The lineup has been unveiled for the 2023 Monsters of Rock Cruise, which is scheduled to set sail from Port Canaveral, Florida, on April 29 and run through May 4.
The 11th annual edition of the seagoing hard-rock festival, which has been dubbed “They Came from Outer Space,” will feature over 35 acts, including Tesla, ex-UFO/Scorpions guitarist Michael Schenker, Queensrÿche, Winger, Extreme, Vandenberg, Autograph, Great White, Saxon, Faster Pussycat, Whitesnake guitarist Joel Hoekstra, Kix, Loudness, Rose Tattoo, Stryper and former Mötley Crüe singer John Corabi.
The cruise will make stops in Puerta Plata, Dominican Republic, and the private isle of Labadee in the Bahamas before returning to port.
In addition to the many performances, the cruise will feature Q&A sessions, karaoke, a “So You Think You Can Shred” contest, “Cooking with Rock Stars” and “Painting with Rock Stars” events, a basketball game where select rockers will face off against cruise attendees, comedy sets, theme nights, photo ops and the chance for fans to have dinner with some of the performers.
Other onboard activities include a surf simulator, a rock-climbing wall, hot tubs and pools, a world-class spa, a bungee trampoline experience called the SkyPad, waterslides, laser tag and an escape room.
Cabins can be reserved now, with prices stating at $1,699 per person, double occupancy. Visit MonstersofRockCruise.com for more details.
To celebrate the milestone anniversary of the Oscar-winning animated film, ABC and Disney are teaming up for a “one-night only” event called Beauty and the Beast: A 30th Celebration.
Airing on December 15 at 8 p.m. ET, the two-hour animated and live-action “reimagination” will pay tribute to the original 1991 film and its legacy “by showcasing the fan-favorite movie, along with new memorable musical performances, taking viewers on a magical adventure through the eyes of Belle,” according to a press release.
The live-action performers will be announced at a later date, but John M. Chu, the director of the hit Crazy Rich Asians and the musical movie In The Heights, is producing. British director Hamish Hamilton, a veteran of the Super Bowl halftime show who has worked with the likes of Eminem and Madonna, will be calling the shots.
The original Beauty and the Beast was nominated for an Academy Award in the Best Picture category and took home a Best Music trophy for composer Alan Menken.
The movie was remade into a hit live-action adaptation starring Emma Watson as Belle and Dan Stevens as Adam/The Beast. It also featured performances from Josh Gad as LeFou, Luke Evans as Gaston, and featured the voices of Ewan McGregor as Lumière and Emma Thompson as Mrs. Potts.
(WASHINGTON) — The House select committee investigating Jan. 6 on Tuesday announced its next hearing: July 12 beginning at 10 a.m. ET.
The panel has been holding a series of public hearings since last month related to its year-long inquiry into the events before, during and after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack at the Capitol by a pro-Trump mob.
The most recent hearing featured lengthy testimony from Cassidy Hutchinson, a former top aide to Trump’s last White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(HIGHLAND PARK, Ill.) — As Abby Brosio stood with her father-in-law watching the Fourth of July parade in Highland Park, Illinois, on Monday morning, a hail of bullets began to fly from top of the building directly across the street.
“I remember looking around to try to figure out where the sound was coming from,” Brosio told “Good Morning America” on Tuesday morning. “And I, in fact, looked up at the neighboring business across the street and saw the shooter on the roof and I just screamed that it was a shooter.”
She said she saw “long hair and a gun.” As she turned to pull her 1-year-old daughter and 3-year-old son into Gearhead Outfitters, a store managed by her husband, Tony, she was grazed by a bullet, she said.
Her father-in-law was shot in the leg, she said.
Six people were killed and more than 24 others were injured in Monday’s mass shooting in Highland Park, a suburb north of Chicago, according to officials. Police said on Monday they took into custody a 22-year-old person of interest, Robert “Bobby” Crimo III, in connection with the incident.
Tony Brosio was inside Gearhead Outfitters as the shooting began. As parade spectators rushed the store, looking to take cover, he helped coordinate. Video from inside the store shows crowds running inside. Some stumble, others glance behind them.
“We were just trying to get as many people as we possibly could inside,” he told “GMA” on Tuesday. “Like I said, it was just instinct.”
Both the Brosios had the feeling that it “could never happen” to them that they’d be in an active shooting situation, he said.
“You alway have that, ‘It could never happen here,'” he said. “It just did.”
“It was like a dream. All I could say to myself was, ‘This isn’t real,'” Abby said.
As Abby and her father-in-law reached the safety of Gearhead Outfitters, she realized that they’d both been hit by bullets, she said. Both were taken to a local hospital and later released, she said.
Miranda Lambert is embarking on a glamping trip across the country.
