coming

The peer is an ex-Labour MP and secretary of state for culture, media and sport as well as a former chairman of the Environment Agency.

Downing Street declined to say “at this stage” whether Prime Minister Andy Burnham was considering an inquiry, reiterating that it was “a moment for reflection”, and that it was right for “the usual processes” like an inquest, to conclude.

An investigation will be carried out to determine the cause of death, which could take several weeks, London Inner South Coroner’s Court said.

Once complete, the coroner will confirm if an inquest will take place.

Shadow housing secretary Sir James Cleverly said he was angry about what happened to Arday, and the university establishment – not just Cambridge – should have “done the robust due diligence and checking that should happen with any senior academic appointment”.

Speaking to the BBC’s Today programme, the shadow housing secretary said he felt Arday was used as “bragging rights by some universities”, and that people spoke of his “age and his ethnicity rather than his talent”.

Sir James – who was Britain’s first black home secretary and foreign secretary – said much of the coverage surrounding Arday was “quite possibly” motivated by racism, but that the questions over plagiarism were legitimate, regardless of motivation.

The plagiarism row began after another academic – self-defined “race realist” Nathan Cofnas, who was sacked from his Cambridge role in 2024 – said he found numerous instances of plagiarism in the professor’s work.

Cofnas’s post had been terminated amid a backlash to his view that under a true meritocracy black people would “disappear from almost all high-profile positions outside of sports and entertainment”.

Cambridge had celebrated Arday’s appointment as a young black professor, one of a tiny and visible minority in academia. Only 1% of professors in UK universities are black, making each appointment hugely significant.

On Sunday, more than 200 people attended a vigil at Cambridge that was organised by Arday’s postdoctoral students.

Video podcasts from the Jonas Brothers and the cast of “Boy Meets World” are heading to Disney+ as part of a new licensing partnership with iHeartMedia designed to capture viewers on mobile and beyond.

The agreement will bring six iHeartMedia podcasts to Disney+ and Hulu, starting with “Hey Jonas!” hosted by Kevin, Nick and Joe Jonas on both streaming services. “Pod Meets World,” hosted by the stars of the ’90s sitcom “Boy Meets World,” will also appear on Disney+ later this month.

Other podcasts coming this fall to Hulu include “Fake Doctors, Real Friends with Zach and Donald” hosted by the stars of medical comedy “Scrubs,” “Desperately Devoted” that will discuss drama “Desperate Housewives,” “StraightioLab,” that delves into straight culture and “Thanks Dad with Ego Nwodim.”

“Fans can’t get enough of the stories and talent they love, and podcasts have become one of the fastest growing ways for audiences to connect with them,” said Lauren Tempest, Head of Content Planning & Partnerships, DTC at The Walt Disney Company in a statement.

The additional iHeartMedia content adds to Disney+ and Hulu’s existing collection of 30 podcasts available to stream in the U.S.

Disney and iHeartMedia declined to comment on the financial terms of the deal.

“From iconic rewatch series and fan-favorite conversations to original storytelling, this deal gives both existing listeners and new viewers an easy way to discover and connect with some of podcasting’s most engaging voices through video,” Bob Pittman, Chairman and CEO for iHeartMedia, said in a statement.

Podcasts initially started as audio only, but over the years, have delved into showing video too. Other streamers, including Netflix and HBO Max, have video podcasts available on their platforms.

Netflix made deals with Spotify and iHeartMedia to bring popular video podcasts, including “The Bill Simmons Podcast,” “The Breakfast Club” and “My Favorite Murder” to its streaming service.

Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos said in an April 16 earnings presentation that people consume podcasts on Netflix during the day, at a time when the streamer historically has less engagement and they’re watching the podcasts more on mobile devices, where professional TV and film historically makes up a small percentage of mobile viewing, he said.

“It’s great that we get to meet members where they are, even when they’re enjoying other forms of entertainment,” Sarandos said.

GEMMA Collins has opened up about her journey with grief after heartbreakingly losing her mum.

The former Towie star announced earlier this week that her beloved mum Joan had passed away after several years of health issues.

Now, Gemma says her grief is ‘coming in waves’ and detailed how she is healing during the difficult time.

In a new Instagram post, the star shared a picture of a memorial area set up for her mum – containing a framed picture of them together, flowers, and candles.

She captioned the snap: “Grief is the price we pay for love. ❤️

“Thank you from the bottom of my heart for every message, every prayer, every kind word. I’m reading them all and getting back to everyone slowly. Please bear with me. Some moments I feel okay, and then it comes in waves.

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“One beautiful thing keeps happening. A butterfly has been with me constantly, appearing wherever I go.

“It brings me a sense of peace, and in my heart I truly feel it’s my mum letting me know she’s close, watching over me, and reminding me that love never really leaves us.”

Gemma continued to say that her fans and friends were ‘holding me up’ – after a wave of tributes piled in for Joan.

She ended the post: “Thank you all for holding me up with your kindness. It means more than you’ll ever know. 🦋🤍

“She loved @paulmccartney and the @thebeatles I’m finding lots of healing listening to the music 🦋🐦‍⬛”.

