Zoe Saldana addresses Emilia Perez costar Karla Sofía Gascón scandal

By TERRY ZELLER and EVE BUCKLAND and J. PETERSON FOR DAILYMAIL.COM

Zoe Saldaña broke her silence after racist, homophobic, and anti-Islam tweets by her Emilia Pérez co-star Karla Sofía Gascón resurfaced this week.

‘I’m still processing everything that has transpired in the last couple of days, and I’m sad,’ Saldaña, nominated for Best Supporting Actress for Emilia Pérez, shared during a Q&A for the film in London on Friday, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The Avatar star, who didn’t mention Gascón or the controversial posts, sat next to Emilia Pérez director Jacques Audiard, while Gascón, originally scheduled to attend, was absent, the outlet reported.

Saldaña continued, ‘It makes me really sad because I don’t support and I don’t have any tolerance for any negative rhetoric towards people of any group.’

‘I can only attest to the experience that I had with each and every individual that was a part of this film, and my experience and my interactions with them were about inclusivity and collaboration and racial, cultural, and gender equity. And it just saddens me.’

She also expressed her disappointment over the film facing this ‘setback’ but thanked fans for continuing to ‘show up’ for the project.

Zoe Saldaña broke her silence after racist, homophobic, and anti-Islam tweets by her Emilia Pérez co-star Karla Sofía Gascón resurfaced this week

‘I’m still processing everything that has transpired in the last couple of days, and I’m sad,’ Saldaña, nominated for Best Supporting Actress for Emilia Pérez, shared during a Q&A for the film in London on Friday, according to The Hollywood Reporter; (Selena Gomez, Zoe, and Karla Sofía Gascón in November)

‘Because the message that this film has is so powerful and the change that it can bring forward to communities that are marginalized day in and day out is important.

‘And all that I can attest is that all of us that came together to tell this story, we came together for love and for respect and curiosity, and we will continue to spread that message.

‘That’s all we can say right now. Thank you.’

Read More Selena Gomez’s Emilia Perez costar Karla Sofia Gascon called her ‘rich rat’

Saldaña’s remarks come after Gascón addressed her decision to delete her X account following an apology over the resurfaced tweets.

In the tweets, Gascón criticized the diversity of the 2021 Oscars, called George Floyd a ‘drug addict swindler’ after his killing by a police officer in 2020, which sparked nationwide protests, and made disparaging comments about Islam, claiming the faith ‘fails to comply with international rights.’

In additional tweets seen by Deadline before she deactivated her account, Gascón used derogatory language, calling gay people ‘f******’ and criticizing the rhetoric within parts of the LGBTQ+ movement.

On Friday, Gascón explained she deleted her X account after receiving death threats and harassment.

‘I’m sorry, but I can no longer allow this campaign of hate and misinformation to affect me and my family, so at their request I am closing my account on X,’ Gascón, 52, wrote in her statement, per The Hollywood Reporter.

‘I have been threatened with death, insulted, abused and harassed to the point of exhaustion. I have a wonderful daughter to protect, whom I love madly and who supports me in everything.’

Saldaña continued, ‘It makes me really sad because I don’t support and I don’t have any tolerance for any negative rhetoric towards people of any group’; (seen in January)

‘And all that I can attest is that all of us that came together to tell this story, we came together for love and for respect and curiosity, and we will continue to spread that message. ‘That’s all we can say right now. Thank you’; (seen in January)

She added, ‘I have defended each and every one of the minorities in this world and supported any event against racism, freedom of religion or homophobia, in the same way that I have criticized the hypocrisy that underlies them, because the first thing I am self-critical of is myself.’

‘Perhaps my words are not correct, many times due to ignorance or pure mistake. I apologize again if anyone has ever felt offended or in the future. I am a human being who also made, makes and will make mistakes from which I will learn. I am not perfect.’

‘I am only responsible for what I say, not for what others say I say or what others interpret from what I say.

