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Published by AFP Israel announced some of the strictest curbs, closing the borders to all foreigners The Hague (AFP) – A new, heavily mutated Covid-19 variant spread across the globe on Sunday, shutting borders and renewing curbs as the EU chief said governments faced a “race against time” to understand the strain. Indonesia announced similar entry restrictions on Sunday and Angola became the first southern African country to suspend all flights from its regional neighbours Mozambique, Namibia and South Africa. Dubbed Omicron, the strain has cast doubt on global efforts to battle the pandemic because of fears that it is highly infectious, forcing countries to reimpose measures many had hoped were a thing of the past. “We know we are now in a race against time,” European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said, adding that vaccine manufacturers needed two to three weeks “to get a full picture of the quality of the mutations”. Dutch health authorities said they had identified at least 13 cases of Omicron among 61 quarantined passengers who tested positive for coronavirus after arriving from South Africa. “The investigation has not yet been completed. The new variant may be found in more test samples,” the National Institute for Public Health warned. Despite the alarm, in Austria tens of thousands rallied to protest against the government’s introduction of compulsory vaccination — the first EU country to do so. Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg said it was “a minor interference” compared to the alternative for a country with one of the lowest vaccination rates in Western Europe. With many European nations, including Germany and France, already bringing back curbs to counter surges in infections, Swiss voters firmly backed a proposed Covid pass law in a referendum on Sunday. In Britain, Health Secretary Sajid Javid said new Covid rules will be enforced from Tuesday. Mask-wearing will again be mandatory in shops and on public transport in England. And all arriving passengers will have to take a PCR test and self-isolate until negative. As scientists race to determine the level of threat posed by the new strain — particularly whether it can evade existing vaccines — a South African doctor said dozens of her patients suspected of Omicron infection had only shown mild symptoms such as fatigue. Angelique Coetzee, chair of the South African Medical Association, who alerted health officials to a “clinical picture that doesn’t fit Delta”, told AFP she had seen 30 patients over the past 10 days who tested positive for Covid-19. They had fully recovered without hospitalisation. Coetzee said it was unfortunate that Omicron had been hyped as “this extremely dangerous virus variant” when its virulency was still unknown. A long list of countries have already imposed travel restrictions on southern Africa, where it was first detected, including key travel hub Qatar, the United States, Britain, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the Netherlands. Indonesia announced similar entry restrictions on Sunday and Angola became the first southern African country to suspend all flights from its regional neighbours Mozambique, Namibia and South Africa. Morocco said it was halting incoming flights for two weeks from Monday. ‘Very dangerous’ Israel announced some of the strictest curbs, closing the borders to all foreigners — just four weeks after reopening to tourists following a prolonged closure due to Covid. “We are raising a red flag,” Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said. Ten million PCR test kits would be ordered to stem the “very dangerous” strain. Israeli citizens will be required to present a negative PCR test and quarantine for three days if they have been vaccinated against the virus and seven days if they have not. But the new strain has already slipped through the net, and has now been found everywhere from the Netherlands to the UK, Hong Kong to Australia, where authorities Sunday said they had detected it for the first time in two passengers from southern Africa who were tested after flying into Sydney. Omicron’s emergence comes just a month after Australia lifted a ban on travelling overseas without permission. Denmark confirmed its first Omicron infections, in two passengers who arrived on a flight from South Africa and Germany added a third case. Blame game The speed at which governments slammed their borders shut took many by surprise, with travellers thronging Johannesburg international airport, desperate to catch the last flights to countries that are imposing sudden travel bans. Scientists in South Africa said they had last week detected the new B.1.1.529 variant with at least 10 mutations, compared with three for Beta or two for Delta — the strain that hit the global recovery hard and sent millions worldwide back into lockdown. The variant has also revived geopolitical fault lines exacerbated by the pandemic, with the US quick to hail South Africa’s openness — a thinly veiled jab at China’s handling of information about the original outbreak. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Saturday “praised … South Africa’s government for its transparency in sharing this information, which should serve as a model for the world”. South Africa had complained it was being unfairly hit with “draconian” air travel bans for having first detected the strain. burs-oho/bp/har View the full article

Published by Radar Online Arnold Schwarzenegger‘s son Joseph Baena showed off his exquisite physique as he revealed he is following in his father’s footsteps and becoming an actor. He posted an announcement on his Instagram about his appearance in a movie calledLava that is set to be filmed in Hawaii. MEGA, @projoe2/Instagram The 24-year-old actor displayed his ripped body in the snap where he was seen standing in the middle of a smoke-filled tropical location. He seemed delighted to be working on the project as he wrote in the caption, “Excited to be filming the movie Lava with the @bitflixnfts team!” The movie is also deemed to be the first film fully financially backed by cryptocurrency. In his previous posts, he also shared the behind-the-scenes shots from the movie that caught the attention of his followers, who immediately noticed the resemblance of his father in him. One Instagram user commented, “Looking like your father’s body double in like all his movies where his shirt is off!” A second user said,” It’s just unreal how much your body resembles Arnold, especially in the third pic of fulness of that upper chest crazy!” Another wrote, “Just like the legend himself @schwarzenegger.” There isn’t much information regarding the movie, including the plot details or the release date, although the project’s development appeared to have begun earlier this month. Throughout the week, Baena worked hard at the gym, building his muscles to play the role for the upcoming movie. In one video, he was seen lifting some equipment to work on his shoulder and back muscles while jamming to the tune of E-40’s Tell Me When To Go. MEGA According to his IMDB page, the influencer already has five movie credits, including Terminator, Chariot, and Encounters. The young actor has always been open about training with his father in the past. Back in May, he posted a picture of himself and his famous 73-year-old dad at the gym with the caption, “You have to go all out and absolutely NO cheating when you train with him, so you know I’m going to be hurting tomorrow.” Baena was born after Arnold had an affair with his mother,Mildred Baena, who worked as a housekeeper for the former Governor. Following the discovery of the scandal, Arnold’s wife, Maria Shriver, filed for divorce from the bodybuilder. The former couple also shared four children, Katherine, Patrick, Christopher, and Christina. MEGA View the full article

Published by Reuters WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Republican Representative Lauren Boebert, a loyal supporter of former U.S. President Donald Trump, apologized on Friday after suggesting that a liberal Democratic colleague, Representative Ilhan Omar, had been part of a “jihad squad” on Capitol Hill. “I apologize to anyone in the Muslim community I offended with my comment about Rep. Omar. I have reached out to her office to speak with her directly. There are plenty of policy differences to focus on without this unnecessary distraction,” Boebert said on Twitter. Her apology came after a video surfaced on Twitter of her speaking at an event in her home state of Colorado where she said she was getting into an elevator at the Capitol when she saw a Capitol police officer running toward her. “I see fret all over his face, and he’s reaching, and the door’s shutting, like I can’t open it, like what’s happening. I look to my left, and there she is. Ilhan Omar. And I said, ‘Well, she doesn’t have a backpack, we should be fine,'” she said. She said it was “not my first ‘jihad squad’ moment.” Boebert is part of a group of Republican House lawmakers who say they are staunch supporters of Trump, and who frequently attack their own Congress colleagues with slurs and insults. She is in her first term in office. Omar said on Twitter the event described by Boebert in the video never happened, and that “Anti-Muslim bigotry isn’t funny & shouldn’t be normalized.” “Saying I am a suicide bomber is no laughing matter,” Omar tweeted. She called on House Republican leader Kevin McCarty and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to take “appropriate action.” (Reporting By Steve Holland; Editing by Heather Timmons and Sam Holmes) View the full article

