After news last week that Major League Soccer was formalizing a plan to play out a tournament at the ESPN Wide World of Sports in Orlando next month, new details have arrived via The Athletic, including the stakes when it comes to a possible regular season as well as the grouping of teams and the tournament format.

Paul Tenoria and Sam Stejskal reported on Thursday that all 26 teams would venture to Orlando in early June to begin crafting a “bubble” and practicing together at the massive ESPN campus new Walt Disney World. There, teams will be split into four groups for competition, with six teams in three of the groups and eight teams in the final group. After five games of group play, the top two squads from each group would move onto a knockout-style competition to complete the tournament.

These group games would count toward MLS league standings, The Athletic reports, “with the intention being for clubs eventually to continue to play regular season games in home markets later this year.” It’s still unclear what the reward would be for the winner of the Orlando bubble tournament.

In order to reduce travel, MLS already has determined no inter-conference games would be part of any possible regular season, and Nashville SC will jump to the East. The league, according to The Athletic, will also allow nine teams into the playoffs in an attempt to increase revenue for the most high-profile part of the season.

Considering time has no meaning anymore, it’s easy to forget that Mission: Impossible 7 was the first blockbuster film to abruptly abandon production all the way back in February. The latest film in the franchise was preparing to shoot in Italy just as that country began to explode with cases from the pandemic, and it wasn’t long before all of Hollywood began shutting down shortly thereafter.

But now Mission: Impossible 7 could be facing another first from the ongoing health crisis: A recasting of a major role. According to Deadline, Esai Morales (Ozark, Titans) could be replacing Nicolas Hoult as the villain.

The delay put Hoult in conflict with another commitment. This is going to happen often as films resume production with talent that has contracted out fall slots with other pictures, when there was no thought about a pandemic.

The picture was scheduled to be released on July 23, 2021 but that seems like a mission impossible because of COVID-19. The picture has been re-dated for November 19, 2021 to account for the delay.

Considering Hoult’s role was announced back in January and Morales is a last-minute replacement, we’re assuming this isn’t the exciting new addition to the cast that writer-director Christopher McQuarrie recently teased. While stopping by the Mission: Impossible podcast Light The Fuse, McQuarrie seemed particularly jazzed about hopefully landing the mystery actor. Via The Hollywood Reporter:

“There is someone we were talking to before the world blew up,” the director said. “An actor I was very excited about. I don’t know where that is, because we had talked days before [the shutdown] and it was an incredibly exciting casting coup.”

Mission: Impossible 7 is just one of two films in an overall story that McQuarrie is planning to tell back-to-back. Whenever the seventh installment wraps, the team will hop right into Mission: Impossible 8, which McQuarrie has already begun writing while waiting for Hollywood to fire back up.

(Via Deadline)

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Lady Gaga’s latest album, Chromatica, comes out in just over a week. Ahead of then, Gaga sat down with Apple Music’s Zane Lowe for a wide-ranging conversation about the record. At one point, the pair spoke about Ariana Grande’s appearance on the album, and Gaga discussed what it was like to collaborate with the fellow pop superstar.

Gaga spoke about how they connected in the studio and how she pushed Grande on a creative level:

“Her and I connected right away and she was so wonderful. And I think maybe she assumed that it [would] be that she came in and I was like, ‘Here, just sing this and thank you so much for your time.’ Right? But instead, I asked her what she needed, how she wanted to do things. When we were vocally producing her, […] I was sitting at the console and talking to her. And then I remember I said to her, ‘OK, now everything that you care about while you sing, I want you to forget it and just sing. And by the way, while you’re doing that, I’m going to dance in front of you,’ because we had this huge big window. […] And she was like, ‘Oh my God. Oh my God, I can’t, I can’t. I don’t know. Oh my God. Okay, okay.’ And then I did it and she sang, and she started to do things with her voice that were different. And it was the joy of two artists going, ‘I see you.’”

Gaga then revealed why at one point, she was “too ashamed to hang out” with Grande. The story starts with Gaga crying in the studio:

“She was like, ‘You’re going to be OK. Call me, here’s my number.’ And she was so persistent. She would try over and over again to be friends with me. And I was too ashamed to hang out with her, because I didn’t want to project all of this negativity onto something that was healing and so beautiful. And eventually she called me on my sh*t. She was, ‘You’re hiding.’ And I was like, ‘I am hiding. I’m totally hiding.’ And then this friendship blossomed.”

