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Brad Pitt Is A Rock Star General In Absurdist 'War Machine' Trailer

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The last time Brad Pitt pulled off an absurdist satire he played a water-bottle chugging gym rat with a mean pompadour haircut in “Burn After Reading,” so consider us excited for his second time at bat.


The trailer for Netflix’s “War Machine,” which reportedly cost a cool $60 million to produce, debuted online Wednesday, and it looks like the streaming service has yet another hit on its hands. 


Inspired by the late journalist Michael Hastings’ book The Operators: The Wild & Terrifying Inside Story of America’s War in Afghanistan, “War Machine” takes aim at the ridiculousness of combat abroad. Starring Pitt as rock star U.S. General General Glenn McMahon, the film chronicles his rise and fall after a magazine exposes some of the less than savory practices of the American military. Pitt also gets to utter genius lines like, “Finish your phone call. The war can wait,” so it looks like it’ll be worth our time. 


The film also stars Tilda Swinton, Sir Ben Kingsley, Anthony Michael Hall and Topher Grace. 


Watch the trailer below. 


“War Machine” premieres on Netflix May 26.




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'Dancing With The Stars' Season 24 Cast Features Nick Viall, Simone Biles, Charo And Mr. T

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The star-studded cast of Season 24 of “Dancing with the Starswas revealed on “Good Morning America” Wednesday ― and let’s just say, it’s a nice range of contestants. 


The Bachelor” star Nick Viall will be gracing the ballroom after, possibly, finding love; Simone Biles will follow in the footsteps of last season’s champion and her Olympic teammate, Laurie Hernandez; Normani Kordei of Fifth Harmony will show off her solo dance moves; and Mr. T will cha-cha his way to ultimate lovability. 


Check out the 12 new cast members below: 


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'Moonlight' Will Expand To A Peak 1,500 Theaters After Astonishing Best Picture Win

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On the heels of on its unexpected victory at Sunday’s Oscars, “Moonlight” will play at least 1,500 theaters this weekend. 


It’s standard practice for a studio to re-release or expand its Best Picture medalist, but this year’s tradition assumes added import, becoming the widest bow since “Moonlight” first opened in four theaters in late October. A24, the 5-year-old trendy independent distributor enjoying its first Best Picture win, had so far booked the movie in a peak 1,014 locations.


For comparison’s sake, presumed front-runner “La La Land” played in 3,236 during its ninth week in theaters. A top-tier blockbuster like “Rogue One” or “Fifty Shades Darker” will typically debut in approximately 4,000.



The “Moonlight” expansion is larger than that of “Spotlight,” which jumped to 1,227 theaters after last year’s Best Picture triumph. It’s also bigger than 2015’s winner, “Birdman,” which soared to 1,213. Both films can attribute 10 percent of their domestic grosses to the post-Oscar bump, according to The New York Times.


As of Monday, “Moonlight” had collected $22.3 million at the box office, making it the second-lowest-grossing Best Picture champ in history after the Iraq War drama “The Hurt Locker,” which won in 2009. Nonetheless, that’s a decent sum for a movie budgeted at $1.5 million.


Heading into Oscar night, pundits almost unanimously expected “La La Land” to score the top award. “Moonlight” was seen as the potential spoiler, thanks to its overwhelming critical acclaim, social significance and a bevy of precursor prizes that favored it over the other contending titles. But Oscar campaigns are wildly political, and rarely does a year’s greatest film actually win Best Picture. It turns out we underestimated the newly diversified Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. 


“Moonlight” will be further minted in Oscar history thanks to the much-dissected mishap that resulted in presenters Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway arriving onstage with the wrong envelope. Representatives from the accounting firm that tabulates votes handed the “Bonnie and Clyde” stars the Best Actress information, leading them to declare “La La Land” the winner. After the “La La” producers had begun delivering acceptance speeches, one returned to the podium to announce the mistake, resulting in a frenzied and unexpected moment now etched in Oscar history.


What followed was a graceful exchange, but the mishap doubled as a metaphor for one of the most heated Best Picture matches in recent memory. If nothing else, this snafu will help “Moonlight” ― the three-chapter story of a black, gay latchkey kid coming of age in an under-privileged Miami neighborhood ― to be remembered as the exemplary work of art it is.


“Moonlight” picked up two other Oscars on Sunday: Mahershala Ali nabbed Best Supporting Actor, and Barry Jenkins and Tarell Alvin McCraney went home with Best Adapted Screenplay. The movie’s trajectory can be attributed to luminous word of mouth, as A24 did not pull out flashy marketing maneuvers to generate attention. Reviews were so glowing (98 percent on Rotten Tomatoes) that the momentum grew organically, all the way to the Oscars, where the film received an impressive eight nominations


“Moonlight” is also currently available via iTunes and DVD.

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Oprah Is Thinking Maybe She *Could* Run For President

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Oprah Winfrey never thought someone from a show business background with no political experience could rise to the office of POTUS, but here we are. And she’s apparently not ruling out a run of her own. 


The media queen sat down for an interview on the Season 2 premiere of “The David Rubenstein Show: Peer-to-Peer Conversations” on Bloomberg Television, and revealed she’d maybe consider running for president. Rubenstein wondered if Oprah could be the one to break the glass ceiling and be elected the first female president of the United States.


The 63-year-old mogul replied, “I never considered the question even a possibility. I just thought, ‘Oh.’ I thought, ‘Oh, gee, I don’t have the experience. I don’t know enough.’ And now I’m thinking, ‘Oh.’”  



In January, Oprah brushed off the idea, telling Jimmy Kimmel, “Never! No, it’s not my thing.” But her mind might be changing. 


She would seemingly have Michael Moore’s vote. The director said the Democrats need to run a “beloved” candidate. 


