Entertainment

The U.S. Attorney’s Office in New York announced on Wednesday that four men have bee arrested on federal charges in connection with the overdose death of actor Michael K. Williams on September 6, 2021.

Irvin Cartagena, 39, is accused of selling heroin laced with fentanyl to the Boardwalk Empire and The Wire star on September 5, the day before Williams was found dead in his Brooklyn apartment. Hector Robles, 57, Luis Cruz, 56, and Carlos Macci, 70, were also arrested on a charges of conspiracy to distribute heroin and fentanyl.

Williams, a five-time Emmy nominee, died from a lethal combination of several drugs, including heroin and cocaine. He was 54.

In other news, two of the stars of the 2017 film Girls Trip are reuniting on television. Jada Pinkett Smith will be featured on an upcoming episode of The Equalizer starring Queen Latifah, according to Deadline.

Smith will guest star as Jessie Cook, an expert thief with a photographic memory. Cook and Robyn McCall, portrayed by Latifah, previously worked together on a mission for the CIA. Jada, who recently reprised her role as Niobe in The Matrix Resurrections, also appeared with the rapper/actress in the 1996 movie Set It Off, co-starring Vivica A. Fox and Kimberly Elise.

Finally, Jennifer Lopez, H.E.R., Kerry Washington, Janelle Monáe, Shonda Rhimes, Lin-Manuel Miranda and basketball stars Steph Curry and Chris Paul have joined Michelle Obama‘s When We All Vote campaign to change the culture around voting and increase participation in every election.

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If you’re a male of a certain age, it’s likely you had that iconic poster of Farrah Fawcett on your wall — it sold 12 million of copies, after all.  Now you can relive those days in digital form. 

The Farrah Fawcett Foundation announced Wednesday it would be releasing a limited edition of the famous snap, which captured the Charlie’s Angels bombshell in a red bathing suit, smiling and crowned with her famously feathered locks.

“Proceeds will be used to further the Foundation’s mission to support HPV-related cancer research, prevention and awareness,” noted the non-profit in the announcement, which dropped on what would have been Farrah’s 75th birthday.

Fawcett was diagnosed with anal cancer in September 2006.  The disease spread to her liver, eventually ending her life at age 62 in 2009. 

“Farrah and this image are globally recognized icons in the world of celebrity,” noted Peter Klamka, CEO of MORE Management, LLC, which is producing the NFTs. “We are beyond grateful to be part of preserving this image forever on a blockchain and bringing an entirely new audience to the NFT community,” he continued.

If you no longer have the poster but still have your paper route money saved from back in the day, the auction begins in April. 

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(NOTE CONTENT) With the Super Bowl less than two weeks away, advertisers have been teasing their pricey ads that will air during the Big Game, and Gwyneth Paltrow is in the mix with a commercial for Uber Eats. 

The short is, literally, in questionable taste: Paltrow pokes fun at herself by taking a bite of that candle she sells as part of her Goop lifestyle brand — you know, the one that’s supposed to smell like the Oscar winner’s most intimate place. 

In the spot, a teaser of which just dropped, Paltrow contemplates the taste of the allegedly vaginal votive, and muses, “This candle tastes funny. Not bad, but funny.”

The ad is one of a series that shows people they can use Uber Eats to have other things delivered than just stuff to eat.

Another commercial has Two Broke Girls and Legally Blonde star Jennifer Coolidge biting into lipstick that an Uber Eats driver just dropped off. “Tastes like purple!” she declares, before chomping into the bristles of a make-up brush and exclaiming, “I love this!”

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AT&T is celebrating Black history through its Dream in Black initiative’s signature program, Black Future Makers, honoring ​John Legend, Kirk Franklin, Meagan Good and others who are shaping culture, advocating for equity, and creating pathways for the next generation of Black achievers. 

The Black Future Makers Contest is offering a chance to win $10,000. For a chance to win, consumers can post a video or photo on social media highlighting how they are a black future maker, accompanied by @ATT, #DreamInBlack and #ATTContest.

In other news, McDonald’s has partnered with Keke Palmer to launch its Future 22 campaign recognizing 22 young, gifted and Black leaders whose passion and talent are creating meaningful change in communities across the country. The Emmy and NAACP Image Award winner is narrating Future 22 TV and radio spots.

“I am thrilled to work with McDonald’s to honor these heroic young people who are doing extraordinary things in their communities,” Palmer says in a statement. “They are standing on the shoulders of the giants who stood before them to chart dynamic, new paths and I am excited to let the world know about them and their causes.”

Finally, President Joe Biden kicked off the annual celebration of Black history on Monday by signing a Statement of Proclamation on National Black History Month, 2022.

