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The 2020 NBA Draft is happening far later than usual. As was the case with everything in the world of sports, the COVID-19 pandemic caused the NBA season to get pushed way back, and as a result, the Draft will commence on Nov. 18, 2020. It won’t be the gigantic spectacle we’re used to seeing, but it will still mark the best day of 60 future NBA players’ lives.

With things getting moved back five months, all of these players have needed to figure out ways to make the time go by. In this episode of Dime Breakdowns, we decided to look at the ways that some of the dudes whose names will be read by Adam Silver are getting used to pandemic life and a Draft process like no other.

The last few months have presented challenges for everyone. Overseas players like Deni Avdija and Killian Hayes simply had to get stateside, while college hoopers had a ton of sudden free time on their hands. They’ve filled it up in a number of ways. Some turned to Twitch, some spent time with family, and others took some time away from working out and watching old game film to show some love to their school.

As is the case with every Draft, players hearing their name called and their futures laid out in front of them is something that they’ll never forget. This year, though, the longer-than-usual process made things a little more unforgettable.

Check out the above video to learn a little bit more.

Steven Spielberg’s “E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial” is one of the greatest films ever made but it could have easily been a disaster.

Director Steven Spielberg took huge risks with the film betting the house on the relationship between a young boy named Elliott and an oddly-shaped alien.

If the boy in the lead role of Elliott or the animatronic alien weren’t convincing, the movie would have been nothing more than a bad children’s fare.

Spielberg emphasized the children so much in the film that it was shot from a child’s perspective and most of the adult faces are obscured.

Although Spielberg was taking a risk he must have been pretty confident walking onto the set on the first day because he chose an amazing young actor to be his Elliott, Henry Thomas.

In 1981, the nine-year-old actor flew to Los Angeles from Texas for a screen test with Spielberg. During his first reading he was so nervous that his performance fell flat. But on his send attempt, Thomas was so amazing that he got the role right there on the spot.

In the end, Spielberg simply says, “Okay kid, you got the job.”

Henry Thomas audition för E.T. “Ok kid, you got the job”.

www.youtube.com

“The improvisation was so heartfelt and honest that I gave him the part right there,” Spielberg told Premiere magazine in 1982. “I was blown away by this nine-year-old. Then I came to realize he’s an adult actor, not a nine-year-old.”

“He’s a very controlled, methodical performer who measures what he does and feels what he does and yet broadcasts it in a totally subtle way. His performance is so controlled, unlike most kid performers, who seem to be giving you 150 percent on every shot,” Spielberg continued.

After “E.T.,” Thomas was so recognizable as Elliott that he had a hard time landing more work. However, unlike a lot of child stars, his career flourished as an adult, landing him roles in “Gangs of New York,” Netflix’s “The Haunting of Hill House,” “Legends of the Fall,” and as a young Norman Bates in “Psycho IV: The Beginning.”

Jaega Wise has changed the beer industry for the better. She trained as an engineer, but her deep adoration of beer and the culture surrounding it led her to seek out her true calling: brewing. From humble homebrew beginnings, she worked her way up the ladder. Currently, Wise is the Head Brewer at East London’s Wild Card Brewery and — in a pretty epic testament to following your dreams — she was named “Brewer of the Year” by the British Guild of Beer Writers in 2018.

But this story isn’t all floral hops and bready malts. Once Wise got a view from inside the beer industry, she felt duty-bound to empower other women and push for greater representation in brewing. With this aim, she spearheaded an industry-wide ruling in the U.K. that banned sexist, homophobic, and racist labeling on beer. Next, she worked closely with her brewing mentor to build and grow the International Women’s Collaboration Brew network, bringing female brewers together across the globe to learn, talk shop, and network.

We were lucky enough to chat with Wise recently about her fight to get women more seats at the table in the brewing world, the power of the International Women’s Collaboration Brew network, and how Wild Card is fairing during the continuing pandemic.

Tell us about how you got into brewing.

I got into brewing just like everybody else. It’s really being just a big beer fan. I was studying for a chemical engineering degree. At the same time, I was doing lots of beer drinking, going to beer festivals, and the like. Then I graduated. The same drinking buddies I used to homebrew with and hang out with, they were like, “We’re starting a brewery. Do you want to come on board?” Well, that’s not really what happened. I basically said, “Let me help you.” And then that was it. Then I never left.

Wild Card started in 2012 in the basement of a pub in East London. First of all, we were storing beer in our living rooms and then we were swapping Cassa Beer for rent in a pub. We quickly outgrew that pub and then we got our own site in East London.

