SHOW BIZ

THE reboot of the musical Sunday In The Park With George has been axed after both its leading stars Ariana Grande and Jonathan Bailey dropped out.

The show, announced last year, was set to run at the Barbican in London next summer but won’t go ahead, with organisers instead hoping to launch a version with a different cast the following year.

In a statement, bosses said: “The planned 2027 production of Sunday in the Park with George at the Barbican will no longer proceed as scheduled.

“Empire Street Productions will retain the rights with a view to presenting the production in 2028. Further details will be announced when appropriate.”

Ariana announced her exit from the project as part of her hiatus from showbiz, at the beginning of August.

At the time, a rep for the singer and actress said: “Ariana will be taking a step back from visibility after she completes the Eternal Sunshine Tour.

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“She looks forward to finishing the tour and ending it on a high note, both healthily and happily, and then taking a much-deserved break from public-facing work and appearances, which has led to endless, ongoing public scrutiny.

“This tour has been a beautiful experience for her. She loves her fans and has loved every minute of this tour so much.”

At the time, bosses at Empire Street Productions said her role would be recast.

They said: “We wish her nothing but the best. The production will open at the Barbican in summer 2027 as planned, and casting will be announced in due course.”

However, a month later, Jonathan, who she also starred opposite in both Wicked films, also left the show as a result of Ariana’s exit.

HAYDEN Panettiere took a pill that was allegedly laced with fentanyl on the day of her death.

The beloved actress died aged 36 of a suspected overdose at a luxury Airbnb in South Carolina last month.

Cops are said to be “zeroing in” on her alleged long-term drug dealer in Los Angeles, who she met before travelling to Greenville.

The Heroes and Nashville star is said to have bought several black-market prescription drugs from the dealer.

Days before her 37th birthday, Hayden allegedly took an oxycodone laced with fentanyl, sources told TMZ.

The mum-of-one had been in South Carolina with her on-off ex Brian Hickerson, who was arrested yesterday after an alleged incident at a bar.

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According to sources, the 37-year-old actor started yelling at officers about her death while cuffed and sitting on the pavement.

Hickerson has already met with Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) officials as they continue to investigate Hayden’s cause of death.

He previously told officers that Hayden had a “bag of medication” with her.

The drugs she was reportedly taken was redacted in the police report, although nine different types were listed.

Hayden has been open about her struggles with substance abuse, once revealing how her liver “gave out” due to a secret opioid addiction.

The actress told PEOPLE how her addiction issues severely worsened after the birth of her child in 2014.

To help cope with the postnatal depression, Hayden admitted she turned to alcohol.

Hayden ended up having to go to the hospital after her liver “gave out”.

A year after giving birth, she underwent her first stint in rehab while still filming for the hit show Nashville.

Years later, Hayden admitted she couldn’t stop drinking as she returned for treatment in 2021, enrolling in a 12-month program.

It took eight months of “intensive therapy” to help her move on past her addiction.

More to follow… For the latest news on this story keep checking back at The Sun Online

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Paramount Skydance Chief Executive David Ellison faces a pivotal decision: Should he uproot his Hollywood studio — the birthplace of such film classics as “Sunset Boulevard,” “The Godfather” and “Beverly Hills Cop”?

Paramount floated shifting its home base to Tennessee or Texas in July, hoping to deter California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta from waging a legal battle to block Paramount’s $111-billion acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery.

Bonta rejected the tactic, calling it “blackmail.” His antitrust lawsuit, filed in collaboration with 11 other Democratic state attorneys general, has since stalled the largest Hollywood merger in decades and put Ellison in a jam.

The 43-year-old tech scion — a film aficionado who has spent two decades building his career in Hollywood — has told associates he doesn’t want to leave L.A. But he has signaled that he’s prepared to sell the historic studio lots and move Paramount’s and Warner Bros.’ operations from California if the merger isn’t finalized by next month, according to people familiar with the situation who were not authorized to comment.

The prospect has rattled a region already reeling from steep declines in film production, heavy job losses, empty soundstages and shuttered small businesses.

“It would be devastating,” Assemblymember Rick Chavez Zbur, who represents a district that includes the Melrose Avenue movie lot and neighborhoods near Warner Bros. in Burbank, said of a Paramount move. “We need to do everything we can to protect these important jobs in California’s iconic industry.”

Paramount declined to comment.

Ellison is frustrated after securing approvals from more than 65 regulators worldwide for the mammoth merger that would bring HBO, CNN, CBS, Comedy Central, MTV and TBS under the same roof.

Bonta’s lawsuit stands in the way.

“California is the fourth-largest economy in the world and the best place to do business,” a spokesman from Bonta’s office said. “Strong antitrust enforcement is essential so everyone can benefit from a vibrant economy.”

A federal judge in Oakland temporarily blocked the deal, prompting Paramount to agree not to finalize the acquisition until after a trial or June 1, whichever comes first. Settlement talks collapsed in late August after Bonta accused Paramount of leaking and misrepresenting their discussions.

Paramount has plenty at stake. U.S. District Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín set the trial for March, but the company urgently needs the valuable Warner assets to better compete against tech behemoths. And beginning Oct. 1, Paramount must increase its payout to Warner Bros. Discovery shareholders by $7 million a day, so-called ticking fees that will heap more debt onto the highly leveraged transaction.

Paramount asked the judge to require California and other plaintiff states, including Nevada, Oregon and New York, along with the Writers Guild of America (which also sued) to post a $1.88-billion bond that could compensate Paramount for ticking fee costs. A hearing is set for Sept. 24.

For weeks, Paramount’s most potent weapon has been its in-the-works plan to leave L.A.

Lobbying has been intense, prompting a parade of politicians led by Gov. Gavin Newsom, L.A. Mayor Karen Bass and gubernatorial nominee Xavier Becerra to urge the two sides to settle the lawsuit.

“It’s a game of chicken,” Kevin Klowden, an economist and managing director at the Melcene Advisory firm, said in an interview. “But I’m not dismissing the threat because it is very real.”

Relocating from Los Angeles would allow Ellison’s cash-hungry media company to qualify for lucrative tax incentives offered by another state. Ellison’s short list includes Tennessee, Texas and Georgia. But leaving its longtime home would be costly for Paramount too, given how much of the talent and deal-making remains concentrated around L.A.

Tennessee’s Department of Economic and Community Development declined to discuss its negotiations with Paramount, but in a statement a spokesperson said the state “remains committed to working with companies across a wide range of industries that are exploring opportunities to invest and grow in Tennessee.”

Early this month, a pro-merger group was set to hold a news conference outside Paramount, but it moved its gathering to a warehouse a few blocks away after anti-merger activists planned a counterprotest.

The pro-merger organization, Neighbors for Strong Communities, was incorporated in Washington, D.C., in June and has lobbed text messages to Californians urging them to press Bonta to drop the case.

Speakers were concerned with just one issue: What would happen should Paramount pull out?

“What are we going to do with all these people who have invested their lives and many generations into building something here?” asked Keyla Wood, who moved from Mexico to L.A. about a decade ago after getting her start in Spanish-language soap operas.

“It’s been one thing after the other: The pandemic, the strikes and then it was the fires,” said Wood, who has worked as a stand-in for Eva Longoria and Salma Hayek. “So many people never work again.”

David Ellison is deciding whether to leave Hollywood.

(Bloomberg via Getty Images)

L.A.’s very identity is at stake, added Daniela Kelly, an actor and dancer who arrived from Brazil two decades ago.

“Everyone in the world sees Los Angeles and Hollywood as the platform for their dreams,” Kelly said. “Imagine if a huge studio with 100 years of history here just leaves? What will we be?”

Businesses like Kelly’s small Kreashen Studios USA, which provides video and podcasting space in Marina del Rey, depends on the region’s entertainment economy.

“It’s difficult financially right now to keep open,” she said. “So I’m pro having Paramount stay because this is the center, the heart of Hollywood.”

But deal opponents and some experts say the merger would actually worsen L.A.’s already bleak production picture.

Paramount has promised to cut $6 billion in expenses — a figure that doesn’t factor in the cost of ticking fees, which would add $650 million each quarter to the $81 billion that Paramount had anticipated paying Warner shareholders.

“We’ve seen from previous mergers that jobs have been lost,” L.A. City Councilmember Adrin Nazarian said at a City Hall event recently.

Combining Paramount and Warner could result in the elimination of nearly 4,500 positions over three years and put at risk an additional 5,865 jobs within businesses that serve the studios, according to an August report by the Los Angeles County Department of Economic Opportunity.

“When you look at the economic impact, it’s pretty staggering,” Kelly LoBianco, the department director, said in a recent interview. “An estimated $4 billion in economic output lost, and another $550 million lost in tax revenue at the local, state and federal level.”

The merger also could erase $79 million in tax revenue to Los Angeles County even if Paramount stays in L.A., she said.

But state and county tax revenue would plummet further should Paramount dispatch hundreds of its workers to Tennessee or some other state, Klowden said.

“If Ellison moves all the management out and all of the productions out, you’re talking about potentially tens of thousands of jobs,” Klowden said. “That, bluntly, isn’t just devastating to L.A. That becomes devastating to everybody.”

A report commissioned by Paramount from Los Angeles Economic Development Corp. predicted even steeper losses of at least 28,000 jobs should the studio move its entire operation out of state, according to a draft report given to Politico.

Under a less dire scenario, Paramount could shift its corporate headquarters to another state to qualify for incentives but still maintain large staffs in the creative hubs of Los Angeles and New York, where the company has its legal headquarters.

When the Ellison family acquired Paramount from the Sumner Redstone family last year, Ellison shifted operations to L.A., where he and other key executives work on the Melrose Avenue lot.

The threat to pull up stakes has created a disconnect after Ellison has spent more than a year touting how his family’s growing collection of media properties would strengthen traditional Hollywood.

The relocation campaign echoes a tactic used by software giant Oracle Corp., co-founded by Ellison’s billionaire father, Larry Ellison. For three decades, Oracle thrived in Redwood City, Calif., but in 2020, the company moved its headquarters to Austin, Texas, joining other California tech firms leaving in protest of the state’s high taxes.

The elder Ellison announced in 2024 that Oracle would be moving again, this time to Nashville, although that relocation hasn’t been finalized.

Paramount would risk leaving behind a skilled talent pool filled with experienced production workers and entertainment executives, Klowden said.

Fleeing L.A. could prompt “a talent bleed-out,” Klowden said. “Creative types are like: ‘Would I feel comfortable moving there?’ And, ‘What if I move there and something goes wrong? There would be nowhere else for me to go.’”

