Artists on The Verge, Cultural Events, Entertainment, Film Projects

Oscars: ‘Roma,’ ‘Favourite’ Top Nominations With 10 Apiece

The 91st Annual Academy Awards will air Feb. 24 on ABC.

The Academy unveiled its 2019 Oscar nominations early Tuesday morning, with The Favourite and Roma leading all films with 10 nods apiece. Both movies are nominated for best picture for the 91st Oscars alongside BlacKkKlansman, Black Panther, Bohemian Rhapsody, Green Book, A Star Is Born and Vice.

A Star Is Born and Vice also were dominant in the 2019 Oscar nominations, earning eight apiece, followed by Black Panther with seven, BlacKkKlansman with six and Bohemian Rhapsody and Green Book with five each. Meanwhile, in the directing category, Spike Lee earned his first-ever best directing Oscar nom for BlacKkKlansman, while A Star Is Born director Bradley Cooper was among the snubs, though he did earn a best acting nomination. Lee will vie with Alfonso Cuaron (Roma), Yorgos Lanthimos (The Favourite), Adam McKay (Vice) and Pawel Pawlikowski (Cold War) for the honor of best director at the 2019 Oscars.

The Oscar nominations announcement took place at the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater, with Kumail Nanjiani and Tracee Ellis Ross hosting. The 91st annual Academy Awards will be presented once again at the Dolby Theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center in Hollywood. The show will air live Sunday, Feb. 24, on ABC.

A full list of nominees follows. Keep up with all the latest news and analysis leading up to the 91st annual Academy Awards here.

Black Panther (Kevin Feige, Producer)
BlacKkKlansman (Sean McKittrick, Jason Blum, Raymond Mansfield, Jordan Peele and Spike Lee, Producers)
Bohemian Rhapsody (Graham King, Producer)
The Favourite (Ceci Dempsey, Ed Guiney, Lee Magiday and Yorgos Lanthimos, Producers)
Green Book (Jim Burke, Charles B. Wessler, Brian Currie, Peter Farrelly and Nick Vallelonga, Producers)
Roma (Gabriela Rodriguez and Alfonso Cuaron, Producers)
A Star Is Born (Bill Gerber, Bradley Cooper and Lynette Howell Taylor, Producers)
Vice (Dede Gardner, Jeremy Kleiner, Adam McKay and Kevin Messick, Producers)