Was there a beer that gave you that “Ah-ha!” moment that keyed you into how great a well-made beer can be?

Yeah, for sure. I come from the Midlands in Nottingham. It’s Robin Hood territory. It’s also really close to Burton on Trent, which is a global powerhouse for brewing — they have amazing cask beer, but pale ale is the standard.

There was a brewery called Castle Rock Brewery who was making a beer called Harvest Pale, which is a 3.8 percent pale ale and that’s really drinkable. You don’t realize just growing up where I grew up the training you’re receiving just by being in the pub all the time because it’s just what you do. It’s how you socialize. So I would say being a Midlands girl, it gave me the grounding and the experience I didn’t know I was getting at the time.

You’ve folded your work in beer into being an advocate for women and people of color in brewing. Can you walk us through how you started turning your love of beer into advocating for people who aren’t fully or fairly represented in beer?

It wasn’t something that was particularly purposeful. I was giving a talk a few years ago at this amazing building, the Institute of Civil Engineering, which is opposite Parliament, for God’s sake. So it’s a beautiful building and it’s a fantastic location. And it was quite obvious by the room and my experiences over the years how women were treated and the way they were spoken about. It was off-putting and it was harming us as an industry.

I pointed out that if we want to sell more beer, why are we trying to isolate 50 percent of the population? It doesn’t make any sense. That’s kind of where it started and then everything kind of went a bit mental after that. I had to make a choice to continue and put up with Twitter and being in the papers and the horrible stuff that comes with it or do I stop?

You didn’t stop.

I decided to continue because I figured it’s not every day you have an opportunity to change the rules of the game. I got involved with our trade body and I decided to try and change the rules of the book essentially. In the UK, we managed to pass a rule that says that “there’s no alcoholic drink in the UK that it is allowed to have branding that is sexist, homophobic, racist or anything like that in the UK.”

I’m super, super proud of being able to get that through. And it’s kind of shocking that wasn’t there before, but it wasn’t. So if there is a brand that someone comes across and it breaches those rules, then it can be complained about to a group called the Portman Group, who regulates branding in the UK alcohol industry. Then that will get investigated by an independent team and they have the power to pull beers from the shelf, et cetera. So they’re quite a powerful adjudicator. That’s been really good. It kind of covers all the “isms,” basically.

The whole point is we want to have a beer industry that is as inclusive as possible because surely we want to sell beer to as many people as possible. It’s really hard for people to argue with the financial side of it. Like you want to sell more beer, why are you actively trying to exclude a particular group or particular person? You don’t want them to feel that way, you want them to buy your product because it means better things for you and your business, as well as all the other advantages.

And it’s good for society!

How has the reaction been? Have people been reacting positively or have people been pushing back?

I mean, it’s not my job to call out a particular brewery. I’m in this industry. These people, I know them, a lot of them are my friends or I see them at conferences. They’re my fellows in my industry. But that’s one of the reasons why I decided to join our trade body. I can have a quiet conversation, it doesn’t have to be a public thing.

I often get breweries that come to me for advice and say, “I’m not sure about this.” Those conversations are often the most useful that you can have, rather than doing it on Twitter or what have you. I do think that’s great and it has its place and it is excellent to bring attention to stuff. But I think there can be a lot of echo-chamber behavior happening in the brewing industry where you’re talking to very like-minded people who agree with you. And that’s not the point of this. The point of this is working together to make a better industry for us all. And that is often a lot of quiet conversations. Which is, I think, the most useful.

Let’s then talk about the International Women’s Collaboration Brew. Can you sort of walk us through how this got started and how you gathered such an amazing group of brewers?

So this started eight years ago. It was started by a brewer, Sophie de Ronde, who works a brewery called Burnt Mill. She was very much my mentor. So when I first started to learn to brew … yes, you can read all the books you like, but nothing really shows you your path more than learning from another really good brewer. She taught me a huge amount and she invited me to the first International Women’s Day Brew. To this day, she takes the mick out of me because I turned up in a little skirt. She looked at me and said, “That’s not how you brew, darling.” So we did a launch at our taproom at Wild Card, and then that was eight years ago and every year we just got bigger and bigger and bigger and more people came every year.

Every year, I put an open call to all brewers — around the world, really — and people show up. You can come and brew for the day. It’s a great place to learn, to network, to educate yourself. And lots of people have become lifelong friends because they met at the International Women’s Day Brew. It’s also just a good support group for each other. It’s a really good network.

It’s a day that is now sacred in the brewing industry, especially for women. This is a day you put aside. This is the day where you go and you hopefully learn something.

