Category: Worldwide

Mike Budenholzer is one of the NBA’s more expressive coaches. Budenholzer, who has been at the helm of the Milwaukee Bucks since 2018 and helped lead the team to a championship in 2021, has never been able to hide his disgust when his team is on the receiving end of a bad call, as the cameras will usually catch him making a perplexed face over stuff a few times a game.

A clip going around Twitter on Thursday shows the latest example of Bud being able to hide whatever he was feeling. The catch: It came from a postgame press conference, where the Bucks coach took a sip from a bottle of water but did not like how it tasted.

Now, the general shape of the bottle and the green ring around the top sure makes it seem like this is Dasani, which doesn’t exactly have the best reputation among bottled water. But for what we can only assume are sponsorship reasons, the label is replaced with something more bland and generic. The catch is this is nothing new. Budenholzer takes sips of brand-less bottles of water during his postgame press conference pretty frequently, as you can see below:

Mike Budenholzer if you ever want to talk about water — bottled, tap, sparkling, whatever — feel free to reach out to your friends at Dime.

Even if you don’t care too much about the Royals, you’ve undoubtedly heard a lot about Prince Harry over the past few years. Much of this outpouring is arguably down to that Oprah interview, which introduced plenty of Yanks to the ongoing kerfuffle between Harry/Meghan Markle and the British royal family. That’s especially juicy to some people given the apparent rift between Duchesses Meghan and Kate and the more than apparent feud between Harry and his brother, Prince William. It’s a real soap opera for sure, and whether or not one takes sides, there’s a lot of fatigue on the subject.

Harry’s new Spare memoir has been promoted with an endless stream of scandalous excerpts, including talk of a frostbitten male organ and Harry’s first time (with a woman who spanked him in a field), and what he thought of Meghan’s love scenes on Suits. Even if you don’t have strong opinions on the Harry/William feud, it’s a lot. As someone who watches The Crown but can’t get worked up about royals in real life, I find all sides to be slightly exhausting. Piers Morgan, on the other hand, has the energy to lash out at every blow by blow, and perhaps the overexposure has been a good thing?

In other words, despite how Harry’s juiciest revelations may have surfaced in the press and online, people still bought the heck out of this book. Via People, Spare broke a first-day record for Penguin Random House:

“Penguin Random House announced today the English language edition of SPARE, the memoir by Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex, sold more than 1,430,000 million units in all formats and editions in the United States, Canada and the UK on the first day of its publication, Tuesday, January 10, 2023,” the statement said.

“The first full day of sales of SPARE represents the largest first-day sales total for any nonfiction book ever published by Penguin Random House, the world’s largest trade publisher,” it added.

Importantly, this is a record set for nonfiction, so it would be unfair to compare it to, say, J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series, which cranked out 8.3 million copies in first-day sales for the final book. Still, 1.4 million is impressive. That’s far more than the 5,600-ish number (in an indeterminate time frame) books recently sold by Harry’s biggest critic… Piers Morgan. That will probably make him furious, but he’s also obsessed and even admitted that he neglected to publicly wish is wife a happy birthday while fretting over Harry and Meghan’s recent Netflix show.

(Via People)

It’s the most wonderful time of the year. No, not that time — the time we get a slew of new, over-the-top commercials featuring our favorite actors, artists, and athletes pitching already ubiquitous products, all timed to air during the biggest football game of the year (which almost nobody watches for the actual football). We’ve already heard some buzz about Cardi B and Offset’s lovey-dovey spot for McDonald’s, but now, the trailers are finally hitting the net.

And as depressing a prospect as it is for television advertisements to have preview trailers, we’ve gotta look for some fun in the bleak times we’re living through. And you know who’s been having a lot of fun recently? Jack Harlow. The Louisville rapper blew up in a big way just before the pandemic and he hasn’t shown any signs of slowing up yet. Naturally, his stardom makes him an excellent pitchman — he also has an appealing, laid-back charisma and goofy sense of humor that lends well to that sort of thing — so he’s been recruited to sell everything from basketball kicks to fried chicken.

In his upcoming Super Bowl ad, he’ll be graduating to corn chips, as he munches on Doritos in the back of a limo while paparazzi ask him about a potential love triangle. We’ll have to wait for the big game to see how it shakes out, but Jack acquits himself well here and ensures we’ll at least be seeing a lot of him on TV this year, even as he heads to Vegas for a month-long residency.

Jack Harlow is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Vagabon is preparing to open on 16 dates of Weyes Blood’s In Holy Flux Tour, from March 13 to April 2, and she has a brand new song to add to her setlist. This morning, January 11, Vagabon released “Carpenter.” The introspective groove is a testament to patience — fitting, considering this is her first solo single since her 2019 self-titled album.