Gemma announced her mum’s death online earlier this week, sharing how she had passed ‘peacefully’ and was finally ‘out of pain’.

Just last month, Joan was rushed to hospital after being struck down with pneumonia for the second time in the space of six months.

When her mum was admitted to hospital, Gemma told fans she “couldn’t sleep with worry”.

Just six months before her hospital visit at the start of June, Joan was hospitalised with pneumonia again.

She spent five weeks under medical care before Christmas, with Gemma describing the time as the ‘toughest of her life’.

Joan had spent time in medical care several times in recent years.

In March 2020 , she was first taken to hospital with pneumonia and it was reported that she suffers from rheumatoid arthritis.

The condition left her with a heavily compromised immune system and vulnerable to infections.

Four years later in 2024, Gemma was left heartbroken as she told how her mum was in intensive care following a breast cancer diagnosis.

At the time, Joan, who found a cancerous lump between her breast and armpit, was rushed to hospital after she stopped breathing.

Would he get his own song?

Lars Nootbaar grew up in Southern California, playing for USC and attending games at Dodger Stadium. His mother is from Japan, so he played with Shohei Ohtani on Team Japan in the 2023 World Baseball Classic.

In Japan, fans come up with a song for each player and sing it happily and relentlessly. Nootbaar played in the major leagues, not in the Japanese league, so he was not sure he would get a song until he came up to bat.

“I don’t know how everybody in the stadium knew how to do it,” the St. Louis Cardinals outfielder said Wednesday at Angel Stadium. “Everybody was chanting it. It was pretty awesome.”

Japan’s Lars Nootbaar, center, played for Team Japan in the 2023 World Baseball Classic.

(Eugene Hoshiko / Associated Press)

In Japan, baseball games are nine innings of songs and chants, drums and noise sticks. No excessively caffeinated in-game hosts. No scolding video commands to make some noise. The joyful sounds are organic, and they come from the fans.

Nootbaar attended Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s last game in Japan and absolutely raved about the energy in the stadium. Does he believe that kind of fan experience would translate to an American ballpark?

“I don’t see why not,” Nootbaar said. “It would probably have to start small, but it would be cool to integrate that.”

We’re starting small, and soon. A minor league team plans to launch in Irvine next year, and the entrepreneur behind it is pitching it as a way to provide fans with a taste of Asian baseball.

“We’re going to really lean into some of the innovation in fan experience that you’ve seen in Korea and Japan,” said Paul Freedman, co-founder of Innovation Baseball Partners.

“We’ll be the first, to our knowledge, to bring that as the fan experience of an American baseball team.”

The team would play in the Pioneer League, the independent league in which Freedman and his partners previously launched teams in Oakland and Long Beach. In Oakland, the ballpark is a pop-up. In Long Beach, the team plays at 70-year-old Blair Field.

Irvine hits the sweet spot: a glistening new community ballpark in as targeted a demographic as an Asian-themed team could want. In Irvine, which has about 320,000 residents, 44% of the population is Asian.

The defending champions of Korea’s league last year held spring training in Irvine. More Koreans live there than in any city in the United States besides New York or Los Angeles.

Asian food will be available at the games, as will hot dogs.

On Tuesday, the Irvine City Council is scheduled to consider a five-year contract with Innovation Baseball Partners, under which the team could sell naming rights to the Great Park stadium and would split the revenue with the city 50-50. The agreement also provides a framework for potential expansion of the stadium from 1,300 to 3,000 seats.

Don Wakamatsu, who runs baseball operations for Freedman’s teams, was the first Asian-American manager in major league history and managed Hall of Famer Ichiro Suzuki with the Seattle Mariners.

Ichiro won’t be playing in Irvine — the Pioneer League limits players to no more than two years of professional experience — but Wakamatsu plans to tap into his network to ensure the team has an Asian manager or coach and a nucleus of Asian players.

Wakamatsu described Freedman’s model of minor league teams as “somewhere between conventional baseball and the Savannah Bananas” and believes the Asian style could take hold in Irvine.

“If we can truly capture some of that excitement and fan interaction,” Wakamatsu said, “I think we’ll get a deeper connection with the players.”

To help launch the Irvine team, Freedman tapped two Korean-Americans: Martin Kim, a onetime interpreter to former Dodgers pitcher Hyun-jin Ryu and international business development executive with the Dodgers and Major League Baseball; and Yugina Yun, an Orange County-raised sports executive that said she “begged” to join the team as its operations director.

“The element that we’d really like to bring forth is the idea that fans in the stands can impact a team,” Yun said. “We want them to feel like they’re a part of the culture from the ground up.

“We’re not manufacturing the experience. They are.”

If you watched the World Baseball Classic, or for that matter the World Cup, you don’t have to be sold on this. On the night before the World Cup final, Argentinian fans took over Times Square, singing and chanting and waving banners.

A sign outside this year’s WBC finals in Miami listed 16 “permissible instruments” (bongos, cowbells and tambourines welcome) and eight “prohibited instruments” (no airhorns, please). In Tijuana, where Dodgers icon Justin Turner is playing this season, airhorns buzz constantly, and games feature skits between innings.

