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It turns out Ty Dolla Sign is a Nirvana superfan. Not only did the LA-bred singer once recreate the 2001 Spin magazine cover featuring Kurt Cobain for the magazine, but he also has a portrait of the rock icon tattooed on his leg.

So it should come as no surprise that for the 30th anniversary of Nirvana’s inarguable signature song, “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” Ty would perform a rousing cover of the song to pay homage to it. During what looks like a rehearsal session with his band, the musicians launch into the instantly recognizable riffs, as Ty plays a ripping guitar solo, dreads swinging and fingers flying over his instrument’s strings.

Dolla Sign had a busy 2020 that saw him holding his position as the go-to feature man for hip-hop and R&B’s biggest acts, including Post Malone, with whom he collaborated on “Spicy,” SZA, who made her return to the spotlight after an extended absence, and more. Ty released his own album in the fall, riffing on his well-founded reputation with Featuring Ty Dolla Sign. The warm reception of the album included performances for Jimmy Kimmel and NPR Tiny Desk Concerts.

Watch Ty Dolla Sign cover “Smells Like Teen Spirit” above.

Ty Dolla Sign is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

On her new album No Place, Danielle Durack delivers ten tracks documenting significant heartbreak, relayed through vivid descriptions and intimate journal entries. The record takes inspiration from a versatile range of influences and sonic pallets, embodying everything from classic songwriters like Joni Mitchell and The Beatles to modern indie icons like Hop Along and Boygenius.

Ahead of the record’s release later this week, we’re happy to give an exclusive look at the new video for “There Goes My Heart,” another track from No Place, which was directed by Kristene Morgan. “When I wrote this song, I was at a point where every day felt like a mountain to climb,” Durack said in an email. “Little things like getting out of bed, making food, social interactions, and other very ordinary things were laborious activities. I wanted to visually encapsulate that feeling of a broken heart and what it looks like in an everyday context, and I’m so stoked I got to collaborate with Kristine on it.”

Morgan added: “What I love about this song and the video we created is that the journey can be through the mundane and the resolution can be a little messy. It was so rewarding to work with Danielle on this video because it allowed for really truthful moments to take the center stage.”

To celebrate the new song, Durack sat down to talk Aaron Carter, listening to “Life Is A Highway” in the van, and Mean Girls in the latest Indie Mixtape 20 Q&A.

What are four words you would use to describe your music?

Jesus, who hurt you?

It’s 2050 and the world hasn’t ended and people are still listening to your music. How would you like it to be remembered?

Honestly what a dream to be remembered at all. As long as my music doesn’t become a meme, I’m thrilled.

What’s your favorite city in the world to perform?

Probably Seattle! Lots of devout music fans and I’ve got a lot of friends up there who are always super supportive/receptive. It always feels a little bit like coming home.

Who’s the person who has most inspired your work, and why?

My childhood babysitter, Austin, was the first person I sang my songs to. She was the only person in my childhood who really fed my dreams so I have her to thank for where I’m at today. I think I would have given up pretty early if it wasn’t for her.

Where did you eat the best meal of your life?

It was a breakfast spot in San Diego called The Mission. I had some kind of green chili eggs situation, it was life-changing. I ascended.

What album do you know every word to?

Honestly, there’s not a lot of brain left that isn’t entirely taken up by lyrics. The latest probably being Haim’s Women in Music Pt. III. Sara Bareilles’ Little Voice was a staple from high school. Aaron Carter’s Aaron’s Party (Come Get It) was burnt into my young developing mind. The list is very long.

What was the best concert you’ve ever attended?

That’s so hard! I saw S. Carey play at Crescent Ballroom back in 2014 and that was one of the coolest experiences. He had 3 drummers on the stage and somehow everything sounded so tight and precise. I was mesmerized the entire time. That was absolutely the best show I’ve seen in terms of musicianship, but I also had a really great time seeing Say Anything at The Marquee. They brought a beer bong out on stage. Very different experiences. Hard to choose.

What is the best outfit for performing and why?

I’m definitely more of, like, an Ed Sheeran than a Lady Gaga. I’ve learned that nice pants and a T-shirt are the way to go for me. Sometimes I’ll go crazy and wear a dress/heels but it always backfires. I’m already pretty uncomfortable on stage baring my soul and whatnot so the less I have to be self-conscious of while I’m up there, the better.