“Democrats would be better off if they ran Oprah [Winfrey] or Tom Hanks,” Moore told CNN after Hillary Clinton’s loss in November. “Why don’t we run beloved people? We have so many of them. The Republicans do this – they run [Ronald] Reagan and the Terminator [Arnold Schwarzenegger] and other people. Why don’t we run somebody that the American people love and are really drawn to, and that are smart and have good politics and all that?”


Oprah’s got our vote! 

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Gloria Steinem & Dorothy Pitman-Hughes' Restaging Of Iconic Portrait Shows That Activism Has No Age

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In 1971, feminist activists Dorothy Pitman-Hughes and Gloria Steinem raised their fists in solidarity while posing for photographer Dan Wynn. The image, which first ran in Esquire Magazine, remains one of the most iconic visual representations of women’s empowerment and the ongoing struggle for equal rights. 


More than 40 years later, Pitman-Hughes and Steinem reunited in 2014 to recreate the influential image, this time for Florida photographer Daniel Bagan. The two feminist warriors assume their lauded positions, fists lifted high, their formerly stern expressions giving way to gentle smiles. 


Happy Women’s History Month, y’all. 



“Gloria and Dorothy were phenomenal to share this moment as they stood together side-by-side again,” Bagan said in a statement. 


Through the photo, Bagan hopes to address the discrimination older women, often made to feel invisible by mainstream culture, endure. Depicting Pitman-Hughes and Steinem at 80 and 75 years old, respectively, the photographer shows that strength and beauty only increase with age. This photograph ended up inspiring Bagan to launch an entire series, “The Age of Beauty,” dedicated to photographing women over 50. 


The Plum Gallery will exhibit a limited edition of numbered prints signed by Gloria Steinem and Dorothy Pitman-Hughes on March 3, 2017. Proceeds from the sale of the print will go to towards Dorothy Pitman-Hughes’ Jacksonville nonprofit Charles Junction Historical Preservation Society LLC.

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New Yorker Cartoon Speaks To Every Woman Who’s Been Mansplained To

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On Sunday, the New Yorker shared a Will McPhail cartoon depicting an experience with which many women are familiar: the dreaded mansplain.


In the image, a man and a woman stand in an art gallery observing an abstract painting. The woman grimaces, and in the caption, she says, “I said, ‘I wonder what it means,’ not ‘tell me what it means.’”





When the New Yorker shared McPhail’s image on its Facebook page, many men were quick to mansplain how mansplaining isn’t real, or tried to separate the image from its obvious statement about a gendered topic. One commenter wrote, “Not gender related. One person wonders, & another compassionately assists,” and another wrote, “Her companion may only speak when invited? It’s sexist to volunteer an opinion?”


That’s just the thing, though. As the cartoon suggests, when women want “compassionate assisting” or “volunteered opinions,” they’ll ask for them.  


The mansplain cartoon is not the first of McPhail’s images to make a bold statement about gender dynamics. In October of 2016, the artist published a cartoon featuring a man who is offended by a woman breastfeeding her baby. And just like his more recent work, the cartoon is both incredibly simple and devastatingly accurate: 



This week's New Yorker cartoon.

A post shared by Will McPhail (@willmcphail4) on




McPhail’s cartoon will be featured in this week’s New Yorker, on newsstands now. 

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The Most Beautiful Acceptance Speech This Week Came From A Queer Korean

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Andrew Ahn set a Hollywood precedent last year with his feature-length directorial debut, “Spa Night.” The film, which premiered at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival to great acclaim, brought the queer Asian-American experience to the big screen with nuance.


The plight of the Asian LGBTQ community was once again on the writer-director’s mind Saturday when “Spa Night” was honored with the 2017 John Cassavetes Award at the Independent Spirit Awards in Los Angeles. In a moving, politically charged speech, Ahn stressed the importance of diversity in Hollywood at a time when many minority groups are facing an uncertain future.


“This is so meaningful that this is going to a film about a Korean-American immigrant family, about queer Korean people,” Ahn said in the speech, which can be viewed above. “Now, more than ever, it’s so important that we support stories told by, and about, communities that are marginalized. That we tell stories about immigrants, about Muslims, women, people of color, trans and queer folk.”


He continued, “Film is such a powerful tool in humanizing these communities, so that we can’t be pushed aside [and] labeled as other. We are part of this great country, and we are undeniable.”


The most personal moment of the speech came at its conclusion, when Ahn thanked his parents for “understanding that their gay Korean-American son is their son.”


The John Cassavetes Award is given annually to the best feature film made for under $500,000. Ahn raised the bulk of the funds for “Spa Night,” a coming-of-age film about a young man who discovers an underground world of gay sex when he takes a job at a Korean spa, via a Kickstarter campaign.


Here’s to hoping that “Spa Day” is paying the way for more queer Asian narratives in film and other mediums. 

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Casey Affleck Addresses Sexual Harassment Allegations After Oscar Win

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After months of media scrutiny that threatened to derail his Oscar odds, Casey Affleck vaguely addressed his sexual harassment allegations on Tuesday.


“I believe that any kind of mistreatment of anyone for any reason is unacceptable and abhorrent, and everyone deserves to be treated with respect in the workplace and anywhere else,” Affleck told the Boston Globe, which noted that he answered “wearily.” “There’s really nothing I can do about it. Other than live my life the way I know I live it and to speak to what my own values are and how I try to live by them all the time.”


Affleck, whose settlement legally prohibits him or his alleged victims from discussing the details of the case, has remained mostly mum about the situation throughout awards season. Affleck’s troubling allegations first resurfaced in a Mashable article published in September, after which it defined his Oscar narrative so heavily that some expected he would lose his front-runner status. 