Published by AFP French-American dancer and singer Josephine Baker (pictured two weeks before her death in 1975) will be the first black woman to be immortalised in France's Pantheon mausoleum Paris (AFP) – Josephine Baker, the French-American dancer, singer and actress who mesmerised France with performances mocking colonialism and later joined the French Resistance, will become the first black woman to be immortalised in France’s Pantheon mausoleum Tuesday. Baker will be just the sixth woman to join the around 80 great national figures of French history in the secular temple on Paris’s Left Bank. She will also be the first showbiz figure to be honoured with a symbolic spot in the secular sanctuary, final resting place of a long list of luminaries from the worlds of politics, culture and science, including Victor Hugo, Emile Zola and Marie Curie. The “pantheonisation” of the world’s first black female superstar, who campaigned for civil rights alongside Martin Luther King, caps years of campaigning by her family and a group of intellectuals for her to be given the rare posthumous honour. French President Emmanuel Macron in August finally granted the request “because she’s a woman who was born black and American in a closed society… who became the incarnation of the Enlightenment values of the French Republic throughout her life,” his office explained this week. “She’s a woman whose whole life was dedicated to the twin quest for liberty and justice,” an official at the presidency added. ‘France made me’ Born Freda Josephine McDonald into extreme poverty in Missouri in 1906, Baker left school at 13. After two failed marriages — she took the name Baker from her second husband — she managed to land herself a place in one of the first all-black musicals on Broadway in 1921. Like many black American artists at the time, she moved to France to escape racial segregation back home. The woman nicknamed the “Black Venus” took Paris by storm with her exuberant dance performances, which captured the energy of the Jazz Age. One of the defining moments of her career came when she danced the Charleston at the Folies-Bergere cabaret hall, wearing only a string of pearls and a skirt made of rubber bananas, in a sensational send-up of colonial fantasies about black women. A singer and actress as well as dancer, she adopted France wholeheartedly, taking French nationality upon her marriage to industrialist Jean Lion in 1937. She would go on to divorce him and remarry twice more, adopting 12 children along the way. At the outbreak of World War II, she joined the French Resistance against Nazi Germany, becoming a lieutenant in the Free French air force’s female auxiliary corps. She became a spy for France’s wartime leader-in-exile General Charles de Gaulle and used her people skills and contacts to get information on the plans of Italian fascist leader Benito Mussolini. “France made me who I am,” she said later. “Parisians gave me everything… I am prepared to give them my life.” ‘True anti-racist’ Throughout her life she fought discrimination, adopting children from different ethnic backgrounds to form a “rainbow” family at her chateau in southwest France. Pascal Bruckner, a novelist who campaigned for her to be given a coveted spot under the famous dome of the Pantheon, said Baker “is a symbol of a France that is not racist.” “Josephine Baker is a true anti-racist, a true anti-fascist,” he told AFP in an interview earlier this year. Baker died on April 12, 1975, aged 68, from a brain haemorrhage, days after a final smash-hit cabaret show in Paris celebrating her half-century on the stage. She is the second woman to be inducted by Macron into the Pantheon after former minister Simone Veil, who survived the Holocaust to fight for abortion rights and European unity. Macron’s former mentor and predecessor Francois Hollande had refused calls to immortalise Baker in the former church, which was transformed into a temple to “great men” after the French Revolution. “He thought it was a daft idea,” one of Macron’s advisors confided. In a sign of the affection in which Baker is still held in France, there was no public criticism of the decision to honour her, including from far-right commentators that are generally scathing of anti-racism gestures. A symbolic tomb will be carried into the Pantheon by members of the French air force, a nod to her role in the wartime Free French air force. Baker’s remains will however remain in Monaco, where she is buried. View the full article

Published by Reuters By Deena Beasley (Reuters) – The new Omicron coronavirus variant – identified first in South Africa, but also detected in Europe and Asia – is raising concern worldwide given the number of mutations, which might help it spread or even evade antibodies from prior infection or vaccination. News of the variant prompted countries to announce new travel restrictions on Friday and sent drugmakers scrambling to see if their COVID-19 vaccines remain protective. WHY ARE SCIENTISTS WORRIED? The World Health Organization on Friday classified the B.1.1.529 variant, or Omicron, as a SARS-CoV-2 “variant of concern,” saying it may spread more quickly than other forms of coronavirus. The Delta variant remains dominant worldwide, accounting for 99.9% of U.S. cases, and it is not yet clear whether Omicron will be able to displace Delta, said Dr. Graham Snyder, medical director, infection prevention and hospital epidemiology at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. But the new variant has over 30 mutations in the part of the virus that current vaccines target. It is also suspected of driving a spike in new infections in South Africa. Omicron’s mutations are likely to render certain COVID-19 treatments – including some manufactured antibodies – ineffective, said Dr. David Ho, professor of microbiology and immunology at Columbia University. Experimental antiviral pills – such as Pfizer Inc’s Paxlovid and Merck & Co Inc’s molnupiravir – target parts of the virus that are not changed in Omicron, and these drugs could become even more important if vaccine-induced and natural immunity are threatened. THE UNKNOWNS Scientists say it could be several more weeks before they can define the type of disease caused by the variant, determine how contagious it is and identify how far it has already spread. Some note that other variants of concern, including Beta, which was also first detected in South Africa, were ultimately replaced by Delta. But the biggest question remains whether protection from COVID-19 vaccines – nearly 8 billion doses have been administered globally – will hold up. And, will people previously infected with the coronavirus be immune from infection with Omicron? Experts also don’t yet know whether Omicron will cause more or less severe COVID-19 compared to other coronavirus strains. BEST RESPONSE? Omicron has not yet been identified in the United States, but it is likely already here, scientists said. Even without the new variant, U.S. COVID-19 rates have increased in recent weeks, mainly in northern states, as people move indoors to avoid winter weather. Some countries have moved to limit travel from southern Africa. Beyond government restrictions, individuals should still assess their own vulnerability to COVID and tolerance for risk as they make travel decisions for the winter holidays, Snyder from University of Pittsburgh Medical Center said. He and others said vaccination should remain a priority despite questions about effectiveness against Omicron, because it is likely that they still remain protective to a certain extent. Everyone should also continue to wear masks, avoid crowds, ventilate rooms, and wash hands. “We have all those tools that will work against any variant,” said Dr. Eric Topol, director of the Scripps Research Translational Institute in La Jolla, California. (Reporting by Deena Beasley; Editing by Sam Holmes) View the full article

Published by Reuters By Alex Dobuzinskis and Steve Gorman (Reuters) -Broadway composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim, who helped American musical theater evolve beyond pure entertainment and reach new artistic heights with such works as “West Side Story,” “Into the Woods” and “Sweeney Todd,” died early Friday at the age of 91, his publicist said. The musical great died at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut, spokesperson Kathryn Zuckerman told Reuters by email, saying she had little additional information. The news was reported earlier by the New York Times. Sondheim’s eight Tony Awards for his lyrics and music surpassed the total of any other composer. In 2008 he also won a Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement. He started early, learning the art of musical theater when he was a teenager from his mentor Oscar Hammerstein II, the legendary lyricist behind “The Sound of Music.” “Hamilton” creator Lin-Manuel Miranda, who was in turn mentored by Sondheim, has called him musical theater’s greatest lyricist. Sondheim’s most successful works included “Into the Woods,” which opened on Broadway in 1987 and used children’s fairy tales to untangle adult obsessions; the 1979 thriller “Sweeney Todd,” about a murderous barber in London whose victims are served as meat pies; and 1962’s “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum,” a vaudeville-style comedy set in ancient Rome. He also wrote the lyrics to Leonard Bernstein’s score for “West Side Story,” inspired by William Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet,” and collaborated with fellow composer Jule Styne as lyricist for “Gypsy,” loosely based on the memoirs of burlesque star Gypsy Rose Lee. “I love the theater as much as music, and the whole idea of getting across to an audience and making them laugh, making them cry – just making them feel – is paramount to me,” Sondheim said in a 2013 interview with National Public Radio. Several of Sondheim’s hit musicals were turned into movies, including the 2014 film “Into the Woods,” starring Meryl Streep, and the 2007 “Sweeney Todd” with Johnny Depp. A new film version of “West Side Story,” directed by Stephen Spielberg from a screenplay by Tony Kushner, opens next month. During a guest appearance in September on the CBS “Late Show with Stephen Colbert,” Sondheim said he visited the set of Spielberg’s adaptation, and endorsed the film “as really first rate.” Sondheim’s songs were celebrated for their sharp wit and insight into modern life and for giving voice to complex characters, but few of them made the pop charts. ‘CLOWNS’ HIT He scored a hit, however, and one of three Grammys of his career, with “Send in the Clowns” from his 1973 musical “A Little Night Music.” It was recorded by Frank Sinatra, Sarah Vaughan and Judy Collins, among others. Sondheim also earned a best-song Academy Award in 1991 for “Sooner or Later (I Always Get My Man),” sung by Madonna in the “Dick Tracy” movie. In 2015, President Barack Obama presented the lyricist the Presidential Medal of Freedom at a White House ceremony. One of Sondheim’s greatest triumphs was the Pulitzer Prize he shared with composure James Lapine for the 1984 musical “Sunday in the Park with George,” about 19th-century French Neo-Impressionist artist Georges Seurat. The two also collaborated on “Into the Woods.” Actress Bernadette Peters, who played the roles of Dot and Marie in “Sunday in the Park” and the witch of “Into the Woods,” expressed sadness at the loss of a friend, tweeting, Sondheim “gave me so much to sing about.” Fellow actress Anna Kendrick, who starred as Cinderella in the film version of “Into the Woods,” called Sondheim’s death “a devastating loss.” “Performing his work has been among the greatest privileges of my career,” she added on Twitter. As Sondheim collected accolades, New York City’s Broadway theater industry underwent many changes. It had a key role in American culture through the 1950s, with many Broadway songs making the pop charts, but lost significance as rock music gained a hold on the public starting in the 1960s. Increasingly, musicals borrowed material from television and movies, instead of the other way around, composer Mark N. Grant wrote in his book “The Rise and Fall of the Broadway Musical.” Sondheim shared the view that Broadway had experienced decline, expressing it repeatedly in interviews. “There are so many forms of entertainment, theater is becoming more marginalized,” he told British newspaper The Times in 2012. But Broadway musicals also became more artistic, and Sondheim played a key role in their evolution, critics said. He explored such weighty topics as political violence in “Assassins,” the human need for family and the pull of dysfunctional relationships in “Into the Woods,” social inequality in “Sweeney Todd,” and Western imperialism in “Pacific Overtures.” He developed new methods for presenting a play as well. Instead of telling a story from beginning to end, he would jump backward and forward in time to explore a single theme. It was called the “concept musical.” Broadway audiences were introduced to Sondheim with “West Side Story” in 1957. The story about a love affair between a Puerto Rican girl, Maria, and a white boy, Tony, in working-class Manhattan was turned into an Oscar-winning film in 1961. The central characters expressed their infatuation in the songs “Maria,” “Somewhere” and “Tonight.” CONFLICT WITH MOTHER Sondheim was born March 22, 1930, in New York City to affluent Jewish parents who worked in fashion. He described his early childhood as a lonely one, with servants as his main company. After his parents split up when he was 10 years old, Sondheim moved with his mother to rural Pennsylvania, where she bought a farm. He later said his mother took out her wrath over the divorce on him. He found a surrogate family in the nearby household of Hammerstein and his wife, Dorothy. Hammerstein, who along with composing partner Richard Rodgers created the classic musicals “Oklahoma!” “South Pacific and “The Sound of Music,” taught the teenage Sondheim how to write musical theater. After Sondheim became famous, he mentored others on Broadway. When Miranda began work on a rap musical about American founding father Alexander Hamilton, Sondheim encouraged and critiqued him. The play became a smash hit on Broadway in 2015. In box office success, Sondheim fell short of Andrew Lloyd Webber, the composer behind “The Phantom of the Opera” and “Cats” with whom Sondheim shared a birthday. Sondheim pushed audiences, which sometimes resulted in box office flops. Some of his least commercially successful plays were lauded by critics. Those included the 1976 “Pacific Overtures,” which depicted Japan during an age of Western colonialism, and his 1990 off-Broadway production “Assassins” about real-life figures who each set out to kill an American president. Sondheim had many fans in the academic world. In 1994, a quarterly magazine called the Sondheim Review was founded to examine his work, five years after Oxford University in England named him a visiting professor of drama. His devotees celebrated the acerbic irony of his lyrics, which they described as commenting on everything from the limits of America’s melting pot to the downside of marriage. These lines from “The Ladies Who Lunch” in his 1970 musical “Company” contained a typical slice of Sondheim’s wit: “Here’s to the girls who play wife/Aren’t they too much?/Keeping house but clutching a copy of ‘LIFE’/Just to keep in touch.” (Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis and Steve Gorman in Los Angeles; Editing by Donna Bryson, Bill Trott and Leslie Adler) View the full article