What did this year’s look like?

This year, I did an education on hops called “Know Your Hops.” So lots of blind smelling of hops from all over the world and trying to really hone everyone’s palate. If you want to be able to sell a beer, you should be able to identify the hop and where they come from. And there’s not a huge amount of that kind of work that’s done in the brewing industry, especially compared to, like, wine. So that was really fascinating.

Usually, we’d both be at beer shows and booze conventions. That all, of course, has changed drastically. I feel like we’ve all become Zoom tasters now.

I know. I know. I know! I’ve literally just been judging two beer competitions in the last week on Zoom.

Exactly!

I’ve drunk so much beer on Zoom now. It’s ridiculous.

How are you looking at the future now? It seems like the end of this pandemic horizon keeps getting further away.

From the beginning, we’ve really just battened down the hatches. We had never sold a single can of beer online. It was never our business. Literally overnight, we set up an online shop. We did it within 24 hours. To put it into context, we just decided to basically put a call out to everyone to say, “We are now delivering beer, same-day delivery in the local area.” And we put it in our car — the really rubbish Kia we have here — and we just started manually delivering beer to people in East London. And we kept on doing that and it was going really, really well.

Our sales manager started working on the packaging line. Our taproom manager started running the online shop. Everyone pitched in. I think for us, the team is tired and the team is pretty exhausted really because of just, I think, the stress of it all. I know I’m certainly tired. To keep that fear level up and to remain working in a period of a global pandemic while constantly being aware of what is going on and to make sure no one gets sick and that sort of stuff, it’s quite mentally tiring. Now with bars reopening our taprooms are back up and running but the rules are constantly changing there too.

We’re serving everything in recyclable plastic pint glasses so the staff doesn’t have to touch anyone. The tables are all two meters apart. And we have a really good food vendor every week. Over the summer, the weekends were really actually quite packed. We’re really lucky. A lot of breweries are not in the same situation. Nothing comes easy if that makes sense. It’s been a horrible time. And I think the brewing industry around the world is in for a horrible time. It’s not pleasant.

Yeah, it’s going to be interesting to see who’s standing at the end of just this year of the pandemic.

Yeah, I think … You have to adapt and innovate. It’s the only way. And if you’ve not done that, that’s going to be hard times.

Graffiti is an underground form of expression that can be seen as anything from criminal destruction of property to art. Most of the time that depends on whether it was your wall that was defaced.

While most graffiti is painted over, some of it is so powerful that it becomes a beloved part of the community. Many of street artist Banksy’s pieces are still up and have become popular landmarks throughout the world.

But what about little nuggets of fake history placed on park benches around Canada? Where do we sign up?

An anonymous person in Calgary, Canada has made such lovable pieces of illegal art that after the city tore them down, public outcry made them put them back up.

Recently, six signs appeared attached to ark benches at Bowmont Park that hilariously commemorated events that never happened.

“Humans first invented fire right here, 1903.”

“Nothing of note happened here — or at least that is what they want you to believe.”

“The bench marks the farthest west that Christopher Columbus ever travelled. September 1494.”

“At this date in 1806, explorer David Thompson forded the Bow River with a herd of 14 African elephants.”

“Benjy, the first hamster to fly solo around the world, took off from this spot in 1937.”

“This bench marks the first confirmed UFO landing in Calgary, 1963.”

via City of Calgary

Unfortunately, after a few days, they were removed by the city. But local residents loved the signs so much they demanded they be reattached to the benches. The city agreed they were being a bit too harsh and decided they should go back up.

(Isn’t the good-natured common sense of Canadians amazing? Imagine that happening in America.)

“Due to our policy around commemorative plaques and graffiti, we removed them,” the City of Calgary tweeted on Wednesday. “But we heard from Calgarians that you loved the sayings and you wanted them to stay.

“As the city, we have to err on the side of caution — but in this case, it was a bit too cautious,” the statement continued. “Listening to what’s important to Calgarians is part of our job. If we can make changes for a better outcome, that’s what we’ll do.”

The city’s decision was backed up by the mayor who believes we need all the opportunities to smile that we can get in 2020.

“We need a bit of whimsy in our 2020 world and certainly at the city we encourage citizens to do a little bit of guerrilla art and a little bit of fun things to make their neighbors smile,” Mayor, Naheen Nenshi told the CBC.

The mayor also said that the bench plaques’ professional quality and wholesome humor were the big reason they were reattached to the benches.

“The news out there is tough,” said the mayor. “So a little plaque about a flying hamster is a perfect way to kick off our Thanksgiving and I’m grateful for the vandal that put these plaques up.”