Who’s your favorite person to follow on Twitter and/or Instagram?

@sydneysprague and her meme account @_bouncylincolnseldestdaughter_ ! I also adore astrology meme accounts.

What’s your most frequently played song in the van on tour?

“Life Is A Highway.” Always feels right. Hits every time.

What’s the last thing you Googled?

“Masterclass” because I saw St. Vincent did one on songwriting and wanted to check it out!

What album makes for the perfect gift?

This is a bit of a cop-out, but my favorite records I’ve ever received as gifts were bands I had never heard of. It’s a really special way to be put on to something new. To name a few, I’ve received a St. Vincent record, a Wild Pink record, and this year I got 1 Of by Ben Seretan. All 10/10.

Where’s the weirdest place you’ve ever crashed while on tour?

On my first tour I slept on a sailboat in Southern California.

What’s the story behind your first or favorite tattoo?

I got my first tattoo when I was 19 — it reads “Stay Foolish” placed kinda wonky on my left bicep. It was originally on a NASA poster, but I heard the phrase for the first time when reading a commencement speech by Steve Jobs. It basically holds the sentiment that you have to be a little crazy to dream big, and that’s okay. It’s a reminder to myself for the rest of my life not to get jaded or grow out of that mindset.

What artists keep you from flipping the channel on the radio?

Not going to lie, I indulge in a looot of pop music. The list of artists who make me turn off the radio is far shorter than the list that keeps me listening. That being said, there is a special place in my heart for Bieber.

What’s the nicest thing anyone has ever done for you?

I guess I’m lucky to say this is a really hard question. Maybe my mom? When she willingly destroyed her body and sacrificed her financial and general freedom to raise my silly ass?

What’s one piece of advice you’d go back in time to give to your 18-year-old self?

Your attitude doesn’t serve you and you’re missing out on a lot of life as a result. Try to be more open.

What’s the last show you went to?

Andy Shauf at Crescent Ballroom

What movie can you not resist watching when it’s on TV?

Mean Girls.

What would you cook if Obama were coming to your house for dinner?

I am basically incompetent in the kitchen I would probably make box mac n cheese and hope he finds it charming/nostalgic.

No Place is out January 15. Pre-order it here.

With the first wave of live music cancelations in the spring of 2020, it was clear: The music industry was about to undergo a massive shift. With every announcement, it was like another domino fell in the chain reaction that led to the shut down of live entertainment and the recording industry as we all knew it. The ramifications of the past year likely won’t be fully known for years to come, but we’ve seen some of them already: Billions of dollars have been lost, hundreds of venues have been or will be permanently shuttered (although help is on the way), and thousands of artists were forced to figure out how to survive in a world where their primary source of income had suddenly been cut off.

That crisis naturally extended to the most popular genre, which seemed both uniquely vulnerable to its effects, as well as solely suited to weathering the brunt of it. Some of this was due to hip-hop’s natural versatility since it’s the genre that’s undergone some of the biggest changes over the course of its 50-year history. It’s also been at the forefront of innovation within the music industry; remember ringtones? Hip-hop had already adapted so well to the digital age that recalibrating its focus online was like second nature for artists — artists who can credit the advent of social media and streaming with their success in trimming the sails to get through the storm.

While nobody made quite as much money as they would have had festivals still gone on, and the future outlook for the genre remains hazy, here are some of the ways rappers survived the first year of a global pandemic — and what might happen next as the world struggles to curtail the spread of a deadly disease in the midst of social upheaval.

Streaming

One area where hip-hop outperformed the rest of the industry — to a borderline surprising degree, in fact — was streaming. This one innovation was a game-changer for the entire industry, which could very well have completely collapsed twenty years ago. However, thanks to services like Apple Music, Spotify, and Tidal, as well as YouTube, where more and more people are listening to music these days, fans were still able to listen to their faves’ newest releases without risking infection at a record store, which also helped cut out (some) middlemen in the revenue stream.

Unfortunately, despite the major strides that have been made in recent years, many as a result of legislation favoring artists, there are still far too many entities between the fan and the artists, especially the streaming platforms themselves, who pay out minimal royalties to artists on the backend. Unless you were Lil Baby, who outperformed Taylor Swift to become the best-selling artist of 2020 with his album My Turn, you just weren’t seeing that much revenue from streams. Even DaBaby, who wasn’t too far behind his similarly-styled comrade in total streams, said he suffered a huge reduction in his gross pay for the year. Fewer people streamed music as well, thanks to having so many other options, although physical media made a comeback.

