A poster for the 20th anniversary rerelease of ‘Cars.’ (Disney, Pixar)
Life is a highway, I’m gonna ride it all the way to the movie theater.
Disney and Pixar are rereleasing Cars in theaters to celebrate its 20th anniversary. Audiences should get their motors running to watch the film in its original format starting on Sept. 4.
This theatrical rerelease also happens to coincide with Cars Lightning McQueen Day, which is observed on Sept. 5, in honor of the character’s race car number, 95.
There are many other collaborations and activations set to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the animated film.
A Cars integration is planned for Route 66’s centennial anniversary, with screenings of the film set at the historic Tee-Pee Drive-In in Sapulpa, Oklahoma, and Tulsa Circle Cinema in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Additionally, a Cars-wrapped Mercedes Safety Car will appear alongside a life-size Lightning McQueen at the Formula 1 Gran Premio D’Italia 2026. There will also be a Porsche “Sally Special” vehicle touring the U.S., with stops set in Atlanta; Costa Mesa, California; Monterey, California; Los Angeles; and New York.
Cars originally raced into theaters in 2006. It follows “a hotshot rookie race car driven to succeed, who discovers that life is about the journey, not the finish line, when he finds himself unexpectedly detoured in the sleepy Route 66 town of Radiator Springs,” according to an official description.
Owen Wilson, Paul Newman, Larry the Cable Guy and Bonnie Hunt lent their voices to the film, which was directed by John Lasseter.
Kit Harington attends the 2026 Disney Upfront at Jacob Javits Center on May 12, 2026, in New York City. (John Nacion/FilmMagic via Getty Images)
Kit Harington is headed to Hogwarts.
The actor is set to play Gilderoy Lockhart in season 2 of HBO’s upcoming Harry Potter TV series, ABC Audio has confirmed.
Harington replaces Nicholas Hoult in the role. Hoult was previously announced to star as the character on Aug. 12. He now leaves the part over scheduling issues. HBO had to work around two of Hoult’s preexisting projects, and when it was no longer feasible, the actor was let out of his deal.
This means Harington takes over the role he previously voiced in Harry Potter: The Full-Cast Audio Editions, which released in late 2025.
The first season of the series, titled Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, debuts on HBO and HBO Max on Dec. 25. Its season 2 renewal was announced on May 6.
Gilderoy Lockhart was previously played by Kenneth Branagh in the 2002 film Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. The character is a famous, vain wizard known for his heroic acts that he has described in books written about himself. He takes over as the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor at Hogwarts.
Dominic McLaughlin leads the cast of the upcoming show as Harry Potter. He stars alongside Alastair Stout and Arabella Stanton, who play Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger. The series is described as a faithful adaptation of the books by J.K. Rowling, who serves as an executive producer.
Succession‘s Jon Brown, who was a writer on season 1, has been promoted to co-showrunner for season 2. He will serve in the role alongside Francesca Gardiner, the showrunner of season 1.
Harington replacing Hoult isn’t the first casting news about season 2. On May 18, ABC Audio confirmed that Gracie Cochrane, the actress who portrays Ginny Weasley in season 1, will not return to play the character in season 2 of the series.
Sharna Burgess attends the 32nd annual Race To Erase MS Gala on May 16, 2025, in Los Angeles, California. (Kayla Oaddams/WireImage via Getty Images)
Sharna Burgess is officially returning to the Dancing with the Stars ballroom.
On Monday, the longtime DWTS pro announced on Good Morning America that she will compete on the upcoming 35th season of the hit dance competition series, marking her first time competing on the show since season 30 in 2021.
“I’m back! Some of you guys guessed it. Yes, I am here with a special announcement to finally confirm I’m back on Dancing with the Stars, baby,” Burgess said. “I’m going to be competing for that Len Goodman Mirrorball Trophy. I can’t wait to be back in the ballroom with my dancing family, and mostly it feels so good to be coming home. I’ll see you all soon.”
The upcoming season will mark Burgess’ 15th season competing as a professional dancer on DWTS.
Burgess previously took home the Mirrorball Trophy with radio personality Bobby Bones in 2018 during season 27. Her last season as a competing pro was season 30 in 2021, when she was partnered with her now-fiancé, actor Brian Austin Green.
Burgess’ return comes as excitement builds for season 35. Several celebrity contestants have already been announced, including Summer House star Ciara Miller, The Traitors star Maura Higgins, Savannah Bananas player Jackson Olson and Jimmy Kimmel Live! personality Guillermo Rodriguez.
Rodriguez will be partnered with returning pro Witney Carson.
The rest of the DWTS season 35 cast will be revealed Sept. 2 on GMA.
DWTS season 35 will debut with a two-night premiere Tuesday, Sept. 15, and Wednesday, Sept. 16, at 8 p.m. ET on ABC and Disney+, streaming the next day on Hulu.