After completing her co-headlining tour with Little Big Town on the Bandwagon Tour, the singer is using some of her downtime this summer to venture across the U.S. with her husband, Brendan McLoughlin, and best friend Gwen Sebastian and her husband, drummer Louis Newman, on a nearly three-week excursion.
Miranda and Brendan are in their Airstream, known as “The Sheriff,” while Gwen and Louis are traveling in their camper, called “Toodle Lou.” Their trek began in Colorado, with the singer sharing a photo of her and Gwen sitting in front of a mountainside lake with beers in hand. The trip also includes hiking and mountain biking.
“Time off touring means it’s time to hit the dusty trail! There is no better way to spend summer than glamping with your best pals,” Miranda says in an Instagram post. “We’re out on a 20 day run of adventures out west. We kicked it off in beautiful Colorado. Stay tuned for more tales from the road. Happy trails y’all!”
Miranda and Brendan previously ventured out in a cross-country road trip in their Airstream in 2020, covering four states in six days.
(WASHINGTON) — Four U.S. Army veterans were awarded with the Medal of Honor Tuesday for their “acts of gallantry and intrepidity” during the Vietnam War half a century ago — after their cases got a fresh review.
President Joe Biden presented Specialist 5 Dwight W. Birdwell, Major John J. Duffy and Specialist 5 Dennis M. Fujii with the nation’s highest military honor at a White House ceremony on Tuesday morning. John Kaneshiro, the son of Staff Sergeant Edward N. Kaneshiro, accepted the award on his late father’s behalf.
The awards come after the Army concluded the decorated veterans’ previous honors should be elevated to the Medal of Honor, the United States military’s most prestigious award for bravery and heroism.
“Today, we’re setting the record straight. We’re upgrading the awards of four soldiers who performed acts of incredible heroism during the Vietnam conflict to respect the conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity of their service,” Biden said. “They went far above and beyond the call of duty. It’s a phrase always used but it just — it takes on life when you see these men.”
“Today’s ceremony presented a poignant reminder of the sacrifices of the service members who served with these men, especially those who never made it home,” the Congressional Medal of Honor Society said in a statement welcoming the recipients. “These newest Medal of Honor recipients wear the Medal on behalf of those who were lost and those whose freedom was secured by their sacrifice.”
Birdwell, who is also a former Cherokee Nation Supreme Court justice, becomes the first Native American honored for action in Vietnam and the first to receive the award for action in any conflict since 1973. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin introduced a directive last year ordering the Secretaries of the Military Departments to review Black and Native American war veterans for upgrades to the Medal of Honor.
“It’s a point of great pride for the Cherokee people and I think all native people to see a Native American get this honor,” Cherokee Principal Chief Chuck Hoskin told ABC News in an interview. “I think about the fact that Dwight Birdwell represents thousands of Native Americans who have served this country in military service since the 1970s and even before at such high numbers, disproportionately high numbers. I think it’s fitting and high time that someone get the Medal of Honor who’s a Native American.”
On Jan. 31, 1968, Birdwell moved directly into the line of fire, getting wounded in the process, to retrieve ammunition for his fellow soldiers.
Birdwell told ABC News his time in the Army gave him “a sense of discipline, enhanced respect for life, more respect for nature, and respect for people beyond the boundaries of this country.”
“Someone asked me if I feel like a hero. I don’t feel like I am, but I served with plenty, especially that day, and [I’m] honored to have served with them,” Birdwell said. “I’m really overwhelmed by the whole process. But again, proud for the Cherokee people, proud for the unit I served with, and personally very satisfied that it came about.”
In a 1972 battle for Fire Support Base Charlie, Duffy directed defense and facilitated the air evacuation of his team while under attack. He was the last to board an aiding helicopter.
“It’s a great honor. Each of those awards are appreciated, and recognizing your endeavors, your duty that you’ve done, and the pride you have in your uniform that you’ve earned in combat,” he said of his nomination. “And the same disciplines that applied in battle applied in life, whether it’s being a broker or any other occupation, journalist, etc., you’re focused, you’re trying to tell a story and you’re trying to do your job. So you learn discipline in the military — not just the Army but all the military — that serves you forever throughout life.”
After retiring from the Army, Duffy went on to work in publishing and finance before focusing on poetry. The Pulitzer Prize nominee’s works are engraved on two monuments.
In February 1971, Fujii served as crew chief of a helicopter ambulance. He is being honored for his role in several evacuations and tireless treatment of wounded Vietnamese military along the allied perimeter, even after a series of failed attempts to rescue him following a helicopter crash. Throughout this time, he directed strikes and defense until his eventual rescue.
“I was overwhelmed…the news it really shocked me,” Fujii told KITV. “I mean, to be congratulated by the president himself, the commander in chief, that’s something.”