Alfonso Cuaron (Roma)
Yorgos Lanthimos (The Favourite)
Spike Lee (BlacKkKlansman)
Adam McKay (Vice)
Pawel Pawlikowski (Cold War
Yalitza Aparicio (Roma)
Glenn Close (The Wife)
Olivia Colman (The Favourite)
Lady Gaga (A Star Is Born)
Melissa McCarthy (Can You Ever Forgive Me?
Christian Bale (Vice)
Bradley Cooper (A Star Is Born)
Willem Dafoe (At Eternity’s Gate)
Rami Malek (Bohemian Rhapsody)
Viggo Mortensen (Green Book
Amy Adams (Vice)
Marina de Tavira (Roma)
Regina King (If Beale Street Could Talk)
Emma Stone (The Favourite)
Rachel Weisz (The Favourite
Mahershala Ali (Green Book)
Adam Driver (BlacKkKlansman)
Sam Elliott (A Star Is Born)
Richard E. Grant (Can You Ever Forgive Me?)
Sam Rockwell (Vice)
A Star Is Born (Eric Roth, Will Fetters & Bradley Cooper)
The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (Joel Coen & Ethan Coen)
BlacKkKlansman (Charlie Wachtel & David Rabinowitz and Kevin Willmott & Spike Lee)
If Beale Street Could Talk (Barry Jenkins)
Can You Ever Forgive Me? (Nicole Holofcener and Jeff Whitty
Border (Goran Lundstrom and Pamela Goldammer)
Mary Queen of Scots (Jenny Shircore, Marc Pilcher and Jessica Brooks)
Vice (Greg Cannom, Kate Biscoe and Patricia DeHaney
The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (Mary Zophres)
Black Panther (Ruth E. Carter)
The Favourite (Sandy Powell)
Mary Poppins Returns (Sandy Powell)
Mary Queen of Scots (Alexandra Byrne)
The Favourite (Robbie Ryan)
Never Look Away (Caleb Deschanel)
Roma (Alfonso Cuaron)
A Star Is Born (Matty Libatique)
Cold War (Lukasz Zal)
“All the Stars” (Black Panther)
Music by Mark Spears, Kendrick Lamar Duckworth and Anthony Tiffith)
Lyric by Kendrick Lamar Duckworth, Anthony Tiffith and Solana Rowe
“I’ll Fight” (RBG)
Music and Lyric by Diane Warren
“The Place Where Lost Things Go” (Mary Poppins Returns)
Music by Marc Shaiman; Lyric by Scott Wittman and Marc Shaiman
“Shallow” (A Star Is Born)
Music and Lyric by Lady Gaga, Mark Ronson, Anthony Rossomando and Andrew Wyatt
“When a Cowboy Trades His Spurs for Wings” (The Ballad of Buster Scruggs)
Music and Lyric by David Rawlings and Gillian Welch
Black Panther (Ludwig Goransson)
BlacKkKlansman (Terence Blanchard)
If Beale Street Could Talk (Nicholas Britell)
Isle of Dogs (Alexandre Desplat)
Mary Poppins Returns (Marc Shaiman)
Free Solo (Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi, Jimmy Chin, Evan Hayes and Shannon Dill)
Hale County This Morning, This Evening (RaMell Ross, Joslyn Barnes and Su Kim)
Minding the Gap (Bing Liu and Diane Quon)
Of Fathers and Sons (Talal Derki, Ansgar Frerich, Eva Kemme and Tobias N. Siebert)
RBG (Betsy West and Julie Cohen)
Incredibles 2 (Brad Bird, John Walker and Nicole Paradis Grindle)
Isle of Dogs (Wes Anderson, Scott Rudin, Steven Rales and Jeremy Dawson)
Mirai (Mamoru Hosoda and Yuichiro Saito)
Ralph Breaks the Internet (Rich Moore, Phil Johnston and Clark Spencer)
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, Rodney Rothman, Phil Lord and Christopher Miller)
Capernaum (Lebanon)
Cold War (Poland)
Never Look Away (Germany)
Roma (Mexico)
Shoplifters (Japan)
Black Panther (Steve Boeddeker, Brandon Proctor and Peter Devlin)
Bohemian Rhapsody (Paul Massey, Tim Cavagin and John Casali)
First Man (Jon Taylor, Frank A. Montaño, Ai-Ling Lee and Mary H. Ellis)
Roma (Skip Lievsay, Craig Henighan and Jose Antonio Garcia)
A Star Is Born (Tom Ozanich, Dean Zupancic, Jason Ruder and Steve Morrow)
Black Panther (Hannah Beachler and Jay Hart)
The Favourite (Fiona Crombie and Alice Felton)
First Man (Nathan Crowley and Kathy Lucas)
Mary Poppins Returns (John Myhre and Gordon Sim)
Roma (Eugenio Caballero and Barbara Enriquez)
Avengers: Infinity War (Dan DeLeeuw, Kelly Port, Russell Earl and Dan Sudick)
Christopher Robin (Christopher Lawrence, Michael Eames, Theo Jones and Chris Corbould)
First Man (Paul Lambert, Ian Hunter, Tristan Myles and J.D. Schwalm)
Ready Player One (Roger Guyett, Grady Cofer, Matthew E. Butler and David Shirk)
Solo: A Star Wars Story (Rob Bredow, Patrick Tubach, Neal Scanlan and Dominic Tuohy)
BlacKkKlansman (Barry Alexander Brown)
Bohemian Rhapsody (John Ottman)
The Favourite (Yorgos Mavropsaridis)
Green Book (Patrick J. Don Vito)
Vice (Hank Corwin)
Animal Behaviour (Alison Snowden and David Fine)
Bao (Domee Shi and Becky Neiman-Cobb)
Late Afternoon (Louise Bagnall and Nuria González Blanco)
One Small Step (Andrew Chesworth and Bobby Pontillas)
Weekends (Trevor Jimenez)
BlacKkKlansman (Barry Alexander Brown)
Bohemian Rhapsody (John Ottman)
The Favourite (Yorgos Mavropsaridis)
Green Book (Patrick J. Don Vito)
Vice (Hank Corwin)
Animal Behaviour (Alison Snowden and David Fine)
Bao (Domee Shi and Becky Neiman-Cobb)
Late Afternoon (Louise Bagnall and Nuria González Blanco)
One Small Step (Andrew Chesworth and Bobby Pontillas)
Weekends (Trevor Jimenez)
Detainment  (Vincent Lambe and Darren Maho)
Fauve (Jeremy Comte and Maria Gracia Turgeon)
Marguerite (Marianne Farley and Marie-Helene Panisset)
Mother (Rodrigo Sorogoyen and María del Puy Alvarado)
Skin (Guy Nattiv and Jaime Ray Newman)
Black Sheep (Ed Perkins and Jonathan Chinn)
End Game (Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman)
Lifeboat (Skye Fitzgerald and Bryn Mooser)
A Night at the Garden (Marshall Curry)
Period. End of Sentence. (Rayka Zehtabchi and Melissa Berton)