Find more from the interview here.

Jaden Smith is back with the new video for his Syre standout “Ninety,” two and half years after the debut album’s initial release. The video opens with the subtitle, “This is a twisted love story,” and tracks the young rapper as he roams a desolate landscape reminiscing about a lost love at either dawn or dusk. Flashbacks of Jaden’s good times with his paramour flash between his solo wanderings, with occasional captions detailing his state of mind.

Syre was a surprise breakout in 2017, garnering a highly engaged fanbase of enthusiastic supporters in its wake, which he leveraged on a slew of impressive tours and festival performances, including one alongside his dear old dad, Will Smith, at Coachella. Jaden followed up Syre two years later, introducing a dark alter ego with Erys and solidifying his newfound stardom into something of a veteran position among the under-30 hip-hop set. He closed out 2019 with a joint tour alongside his sister Willow then went radio silent for much of 2020, aside from sporadic examples of his signature, mysterious tweets. However, last week he determined that it was time for a “re-up” of his merch collection from his Syre era, and to celebrate, gifted fans the latest video from the project — if not the last.

Watch Jaden’s “Ninety” video above.

The world remains home due to the pandemic while LA-based singer Mike Milosh, who assumes the moniker Rhye, keeps up his creativity. The singer is encouraging listeners to continue to seek out the beauty in the world with his picturesque track “Beautiful.” Now, Rhye follows the single with an intricately-filmed video to accompanying the shimmering track.

Though Rhye’s “Beautiful” video features a few characters, the entire visual was shot maintaining social distancing practices. Directed and shot by Rhye himself, the musician was able to execute each shot while keeping his distance using a telephoto lens. Showing intertwining clips of women moving through a scenic desert landscape, Rhye’s visual reflects the song’s theme of finding beauty in everyday life.

In an interview with Vanity Fair alongside the video’s debut, Rhye detailed his inspiration while songwriting: “When I’m working on a song, it’s like the rest of the world falls away, and I’m in this weird little tiny world — it’s just me and the song that I’m working on. You’re in that very sacred, special place when you’re making something.”

Ahead of the visual’s release, Rhye detailed his 72-hour livestream project “A Beautiful Weekend,” offering his advice for remaining sane during quarantine:

“As we all share in this collective crazy moment that is quarantine, there are many ways to deal with the isolation, many ways we can truly fall into ourselves. For me, celebrating the beauty that is my partner has been a huge inspiration for me and a saving grace. Beauty is something we truly need to be open to in this moment. Find it in music, art, your loved ones, or yourself.”

Watch Rhye’s “Beautiful” video above.

Some Good News — the web series that pretends things are good when they are, in fact, bad — has been a huge hit on YouTube, with millions of viewers tuning in to watch John Krasinski throw virtual proms, officiate weddings, and get Brad Pitt to do the weather. “No matter how hard things get, there is always good in the world. Thank you all for making this show so very special. We will see you again,” The Office star said in the most recent episode — it was also the final episode, at least with Krasinski as host.

Following a “massive bidding war,” Some Good News “has been licensed to in a rich deal with ViacomCBS,” according to the Hollywood Reporter. “CBS All Access, which will be rebranded this summer and bolstered with more originals from across the ViacomCBS portfolio, will have the first window for the new episodes before they move to a number of the company’s linear networks.” Krasinski will executive produce the series and have an “on-air presence,” but not host. Is it too soon to suggest Morbo?

“Could not be more excited and proud to be partnering with CBS/Viacom to be able to bring Some Good News to so many more people!” Krasinski said. “Our goal was to create a news show dedicated entirely to good news. Never did I expect to be joining the ranks of such a historic news organization as CBS.”

You know what’s better than some good news? Great News. Bring that show back, too.

(Via the Hollywood Reporter)

Indiana-bred emo rapper Lil Aaron stops by The Bathroom for an intense performance of his new song “BADSIDE” on this week’s episode of UPROXX Sessions. Picking where Horse Head left off last week, Aaron turns up the aggression on the introspective crooning provided by his predecessor, switching out the melancholy acoustic guitar for an aggressive, hard-driving electric one as he growls and threatens his way through the bristling track, warning listeners that they don’t want to see his “bad side.”

