Rap lyrics were used to send a man to death row in Texas. The tactic is more common than you think.

The Michael Jackson biopic is a drama both onscreen and off. If there was one place the new Michael Jackson biopic was sure to be warmly received, it was Gary, Indiana.

The pop superstar grew up there with his famous siblings. Their home in the city, referenced in the 1989 The #Jacksons track “2300 Jackson Street,” is now a tourist attraction. And on one night last week, the city’s only high school was the venue for a homecoming for members of the Jackson family, who trekked there for a screening of the new film “Michael,” about its most famous former resident and starring his nephew, Jaafar.

Several of Michael Jackson’s brothers, the singer’s eldest son Prince and one of the film’s producers Graham King attended, in addition to the film’s star.

The city’s mayor, Eddie D. Melton, moderated a panel during which they discussed the making of the film and the Jackson family legacy — but not all of it.

“I don’t think there’s a need to address the actual allegations,” Melton told CNN by phone the day after the event, referring to Jackson’s alleged sexual predation.

The accusations surrounding child molestation and sexual abuse that Jackson faced in life and after his death have long divided his admirers. The movie is set to be similarly polarizing. As sure as his defenders will laud the new film, others will take issue with its approach to a complicated legacy.

Singer D4vd charged with first-degree murder in connection with teen found dead in his Tesla

#Kanye West concert in Poland will be cancelled, newspaper reports. The decision by Slaski stadium in the western city of Chorzow, reported by Wyborcza newspaper on its website, comes just over a week after Britain blocked the 48-year-old from traveling to the country to headline a festival.

There was no immediate comment from the rapper, now known as Ye, who in January apologized for his behavior, which he attributed to untreated bipolar disorder, and renounced past expressions of admiration for Adolf Hitler.

Maren Wade says in the trademark infringement lawsuit filed Monday in federal court in California that the glittery branding of Swift’s 2025 album comes too close to the aesthetic of her own “Confessions of a Showgirl.” That was the name of a column she wrote on backstage Sin City life in the Las Vegas Weekly starting in 2014, which she turned into a live show that she took on a national tour.

“Both share the same structure, the same dominant phrase, and the same overall commercial impression,” the lawsuit says. “Both are used in overlapping markets and are directed at the same consumers.”

Wade is described as a “singer, songwriter, comedian, and writer” in the lawsuit filed under her legal name, Maren Flagg, and her “Showgirl” brand encompasses performances, writing and digital media.

“The Life of a Showgirl,” the stadium-packing superstar’s 12th studio album, released in October, sold 4 million copies in its first week. Its cover features her in Las Vegas cabaret garb, submerged in water with her current favorite color scheme of orange and mint green. On Tuesday, the morning after the lawsuit was filed, Swift dropped the newest video for the album for the album’s track “Elizabeth Taylor,” featuring archival footage of the Hollywood luminary who died in 2011.

Wade appeared to embrace Swift’s use of the showgirl image initially, sharing Instagram posts that used Swift’s music, hashtags related to the album, and the mint green color scheme. But Wade’s social media presence has gone silent in recent months.

Also named as defendants in the lawsuit are the company that manages Swift’s trademarks, her record label and its merchandising arm.

The lawsuit says the album, its promotion and the products surrounding it caused “textbook reverse confusion: a junior user’s overwhelming commercial presence drowns out the senior user’s mark, until consumers begin to assume that the original is the imitation. What Plaintiff had built over twelve years, Defendants threatened to swallow in weeks.”

A representative for Swift declined comment on the lawsuit.

Wade and her attorney say that the existence and trademark of “Confessions of a Showgirl” would not have escaped the notice of Swift’s team.

The lawsuit says the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office declined to grant a trademark registration to “Life of a Showgirl” over potential confusion with the existing trademark.

“Defendants were therefore placed on actual notice that their chosen designation was likely to be confused with a mark that already belonged to someone,” the lawsuit says. “They continued using it anyway.”

A letter issued by the office in early March says the application was suspended due to potential confusion with another pending trademark filed earlier, for “Showgirl,” by a third party and pertaining to perfume. It also cited a “Likelihood of Confusion Refusal” based on the existing “Confessions” trademark.

