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The 2020 WNBA season is currently on hold, with a scheduled start in mid-May postponed due to COVID-19 concerns. However, word emerged in late May that the league’s plans “would likely include a shortened season.” On Thursday, additional buzz came to light from Mechele Voepel of ESPN with the news that the WNBA is set to propose a 22-game regular season that would begin on July 24.

The location of the proposed venue is slightly more than 100 miles away from the NBA’s restart in Orlando, with the reporting indicating IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida will be the host. While the WNBA was set for a 36-game regular season in 2020, the new proposal would feature only 22 games and, though all discussions are described as “tentative” at this juncture, the postseason would reportedly end sometime in October.

While there are many details to be ironed out, IMG Academy does have the capacity to host multiple games at once, with a setup that includes four courts and, unlike the NBA with a sprawling 22-team format (down from 30 under regular circumstances), the WNBA has only 12 teams to accommodate. Still, the players have not yet had a chance to weigh in on any proposal, leaving a lot of room for uncertainty.

There could be a sense of urgency to the plans, especially with the example of the NBA ramping up to July 31 with a proposal already in place. In the meantime, however, the WNBA is seemingly picking up steam with regard to kicking off its season and, even if the regular season is abbreviated, having basketball back, presuming it is safe for all parties, is a great thing.

We’re still a bit a ways away from what will likely be a socially distanced Independence Day, but here’s some new trivia about the movie that shares its name. Did you know the game-changing 1996 summer blockbuster Independence Day wasn’t always called that? That it had a much more generic name that might have not made it as big as it proved to be? Well, according to one of its main stars, Bill Pullman, that’s the case.

In a new interview with CinemaBlend, as found by ComicBook.com, the actor opened up about one of the most popular titles on his CV, revealing that it was once called — [drum roll] — Doomsday. It’s not a bad title, but it is kind of all-purpose. The reason? Another studio owned the rights to that title, thanks to a film from 1983 also called Independence Day (which is a character study set in a small town, not a spectacle about a mass alien invasion). However, director Roland Emmerich and producer Dean Devlin really wanted to call the film Independence Day — the production’s code name was even “ID4” — but 20th Century Fox was loath to let them…until they saw Pullman’s classic rally-the-troops speech.

About the original title, Pullman said, “It’s what Fox wanted, and it was a title that was typical of the time [for a] disaster movie.” But Emmerich and Devlin persisted.

“They really wanted Independence Day, so we had to make the speech really good. And then they cut it together, and a couple of nights later, Dean came to my trailer, and he said, ‘Do you wanna see it’? … So he popped in the VHS, he showed me the cut of the speech, and I went, ‘Holy Mother, they have got to name this movie Independence Day.’ And they did.”

And there you have it. There is no doubt that patriotically naming the film after the holiday — and then releasing it over that holiday, 24 years ago — helped stir extra-excitement, and helped create what became first the roided-up summer movie season, and then what was essentially a year-round summer movie season, filled with one blockbuster after another. Maybe those days will return soon once movie theaters are a thing again. Until then, all we have is that wacko doctored version that surreally splices Trump and his cronies into a scene where the sitting president delivers an articulate speech that unites the nation gripped by fear. Only at the movies!

(Via CinemaBlend and ComicBook.com)

The Twitter hashtag #WendysIsOverParty started trending this week after a Business Insider article from May 18th revealing that a Wendy’s franchisee had donated more than $400,000 to President Trump’s reelection campaign started to make the rounds. Right now, the American public seems hyper-aware of who and what they give their money to, which created a strong backlash against the brand, causing the Wendy’s Twitter account to go on the defensive, tweeting, “We never have and never will contribute to a presidential campaign. For the record our CEO has always kept the same energy too. Facts.”

In Wendy’s defense, they’re right! According to CNN, the franchisee in question, James Boldenstedt, is the CEO of Muy Companies, which owns and operates a total of 800 Wendy’s, Taco Bell, and Pizza Hut locations in the United States of America, he is not the CEO of overall Wendy’s brand. While Boldenstedt donated almost a half a million to President Trump in 2018 and most recently another $200,000 in March, Wendy’s actual CEO Todd Penegor, has no record of donating to Trump directly, though to imply Wendy’s doesn’t have a right-leaning agenda is misleading, considering Penegor has donated $6,000 to Wendy’s Political Action Committee, which CNN reports donates much more money to Republican congressional candidates than Democratic candidates. In addition, according to the Palm Beach Post, the chairman of Wendy’s board of directors, Nelson Peltz, raised $10 million for President Trump’s reelection campaign at a private fundraiser this past February.