It’s the small things in life that can turn a run-of-the-mill park into a place that helps define the attitude of a community. Whomever the artists who put those up happens to be, you know what needs to happen now.

Get out your engraving kit and get to work on some more plaques.

There’s not much to Freddie Gibbs and The Alchemist’s “Babies & Fools” video, just the Alchemist produced beat, Freddie Gibbs and guest rapper Conway The Machine hanging out at the strip club, and some grainy footage of twerking dancers that looks like it was shot on an old camcorder. To be fair, like the stripped-down style of Freddie and Alchemist’s Alfredo album that the single lives on, it’s more than enough to get the point across.

Way back in May of this year — seems like 100 years ago, doesn’t it? — Freddie and Alchemist teased the first single from their upcoming joint album, “1985” featuring Rick Ross. The release caused quite the stir in underground rap fan circles, as did the Rick Ross-featuring “Scottie Beam” video after the project’s initial release. Freddie then tapped Conway’s Griselda Records compatriot Benny The Butcher for a Miami boat cruise in their “Frank Lucas” video, proving that the 10-song set had a lot of legs, despite its simplicity. Sometimes, all you need is a rapper, a producer, and a handful of guests with “Something To Rap About” to have one of the more prolific projects in any given situation.

Watch Freddie Gibbs, The Alchemist, and Conway The Machine’s “Babies & Fools” video above.

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

Megan Thee Stallion has received a lot of sympathy after being shot by Tory Lanez, but there are those who continue to defend Lanez. Now, Meg has addressed those people, expressing her confusion at the situation.

Today, Meg tweeted, “People wish I was the ‘bad guy’ so bad it’s weird,” followed by laughing and crying emojis. She then retweeted a fan who replied, “For no mf reason !!”

This comes a couple days after Meg responded to a Twitter user who posted, “If @theestallion is taking advantage of this #PROTECTBLACKWOMEN and pandering, she gonna lose a lot of fans when the facts comes out.” Meg wrote, “This is exactly the type of dumb comment that makes me scream PROTECT BLACK WOMEN. Please tell me why I would need to lie abt being shot to promote the protection of women… like out of all the things to lie about … this is sad coming out of a BLACK MAN’S MOUTH.”

She also just penned a New York Times op-ed in which she addressed the shooting, saying, “I was recently the victim of an act of violence by a man. After a party, I was shot twice as I walked away from him. We were not in a relationship. Truthfully, I was shocked that I ended up in that place. My initial silence about what happened was out of fear for myself and my friends. Even as a victim, I have been met with skepticism and judgment. The way people have publicly questioned and debated whether I played a role in my own violent assault proves that my fears about discussing what happened were, unfortunately, warranted.”

Hailing from Landover, Maryland, 23-year-old rapper Black Fortune brings his buzzing melodic sound to Uproxx Studios for a passionate performance of his new song “Slime In My Genes” from his June mixtape OsshLord.

After dropping his debut mixtape OsshRock in 2018, Fortune saw his profile jump in prominence as single “OsshWop” racked up streams, including 1 million views on YouTube. Since then, he’s begun to receive high-profile co-signs from the likes of Diddy, SZA, and Travis Scott, re-releasing OsshRock to capitalize on the new attention.

He followed up this summer with OsshLord, a 16-track effort that put his sing-song style on display and featured burgeoning Brooklyn star Fivio Foreign. With his buzz growing, Black Fortune is bringing a unique take on the DMV style to the world with songs like “Bankrupt” and “Slime In My Genes.”

Watch Black Fortune Perform “Slime In My Genes” for UPROXX Sessions 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..

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

C’mon, Hubie Halloween wasn’t that bad: Boston news anchor Alaina Pinto was fired by WHDH Channel 7 News for making a cameo in Adam Sandler’s hit horror-comedy. It had nothing to do with the quality of the Netflix movie, however (Boston prides itself on making only the finest films). Pinto lost her job for “mistakenly [violating] my contract.”

“Earlier this week I was let go from 7 News. I am posting this because I want to be open and honest with all of you. Last year, I participated in a cameo in the recently released Netflix movie by Adam Sandler, Hubie Halloween. In doing so, I mistakenly violated my contract with the station and I understand why management unfortunately chose to terminate me. I am deeply disappointed and saddened, and I hoped this would not be how things evolved,” Pinto tweeted. She has a small role in Hubie as a morning news anchor who dresses up as Harley Quinn on Halloween, as do her female co-workers.