The lawsuit seeks an injunction permanently barring Swift and her companies from using the “Life of a Showgirl” name and imagery, and monetary damages to be determined at trial, including profits attributable to the use of the brand.

Andrew Dalton, The Associated Press

A woman prosecutors say fired shots at #Rihanna's home in attempt to kill her set to appear in court.


Prosecutors allege the singing superstar, her hip-hop star partner A$AP Rocky, their three young children and many others were at their home in the Beverly Hills area when Ivanna Lisette Ortiz, 35, of Orlando, Florida, opened fire on the property on March 8.

Ortiz is charged with 10 counts of assault with a semiautomatic firearm and three counts of shooting at an occupied vehicle or dwelling.

At her first appearance in Los Angeles Superior Court on March 11, Ortiz’s lawyer entered a plea of not guilty on her behalf, but then withdrew it in favor of postponing the arraignment.

Public records show Ortiz has been a licensed speech pathologist for more than a decade. Now jailed on $1.8 million bail, she could get life in prison if convicted on all charges.

The Public Defender’s Office said only that “we will work to ensure that our client receives the full protections guaranteed under the Constitution.”

District Attorney Nathan Hochman said when Ortiz was charged that Rihanna and Rocky were together in an Airstream trailer at the time of the shooting, while her mother, their children and staffers were in the main house.

The three counts of firing at a dwelling were for Rihanna’s house, her trailer, and a neighbor’s house, prosecutors said. The 10 assault counts were for Rihanna and family, two staffers and two people in the neighboring house.

Hochman would not say where any of the bullets landed, discuss a motive or describe any connection between Ortiz and Rihanna, saying all were under investigation.

A nine-time Grammy Award winner, Rihanna has 14 No. 1 hits on the Billboard Hot 100, including “We Found Love,” “Work,” “Umbrella” and “Disturbia.” She founded the makeup brand Fenty Beauty in 2017.

She and A$AP Rocky announced the birth of their third child, a girl named Rocki Irish Mayers, in September.

Andrew Dalton, The Associated Press

Everything you need to know about '#BTS: The Return,' the new #Netflix #documentary

That’s the scene that begins “BTS: The Return,” a new Netflix documentary from director Bao Nguyen (“The Stringer,” “The Greatest Night in Pop”), produced by This Machine (“Martha,” “Karol G”) and HYBE, the South Korean entertainment company behind BTS and countless other international acts.

The mostly-Korean language film offers an intimate look at BTS’ journey to their latest album, “ARIRANG,” released Friday. It also follows the seven member group — RM, Jin, Jimin, V, Suga, Jung Kook and j-hope — as they learned to reacclimate to their life in the fast lane, together again.

Here are key takeaways from the documentary film, which premieres on Netflix on Friday, March 27.

South Korea’s mandatory military service comes up fast

As BTS fans are well aware, “ARIRANG” is the band’s first full-length release since all seven members completed South Korea’s mandatory military service. In South Korea, all able-bodied men aged 18-28 are required by law to perform 18-21 months of military service under a conscription system meant to deter aggression from North Korea.

In their documentary, mention of BTS’ service emerges right away. In the first minute, while the band films their live video on the beach, RM mentions that he “learned to hustle” in the military. Then it cuts to footage of the guys getting their heads shaved and wearing their uniforms — and quickly thereafter, rejoining the band. In reality, they were separated for a number of years. Before announcing their comeback in June, all seven members hadn’t been seen broadcasting live together since September 2022.

The road to ‘ARIRANG’ was swift

Shortly after returning from their mandatory service, the band decamped to Los Angeles during the summer of 2025 to begin work on “ARIRANG,” their 14-track, fifth studio album and first in nearly four years.

They lived in the same house together. It was tight quarters, and a tight turnaround: In the film, Jin says he joined the band in Los Angeles the day after completing his 2025 solo tour. For that reason, he missed some of the early writing and recording.

The journey was also bumpy. As RM mentions in the movie, a long lifespan for a K-pop group is not guaranteed.

