Month: June 2020

A Moscow court on Friday convicted acclaimed Russian theater and film director Kirill Serebrennikov of fraud, in a long-running case that critics have slammed as fabricated.The judge ruled that Serebrennikov, 50, and two co-defendants were guilty of misappropriating 129 million rubles ($2 million) of state funds that financed a theatrical project.”Serebrennikov, [Yury] Itin and [Konstantin] Malobrodsky carried out actions directed at personal enrichment” and acted as a group to mislead employees of the culture ministry, Judge Olesya Mendeleyeva said, according to an AFP correspondent in the court.A fourth defendant in the case, Sofia Apfelbaum, was “unaware” of the fraud, the judge said.The prosecution earlier this week asked the court to give Serebrennikov a six-year prison sentence, but the judge can take a long time to reach sentencing.Serebrennikov, who heads one of Moscow’s top theater venues, the Gogol Center, was arrested in 2017 and the case against him nearly fell apart last year when a judge handed it back to the prosecution because of “inconsistencies.”It restarted with a new judge, and the amount of the alleged fraud was revised from 133 million rubles to 129 million rubles.The judge on Friday backed claims by the prosecution that Serebrennikov orchestrated theft of state money allocated to the Platforma project he ran between 2011 and 2014.Serebrennikov and his co-defendants insisted they were innocent. The director this week called the accusations that he stole the money “laughable.”
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The rap superstar will design adult and kids’ clothing that will be sold at Gap’s stores next year. Yeezy is best known for pricey sneakers that sell out online quickly. But Yeezy footwear, made with sneaker company Adidas, won’t be sold at Gap stores.San Francisco-based Gap Inc., whose sales are dwindling, hopes the deal will keep it relevant with shoppers. For Yeezy, being in more than 1,100 stores worldwide could get the brand in front of more people.On Friday, West tweeted a photo of what the collaboration might look like: bright colored hoodies, jackets and T-shirts. Shares of the retailer soared nearly 30%.West has a history with Gap. He worked at one of its stores in Chicago as a teenager. And he told Vanity Fair magazine back in 2015 that he wanted to be creative director of the brand.  As part of the deal announced Friday, Yeezy will receive royalties and possibly Gap stock if the line sells well.
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When country singer Rissi Palmer was working on her debut album, she wanted a song like Gretchen Wilson’s “Redneck Woman,” a song that would introduce her and tell her story to fans.  On her 2007 debut single, “Country Girl,” she celebrated her country roots while explaining that she didn’t have to look or talk a certain way to call herself a country girl.  “I said that I am not white in the first verse, and the label was like, ‘No, no, no,'” said Palmer, who then rewrote the lyrics to make it feel more universal. “It was very intentional when I wrote that song to talk about all the women, or all the people, that might not necessarily fit in the box, but are still of the same mindset.”The country music industry has long been hesitant to address its long and complicated history with race, but the death of George Floyd in police custody and the protests it sparked in the U.S. and around the world became a sound too loud for the genre to ignore.Over the past weeks, country artists, labels and country music organizations posted about Black Lives Matter on social media, participated in the industry wide Blackout Tuesday or denounced racism outright. On Thursday, Grammy-winning country group, The Dixie Chicks announced it would drop “dixie” from its name. The group said in a statement that it wanted to meet “this moment.”  But Black artists say the industry still needs to address the systematic racial barriers that have been entrenched in country music for decades. Stereotypes that country music is just for white audiences, written by white songwriters, and sung by mostly white males are reinforced daily on country radio, playlists, label rosters and tour lineups. In recent years, however, the conversations about country music have shifted to a broader acknowledgement that non-white artists have always been in the genre, even if they aren’t always recognized.  Artist/scholar Rhiannon Giddens received a MacArthur Foundation grant for her work to reclaim Black contributions to country and folk music. And artists like Darius Rucker, Kane Brown and Jimmie Allen have all had No. 1 country hits in recent years, while Mickey Guyton just released an unflinching song called “Black Like Me.” But that ingrained culture of exclusivity remains a struggle to change.  “You can look at the reviews of my first album. I was called colored, like, ‘I didn’t know colored people like country music,'” said Palmer, who had three singles reach the Hot Country Songs Chart. “I used to get messages all the time on MySpace, saying, ‘I am so sick of you. Why are you trying to be white?’ or ‘Why are you trying to take over country music?'”Change hasn’t been easy. After Grammy-winning country group  Lady Antebellum announced they were changing their name to Lady A, they later had to apologize to a Black singer who had been using that stage name for years.  