Hollywood

Beloved Los Angeles comedian Ken Flores died earlier this year, but not before giving audiences one final hearty laugh.

On June 6, Hulu released two episodes of Hartbeat’s stand-up series, “LOL Live,” featuring sets by Flores and Daphnique Springs. This is the first and last special ever taped by the budding comedian, who died in the midst of his headlining “Butterfly Effect” tour at age 28, following a history of congestive heart failure.

“Ken Flores was exactly the kind of authentic comedic voice we sought to champion through our ‘LOL Live’ series,” said Jeff Clanagan, president and chief distribution officer of Hartbeat, Kevin Hart’s entertainment company, which produced the program. “[The special] captured his unique ability to connect with audiences through genuine storytelling.”

Born in Chicago and raised in Aurora, Ill., Flores was intrinsically comical, deeply convinced that he was funnier than any of the booked comics he witnessed on stage.

“These people suck!” he told the Comedy Gazelle blog in 2023.

Flores honed his comic chops at popular Chicago-area comedy clubs, including the Laugh Factory and Zanies, and rose to greater popularity on social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram, where he shared snippets of his sets— often filled with his impeccable crowd work and self-deprecating humor. The comic often made his lifestyle the punchline, mainly taking aim at his own weight and Mexican identity.

Gabriel Iglesias took notice of the rising star, tapping him to open for his 2023 “Don’t Worry Be Fluffy Tour” in Chicago.

“It was a highlight to have his family. His mom, dad and friends were there with him — and 15,000 people that night,” said Iglesias, who remembers Flores as “kind” and “respectful.” The young act also went on tour with established comedians Jo Koy and Felipe Esparza.

But it was after his move to Los Angeles in 2023 that Flores seemed to take flight, building a community across various comedy clubs including Hollywood‘s Laugh Factory, the Comedy Store, the HaHa and the Hollywood Improv.

“People did like him and that’s very telling,” said Iglesias.

Among those who loved and continue to mourn Flores are Rene Vaca and Ralph Barbosa — prominent Latino acts in the comedy world — who considered the late comedian a “brother.”

“The most memorable thing about him was how real he was,” said Barbosa. “[Ken] never kissed anybody’s ass, which made me respect him more, because that means everything that he got was through talent and hard work.”

Two distinct memories linger for the duo. The first took place at a restaurant in L.A., which marked the first time they all got together.

“It was one of those Chinese restaurants with those spinning tables,” said Vaca. “Ken was always trying to reach for the orange chicken, but every time he reached for it, [the table] kept spinning away from him.”

Then there’s their last reunion in L.A. when all three comedians got on stage to perform during Barbosa’s set at the Hollywood Improv on Jan. 21, just a week before Flores’ death.

“We had some drinks in us, we had the piano, we were improvising songs …  Rene fell on the ground trying to pants Ken,” said Barbosa. “It’s hard not to get teary eyed when I think about that day.”

“It was as if the universe gave us our opportunity to have that moment with Ken before he left us, you know?” said Vaca.

Vaca has already watched the Hulu special, marveling at Flores’ ability to land the jokes perfectly. “Like butter, man — it was beautiful,” he said. Barbosa, on the other hand, has only seen snippets. Choking up, he admits, “ I just don’t want it to be over, you know?”

The three had plans for a national tour this year, which Vaca and Barbosa continued in honor of their friend. They adopted his tour name, “The Butterfly Effect,” splitting the profit three ways to include Flores’ family. “None of us would do it unless it was like we split this evenly,” said Barbosa.

During every show, the pair play an unreleased 15-minute segment of Flores, who jokes about the fluttering impact of such majestic creatures. “He’s still killing it in the audience,” said Vaca.

An unprecedented heat wave is baking Seattle, and Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital is overwhelmed.

Doctors scramble to treat people with heat stroke and pregnant women going into early labor due to triple-digit temperatures. The emergency room runs out of ice. Elective surgeries are canceled. Grey Sloan is so inundated — partly due to power outages at another hospital — that it’s forced to turn away patients.

In one scene — because this is all happening on the latest season of “Grey’s Anatomy” — several doctors operate on a young man who tried to rob a convenience store, only to wind up shot with his own gun during a scuffle.

“We should invite the lawmakers voting against background checks to assist,” says Teddy Altman (Kim Raver), the hospital’s chief of surgery.

“Well, violent crime rises along with the temperature,” responds intern Jules Millin (Adelaide Kane).

Fact check: Accurate. There’s real research linking gun violence to above-average temperatures.

There was also a real heat dome that inspired the writers of “Grey’s Anatomy.” Portland hit a record 116 degrees in 2021; between the U.S. and Canada, 1,400 people died. Global warming made it worse, researchers found.

If President Trump and other politicians keep doing the oil and gas industry’s bidding, the climate crisis will only get deadlier. But Hollywood can play a leading role in turning the tide.

Not by preaching. By entertaining.

I’d never seen “Grey’s Anatomy” before watching the heat wave episodes; soap operas aren’t really my thing. But the long-running ABC drama got me invested right away. The characters are sympathetic, the dialogue sharp and funny, the medical plotlines rife with tension. And I was impressed by how the writers kept the heat front of mind: a coffee cart running out of cold drinks, patients fanning themselves, several references to cooling centers.

In one of the final scenes of the two-episode arc, which concluded in March, surgical resident Ben Warren (Jason George) says the hospital needs an emergency plan for heat domes. It isn’t prepared for wildfires, either.

“They’re only increasing with climate change,” he says.

Sabina Ehmann and her daughter Vivian, visiting Seattle from North Carolina, use umbrellas to shield themselves from the sun during the June 2021 heat wave in the Pacific Northwest.

(John Froschauer / Associated Press)

Some of you may be thinking: Who cares about a bunch of fake doctors running around a fake hospital? We have real climate problems in the real world. Trump and congressional Republicans are eviscerating clean air rules and revoking clean energy grants. Let’s focus on politics and policy, not pop culture.

Thing is, people don’t form opinions in a vacuum. The media we consume inform our politics — fiction included.

Studies have shown, for instance, that the sitcom “Will & Grace” reduced prejudice against gay men, and that on-screen violence can increase the risk of violent behavior. Researchers found that a scene from HBO’s “Sex and the City” reboot “And Just Like That …” made viewers more likely to say eating less meat is good for the environment.

Millions of people watch “Grey’s Anatomy.” The impact is clear to producer Zoanne Clack, an emergency medicine physician who spoke at the Hollywood Climate Summit this month.

“In the ER, I could tell two people about diabetes. They might tell two people, and they might tell two people,” she said. “But I do a story on [diabetes] on ‘Grey’s Anatomy,’ and 20 million people have seen it.”

“And if 10% of those people get something out of it, that’s a lot of people,” she added.

Already, researchers are studying viewer responses to the heat dome storyline. The conservation nonprofit Rare surveyed 3,600 people, showing some participants the first heat episode and others an unrelated episode.

Although the study isn’t done yet, Anirudh Tiwathia, Rare’s director of behavioral science for entertainment, told me it’s clear that viewers came away from the heat episode more concerned and better-informed about extreme heat. The nonprofit is still testing whether those effects persisted several weeks after watching.

Rare also showed some viewers the heat dome episode plus a social media video reiterating the health dangers of extreme heat. Those viewers may come away even more informed. Rare released a study last year finding that people who watched “Don’t Look Up” — a disaster movie with intentional climate parallels — were far more likely to support climate action if they also watched a climate-focused video starring lead actor Leonardo DiCaprio.

“People see stuff on screen, and then they see stuff on the second screen,” Tiwathia said, referring to phones and laptops. “The second screen is an opportunity to really pick up the baton from the main narrative.”

The videos used by Rare for its “Grey’s Anatomy” study were commissioned by Action for the Climate Emergency, which paid social media influencers to create 21 videos tied to the show. Rare chose four videos, including one by a gardener with 234,000 Instagram followers and one by an artist with 2 million followers.

A survey by Action for the Climate Emergency found that social media users who saw the videos were more likely than typical “Grey’s Anatomy” viewers to understand the links between heat, health and global warming.

“It’s an opportunity for us to reach outside the echo chamber,” said Leah Qusba, the group’s chief executive.

Jules Millin (Adelaide Kane) talks with Richard Webber (James Pickens Jr.) on the “Grey’s Anatomy” heat wave episode “Hit the Floor.”

(Christopher Willard / Disney)

Fortunately, there’s a small-but-growing ecosystem within Hollywood that’s increasingly able to support this kind of partnership. A few major studios have started teams to advise creatives on climate storytelling. Environmental groups, consulting firms and universities have stepped up to provide expertise and research.

The “Grey’s Anatomy” heat dome storyline might not have happened except for Adam Umhoefer, an executive at the CAA Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Creative Artists Agency, one of Hollywood’s top talent agencies. He co-founded Green Screen, an effort to connect CAA clients and others in the industry to sustainability experts.

“The idea is that I’m kind of operating as an agent for climate,” Umhoefer told me.

When Umhoefer heard from a friend in the “Grey’s Anatomy” writers’ room that the writers were looking to tell a climate story — after ending Season 20 with a massive wildfire — he connected them with the Natural Resources Defense Council, whose Rewrite the Future initiative consults with studios to improve climate storytelling.