“I think there is a lot of attention to how different cultures have taken America’s pastime and created experiences around it that are different than we have here,” Freedman said. “We’re excited to bring some of that back home.”

Lily Allen’s phenomenal musical comeback with West End Girl caused quite the stir.

Lily Allen fans will see the star as “she’s never been seen before” in a “redefining” new documentary.

Pop star Lily Allen was a cultural icon in the noughties, and was recently catapulted back into the spotlight after an eight-year break, thanks to her scandalous hit album West End Girl.

Now, the Not Fair singer is at the heart of an upcoming biographical documentary “offering an intimate portrait of the life and career of a global icon and voice of a generation”.

Set to be released on Prime Video, the film will take a deep dive into her “extraordinary journey” and why she has remained a cultural force for the past two decades.

The special will feature interviews from those closest to the star to give subscribers a real insight into the musical legend’s life away from the cameras.

The official synopsis teases: “As a pioneering woman in modern music, Lily’s sharp wit and candid storytelling directly paved the way for a generation of today’s biggest female artists.

“This is a story of resilience, reinvention, and an artist reclaiming her narrative on her own terms.

“This is Lily Allen as she’s never been seen before. Raw, real, and redefining what it means to thrive in the spotlight.”

So far, a release date for the Lily Allen documentary hasn’t been confirmed by Prime Video but it will be sometime in 2027.

Her shocking fifth studio album West End Girl was written following the collapse of her marriage to Stranger Things star David Harbour.

The famous couple first started dating in 2019, got married the following year and separated in 2025.

In her 14-track West End Girl album, she accuses Harbour of infidelity and talks about their open marriage agreement.

Harbour has since addressed the album in an interview with Variety, saying “stories are complex” and that “it wasn’t my experience”. Nevertheless, he does “respect her creation of art to channel her experience”.

The Lily Allen documentary will air sometime in 2027 on Prime Video.

A MULTI-MILLION pound karting attraction is set to come to a major seaside city.

Thrill-seekers will be able to experience the ride in just two years time.

The brand-new attraction – known as Skyline Swansea – is set to bring Europe’s first ever skyline luge to the Welsh city.

The £49million experience will see visitors taking a cable car up the mile-long stretch from the Copper Quarter to Kilvey Hill.

Once there, thrill-seekers will be able to ride a three-wheeled luge cart – a type of reclining sled – down a 1,012-meter snaking track, propelling visitors downwards using gravity.

Three luge tracks will be available to ride upon opening, along with a children’s adventure park, a 50mph sky swing, and a 150-seat restaurant with a separate bar area.

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The mountain biking trails that are currently available on the hill will also be maintained and improved, with additional trails to be added.

New Zealand-based Skyline Enterprises, the firm behind the project, revealed that construction is currently underway, with an estimated completion date of mid-2028.

The leisure company said their mission was to “open up Kilvey Hill for everyone to enjoy, bringing accessible tourism to the heart of Swansea” and “where the sweeping views of Swansea Bay, Gower, and Bannau Brycheiniog can be enjoyed by all”.

This marks the firm’s first project in the UK, having built similar style sites across New Zealand, Canada, Singapore and South Korea.

The 193-metre hill also remains a popular site for hikers, cyclists and trail runners, with an estimated 140,000 visitors each year.

However, the new attraction is projected to bring in upwards of 450,000 visitors annually, with more than half coming from outside of Wales.

Streaming service Netflix has started early production on your next thrilling TV obsession

Another bestselling thriller is coming to screens soon.

Netflix has lined up an adaptation of Lucy Clarke’s bestselling thriller The Surf House with a familiar name behind the scenes.

No casting has been announced just yet, but the upcoming drama is being helmed by director Ed Lilly, who was behind episodes of major TV titles such as Industry and Tell Me Lies.

Clarke’s novel is set in Morocco and follows a woman named Bea seeking sanctuary amongst a community of travellers.

However, Bea’s travels soon take a dark turn when she uncovers a sinister secret at the heart of the commune.

A synopsis via Deadline reads: “The Surf House is set high on the cliffs of Morocco and is based in a sanctuary for surfers and travellers chasing sunshine and waves.

“But the idyll hides a dark mystery, and when Bea washes in, seeking refuge after a dangerous encounter in Marrakesh, she soon gets caught in the current.

“A woman her age – who stayed in the same area, walked the same beaches, met the same guests – disappeared one year earlier, vanishing without trace, and her last known whereabouts was The Surf House.”

Author Clarke is quickly becoming a household name for thriller fans, with Deadline’s report describing her as a “British Liane Moriarty” (author of Big Little Lies and Nine Perfect Strangers).

Two of her novels, The Castaways and No Escape, have already been adapted by Paramount+, the former starring Sheridan Smith.

Another book, The Hike, has also been optioned by Urban Myth Films, which is backed by Studiocanal, so a big screen adaptation could be imminent.

In the meantime, The Surf House is shaping up to be another must-watch thriller for Netflix based on the original novel’s rave reviews from readers.