“As we celebrate National Black History Month, let us all recommit ourselves to reach for that founding promise. Let us continue to fight for the equity, opportunity, and dignity to which every Black American is due in equal measure,” the President writes. “Let us carry forward the work to build an America that is, in the beautiful words of the poet Amanda Gorman, ‘Bruised, but whole — benevolent, but bold, fierce, and free.'”

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Today, a new episode of Wild Things: Siegfried & Roy dropped on Apple Podcasts. The series takes a deep dive into the titular tiger handlers, and what happened before and after a 2003 performance in which a 400-pound white tiger mauled and nearly killed Roy Horn.

The attack ended the pair’s reign as the kings of Las Vegas, but as the podcast shows, the investigation into the incident was possibly even more bizarre than the mishap — with theories ranging from a tragic accident to attempted murder. 

“I think they were the most hyperbolic magicians in history, right? I mean, magic and illusions are all predicated on spectacle, but the two of them took it to another level,” Wild Things‘ executive producer Steven Leckart tells ABC Audio. “To look at just their personas, the way that they dress, the music, the scale of the show, we’ve never really seen anything like that, and I’d argue we’ll never see anything like it again.”

With interviews from those who worked with the pair, and those who investigated the incident, the podcasters sought to “weave between not just the tragedy, but also just their rise and how meteoric it was,” Leckart says. “That was the goal of the series, to kind of intercut between the two and not just reduce them to a tragedy.”

A new episode of At Will Media’s Wild Things: Siegfried & Roy drops every Wednesday until its finale, February 23. “It’s about to get more wild,” Leckart teases. “Every week is going to get crazier and crazier…the deeper you go in the story and the closer you look at everything, it just became crazier and weirder and wilder and shocking, so tune in.”

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(NOTE CONTENT) EGOT-winner Rita Moreno looked back at her “tempestuous sexual” relationship with another acting legend, the late Marlon Brando, during a new installment of Variety‘s Actors on Actors series. 

Their coupling was so intense, in fact, the West Side Story actress revealed to Jessica Chastain that Moreno revealed she tried to kill herself. 

“I tried to end my life with pills in his house,” Moreno explained, noting, “I didn’t understand that if I was going to kill this pathetic, sad, trod-upon Rita, the rest of Rita was also going to go with me. I really didn’t seem to understand that.”

Moreno, now 90, met Brando on the set of the 1954 film Désirée, when she was 22 — and the sparks flew. “Ultimately, it was exciting to be with Marlon,” she recalled, “Oh, my God, it was exciting.”

Moreno added, “He was extraordinary in many, many ways, but he was a bad guy,” explaining, “He was a bad guy when it came to women. I was such a different person then. I had all the makings of a doormat.”

Moreno explained how Brando lied to her throughout their eight-year relationship, but he wasn’t fooling anybody. “He was afraid of me,” she explained. “I could read him like a book and that’s why he loved me, and that’s why he mistreated me in so many ways.”

Brando passed away in 2004 at 80 years old. “I only found out after he died that I was the love of his life, not just the lust of his life,” Moreno expressed, sharing that in spite of Brando’s many relationships, the father of 11 had in his home only one picture of himself with a woman — and it was Moreno.

If you are struggling with thoughts of suicide, or worried about a friend or loved one, help is available. Call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 [TALK] for free confidential emotional support 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Even if it feels like it, you are not alone.

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Last year, Budweiser sat out its traditional Super Bowl commercial buy and donated instead to COVID-19 vaccine awareness efforts. But this year, the brewer’s back in a big way for the Big Game — by tapping an Oscar winner.

Academy Award-winning Nomadland director Chloe Zhao called the shots on the spot, titled A Clydesdale’s Journey, which follows one of the beer brand’s trademark horses “as it fights through setbacks and overcomes challenges, embodying the continued resilience of the people of America.”

The dramatic ad shows the titular horse hobbled by an injury, as well as its road to recovery with his faithful golden retriever pal by his side.

As “The Star-Spangled Banner” plays in the background, the horse struggles to get back on his feet repeatedly, eventually breaking into a gallop as an electric guitar shreds. 

“In the home of the brave, down never means out,” a title card reads. 

According to Budweiser, the spot reminds viewers “that while the country has faced numerous challenges throughout its history, the steadfastness of the American spirit will allow us to recover from hardship, continue rebuilding and come back stronger than ever before.”

Eternals director Zhao was tapped because “her work often depicts true American grit and journeys of self-discovery through a deeply human lens,” Budweiser explained.

Super Bowl LVI, featuring the AFC champion Cincinnati Bengals versus the NFC champion Los Angeles Rams, is on Sunday, February 13.

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On Tuesday’s Late Night with Seth Meyers, Seth commemorated the 40th anniversary of David Letterman‘s first episode of Late Night.

The tribute began from the drop, with a recreation of the opening to Letterman’s vintage series, and continued with a sit down with the man himself, who was on hand to share memories of his time on the groundbreaking series. 

