S. District Judge Nathaniel Gorton handed Giannulli, who he described as guilty of a “breathtaking fraud,” five months in prison:

“I accept the… plea agreement negotiated by the government and Mr. Giannulli and I conclude that the agreed sentence… is sufficient but not greater than needed for punishment,” Gorton said. “There is no mystery about the outcome.”

Five months is most decidedly longer than the 14 days that Felicity Huffman received in September 2019, although that doesn’t account for any difference in offense level. In addition, the legal system was possibly feeling more generous with Huffman, given that she cooperated and struck a plea deal much earlier in the scandal’s timeline.

As mentioned above, Loughlin will appear before the court for her own sentencing on Friday afternoon. Prosecutors have recommended that she receive two months for her participation in a scheme to admit their two daughters into the University of Southern California while as faux recruits to the crew team. The prosecutors did concede that Loughlin was “less active” in the scheme than her husband, but we’ll see how strict or lenient the judge is feeling soon.

(Via USA Today)

There are 11 seasons of The X-Files, two movies, and that Simpsons episode, so the world isn’t lacking in Mulder and Scully content. But it’s still always nice to see David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson together, or in the case of the video below, “together.”

The X-Files duo — along with co-stars Mitch Pileggi (Skinner), Robert Patrick (Doggett), Annabeth Gish (Monica Reyes), unmistakable “Humbag” standout The Enigma; creator Chris Carter; writer Vince Gilligan; and director Michelle MacLaren, among others — virtually reunited to raise funds for the World Central Kitchen and provide lyrics to the show’s eerie and iconic theme song. (Anderson unfortunately doesn’t appear until the end.) There are few never-skip television theme songs; The X-Files had one of them.

Variety reports that “executive producer Frank Spotnitz’s desire to help the needy during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic saw him devise a challenge for The X-Files fans to write bespoke lyrics for the show’s instrumental theme tune. The winning tune was written by fans Jennifer Large and Rebecca McDonald.” The lyrics go:

Deep conspiracies
Unsolved mysteries
Spooky UFOs
Files that have been closed

It works much better with musical accompaniment, so crank that Mark Snow-composed instrumental (or better yet, the Pure Moods remix) and sing along.

(Via Variety)

Maluma is among the performers at this year’s MTV VMAs ceremony, and for his time in the spotlight (alongside CNCO), he wants to do something that used to be commonplace but isn’t anymore: Perform for a live audience. That’s not just wishful thinking, as he apparently has a plan to make that happen.

TMZ reports that the duo is casting “super fans” to join them for an outdoor performance at the VMAs, but precautions will be taken. The casting call notes that fans must live near New York City, bring a guest (as long as they live together), get a coronavirus test on August 23 before self-isolating with their guest until the day of the show, on August 30.

Aside from performing, Maluma also earned himself a nomination this year, as his J. Balvin collaboration “Queì Pena” is up for Best Latin. CNCO also has a pair of nominations, in Best Quarantine Performance and Best Choreography.

Meanwhile, DaBaby and Black Eyes Peas were recently added to the list of this year’s performers, so they’ll be joining Maluma, CNCO, Doja Cat, BTS, J Balvin, The Weeknd, Roddy Ricch at this year’s ceremony.

Find the full list of this year’s VMAs nominees here.

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

It’s been a busy week around the Association. The playoffs are in full swing, and the story lines have already started their usual twists and turns, as certain teams have surprised us, while others have been exactly who we expected them to be. Friday represents something of pivot point in many series, as a slate of Game 3s will reveal which teams have the upper hand in their respective matchups.

One such team is the Utah Jazz, which are currently tied 1-1 with the Denver Nuggets. In their opener earlier this week, the got a historic 57-point outburst from Donovan Mitchell, despite the losing effort, but were able to even the series in Game 2. They’ve had to do it all without Mike Conley in the lineup, who left the bubble last weekend to attend the birth of his son, Elijah.

On Wednesday, news emerged that Conley had returned to Orlando and was undergoing quarantine with the hopes of returning for Game 3 on Friday, and it now appears that he will be back in the starting lineup for his team when they tip off, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski.