Published by Reuters By David Shepardson WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and State Department on Saturday advised against travel to eight southern African countries after the White House announced new travel restrictions in response to a new COVID-19 variant. The CDC raised its travel recommendation to “Level Four: Very High” for South Africa, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Mozambique, Malawi, Lesotho, Eswatini and Botswana while the State Department issued parallel “Do Not Travel” advisories Saturday. On Monday, the CDC had lowered its COVID-19 travel advisory for South Africa to “Level 1: Low” from “Level 3: High” Of the eight countries, only Botswana was previously listed as “Level 4.” Omicron, dubbed a “variant of concern” by the World Health Organization, is potentially more contagious than previous variants of the disease, although experts do not know yet if it will cause more or less severe COVID-19 compared to other strains. It could take weeks for scientists to fully understand the variant’s mutations and whether existing vaccines and treatments are effective against it. The discovery of the variant has sparked global concern, a wave of travel bans or curbs and a sell-off on financial markets on Friday as investors worried that Omicron could stall a global recovery from the nearly two-year pandemic. The new variant prompted the White House to announce Friday it would bar nearly all foreign nationals who have been in any of eight countries within the last 14 days from flying to the United States effective Monday at 12:01 a.m. ET (0500 GMT). Travelers on flights that depart before that time will be allowed to land in the United States. But foreign nationals must be vaccinated and have tested negative within three days. Britain detected two cases of the new Omicron coronavirus variant on Saturday, even as Australia and other countries joined nations imposing restrictions on travel from southern Africa in an effort to stop its spread. The variant was first discovered in South Africa and had also since been detected in Belgium, Botswana, Israel and Hong Kong. A U.S. official told Reuters Friday the Biden administration could also add other countries to the travel curb list if the variant spreads. The United States only lifted travel restrictions on South Africa and 32 other countries on Nov. 8. (Reporting by David Shepardson; editing by Diane Craft) View the full article

Published by Reuters WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Joe Biden has been briefed on the latest situation regarding the new Omicron variant of COVID-19, the White House said on Saturday, as Britain, Germany and Italy reported detecting cases. “At the same time, senior health officials and the COVID response team have been monitoring the latest updates on Omicron and in regular touch with health officials around the world,” a White House official said in a statement. Omicron was first detected in South Africa this week, leading countries around the globe, including the United States, to impose travel restrictions on the southern African nation and at least seven others in the region. So far, the Omicron variant has not been detected in the United States. But Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease specialist, said on NBC’s “Weekend TODAY” show on Saturday, “I would not be surprised if it is.” “When you have a virus that is showing this degree of transmissibility and you’re already having travel-related cases that they’ve noted in Israel and Belgium and other places, when you have a virus like this, it almost invariably is ultimately going to go essentially all over,” Fauci said. (Reporting Nandita Bose; writing by Lucia Mutikani; Editing by Leslie Adler) View the full article

Tom Daley knitting kits site launched today with many choices. Tom Daley Knitting Kits Launch Under The Olympian's Made With Love Brand. Knit a Hat, Vest, Sweater -- With or Without Wild Flamingos 16 Tom Daley Knitting Kits on Towleroad Laverne Cox confirms she’s got a boyfriend who she ‘met on Tinder’ More Merck’s COVID-19 pill significantly less effective in new analysis More U.S. President Biden calls for intellectual property protection waivers on COVID-19 vaccines More Zelenskiy says Ukraine uncovers coup plot involving Russians; Kremlin denies role More Busy Philipps: I received messages from other moms after talking about my kid’s gender identity More Baga Chipz is sick of cancel culture More S.Africa detects new COVID-19 variant, implications not yet clear More Factbox-The charges in the Ahmaud Arbery case More Manhattan DA not planning to charge Trump Organization COO in fraud case -lawyer More GROWING UP GAGA: THE WHOLE STORY More Flash mob thefts terrorize US retailers ahead of Christmas More Load More View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Laverne Cox has confirmed she has a boyfriend whom she “met on Tinder”. The ‘Orange is the New Black’ star revealed she used the dating app to find her special someone, and is now “super happy” to be able to delete the app – as well as other dating sites including Hinge – from her phone now that she’s off the market. Laverne announced her relationship status on Twitter after responding to a tweet which slammed Hinge for being a “super toxic” place, as they suggested Laverne had been banned from the app because she is a trans woman. The initial tweet read: “Guess you gotta be a high profile trans woman like @Lavernecox to get a @hinge ban for being trans overturned. (sic)” And Laverne responded to say she had been banned from Hinge a second time before she met her boyfriend on Tinder. She said:” I have a bf now and haven’t been on the apps in over a year. But after being reinstated on @hinge I was banned again. Not sure why. “I wasn’t really meeting guys on Hinge anyway. So I just didn’t bother to to look into it.. Met my bf on Tinder. “Super happy to be off the apps. (sic)” Laverne first spoke about her boyfriend in January this year, when she said she had embarked on a romance with him six months prior. She gushed: “[Found love in 2020] almost sounds like a punchline, but, yeah, Laverne is in love again, it feels amazing. Love is an incredible thing. It’s literally this chemical thing that’s awesome and he is a really great guy and I didn’t expect it. “I thought he was going to be this hot dude I was going to be hanging out with and then it just kind of happened.” View the full article

Published by Reuters By Manas Mishra and Michael Erman (Reuters) -Merck & Co said on Friday updated data from its study of its experimental COVID-19 pill showed the drug was significantly less effective in cutting hospitalizations and deaths than previously reported. The drugmaker said its pill showed a 30% reduction in hospitalizations and deaths, based on data from 1,433 patients. In October, its data nL1N2QX0QJ showed a roughly 50% efficacy, based on data from 775 patients. The drug, molnupiravir, was developed with partner Ridgeback Biotherapeutics. The lower efficacy of Merck’s drug could have big implications in terms of whether countries continue to buy the pill. Interim data from 1,200 participants in Pfizer Inc’s trial for its experimental pill, Paxlovid, showed an 89% reduction in hopsitalizations and deaths. Merck’s shares fell 3.5% to $79.39 in morning trading. Merck released the data before the U.S Food and Drug Administration published a set of documents on Friday intended to brief a panel of outside experts who will meet on Tuesday to discuss whether to recommend authorizing the pill. The agency’s staff did not make their own recommendation as to whether the pill should be authorized. FDA staff asked the panel to discuss whether the benefits of the drug outweigh the risks and whether the population for whom the drug should be authorized should be limited. They also asked the committee to weigh in on concerns over whether the drug could encourage the virus to mutate, and how those concerns could be mitigated. Pills like molnupiravir and Paxlovid could be promising new weapons in the fight against the pandemic, as they can be taken as early at-home treatments to help prevent COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths. They could also become important tools in countries and areas with limited access to vaccines or low inoculation rates. EASIER TREATMENT The Merck and Pfizer pills are cheaper to produce and easier to administer than existing treatment options such as antibody therapies from Regeneron and Eli Lilly, which are mostly administered as intravenous infusions. The two experimental drugs have different mechanisms of action. Merck’s is designed to introduce errors into the genetic code of the virus. Pfizer’s drug, part of a class known as protease inhibitors, is designed to block an enzyme the coronavirus needs in order to multiply. Merck filed for a U.S. authorization of molnupiravir on Oct. 11, following the interim data, and submitted the updated data to the FDA this week. The molnupiravir arm of the study had a hospitalization and death rate of 6.8%, according to the updated data. The placebo group had a hospitalization and death rate of 9.7%. One patient in the molnupiravir arm died, versus nine in the placebo group. The United Kingdom conditionally approved molnupiravir, branded as Lagevrio, earlier this month. Merck expects to produce 10 million courses of the treatment by the end of this year, with at least 20 million set to be manufactured in 2022. It has a contract with the U.S. government to supply as many as 5 million courses at a price of $700 per course. Several other countries have already secured millions of courses of the pill. Merck has said data shows molnupiravir is not capable of inducing genetic changes in human cells, but men enrolled in its trials had to abstain from heterosexual intercourse or agree to use contraception. Women of child-bearing age also had to use birth control. Still, the FDA said in its briefing document that there are safety concerns about potential birth defects from the drug and asked the panel to discuss whether the drug should be available to pregnant women. (Reporting by Manas Mishra in Bengaluru and Michael Erman in New JerseyEditing by Shounak Dasgupta, Frances Kerry and Emelia Sithole-Matarise) View the full article