Fans of the genre might be familiar with what is referred to as the “seven-year curse,” where a group disbands, or loses members, or contracts expires, and they fall apart. That has not been the case for BTS, still widely regarded one of the most popular bands on the planet. The question then, for them, became: Where does their sound go from here?

“We’re doing a lot of experiments, trying to find out, like, what makes us special,” RM said. “What makes us BTS?”

They also felt the pressure to deliver a good album, and fast. “We’ve been out for too long,” said Jimin in one dinner scene. “Now that we’re finally out of the military, we don’t want to extend this break.”

Los Angeles was a creative hub

Working in and around Hollywood was a source of creativity for the band. The documentary shows clips of the guys in the studio working with some recognizable producers like Diplo and the South Korean songwriter Pdogg.

It also shows the band struggling to land a lead single and their in-studio dynamics: Suga playing guitar, serious and studious, V comforting an anxious Jin, so on and so forth.

Then they returned to South Korea to finish and mix the album.
The album really started to connect when they had a story

Boyoung Lee, executive creative director at Big Hit Music, told the band that in 1896, a group of Koreans arrived in the U.S. for an education, where they met music producer and ethnologist Alice C. Fletcher. Together, they recorded the first-ever Korean-language song in the U.S.: “Arirang,” the traditional Korean folk song that dates back to the 1400s and that inspired BTS’ album title.

It also meant that the album was a true celebration of South Korea and BTS’ efforts to bring their country and culture to the world. In one scene, Suga mentions changes needed to the song “Normal,” which he felt originally featured too much English and not enough Korean. “For this album, authenticity matters,” RM agreed.
Preparing for their comeback was daunting

Some members expressed reservations about how they may be received — what did their fans want from them, after so much time apart? And in an industry that demands reinvention? So, they worked as hard as they could, and in surprising ways: In one scene, V throws a baseball in a parking lot — seemingly to blow off steam. Days later he’s throwing a pitch at Los Angeles’ Dodgers Stadium. It’s clear he was practicing as to not disappoint their fans.

Even when the band is relaxing at night together at their shared home in Los Angeles — enjoying pork belly, soju and beer — they are still shown talking about their music, what could’ve been done differently in the studio, what they might want to try in the future. It’s a 24/7 process.

“I wonder if we’ve done a good job here,” Jung Kook asks aloud.
They were unsure about ‘Swim’ as the first ‘ARIRANG’ single

Some members of the band thought the song “Swim” might be too low in energy to serve as their lead single. But they also weren’t sure about “Dynamite” back in 2020, which became a huge international smash. It was their first all-English-language single and it debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 — a first for an all-South Korean musical act.

Suga appeared to be an early believer in “Swim.” “‘Oh, they can come back with a song like this?’ I think it’ll be cool,” he told his band mates, fantasizing about fan reaction.

“It’s a cool, mature song for us,” RM agreed. “It’s time we give off a grown-up vibe.”

Appearing more adult — and writing songs that mirror where they are in their lives — was a priority.

“We’ve all gotten older in general,” said Suga. “We tried to express more about being an adult.”

Maria Sherman, The Associated Press

Police video of Justin Timberlake's 2024 drunken driving arrest released.

Justin Timberlake struggled to perform field sobriety tests requiring him to walk a straight line and stand on one leg after he was pulled over in New York’s Hamptons in 2024 by police officers who suspected him of driving drunk, according to video footage released Friday.

The pop star tells officers at one point, “these are like really hard tests.”

The footage, which runs roughly eight hours, includes Timberlake’s initial stop after Sag Harbor police said he ran a stop sign in the village centre, veered out of his lane and got out of his BMW smelling of alcohol that June.

The NSYNC singer-turned-solo artist and actor tells officers he had consumed one martini and had been following friends home in the former whaling village, which is among the affluent beach towns of the Hamptons, about 100 miles (160 kilometres) east of New York City.

When an officer asks why he is in town, Timberlake says, “I’m on a world tour.”

“Doing what?” the officer asks.

“Hard to explain,” Timberlake says.

After stammering a bit, he says “World tour. I’m Justin Timberlake.”