He pointed to Nissan’s 2006 U.S. headquarters move to the Nashville area from Gardena in L.A.’s South Bay, which dramatically reset the automaker’s workforce as fewer than half of its Southern California employees made the trek to Tennessee.

On Friday, a magistrate judge told both sides to identify dates in late October to meet for court-ordered settlement talks.

Each has motivations to settle — including avoiding a years-long court fight. Bonta has said Paramount must be willing to part with assets to alleviate market concentration, which could lead to a sale of Warner’s New Line Cinema, which has rights to “The Lord of the Rings” and “The Conjuring” franchises, and potentially cable channels such as CNN, Food Network or Cartoon Network.

Paramount, as part of a settlement, could abandon plans to leave L.A.

“All of the parties need to understand what this [issue] means to workers and small businesses,” Zbur, the local Assembly member, said. “I’m hopeful for a settlement that assures that Paramount and Warner Bros. will maintain their operations and remain a significant economic and employment force in Los Angeles.”

Times staff writer Cerys Davies contributed to this report.

As the scorching heat of the summer reaches its peak and the calendar brings hope of cooler temperatures, it’s time to fluff the pillows and settle in to enjoy the comfort of the new television season.

But before we turn the page, the Emmy Awards will honor the shows of the past year that had audiences crying, laughing and glued to their screens — some returning this fall, while others bid adieu last year.

The 78th Emmy Awards, honoring the standouts from the 2025-26 television season, will celebrate the shows that gave viewers plenty of reasons to stay in. Whether it was the nail-biting anxiety over the chaos in HBO Max’s drama “The Pitt,” the most nominated show with 25, or laughing at the silly situations of Apple TV’s “Widow’s Bay,” which earned 19 nominations, television gave viewers different reasons to watch.

Some of the top contenders are already coming into the ceremony as winners after the first round of awards were handed out earlier this month. “Widow’s Bay” currently leads with eight Emmys, following by six for “DTF St. Louis,” and “The Pitt” won four. Notably, Rob Reiner received a posthumous Emmy for his guest appearance in Season 4 of “The Bear.”

Here’s everything you need to know about the 2026 Emmy Awards:

Where are the Emmys?

The 78th Primetime Emmy Awards will take place on Monday beginning at 5 p.m. PT at the Peacock Theater at L.A. Live in downtown Los Angeles.

Earlier this month, a pair of ceremonies, formerly called the Creative Arts Emmys, honored artistic and technical achievements as well as some performance categories. Those ceremonies will be televised Saturday on FXX at 8 p.m. and stream next day on Hulu.

How can I watch the shows?

The live telecast will be broadcast on NBC and streamed simultaneously on Peacock.

Who is hosting?

Mariska Hargitay at the blue carpet rollout at L.A. Live in downtown Los Angeles on Thursday.

(Christina House/Los Angeles Times)

Mariska Hargitay, known for playing Olivia Benson on NBC’s “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit,” will make her hosting debut at this year’s award show.

In an interview with The Times, the multihyphenate said she was excited to televise some “razzle-dazzle” and to become the first woman to host in 15 years.

“Am I scared? Of course I am; I’ve never done this,” she recently told The Times. “But at a certain point, you have to go: Why not me? Bring it on.”

When does the red carpet start, and how can I watch that?

The countdown to the award ceremony will begin at 2 p.m., with several opportunities to see your favorite stars arrive on the red carpet — which is actually blue this year in celebration of NBC’s 100th anniversary — at the Peacock Theater.

E! will get the party started with a programming block from 2 to 5 p.m. with “Live From E!: Countdown to the Emmys,” hosted by Erin Lim Rhodes with Lance Bass and Ciara Miller, and “Live From E!: The Emmys,” hosted by Justin Sylvester, Keltie Knight and Will Marfuggi.

People and Entertainment Weekly will be conducting interviews as guests arrive on their websites and social platforms throughout the day, while NBC will be livestreaming pre-show arrivals on the network’s official TikTok account from 4 to 5 p.m.

KTLA will air “Live From the Emmys,” hosted by Jessica Holmes and Melvin Robert with Megan Henderson reporting, from the blue carpet beginning at 3 p.m. And CNN will air “Red Carpet Live: TV’s Biggest Night” beginning at 2 p.m. It will be hosted by CNN’s Elizabeth Wagmeister and Variety co-president and co-editor in chief Ramin Setoodeh.

What shows and actors are nominated?

“The Pitt” will defend its drama series title against “The Diplomat,” “The Gilded Age,” “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms,” “Paradise,” “Pluribus,” “Slow Horses” and “Your Friends & Neighbors.”

Zendaya (“Euphoria”) is looking to become a three-time winner for lead actress in a drama. She is nominated alongside Carrie Coon (“The Gilded Age”), Chase Infiniti (“The Testaments”), Keri Russell (“The Diplomat”) and Rhea Seehorn (“Pluribus”).

Noah Wyle (“The Pitt”) is again nominated for lead actor in a drama, along with Sterling K. Brown (“Paradise”), Gary Oldman (“Slow Horses”), Mark Ruffalo (“Task”) and Rufus Sewell (“The Diplomat”).

“Hacks” earned the most nominations in a single year for a comedy, with 24. It’s nominated for comedy series, as is “Margo’s Got Money Troubles,” “Nobody Wants This,” “Only Murders in the Building,” “Abbott Elementary,” “The Bear,” “Shrinking” and “Widow’s Bay.”

Jean Smart looks to win her fifth award for lead actress in a comedy series for “Hacks.” She is nominated alongside Quinta Brunson (“Abbott Elementary”), Ayo Edebiri (“The Bear”), Elle Fanning (“Margo’s Got Money Troubles”) and Lisa Kudrow (“The Comeback”).

Yahya Abdul-Mateen II (“Wonder Man”), Steve Carell (“Rooster”), Matthew Rhys (“Widow’s Bay”), Jason Segel (“Shrinking”) and Martin Short (“Only Murders in the Building”) are nominated for lead actor in a comedy.

See the full list of nominees here.

Who’s going to win?

It’s looking like a year where the winners will be easy to decipher, according to awards prognosticators, which includes The Times’ award columnist Glenn Whipp. If you’re an actor attached to either the medical drama “The Pitt” or the horror-comedy “Widow’s Bay,” consider yourself the front runner. Noah Wyle and Matthew Rhys are both the leading contenders in their respective categories.

Jean Smart is predicted to complete her sweep of lead actress in a comedy for the fifth and final season of “Hacks.” In the leading actress in a drama, it’s a tight race between Rhea Seehorn for “Pluribus” and Keri Russell for “The Diplomat.”

The second season of “The Pitt” currently stands as the favorite for drama series, while the comedy series category is a battle between new series “Widow’s Bay” and departing series “Hacks.”

Harrison Ford could win his first major acting award, for supporting actor in a comedy for “Shrinking,” unless another veteran actor takes the spotlight — Stephen Root of “Widow’s Bay.”

Supporting actress in a comedy also comes down to the top shows, likely to be between Kate O’Flynn (“Widow’s Bay”) and Hannah Einbinder (“Hacks”).

Who’s going to present?

A number of nominees will present the awards throughout the night. Past and recent Emmy winners, including Linda Cardellini, Sally Field, David Harbour, Zendaya and Alan Cumming will take the stage.

The Television Academy will celebrate the 30th anniversary of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” and bring together David Boreanaz and Sarah Michelle Gellar as presenters. They will also honor the 50th anniversary of “Charlie’s Angels,” and reunite Cheryl Ladd, Kate Jackson and Jaclyn Smith.

Other presenters include Odessa A’zion, Macaulay Culkin, Jon Hamm, Marcello Hernández, Peter Krause, Dan Levy, Julianna Margulies, Annie Murphy, Niecy Nash-Betts, Keke Palmer, Amanda Peet, Amy Poehler, Florence Pugh and Rachel Sennott, with more to be announced.

Singer-songwriter Noah Kahan will cover Simon and Garfunkel’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water” during the in-memoriam segment of the show.

The Great Celebrity Pottery Throw Down sees six stars take on a new challenge in the pottery barn.

Viewers of The Great Celebrity Pottery Throw Down have issued their verdict on host Liza Tarbuck.

The Channel 4 series launched on Sunday, September 13, with six celebrities taking on a new challenge. They include Lucy Beaumont, Fatiha El-Ghorri, Richard Herring, Paul Merson, Layton Williams, and Denise Van Outen.

With little to no pottery experience, they braved the pottery studio, hoping to impress judges Keith Brymer Jones and Rich Miller to earn a place in the grand final and be crowned winner. But unlike the original format, the celebrity edition has no weekly elimination rounds.

Channel 4 had earlier teased: “Viewers can expect a few wonky edges, and some cracking clay creations as each celebrity grows in confidence and ability. But who will be holding their breath, waiting to see if their muddy masterpieces emerge from the kiln intact, who will reduce Keith to tears with their creative ceramics, and who will crack under the pressure as the competition gets more competitive over the weeks?”

After being announced as presenter, Liza previously shared: “I knew I’d enjoy Keith and Rich’s company and I did. People flourish around emotionally intelligent people, and the boy’s encouragement and kindness really promoted a growth in our newbie potters that was a pleasure to witness. I absolutely loved being there.”

Viewers have now declared their support for the former BBC Radio 2 presenter, who announced her radio show exit earlier this year, saying that after 36 years, it was “time to go”. Demanding to see more of her on their screens, one fan wrote: “Liza Tarbuck is such a natural presenter, yet television companies consistently use the same faces. Liza is a great addition to #potterythrowdown.”

Another said: “LOVING Liza Tarbuck on #PotteryThrowdown Always loved her on Radio2.. but she is PERFECT for this! What a signing @Channel4.” Someone else wrote: “Never watched Celeb Pottery Throw Down before… It’s brilliant, loving Denise, Layton, Lucy, Richard, and Liza Tarbuck presenting is brilliant… she always is, why doesn’t she get more TV time?”

“More Liza Tarbuck on the telly box please!” one viewer added, as another said: “I’d love to see more of Liza Tarbuck – she’s absolutely hilarious! Make her the permanent presenter for #potterythrowdown.”

Another wrote: “Liza + Pottery Throwdown is a dream come true! But seeing the skill level they’re all starting this, I feel this is going to be an emotional journey of a series.” Yet another echoed: “@PotteryThrow great to see Liza on the TV again, funny lady, love her.”

