show biz

STRANGER Things sensation Millie Bobby Brown is one of the top ten highest-paid Hollywood screen stars — aged just 22. 

The Brit actress earned a whopping £19.6million last year, Forbes magazine has revealed. 

Her bumper pay makes her the youngest star to grace the business bible’s annual highest-paid actors list.

It comes after Millie’s hit Netflix sci-fi show ended with its fifth and final series last year — becoming one of the streamer’s most-watched shows of all time. 

Topping Forbes’ 2025 list is US actor Adam Sandler, 59, known for his comedy roles.

He reportedly made £36.2million last year from producing and starring in Happy Gilmore 2, and co- starring in Netflix comedy drama Jay Kelly. 

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Tom Cruise, 63, came in second with a £34.7million payday off the back of Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning.

Scarlett Johansson, 41, was fourth and the best-paid woman in the industry, raking in some £32.4million. 

While Hollywood pay is still huge, the combined earnings of the top 20 actors actually fell from 2024’s £551million — down to £445million. 

ZENDAYA grows back in time with a classic floral dress.

The actress, 29, posed in the gown, featuring a gilded ­hibiscus flower on the shoulder, at an awards bash this week.

Sarah Jessica Parker’s character Carrie Bradshaw strutted in it in 2008’s Sex and The City film.

And Whitney Houston wore a similar dress on a tribute issue of Life magazine in 2012.

Zendaya appeared to confirm she has wed Spider-Man co-star Tom Holland, 29, at the Essence Black Women in Hollywood Awards in LA.

The host asked for “a signal” on whether she should send a wedding gift, prompting Zendaya to show a gold band on her ring finger.

SECRET CEREMONY

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Zendaya’s stylist Law Roach has told how the A-List couple, both 29, have gotten hitched after getting engaged last year.

The singer has now been snapped at a Louis Vuitton fashion show, flaunting what appears to be her “wedding ring.”

She was spotted donning a thin gold band on her ring finger hidden among three huge silver rings.

Zendaya looked incredibly chic, flashing her legs in a white bubble skirt.

The US star wore a long sleeved white shirt with dramatic collars and cuffs and finished the outfit off with a chunky black belt and matching heels.

Her short brunette locks were tightly curled and tucked behind her ears.

Speaking on the red carpet at the Actor Awards earlier this month, Law told Access Hollywood: “The wedding has already happened. You missed it.”

When asked to spill more details by the reporter, the stylist laughed and said: “It’s very true.”

ACTOR Warwick Davis’s mystery lover is a woman named Yvette who he has been dating for a year.

The star, whose wife Samantha died in 2024, ­affectionately referred to his new partner as “Sponge” in a speech last year.

Pals said American-born Yvette, who Warwick said had helped him “to laugh and to love again”, was his ­formal date when he received his OBE from Prince William at Windsor Castle on Wednesday.

The Sun can reveal she also attended the Bafta Film Awards with the Harry Potter star, 56, at London’s Royal Festival Hall last month.

And they were also seen backstage together at a Madness concert in Cornwall last July.

A source told The Sun: ­“Warwick has been with Yvette for over a year now and they couldn’t be happier.

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“She has no interest in being a public figure and — although she has accompanied Warwick to events — Yvette does not court the limelight.

“Yvette is so proud of Warwick and loves to be by his side at events, but she will stand back and allow him to be in the ­spotlight.

“Yvette is close with his children and they have a lovely life together.

“All anyone wanted was to see Warwick happy and he has that with Yvette.”

Warwick revealed he had started dating again at the Bafta Film Awards in February last year.

After accepting the Bafta ­Fellowship on stage, he said: “Above all I’d like to dedicate and thank my wonderful wife Sammy, who died almost a year ago.

“Since then life has been pretty tough for me, but thanks to the support of our wonderful children Annabelle and Harrison, I’ve been able to continue working and engaging in life.

“A special mention too should go to Sponge, you know who you are.

“Thank you for showing me that life can still have meaning and helping me to laugh and to love again.”

This week at his investiture, Yvette was spotted in the background with his children while her partner spoke to William.

Warwick, who was born with a rare form of dwarfism called spondyloepiphyseal dysplasia ­congenita, was named in King Charles’ New Year Honours list.

He was praised for his work supporting people with dwarfism, co-founding the charity Little People UK in 2012 with Samantha.

Meanwhile, the Star Wars actor is to reprise his role as Professor Filius Flitwick in the upcoming Harry Potter TV spin-off.

AN unexpected Brit name has been thrown into the ring to play the next James Bond.

Bookmaker Coral has announced the surprising news about who is currently in the lead to scoop the iconic role.

It has been revealed that Jack O’Connell’s name is flying high after seeing support rise over the last 48 hours.

The SAS: Rogue Heroes star is a big contender to jump into James Bond‘s boots with odds to 8-1 (from 33-1).

“Jack O’Connell’s next James Bond odds have collapsed over the last couple of days, with the British actor now just single figures in our betting for the iconic role,” said Coral’s John Hill.

The new movie will be written by Oscar-nominated filmmaker Steven Knight – who was behind iconic TV show Peaky Blinders.

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Steven also wrote SAS: Rogue Heroes and worked with Jack on the feature.

The 28 Years Later actor has come a long way since his days in the Skins cast.

O’Connell has played a variety of roles since he starred in the TV teen drama as James Cook from 2009 to 2010 – and for the show’s final season in 2013.

Ever since Daniel Craig said goodbye to the role in 2021 release No Time To Die, the role of super spy 007 has been up for grabs, with speculation rife over who should take over. 

Coral stated the odds: 4-5 Callum Turner, 3-1 Aaron Taylor-Johnson, 3-1 Theo James, 6-1 Henry Cavill, 8-1 Jack O’Connell, 10-1 Anthony Boyle, 12-1 Harris Dickinson, 16-1 Jack Lowden, 16-1 James Norton.

Actors thought to be in the running to play Bond include Spider-Man star Tom Holland, 28, Bridget Jones hunk Leo Woodall, 28, SAS Rogue Heroes leading man Connor Swindells, 28, plus Hero Fiennes Tiffin, 27, and Kit Connor, 21. 

Irishman Paul Mescal, 29, is also said to be in the frame along with Wuthering Heights heart-throb Jacob Elordi, 27.

Among the other names rumoured to be in the frame included Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Callum Turner and Henry Cavill.

The Sun recently revealed the latest 007 adventure — spearheaded by new owners Amazon Prime Video — will start filming before the end of the year.

Work has already begun on assembling the crew with a view to starting filming late autumn into early winter.

Amazon has yet to confirm anything about the new Bond movie and there’s no hint as to what it will be called.

But if the cameras start to roll this year it means it could wrap in 2027 and be on our screens by 2028.

The franchise was snapped up by the streaming giants after 2021’s No Time To Die featured the death of the super-spy, played by Daniel Craig.

The 10th season of “Love Is Blind” ventured to Ohio, yielded a record seven engaged couples and made structured cape blazers and the idea of daily Pilates classes feel like rage bait.

With the season over, and just two couples saying “I do,” the cast of the popular Netflix dating series came together for this week’s reunion special to share updates on their lives since the cameras went down — and to unpack the twists, turns and lies that played out over the season. The result was a reunion that finally provided (mostly) satisfying questions and answers about participants’ pasts and presents instead of dancing around topics.

Unable to budget the time for a trip to Cabo — or even Malibu — to process it all, TV editor Maira Garcia and I have brought our running “LIB” thread out of our Slack DMs to unpack our thoughts in this safe place.

Also in this week’s Screen Gab, our streaming recommendations include a spray-tan crime comedy and a Morgan Freeman-narrated mind trip about the rise and fall of dinosaurs. Plus, we tell you where you can stream the slate of best picture nominees ahead of this Sunday’s Academy Awards ceremony.

This is your cue to block off some “couch time” in your calendar this weekend.

— Yvonne Villarreal

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Recommendations from the film and TV experts at The Times

Will Forte as Martin and D’Arcy Carden as Vicki in a scene from “Sunny Nights.”

(Lisa Tomasetti / Hulu)

“Sunny Nights” (Hulu)

D’Arcy Carden fans, and I can’t imagine anyone who’s ever seen her work isn’t one, will be elated to find her at full force starring in this dark, sometimes violent Australian crime comedy alongside Will Forte, who, yes, has fans of his own. They play brother Martin (cautious) and sister Vicki (impulsive), who have traveled to Sydney to flog a tanning spray at a lifestyle convention, though Martin has an ulterior motive, to win back his wife, Joyce (Ra Chapman). What with one thing and another, they find themselves repeatedly in need of cash and mixed up with a panoply of criminals, some fairly sympathetic (former rugby star Willie Mason, excellent as former rugby star Terry; Jessica De Gouw as Susi), and others not at all (Rachel House as kingpin Mony, just out of the jug). All are trying to change their lives, or at least their business plan, including Joyce, a journalist stuck writing clickbait articles for an editor who doesn’t want to know, and Megan Wilding as Nova, an animal control worker who knows something important about an exploding crocodile. — Robert Lloyd

A still from “The Dinosaurs.”

(Netflix)

“The Dinosaurs” (Netflix)

This four-part series will have you mentioning the Carnian pluvial episode in every conversation. Aptly narrated by Morgan Freeman and executive produced by Steven Spielberg, the sweeping CGI-enhanced nature documentary traces the evolutionary history of dinosaurs, from their origins in the Triassic period to their extinction 66 million years ago. And it’s more proof that attention spans, no matter a person’s age, will always lock in for dinosaurs. Before morning, your Google search history will include terms like “Marasuchus,” “Vulcanodon,” “Heterodontosaurus” and that Carnian pluvial episode (a.k.a. the longest downpour in history, which lasted more than a million years). Prepare to have your perception of time forever altered. Still, it’s a surefire way to give your mental health a break from current events — though, for a certain generation, it may also unlock those “Land Before Time” memories. — Y.V.

Catch up

Everything you need to know about the film or TV series everyone’s talking about

Scenes from “One Battle After Another,” left, “Hamnet” and “Sinners.”

