Booker prize reveals ‘original and thrilling’ 2023 longlist

Previously nominated authors Sebastian Barry, Tan Twan Eng and Paul Murray join 13-strong field including four debuts
Irish writers, debuts – and groundbreaking sci-fi: the Booker longlist in depth

A longlist of 13 “original and thrilling” books offering “startling portraits of the current” are in contention for the 2023 Booker prize, the UK’s most prestigious literary award.

The longlist features four debut novelists and six others who have been longlisted for the first time, alongside Sebastian Barry, Tan Twan Eng and Paul Murray, who have seven previous Booker nominations between them.

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Mexican city of Chihuahua bans misogynist lyrics in live music venues

Fines of up to £55,000 could be imposed on musicians who sing songs deemed to promote violence against women

Authorities in the north-western Mexican state of Chihuahua have banned artists from singing misogynist lyrics in live music venues.

Chihuahua, the capital city of the state, which borders the US, has passed a measure to prohibit musicians from performing songs that promote violence against women.

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Barbenheimer backlash: Warner Bros apologises after its Japan arm complains

Warner Bros Japan publicly criticised US counterparts over ‘inconsiderate’ reactions to art combining playful Barbie imagery with mushroom clouds

Warner Bros global headquarters has apologised after its Japan office publicly complained that the US-based company was engaging with the “Barbenheimer” movement, which promotes a double bill of the apocalyptic Oppenheimer film and the lighthearted Barbie blockbuster.

There is a growing backlash in Japan against the conflation of Greta Gerwig’s playfully marketed movie with Oppenheimer, a biopic of the scientist behind the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

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Actor Angus Cloud of Euphoria fame dies aged 25

Cloud, who portrayed Fezco ‘Fez’ O’Neill in the HBO teen drama, had recently lost his father

The actor Angus Cloud, best known for his role on HBO’s teen drama Euphoria, has died at age 25, his family confirmed to media on Monday.

Cloud’s publicist, Cait Bailey, said Cloud died Monday at his family home in Oakland, California. No cause of death was given.

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Hidden meaning of Magritte uncovered as new image is found under painting

Secret portrait of woman likely to be wife of Belgian surrealist found during examination of artist’s work

A painting by René Magritte has been discovered beneath another painting by the Belgian surrealist master – to the excitement of experts.

A portrait of a woman had been hidden under La Cinquième Saison (The Fifth Season), from 1943, now held in the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium (RMFAB) in Brussels. She was discovered using infrared reflectography.

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Elon Musk reinstates Kanye West’s Twitter account after ban

Social media platform rebranded as X lifts ban on rapper-producer imposed after swastika tweet

Kanye West’s account on the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, has been reinstated almost eight months after he tweeted an image of a swastika blended with a star of David.

The rapper-producer and designer, legally known as Ye, embarked on a series of antisemitic rants on social media and during interviews towards the end of last year. In October, he tweeted that he would go “death con 3” on Jewish people. His account was subsequently locked but he was soon readmitted.

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Emmys 2023: awards likely postponed to next year due to Hollywood strikes

Vendors have reportedly been told the ceremony will be pushed as studios refuse to meet demands of actors and writers

Fox is expected to announce soon that the Emmy awards will be rescheduled to January next year due to the ongoing writers and actors strikes in Hollywood.

Variety first reported on Thursday that vendors for the ceremony have been informed of an imminent date change, but not given an exact date, while the Los Angeles Times cited an unnamed source familiar with the plans, who said Fox was planning to move the telecast date to January.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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Why English Heritage is encouraging adults to dress up

Research shows our imaginations grow richer with age so the charity is giving grownups a chance to have fun

Parents are used to watching their children eagerly dress up as a knight or a gladiator before going bananas when they visit castles, forts and stately homes.

But English Heritage believes adults will also get more out of visiting their sites if they leave their inhibitions aside and don a Roman toga or medieval chainmail for the day.

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Randy Meisner, a founding member of the Eagles, dies aged 77

The bassist and vocalist, who sang the hit Take It to the Limit, died of complications from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease

Randy Meisner, a founding member of the Eagles, has died at age 77, the band said on Thursday.

Meisner died on Wednesday night in Los Angeles of complications from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, the Eagles said in a statement.

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‘An incredible loss’: Ireland shares memories of Sinéad O’Connor

Shocked by her death, the singer’s compatriots recall her courage, kindness and humour

The memories have come tumbling out. The little girl who played in a Dublin park. The teenager who sat on school steps strumming a guitar. The pop star who leaned out of a record company’s limousine in Washington DC to shout joyous insults at the Pentagon.

Ireland is remembering Sinéad O’Connor – and grasping what it has lost. For some people in Glenageary and Dún Laoghaire – the south Dublin suburbs where the singer grew up – the news of her death still had an air of unreality on Thursday.

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Netflix lists AI job worth $900,000 amid twin Hollywood strikes

Company lists highly paid machine-learning project manager role while actors and executives at odds over future of AI in Hollywood

As actors and writers strike over fair compensation and protections from the encroachment of artificial intelligence, Netflix has listed a position for a machine learning product manager that will compensate somewhere between $300,000 and $900,000 a year. According to the Screen Actors Guild (Sag-Aftra), 87% of the guild’s actors make less than $26,000 per year.

The use of AI in the production of film and television – either to write scripts, generate actors’ likenesses, or cut corners in paying creative work, has been a major point of contention in negotiations between the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) and Sag and the Writers Guild of America (WGA). Writers have been striking since May; the actors joined earlier this month. The first joint strike since 1960 threatens to bring Hollywood to a complete standstill.