Indie rappers weren’t completely out of luck, however. Services like Audiomack and Bandcamp took pains to ensure that the direct-to-consumer market for music remained that way, with Bandcamp hosting multiple artist appreciation events and allowing them to sell merch and music to fans without taking its customary cut. Meanwhile, even for those who couldn’t monetize streaming to offset their losses, streaming did open up nearly every other avenue for their continued ability to make money in the pandemic.

Deluxe Albums

With touring out of the question, the question had to change. Normally, concerts extend the life of an album while also generating most of the revenue behind the album. Confronted with the conundrum of how best to kickstart album cycles, hip-hop artists were given the answer by Lil Uzi Vert, who put a fresh twist on an old tactic. Deluxe albums are nothing new, but until last year, they were spaced out from the original release enough to take advantage of lulls in the artists’ work cycle. For instance, Shelly (FKA DRAM) re-released his Big Baby DRAM album a year later, while Nicki Minaj and Bryson Tiller opted for splashy anniversary editions of their debuts last year.

However, when Uzi followed up his long-awaited Eternal Atake with an entire album that functioned as both the deluxe version of EA and the follow-up to his fan-favorite LUV Vs. The World mixtape, it wasn’t long before seemingly every rapper was following suit. These deluxe versions were super-sized, often eclipsing the original releases in running length and ballooning tracklists to nearly 40 songs — as in the case of Eminem’s Music To Be Murdered By – Side B. These deluxe versions also arrived within months, sometimes weeks, and in some cases, days of the original iterations of artists’ albums, juicing their streaming stats and launching them back up the Billboard 200 chart. As a play on the oft-lamented album-length strategy that played itself out in 2018, it allowed artists to have their cake and eat it too: Fans who preferred a trim tracklist could stick to the originals, but they also didn’t have to wait for a full promotional cycle for a follow-up.

TikTok

And while newer artists couldn’t quite rely on this tactic as they tried to build their captive fan bases amid the noise of lockdown, competing with Netflix, Hulu, Disney Plus, and that dreaded distance learning, they did get a new tool that could be an artist’s best friend — provided they spoke the language of the largely teen audience of TikTok. Once considered a novelty and only part of the reason Lil Nas X’s take on country music took over pop culture in 2019, TikTok was instrumental to the success of both established artists and newcomers alike, thanks to fan-sparked “challenges” that saw folks with a lot of time on their hands play social distancing street teams for their favorite singles.

Doja Cat and Megan Thee Stallion both owe their early-year No. 1 hit records to TikTok, at least in part, thanks to the “Say So” and “Savage” dance challenges. Detroit newcomer Curtis Roach cooked up the unofficial theme song of the quarantine with “Bored In The House,” while Tobi Lou’s 2018 song “Buff Baby” helped spark interest in the burgeoning Chicago star whose upcoming album Parrish Blue landed on Uproxx’s Most Anticipated Albums of 2021 list due to the chatter generated by his TikTok breakout. Artists like Philly’s Popp Hunna have updated the titles of their songs to take advantage of their popularity on the app and it appears the prevalence of challenges will continue into the new year; already, Dallas rapper Erica Banks’ single “Buss It” is trending thanks to a quick-change, knee-testing twerk challenge.

Sync, Livestreams, OnlyFans, and Podcasts

That buzz could translate, as it has for so many other artists in the past year, into lucrative sync licensing placements, like the ones Blimes and Gab told me are helping to keep them afloat or like the ESPN look that helped Rexx Life Raj cop a Tesla in a pandemic and write a song about it. Furthermore, with performances shifting to pre-taped, self-shot appearances, the possibilities have opened up for artists who would otherwise be unable to travel to appear on NPR Tiny Desk or late-night talk shows. Sister duo Chloe X Halle carved out a reputation for their elaborate and scintillating performances, all conjured in the comfort of their backyard. They’re now household names thanks to a steady stream of trending topic-inciting recitals, and they’re far from the only ones. There are also still those artists willing to flout safety regulations in states that have yet to adopt common-sense measures to contain the virus.