The officer eventually responds: “You are Justin Timberlake? Do you have a licence with you?”

Timberlake, who ultimately pleaded guilty to a lesser charge, is asked by officers to walk heel-to-toe in a straight line on the road and lift one leg. At times he seems flustered listening to the instructions. He apologizes to officers and tells them his heart is racing.

“I’m a little nervous,” Timberlake says at one point.

In the back seat of the police car, he asks: “Why are you arresting me?”

Back at the police station, Timberlake is informed he will be held overnight, to which he says, “I’m going to be here all night? You guys are wild, man.”

He asks the officer to keep the light on in the cell as they lock the door.

The release by Sag Harbor Police comes after the village and Timberlake’s lawyers agreed to disclose a redacted version of the footage. The Associated Press was among several media outlets that filed a records request seeking the release of the video.

Timberlake’s lawyers had sued to block the release of the video, arguing it would “devastate” Timberlake’s privacy by revealing “intimate, highly personal, and sensitive details.” They also said it would cause “severe and irreparable harm” to his reputation by subjecting him to “public ridicule and harassment.”

But in a joint filing with the village Friday, Timberlake’s lawyers acknowledged the video “does not constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy under” the state’s public information law and agreed to its release.

Timberlake’s lawyers and representatives didn’t immediately respond to emails seeking comment Friday.

Sag Harbor officials, in a statement provided by the village’s lawyer, Vincent Toomey, said they are pleased the matter was resolved and they were able to comply with state public records law.

“From the beginning of this matter, after Mr. Timberlake’s arrest, the Village has attempted to comply with the mandates of the Freedom of Information Law,” the statement reads. “As would be true in any case involving records or video footage from our Police Department, such material is reviewed and redacted to address public and officer safety concerns as well as personal privacy considerations.”

Timberlake pleaded guilty to impaired driving in September 2024.

The Tennessee native agreed to give a public safety announcement against the perils of drunken driving as part of the plea deal that knocked down his initial misdemeanor charge to a noncriminal traffic violation.

He was also sentenced to a US$500 fine, 25 hours of community service and a 90-day suspension of his license.

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Hill reported from Albany.

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Philip Marcelo And Michael Hill, The Associated Press

Taylor Tomlinson’s #Netflix special is too ungodly for many churches. This one welcomed her.

“My iPhone started capitalizing the G in God again without asking me,” Taylor Tomlinson says in her latest Netflix stand-up special, gripping a mic beneath the ornate ceiling of Fountain Street Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan. “The robots are coming, and they love the Lord.”

Wearing a cross on her necklace and a long leather jacket, Tomlinson looked right at home in the vaulted sanctuary. But the comedian’s set, filmed in November and released on Feb. 24 with the title “Prodigal Daughter,” would be regarded as irreverent at best by most nondenominational Christian congregations. Filled with sexual themes, f-bombs and jokes about everything from foreskins to the crucifixion — “I hope I die in a way that looks good on jewelry,” she quips — it would rate as blasphemous in many.

But Tomlinson’s edgy content is exactly what made Fountain Street the perfect venue, church leaders say. The historic congregation is known for its support of abortion access, free speech and LGBTQ+ rights. It’s also an interreligious community that rejects specific doctrines.

“The charge that has been leveled against Fountain Street Church since the 1890s is that it’s not really a church,” said Fountain Street’s leader, the Rev. Nathan Dannison.

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This content is written and produced by Religion News Service and distributed by The Associated Press. RNS and AP partner on some religion news content. RNS is solely responsible for this story.

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Founded in 1869 through the merger of two Baptist congregations, Fountain Street has cultivated a reputation as a radical liberal outpost; women have always been voting members, Dannison said, and the church’s historic stained-glass windows celebrate humanists such as Charles Darwin and Erasmus. That reputation is especially noteworthy in Grand Rapids. While the city’s religious landscape has become increasingly diverse, it’s known for its historic ties to theologically conservative Dutch Reformed Christian traditions.