On Dec. 1, 1966, Kaneshiro defended his squad in the trenches from enemy fire using six grenades and a rifle, allowing for their successful extrication.
Naomi Viloria and John Kaneshiro were young children when their father was killed in action on March 6, 1967. Viloria was 8 years old and her brother, who went on to enlist in the Army after high school, was only 4 months old.
“I didn’t know him. So you know, I didn’t have that father figure, but just reading the actions that he did in newspaper articles of the period, that told me he was a man of character,” he said. “So, you know, you put that together and say, ‘Wow, you know, I hope I can be like him.'”
Viloria told ABC News their family has worked for decades to have his actions reviewed and nearly gave up.
“But then finally, this year, right after my mother passed away, we were notified that his combat record was being under review and he could possibly be awarded the Medal of Honor, and I finally got the call from President Biden,” she said, adding that the family was “overjoyed” to hear the news.
“I think for us now, our family, it’s an honor that America has suggested we recognize his selflessness, his courageousness in the face of adversity,” John Kaneshiro said. “We’re happy that he was recognized, finally.”
ABC News’ Luis Martinez, Cindy Smith, and Abby Cruz contributed to this report.
(PHILADELPHIA) — Two police officers were shot during a Fourth of July fireworks show and concert on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway in Philadelphia on Monday. Both officers were treated and released from the hospital later that night, according to police.
Sergio Diggs, 36, an officer assigned to highway patrol, received a graze wound to the forehead, police said. The round stopped in the officer’s hat. He is a 13-year veteran of the Philadelphia Police Department.
The other officer, John Foster, who was assigned to the Montgomery County Bomb Squad, sustained a gunshot wound to the right shoulder. The 44-year-old, who has 16 years of service, was present to work security at the event, as was the other injured officer.
The officers were standing on the sidewalk at the base of the Art Museum steps when the shooting began.
They both were transferred to the Jefferson University Hospital for treatment, according to WPVI, and police said they have been released.
The shooting took place in Center City on Monday night. The city Office of Emergency Management advised on Twitter to avoid the area.
This marks at least the second incident of gun violence around an Independence Day celebration in the United States, after at least six were killed in a shooting at a parade in Highland Park, Illinois.
A suspect in the Philadelphia shooting has not yet been named or arrested. Police said they are still investigating the shooting. A $20,000 reward is being offered for information that leads to the arrest of the armed suspect, according to WPVI.
Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney said at a late-night press conference that it had been “a laid-back, chill day” — “but we live in America.”
“If I had the ability to take care of guns,” he said, “I would.”
Stranger Things brought the fireworks for Netflix over the weekend.
For the first time since the global phenomenon Squid Game, viewership for Stranger Things surpassed 1.15 billion hours on the streaming service following the drop of season 4, volume 2 on July 1.
The show’s fourth season made up for more than 301 million hours of that staggering total for the week spanning June 27-July 3, landing it on the Top 10 for English language TV shows in 93 countries.
The previous seasons also landed on the list in that period: Its first season ranked #3; season 2 #6; and season 3 came in at #5.
Luke Bryan released a sizzling new summer anthem, “Country On,” on Friday, and it’s no accident that it’s the latest in a long line of warm-weather bangers from the singer.
“I was having tremendous anxiety about not having a song out in the summer,” he says, talking about the lead-up to the release of “Country On.” “I just always love having a summer song out. And not actually always pointed at summer, but to know that people are out on the lake and on their boats [playing the song.]”
Mission accomplished: “Country On” is the perfect soundtrack to a carefree day out on the boat. Luke has also hinted that it’s the first of a lot of new music ahead. He says he’s currently working on a new album that’s about halfway done.
(FULTON COUNTY, Ga.) — The Fulton County special grand jury investigating possible criminal interference in Georgia’s 2020 elections has issued subpoenas for Rudy Giuliani, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and several others in former President Donald Trump’s orbit.
Others who were issued subpoenas include John Eastman, Cleta Mitchell, Kenneth Chesbro and Jenna Ellis, all of whom advised Trump on ways to overturn President Joe Biden’s win in Georgia.
The special grand jury also subpoenaed attorney and podcast host Jacki Pick Deason.
The development was first reported by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Giuliani, Trump’s personal attorney, testified in front of Georgia lawmakers on several occasions in late 2020.
Eastman, who part of a plan to push then-Vice President Mike Pence to reject the official slate of Democratic electors in Georgia and other battleground states, also testified in front of Georgia’s legislators following the election, saying that there was “more than enough” evidence of fraud to warrant a different slate of electors.
At the end of its investigation, the special grand jury conducting the probe will, if appropriate, make recommendations to prosecutors, who would then need to decide whether to pursue any charges.