“We were very interested in continuing that [fire] story, and the effect on the community of Seattle,” showrunner Meg Marinis said at the Hollywood Climate Summit. “We just didn’t want to pretend that never existed.”

To foreshadow the heat dome, they started the season with climate protesters blocking a bridge, causing several characters to get stuck in traffic. One of them, Link (Chris Carmack), scolds his partner Jo (Camilla Luddington) for getting annoyed, since the protesters are fighting for a worthy cause. Tick populations are exploding, he reminds her, increasing the risk of Lyme disease. And the last 10 years have been the 10 hottest on record globally.

“When Camilla and Chris Carmack were in that car, it was like 95 degrees near Long Beach. … They were putting ice packs on their heads in between takes,” Marinis said. “It was all very relatable. We were all living through it.”

Lived experience aside, it’s hard to know how much appetite entertainment executives will have for more climate stories while Trump is in office. He’s flouted democratic norms by threatening and even pursuing lawsuits against media companies that irk him, including Paramount, Comcast and the Walt Disney Co., which owns ABC.

But the fossil fuel industry won’t stop winning the culture wars, and thus the political wars, until a much broader segment of the American public demands climate solutions, now. Hollywood can help make it happen.

The folks behind “Grey’s Anatomy,” at least, say they aren’t planning to back down. Stay tuned.

This is the latest edition of Boiling Point, a newsletter about climate change and the environment in the American West. Sign up here to get it in your inbox. And listen to our “Boiling Point” podcast here.

For more climate and environment news, follow @Sammy_Roth on X and @sammyroth.bsky.social on Bluesky.

THIS nepo-baby looked incredible as she appeared at an exhibition in London last night.

And it’s no surprise, as the actress has grown up with very famous Hollywood parents.

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The 17-year-old was snapped in London at the Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition Party.

And she looked absolutely stunning as she posed in a sweet pink dress beside her famous mother.

But can you guess who she is? Or who her famous parents are?

The young lady in question is Nell Burton, the daughter of Hollywood director Tim Burton and A-list star Helena Bonham Carter.

Nell made her first movie appearance as a toddler, as a Baby at Dock in the movie “Alice in Wonderland”, directed by her father Tim.

Her mother, Helena, played the Red Queen, starring opposite Johnny Depp as a Mad Hatter and Mia Wasikowska as Alice.

Nell was then seen as a Little Girl at the Train Station in the 2012 fantasy comedy “Dark Shadows”.

She also made an appearance as Girl at Park in the biographical drama “Big Eyes”, about the life of the painter Margaret Keane.

And she appeared as Unnamed classmate in Beetlejuice Beetlejuice.

Tim and Helena met for the first time when he cast her to play in his 2001 movie “Planet of the Apes”, during which the two began their relationship.

Sweeney Todd actress Helena, 59, and Tim, 66, went on to have an unconventional marriage.

The couple famously lived together in adjoining houses in Belsize Park, North London, before knocking them together.

They had two children Billy, 22, and Nell, 17, but split in 2014.

They remained friends after the split with Helena branding the director “very generous”.

She said at the time: “You go through massive grief — it is a death of a relationship, so it’s utterly bewildering.

“Your identity, everything, changes.

“Luckily I’ve kept both houses. He was very generous.”

Helena is now with writer and academic Rye Dag Holmboe, who at 37 is 22 years her junior.

And Tim is with Bond girl and model Monica Bellucci, 66, who presented him with a lifetime achievement award at the Lumière Film Festival in Lyon in 2022.

Nell’s older brother has also made appearances in several of their father’s movies.

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A RECLUSIVE Hollywood star has been spotted lapping up the sunshine with his rarely seen wife on a trip abroad.

The 66-year-old actor appeared to be enjoying some downtime as he relaxed with his wife in Mallorca.

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But can you work out who he is?

It is actor Daniel Day Lewis who was spotted with his wife Rebecca Miller at the Port of Andratx.

The popular star was seen leaving a van by the port as he hopped into a speedboat with his wife.

It is understood the couple were travelling via speedboat to join a yacht with legendary filmmaker, Steven Speilberg.

The pair famously worked together on the 2012 historical drama movie, Lincoln.

Daniel looked relaxed as he opted to cover up despite the Spanish sunshine.

He wore a long beige coat with matching trousers and kept his eyes hidden behind a pair of dark shades.

His wife Rebecca also appeared to keep things simple with a plain white t-shirt and a wide-brimmed hat.

Daniel has famously kept a low-profile and retired from acting but was encouraged by his son to dip his toe back into the game last year.

His son Roman convinced him to star in his directorial debut.

The father and son duo wrote the screenplay together, with the film described as an “exploration of the relationships between fathers, sons and brothers, and the dynamics of familial bonds”.

Along with Daniel, the movie has an impressive cast which includes Sean Bean, Samantha Morton, Samuel Bottomley and Safia Oakley-Green.

The triple Oscar-winner’s last film was the 2017 movie, Phantom Thread, based on the fashion world of 1950s London.

Announcing his retirement at the time, Daniel’s representative said in a statement: “Daniel Day-Lewis will no longer be working as an actor.

“He is immensely grateful to all of his collaborators and audiences over the many years.

“This is a private decision and neither he nor his representatives will make any further comment on this subject.”

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IF awards were given out for most toxic break-up in Hollywood, Alice Evans and Ioan Gruffudd would sweep the board.

Four years after the couple’s marriage ended, their bitter feud continues to overshadow anything either party has ever delivered on the big screen.

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And the end credits are still some way off from rolling, especially when Alice is the leading lady. 

In recent weeks, the actress’s behaviour has become increasingly erratic, from declaring herself homeless to begging her Instagram followers for a place to stay.

Her antics have left fans understandably concerned for her well-being, but there are also suspicions that her brutal honesty is also part of a ‘game plan’ – one she secretly hopes may spark a career renaissance.

An insider told The Sun: “Alice is aware her car crash relationship is the only thing keeping her relevant right now.

“The acting jobs have dried up, and even she admits she’s currently unhireable.

“So documenting both her innermost feelings and stark truths of her desperate situation on social media maintains a profile, and therefore could lead to other opportunities away from acting but still within the industry, like her own reality show.”

The insider added: “Alice knows what she’s doing and will continue airing her dirty laundry in public. She has nothing to lose.”

While Alice, 56, continues to offload on social media, her Fantastic Four actor ex Ioan, 51, is quietly getting on with his life. 

He’s recently remarried to Australian actress Bianca Wallace, who’s felt the wrath of Alice’s sharp tongue, which led to Ioan filing a request for a restraining order against her.

And his most recent movie, Bad Boys: Ride Or Die, banked an impressive $403million worldwide.

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He’s still battling Alice for spousal support and custody and financial support for their two daughters, Ella, 15, and Elsie, 11, but is doing all of his talking via lawyers – unlike his ex, whom he met on the set of the 2000 movie 102 Dalmatians.

Indeed, Alice is updating fans with every cough and spit of the fallout from the pair’s divorce, which she claims has left her financially ruined.

In February, Alice told her 95,000 Instagram followers she, her two daughters, plus their dog Emma were on the verge of being evicted from their home in Los Angeles.

She said it was due to being unable to pay her rent, all while Ioan, who says his ex-wife’s poverty claims are “exaggerated”, was living in comfort in a $5,500 (£4,000) a month apartment with a home gym.

Alice knows what she’s doing and will continue airing her dirty laundry in public. She has nothing to lose

Insider

She claimed there was “no way of renting even the cheapest room anywhere in the city” due to January’s wildfires, which has decimated the rental market. 

Alice wrote: “Four years of hell. And now the girls and I are going to be homeless. Somebody please help. I think I have reached rock bottom.

“In 16 days, we have nowhere to go. Does anybody have a spare room? I’m so sorry for this. So embarrassed.”

In the comments section of the post, Alice replied to many fans’ offers of help, once again opting for stark honesty surrounding her situation.

She revealed that “both sets of grandparents estranged themselves from my girls” when quizzed why her family aren’t supporting her.

Four years of hell. And now the girls and I are going to be homeless. Somebody please help. I think I have reached rock bottom

Alice Evans

She explained: “It breaks my heart. It would be perfectly possible to take sides against me whilst retaining a relationship with my kids.

“They both have their own phones that I have vowed to never touch. Nothing is stopping them from communicating.

“I think it’s a terrible mistake. And punishing children for something they believe their mother has done. Not fair at all.”

She also responded to fans’ offers of rooms to inhabit in countries including Ireland and Mexico, saying she can’t leave LA “without authorisation”, but would have “loved” to take up their kind gestures.

Desperation

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Such was her desperation, she repurposed her GoFundMe page – originally set up in 2022 to help pay for her divorce  – to seek funds for a new home, and she’s now just over $6,500 (£5,000) from reaching her target of $25,000 (£18,000).

Thanking donors this week, some of whom shelled out $2,500 anonymously, she wrote: “Just wanted to tell everybody that me and the girls and Emma are safe with a roof over our heads!

“It’s been a whirlwind, but we made it through the last three days and managed to save all our belongings too! 

“We could never, ever have done this without the incredible love and kindness from all of you. Honestly, I was at my wits’ end and you saved me. 

“Thank you from the bottom of my heart. I will keep you posted. Love you so much.’