The congregation dropped its Baptist affiliation in the 1960s under the leadership of the Rev. Duncan E. Littlefair, its longtime, University of Chicago-trained pastor, and solidified its non-creedal identity. Local chapters of the American Civil Liberties Union and Planned Parenthood were organized at the church during Littlefair’s tenure, as was the establishment of the church’s Choice Fund, which provided funds for emergency abortion care in Michigan; Recently, the church has made headlines as a hub for immigrant rights activism.

Fountain Street’s 1,507-seat auditorium has welcomed speakers such as Eleanor Roosevelt, Angela Davis, Winston Churchill and Malcolm X. The church has been hosting comedians since at least 2011, when it welcomed acts that were part of Gilda’s LaughFest, a community comedy festival. So when Tomlinson’s team reached out to Fountain Street in spring of 2024 as the place to record her fourth Netflix special, the church leadership listened.

“This show that she was putting together was heavily focused on her conservative Christian upbringing and her struggle with what it means to be religious,” said Kayle Clements, director of audio and visual technology at Fountain Street. “She was looking for a church setting where she could film this.”

Tomlinson has made comedic and serious points about her religious upbringing in her set for years. Her uncle is a progressive Christian pastor — “We’re both out here on weekends changing lives,” she joked in her recent special — and she got her start in comedy on the evangelical church circuit.

But these days she’s no longer religious and is upfront about the negative experiences she says she suffered in her childhood. “I have religious trauma. Anybody else have religious trauma?” she asked the crowd. “It just means you grew up in church, you’re not religious anymore, but now when you kind of feel good, you feel kind of bad about it.”

The critique didn’t faze Fountain Street. “We have a significant population of reconstructing Christians, refugees from the toxic theologies of Christian nationalism or right-wing Christian fundamentalism,” said Dannison. “They hear in Taylor’s comedy a lot of the same frustrations and values and radicalism that has been a part of Fountain Streeters’ lives growing up in this part of the country.”

Once Tomlinson’s team settled on Fountain Street, it took months of preparation to tape the Netflix special. The church was still in the process of restoring its historic bell tower and scrambled to finish it in time. The week of the recording, the church was beset with production assistants, security, Netflix employees and cases of AV equipment.

“They landed with, like, 12 people, and by the time they were done, we had 135 people there,” said the church’s governing board chair, J. Spalding Wall. “It was a major undertaking.”

Tomlinson performed four shows the week of Nov. 1, 2025 — the Netflix special is an amalgam of the best moments. Clements said he worked nearly around the clock to pull it off. “I think my shortest day was a 17-hour day. My longest was 23. But I would do it again tomorrow,” he said.

The special includes exterior shots of Fountain Street’s neo-Romanesque structure and begins with Tomlinson exiting the church’s choir room onto the stage.

Some of the set works in her bygone church basement routines. She jokes about the “decaf” Christians who only attend church on Easter and Christmas, and she gets a big response from the crowd when she mentions Veggie Tales, a cartoon show that has been a staple of evangelical Christian childhoods. But she soon gets progressively edgier, riffing on why the show never depicted Jesus’ death on the cross — VeggieTales characters have no arms, she points out. She questions how the story of Noah’s Ark, which she calls “dark as hell,” ever became the Bible’s most popular children’s story.

She says her biggest issue with church is that it “wouldn’t let you make a good point.” Difficult questions, she adds, were met with the unhelpful response, “We can ask God that when we get to heaven.”

Despite growing up in a “scary Christian house,” she credits her loving grandparents for modelling Christianity done right. “There are a lot of people who are using religion correctly, people like my aunt and uncle, my grandparents, the people at this church,” says Tomlinson. “There are a lot of people who are using religion as a tool for community and connection and comfort.”

The night of the special’s release, dozens of Fountain Street members gathered at the church for a celebratory viewing party, including a “thank you” video from Tomlinson.

“This is Fountain Street Church at its very best,” said Dannison, “living out its values of liberalism, free speech, progressive values, sanctuary, freedom to share your story, freedom to share your hurt without fear of censorship.”

Kathryn Post, The Associated Press

#Nigeria : Evangelist Tonto Dikeh shared how her faith journey began, urging those feeling the Holy Spirit’s call to pursue closeness with God.