One Goodreads user gushed: “This is the perfect thriller. It had everything going on. The scenic beach front hostel in Morocco as the setting was amazing.”

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Another wrote: “I felt like I could not put this one down. I needed to keep reading to see what was going to happen. Also the last 60 percent has several twists and turns. Once I thought I had it figured out it kept changing up on me.”

“I could not get enough of this book,” someone else said. “I am going to buy all of this author’s books now. Such a perfect 5 star for me.”

And a final fan recommended: “If you like fast paced thrillers, multiple mysteries wrapped up in one story all in the back drop of a gorgeous destination and travel setting then this is absolutely for you.”

Netflix’s The Surf House does not yet have a release date.

WASHINGTON — The curtain started to come down for President Trump at the Kennedy Center on Saturday.

After a day of legal maneuvers and thunderstorms, workers began the process in the early morning hours of removing the letters spelling out Trump’s name from the facade of the performing arts venue. They were a few hours past a court-ordered deadline and did their work shrouded by a tarp, much to the frustration of onlookers who had gathered for hours hoping to witness a dramatic moment symbolizing the limits of Trump’s power.

As the sun rose over Washington, the tarp remained in place, leaving it impossible to determine whether all the letters had been removed. Shortly after midnight, the Kennedy Center asked a judge to extend the deadline until noon Eastern time, citing the storms for delaying the work. The court agreed to that request Saturday morning.

The removal of Trump’s name closes one of the more unusual chapters in the history of the Kennedy Center, which began construction in 1964 and was dedicated to the memory of the slain president, John F. Kennedy. At what is typically one of the few relatively nonpartisan spaces in Washington, Trump has exerted unprecedented executive influence over the congressionally created venue during his second term.

Though he rarely discussed the Kennedy Center during his 2024 campaign, Trump moved quickly to oust the institution’s leadership when he returned to office in January 2025 and replaced it with a board of trustees that named him chairman. It rebranded the venue the “Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts” and his name was quickly added to the building’s exterior, though an official name change would require an act of Congress.

While the removal of his name marks a setback for Trump, he is moving forward with other plans to reshape the physical landscape of the nation’s capital in ways that have few modern parallels.

He demolished the East Wing of the White House and is building a controversial ballroom in its place. He remodeled the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool and plans extensive renovations of a golf course in East Potomac Park, moves that could significantly reduce the public’s access to running and biking paths. He is also moving forward with a triumphal arch that would sit near Arlington National Cemetery across the Potomac River in Virginia.

Indeed, as Trump’s name is being removed from the Kennedy Center, the South Lawn of the White House has been transformed into a venue for a UFC match intended to celebrate the 250th anniversary of American independence but also coinciding with Trump’s birthday on Sunday.

Back at the Kennedy Center, there are many questions about the institution’s future. The same May court decision that ordered Trump’s name to be removed from the building also blocked a planned two-year closure for renovations that was set to begin next month.

The Kennedy Center’s calendar for the weeks ahead include performances of “Moulin Rouge! The Musical” and “Bluey’s Big Play.” Comedian Bill Maher is to be awarded the Mark Twain Award for American Humor during a ceremony on June 28.

But little is scheduled for the stages beyond that and, after the Kennedy Center substantially reduced staff, it is unclear how quickly it could build out a robust performance list. Trump, angered by the court’s order to remove his name, has said he would turn the Kennedy Center over to Congress and has suggested it might simply shutter because of public safety concerns.

In its unsuccessful appeal Friday seeking a pause on the order removing Trump’s name, the Kennedy Center’s leadership argued, in terms similar to the president’s use of language and framing of the argument, that the lower court was interfering with needed renovations.

“The District Court is not allowing us to close in order to properly fix up and repair the Building, including potentially life threatening structural damage like beams and parking garage ceilings that are rusted, and in serious danger of falling onto people below,” according to the appeal. “Indeed, total collapse!”

The institution also suggested that the president’s name could return to the building if the Kennedy Center later wins its appeal.

If the court denied the venue’s request for a pause, the Kennedy Center argued that it would “be forced to squander time and money — by both removing the signage and then potentially returning it after appeal.”

Sloan writes for the Associated Press.

Longtime on-air anchor Glen Walker is making his way back to broadcast news in Los Angeles.

After being laid off from KTLA in February, alongside other veteran broadcasters like Lu Parker and Mark Kriski, Walker is starting a new chapter with KTTV, L.A.’s local Fox affiliate. He began his new role as a per-diem anchor this week, where he’s set to have an on-air introduction on Wednesday and begin anchoring shows on Thursday evening.

“I didn’t feel like I was done,” said Walker of his career, in a phone interview Wednesday morning. “I’m still healthy. I’m not ready to retire.”

As Fox’s new rotating anchor, he won’t have a regular broadcast time, but will instead float between the KTTV and KCOP channels to fill in as needed.

Over the last few months, Walker has been eager to get back on air, especially with the local primary elections this month and the coming midterms in November. He said he plans to take the new gig “one day at a time,” but he’s most interested in covering politics and the current state of affairs in Los Angeles.