(Warner Bros. Pictures; Focus Features)

The 98th Academy Awards will broadcast Sunday at 4 p.m. Pacific. How many of the best picture nominees have you seen? Is it less than the number of think pieces you’ve read on Timothée Chalamet’s comments on ballet and opera? We’re here to help. If you’re feeling inspired to be a studious viewer ahead of film’s big night, here’s where you can stream the best picture nominees:

• “Bugonia” (Peacock): Directed by Yorgos Lanthimos, the surreal comedy thriller follows a paranoid bee keeper (Jesse Plemons) who kidnaps a pharmaceutical CEO (Emma Stone), convinced she is an alien responsible for destroying humanity. The film received four Oscar nominations.
• “F1” (Apple TV): From “Top Gun: Maverick” director Joseph Kosinski, the sports drama stars Brad Pitt as retired F1 driver Sonny Hayes, who agrees to compete in the globe’s most prestigious racing event to salvage his reputation and the failing team of his buddy. The film received four Oscar nominations.
• “Frankenstein” (Netflix): Guillermo del Toro’s adaptation of the classic horror tale transforms Jacob Elordi into the tragic monster, known here as The Creature, and features Oscar Isaac as its titular mad maker. The film received nine Oscar nominations.
• “Hamnet” (Peacock): Based on Maggie O’Farrell’s novel, Chloé Zhao’s historical drama explores the grief, love and strained marriage of William Shakespeare (Paul Mescal) and his wife, Agnes (Jessie Buckley). The film received eight Oscar nominations.
• “Marty Supreme” (Available to rent or buy on platforms like Prime Video and Apple TV): Directed and co-written by Josh Safdie, the film is loosely based on the life of American table tennis player Marty Reisman, here called Marty Mauser and played by Timothée Chalamet. It is expected to be released on HBO Max later this spring. The film received nine Oscar nominations.
• “One Battle After Another” (HBO Max): Paul Thomas Anderson’s satirical political thriller, a loose adaptation of Thomas Pynchon’s “Vineland,” follows a paranoid ex-revolutionary (Leonardo DiCaprio) trying to save his daughter when an old enemy (Sean Penn) resurfaces. The film received 13 Oscar nominations.
• “Sentimental Value” (Available to rent or buy on platforms like Prime Video and Apple TV): Joachim Trier’s Norwegian drama follows two sisters (played by Renate Reinsve and Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas) as they reunite with their estranged filmmaker father (Stellan Skarsgard). The film received nine Oscar nominations. It is expected to be released on Hulu later this month.
• “Sinners” (HBO Max): Ryan Coogler’s gothic horror drama is set in 1932 Mississippi and follows twin brothers (played by Michael B. Jordan) who, trying to leave their troubled past behind them, return to their hometown to start anew — only to face new horrors. It became the most-nominated film in Academy Awards history with 16 total nominations.
• “The Secret Agent” (Hulu, Disney+): Directed by Kleber Mendonça Filho, the Brazilian historical political thriller stars Wagner Moura as a former professor fleeing persecution during the 1970s military dictatorship while trying to protect his son. The film received four Oscar nominations.
• “Train Dreams” (Netflix): Based on Denis Johnson’s 2011 novella of the same name, the film is an intimate birth-to-death portrait of a quiet railway laborer (Joel Edgerton) as he watches the world change around him. The film received four Oscar nominations.

Break down

Times staffers chew on the pop culture of the moment — love it, hate it or somewhere in between

It’s crazy to think that about six years ago, golden goblets, pods and “the experiment” were disparate ideas and objects that were on the precipice of infiltrating the culture. Now, you can’t think of one without the others. “Love Is Blind,” the reality dating show that tests the premise of whether singles can find love sight unseen and marry at the end, marked a milestone this year with its 10th season, filmed in Ohio.

While the series has produced a number of marriages and engagements, some have ended in breakups and divorce, as we saw on Wednesday’s Season 10 reunion. So while the answer to the question “Is love blind?” seems to be no, the series has nonetheless made for entertaining television for viewers who have made dissecting the people, fights and makeups a sport. Why are we so invested? Because it’s a reflection of where we are as a society when it comes to relationships and what we expect from partners emotionally, politically, physically and financially. With that in mind, Yvonne and I sat down with our golden goblets to unpack the Season 10 reunion. Here are five moments that stood out. — M.G.

Jordan and Amber are now divorced

Jordan Faeth and Amber Morrison were one of two couples to say “I do” at the altar. Morrison, a single mom, discussed with Faeth over the course of the show if he was ready to be a stepparent and where they would live, given that Morrison owned a home and her daughter was happy at her school. At the reunion, the couple revealed that they never moved in together and that they divorced after four months. Morrison talked about how her daughter was distraught after the breakup, leading to an emotional moment where Morrison ran offstage in tears. It raised an important question that fans have debated closely: Should parents be on the show? Seasons 6 and 9 also featured single parents, neither of whom made it to the altar. Given the compressed timeline of when people meet, become engaged and head to the altar, deciding whether marriage should include parenthood at the start adds another layer of complexity, not to mention how it could affect a child, who suddenly has a stranger in their life. The outcome wasn’t necessarily surprising, but it was sad.

Vic and Christine: boring but perfect. More, please

The other couple to make it down the aisle was Vic St. John and Christine Hamilton, who hit it off from the get-go and seemed to exist in their own blissful bubble. According to Netflix production, the show only budgets for six couples to go on a trip after the reveal and engagement. But they continued to track them, with St. John and Hamilton spending time in Malibu instead, taping dispatches together and getting to know each other without the rest of the cast in proximity. Throughout the course of the show, you see their connection grow. Their mature and thoughtful conversations about being an interracial couple and potentially raising biracial children were exactly the type of discussions you would hope they’d have before proceeding down the aisle. It may not make for dramatic TV, but it was genuinely thrilling to see a couple so well-suited for each other continuing to thrive. And in an effort to make up for not getting to go to Cabo, Mexico, with everyone else, the show offered them a trip paid by … Turbo Tax? It was an odd product placement, but if they want to foot the bill for their honeymoon, no one’s complaining. As long as it’s somewhere tropical on a beach — and not Lake Erie.

Who took accountability?

Despite not making it to the altar on screen after the blazer cape breakup, Connor Spies and Bri McNees are still together. But the bigger record-scratch moment arrived later, when it was revealed that Devonta Anderson broke up with Brittany Wicker a few days after what he told her was a work trip but was actually a getaway to Austin, Texas, to attend a concert with McNees, Ashley Carpenter and Priyanka Grandhi. Wicker didn’t seem thrilled that she had to find out about the trip from Amber (who found out from Jordan, who can’t remember that he even knew about it). McNees didn’t like the implication that she may have broken “girl code” with the whole fiasco — but if all the women are as close as they say they are, why wouldn’t you check in about such an arrangement regardless of the relationship status? (It was weird, too, that Connor thought it was a girls’ trip.) And the fact that it was the same three women who listened to Chris Fusco talk poorly about his former fiancée Jess Barrett — giant sigh. During the reunion, after Barrett voiced her disappointment in her friends about that incident, Carpenter apologized for not doing more to defend her in the moment.

Meanwhile, Nick unleashed his best attempt to channel Andy Cohen and grilled Fusco about his highly questionable behavior and the backlash over his comments to Barrett about her body, specifically stating he usually dates women who do Pilates or workout daily, and for trying to make the moves on McNees. Fusco, mostly quiet and stone-faced (could it be the shame?), acknowledged he was not proud of the moments he watched back and apologized to Barrett. His seat mate, goalkeeper Alex Henderson, was also on the defense. The self-proclaimed nomad never fully seem to vibe with his fiancée, Carpenter. He admitted she’s not his usual type. She still maintained he wasn’t telling the whole truth about his job or dating history, and overall lifestyle. Throughout his segment, Henderson was noticeably irritated by the insinuation that his stories didn’t add up. But he did seem to enjoy being asked to describe his relationship with Carpenter as if it was a soccer match, prompting him to cite a Liverpool game that ended in a tie. Are you laughing too?

Can this be a TikTok?

To commemorate the milestone season, the audience for the reunion special consisted of 150 former participants of the series. And while the time spent getting life updates with some of them throughout the show felt less forced and time-consuming than reunions past, it still felt like an add-on better suited to live in a separate (shorter) special or as social media content. If we wanted an update on these people’s lives, we can find them on social media. A gender reveal courtesy of someone’s dead grandmother, as sweet and touching and lovely as that may for an expectant couple, is not the sort of jaw-dropping moment a show like this needs. And maybe the money saved — assuming production footed the bill for those flights — could have sent every couple to Cabo.

Did you hear? Nick Lachey is from Ohio, guys.

His constant mention of his hometown roots was unquestionably the biggest declaration of love in the 90-minute special. Sorry, Vanessa.

ICYMI

Must-read stories you might have missed

Stranger Things’ The Duffer Brothers have teamed up with Baby Reindeer’s director for an “atmospheric” new horror drama.

Netflix has dropped the hotly-anticipated trailer for Something Very Bad Is Going To Happen just days before it premieres.

The eight-part limited horror series, starring The Night Manager actress Camila Morrone and The White Lotus actor Adam DiMarco, is scheduled to be released in full on Thursday, March 26, on Netflix.

The streamer teases that it will revolve around an “atmospheric wedding…following a bride and groom in the week leading up to their ill-fated nuptials”, cheekily teasing that it’s “not a spoiler”, given the show’s title.

The trailer sees loved-up Rachel (played by Camile Morrone) and Nicky (Adam DiMarco) head up to his family’s log cabin where they plan to get married but she soon feels as if something “weird” is happening.

While fans have shared their excitement at the upcoming horror, some couldn’t help but point out it resembles the plot of horror franchise Ready or Not.

For the latest showbiz, TV, movie and streaming news, go to the new **Everything Gossip** website.

Released in 2019, the original horror film saw Grace (Samara Weaving) fight for her life on her wedding night as she is forced to play a deadly game of hide-and-seek with her wealthy in-laws.

The sequel to Ready or Not is scheduled to be released next month and will see Grace joined by her sister as they try and survive rival families hunting them down.

Taking to YouTube ’s comments section, a viewer posted: “Feels like ‘Ready Or Not’ without a sense of humour.”

“What in the Ready or Not,” another said followed by a crying face emoji as a fan replied: “Right??! Like haven’t we already seen this.”

Someone else asked: “Is this like Ready or Not or something?”

But not everyone agreed that it was the same story as a user pointed out: “Ready Or Not isn’t the first film to have a spooky marriage plot, begging you people to watch movies.”

What makes Something Very Bad Is Going To Happen stand out even more is the fact that it’s executive produced by Stranger Things legends The Duffer Brothers and directed by Baby Reindeer’s Weronika Tofilska.

“The Duffers Cooked,” a fan praised as another posted: “I just realized this is a show by the Duffer brothers..I will be checking it out.”

