Today is National Dive Bar Day and comedian Iliza Shlesinger is doing her part to ensure those small businesses aren’t left behind during the post-COVID-19 economic recovery.
The Good on Paper star spoke to ABC Audio about her partnership with Seagram’s 7 Crown American Blended Whiskey, which rolled out its annual #KeepTheDiveAlive campaign.
“This was a very cool way to give back and do something meaningful,” she said.
#KeepTheDiveAlive aims to protect dive bars — especially those impacted by the economic downturn caused by the pandemic. To assist in recovery efforts, Shlesinger starred in a series of hilarious videos that provide “training materials” to former regulars who may be out of practice after a year of Zoom meetings. The tongue-in-cheek videos show Iliza demonstrating the do’s and don’ts of dive bar etiquette, such as how to properly order a drink, what to wear and, overall, how to be a supportive patron.
Shlesinger says sharing those videos and utilizing the #KeepTheDiveAlive hashtag on social media will help support those businesses. “Every time people share the content we created for their hashtag #KeepTheDriveAlive campaign, Seagram’s donates $7 dollars to [the Main Street Alliance] nonprofit that helps local businesses, some of which are dive bars,” she explains.
The Spenser Confidential star says not only did dive bars help her career by giving her places to hone her craft, but reveals she also used to work at one before her big break.
“These are part of the fabric of our local economies. These are not mom and pop businesses, but independent businesses that we all have a connection to in one way or another,” says Shlesinger.
(NEW YORK) — Confetti filled the streets of lower Manhattan on Wednesday as New Yorkers gathered for a ticker tape parade honoring the heroes of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Called the Hometown Heroes Parade, the event was held along the Canyon of Heroes, nearly 16 months after New York City became the nation’s first COVID-19 epicenter.
Here is how the news is developing. All times Eastern. Check back for updates.
Jul 07, 12:47 pm
Subway car from 1904 resurrected as parade float
Among the 14 floats is an old subway car from 1904 that was resurrected for MTA workers to ride in along the parade route.
Sarah Feinberg, interim president of New York City Transit, was overcome with emotion seeing how many people came to show their support.
“It’s just wonderful to see the city come out and thank our workforce,” she told ABC New York station WABC.
Jul 07, 11:50 am
Eric Adams joins parade festivities
Eric Adams, who was announced Tuesday as the winner of New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary, was among those joining parade festivities.
The former police captain declined to comment on the race to ABC New York station WABC, insisting the day was about essential workers.
“We need to honor them [essential workers] with pay equity … we need to show them the respect they deserve,” Adams said.
Mayor Bill de Blasio is also at the party.
Jul 07, 11:35 am
Sounds of marching band, cheers echo through the streets
As the confetti falls, the sounds of marching bands and revelers are echoing through the streets. New Yorkers are standing on the sides of the parade route, cheering, ringing bells and holding “Thank you” signs while the floats and bands move through.
While the COVID-19 pandemic is not over, New York City’s seven-day average positivity rate is now 0.96%. More than 605,000 people in the U.S. have died from COVID-19.
Jul 07, 11:00 am
Ticker tape parade underway
The ticker tape parade along lower Manhattan’s Canyon of Heroes is underway.
The 14 parade floats represent 260 groups of essential workers, including first responders, small business employees, delivery workers and childcare employees.
MTA workers have resurrected an old subway car from 1904 as their float.
Queens nurse Sandra Lindsay, who was the first person in the U.S. to get the COVID-19 vaccine, is the parade’s Grand Marshal.
Jul 07, 8:49 am
Pittsburgh nurse who came to NYC for COVID returns to ride on float
Justin Davis, a traveling nurse with AMN Healthcare, left his wife and three children behind in Pittsburgh to care for COVID-19 patients in an overwhelmed Manhattan hospital when the pandemic began.
“Never seen anything like it,” said Davis, who trained as an Army field medic and has been a nurse for 17 years. “I had more bodies, not enough people to take care. There were unqualified people there because there was nobody else.”
When New York’s crisis subsided, he moved to COVID hot spots in Orlando and Buffalo.
He will ride atop one of 14 floats that will make its way through the shower of confetti on Wednesday.
Davis told ABC News the parade is also a way to put his pandemic work behind him.
“I’ll accept the thanks,” he said.
Jul 07, 7:53 am
Ceremony scaled back due to heat
The City Hall ceremony at the end of the parade will be “a much smaller, stripped down version” than originally planned due to the heat, Mayor de Blasio said Tuesday.
“We will be greeting the marchers at the end of the parade and thanking them,” de Blasio said. “Not a big ceremony, but the parade itself of course will be the central salute to our heroes.”
“We will be adding additional cooling centers and water stations along the route,” the mayor added.
Jul 07, 7:24 am
New York to hold first ticker tape parade in two years
Ticker tape parades along the Canyon of Heroes are a historical part of New York City. These parades have honored people from Amelia Earhart in 1932 to Winston Churchill in 1946. The most recent ticker tape parade was in 2019 for the U.S. women’s national soccer team after they won the World Cup.
