2022 is just days away and, with that, will come a tidal wave of new gym memberships and promises to get in shape. To help excite people for their swiftly approaching new workout schedule, Justin Timberlake shared a video of him working out side-by-side with wife Jessica Biel.
“Swolemates. See you in 2022,” Justin captioned the Instagram video that showed them doing a series of moves that strengthens the core muscles — like plank shoulder touches and hip dips. Inspiring music plays as the two complete their reps at their gym.
While the duo tries to hide their expressions, there is one segment in the video that shows Justin’s grimacing while balancing on his side as he touches his knee to his chest. As for Jessica, she is much better at masking how she feels about going through the motions of her challenging routine.
Finally, when it’s over, Justin is seen on all fours to seemingly catch his breath as Jessica sits on her knees and grins in relief.
(NEW YORK) — A jury has reached a verdict in the criminal trial of Ghislaine Maxwell, the longtime associate of serial sex offender Jeffrey Epstein who is facing charges related to the alleged abuse and trafficking of underage girls.
Maxwell faces a six-count indictment for allegedly conspiring with and aiding Epstein in his sexual abuse of underage girls between 1994 and 2004. She has been held without bail since her arrest in July 2020 and has pleaded not guilty to the charges.
If convicted, Maxwell could spend decades in prison.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
Stone Temple Pilots bassist Robert DeLeo has revealed he’s contracted COVID-19.
“Well, like so many others this virus has come to pay me a visit,” DeLeo writes in an Instagram post alongside a photo of him holding a rapid antigen test showing two pink lines, signifying a positive result.
“Yes, double lines…Jackpot!,” the post reads. “Except this time you don’t win anything but a nice chunk of time by yourself doing the ‘q’ word.”
“Omicron, Robotron, Lexicon, whatever they wanna call it, it’s the CRUD!” DeLeo adds. “A new year is upon us and I hope and pray everyone stays healthy and safe. Let’s all make this new year a positive and forward moving experience filled with everything we all love!”
STP’s 2022 plans include a tour of Australia kicking off in March.
As the fashion, music and entertainment worlds continue to mourn the late Virgil Abloh, Moneybagg Yo is paying tribute to the Louis Vuitton artistic director.
The “Time Today” rapper posted several Instagram photos of him wearing a white fur Louis Vuitton jacket and commented, “#RIPVirgil Abloh.” The price tag read $25,900.
Lil Baby commented, “25 thousand on a jacket wear it once,” while Fabolous wrote, “A piece” with a fire emoji, and Young Bleu responded, “Fresh as a mf no cap.”
Last week, Drake remembered Abloh with a tattoo showing Virgil from behind, throwing a paper airplane. “A remembrance of the great Virgil Abloh done on Drake,” the caption reads.
On November 28, the day Abloh died, Drake also paid tribute with a photo of the two of them, writing, “My plan is to touch the sky 1000 more times for you…love you eternally brother thank you for everything.”
The four-time Grammy winner attended the memorial service for Abloh on December 6 in Chicago with several other celebrities, including Kanye West, Kim Kardashian, Rihanna, A$AP Rocky, Lauryn Hill and Frank Ocean.
Abloh passed away after a private two-year battle with cardiac angiosarcoma, a rare, aggressive form of cancer. He was 41. Virgil was the founder of fashion brand Off-White and the first African American to serve as artistic director for Louis Vuitton.
In the second season of the Netflix show Emily in Paris, which is now streaming on Netflix, Ashley Park‘s character Mindy Chen performs a version of the BTS smash “Dynamite” in a drag bar. And she — as well as the BTS ARMY — will be happy to know that at least two members of the group have given her rendition a thumbs-up.
Park posted a clip of her performance — for which she wore a half-man/half-woman costume — on Instagram, and wrote, “ I’m still pinching myself that I got to sing my favorite #bts @bts.bighitofficial song as Mindy!”
She added a special thanks to “RM, Suga, V, JungKook, J-Hope, JiMin, Jin for YOUUUU and your constant hard work and music!”
V shared Park’s post on Instagram and added two heart emojis: one black and one white, to match her costume. Billboardreports that RM posted about the cover on his Instagram Story, which has now expired.