Someone else then joked: “Imagine Vecna making an entry.”

The official synopsis reads: “Rachel (Camila Morrone) is getting married in five days.

“Together with her fiancé, Nicky (Adam DiMarco), she embarks on a road trip to his family’s vacation home, secluded in a snowy forest, for the intimate wedding ceremony of their dreams.

“Which really would be so lovely, except… prone to superstition and paranoia, Rachel can’t shake the relentless feeling that something bad is going to happen.

“Her foreboding doubts, coupled with a series of eerie coincidences and dreadful surprises, force her to ask the question: What makes two people soulmates? And worse — what could be scarier than lifelong commitment to the wrong person?”

Something Very Bad Is Going To Happen premieres on Thursday, March 26, on Netflix.

A Strictly pro who joined the show in 2022 has shared two words that sum up their thoughts on former host Claudia Winkleman, who announced her departure last year

A professional dancer from Strictly Come Dancing has shared two words that sum up their thoughts on former host Claudia Winkleman. A Chinese Strictly pro who joined the show in 2022 and lifted the Glitterball trophy with former Lioness Karen Carney last year, Carlos Gu was recently quizzed about whether he’d like to step into Claudia and Tess Daly’s shoes.

In October last year, the duo shocked fans by announcing they would be stepping away from their joint presenting duties on the BBC programme, sparking widespread speculation about their replacements.

Carlos doesn’t seem eager to throw his hat into the ring, though, noting that he doesn’t believe he could “ever be a presenter,” but he did have some kind things to say about the former hosts.

In a recent interview, Carlos was asked if he would like to take over from Claudia and Tess, to which he replied that he “didn’t see this coming” and that he loves them both.

He told Best Magazine’s Suddenly Single podcast: “I love Claudia and Tess. I love both of them. They are just iconic and obsessed about Claudia, too, personally. I love her.”

It was then suggested that Claudia was “kooky,” to which Carlos responded: “Very witty, very cool.” And, when it was claimed that the Traitors star “doesn’t like looking in the mirror,” he added that she knows her “value.”

Carlos continued: “No, it’s just, oh, she’s a woman who knows her value, and she knows everything about herself, and she’s so confident with it, which is so powerful. Like, Tess is, too, you know.”

In response to the original question, the dancer explained that he was a “born performer” and would “die on stage,” but doesn’t think he could “ever be a presenter.”

At the time of their announcement, Claudia and Tess shared a message on Instagram that reflected on their time on the show, noting that they “loved working as a duo and hosting Strictly has been an absolute dream.”

It represents the end of a remarkable 21-year journey for Tess, who, in addition to Claudia, also revealed that they were “always going to leave together” and that they felt it was the “right time.”

Speaking on Instagram, Tess shared: “After 21 unforgettable years, the time has come to say goodbye to Strictly Come Dancing. It’s hard to put into words what this show has meant to me, so here goes…

“Strictly has been more than just a television programme. It’s felt like having a third child, a second family, and a huge part of my life since that very first show back in 2004. I knew then it was something special, but I could never have imagined the magic it would bring.

“Strictly has always been about joy, celebration, and bringing people together – and I’m so proud to have played a small part in something that continues to mean so much to so many.”

Claudia Winkleman will be joined by a star-studded line-up on her BBC chat show

Claudia Winkleman is set to make an appearance on our TV screens in just a few hours alongside a star-studded line-up of famous faces from the world of TV, music and more.

It was announced last year that the TV presenter would front her own chat show, titled The Claudia Winkleman Show, which will be filmed in front of a live studio audience.

“I can’t quite believe it and I’m incredibly grateful to the BBC for this amazing opportunity,” The 54-year-old said in a statement . “I’m obviously going to be awful, that goes without saying, but I’m over the moon they’re letting me try.”

This marks Claudia’s first new solo gig since she and co-host Tess Daly stepped down from hosting Strictly Come Dancing, with The Traitors star describing her new venture as “really scary”.

Ahead of the show’s debut, here’s everything you need to know about the famous faces set to appear on the first episode of the BBC show.

Who is on The Claudia Winkleman Show tonight?

Among the many guests set to join Claudia on her new chat show is Hollywood actor Jeff Goldblum, who will talk about his new album, Night Blooms, from his band The Mildred Snitzer Orchestra.

Elsewhere Vanessa Williams will also make an appearance to discuss her turn in The Devil Wears Prada on the West End. As well as Jennifer Saunders, who is promoting her new family film, The Magic Faraway Tree.

Rounding off the celebrity line-up is Tom Allen, who will be chatting about his debut novel, Common Decency.

Sharing the news with fans, ITV took to their official Instagram and shared a first look snap of Claudia with her star-studded guest line-up.

Alongside the photo they confirmed: “The Claudia Winkleman Show lands this Friday. Joining Claudia this week: Jeff Goldblum, Jennifer Saunders, Vanessa Williams and Tom Allen. Big personalities, big laughs and plenty to talk about. Tune in at 10:40pm on BBC One. Co-Produced by So TV, part of ITV Studios and Little Owl.”

It didn’t take long for the comment section to be flooded with messages from fans as one said: “So excited. Love how @claudiawinkle represents the power of women, authentic, witty, unapologetically herself and lifting the whole room with her presence. Claudia quietly reminds the rest of us to take up our space.”

Another wrote: “So looking forward to this, it is going to be amazing.” A third commented: “This is going to start the weekend with style….and a fringe!! Can’t wait!!”

One commented: “This is so exciting. Can’t wait. Good luck Claudia.” One said: “Can’t wait for this @claudiawinkle.” Another excited fan wrote: “WHAT A LINE UP.”

The Claudia Winkleman Show begins tonight (March 13) at 10:40pm on BBC One and iPlayer.

For the latest showbiz, TV, movie and streaming news, go to the new ** Everything Gossip ** website.

It’s taken 18 months, but Bob Lomas has been shown the error of his ways and has said sorry to all those he offended

Sacked Reform candidate Bob Lomas has apologised for the racist comment that saw him disowned by party leader Nigel Farage 18 months ago, after being chained to a Black youth worker on Channel 4’s Handcuffed.

The former soldier, 70, has posted his apology on Instagram, after he was persuaded by Chris Preddie that his views were offensive and racist. In the video post the ex-Reform member, from Yorkshire, said: “My name is Bob Lomas and 18 months ago I said that Black people should get off their lazy arses, go and get a job and stop acting like savages.

“I can’t change what I said, I can only apologise for saying it. I vehemently apologise for using those words. I made a bloody big mistake and I am bloody sorry that I did and I want to apologise to anybody that is affected.”

Handcuffed, hosted by Jonathan Ross, sees people with opposing viewers shackled together for a shot at the £100,000 prize. In Monday’s episode viewers will see Chris Googling Bob to find out who he is actually chained to.

Bob admits having made the shocking comment that ended his political career, on Facebook, but starts off defending himself, arguing: “Everything’s racist if you want it to be. I witnessed a riot in London and was appalled by what was happening in my capital city. I could have worded it better but it gets to the point where you can’t say anything about anything.”

But Londoner Chris, who was awarded the OBE 13 years ago at the age of 25 for his inspirational youth work, said that the terminology had left him feeling “quite disgusted”. And once he has explained his own background, Bob backs down and admits that his views were wrong.

In the programme, Chris tells him that his father had died after being caught up in gangs and he was quickly groomed for a life of crime. himself. “I didn’t have a role model,” he explains. “I didn’t want to sell drugs but, if I didn’t, then I’m not eating. Not surviving.”

He credits the youth worker who helped him to break out with having “saved my life” because Chris feels certain he’d be “dead or in prison” without that support. Getting the OBE from the late Queen Elizabeth had been a huge honour. “I was so proud,” he confesses. “People started to see me as a normal citizen – I was told my whole life that I’d amount to nothing.”

Looking moved by what he’s learned, Bob admits that Chris’s story is “very, very shocking” and tells the camera that he’s impressed by how he not only got out, but went on to help others do the same. “He used that experience to help bring other young men and women out of that mindset. What he does for his community is unbelievable. I salute him.”

Bob was standing as the Reform candidate for Barnsley North when he was dropped by party leader Farage, along with two others, in June 2024 over remarks made by all three on social media. Speaking on Question Time afterwards, Farage claimed: “I wouldn’t want anything to do with them”. The racism within Reform was widely condemned by other political leaders, with Farage told to “get a grip” on his party.

– Handcuffed – Last Pair Standing continues on Monday, Channel 4, 9pm

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If David Nihill was a philosopher, his credo might be “I digress, therefore I am.”

Instead, Nihill is a comedian. Kind of. “I don’t know if I think of myself in those terms,” says Nihill, whose “Cultural Appreciation” special has 2.5 million views on YouTube. “I wouldn’t even call mine comedy specials.”

Nihill is a conversational storyteller who rarely even moves on stage. “I don’t know how to do performance,” he says, “but I do know how to talk.”

His current show, “Taking Tangents,” which takes him to Irvine, Pasadena and Los Angeles from March 13 to 17, is a wide-ranging collection of tales, with some material shifting from show to show. We’ll come back to it, but first, a few tangents.

Growing up in Ireland, Nihill, 47, struggled to learn, hampered by dyslexia — “I came in the lowest five percentile in the whole country of Ireland for spelling, and I didn’t even spell my name right on the test” — and an aversion to math. He was made to feel inferior because of his difficulties. “I was 100% in the ‘I am a moron’ category,” he says.

Nihill was shoved into a vocational program and most of his friends dropped out of school. He stayed in, but even when his father offered to buy him a Super Nintendo for certain math scores, Nihill fell short. His father bought it for him anyway, he says, “but I sold it and bought myself a motorcycle even though I was 15 and not legally old enough to drive.”

He finished high school and became a poorly paid, overworked apprentice electrician. That was enough to motivate him to go to college; there, he figured out how his brain worked and how to learn. He even developed a passion for reading: His last show, “Shelf Life,” wove in dozens of book recommendations.

During our conversation via video after a New York show, I’d ask one question, then follow Nihill as he ambled through his personal history. He started with a story about jumping off a cliff in Greece and shattering his leg — a part of “Tangents” — then going to Australia, before he stumbled into a master’s degree studying business back in Ireland (despite botching his application). A new friend there took him to his first-ever comedy show in Glasgow — there are even tangents within his digressions — before getting him a job with Enterprise Ireland, the government’s investment fund to boost Irish business overseas. That landed him in San Francisco, part of the “Cultural Appreciation” special. He left to pursue business opportunities in Mexico but, due to a hurricane, somehow ended up in Chile, spent a year wandering north toward America, and then scored an internship in Colombia.

