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It does look like rock super group U2 is about to announce something for its 50th anniversary.
A new post has gone up on social media showing the video history of the band. It ends with them preparing for what could be a worldwide tour.
We already knew a new album was being worked on. U2 has already issued a couple of EPs and single in the last year. The album was inevitable. A new single, “Silencio,” is coming next Friday.
Donald Trump says he’s banning CNN, Politico, and MS Now from the White House.
So far, he hasn’t done anything actually, and is just threatening or talking through his ass, as usual.
He can’t really ban any press organization. In the past he tried this with the Associated Press, and also with CNN’s Jim Acosta. The courts overturned those declarations right away.
What a tool this guy is. It’s just another distraction from Iran, Epstein, and inflation.
The record business is not a happy place this week.
The number 1 album, “Westside Whimsy,” by Jhené Aiko sold just 73,400 copies. Most of that was from streaming.
It was one of the lowest selling weeks in chart history.
The most CDs and downloads sold were from KPop group Stray Kids, with 22,000.
The number 50 album was a re-entry of Harry Styles’ latest album with with 15,500 copies — almost all from streaming, too.
With all the talk about rapper Macklemore, he didn’t sell enough of anything to make the top 50.
How are record companies paying salaries, and so on? Beats me. It’s a serious situation.
Everyone is counting on Miley Cyrus’s excellent new “Bass Persuades” album to kickstart sales. Right now, the album is taking up slots 2 and 3 on iTunes. There are 10 songs on the album, and at least two of them are gems that should be heard on the radio right now — “Let’s Get Married” and “REDLIGHTS.” Miley is inconsistent in her releases, but this one is a winner.
Frankie Muniz played the wily Malcolm on the hit “Malcolm in the Middle” for years.
When the show was over, he seemed to step away from showbiz and became a race car driver.
More recently, he returned for the “Malcolm” reunion on Netflix.
On September 1st, he posted to Twitter one word: Struggling.
Today, he’s posted at length about his life falling apart. Seems like a cry for help. Muniz announced in July he and his wife were divorcing after six years. They posted a video of themselves dancing joyfully with their toddler son, which seemed odd and inappropriate.
I don’t know what else is going on, but hopefully the people who love him can get him off social media and arrange for support and assistance.
The last 6 weeks of my life have been a nightmare I’m praying to wake up from. Everything felt heavy, unclear, and like it was falling apart at the same time. I wouldn’t wish this season on anyone.
The unexpected gift in the middle of it is that I’ve had nowhere to hide. I’ve… pic.twitter.com/CwnqJ7k7Er
Tom Cruise is about to open a new movie, called “Digger.”
The movie is an original, not a sequel. It’s a gamble, to be sure. He’s not playing Maverick or Ethan Cane from “Top Gun” and “Mission Impossible.”
“Digger” also seems like it’s social satire, not an action film.
So Tom, smart as a whip, is on a mega publicity tour.
First he gave an information free interview to GQ magazine, which resulted in a 30 minute interview of typical Cruise platitudes. Every Cruise publicity tour is full of speeches about how he grew up on the magic of movies He also appears in photos meant to be a a little “racy,” with his shirt open and pants unbuttoned. .
On Sunday, he turned up in Taylor Swift’s booth at the Kansas City Chiefs game to watch her husband, Travis Kelce. The long lens cameras went crazy documenting their substance-less meeting.
Last night Tom appeared on Jimmy Fallon’s Tonight show, for a recap of the Swift adventure. Then he and Fallon played an amusing game of getting hitched up to wires, floating through the air and acting as human claws in an arcade game.
Through it all, not a single personal question is asked. No mention of kids, partner, or Scientology, the religious cult he represents.
Coming back to the popularity of Taylor and Travis, Tom was also on the Kelce brothers podcast, where he continued to say nothing. You can fast forward through it below. Millions of Taylor Swift fans way too young to know who Tom Cruise is, are getting a full dose of his charming smile.
More appearances are coming, no doubt, before the October 2nd premiere. “Digger” remains a mystery, even its trailers aren’t helpful establishing what the movie and why people should see it. Critics get a look at it tomorrow in New York and Los Angeles. With Oscar winner director Alejandro Innaritu in charge, we know it’s going to be of interest.
But keep in mind how Tom conducts this campaign. He has nothing to do with Taylor Swift or Travis Kelce, but suddenly he’s their biggest fan. He wants that magic to wear off on him. It will be instructive to see where he goes with this next week. Usually there’s a New York premiere, with a lot of hoopla, where he goes out and shakes hands and signs a million autographs.
Tony winning composer Duncan Sheik has died at 56. His family says it’s from cardiac arrest.