Meanwhile, Liza spoke about working with judges Keith and Rich in an interview with The Guardian ahead of the new series airing. “Keith is fabulous,” she said. “A really good laugh. But trust me, Rich is the one slyly holding it all together.

“They’re both open-hearted and emotionally intelligent, which is a lovely quality in men of a certain age. That makes it a safe space and brings people’s barriers down. Celebrities aside – what a horrible label – they’re just humans. Keith said to me early on: ‘Just watch the clay work as therapy,’ and it really did.”

After being announced as the presenter of the series, Liza was flooded with support from fans. One person said: “Yay, so excited to see Liza Tarbuck!!”

Another said, “Yay, Lisa Tarbuck,” while a third added, “So excited to see this … and Lisa Tarbuck.” Someone else wrote: “Never watched this before… Liza Tarbuck appears- I’M IN!”

The Great Celebrity Pottery Throw Down is available to watch on Channel 4.

KATIE Price has begged her terminally ill mum Amy to “find the strength to stay” in an emotional Instagram post.

The 48-year-old star said she’s never loved anyone as much as seriously ill Amy, 74, who is living lung condition Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis (IPF).

She wrote: “Mum please don’t leave me, please find the strength to stay
with me longer on this earth your my EVERYTHING.

“And you know I’ve turned everything around and your so proud of me.
Your my eyes, my voice, my strength, my absolute Everything.

“You’re a warrior and I’m your baby girl always and you love me through everything and held my hand. I can’t lose yo, u not n, ow not EVE”R.”

Just days ago, Katie revealed on her podcast with sister Sophie that their mum Amy is in hospital and “very poorly”.

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Amy was diagnosed with IPF in 2017 and the chronic condition causes irreversible scarring of the lung’s air sacs making it difficult to breathe.

She had a lifesaving lung transplant in 2023 after drifting into a coma and being days away from death.

In July, Katie said she feared Amy might die while filming her recent autobiographical Sky documentary.

“There were so many times we thought we were gonna lose mum through the filming,” admitted Katie.

Sophie agreed, saying she didn’t think Amy was “going to make it.”

Katie went on: “She just keeps battling through and I never thought she’d make the BAFTAs [in February], none of us did.”

A former employee of Activision Blizzard is suing the Santa Monica-based game company, alleging she was sexually harassed and subject to retaliation.

In a lawsuit filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court on Wednesday, the woman, filing anonymously as Jane Doe, says the game giant “fostered and tolerated a pervasive ‘frat boy’ workplace culture,” where male employees and supervisors “openly objectified women, viewed and displayed pornography” and made demeaning sexual remarks in her presence.

She is seeking unspecified compensatory damages, including for lost wages, benefits and earning capacity.

“We take these allegations seriously. We strive to maintain a respectful and inclusive workplace, and we do that through best-in-class policies and systems designed to prevent and address harassment, discrimination, and retaliation, and by holding employees accountable for their behavior,” said a Blizzard spokesperson in a statement to The Times.

The woman, who said she worked for the company for 14 years beginning in 2009 in its sound department, accuses 10 men of subjecting her variously to harassment, physical assault, inappropriate touching and inappropriate comments.

Between 2011 and 2012, she alleges, one co-worker lured her to his apartment, where he repeatedly touched her leg and “blocked her exit, threaten[ing] her with physical violence and attempted to rape her.” He continued to demand dates and spread sexual rumors about her calling her a “bitch” and “slut” in front of co-workers and a male manager, according to the suit.

Over five years starting in 2010, Jane Doe says that she was “repeatedly sexually harassed” by another man, a re-recording mixer with whom she worked with, and who told her that she would “be risking her career if she reported him,” the complaint states.

She further alleges that a third man, Blizzard’s audio director, “repeatedly touched” her leg “in a sexual manner without her permission” and when she rejected his advances he “retaliated against her by sabotaging her work and ensuring that she was denied a promotion.”

According to the suit, Jane Doe’s complaints and reports to her supervisors and human resources about her alleged treatment were dismissed and they “failed to take timely or effective corrective action.”

Further, the former employee says that she was “required to work excessive and unsafe hours” and told not to report overtime.

As a result of the harassment, the employee says in her complaint, she suffered suffered depression “and was required to seek ongoing psychiatric care” before being discharged in April 2024.

A year earlier, Activision Blizzard and California’s Civil Rights Department reached a roughly $50-million settlement agreement to resolve an employment discrimination and equal pay lawsuit. .

The Civil Rights Department sued Activision Blizzard in 2021, alleging that women at the company were regularly subjected to sexual harassment, paid less, denied promotions and met with retaliation when they raised concerns with managers.

As part of the agreement, Activision Blizzard agreed to pay up to $45.75 million to compensate women who worked for the company in California from Oct. 12, 2015, to Dec. 31, 2020. The company also agreed to pay $9.1 million to cover the Civil Rights Department’s attorneys fees and costs.
Activision Blizzard also settled a case with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. As part of that 2022 settlement, the company agreed to establish an $18-million fund for workers who experienced sexual harassment or discrimination, among other types of workplace misconduct.

Activision Blizzard has denied all wrongdoing.

Poorna Jagannathan has played everything from a ruthless gangster (“Deli Boys”) to an overbearing immigrant mom (“Never Have I Ever”). Now with HBO’s “Lanterns,” she adds an all-powerful galactic android to her acting resume.

Her character’s identity was a secret for much of HBO’s DC Comics series until a reveal in Episode 4 that a rancher’s trophy wife, Zoe Macon (Jagannathan), was, in fact, the deadly Manhunter. Then another great surprise rocked the “Lanterns” universe Sunday when in Episode 5, she is killed by Lantern trainee, John Stewart (Aaron Pierre).

“She is dead, for sure. Maybe …” teases Jagannathan, who had to take a crash course in Green Lantern lore before assuming the role in the eight-episode series from showrunner and co-creator Chris Mundy (“Hell on Wheels,” “True Detective,” “Ozark”).

Jagannathan’s character belongs to an ancient, shape-shifting race created by the Guardians of the Universe as the galaxy’s first police force, but they’ve since gone rogue and are now out to eliminate the human race. Green lanterns are interstellar peacekeepers who wear rings that give them extraordinary powers. When veteran Lantern Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) and his mentee Stewart are tasked with solving a murder in rural Nebraska, they trip upon a great mystery that included ferreting out which resident in the small town of Rushville is the Manhunter.

The series has been lauded for elevating the superhero genre while presenting as a gritty crime drama. In this edited conversation, Jagannathan explains the demise of the Manhunter, how she morphed into a comic book villain for the role and what it’s like to feel all powerful at this stage in her career.

John Stewart (Aaron Pierre) and Zoe Macon (Poorna Jagannathan) in a scene from Episode 5 of “Lanterns.”

(HBO)

How much did you know about the DC universe before taking on this role?

I didn’t understand a lot of this world, but I did grow up on Wonder Woman. I twirled my way into my teens. So at least there’s that. It’s such a huge property, so there’s a lot to learn. But I realized that there’s a lot of similarities between Lucky (the gangster she played in “Deli Boys”) and Zoe. Lucky was originally written for a man. So with “Lanterns,” when I was first reading the script, I just kept looking at the cast of characters and thinking who might it be? I just expected a man would be playing the Maneater.

Maneater?

I mean Manhunter. I kept messing up and saying that when we started working on the show, too. It’s the name of an old Hall & Oates song. [Jagannathan hums, “She’s a man eater… .”]

Explain who or what a Manhunter is.

Manhunters were created by the galaxy as part of a police force, and then they went rogue. They were created to enforce justice, but it was a very particular kind of justice. There was no gray in the Manhunter. No emotion. It was either right or wrong, and they would eliminate what was wrong. But then they started feeling things.

The guardians saw it was an operation that went wrong so they closed it down. She [Zoe] is a sole survivor. She runs away to a place where she adapts quickly to the creatures around her, and learns how to feel. So she’s this feeling machine that battles against her own programming, but at the end of the day she can’t help her programming. When there’s a conflict, she resolves it by killing half the population.

Jagannathan on her character in “Lanterns”: “She’s a sole survivor. She runs away to a place where she adapts quickly to the creatures around her, and learns how to feel.”

(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

Manhunters morph to fit in with the population around them, but the skin your character chooses is that of a brown Indian woman. She does not look like anyone else in the small, predominantly white town of Rushville. Her explanation of why she made that decision — to essentially not fit in — is really powerful. Can you recall what she said?

I remember that monologue. [John Stewart] asks, “Why did you choose this skin?” I say, “Power.” “How do you conquer a civilization and a people?” You come to it from the outside. “How do you learn about things from the outside?” In your world, you don’t want obstacles, but in my world, I need those obstacles to get a higher vantage point, to see a deeper purpose.

The absolute outsiderness is a relatable point. I did ask Chris about it and he basically said that as an Indian woman in Nebraska, you’re an outsider. You’re already alien. People are not going to ask you a lot of questions. You’re not going to be part of any power structure. So she just is an anomaly, and there’s no more questions around it.

Did you know Zoe would turn out to be the Manhunter when you first auditioned for the role?

No. The scenes that I got were the one at the bar where I’m picking up Stewart, and the scene right before I die, which is [when we’re] in bed and I’m trying to get him to leave. Like “You gotta go or you’ll die!” They didn’t indicate she was extraterrestrial in anyway. There was no E.T. flair to [the dialogue]. It was so grounded that it was easy to inhabit this character. I’m happy because if I had had even an inkling she was the Manhunter, I might have brought an alien touch to the scene. But I couldn’t quite figure out her place in the story. Definitely not during the audition, and definitely not till I read the last [scene].

Your first big breakthrough on American television was in 2016’s “The Night Of.” That was 10 years ago. Now you’re landing all these powerful, commanding and sometimes villainous roles.

I’m telling you, it’s like I couldn’t have imagined a future like this. If you’d asked me back then what kind of role do you want, I’d have no idea. Between Zoe and Lucky, they’re my two favorite TV baddies. Then Nalini (the overbearing mom in “Never Have I Ever”) and Salma (who has an affair with the title character in “Ramy”). All these characters are very strong women.

What is it that you channel to embrace these powerful roles?

The second I turned 50, I just felt an inexplicable comfort in my own skin that I never felt before. A belonging in my own skin. That translates into belonging in different spaces where I could have been uncomfortable in before, so it’s a great time to inhabit these characters. Before I would have really s— myself with a character like Lucky or Zoe, but now it feels a lot more accessible.