Affleck addressed the allegations in Variety and New York Times profiles, telling the former outlet, “People say whatever they want. Sometimes it doesn’t matter how you respond. I guess people think if you’re well-known, it’s perfectly fine to say anything you want. I don’t know why that is. But it shouldn’t be, because everybody has families and lives.”


The “Manchester by the Sea” actor’s publicity team worked to quash the escalating story, which recounted 2010 lawsuits in which two women accused Affleck of unwanted sexual advances during the making of “I’m Still Here.” Affleck’s reps said the case was settled to the content of both parties.


Affleck seemed to hint at the negative attention while accepting the Golden Globe in January, saying, “It’s my kids who give me permission to do this because they have the character to keep at bay all the noise that sometimes surrounds people who live publicly.”


It didn’t seem like Hollywood was listening anyway, as Affleck racked up almost every major precursor prize until Denzel Washington beat him for the Screen Actors Guild Award, which typically predicts the Oscar. Washington’s victory left pundits wondering whether the scrutiny would indeed prove damning, but in the end, Affleck walked away an Oscar winner


The degree to which these allegations will haunt the rest of Affleck’s career is yet to be seen. His IMDb page lists four upcoming projects, so he isn’t hurting for jobs. But Affleck, 41, should be prepared to answer questions about his past for the rest of his time as a public figure. 

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'Significant Other' Is The Broadway Play You Need To See Right Now

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When it debuted Off Broadway in 2015, “Significant Other” felt innately plugged into the cultural zeitgeist, breaking away from so-called “issue” plays like “The Boys in the Band” and “The Normal Heart” that had come to define queer theater. Joshua Harmon’s dramedy, which follows a romantically challenged gay man’s search for love, couldn’t have been more impeccably timed, as the Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage nationwide on June 26, eight days after the show opened in New York.


Less than two years later, “Significant Other” is gearing up for its highly anticipated transfer to Broadway’s Booth Theatre, where it opens March 2. At the heart of Harmon’s narrative is Jordan Berman, a neurotic, out millennial who has marriage on his mind. Now that Jordan (played by Gideon Glick) has the legal right to marry, he’s driven to fulfill it, and thus embarks on an earnest, if ill-conceived, mission: to land a boyfriend who will ultimately become a husband.



While the future of same-sex marriage is uncertain under President Donald Trump, Glick feels audiences will still be able to laugh (and cry) at Jordan’s stumbles on the road to matrimony as much now as they did in 2015. The character, he said, is “an honestly written depiction of a modern gay man,” and more three-dimensional than the quirky sidekicks that many LGBTQ people are relegated to in other plays. Presenting Jordan’s tribulations in a tragicomic light, he said, is “a privilege” given the real-life struggles many queer people are now experiencing.


“I think that having a protagonist who is a gay man is really important, in the same way that having a protagonist who is someone of color in a play is really important,” Glick, who is also gay, told The Huffington Post. Moreover, Jordan’s experiences aren’t defined by his sexuality or gender. “We’re dealing with universal themes – loneliness, yearning, striving for companionship. That, to me, is thrilling,” he said.



From a professional standpoint, “Significant Other” marks the start of a new chapter for Glick. The show is the Philadelphia native’s first Broadway stint since he left the cast of “Spring Awakening” in 2007; though he was cast in 2010’s “Spider Man: Turn Off The Dark,” his character got cut before the show’s opening night. Glick has been a fixture on the New York stage, starring in 2007’s “Speech and Debate” and the Public Theater’s production of “Into The Woods” in 2012. “Significant Other” is his first time as a leading man. “I’ve been playing teenagers for a decade,” he quipped, “so this is a nice little jump.” 



“The only responsibility that I feel is honesty. I think sometimes people feel like being gay is a niche. It’s not a niche.”



As for Jordan himself, Glick said he identified with the character instantly. “We speak many of the same languages. The stretch is not too far,” he told HuffPost. Still, there’s one notable difference: Glick is in a relationship, while Jordan remains unhappily single even as his gal pals (Sas Goldberg, Rebecca Naomi Jones and Lindsay Mendez) couple off one by one. “I tend to overthink and overanalyze, but I think Jordan can get in his own way a bit. Part of his struggle is that he’s always comparing himself to his friends,” he said. “I don’t think I do that.”



Though his “Spring Awakening” character, Ernst, was also gay, the actor said he isn’t concerned about being pigeonholed after his turn in “Significant Other” wraps. Moving forward, his only requirement is that his characters are “varied and authentic,” he said.


“Straight men are never asked, ‘How does it feel playing a straight guy all the time? What’s that like?’ I don’t think my approach is any different,” Glick who has never shied away from the subject of his own sexuality in interviews, said. “The only responsibility that I feel is honesty. I think sometimes people feel like being gay is a niche. It’s not a niche.” 


If Glick has it his way, this won’t be his only crack at the role of Jordan Berman, too. “I’m secretly hoping that this will be a trilogy of some sort,” he said, “and that we can find a way to revisit it every 10 years.” 


Significant Other” opens at the Booth Theatre in New York on March 2. Head here for more details. 

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James Van Der Beek's Daughters Had An Amazing Reaction To 'Moana' Performance

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At the 89th Academy Awards on Sunday, “Moana” actress Auli’i Cravalho performed the film’s Best Original Song nominee, “How Far I’ll Go.”


The performance gave families the opportunity to watch the “real-life” Moana sing live, but it seems that not all kids were fans...


On Tuesday, “Dawson’s Creek” actor James Van Der Beek posted a hilarious video of his daughters watching Cravalho’s rendition on Instagram.



When a cartoon comes to life and you just don't f*cking trust it... #Moana

A post shared by James Van Der Beek (@vanderjames) on




The video shows 6-year-old Olivia and 3-year-old Annabel looking thoroughly unimpressed. 