Jordan Clarkson has stepped up big time for Utah in Conley’s absence, putting up 26 points, four rebounds, and three assists in their Game 2 win. But Conley was finally finding his way back to form in the eight seeding games after struggling before the hiatus. Prior to leaving Orlando, he was averaging 18 points and five assists per game, and his steady hand and postseason experience will add a needed dimension to the Jazz attack.

In the week since Nas’s offhand reference to Doja Cat in his new single “Ultra Black,” fans who perceived the line as a slight against the younger rapper have wondered whether she’ll offer a response in the form of a record of her own. While she did sarcastically remark on the lyric during a recent Instagram Live session, some still want to see her drop a bar or two about it in a song. During another Live, it seemed they might get their wish, but in typical Doja Cat fashion, the “Like That” rapper used the opportunity for more good-natured trolling instead.

“The song that I have coming out is called ‘Nas,’” she quipped. “But only if you abbreviate it. It’s three words.” She points out that the title was actually coincidental, commenting, “It’s funny, because that was before the fact. If you know what I’m talking about, you know what I’m talking about.” The song in question is the previously teased “N****s Ain’t Sh*t,” which went viral on TikTok after she played a snippet during a pre-scandal Live.

Nas’ new single riled some communities on social media — and amused others — when he referred to Doja Cat’s recent chat room controversies on “Ultra Black.” “We goin’ ultra black, unapologetically black,” he cracks. “The opposite of Doja Cat.” The line perpetuates a social media narrative that Doja Cat is “anti-Black” because of an old song on which she used a slur to come to grips with her complicated feelings about being mixed. The song’s title, “Dindu Nuffin,” is a slur used online to make light of Black people’s fraught relationship with the police, while the song itself resurfaced as Doja was being accused of participating in racist chats. However, Doja has since apologized for the track and denied visiting chat rooms frequented by white supremacists.

Check out Doja’s “N.A.S.” tease above.

The RX is Uproxx Music’s stamp of approval for the best albums, songs, and music stories throughout the year. Inclusion in this category is the highest distinction we can bestow, and signals the most important music being released throughout the year. The RX is the music you need, right now.

With as many rap reality competitions as there have been, you might think the hip-hop world is littered with their products. Even a cursory glimpse at the Billboard charts, streaming playlists, and most popular Instagram pages would disabuse you of that notion. For all its love of spectacle and drama, the rap game has traditionally been unkind to even the winners of most reality shows that purport to boast the next big things in rap. Going all the way back to the first, Dr. Dre and Eminem’s Showtime series The Next Episode, competition winners like Spitfiya, Da Band, Astro, Shamrock, Rece Steele, and the handful of 106 & Park seven-week champions have come and gone, some eking out modest careers behind-the-scenes or under the radar, but most getting lost in the shuffle.

So it may come as a surprise that the show with perhaps the cheesiest gimmick yet would produce the first bonafide rap superstar, Mulatto. With all due respect to D Smoke, the inaugural winner of Netflix’s Rhythm + Flow, it’s the former teen queen of Lifetime and Jermaine Dupri’s The Rap Game who glowed up to become honest-to-goodness rap royalty. In the past two weeks, the 21-year-old from Atlanta, Georgia completed an immaculate rollout of her major label debut, Queen Of Da Souf, with a perfectly promoted lead single featuring one of the godfather’s of the city’s sound, Gucci Mane. Then, in the weeks since “Muwop” was released, she was featured in both the most-watched music video of the last decade and on XXL‘s hotly-contested highly coveted Freshman Class cover.

In 2016, as the first season finale of The Rap Game revealed her as its inaugural champion, it might not have seemed possible to anyone watching. But in Mulatto’s mind, it was only a matter of time. Not only did she eventually turn down the deal offered at the end of the show’s first run — to which she alludes on Queen Of Da Souf standout “No Hook” — she committed herself to a four-year independent grind that eventually paid dividends with the arrival of her noteworthy major debut. Filled with swaggering, smart lines and speaker knocking beats, Queen Of Da Souf isn’t just the culmination of all that hard work, it’s also a validation of every move she’s made since first featuring on Lifetime under the moniker Miss Mulatto.