‘I hope to have the opportunity to give a more extensive explanation at some point.

‘Forgive me because I keep going from one side to the other and I cannot be responding to every single thing you bring up to try to sink me.

‘But if you want, you can continue attacking me as if I were responsible for hunger and wars in the world. I apologize again if I have ever offended anyone with my words in my life.

She added: I am only Karla Sofía Gascón, an actress who has reached where very few have thanks to her effort and work, without stealing or harming anyone in this world, just trying to get them to let me live in peace, love and respect, something that seems to bother a lot of people in this world.

‘It is clear that there is something very dark behind it.’

Oscar nominee Karla Sofía Gascón is facing more backlash as a fresh wave of controversial tweets resurfaces, this time featuring hurtful comments about her Emilia Pérez costar Selena Gomez; Gomez is seen in January

But Gascon continues to face more backlash as a fresh wave of controversial texts resurfaces, this time featuring hurtful comments about her Emilia Pérez costar Selena Gomez.

In a 2022 tweet, Gascón — who made history as the first transgender star nominated for Best Actress — criticized Gomez, commenting on a now-iconic photo of Selena and Hailey Bieber posing together, despite ongoing rumors about a feud due to Hailey’s marriage to Selena’s ex Justin Bieber, as reported by The Latin Times.

‘She’s a rich rat who plays the poor bastard whenever she can and will never stop bothering her ex-boyfriend and his wife,’ Gascón, 52, wrote.

The backlash grew when an X user pointed out that just months before sharing the comment, Gascón had reposted news about Emilia Pérez, where her name appeared alongside Gomez and Zoe Saldaña as potential cast members.

The timing raised questions about whether Gascón knew she might work with Gomez when making these harsh remarks.

This resurfaced post comes after Gascón faced criticism for resurfaced anti-Islam posts on her social media, leading her to issue an apology for ‘causing pain’ before deactivating her X account.

In a 2022 tweet, Gascón criticized Gomez, commenting on a now-iconic photo of Selena and Hailey Bieber posing together, despite ongoing rumors about a feud due to Hailey’s marriage to Selena’s ex Justin Bieber, as reported by The Latin Times; Gomez and Gascon seen in November

But even with her apology, the internet continues to dig up past posts, keeping the controversy going.

In another post from May 2020, Gascón body shamed Adele, speculating about loose skin on the singer’s arms after her weight-loss transformation.

Read More Oscar nominee Karla Sofía Gascón body-shamed Adele over weight loss

She also took aim at Mexican filmmaker Guillermo del Toro in yet another controversial post.

Fans are now calling for the Academy to ‘cancel her nomination,’ with one commenting: ‘And that’s why Adele won it and YOU are going to lose it.’

The Islamophobic posts were dug up by Muslim writer Sarah Hagi and translated into English by Variety.

One post, from November 2020, read: ‘I’m sorry. Is it just my impression or is there more muslims in Spain? Every time I go to pick up my daughter from school there are more women with their hair covered and their skirts down to their heels. Next year instead of English we’ll have to teach Arabic.’

Another post from September 2020 featured a photo of a Muslim family dining in a restaurant in traditional Islamic attire, which included the wife covered from head-to-toe in a black burqa.

‘Islam is marvelous, without any machismo. Women are respected, and when they are so respected they are left with a little squared hole on their faces for their eyes to be visible and their mouths, but only if she behaves. Although they dress this way for their own enjoyment. How DEEPLY DISGUSTING OF HUMANITY,’ Gascón wrote.

The iconic photo of Hailey and Selena, which Karla Sofía Gascón commented on, is shown above

‘She’s a rich rat who plays the poor bastard whenever she can and will never stop bothering her ex-boyfriend and his wife,’ Gascón wrote

Gascón has been slammed over other ‘hurtful’ posts, which criticize Islam, the Oscars and George Floyd

Responding to the controversy in a statement to DailyMail.com, Gascón said, ‘I want to acknowledge the conversation around my past social media posts that have caused hurt’; seen in January in Beverly Hills

In 2021, Gascón wrote that ‘Islam fails to comply with international rights,’ and ‘I am so sick of so much of this s***, of islam, of christianity, of catholicism and of all the fucking beliefs of morons that violate human rights.’