So while Wendy’s hasn’t directly donated to President Trump, it might be a stretch to say they’re wholly anti-Trump. However, Wendy’s does seem to be pro-Black Lives Matter and the brand recognizes just how much they rely on Black culture for their identity, tweeting “Our voice would be nothing without Black culture. Right now, a lot of people are hurting because of blatant racism against Black People, Their voices need to be heard. Period.” Before using the #BlackLivesMatter hashtag and committing to a donation of $500k to “support social justice, the youth and education in the Black community starting with Thurgood Marshall College Fund and we’ll have receipts.” Wendy’s social media account also indicated that they’d be using their platform to further amplify Black voices going forward.

Wendy’s does indeed owe a huge debt to Black culture; not only have they dropped a viral hip-hop-inspired mixtape, they’ve created an entire corporate identity that relies heavily on slang terms and phrases popularized and originated by black Americans. Still, as self-aware as Wendy’s is revealing itself to be, the brand is still being met with some criticism from Twitter users who aren’t down with supporting a company that donates money to congressional leaders like Mitch McConnell, who enable the President’s agenda. Check out some of the criticism below.

Like many major brands and leagues, the NFL issued a statement as protests against police brutality and racial injustice, sparked by George Floyd’s killing by Minneapolis police, launched nationwide. Many of its players have spoken out on the subject and the league committed $20 million to social justice programs on Thursday, but the hypocrisy of the league that has effectively blackballed Colin Kaepernick for peacefully protesting issuing these statements claiming to support the movement has not been lost on many of its biggest stars.

While Drew Brees’ comments about how he still feels Kaepernick kneeling during the anthem to protest police brutality is wrong drew ire from teammates, others in the NFL, and even the likes of LeBron James, the players haven’t forgotten the league’s stance on the same issue. On Thursday night, a number of star players posted a strong video message featuring prominent voices like Patrick Mahomes, Deshaun Watson, Odell Beckham Jr, Saquon Barkley, and many more, calling for the league to strongly “condemn racism and the systematic oppression of black people” and “admit wrong in silencing our players from peacefully protesting.”

It’s an incredibly powerful video, and that this many of the league’s stars participated shows that the NFL is going to have to take this very seriously. Having the players say “I am…” and listing out only a partial, yet lengthy, list of names of unarmed black people killed by police and white citizens, like George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tamir Rice, and Trayvon Martin was gutting, and the players asserting their right to peacefully protest indicates that whenever football returns to the field, so will the protests the league tried so hard to get rid of.

Billie Eilish has never shied away from addressing her public persona and various personal issues. To close out May, Eilish shared a video titled “Not My Responsibility,” in which she addressed, among other things, her body image and clothing style. In mid-April, she revealed in a feature with Dazed that she “can’t win” when it comes to the public’s perception of her body. In the upcoming July/August feature of GQ, she’s further addressed those ideas.

In the article, she reveals that she has “never felt desired,” saying, “My past boyfriends never made me feel desired. None of them. It’s a big thing in my life that I feel I have never been physically desired by somebody. So I dress the way I dress as I don’t like to think of you guys–I mean anyone, everyone–judging it, or the size of it.” Opening up about her style as well, she said, “Sometimes I dress like a boy. Sometimes I dress like a swaggy girl. And sometimes I feel trapped by this persona that I have created because sometimes I think people view me not as a woman.”

Later in the interview, Eilish revealed that she is very much aware that she is subject to comments regardless of what she does. “I am clickbait at the moment. Anything with my name on it or anything I say or do can and will be used against me,” she states. “I don’t watch people’s [Instagram] Stories, I quit Twitter a couple of years ago.”

Lastly, Eilish acknowledged that she will always be subject to extreme reactions. “You will be super hated. And super loved,” she said. “There are a million people who don’t like Beyonce – and I don’t know how the hell you can’t love Beyonce. Same with Rihanna. Same with Trump – people actually like that fool.”

The July/August issue with Eilish arrives on newsstands June 5th.

[via GQ]

The NBA announced its plan to return to play later this summer, with 22 teams going to Orlando to play at Disney’s Wide World of Sports complex. The plan was agreed upon by 29 of the 30 teams, with Portland as the lone exception, and it now moves on to the players’ association to ratify and negotiate terms, both for this season’s return and how next season will take place.