Nihill is a conversational storyteller who rarely even moves on stage. “I don’t know how to do performance,” he says, “but I do know how to talk.”

(Jim McCambridge)

Eventually, Nihill’s story works its way to his current career, which began by accident. “It was never a dream or a goal,” he says. A friend in San Francisco had suffered a spinal cord injury and Nihill wanted to run a fundraiser, but dreaded public speaking.

That leads to a minor diversion, back to a college public speaking course in which Nihill was so terrified that he got drunk before his presentation and introduced himself “as an exchange student from Southern Yemen.”

In San Francisco, he started doing live comedy to overcome that fear. Meanwhile, his business background led him to see an opportunity and he created FunnyBizz, a company and conference where comedians help teach business leaders, like Kevin Harrington of “As Seen on TV,” how to use humor to communicate. The business bankrolled Nihill’s early days in comedy.

While Nihill has lived in America for years, most recently in Los Angeles, he remains passionately Irish, which shapes his shows in several ways.

In Ireland, “your nature is to just default to funny stories.”

He says American stand-up is about taking a topic and making it funny, aspiring for a five-minute joke-filled late night TV spot. Irish comedians say, “This thing happened to me and I think that’s funny. Let me just repeat it.”

The new show is named after “tangents” so that Nihill can go down different rabbit holes each night if he wants. “My head is always doing 60 different things,” he says, and he loves keeping his storytelling “free form and unfiltered,” whether he’s in a pub or on stage (or, apparently, in an interview).

The new show’s subjects will be familiar to Nihill’s fans: his parents, his foolish behavior (there are drunken college-age antics in a story that somehow eventually weaves in White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt) and Irish culture. “There are few countries that punch above their weight in social justice and social impact,” he says, and he always looks to draw connections with other cultures around the world. But the observations and connections he draws are new.

In New York, he added a bit about how 35% of Jamaicans have some Irish roots, quipping “imagine how fast they’d be without that” (in a nod to legendary sprinters like Usain Bolt). But for Nihill, that joke only works if it’s couched within the larger context of the cross-cultural connections, including the fact that Jamaican-born political activist Marcus Garvey drew upon the Irish independence movement for inspiration.

“There has to be some social value to doing it,” he says, although he’s quick to add his comedy isn’t overtly political. “My dad’s a teacher and that lives inside of me. Humor can be the ultimate tool for social activism. I am deliberately getting people to expand their minds in understanding these connections. I want comedy that makes everyone feel good and maybe learn something.”

Nihill on stage at Hollywood Improv.

(Jim McCambridge)

That “feel good” part is central: While he discusses his mother’s death from cancer last year, he leaves out a beautiful but poignant part of their final days together. “I’m deliberately avoiding that,” he says, because he wants to maintain an upbeat mood.

He digresses to tell me the story, however, and it’s literally longer than this entire article’s word count. “A very long answer to a very short question,” he admits, before swerving into a tale about back when his father had overstayed his visa in New York — it involves his dad being interviewed on CNN, getting into a bar fight and avoiding deportation because the immigration officer hailed from County Cork and Nihill’s dad burst into a song from there, earning him a six-month visa extension. The humanity of that scene “in contrast to a 5-year-old being dragged off to a detention center” may end up in a future Nihill show.

Nihill loves sharing the stories that come from observing and listening to people but says he doesn’t love the spotlight, which, he admits, makes comedy an odd career choice. He says he prefers telling stories to just a few people.

“With comedy, the best part for me is that before a show I eat half a chocolate bar and I leave the other half in the hotel room,” he says. “After the show, I get to finish it. That’s true happiness.”

TIKTOK star Becki Jones has finally responded to claims she has “not been honest” about her extreme weight loss.

The influencer rose to fame on the video streaming platform back in 2020 and is famed for her ‘what I eat in a day’ videos, which showed her enjoying foods such as McDonalds for breakfast, takeaways and treats.

However, in March last year she quit the platform without explanation before suddenly returning in September — with a significantly smaller frame.

While Becki has consistently insisted that she has not lost weight via jabs or surgery, fans have been left questioning the legitimacy of her claims.

And now, she has made a cryptic comment in response.

During a TikTok live stream by Becki this week, one user left a comment which read: “People would hate less if you were honest”.

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Becki replied: “I have been honest about everything that needs to be said.

“The only thing I haven’t told you about is what I’ve been through and what I’m currently battling with as well. It’s nothing that will benefit anybody knowing, so, yeah.”

Later on in the stream, she said: “I did not come back to TikTok in September to be like, ‘Guys! I’ve lost weight’.

“That was not my intention, it was not my goal. Like I’ve said, my page was never gonna be ‘Becki Jones for fitness’ or ‘Becki Jones for how to lose weight’.

“That’s never been my goal for my journey on TikTok or as a content creator.”

Becki added: “I’ve come back and to be fair, most of my weight I’ve lost has been since September.”

Fans in the comment section still weren’t convinced by her comments, as one wrote: “People just want honesty… period!”

“Just give people a straight answer, especially your loyal followers,” echoed another.

However, others defended that it was “nobody’s business” what Becki has done.

Last year, a source told The Sun why Becki really left social media, and why she returned.

They explained: “Everyone knows Becki took six months offline because she felt the trolling had become too much.

“It was a real chance to reflect on her life and the main cause of issues – her weight. She’s also a secret smoker, so really did start to feel like her lifestyle wasn’t doing her any favours. 

“Once she started losing some weight, she felt a new wave of confidence and when she returned online and saw the reaction to the way she looked, it really spurred her on.”

They added: “It’s the same when she was larger and the more she ate, the more people watched her videos. At the end of the day, it’s all about engagement and making money. It’s addictive.”

Martin Lewis has explained the personal savings allowance and when basic rate taxpayers with over £22,000 in savings could pay tax on interest earned

Martin Lewis has issued a tax alert for savers, with a particular warning for those holding more than £11,000 or £22,000 in savings, depending on their tax bracket. On his ITV programme this week, Mr Lewis provided savers with guidance on structuring their savings to prevent unnecessary tax charges on interest.

He began by explaining the personal allowance, which permits anyone to earn £12,570 before any tax is levied. This threshold has remained frozen since 2021, and last November Chancellor Rachel Reeves controversially extended this freeze until 2031.

The freeze has faced criticism for creating ‘fiscal drag’, meaning more of the lowest earners in the country now pay tax as inflation and wage rises leave them with less disposable income whilst facing higher taxation.

On this he said: “The first one, the personal allowance, £12,570 a year that you can earn from any source, earnings, rent, savings, interest without paying tax on. Most people get that unless you start earning over £100,000 when it’s taken away.”

Starting Rate for Savings Tax.

Mr Lewis said: “The next one not that many people know about is called the starting rate for savings. This is another £5,000 of savings. savings interest you can earn a year on top of the personal allowance. And this is designed for people who have low work earnings but high interest on savings. Often people who are retired. And here’s how it works.

“For every pound of earnings you earn above this allowance, you lose a pound on your starting savings rate. So imagine you earn £13,570. You’re a £1,000 above that. You can now only have £4,000 of tax-free interest in your savings due to the starting savings rate. And by the time you earn from work £17,570, this is gone. So it’s only for people on low work earnings and high interest on savings.”

He previously outlined that those in the ‘perfect circumstance’ would receive £12,570 from earned income. Mr Lewis explained the individual would then gain £5,000 through the starting savings allowance, plus £1,000 from the personal savings allowance on top ‘because they all go on top of each other’.

He added: “You could earn £18,570 a year tax-free with £12,570 of it coming from work or other sources, and another £6,000 of it coming from savings. I hope that makes sense. The main two for most people are the personal allowance and the personal savings allowance, but for those on lower incomes, it’s worth reading the starting savings allowance guide that’s our money saving expert just so you really understand it.”

Personal savings allowance

Mr Lewis described this as the ‘big one’ and said: “Next, we get the big one that many of you will know about, the personal savings allowance. And this is on top of those two. This is the fact that a basic rate taxpayer, 20% taxpayer, can earn £1,000 a year of interest in any form of savings at all without paying tax on it. Now, the top savings accounts at the moment pay about 4.5 per cent. So, you need about 22,000, just a little over £22,000 in the top savings account before you earned £1,000 interest.

“So, if you got less than that, you’re not going to be paying tax on your savings interest because it’s tax free. High rate tax because it’s within your personal savings allowance. High rate taxpayers pay £500 a year of interest they can make each year tax free. It’s about £11,000 saved at the top rate.

“If you’re an additional rate taxpayer earning over £125,000, you don’t get one of these. So, you got your personal allowance, your starting rate for savings, and on top of that up to another £1,000 in your personal savings allowance.”

For the 2025/26 tax year, the UK Personal Allowance stays at £12,570, with a 20% basic rate (up to £50,270), 40% higher rate (£50,271-£125,140), and 45% additional rate (over £125,140) applying to England, Wales, and Northern Ireland.

ISAs

Mr Lewis stated that this week’s show was focused on ISAs, explaining: “You can put up to £20,000 a tax year in, as you know. And crucially, the interest earned in a cash ISA does not count towards the personal allowance, does not count towards the starting rate of savings does not count towards the personal savings allowance. It is totally separate from that. So, anything you earn in there is not taxable. I should note premium bonds work roughly the same way, but it’s not an annual allowance. It’s a maximum £50,000 you can put in in total. Those are the main ways that you can save without paying tax on them.”

MICHELLE Keegan melted hearts when she shared an adorable photo of her and daughter Palma wearing matching pyjamas.

The mum-of-one, 38, shares one-year-old Palma with her husband Mark Wright, 39, after welcoming the tot last year.

Former Coronation Street actress Michelle looked every inch the proud mum, as she beamed in the photo.

The Fool Me Once star posted the sweet snap on her Instagram Stories last night.

In the heartwarming photo, which is to celebrate Mother’s Day this weekend, Michelle is seen posing in matching nightwear with her mum Jacqueline and daughter Palma.

The trio looked adorable all wearing the same PJs that were cream with flowers on them.

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Michelle smiled in the photo, as Palma was seen with her back to the camera and trying to climb up on her mum.

The star wrote on the sweet snap: “Two mummies and a baby.