“With the elections and how it’s all related to the fires and the homeless problem, this city — maybe the whole state — has reached a point where [we ask], which direction are we going from here?” Walker said.

The broadcast news industry has been experiencing upheaval and consolidation — most recently with layoffs and firings at “60 Minutes,” and the pending merger of news giants Tegna and Nexstar. With the ongoing domination of streaming services, many local stations are struggling to compete and maintain viewership.

“[The stations] will get it figured out because there’s an adjustment period. It used to be just newspapers and radio, then you had television,” Walker said. “Now we’ve got the internet. Technology advances, and you just have to adjust to it.”

When he and several of his colleagues received the news of the layoffs at KTLA, the group was met with an outpouring of support from many loyal viewers and fans of the station. Walker, who had been with the station since 2010, was surprised by how many messages he received.

“You make a bigger impact than you think,” said Walker, who’s hopeful the same viewers will start to tune in to the local Fox station. “You just go to do your job every day, and you don’t think about it day to day, but then when something like that happens, that’s when you really see where people appreciate you.”

In between jobs, Walker said he spent his time golfing and trying to keep busy around the house and focused on landing a job. As soon as he stepped into Fox’s studio for a practice run, he said he felt an immediate sense of familiarity.

“I was sitting behind the anchor desk, and there was the teleprompter, the camera and that’s it,” Walker said. “It’s all the same at every TV station. It’s just a little bit of a different environment.”

June 9 (UPI) — Two U.S. Army helicopter crew members were rescued and brought to safety within two hours after their Apache gunship crashed near the Strait of Hormuz.

U.S. President Donald Trump said early Tuesday that the two service personnel were “fine” and promised a report on the incident would be released in the next 24 hours or so.

U.S. Central Command said the pair were in a stable condition with spokesperson Capt. Tim Hawkins telling NBC News that a Task Force 59 unmanned surface vessel found and recovered the soldiers — the first time the U.S. military had carried out such an operation with a drone boat.

A source told the New York Times that it was yet to be established whether the aircraft came under Iranian fire, sustained a technical malfunction or encountered another issue.

The loss of a Hellfire missile-armed AH-64 Apache — which patrol the strait, downing Iranian drones and preventing small boats from attacking shipping — is a first for the U.S. military since the conflict started Feb. 28.

At least eight U.S. fighter jets and other military aircraft, plus more than two dozen uncrewed aerial vehicles, have been lost in both enemy and friendly-fire incidents but Monday’s crash was the first loss of a helicopter.

The Apaches play a key tactical role alongside F/A-18 and F-35s fighter aircraft in U.S. Central Command’s mission to counter the blockade of the vital international shipping route, which Iran has effectively put out of bounds to the vast majority of oil tankers and other commercial vessels.

However, the helicopters have been patrolling closer to Iran, including its islands in the Hormuz Strait and Persian Gulf, as part of Centcom’s effort to maintain the pressure on Tehran amid protracted negotiations to resolve the 100-day-long conflict.

Tehran did not immediately claim responsibility for the incident, according to Iran’s semi-official Mehr News Agency.

The confirmation from the U.S. side came hours after Iran and Israel sides paused airstrikes on each other at the request of U.S. President Donald Trump, who urged them to “stop shooting” because an agreement with Tehran to end the war was very close.

“We’re in the final throes of what will be a very, very good deal that will not allow in any way, shape, or form nuclear weapons. The strait will open up right away.

Trump said the Strait of Hormuz would reopen to international shipping immediately after the agreement was signed, which could be before the weekend, adding that there was a chance it could be far earlier, “in one hour, if you want to know the truth.”

A HUGE water attraction launching in the UK for the first time has revealed plans for five more attractions across the country.

Therme Manchester – a giant water attraction with pools, saunas and beaches – is currently under construction and now new plans have been revealed to build more Therme attractions in the UK.

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According to Spa Business, David Russell, CEO of Therme UK explained that new locations under consideration include Glasgow in Scotland; Cardiff in Wales,Bristol; London and possibly Birmingham.

The first of these to open would be Glasgow, where the site would be around the same size as Therme’s attraction in Bucharest, Romania, spanning 2,787sqm.

The site would be between the Kelvin and Clyde rivers, opposite Glasgow’s Transport Museum.

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The site is only in the early stages with Therme currently working on the lease for the location.

The plans are part of Therme’s ’90:90′ aim – 90 per cent of the UK public being within 90 minutes of a Therme attraction.

Therme also has a number of other attractions planned for the rest of the world, such as in Toronto, Canada; Washington and Dallas, America; Seoul, Korea; Singapore; Dubai, UAE and Frankfurt, Germany.

It comes as more details have been revealed about Therme Manchester which is currently under construction and is set to open in late 2028.

The £500million attraction is set to host up to 2.8million people each year, with a maximum of 6,500 to 7,000 at the attraction at any one time.

Inside visitors can expect a large-scale waterpark split into three zones (Play, Relax and Restore) heated to 33C, with numerous spa and wellness facilities.

