During a private audience with Hollywood stars like Cate Blanchett, Spike Lee, and Gus Van Sant, Pope Leo XIV expressed concern about the decline of cinemas.

Singer #Akon arrested near Atlanta for missing court over suspended licence.


#Police records show Akon, whose legal name is Aliaune Thiam, was arrested Friday by police in Chamblee, just northeast of Atlanta. Akon was taken to the DeKalb County jail, where he was handed over to the Roswell police. They in turn booked Thiam into another jail, after which he posted bail and was released the same day.

Akon, who was born in the United States to Senegalese parents, rose to R&B fame after his 2004 debut album. The Grammy-nominated singer has performed on more than a dozen Top 10 hits, including “Smack That,” ’’I Wanna Love You” and “Locked Up.” He has also been active in philanthropic ventures in Africa, having lived in Senegal as a child.

Representatives for Akon didn’t immediately respond to requests seeking comment Wednesday.

Police reports from Roswell show Akon, who lists an address in gated community in neighboring Alpharetta, was found Sept. 10 in a disabled Tesla Cybertruck on a busy street. The police officer called for a tow truck. While he was waiting, the report states the #officer checked the #licence plate and found Akon had no valid auto insurance and had a suspended driver’s licence for failing to appear for a #court hearing in January 2023.

Police impounded the truck and cited Akon for driving without a valid licence, the report says, taking the licence he was carrying and releasing him. Police also found and seized an “illegal vape,” the report says.

Chamblee police told local news outlets they responded to a business called Tint World on Friday when a traffic camera alerted them that the Cybertruck was present and was connected to an outstanding warrant.

Akon is currently on tour in India. He performed in Delhi on Sunday, two days after his arrest.

The #film is a straightforward yet engaging survival-action romp. The paint-by-numbers blockbuster approach offers everything you would expect from a Hollywood IP film - but done well.

Rock & Roll Hall of Fame ceremony will induct Outkast, Cyndi Lauper, Salt-N-Pepa, the White Stripes

Rock group Bad Company opens door to Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. “I said to him, ‘Do you remember when we were looking for a band name and we called each other with silly names?’ And then I just called him up one day and I said, ’Bad Company’ and he dropped the phone and he said, ‘Oh yeah, that’s it. That’s the name,’” says Rodgers.

“I said, ‘From then, it’s a long way, but it seems like we just blinked our eyes a couple of times and here we are at the Hall of Fame.’ So at least I was able to tell him that.”

Ralphs died in June, just weeks after learning the induction news.

Rodgers and drummer Simon Kirke are the last surviving original members of the British supergroup that crafted such arena-rock staples as “Feel Like Makin’ Love,” “Can’t Get Enough” and “Rock ‘n’ Roll Fantasy.” They will be part of the celebrations Saturday at the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles, which will stream live on Disney+. ABC will air a prime-time special on Jan. 1, available on Hulu the next day.

“The fans have just been so great throughout the years. We feel like we’re celebrated, but it’s just not been stamped officially. That’s the only difference,” says Rodgers.

Who else made it?

Bad Company will join rock legend Chubby Checker, late soul singer Joe Cocker, pop icon Cyndi Lauper, hip-hop pioneers Outkast, rock duo the White Stripes and grunge masters Soundgarden in the class of ’25.

Salt-N-Pepa, the first female rap act to achieve platinum status, and the late singer-songwriter Warren Zevon will get in via the Musical Influence Award. The late record producer Thom Bell, pianist Nicky Hopkins and bassist Carol Kaye will each get the Musical Excellence Award.

Chappell Roan and The Killers will be special guests, as will Elton John, Olivia Rodrigo, Doja Cat, Questlove, Twenty One Pilots, Missy Elliott, Raye, Beck, Brandi Carlile, David Letterman, Flea, Iggy Pop, J.I.D, Killer Mike, Maxwell, Sleepy Brown, Taylor Momsen and Teddy Swims.

More stars attending will include Avril Lavigne, Bryan Adams, Donald Glover, En Vogue, Feist, Janelle Monáe, Jim Carrey, Joe Perry, Mick Fleetwood, Mike McCready, Nancy Wilson and Nathaniel Rateliff.