Other artists have branched out their content creation game to hosting podcasts and Apple Music radio shows, weekly live streams, and more. I’d be remiss not to mention the reigning queen of social content, Saweetie, who concocted a bevy of YouTube shows and content, from her documentary series The Icy Life to her borderline excessively curated Halloween costumes. Artists who hosted podcasts used their massive and deep contact lists to ensure that they got the highest-profile guests and their relationships kept the conversations lively and insightful. And of course, there’s streaming and OnlyFans, which keeps the checks coming in, even without the X-rated content the site is known for.

The question going into 2021 is: How sustainable is all this? Fans eventually get hip to algorithm-gaming tricks and unless they’re a superfan of an artist, tend to overlook or get bored with alternative content, especially with the glut of choices for in-home entertainment at the moment. More and more artists are participating in virtual concerts and festivals — ASAP Mob is reviving its Yams Day festival as a livestream this week, and others are sure to follow suit. Maybe this will become the new normal, with hundreds of streaming concerts cropping up and a new weekly challenge on TikTok becoming the closest thing we have to a communal experience. Maybe artists and their fans will have to get used to their only contact being in a chat room instead of a mosh pit.

Or maybe people will start wearing their damn masks and we can begin to get back to some semblance of normal. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and the head advisor of the United States’ coronavirus response, suggests that if we meet a certain threshold of people receiving vaccinations and continue to practice common-sense safety precautions, some venues could begin hosting concerts again this fall. So, get your shots, cross your fingers (after washing your hands, of course), and keep social distancing — we just might make it after all.

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

On Tuesday night, word dropped that the NBA had to make its latest game postponement due to COVID-19 protocols. The game between the Washington Wizards and the Utah Jazz scheduled to occur on Wednesday got postponed due to positive tests that popped up on the Wizards’ roster, although it is unclear who tested positive or how widespread this is among the team.

We now know that the ramifications from that game are spilling over into others, as another game on Wednesday night has gotten moved. Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN reported that the NBA opted to move the Phoenix Suns’ tilt against the Atlanta Hawks due to contact tracing related to the game Phoenix played against Washington on Monday.

The league confirmed this shortly after Wojnarowski’s report, saying the following in a release: “Because of ongoing contact tracing within the Suns, the team does not have the league-required eight available players to proceed with tonight’s game against the Hawks.” It is unclear when this game will be rescheduled or if the Suns will be able to play next — the team has home tilts against the Golden State Warriors and Indiana Pacers on Friday and Saturday, respectively, before embarking on a road trip to Memphis and Houston next week.

Up to this point, Amazon has been dropping details about its mega-budget Lord of the Rings series as slowly as a tree walking across Middle-earth. We know it will film in New Zealand, not star the Bandersnatch guy, take place thousands of years before the events of The Fellowship of the Ring, and… that’s about it. But as reported by TheOneRing.Net, the streaming service has finally released some concrete details about the show.

Here’s the official plot description:

Amazon Studios’ forthcoming series brings to screens for the very first time the heroic legends of the fabled Second Age of Middle-earth’s history. This epic drama is set thousands of years before the events of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, and will take viewers back to an era in which great powers were forged, kingdoms rose to glory and fell to ruin, unlikely heroes were tested, hope hung by the finest of threads, and the greatest villain that ever flowed from Tolkien’s pen threatened to cover all the world in darkness. Beginning in a time of relative peace, the series follows an ensemble cast of characters, both familiar and new, as they confront the long-feared re-emergence of evil to Middle-earth. From the darkest depths of the Misty Mountains, to the majestic forests of the elf-capital of Lindon, to the breathtaking island kingdom of Númenor, to the furthest reaches of the map, these kingdoms and characters will carve out legacies that live on long after they are gone.

The Second Age lasted for 3,441 years (Peter Jackson’s trilogy takes place during the Third Age) and notable events include the founding of Gondor, where much of the movies take place, and Sauron (the “greatest villain” teased above) forging the One Ring. The Misty Mountains should be familiar to those who have seen films, but Númenor has yet to be depicted on screen. A day may come when Amazon reveals when we’ll get to see the “breathtaking island kingdom,” but it is not this day.