“Ticker tape parades up the Canyon of Heroes, they’ve happened for generations,” Mayor Bill de Blasio said last month. “But this one will have a special spirit to it, a special heart and soul, because it’s about celebrating everyday New Yorkers who did something heroic and need our thanks.”
Members of three iconic ‘90s boy bands — *NSYNC, Backstreet Boys and Boyz II Men — are teaming up for The After Party, a new show at the Venetian in Las Vegas.
*NSYNC’s Joey Fatone, Backstreet Boys’ AJ McLean and Nick Carter, and Boyz II Men’s Wanya Morris will perform a variety of classic hits with a live band during the four-night engagement. There will be comedy, storytelling and special guests, and the set list will change nightly.
“Being on stage has always been a part of all of us so having the opportunity to create a show with the best songs of all our groups has been a lot of fun,” Joey says in a statement. “Working together has brought up so many memories and I’m excited to see how the fans react to seeing us all on stage together. Plus, we have some surprises in store!”
AJ adds, “We’ve had so much fun putting this show together and finally sharing a stage, I can’t wait to share it with the fans. I promise an incredible night of wild surprises, this is an absolute must see!”
The show will run from Thursday, August 19 through Sunday, August 22, with tickets going on sale to the general public on Saturday, July 10 at 10 a.m. PT.
(BEDMINSTER, N.J.) — Former President Donald Trump announced Wednesday he is filing class action lawsuits against three of the country’s largest tech companies — Facebook, Twitter, and Google — all of which have banned the former president from their social media platforms.
At a press conference at his Bedminster, New Jersey, golf club, Trump announced a “major class-action lawsuit” against the three companies, demanding “a stop to the blacklisting, banishing, and canceling that you know so well.”
The former president is currently banned from Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.
“Today, in conjunction with the America First Policy Institute, I’m filing, as the lead class representative, a major class action lawsuit against the big tech giants, including Facebook, Google, and Twitter, as well as their CEOs, Mark Zuckerberg, Sundar Pichai, and Jack Dorsey, three real nice guys,” Trump said.
The former president said the lawsuits seek injunctive relief to “allow prompt restitution and, really, restoration.”
“In addition, we are asking the court to impose punitive damages on these social media giants,” he said.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
For the first time in six years, Garth Brooks is returning to the Boston area for a major concert event. This week, he added a new stop on his Stadium Tour in Foxborough, Massachusetts.
The show will take place October 9. It’ll be the first time Garth has ever played the venue — Gillette Stadium — as well as the first concert that’s been held there in 2021.
But that’s not the only reason the show will be a special one, says Garth, pointing out that “[o]ne of the many reasons why I’m so excited about playing Gillette Stadium is this is kind of where it all began for us.” The venue is owned by billionaire businessman Robert Kraft, whose holdings also include the NFL team the New England Patriots, and whose family encouraged Garth early on to branch out into the realm of stadium shows.
“The Krafts were the first stadium — and the first family — to come to us and say, ‘Hey, man — you can play stadiums, and you should play stadiums.’ It was very sweet,” the singer says. “They believed in us years and years ago. Now it’s neat that it’s finally coming to fruition and the circle is kind of being complete.”
Tickets to Garth’s Foxborough show go on sale next Friday, July 16 at 10AM ET. As always for Garth’s stadium stops, the show will feature in the round seating, and tickets will cost $94.95, all-inclusive.
Fans on social media have high hopes to receive another collaboration with Drake and Nicki Minaj before the end of the year.
The OVO head honcho shared two cryptic posts on his Instagram Story Tuesday night, including a pic taken inside Nicki’s studio — hence the wall with her name written on it in neon pink.
The other photo shows Drake sitting in the back of a vehicle rocking a YMCMB hoodie, which stands for Young Money Cash Money Billionaires. It represents Drake, Nicki, and other artists signed to Lil Wayne’s Young Money Entertainment label and Birdman’s Cash Money label.
Drake’s posts came hours after Nicki Minaj made public service announcement on her Instagram account. “There’s something I urgently need to share with you guys. I’ll go LIVE on IG THURSDAY @ 10:30 PM EST,” Nicki wrote in the caption. “No, I won’t be late. In fact, I’ll be early. This is VERY VERY VERY IMPORTANT. Love you so much.”
Nicki and Drake recently collaborated with Lil Wayne on “Seeing Green,” from the re-release of Nicki’s critically acclaimed mixtape, Beat Me Up Scotty. Throughout the project, Nicki lyrically mentions working on the follow up to 2018’s Queen.
Fans are still waiting on Drake’s album, Certified Lover Boy, which was set to arrive this summer. The Toronto rapper recently changed his Instagram bio to Certified, which gives the impression the album has a new title or has been delayed.
The Offspring has premiered the video for “This Is Not Utopia,” a track off the band’s new album, Let the Bad Times Roll.
The clip finds the SoCal punks sporting gas masks as they rock out in a smoky blue room while a woman dances in an American flag bikini. That’s all cut with microscopic footage of blood, which a press release describes as a “sly wink” to vocalist Dexter Holland‘s PhD in Molecular Biology.
You can watch the “This Is Not Utopia” video streaming on YouTube.