The Walt Disney Co. is the parent company of ABC News, Disney+ and Hulu.
Lesley Vogel, mother of Hayden Panettiere, speaks with ABC News, August 23, 2026. (ABC News)
Hayden Panettiere’s mother is opening up about how she hopes her daughter will be remembered following the actress’s death at age 36.
“I want Hayden to be remembered for the talented, you know, beautiful, outgoing, intelligent woman she really was,” Lesley Vogel told ABC News.
Panettiere, known for her roles in Heroes, Nashville and Ice Princess, died on Aug. 16 after she was found unresponsive and in cardiac arrest at a residence in Greenville, South Carolina. First responders attempted to resuscitate her, but she was pronounced dead at the scene.
Vogel described the moment she heard the news, saying, “I was numb. I was just numb.”
“I still am not grasping this is real. It just doesn’t, it doesn’t feel real,” she said. “My mind tells me it’s not at times. You know, it’s going to be a process.”
She acknowledged the difficulty of mourning someone who was in the public eye, describing potential critics as “haters” and telling them that they “don’t have a right to tell me how to mourn the loss of my second child, that’s my domain.”
Vogel and Skip Panettiere, Hayden’s parents, who divorced when she was young, lost their son, Jansen Panettiere, in 2023. The family said in its statement at the time that Jansen Panettiere died from an enlarged heart.
Their daughter’s death came months after Hayden Panettiere spoke publicly about her relationship with her mother, who served as her acting coach and manager in her childhood.
In a May interview with ABC News, Hayden Panettiere said trying to maintain a relationship with her had been “tough.”
“Over the years, I’ve tried to leave that door open, hoping that the relationship would evolve into a healthy mother-daughter relationship, and it’s obvious that that’s just not going to be the case,” she explained.
At the time, Vogel responded to her daughter’s comments in a statement to Page Six, saying she had chosen to go “the no-contact route” after taking “the advice of professionals.”
Speaking with ABC News on Sunday, Vogel said her relationship with Hayden Panettiere evolved as she grew older.
Vogel recalled that the actress had landed her Heroes role of Claire Bennet, a cheerleader with supernatural abilities, as a 16-year-old. Until then Hayden Panettiere had lived “a very happy life,” Vogel said, adding, “but I would say at about 17, I started seeing her going downhill.”
“As she got older, then it wasn’t my voice anymore. I wasn’t in charge of her choices,” Vogel said. “I tried to give her the best advice I could, but again, you know, any young person, teen, come on, they want to be liberated. And I get that. I did get that!”
Hayden Panettiere had been candid about her struggles from child stardom through adulthood, releasing a memoir, This Is Me: A Reckoning, in May in which she wrote about postpartum depression, addiction and recovery, domestic abuse and more.
The book includes a scene in which Hayden Panettiere told her mother at 19 that she didn’t want to be managed by her anymore. The book describes Vogel’s response, which the book said was Vogel saying, “You owe me.”
“I remember being in her trailer and literally saying nothing,” Vogel told ABC News. “I was — I knew that day would come. It’s not that I didn’t expect it, but it was very short, very brief conversation, and then she turned and went to set. But did it hurt to read that in the book? You know, it just — I know I didn’t say what she said.”
The Greenville City Police Department is leading the investigation into Hayden Panettiere’s death, with the Drug Enforcement Administration assisting, according to sources familiar with the matter.
According to a police report obtained by ABC News, Hayden Panettiere was with her on-again, off-again boyfriend, Brian Hickerson, and his brother, Zach Hickerson, at the time of her death. The report said it was unknown whether Hayden Panettiere had been using drugs or alcohol.
Hayden Panettiere’s official cause and manner of death “remain pending further investigation and the completion of additional studies,” the coroner’s office said.
Vogel and Hayden Panettiere were estranged in the actor’s final months, a separation that Vogel said came about after she went to stay with her daughter about a year ago. Vogel said Hayden Panettiere at that time wanted to get out of her relationship with Hickerson.
“She knew that Brian was toxic,” Vogel said. “She knew she had to get him out of her life.”
But after about six weeks, Vogel said, she noticed her daughter pulling away, so she returned home to Florida. Vogel said Hayden Panettiere called her and told her that she was “going to be with the person I love,” which was Hickerson.
Vogel said she issued her daughter an ultimatum, telling her she couldn’t be in her life if Hickerson was also a part of it. She said she had expected the estrangement that followed to be a “pocket of time.”
She said she didn’t “by any stretch of the imagination think that this was going to happen to Hayden.”
“I’ll be honest. It just, I don’t know why, I just didn’t,” she added. “Maybe I didn’t want to.”
Vogel said Hickerson and Hayden Panettiere grew closer in 2018 after she ceded full custody of her daughter, who was then 4, to her ex-fiance, longtime heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko.