Confessing she felt shame in turning to the public for help, she previously wrote: “I’m so embarrassed about this. If you’re here, you know my story. 

Alice is aware her car crash relationship is the only thing keeping her relevant right now

Insider

“You know how much I struggle to keep my two girls healthy and happy and a roof over their heads. 

“You know what I’ve been through. It never ends. I’m just getting squeezed in every which way and smeared in the media so that nobody even wants to employ me.”

Ioan agreed to pay Alice $3,000 (£2,200) per month in child support and $1,500 (£1,100) a month in spousal support in September last year. 

However, Alice has claimed the $4,500 (£3,300) fee was not sufficient to live in LA, and that money raised from the sale of their old marital home has slowly dwindled away, citing legal fees.

In March, the Vampire Diaries star slammed Ioan in a court filing for saying he “does not really believe” she was facing eviction and that she secretly had the money to pay for it, saying it was an effort “to make him look bad.”

Dark turn

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Last month, the rift took another dark twist when Ioan claimed he saw Alice try to give their children cocaine after leaving the door of their family home unlocked so a drug dealer could enter.

The bombshell revelation came in the Welshman’s latest court bid to extend the aforementioned restraining order against him and his new wife, Bianca.

Alice and Ioan married seven years after co-starring in the Disney sequel, tying the knot in Mexico in 2007 during an intimate service attended by close friends and family who had “travelled from all over the world for it”.

They welcomed their first daughter Ella in 2009 before Elsie arrived four years later.

But in January 2021, the pair announced their separation, and it was New Jersey-born Alice, who was brought up in the UK, who revealed the news in a typically blunt style, kick-starting their public feud.

She wrote: “Sad news. My beloved husband/soulmate of 20 years, Ioan Gruffudd, has announced he is to leave his family, starting next week. 

“Me and our young daughters are very confused and sad. We haven’t been given a reason except that he ‘no longer loves me’. I’m so sorry.”

But the rift turned really ugly when Ioan went public with new love and A Ray of Sunshine co-star Bianca, 32, nine months later, sharing a snap of the pair on Instagram alongside the caption: “Thank you for making me smile again.”

Previously, Ioan requested a restraining order against Alice in February 2022 after accusing her of harassment, making up “false stories about him”, and sending his mother “threatening emails.”

The actor’s daughter, Ella, then filed a domestic violence restraining order against him in June 2023 following an incident at his Los Angeles home, which was later rejected.

Two months later, Ioan accused Alice of keeping their children from him and had not seen them in three months, which his ex-wife denied.

She said he was to blame, claiming the actor had not bothered making contact with their daughters for 11 weeks.

Over the last two years, Alice’s complaints have centred around her financial struggles in the wake of their split.

She has said she’s relying on “food stamps”, while Ioan continues his “lavish lifestyle”, buying Rolex watches for his new partner, and is now reportedly considering working at Starbucks.

There have been worse angles for a reality show.

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Strumming a black acoustic guitar to match his black tuxedo pants and jacket, Hugh Jackman strolled onto the stage of the Hollywood Bowl and let the audience know precisely what it was in for.

“Little bit of Neil Diamond,” he said as the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra revved up the go-go self-improvement jive of “Crunchy Granola Suite.”

A dedicated student of showbiz history, the Australian singer and actor was starting his concert Saturday night just as Diamond did half a century ago at the Greek Theatre gig famously captured on his classic “Hot August Night” LP.

Yet Diamond was just one of the flamboyant showmen Jackman aspired to emulate as he headlined the opening night of the Bowl’s 2025 season. Later in the concert, the 56-year-old sang a medley of tunes by Peter Allen, the Australian songwriter and Manhattan bon vivant whom Jackman portrayed on Broadway in 2003 in “The Boy From Oz.” And then there was P.T. Barnum, whose career as a maker of spectacle inspired the 2017 blockbuster “The Greatest Showman,” which starred Jackman as Barnum and spawned a surprise-hit soundtrack that went quadruple-platinum.

“There’s 17,000 of you, and if any of you did not see ‘The Greatest Showman,’ you might be thinking right now: This guy is super-confident,” Jackman told the crowd, panting ever so slightly after he sang the movie’s title song, which has more than 625 million streams on Spotify.

The success of “Showman” notwithstanding, Jackman’s brand of stage-and-screen razzle-dazzle feels fairly rare in pop music these days among male performers. (The theater-kid moment that helped make “Wicked” a phenomenon was almost exclusively engineered — and has almost exclusively benefited — women such as Ariana Grande, Cynthia Erivo, Chappell Roan and Laufey.) What makes Jackman’s jazz-handing even more remarkable is that to many he’s best known as the extravagantly mutton-chopped Wolverine character from the Marvel movies.

Before Jackman’s performance on Saturday, the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, conducted by Thomas Wilkins, played a brief set of orchestral music that included selections from John Ottman’s score for “X2: X-Men United.”

The ascent of Benson Boone, with his mustache and his backflips, suggests that Jackman may yet find inheritors to carry on the tradition he himself was bequeathed by Diamond and the rest. But of course that assumes that Jackman is looking to pass the baton, which was not at all the impression you got from his spirited and athletic 90-minute show at the Bowl.

In addition to stuff from “The Greatest Showman” and a swinging tribute to Frank Sinatra, he did a second Diamond tune — “Sweet Caroline,” naturally, which he said figures into an upcoming movie in which he plays a Diamond impersonator — and a couple of Jean Valjean’s numbers from “Les Misérables,” which Jackman sang in the 2012 movie adaptation that earned him an Academy Award nomination for lead actor. (With an Emmy, a Grammy and two Tonys to his name, he’s an Oscar win away from EGOT status.)

Hugh Jackman with members of the L.A. Phil’s Youth Orchestra Los Angeles on Saturday night.

(Timothy Norris)

For “You Will Be Found,” from “Dear Evan Hansen,” he sat down behind a grand piano and accompanied himself for a bit; for the motor-mouthed “Ya Got Trouble,” from “The Music Man” — the first show he ever did as a high school kid, he pointed out — he came out into the crowd, weaving among the Bowl’s boxes and interacting with audience members as he sang.

“I just saw a lot of friends as I went through,” he said when he returned to the stage. “Hello, Melissa Etheridge and Linda. Hello, Jess Platt. Hi, Steph, hi, David, hi, Sophia, hi, Orlando — so many friends. Very difficult to say hello to friends and still do that dialogue.” He was panting again, this time more showily. “It’s like 53 degrees and I’m sweating.”

The show’s comedic centerpiece was a version of John Denver’s “Thank God I’m a Country Boy” that Jackman remade to celebrate his roots as an “Aussie boy.” There were good-natured jokes about shark attacks and koalas and Margot Robbie, as well as a few pointed political gibes, one about how “our leaders aren’t 100 years old” — “I’m moving on from that joke fast,” he added — and another that rhymed “Life down under is really quite fun” with “I never have to worry: Does that guy have a gun?”

The emotional centerpiece, meanwhile, was “Showman’s” “A Million Dreams,” for which the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra was joined by 18 members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Youth Orchestra Los Angeles. The song itself is pretty cringe, with a lyric bogged down by cliches and a melody you’ve heard a zillion times before. But Jackman sold its corny idealism with a huckster’s sincerity you couldn’t help but buy.

Is a restaurant worth a visit simply because it’s been around longer than that bottle of yellow mustard in your refrigerator? Longer than your oldest living relative? Maybe. Proper respect should be paid to an institution.

Los Angeles is home to restaurants celebrating a century in business. About 36,500 days in operation. The feat alone is something to marvel at.

What is Hollywood without the martini culture built around Musso & Frank Grill? The Long Beach bar scene without the Schooners of cold beer and pickled eggs at Joe Jost’s? A South Pasadena stretch of Route 66 without milkshakes and phospate sodas at Fair Oaks Pharmacy? Over decades in business, these restaurants have become landmarks synonymous with the cities themselves.

Some of L.A.’s most popular attractions are our food halls, with Grand Central Market in downtown and the Original Farmers Market in Fairfax drawing millions of visitors each year. Grand Central Market opened in 1917 with nearly 100 food merchants. Its oldest running restaurant is the China Cafe, with a 22-seat counter that’s been around since 1959. In 1934, about a dozen farmers and other vendors started selling produce at the corner of 3rd Street and Fairfax Avenue, where the Original Farmers Market still operates today. Magee’s Kitchen, its oldest restaurant, began when Blanche Magee started serving lunch to the farmers in the ‘30s.

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1. El Coyote founder Blanche March. (El Coyote) 2. The counter at Fugetsu-Do in 1904. (Fugetsu-Do Bakery Shop) 3. Alicia Mijares, left, daughter of Mijares founder Jesucita Mijares, with Maria Guzman in 1984. (Mijares Restaurant)

Many of the restaurants on this list were built by immigrants from every corner of the world, their American dreams realized in a mochi shop in Little Tokyo, a French restaurant in downtown L.A. and a taste of Jalisco, Mexico, in Pasadena.

If you’re looking for the oldest restaurant in Los Angeles County, you’ll find it in Santa Clarita, a city about 30 miles northwest of downtown. Originally called the Saugus Eating House when it opened as part of a railway station in 1886, the Saugus Cafe boasts a history rich with Hollywood film stars, U.S. presidents and a train network that helped establish towns across the state.