In the Play zone, visitors will find ‘next-generation’ water slides, as well as a wave pool, warm water pool, steam rooms, saunas and lounging and family dining experiences.

This zone will boast an outdoor beach too.

In the Relax zone – which will be adults-only – there will be a “focus on premium wellbeing experiences”, which includes indoor and outdoor pools, waterfall showers, mineral baths, steam rooms, saunas and casual dining.

In the Restore Zone – which is also an adults-only area – there will be “industry leading health, nutrition and wellbeing therapies”, “sauna rituals”, experience showers, wellbeing consultations and dining.

Therme Manchester will also have some of the latest technology including robots that will take guests’ belongings and store them away.

Guests will get a wristband which they scan each time they want paid-for experiences inside Therme, as well as food.

Russell even shared that visitors will be able to get a discount if they arrive at Therme by public transport.

Visiting the new attraction is set to cost £48 per person.

Russell said: “There won’t be anywhere in this country that has the facilities we have in terms of slides, pools, thermal pools, cryotherapy, snow rooms, heat rooms – like 30 saunas.

“We want to do it through volume and that’s brave because it’s a challenge. But it’s a leap of faith.”

PALM SPRINGS — Barry Manilow steers a golf cart to the end of a long driveway, pulls to a stop and flings a plush toy goose across a manicured lawn to the delight of his two Labrador retrievers.

“OK, where we doing this?” the 82-year-old singer asks about our interview. Dressed in a khaki shirt and slim-fitting rust-colored trousers, he’s got the look of a man prepared to undertake some très chic brush clearance; in reality, he’s motored down here merely to answer questions about his fabulous life and career.

Manilow and his husband and longtime manager, Garry Kief, moved to this sprawling desert estate from Los Angeles in the late 1990s. “We kept coming out, and it’s so beautiful that eventually we said, ‘Screw it — let’s just stay,’” he says. By then, Manilow had long since established himself as one of music’s premier showmen, with a Grammy Award, 11 Top 10 hits and a storied 15-night run at L.A.’s Greek Theatre under his belt.

So you might’ve taken Palm Springs as a sign that he was ready to slow down. Instead, he launched a residency at the Las Vegas Hilton in 2005 that eventually surpassed the length of Elvis Presley’s show there; in 2006, he released “The Greatest Songs of the Fifties,” which went platinum and spawned a series of successful follow-up albums.

Last month, Sabrina Carpenter interpolated a bit of Manilow’s iconic “Copacabana (At the Copa)” into her headlining set at Coachella just days before he was honored by the American Advertising Federation for his work writing commercial jingles. The range of those achievements said something about his blend of music-nerd craft and pop-star razzle-dazzle.

“Barry loves music as much as anyone I’ve ever known,” says Bette Midler, who hired Manilow as her pianist for the name-making gig she played at New York’s Continental Baths in the early 1970s. Performing, Midler adds, “isn’t a job with him — it’s a vocation, a calling.”

Yet now that calling faces a threat. In December, Manilow announced that he’d been diagnosed with lung cancer and that surgery would require him to postpone a number of concert dates; five months later, he has yet to return to the stage — the longest break, COVID-19 aside, he can remember taking in decades.

Fortunately for Manilow, he has a new album, “What a Time,” with which to occupy himself. Due June 5, it consists mostly of original material — his first such LP in nearly 15 years — though it opens with a sumptuous rendition of Peter Allen and Dean Pitchford’s “Once Before I Go.” Manilow notes proudly that the song, which was produced by Kenneth “Babyface” Edmonds, recently made Billboard’s adult contemporary chart, extending his run on that tally beyond the half-century mark.

Barry Manilow performs in Beverly Hills in 2025.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

Still, performing is clearly on his mind as he leads me into a tile-roofed gym equipped with weights, a treadmill and a massage table. Manilow has been working out here every morning, he says, to regain the strength needed for his show; he’s got Vegas dates on the books for July but admits he’s unsure whether they’ll happen or not. We settle into two leather club chairs, his dogs Jake and Abby at his feet.

“Please be brilliant,” he tells me. “Don’t be boring.”

What are you doing on a day you’re not working?
Working.

I see.
Since the surgery, I can’t go on the road. Ninety minutes of screaming in tune, which is what I do for a living — I’m not up for that yet. I will be, but it’s taking a long time to get my voice back. They warned me that I’d have to learn to breathe again. So these days, I get up, I go to my piano and I try to be creative. Before I know it, the afternoon’s over.

Was the diagnosis a shock?
Imagine your doctor saying, “You’ve got lung cancer.”

Fair enough.
I’ll tell you the story. I have terrible hips — bursitis and everything — and they hurt so bad that I thought maybe I broke a bone or something. So I asked my wonderful family doctor, I said, “Can you just do one of those MRIs and see?” Now, before that, I’d had two bad bouts of bronchitis, one after the next. Have you ever had bronchitis?

I have.
It stinks. So I asked him if he could check my hip, and he told the guys that were doing it, “Why don’t you check his lungs?” And I think he might have saved my life because they found a big black thing in my chest. One doctor said it was probably remnants of the bronchitis, the other doctor said it could be cancer. I voted for the bronchitis. But they went back in to see and it was a cancerous tumor.