MORE:https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/lists/oscar-nominations-2019-complete-list-nominees-1172407/item/best-picture-1172473

Healthcare, SOCIAL MEDIA, Today' News Headlines

The Reasonable Way to View Marijuana’s Risks

Cannabis has downsides, but speculation and fear should be replaced with the best evidence available.

Are we underestimating the harms of legalizing marijuana?

Those who hold this view have been in the news recently, saying that research shows we are moving too far too fast without understanding the damage.

America is in the midst of a sea change in policies on pot, and we should all be a bit nervous about unintended consequences.

Vigilance is required. But it should be reasoned and thoughtful. To tackle recent claims, we should use the best methods and evidence as a starting point.

Crime has gone up in Colorado and Washington since those states legalized marijuana. It’s reasonable to wonder about the connection, but it’s also reasonable to be skeptical about causation.

The best method to investigate this may be synthetic controls. Researchers can use a weighted combination of similar groups (states that are like Colorado and Washington in a number of ways) to create a model of how those states might have been expected to perform with respect to crime without any changes in marijuana laws. Benjamin Hansen, a professor of economics at the University of Oregon, used this methodology to create a comparison group that most closely resembled the homicide trends and levels from 2000-12.

“I picked those years because they were after the tremendous crime drop in the early ’90s and most predictive of crime today,” he said. “I ended in 2012 because that’s when Colorado and Washington voted to legalize marijuana.”

This model showed that we might have predicted more of an increasein Colorado or Washington just based on trends seen in comparable states, even without legalization. When he compared the two states with the synthetic control, Colorado and Washington actually had lower rates after legalization than you’d expect given trends.

This is not evidence that legalization lowers crime rates. But it does suggest that we shouldn’t conclude that it increases them. A number of other studies agree.

A potential misperception involves automobile crashes. Drunken drivers are measurably impaired when their blood alcohol level is above a certain level. We can prove this in randomized controlled trials.

READ MORE: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/14/upshot/the-reasonable-way-to-view-marijuanas-risks.html

African American Issues, Commentary, Cultural Events, Environment, Lifestyle

Gladys Knight, Ahead of Super Bowl Anthem Date, Criticizes Colin Kaepernick

The soul singer Gladys Knight, who will be singing the national anthem at this year’s Super Bowl in Atlanta, seemed to criticize Colin Kaepernick in a statement published by Variety on Friday.

Kaepernick is the former San Francisco 49ers quarterback whose refusal to stand during “The Star-Spangled Banner” — and decision to kneel instead — to protest police brutality has made him a divisive figure nationwide, earning him praise from civil rights groups, but scorn from many conservatives, including President Trump.

“I understand that Mr. Kaepernick is protesting two things, and they are police violence and injustice,” Knight wrote to Variety. “It is unfortunate that our national anthem has been dragged into this debate when the distinctive senses of the national anthem and fighting for justice should each stand alone.”

The statement continued: “I am here today and on Sunday, Feb. 3, to give the anthem back its voice, to stand for that historic choice of words, the way it unites us when we hear it and to free it from the same prejudices and struggles I have fought long and hard for all my life.”

This is the latest twist at the intersection of politics, sports and music that has surrounded this year’s Super Bowl. Kaepernick is still in the middle of an ongoing arbitration case regarding a grievance he filed against the N.F.L. He has accused the league’s owners of colluding to keep him out of the league after not being signed last season.

