The only member of the US rock band to appear on all of its albums, Rossington survived the 1977 plane crash that killed several of his bandmates
Gary Rossington, the Lynyrd Skynyrd guitarist and the last surviving original member of the band, has died at the age of 71.
No cause of death was given for Rossington, who died on Sunday, nearly four months before the band was set to embark on their next tour.
Continue reading...Uruguayan-born Viñoly’s sometimes controversial work included more than 600 structures around world
Rafael Viñoly, the Uruguayan-born and New York-based architect known for designing landmark buildings around the world, has died aged 78.
Viñoly’s death on Thursday was announced by his son, Roman, on the website of the family firm, Rafael Viñoly Architects.
Continue reading...The actor, best known for his tough-guy roles in war and action movies including Black Hawk Down, also had a turbulent private life
Tom Sizemore, the actor best known for appearances in Saving Private Ryan and The Relic, has died aged 61, his manager confirmed in a statement.
“It is with great sadness and sorrow I have to announce that actor Thomas Edward Sizemore … passed away peacefully in his sleep today at St Joseph’s Hospital Burbank. His Brother Paul and twin boys Jayden and Jagger (17) were at his side,” Sizemore’s representative, Charles Lago said.
Continue reading...Files show actor had relationship with Jho Low, on the run over links to 1MDB scandal, and Kim Kardashian was also interviewed
New details have emerged of the actor Leonardo DiCaprio’s ties to Jho Low, the Malaysian financier turned fugitive currently wanted by international authorities over his links to one of the world’s largest corruption scandals.
On Thursday, Bloomberg revealed previously undisclosed details from FBI documents in which authorities interviewed DiCaprio in 2018 about his relationship with Low, who is accused of involvement in a money-laundering scheme of over $4.5bn being siphoned from the Malaysian state investment fund, also known as 1MDB.
Continue reading...The director, whose Oscar-nominated film The Fabelmans depicts the racial abuse he faced in the 60s, said he was very surprised by its current resurgence
Steven Spielberg has spoken out about his impression of the current levels of antisemitism in the US.
Speaking on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Spielberg was asked whether the abuse faced in 1960s California by the young Jewish hero of his new film, autobiographical drama The Fabelmans, was something he recognised today.
Continue reading...Ex-PM criticises sensitivity edit of author’s works – and also rejects sending Parthenon marbles to Greece
Boris Johnson has criticised a publisher’s rewriting of some language in Roald Dahl’s stories by reciting a song by the Oompa-Loompas.
The former prime minister expressed his “irritation at wokeness and political correctness” after Puffin made extensive changes to the author’s work to remove language it deemed offensive.
Continue reading...Official figures show £9,982 was spent per 1,000 people on libraries by central and local government in England, Scotland and Wales last year, down from £11,970 the year before
Spending on libraries in Britain has fallen by 17%, according to new statistics, despite in-person visits increasing by 68% since the pandemic.
Figures released by CIPFA, the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy, show that in 2021/22 £9,982 was spent per 1,000 people on libraries by central and local government in England, Scotland and Wales. This was down from £11,970 in 2020/21 and £12,646 in 2018/19.
Continue reading...The multiverse adventure picked up four major categories, while The White Lotus and Abbott Elementary won big for television
Everything Everywhere All at Once reigned supreme at this year’s Screen Actors Guild awards, winning four major awards and breaking the record for most wins for a single film.
The multiverse fantasy film picked up the night’s biggest award for ensemble in a motion picture, female actor for Michelle Yeoh and both supporting actor awards, for Jamie Lee Curtis and Ke Huy Quan.
Continue reading...Young ‘custodian’ hopes to make ancestral home of Muncaster first carbon-zero castle in UK
In 1990, the year Ewan Frost-Pennington was born, the final bears left Muncaster Castle in the westernmost corner of the Lake District. Winnie, an Asiatic black bear, departed Cumbria for Dudley zoo, along with Inca, her daughter, and her sister, Gretel.
Three decades later, the bear pit has now been covered over with a solar farm. It is the brainchild of Frost-Pennington, the heir to the 800-year-old pink granite fortress, as he tries to make Muncaster the first carbon-zero castle in the UK.
Continue reading...Ever since Beatlemania, UK acts have set their sights across the pond. Now spiralling costs are pulling the plug
“Breaking” America has been the goal of young British musicians since the days of Beatlemania, but that dream is being dashed. Hundreds of emerging artists could be affected by plans to hike visa fees by 250% – and music industry executives have criticised ministers for failing to act.
The US immigration service wants to raise visa costs from $460 (£385) to $1,615 (£1,352) alongside other changes that artists and their managers say would make it almost impossible for anyone but the biggest stars to perform in the US.
Continue reading...Elton John, Hugh Jackman, Dolly Parton, Pink, Sir Barry Gibb and Mariah Carey sent video condolences, which were played to the crowd in Melbourne
A host of international stars and dignitaries paid tribute to the late Australian star Olivia Newton-John in at a state memorial service in Melbourne on Sunday.