How’d you react?
When they told me, I was on the road, and I just went back to sound check. What else could I do? I never thought cancer would get me — it wasn’t in the cards. They wanted to get rid of it as soon as possible, so we made a deal: I’d finish the couple of weeks of shows that I had, then I’d go to the hospital and they’d remove it. It was supposed to be a no-brainer — it hadn’t spread yet, thank goodness. But then my AFib kicked in and acid reflux kicked in and pneumonia kicked in. They rushed me to the ICU for seven days.

Barry Manilow with Dionne Warwick in Los Angeles in 1985.

(Paul Harris / Getty Images)

Sorry to be morbid, but were you close to death?
They said at one point — I didn’t hear them say this but I heard that they did say it — “We don’t want to lose him.” It’s all a total blur now. When they finally brought me back to my lovely room at the Eisenhower [medical center], I weighed 128 pounds.

How long you figure it had been since you weighed 128 pounds?
I don’t remember ever being 128.

You said you never thought cancer would get you. Why?
I’m too busy. Pretty stupid. What I realized is that I’ve always been the leader — leader of the band, leader of an audience — but I wasn’t the leader of this one. That was a big lesson for me. I had to rely on everybody else. Nurses, doctors, friends — you should see some of the notes people have sent.

What’s it been like to be offstage for so long?
Agony. Make an album, go on the road, come back, make an album, go on the road — that’s what my life’s been for years. And I like it. Now I just have to get better and do what the doctors are telling me. It’s the only way out.

Well, there’s one other way.
I’m not ready to croak. But I wasn’t ready to stop performing either, and it just went like that [snaps fingers]. The day before surgery, people are screaming, standing ovation, band sounds great. Next day I’m packing to go to the hospital.

Are you working with a vocal coach?
Yep. But I get winded just walking down the hallway. I turn on my old records and sing along, and three songs in I’m like [pants].

Could you do a show where you skip the uptempos? No “It’s a Miracle” or “Copacabana”?
I’m trying ballads too — my ballads end big.

Are you allowed to smoke or drink?
I stopped smoking many, many years ago. I vape but hardly — I just like holding it. I was a great smoker. Brooklyn in the ’50s? Please. I started smoking when I was 9. I got up to three packs of Pall Mall non-filters a day, and it never bothered me — never had any problem breathing. I was just a skinny piano player who smoked. That’s who I am. That’s who I was.

Before he was a skinny piano player, he was a skinny accordion player.

Manilow grew up poor in Brooklyn, the only son of a Jewish mother and an Irish father who split up right after he was born. As a kid he entertained his mom and his maternal grandparents by squeezing out the Jewish folk song “Hava Nagila”; later, his stepfather brought home records by Gerry Mulligan and Judy Garland that opened his mind to jazz and pop.

He says today that he never saw himself as a performer — he wanted to write, arrange, produce. His first success came with jingles for brands like State Farm — “Like a Good Neighbor” is his handiwork — and Band-Aid.

“My ideas were good for pop music because of the commercials,” he says. “The rules are pretty much the same — you need to grab the listener as soon as possible. For a commercial, you’ve got about five seconds. For a pop song, you’ve got 10.”

In 1971, Manilow got the job with Midler and ended up working on her million-selling debut, “The Divine Miss M,” which led to a deal of Manilow’s own with Clive Davis’ Arista Records. Despite Manilow’s insistence that he was a behind-the-scenes guy, he scored a No. 1 hit out of the box with the plaintive “Mandy,” then quickly followed that with another chart-topper, “I Write the Songs” — a pop-philosophical epic, as nobody’s tired of pointing out ever since, that Manilow didn’t actually write.

Barry Manilow at home in Palm Springs.

(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

Bruce Johnston, who wrote “I Write the Songs” — and won a Grammy for song of the year thanks to Manilow’s recording — says the key to Manilow’s performance is that “he’s never too cool for school.” A Beach Boy for six decades until he retired from the band this year, Johnston adds that Manilow’s rendition of the song, which was also cut by Captain & Tennille and David Cassidy, “is the only one I care about, honestly. He really grabbed it — he’s just as real as he could be.”

After several more Manilow hits — “Tryin’ to Get the Feeling Again,” “Weekend in New England,” “Looks Like We Made It” — Davis asked the singer to produce a would-be comeback album by his latest Arista signing, Dionne Warwick. Warwick’s initial reaction to that idea: “Really?” she says with a laugh. “Did Barry Manilow really know anything about Dionne Warwick? As it turned out, he knew quite a bit,” adds Warwick, who recalls turning up for their first session to discover that Manilow had laid every one of her albums on his piano. “He was letting me know: I know you,” she says.

“Dionne,” the album they made together, went on to win a pair of Grammys and spun off silky hit singles including “Deja Vu” and “I’ll Never Love This Way Again” that reinvigorated Warwick’s career and helped solidify Manilow’s standing as a kind of soft-rock auteur.