“From the jump, I was like, ‘I know I’m here to say,’” she evangelizes over the phone. “‘Nobody can convince me otherwise. I know what God put me on this earth to do, and I know my purpose.’ I don’t believe in that blackballing or burning bridges. You keep it real and you work hard and you pray hard, it’s going to happen to you, and I’m living proof of that.” However, she also knew why she had to turn down the proffered deal in order to achieve her vision of her own success. “It wasn’t something that I was comfortable doing yet,” she recalls. “I was 16 when we filmed the show, I was 17 by the time it aired. I’m a baby at 17. I don’t want to get myself into no record deal to where I don’t even fully understand the terms, or be locked down for years to come.”

That wherewithal and prescient industry savvy is why, on “Muwop,” Gucci Mane laments, “I tried to sign Mulatto, but she was signed already.” Mulatto, already forthcoming, bubbly, and warm during our interview, turns up even more when discussing the song’s origin. “The producer came to Atlanta and we had locked in,” she reminisces. “He was cooking from scratch. And he had started doing the dun, dun, dun, dudadundun [the key lead from Gucci’s 2006 anthem ‘Freaky Gurl‘]. When he started doing that on the keys, I looked over. I said, ‘No, you not. You not going to go there. Because if we going to go there, we going to go there. Don’t play with me.’” She says the decision was made to put a gender twist on the hook and the session ended with a promise to deliver the song to Gucci personally.

“Maybe like a couple weeks later, maybe two weeks later, they had just sent me an audio file,” she says, “And I’m thinking it’s the mixed version of ‘Muwop’ or something. Man, I’m listening to the song, it’s a whole Gucci verse on the end. And I just stood up screaming. Literally, I called my whole team on FaceTime. I’m like, ‘Y’all’s got to be playing with me right now.’ And then the fact he had said my name in the song… Imagine hearing your favorite rapper say that about you. Cloud nine, cloud nine.” The rapper floats back down to earth, though, on songs like “My Body,” which demonstrates her surprising ability to switch up her flow and seamlessly add melody, despite being known for her crisp rhythmic delivery.

“The thing is, I actually got a lot of melodic songs,” she teases. “But the people just gravitate towards the rapping, the ratchetness. I have melodic songs in the vault, or whatever, but I don’t want to cross over too early. I love to rap. I always want people to know me as a rapper first, before I get into that versatility. But I just feel like right now, it’s time for that. On this project, I definitely wanted to throw in just a little bit of singing stuff. It’s still majority rapping, but just to show my versatility coming out the gate as a new artist. Even though I’ve been rapping since 10 years old. On the industry scene, I’m a new artist. Just showcasing, hey, now I’m here to stay. The range is crazy.”

Meanwhile, that versatility extends beyond the playful flirtation of songs like “Muwop,” “My Body,” and party-ready anthems like the City Girls-featuring “In N Out” or the 21 Savage duet “Pull Up.” On “No Hook,” she lowers her stance like a tiger ready to pounce, going for broke on the moody keys and reflecting on the more controversial aspects of her come-up. When asked if the line “I love my OG, but he ain’t show me how to treat shit” was a reference to The Rap Game‘s Jermaine Dupri (who shared a few problematic comments about female rappers last year), she doesn’t shy away from addressing the potential drama. “I was being real vulnerable,” she admits. It’s a real shock to hear, as the song’s fierce disposition seems to belie that position.

“I did touch on the outcome of The Rap Game, and I said something like, ‘I would take it back if I could,’” she confesses before stunning again. “That was hyperbole. I’m definitely grateful for the platform, but it was just kind of just being dramatic about the fact that people won’t let me grow up. You get judged for basically believing in yourself. People think that it was me being cocky or ungrateful and unappreciative of the opportunity when it was just me wanting more for myself. That’s it.”

She also addresses some of the murmurs regarding her controversial moniker. Acknowledging that she has heard the valid complaints, she emphasizes that she’s not using her name “promoting the fact that I’m mixed. It’s not about me comparing my ‘struggles of being mixed’ to any other skin tone, any other race, anything like that. It’s just simply me explaining my story. I did experience a different type of upbringing having two completely different cultures. One side of my family cooked this way, talked this way, celebrate this way, traditions is this way, and then one of the sides is different, and as a kid, I was just confused and kind of had to find my way in my identity. It’s just about an experience, and flipping that negative into something positive.”