“How cuuuuute are these PJs from my @veryuk collection??? Perfect for Mother’s Day to match all the generations.”

The latest photo comes just days after Michelle and husband Mark threw a very extravagant first birthday party for Palma last weekend.

To celebrate their only child turning one, they hosted a pink-themed bash for the young tot at their £3.5 million mansion.

No expense was spared, and there was yummy food and drinks for party-goers to enjoy.

There was a themed cocktail bar serving “Palma Tinis”, with vodka, raspberry liqueurs and pineapple juice, and pink gin refreshers called “Bubbly First Birthday”.

Outside in the couple’s huge garden, there was a large marquee which had an inflatable balloon dome, a bouncy slide, and seating areas. 

The couple have kept their firstborn largely out of the spotlight, hiding her face from social media snaps to maintain her privacy.

Michelle and Mark shared the arrival of Palma last year: “Together we have a new love to share… Our little girl.

“Palma Elizabeth Wright 06.03.25.”

There are two very sweet reasons behind both monikers, with the couple having strong links to Mallorca, which is where they announced their pregnancy news to fans.

Palma is the capital of the Mediterranean island.

The couple consider it their “second home”, making no secret it is their “favourite place” to holiday.

Meanwhile, the couple chose Elizabeth for their daughter’s middle name as a tribute to Michelle’s great-great grandmother.

WHEN Gaz Beadle and Emma McVey announced their split in 2023, their fans were shocked. 

Geordie Shore lothario Gaz had always described the model, who he had two children with, as his ‘rock’. But, just months after she underwent heart surgery, Gaz announced their eight-year relationship was over. Now, insiders tell us tension has been bubbling behind the scenes.

Things are said to have reached boiling point after Gaz announced he was expecting a baby with his new girlfriend, Maia, 13 years his junior.  

Our insider says: “Gaz and Emma have both moved on and are in happy, loving relationships with new people.

“But fans have noticed there is a level of competitiveness between them, and they seem to be trying to outdo each other.

“Emma got engaged, and then Gary announced he was having a baby. It was a huge shock and very eye-opening.

“She feels like she has a very small group of loyal friends, and exactly who they are has become very clear since her split from Gary.”

It’s certainly not the first time Emma has been blindsided by Gaz – she was shocked when he announced they had split during a Q&A with fans.

He casually revealed they had split three weeks prior and insisted there was no bad blood between the couple, who share kids Chester, eight, and Primrose, six.

Sources said Emma felt it was ‘unfair’ and was keen to announce it to her own followers herself.

She didn’t shy away from how hard the breakup was, in contrast to Gaz’s laissez-faire attitude.

In a heartbreaking post, she told her followers: “It’s been really hard for me and the kids to be separated. There’s been a lot of crying on FaceTime, which really breaks my heart.

“I’ve been numb and focusing on my children while still trying to work. I’ve honestly not known what to say. I’m hoping this will get easier in time.

“Sending so much love to anyone going through something similar, and thank you so much to everyone who has been checking in on me.”

If Gary took them to the park, the next week Emma took them to a theme park

Our insider

And when she moved on with a new man and a fan accused her of being unfaithful, she shot back with a jibe that appeared to be aimed at Gary: “I was unfaithful? What with someone I met 7 months after my separation? No darlin, you clearly have NO IDEA who was unfaithful.”

Our insider continued: “There was tension from the get-go but they masked it pretty well. They both doted on their kids whenever they had them, but fans noticed how they often posted competing snaps. If Gary took them to the park, the next week Emma took them to a theme park.”

Cheating allegations

Emma and Gaz first started dating in 2016, but just a year later, they called time on their relationship, with Emma accusing Gaz of cheating and dumping her by text.

She ranted: “When he’s been filming Geordie Shore, he decided to send me a TEXT ending things, telling me to move my stuff out of OUR home that I furnished and paid for without explanation.

“After begging me to go to Australia with him and making me leave my career, I still find out he still managed to cheat on me throughout our relationship and continually lie.”

But the pair reconciled, and in 2017, they announced they were having a baby. Their son Chester was born in January 2018, and their second child, a daughter named Primrose, was born in December 2019.

Gary popped the question while she was pregnant with baby number two – the whole thing was filmed.

They tied the knot in 2021 in front of 90 guests and their kids in Cheshire.

Bedding 1000 women

Gary appeared to be a very different man – his wild Geordie Shore days were well in the past.

He once boasted about sleeping with over 1000 women – his tumultuous relationship with Charlotte Crosby was well documented – but after quitting the show in 2017, he turned his life around. 

He told us previously: “My life couldn’t be more different.

“My DM’s have changed dramatically, I can tell you that. It’s gone from mum’s wanting to shag me to mums and dads talking about colic, acid reflux, nappies, and bath toys.

“I had ten-years of partying and doing whatever I wanted. I was so used to life being all about me then I had a baby and quickly realised life wasn’t about me anymore.”

It wasn’t an easy time for any of them, as Emma suffered a series of debilitating health issues 

The model, who once dated Towie’s Mario Falcone, had no idea she’d been born with three holes in her heart until a monitor was fitted following her second pregnancy.

She’d suffered years of seizures, exhaustion and fainting episodes – but while the diagnosis was illuminating, medics were cautious about operating because Emma is also battling ulcerative colitis.

The condition, which affects roughly one in 420 in the UK, causes ulcers and inflammation in the digestive tract.

The steroid treatment used to treat it can lead to bone loss and breakage, which doctors warned could stop Emma’s bones from fusing back together.

I thought, ‘I’m going to get put to sleep and I’m not coming back out’.

Emma, on her heart surgery

Around Christmas time of 2023, her tricuspid valve – the valve between the two right chambers of the heart – further deteriorated, and the decision was made to proceed with the op in spite of the risks.

She later said: “I knew in surgery I’d be connected to a heart machine that would be keeping me alive while my heart was stopped, and I kept thinking, ‘They’re not going to be able to start my heart again’. 

“I thought, ‘I’m going to get put to sleep, and I’m not coming back out’.”

It was a life-changing experience for all the family, and made their split even more surprising. 

It wasn’t long until they both moved on, though. Emma started dating electrician James Staszewsky, and he became a huge part of her life and that of the kids as they set up home. 

Gary had a brief romance with pro golf star Charley Hull, before falling for student Maia.

In what some felt was a dig at influencer Emma, Gary gushed about Maia:  “I like how she’s got a normal job. Like, she got in at 8 o’clock this morning after leaving at half past 7 last night… 13 hours. She’s doing it again tonight, it’s inspirational.

“It almost brings me down a peg and I think that’s why I’m getting more normal and normal.

“I just love to pop to the pub for a bit of food and a walk with the dog, cutting the grass, like, I’ve become quite a normal boring person.”

The romances both came under fire and in a very surprising move they joined forces once again in order to issue a lengthy statement in which they addressed their marriage ending and the attention their new romances had gained.

‘One team’

Gaz hit back to insist they are “really good friends” and that they are both “happy and happy for one another” despite being in “new relationships”.

He added: “Both of us are in new relationships and we all get along well, and we can say we are so proud of ourselves to be able to all stay as one team.”

We’re told it was a brief period of calm for all parties involved but it wasn’t long that changed.

Gaz’s baby news was said to be one of those moments that rocked the boat.

Only a couple of years ago, Gaz had told The Sun he wouldn’t be having more kids, he said: “Two is hard enough. I think if you asked us before we may have said three but that was before we realised how hard it is.

“If we had two boys or two girls, then maybe it would be different but we have one of each, which is perfect.”

A baby bombshell

In a post last week, Gary told fans that nursing graduate Maia, 24, was pregnant.

He told fans: He wrote: “We’ve been keeping a little secret…

“Baby Beadle, you are so loved already.”

He recently returned to Geordie Shore after eight years away, though in a far cry from his wild days on the show he did it all sober.

He insisted that Maia won’t be joining the show because she has her own career, but with a baby on the way that could all change.

Friends are hoping it might put a stop to the one-upman ship.

They tell the Sun: “Everyone knows having a baby changes everything.

“They both have their happy ever afters now and can concentrate on that, and of course, the kids they share.

“There is room for them both to enjoy the limelight, without having to compete.”

You can’t help rooting for Colleen Hoover heroines, bless their bruised hearts. The bestselling novelist specializes in women who have been kicked around by life. She’s the new name brand of tragic romance, picking up where Nicholas Sparks’ terminal diseases left off.

“Reminders of Him,” directed by Vanessa Caswill, is the third film based on a Hoover book in three years and the first that the author herself has adapted alongside co-screenwriter Lauren Levine. Like the others, its lead suffers heartily before falling in love with a hunk. The previous two, “It Ends With Us” and “Regretting You,” were about, respectively, domestic abuse and adultery. “Reminders” adds more tarnish to the poor dear: She’s an ex-convict who served six years for killing her boyfriend in a DUI.

Finally freed from prison, Kenna (Maika Monroe) has returned to Laramie, Wyo., the hometown of her dead lover, Scotty (Rudy Pankow). From what we see of Scotty in flashbacks, he was a buoyant blond goofball — exactly the kind of guy that the apparently friendless and family-less Kenna would have clung to like a life preserver. But she’s not here to lay flowers at his grave. In a salty touch, the first thing Kenna does is remove his roadside cross, claiming he hated memorial shrines.

But Kenna is desperate to meet their 5-year-old daughter, Diem (Zoe Kosovic), who was born months into her incarceration. The girl’s name comes from carpe diem, as in Kenna’s vow to seize the child she never got to hold, but the script has the restraint not to make a big standing-on-a-desk speech about that. Nevertheless, the kid’s grandparents, Grace and Patrick (Lauren Graham and Bradley Whitford), who never liked Kenna to begin with, consider a restraining order in fear that Kenna might actually kidnap Diem.

The stakes are plain: Can Kenna prove herself worthy to be Diem’s mother? Her only tentative ally is Scotty’s childhood friend, Ledger (Tyriq Withers), who thinks she’s hot and intriguing until he realizes who she is. Then he wants Kenna gone too.

Caswill sets the mood with a shot of a snow-capped mountain range, fitting for a movie that proceeds at a glacial pace. (The book moves faster, with Kenna and Ledger hooking up immediately and then discovering their unfortunate connection.)