Van Der Beek captioned his post, “When a cartoon comes to life and you just don’t f*cking trust it... #Moana.”


The actor and his wife Kimberly Brook have two other children, 4-year-old Joshua and 11-month-old Emilia.


Clearly, the Van Der Beek kids have already mastered the art of side-eye. We look forward to seeing their future feats of sass.

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Alec Baldwin's Donald Trump Impression Now Has Its Own Book Deal

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This is just huge.


Alec Baldwin is taking his popular “Saturday Night Live” impression of Donald Trump to the page, announcing plans to cowrite a book in the voice of his parody character with author and former Spy magazine editor Kurt Andersen.


The book, entitled You Can’t Spell America Without Me: The Really Tremendous Inside Story of My Fantastic First Year as President Donald J. Trump, will be published by Penguin Press, an imprint of Penguin Random House, which also just announced the acquisition of a two-book deal with Barack and Michelle Obama.


In a press release, Penguin described the book as “a parody of a presidential memoir.” The cover art features a be-wigged, red-tied Baldwin, and the back cover announces, boldly, “I have the best words, as everyone has said forever ... People are already claiming it’s maybe the truest book ever published.”


The actor will also read the entire audio book in his trademark Trump voice ― that’s a lot of Trump-speak.



As for the actual text, The New York Times reported that Baldwin’s coauthor, Andersen, would be taking the lead. Though Baldwin has a history of political writing, he told the Times, “We have that arrangement whereby he doesn’t put on the wig, I don’t open up a Word document.”


Andersen has a long and scathing journalistic record when it comes to the new president. In 1988, Spy Magazine famously called Trump a “short-fingered vulgarian,” sparking a feud that drove the real estate tycoon to threaten lawsuits and send a copy of The Art of the Deal with his hand outlined in gold to the Spy office. 







The magazine continued to closely examine Trump's business, his public image, and even his marriage to Ivana Trump over the years ― meaning Andersen is likely well-acquainted with his source material. In a conversation with the Times, he described poking at Trump as an “old hobby of mine.”


Though Trump engaged with Spy’s harsh coverage and has repeatedly tweeted angrily about Baldwin’s “SNL” impression, it remains to be seen whether he will react to the book. It can be speculated that any response won’t go into great detail, however; the president generally does not read books.


You Can’t Spell America Without Me is slated for a November release.

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Former NICU Baby Sports Helmet With Totally Fitting Phrase

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A viral photo of a preemie wearing a special helmet is spreading a beautiful message of hope and determination.


On Monday, a mom named Lori shared a photo of her 8-month-old daughter with the popular Facebook group, Pantsuit Nation. In the photo, the baby wears a cranial helmet with the words “Nevertheless she persisted.”



In the caption, Lori dedicated the post to her fellow NICU parents. 


“My little girl was born with some health issues that resulted in some pretty intense interventions that ended up saving her,” she wrote. “We were told by the doctors some pretty scary news ... we were given an explanation of what to expect but nevertheless, despite the rollercoaster, she persisted”


“Nevertheless she persisted” is of course a reference to the battle cry many women adopted after Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) silenced Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) as she read a letter from Coretta Scott King during during a debate over the nomination of Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) for attorney general.


“She was warned,” McConnell later stated. “She was given an explanation. Nevertheless, she persisted.”


Lori told The Huffington Post she was struck by the incident. “I watched Senator Warren as she was trying to read the letter from Mrs. King. I saw the look of shock as they tried to silence her and her disbelief that they wouldn’t let her read the letter regarding Sessions. I was in shock myself,” she recalled.


“When I heard Mitch McConnell use that phrase as a way to explain what happened and his treatment of Senator Warren, it bothered me, and apparently I wasn’t alone,” she added. “So let’s take what he said and empower ourselves with it. Let’s make it a phrase for every female that keeps pushing ahead despite obstacles.” 



Lori’s baby daughter has certainly persisted. She was born a month and a half early after doctors detected a blood incompatibility issue during the pregnancy. Within an hour of her birth, the baby had high levels of a compound called bilirubin and ultimately had to undergo a risky procedure called an exchange transfusion.


“Her bilirubin was so high that she turned green ― her skin was literally green like the Statue of Liberty, and it stayed like that for months,” Lori told HuffPost. “After five days her liver kicked in, but due to the risks of the procedure she was kept in the NICU for a few weeks more.”


Lori’s daughter has faced several other medical challenges, including plagiocephaly, or “flat head syndrome,” and brachycephaly, which means her forehead bulges out due to flatness in the back of her head. As a result, the baby has to wear a helmet 23 hours a day for a total of seven or eight months. 


“She doesn’t notice it, but she does love being free of it,” Lori said. “Two helmets later and we are getting to a nicely formed noggin.”


The mom thinks cranial helmets for babies are generally “cute but boring,” so she decided to jazz one up for her daughter. While at the local craft store, she noticed some letter stickers. “I thought of the line ‘Nevertheless she persisted’ because I had just bought a T-shirt,” Lori recalled. “And then it hit me: We were told bad news by the doctors, we were given an explanation of what could happen, but look at this little girl! Nevertheless she persisted, just like all NICU babies who fight and all strong women, too.” 


Lori told HuffPost she wants her children to grow up with a sense of empathy, compassion, logic, respect, hard work, grit and appreciation for diversity.


She also offered a message of hope for her daughter’s future. “No matter what life throws in your way, you have what it takes. You can be everything you want to be, you will get to it with hard work and resilience. Persist, little one, and you’ll always make us proud.”