It’s important to her that people know that she is just as intentional in all of her artistic choices. “In my most recent music video, which has been the biggest video of my career, I personally cast all brown skin and dark skin females for the lead roles,” she declares. Something that these casting directors and some other artists would never do… I do so much for the Black community. Half of the trolls on Instagram, Twitter, wherever they at, don’t do half of the stuff that I do. So I feel like it’s not even their place to even speak to me about that topic.” She nods to the accusations that she uses “pretty privilege” or “light skinned privilege,” saying, “It definitely is a thing, but as far as maneuvering, I’m going to use it to my advantage — hate it or love it.”

But rather than simply using it to her own advantage, she often shares alike with other rising artists, collaborating with fellow emerging star Saweetie and “pretty bitch rap” legend Trina on the remix to her breakout single “Bitch From Da Souf,” with R&B group Good Girl on “Thirsty,” with Omeretta The Great and LightSkinKeisha on “Baddest,” and with a plethora of rising female rappers including Chinese Kitty, Dreamdoll, Dreezy, and Young MA on Hitmaka’s “Thot Box” remix. She also lent her voice to the unconventional Saucy Santana on “Up & Down” from his Pretty Little Gangsta mixtape — a show of support for an artist who was recently the victim of a homophobic attack.

“Santana is a whole mood,” she says of the flamboyant Floridian entertainer. “I love everything about him. That’s my dog. We friends outside the music, that’s my dog outside of music.” The video for the track, she says, was, “so fun because we both so ratchet. You know, strip clubs, that’s the Atlanta culture. It was so fun. We both had a ball.” But the video that may have truly benefitted her most and reflected her own willingness to share her platform was Cardi B’s “WAP.” Appearing in a cameo appearance at the end of the video alongside Megan Thee Stallion, Normani, Rosalía, Rubi Rose, and Sukihana, Mulatto instantly landed on thousands of potential fans’ radars — just after the release of her debut major label single and ahead of being profiled in XXL.

Her phone didn’t just blow up, she gushes. “It beyond blew up. Everybody was DM-ing me, commenting, texting me, calling me everything. Congratulated me and just telling me how proud they is. And it was hard to keep that a secret!” Then, just after that, she received the next huge co-sign, teeing up Queen Of Da Souf for even more exposure. “That’s something that I’ve been waiting my whole career,” she divulges. “Every year I be tuned into the Freshmen List trying to just wait my turn patiently. And if you would have told me last year that I had it this year, I wouldn’t have believed you. That was a big goal of mine. Even on set and stuff, I’m talking to the staff, I’m like, ‘I don’t think y’all know how happy I am just being here.’ I was so ecstatic.”

With the rollout for Queen Of Da Souf sticking the landing and the album already generating positive buzz online, Mulatto has plenty of reasons to be ecstatic. Thanks to the support of a “24-7 team” courtesy of RCA, Mulatto already “knew that the reaction off of this project was going to be crazy because it’s everywhere.” While declaring herself royalty and claiming her crown on her first mainstream project is a tall order to pull off, she’s not sweating it, because she was groomed for this, and has already made it so much further than so many who came before her. “It’s a lot riding on the project, but I know I’m going to deliver, especially with a title like Queen Of Da South. It’s up.”

Queen Of Da Souf is out now via RCA Records. Get it here.

Joe Rogan recently got blasted by Bill Burr for describing people who wear masks during the pandemic as “bitches.” However, Rogan adopted an entirely different tone during his latest The Joe Rogan Experience episode with comedian Nikki Glaser. The pair got real about men who cry, and at one point, Glaser admitted that she was thrilled about the direction that the conversation was taking because “so many men who listen to you… so many men don’t cry, Joe.”

That declaration came shortly after Rogan got candid about his own emotions.

“I definitely cry,” Rogan admitted. “I cry a lot for like things that make me happy.”

“Really? That’s cute,” Glaser responded.