Published by Reuters WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Joe Biden on Friday called on nations meeting at the World Trade Organization next week to agree to waive intellectual property protections for COVID-19 vaccines in the wake of the discovery of a new coronavirus variant in South Africa. “The news about this new variant should make clearer than ever why this pandemic will not end until we have global vaccinations,” Biden said in a statement. “This news today reiterates the importance of moving on this (waiving intellectual property protections) quickly.” (Reporting by Nandita Bose, writing by Lucia Mutikani, editing by Chris Reese) View the full article

Published by Reuters By Natalia Zinets and Pavel Polityuk KYIV (Reuters) -President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Friday said Ukraine had uncovered a plot to overthrow his government next week, involving individuals from Russia caught on tape talking about roping Ukraine’s richest businessman into backing a coup. The Kremlin denied any role in any coup plot, and the businessman called the president’s account an “absolute lie.” Zelenskiy himself gave few details and stopped short of saying whether he believed the Kremlin was behind the plot. But the accusation raised the temperature at a time when Kyiv and its Western allies have already accused Moscow of massing troops near the Ukrainian border for a possible assault, a suggestion Moscow dismisses as false and alarmist. Speaking at an hours-long news conference, Zelenskiy said Ukrainian intelligence had obtained audio recordings of the plotters talking about involving business magnate Rinat Akhmetov into joining their coup. “We have challenges not only from the Russian Federation and possible escalation – we have big internal challenges. I received information that a coup d’etat will take place in our country on Dec. 1-2,” Zelenskiy said. Akhmetov said in a statement: “The information made public by Volodymyr Zelenskiy about attempts to draw me into some kind of coup is an absolute lie. I am outraged by the spread of this lie, no matter what the president’s motives are.” “As a Ukrainian citizen, the country’s biggest investor, taxpayer, and employer, I will continue to defend a free Ukraine, a free economy, democracy, and freedom of speech.” Ukraine’s sovereign dollar bonds tumbled to their lowest level in more than a year on Friday and the cost of insuring exposure to the country’s debt soared amid rising security concerns. UKRAINE PREPARED FOR ESCALATION Zelenskiy did not give full details of the coup plot. Asked explicitly whether he thought the Kremlin was involved, he said: “I’m sorry, I can’t talk about it.” But he also spoke at length at the news conference of a threat of Russian military escalation, and said Ukraine would be ready for it. “We are in full control of our borders and are fully prepared for any escalation,” Zelenskiy said. The head of Ukraine’s military intelligence told the Military Times outlet last week that Russia had more than 92,000 troops massed around Ukraine’s borders and was preparing for an attack by the end of January or beginning of February. Ukraine, which wants to join the NATO military alliance, has blamed Moscow for supporting separatists in a conflict in its east since 2014. It received a large consignment of U.S. ammunition and Javelin missiles earlier this year, prompting criticism from Russia. U.S. officials were in touch with Ukraine to get additional information on the plot, said Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Karen Donfried. Ministers from NATO member states, including U.S. top diplomat Antony Blinken, would also meet Ukrainian officials during a summit in Latvia next week, Donfried told reporters in a telephone briefing. Zelenskiy also said his chief of staff Andriy Yermak would soon be contacting representatives of Russia about the standoff between the two countries. Separately, Yermak said he would be contacting senior Kremlin official Dmitry Kozak. Russia has said it suspects Ukraine of wanting to recapture separatist-controlled territory by force. Zelenskiy said Ukraine had no such plans and added that Russia’s rhetoric opposing Ukraine’s bid to join NATO was a worrying signal. A former actor who once played a fictional president in a popular sitcom, the 43-year-old Zelenskiy came to power by a landslide in 2019 promising to end the war in eastern Ukraine, which Kyiv says has killed 14,000 people. But after a lull in fighting and confidence-building measures including prisoner swaps, tensions with Russia rose this year. President Vladimir Putin said the West was taking his “red lines” about NATO expansion too lightly. At his news conference, Zelenskiy said he wanted the prisoner swaps to resume. He called on Russia to state explicitly that it would not launch a new attack on Ukraine. (Reporting by Natalia Zinets and Pavel Polityuk in KyivAdditional reporting by Simon Lewis in WashingtonWriting by Matthias WilliamsEditing by Peter Graff and Matthew Lewis) View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Busy Philipps has received messages of thanks from other mothers after revealing her child is non-binary. The ‘Busy Tonight’ host announced her 13-year-old child Birdie had come out as non-binary last year, and has said that since sharing the news with the world, she has received “so many” messages from other parents who thanked her for talking openly about her child’s gender. She said: “I have gotten so many messages and letters in the last year of … moms just thanking me for talking about it, talking about my child’s queerness and their choice of pronouns because they’re also having the same thing, but they live in a small town in the middle of the country, and this helps them be able to have the conversation easier.” Busy – who has Birdie, as well as eight-year-old Cricket, with her husband Marc Silverstein – also said that while some people responded negatively to Birdie’s decision to use they/them pronouns, most people were understanding. She added: “I think it’s a part of our culture, sharing things on social media. You cannot ever predict how they’re going to be received, but you just have to know that when you’re moving through the world in a truthful way, [some] people will respond to it in a positive way, and some people won’t, but that’s their issue to work out.” The 42-year-old actress also spoke about Birdie’s decision to let their mother go public with their pronoun change. She told ‘Entertainment Tonight’: “Birdie had discussed it with me. They had come to me and were like, ‘You can talk about me, my queerness, and my pronouns on your podcast. I was like, ‘Well, are you sure? Let’s discuss it.’ “They’re kind of always unfazed by everything, in terms of how people have responded. It was hard for me in terms of knowing that there would be people that would be unkind to my child. I felt like I was putting my kid out there, and putting them at risk of getting some of that negativity toward who they are as a person.” View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Baga Chipz is sick of cancel culture. The 31-year-old drag superstar – real name Leo Loren – who shot to fame when she was runner up on the first UK season of ‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ admitted that she now has “rules” in an attempt to avoid being “cancelled.” She exclusively told BANG Showbiz: “I’ve been doing drag for over 15 years but now I have rules. In my act, I don’t talk about race. I work in a lot of gay clubs so I’ll not talk about serious things like AIDS. I do a lot of charity work for HIV and stuff but I don’t joke about those things. I don’t think anyone would anyway but it does boil my p*** when it’s silly miniscule things. “You only have to fart these days and people go, ‘Let’s cancel all their work, let’s hang the witch!'” However, the star – who admitted that these days it is just a lot easier now to “just take the p*ss out of [herself]” – said that while cancel culture sometimes serves its purpose, it should not be used just “for the sake of it.” She said: “When I first started you could say what you want. But we live in cancel culture – and rightfully so if you’ve done something really bad, like used racist language or homophobic language, yeah you have to be held accountable for it. I believe in accountability I don’t like it when people moan just for the sake of it.” The ‘Frock Destroyer’ singer revealed that urged fans to see the whole thing as a joke, reminding them that she is just playing an “old Northern trollop”. She said: “I have said stuff on stage before that people are like ‘Oooh’ but it’s no different to any other comedian. I’ve said nothing that someone like Alan Carr or Paul O’Grady hasn’t said. It’s a joke. If I do say an offensive joke, it’s not personal – I’m not gonna knock on your mum’s door and tell her. I’m a man in a dress pretending to be a middle-aged woman in a chip shop. It’s not real life. I do take the wig off! I’m just an old Northern trollop!” ‘The Celebrity Circle’ star was speaking to promote the release of new video game ‘Let’s Sing 2022’ – a karaoke title in which players can belt out classics like Amy Winehouse’s ‘Back to Black’, Wham! festive hit ‘Last Christmas’ and ‘A Whole New World’ from Disney’s ‘Aladdin’. On her combined love of karaoke and gaming, Baga said: ” I love a good sing-song. A bit of Liza [Minnelli]. ‘New York, New York’, ‘All That Jazz’ – love it! “The other week at the Admiral Duncan I did a duet – Kylie [Minogue] and Jason [Donovan]. She’s got that voice in her, Kylie, so when I went up I was like [mimics Kylie] ‘Especially for yooo…’ “I love Nintendo, I used to play ‘Donkey Kong’ and ‘Super Mario Bros.’ Then I got my PlayStation – I had the Spice Girls game. Then I got my PlayStation 2. I used to play ‘The Sims’ – I’d spend hours doing me house up!” ‘Let’s Sing 2022’ is available now on Nintendo Switch, PS4, PS5 and Xbox. Please visit Amazon.co.uk for more information. View the full article