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Renowned Chef Defends Immigrants, Regardless Of Status, In Rousing Speech

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Internationally renowned chef José Andrés declared “I am an immigrant” in front of an audience of hundreds at a black-tie event in South Florida.


The high-profile restaurateur was the man of the night as the annual South Beach Wine & Food Festival held a dinner with other top chefs in his honor Saturday, according to The Miami Herald. 


Andrés made a moving plea for all hardworking immigrants ― regardless of status ― at the auction dinner, which raised money for Florida International University’s hospitality school. During the speech, he took off his chef coat to reveal a T-shirt that read “I Am An Immigrant.” 


“Many of those immigrants are undocumented and that unfortunately, yes, many of them came crossing the frontier or they overstayed their visa,” the Spanish-born chef said in his speech, which The Miami Herald posted on Facebook. “But they are working every day with the same pride as you and I, documented or not; working hard every day with a smile, sometimes underpaid, sometimes without health insurance, sometimes under hardships, working 12, 14 hours under the hot sun ― but working because they are proud to be part of the system.”


In a reference to President Donald Trump’s plan to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border, Andrés said he does believe in building certain types of walls.


“We need to build a very big wall, the biggest wall ... we need to be building walls to build communities, to build schools, to build hospitals, to build community centers, soup kitchens, to build an America we all believe in,” Andrés said as the crowd applauded.


Andrés owns the Think Food Group, the company behind his restaurants in Washington, D.C., Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Miami and Puerto Rico. The chef made headlines last year after Trump sued him for backing out of plans to open a restaurant in a Trump hotel. 


As an activist for the immigrant community, Andrés showed solidarity by closing all five of his D.C.-area restaurants on Feb. 16 for a national strike dubbed “A Day Without Immigrants,” and rallied other restaurateurs to do the same.






In his speech at the South Florida event, Andrés told the audience that “we are all immigrants” and that only united can the country succeed.   


“The American dream of the 21st century is to be an America of inclusion not of exclusion,” he said. “And we need to work hard to provide the same that we want to provide for us, to the other people that are left behind. So, I am an immigrant and I am proud of American immigrants. I am José Andrés and together, with a message of inclusion, we can keep moving this amazing country forward.”

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Barbie's Surprising Comeback Has Everything To Do With Race

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Totally Hair Barbie, which debuted in 1990, is the best-selling Barbie doll of all time. She looks exactly like you’d think: cascades of crimped blonde hair hang to high-heel ready feet, flowing over her stilt legs and vanishing waistline.


Meanwhile in 2016 the best-selling doll in Barbie’s Fashionista line was a brunette Latina with a “curvy,” build and brown eyes, Mattel told The Huffington Post.



 


She looks like this:



Though the Fashionista line is just one piece of the Barbie product universe ― other dolls still look as blonde as ever ― the success of this doll is a clear victory for the toymaking giant.


For the past two years, facing rapidly declining Barbie sales, Mattel pushed to diversify its iconic doll away from its classic look. The goal: win back parents turned off by the impossible and widely-criticized beauty standard (skinny, white) Barbie set for girls since the brand debuted in 1959.


“The brand was losing relevance,” said Lisa McKnight, a senior vice president at Mattel who manages the Barbie line. “We knew we had to change the conversation.”


It’s worked. Barbie sales rose 7 percent to $971.8 million in 2016, putting an end to four consecutive years of steep declines. 


The turnaround comes two years after Mattel unveiled the revamped Fashionista line, with Barbies in a range of skin colors and hair colors plus flat feet (previously the feet were shaped like high heels) and less than 12 months after the company introduced “body diversity,” selling curvy, tall and petite Barbies, kicking off a major conversation in a culture that’s long been overly obsessed with a doll.


This year the company is introducing an even more diverse range of Barbies, including a tall African-American doll with an Afro, a red-headed petite Barbie with a girl power T-shirt, and a mini-skirted blue-haired Barbie. In all there will be 10 skin tones, 4 body types and 15 hairstyles for Barbie.


Mattel’s also worked to diversify its American Girls line, last year rolling out a doll with a civil-rights background named Melody Ellison. 


Scroll down to see all the new Barbie dolls.



Little girls are fickle, for sure, but Barbie’s fall from grace and return to coolness was about parents’ complicated feelings about the doll. Winning adults back was key to her resurgence.


McKnight says that millennial parents are more particular about what kinds of toys their kids play with. They’re bigger “gatekeepers,” she said. “They want to not just buy, they want to buy-in,” McKnight said.


Barbie’s re-brand included several commercials aimed not at girls, but at their parents: like a recent spot that showed fathers playing with their daughters and dolls.


Mattel’s rebranding efforts are clearly paying off. “I have definitely bought more Barbies for my daughter since these new ones came out,” Lynnette Oursier, a mother in Oak Creek, Wisconsin, told The Huffington Post via Facebook message. She shared a photo of five of her 7-year-old’s Barbie dolls in a range of skin tones: “For me it was less about how my daughter would reflect on herself in relation to Barbie (my daughter already is caucasian, blond hair, blue eyes). It was about how she will come to view others.”


Sixty-six percent of Americans surveyed by HuffPost/YouGov said they were aware that Mattel is selling a more diverse line of dolls. And an overwhelming majority were on board with the development: Only 8 percent said the diverse dolls comprised a negative change.









Perversely enough, diversifying the brand has helped keep the classic version of Barbie alive: Little girls are still playing with the wasp-waisted original version. And they’re watching her on-screen, as well. A 2014 Netflix show called Life In the Dreamhouse, centered around a very blonde doll with many materialistic concerns is popular with girls of a certain age. (A representative from Mattel said it’s giving that show a makeover to bring it more in line with Barbie’s revamped image.)