“I’m not scared of emotions.” Then he added, “I’m scared of weakness. I don’t like weakness.”

The definition of weakness, in Rogan’s mind, includes his conclusion that “it’s weak to not wanna cry.” He stressed that it’s important to allow oneself “to feel the full spectrum of life.” Even the most horrible things exist, and Joe doesn’t want to be “delusional” by pretending that bad things exist and, in turn, not allowing himself to cry. So yes, he cries when he misses people, too. And Rogan reminded everyone that he cried once on his podcast while discussing The Innocence Project (including a particularly tragic case of wrongful conviction) with guest and attorney Josh Dubin.

Meanwhile, Glaser confessed that she is often afraid to cry and needs to explicitly give herself “license” to let those emotions out. However, she added, “I’m seriously turned on by men crying. I love it. Can I really put that out there?” And then she got explicit about what she once did for a boyfriend who cried. Enjoy!

You can watch the full episode here:

Bill Lawrence likes to joke that he’s ancient, but he’s not. He’s just been working at the highest levels of comedy craft since he was in his mid-20s, co-creating Spin City before going on to create Scrubs, the cult favorite Clone High, and Cougartown. There have for sure been misses mixed in, but that resume is a difference-maker, alluding to an ability to not just find laughs but also that magical ingredient that causes people to connect with and care about the characters on their screen for years and years. Does Ted Lasso (which is now available to stream on Apple TV) have that? It seems like it, and as Lawrence explained when we spoke with him recently, it’s that ability (and concept co-creator and star Jason Sudeikis’ vision and ambition) that elevates an over-his-head fish-out-of-water football coach from some NBC Sports commercials. Now, Ted Lasso is a real boy. They Pinochio’d it.

In addition to speaking about the heart and soul of Ted Lasso, Lawrence also discusses the welcome challenge of trying to appeal to an international audience, aiming to emulate the best sports movies, the lack of Spin City on streaming, and his experience with the seemingly cursed attempts to reboot Fletch.

I really enjoyed the show. And then, obviously, everything you’ve been doing for a long time.

Thank you very much, man. I’m bad at accepting compliments. My wife told me not to interrupt and say thank you. I hate when people do that. I really appreciate it.

Yeah. I’m the worst at accepting compliments too.

I come off as standoffish. I stare at my feet, and then I just look like an asshole.

“Yeah, I know, I’m pretty good.” You can’t say that. It’s not polite.

That’s correct.

So I guess my first question is, is it weird or challenging to come into something that is sort of pre-established? Or is that part of the fun?

Look, man, I’m a bazillion years old. I’ve been doing this for a long time. So the challenge is part of the fun. Even some of my own friends were like, “Dude, what are you going to do? The Geico caveman?”

I was going to say, there’s a not great track record of this kind of thing.

Yeah, because there are already videos, but to me, I have really enjoyed over the years turning some… Whether it’s even back during the Fletch movie, or now I’m working with Carl Hiaasen who’s a favorite author, taking IP in books, and it’s the same risk. You can have something that you don’t realize nearly as well as its potential. So the fun and the challenge… Let’s get Jason (Sudeikis) with his buddies to talk about this character. It’s not really a commercial as much as a kind of little promotional videos for Premier League Soccer. I was initially skeptical, just because even though I thought those things were very funny, it’s the same way that I always loved Police Squad, which is the Naked Gun TV series. But it had only six episodes or something when it was all said and done. They couldn’t do many more than that. It was just relentless jokes and the same sketch over and over.

And so the challenge and Jason going, “Hey, I want to take this character and make him three dimensional and invent an ensemble in a world around him that doesn’t exist…” It was definitely a challenge because there are passionate fans of it. I don’t want them to be let down, but by the same token, we couldn’t make the show that was those commercials.

There’s a long tradition of great sports movies, not so much great sports TV, but sports movies. This definitely feels like it’s walking in that same space. How do you deal with maybe a barrier to entry that is people looking at this and saying, “Oh, it’s a soccer show”?