There are financials to figure out and start and end dates for a 2020-21 season to be determined — the owners proposed a Dec. 1 date, which came as a “surprise” to the NBPA — but it seems as though we are indeed moving closer to basketball being played. One of the biggest questions facing the league’s return is the continuation of the COVID-19 pandemic, where Florida just saw its highest new case count on Thursday.

Silver said in an appearance on TNT’s Inside The NBA that they are constantly monitoring the situation and are still in “the first inning” with the understanding that a plan was needed for a return, but factors beyond their control will dictate if that plan can take place. If it does go on and we do get to playoff basketball, the question of what happens if a positive test of a player happens in the middle of a series looms large. Charles Barkley asked exactly that, wondering if a team would need to pull out of the playoffs due to a positive test, with Silver saying he and the league don’t believe that to be the case.

“The answer is we don’t believe we would need to,” Silver said. “We’ve been dealing with a group of our experts plus public health authorities down in Florida now. The view is that if we are testing every day, and we are able to trace in essence the contacts that player has had, we’re able to in essence contain that player and separate him from his team, and we’re continuing to test every day, the belief is we would not have to shut down if a single player tested positive.”

That the league will be doing daily testing of everyone in the bubble is what gives them this opportunity, given most experts say the best way to limit spread is to test and contact trace to understand who is impacted and who needs to be isolated. Still, while Silver says “we would not have to shut down” for a single positive test, that didn’t fully answer the question of if a team would need to, should tracing indicate much of that team has been in contact with the player in question.

All of this is to say, there are still many unknowns and the league is proceeding with the understanding that things are always capable of changing, but the hope is they can move forward even with a positive test.

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Several members of the New Orleans Saints took star quarterback Drew Brees to task this week for comments that failed to display understanding of Colin Kaepernick’s protest of kneeling during the national anthem. From there, a firestorm emerged with LeBron James calling Brees out and FOX Sports personality Shannon Sharpe going as far as to say that Brees “should probably retire” following his comments.

After the initial and deeply negative reaction, Brees offered a public apology and later apologized to his Saints teammates for what he said. On Thursday evening, an interesting wrinkle came to light during TNT’s special edition of Inside The NBA, with Shaquille O’Neal revealing that he was actually present, at least virtually, when Brees addressed the team.

O’Neal, who indicated that he was scheduled to speak to the team on Thursday well before the controversy, went on to describe the events, albeit in limited detail.

“Most of his teammates accepted his apology,” O’Neal said. “They said, ‘Drew, we know your character. We know you stepped in some stuff that you can’t get out of but, guess what, we want you to do more positive things and less talking.’ And they all said ‘we accept your apology.’ I agree with Chuck. He made a mistake.”

Saints running back Alvin Kamara was among a number of players that discussed things with Brees and, since then, Kamara went on to describe his personal experiences with racism on Thursday. While Brees’ apology certainly did not appease everyone or evaporate the negative sentiment toward his initial comments, some statement of contrition was immediately necessary, and in another example, Saints star wide receiver Michael Thomas revealed he accepted Brees’ apology despite disagreeing with his original statement.

It will be interesting to monitor the ongoing sentiment toward Brees, as even the TNT panel was split to some degree, with O’Neal and Charles Barkley on one side and Kenny Smith still channeling a more negative reaction to Brees’ comments. Still, it was quite something to consider that, by apparent coincidence, one of the biggest names in basketball just happened to be within earshot when a prominent football player apologized for a high-profile misstep.

The movie industry is still shut down, and it’s not clear when it will reopen — when, essentially, it’s safe to have cast and crew once again sharing spaces that aren’t six feet apart. But months of quarantine have given talent plenty of time to plot their next move when they can make them. When Ari Aster, acclaimed director of Hereditary and Midsommar, finally gets to a film set, he’s planning on going big.

As caught by /Film, the filmmaker was speaking to the Associated Students Program Board at UC Santa Barbara, during which he dropped a couple details about his next movie. He didn’t say much, but what he said was tantalizing — namely that it will be, in his words, a “nightmare comedy,” or to be slightly more specific am “apocalyptic break-up movie.” Oh, and it will be four hours long.

A couple things. One, Aster may make serious, downer, incredibly upsetting horror movies, but they’re also quite funny, at least if you’re on their mordant wavelength. Granted, not everyone probably thinks the thing that happens with the bear in Midsommar is amusing, but then, not everyone’s going to see a four hour movie. Which brings to point number two: His movies are quite long. Midsommar is exactly as long as Goodfellas, and the director’s cut he made available in some markets later on ran nearly three hours. Truly, if anyone’s going to make the longest comedy since It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World, it might by Ari Aster.

(Via /Film)