Let the Bad Times Roll, the first new Offspring record in nine years, was released in April. Its lead single and title track hit number one on Billboard‘s Mainstream Rock Airplay chart.
98 Degrees is back to heat up your summer with a brand new song.
The reunited boy band teased their new single, “Where Do You Wanna Go,” and gave a behind-the-scenes look at the recording process this week.
The song, which drops Friday along with a music video, was recorded at a makeshift recording studio at the Westgate Las Vegas Resort & Casino during quarantine. In a clip posted to the band’s social media, we see the group playing around with melodies for the upbeat pop tune.
“Where Do You Wanna Go” is part of their 98 Days of Summer campaign, which they launched last month. The campaign will include the release of a new EP, titled Summer of 98, with new songs and remixes of their most popular hits, including “Heat It Up,” “I Do (Cherish You),” “Invisible Man,” “Because of You,” “The Hardest Thing,” and more.
The group — Nick Lachey, Drew Lachey, Jeff Timmons and Justin Jeffre — most recently released a Christmas album, Let It Snow, in 2017. Their last album of original music was 2013’s 2.0.
(LONDON) — Haitian President Jovenel Moise was killed in an attack at his home before dawn on Wednesday, the country’s interim premier said.
A group of unidentified individuals raided Moise’s private residence in Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince, at around 1 a.m. local time. They gunned down the 53-year-old head of state and wounded his wife, Martine Moise, who remains hospitalized, according to a statement from Haitian interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph.
Joseph, who condemned what he called a “hateful, inhumane and barbaric act,” said that the Caribbean country’s national police force and military had the situation under control and declared a state of emergency.
Reaction has been pouring in from around the world condemning the assassination, including from U.S. President Joe Biden, who called the situation “very worrisome.”
Reeling from the coronavirus pandemic, Haiti has also been in the midst of a constitutional crisis as Moise and opposition leaders disputed the end of his five-year presidential term and legislative elections remained interminably delayed.
Addressing the nation in a televised speech, Joseph called on the people of Haiti to “stay calm.” He chaired a meeting of the government’s ministers Wednesday morning, although the country’s line of succession is unclear, especially given its recent political turmoil.
“All the ministers and I have been working since the news broke and we want to assure you we will bring the killers of the president to justice,” he said. “Please stay calm and let the authorities do their work. We don’t want the country to plunge into chaos. This is a very sad day for our nation and for our people.”
Joseph’s initial paper statement said some attackers were speaking Spanish, but a second statement issued in English by the Haitian embassy in Washington made no mention of that. Instead, it said that the group was “highly trained and heavily armed” and called for an urgent United Nations Security Council meeting and an international investigation into the attack.
The streets of Haiti’s capital Port-au-Prince were largely deserted Wednesday, and Toussaint Louverture International Airport has been closed in the wake of the assassination.
The U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince was also closed Wednesday, including for consular services, “due to an ongoing security situation,” it said in a security alert. The embassy also said it is restricting its American staff to its compounds “until further notice” and urged members of the public to avoid unnecessary travel to the area.
U.S. officials are “still gathering information” on the deadly attack, according to White House press secretary Jen Psaki, offering U.S. assistance “if there’s an investigation. We’re still assessing, still gathering information, and the president of course will be briefed by his national security team this morning.”
Hours later, the White House issued a statement from Biden condemning “this heinous act, and I am sending my sincere wishes for First Lady Moïse’s recovery. The United States offers condolences to the people of Haiti, and we stand ready to assist as we continue to work for a safe and secure Haiti.”
Haiti has been in a state of chaos for months now, with frequent gunfire and street skirmishes between armed groups, political demonstrations and strikes, and a coronavirus wave never brought under control. Cases of the virus were as high last month as they were one year ago, and the country has yet to distribute a single vaccine dose or receive any shipments from COVAX, the international program to provide vaccines to low- and middle-income countries.
That’s in part because of the governing crisis roiling Haiti. The country’s political opposition had argued that Moise’s five-year presidential term ended this February — five years after his election victory, but four years after he took office — while he said he had one more year left because the disputed 2016 election delayed his inauguration until 2017.
Moise had been governing by decree since January 2020, after the country failed to hold legislative elections and the legislature’s mandate expired. Opposition leaders accused him of wanting to return Haiti to a dictatorship.
Earlier this year, Moise ordered the retirement of three Supreme Court judges and the arrest of nearly two dozen people, including prominent officials, who he alleged were plotting a coup. Violent protests against Moise erupted, prompting the president to declare a state of emergency in parts of the country in March.
The political instability in addition to economic woes and escalating gang violence have undermined efforts to rebuild Haiti from a devastating earthquake in 2010 and Hurricane Matthew in 2016.
While the Biden administration backed Moise’s claim to have one more year in office, it had grown increasingly vocal in its opposition to his “one-man rule,” in the words of the top U.S. diplomat for the Western Hemisphere, including governing by decrees and refusing to hold those legislative elections.
While the White House has said it will provide Haiti some of the initial 80 million COVID-19 vaccines it has promised to share overseas, it has yet to announce when it will do so — with the worsening security situation now making it that much harder.
