Tourist and creative industries react angrily to ‘curb on freedom of expression’
Greek music in hotel lobbies, Greek tunes in lifts, Greek melodies in casinos, shopping malls, airport lounges and ports.
If the Athens culture ministry has its way, tourists from around the world should prepare for a holiday soundtrack that is decidedly Hellenic in tone.
Continue reading...Christopher Dorsey, 43 accused of performing alongside other rappers without obtaining permission from authorities
About two months into his supervised release from federal prison on gun charges, the rapper who scored a hit song with Bling Bling has been charged with violating the terms of his supervision after performing alongside other prominent entertainers without authorities’ permission.
A federal judge ordered Christopher Dorsey – or BG, who once belonged to Cash Money Records’ rap supergroup the Hot Boys – released on his own recognizance on Wednesday after his arrest on the charges, records show.
Continue reading...Tailor-made suits, live music and – of course – a scooter run are expected at this weekend’s celebration
Hundreds of vintage fanatics, dressed in tailor-made suits and berets, are expected to descend on London this weekend for a three-day event celebrating mod subculture.
Modstock, launched 30 years ago by a British vintage fanatic, Rob Bailey, and his organisation New Untouchables, returns for its fourth edition.
Continue reading...Singer posts on Instagram she resents ‘lies being told about me for clout and views’ and implies she is quitting music industry
The Emmy and Grammy award-winning performer Lizzo seems to have announced her departure from entertainment via a post on her Instagram that ended with: “I QUIT.”
“I’m getting tired of putting up with being dragged by everyone in my life and on the internet,” the singer and flautist wrote. “All I want is to make music and make people happy and help the world be a little better than how I found it. But I’m starting to feel like the world doesn’t want me in it.”
Continue reading...The former Years and Years singer and star of It’s a Sin signed a joint response affirming a stance against ‘all forms of hate, including antisemitism and Islamophobia’
Britain’s Eurovision competitor Olly Alexander and several other entrants have rejected calls to boycott this year’s Eurovision song contest owing to its inclusion of Israel among the competitors, stating their belief in “the unifying power of music, enabling people to transcend differences and foster meaningful conversations and connections”.
Maxine Peake and the author Sarah Schulman were among a list of more than 450 queer artists, individuals and organisations who signed an open letter as Queers for Palestine calling on Alexander – the former Years and Years singer and star of Channel 4’s It’s a Sin – to pull out of the contest in solidarity with Palestine.
Continue reading...Maxine Peake and Sarah Schulman among signatories of open letter asking singer to withdraw from contest
More than 450 queer artists, individuals and organisations have called on the UK’s Eurovision contestant, Olly Alexander, to boycott this year’s competition in solidarity with Palestine.
The actor Maxine Peake and the novelist and playwright Sarah Schulman are among the signatories of the open letter calling on the singer to withdraw from the contest in May due to the conflict in Gaza.
Continue reading...Les Jeux Olympiques: Miroir des Sociétés opens ahead of Paris Olympics and puts previous games in context of conflicts and injustices
From the Nazi stadium propaganda in 1936 Berlin to the 1968 Mexico City podium protest of medal-winners Tommie Smith and John Carlos, who were expelled from the competition after raising their gloved fists in a Black Power salute against racial injustice, the Olympic Games have held a mirror up to some of the darkest moments of 20th-century history.
Now, as the Paris Olympics prepares to open this summer against a backdrop of war from Ukraine to the Middle East – with Emmanuel Macron saying Russia will be asked to observe a ceasefire in Ukraine during the Games – a new exhibition in Paris takes an unflinching look at the social and geopolitical impact of the Games over the last century.
Continue reading...More than half of the borrowed words relate to cooking, while Kintsugi, the increasingly popular art of repairing broken pottery with gold lacquer is also included
Katsu, donburi and onigiri are among 23 Japanese words added to the Oxford English Dictionary in its latest update.
More than half of the borrowed words relate to food or cooking. Santoku, a knife with a short, flat blade that curves down at the tip, and okonomiyaki, a type of savoury pancake, were both added. Okonomiyaki is derived from okonomi, meaning “what you like”, combined with yaki, meaning “to fry, to sear”.
Continue reading...Sex-trafficking investigation comes amid multiple lawsuits including singer Cassie accusing him of rape and physical abuse
The rapper and mogul Sean Combs is facing mounting legal troubles after federal agents searched his properties in Los Angeles and Miami as part of a sex-trafficking investigation.
On Monday morning, US Department of Homeland Security agents in tactical gear and armored vehicles raided two of Combs’ mansions as part of an investigation by federal authorities in New York, sources told the Associated Press.
Continue reading...Footage of green-fingered BBC presenter obscured from waist down to hide ‘symbol of US imperialism’
His calm demeanour and wholesome vocation have apparently endeared him to one of the most authoritarian regimes in the world. But there is something about Alan Titchmarsh that North Korea’s censors can’t quite forgive – his jeans.
The green-fingered broadcaster and author of raunchy novels has been a fixture on state television since 2022, albeit with the addition of a blurred effect from the waist down.