Park, who rose to fame playing Gretchen Weiners in the Broadway musical Mean Girls, told MTV that she specifically asked the Emily in Paris producers if Mindy, who’s trying to launch a singing career, could sing a K-pop song.
“Never in my wildest dreams as a BTS stan, BTS ARMY, did I think that they would get ‘Dynamite’ by BTS,” the actress added.
Not only will we likely be getting a season two of Squid Game, we might be getting a season three as well.
The Korea Times reports that the creator of the mega-popular South Korean series, Hwang Dong-hyuk, is in talks with Netflix about bringing the show back for two more seasons.
Back in November, Hwang confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter that he’s already been plotting out season two.
“I do have a basic storyline for season two — it’s all in my head — and I am currently in the brainstorming stage,” he said. “It will happen, someday, but as for when I cannot tell you the details.”
A Netflix spokesperson told ABC Audio at the time that a second season was “in discussions, but not confirmed yet.”
Since its launch on September 17, Squid Game has become the biggest hit in Netflix’s history in terms of worldwide viewership, and the first Korean-language series to reach the number-one slot on the streaming giant’s charts.
While Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with Ryan Seacrest will go on Friday night, two performers slated to join Seacrest and co-host Liza Koshy live in Times Square have pulled out of the show.
Neither LL Cool J nor Chlöe will be performing on the telecast, which is marking its 50th anniversary this year. In a statement, the hip hop legend said, “I know it’s disappointing to the millions of fans but my test came back positive for COVID, which means I’ll no longer be able to perform as scheduled at NYRE.”
“We were ready and I was really looking forward to ringing in 2022 in my hometown in a special way, but for now I wish everyone a healthy and happy New Year. The best is yet to come!” LL added. No reason has been given for Chlöe’s absence.
As of now, the other two Times Square performers — veteran rockers Journey and Latin star Karol G — are still set to perform.
Performers at the Los Angeles party segments of the show include Avril Lavigne, OneRepublic, Masked Wolf, French Montana, Big Boi and Sleepy Brown, Macklemore, Polo G, Mae Muller, Måneskin and Walker Hayes. Daddy Yankee will perform from Puerto Rico, while Billy Porter will hold things down in New Orleans.
Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with Ryan Seacrest will air on ABC Friday night starting at 8 p.m. ET.
(NEW YORK) — As the COVID-19 pandemic has swept the globe, more than 5.4 million people have died from the disease worldwide, including over 821,000 Americans, according to real-time data compiled by Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Systems Science and Engineering.
About 61.9% of the population in the United States is fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Latest headlines:
-3 Americans testing positive every second
-Fauci recommends against big New Year’s parties
-WHO concerned omicron, delta leading to ‘tsunami’ of cases
-US daily case average nearly triples in 1 month
Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern.
Dec 29, 4:01 pm
3 Americans testing positive every second
The U.S. reported more than 1.9 million new cases this week, which equals about three Americans testing positive for COVID-19 every second.
The U.S. is now averaging 277,000 new cases each day, shattering the previous record average from Jan. 11, 2021, which was 250,000 cases each day, according to federal data.
Although this significantly high number is in large part due to the latest surge, it’s also attributable to the soaring demand for tests and backlogs of data following Christmas weekend.
ABC News’ Arielle Mitropoulos
Dec 29, 3:01 pm
30% of New York City’s EMS out on COVID sick leave
In New York City, 30% of emergency medical workers and 17% of firefighters are out on leave tied to COVID-19 — and the fire department is reminding New Yorkers to only call 911 in a true emergency.
“If you are not severely ill, allow first responders to assist those most in need,” the FDNY said in a video message.
Meanwhile, the New York Police Department has canceled regular days off for Dec. 31 and Jan. 1 due to COVID-19 and staffing needs for New Year’s Eve.
ABC News’ Mark Crudele, Aaron Katersky
Dec 29, 2:24 pm
4 Smithsonian locations closed
Four Smithsonian locations in Washington, D.C., have closed due to an increase in COVID-19 cases over the last few days.