Aaron is remarkably established even at the relatively young age of 25. He’s written songs with superstars like Liam Payne, Lizzo, and Selena Gomez, and is a member of the alt-rap group Boyfriendz with Lil Lotus and SMRTDEATH. Among his other collaborative partners are a name that might be familiar to fans of his aggressive style of punk rock-influenced singsong rap: Rico Nasty, with whom he worked on 2018 single “Rockstar Famous.”

Watch Lil Aaron’s performance of “Badside” above.

UPROXX Sessions is Uproxx’s new performance show featuring the hottest up-and-coming acts you should keep an eye on. Featuring creative direction from LA promotion collective, Ham On Everything, and taking place on our “bathroom” set designed and painted by Julian Gross, UPROXX Sessions is a showcase of some of our favorite performers, who just might soon be yours, too.

Sister trio Haim was originally planning on releasing their third full-length record, Women In Music Pt. III, at the end of the summer. But along with the rest of the music industry, their plan was thrown off course due to the pandemic. After postponing, Haim decided to release the record early, announcing that it will now arrive in June. Now Haim gives fans another taste of the project with the upbeat single “Don’t Wanna.”

About the song, Haim cooked up three adjectives that perfectly encapsulates its sound: “This song rolled off the tongue, it’s sexy, flirty and hopeful.” Effervescent snares provide a rhythm for Haim’s loose guitar riffs and soaring melodies. “Well we both had nights / Waking up in strangers’ beds / But I don’t wanna don’t wanna / I don’t want to give up yet,” Danielle Haim sings.

Just ahead of the single’s release, producer and ex-Vampire Weekend member Rostam Batmanglij shared a behind-the-scenes look at the “Don’t Wanna” recording process. “got heavy on this on,” he wrote in the caption.

Along with sharing the new single, Haim has another exciting project to keep fans entertained in quarantine. Following the release of the choreography video accompanying their previous track “I Know Alone,” Haim announced an ongoing virtual dance lesson series. Taking place over the next three Sundays, fans will have the chance to learn the moves to the group’s “I Know Alone” video, along with dances to “Little of Your Love” and “If I Could Change Your Mind.”

Listen to “Don’t Wanna” above.

Women In Music Pt. III is out 6/26 via Columbia. Pre-order it here.

Another day, another new addition to the Sony Pictures Universe of Marvel Characters.

According to Deadline, Arrowverse scribe Marc Guggenheim is writing a script for a new movie featuring Jackpot, a “crime-fighting mom” who has appeared in Spider-Man comics that Guggenheim also wrote. At this early stage, there’s no concrete information on which version of Jackpot will appear in the spinoff film. Because comic books be comic book-ing, there are actually two characters who have assumed the Jackpot mantle.

Based on the “crime-fighting mom” remarks in Deadline‘s reports, the likely scenario is Guggenheim’s script will feature Sara Ehret, the first Jackpot whose origin story leans into the tried and true formula of a good ol’ lab accident. Via Fandom:

Sara Ehret was a pregnant scientist at Phelcorp (a subsidiary of OsCorp) where she worked on gene therapy to cure Parkinson’s disease when she was accidentally exposed to “Lot 777”. The virus rewrote the DNA in her cells leaving her in a coma for four months. Coming out of her coma, Ehret went on to have her child Madeline with no complications. However, when her family came under threat by falling debris she displayed superhuman strength in order to save them. Sara then became Jackpot, a registered super-hero.

A second character, Alana Jobson, later purchased the Jackpot name from Ehret who wanted to spend more time with her family. Jobson’s tenure was short-lived, however, due to her abuse of the Mutant Growth Hormone, which would require the Sony movies to acknowledge the now-Disney-owned X-Men, and we’re guessing everyone’s going to want to avoid that tangled legal knot.

Jackpot marks the second announcement of a female-centric Spider-Man spinoff in the past 24 hours. On Wednesday, S.J. Clarkson was announced as the director of a “secret Marvel movie” from Sony, which is presumed to be the Madame Web film that was reported on last year.

(Via Deadline)