And you can still see Barbie’s look in the style of so many white women, the Taylor Swifts and Kelly Ripas of the world. You see it, in particular, in the conservative women that surround and champion President Donald Trump: Ivanka Trump, her sister Tiffany, Kellyanne Conway, Ann Coulter, Tomi Lahren all have that flash of white teeth and impossibly blonde hair that girls learn at a very young age is a marker of true (white) “beauty.” In these circles Barbie still represents the ideal white woman.


That’s always been the heart of the Barbie critique: The doll offered girls a single, impossible beauty standard (literally impossible, as some analysis has showed) and women kill themselves trying to meet it.


It’s hard to name a children’s toy that engenders more passion and feeling in adults than a Barbie doll. Over the years, she’s been the subject of myriad academic papers and subversive art pieces. And, though sales are off from the highs of the previous decade, Barbie still far-and-away has the biggest share of the doll market.



Of course, a doll isn’t the singular cause of anyone’s eating disorder or obsession with juice cleanses or extremely high hair salon bill. Barbie is part of a larger system that enforces a message about what women are supposed to look like, according to Marianne Cooper, a sociologist at the Clayman Institute for Gender research at Stanford University.


“Not every girl who plays with Barbie is going to come out thinking she’s too fat,” said Cooper, who’s best known for contributing the research to Facebook executive Sheryl Sandberg’s best-seller Lean In. “But it’s one cog in a massive cultural system.”


And the message of the system is that a woman’s value comes down to her looks. Cooper was positive about the recent changes to Barbie. “The hope is it expands what girls’ possibilities are,” she said. But she lamented the fact that we are still talking about the way Barbie looks.


“We can expand the definition of what’s beautiful but we’re still not moving far from the general point,” Cooper said.


Mattel says that Barbie is hardly just about looks, pointing to new dolls that focus on what women do: A game developer Barbie debuted last year that was designed with input from female engineers. There are role model Barbies that look like African-American ballerina Misty Copeland and “Selma” director Ava DuVernay.


Besides, little girls are just playing. “Girls don’t see the line like parents do,” McKnight said.


She’s inadvertently hit on the big question: What will these girls think about beauty when they grow up? Mattel can change Barbie, but it can’t shift a whole culture. What happens next is bigger than a toy doll. 


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Patrick Stewart And Stephen Colbert Rip Donald Trump's Obamacare Repeal In 'Waiting For Godot' Spoof

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Patrick Stewart and Stephen Colbert gave Samuel Beckett’s play “Waiting for Godot” a Trumpian twist on Wednesday’s broadcast of the “Late Show.”


Channeling characters Vladimir and Estragon, the duo speculated as to if and when President Donald Trump’s promised replacement for Obamacare would arrive.





“Why hasn’t it come already?” asked Colbert.


“He said it was more complicated than anyone thought,” Stewart replied, in a dig at Trump’s ridiculed comments on the complexities of the health care system.


Luckily, the actor used his “Star Trek” powers to extricate himself and Colbert from their precarious position.


Check out the full clip above.


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Breakout Star K.J. Apa On 'Riverdale' And That 'A Dog's Purpose' Controversy

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From the island of picturesque landscapes, hobbits and rugby comes an actor by the name of K.J. Apa. 


The 19-year-old New Zealander made his U.S. debut last month, appearing in the film “A Dog’s Purpose” and taking on the role of the red-haired comic book star Archie Andrews on The CW’s latest hit show, “Riverdale.” Prior to earning big and small screen roles in Hollywood, Apa, of Samoan descent, played Kane Jenkins on the New Zealand prime-time soap opera “Shortland Street” from 2014 to 2015 and appeared on the TV series “The Cul De Sac” in 2016.


But his new gig is amping up his recognition a bit. 


“When I was 13, my mom checked me into a modeling agency,” Apa told The Huffington Post during a recent interview. “Then, out of nowhere, they asked me to audition for a TV show, which I did and I got going from there.” 


Apa said he never aspired to be an actor ― he considers himself more of a musician ― but has come to love the craft through working on sets. If there’s anyone’s career he looks to emulate, it’s not so much about their talent as it is their kindness. 


“I look up to a lot of actors,” he said. “In terms of quality, I look at guys like Dwayne Johnson, for example, and Mark Wahlberg. Sure, they’re not Oscar-winning actors, but everyone knows those guys turn up every day on set, there’s never any drama, they work hard and they treat people well and I think that means a lot more, to me at least, than just being one of the best actors in the world. It’s the way you treat people that really makes it.” 


Below, find out more about Apa, his storyline on “Riverdale” and how he felt about the leaked video that almost affected the “A Dog’s Purpose” release. 



What has it felt like to be involved with “Riverdale”?


It’s been awesome. It’s been such a ride being able to work with Luke [Perry] and Cole [Sprouse]. I’m starting to become a family with these guys, because we’re with each other literally 24 hours a day.


Are you ready for all the attention that comes with being a CW star?


I think I’m ready. I mean, I don’t know. I don’t really think about it too much and I think it’s sort of a gradual kind of process. It’s good that it doesn’t just hit all at once.


What’s been your favorite part about playing Archie? It must be cool to take inspiration from the comic books, but make the character your own.


It’s definitely a responsibility to play this iconic character and, beyond that, I have to tread lightly and treat it with a lot of respect. I take it seriously. Although it’s not a direct translation from the comics, it should still be honest and still play with all the iconic aspects that the comic had, as well. So yeah, I feel really great and thankful to be able to be a part of it.


What have you noticed about the “Archie” comics vs. “Riverdale”?


Overall, I think the characters in our show are dealing with real-life problems that anyone in high school can relate to. And I also think we’re dealing with [a] murder mystery that is so much darker. Although it’s different from the comics, it’s also really similar at the same time. We still have the iconic love triangle, which is going to be playing out throughout the whole season.