(Via TheOneRing.net)

Though we hadn’t heard much from Jazmine Sullivan since her 2015 LP Reality Show, she’s recently been making the rounds now that she has released her vulnerable new project Heaux Tales. Last week, Sullivan appeared on NPR’s Tiny Desk concert series to showcase a medley of her music, including her HER-featuring single “Girl Like Me.” Sullivan returned in front of the camera Tuesday night, this time without HER, to give a rendition of “Girl Like Me” for late-night television.

Performing a stripped-down version of the song, Sullivan took The Tonight Show stage to deliver “Girl Like Me” with her octave-climbing vocals. Editing the track into a clean version fit for television, Sullivan details the insecure feeling that’s unavoidable after being left for another woman.

“Girl Like Me” was the last single Sullivan released before debuting Heaux Tales, and it’s radically honest nature sets the tone for Sullivan’s project as a whole. Describing the effort as an “observation of today’s women standing in their power and owning who they are,” Sullivan lays out modern-day dating dilemmas through 14 soulful tracks.

Watch Sullivan perform “Girl Like Me” on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon above and revisit our review of Heaux Tales here.

Heaux Tales is out now via RCA. Get it here.

With all of the turmoil happening in Washington due to the fallout from Donald Trump’s attempted coup, it takes a pretty extraordinary event to burst through the social media chatter right now. Well, Bruce Willis pulled it off after the actor was photographed shopping inside a Los Angeles Rite-Aid without a mask on. The city is being ravaged by the pandemic to the point where frontline workers are being encouraged to wear masks inside their own homes, so it was an especially notable faux pas when a bare-faced Willis was spotted, which reportedly caused him to be ejected from the store.

After being lambasted on Twitter, the Die Hard actor has since owned up to his mistake and issued an apology. “It was an error in judgment,” Willis told PEOPLE. “Be safe out there everyone and let’s continue to mask up.” The incident was first reported by Page Six along with a photo of a maskless Willis who was asked to leave the store by a Rite-Aid employee:

The spy says people inside the store became upset that Willis, 65, wasn’t wearing a mask — despite having a bandanna tied around his neck, which he could have easily pulled up.

We’re told the “Die Hard” star, who was photographed at the store without a mask on, walked away without making his purchase.

Besides the fact that wearing a mask is the right thing to do during an unprecedented pandemic, you’d think Willis might be more than willing to mask up after 12 Monkeys director Terry Gilliam recently said something unflattering about the actor’s mouth. Willis either hasn’t heard about Gilliam’s recent comments, or he isn’t the self-conscious type.

(Via PEOPLE)

Joe Biden’s inauguration on January 20 is something many Americans have anticipated for years, so there will be some celebrating. Part of that will include Celebrating America, a TV special on January 20 that will air live at 8:30 p.m. ET on ABC, CBS, CNN, NBC, and MSNBC, as Variety reports.

Tom Hanks is set to host, and the event will feature musical performances from Justin Timberlake, Demi Lovato, Jon Bon Jovi, and Ant Clemons. Furthermore, Timberlake revealed that he has written a new song, “Better Days,” that he will perform for the event.

Timberlake wrote on Instagram of the track, “A few months ago, during lockdown, @antclemons and I wrote a song together called BETTER DAYS. (I actually recorded my final vocals for this song on election night…) This past year brought a lot of frustration, grief, anger — and there were times when it was easy to feel powerless. This song was our way of doing what little we could to encourage everyone to stay hopeful… and keep working towards a better, more equal future. I’m very honored to announce we will be performing this song on January 20th for the Presidential Inauguration. We have a long way to go to fix, undo, and rebuild this country… but I hope now, despite the past four years, we are on our way.”

In addition to the aforementioned TV networks, the event will also be livestreamed via YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Twitch, Amazon Prime Video, Microsoft Bing, NewsNOW from Fox and AT&T DirectTV, and U-verse.

Regina King has been part of this writer’s entertainment viewing since he was 10 years old, back when she played Brenda Jenkins on 227, a show I watched religiously. (I was a big Marla Gibbs fan from watching The Jeffersons so of course I was going to watch her new vehicle.) The reason any of this is brought up is because, at that time, television shows featuring Black casts were plentiful on primetime network TV, which obviously included King’s. Then, by the mid-’90s, they were for the most part gone. And I’ve always wondered what King’s opinion was on this. And, it turns out, she’s thought about that a lot, too.