1

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1. Jagannathan as Aunt Lucky in Hulu’s “Deli Boys.” (James Washington/Disney) 2. Maitreyi Ramakrishnan as Devi, left, and Jagannathan as Nalini in Netflix’s “Never Have I Ever.” (Isabella B. Vosmikova/Netflix)

Do you see similarities between the characters you’ve played over the past few years?

They’re untethered, powerful women. They will do anything to keep their power. Their north star is power over anything else. Usually with female characters, everything always hearkens back to the family. Zoe is older. She is confident. She weaponizes her femininity right away, and she’s unafraid. She does it with nonchalance. She appears to not give a [damn].

All villains and warriors have an Achilles’ heel, and for female roles in particular, it’s usually sacrificing themselves to protect their family. Family is their kryptonite.

But a character like Zoe is willing to destroy everything, including her family, to keep power. She’s untethered from love and responsibility. You always expect a very masculine force to come in with this kind of power, and the fact that it never does with “Lanterns” is so unique.

You spoke on a “Lanterns” panel at San Diego Comic–Con? Describe the experience.

The [people who come in costume] are better humans than I am. To go somewhere and have your entire family dressed in Spider-Man regalia, roaming the streets of San Diego. It’s a manifestation of pure, unbridled passion from youth then passed down through generations. I wish I too had a passion like that.

“The second I turned 50, I just felt an inexplicable comfort in my own skin that I never felt before,” Jagannathan says. “That translates into belonging in different spaces where I could have been uncomfortable in before, so it’s a great time to inhabit these characters.”

(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

Were you terrified somebody would ask you a complicated question …

… about Green Lantern?

Yes.

I had to be really upfront and honest and explain that I know so little. It’s Aaron [Pierre] who is really into comic books. He really got into this world. I did speak to a Green Lantern expert as part of the preparation for the role. I do remember him telling me how special John Stewart was in the universe. One of the first introductions of a Black superhero [in mainstream comics] was in Green Lantern, so it holds a very sacred space in comic book history.

Can you talk about your forthcoming Apple TV drama series, “Nocturne.”

It comes out Oct. 30, and it’s basically like if “Silence of the Lambs” was a documentary on Florence Nightingale. That makes it seem so tame, but it’s so, so frightening. The serial killer genre is new for me. I read the book [it’s based on] and had to install a security system in my home. I couldn’t sleep anymore! It’s with Stephen Graham, Liev Schreiber and Zazie Beetz. I play an overworked FBI agent who was brought in to help solve a crime that [law enforcement] initially tried to deal with internally and they messed it up. So they decided they decided to bring in the big guns.

You said earlier that Zoe is an outsider. Did you consider yourself an outsider, too?

Growing up, we moved around a lot. I was literally changing languages every three years. I needed to adapt quickly to whoever was around me, and it often came at the expense of never really knowing myself. You just had to quickly read the society. The language. The gestures. You had to decode quickly in order to fit in.

Even as an adult, I was not fully settled into a point of view until my 40s. That was maybe the allure of acting — getting to show a little bit of my insides through acting. It’s finding out who you might be.

MODEL Bella Hadid gives fans a lift as she grabs some dumbbells for a gym workout.

The US beauty, 29, showed off her physique in a black crop top and grey shorts for high-end athletics brand Alo, a favourite among celebrities.

In another shot she stretched out in black shorts and matching cutout top.

Displaying her toned biceps, she said: “Health is wealth, baby!”

Earlier in the year, the newly-single model put her ex behind her in a mini denim playsuit.

The star was promoting her latest collection with Miss Sixty.

CIAO, BELLA

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She had said she was keen to work with the denim brand because she lives in jeans when she isn’t working.

Bella explained: “I love denim. When I’m not working, it’s always jeans, my belt with my buckle on it, and a button-down (shirt).”

It follows her split from cowboy tycoon Adan Banuelos, 37, at the beginning of the year.

Bella and Adan had been saddled up together since October 2024, after being spotted on a date in Fort Worth, Texas.

He said of Bella last year: “I didn’t know God made ’em like that.”

Hadid made a dramatic hair change a year ago when she swapped her signature brunette hair for a bright shade of platinum.

She recently appeared in FX horror series The Beauty.

Viewers were left shocked as her character met a grisly end in an opening scene.

PETE Wicks has opened up about the huge birthday gesture he received from Olivia Attwood that made him cry – and her awkward reaction.

The pair confirmed their relationship back in July after the tattooed hunk hard launched their romance on Instagram.

Pete will be turning 38 on November 1 and Getting Filthy Rich presenter has decided to treat him.

Speaking on the Staying Relevant Podcast, Pete revealed: “Liv has booked my birthday present. She’s taking me to Vegas.

“She told me over lunch at the weekend.

“And do you want to know something even more embarrassing? I cried.

BABY STEPS

Olivia Attwood and Pete Wicks fans convinced they’re hinting at having kids

LETTING LOOSE

Pete Wicks makes raunchy dig at ‘loose’ girlfriend Olivia Attwood at NTAs

“No one has ever bought me anything for my birthday.

“I’ve never had anything or done anything. So when she did that, I cried at the dinner table. How pathetic is that?!

“And it’s really awkward because Liv and I are not really like that.

“And she went ‘Oh God. What are you doing?’”

He added: Favourite place ever. Favourite person.”

The loved-up couple made their first red carpet appearance at the National Television Awards earlier this week.

Days before Olivia branded her boyfriend Pete “so hot” as they posed together for romantic new snaps.

“Went on a date with Pete Wicks from Towie can’t believe it, he’s so hot in real life too xxxx,” she captioned the post.

She also revealed what gives her ‘the ick’ about her man.

Talking on her podcast, Olivia’s House, the reality star admitted that Pete’s 2024 stint on Strictly Come Dancing isn’t one she likes to look back at.

Explaining that the sequin ensembles and foxtrots are a far cry from Pete’s day-to-day rugged image, Olivia said: “Oh this is so mean, he won’t even care about me saying it.

“I obviously think he’s the most handsome, gorgeous man. But, when I see Strictly Come Dancing, I, honestly, I don’t even – some people might find men dancing sexy but that is just not my thing.”

Olivia split from her ex husband Bradley Dack in January.

The pair tied the knot in 2023.

Evelina Fernández’s “Antigone: In the Language of Kings” receives a theatrically entrancing staging at the Getty Villa’s Outdoor Theater in a production co-produced with Latino Theater Company.

The adaptation resets Sophocles’ tragedy to Aztec culture in a transposition that is both visually and musically enlivening. If the drama is oversimplified, it nonetheless makes for a gripping spectacle.

It’s not easy to find analogies that can reanimate the importance of burial rites to a modern audience. The production’s creative team, led by the inexhaustibly inventive director José Luis Valenzuela, returns us to a world where the dead are owed sacred duties and the living are fearful to renege on this basic human responsibility.

The incense-filled production — conducted in English, Spanish and Nahuatl (the language of the Aztecs), with English and Spanish supertitles — proceeds like a pageant. Headdress-clad warriors clash on the battlefield. A masked chorus, moving with the coordination of a Broadway musical ensemble, gives voice to the anxiety and grief of the collective. A statuesque figure of death, trailing black fabric, sweeps up the casualties of war with the efficiency of a human vacuum.

In Sophocles, Antigone, Oedipus’ headstrong daughter, defies the edict issued by her uncle Creon, the newly deputized king, declaring that her slain brother Polynices is an enemy of the state and therefore ineligible for burial. For Antigone this is an imposition of political power over divine law, and she puts her life on the line to uphold her obligation to her family and faith.

The ensemble of “Antigone: In the Language of Kings” at the Getty Villa Museum Outdoor Classical Theater.

(Cassia Davis / © 2026 J. Paul Getty Trust)

The German philosopher Hegel considered Sophocles’ “Antigone” the high-water mark of tragedy for the way it dramatizes the collision between two equally justified moral positions. Creon, representing the claims of the polis over the clan, cannot be dismissed outright. Nor can Antigone, whose all-consuming identification with her cause renders her indifferent to other obligations, be adopted as a user-friendly hero.

Tragedy arises from the one-sidedness of their claims. Antigone loses her life and Creon, for all intents and purposes, destroys his own, suffering the deaths of his most cherished loved ones.

Hegel’s reading of “Antigone” illustrates his thesis-antithesis-synthesis view of dialectical progress. Sophocles, it can be surmised from the other plays in his Oedipus cycle, likely conceived “Antigone” with a larger metaphysical design. But even if Hegel’s interpretation would have seemed off the mark to him, Antigone and Creon are too complex to reduce to a schematic argument.

Fernández simplifies these antagonists. Her Antíkona (a formidable Esperanza América) reveals her softer side even when rejecting her sister, Ixmene (Alexis B. Santiago), for not having the courage to zealously join her fight.

Tlahtoani Klion (Cástulo Guerra), Emperor of Tenochtitlan, is a ruler so intoxicated with his own authority that he’s clearly courting rebuke from the gods. It’s only a matter of time before his hubris is slapped down.

The acting is theatrically robust, though not always subtle. I wondered if ambiguity had been outlawed along with the funeral rites of Antíkona’s warrior brother Polynices. The bold clarity of the performances was energizing, but the wailing sometimes sounded like parody grief.

The outsize nature of the production invites overacting. And Ric Salinas, who plays Chachalacani, humorously obliges, bringing his Culture Clash vaudeville skills to the role of the sentry who’s caught between the rock of Klion’s tyranny and his fellow feeling for Antíkona’s sympathetic cause.

Strong performances are elicited from José Eduardo Moreno, who plays Klion’s son Hemon, Antíkona’s fiancé, and Zilah Mendoza, who plays Cihuatlahtoani Euridice, Klion’s wife. Their portrayals, mixing ferocious strength with stark vulnerability, make the tragedy’s pileup of bodies at the end all the more piercing.

The ensemble of “Antigone: In the Language of Kings” at the Getty Villa Museum Outdoor Classical Theater.

(Cassia Davis / © 2026 J. Paul Getty Trust)

América’s Antíkona is as unyielding as any Antigone I’ve seen. It’s a commanding portrayal, but I wish the production didn’t shrink from its protagonist’s fierceness. The obdurate side of the character is lessened with a gesture Antíkona bestows on Ixmene — a reassurance that even though she’s a revolutionary, she’s still an affectionate sister.

Sophocles is made of harsher stuff. Fernández’s adaptation is anxious to turn tragedy into a sermon, offering theatergoers moral solace where Sophocles leaves his audience in a contemplative state of stunned silence.