“That was probably the catalyst,” she said. “In my opinion, that was the catalyst that she just couldn’t keep those demons away. I think she struggled, and Brian came into her life. She was vulnerable.”
Hickerson pleaded no contest to two felony counts of injuring a spouse or girlfriend in April 2021.
Hickerson’s attorney shared a statement with ABC News on Thursday, writing, “Hayden’s death remains under investigation and it is important to allow that investigation to proceed. As has been publicly reported, police confirmed there were no signs of foul play. Out of respect for Hayden’s loved ones and the ongoing investigation, there will be no further comment at this time.”
Vogel said she wants her daughter to be remembered as the “talented, beautiful, outgoing, intelligent woman” she had been.
“But I also want people to understand that it is my belief that … she was suffering,” Vogel said. “Now that doesn’t make sense because when you look at a beautiful girl who’s got an incredible career, even though it has had its ups and downs, but you know, you look that big picture and you go, why would you be suffering? People don’t understand that you can have on the exterior all of this. But that doesn’t mean that what’s going on in here matches.”
L-R) Dave Matthews, Willie Nelson, Neil Young and John Mellencamp backstage at Farm Aid at the KeyBank Pavilion in Burgettstown, Pennsylvania, United States on September 16, 2017. (Photo by Ebet Roberts/Redferns)
Farm Aid is headed to Virginia this September, but folks who can’t make it to the show will be able to enjoy it from the comfort of their own home.
Farm Aid just announced that the annual benefit concert, taking place Sept. 26 at Veterans United Home Loans Amphitheater in Virginia Beach, Virginia, will broadcast live on CNN.
Farm Aid board members Neil Young, John Mellencamp, Willie Nelson, Dave Matthews, Margo Price and Nathaniel Rateliff are all set to perform this year. Young will be performing with his band The Chrome Hearts, while Matthews will perform with frequent collaborator Tim Reynolds.
Other artists on the bill include Mike Campbell & The Dirty Knobs, Turnpike Troubadours, Lukas Nelson, Jesse Welles, Sierra Ferrell, I’m With Her, Mon Rovîa, Amythyst Kiah, Lily Meola and Chris Pierce.
The concert will begin on CNN at 7 p.m. ET. It will stream live on nugs.net, FarmAid.org and YouTube starting at 11:30 a.m. ET.
The first Farm Aid concert was held on Sept. 22, 1985, in Champaign, Illinois. Since then, the Farm Aid organization has raised nearly $90 million to help American farmers.
The Grateful Dead has shared another preview of their upcoming live box set celebrating the summer of 1985 and the band’s 20th anniversary tour.
The latest is a performance of the Dead classic “Shakedown Street,” recorded during their June 30, 1985, concert at the Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, Maryland. It is available now via digital outlets.
“Widely considered not only one of the greatest performances of ‘Shakedown Street’ the Grateful Dead ever played, this is also often called one of the best individual song performances the Dead ever played,” Dead legacy manager and audio archivist David Lemieux says in the video description. “This one is often described with well-deserved hyperbole; it’s really that great.”
The Merriweather Post Pavilion show is one of seven previously unreleased full concerts that make up the 20-CD box set Summer Magic 1985, dropping Sept. 18.
Summer Magic 1985 is limited to just 10,000 numbered copies and is available for preorder now on Dead.net.
The Merriweather Post Pavilion show will also be released as a standalone three-CD or four-CD set. It is also available for preorder now.
Cover art for Mariah Carey ‘Glitter 25th Anniversary Edition’ (Def Jam Records/UMe)
Mariah Carey’s eighth studio album, Glitter, turns 25 years old in September, which is a cause for celebration.
In honor of the milestone, the album, which also served as the soundtrack to the film of the same name, will make its debut on vinyl for the first time since its release. It will be pressed on Midnight Purple two-LP vinyl, while a limited-edition deluxe version will be pressed on Glittering Pink two-LP vinyl. The latter will be exclusively available via Amazon, Mariah’s website and uDiscover Music and will feature three bonus tracks: “Out Here On My Own,” “Loverboy (Firecracker – Original Version)” and “Never Too Far/Hero (Medley),” which marks its first time on vinyl.
An expanded digital deluxe edition will also be available to stream, complete with 15 additional tracks. It includes rare and previously unreleased recordings, as well as selections from Mariah’s personal vault that offer fans insight into the behind-the-scenes process of making the album and showcase some of her collaborations. It will all be available starting Oct. 30. Fans can preorder the vinyl and presave the digital edition now.
“If someone had told me back in 2001 that I’d one day be unironically celebrating Glitter’s 25th anniversary, I never would have believed them,” Mariah said in a statement. “I made this album with so much love and care, so it was devastating to watch it become a punchline. I’m endlessly grateful to my fans who kept championing it all these years, and I hope even more people can finally hear it for what it is. We found a few recordings buried in the vault that I am really looking forward to sharing with you in October!”