Yeah. There are two ways. One is what you just nailed, which is cool, because there are two dimensions to it. One way Jason hooked me into this is he said, “How fun would it be to make our own version of a sports movie?” Being able to pad it out so that… in Major League, the boss was just a villain and you didn’t get to find out in 90 minutes all the other levels and how they got there and what screwed them up in the first place. All that stuff.

And when we extended that metaphor, sports movies don’t work because of the sport. My wife loves Bull Durham. I’m not judging anybody that does, but I’ve never done a pay-per-view to see a boxing match, a fight, and I watched every Rocky movie the night they came out. And it doesn’t matter if it’s The Cutting Edge and figure skating, or The Longest Yard or Bull Durham or Tin Cup or whatever. If sports movies are about the sport, you’re screwed.

And so, on the one hand, we said, we’re going to make sure people know it’s an ensemble show. It has great friendships, male and female characters. And hopefully, in a cool way, football/soccer is not a barrier. And then the second thing that made us not worry… Apple jumping on this is a really new, cool experience. They’re a true international company and they are releasing this simultaneously into a hundred different territories where football/soccer is huge. And it’s been a fascinating experience for me because in the past on my shows, I find out if they do well overseas long after the fact. It’s like, “Hey, they like Spin City in Scotland.” Oh, cool. Whatever. And for us, the amount of international press that we’ve done and how we were pushed to have an international cast and shoot in Europe and have European press on top of the show was really eye-opening in terms of the very thing that you might go superficially could be a barrier to the entrance here. It’s a massive kind of positive to get people to take a look there. And in fact, kinda comes with a stack of burdens and obligations to make the football look real, and not to dramatize the Premier League in a way that seems fake or fraudulent to those guys because they turn on that stuff immediately.

The emotions that Jason’s character is dealing with, with the family while abroad and that situation, obviously that’s universal and relatable.

It’s a good point, because Jason and I definitely connected initially because… I know as a performer, he had many suitors. I think that he knew that I liked instilling a level of emotional depth and heart into my shows, and that’s what he was looking to do in this. So that kind of connected us in the first place.

I think it’s a vital element, honestly. And kind of sticking to what you were saying before, obviously it’s one-note without that. Can you tell me a little bit about the importance of the Nathan, Coach Beard, Ted friendship triad.

Nick Mohammed is so good as Nate, and he has an amazing arc not only in the first season, but if we’re lucky enough to continue doing the show [Update: season 2 has been given the green light], he’s a major character. He’s super talented. He’s working on another show on Peacock that’s premiering now with Schwimmer and stuff. He’s really good. And one of the things we talked about with the concept of the show and why Nate is so important to that group is, look: Ted and Beard are inseparable from the original videos, and they’re friends in real life and you see that rapport and that kind of unspoken language. What Nate represents for us is way too much subtext about who Ted… I don’t know if you’re as cynical as I am during these kind of dark times, man. But we could all use some optimism and some hopefulness. We’ve all met a man or woman where when you first meet them you’re like, “there’s no way this person is this sincere and this open-hearted and this kind. Eventually, five days from now, their mask will come off and they’ll be an asshole like everybody else.” And then if the mask doesn’t come off, then you have to look at yourself and go, “Man, what have I become? I’m inherently distrustful.” I had this moment with a friend of my daughter’s. He was in his twenties, so he wanted to go into politics. That’s immediately like, “oh, so that dude obviously has some kind of weird, narcissistic, horrible robber baron side to him.” No, he just wanted to be of service.

And that extends deeper into Ted. Jason and I both like to think that every person had a seminal kind of character in their life that was either a coach, a parent or a teacher that sees something and then believes in them, and kind of gives you the open gate to go for it. And having Ted do that for Nate was kind of a metaphor for what we wanted the whole show to be. Not white knighting him and not doing it for him, but certainly… and it’s, of course, intentional that he’s a young man of color, and somebody that might not otherwise even see the opportunity to rise through the ranks, whether it be coaching or any other thing. It’s cool. It was one of the things that Jason was really kind of driving through at the start.

Obviously there’s been a lot of nostalgic affection for Scrubs. I’m not surprised that that show gets that. I’m surprised that you don’t hear more about Spin City, because I love that show. Is that surprising to you that you don’t see more of that? And also, as I just did a little research before this, I see that it’s not streaming anywhere. Is that a frustration for you as a creator of something, that it’s not able to find that second, third, fourth wind?