But the staging makes up for the dramatic shortfall. Valenzuela masterly orchestrates the mise-en-scène. The majestic costumes of Catarina Copelli, invoking a rich brocaded world on the brink of disappearance, might be the real superstar.

François-Pierre Couture’s scenic design is mesmerizing without ever being overbearing. “Lee” Xinyuan Li’s lighting heightens the sense of theatrical foreboding. Yee Eun Nam’s projections inject into this transient world a welcome subtlety.

Urbanie Lucero’s choreography and movement direction maintain the production’s graceful poise. The musicians, discreetly performing at the back of the stage under the guidance of Mesoamerican instruments director Christopher García, charge the air with percussive Indigenous wonder.

“Antigone: In the Language of Kings” marks the Getty Villa’s 20th anniversary of reinventing classical tragedy for our time. This gorgeous staging makes me ardently wish that the theater extends the tradition for at least another 20 years.

Turn on a radio between 1978 and 1987 and you were sure to hear Journey — any of the more than two dozen sumptuous yet muscular rock hits that shaped young America’s ideas about love, inspiration and wanting it the way you need it. Four decades later, the band’s music is still everywhere, including television, social media and streaming platforms like Spotify, where Journey has more monthly listeners than Bruce Springsteen, U2 or Bob Dylan. Yet Saturday night the group will bring what it’s calling its farewell tour to Crypto.com Arena — a capstone (at least if the band is to be believed) to a long career full of twists and turns.

Indeed, domination was hardly a given when guitarist Neal Schon and keyboardist Gregg Rolie — both of whom had played with Carlos Santana — formed Journey as a kind of jazzy proto-jam band in San Francisco in 1973. But with the addition a few years later of singer Steve Perry, the group found its gloriously dramatic sound and began racking up hits one after the next (though critics were rarely kind). Perry eventually quit, which took the wind out of Journey’s sails until Schon discovered an uncanny soundalike from the Philippines, Arnel Pineda, on YouTube; he’s helped the band get back into arenas and the occasional stadium even as Schon and keyboardist Jonathan Cain, who replaced Rolie in 1980, have battled each other in court over financial matters.

Got all that? To try to make sense of Journey’s path, I’ve ranked all 25 of the band’s hits that have charted on Billboard’s Hot 100, starting with the worst and ending with the best. Hold onto that feeling — it goes on and on and on and on.

25. ‘Walks Like a Lady’ (peaked at No. 32 in July 1980)

Some are born to sing the blues, as Perry once observed — just not Perry himself, who chews his way through this corny come-on like an overserved uncle at the Hard Rock Cafe. Nice showcase for Rolie’s organ work, though, on one of the last Journey singles he played on before leaving the band.

24. ‘Just the Same Way’ (peaked at No. 58 in May 1979)

Rolie and Perry tag-teaming lead vocals is not a form of democracy I’d vote for.

23. ‘After the Fall’ (peaked at No. 23 in August 1983)

Safe? Sterile? Soulless? Look, the haters can’t always be wrong.

22. ‘Too Late’ (peaked at No. 70 in January 1980)

“Before your time has run astray / You’ve got to try to get away.”

21. ‘Anytime’ (peaked at No. 83 in July 1978)

After overseeing Queen’s first few albums, producer Roy Thomas Baker turned his attention to Journey (and to the Cars); this midtempo number from the “Infinity” LP offers a credible approximation of Queen’s trademark stacked vocal harmonies.

20. ‘The Party’s Over (Hopelessly in Love)’ (peaked at No. 34 in April 1981)

Three platinum plaques in less than two years — for “Infinity,” “Evolution” and “Departure” — meant that Journey had no choice but to drop a live record, “Captured,” at the top of 1981. (It went platinum by Christmas.) As extra consumer bait, the double album closed with this new studio cut built around a killer Schon lick (and not much else).

19. ‘Good Morning Girl’/‘Stay Awhile’ (peaked at No. 55 in September 1980)

Phantom of the roller rink.

18. ‘Why Can’t This Night Go On Forever’ (peaked at No. 60 in May 1987)

Propelled by the success of his debut solo album — not to mention his appearance on the smash all-star “We Are the World” — Perry assumed greater control of Journey’s sound for 1986’s synthed-up “Raised on Radio,” which spawned no fewer than five singles, ending with this slightly lugubrious ballad. Yet the takeover came with a cost: By the end of 1987, the band had entered a hiatus that would last nearly a decade.

17. ‘Still They Ride’ (peaked at No. 19 in July 1982)

Listen to how nimbly Perry maneuvers some very tricky intervals.

16. ‘When You Love a Woman’ (peaked at No. 12 in December 1996)

Journey reunited for 1996’s “Trial by Fire,” which brought the band its only Grammy nomination (and which might feature the ghastliest album cover in music history). If the members knew that rock had changed dramatically while they were away, they didn’t show it in the LP’s romantic lead single: “When You Love a Woman” — a chart-topper for three weeks on Billboard’s adult contemporary tally — clearly sought to pick up where “Open Arms” and “Faithfully” had left off.

15. ‘Girl Can’t Help It’ (peaked at No. 17 in November 1986)

Wonder what Perry and Huey Lewis talked about between takes on “We Are the World.”

14. ‘Be Good to Yourself’ (peaked at No. 9 in May 1986)

“Karate Kid”-core.

13. ‘Only the Young’ (peaked at No. 9 in March 1985)

More “Karate Kid”-core, in this case released first as a song by Patty Smyth’s band Scandal; Journey’s version later wound up alongside Madonna’s “Crazy for You” on the soundtrack to “Vision Quest.”

12. ‘Wheel in the Sky’ (peaked at No. 57 in May 1978)

Before Perry came aboard in 1977, Journey spent a few months with Robert Fleischman as lead singer — long enough for Fleischman to co-write the group’s first Hot 100 entry, not so long that he got to sing it on the record.

11. ‘Any Way You Want It’ (peaked at No. 23 in April 1980)

Ooh, baby, hold tight.

10. ‘Suzanne’ (peaked at No. 17 in August 1986)

Easily Perry’s most unhinged vocal performance.

9. ‘Send Her My Love’ (peaked at No. 23 in November 1983)

A luscious and melancholy white-soul song that I’d bet Phil Collins admired back in the day — and that Justin Bieber would probably flip for now.

8. ‘Lovin’, Touchin’, Squeezin’’ (peaked at No. 16 in October 1979)

Inducting Journey into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2017, Train’s Pat Monahan belted the na-na-na outro of the band’s first Top 40 hit as he made his case for the group’s excellence. “They didn’t even need lyrics — that’s how badass this band is,” he pointed out. Still, let’s not gloss over the appealing perversity of starting a song this horny the way Perry does: “You make me weep and want to die.”

7. ‘Lights’ (peaked at No. 68 in September 1978)

Dodgers fans can delight in the fact that Perry originally wrote this paean to San Francisco — an anthem taken up at one time or another by every Bay Area pro sports team, including the Giants — about the lights going down and the sun shining on … Los Angeles. (Swap out “the bay” for “L.A.”) Maybe that’s why “Lights” has always felt to me like a precursor to the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ “Under the Bridge.”

6. ‘Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)’ (peaked at No. 8 in March 1983)

[Listens to “Eye of the Tiger” once.]

5. ‘I’ll Be Alright Without You’ (peaked at No. 14 in February 1987)

Shout out to future “American Idol” judge Randy Jackson, who joined Journey for “Raised on Radio” and proceeded to lay down the slinkiest, sultriest, funkiest bass line the band had ever known.

4. ‘Don’t Stop Believin’’ (peaked at No. 9 in December 1981)

Believin’ in what, exactly? The genius of Journey’s most-streamed track on Spotify (with more than 2.9 billion plays) is its use of concrete images to advance a pretty mysterious narrative. We’ve all stood under a streetlight; we all know the smell of wine and cheap perfume. Yet everybody’s midnight train is going to a different anywhere.

3. ‘Open Arms’ (peaked at No. 2 in February 1982)

Famously — and fortuitously — rejected by a former bandmate of Cain’s as “sentimental rubbish,” “Open Arms” was perhaps just waiting to be embraced by Perry, who sings it with the wounded gusto of a man well acquainted with regret. In a poetic twist, Journey’s highest-charting hit was blocked from No. 1 by the J. Geils Band’s “Centerfold,” in which the heartbroken narrator goes laughing all the way to his bed.

2. ‘Who’s Crying Now’ (peaked at No. 4 in October 1981)

The first of three Top 10 singles from 1981’s 10-times-platinum “Escape,” this immaculate R&B jam imagines an alternate dimension where Perry and Cain hear Earth, Wind & Fire’s “After the Love Has Gone” and decide to form a new group with David Foster. Except Perry remembers the song as a high point for Schon: “You know the guitar outro from ‘Who’s Crying Now’?” he asked a New York Times reporter in 2003. “I fought for that because I knew no DJ would cut that song off with Neal’s guitar wailing at the end of it. It was too brilliant.”

1. ‘Faithfully’ (peaked at No. 12 in June 1983)

It wasn’t the first rock ballad about life on the road — and it definitely wasn’t the last — but “Faithfully” might be the most emotionally generous: “Loving a music man ain’t always what it’s supposed to be,” Perry tells his lady, grounding the song in the experience of those who leave and those left behind; later, he envisions their reunion with such tenderness — “I’ll get the joy of rediscovering you” — that you know he’s already decided to take off again.

ALISON Hammond looked incredible as she showed off her 13 stone weight loss in a glam gown during London Fashion Week.

Big Brother icon turned TV golden girl Alison, 51, has overhauled her body in recent years and is now proudly reaping the rewards of her hard work. 

Alison looked sensational as she posed backstage ahead of the Vin + Omi “Anarchy” show during London Fashion Week.

The TV presenter was seen in a purple sequinned gown as she stared moodily at the camera.

With full glam makeup and voluminous hair, Alison looked absolutely fabulous.

Alison has spent recent years vehemently denying fat jabs helped her to shed her weight. 

OFF THE SCALE

How Alison REALLY lost 13st… from £2 trick to breaking scales & toyboy’s role

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And we revealed earlier this year that her astonishing weight loss is actually the result of an adventurous gym routine, a toyboy boyfriend and a £2.85 supermarket secret.  

A close pal said: “Alison was mortified when she stepped on the scales in 2020 and her weight was so high the sensor broke. 

“It stopped at anything over 29st, so she has no idea exactly how much she weighed back then.”

The scale shock prompted her to visit the doctor, who confirmed she was prediabetic and needed to slim down or face an early death. 

