Entertainment

It’s a dream come true for Star Trek fans: The cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation is back in the saddle one last time in the new and final season of Star Trek: Picard on Paramount+. But is it truly the final frontier?

“The response has been dangerously encouraging,” says Jonathan Frakes, who plays Capt. William Riker, longtime#1 to Adm. Jean-Luc Picard. He tells ABC Audio for now he’s just savoring the moment with his castmates. “We love each other, and we know how to play with each other, and we have a good story to tell.”

Just don’t expect those feel-good vibes to move on-screen between Frakes and Patrick Stewart, who suits up once again as the title character. The good admiral and his former first officer’s friendship is put to the test this outing.

“We’ve all fallen out with people,” Stewart explains to ABC Audio. “We’ve all said things that we regret afterwards. And there’s no reason why Jean-Luc Picard shouldn’t say them because he’s human. And this is one of the best aspects of Picard for me, that he becomes increasingly human.”

Other returning cast members include LeVar Burton as Chief Engineer Geordi La Forge, a role he originated back in 1987 when Star Trek: The Next Generation debuted.

Thirty-six years ago, the original Star Trek was at one of its high points thanks to a successful run of films, so the pressure on this crew of newcomers was enormous.

“Now, we are in a position to shepherd in the next generation of storytelling,” Burton says. “Who gets to do that? You know? We’re pretty lucky.” 

Episodes of Picard season 3 are now streaming on Paramount+.

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On Thursday’s installment of Live with Kelly and Ryan, Ryan Seacrest made the surprising announcement that he was leaving the show he’s co-hosted since 2017. He will “pass the baton” to frequent guest host, and Kelly Ripa‘s real-life husband, Riverdale actor Mark Consuelos.

Calling the news “bittersweet,” Seacrest said the “tough, tough decision” was “something that [Kelly] and I have been talking about for a long time…”

He continued, “What I plan to do is once American Idol starts from Los Angeles later this spring, I’ll head out to the West Coast and host that show,” adding he’ll return to fill in as a guest host on occasion.

Seacrest noted, “Working alongside Kelly over the past six years has been a dream job and one of the highlights of my career. She has been an amazing partner, friend, and confidant, and although we will always be a part of each other’s lives, I will miss our mornings together.”

Saying he and the crew have “made memories to last a lifetime,” Ryan added, “I’m excited to pass the baton to Kelly’s ‘real’ husband, Mark.”

Consuelos has been married to Ripa since 1996, and they have three children: 19-year-old Joaquin, Lola, 21, and Michael, 25. Mark, who previously worked with Kelly on All My Children, often fills in for Seacrest on the morning show.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

Regina Hall‘s 2023 is off to an exciting start. 

The actress and producer kicked off the year by unexpectedly going viral after she accepted an award on Kevin Costner‘s behalf at the Golden Globes last month. She struggled to maintain a straight face as she laughed her way through the script, which explained Costner’s absence was due to the California storms.

The moment made headlines and when speaking with ABC Audio while promoting her new partnership with Jameson Irish Whiskey, Hall admitted the response surprised her, saying she “just had a live reaction reading the teleprompter.”

“Sometimes things that people write are funny, you know, And you just. Yeah,” she explained. “You’re in the moment, but it was a good night.” 

Also coming up for Hall, is the highly anticipated sequel to the 2017 comedy Girls Trip. Last month writer/director Tracy Oliver shared hopes of setting the new film in Ghana. So what other details can Hall share?

“You know what? It’s not even I can’t say much. I will be honest. There’s just I don’t know that we necessarily at this point… I mean, I do know but we don’t necessarily know the details,” she says. “I read about Ghana the next day like everyone else, and I was like, ‘Oh, okay.'” 

Hall, who starred alongside Queen Latifah, Jada Pinkett Smith, and Tiffany Haddish in the film, added, “But I will say this. We’re excited to reunite.”

“I think it’s really important for us to make sure that it’s something that the fans will be really excited about,” she continued. “But I wish I had more details. I mean, I know it’s all of us. I guess that’s a detail. And I heard we’re going to Ghana.”

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

Better Call Saul‘s Bob Odenkirk is returning to AMC in the drama series Lucky Hank, which debuted its first full-length trailer on Wednesday. The series, from the executive producers of Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, stars Odenkirk as “an English department chairman at an underfunded college” who “toes the line between midlife crisis and full-blown meltdown, navigating the offbeat chaos in his personal and professional life – oddly proving tantrums get better with age,” according to AMC. Lucky Hank — also starring Hanna‘s Mireille Enos, Sara Amini, Diedrich Bader, Suzanne Cryer, Olivia Scott Welch and Cedric Yarbrough — premieres March 19… (Trailer contains uncensored profanity.)