In 1916, the cafe moved across the street to where it sits now, one long, narrow building that includes a dining room and a bar. It has closed, reopened and changed hands numerous times over the last 139 years. Longtime employee Alfredo Mercado now owns the restaurant.

It’s a place that exists in a cocoon of nostalgia. The history embedded in the walls, the decor and the friendly staff are the main draw. If you’re searching for the best breakfast in town, you may want to keep looking.

The following are decades-old restaurants that have stood the test of time, shrinking wallets and fickle diners. In operation for 90 years or longer, these 17 destinations (listed from oldest to newest) are worth the trip for both the history, and whatever you decide to order.

FIVE protesters have been arrested after they allegedly targeted the filming of Gal Gadot’s new movie.

The demonstrators disrupted production at several locations across London in recent weeks, the Metropolitan Police said.

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The force said the protestors targeted sets “solely because an actress involved in the production is Israeli”.

Gadot, 40, who served in the Israel Defense Forces, previously showed support for Israel’s invasion of Gaza after the October 7 Hamas attacks.

The Palestinian Campaign for the Academic & Cultural Boycott of Israel (Pacbi) has since argued people who support their group should boycott Gadot films.

Gadot is understood to currently be filming an action thriller called The Runner in the capital.

Police were called to a set location in Westminster on Wednesday.

Officers detained five people on suspicion of harassment and offences under Section 241 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act.

Two of the arrests were in relation to previous protests, while three were in response to incidents that unfolded on Wednesday.

All five remain in custody.

Supt Neil Holyoak said: “While we absolutely acknowledge the importance of peaceful protest, we have a duty to intervene where it crosses the line into serious disruption or criminality.

“We have been in discussions with the production company to understand the impact of the protests on their work and on any individuals involved.

“I hope today’s operation shows we will not tolerate the harassment of or unlawful interference with those trying to go about their legitimate professional work in London.”

The Runner, produced by David Kosse, stars Gadot as a lawyer on a mission to rescue her kidnapped son.

Gadot has been pictured back on set this week, despite the protests.

Demonstrations also followed the actress to her Hollywood Walk of Fame ceremony after her role in the latest Snow White movie.

A Pro-Palestine group stood outside the ceremony carrying signs reading: “Viva Viva Palestina”.

In a Variety interview earlier this week, Gadot said: “After October 7th [2023], I don’t talk politics — because who cares about the celebrity talking about politics?

“I’m an artist. I want to entertain people. I want to bring hope and be a beacon of light whenever I say anything about the world.

“But on October 7th, when people were abducted from their homes, from their beds, men, women, children, elderly, Holocaust survivors, were going through the horrors of what happened that day, I could not be silent.

“I’m not a hater. I’m a grandchild of a Holocaust survivor who came to Israel and established his family from scratch after his entire family was erased in Auschwitz.

“And on the other side of my family, I’m eighth generation Israeli. I’m an indigenous person of Israel.

“I am all about humanity and I felt like I had to advocate for the hostages. I am praying for better days for all.

“I want everybody to have good life and prosperity, and the ability to raise their children in a safe environment.”

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When filmmakers say they’re experimenting with artificial intelligence, that news is typically received online as if they had just declared their allegiance to Skynet.

And so it was when Darren Aronofsky — director of button-pushing movies including “The Whale” and “Black Swan” — last week announced a partnership with Google AI arm DeepMind to use the tech giant’s capabilities in storytelling.

Aronofsky’s AI-focused studio Primordial Soup is producing three short movies from emerging filmmakers using Google tools, including the text-to-video model Veo. The first film, “Ancestra,” directed by Eliza McNitt, will premiere at the Tribeca Festival on June 13, the Mountain View-based search giant said.

Google’s promotional materials take pains to show that “Ancestra” is a live-action film made by humans and with real actors, though it’s bolstered with effects and imagery — including a tiny baby holding a mother’s finger — that were created with AI.

The partnership was touted during Google’s I/O developer event, where the company showed off the new Veo 3, which allows users to create videos that include sound effects, ambient noise and speech (a step up from OpenAI-owned competitor, Sora). The company also introduced its new Flow film creation tool, essentially editing software using Google AI functions.

Google’s push to court creative types coincides with a separate initiative to help AI technology overcome its massive public relations problem.

As my colleague Wendy Lee wrote recently, the company is working with filmmakers including Sean Douglas and his famous father Michael Keaton to create shorts that aren’t made with AI, but instead portray the technology in a less apocalyptic light than Hollywood is used to.

Simply put, much of the public sees AI as a foe that will steal jobs, rip off your intellectual property, ruin your childhood, destroy the environment and possibly kill us all, like in “The Terminator,” “2001: A Space Odyssey” and the most recent “Mission: Impossible” movies. And Google, which is making a big bet by investing in AI, has a lot riding on changing that perception.

There’s a ways to go, including in the entertainment industry.

Despite the allure of cost-savings, traditional studios haven’t exactly dived headfirst into the AI revolution. They’re worried about the legal implications of using models trained on troves of copyrighted material, and they don’t want to anger the entertainment worker unions, which went on strike partly over AI fears just a couple years ago. The New York Times and others have sued OpenAI and its investor Microsoft, alleging copyright theft. Tech giants claim they are protected by “fair use.”

AI-curious studios are walking into a wild, uncharted legal landscape because of the amount of copyrighted material being mined to teach the models, said Dan Neely, co-founder of startup Vermillio, which helps companies and individuals protect their intellectual property.

“The major studios and most people are going to be challenged using this product when it comes to the output content that you can and cannot use or own,” Neely said by phone. “Given that it contains vast quantities of copyrighted material, and you can get it to replicate that stuff pretty easily, that creates chaos for someone who’s creating with it.”

But while the legacy entertainment business remains largely skeptical of AI, many newer, digitally-native studios and creators are embracing it, whether their goals are to become the next Pixar or the next Mr. Beast.

The New York Times recently profiled the animation startup Toonstar, which says it uses AI throughout its production process, including when sharpening storylines and lip-syncing. John Attanasio, a Toonstar founder, told the paper that leaning into the tech would make animation “80 percent faster and 90 percent cheaper than industry norms.”

Jeffrey Katzenberg, the former leader of DreamWorks Animation, has given a similar estimate of the potential cost-savings for Hollywood cartoons.

Anyone working in the traditional computer animation business would have to gulp at those projections, whether they turn out to be accurate or not. U.S. animation jobs have already been hammered by outsourcing. Now here comes automation to finish the job. (Disney’s animated features cost well over $100 million to produce because they’re made by real-life animators in America.)

Proponents of AI will sometimes argue that the new technology isn’t a replacement for human workers, but rather a tool to enhance creativity. Some are more blunt: Stop worrying about these jobs and embrace the future of uninhibited creation. For obvious reasons, workers are reluctant to buy into that line of thinking.

More broadly, it’s still unclear whether all the spending on the AI arms race will ultimately be worth the cost. Goldman Sachs, in a 2024 report, estimated that companies would invest $1 trillion in AI infrastructure — including data centers, chips and the power grid — in the coming years.

But that same report raised questions about AI’s ultimate utility.

To be worth the gargantuan investment, the technology would have to be capable of solving far more complex problems than it does now, said one Goldman analyst in the report. In recent weeks, the flaws in the technology have crossed over into absurd territory: For example, by generating a summer reading list of fake books and legal documents polluted with serious errors and fabrications.

Big spending and experimentation doesn’t always pan out. Look at virtual reality, the metaverse and the blockchain.

But some entertainment companies are experimenting with the tools and finding applications. Meta has partnered with horror studio Blumhouse and James Cameron’s venture Lightstorm Vision on AI-related initiatives. AI firm Runway is working with Lionsgate. At a time when the movie industry is troubled in part due to the high cost of special effects, production companies are motivated to stay on top of advancing tech.

One of the most common arguments in favor of giving in to AI is that the technology will unshackle the next generation of creative minds.

Some AI-enhanced content is promising. But so far AI video tools have produced a remarkable amount of content that looks the same, with its oddly dreamlike sheen of unreality. That’s partly because the models are trained on color-corrected imagery available on the open internet or on YouTube. Licensing from the studios could help with that problem.

The idea of democratizing filmmaking through AI may sound good in theory. However, there are countless examples in movie history — including “Star Wars” and “Jaws” — of how having physical and budgetary restrictions are actually good for art, however painful and frustrating they may have been during production.

Even within the universe of AI-assisted material, the quality will vary dramatically depending on the talent and skill of people using it.

“Ultimately, it’s really hard to tell good stories,” Neely said. “The creativity that defines what you prompt the machine to do is still human genius — the best will rise to the top.”

Like other innovations, the technology will improve with time, as the new Google tools show. Both Veo 3 and Flow showcase how AI is becoming better and easier to use, though they are still not quite mass-market products. For its highest tier, Google is charging $250 a month for its suite of tools.

Maybe the next Spielberg will find their way through AI-assisted video, published for free on YouTube. Perhaps Sora and Veo will have a moment that propels them to mainstream acceptance in filmmaking, as “The Jazz Singer” did for talkies.

But those milestones still feel a long way off.