Tell us about that love triangle between Archie, Betty and Veronica?


The middle of the season that we’re in now, the triangle gets lost a little bit because we have such heavy storylines. We really do come back to it in the later half of the season, for sure, but everyone who’s involved in the triangle have all gotten over what happened after the first episode. I think everyone is doing their own thing now, but for sure at the end in the finale it will [heat up again].


Ms. Grundy is out of the picture now, as well. Do you see Archie falling for his new music mentor, Valerie, in the upcoming episodes?


Yeah, for sure. They already have so much in common with the music. Archie does really like Valerie a lot because she’s talented and, apart from being beautiful, her talent and music is something that Archie admires and he thinks that she can help him with his music, and he wants to be better. I think there’s a lot of chemistry there. But I also think it’s not going to ... it’s only going to last without ... [pause] I was leading down somewhere that I probably shouldn’t go! [Laughs]


Do you believe Archie and Betty belong together or are you a Veronica person?


I can’t decide. Honestly, if you gave me the choice, I always say I’m like Archie because he’s the most sympathizing person in the world. So, I can’t say!


Are you passionate, like Archie is, about singing and performing as much as you are about acting?


I’m really passionate about music. I do love acting, but music is the end goal for me. Not so much singing, but more like playing guitar is something I really love.


 



Let’s talk a bit about “A Dog’s Purpose” – I know the controversy messed things up a bit, but can you talk about your experience working on the film?


It was my first film ever and, to date, it was my favorite production that I’ve ever been a part of. It’s a shame that a video has created an altered perception of a movie that’s about love. They say that video was a little bit manipulating and, in a way, it created an untrue vision about our movie. Every day that I was on set, I witnessed firsthand our production and crew and the dog wranglers and the director, and they treated those animals with respect every time. I can only really judge from what I’ve seen with my own eyes and that’s what I saw. I didn’t see anything inappropriate or I would have stood up and said, “I don’t believe in it.” I have a lot of love for animals.


I love that movie so much, I think about it so much and it makes me cry sometimes —it has a place in my heart, for sure. For a first movie, I love it and I hope people love it, as well.


Now that the trainers have been cleared of the charges, do you hope more people will get out to the theater to see it?


It’s that thing where all media is good media, you know what I mean? I think most people can figure it out for themselves. My thing was, why would they just so happen to release a video right before the movie airs? If they really cared about animals, they would have released that video as soon as it happened. That was something that I was thinking about. But the movie is doing really well and I’m really, really proud of it.


Anything you took away from playing Ethan in “A Dog’s Purpose” that you brought to “Riverdale” to play Archie?


I think Ethan is really similar to Archie. I think, in life, those two characters are both growing up and figuring out what they’re good at and figuring out their dreams. For Ethan, it’s football, and for Archie, he thinks it’s football but he realizes it’s something else with music.


I can definitely relate, like going through the same thing with the old man where he wanted me to play rugby but I wanted to act so I went for it. The high school culture in America is so different than it is in New Zealand. I had to kind of adapt to and learn about a whole new culture. With the movie as well, that was the first time I had to play that. It’s not hard – we’re surrounded by it from movies and TV and this image of high school: the prom, pep rallies.


You’ve gotten to work with some talented young women ― Britt Robertson, Lili Reinhart and Camila Mendes. What have you learned from them about the craft?


I loved working with Britt on that movie, she was incredible. Cami and Lili are great people ― really, really good actors. This is their dream, they’ve been going after this for a while and they’ve got it. I can’t relate to that — I’ve been a person who never really wanted to act and I just kind of fell into it. I’m thankful for it and I love it now, but it wasn’t really anything I was trying to do. But it’s amazing because it’s their dream and they’re living it.


“Riverdale” airs Thursdays at 9 p.m. on The CW. “A Dog’s Purpose” is in theaters now. 

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The Trailer For Netflix's 'Sand Castle' Sends Nicholas Hoult And Henry Cavill To Battle

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Happy Netflix Trailer Week!


The streaming service has already released no fewer than eight promos for forthcoming projects over the past few days, including a Brad Pitt military movie, an Alison Brie wrestling series and an Amy Schumer stand-up special. Next up is “Sand Castle,” a fact-based drama about U.S. soldiers on the front lines of the Iraq War. Writer Chris Roessner based the film on his experiences as a machine gunner.


Starring Nicholas Hoult, Henry Cavill, Glen Powell, Logan Marshall-Green, Tommy Flanagan and Parker Sawyers, “Sand Castle” premieres April 21. Netflix was reportedly eyeing a $13 million deal for the project last May.

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Brad Pitt Reportedly Skipped The Oscars Because He Was Sculpting

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Brad Pitt’s Plan B Entertainment produced Barry Jenkins’ “Moonlight” ― also known as the 2017 Academy Award winner for Best Picture. And yet, on the evening that prestigious title was announced, Pitt was strangely absent from the award ceremony and subsequent festivities.


Apparently the actor didn’t make it to the Oscars because he was 10 days deep into creating a sculpture, according to The Hollywood Reporter, and just couldn’t tear himself away. Pitt was reportedly hunkered down at British artist Thomas Houseago’s studio in the Frogtown neighborhood of Los Angeles, no doubt losing track of time as the cold, smooth clay made sweet love to his fingertips.


No word yet on what exactly Pitt’s masterpiece will look like; Housago is known for hulking plaster casts that resemble Cubist golems.



We can only hope he’s at work on a life-size self-portrait of his already highly sculpted physique. In our strictly artistic opinion, few sights are more glorious to behold than Brad Pitt himself, made by that crazy sculptor in the sky. 