Greek singer-songwriter Dionysis Savvopoulos buried in a state funeral, Savvopoulos had died of a heart attack after battling cancer since 2020.

Thousands came to pay their respects to a well-beloved, if sometimes controversial, artist as he lay in state at a chapel of the Athens Metropolitan Cathedral Saturday morning. Hundreds made the nearly 2-kilometre (1.2-mile) walk behind the hearse to the cemetrey.

The presence of a Greek navy band playing mournful music was indicative of the change in Savvopoulos’s status, from someone lionized by anarchist-leaning leftists in the 1960s and 1970s and dismissed by the establishment as a long-haired freak, to a figure embraced by the same establishment and cultural mainstream.

Savvopoulos never changed his musical style — a blend of rock, folk-rock, jazz and Greek popular music — to conform to mainstream tastes. Always a political animal, he didn’t shy away from criticizing the left and its illusions, especially on his 1989 album “The Haircut,” whose sleeve showed him beardless with long locks. A few of his songs drew the enmity of some of his longtime admirers. The beard grew back but his politics remained moderate.

Conservative Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, the first of many who eulogized Savvopoulos during the funeral service, used the lyrics of the 1972 song “Messenger Angel” to portray the artist as a speaker of uncomfortable truths that many did not want to hear. “If he had no pleasant news to tell/better tell us none,” he quoted the song’s ending.

Others who joined in eulogizing Savvopoulos were former President Katerina Sakellaropoulou, fellow musicians, artists and literary figures, some from his hometown of Thessaloniki, and one of his two grandsons.

Demetris Nellas, The Associated Press

Oscar nominations are already three months away. Here’s where the race stands so far.

Where has 2025 gone? One way to mark the dizzying elapsing of time: The Oscar race is already coming into focus, now that we’re – gulp – three months out from nominations.

The competition still has much time to take shape, but there are a few frontrunners emerging, starting with Paul Thomas Anderson’s recently released chaotic opus “One Battle After Another” – which has enjoyed the best word of mouth this year, notching an impressive critic score of 95 on both Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic. (“One Battle After Another” is distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures, which is owned by CNN’s parent company Warner Bros. Discovery.)

But not far behind are several other titles, including many yet to be released, like “Sentimental Value,” “Marty Supreme,” “Hamnet,” “Bugonia” and “Wicked: For Good,” to name a few.

A preliminary breakdown of top categories follows:
Best picture

It’s been 15 years since the Academy opened up this race to more than the previously fixed number of five nominees – vacillating between eight and ten best picture contenders, and settling consistently on ten for the last few years. This year, that leaves the field open to quite a few possibilities. First, there’s “One Battle After Another,” whose director Anderson has frequently attracted Oscar love over the years and is seemingly a shoe-in for scoring a nomination for the night’s top honor. Ryan Coogler’s period-horror hit “Sinners” (also a Warner Bros. Pictures production) is also a solid contender, despite coming out in the summer months, which is a window often overlooked by Academy voters.

At this juncture, other buzzy films generating a fair amount of Oscar buzz are the English-, Norwegian- and Swedish-language “Sentimental Value” (out on November 7) starring Stellan Skarsgård and Elle Fanning, “Hamnet” (out November 27) featuring Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal, and “Marty Supreme” (out on Christmas Day) with Timothée Chalamet and Gwyneth Paltrow. Let us also not overlook the Palme d’Or-winning Iranian film “It was Just an Accident,” out this month.

In the “maybe…could be…you never know!” section, there’s summer actioner “F1,” Netflix’s “Jay Kelly” with George Clooney and Guillermo del Toro-directed “Frankenstein.” These are probably in the long-shot category, but hey, Hollywood loves a twist.
Best actress

The Academy certainly favors return nominees, but it also can’t resist a new arrival. This year, look for newcomer Chase Infiniti – whose quietly explosive performance is at the center of “One Battle After Another” – to be in the conversation. And although not a newbie on the scene, acclaimed Norwegian performer Renate Reinsve could have a place in the race for her work as the resentful daughter of an estranged director in “Sentimental Value,” which would mark her first Oscar nod.