Now Alison, who is mum to Aidan, 21, works out three to five times a week with her personal trainers Lui Mancini and Ellis Gatfield.  

She combines strength training, boxing and Pilates rather than cardio and when she is busy working she enjoys walking.

But no doubt also helping Alison’s confidence is her lover David Putman, 29, a former Russian model, who she met when she booked in for a massage in 2023.

Alison, previously told how weight loss jabs were not for her because she was “frightened” by “scary” stories surrounding them. 

TORONTO — Greetings from the Great White North, where the Toronto International Film Festival rolls to the end of its first weekend.

As packed as our viewing schedules have been, Amy Nicholson notices something lacking at this year’s festival: big Hollywood. In her first critical dispatch, she sees no “Frankenstein” or “Wake Up Dead Man” in the lineup.

Toronto has even resorted to rebooking the under-the-radar smash “Obsession,” the little movie that grew from a 2025 midnight TIFF launch into a global phenomenon.

Director Curry Barker and star Inde Navarrette delighted festgoers who lined up around the block to watch a special conversation.

There’s still plenty of time left. Amy is finding indies to like. Some of her early recommendations are here.

Our portrait studio is heating up

Cynthia Erivo of the film “Prima Facie,” photographed in the Los Angeles Times Studio at RBC House during the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival.

(Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times)

Cynthia Erivo stunned us in our studio space, looking fierce in a dark ensemble and scary nails. We also saw the likes of the luminous Laura Linney and the dapper Korean cast of “Possible Love.” Click through for more celebrity photos and daily surprises.

And do we have video interviews? Do we.

Sarah Paulson, Naomi Watts, and director Cody Fern discuss their new film, “Closing Night.” Chase Infiniti of “One Battle After Another,” Jason Isaacs and more talk “The Julia Set.”

And only minutes after they won the grand jury prize at Venice, we were speaking to the cast of “Possible Love.”

What are we watching tonight?

‘Club Kid’

Jordan Firstman, center, in the movie “Club Kid.”

(A24)

It takes thermonuclear moxie to write, direct and star in your debut feature — and cast yourself as the cad. No wonder Jordan Firstman‘s uproarious dramedy “Club Kid” blew away expectations at Cannes and has landed in Toronto ready to shake up awards season.

Firstman plays Peter, an aging New York City party promoter whose scene-y shindigs and subsequent hangovers are starting to feel old.

Enter Arlo (a self-possessed Reggie Absolom) the 9-year-old kid he never knew he had and never fathomed he would have, given that women aren’t his thing (except for that one drug-fueled night with a British girl he barely remembers).

You may think you know where the story is headed and you aren’t entirely wrong, but the route there is a riot. — Amy Nicholson

‘Alpha Gang’

A scene from the movie “Alpha Gang.”

(TIFF)

The latest from filmmaking siblings Nathan and David Zellner rolls into Toronto after having just had its world premiere at Telluride.

Their oddball sensibilities and elastic imagination means that you never quite know what to expect from one of their films and this is no exception: a wholly unpredictable story of an alien invasion told from the aliens’ point-of-view that is inscrutably absurd and touched by a startling romantic fatalism.

Two alien cadres, having assumed the looks of 1950s biker gang members, bicker and fight with one another even as they largely overlook their common enemy, the humans.

The cast is likewise a preposterous mash-up of performers you would not wholly expect to see together, including Cate Blanchett, Kelvin Harrison Jr, Léa Seydoux, Riley Keough, Chris Pine, Dave Bautista and others, making the film’s very existence seem like something dropped from outer space. — Mark Olsen

‘The Spiral’

A scene from the movie “The Spiral.”

(TIFF)

Italian horror is my happy place and this is where I’ll be tonight at midnight, sopping up what many early viewers have already described as stylish and vicious.

Director Paolo Strippoli’s domestic drama got sharp reviews out of Venice; it sounds like a cross between a Bava film and “Parasite.” I’ll investigate. — Joshua Rothkopf

Experienced host Emma Willis knows what to expect in some ways and just wants to bring ‘joy’ to Strictly viewers in the same way Tess and Claudia did

Defiant Emma Willis says she knows the new Strictly Come Dancing series will bring her and the other new hosts lots of abuse and criticism – but she won’t engage with it. Emma, former Strictly professional dancer Johannes Radebe, 39, and comedian Josh Widdicombe, 43, will take over later this month from long-time hosts Tess Daly and Claudia Winkleman, who stepped down last year.

Emma is used to comparisons with other hosts having fronted Big Brother after Davina McCall and Brian Dowling. But she vowed to ignore the haters and just wants to try to enjoy the experience. She said: “I’m ready for the comparisons. I am ready for the negative opinions that can come with these things. Those things I don’t engage with or read, and there are always positives as well.

“At the end of the day, I feel like it’s really simple, right? We we work in this industry, and we’ve been given the opportunity to work on a phenomenal show that is really well loved by the public and also by ourselves. We we aren’t reinventing the wheel, and we’re not rocket scientists.

“We’re working on an entertainment show about dancing that is meant to hopefully bring joy to everybody watching it. So hopefully we can be a small part of that joy and have a really lovely time doing it.”

She added: “There’s obviously a kind of fear that comes with it because of the enormity of it, and you have nerves about being good enough to kind of do the job and step into the role.”

The trio were a surprise choice to make up the presenting team and they admitted they were also a bit shocked to be picked. They gave the impression they were unsure if they were in pole position to get the jobs, saying their final audition was the “very last of the callbacks on a Friday afternoon”. They had also been told it would be a pair presenting and so Josh presumed it was “two weirdos against each other” and he was being pitched head-to-head with Johannes, only to end up working with him and more established host Emma.

Comedian Josh also said that while they would not “reinvent the show”, they would “be ourselves and our personalities will be there”. He added on taking the job: “It’s like you only get one opportunity at this career. We’re incredibly blessed that we’ve got where we are in our careers, and just why not?”

Johannes was initially nervous but after speaking with his agent was more confident. “If anybody was afforded this opportunity amongst my peers[dancers], any one of them would jump at it.”

Emma turned 50 in March, but rather than seeing that milestone as a time to reflect or slow down, is arguably enjoying her most successful stage of her career. She said: “I think maybe there’s more of a reframe needs to be had around 50 and as you’re getting older, you should slow down or change or maybe not do as much. I feel more invigorated at 50, I’m more like I’m more sure of myself. I know what I want to do. I’m not going to apologise for myself and my successes like I’ve done for the last 25 years.

“I’m not about to step down and slow down for anything. So I say, bring it on. You know, life is short. So take these opportunities when they they come your way, because at some point they’ll stop.”

* Strictly Come Dancing will return on Sunday September 19 to BBC One and iPlayer.

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Stephen McGann has opened-up about his character, Dr. Turner, being played by a new actor for the drama’s prequel

Call the Midwife legend Stephen McGann has claimed he “cannot see” the resemblance as a new actor steps into the role of Dr. Turner.

The 12th season of the much-loved BBC period drama, based on the memoirs of Jennifer Worth, concluded earlier this year with a heartbreaking finale. The death of Sister Monica Joan (Judy Parfitt) left viewers devastated, while the future of Nonnatus House remained uncertain due to advances in the NHS.

Before the show returns with season 16, a prequel titled Sisters in Arms is set to air this festive season. The three-part mini-series will be set during the London Blitz and follow familiar characters in the early stages of their careers, including Dr. Patrick Turner.

The adored GP first arrived in Poplar during the debut episode of Call the Midwife, which aired in 2012, and has since remained a favourite among fans. The character will appear in the prequel, with This Town actor Ben Rose portraying a young Patrick Turner.

Speaking about Sisters in Arms, Stephen, 63, has offered a playful glimpse into his marriage with the show’s creator, Heidi Thomas, who thinks Ben Rose is the spitting image of her husband. “I think he’s the image of Steve,” Heidi told Radio Times. “Steve can’t see any resemblance, so the audience are going to have to draw their own conclusions.”

Stephen was quick to chime in: “Do you know what happened? I’m in my house, and when the final casting was confirmed, my good lady wife and my son were conferring, going, ‘Oh, he looks like Dad, doesn’t he? Doesn’t he look like Dad?'”

Heidi laughed: “He does, he does, but you can’t see it, can you, love?” Stephen then confirmed: “I can’t see it at all.”

Stephen and Heidi first crossed paths in 1988 and exchanged vows two years later, when they were both 27. They spent their honeymoon in Tuscany before settling down in a quaint cottage in rural Essex, before moving to Cambridge. The couple share one son, Dominic. As per Stephen’s memoir, A History of My Family in Seven Maladies, he first encountered Heidi when he auditioned for her new play at the Liverpool Playhouse.

What is Sisters in Arms about?

Call the Midwife will turn back the clock to World War II as bombs rain down in Poplar, East London, at a time when the National Health Service was non-existent. Set in 1939, it will see three familiar nuns in the early stages of their careers.

According to the BBC’s synopsis: “In September 1939, Sister Monica Joan is in her prime, Sister Julienne and Sister Evangelina are young and zealous, and Nonnatus House is the beating heart of Poplar.

“Together with Sister Alice, and local GP Dr Kit, the nuns dedicate their lives to mothers, babies and those in need. But there is no gas and air, no penicillin, no cure for TB, and no welfare state. Then war is declared – and life gets even harder.”

It adds: “While bombs rain from the sky, women give birth underground, families are shattered, children run wild, and whole streets are reduced to rubble. But courage, compassion and resilience triumph as the community unites in its efforts to survive.”

Created, written, and executive produced by Heidi Thomas, Sisters in Arms welcomes a new cast, including Coronation Street’s Hayley Cropper star Julie Hesmondhalgh as Sister Alice.

Theatre star Helena Wilson is taking on the role of a young Sister Julienne, though the original actress, Jenny Agutter, will be narrating the miniseries. Ami Metcalf, who played Lynette in the first Christmas special, is returning as Betty Buckle, the first wife of Fred Buckle, now played by Ciaran Bowling. Ben Rose also takes on the role of Dr. Turner.

The BBC has confirmed that Sisters in Arms will air on BBC One and iPlayer this Christmas, though the exact days and times are yet to be confirmed.

Call the Midwife is available to stream on BBC iPlayer

ONCE dubbed “the most boring man in football” Michael Owen’s choice to sign up for a fly-on-the-wall Amazon documentary about his family was unexpected to say the least.

The former England striker turned pundit, 46, allowed cameras to follow him, his wife Louise and their children Gemma, James, Emily and Jessica as they balance family life with running a horse racing business in Cheshire.