Dave and Seth reminisced about classic bits on the show, which are now available on YouTube, including “Elevator Races,” and a week-long segment Letterman had done with the “World’s Largest Vase.”

While admonishing Meyers for not having “an animal guy” on the show, a chat show staple for decades, Letterman remembered Jack Hanna‘s many appearances on Late Night. “We realized two or three shows in that Jack doesn’t know anything about animals,” Letterman joked. He also remembered a beaver they had on the show that bit Hannah so badly that Hanna walked himself to the emergency room — where he was mistaken for a gunshot victim. 

Making matters worse, Hanna caught flak from the cops for having an “illegal beaver” within New York City limits, recalled Dave, now the host of My Next Guest Needs No Introduction on Netflix.

Later, Adam Duritz from Counting Crows performed a solo version of “Long December,” a favorite song of Letterman’s.

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Multifaceted entertainer Billy Crystal will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 27th annual Critics Choice Awards on March 13 at the Fairmont Century Plaza Hotel, The Critics Association announced on Tuesday. He joins Lauren Bacall, Kevin Costner, Clint Eastwood, Eddie Murphy and Robert Wise as the only past Lifetime Achievement honorees in the organization’s 27-year history. As previously announced, Halle Berry will receive the sixth annual SeeHer Award during the ceremony. Crystal, a Tony and Emmy winner, is currently prepping his Broadway return in his first musical comedy, an adaptation of his 1992 film Mr. Saturday Night, which is set to open on April 27. The Critics Choice Awards will air live at 7 p.m. ET on TBS and The CW and will be tape-delayed in the West…

Taraji P. Henson has been tapped for a starring role, alongside In The Heights‘ Corey Hawkins and Oscar/Grammy-winning artist H.E.R., in director Blitz Bazawule’ feature adaptation of The Color Purple, according to Variety. Henson will play jazz-blues singer Shug Avery, while Hawkins takes on the role of Harpo and H.E.R. portrays Squeak, played respectively by Margaret Avery, Willard Pugh and Rae Dawn Chong in Stephen Spielberg‘s 1985 feature film adaptation of the Tony-winning Broadway musical, which was itself an adaptation of Alice Walker’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel. Oprah Winfrey, who made her feature film acting debut in Spielberg’s The Color Purple, is producing the new movie, along with Spielberg. It’s set to hit theaters December 21, 2023…

Friday Night Lights‘ Connie Britton is reuniting with creator Jason Katims for a new Apple TV+ series based on author Ann Napolitano’s best-seller, Dear Edward. The drama also stars Orange Is the New Black alum Taylor Schilling and Wonka‘s Colin O’Brien. Dear Edward follows Edward Adler, “a 12-year-old boy who survives a devastating commercial plane crash that kills every other passenger on the flight, including his family.” As Edward and a diverse ensemble of others affected by the tragedy try to make sense of life after the crash, unexpected friendships, romances and communities are formed,” according to the streaming service…

Oscar-winning actor Geoffrey Rush is set to play legendary comedian Groucho Marx in Raised Eyebrows, an upcoming adaptation of Steve Stoliar’s memoir Raised Eyebrows: My Years Inside Groucho’s House, according to Variety. Set between 1973 and 1977, Raised Eyebrows stars Charlie Plummer as Stoliar, who is hired by Erin Fleming — played Sienna Miller — to work with Rush’s aging and frail Groucho Marx. Fleming was in charge of Marx’s personal and professional life as his manager, and the two had a controversial relationship…

Paramount+ is expanding the Star Trek universe with the new spinoff Starfleet Academy, according to Deadline. The series, which shares its name with the late 1990s video game, follows a group of cadets being mentored for leadership roles in the United Federation of Planets’ Starfleet. Sources tell the outlet that the series will be pitched to Paramount+, and the hope is to get it going in the next year…

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ABC has temporarily suspended Whoopi Goldberg as co-host of The View for comments she made about the Holocaust. 

ABC News President Kim Godwin said in a statement issued Tuesday, “I am suspending Whoopi Goldberg for two weeks for her wrong and hurtful comments. While Whoopi has apologized, I’ve asked her to take time to reflect and learn about the impact of her comments. The entire ABC News organization stands in solidarity with our Jewish colleagues, friends, family and communities.” 

The suspension came a day after Goldberg commented on a Tennessee school board’s banning of Maus, a Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel about the Nazi death camps during World War II. She said the Holocaust was “not about race…it’s about man’s inhumanity to other man.”

The remark drew condemnation from several prominent Jewish leaders.  Goldberg apologized hours later and then again on Tuesday’s morning edition of The View, stating, “I misspoke.”  

“My words upset so many people, which was never my intention,” she said. “I understand why now and for that I am deeply, deeply grateful because the information I got was really helpful and helped me understand some different things.”

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