Stuff we wrote

Number of the week

The Memorial Day weekend box office achieved record revenue (not adjusting for inflation) of $329.8 million in the U.S. and Canada, thanks to the popularity of Walt Disney Co.’s “Lilo & Stitch” and Paramount’s “Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning.”

Disney’s live-action remake generated $183 million in domestic ticket sales, exceeding pre-release analyst expectations, while the latest Tom Cruise superspy spectacle opened with $77 million. The weekend was a continuation of a strong spring rebound for theaters. Revenue so far this year is now up 22% versus 2024, according to Comscore.

This doesn’t mean the movie business is saved, but it does show that having a mix of different kinds of movies for multiple audiences is healthy for cinemas. Upcoming releases include “Karate Kid: Legends,” “Ballerina,” “How to Train Your Dragon” and a Pixar original, “Elio.”

“Lilo & Stitch” is particularly notable, coming after Disney’s previous live-action redo, “Snow White,” bombed in theaters. While Snow White has an important place in Disney history, Stitch — the chaotic blue alien — has quietly become a hugely important character for the company, driving enormous merchandise sales over the years.

The 2002 original wasn’t a huge blockbuster, coming during an awkward era for Walt Disney Animation, but the remake certainly is.

Finally …

Watch: Prepping for the new “Naked Gun” by rewatching the classic and reliving the perfect Twitter meme.

Listen: My favorite episode of “Blank Check with Griffin & David” in a long time — covering Steven Spielberg’s “Hook” with Lin-Manuel Miranda.

A 90’s TV star looks unrecognisable after swapping lads’ mags for a luxury LA lifestyle.

The fan favourite featured in more than 30 shows – including Big Breakfast.

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Dani Behr started her career with a brief appearance on the hit school drama series, Grange Hill in 1989.

She went on to be a presenter on Channel 4‘s music show The Word for five years.

Dani became a lads’ favourite and later moved to the US to continue presenting over there.

Following brief stints on I’m A Celebrity and Come Dine With Me, she embarked on a new career as a luxury real estate agent.

In this role, the TV legend lets out and manages property for the Hollywood elite.

Fans may have seen Dani appear on popular show Million Dollar Listing LA.

She married restaurateur Carl Harwin in 2005, having two children, although the two went their separate ways nine years later.

Speaking on White Wine Question Time in 2020, she revealed her full time switch to real estate came when on-screen work dried up – around the time of her 2014 divorce.

Dani told Kate Thornton: “They don’t have careers as presenters out here, like back home.

“You’re either a news journalist or a sportscaster or a late night comedian, those were the hosts of all the shows here and I didn’t fit into any of those categories.”

She already had ties to real estate industry – with her dad himself working in real estate while her mum is an interior designer.

Dani therefore decided to study for real estate exams in order to obtain a license.

She hosted a podcast titled The Behr Essentials for two years – focusing on her career in property.

It comes as the TV legend looked unrecognisable last year while she striped off to workout gear for a fitness class.

Taking to social media, Dani flaunted her stunning figure to her followers.

She captioned the post: “I always get asked what I do to keep things tight and high and my secret weapon for the last ten years is Dance Cardio!

“Love @manumoves class- always so fun, great music and a mighty sweat!!

“You don’t have to be in LA to participate – check out manumoves.com and sign up and start dancing at home!”

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CONTROVERSIAL porn star Bonnie Blue appeared to be kicked out of Nottingham Forest’s stadium.

The adult film actor was issued a ban at the City Ground in April after offering to “entertain” fans before a game.

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So Bonnie – real name Tia – wore a black wig and cap to disguise herself after entering Chelsea’s away end against Forest.

She said: “I am playing hide and seek with Nottingham Forest’s security. The first security officer that finds me, gets to boink me.”

Bonnie was eventually found and escorted out – with footage circulating online capturing the moment.

She then made a lewd gesture behind one of the security guards.

Bonnie shot to recognition earlier this year after she claimed to break the world record for sex after allegedly sleeping with 1,057 men in 24 hours.

She ditched her 9 to 5 to become a cam girl and later an adult film star.

The Sun previously revealed how the controversial model is currently filming  a documentary with Channel 4 about her life.

And we also revealed how her most recent controversy – when she appeared to get arrested – was nothing more than another desperate publicity stunt.

Bonnie opened up on how she was banned from Forest’s ground on the Only Stans podcast.

She said: “I recently went to a Nottingham Forest game. Well, I attempted to.

“I put on my socials, ‘hey boys, I’m going to be at the game, I’d like to film with you afterwards’.

“I turn up at the football game and the gate security was like, ‘you are permanently banned from the ground’.

“I thought when they asked me to go to the side, ‘maybe they’re upgrading my tickets, maybe they want to escort me to my seat, this is quite nice, it’s a good service’.

“They asked to see my tickets, I showed them and they took them off me, saying, ‘we’re escorting you off the premises’.

“Apparently they don’t discriminate against sex workers but I was banned because I was a sex worker.

“I was going to encourage them (the players), give them a good time. I also think if I’m entertaining the supporters it’s less people drinking so I’m actually doing something good for their health.”

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AXED Doctor Who star Ncuti Gatwa has revealed a huge new job after his BBC show exit.

We previously revealed that the former Sex Education star was given the boot by bosses after just two series.

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Ncuti, 32, has left the long-running drama after ‘woke’ storylines have seen ratings plummet in recent years.

The actor is off after just two series with no replacement likely for the Time Lord’s regeneration on May 31.

Now, the actor is quickly moving on as he has just announced his next project on social media.

He will stay in the upcoming satirical black comedy film called The Roses.

The star took to his Instagram stories as he displayed the poster of the Hollywood movie, alongside a simple rose and red heart emoji.

It features a completely star-studded cast of Hollywood A-listers and Oscar winners.

Benedict Cumberbatch, Olivia Colman, and I, Tonya star Allison Janney all have leading roles in the new flick.

While former Saturday Night Live favourites Andy Samberg and Kate McKinnon will also have feature roles.

The news comes after Ncuti backed out of announcing the UK’s jury scores in last weekend’s Eurovision Song Contest.

He pulled out of his commitments just 48 hours before he was due to appear in front of 160million people.

At the time, the corporation confirmed he would no longer be involved, citing “unforeseen circumstances” and he was replaced by Sophie Ellis-Bextor.

This was amid controversy among some at Israel’s inclusion in the global singing competition and Ncuti stepped aside moments after Israel qualified for the grand final.

A TV insider said: “If the final nail wasn’t already in the coffin, it was well and truly hammered in after that.

“Bosses were incredibly disappointed. Ncuti, as the Doctor, is one of the corporation’s most high-profile faces.

Who has starred in Doctor Who?

Which actors have portrayed the famous Time Lord over the years?

• First Doctor: William Hartnell (1963 – 1966)
• Second Doctor: Patrick Troughton (1966 – 1969)
• Third Doctor: Jon Pertwee (1970 – 1974)
• Fourth Doctor: Tom Baker (1974 – 1981)
• Fifth Doctor: Peter Davidson (1982 – 1984)
• Sixth Doctor: Colin Baker (1984 – 1986)
• Seventh Doctor: Sylvester McCoy (1987 – 1989)
• Eighth Doctor: Paul McGann (1996)
• Ninth Doctor: Christopher Eccleston (2005)
• Tenth Doctor: David Tennant (2005 – 2010)
• 11th Doctor: Matt Smith (2010 – 2013)
• 12th Doctor: Peter Capaldi (2014 – 2017)
• 13th Doctor: Jodie Whittaker (2018 – 2022)
• 14th Doctor: David Tennant (2023)
• 15th Doctor: Ncuti Gatwa (2023 – present)

“His withdrawal was incredibly embarrassing. It caps what has been a largely depressing tenure in the Tardis for Ncuti.“

Execs are likely to rest the 62-year-old show to consider who might revive its fortunes.

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ACTRESS Madeline Brewer makes a splash — in a dress made from a Sun front page.

Redhead Madeline, 33, star of Netflix hit You, wore it for Behind the Blinds magazine.

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It features a January 1986 edition of The Sun — the first printed at Wapping.

The style resembles the John Galliano newspaper dress worn by Sex and The City star Sarah Jessica Parker in the popular series.

Madeline starred alongside actor Penn Badgley in popular series You.

In the fifth and final series, which is now streaming, viewers will see Joe embarking on an affair with a young woman named Bronte, played by Madeline.

They meet after she gains employment at his bookstore but it soon becomes clear that she has an ulterior motive after she developed suspicions that Joe was responsible for the death of her close friend.

Penn has led the show since its inception on the streaming service but has shied away from getting down and dirty on-camera for the past two series.

However, he has since decided that in order to give the show a “proper conclusion,” he needs to head back to the bedroom to spice things up for the final series.

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• @behindtheblinds. Madeline is wearing @vetements_official on the cover. She’s captured by @foxhunter & styled by @orettac. Shot for Behind The Blinds Magazine.