Gosh, what a run for Regina King over the last couple of years. In early 2019 she won an Oscar for If Beale Street Could Talk. Then she won a fourth Emmy for starring in one of the best television series of the last decade, Watchmen. And now comes her feature film directorial debut, the wonderful One Night in Miami, which has received almost universal acclaim (and starts streaming via Amazon Prime this Friday).

Written by Kemp Powers (who also wrote Pixar’s Soul), it’s loosely based on a true story of the night Muhammad Ali (then using the name Cassius Clay) beat Sonny Liston in what would be one of the famous boxing matches of all time. Later that night, Ali (Eli Goree) hung out with Jim Brown (Aldis Hodge), Sam Cooke (Leslie Odom Jr.) and Malcolm X (Kingsley Ben-Adir). Not a lot is known about what the foursome actually discussed that night. When Jim Brown talks about it today, it’s usually some form of, “We had a great time.” So the dialogue is imagined, but it creates a fascinating case study of four famous men with different ideas of how to use their fame. (For instance, in the film, Malcolm X has very different opinions than Jim Brown, who wants to star in movies.)

Ahead, King talks about why it was this particular project that got her in the director’s chair for the first time. And she talks about who might represent these four people today, if they were all in a room together talking, which, she admits, is kind of an impossible question to answer, except for the inclusion of LeBron James.

(For context, the day we spoke was after the events of January 6th, which makes even informal greetings hard to do these days.)

How are you?

I am… You know…

I told myself I wasn’t going to ask that because there’s no good answer to that right now and now I feel like a fool.

No, I’ve been telling myself that for the past year now and I still say, “How are you?” We’ve been conditioned to ask those three words.

I’ve been doing this job for a long time now, but I still get anxious when I talk to people I have literally been watching since I was like 10 years old, when you were on 227. In a, “Oh, this is someone that’s been part of my life for a very long time,” kind of way.

[Laughs] Yeah, I feel like a relative.

Yeah that whole NBC Saturday night lineup were like relatives of mine.

[Laughs] Right.

One Night in Miami… what a wonderful movie you’ve created.

Thank you. Thank you.

I am curious, this is your first feature film you’ve directed. Were you set to direct anything ever before? I know you’ve done TV, but as far as feature films?

Yeah, there was a bit of that. There were things that had come my way, but I didn’t really respond to. I’m always reading things as a director, the same way I read things as an actor. Are they things that are interesting to me as an audience member? I’m always reading it as an audience member, and so this was one that truly made me sit up in my seat. It was on the page. Kemp [Powers] had done most of the heavy lifting. While it might’ve been 2019 when I was reading it, it was just this time then – as it is now; whether it’s 1980s, ’60s, ’50s, ’40s – these conversations have been conversations within black circles for so long that they’re exhausting. But here was a way to have a private conversation publicly, which I felt was necessary.

Have you talked to Jim Brown? Because every time I’ve heard him talk about he just says something like, “Oh, we had a wild time.” At least I’ve never heard him getting into the specifics of it. Or does that even matter?

He doesn’t. The only thing that I think has been said about that night, from him, is that it was a good time and that they ate vanilla ice cream.

So to take four of the most famous people of the last century and put them in a room together, which they actually were, and then just create these conversations between them, what were you expecting the reaction to be to something like this? Obviously it’s been going over very well.

Well, if we, as a film team, did a great job at taking Kemp’s work and bringing it to life as passionately as he brought those words to his pen to paper, then I felt like there was definitely an opportunity for the audience to receive it the way I did when I read it. I can’t imagine anyone reading the script and not being moved and not feeling like, wow, I’ve never seen these men like this. And I’ve been seeing these men all of my life. And so I am happy that people are receiving it the way I did upon my first read.

Is there an equivalent today to these four people?

I mean, this is one of those questions that is truly subjective, right? It’s depending on who you asked. Someone could quickly say four people who they think and we might be like, oh my God, you are actually comparing them to Malcolm X? Are you serious? You know, but to each his own. Someone asked me that question yesterday and I just threw some names out there. But I did because I was asked that question and I was in the hot seat, but I tried to think about it afterwards and I still had a tough time coming up with 2020 equivalent, or 2021 equivalent to those four men. But perhaps, you know, one of those people was like a LeBron James.

Well, LeBron is a good answer. He’s very famous and very socially involved.