“I wasn’t ready to shut it down / I wasn’t ready to talk it out,” she sings. “I wasn’t ready to be let down / I wasn’t ready to hear you out / I wasn’t ready to move on out / I wasn’t ready for what you were saying / But I’m more ready now.”

Vagabond’s listeners have likely been ready to hear new music from her before now, but “Carpenter” is worth the wait.

Co-produced alongside Rostam, the song is “about that humbling feeling when you desperately want to be knowledgeable, you want to be advanced, you want to be mature, forward-thinking, and evolved,” Vagabond said in a statement. “It’s about being confronted with your limitations. It’s about that a-ha moment when a lesson from the past finally clicks and you want to run and tell someone who bore witness to the old you, ‘I finally get it now.’”

Per a press release, “Carpenter” is the first breadcrumb to a new Vagabond album due later this year. More details will be announced soon. In the meantime, watch the “Carpenter” lyric video above.

Wednesday is not only one of Netflix’s biggest shows ever. The Tim Burton-directed series also led to an overdue surge in popularity for The Cramps and Lady Gaga’s “Bloody Mary” and an increase in tourism activity for Romania, where filming took place.

Jenna Ortega and her influence can be felt all over the globe:

Scenes in the ghost town of Jericho and the Nevermore Academy were filmed on sets in the Buftea studios in Romania, near Bucharest, which are now open to tours… [A] tour operator reportedly estimated a 55 per cent increase in hotel occupancy around Bucharest since Wednesday aired.

Flavian Dobre, who worked on Wednesday and now gives tours of where the gothic show was filmed, told Euronews (via NME), “It was a hefty production, that took over eight months to film, and involved beautiful people: people who have revived, who gave precedence to Romanian cinema and made everything happen here at the Buftea Studios, a place that has a very strong emotional, cinematic and cultural charge.”

Wikipedia tells me that other projects shot at Buftea Studios include the JCVD thriller Assassination Games and Sand Serpents, which I want to watch immediately. Maybe there’s where the Ortega-starring Jules et Jim remake can be filmed?

(Via NME)

With Deadpool 3 set to start filming later this year, Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman have been slowly trickling out details about the highly-anticipated sequel that will officially bring both Reynolds’ Merc with a Mouth and Jackman’s Wolverine into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. This time around, Reynolds opened up about the challenges of bringing the powerhouse characters together considering they both have starred in films with wildly different tones. (Jackman’s performance in Logan is about as far away from Deadpool as it gets.)

“I think it’s a tightrope walk,” Reynolds told The Wrap. “I mean most of these movies are always a tightrope walk of tone, so in this instance, though, you have a collision of two pretty iconic characters that exist in the Marvel Ancillary Universe [laughs] — we’re in the Marvel Cinematic Universe at this point.”

However, Reynolds is confident that it will work out:

“It’s really kind of finding a way to service both of these characters that feels extraordinarily authentic to each of them, and I think these two wrongs actually will make a right in a pretty great way.”

Reynolds’ remarks jibe with what Jackman has shared about his role in the film. Back in December, the Wolverine actor revealed that the two characters will not be the best of buds at the start of Deadpool 3. In fact, it sounds like Jackman will be smacking Reynolds around, so no wonder he leaped at the chance to come back.

“We’re opposites, hate each other,” Jackman told the Empire Film Podcast. “I’m just talking from my perspective, [Logan’s] frustrated by him, wants to be a million miles away from him or wants to punch him in the head. Unfortunately, he can’t be a million miles away from him in this movie, so I’m probably going to punch him in the head a lot.”

Deadpool 3 hits theaters on November 8, 2024.

(Via The Wrap)

Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret is one of those classic novels that feels almost too renowned and familiar to make into a movie for fear of it being bad. Listen, it’s happened before, and you want to make sure these things are in the right hands. So when Judy Blume hopped on to produce a movie based on one of her most celebrated novels, things became promising!

The classic coming-of-age story about sixth-grader Margaret Simon is really coming to theaters. She’s portrayed by Ant-Man’s Abby Ryder Fortson as she and her family move from the big city to the suburbs where she begins to learn about all the fun preteen topics that were rarely talked about in novels at the time, like pads, periods, and doing exercises to help make your chest grow. The ’70s were a wild time!

Rachel McAdams stars as Barbara, Margaret’s mother, while Kathy Bates plays grandma Sylvia. Benny Safdie (!!) also stars. As per the official description:

11-year-old Margaret (Abby Ryder Fortson) is uprooted from her life in New York City for the suburbs of New Jersey, going through the messy and tumultuous throes of puberty with new friends in a new school. She relies on her mother, Barbara (Rachel McAdams), who is also struggling to adjust to life outside the big city, and her adoring grandmother, Sylvia (Kathy Bates), who isn’t happy they moved away and likes to remind them every chance she gets.

Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret hits theaters on April 28th. Check out the trailer above.

As the controversial racketeering trial against Young Thug and his YSL crew proceeds, more observers are sharing their opinions on everything that has happened in the case so far. The latest is Harlem rapper Jim Jones, who shared some of his thoughts during an interview with Atlanta’s DJ Univercity on the latter’s podcast. Specifically, he called out the members of YSL who accepted plea deals in exchange for their freedom ahead of the trial; they include Gunna, YSL co-founder Walter Murphy, and Young Thug’s brother, Unfoonk.

Faced with the possibility of incurring double-digit prison sentences due to their connection with YSL Records, these members accepted so-called “Alford pleas,” in which they maintained their innocence and did not offer up any specific information, but pled guilty to lesser counts (mainly racketeering) and had their sentences commuted to time served, allowing them to leave Fulton County Jail without bond. This means they are obligated to appear in court if called as witnesses but reserve their ability to exercise their Fifth Amendment rights. Unfortunately, this can make it appear that they agree YSL is a gang — which is, of course, the prosecution’s whole strategy in extending these offers.

It can also give the appearance to outside observers — especially those not particularly well-versed in criminal law — the impression that they “snitched” in order to avoid longer sentences. Each member to accept a plea has maintained that their cooperation was limited to pleading guilty and that they won’t testify if subpoenaed. That didn’t stop Jim Jones from criticizing them and comparing their circumstances to his own brushes with the law.

“From where I come from, taking a plea when you have co-defendants is really not the thing you supposed to do,” he said. “If you up against a case by yourself and sh*t like that, that’s something different. But when you’re taking a plea it’s a touchy thing.” He continued, “I can say this: None of my n****s took a plea. They all in jail right now doing the time. They accepted what they did, they accepted who snitched on them, they accepted it all, and they all sat down and did their time… Nobody tried to take a plea, nobody tried to go around. N****s even went to trial — they did everything they could but do that.”

You can watch the full interview above.

Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Shakira‘s highly-anticipated collaboration with Bizarrap arrived last night (January 11). The Colombian superstar name-checks her ex Gerard Piqué and seemingly his current girlfriend Clara Chía Marti in the explosive video for “BZRP Music Sessions #53.”

Bizarrap is the most-streamed artist on Spotify from Argentina. The producer has over 35.2 million monthly listeners on the platform. Last year, Residente released his J Balvin diss track “BZRP Music Sessions #49” with Bizarrap. Now Bizarrap is teaming up with Shakira as she goes in on Piqué. Shakira and Piqué announced their split in June of last year after the soccer star reportedly cheated on her with Marti.

In “BZRP Music Sessions #53,” Shakira howls throughout the chorus while revisiting her “She Wolf” persona from 2009. Piqué has gotten dragged online since the news of his split from Shakira. In Spanish, she sings, “I understood it’s not my fault that they criticize you.” Shakira then evokes Piqué’s name in some clever wordplay with the Spanish word “salpique.” “I only make music, sorry if it splashed (salpique) you,” she sings. Shakira then apparently calls out Marti’s first name Clara in some wordplay with the Spanish word “claramente” (clearly).

Shakira also seemingly touches on her alleged tax evasion claims in Spain. “[You left me with] the press at my door and a debt with the Treasury,” she sings in Spanish. The most striking line of Shakira’s empowering kiss-off anthem is when she sings about channeling her heartbreak into her music. “Women no longer cry / Women get paid,” she belts out in Spanish.

Paramore‘s new album arrives next month and the singles so far, “This Is Why” and “The News,” have been explosive. They’re back today with “C’est Comme Ça,” a track that continues the pattern of snarky and relentlessly infectious dance anthems.

“I’m trying to get un-addicted to a survival narrative,” Hayley Williams said about the song in a statement. “The idea of imminent doom is less catastrophic to me than not knowing anything about the future or my part in it. The guys and I are all in much more stable places in our lives than ever before. And somehow that is harder for me to adjust to.”

The theme of stability in the song is ironic considering the sonic chaos. Against Interpol-like riffs and a new wave rhythm, Williams deadpans acerbic lines in an almost Dry Cleaning fashion: “I’m off caffeine on doctor’s orders / Said it was gonna help to level out my hormones / Lucky for me I run on spite and sweet revenge / It’s my dependence on the friction that really hinders my progression.” For the chorus, she sings in frivolous French and it sounds like a call to get up and dance.

Listen to “C’est Comme Ça” above.

This Is Why is out 2/10/2023 via Atlantic. You can pre-save it here.

Paramore is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.