Atlanta-based country rapper Breland also wanted to address, with a wink and a smile, country music’s racial blinders with his TikTok-fueled song  “My Truck.” The music video starts with a white guy in a black cowboy hat singing as smoke billows across a dusty landscape, then Breland abruptly shoves him out of the frame to announce, “Don’t touch my truck.””I just felt like it was time for people to change their perspective on what country music is and what country music can be, because there is an audience of country music listeners under 30 who believe Black Lives Matter,” said Breland, whose song reached No. 26 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart and has been remixed with Sam Hunt.  Like Lil Nas X’s genre bending “Old Town Road,” Breland playfully fuses trap rhythms with country tropes about horses, do-si-dos and beer on his self-titled EP and sings with country artists Chase Rice and Lauren Alaina. Breland said country music labels can’t just continue to focus on one type of audience.  “There’s a group of country listeners who love country music because of the way it sounds, but don’t love some of the politics that they know are going on behind the scenes,” he said.  Historically country music was created by and played in both white and Black communities in the South, but the music became marketed along racial lines in the Jim Crow era, said Amanda Marie Martinez, a historian and writer who is studying country music and race. White country music was stigmatized early on as “hillbilly music” so the industry started pushing it toward the rising white middle class as a way to make the genre more respected and hugely profitable.”In the process, they’ve also prioritized the white, middle income, relatively conservative listener as their demographic, kind of the opposite of youth culture,” Martinez said.  But there were periods of diversity, such as the post-Civil Rights era, when Black artists like Charley Pride, Linda Martell, O.B. McClinton and Stoney Edwards were having success, alongside Johnny Rodriguez and Freddy Fender, who were singing in English and Spanish.Black artists today are also reclaiming spaces that have been overwhelmingly white domains.Claude Kelly and Chuck Harmony, who work as a duo called Louis York, were already hit-making songwriters and producers behind pop songs like “Party in the USA” by Miley Cyrus and “Grenade” by Bruno Mars when they moved to Franklin, Tennessee, a Nashville suburb that is home to historical sites of a major Civil War battle and plantations where slaves were once held. There they set up their Weirdo Workshop artist collective and have worked with Jimmie Allen and noted author/poet Caroline Randall Williams.  “We knew that if we were to make our mark in this town as musicians and as Black musicians that playing the Grand Ole Opry would be the pinnacle for that,” Harmony said.  They got a standing ovation at the Opry, but more importantly for Harmony, he wanted the audience to learn about country music’s roots.  “I just wanted their unbiased, undivided attention, so that they can make the correlation between the music that they came to see and the music that we make as Black people,” Harmony said.  Both the Academy of Country Music and the Country Music Association started diversity task forces more than a year ago when country music was being criticized for a lack of female voices and women were being left out of major categories like entertainer of the year.  Becky Gardenhire, a top executive at talent agency WME in Nashville who leads ACM’s diversity task force, said they are looking at ways to recruit and retain diverse voices, both in the boardroom and on the stage, with efforts like mentorships, networking and outreach to build up a pipeline of future leaders and artists.  “We’re hungry for diversity. We want the candidates to come and knock on the door, but we have to also show them that the door is open for them,” said Damon Whiteside, CEO of ACM.But just as country artists outwardly reflect a predominantly white image, there are few Black country music executives working behind the scenes. Candice Watkins got one of her first big breaks in country music working as the day-to-day manager for Keith Urban between 2009 and 2011.”That changed my life because obviously he’s a superstar,” said Watkins, who is now the vice president for marketing for Big Loud Records, whose roster includes Jake Owen and Morgan Wallen.  But in that manager’s role, she realized that she was often the only Black person at the boardroom table. Watkins said her label supports her and values her opinion, but she knows that might not be the same for other minorities and their companies.  “How is a young A&R person empowered to come back to the table and maybe pitch a Black artist or person of color? Culturally speaking, do they feel free to do that or do they automatically know this is dangerous ground for them to even bring up?” Watkins said. “There’s a dismantling of culture that needs to happen.”Palmer, who is recording a podcast that focuses on the experiences of women of color in country music, said she feels optimistic that the current discussions about race and country music can lead to progress, if real changes are implemented.  “I love country music, always have, always will. It’s healing music. It’s beautiful music at its core. It’s heartfelt. It’s spiritual,” Palmer said. “And it would be a shame if not everybody got to enjoy it because of the outward package.” 