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Malaysian musicians prepare lawsuit against the 1975 over festival cancellation

Authorities cancelled the Good Vibes festival after frontman Matty Healy criticised the country’s anti-LGBTQ+ laws, leading musicians and food vendors to seek damages

A group of Malaysian musicians and festival vendors are preparing a class action lawsuit against the 1975 after frontman Matty Healy’s onstage criticism of the government’s anti-LGBTQ+ at the Good Vibes festival saw the entire event cancelled.

On Friday, Healy paused the band’s set at the Kuala Lumpur event to admit that he hadn’t looked into the country’s punitive LGBTQ+ laws before agreeing to perform there. “I don’t see the fucking point, right, I do not see the point of inviting the 1975 to a country and then telling us who we can have sex with,” he said.

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Michael K Williams: drug dealer in overdose death of Wire actor sentenced to 30 months in prison

Williams’ nephew and The Wire creator David Simon spoke on behalf of Carlos Macci, 72, who pleaded guilty to conspiring to possessing and distributing narcotics

A 72-year-old man linked to a crew of drug dealers blamed in the fentanyl-laced heroin death of The Wire actor Michael K Williams has been sentenced to more than two years in prison at a proceeding in which the actor’s nephew recommended compassion for the defendant.

Carlos Macci was sentenced to 30 months in prison by US district judge Ronnie Abrams, who told Macci that selling heroin and fentanyl “not only cost Mr Williams his life, but it’s costing your freedom” – in part because he did not stop selling drugs after Williams died.

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Venice film festival picks starry films despite actors’ strike

Hollywood films vying for Golden Lion include Bradley Cooper’s Maestro and Yorgos Lanthimos’s Poor Things, with non-competition films by Wes Anderson and Richard Linklater

The Venice film festival appears to have largely shrugged off issues caused by non-attendance of Hollywood actors due to the Sag-Aftra strike as it unveiled its lineup for its 2023 edition.

Venice has traditionally functioned partly as a platform for major American releases looking for strong positioning in the autumn awards season, and it has already seen its originally announced opening film Challengers, a tennis drama starring Zendaya, drop out after it was forced to delay its release date.

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Malaysia’s gay community fears backlash after Matty Healy’s outburst

The 1975 singer’s onstage condemnation of homophobic laws has angered conservatives and left some LGBTQ+ people uneasy

The 1975 frontman Matty Healy’s recent appearance at a festival in Kuala Lumpur – where he criticised Malaysia’s homophobic laws and kissed a male bandmate on stage – has strongly angered conservatives in the country.

Members of the LGBTQ+ community have also expressed unease over his actions, fearing that the episode risks further exacerbating the hostilities they face.

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‘The Barbenheimer effect’: Barbie and Oppenheimer smash Australian box office records

Both blockbusters broke a variety of opening weekend records, in a double feature that’s enticing film lovers back to cinemas

The “Barbenheimer” effect has taken its hold over the Australian box office, with the release of blockbuster movies Barbie and Oppenheimer breaking a slew of local cinema records across their first weekend.

The Greta Gerwig-directed Barbie movie has made $21.5m at the box office since the film opened on Wednesday night. It was the biggest opening weekend for a movie released in Australia in 2023, more than double the nearest rival, The Super Mario Bros Movie, which collected $10.5m in ticket sales.

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LGBTQ+ military charity backs proposal for Alan Turing statue on fourth plinth

Trafalgar Square monument would stand in ‘stark contrast’ to treatment codebreaker received in his lifetime

An LGBTQ+ armed forces charity has backed proposals to erect a statue of the second world war codebreaker Alan Turing on Trafalgar Square’s fourth plinth – a high-profile platform for contemporary art commissions.

The defence secretary, Ben Wallace, originally made the suggestion in the House of Commons last week in response to an independent review into the service and experience of LGBTQ+ veterans who served under the pre-2000 ban on homosexuality in the armed forces.

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Greta Gerwig makes history as Barbie has biggest opening weekend for film directed by a woman

Barbie made $377m while Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer took home $174m, making ‘Barbenheimer’ biggest box office weekend of 2023 so far

Greta Gerwig has made history as Barbie scored a US$377m (£293m, A$560m) opening weekend around the world, making it the biggest debut ever for a film directed by a woman.

At the North American box office – combining the US and Canada – Barbie claimed top spot with a massive $155m in ticket sales from 4,243 locations, surpassing The Super Mario Bros Movie and every Marvel film released this year to become the biggest opening of the year.

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Barbie release delayed in Pakistan’s Punjab province over ‘objectionable content’

Film being reviewed to ensure it is not violating the country’s social, cultural and religious values

The launch of the highly anticipated Hollywood movie Barbie has been delayed in Pakistan’s Punjab province over “objectionable content”.

Officials said the film would be reviewed and needed clearance from the provincial boards that censor scenes violating the country’s social, cultural and religious values.

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‘Bargaining for our very existence’: why the battle over AI is being fought in Hollywood

The ramifications of artificial intelligence are of concern to the actors and writers on strike – from big stars to bit players

To get her start in Hollywood, Chivonne Michelle studied acting at New York University. But what helped her break into the industry and gave her the key training she needed was working on set as a background actor.

Today, the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) technology threatens to put those “entry level and working class” Hollywood jobs at risk, Michelle and other striking actors say.

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