For the second time in less than a year, Willie Nelson and Bob Dylan played the Hollywood Bowl on Friday night, bringing together two legends of American song on one stage. The concert — actually Nelson’s third recent visit to the Bowl after his 90th-birthday bash in 2023 — was part of the annual traveling Outlaw Music Festival, which will keep Nelson, now 92, and Dylan, who’ll turn 84 next week, on the road through mid-September. Here are nine highlights from the show:

1. Last year’s Outlaw tour stopped at the Bowl in late July, which at that time meant Nelson didn’t have to ward off the chilly May gray that inevitably settles after dark over the Cahuenga Pass. Here, a day after reportedly suffering from a cold in Chula Vista, Nelson kept warm in a stylish black puffer jacket to go with his signature red bandanna.

2. John Stamos played percussion in Nelson’s six-man band Friday — a somewhat lower-key role than the prominent guitar-and-vocals spot he often holds down these days in Mike Love’s touring Beach Boys. Yet the TV star looked pleased as punch to be back there, shaking a shaker as Nelson opened his set, as always, with “Whiskey River.” Also on hand, filling in for Nelson’s son Lukas was singer-guitarist Waylon Payne, who sang lead in a moving version of Kris Kristofferson’s “Help Me Make It Through the Night” — the folk-soul masterpiece made a hit in 1970 by Payne’s mother, the late Sammi Smith.

3. My favorite of Nelson’s styles to hear him do at this point in his career, with a voice and a soloing hand as free as they’ve ever been, is the spectral country-jazz mode of “Angel Flying Too Close to the Ground” and “Always on My Mind,” which gave him a pair of No. 1 country hits between March 1981 and May 1982. On Friday, he nailed high notes you might not have expected him to in the former and used the latter to show off the rhythmic daring of his line readings. Both were achingly beautiful.

4. Nelson didn’t perform anything from his latest album, “Oh What a Beautiful World,” which came out last month and collects his interpretations of a dozen Rodney Crowell tunes. (By some counts, it’s Nelson’s 77th solo studio LP — and the 15th he’s dropped since 2015.) He did, however, do a cut from his second-most-recent effort: a stately rendition of Tom Waits’ “Last Leaf,” in which he rhymes “They say I got staying power” with “I’ve been here since Eisenhower.” In fact, Nelson’s been here since FDR.

5. The big event in Dylanology between last year’s Outlaw tour and this year’s was, of course, James Mangold’s Oscar-nominated biopic, “A Complete Unknown,” which inspired a widespread resurgence of interest in Dylan’s music — particularly the early stuff Timothée Chalamet performs in the movie. Perhaps that’s why Dylan is singing “Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right” on the road again for the first time in six years, including at the Bowl, where he gave the song a jaunty rockabilly vibe. (Anyone wondering why Chalamet wasn’t at Friday’s gig clearly hasn’t seen the TikToks of him wilding out after his beloved Knicks defeated the Celtics at New York’s Madison Square Garden.)

6. A rare-ish bit of stage banter from His Bobness, directed toward an audience member near the front row: “What are you eating down there? What is it?”

7. The whole point of going to see Dylan play is to be delighted — or to be outraged, or baffled — by his determination to reinvent songs so deeply etched into the history of rock music. Yet I was still thrilled by how radically he made over some of his classics here: “Desolation Row” was bright and frisky, while a sultry “All Along the Watchtower” sounded like Dire Straits doing ’80s R&B.

8. In addition to Nelson and Dylan, Outlaw’s West Coast leg also features two younger roots-music acts in Billy Strings and Sierra Hull. (Later in the summer, the tour will pick up the likes of Nathaniel Rateliff, Sheryl Crow, Waxahatchee and Wilco, depending on the city.) Strings, who’s been bringing bluegrass to arenas lately — and whose tattooed arms meshed seamlessly with the sleeves of his tie-dyed T-shirt — sang “California Sober,” which he recorded in 2023 as a duet with Nelson, and offered a haunting take on “Summertime” from “Porgy and Bess.”

9. A former child prodigy on the mandolin, Hull opened the evening flexing her Berklee-trained chops in a series of lickety-split bluegrass numbers that got early arrivers whistling with approval. But she also showed off a winsome pop sensibility in originals like “Muddy Water” and “Spitfire” — about “my spitfire granny back in Tennessee,” she said — and in a yearning cover of “Mad World” by Tears for Fears.

LEGENDARY British actor Tim Curry was seen on a rare outing in Los Angeles today, 13 years after suffering a major stroke.

The 79-year-old was spotted leaving Gelson’s supermarket wearing a red sweater, matching trainers, and black trousers.

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Also sporting dark sunglasses and clutching a paper bag, Tim was pushed in a wheelchair by his carer.

Tim’s 2012 stroke left him partially paralysed on one side of his body and affected his speech.

The health crisis forced him to step away from acting and public life for several years.

A celebrated actor, Tim is known for his charismatic performances in film, television, and theatre.

He became a cult icon playing Dr. Frank-N-Furter in The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

His other notable roles include Wadsworth the butler in the cult classic Clue and Pennywise the Dancing Clown in the 1990 adaptation of Stephen King’s It.

The stroke had a severe impact on Tim’s mobility, leaving him reliant on a wheelchair and carers for support with everyday tasks.

Since 2012, Tim has undergone extensive physical therapy and rehabilitation to regain as much movement and speech as possible.

He has kept a low profile in recent years, rarely seen in public and not active in major acting projects.

However, Tim has made some notable appearances and engaged with fans through interviews and virtual events.

In 2015, almost three years after his stroke, he made a rare public appearance at the Actors Fund Tony Awards Viewing Party in Los Angeles.

There, he received a lifetime achievement award and spoke openly about his recovery, highlighting how maintaining his sense of humor was vital to coping with his health challenges.

More recently, since 2023, Tim has participated in virtual video chats with fans through conventions like GalaxyCon.

He has also shared occasional video messages on social media, providing insight into his life post-stroke and answering fan questions about his recovery and career.

In addition to these appearances, Tim marked a notable return to acting in 2024 with a role in the horror film Stream – his first feature film role in 14 years.

The film was released in select theaters in August 2024.

He has also remained active in voice acting, lending his talents to animated series and projects, further demonstrating his enduring passion for performance.

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Rams owner Stan Kroenke will build a movie studio next to SoFi Stadium in Inglewood that will serve as the international broadcast center for the 2028 Olympic Games.

Construction will start by summer on the studio and production facility that will house hundreds of broadcasters from around the world that have acquired rights to cover the Summer Games in Los Angeles, Kroenke’s company said Tuesday.

After the Games, the facility known as Hollywood Park Studios will be used to make movies, television shows and other productions and perhaps host live broadcasts.

The development is part of Hollywood Park, a multibillion-dollar complex built on the site of a former horse racing track also known as Hollywood Park that includes the stadium, apartments, theaters, offices, shops and restaurants.

A luxury hotel is under construction there, and more development including a grocery store and medical offices is being considered.

Kroenke’s organization hopes that attention from the Olympics will boost Hollywood Park Studios’ appeal as a future entertainment production center.

“We want it to be recognized around the world,” said Alan Bornstein, who is overseeing development of the studio for Kroenke.

The studio is part of Hollywood Park’s master development plan focusing on media, entertainment and technology, Bornstein said, anchored by SoFi Stadium, YouTube Theater and the NFL Media office building.

“There has been an increasing convergence of media and technology and sports, all under the notion of entertainment that is now distributed in in multiple channels,” Bornstein said, “whether it’s through streaming or whether through broadcast television or movies in theaters,”

The first phase of Hollywood Park Studios will occupy 12 acres and will consist of five soundstages, each 18,000 square feet, two of which may be opened to a single 36,000-square-foot stage.

The complex will have a three-story, 80,000-square-foot office building to support stage, production and postproduction activities. The studios will have a dedicated open base camp where trucks, equipment and actors’ trailers could be placed, along with a parking structure for 1,100 cars. Future development could include as many as 20 stages and 200,000 square feet of related office space.

The additional stages would be built to suit for future tenants as demand emerges, Bornstein said, who declined to estimate how much the studio complex will cost.

Although demand for soundstages outstripped supply a few years ago, production has recently slowed and dampened the current need for them.

A rendering of the Hollywood Park Studios broadcast center and movie production facility.

(Gensler)

Last year, the average annual occupancy rate dropped to 63%, a further indication of Hollywood’s sustained production slowdown, according to a recent report by FilmLA, a nonprofit organization that tracks on-location shoot days in the Greater Los Angeles area.

That was a decline from 2023, which saw an average regional occupancy rate of 69%. That was the year when dual strikes by writers and actors crippled the local production economy for months.

The foray into Hollywood-level production facilities is part of Kroenke’s goal to combine sports, entertainment and media from around the world, Bornstein said.

In addition to the Rams, Kroenke is owner of the Denver Nuggets basketball team, the Colorado Avalanche hockey team, the Colorado Rapids soccer team, the Colorado Mammoth lacrosse team and Arsenal Football Club, the Premier League soccer team based in London.

SoFi Stadium, where the Chargers also play football, will be converted into the largest Olympic swimming venue in history during the Games in 2028. It will host the Olympic opening ceremony with the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, as well as the opening ceremony for the Paralympic Games.

Kroenke is also a major real estate developer and landlord. The 300-acre Hollywood Park project is one of the largest mixed-use developments under construction in the western United States. SoFi Stadium alone cost $5 billion to build.

Last month, he also unveiled plans for a new Rams headquarters on a 100-acre site at Warner Center in Woodland Hills that would include a residential and retail community intended to be the centerpiece of the San Fernando Valley. It could cost more than the total price of Hollywood Park, which has been valued by outside observers at more than $10 billion.