Thousands gathered at Hamer Hall and video tributes came from Elton John, Hugh Jackman, Dolly Parton, Pink, Barry Gibb and Mariah Carey.
Continue reading...The Story of Flanders, spanning 38,000 years of the region’s history, is funded by the nationalist government and is accused of stretching the truth
It is blockbuster TV, with Romans and Vikings, knights and Neanderthals, trains and the trenches of the first world war – and a hefty dose of political controversy.
The Story of Flanders, a 10-part history series airing in Belgium’s northern region until March, has been a cultural landmark. But the apparently lavish funding from the region’s government, run by the separatist New Flemish Alliance (N-VA) party, which seeks to make Flanders independent from Belgium, has led to accusations of propaganda.
Continue reading...The designer of the glasshouses at Kew Gardens fell out of favour – but supporters of a new museum hope to change all that
One major name is missing from the line-up of great British architects that students learn have shaped the way that Britain looks. And it is a name with quite a ring to it: Decimus Burton.
Now members of the Decimus Burton Society believe they are about to put that right by establishing this Victorian classical revivalist’s place alongside better known titans such as Christopher Wren, John Nash and Edwin Lutyens. A new museum celebrating his achievements is on the drawing board and awaits approval this spring.
Continue reading...Conversation with Francis Bacon emerges amid the row over updating controversial language in the children’s author’s books
One of Roald Dahl’s best-known characters was the Enormous Crocodile, “a horrid greedy grumptious brute” who “wants to eat something juicy and delicious”.
Now a conversation the author had 40 years ago has come to light, revealing that he was so appalled by the idea that publishers might one day censor his work that he threatened to send the crocodile “to gobble them up”.
Continue reading...Adler defends ‘courageous spaces to air opposing views’ as major sponsor and three Ukrainian writers pull out over comments from other invited authors
The Adelaide Writers’ Week director, Louise Adler, has vowed not to be dissuaded from creating space for “courageous” discussions of literature and opposing views, despite high-profile withdrawals and calls for her resignation.
Three Ukrainian writers and a major financial sponsor have withdrawn from next month’s Adelaide festival event in response to social media comments by two writers appearing at the event, Susan Abulhawa and Mohammed El-Kurd.
Continue reading...Five-yearly data drive to be conducted on 7 March, the same night as the singer’s Auckland show
Harry Styles will have to take part in the 2023 New Zealand census, which aims to capture the country as it was on the same night as his only show in the country.
The census is conducted every five years and requires everyone in the country, including overseas visitors, to take part. This year it happens to be held on the night of the British pop star’s Auckland show on 7 March.
Continue reading...Oscar nominated actor says a woman ‘put her hand on my ass’ after asking for photograph outside theatre where he is performing
The Oscar nominated actor Paul Mescal said he confronted a female fan who groped him outside the theatre where he was performing.
He told ES Magazine that the woman “put her hand on my ass” as he posed for a photograph with her outside the Almeida theatre in north London.
Continue reading...Subversive Slovenian quintet, who performed in North Korea in 2015, to play full concert at Bel Etage Music Hall
Subversive Slovenian industrial rock band Laibach are set to be the first foreign group to perform a full concert in Kyiv since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
The group will play Bel Etage Music Hall on 31 March, under the concert title Eurovision – an arch reference to the fact the Eurovision song contest, won by Ukraine in 2022, will not be hosted in the country this year, but rather Liverpool in the UK.
Continue reading...Using local creatives and actors, director Katie Mitchell’s A Play for the Living in a Time of Extinction is a narrative response to the climate crisis and an experiment in sustainability
Katie Mitchell’s new theatre production will arrive at the Barbican in London in April having already toured internationally without anyone involved getting on a plane or even crossing a border. The show, entitled A Play for the Living in a Time of Extinction, is an experiment in how theatre can be more sustainable. It is staged by a local creative team and features a different performer in each venue it plays.
The idea took shape at Théâtre Vidy-Lausanne in Switzerland, where the British theatre director was due to stage a show. The French choreographer Jérôme Bel had recently announced that he would no longer fly, a decision Mitchell had herself made after working with scientist Stephen Emmott on Ten Billion, staged at the Royal Court in 2012. Mitchell and Bel began discussions with producers at Vidy-Lausanne about sustainable theatre in which, says Mitchell, “the artistic conversations were intersecting with budgeting and systems and structures as well”. The zero-travel rule is just one part of the initiative which is not a set-in-stone model but rather a way to prompt new ways of working on individual productions and within organisations.
Continue reading...Standup comedian played police role in Homicide: Life on the Streets, Law & Order: SVU and other series
Richard Belzer, a stand-up comedian who became one of TV’s most indelible detectives as John Munch in Homicide: Life on the Street and Law & Order: SVU, has died. He was 78.
Belzer died on Sunday at his home in Bozouls in southern France, his longtime friend Bill Scheft told the Hollywood Reporter.
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