Published by Reuters JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) -South African scientists have detected a new COVID-19 variant in small numbers and are working to understand its potential implications, they said on Thursday. The variant – called B.1.1.529 – has a “very unusual constellation” of mutations, which are concerning because they could help it evade the body’s immune response and make it more transmissible, scientists told reporters at a news conference. Early signs from diagnostic laboratories suggest the variant has rapidly increased in the most populated province of Gauteng and may already be present in the country’s other eight provinces, they said. In a regular daily update on confirmed cases countrywide, the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) later reported 2,465 new COVID-19 infections, slightly less than double the previous day’s infections. The NICD did not attribute the latest resurgence to the new variant, although some leading local scientists suspect it is the cause. South Africa has confirmed around 100 specimens as B.1.1.529, but the variant has also been found in Botswana and Hong Kong, with the Hong Kong case a traveller from South Africa. As many as 90% of new cases in Gauteng could be B.1.1.529, scientists believe. “Although the data are limited, our experts are working overtime with all the established surveillance systems to understand the new variant and what the potential implications could be,” the NICD said in a statement. South Africa has requested an urgent sitting of a World Health Organization (WHO) working group on virus evolution on Friday to discuss the new variant. Health Minister Joe Phaahla said it was too early to say whether the government would impose tougher restrictions in response to the variant. South Africa was the first country to detect the Beta variant last year. Beta is one of only four labelled “of concern” by the WHO because there is evidence that it is more contagious and vaccines work less well against it. The country detected another variant, C.1.2, earlier this year, but that has not displaced the more common Delta variant and still accounts for only a small percentage of genomes sequenced in recent months. (Reporting by Alexander WinningEditing by Angus MacSwan, Mark Potter and Frances Kerry) View the full article

Published by Reuters (Reuters) – Three white men were convicted of murder on Wednesday in the shotgun slaying of Ahmaud Arbery, a 25-year-old Black man who was chased while on a Sunday run in a mostly white neighborhood in Georgia on Feb. 23, 2020. The jury found Travis McMichael, 35; his father Gregory McMichael, 65, and a neighbor, William “Roddie” Bryan, 52, guilty of murder and other charges. All three defendants pleaded not guilty to the same nine counts: one count of malice murder, four counts of felony murder, two counts of aggravated assault, one count of false imprisonment and one count of criminal intent to commit a felony. * Travis McMichael was convicted on all nine counts, including one count of malice murder and four counts of felony murder. * His father was found not guilty of malice murder but guilty on all other counts, including felony murder. * Bryan was found not guilty of malice murder but guilty of three counts of felony murder, one count of aggravated assault and one count each of false imprisonment and criminal intent to commit a felony. Malice murder (one count each) Malice murder is when a person unlawfully and with malice aforethought causes the death of another person. The decision to commit malice murder can come in a spilt second or be planned long before. A malice murder conviction carries a sentence of life in prison with the possibility of parole, life imprisonment without the possibility of parole or the death penalty. In this case, the prosecution is not seeking the death penalty. Felony murder (four counts each) Felony murder occurs when someone commits a serious or inherently dangerous felony and someone else dies during the crime, even if that murder was not planned. The classic example is when two people rob a bank and a teller is shot dead. Even if only one person actually shot the teller, all those involved in the crime, even if unarmed, are considered equally guilty. It is punished in Georgia by either life in prison with parole or without parole or the death penalty. Aggravated assault (two counts each) Aggravated assault in Georgia is defined as being an assault with the intent to commit another crime such as murder, robbery or rape and a weapon is used. It can be punished by one year in prison to a maximum of 20 years for each count. False imprisonment (one count each) A person commits the offense of false imprisonment when he or she violates the personal liberty of another, illegally arrests, confines, or detains such person without legal authority. False imprisonment is punished by one to 10 years in prison. Criminal attempt to commit a felony (one count each) It is a substantial effort to commit a specific felony crime. It is punished by one year in prison or up to half of the maximum period of time for which he or she could have been sentenced if the crime was successful. (Reporting by Rich McKay in Atlanta; editing by Jonathan Oatis) View the full article

Published by Reuters By Kanishka Singh and Karen Freifeld (Reuters) – The Manhattan district attorney is not planning to charge Trump Organization Chief Operating Officer Matthew Calamari in a fraud case in which the former U.S. president’s firm and its chief financial officer have been charged, Calamari’s lawyer said. “Mr. Calamari is pleased that the District Attorney’s office has indicated that it has no present intention to bring charges against him. That is the fair and appropriate decision. He has committed no crimes and led an exemplary life”, Calamari’s lawyer Nicholas Gravante said in an emailed statement on Tuesday. The office of Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance declined to comment. An indictment unsealed in July charged the Trump Organization and its CFO Allen Weisselberg with tax fraud arising from a probe into Trump’s business and its practices. That indictment said the company provided perks and benefits such as rent-free apartments and leased cars to Weisselberg and other officials without proper reporting on tax returns. Both Weisselberg and the company pleaded not guilty. Trump himself has not been charged. Earlier this month, a source told Reuters that the Manhattan district attorney had convened another grand jury to weigh possible new charges in a case involving the Trump Organization. The second grand jury was expected to examine how the company valued its assets. The criminal case stemmed from a probe by Vance in collaboration with New York State Attorney General Letitia James. Trump has called the charges politically motivated. Trump’s company operates hotels, golf courses, and resorts around the world. Before entering the White House in January 2017, Trump put it into a trust overseen by his adult sons Donald Jr. and Eric, as well as Weisselberg. Calamari’s son, Matthew Calamari Jr., testified before a grand jury in September and has immunity from possible prosecution, a source told Reuters earlier in November. (Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Bengaluru and Karen Freifeld in New York; Editing by Bill Berkrot) View the full article