Two nights ago, the family posted on Instagram that Sheik was in the hospital and very ill.
The writer of the Broadway hit “Spring Awakening,” he was also known for his big chart hit, “Barely Breathing,” in the 90s.
He had a new show, called Memoirs of Amorous Gentlemen, a musical set to begin performances on September 25, 2026, at The Night Egg at the Culture Club in New York.
So I can tell you what Alex Gibney told me tonight.
Universal Pictures will be distributing his “Musk” documentary around the world, as planned.
There was a brief moment of hesitation, but the studio sees the big picture and will continue with its original plan.
Bleecker Street and HBO are distributing in the US and Canada, also as planned. Gibney says they’ve both been amazing, and cited HBO for its steadfastness.
Our conversation took place after the screening of Gibney’s other doc that’s about to be released, “Knife: The Attempted Murder of Salman Rushdie,” the remarkable story of writer Salman Rushdie’s 2022 stabbing at the Chautauqua Festival in upstate New York.
By the way, the attempted murderer, Hadi Matar, has been convicted at the state and federal levels, and is going to be in prison for life.
Gibney’s doc, made with extraordinary footage provided by Rushie’s wife, Rachel Eliza Griffiths, opens today in New York before going wide across the country. It’s a riveting piece of work that shows the attack on the writer and how he managed to come back from it.
Rushdie and Griffith attended a private screening last night in New York followed by a reception at Barbuto restaurant. Rushdie was too exhausted to make the party after a Q&A, but Griffith is his able ambassador who accepted kudos from a room full of documentary filmmakers.
As for “Musk,” Gibney, Bleecker, and HBO send it into the world on October 9th in New York and Los Angeles, followed by a wide release. By all accounts, Elon Musk is unmasked in many ways in this film, which is even more important now that we’re learning how dangerous AI is becoming.
He says right now on Twitter that ” the film will be released in theaters in the US, starting on October 9. Bleecker Street is the theatrical distributor. Following theatrical and pay-per-view, HBO will stream the film in the US. It will also be released in Canada by Elevation.”
Beyond that, he doesn’t know what will happen.
The film will be released in theaters in the US, starting on October 9. Bleecker Street is the theatrical distributor. Following theatrical and pay-per-view, HBO will stream the film in the US. It will also be released in Canada by Elevation. https://t.co/NUtTVpk5RN
There’s a report this morning that Universal could back out of their worldwide distribution deal. Steve Zeitchik writes in the Hollywood Reporter that Universal “is not committed” to the original plan, and could let the producers sell it elsewhere.
For Universal, part of NBC Universal, this seems like a curveball. The company is already no favorite of Donald Trump and usually doesn’t care what outsiders think.
Gibney’s film is said to deliver devastating blows to Elon Musk’s reputation.
Zeitchik says that two sources have told him “they believed that Universal would ultimately decide against releasing the film and return rights to the movie to filmmakers.”
That would certainly leave the good people at Universal in an awkward situation to explain out and out censorship and cowardice.
The head of the Kennedy Center, Matt Floca, insists they’re only closing “for a week,” to make repairs.
Rep. Joyce Beatty, currently in court with the Kennedy Center board of which she’s a non voting member, wants assurances.
In the center of this chaos is Donald Trump’s sick obsession to put his name on the building and wipe out the Kennedy legacy.
In a new court filing today, Beatty asks Judge Christopher Cooper to make it clear Donald Trump cannot demolish the theater.
She has reason to worry. Trump is famous for violating orders 40 plus years ago in New York and knocking down the Bonwit Teller department store in the middle of the night. More recently, he surreptitiously destroyed the East Wing of the White House to build his unsanctioned ballroom.
The new motion cites the emergency shut down of the Center.
“This directly contravenes the Court’s preliminary injunction. It is a recipe for Defendants extending their shutdown forever and closing the Kennedy Center for the next two years—the very thing this Court said they could not do without its permission. Finally, Defendants cannot point to any new meaningful information or true exigency to justify this sudden shutdown. Instead, they merely say that Mr. Floca reviewed the existing evidence—including prior building plans—and decided a closure was necessary. This was not permissible under the Court’s order.”
Tomorrow evening at 6:30 PM, a group called Hands Around the Kennedy Center will form a human chain on the property to call attention to the building’s perilous status.
They say, “With the future still very much uncertain, now more than ever, the Center needs you to stand up for freedom of expression and against authoritarian overreach into arts and culture institutions.”
At this point, they may have to camp out there for the winter.
Meantime, PS, the likelihood of Kennedy Center Honors this December is diminishing quickly. Even if Trump decided to stage the event somewhere else in Washington, who in their right mind would accept the Honor now?