She also posted about George Floyd, whose murder by Minneapolis police, as he protested ‘I can’t breathe,’ sparked widespread Black Lives Matter protests in 2020.

Gascón wrote: ‘I really think that very few people ever cared about George Floyd, a drug addict swindler, but his death has served to once again demonstrate that there are people who still consider black people to be monkeys without rights and consider policemen to be assassins. They are both wrong.’

Read More Emilia Pérez is branded ‘the worst movie ever’ after it dominated Oscar nominations with 13 nods

The actress added: ‘Too many things to reflect on regarding the behavior of our species every time an event occurs. Perhaps it is no longer a question of racism, but of social classes that feel threatened by each other. Maybe that’s the only real difference.’

Gascón, who is the first transgender actress to be nominated for an Oscar, also slammed the Hollywood ceremony in a scathing post from 2021.

‘More and more the #Oscars are looking like a ceremony for independent and protest films, I didn’t know if I was watching an Afro-Korean festival, a Black Lives Matter demonstration or the 8M. Apart from that, an ugly, ugly gala,’ she posted.

Among her controversial tweets were anti-Chinese posts made the Covid pandemic.

‘The Chinese vaccine, apart from the mandatory chip, comes with two spring rolls, a cat that moves its hand, 2 plastic flowers, a pop-up lantern, 3 telephone lines and one euro for your first controlled purchase,’ she wrote.

Responding to the controversy in a statement to DailyMail.com, Gascón said, ‘I want to acknowledge the conversation around my past social media posts that have caused hurt.’

She continued, ‘As someone in a marginalized community, I know this suffering all too well and I am deeply sorry to those I have caused pain. All my life I have fought for a better world. I believe light will always triumph over darkness.’

Gascón’s posts have already been criticized by The Muslim Public Affairs Council, which issued a statement to The Wrap on Thursday.

Karla is pictured with Adriana Paz, Selena Gomez, and Zoe Saldana at the Golden Globes earlier this month

‘Deleted or not, these tweets are hurtful, offensive, and shocking, most especially coming from someone who is a member of another vulnerable community,’ they said. ‘Muslims are part of every community, including the transgender community.’

Gascón is up against Cynthia Erivo (Wicked), Mikey Madison (Anora), Demi Moore (The Substance) and Fernanda Torres (I’m Still Here) for Best Actress at the upcoming Oscars.

Torres issued a public apology earlier this month after a 17-year-old Brazilian television sketch resurfaced that showed her performing in blackface.

Gascón’s film Emilia Pérez was the most-nominated film this year, with nominations in categories including top honor Best Picture, Best Director for Jacques Audiard, Best Supporting Actress for Zoe Saldaña, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best International Feature.

In the film, Karla portrays the title character character Emilia Pérez, who is a cartel leader who enlists the help of under-appreciated lawyer Rita Mora Castro (played by Saldaña) to help fake her death so that she can transition and finally live authentically as her true self.

The real-life star completed most of her gender transition in 2018 and announced her new identity after acting in Mexican telenovelas for years.

As the drama unfolds, it remains to be seen how this will affect Gascón’s public image and her standing in the awards race.

The Grateful Dead is honored — and rainbow grilled cheese served — at starry MusiCares gala

Deadheads mixed with bigwigs Friday night at the annual MusiCares Persons of the Year gala, where the members of the Grateful Dead were honored by the Recording Academy for their philanthropy and cultural impact 60 years after the iconic jam band formed in 1965.

“Longevity was never a major concern of ours,” the Dead’s Bobby Weir said to laughs in the audience as he accepted the award. “Lighting folks up and spreading joy through the music was all we ever really had in mind, and we got plenty of that done.”