Published by Radar Online She wasn’t born this way, but Lady Gagaalways knew she wanted to become a superstar. This is how it happened. For 19-year-oldStefani Germanotta, a little-known but scarily ambitious New York University dropout turned pop singer desperate to make a name for herself in the hipster club circuit of Manhattan’s Lower East Side, it was a pivotal moment. There she was, ready to sing some of her hot new material in a dingy dive, dressed to the max — a carefully calibrated mix of American Apparel promiscuity and Bride of Frankenstein weirdness. She downed a few drinks. She was ready. But the blasé crowd didn’t seem to care: they never stopped talking, barely mustering a glance at the stage. Enough, she thought. Without missing a beat, she peeled off her clothes, sat back down at the piano in a skimpy bra and panties, and started her set. Everyone shut up and listened. And they haven’t stopped listening since. mega Years later, Stefani, now better known as Lady Gaga — the biggest, wildest, least predictable pop star on the planet — told a reporter that her alter ego sprang to life that night, fully formed. “That’s when I made a real decision about what kind of pop star I wanted to be,” she said. “Because it was a performance-art moment then and there…. Unless you were in the audience in that very spontaneous moment, it doesn’t mean anything. It’s like, she took her clothes off, so sex sells, right? But in the context of that moment, in that neighborhood, in front of that audience, I was doing something radical.” Doing radical stuff has become a big business for Lady Gaga. Meat dresses. Bubble dresses. Meat bikinis. Naked thanksgivings. Flaming pianos. Music videos strewn with corpses, unicorns, and hunky, oiled-up Judases. It all works for her, brilliantly. She’s parlayed an unerring sense for crazy, high concept fashion, insanely catchy dance beats, larger-than-life oddness — and, yes, amazing talent as a singer, songwriter, and musician — into one of the quickest and quirkiest rides to superstardom ever. The numbers have become legendary: 12 straight No. 1 singles on the Billboard dance chart; 32 million Twitter followers; more than 23 million albums sold; more than one billion views of her videos on YouTube. Her fans — little Monsters, as she calls them — are fanatical, and her concerts are huge, meticulously produced extravaganzas. She’s the pop star we needed, the first true superstar of her era. She’s weirdly famous and famously weird. But still, everyone wonders: Who is Lady Gaga, really? And, most intriguing, how on earth did she get that way? “The goal has never been to be famous,” she says. “My goal has been to be a star.” She succeeded beyond anyone’s wildest imagination. Not surprisingly, trying to separate myth from reality in the astonishing tale of Lady Gaga’s meteoric rise from a nice Upper West Side girl into the biggest star in a generation is a bit like trying to separate a vapor trail from a streaking comet. Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta, born on March 28, 1986, grew up in Manhattan, in a nice, expensive duplex apartment, with loving parents. Her dad, Joseph, was an entrepreneur who made a fortune selling WiFi to hotels. Her early childhood was — dare we say it? — upper-middle-class ordinary. But practically from the time she could talk, one thing set her apart from the other kids in the affluent neighborhood: single-minded, unvarnished ambition. She started playing classical piano at age four — forced into it first by her mom but soon excelling to the point where her proud parents considered enrolling her in Juilliard. But she opted to take a different road: Catholic school. At age 11, she entered the Convent of the Sacred Heart, a prestigious private school (annual tuition: $35,000; her sister, Natali, six years younger, went there as well). The place had plenty of well-known alumni (including Caroline Kennedy). Still, one student a few years ahead of Stefi made an especially big impression: Paris Hilton, a socialite princess who was already the object of paparazzi fascination. “She became a bit obsessed with Paris,” says one Gaga friend from her Sacred Heart days. “Stefi was this sweet, slightly pudgy, short, weirdly dressed girl with a perma-tan. And Paris was a blonde goddess. Stefi would watch her, study the way she carried herself.” Years later, Gaga herself admitted: “I am fascinated with the blonde woman as a seductress. There’s a way that these women position themselves in front of the cameras. There’s a real art to fame.” Stefi was not, as she is quick to point out, one of the cool kids in high school. She was an unabashed theater nerd, taking lead roles in school productions of musicals like Guys and Dolls, squeezing in voice and acting lessons in her spare time. mega She played piano in school recitals. She went on auditions for TV and movie roles. She dressed in quirky, mismatched clothes. She was, literally and figuratively, a drama queen. Gaga says she suffered some nasty taunting from her classmates — some of whom called her “the Germ” behind her back — and characterizes the period as one that forever cemented her identification with outsiders. She described it in Rolling Stone as “Being teased for being ugly, having a big nose, being annoying, right? ‘your laugh is funny; you’re weird; why do you always sing; why are you so into theater; why do you do your makeup like that; what’s with your eyebrows…. Why do you have to look like that for school?’ I used to be called a slut. I didn’t even want to go to school sometimes.” But some of her former classmates remember it differently. “She was really a pretty popular kid,” says her high school pal. “She had a core group of good friends. And everyone knew her as the most talented one in the place.” Either way, she escaped more and more into her dreams of stardom. She started writing music, emulating the classic rock that her Baby Boomer parents loved — Billy Joel, Pink Floyd, the Beatles — and formed a band with her classmates. She began entering open-mic nights at local bars, always accompanied by one of her doting parents. But she left mom and dad behind to get a taste of the burgeoning, fashion-forward downtown and Manhattan nightlife on weekends. She began dressing more and more provocatively, making the most of her curvy, 5’1″ frame (“she was very big on cleavage,” her friend recalls); she got a fake ID and started sneaking into clubs on the Lower East Side. It was a world of avant-garde artists, musicians, actors, drag queens, freaks, and geeks. It all made a big impression on the little uptown girl, one that would help form her worldview, fashion sense, sense of who she was, and what she wanted to be. She graduated high school early, then enrolled in New York University’s well-regarded Tisch School of the Arts. Living in a dorm — on her own for the first time, at 17 — she became a regular fixture on the downtown scene. She fit in just fine at school, where she started focusing on the work of convention smashing modern artists like Spencer Tunick (known for photos of large groups of naked folks in public places) and Damien Hirst (famous for art pieces comprising dead sharks and cows, preserved in formaldehyde). She loved how they shocked people, engaging some, enraging others. At the same time, she immersed herself in the work of glam-rock stars like David Bowie, Queen, and Grace Jones. She began envisioning a new type of pop singer who combined performance art, modern music, theatrics, and sex in one intoxicating brew. The pull of stardom grew even stronger. mega After a year, she’d had enough — she had to take her shot. Nervously, Stefi approached her dad to tell him she was quitting school to pursue her dream. Joseph surprised her with a counter-proposal: he would financially support her for one year as she made a grab for stardom. After that, she was on her own. (In a highly unusual arrangement, she and her dad would reportedly come to sign a contract to split all her future earnings 50/50.) She rented a small walk-up apartment on the Lower East Side and began working full-time on her music, her look— everything. She had a year to make something happen. And the clock was ticking. It is said failure is an orphan, but success has many fathers. If that’s true, then few have had more fathers than Lady Gaga. She met one of them shortly after moving to the Lower East Side. She’d been touring lousy downtown bars with her lousy lo-fi rock band formed with some friends from NYU, mostly playing to tiny, disinterested crowds. The music was standard Fiona Apple–type singer/songwriter stuff, and the stage act was unmemorable. Still, she had … something. One person who noticed it right away was a singer and burlesque queen named Lady Starlight. She was a decade or so older, and she was at the apex of the downtown art scene. She knew all the players; she knew the hottest clubs and most exclusive parties. “I wanted to bring [Gaga] into my world,” she told the New York Post. She helped Stefi copy her look: heavy makeup; torn fishnets; huge, spiky heels; lots and lots of skin. mega Lady Starlight also introduced young Stefi to the world of hipster burlesque dancing. Together, they made the rounds with a wild act that was half performance art, half strip show: dancing on stage in thongs, singing songs about oral sex, and lighting cans of hairspray on fire. Not everyone was a fan. “My parents couldn’t look at me for months,” she said. She has characterized this as her wild period, one filled with cocaine and a slew of wildly inappropriate relationships with older men. Eventually, she would meet Lüc Carl, a self-fashioned “heavy metal drummer” who was tending the bar at a hipper-than-thou Lower East Side hotspot. A handsome, well-muscled dude prone to leather vests without shirts and a world-class mullet, he was her on-again, off-again boyfriend for years — and became the inspiration for many of her early songs. But two of the relationships from this period that would wind up having the most significant impact on her life and career happened by pure chance. One of her small gigs was seen by Wendy Starland, a singer who was friends with Rob Fusari, the 38-year-old producer known for crafting dance hits for Destiny’s Child and Whitney Houston. Fusari had asked Starland to help him find a singer under 25 to front a band, someone an audience wouldn’t want to take their eyes off of. He was looking for a once-in-a-lifetime star. Bursting with excitement, Starland called the producer minutes after seeing Stefi onstage. “Why are you waking me up?” he asked. “I found the girl,” she replied. mega A meeting was set up. Fusari wasn’t bowled over at first. He’s been quoted as saying Stefi looked “totally Jersey Shore…like something out of Goodfellas. She was a little overweight. She looked like she was ready to make us pasta.” But he took a 180-degree turn once he heard her sing and play the piano. Fantastic voice, great keyboard skills, awesome stage presence, so-so songs, he thought. Maybe, just maybe, this was the star he was looking for. They worked on writing and recording rock songs for months, but they didn’t seem to be gelling; the earnest singer/songwriter mode didn’t fit. Fusari recommended that Stefi switch to a far more popular genre, one that would be far more saleable to record labels: beat-heavy dance music. She fought it at first — after all, she was a rock’ n’ roll chick at heart. But it was a eureka moment, and she never looked back. She merged the flamboyant songcraft of Queen or Bowie with dark, propulsive Eurodisco beats and state-of-the-art production. It may not have been thought-provoking, but it was sexy, accessible, and almost frighteningly catchy. Eager for a full star makeover, Stefi Germanotta no longer felt like a Stefi Germanotta. She has said that the name Lady Gaga came from a text sent to her from her producer, in which “radio Ga Ga” — one of her favorite Queen songs, and a nickname he had for her — was mistakenly autocorrected to “Lady Gaga.” Wendy Starland says it was the product of marketing discussions. Either way, Stefi ceased to exist. From this point forward, she was Lady Gaga. mega The first big breakthrough happened shortly after that. In late 2006, one of her new songs, “Beautiful, Dirty, Rich,” made its way to Island Def Jam, a label specializing in hip-hop and R&B, and its CEO, L.A. Reid, the guy who helped make Kanye West and Mariah Carey (and later Justin Bieber) into mega successes. Reid wasn’t quite sure what to make of Gaga, but he decided to take a chance. “LA told me I was a star,” Gaga recalled. And he backed up his words with cold, hard cash: reportedly an $850,000 contract, an almost-unheard-of sum for a new artist. Gaga was on her way. Unfortunately, Lady Gaga’s first taste of real success was short-lived. In the panic-ridden, ever-shrinking post-iTunes music industry, fortunes shift with the wind. Only three months after he signed her to his label, L.A. Reid sat with some of his top execs in an Island Def Jam conference room and listened to a few of Gaga’s newest tracks. According to those present, Reid leaned back and made a slitting motion across his throat. And just like that, Gaga’s contract was dropped. She did what most 20-year-old girls would have done: she retreated to her apartment and cried for days. It was a devastating blow, the first time she allowed herself to think that maybe she wouldn’t be a star after all. She ate junk food. She wallowed in depression. She watched monster movies on TV. But then something happened: she got angry. And she became even more laser-focused than ever. As she told New York Magazine years later: “That’s when I started the real devotion to my music and art.” She continued to refine her music, her ever-more-flamboyant stage show, and outfits — even her figure. Always a bit on the chunky side, Gaga cut down on the pizza and pasta — her twin demons — and joined a gym for the first time. Before long, she lost 15 lbs. and threw herself into a new, critically acclaimed burlesque show with Lady Starlight. mega A music-biz dictum says that true talent can’t be contained for long, and that’s certainly true in the story of Lady Gaga. Her producers were still knocking on record-label doors, and in mid-2007, Gaga got a meeting with Jimmy Iovine, the legendary head of Interscope Records. The Brooklyn-born Iovine is famous for having the best ear in the business — one that detected the early potential of stars ranging from U2 to Eminem. Gaga showed up for her first meeting wearing mini shorts, go-go boots, and a tiny cutoff top. According to one source, the Interscope folks weren’t sure that Gaga was pretty enough to be a headline act. So, at the same time she was recording new songs with one of the label’s top producers, Interscope had her writing tunes for some of their other artists, including Britney Spears and the Pussycat Dolls. mega Meanwhile, the label cranked up the star-development machine. She was set up to play at Lollapalooza, the enormous multi-day outdoor rock festival. But it didn’t go particularly well. Playing one of the smallest stages, her music system was faulty, and the stage bounced every time she moved. Worse still: swarming reporters thought she was Amy Winehouse. With her Goth look and brunette bouffant, Gaga looked like Amy’s evil twin. Interscope executives told her that she should dye her hair platinum blonde. She did. Everything was finally starting to click. Everything, that is, but Gaga’s love life. As one of Lüc Carl’s buddies explains: “Lüc is a rock’ n’ roll guy, and he really doesn’t like pop. As [Gaga] became more successful, he began to look down on her for choosing to make dance music.” During one of the last of their epic, drama-filled breakups (she has compared their relationship to Sandy and Danny, the main characters from Grease), she told Lüc, “Someday, when we’re not together, you won’t be able to order a cup of coffee at the f*cking deli without hearing or seeing me.” After Akon, one of Interscope’s biggest stars heard tracks from Gaga’s soon-to-be-released debut album, the fame, he urged the label to throw all its marketing and development muscle behind the new artist. They hired a top choreographer to work on her dance moves; theatrical experts to help transform her eccentric live shows into flashy, sexy, high-tech masterpieces; and stylists, including the much-sought-after Nicola Formichetti, to elevate and conceptualize her look. “[The Interscope executives said,] “‘You look like a stripper,’” Gaga told New York Magazine. “I said: ‘Is this the only major label on planet Earth that is asking a female pop artist to put more clothes on?’” She moved to Los Angeles to work more closely with her creative team, which she dubbed Haus of Gaga, envisioning it as a modern version of Andy Warhol’s factory. mega In late summer 2008, her debut album was released and slowly began making its way up the charts — led by wildly addictive singles like “Just Dance,” about getting trashed in clubs, and “Poker face,” about bisexuality (Gaga says that both songs are based on her own experiences). She crossed the US, touring nonstop: gay clubs, cowboy joints, Top 40 clubs, you name it. Every night, it was a new city. Then, Interscope gave Gaga her first taste of bigger venues, booking her as the New Kids’ opening act on the Block’s US tour, then the Pussycat Dolls’ tour in Europe. According to sources, she didn’t get along too well with either band. “Here is this chick dressed like a disco alien, wanting to do these elaborate sets with half-naked male dancers and weird props and video screens,” says one person who worked on both tours. “No one knew what to make of her.” More to the point, jealousy reared its ugly head when Gaga began to outdraw the headliners. By the end of the Pussycat Dolls tour, her album was nearing No. 1 on the UK charts, and she was becoming a bona fide sensation. She started taking off in the US as well. Her singles were in heavy rotation; there were Grammy nominations and a series of increasingly outrageous TV appearances. She launched The Fame Ball Tour across America, her first major-venue headlining tour. She created music videos that harked back to the heyday of Michael Jackson. And, most notoriously, she spewed blood in her number at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards. Suddenly Gaga was everywhere. Since then, life has played out like a fever dream that might have been experienced by a young Stefi Germanotta, fantasizing about superstardom in her parents’ uptown duplex, like performing at the NFL’s famed Half-Time Show. mega At the end of 2009, there was another album, the Fame Monster, which quickly shot to No. 1, and she kicked off The Monster Ball Tour, a colossal, international-arena show that continued for more than a year and a half and snared $227 million — one of the highest-grossing tours in history. (But not one of the most profitable; a cross between Cirque du Soleil and the seventh circle of Hell, the evolution-themed production cost so much to mount that it lost money). Born This Way, her third album was released in 2011. Not only was it a massive hit, but its title song became a rallying cry for the gay community, one that Gaga has actively supported over the years. Elton John called it “the gayest song ever.” In 2013, she wrapped up her third huge global tour and released an eagerly anticipated new album, Artpop. But even in the hermetically sealed, carefully engineered life of Lady Gaga, not everything is fresh-cut roses and frolicking unicorns. There have been troubling recent accounts of continuing battles with weight, including an all-too-apparent 25-lb. gain in 2012. Her record label ordered looser-fitting outfits for the remainder of her tour and told her to work off the poundage. Another health issue: Gaga has tested borderline-positive for Lupus, the disease that killed her aunt at an early age. And there have been legal woes as well, including a $30 million lawsuit from the former producer and songwriting partner Rob Fusari, claiming that he was largely responsible for her success and demanding a bigger chunk of the spoils. The case was eventually settled. mega “My ride through the industry was an interesting one because people loved me, but there was a very big raised eyebrow about me,” Gaga told one reporter after the suit. “And as soon as I took off, it was like, ‘I invented her, I made her, I wrote the music.’ When in reality, I am completely self-invented.” Others would disagree with that. Madonna, especially, seems in virtually every way (except for her self-seriousness and faux Brit accent) to be a prototype for Gaga — the Catholic, Italian-American background; the lower East Side gay-club roots; the pulsing dance tunes; the taboo-breaking videos; the sex; even the ever-morphing costumed personas. Many have noticed the striking similarities between “Born this way,” and Madonna’s 1989 hit “Express Yourself.” Madge, publicly at least, has taken the high road. “When I heard [‘Born This way’] on the radio, I said, ‘That sounds very familiar.’ It feels reductive,” she said on 20/20. “I certainly think she references me a lot in her work…. There’s a lot of ways to look at it. I can’t really be annoyed by it because, obviously, I’ve influenced her.” Not every pop star is so charitable. Fellow glam-art rocker Grace Jones told UK’s The Guardian, “Well, you know, I’ve seen some things she’s worn that I’ve worn. And that does kind of piss me off.” MIA has said of Gaga: “She’s not progressive, but she’s a good mimic. She sounds more like me than I f–king do! She’s the industry’s last stab at making itself important.” Even Katy Perry called one of her videos “blasphemous.” Gaga takes it all in stride. As for Stefi? She has completely ceased to exist. Like Norman Bates at the end of Psycho, the fictional alter ego has overtaken the real person. These days, Gaga is never seen in public without her full stage makeup and freak-chic disco outfits. In her downtime, she obsessively surfs the web, reads stories about herself, or watches her beloved monster movies and Family Guy reruns. But she stays in character, according to those who know her, even in private. “Lady Gaga is my name,” she has said. “If you know me and you call me Stefani, you don’t really know me at all.” mega View the full article