The first stretch of the movie is strong, with Kenna, who is too broke for a car or even a phone, hoofing it around town in search of any job willing to hire a broke girl with a criminal record. A grocery store manager sends her away coldly after nattering on in corporate-speak about the importance of treating people with respect — an exchange that feels so real it gives you the shivers — but his beleaguered assistant, Amy (country singer Lainey Wilson in her promising, but brief, film debut), steps in and treats Kenna like a person. “What’s your trauma?” Amy asks her and somehow Wilson delivers that line with a lilt that keeps it from sounding corny.

These female strangers share a moment of such sincere human connection that I would have happily watched a dozen more scenes of the two women leaning on each other while they endure their hard-luck lives. Alas, these nice detours don’t last long; the movie has a preordained higher parental purpose that’s bigger than anything else onscreen, from the Wyoming skies to the bond between Kenna and Ledger that’s the main reason an audience has bothered to come.

Where this is all going is as unavoidable as the fact that Scotty died on what seems to be only road in and out of town. As the title declares, there are traces of him everywhere, including Diem’s giggle.

To get anywhere with the film, you have to settle into the idea that Kenna and Ledger must slowly build trust in each other while spending most of the baggy running time talking about a little girl who is rarely around. (When Kosovic is, she’s charming.) Cinematographer Tim Ives snatches his rare opportunities to shoot the beautiful scenery, but most of the pair’s encounters take place in or near Ledger’s orange pickup truck, a totem from the book. Visually, these car chats get stagnant. At least Monroe and Withers generate decent chemistry, eyes shiny and gleaming as they try their hardest to put gas in this love story’s tank.

Ledger calls Kenna “the saddest girl in the world.” True, but the glumness of said world is central to Hoover’s zeitgeisty appeal — a point she underlines a few beats later, Kenna insisting that the radio only ever plays depressing songs. To prove her wrong, Ledger flips it on anyway and to his dismay, it plays one bummer after another, station after station, until finally, the two of them share a much-needed laugh. (Meanwhile, Tom Howe’s acoustic country score is adamantly winsome, even intercut with Coldplay covers.)

Hoover is a strong world-builder. When she writes about small towns with shuttered bookstores or dive bars with fetid pots of coffee, you feel that she truly knows these places and has made a principled choice to set her hard-earned happy endings there. Caswill gets it, keying into credible, lived-in details, like Kenna’s tiny glance at the price tag on a stuffed animal that she’s considering for Diem.

Monroe’s Kenna couldn’t be farther from the cliché romantic diva, usually a high-heeled glamazon who runs a cupcake boutique. Even her hair really does look like she fixed it in the squalid bathroom of the only apartment she can afford. The complex is called Paradise, an on-the-nose irony. The owner (Jennifer Robertson) cuts Kenna a deal if she promises to take a free kitten. (I never saw Kenna get a litter box, but the kitten’s pretty cute.)

Ledger is the fantasy: a former NFL player whose hobbies include babysitting Diem, wearing tight shirts and building himself a hilltop dream cabin that will someday belong in Architectural Digest. (He owns that dive bar but the cast stays Mormon-sober.) Withers, a former wide receiver at Florida State University, also played a football jock in the gorgeously made but narratively screwy horror film “Him,” and it’s a treat to see an actor who moves like a genuine athlete and has that “Yes, coach” politeness that comes from being humbled in a locker room. You don’t totally buy his character exists in reality, but Withers believes in it enough to get the job done.

Another Paradise tenant, Lady Diana (Monika Myers), a headstrong teenager with Down syndrome, is the closest thing the film has to comic relief. Bursting into Kenna’s quarters seemingly at will, she raids her near-empty fridge while bluntly shouldering much of the exposition. “Why are you so poor?” Lady Diana asks, following that up by wondering, “Why are you so sad?”

“Reminders of Him” could use a little more swooning, a little less of the endless middle stretch of driving and talking, interrupted by wet sprints through thunderstorms. The rain pours down so often that you can’t help but snort when the film cuts to Whitford’s granddad angrily watering his lawn.

Eventually, even the film itself seems over all of the dilly-dallying. It takes a narrative shortcut to wrap things up, leaving behind not much other than a few worthwhile scenes: Kenna and Scotty’s meet-cute at a dollar store, her and Ledger pushing through their morning-after guilt, and a powerful moment shortly after Diem’s birth when a fellow inmate gives her a friendly but stern pep talk that sums up everything this film takes nearly two hours to say.

NEW YORK — What makes life worth living? For hard-core “Harry Potter” fans with money to burn, it might be getting Broadway tickets to interact fleetingly with Daniel Radcliffe in “Every Brilliant Thing,” an ingenious and touching solo performance piece written by Duncan Macmillan with Jonny Donahoe on the subject of suicide — or more precisely, on the ordinary joys that militate against such a drastic step.

Radcliffe was breathlessly scampering up and down the aisles of the Hudson Theatre before the show began, enlisting audience members to be participants in the play. Having seen “Every Brilliant Thing” twice before, once at the Edye (the black box at Santa Monica’s BroadStage) starring Donahoe in 2017 and once at the Geffen Playhouse’s intimate Audrey Skirball Kenis Theater starring Daniel K. Isaac in 2023, I knew exactly what he was up to.

The play revolves around a list that the narrator began at the tender age of 7 after his mother first attempted suicide. While she was still in the hospital, he started compiling, as much for her benefit as for his own, sources of everyday happiness.

Ice cream, water fights, kind people who aren’t weird and don’t smell unusual. These items are given a number, and audience members assigned a particular “brilliant thing” are expected to shout out their entry when their number is called.

The list gradually grows in complexity as the narrator gets older. Miss Piggy, spaghetti bolognese and wearing a cape give way to more sophisticated pleasures, such as the way Ray Charles sings the word “You” in the song “Drown in My Own Tears” or the satisfaction in writing about yourself in the second person.

Music plays a prominent role in “Every Brilliant Thing,” which was adapted from a monologue/short story Macmillan wrote called “Sleeve Notes.” The narrator’s terribly British father takes refuge from the emotional storms of his household by listening to jazz records in his office. John Coltrane, Cab Calloway, Bill Evans, Nina Simone are favorite artists, and the narrator can tell his father’s mood simply by the record he’s decided to play.

The production, directed by Jeremy Herrin and Macmillan, involves every level of the Hudson Theatre. I assumed I would be safe, occupying an aisle seat in the murderously expensive prime orchestra during a press performance attended by critics. But I wasn’t flashing a pad as my colleague across the aisle from me was doing to ward off any intrusions. And just before the show was about to start, Radcliffe was suddenly kneeling beside my seat asking if the person I was sitting with was my partner.

I told him that we weren’t a couple, just friends, and that I would be the worst person he could possibly ask to perform anything. But Radcliffe wasn’t so easily put off. “Let’s just say that you’re an older couple who have been together for some time,” he whispered. “And all you have to do is hand me this box of juice and candy bar when I refer to the older couple.”

OK, what harm could there be? Little did I know that “older couple” was to become “old couple,” a term that seemed to be repeated incessantly, at least to my Gen X ears not yet accustomed to scurrilous millennial attacks! I composed myself by pretending that we were in the world of anti-realism. But in truth, I would like to be the kind of person who would offer an anxious kid in a hospital waiting room a juice box and a candy bar, so maybe the casting wasn’t so far-fetched after all.

Daniel Radcliffe in the Broadway production of “Every Brilliant Thing.”

(Matthew Murphy)

A theatergoer was called upon to play the vet who euthanized the narrator’s childhood pet, a dog named Indiana Bones that was symbolized by a coat someone volunteered from the audience. It was the boy’s first experience of death, a difficult concept for a young mind but an important precursor for a boy not given the luxury of existential innocence.

Other audience members, particularly those seated on the stage, played much more elaborate roles. One man, first invited to serve as a stand-in for the narrator’s father, was asked instead to play the boy. He was given one word to say in reply — “Why?” — as his father tries to explain the reason his mother is in the hospital. This same enlisted actor was later called upon to play the dad giving a toast at his son’s wedding, one of the rare occasions when he was able to summon language for the kind of deep feeling he would normally only be able to express through his records.

One kind and patient spectator conscripted to play the school counselor had to remove her shoe to improvise a sock puppet, one of the tools of her empathetic practice. Another audience member sensitively played Sam, the narrator’s love of his life, a relationship that reveals the long-term toll of being raised by a parent suffering from suicidal depression.

Radcliffe’s audience wrangling was as intuitively sharp as his deeply felt performance. He has the comfort of a good retail politician, who’s not afraid of making direct contact with crowds. Two-time Tony winner Donna Murphy, in the house at the reviewed performance, gamely went along when Radcliffe briefly enlisted her luminous services.

Obviously, Radcliffe is the main reason “Every Brilliant Thing” is on Broadway. The show, which began at Britain’s Ludlow Fringe Festival in 2013, is a gossamer piece, a 70-minute curio best experienced in close quarters without the high expectations and ludicrous prices of New York’s turbo-charged commercial theater. The Hudson Theatre lends a mega-church vibe to the proceedings, but the spirits of theatergoers are nonetheless moved.

A scruffy-faced Radcliffe, twinkling accessible geniality in jeans and a sweatshirt, zips up and down the cavernous theater as though waging a one-man campaign against the isolation epidemic. There’s no denying that Harry Potter has matured into an assured stage actor. His Tony-winning performance in “Merrily We Roll Along” should have put to rest any doubts, but the glare of his fame can still obscure his serious chops.

Sincere yet never smarmy, ironic without ever being cynical, well-groomed though far from swank, he’s a more glamorous version of the character than the one originated by Donahoe, the British comedian with an everyman demeanor whose portrayal seemed so genuine at the Edye that I mistakenly thought that the play was his personal story.

Donahoe’s performance was filmed for HBO, but “Every Brilliant Thing” is meant to be experienced in a theater. The whole point of the show is to transform the audience into an impromptu ensemble, a group of strangers emotionally united through the story of one young man’s intimate knowledge of suicide, a subject that Albert Camus called the “one truly serious philosophical problem.”

I’m of two minds about “Every Brilliant Thing.” I was moved once again by the piece, but I’m grateful I didn’t have to wreak havoc on my credit card to pay for my seats. I love the interactive, gentle humanity of the play, but I was also acutely aware of how the work has been commodified. I applaud Radcliffe’s willingness to carve an independent path as an actor, but I might have been more impressed by his adventurousness had he decided to perform in a pocket venue that didn’t have the tiers of pricing I associate with airlines.

Yet launching a conversation around mental health with an audience magnet as powerful as Radcliffe is on balance an excellent thing. And Radcliffe’s compassionate portrayal of a survivor recognizing that he’s not out of the woods just because he made it into adulthood is one of those things that makes a theater lover just a little more appreciative of the humanity at the center of this art form.