Creating a second epicenter in Woodland Hills allows the Rams to significantly increase the size of their footprint in the Southern California market.

“When you’re looking to do a practice facility, you don’t need to be right in the middle of everything, and typically that real estate is very expensive,” Kroenke told The Times. “We built an identity in the Valley, with Cal Lutheran, and a lot of our players and families are up there. Our experience was really good.”

Architecture firm Gensler spearheaded the design for the Warner Center headquarters and Hollywood Park Studios. Clayco will be the general contractor for the studio, with Pacific Edge acting as project manager. Financing was arranged by Guggenheim Investments.

Times staff writer Sam Farmer contributed to this report.

A GIANT dragon which fans will recognise from a classic Harry Potter film stunned Londoners today as it roared its way through the capital’s streets.

The 25-foot-long animatronic creature appeared ‘captured’ in chains, snarling past iconic landmarks like Westminster Bridge and King’s Cross Station.

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The theatrical stunt was staged to mark the launch of ‘Triwizard Tournament – Making of Champions’, a new feature at Warner Bros.

Studio Tour London – The Making of Harry Potter, which celebrates the 20th anniversary of the cinematic release of Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire.

The Hungarian Horntail, which weighs in at a hefty 1.3 tonnes, recreates the jaw-dropping moment in the fan-favourite film, where Harry battles the beast in the first task of the ‘Triwizard Tournament’.

Replicating the drama of the film, the dragon’s chained journey mimicked its on-screen escape before heading back to Warner Bros. Studio Tour via the Houses of Parliament and a quick pitstop at St. Pancras.

Designed by Harry Potter filmmaker and animatronic designer Joe Scott, the lifelike creature features a moving head, mouth and eyes, and sound effects.

Crafted over 750 hours, the dragon includes a 3D printed head, 25kg of fibreglass, and 119 hand-applied spikes.

Its menacing mouth is lined with 38 resin-printed teeth, recreating the film’s fearsome look in painstaking detail.

Scott drew on original sketches, CGI mock-ups and scans of the original movie model to guide the design process.

He said: “Revisiting the creation of the Hungarian Horntail 20 years on from Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire has been magical.

“Creating the dragons for the Triwizard Tournament was no mean feat, with engineers, animatronics, designers and the special effects teams all working together to bring them to life.

“It’s fantastic to see the craftsmanship that went into this on display at the new feature – inspiring visitors with the magic of our filmmaking secrets.”

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The Triwizard Tournament – Making of Champions exhibit will run from 15 May to 8 September 2025 at Warner Bros. Studio Tour London – The Making of Harry Potter.

Fans will be transported behind the scenes of the iconic Triwizard Tournament, discovering how the thrilling magical challenges were brought to life.

The Studio Tour’s new summer feature invites visitors into the all-new Backlot Stage to explore the Secrets of Special Effects.

The dedicated indoor space includes a digital screen, tiered seating and live demonstrations revealing how filmmakers created the magic.

Among the highlights is a reimagining of the Beauxbaton and Durmstrang students’ arrivals, complete with costumes and choreography.

Visitors will also discover the techniques used to show Harry holding his breath underwater during the second task.

Geoff Spooner, senior vice president at Warner Bros. Studio Tour London, said: “We’re excited to launch our brand-new summer feature, Triwizard Tournament – Making of Champions, where visitors can learn behind-the-scenes secrets of the fourth Harry Potter film.

“To celebrate and bring the magic of Warner Bros. Studio Tour London to the streets of the capital, we recreated the iconic moment of the escaped Hungarian Horntail dragon 20 years on from ‘Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.”

When Mara Brock Akil was a little girl, she voraciously read Judy Blume. Looking back, she sees her obsession as the start of her becoming a writer.

So when Akil heard that Blume was allowing her work to be translated to the screen, she was ready: “My little girl hand just shot up, ‘I want to do that!’” says Akil.

She adds that while this generation’s youth can search the internet for information — and, sometimes, misinformation — Blume was her own trusted source.

“The Information Age linked us and let us see things that we weren’t able to see or know, and Judy was that for us,” says Akil. “Judy was writing from a place that was really grounded and gave full humanity to young people and their lives. She took their lives seriously.”

Akil has channeled her affection for Blume’s work into a new adaptation of the author’s 1975 novel “Forever…,” which premiered Thursday on Netflix. Focused on two teens falling in love, the book contains sex scenes that placed it on banned lists from its inception — and Blume, whose work offers frank discussion of subjects like masturbation and menstruation, remains no stranger to banned book lists, despite selling more than 90 million books worldwide. But as censorship ramps up again, Blume has become something of a hot commodity in Hollywood. In addition to the documentary “Judy Blume Forever,” a feature film based on her novel “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret” was released in 2023, an adaptation of “Summer Sisters” is in development at Hulu and an animated film based on “Superfudge” is in the works at Disney+.

Michael Cooper Jr. in “Forever.”

(Hilary Bronwyn Gayle / Netflix)

Akil’s “Forever,” set in 2018 Los Angeles, stars Michael Cooper Jr. and Lovie Simone as the teenage leads — though the roles are gender-swapped from the novel. In 2020, while Akil was developing the adaptation, she tried to think of who the most vulnerable person is in society.

“I posit that the Black boy is the most vulnerable,” she says. “My muse is my oldest son, and through the portal of him I got to go into the generation and just really start to look at what was going on.”

While working on the project, she realized there are few depictions of boys and young men whose story is anchored in love, rather than relegating love to a side plot. “Mentally, emotionally, physically — they too deserve to fall in love and be desired and have someone fall in love with them,” she says. “And for Keisha — his honesty was attractive to her. How often do we ever really see that level of vulnerability be the leading guy?”

In true Blume style, Akil also incorporated a central issue affecting people today — technology.

“The phone is a big character in the show, because there’s a lot of duality to the phone,” she says.

Throughout the series, the characters use phones to connect and disconnect via blocked messages, lost voicemails and unfinished texts. In the premiere, the drama revolves around the dreaded disappearing ellipsis — that feeling when you can see someone typing and then it stops.

Mara Brock Akil.

(Emma Feil)

Akil laughs when I bring it up: “At any age, that ellipsis will kick your butt.”

And when you add sex into the mix, everything becomes more charged. “The phone in the modern times is an extension of pleasure in sexuality, when used in a trusting way, and then it can be weaponized,” says Akil. “It can be so damaging to this generation’s future at a time in which mistakes are inherent in their development.”

It’s this keen awareness that the mistakes haven’t changed but the consequences have that grounds Akil’s version of “Forever.” “There’s a lot of real fear out there and real tough choices that parents are going through,” says Akil. “And in this era of mistakes, kids can make a mistake and die by exploring drugs or —”

She stops herself. “I get very emotional about the state of young people and their inability to make a mistake,” she says, “because I think most young people are actually making good choices.”

Akil says Blume and her family have seen the episodes more than once and told the showrunner she really enjoyed them. Akil remembers first meeting Blume.

“I was nervous. I wanted to be seen by her,” she says. “I fangirled out and she allowed it and then was, like, sit your soul down. We had a conversation, and it felt destined and magical. I was grateful that she listened, and it allowed me to come to the table saying, ‘I know how to translate this.’”

I ask Akil why she thinks Blume’s work continues to resonate, lasting for decades in its original form and spawning new projects to attract the next generation of viewers and, hopefully, readers.

“She’s relevant because she dared to tell us the truth,” says Akil. “And the truth is forever.”

It’s been a chaotic week in Hollywood.

Less than a week ago, President Trump called for 100% tariffs on movies made outside the U.S., a move meant to bring productions home that most people in the industry believe would have devastating consequences for the entertainment business.

Then industry trade publication Deadline published the “Make Hollywood Great” proposal from actor Jon Voight, one of Trump’s so-called Hollywood ambassadors, that he recently presented to the president.

It has all led to confusion and disagreement from those in the industry about how to make the most of the current spotlight on a crucial issue — maintaining production and jobs in the U.S. — but in a way that will actually benefit the entertainment business.

“Any financial help we can give to filmmakers is going to keep filmmakers at home,” said George Huang, professor of screenwriting at the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television. “Ideally, legislators will try to be creative and try to support what I think is one of our most highly sought-after industries here in the United States.”

On Friday, the Motion Picture Assn. trade group convened a meeting with movie studio chiefs to discuss how to respond to the Trump administration’s plan and how to advocate for measures they think would actually help boost domestic filming.

As other Hollywood unions and organization put out statements about the federal issues, the MPA was conspicuously silent publicly.

Representatives from the MPA and the studios declined to comment Friday.

The MPA — the Washington, D.C.-based lobbying organization for the major studios — has historically faced a difficult task getting its members to agree to anything, and that has only increased since the group expanded to include streaming services Netflix and Amazon, according to people familiar with the organization. The companies all have different priorities and, in some cases, completely different business models.

Some studio executives are hoping Voight’s list of ideas to rebuild Hollywood becomes a rough blueprint for a more realistic alternative to tariffs.

Studio chiefs say it’s often too expensive to make movies and TV shows in the U.S., even with the generous incentives offered by various states. Movies are a low-margin business, and shooting abroad can offset production costs by as much as 30%.