Published by AFP Luxury shops in San Francisco's Union Square have been particular targets in the surge of Washington (AFP) – US retailers are adding security and locking up goods after flash mob heists involving dozens of thieves at once stunned luxury stores in the San Francisco area and beyond, as the holiday shopping season opens. In the most shocking of recent thefts, around 80 masked people in 25 cars raided a high-end Nordstrom department store in Walnut Creek, California east of San Francisco on Saturday, plundering its first-floor luxury goods counters in just a few minutes before fleeing. That took place one day after 40 people drove up and swarmed a Louis Vuitton store in San Francisco’s Union Square, emptying its shelves in seconds before jumping in cars to speed away. And near Chicago, also hit by a series of similar thefts, a gang of 14 crooks swept into a Louis Vuitton store in the Oak Brook suburb, snatching more than $100,000 worth of luxury bags and garments. It was the third such attack on a Chicago-area Vuitton outlet in a month. Retailers around the country are taking notice and precautions against possible copycat hits as the sheer size of the robbery gangs and their ability to plan secretly have made them nearly impossible to halt. “The level of organized retail theft we are seeing is simply unacceptable,” California Governor Gavin Newsom said Tuesday. “Businesses and customers should feel safe while doing their holiday shopping.” The thefts come at a key moment on the shopping calendar. Thursday is Thanksgiving, and the day after the holiday has been nicknamed “Black Friday,” the traditional kickoff to America’s frenzied Christmas shopping season. Newsom ordered a special task force in the California Highway Patrol to work with local officials to address the theft problem. Despite the action, the number of flash mob thefts multiplied, with a jewelry store in Hayward near San Francisco hit by a group of between 30 and 40. In nearby Oakland a streetwear store was cleaned out: security video shows more than 30 masked, hooded people squeezing into the small shop, grabbing collectable shoes and garb and rushing out in under a minute. Flash mob thefts, also dubbed “flash robs,” have been around for years, but have accelerated in 2021, besetting owners of small pharmacies, mid-level chain clothing stores and top-end luxury goods alike. But the sheer size and speed of the Nordstrom attack in Walnut Creek stunned many. “I wouldn’t even characterize that as organized crime, that was domestic terrorism,” Rachel Michelin, president of the California Retailers Association told Fox40 television in Sacramento. Brazen and graphic Jeffrey Ian Ross, a criminologist at the University of Baltimore, said there is nothing indicating that overall retail theft in the country has risen significantly. But he said the spread of video footage of the heists on news and social media may have inspired others to copy them. “It’s brazen, it’s graphic,” he said. Ross said that police, already burdened by rising murder cases and other violent crime, “just can’t keep up” with the volume of stolen goods and the people who resell them. What remained unclear are the ties if any between the multiple group thefts in the San Francisco area, how the participants communicate and coordinate, and how any organized fencing operation might work. Only three people have been confirmed arrested in the Walnut Creek robbery, out of the estimated 80-plus people who took part. On Tuesday San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin announced felony charges against nine people in store robberies, including the Louis Vuitton store in Union Square. Michelin, though, said that California could need tougher laws against this kind of crime, where social media appears to be used to coordinate the culprits. “We’re going to have those uncomfortable conversations and have a look at some of the laws on the books,” she told Fox40. “Obviously they aren’t working.” View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Adam Driver took a pair of Gucci shoes home from the ‘House of Gucci’ set, but he snubbed the suits. The 38-year-old actor plays Maurizio Gucci, one-time head of the fashion house, in the movie, and while he decided to treat himself to a pair of Gucci shoes after filming wrapped, he opted against taking any of the suave suits because he didn’t want to feel like his character off-set. He said: “I didn’t take the suits. I took a pair of Gucci shoes. “I always find from when I work on a movie and you’re wearing a costume 14 hours a day for months, always something weird happens where I start to feel like, ‘Oh. This is actually who I am. This is my identity. I’ve been doing it wrong this whole time.’ “And then, you get back to reality and you put the clothes on that you’ve taken from set, because you’re like, ‘This is great.’ And then you pretty soon are like, ‘What? What am I doing? This is not who I am at all.’ “ Driver admitted that also happened to him on historical drama movie ‘The Last Duel’, but joked if he wore his chain mail to the bank staff might think he was about to rob the place. Speaking to Screen Rant, he added: “And that’s what happened with this, regardless if it was Gucci. I mean ‘Last Duel’, you put chain mail on. “After a certain point, you’re like, ‘Actually, think I can kind of pull… You know? I could do this at the bank.’ “And then you get back in reality and realise, ‘No, probably people would construe this as robbery.’ “ This comes after Driver’s ‘House of Gucci’ co-star Lady Gaga joked she probably “annoyed” him on set by remaining in her Italian accent throughout the motion picture. Gaga – who portrays Patrizia Reggiani, who was convicted of hiring a hitman to kill her ex-husband Maurizio – said: “I started in the voice six months before we started shooting and I stayed in it for the whole of filming, which I am sure was super annoying for Adam. “For me I thought it was harder to go in and out, so I stayed in character.” Gaga – whose parents both have Italian ancestry – admitted she felt “so excited” to work alongside Driver, and that was one of the reasons she signed up for the film. View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English A previously unreleased Whitney Houston demo has been released as a part of a new NFT collection. The pop superstar – who died in 2012 and was known for hits ‘I Will Always Love You’ and ‘I Wanna Dance with Somebody’ – is being offered as part of an upcoming NFT which will see the demo auctioned off to auctioned off next month as a single “OneOf One Iconic” item. Pat Houston, executor of Whitney’s estate said in a statement: “I’m excited to see Whitney’s legacy and her wonderful music expand into bold new technology of this era.” An NFT is a non-fungible token, which operates almost as a one-of-a-kind trading card and at their highest level are part of Ethereum cryptocurrency. The winning bidder will gain access to the song demo in the OneOfVault as well as a video that has been digitally 17-year-old artist Diana Sinclair which features archival footage of the legendary musician. Pat Houston added: “It was a joy partnering with 17-year-old Diana Sinclair and watching the artistry of Whitney’s music influence a new generation.” For gaming fans who miss out on the coveted never-before-released demo song, there are still other tiers of Whitney-themed NFTs up for grabs. Thousands of fixed-price NFTs tiered as Golden, Platinum and Diamond will be available, with the first two featuring artwork of the singer inspired by her hit songs ‘I Will Always Love You’ from ‘The Bodyguard’ and ‘The Greatest Love of All.’ Proceeds from the sales of the collection will benefit the Whitney E. Houston Foundation, which aims to inspire the creative youth of today. View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Peter Jackson would have cast John Lennon as Gollum in ‘Lord of the Rings’. The 60-year-old filmmaker – who is at the helm of new documentary series ‘The Beatles: Get Back’ – has opened up on the Fab Four’s nixed plans to make a live action musical movie based on J.R.R. Tolkien’s fantasy novels, and he’s weighed on how the casting could have gone with Sir Paul McCartney, Sir Ringo Starr, John Lennon and George Harrison taking on the lead roles. Appearing on ‘The Late Show’, he told host Stephen Colbert: “Obviously Paul is Frodo, isn’t he? Sam is obviously Ringo. So then you’ve got, well, John is Gollum obviously. “They cast themselves, and they did it right. Gandalf is George the mystic, magician, that’s perfect. I mean you’d have to age him up a bit. “And I guess if you had have Gollum, and you had the four Beatles, John Lennon is the obvious one, absolutely, slam dunk.” In the end, the ‘Hey Jude’ hitmakers didn’t get the rights to the movie, and Jackson would later go on to direct the big screen trilogy. Meanwhile, the director explained who Apple film producer Denis O’Dell originally had the idea, but it didn’t get off the ground. He told the BBC: “Ultimately, they couldn’t get the rights from Tolkien, because he didn’t like the idea of a pop group doing his story. So it got nixed by him. “They tried to do it. There’s no doubt about it. For a moment in time they were seriously contemplating doing that at the beginning of 1968.” Jackson admitted he was in “two minds” about the quartet’s version never getting made. He explained: “Paul said, ‘Well I’m glad we didn’t do it, because you got to do yours and I liked your film.’ “But I said to him, ‘Well, it’s a shame you didn’t do it, because it would have been a musical.’ What would The Beatles have done with a Lord of The Rings soundtrack album? “That would have been 14 or 15 Beatles songs that would have been pretty incredible to listen to. So I’ve got two minds about it. “I would have loved to hear that album, but I’m also glad I got the chance to do the films. But those songs would have been fascinating.” View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Billy Porter thinks of himself as “spiritual” after becoming unsure about his belief in God following his upbringing around the church. The ‘Pose’ star reflected on his relationship with religion despite his agnostic position upsetting his mother – who raised him in the Pentecostal Church – as he noted he does believe in “a higher power”. The 52-year-old actor told the ‘Table Manners’ podcast with Jessie and Lennie Ware: “I don’t know. I don’t know. That hurts my mother’s feelings. I know it hurts her feelings. It hurts her heart so much. And I don’t know. I don’t know, “I do believe in something in something, I do believe in a higher power. I don’t know any more if that is simply out of habit. Because I don’t know anything else. “And I’m afraid to not believe in something. Because, like my grandmother said, ‘If you don’t believe in something, you’ll fall for anything. You gotta believe in something, or you’ll fall for anything.’ “ Billy labelled himself and his wedding five years ago to eyewear entrepreneur Adam Smith as “spiritual” instead of religious. He explained: ”It was a was a legal ceremony. Yeah. But it wasn’t religious. It was spiritual. Yeah, you know, I’m spiritual. I really do believe in spirit, I do believe in a higher calling, a higher level of consciousness. You know, I do believe that, you know, God is the word that we most know. “I do believe that energy is inside of all of us. Personally, how we access that, how we share that is our life’s work. You know, that’s my life’s work, is how I share that energy. You know, I try to be the change that I want to see.” The ‘Cinderella’ star said the church was “what I grew up with”. He added: “You know, so coming out in the church, being young, when that was happening. And then, you know, I mean, I can talk about this because I talk about it in my book, but I was molested by my stepfather.” Billy also recognised that much of who he is comes from “those teachings” however expressed disgust at hypocrisy after he experienced negative aspects of it. He said: “The human being that I am is because of those teachings. A lot of those teachings. My problem is, so many of those people don’t live by those teachings. So many of those people don’t practice what they preach. I stand at the intersection of holding that community accountable. Your language is murderous, you’re killing people. “I have a Bible too. I know what it says. And you are not practising what that book says. And somebody needs to call you out for that. All of you evangelicals who stand behind that Bible and act like [President Donald] Trump is the saviour, f*** you. Somebody needs to say it.” View the full article