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Country music trio The Dixie Chicks are now just The Chicks, joining other artists and companies who have recently altered their brands to discard names that connote racism or slavery.  The Chicks’ release of a new protest song Thursday came with new social media handles, a new website address and a new cover for an upcoming album. “We want to meet this moment,” members Martie Maguire, Natalie Maines and Emily Strayer said in a joint statement on their website, the only comment on the name change thus far. The Grammy-winning group has performed under its previous moniker since its start in 1989. Dixie and Dixieland are nicknames for the U.S. South, and may have come from the Mason-Dixon line, once considered the line between “free” Northern states and “slave” Southern states. The name change came just a week after writer Jeremy Helligar challenged The Chicks’ former name in a Variety magazine Op-Ed. “For many Black people, (Dixie) conjures a time and a place of bondage,” Helligar said. The Chicks are releasing their first album in 14 years next month, “Gaslighter.” The music video for new protest song “March March” uses footage from Black Lives Matter protests and features the names of prominent victims of racism and police brutality, including George Floyd and Breonna Taylor. In a statement to online magazine Pitchfork, the group thanked a New Zealand-based duo, also called The Chicks, for letting them “share the name.” Country group Lady A, previously known as Lady Antebellum, made a similar change earlier this month to drop associations with the pre-Civil War South. The band faced opposition from Anita White, a Black singer who has used the stage name Lady A for over 20 years. A meeting between the group and White ended in “positive solutions and common ground,” according to social media posts by both.    View this post on Instagram         @ladyantebellumofficial How can you say Black Lives Matter and put your knee on the neck of another Black artist? I’m not mad..I am however not giving up my name, my brand I worked hard for. #GodWillFightMyBattle #TheRealLadyA #LadyABluesSoulFunkGospelArtist #TheTruthIsLoudA post shared by LadyA (@ladya_bluesdiva) on Jun 12, 2020 at 9:34am PDT
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A New York City judge on Thursday dismissed a claim by Donald Trump’s brother that sought to halt the publication of a tell-all book by the president’s niece, saying the court lacked jurisdiction in the case.  Surrogates Court Judge Peter Kelly said the claims were not appropriate for his court, where disputes over estate matters are settled.  The motion filed earlier this week sought an injunction to prevent Mary Trump and the book’s publisher, Simon & Schuster, from releasing it, as scheduled, in July. Mary Trump is the daughter of Fred Trump Jr., the president’s elder brother, who died in 1981. An online description of her book, “Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man,” says it reveals “a nightmare of traumas, destructive relationships, and a tragic combination of neglect and abuse.” Robert Trump’s lawyers filed court papers arguing that Mary Trump and others had signed a settlement agreement that would prohibit her from writing the book. The settlement decades ago included a confidentially clause explicitly saying they would not “publish any account concerning the litigation or their relationship,” unless they all agreed.  The agreement related to the will of Donald Trump’s father, New York real estate developer Fred Trump. Mary Trump’s attorney, Ted Boutrous Jr., said the court was correct in its decision.  “We hope this decision will end the matter. Democracy thrives on the free exchange of ideas, and neither this court nor any other has authority to violate the Constitution by imposing a prior restraint on core political speech,” he said in a statement.  The White House did not have an immediate comment Thursday. A spokesman for Simon & Schuster said in a statement that the publishing house was “delighted” with the decision.  