And it was a distinctly left-field move from Michael, who – unlike celebrity documentary subjects David Beckham, Wayne Rooney and the larger-than-life Tyson Fury – has largely stayed out of the spotlight.

He is seen joking in six part series Meet The Owens that he is now best known as a “boring p***k” or “Gemma Owen’s dad” after she appeared in Love Island, raising questions about why he would agree to film the at-home-with style show.

And we can reveal that the ex-footballer – often referred to as ‘the most boring man in football’ – signed up for his TV payday after ploughing £13 million into his racing business pushed him to his financial limit.

While he may have other streams of income, accounts for Michael’s company Owen Promotions show it holds just £7,219 in cash and owes £2.3m to creditors.

It also has three outstanding loans, two of which were taken out in March 2022 and February 2024 with Leeds-based MR Denton Properties.

A further loan was taken out in February 2024 with Andrew Black, who co-founded Betfair.

Two other loans with Grosvenor Funding, which claims to offer “fast and flexible” bridging loans were paid off in 2023.

And all five loans were secured using parts of the Owens home estate – a 42-acre estate he bought in 2001 for £4million.

Speaking in Meet the Owens, which is now number 3 on the Amazon Prime UK chart, Michael revealed he has had to put “£12 or £13 million” into Manor House Stables to build it to its current level.

But he admits the business – which makes cash by persuading investors to back the horses they buy at auction – still desperately needs investors.

And he describes their current status as: “Premier League. Brighton, but not seventh, but kind of bottom half.”

Footage from the first episode shows the racing enthusiast giving pal Jamie Carragher a tour of the impressive grounds and stables, showing off a horse owned by Sir Alex Ferguson and another he owns along with Paul Scholes, Steve McManaman and Owen Hargreaves.

Drone shots show the impressive site from the air, while graphics also flash up on screen showing how the structure works – a handy guide for any would-be investors.

One source told us: “Michael is passionate about Manor House and racing, and he has done an incredible job on Manor House.

“The problem is that it is a big money pit and you can pour millions into it without any guarantee of winning horses.

“He loves it, and would never walk away, but it would be naive to say it hasn’t had a massive impact on his finances.

“And the pressure is never ending because as a business, you have to buy horses each year – for £90,000 or more – and try to find investors for them.

“Then the million-dollar question is whether or not those horses win, as the stables need winners to succeed.

“But the reality is that you only win a very small percentage of the races in which you have horses.”

Michael is now the sole shareholder for Manor House Stables LLP, which owns the stables, after director and co-owner Andrew Black resigned in March 2022 after six years.

Accounts show the company has healthy assets of approximately £13.6million.

Yet the source said the business still has a way to go before it becomes a money-spinner, rather than a money pit.

They added: “The Amazon payday has come at a good time for Michael, but he is also hoping the airtime for Manor House will attract more investors.

“The more money that comes in, the better the horses and the more winners we will see here.

“That will help the business move higher up the rankings among the top British stables.

“Michael loves racing and he is driven by passion for the sport, but he is also very competitive and wants to win.”

Previously, a source told us: “Michael is extremely determined to succeed in racing. He has poured millions of his own money into Manor House, and he will not stop until he’s at the very top.

“Signing up to broadcast this to the world was a huge risk for him, and he’s desperate for it to work.

“Michael is keen to show off how much Manor House is a reputable and successful stable, and he hopes putting the business on screen ends up being a help rather than a hindrance.”

A spokesperson for Michael declined to comment.

EastEnders fans think they know what brings Stacey Slater back to Walford amid reports actress Lacey Turner is filming a few episodes for the BBC soap during her Strictly stint

Stacey Slater is returning to EastEnders, according to new reports – and it’s very soon.

Lacey Turner is said to be reprising her role on the BBC soap, while she’s starring on Strictly Come Dancing. According to the reports, Stacey could be back in time for Christmas and the big New Year’s Day 2027 episode.

While nothing has been confirmed, it’s thought Lacey will be filming for a handful of episodes, reprising her role around October and November time. Given filming is often around six to eight weeks ahead of transmission, this could mean Stacey is back for December and New Year.

This detail has left many fans convinced they have figured out what brings Stacey back. Some think the episodes are tied into the return of her brother Sean Slater, while others wondered if this means Stacey could be the pregnant woman in Max Branning’s bed, yet to be identified.

A fan posted on social media: “Stacey only seems to be back for a few episodes which must link in with Sean returning. Lacey couldn’t have come back to film anything without it being noticed.”

Another fan said: “Great that Stacey is coming back. I did wonder at the start if it may be her in Max’s bed, but they didn’t part on good terms when she left for Brazil because of Max and Zoe.

“To be cosying up to Max again seems a bit strange. It might be to do with the Vic as she helped Kat.” A third fan said: “I think the best outcome would be if she was the pregnant woman.

“I know it’s probably Priya but that feels to obvious. I don’t really want Max to have another kid, but I’d rather he have one with Stacey than Priya.”

One fan theorised: “Streets are saying stacey is the pregnant woman in max’s bed nyd 2027.” Another said: “Stacey back around new years? How do i make sure she’s not the pregnant woman in max’s bed?”

A further post read: “Stacey is returning for a guest stint but they’ll probably have her involved with Max.” A final comment said: “Will she be the pregnant woman in his bed or will he cheat on Linda with her? Lbr it’s going to be one or the other.”

On Stacey’s apparent comeback, the source told The Sun: “Lacey has created one of the soap’s most iconic character’s in Stacey Slater. She is loved by the fans.

“So the fact that she’s agreed to return, even if it’s only for a handful of episodes, will come as a huge boost for the loyal viewers. Lacey returning for a few episodes to turn the tide. This is not a permanent return.”

They added: “It’s going to take more than Lacey returning for a few episodes to turn the tide.”

EastEnders airs Mondays to Thursdays at 7:30pm on BBC One and BBC iPlayer. * Follow Mirror Celebs and TV on TikTok , Snapchat , Instagram , Twitter , Facebook , YouTube and Threads .

JEREMY Clarkson has backed an Instagram influencer to take over Gardener’s World following Monty Don’s shock exit.

Don announced his departure earlier this week after 23 years on the show.

Writing in his column for The Times, Jeremy has called upon the BBC to carefully consider who will be Don’s replacement.

The former Top Gear presenter reflected on the gardening show tenderly, calling it a “pixelated comfort food”.

However, Jeremy made a surprising suggestion as to who could fill Don’s shoes.

He said: “So, for the new host, might I recommend that the producers trawl the staff in the nation’s garden centres for candidates. Or check out a girl called Chloe from Blooms & Greens on Instagram.”

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Chloe, who boasts 672,000 followers online, is famed for her gardening videos.

She offers short snippets of her tending to her organic vegetable garden or floral bouquet creations.

And it seems Jeremy is not the only fan, with one of her videos racking up 2.3million views.

He said: “This is a show that’s watched by a certain type of people. And it should be presented and written and produced by that sort of person.”

He likened her to Don himself, but 50 years his junior, Irish, and a woman.

Speaking of his own gardening skills, Jeremy confessed to being less garden-native than the beloved host.

He called himself “the only person in human history ever to kill a spider plant.”

And that was not his only planting frustration he reflected on – one time he bought a Baobab tree seed from Morocco.

The same seed refused to grow until he passed it onto his gardener, Shaun, where it is now thriving under his care.

Jeremy also delved into the time he planted 50 Christmas trees, only for 47 of them to grow too tall to be of any use.

He said: “But despite this ineptitude, I do watch Gardeners’ World and that’s why I was sad this week to hear that after 23 years, Monty is leaving the show.”

With the BBC likely currently having conversations about Don’s replacement, Jeremy weighed in with his concerns on the topic.

He said: “I have the most horrible feeling that whoever gets the gig will not be the sort of person who wears corduroy.”

He suggested, if not Chloe, then producers try garden centres to find a host.

Jeremy added: “What they need to remember is that Gardeners’ World is a show about gardening, for sure, but it’s also a state of mind.”

For 10 days, the center of the cinematic universe is the Toronto International Film Festival, whose closest geographical landmark is currently a ludicrous controversy.

“Welcome to TIFF and welcome to the beautiful shore of — say it with me — Lake Ontario,” festival CEO Cameron Bailey said on opening night as he introduced “Being Heumann,” director Sian Heder’s crowd-pleasing follow-up to her best picture Oscar-winner “CODA.”

The crowd said it back. Google Maps, however, insists that the festival is actually a 15-minute stroll to Lake America. I’ve yet to hear a single person call it that without an eyeroll.

What’s in a name? Last year in the spirit of patriotism, my favorite Toronto coffee shop taped over the menu listing for its Americano to re-dub it a Canadiano. This fall, the sign has returned to Americano. Taking a pause from politics, I ordered a flat white.

Yet, the festival’s programmers seem to be decentralizing their attention-hogging neighbors to the south. Typically, TIFF is a launch pad for awards contenders. But there are fewer high profile Hollywood filmmakers this year than usual — which was also the case in Cannes. Perhaps these international festivals are testing their own waters to see if they’re obliged to invite Americans to their party.

Instead, the Toronto line-up boasts pointed films about fascism. On its surface, Michaël R. Roskam’s “Le Faux Soir” is a procedural account of how a network of rebels in occupied Belgium published its own parody issue of a pro-Nazi newspaper on the 25th anniversary of Armistice Day in 1943. Most of the script’s energy goes to talking about typesetting and rotary press flongs, but right before the end credits roll, “Le Faux Soir” blurts out its timeliness about combating Le Fox News with comedy. Metaphorically alluding to the satirical newspaper “The Onion,” the narrator says that to pull off this operation, the team had to stick together like layers of an onion: “Never forget, onion is strength.”

Plenty of local comedies abound, including “The Stunt Driver” by Michael Dowse (“Goon”), an energetic biopic about Ken “The Mad Canadian” Carter, the ’70s speedster who vowed to vault across the mile-wide river between Ottawa and New York in a rocket-powered Lincoln Continental. The site of Carter’s jump is four hours away from the fest, although at his car’s top speed of 280 mph, you could get there in less than one. Safer just to enjoy Jay Baruchel’s funny and endearing portrait of a reckless risk-taker who hates being called a daredevil as much as he resents Ben Foster’s Evel Knievel attempting to give him some advice. “Canadians are God’s chosen people,” Carter growls defiantly. “The last thing we need is a Yankee doodle dandy telling us how to do our jobs.”