I am lucky enough to get to keep grinding on and to have really narrowed my frustrations. I’m really proud of Spin City. It was a life-changer for me, and I was 26 when it started and getting to see Michael J. Fox say things that I wrote was insane. He was Back To The Future and Family Ties for me, so it was just fantastic.

I have always been very lucky that the worst shows that I’ve ever made have not been seen, for the most part. They’re made as pilots and then quickly buried in a vault somewhere, which is a joy for me. Or not made as pilots. When I started out, because I’m so old, you had time to catch your legs and get chemistry and figure out what the show was, and you had a little breathing room to survive. Nowadays, you’ll sometimes be involved in shows that as a writer-creator, you go, man, the show could be really good, but the business of it is you hit the ground running or you’re doomed now.

For me, the ones that I regret the most, I didn’t even create. I was involved in this one called Surviving Jack with Chris Meloni and these two writers, Justin Halpern and Patrick Schumacker. They’ve gone on create Harley Quinn, that cartoon. It was really good. That should have survived, and a show called Whiskey Cavalier that I thought was really fun and should have survived. Clone High, we’re getting to do again. We’re rebooting that. I always thought, Chris Miller and Phil Lord, not only are they geniuses as animators and creators, but they’re the top of my list of young dudes that’ll have to give me a job once I’m no longer hireable. So to me, I always regret the ones that I don’t think got the chance.

One of my favorite sagas to monitor is the Fletch thing. Obviously you’ve seen the news now that there’s another tribute to the fire to try and make this happen. Best of luck to them. But how conscious of the troubled development history were you when you were involved in that?

When I was involved, it felt like a sure thing. So I should have been well more aware that it was doomed. [Laughs].

Why do you think it’s been so hard to get it over the finish line?

I think it’s so hard because the original Fletch movie is so iconic, and for guys, especially kids of a certain age, like me, they can do every line. And because of that, it’s a big thing to bite off for a performer to go, “Oh, I’m going to be compared to Chevy Chase doing this.” Like, I got to know Greg Mcdonald before he passed away, the author of all the books, and the books are so much darker. They’re still banter-driven, but no one’s wearing fake teeth, do you know what I mean? And so there’s also this weird push and pull to going, “it’s a reboot, but it’s not.” It’s a reboot the same way that Riverdale is the Archies, and no one read the Archies and goes, “You know what this is going to become? Some weird noir murder mystery.” It’s because the Fletch novels are so different than what they turned that movie into, I think it just makes it… You often will find yourself knee-deep in a project where all the big players think you’re doing something different, and that’s why it’s been tough so far.

I’m very curious to see what happens with this. I mean, every time they [fresh rumors] come out, I get really excited.

I get a combination of hopefulness and intense jealousy.

‘Ted Lasso’ is streaming now on Apple TV.

Chance The Rapper may be hip-hop’s ultimate wife guy, but that doesn’t stop him from spitting his raunchiest verse in years on Baha Banks’ new song “Shake Dat Ass” or accompanying her to the strip club for some non-social distanced debauchery in the song’s video. Directed by Armani Martin, the video has a pretty straightforward treatment. It’s a song about shaking dat ass, so the artists and their respective crews take over the gentlemen’s club to throw some bills while booties clap in their faces.

The song may come as a surprise to all the Chance fans who discovered him since his uber-positive Coloring Book rollout and may be something of a course correction for the Chicagoan since his “debut” album The Big Day met an uneven reception from fans (I maintain that it’s a really good album and maybe one day once the memes have died out, everyone else will admit it too). It’s certainly a huge look for Baha Banks, a new-ish artist whose first single just dropped in April of this year. Of course, thanks to big breakouts for fellow female rappers like Flo Milli, Mulatto, and Rubi Rose, the co-sign is both timely and crucial, helping to establish her footing amid the deluge of women breaking into hip-hop’s mainstream and whetting fans’ appetites for more.

Watch Baha Banks’ “Shake Dat Ass” video with Chance The Rapper above.