Out of the things that Muhammad Ali and Jim Brown were able to accomplish with their careers, and then what they accomplish with their platforms. You know, LeBron is about the closest thing to it, you know?

It was really interesting what you did with Jim Brown in this movie. He just wants to make some movies and wasn’t as into what some of the other people in the room were saying.

Well, I think the thing that was powerful to us as filmmakers, the reasoning that Jim Brown left the NFL, sure, it was hard on his body, but being told that you can’t do what you dream to do? Athletes now? People go out of their way to get that athlete into their frame, where Jim was put in a position where he was being told he had to choose either or.

Was there an episode of television you directed, or maybe a film that you had been in before, that you leaned on for how to make this?

I don’t know if I can think of one film, in particular, that I felt like our set is similar to. And I think I can pretty much say that about everything that I’ve been part of. They’ve all been unique in their own way. Part of what makes it hard to call out a favorite, you kind of feel like they all have things about them that make them stand out, for different reasons. So I always say my favorite project is the one I’m working on now. I mean, I would say that there are a lot of things that I’ve picked up along the way: that I employed when having this first film, navigating, you know. You learn the good things to do are equally as important as seeing things that don’t go well and saying, okay, yeah, I will never do that.

Something I’ve really wanted to ask you about — I mentioned 227 earlier — when I think about watching network television in the ’80s, maybe around half of the prime time shows I watched had Black casts. I watched 227, I watched Amen, I watched The Jeffersons. And I’ve always wondered about that because I think that made a big difference in pop culture and, as a kid, it had an effect. And then they all went away and I’ve always curious what you thought about that.

Well…

If I worded that weird, which is very possible, I’m sorry…

Oh no, no, no, no, no. I definitely think about that. I remember, because, like we talked about, the Saturday night lineup. And I think The Cosby Show came on a weeknight, or something like that. And A Different World was after that. And we were just in a space where there were a lot of shows that had Black actors in it, or subject matter that really highlighted the Black experience. We had Martin and The Jamie Foxx Show and that rolled right into Spike Lee and John Singleton. And the late ’80s and early ’90s definitely seemed as though we were on our way to this space in cinema and TV that really was going to continue to include Black people in the stories and star Black people in the stories and these stories that are Black stories. And that seemed to be happening. And then, just like all of a sudden, like ’93, ’94 rolls around, and it just was completely gone.

You kind of joked earlier, oh, we were a relative. But I was an only child living in Missouri and having those shows on in prime time had an effect on me. And like you said, by the mid ’90s they were gone. I really do wonder if that had an effect on people?

I do. Things started slowing up around that time, and so here we are again, in a time where there are more outlets to tell stories. And so we’re starting to see that pick up again, so I hope that this is not “a moment.” I feel like we won’t allow it to be. But we’ll see.

You can contact Mike Ryan directly on Twitter.

As it turns out, inciting an insurrection has consequences. These may or may not include President Trump getting impeached for a second time (we should know more on that soon), but the results are certainly turning out to be financial hits for GOP senators who dug in their heels over certifying the Electoral College vote. For example, Hallmark decided to take a stand against Missouri-based Senator Josh Hawley, who had already been dropped by his book publisher for his role in helping to incite the failed MAGA uprising. And now, New York City is coming out against Trump himself by making it clear that he’s not welcome, which is happening after his Mar-a-Lago neighbors said they don’t want him, either. (It might be time to move to Russia.)

The New York City stuff is really something, although it’s a move that many feel is overdue, given that Trump’s name is stamped in gold on hotels and towers, and the Trump Organization owns some landmarks (like the Central Park Carousel) without a lot of advertising about it. Well, it’s not happening anymore. In a tweet, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced (while tweeting, “New York City doesn’t do business with insurrectionists”) that the city will terminate contracts with the Trump Org regarding the Central Park carousel operations, along with a pair of ice skating rinks area (this essentially purges Trump from Central Park) and a golf course in the Bronx.

This will make Donald Trump’s wallet a whole lot lighter, given that (according to Forbes) these contracts are worth over $17 million per year. People sure are feeling good about this move, but they’d like Trump out of all five boroughs.

The full statement from the City of New York, which does not tread lightly (“[t]he President incited a rebellion against the United States government that killed five people and threatened to derail the constitutional transfer of power”), can be read below.