As for returning favorites, there’s Buckley, who was nominated for best supporting actress in 2022 for “The Lost Daughter,” and is all but sure to receive one again this year for her lead role in Chloé Zhao’s “Hamnet,” playing a grief-stricken mother and wife to one William Shakespeare (Mescal). It would also be a major upset if Cynthia Erivo isn’t again recognized for her performance as Elphaba in the sequel “Wicked: For Good,” even though the film has yet to be screened for most anyone.

Other possible contenders who are not new to the Oscar race include Amanda Seyfried in “The Testament of Ann Lee,” Julia Roberts in “After the Hunt,” “Bugonia’s” Emma Stone and Jennifer Lawrence for “Die My Love.”
Best actor

Let’s assume we’re reserving one chair for “One Battle’s” Leonardo DiCaprio – already an Oscar-winner for 2015’s “The Revenant.” That leaves us four slots to play with in the best actor race.

Actually, make that three, because “Narcos” actor Wagner Moura, who is making waves for his work in the Brazilian film “The Secret Agent,” already won best actor at Cannes for the espionage thriller. In the film, he plays a technology expert in late-’70s Recife who discovers he’s being targeted by some unsavory characters. Notable: Only 16 best actor winners from the ritzy Cannes fest have gone on to be nominated for an Academy Award.

The three other spots could go several ways. Michael B. Jordan, who plays twins with very different fates in “Sinners,” and Chalamet, who would be returning for a second consecutive Oscar nomination (and his third in total), are strong options.

On their heels, however, might be “The Bear” star Jeremy Allen White, whose portrayal of Bruce Springsteen in “Deliver Me from Nowhere” has certainly generated press and some voter buzz. Other potential nominees include Dwayne Johnson for “The Smashing Machine,” Ethan Hawke for “Blue Moon” – in which he plays Broadway lyricist Lorenz Hart – and Jesse Plemons for his turn as a wild conspiracy theorist in Yorgos Lanthimos’ “Bugonia.”
Best supporting actress

The best supporting actress race is a tough one to predict, since as usual, there’s just so much to choose from. Amy Madigan, known to most for ’80s films like “Uncle Buck” and “Field of Dreams,” turned out a bonkers performance in this summer’s breakout elevated horror hit “Weapons” (also from Warner Bros.) and has appeared on several lists as a favorite to be nominated here. It would mark her second Oscar nomination in this same category in exactly 40 years, after 1985’s “Twice in a Lifetime.”

#Batman-themed bread unveiled ahead of Pittsburgh Walk of Fame ceremony, The bread was on display at the Mancini’s in Pittsburgh’s Strip District due to the shop’s proximity to the terminal building, where the Walk of Fame will be unveiled on Monday.

According to a release, this is the second year Mancini’s has continued the tradition of honouring Keaton with their Halloween bread art. Last year, the bread was constructed to look like Beetlejuice, and now, Batman.

The bread is expected to measure 4-by-4-feet (1.2 metres by 1.2 metres) and weigh around 200 pounds after four hours of baking the masterpiece.

Pittsburgh’s Action News 4 was at Mancini’s on Sunday, where the beloved loaf could be seen through the store’s window.

“I love to do this because Keaton exemplifies Pittsburgh,” Mancini’s Owner Nick Mancini Hartner said in a release. “We are celebrating 100 years of Mancini’s bakery next year and looking for any opportunity to tie our bread art with the city we love.”

Mancini’s Bread has served the Pittsburgh region since 1926, according to the release.

Mancini’s Bakery bakes more than 10,000 loaves a day with a team of 48 Pittsburghers, using most of the same old-world techniques that James Mancini devised back in 1926.

Mancini’s still bakes 24 hours a day, seven days a week, at its original location in McKees Rocks, now with a retail bakery in the Strip District.

#Gospel singer Mmalesedi Mankonko Makitla, 71, is finally about to fulfil her lifelong dream of performing songs from her debut album on the big stage, after more than 40 years of singing at taxi ranks.

Ace Frehley, legendary guitarist and founding member of KISS, died at home at age 74, surrounded by family, after a recent fall.