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Garfield’s Gender Has Become Such A Heated Debate, Even Congress Is Involved

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He’s orange, he’s slothful, and he’s the hero of one of the worst-reviewed film series of the aughts. But what do we really know about Garfield, everyone’s favorite gluttonous feline?


What, for example, is Garfield’s gender? It’s somewhat of a trick question; according to Select/All, the topic has turned into a debate on the Garfield Wikipedia page, where updater Virgil Texas recently added that the cat is gender-fluid, citing a statement his creator, Jim Davis, made about the cat’s genderless-ness in 2014.


“He’s not really male or female or any particular race or nationality, young or old,” Davis told Mental Floss, although Garfield is referred to as “he” and “him” throughout the comic. (The same article notes that Garfield is named after Davis’ grandfather, and in some countries he’s referred to as more gendered names, such as “Gustav,” in Sweden.)


The update to the cartoon’s Wikipedia page ignited debate, eventually leading someone with a U.S. congressional IP address to weigh in, removing Garfield from the category of male comics characters on Wikipedia.






According to the Twitter bot @congressedits, which keeps track of such updates, Congressperson Wikipedia additions tend to be more overtly political, including revisions to the page for the Nebraska Republican Party and the Congressional LGBT Equality Caucus.


Of course, outside of Congress, debates over fictional characters’ and historical figures’ gender, sexual orientation and race are common and often fraught. In these cases, referring to the author’s established canon usually puts bigoted inquiries to rest. Last year, after a black actress was cast to play Hermione in the theatrical version of “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child,” J.K. Rowling responded to complaints by saying in an interview, “idiots were going to idiot.






Likewise, as the conversation around Garfield’s gender ballooned, the cartoon’s creator finally weighed in, in a quote provided to The Washington Post. “Garfield is male,” Davis told the outlet. Confirming not only the cat’s gender, but his sexual orientation, he added, “he has a girlfriend, Arlene.”


The revelation was a letdown for Texas, who conceded yesterday on Twitter, “Even when we do not like it we must defer to Jim Davis’ statements, which, along with the comic strips, constitute JD-CANON, and are gospel.” 


It’s easy enough to dismiss such a debate as silly ― Garfield is an inherently apolitical comic, after all ― but in a time when representation for LGBTQ and gender-fluid characters is lacking, the news that the hero of such a long-running, popular comic is non-gender-conforming would have been a kind of victory.


Perhaps if comics and storytelling at large better reflected the identities of readers, the gender of a gluten-loving cat wouldn’t need to be such a hot topic. 






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How A Ghanian-German Artist Uses Personal Style To Express Her Hybrid Identity

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Zohra Opoku was 12 years old when she first started sewing her own outfits, bored by the options available to her in East Germany, where she lived.


The budding artist, of Ghanaian and German descent, realized then the transcendent power that fashion possessed. Clothing could communicate cultural allegiances and familial traditions, personal style could serve as a sort of hybridized autobiography, and rebellious ensembles allowed one to break free ― at least, somewhat ― of circumstances and heritage, giving fantasy physical form.


I actually created my first winter jacket out of scraps of jeans with neon yellow pieces,” she told i-D. “Expressing myself with individual style seemed to me to be the only way to escape from the grey reality of the GDR [German Democratic Republic].”


Now, Opoku lives Accra, Ghana, where she works as a multimedia artist practicing in installation, sculpture and photography. Though she does not identify as a fashion designer, African textiles and the spirit of dress-up play a major role in her work. She’s composed large-scale installations made from second-hand clothes, imported materials from Germany to Ghana, and often transfers her screen-printed photographs onto bedsheets to evoke childhood memories of laundry hanging out to dry. 



Opoku’s ongoing fixation with fashion is rooted in its ability to render one’s interior state onto the body and beyond it. “Textiles feel like the perfect vehicle with which identity can be performed,” she told the website Omenka. “It is the outcome of my research on how fashion, trends and clothes traditions are related to a cultural identity that I then perform in my photographs, video, sculptures and installations.” 


A series of Opoku’s photographic self-portraits are on view this week at The Armory Fair, exhibited by Somali-French gallerist Mariane Ibrahim. The images feature Opoku in the forest behind her Ghana home. In the early morning light, Opoku captures herself ― adorned with striking ensembles and jewelry ― partially submerged in her natural surroundings. The foliage and its fruits become improvised accessories, natural jewels that both complement and mask their wearer. 



This gesture refers to the experience of moving to a new environment and trying to fit in, one Opoku underwent when relocating from Germany to Ghana. She has compared the feeling of blending in with a new habitat to the West African tradition of masquerade ― in which citizens pay homage to guardian spirits, while poking fun at religious and spiritual leaders, by dressing up in elaborate, handmade disguises that turn the world topsy-turvy.


For Opoku, who both relocated across continents and switched fields from fashion to fine art, identity is something textured and hyphenated. Clothing, photography and disguise all offer up a stage on which she can consciously perform certain aspects of herself while hiding others. In this realm, where trees become improvised outfits and photos conceal as much as they reveal, the lines between make-believe, camouflage, hiding and invisibility tend to blur.


In Ghana, Opoku is moved by the abundance of nature, which constantly yields artistic inspiration and potential new getups. Yet there is no opposition between the domains of fashion and nature, which might otherwise appear at odds. Rather, the two bleed into one another, just as a twig becomes a veil in one of Opoku’s photos.


I love the sound of nature and the smooth movements of leafs in the wind,” the artist said. “These sequences remind me of a dream or a mystic appearance, which refer back to ideas of invisibility and masquerade.”



See Opoku’s work this week at Mariane Ibrahim Gallery, Booth P02, at The Armory Show in New York. (Piers 92 & 94 at 711 12th Avenue between 54th and 52nd Sts.) 

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