Held at the Los Angeles Convention Center, the Grammy-weekend charity event — dress code: “colorful black tie” — raised more than $5 million for music professionals affected by the wildfires that devastated much of L.A. last month. As guests munched rainbow grilled cheese sandwiches, host Andy Cohen roamed the well-heeled crowd looking for celebrities to chat up on camera; at one point he buttonholed his old friend John Mayer, whom he asked to name the horniest Grateful Dead song. (“Looks Like Rain,” which imagines “the sound of street cats making love,” was Mayer’s answer.)

Though it never really was in danger, the Dead’s extremely durable legacy got a major boost last year when Dead & Company — in which 77-year-old Weir and 81-year-old Mickey Hart perform music from the Dead’s catalog with Mayer, Jeff Chimenti, Jay Lane and Oteil Burbridge — set up at Sphere in Las Vegas for a hot-ticket summer residency that seemed to go viral every weekend on TikTok. Here, youngsters and oldsters alike turned up to pay tribute to the band.

Vampire Weekend offered a taut “Scarlet Begonias” and Maren Morris a stirring “They Love Each Other.” Noah Kahan and Béla Fleck were folky yet precise in “Friend of the Devil,” while Norah Jones glided smoothly through “Ripple.” The War and Treaty did a typically fiery “Samson and Delilah” with help from a pair of dueling drummers: Fleetwood Mac’s Mick Fleetwood and Stewart Copeland of the Police. Dwight Yoakam brought a hard country edge to “Truckin’”; the War on Drugs found a wistful drive for “Box of Rain.”

Wynonna Judd was the night’s musical and emotional high point: Describing Weir as her “family of choice,” she thanked the whiskery guitarist for singing at the funeral of her mother, Naomi, in 2022, then brought the audience to its feet with a rollicking “Ramble on Rose.” Other performers included Zac Brown, Billy Strings, Sammy Hagar, Bruce Hornsby, My Morning Jacket and the duo of Sierra Ferrell and Lukas Nelson, who teamed up for “It Must Have Been the Roses.”

The night’s excellent backing band was led by Don Was and featured guitarists Rick Mitarotonda (of the ascendant jam band Goose) and Grahame Lesh, son of the Dead’s founding bassist, Phil Lesh, who died last year at 84, just days after the announcement of the MusiCares honor. The Dead’s late mastermind, Jerry Garcia, was represented by his daughter Trixie; Bill Kreutzmann, the band’s founding drummer, sent a video message along with his son Justin.

“The road is a rough existence,” Weir said in his speech, “as plainly evidenced by the simple fact that there aren’t all that many of my old bandmates here tonight to receive this recognition.” After Weir and Hart’s remarks — actor Woody Harrelson also spoke at some length about having done a vast assortment of drugs with Garcia — the two stalwart musicians joined the rest of Dead & Company for a mini-set of classics that climaxed, warmly if inevitably, with the Dead’s improbable late-’80s pop hit, “Touch of Grey.”

“I will get by,” they sang with help from the crowd, “I will survive.”

Actor Lily Collins welcomes birth of first child by surrogacy

Emily in Paris star and husband express ‘endless gratitude’ to their surrogate and those ‘who helped us along the way’

Lily Collins, the star of Emily in Paris, has welcomed her first child via surrogacy.

Collins, 35, shared the news on Instagram with her husband, Charlie McDowell, a British-American filmmaker.

“Welcome to the centre of our world Tove Jane McDowell,” the pair wrote.

“Words will never express our endless gratitude for our incredible surrogate and everyone who helped us along the way.”

The couple’s post includes a picture of their baby daughter wearing a woolly hat, sleeping on blankets ina bassinet with her name on it.

It ended by saying: “We love you to the moon and back again.”

The couple made their announcement a day after Collins posted a tribute to her father, the former Genesis lead singer Phil Collins on his birthday. McDowell is the son of the actors Malcolm McDowell and Mary Steenburgen.