A live-action adaptation of How to Train Your Dragon — from Dean DeBlois, who wrote and directed the animated trilogy — will fly into theaters in 2025, according to Variety. The fantasy series — which includes 2010’s How to Train Your Dragon, 2014’s How to Train Your Dragon 2 and 2019’s How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World — has grossed more than $1.6 billion worldwide and spawned the TV series DreamWorks Dragons, Rescue Riders and The Nine Realms, as well as theme park rides and the live show, How to Train Your Dragon on Ice…

Comedy Central released a first-look trailer and announced the guest lineup for Andy Samberg‘s adult animated series Digman! on Wednesday. Maya Rudolph, Jason Schwartzman, Daniel Radcliffe and Kyle Mooney are among the stars who will appear, in addition to the previously announced cast, which includes Melissa Fumero, Tim Meadows and Tim Robinson. Digman! — the first series written and produced by the Saturday Night Live alum, who also voices the titular character — is “set in a world where archaeologists are massive celebrities and the coolest people on the planet,” per the cable channel. Digman! launches March 22… (Trailer contains censored profanity.)

The SAG Awards on Wednesday announced the first round of presenters for the 29th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards. Andrew Garfield will be presenting this year’s SAG Life Achievement award to Sally Field. Additional presenters include Jessica Chastain — who is also a nominee for her performance in George & Tammy — Emily Blunt, Don Cheadle, Stranger Things‘ Caleb McLaughlin, Paul Mescal, Emily in Paris‘ Ashley Park. More presenters will be announced in the coming week. The SAG Awards will be broadcast live on Netflix’s YouTube channel Sunday, February 26 at 8 p.m. ET from the Fairmont Century Plaza in Los Angeles…

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

Harlem is back!

Season 2 of the comedy series is in full swing, with episodes airing weekly on Prime Video. It’s been over a year since viewers last saw ambitious gal pals Camille, Tye, Quinn and Angie — played by Meagan Good, Jerrie Johnson, and Grace Byers, respectively. So what’s everyone up to now?

“Well, we can say that the show picks up exactly where we left off. So we don’t, you know, fly over that moment and go a year later. It’s like we’re right in the moment of the shenanigans,” Good tells ABC Audio.

While the first season was about establishing the characters, the actress shares that in season 2 “we get to really see them live life.”

“Not always in the perfect way. Sometimes in a very messy way,” she continues. “And we get to see their failures and their triumphs and the things that they experience in life that we all experience that for some reason often aren’t depicted on television or movies or they’re just touched upon, but not really gone into.”

Good adds, “And then there’s also just a lot of crazy and amazingness and messiness, but goodness and heart, too.”

In addition to exploring the characters deeper, this season introduces some familiar faces as guest stars, including Lil Rel Howery, Sherri Shepherd, and more. As for other stars the cast would love to make an appearance on the show, that list includes some pretty A-list names.

Johnson’s pick — Angela Bassett. “Angela [can] play my mother so we can be face to face,” she said.

For Good, she’d love to see Halle Berry make an appearance, “I want Halle to play my big sister.”

Catch up the first four episodes of Harlem season two on Prime Video now, with new episodes released on Fridays. 

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Just in time for Valentine’s Day week, Cara Delevingne wants to take you on an intimate journey with her new six-part Hulu docuseries Planet Sex.

The series explores a lot of subjects — from sexuality to gender roles to monogamy, to name a few — and Delevingne tells ABC Audio that people will be able to identify with a lot of people in the show.

“I think the conversation around sex and gender and sexuality is really hard,” she tells ABC Audio. “…I think there wasn’t enough representation for a lot of people’s stories and what they go through.”

Although the 30-year-old actress — who identifies as bisexual and pansexual — portrays herself as a confident woman, she’s experienced a lot of shame surrounding her own sexuality and expressed that you can have shame and be confident.

“I’m good at putting on a face and I’m good at smiling when I feel like dying…but…You never know how someone feels deep inside,” she shares. “That’s also what the show, I hope teaches people is that deep down, someone may…seem happy and everything’s fine. And actually they’re really suffering.”

What Delevingne hopes people take away from the series is “that it’s okay…to explore constantly…the more we can communicate the way we feel, the less we are likely to struggle alone.”

There’s a lot to learn from the series, which even taught Delevingne a few things: “[T]here is so much that we are still lacking in terms of how people discriminate others and what beauty is to people,” she adds. “I didn’t realize that the more that you see people from around the world, the more that you see people who don’t look like you, the more that you find things beautiful, which is interesting.”

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A new teaser for the live-action film The Little Mermaid is here.

On Wednesday, Walt Disney Studios released the new look at the highly anticipated film starring Halle Bailey, who transforms into Ariel.

“Just 100 days until it arrives in theaters!” the announcement read.