 
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The Eiffel Tower, one of France’s most iconic landmarks, reopened for the first time on Thursday after it was forced to close its doors for months due to the coronavirus pandemic.France was hit badly by the virus, recording 29,731 deaths and 161,348 confirmed cases as President Macron faced heavy criticism regarding his government’s management of the outbreak. Reinstating access to the famed site is yet another sign of Europe’s slow recovery as the continent struggles to balance restarting the economy with public safety concerns.Many countries have expressed cautious optimism about the summer tourist season, hoping that social distancing measures and coronavirus tracing apps will encourage people to travel responsibly.A visitor looks at the view from the Eiffel Tower, in Paris, June 25, 2020.The Eiffel Tower is one of the few Parisian sites permitting visitors. Other tourist attractions, such as the Louvre museum, will remain closed until July 6. To protect visitors, elevators to the tower’s three observation decks scaling 324-meters are closed, and only two of the three decks are open. The remaining deck, as well as the elevators, are expected to open in later summer months.Visitors are free to climb 674 steps to the 2nd floor, according to the Eiffel Tower’s website, which usually takes between 30 to 45 minutes. The tower lost $30 million in revenue from the lockdown that started in March, according to its director general, Patrick Branco Ruivo, and has not been closed for this long since World War II. 
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Back in March, filmmakers Gerard Bush and Christopher Renz gathered their artist friends and a few journalists at Manhattan’s members-only social club, Soho House, for a screening of their first feature-length project, “Antebellum.”They wanted a constructively critical reaction ahead of the planned spring release of the film — a psychological thriller about a Black woman who finds herself trapped in a pre-abolition past that isn’t at all the past. Bush, who is Black, and Renz, who is white, hoped the project would contribute to a national reckoning over the legacy of slavery and white supremacy in the U.S.”To witness how truly moved they were by the film, some even to tears, was the very first time we realized the potential impact ‘Antebellum’ will have on society and the long-deferred conversations that need to be had on race in America,” said the filmmakers, who wrote, directed and produced the project.Then, the coronavirus pandemic exploded internationally.  Once the virus seized up the economy, forcing the closure of movie theaters and all but pushing Hollywood film studios into a mad dash to salvage elaborate release plans, Bush and Renz pulled their film. They said they didn’t want what was intended to be a big theatrical film relegated to a streaming platform, as several movie studios did last spring.  For Bush and Renz, patience may have proven to be a virtue.As many movie theaters reopen in the coming weeks, “Antebellum,” set to be released Aug. 21 by Lionsgate, will debut during the height of a reckoning in America when people are increasingly showing a hunger for works that light a path toward racial justice. Driven in part by nationwide protests over the recent deaths of Black people at the hands of police and vigilantes, it’s a moment that positions “Antebellum” as the only summer release that speaks both to the moment and to the broader movement to defend Black lives from entrenched, systemic racism.”We’ve always believed that 2020 would usher in a brand new era that would require a new type of filmmaking. … We had no idea just how prescient that would prove to be,” Bush and Renz told The Associated Press in a series of interviews and emails since the March screening.”Antebellum,” starring singer and actress Janelle Monáe, plucks the legacy of American slavery out of the past and places it squarely in the present — in a politically divided nation where Confederate nostalgia and white supremacist violence wreak havoc on Black life. The film follows successful Black book author Veronica Henley, played by Monáe, on a quest to destroy the vestiges of that legacy.If that sounds eerily similar to present-day America, it is mere coincidence, Bush and Renz said. Over the last month, protests sparked by the death of George Floyd, a Black man who died May 25 after a white Minneapolis officer held a knee to his neck, have given way to the removal of Confederate monuments, building name changes at public and private schools, and the shedding of racist caricatures from food packaging.Everyday Americans, Black and non-Black, are in the streets demanding seismic policy shifts in policing and the criminal justice system. It’s a consequence of having never reckoned with America’s original sin, Bush said.”We intend to wake people up from the daydream that a superhero is coming to save us,” he said. “Only we, meaning humanity, can save us from ourselves.”Monáe played a supporting role in last year’s “Harriet,” a biopic about the abolitionist Harriet Tubman, and she won critical acclaim for her role in the Academy Award-winning film “Moonlight.” In “Antebellum,” Monáe gives moviegoers a modern Black heroine who takes charge of her own liberation without a male-dominated cavalry.”I knew that it was something that I needed to do, not just for myself, but for my ancestors