On Wednesday, studio executives from Sony, HBO and Amazon discussed the issue at the Milken Institute Global Conference in Beverly Hills. They highlighted the limits of incentives — even if the U.S. offered tax credits, sometimes projects have to be shot overseas because of the story.

“We’re going overseas because we have a show set in London,” said “The Diplomat” creator Debora Cahn. “We want castles and palaces, and we don’t have enough of them here.”

What’s clear is that most of Hollywood — as well as current and former civic leaders — do not favor the use of tariffs to bring production back to the U.S.

“It’s going to kill us,” former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa told The Times. “That’s not going to help us. It’s going to hurt us.”

Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-Los Angeles), too, was skeptical of Trump’s tariff announcement.

“This is the absolute worst way to go about supporting an industry so critical to not just L.A. and the state but the country,” she said. “Filmed entertainment is one of the best products we are able to produce.”

It’s why Voight’s plan is being looked at with interest.

The centerpiece is a “new federal American Production incentive,” which would allow a 20% tax credit — or an added 10% on top of a state’s film incentive.

Projects that qualify would have to meet a minimum threshold American “cultural test,” similar to what Britain requires for film incentives. The incentive would apply to traditional broadcasters and streaming services, including Netflix, Disney+, Hulu and digital platforms, including YouTube and Facebook.

The plan also calls for Section 181 of the federal tax code to be renewed for another five years. It recommends raising the caps on film production to $20 million (or $40 million if the project was shot in a rural area). The proposal recognizes film budgets have increased since 2004.

The group also suggested extending Section 181 to cover movie theater owners for facility improvements and equipment updates to their movie houses.

“Families going to the movies is one of the great American past times that must be preserved,” the draft plan noted.

The plan did raise the specter of tariffs, saying that if a U.S.-based production “could have been produced in the U.S.” but moved to a foreign country to take advantage of a tax incentive, then “a tariff will be placed on that production equal to 120% of the value of the foreign incentive received.”

“This is not meant as a penalty, but a necessary step to ‘level the playing field,’ while not creating a never-ending cycle of chasing the highest incentive,” according to the draft.

After publication, Voight’s manager, Steven Paul, one of the authors, said the document was “crafted solely for the purpose of discussion.”

A group of Hollywood unions and industry trade groups — including the Motion Picture Assn. and guilds representing screenwriters, directors and actors, as well as the Producers United coalition — recently backed the idea of a domestic production incentive.

“We are really advocating right now to make sure that, yes, we bring back American jobs, but we do it in a way that is actually going to provide the lifeblood into this system that will actually sustain it,” said Jonathan Wang, a producer on the Oscar-winning film “Everything Everywhere All At Once” and a member of Producers United. “So we are asking that we are in the room when these decisions are being made, and that we can provide our voice.”

For Producers United, a federal tax incentive would make the U.S. more competitive with other countries, though the group does not support the “cultural test” suggested in Voight’s plan, which they worry could essentially become a form of censorship.

“It’s important that we work hard to not get put into a position where we finally are tempted with the carrot of an incentive and then faced with censorship,” said Cathy Schulman, a producer on the best picture Oscar winner “Crash” and the Amazon Anne Hathaway drama “The Idea of You,” who is part of the Producers United group. “It’s really important that the two conversations go hand-in-hand that we need this financial support for uncensored art.”

Times staff writers Wendy Lee, Meg James, Ryan Faughnder and Seema Mehta contributed to this report.

President Trump surprised California with a pair of announcements over the weekend to impose tariffs on films produced abroad and to reopen Alcatraz, a San Francisco landmark, as a working prison, all without consultation with state officials.

The White House would not offer details on either plan, perplexing industry executives and local lawmakers who see both as highly impractical, and prompting a series of basic questions that administration officials pressed by The Times were unprepared to answer.

How does Trump’s team plan to collect import duties on a product that amounts to intellectual property? Does the president’s team understand that most Hollywood productions are at least partially filmed overseas? And why is the federal government going to shut down a national historic landmark, reconverting it into a prison in the heart of a city after closing it 60 years ago due to skyrocketing costs?

Yet Trump’s focus on Hollywood, in particular, has gained him praise for drawing national attention to a growing crisis for Los Angeles, which is losing its prized industry at a concerning speed. Film executives aren’t asking whether the president’s intentions are in the right place. They are asking whether his solutions make any sense — or might backfire.

Trump’s move to protect ‘America’s cultural dominance’

Trump’s announcement on film tariffs came after one of his three named ambassadors to Hollywood, Jon Voight, flew to Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida over the weekend to present ideas on how to reverse an exodus of production from Los Angeles — a list that proposed tariffs in only “certain limited circumstances,” according to a statement from Voight’s manager.

A White House official told The Times that “while President Trump regularly corresponds with his Hollywood ambassadors, including Jon Voight, to restore America’s cultural dominance, it was President Trump himself who formulated the idea of using tariffs to Make Hollywood Great Again.”

But the White House could not provide additional details on the plan, which could ultimately hurt the very production companies that Trump and Voight seek to protect.

Actor Jon Voight, shown at President Trump’s Jan. 19 victory rally in Washington, visited the president’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida over the weekend.

(Scott Olson / Getty Images)

Hollywood is facing a real crisis over its historic entertainment industry, with production work moving not only overseas but also to competing domestic hubs. Hollywood executives and California leadership, including its Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, have welcomed presidential attention to the matter, extending offers to collaborate on a solution.

“California built the film industry — and we’re ready to bring even more jobs home,” Newsom wrote on social media this week, proposing a federal tax credit for Hollywood filmmakers to the White House and telling Trump, “Let’s get it done.”

But a Times investigation last month found that Voight and Trump’s other two ambassadors, Mel Gibson and Sylvester Stallone, had barely engaged with industry stakeholders on a working plan before the president made his plans public. The White House has also been limited in its outreach. At least one of the special Hollywood envoys learned of their appointment by tweet, sources said.

Another front in California’s tariff battle

Trump said the film tariffs would be implemented to combat foreign nations attempting to siphon industry dollars from the United States, a practice he characterized as a “national security threat.” But the announcement comes as California is leading a lawsuit against the U.S. administration over the legality of Trump’s use of tariffs in the first place — particularly its national security rationale.

“The president of the United States simply does not have the legal authority, under the Emergency Economic Powers Act, to impose tariffs. Period, full stop,” Newsom said last week.

Even if Trump were to proceed with the plan, his team probably would have to come up with another legal vehicle: A 1988 amendment to the Emergency Economic Powers Act explicitly exempts films, publications and artwork, among other items, from foreign duties.

Meanwhile, all other tariffs currently in place against foreign nations — particularly against China — are beginning to affect American families, including those in California.

Furniture and fast fashion retailers have begun urging customers to make purchases now before imminent increases take effect, raising prices 30% or more.

And prices increased overnight for parents of young children this week. Mattel, the maker of Barbie dolls, expects prices to increase, while the signature stroller from UPPAbaby, listed at $899 on Sunday, cost $1,199 as of Monday.

“All costs are down,” Trump said aboard Air Force One on Sunday evening. “Everything is down, other than the thing you carry the babies around in.”

‘Law and order’ at Alcatraz

Trump’s announcement on Alcatraz came just hours after the 1979 Clint Eastwood film “Escape from Alcatraz” aired on South Florida public television, prompting questions to the president this week about how he came up with the idea.

“Well, I guess I was supposed to be a moviemaker. We’re talking — we started with the moviemaking, it will end,” Trump told reporters on Monday. “I mean, it represents something very strong, very powerful, in terms of law and order. Our country needs law and order. Alcatraz is, I would say, the ultimate, right? Alcatraz — Sing Sing and Alcatraz, the movies.”

“But uh, it’s right now a museum,” he continued. “Believe it or not. Lotta people go there. It housed the most violent criminals in the world, and nobody ever escaped. One person almost got there, but they, as you know the story, they found his clothing rather badly ripped up, and uh, it was a lot of shark bites, lot of problems. Nobody’s ever escaped from Alcatraz, and just represented something strong having to do with law and order. We need law and order in this country. And so we’re going to look at it.”

Trump’s proposal was quickly dismissed by local lawmakers, and drew confusion among tourists at Alcatraz. In order to revoke the site’s status as a national historic landmark, the National Park Service probably would have to conduct an extensive review before the Interior secretary, Doug Burgum, makes a decision on how to proceed.

“Alcatraz closed as a federal penitentiary more than sixty years ago. It is now a very popular national park and major tourist attraction,” Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco), a former speaker of the House, said on X in response to the idea. “The President’s proposal is not a serious one.”

Trump’s plan to revive Alcatraz as a “symbol of law and order” comes as Californians are increasingly losing faith in his adherence to the rule of law.

A new UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies poll co-sponsored by The Times found that 65% of registered voters across the state believe that Trump’s actions have “gone beyond his constitutional authority as president,” including 24% of Republicans and 63% of independents.

What else you should be reading

The must-read: Trump’s call to reopen Alcatraz falls flat with tourists, who ask: Why?
The deep dive: Newsom wants a federal tax credit to save Hollywood. Why that’s a long shot
The L.A. Times Special: Trump’s popularity in a slump in California amid abuse-of-power concerns

More to come,
Michael Wilner

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