Continue reading...While the musician faces several lawsuits alleging sexual assault, it was not clear if he was the target of the investigation
The Department of Homeland Security confirmed on Monday that agents have raided properties in Los Angeles, Miami and New York that local news outlets have reported are tied to rapper and mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs.
NBC News and local stations in Los Angeles and Miami first reported the activity at Combs’s properties on Monday. Federal Homeland Security Investigations agents and other law enforcement were conducting searches of the properties as part of a sex trafficking investigation by federal authorities in New York, two law enforcement officials told the Associated Press.
Continue reading...Imogen Wade’s The Time I Was Mugged in New York City impresses judges for ‘lyricism in the account of an abduction’
• Scroll down to read the winning poem
A poem inspired by the author’s experience of being mugged has won the first prize of £5,000 in the National Poetry Competition.
The Time I Was Mugged in New York City by Imogen Wade tells the story of being locked in a van at JFK airport by a man dressed in black, driven to Grand Central station and made to give the man money.
Continue reading...Painter and storyteller, who revived father’s picture-book series about elephant king, said he didn’t consciously write for young people
Babar author Laurent de Brunhoff, who revived his father’s popular picture-book series about an elephant-king and presided over its rise to a global multimedia franchise, has died at the age of 98.
De Brunhoff, who was from Paris and moved to the US in the 1980s, died on Friday at his home in Key West, Florida, after being in hospice care for two weeks, according to his widow, Phyllis Rose.
Continue reading...Immersive tour at Musée d’Orsay takes visitors back to 15 April 1874 – the moment that marked the movement’s birth
In a lush red-and-gold carpeted photographer’s studio in northern Paris, Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Edgar Degas are adding the final touches to the hanging of their paintings, while fellow artists Berthe Morisot and Camille Pissarro lament the lack of recognition for their work and Claude Monet bemoans being mistaken for Édouard Manet.
Outside, Parisian gentlemen in top hats and ladies in bustles are admiring the newly completed Opera House or enjoying an early evening drink on the café terraces while horse-drawn carriages clatter down Baron Haussmann’s new grands boulevards.
Continue reading...Eight-episode series based on Liu Cixin novels triggers accusations of ‘Americanisation’ of a Chinese story
Netflix’s big-budget adaptation of Three-Body Problem, a series of novels by the Chinese author Liu Cixin, has divided opinion on Chinese social media.
The eight-episode series, 3 Body Problem, was released in full on Netflix on Thursday. It is based on the first book in Liu’s trilogy, an ambitious sci-fi series spanning civilisation from the 1960s to the end of humanity.
Continue reading...Character actor, who appeared in more than 220 roles across seven decades, died in Vermont on Tuesday
M Emmet Walsh, the character actor who appeared in more than 220 film and television roles including Blade Runner, Knives Out and the Coen brothers’ films Blood Simple and Raising Arizona, has died aged 88.
Walsh’s manager, Sandy Joseph, confirmed to the industry publication Variety that he had died Tuesday in Vermont.
Continue reading...Eight known components of artwork were housed in five different museums in Europe and the US before being reunited in Milan
Eight surviving panels of Piero della Francesca’s Augustinian altarpiece have been reassembled after 450 years, possibly solving one of its enduring mysteries.
The celebrated polyptych was created by the early Italian Renaissance master specifically for the church of the Augustinians at Borgo San Sepolcro (now Sansepolcro) in his home town near Arezzo and comprised 30 panels, the majority of which have gone missing.
Continue reading...Joe Penhall’s new play marks the talkshow host’s first theatre role since One Man, Two Guvnors and will see him star opposite Anna Maxwell Martin at the Old Vic
James Corden is to return to the London stage for his first role since the National Theatre’s blockbuster farce One Man, Two Guvnors.
The star, who last year left his US late-night talkshow after eight years, will appear in a new political drama by Joe Penhall. The Constituent, at the Old Vic theatre, is set in an MP’s constituency office. Corden will play “an ex-serviceman with a life in freefall” while Anna Maxwell Martin (Motherland, Line of Duty) is an opposition backbencher whose ideals of public office are tested by his demands. Zachary Hart completes the cast as a parliamentary protection officer. The play will be directed by the Old Vic’s artistic director, Matthew Warchus, and is said to explore “the conflict between public service and personal safety”.
Continue reading...Grace Jabbari lawsuit also accuses Marvel actor of intentional infliction of emotional distress, battery and malicious prosecution
Jonathan Majors’s former girlfriend has filed a lawsuit accusing the Creed III and Marvel actor of battery, assault, intentional infliction of emotional distress, malicious prosecution and defamation.
Majors, 34, in December was found guilty of misdemeanor charges of assault and harassment in connection to a March 2023 altercation with his then girlfriend, the actor and dancer Grace Jabbari. Sentencing for the criminal case is set for 8 April.
Continue reading...BBFC survey finds sexual violence remains biggest area of concern while views on some drug use have eased
The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) has introduced stricter guidelines for sex scenes and nudity in 12 and 12A productions, saying the public are concerned about the amount of explicit content to which young people are being exposed.
In the BBFC’s first major audience research for five years, sexual violence remained the biggest area of concern.
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