It’s also possible that this year’s lack of big films — unlike 2025’s “Frankenstein,” “The Smashing Machine” and “Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery” — is just a reflection of the industry’s changing tides. Two of the buzziest guests at this year’s fest have been Inde Navarrette of the micro-budget horror hit “Obsession,” which premiered at last year’s TIFF, and British Columbia-born Hudson Williams of the TV hockey romance “Heated Rivalry.” Twelve months ago, both actors were anonymous Gen Z-ers who could have easily popped into Tim Hortons for a maple-glazed donut without causing a stir. Now they’re stars.

Personally, I’m all for fresh talent. Audiences and critics alike are bored of film executives clinging to the same proven names and proven plots as tightly as worry beads. Yes, I’m hoping to see some Oscar contenders while I’m here and have my fingers crossed for a few movies I’ll be seeing shortly. But for the sake of filmgoing at large, I’d be more thrilled to spot another under-the-radar “Obsession.”

So far, I haven’t found one. However, I have seen ingenuity made for peanuts, like Jenna Cato Bass’ “Future Tense,” a South African sci-fi drama about a travel service that allows the wealthy to blip back to the 1600s to hot tub under the clear skies before the land was ruined by centuries of trash, trade and colonization. Mismatched new couple Tara and Lwando (Kristen Raath and Lawrence Maleka) — she’s white and sunny, he’s Black and snide — take a blistering vacation that their relationship might not survive.

The script gets screwy in the last act, but Bass proves she can pull off a bold time travel premise using only tastefully bland décor, gorgeous nature footage and a couple of menacing brutes with guns. As a bonus, Raath, her lead, has the spunk, charm and smile of Karen Allen, giving a breakout performance that’s such a delight that you could almost swear the “Raiders of the Lost Ark” ingenue had leapt back four decades to star in the film.

An image from “Voices,” a musical drama set in the 1960s.

(TIFF)

While we’re talking about pivotal moments in personal histories, nine years ago Deanté Gray was a rookie wide receiver for the Houston Texans. He tore his ACL in practice and, after muscling through that disappointment, is now a first-time feature director with “Voices,” a lean and loud musical-thriller about thwarted dreams. Set in one tatty motel room in 1967 Detroit, “Voices” is a vicious flick about rising two soul acts hellbent on getting on stage that night to impress Motown Records’ Barry Gordy.

Technically, only the Harmony Brothers, Bubbles and Melvin (Joe Maye and Jamal R. Averett), are booked to play the gig. But a fame-hungry bellboy, Jordan (Francis C. Edemobi), and his cousin Derrick (Ezekiel Ajeigbe) hatch an impulsive, half-baked plan to perform in their rivals’ place. Egged on by Derrick’s ambitious girlfriend Mia (Raél Ba), who’s angling to be the duo’s opening act, this bad idea crescendos with a half-dozen original songs — and a body count.

The sound design of “Voices” is raw and the rumored $50,000 budget so strapped that minor period piece inconsistencies like cheap plastic trash cans sneak into the frame. Who cares? Sam Buckner III and Charlie T. Savage’s smart and surprising screenplay is crowded with scenes that let its cast shine. Someone — ideally, several people — in here will wind up getting their own major break.

Admittedly, I’m biased. Morbid musicals are one of my favorite micro-genres, from “Little Shop of Horrors” and “All That Jazz” to “A Star Is Born” and “Cabaret.” (If you haven’t seen Steve Martin’s 1981 Depression-era hoofer “Pennies From Heaven,” do that this week.)

Add Theo Rhys’ “Stuffed” to that list. Jodie Comer (“Killing Eve”) plays a goth taxidermist; Harry Melling (“Pillion”) is a lonely man terrified of dying, buried and forgotten. Can she convince the sad sack to kill himself now to become a piece of her permanent collection?

The plot alone gives you the shivers, nodding to predatory internet meet-ups and that volatile mix of victimization and egomania that causes people to hurt themselves and/or others. Dark as the story is, though, co-writer Joss Holden-Rea’s tunes are stunners with limber melodies and creatively off-kilter lyrics. “My past is still before me,” Melling belts, picturing himself proudly mounted in a velvet suit and bronze plaque.

“Stuffed” isn’t for everyone. But my fellow sickos are going to love this bleak and lovely tragicomedy once it sets sail from these shores (whatever they’re called by then) to a theater near you.

Tim Lovejoy was left confused by Penn Jillette’s comments during the latest edition of the Channel 4 show

Sunday Brunch presenter Tim Lovejoy was left baffled by one guest.

The weekend show returned to screens on Sunday (September 13), with presenters Tim and Simon Rimmer at the helm. Joining them on the show were guests Beverley Knight, Lara Pulver, Jay Sean, Bloc Party, Van Tulleken, Jesse Tyler Ferguson and Penn Jillette.

As the usual format got underway, the Sunday Brunch studio made for engaging viewing but American magician Penn shared a rather surprising confession.

During the segment where the presenters ask their guests to “dump their grumps” by openly sharing their dislikes, Penn confessed that he was rather lost and only understood a fraction of what was being said.

While discussing the topic of Marmite, and whether they have the sticky spread in the US, Penn said: “I haven’t understood very much of anything that’s being said.”

Revealing that he has bad hearing, Penn also shared that he wasn’t a fan of the British accent. He said: “I don’t hear well and I don’t understand accents so, so far on the show I’ve understood about 30% of what is going on. So when I’m in England, which I am often, I spend most of my time understanding no one.”

He then added that he wrote what he believes he hears and believes that this should be one of his grumps he would dump. He added: “It’s just totally a garble nonsense, which I hear every time you speak.”

Emphasising his point, he then said: “I have no idea what you’re saying. I’m sitting here nodding and smiling in total ignorance.”

Confused by Penn’s admission, Tim branded his complaints as “weird”. He said: “I think that’s really weird because I think we’re speaking like…” Penn interjected: “No, you are! You are speaking wonderfully for people like you!”

It comes after Tim was missing from the show at the end of August. The surprise switch was likely to have been noticed by regular Sunday Brunch viewers, particularly given the long-standing on-screen partnership between Tim and Simon.

The pair have worked together for many years, first joining forces on Something for the Weekend before becoming the faces of Sunday Brunch when the Channel 4 programme launched in 2012.

Their presenting partnership has remained a familiar part of Sunday mornings for more than a decade, making Lovejoy’s absence from this week’s episode all the more striking.

Stepping in to replace him was presenter Yinka Bokinni, who is an experienced broadcaster in her own right. She has worked across both radio and television and has established herself as a familiar face through a range of TV appearances, as well as her work covering entertainment and culture.

There was no explanation given during the programme for Lovejoy’s absence. At the beginning of the show, Yinka simply told viewers that she would be stepping in as his replacement.

Sunday Brunch airs Sundays from 10am on Channel 4.

Filmmaker Paul Greengrass is often associated with a cinematic aesthetic colloquially known as “shaky cam” — handheld cinematography enabled by lightweight digital cameras that function a lot like another character in the room, on foot, at eye-level, responding and reacting to action and dialogue the way a person would.

It’s a style that has served him well in modern action thrillers like his installments of the “Bourne” franchise, and films depicting recent real-world events like “Captain Phillips” and “The Lost Bus.” Now, Greengrass applies his signature style to the Middle Ages — can shaky cam work in a medieval movie?

It may seem odd, but it’s a brilliant creative choice when considering that while “The Uprising” is technically about the 1381 Peasants’ Revolt in England, that’s not really what it’s about. It’s about right now.

The shaky cam is intended to jolt us into that awareness. When we pick up with our protagonist, a pathetic ploughman (Andrew Garfield) living a grief-filled and wretched existence, a plague has wiped out half the population. A small group of men hoards wealth and resources, while the peasant class is heavily taxed, laws brutally enforced. As Greengrass lays out the bare facts of this situation with a cinematic style that’s more news documentary than stuffy period piece, the parallels to our own current situation are laid bare.

“The Uprising,” which Greengrass wrote and directed, is told in a fairly simple fashion, with an emphasis on visual storytelling and visceral sensation (the disparate English accents are also lost in the melee of the mob). All we need to know is that the council advising the 14-year-old King Richard II (Woody Norman) conspires while the young royal prays and his mother (Katherine Waterston) glowers. Outside, a bloodthirsty mob armed with farm tools marches on London, led in part by Garfield’s ploughman, who started his own local uprising when he fought back against the taxman. He joins forces with Wat Tyler (Cosmo Jarvis), a former soldier, and John Ball (Jamie Bell), a priest deemed heretic, as the crowd demands an audience with the king.

As the chaos unfolds, Greengrass doesn’t pontificate on the morality of these events and, in fact, maintains a rather neutral stance on them for most of the film, withholding judgment. A revolution is not right or wrong for most of “The Uprising.” It is simply inevitable under the conditions the film presents.

The ploughman wants to play by the rules, but it’s how the revolt plays out that radicalizes him. While Greengrass shows us the uprising in all its messy confusion as the logical outcome of oppression, by following our protagonist as he witnesses treachery and deceit, Greengrass ultimately arrives at the belief that revolution is necessary, even in failure, and that freedom is worth more than anything.

The opening and closing of “The Uprising” are bracing and stark in their storytelling — the middle is a bit mushy and confusing. But it’s the performances that carry us through. Garfield, sensitive and earthy, is our bellwether as the events descend into bloody carnage dictated by muddled agendas. When he turns, we turn, and the anguish that Garfield wordlessly conveys is our compass.

Greengrass surrounds Garfield with actors who deliver bigger performances, like Jarvis as the brutish but shrewd Tyler, and Bell as the fervent Ball. Thomasin McKenzie plays a young woman, Alyce, steeped in her own trauma and loss, who attaches herself to the ploughman, and her ability to express wide-eyed, barely contained hysteria and fear is unmatched. Young Norman is riveting as the increasingly dastardly king.

The Peasant’s Revolt of 1381 is a fascinating moment because it’s a time when the notion of democracy wasn’t even a twinkle in a feudal servant’s eye. The mob’s actions are frustrating because they’re religiously bound to the king, who they believe is an emissary of God, and desperate to change their day-to-day existence. When those two instincts collide, it’s bound to be complex and conflicting, and Greengrass delivers that with a boots-on-the-ground style.

The murkiness of it all clarifies by the end of the film, not just in terms of its heroes, villains and message, but Greengrass also situates this story within a recognizable cinematic and storytelling history. There’s a thrill as it all comes together. Greengrass might be taking a big swing (of the scythe), but his blade finds its target nevertheless.

Walsh is a Tribune News Service film critic.