His protests during the anthems became a cultural flash point, even though he wasn’t in the league. Other N.F.L. players began kneeling to support Kaepernick, as did celebrities off the field. Last fall, Nike made Kaepernick the face of a prominent advertising campaign.

This year’s Super Bowl became particularly fraught because of the halftime show. Some high-profile artists, including the rapper Cardi B, said they would not be willing to perform, in a show of solidarity with Kaepernick. Last year, Jay-Z rapped in one of his songs: “I said no to the Super Bowl, you need me, I don’t need you.”

Earlier this week, the N.F.L. announced the halftime acts would be Maroon 5 and the rappers Travis Scott and Big Boi. Scott’s decision to participate, in particular, received backlash, including from prominent African-Americans like Al Sharpton. Variety reported that Kaepernick and Scott spoke before the announcement and described the conversation as “cordial and respectful.” But on Wednesday, several posts critical of Scott appeared on Kaepernick’s Twitter account.

Perhaps anticipating the criticism, Scott announced on Sunday, in conjunction with the halftime billing, that he and the league were teaming up on a $500,000 donation to Dream Corps, a social justice group.

Trending Right Now, VIBE STATUS

Quavo Blasts Trump’s Celebratory Dinner for the Clemson Tigers

Quavo believes he can show the president a thing or two.

On Monday night, Donald Trump hosted a celebratory dinner in honor of the Clemson Tigers‘ national championship win over the Alabama Crimson Tide. Many assumed POTUS—who is known for his extravagent tastes—would pull out all the stops and treat the Tigers to a top-tier dinning experience. Instead, Trump presented them with a large buffet of McDonald’s, Wendy’s, Domino’s, and Burger King fare. Yup, the president welcomed these elite athletes to the State Dinning Room and served them cheap hamburgers, fries, and pizza.

Quavo wasn’t impressed.

On Tuesday, the Migos member sent out a tweet shading the president’s dinner choice. He also invited the Clemson football team to the Quality Control headquarters so he can show them, and the president, “how champs are supposed to be treated.”

We’ll see if the Tigers accept Quavo’s invitation.

Though Monday night’s dinner was far from traditional, Trump claimed it consisted of the team’s “favorite food.” The White House also suggested that the food choice was a result of the ongoing government shutdown, as White House staffers, like executive chef, are on furlough.

Celebrity Gossip, Editorial

Journalist Touré Responds to Allegation of Workplace Sexual Harassment

This week well-known journalist Touré was accused of workplace sexual harassment by a makeup artist, following his contributions to the Lifetime docuseries Surviving R. Kelly. He has since issued a response to the allegation.

As Essence reports, in a post advertising Touré’s appearance on the Clubhouse With Mouse Jones podcast, a makeup artist named Dani wrote:

“Every Monday I used to work with him on a show in 2017 and he couldn’t stop asking me to do anal, how I looked naked, if I had sex over the weekend, what it would be like to fuck me, what his cum would look like on my face…. I had to have the crew stay in the room [with] me while I got him ready…. And when I left I called HR…. He got fired instantly. He wrote me a huge apology for doing that in my DMs. Still have it. He did a “20/20” shoot in 2018, and I was there, and he walked out. Told the producer that he was “embarrassed [because] he was inappropriate with a staff member.” He really needs to take a seat.”

Dani told Essence Touré’s involvement with the R. Kelly documentary pushed her to speak out publicly. “When I saw him going around as R. Kelly’s docuseries spokesman to different radio stations, the lies had to stop. I’ve worked with Mouse Jones before and wanted him to know the truth,” she said.

Touré interviewed R. Kelly for BET in 2008, and pressed the singer about his relationship with underaged girls. The docuseries producer Dream Hampton has addressed her decision to include him in the project, and the accusation against him. “I didn’t know Toure sexually harassed someone he worked with,” she wrote. “He was included because he did the most famous interview with R. Kelly ever.”

Touré has since responded to the accusation through a statement sent to Essence. Read it below.

“On the show, our team, including myself, engaged in edgy, crass banter, that at the time I did not think was offensive for our tight-knit group. I am sorry for my language and for making her feel uncomfortable in any way. As a lead on the show, I should have refrained from this behavior. I have learned and grown from this experience.”

Touré was scheduled to interview Terry Crews on Thursday (Jan. 10), but the actor canceled his appearance following the report.