and for all of the many Black women I considered to be modern-day superheroes,” Monáe told the AP.”I hope that (the film) causes those with privilege in this country to have conversations amongst each other, because the topics in this film … are not for Black people to try to fix,” she added.Monáe had never worked with Bush and Renz prior to “Antebellum,” only learning of them because of their work on visuals that accompanied hip hop mogul Jay-Z’s 4:44 album in 2017. The duo started out more than a decade ago as heads of a creative marketing and advertising firm with luxury brand clients such as Moët, Harry Winston and Porsche.After the 2012 killing of Travyon Martin, the filmmakers found themselves wondering if they were “just gonna sell champagne for the next 20 or 30 years,” Renz said.That period of self-reflection led to partnerships with social justice organizations such as Harry Belafonte’s Sankofa.org. In 2016, Bush and Renz directed ” Against The Wall,” a star-studded video campaign to draw attention to racial profiling in law enforcement featuring actors Michael B. Jordan, who starred in the 2013 police brutality drama “Fruitvale Station,” and Michael K. Williams, of HBO’s “The Wire,” as well as activist and CNN commentator Van Jones.The video shows Black men and women assuming the position, as though they were being stopped and frisked by police, while dispatcher recordings of actual officers describe suspects in racially discriminatory terms. It also included a recording of George Zimmerman’s voice from the day he called police to report Trayvon Martin as a suspected burglar before shooting and killing the Florida teen.That project was followed by others featuring musicreleases from artists such as Ty Dolla $ign, Raphael Saadiq and Mali Music on Jay-Z’s TIDAL streaming service. Their path to feature-length films with a racial justice message has been a long time coming, Bush and Renz said.At times, “Antebellum” uses graphically violent depictions of the inhumane treatment of enslaved people, which in recent films has elicited disapproval from some critics and Black moviegoers who were weary of unimaginative Hollywood slavery films.Bush and Renz said they want audiences to trust that they have done something entirely different.”Some within today’s culture are triggered by art, when that is precisely what art is meant to do. We would much prefer you be triggered in a theater and activated to take meaningful, positive action — than all of us continuing to live in an open-air shooting gallery every time we leave our homes,” Bush said.Even as they anticipate finding box office success with “Antebellum,” Bush and Renz are already at work on their second feature-length script, under a newly formed production company, Gloaming Pictures.”Not since the ’60s has the call for an artistic revolution been so urgent,” Bush said. “The work is only just beginning.”
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Disney is postponing the mid-July reopening of its Southern California theme parks until it receives guidelines from the state, the company announced Wednesday.
Disney had hoped to reopen Disneyland and Disney California Adventure in Anaheim on July 17 after a four-month closure due to the coronavirus. But the state has indicated it won’t issue guidelines until after July 4, the company said.
“Given the time required for us to bring thousands of cast members back to work and restart our business, we have no choice but to delay the reopening of our theme parks and resort hotels until we receive approval from government officials,” Disney said in a statement.
The company didn’t provide a new reopening date. The parks closed on March 14 and the reopening requires government approval.
Gov. Gavin Newsom “appreciates Disney’s responsiveness to his concerns about reopening amid the recent increases in COVID-19 infections across many Southern California counties,” Newsom spokesman Nathan Click said. “The governor, the state and our public health experts continue to be in contact with the company and their workers — as well as other theme parks in the state — as we track and combat the spread of the virus.”
Disney also said it is still negotiating agreements with employee unions, some of which have raised safety concerns about the reopenings. Disney said it has signed agreements from 20 union affiliates representing more than 11,000 employees, detailing enhanced safety protocols.  
Disney also will delay the planned July 23 reopening of its Grand Californian and Paradise Pier hotels.
The Downtown Disney District restaurant and shopping area will reopen on July 9 as previously planned “with health and safety protocols in place for our cast members and guests,” Disney said.
Disneyland fans normally can bank on the park being open regardless of what’s going on in the world around it. The park closed only a handful of times in 65 years. The last time was after the terror attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.
The company indicated it still planned to proceed with reopening Disney World in Florida on July 11. Disney resorts in Shanghai and Hong Kong already reopened.
California is seeing a COVID-19 spike, recording a 69% increase in new cases this week.
The virus causes mild or moderate symptoms for most people but for some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause pneumonia and death. 
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