Published by DPA European Commissioner for Values and Transparency Vera Jourova gives a press conference on proposals to reinforce democracy and the integrity of elections. Lukasz Kobus/European Commission/dpa The European Union could soon ban targeted online political advertising using sensitive personal data without user consent under new European Commission proposals published on Thursday. “Elections must not be a competition of opaque and non-transparent methods,” said commission Vice President Vera Jourova in a press release. “People must know why they are seeing an ad, who paid for it, how much, [and] what micro-targeting criteria were used,” said the commissioner whose portfolio covers values and transparency. The proposals come after years of concern that voters in the EU are vulnerable to manipulation from hostile actors on social media. Jourova told journalists in Brussels that the Cambridge Analytica scandal provided a “glimpse” into the risks posed by targeted online advertising. The data analytics company was accused of harvesting the Facebook data of millions of users for work aiding the pro-Brexit campaign as well as former US president Donald Trump’s 2016 White House bid. Under the proposed regulations, targeted political advertisements based on sensitive data like sexual orientation and religious beliefs are to be banned, unless the user explicitly consents. In addition, new transparency labels must show social media users who financed and by how much the political advert they are seeing. The label also needs to explain the relevant connection to current political events like referendums or elections. The commission aims for the rules to be in place by 2024. A recent Eurobarometer survey showed that nearly four out of ten Europeans have been exposed to content where they could not easily determine whether it was a political advertisement or not. European Commissioner for Values and Transparency Vera Jourova gives a press conference on proposals to reinforce democracy and the integrity of elections. Lukasz Kobus/European Commission/dpa View the full article