Which isn’t to say that rock’s intelligentsia ever viewed him kindly. Though his best music finds an emotional truth in over-the-top theatrics, critics routinely dismissed Manilow as a lightweight or a schlockmeister; even now, he seems an unlikely candidate for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, where he’s been eligible for induction for decades.

Manilow, who entered the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2002, insists the slights don’t bother him. “I’ve never been one of the guys,” he says. We’ve been talking for a while, and because of the bursitis, perhaps, he’s hoisted one of his legs over the arm of his chair. “I don’t think about awards and parties and stuff like that. I’m very lucky — I live in the most gorgeous place I’ve ever seen and I have the most wonderful partner that you can imagine. I’m grateful he’s chosen to share his life with me. We’ve been together for over 46 years, and we still laugh and we still love each other. That’s the greatest award I’ll ever get.”

Manilow and Kief married in 2014; the singer came out as gay three years later. (Manilow was briefly married to his high school girlfriend, Susan Deixler, in the mid-1960s.) Has he found that the world looks at him differently since he came out?

“It was a non-event. Nobody gave a s—,” he says. “They all knew. I never really hid it, but in the ’70s and ’80s, that would have killed the career, and I didn’t want to do that. So I just never talked about it.” He smiles.

“Garry and I are just two guys that live in a house on a hill with two dogs that we love.”

Like many of Manilow’s hits, “Once Before I Go” was Davis’ idea.

Allen, the late Australian entertainer portrayed by Hugh Jackman in Broadway’s Tony-winning “The Boy From Oz,” had played the tune for Manilow in the early ’80s. “And I loved it,” Manilow says now. “But I was too young to sing a song like that — that song needs age to be able to pull it off honestly.”

Davis first suggested that Manilow perform it in his set at the post-pandemic We Love NYC concert that Davis put on in Central Park in 2021. After the show, which was called off due to weather as Manilow sang “Can’t Smile Without You,” Davis repeatedly advised the singer to record it.

Clive Davis, left, with Barry Manilow at an Arista Records party in Los Angeles in 1989.

(Lester Cohen / Getty Images)

“I don’t know, he had a bug up his ass,” Manilow says. “He loved it, and he loved it for me. And I’m not even on his record label anymore — he’s just a friend at this point. But he was right once again.”

Given the cancer diagnosis, did Manilow worry that fans might interpret the song — a teary goodbye from a well-wishing lover — as a more permanent farewell?

“Not one time has anybody said, ‘Is he talking about dying?’”

You wouldn’t necessarily call “What a Time” a concept album, though many of the songs ponder the ways memory and history can shape a romance. Manilow knows he’s regarded as a singles act but says that putting together LPs is what he’s always enjoyed best. His favorite is 1984’s jazzy “2:00 AM Paradise Cafe,” on which he collaborated with Mulligan, Sarah Vaughan and Mel Tormé.

“That was one where the critics who’d been killing me, they didn’t know I was capable of doing something like that,” he says. “But frankly, I’d been surprised that I was capable of doing the pop stuff.”

You made records of hits from the ’50s, ’60s, ’70s and ’80s. Why’d you stop before “The Greatest Songs of the Nineties”?
Were there songs in the ’90s?

Barry.
Didn’t it start to go downhill?

I can think of a handful of classics by Whitney Houston alone.
You can’t touch those. I’m a good arranger, but you can’t top those records. Maybe four of those albums was enough. I was ready to go back to writing.

You’ve said the problem with modern pop is that there’s no melody anymore.
That’s what I miss. Clive’s been pushing me to do “The Great New American Songbook.”

Like he did with Johnny Mathis a few years ago.
So I’ve been studying the Top 20. The one I like is Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars.

“Die With a Smile.”
Love that. But the way they’re writing songs these days is not the way I know how to write songs. They don’t do a verse, a chorus, a bridge, a chorus, a big ending. To me, when I listen, the songs feel like run-on sentences.

Barry Manilow with his dog Abby.

(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

I was trying to think of artists older than you who are still performing.
Name me one.

Willie Nelson.
Oh, yeah.

Johnny Mathis.
Mm-hmm.

Frankie Valli.
[Rolls eyes].

You’re invoking the widely held assumption that he lip syncs.
I loved Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. Who didn’t?

Would you ever lip sync?
I’m terrible at it. I try now and again.

Do you find it morally objectionable?
Depends on the artist. I like being in the moment, not knowing what’s gonna happen in the next bar or at the ending. It’s exciting to me to see if I can make those high notes.

Would not being able to make them mean it’s time to hang it up?
Well, what’s happening right now, I’m on the verge. But I’m getting stronger, so maybe I don’t have to hang it up yet. I look fantastic, but I’m a hundred years old, right? I don’t know how that happened, by the way — I don’t get Botox or anything.

You’ve had no work done?
No! I must say: There was one time when we lived in L.A. that I did do a facelift. But after that it’s just been a little here, a little there.

Wait, I asked you —
“Work” is like a facelift, and I only had one of those. The rest of it — I see something falling down, sure, I’ll do that. I’m as vain as anybody else. One of my old friends, his mother said, “I always knew he was talented, but when did he get so handsome?”