In September 2022, Bailey told Good Morning America at the D23 Expo in Anaheim, California, that the upcoming film is a “twist on Ariel’s strength and powerfulness.”

“She’s just so strong in this film and I’m so grateful to play her,” she added.

Bailey, one half of the singing group Chloe X Halle, was cast in the role in July 2019.

Also starring alongside Bailey in the Rob Marshall-directed film is Javier Bardem as King Triton, Jacob Tremblay as Flounder, Jonah Hauer-King as Prince Eric, Melissa McCarthy as Ursula, Daveed Diggs as Sebastian and Awkwafina as Scuttle.

The Little Mermaid premieres in theaters on May 26.

Disney is the parent company of ABC News.

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Not even a month after the show premiered, Peacock has given the green light to Rian Johnson’s stylish, star-packed mystery series Poker Face. 

The show centers on Natasha Lyonne’s Charlie Cale, who is blessed — or possibly cursed — with the ability to tell if someone is lying. Her skills take her on the road, where she finds colorful characters and untangles strange crimes. 

The show premiered on January 26 and this season features a who’s who of Hollywood in guest roles, from Oscar winner Adrien Brody, and Academy Award nominees Nick Nolte and Everything Everywhere‘s Stephanie Hsu to Tony winners Cherry Jones and Judith Light, and comedian and Free Guy actor Lil Rel Howery.

Thursday, February 16, will see the eighth episode drop on the streaming service; it was directed and co-written by Lyonne.

Poker Face‘s creator, Knives Out Oscar nominee Rian Johnson, explains the appeal of Lyonne’s character and the show: “It has that kind of world-wise sort of little edge … Charlie Cale’s a character that really likes people, that genuinely has kind of like an openness and a sunniness to her. And I think the combination of those two things, it’s a little chocolate and peanut butter. I think they go together and it creates this character that I want to just keep watching.”  

Peacock has renewed a slate of original shows this year, including Pitch Perfect: Bumper in Berlin, Bel-Air, Killing It, Dr. Death, We Are Lady Parts and Wolf Like Me.

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Anticipation was already high for Michael B. Jordan‘s return to the Creed franchise, this time as a director, but if fans were somehow not already hyped enough for Creed III, the final trailer should do the trick.

“There’s no enemy like the past,” title cards read during the extended look at the film, which sees Jordan’s Adonis Creed stepping back into the ring after three years away, in order to face Jonathan Major‘s Damian, who vows to “take it all” from the champ.

“He’s not gonna stop,” Creed tells his love, Tessa Thompson‘s Bianca.

“Then you make him,” she replies.

The new trailer delves deeper into their rivalry: Damian was locked up while Adonis thrived, and with the former out of jail and looking for revenge, Creed must risk it all to keep his legacy, and himself, alive.

The sneak peek also showcases another Rocky franchise staple: training montages. Both actors are in absolutely insane shape for their face-off, with Creed towing a private plane and Majors devastating lesser competitors in the ring.

The fighters go toe-to-toe March 3, in both theaters and IMAX, with the large format’s detail allowing Jordan to make fans feel every bone-crunching punch, as well as showcasing stunning visuals that prove Jordan was taking notes from some of the great directors he’s worked with as a leading man.

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Raquel Welch, actress and pinup starlet, has died, ABC News has confirmed. According to a rep, “The legendary bombshell actress of film, television and stage, passed away peacefully early this morning after a brief illness.”

She was 82.

Born Jo Raquel Tejada in Chicago in 1940, Welch was a beauty pageant winner in her youth, before stepping in front of the camera to briefly work as a weather person at a San Diego TV station.

Her big break came in the form of three lines of dialogue — but particularly a fur bikini — in the 1966 campy film One Million Years B.C. Welch also appeared that year in the science fiction film Fantastic Voyage.

The early films cemented her role as a sex symbol, a reputation she often poked fun at, including in the title of her 2010 memoir, Raquel: Beyond the Cleavage.

For 1975’s The Three Musketeers, Welch appeared opposite Faye Dunaway and Charlton Heston, snagging a Golden Globe for Best Actress in the film comedy category. She’d be nominated again in the drama category for the 1987 movie Right to Die.

Welch received her Hollywood Walk of Fame star in 1996.

In 1997, Welch came to a new audience while appearing in the penultimate season finale of Seinfeld. Playing a diva version of herself in the installment called “The Summer of George,” Welch poked fun at her persona, physically taking on Michael Richards‘ Kramer and later Julia Louis-Dreyfus‘ Elaine after her character was fired from the fictitious Tony-winning play Scarsdale Surprise.

In 2001, she had supporting roles on the big screen in the hit Legally Blonde and the indie film Tortilla Soup.

Married four times, Welch leaves behind two children, son Damon Welch and daughter Tahnee Welch.

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