“From a west coast star to the West End stage and everywhere in between, I’m so grateful to be by your side and for the support, experiences and love we have and will continue to share,” she wrote on Instagram.

Her post included snaps of the pair together. One shows them together at Collins’ Hollywood Walk of Fame induction ceremony in 1999, when the Netflix star was 10 years old.

Lily Collins was born in Guildford, Surrey and raised in Los Angeles, and began acting in her childhood.

She is best known for her role in the popular Netflix romantic comedy series Emily in Paris, in which she plays the American marketing executive Emily Cooper.

The show centres around Cooper’s love life as she works at a marketing outfit in Paris. In the latest season of the show, which came out last year, Cooper relocates to Rome to open a new office.

The programme is scheduled to return for its fifth series, but the location remains under wraps.

Collins made her stage debut last year at the Duke of York’s theatre in Barcelona. She played a US tourist called Irene who hooks up with a Spaniard called Manuel, played by Álvaro Morte from Netflix’s Money Heist.

Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey Adds Another Former Marvel Star to Its Cast

The star-studded ensemble for Christopher Nolan’s upcoming epic adaptation of Homer’s The Odyssey continues to grow, with former Legion actor Bill Irwin joining the already impressive roster alongside fellow additions Elliot Page, Himesh Patel, and Samantha Morton, per The Hollywood Reporter. This latest round of casting announcements adds another connection to Marvel’s universe, as Irwin, known for portraying Cary Loudermilk in FX’s Legion, joins Page, who previously appeared as Kitty Pryde in the films X-Men: The Last Stand and X-Men: Days of Future Past.

This marks a reunion with Nolan for several cast members. Patel previously worked with the director on Tenet, Page starred in Inception, and Irwin lent his voice to the beloved robot TARS in Interstellar. For two-time Oscar nominee Morton, however, this represents her first collaboration with the acclaimed filmmaker.

Production is set to begin in roughly two months on Sicily’s Favignana, also known as “Goat Island,” a location that supposedly featured in Odysseus’s original journey. The film will then move to additional shooting locations in Morocco and the UK, utilizing what’s being described as “brand new IMAX technology.”

While specific roles remain unannounced, Tom Holland was the first cast member announced in what Universal describes as a “mythic action epic.” The film will adapt Homer’s classic poem following Odysseus’s perilous decade-long journey home after the Trojan War, featuring encounters with legendary creatures and divine beings.

The new additions join an already impressive ensemble, including Matt Damon, Zendaya, Robert Pattinson, Lupita Nyong’o, Anne Hathaway, Charlize Theron, Jon Bernthal, John Leguizamo, and Benny Safdie. The film is scheduled to reach theaters on July 17, 2026, maintaining Nolan’s lucky tradition of mid-July releases that previously served well for hits like The Dark Knight, Dunkirk, and Oppenheimer.

The project marks Nolan’s first venture into the realm of classical mythology; it’s arguably his most fantastical film to date, promising to bring the epic’s iconic elements like the Cyclops Polyphemus, the Sirens, and the witch-goddess Circe to the screen.

Holland expressed his excitement about joining the project during a Good Morning America appearance, stating, “When the opportunity came in, it was the phone call of a lifetime. It was reminiscent of getting the call about Spider-Man 10 years ago. It’s an amazing thing for me. I’m super proud and I’m really, really excited.”

Speculation suggests Holland could either portray Odysseus himself or potentially his son Telemachus, with some theorizing that Damon might play an older version of Odysseus or appear as Telemachus’s father.

Neil Gaiman’s ‘The Sandman’ Canceled at Netflix, Will End With Season 2 (EXCLUSIVE)

Netflix’s adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s “The Sandman” will end with its upcoming second season.