ISLA Fisher shows she’s a match for any red carpet. 

The Australian star, 50, beamed in a crimson dress at the Time Women of the Year Gala.  

Actress Lucy Liu and Oscar nominee Teyana Taylor were honoured at the LA bash. 

In 2024, Isla split from Sacha Baron Cohen after more than 20 years. 

Isla has revealed she feels like a new woman and is ready to embrace life following her divorce from Baron Cohen. 

Commenting on her split, Now You See Me star Isla, 49, said: “I’m not going to lie, it’s been a really challenging time. 

GUILTY AS SIN

Ketamine, swinging & cheating- the scandals of the modern day Mormon wives

KATIE’S FEAR

Katie Price warns ‘Harvey will die of a heart attack’ as she begs for fat jabs

“I definitely feel like there’s something about the divorce club that anyone in it understands in a way other people don’t.  

“It’s a different grief. 

“I feel like creating a new identity after your divorce is so fun, though.  

“You get to reflect on your values and goals, explore new interests, focus on what you want and rebuild your sense of self.” 

Isla made her comments in an interview for New Beauty magazine, for which she also posed in a series of outfits. 

JENNIFER Lopez hails the courage of actress pal Kerry Washington at a charity gala.

The singer and actress, 56, wore a blazer over a lace slip dress at the event in Los Angeles for Women’s Cancer Research Fund.

She presented the Courage Award to Kerry, 49, a cancer advocate after her mum was diagnosed with the disease.

J Lo, who was also joined by Sofia Vergara, 53, at the event, said on stage: “Kerry, you remind us that together, through sciences, support of survivors, and the relentless pursuit of answers, that real change is possible.”

J.Lo is now an independent artist after it was revealed last July that she split from her record label.

Top label BMG, also home to Kylie Minogue and Rita Ora, released her 2024 album This Is Me . . . Now — her first full project in a decade.

GOING FOR GOLD

J-Lo & Jennifer Lawrence stun in sheer gowns as they lead Golden Globes glam

CRAZY RICH

J-Lo ‘is paid $2m’ to perform at Indian billionaire’s ultra-lavish wedding

But it was understood at the time to be only a one-album deal and they called it a day following disappointing sales.

A music insider said at the time: “Jennifer is obviously massively successful and talented but it’s been hard for her to find a label who she’s on the same page with.

“After her last album came out, it was decided she wouldn’t continue with BMG as it wasn’t the success she wanted.

“It only went to No 55 in the UK. But her team want to push her forward with this new music.

“She has spent a lot of time in the studio this year.”

“Well, I guess it’s a brother thing.”

The Black Crowes singer Chris Robinson is reflecting on his rollercoaster relationship with his younger sibling, guitarist Rich.

Their explosive chemistry once earned the outfit a fitting accolade — “The Most Rock ’n’ Roll Rock ’n’ Roll Band in the World”.

Chris is first to admit they’ve had their ups and downs since forming in 1984 under their original name, Mr Crowe’s Garden, as schoolkids in Atlanta, Georgia.

“Rich and I, for better or worse, were stubborn and arrogant but always strong believers in the art,” he admits.

“This has always been our path and, no matter what, we have to do it like this.

claws out

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SENT HOME

British band leave fans fuming as they cancel gig minutes before its due to start

“In rock ’n’ roll, there are plenty of show dogs, pure bred and beautiful. We’re f***ing feral.”

Following in the footsteps of other warring brothers — Ray and Dave Davies or Noel and Liam Gallagher — the Robinsons weren’t on speaking terms for five years after their so-called “contractual obligations” tour ended in 2014.

“Sometimes, you have to take your lumps,” continues Chris, employing that very American phrase for suffering setbacks. “But, right now, we’re in the zone. The chemistry is 100 per cent there.

“The way we feel goes right back to when we started — it’s f*** it, just play it — even if we are more well-mannered.”

The Black Crowes’ big reunion began in late 2019 with warm-up shows for a planned 30th anniversary tour of their debut album, the seminal Shake Your Money Maker, the following year.

But the pandemic slammed on the brakes before the dates finally happened across the US in 2021, uncorking the band’s celebrated freewheeling energy.

Back to the live arena came Jealous Again, Hard To Handle, She Talks To Angels and Twice As Hard, songs that somehow bottled up the band’s influences — Led Zeppelin, the Rolling Stones and Little Feat among them — but still refreshingly their own.

In 2024, with their creative juices flowing, The Black Crowes released their first album of original material in 15 years, Happiness Bastards.

Now the Robinsons are back again — with a bang.

The follow-up, A Pound Of Feathers, comes tearing out of the blocks with the rocket-fuelled, riff-driven Profane Prophecy, setting the tone for another of The Black Crowes’ “love letters to rock and roll”.

The album arrives with some sound advice — “This isn’t a record you play on Sunday morning, this is a f***ing Saturday night burner!”

In a world where smoothly produced pop dominates the airwaves, The Black Crowes are unashamedly sticking two fingers up at it.

“None of what’s going on in that world is relevant to me,” decides Chris, “and rock ’n’ roll is still huge for millions and millions of people.”

He is talking to me via video call from Aspen, Colorado, the premier ski resort in the States, playground of the rich and famous.

“My wife is an avid skier. She’s the Franz Klammer of the family,” he reports with a reference to the Austrian downhill legend.

“I get to do the cooking, the reading and the hanging out.” (And talking to people like me about The Black Crowes). Brother Rich is at home in Nashville and begins his call by apologising for being under the weather.

“I’m going to be coughing randomly,” he says. “I’m in the middle of flu that’s going around.”

After clearing his throat, Rich, the less flamboyant one who lets his guitar wizardry do most of his talking, gamely picks up on Chris’s theme.

“When we got back together, we both agreed we needed to do it properly,” he affirms.

“We knew that bringing back a toxic dynamic wouldn’t be healthy for anyone.

“We couldn’t have the overarching idea that when Chris and Rich get together, it’s a bad thing.

“We’ve always written all the songs, we own the name so coming back with a more mature approach has been very helpful.”

Rich acknowledges that the music landscape for the older, wiser Black Crowes is vastly different from when they started out. “There’s a bunch of people in the industry who like to think rock ’n’ roll is dead,” he says.

“But then there’s a bunch of people trying to keep it alive. Guns N’ Roses, the Rolling Stones, Metallica and Def Leppard are still selling out stadiums.

“Tens of millions of people still want to see bands like them. Rock ’n’ roll is one thing that no one could tame.

“And it’s still like that for us. We can go into a studio with almost nothing and, in a week, make a record.

“There’s a human, organic quality to rock ’n’ roll. We don’t have auto-tune and we don’t have to set our s**t to a grid.”

Looking back at their unfettered past, Chris exclaims: “I have to say I’m so f***ing proud of The Black Crowes, man!

“Rich and I started this band when we were teenagers in Mom and Dad’s house, as a vehicle to write songs.

“And we found our way to being musicians and performers.”

Yet the creation of A Pound Of Feathers has still blown Chris away, most notably because of the stellar contributions from Rich.

The album was made in double-quick time, carried along by the brothers’ spontaneous fusion of riffs and lyrics.

Chris says: “I’ve been on stage and sat in studios my whole life with my brother playing amazing guitar.

“But, with this album, I sat there with my mouth hanging open.

“Granted I’m very close to the flame but everything he did, I was like, ‘Wow, this guy’s taking it to a new place.’”

During the sessions, The Black Crowes were visited by Chris’s friend, Todd Snider, the singer/songwriter who died last November from pneumonia aged just 59.

Chris cherished the chance to hang out with Todd — and to get some memorable feedback from him.

“He was a storyteller, a real poet, and he and I had a great friendship. He also really liked The Black Crowes.

“He asked if he could come and check out the recording. I went, ‘Dude, yeah fine, but you’re going to be the only one here’. So he sat there taking in me and Rich putting music together.

“At the end of the day, he said, ‘Are you f***ing warlocks? Is this some kind of ESP or is it a parlour trick? You don’t say anything yet, 30 minutes later, there’s this massive song blasting out of the speakers’.”

For Rich, the studio is his happy place. “I’ve always loved being in a studio,” he says.

“It’s where you bring to ­fruition all the things you have in your head.

“With this record, we came in without any concrete ideas. By allowing ourselves just to play in the sandbox, it became fun and exciting.”

Rich gives a shoutout to producer Jay Joyce, who also helmed Happiness Bastards.

He says: “Nine and a half times out of ten, he agrees with us when we’re excited about something.

“He’s there with us, not bogging us down by trying to insert himself when its unnecessary.”

So what of the songs? There’s the aforementioned opener Profane Prophecy which captures the unvarnished sound of The Black Crowes’ live mayhem, yet recorded in the calmer confines of a studio.

You hear Chris nodding to past rock ’n’ roll excesses by hollering, tongue firmly in cheek, “My pedigree in debauchery is my claim to fame.”

He smiles, “Of course I have to embrace that life. That’s why I sing, ‘I eat casino breakfast off the kitchen floor’.”

But he maintains that while giving “a vision of a debauched rock ’n’ roller”, he’s also “confusing fact with fiction”.

The four-minute shindig concludes with the ensemble chant of the phrase that yielded the album title, “a pound of feathers or a pound of lead”.

Chris got the line from In Here The World Begins, a song by long-defunct British electro-pop band Broadcast.

“I loved the phrase and what it could mean because a pound is a pound,” he says. “It doesn’t matter whether it’s lead or feathers. There’s some weird wisdom to it.”

We turn our attention to Cruel Streak, pounding rock underpinned by funky rhythm.

“I’m adjacent to funk at all times,” says Chris. “Growing up in Atlanta, there was this multi­racial band called Mother’s Finest who played heavy funk with ‘Baby Jean’ Kennedy as lead singer.

“There’s a lot of Mother’s Finest in The Black Crowes.”

On the R&B-flavoured It’s Like That, which comes with heavy basslines and a hint of reggae, the brothers employed an amphibian guest, which, as Chris explains, fits with their anything goes attitude.

“I was staying in Nashville, and the doors were open. I heard this frog, so I recorded him. That’s my Nashville rasta frog on the solo.”

Rich says: “There are tree frogs all over the South. They were blaring one night and Chris said, ‘Man, I want to use that sound’.