The four museums — the National Museum of African Art, the National Postal Museum, the Anacostia Community Museum and the National Museum of Asian Art — are expected to reopen Jan. 3.
The Smithsonian said the cases and quarantine periods impacted “essential and operational staff,” so these closures “will allow the Smithsonian to reallocate staff and keep all other museums open for the remainder of the week.”
The Smithsonian closed in March 2020 due to COVID-19 and loccations started to reopen in May 2021.
ABC News’ Beatrice Peterson
Dec 29, 2:00 pm
DC public school students, staff must test before returning to classrooms
All public school students and staff in Washington, D.C., must test when they return to the classroom after winter break.
Free rapid tests will be provided by the city to the over 90,000 students in the largest data collection D.C. has done since the pandemic began, Mayor Muriel Bowser said.
The tests will be distributed on Jan. 3 and Jan. 4. Families are asked to upload results to the city by Jan. 4 at 4 p.m.
“Any student that does not have their results loaded by Jan. 4, will not be allowed to attend school on Jan. 5,” school chancellor Lewis Ferebee told reporters.
Bowser told reporters, “We expect that we’re going to be in this winter surge for a few more weeks, so throughout January we’re going to have to maintain vigilance.”
(NEW YORK) — Following a year of both extreme heat and drought, Lake Tahoe has seen a record-breaking amount of snow this December, according to the U.C. Berkeley Central Sierra Snow Lab.
The Tahoe area has seen 210 inches of snow since the beginning of the month, the lab, based in Soda Springs, California, reported Wednesday. That makes this month the third snowiest on record and the snowiest December ever, per tracking from the lab that started in 1970.
If weather modeling holds up, it’s possible December could also overtake the current No. 2 record holder, February 2019, which saw a whopping 221 inches of snow, Dr. Andrew Schwartz, who works at the lab, told ABC News.
According to data from the lab, typically about 110 inches of snow will have fallen by Jan. 1 in a given water year, which begins on Oct. 1. But, so far, 2021 has already seen 264 inches of snowfall, putting the region at 258% of its average for this point in the year and breaking the 51-year-old October through December snowfall record of 260 inches set in 1970.
California recorded its second driest water year on record in 2021, according to a report from the state’s Department of Water Resources. But there’s hope that the abnormal amount of snow the Sierra has seen could help break the state’s ongoing drought.
“The snowfall that we’ve received has given us an amazing start to the water year and developed a solid foundation for upcoming snow,” Schwartz said, “but we still need average or above average snowfall in the upcoming months for it to impact the drought.”
Schwartz added that the lab has recorded receiving 70% of its average annual snowfall already, “which is great because the remaining four months with snow only need to make up that remaining 30%.”
He cautioned, however, that if those months end up being dry, then California could end up short of its average snowfall and there won’t be any improvement in the drought at all.
The Sierra snowpack typically holds about a third of California’s water reservoirs, but several are still running lower than normal, even with the increased precipitation.
Data from the National Drought Mitigation Center at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln has shown mild improvement in California’s drought, with 79% of the state in an extreme or exceptional drought as of Dec. 21, down from 88% three months ago.
“So, we’re off to an incredibly promising and exciting start,” Schwartz said, “but we need some cautious optimism going forward.”
ABC News’ Hope Osemwenkhae and Daniel Manzo contributed to this report.
Spider-Man: No Way Home is now officially Sony Pictures’ highest-grossing film of all time, Deadline reports.
The Tom Holland-led superhero flick has raked in $1.16 billion at the global box office so far, surpassing 2019’s Spider-Man: Far from Home, which totaled at $1.13 billion.
Through Tuesday, the film has made $516.4 million at the box office domestically and $644.9 million at the international box office. As previously reported, the film also had the second-highest opening ever at the domestic box office, taking in $260 million its debut weekend.
Since its release on December 17, No Way Home has also become the top grossing movie of the year internationally among all Hollywood releases, beating out the James Bond film No Time to Die.
Spider-Man: No Way Home is a co-production of Sony Pictures and Marvel Studios, the latter of which is owned by ABC News’ parent company, Disney.
