1 min read

OpenAI film ‘Artificial,’ dropped by Amazon, finds a new home with Neon

NEW YORK | “Artificial,” Luca Guadagnino’s starry film about Sam Altman and OpenAI, has been acquired by the indie distributor Neon after it was dropped by Amazon MGM Studios. Neon said Tuesday that it bought the film following a bidding process. Amazon dropped the nearly complete $40 million film, starring Andrew Garfield as Altman, earlier […]

2 mins read

Los Angeles medical examiner says former child actor Daveigh Chase died of AIDS

LOS ANGELES | Former child actor Daveigh Chase’s death on June 16 was due to AIDS, the office of the County of Los Angeles Medical Examiner reported. The cause of death for Chase, 35, was acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, according to online medical examiner records from this week that listed her last name as Schwallier. “Chronic […]

9 mins read

How some in Palestinian diaspora find connection, identity and resilience in traditional embroidery

Decades later, Samar Kabouli still fondly recalls gathering with women in her family and sipping cardamom-spiced coffee as they embroidered fabric with colorful threads in traditional Palestinian patterns. Born in Lebanon to Palestinian refugees, Kabouli had never seen her parents’ homeland. But more than just making pretty designs, the threads in her needle were stitching […]

8 mins read

A Jefferson for every era, from Lincoln to Trump, and the contradictions that endure

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. | He’s a prize-winning presidential historian who wrote an entire biography of Thomas Jefferson. But even Jon Meacham needs to think for a moment before defining what it means to be a “Jeffersonian.” “Well for a long time, before the civil rights movement, it meant to be more inclined toward states’ rights and […]

6 mins read

Movie Review: Sex is on the menu in Olivia Wilde’s dinner party comedy of manners ‘The Invite’

Soufflé is for dinner but much more is on the table in Olivia Wilde’s deliciously entertaining chamber comedy, “The Invite,” about a couple whose marriage is on the rocks who invite their upstairs neighbors over for an impromptu get-together. Such a gathering is, of course, a standby setup of stage and screen, alike. Faster than […]

5 mins read

Greece bets on space technology to contain wildfires

ATHENS, Greece | In the searing Mediterranean summer, wildfires turn dangerous in minutes. Greece has learned that at a terrible cost. In 2018, a blaze east of Athens moved with ferocious speed, killing more than 100 people. Five years later, a massive fire tore through a remote nature reserve; it was the largest wildfire ever […]

4 mins read

Pope begs breakaway traditionalist group to back off bishop consecrations

ROME | Pope Leo XIV on Tuesday begged a breakaway group of traditionalist Catholics to call off its plan to consecrate new bishops without his consent, calling the move a schismatic act and a “sin of extreme gravity.” “I plead with you and ask you with all my heart: please turn back!” Leo wrote in […]

7 mins read

Why most Black Americans say they never fly the American flag, according to a new AP-NORC poll

DETROIT | Jerry Esters proudly displays the American flag each day on his Detroit home. A few miles away, Yvonne Pistochini says there is no scenario under which she would allow the Stars and Stripes to cast its shadow where she lives. Both are Black. For Esters, the flag represents the opportunities that allowed the […]

7 mins read

Gender-bending is now part of menswear. Paris runways show how mainstream it has become

PARIS | This was men’s fashion season. The women were everywhere. They walked the coed Paris runways at Amiri and Ami. At Vetements, women modeled many of the “menswear” looks, and Sharon Stone closed the show in thigh-high boots. Inside fashion, none of this was eyebrow-raising. The gender blur was not happening on the margins. […]

2 mins read

Film academy invites 529 new members, including Jenna Ortega, the Safdie brothers and Jacob Elordi

NEW YORK | The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences on Wednesday invited 529 members to the Oscar voting body, a new class that brings the group’s membership to nearly double what it was a decade ago. Among those who received invites are “One Battle After Another” nominee Teyana Taylor, Josh O’Connor, Jenna Ortega, […]