She’s released a reimagined version of “Didn’t Mean To Turn You On” featuring acclaimed British-Canadian singer/songwriter Rochelle Jordan. A visualizer is available on YouTube.
Released in September 2001, Glitter served as the soundtrack to the film, in which she played an aspiring singer navigating love amid her pursuit of fame. Collaborators included Eric Benét, Ludacris, Da Brat, Busta Rhymes, Fabolous and Ja Rule.
In this image released on May 2, 2021, Dave Grohl of Foo Fighters and Brian Johnson of AC/DC perform onstage during Global Citizen VAX LIVE: The Concert to Reunite the World at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California. (Kevin Winter/Getty Images for Global Citizen VAX LIVE)
In between dates on their own stadium tour, Foo Fighters are taking a detour on the “Highway to Hell.”
Dave Grohl and company will be opening for AC/DC during the “Back in Black” legends’ upcoming show in St. Louis on Sept. 8. They will be filling in for The Pretty Reckless, who have been supporting AC/DC’s ongoing U.S. run.
“Foo Fighters are taking a special one-off detour from their Take Cover Global Stadium Tour to fill in for their friends The Pretty Reckless as special guests of AC/DC for one night only in St. Louis,” a press release reads. “The performance brings two generations of rock’s biggest live acts together for a one-night-only event, with the Foo Fighters opening for [AC/DC’s] September 8 St. Louis tour stop.”
The Foos tour, meanwhile, continues Saturday in Los Angeles. The trek supports the “Everlong” outfit’s new album, Your Favorite Toy.
R.E.M.’s sophomore album, Reckoning, is getting an audiophile upgrade.
The album is the latest addition to the Interscope-Capitol Records Definitive Sound Series, and will be released Sept. 18 on 180-gram high-definition vinyl, with the upgraded audio sourced from the original analog master tapes.
Mitch Easter and Don Dixon, who co-produced the original album, were directly involved with the upgrade, which was mastered by mastering engineer Chris Bellman.
According to a post on Instagram, after hearing the finished test pressing of the upgraded audio, Dixon noted that he was “hearing details within the recording that had escaped him on previous vinyl editions.”
The Definitive Sound Series edition of Reckoning will be limited to just 5,000 numbered copies, and is available for preorder now.
This is the third R.E.M. album to get an audio upgrade. In December, both their debut EP, Chronic Town, and their debut album, Murmur, were reissued as part of the Interscope-Capitol Records’ Definitive Sound Series. Both editions sold out.
Released April 8, 1984, Reckoning was a hit with critics and peaked at #27 in the U.S., although it topped college radio airplay charts. Its first single, “So. Central Rain (I’m Sorry),” peaked at #86 on the Billboard Hot 100, while its second single, “(Don’t Go Back to) Rockville,” did not chart. Both went on to become R.E.M. fan favorites.
The album has since been certified Gold by the RIAA.
Jimmy Buffett (C) takes opening night bow during the Broadway premiere of “Escape to Margaritaville” the new musical featuring songs by Jimmy Buffett at the Marquis Theatre on March 15, 2018 in New York City. (Photo by Noam Galai/Getty Images for Escape To Margaritaville)
The late Jimmy Buffett will be celebrated with a new exhibit at the National Maritime Museum of the Gulf in Mobile, Alabama.
Jimmy Buffett: Son of a Son of a Sailor Experience, opening Sept. 12, is described as a 6,000-square-foot permanent installation that will feature not only rare Buffett artifacts and memorabilia, but an immersive concert experience.
According to the description, visitors will gain insight into Buffett “not only as a musician, but as an author, sailor, pilot, entrepreneur, adventurer, philanthropist, friend, and storyteller whose influence extended far beyond music.”
The exhibit will include such artifacts as Buffett’s 2023 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame statue; the guitar he used to write and perform “Son of a Son of a Sailor”; handwritten lyrics; never-before-released concert and recording footage; and more.
“Creating the Jimmy Buffett Experience has been an absolute honor for our entire team. We have spent nearly two years listening, researching, collecting stories, curating artifacts, and working to capture the remarkable life of a man who meant so much to so many people,” said Karen Poth, executive director of the National Maritime Museum of the Gulf. “We didn’t get far into this project before we realized this exhibition will never be a finished story. It is a living exhibit. And it will continue to change and grow as new stories are shared, new artifacts come to light, and we learn more about Jimmy and the world he created.”
The opening weekend will include a Sept. 11 performance featuring Coral Reefer Band members Mac McAnally and Scotty Emerick at the Saenger Theatre, as well as a Sept. 12 unveiling of a new bronze Jimmy Buffett sculpture.
More details, and ticket information can be found at nmmog.org.