Pinto added, “Thanks to all my wonderful 7 News viewers and my supportive and great colleagues at the station. Reporting the news to you every morning was an honor and a privilege. I promise to stay in touch and keep you updated on the next chapter – the future is bright!” This sucks and she could keep her job, but at least she has a very good IMDb.

Not many people can claim they were in Hubie Halloween. Alaina Pinto can.

(Via EW)

A couple weeks ago, Nicki Minaj entered motherhood with the birth of her first child. In the days since having her son, she has received a number of gifts from some of her famous friends.

This afternoon, Minaj shared photos of congratulatory cards she received from Beyonce, Kim Kardashian and Kanye West, and others. She wrote on Instagram, “Thank you to Queen B, Kim & Ye, Riccardo Tisci, Winnie, Karol & everyone who sent well wishes during this time. It meant the world to me. I am so grateful & in love with my son. Madly in love. My favorite liddo boy in the whole wide world.”

Beyonce addressed her card to Onika (Nicki’s legal name) and wrote, “Welcome to motherhood. God bless you and your family.” Kim and Kanye wrote simply, “Congrats! We love you!”

Speaking of kids, an adorable video of Minaj as a kid surfaced recently. The video appears to be from a TV broadcast, and she says to the camera, “I would like to be a nurse when I grow up so that I could help people less fortunate than I am.” Meanwhile, there’s speculation that she could be collaborating with Cardi B soon, which would surely leave her fan base absolutely shook.

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

The best new hip-hop albums coming out this week include projects from Benny The Butcher, Black Thought, Chuck Strangers, Open Mike Eagle, Price, Preme & Popcaan, Rexx Life Raj, Serial Killers, T.I., and WizKid.

Take a deep breath and fasten your seatbelts, this week is so jam-packed with releases that you may need another week to get through them all.

Here are all the best new hip-hop albums coming out this week.

Benny The Butcher — Burden Of Proof

The Griselda Gang keeps trucking. This time, Benny — the quietest of the bunch in 2020 so far — links up with Hit-Boy, who just completed an album with Nas, to release what is (in my opinion) the exclamation point on the Buffalo boys’ year.

Black Thought — Streams Of Thought, Vol. 3: Cane And Able [EP]

The Roots frontman and master rap-tician had to put the third edition of his acclaimed EP series on pause due to the pandemic but knowing him, it’ll be well worth the wait.

Chuck Strangers — Too Afraid To Dance [EP]

Pro Era’s non-Joey Badass members have been slowly but surely carving out an impressive space for themselves on the New York underground scene and Chuck is the latest member to drop as well as the only one to offer up new material in 2020 (aside from Joey’s two singles earlier this year).

Open Mike Eagle — Anime, Trauma And Divorce

Following up 2017’s conceptual Brick Body Kids Still Daydream, the art-rap linchpin returns with a deeply personal rumination on, well, trauma, shot through with tongue-in-cheek references to wrestling, video games, and yes, anime to lighten the burden.

Price — CLRD. [EP]

Audio Push has quietly been producing some of the West Coast’s strongest independent releases over the past few years. Now, the duo’s members are making their first forays into solo work (not including Oktane’s run of 2011 freestyles that proved the group had shifted gears from jerking to straight-up rap). This one might be my favorite release of the week — although, I’ve been known to be biased in the past.

Preme and Popcaan — Link Up

Canada’s Preme *cough cough* links up with Jamaica’s Popcaan for a refreshing take on dancehall that bridges the diasporic gap between the two West Indian enclaves. The OVO-Unruly connection remains strong.

Serial Killers (B-Real, Demrick, And Xzibit) — Summer Of Sam

When this one popped up in my email, eyebrows were certainly raised, since their last release was two years ago. If you think hip-hop has too much singing in it, isn’t menacing enough, doesn’t quite suit your gym mix, this one is for you. Wall-to-wall bars over beats that wouldn’t have been out of place in the late ’90s, all delivered by some of rap’s most respected pioneers.

T.I. — The L.I.B.R.A.

Trap music has come a long way since T.I.’s coined the phrase a decade and a half ago but somehow, he’s managed to keep up with every twist, turn, and evolution to remain one of the genre’s most respected stalwarts. Two years removed from Dime Trap, T.I. has gone independent to bring his 11th project, which features Young Thug, Lil Baby, and more.

WizKid — Made In Lagos

As Nigeria takes the spotlight of world news as the latest epicenter of the fight against police authoritarianism and abuse, Wizkid has been using his platform to demand the end of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad in his home country, all while prepping the release of his highly anticipated follow-up to 2017’s Sounds from the Other Side.

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