“So he took his phone and pressed record. We found the right space for it on the song.” On the loose, laidback country-tinged Pharmacy Chronicles, recalling the vibe of the Rolling Stones’ Exile On Main St., Chris sings “let the demons find you” because, he insists, we mustn’t think everything is “sugar-coated, glossy and gorgeous”.

“Especially something as messy as a 40-year career in rock ’n’ roll,” he adds. “I can’t believe some of the s**t I was doing. Get some surgical gloves and get to it!”

But Chris is not one to dwell on the past, with all its euphoric highs and crashing lows. “I am devoid of nostalgia,” he says.

“I like to think I interact with the world as a poet. I’m always writing — it could be because I overheard a conversation at an airport check-in.

“I’m no Bruce Springsteen,” he confesses. “But I connect with the world through whatever inspires me.”

And, as he puts it, “a lot of the darkness that is the United States right now” informs A Pound Of Feathers.

It explains why final track Doomsday Doggerel with its line “a front row seat to the end of times” is in stark contrast to the closing song on Happiness Bastards.

“On that last record, Kindred Friend was a beautiful pastoral thing with harmonica, about me and Rich, the band and our audience,” says Chris.

“Doomsday Doggerel is much darker. We haven’t remembered lessons from our past and the f***ing racism means we’re operating at a very low frequency.

“I just hope that someone can play this record on a Saturday night, keep out the low frequency and get a better hum going.”

As Pharmacy Chronicles ebbs to a close, you hear a defiant chorus of “the good times never end”.

As far as Chris and Rich and the rest of The Black Crowes family are concerned, rock ’n’ roll is the perfect antidote to personal and universal turmoil.

“We’re loud, we can be sloppy but we are like an old cartoon of two people fighting on a train,” says Chris.

“The train goes round a bend, leaning all the way over a cliff, but then it comes back up. That’s us.”

THE BLACK CROWES

A Pound Of Feathers

★★★★☆

Here’s a hot take: South by Southwest is a Latin music festival.

When the De Los team headed to Austin, Texas, in 2024 to cover the event for the first time, approximately 60 acts that fell under the expansive Latin music genre umbrella had been invited to perform. Two years later, that number has more than doubled, with more than 150 Latin music acts featured at the iconic festival, now in its 40th year.

“Latin music has seen incredible growth at SXSW in recent years, reflecting its rise across the global music industry,” said Evelyn Gómez Rivera, associate programmer for Latin music. “2026 is shaping up to be our biggest year for the genre in over a decade, with several major labels showcasing their newest and most exciting Latin talent here.”

Ahead of the festival, which kicks off Thursday, the De Los team has assembled a list of acts that have caught our attention. And before you blow up our inboxes asking why the big acts (Fuerza Regida and Junior H are also slated to perform) weren’t included, keep in mind that what makes SXSW unique is that it’s a chance for attendees to see the next big thing before they blow up. In that spirit of discovery, our list is made up of acts you might not have heard of.

Big Soto

“Terminé siendo rapero cuando quería ser doctor,” Gustavo Rafael Guerrero Soto, better known as Big Soto, confesses in his pandemic-era collaborative session with Argentine mega-producer Bizarrap. It’s safe to say that he made the right career move. The 29-year-old from Venezuela (he now lives in Mexico) is signed to Rimas Entertainment and has been at the forefront of the Latin trap movement. — Fidel Martinez

Mariangela

Mexican-born singer Mariangela started off as a tender pop darling when she first uploaded covers to her YouTube channel in 2019, drawing inspiration from indie-pop singers like Carla Morrison and Mazzy Star’s Hope Sandoval before releasing her alt-pop debut album “Sensible” under Sony Music Latin in 2024. Now the Texas-based artist is taking her musical stylings in a new direction, drawing from her Monterrey roots with the release of her latest “Cuando Una Mujer,” a cumbia norteña about fierce female empowerment. — Andrea Flores

Esty

First-generation Dominican American singer Esty doesn’t like to be boxed in. From one track to the next, she’ll shift from a mix of dembow and alternative rock to bachata and pop, as seen in her recent single “V3n3n0,” from her upcoming album, “Domi Star.” — Cat Cardenas

Marilina Bertoldi

De Los contributor Ernesto Lechner is 100% responsible for this entry — he included the avant-garde alt rocker from Buenos Aires in his 2025 list of indie artists who deserved to win a Latin Grammy, calling her “the resident hurricane of Argentine rock, blessed with a corrosive sense of the absurd, a knack for pop-punk melodies, and attitude to spare.” How could you not want to see that? — FM

Ruido Selecto

Hailing from Medellín, Colombia, Ruido Selecto drives forward the Caribbean rhythms of cumbia, salsa, electronic dub and Afro-diasporic styles that have been traditionally transmitted through Picós, hand-painted sound systems popular throughout the country’s coast. His hybrid mixes also include elements of sonideros, most audible in tracks like “Lo Que Esconde.” I’m fascinated by his attention to detail in his project “Los 14 Cañonazos Bailables,” where he created experimental and contemporary tropical mixes using archives from Discos Fuentes, a Cartagena record label largely responsible for disseminating 1960s Caribbean sound across the coast of Colombia. — AF

Delilah

The Mexican American singer got her start in mariachi, eventually learning piano, guitar, violin and vihuela. At just 17 years old, her impressive vocals and ability to mix traditional and contemporary Mexican music have already gotten the attention of artists like Becky G and Iván Cornejo. — CC

Danny Felix

Among the biggest feathers in Danny Felix’s hat is being the producer behind the “Soy el Diablo (Remix),” a Natanael Cano track that also doubled as Bad Bunny’s first venture into the world of música mexicana. The Phoenix-based multihyphenate (in addition to producing, he is also a multiinstrumentalist and singer) has played a major role in shaping the current sound of corridos tumbados and will be repping the subgenre in Austin. — FM

60 Juno

Originating from Merced, Calif., this Central Valley post-punk band radiates a hazy, dreamlike sound, so much that one of their most popular tracks is titled “zzz.” While 60 Juno initially began as a solo project led by Jericho Tejeda in his bedroom during the pandemic, it has now expanded to include three additional members from Whittier, Calif. There’s a bit of everything in this band, mellowed surf-rock wading into punk territory that can be heard in songs like the upbeat “Enjoy the Sunset” and their most popular, hypnotic track to date, “J Song.” — AF

RIA

Before she stepped into the spotlight, Ria was writing songs for other artists. Now, she’s combining her knack for emotional lyricism with her soulful voice, recently opening for Tito Double P in Mexico, and breaking out with her recent single, “Pagana.” — CC

Sebaxxss

Sebaxxss is the on-tour DJ for Feid, the pop reggaeton singer and fellow Colombian. I’m interested to see how his set translates into a smaller, more intimate venue. — FM

Diles que no me maten

Diles que no me maten is an experimental, psychedelic rock band from Mexico City named after the famous short story by Mexican author Juan Rulfo about a man who pleads for his life after being captured for killing his neighbor decades earlier. If listeners didn’t know any better, they would think this band started in the late 1980s during the rise of homegrown rock, with its untouched vocals in songs like “Outro.” Tracks like “El Circo” sound like a gentle birth, while “(Radio Sonora Edit)” presents itself as a ghostly acoustic jazz ballad. — AF

Eydrey

Since competing on Netflix’s Latin music competition show, “La Firma,” in 2023, Eydrey has landed a record deal and released a steady stream of R&B, Mexican and reggaeton-infused tracks. Her borderland upbringing in El Paso has also shaped her Spanglish lyrics. — CC

Lena Dardelet

Hailing from Cabarete, Dominican Republic — the same beach resort town is home to the Bachata Academy, the only bachata school in the world — Lena Dardelet fuses pop with various Caribbean genres, including— yep, you guessed it — bachata. — FM

Mosmo

Signed with Rimas Entertainment, Hermosillo singer Mosmo is bringing his own crooning element to the corrido world. The rising singer first came into the spotlight in 2022 on Netflix’s “La Firma,” a competition looking to find the next Latin urban music star. Mosmo’s raw, drawled vocals can be heard in the romantic bélico “Modo B” and the agonizing “Terapia” that implores a past lover for their return. Mosmo also incorporates elements of trap and reggaeton in songs like “Dimensiones,” as well as pop in the bilingual track “Siempre Tú.” — AF

Selines

Inspired by artists like Natalia Lafourcade, singer-songwriter Selines’ guitar-based songs draw on the traditions of boleros, classical music and jazz, bringing a warm nostalgia and romance to her sound. — CC

Baby Reindeer creator Richard Gadd is back for his first drama since the multi-award winning Netflix series.

BBC is set to release an “intense” drama that explores “brotherhood, violence and the fragility of male relationships”.

In 2024, Netflix subscribers went mad for Richard Gadd ’s gripping drama Baby Reindeer revolving around a comedian dealing with his obsessive female stalker.

Now, two years on, Richard Gadd is back for the first time since the Netflix hit’s release with the BBC revealing details for its upcoming drama Half Man.

Filming for the original six-part drama wrapped up last year in and around Glasgow with the series set to launch in April on BBC One and BBC iPlayer in the UK and on HBO Max in the US.

Gadd will star in Half Man alongside BAFTA winning actor Jamie Bell, famed for All of Us Strangers and Rocket Man, with the pair portraying Ruben and Niall, respectively.

The official synopsis reads: “Niall and Ruben are brothers. Not related in blood but the closest you can get. One, fierce and loyal. The other, meek and mild-mannered. Inseparable youth.

“Brought into each other’s lives through death and circumstance, all they have is each other…

“But when Ruben turns up at Niall’s wedding three decades later, everything seems different.

“He is on edge. Shifty. Not acting like himself. And soon, an explosion of violence takes place which catapults us back through their lives, from the eighties to the present day.”

Half Man, which has been created and written by Gadd, will follow Ruben and Niall throughout the past 30 years of their lives, exploring “brotherhood, violence and the intense fragility of male relationships”.

For the latest showbiz, TV, movie and streaming news, go to the new **Everything Gossip** website.

The synopsis concludes: “After all, when things fall apart… it is sometimes the closest relationships which break the hardest.”

Gadd and Bell aren’t the only familiar faces starring in Half Man either with an abundance of other familiar faces joining the cast.

These include SAS Rogue Heroes actor Stuart Campbell, Rivals’ Charlie De Melo, The Nevers star Amy Manson, Outlander actor Tim Downie and T2 Trainspotting’s Scot Greenan, to name just a few.

Half Man will debut in April on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.