The show’s cancellation comes on the heels of several sexual misconduct accusations leveled at Gaiman, who created “The Sandman” DC comics and developed the TV series. This marks Gaiman’s latest project to be impacted amid the allegations. He also departed Amazon’s upcoming final season of the “Good Omens” TV adaptation, and development paused on a movie based on his “The Graveyard Book” at Disney. Most recently, Gaiman was dropped by his longtime comic book publisher Dark Horse and had his “Coraline” musical scrapped.

Prior to the accusations first leveled against Gaiman in a Tortoise Media podcast in July 2024, sources close to the project were already telling Variety the pricey series, produced by Warner Bros. Television for Netflix, was expected to end with its second season when production was underway in summer 2023. The reveal of Season 2 characters that were cast in May 2024 further indicated the series was jumping to the end of the comics much sooner than fans anticipated.

“The Sandman” Season 2 has been a long time coming. The first season debuted in August 2022, and it wasn’t renewed at Netflix until November of that year. At that time, Netflix was also hesitant to label it as a second season at all, choosing instead to say it was “a continuation of ‘The Sandman’ world,” and wouldn’t commit to an episode count.

The release plan for Season 2 will not be impacted by the cancellation and the episodes are still set for a 2025 release.

“‘The Sandman’ series has always been focused exclusively on Dream’s story, and back in 2022, when we looked at the remaining Dream material from the comics, we knew we only had enough story for one more season,” “The Sandman” showrunner Allan Heinberg said in a statement to Variety Friday. “We are extremely grateful to Netflix for bringing the team all back together and giving us the time and resources to make a faithful adaptation in a way that we hope will surprise and delight the comics’ loyal readers as well as fans of our show.”

The second season of “The Sandman” follows the “Season of Mists” storyline from Gaiman’s comics, in which Lucifer (Gwendoline Christie) abdicates control of Hell and presents Morpheus, aka Dream (Tom Sturridge), with the key to its gates, causing many immortals to try to convince Morpheus to give the key to them.

Joining for Season 2 are Esmé Creed-Miles as Delirium, Adrian Lester as Destiny, Barry Sloane as “The Prodigal,” Ruairi O’Connor as Orpheus, Freddie Fox as Loki, Clive Russell as Odin, Laurence O’Fuarain as Thor, Ann Skelly as Nuala, Douglas Booth as Cluracan and Jack Gleeson as Puck, Indya Moore as Wanda and Steve Coogan as the voice of Barnabas the dog.

Among the Season 1 cast members returning for “The Sandman” Season 2 are Patton Oswalt as Matthew the Raven, Vivienne Acheampong as Lucienne, Christie as Lucifer Morningstar, Jenna Coleman as Johanna Constantine, Ferdinand Kingsley as Hob Gadling, Stephen Fry as Gilbert, Asim Chaudhry as Abel, Sanjeev Bhaskar as Cain, Vanesu Samunyai as Rose Walker and Razane Jammal as Lyta Hall.

“The Sandman” was developed by Gaiman, showrunner Heinberg and David S. Goyer based on the DC comics of the same name by Gaiman, Sam Keith and Mike Dringenberg. All episodes of Season 2 were directed by Jamie Childs.

Netflix has not responded to request for comment on the accusations against Gaiman.

See the first-look at second and final season of “The Sandman” below.

2024 Grammy Awards to feature star-studded performances and tribute to Los Angeles

CLEVELAND, Ohio – It’s time for the Recording Academy a.k.a the Music Industry to once again spend a few hours patting itself and its constituents on their collective backs by handing out several tiny Gramophones to artists, songwriters and producers at the Grammy Awards.

The 67th awards – happening 8 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 3 – will be broadcast on CBS, (WOIO channel 19, locally) and Paramount+.

Artists up for multiple major awards include Beyonce whose genre-line stomping country soul album “Cowboy Carter” earned her 11 nominations including the big three awards, album, song and record of the year for the single “Texas Hold ‘Em.” That brings her total nominations to 99, the most single-artist nominations in Grammy history.

Behind Beyonce are Post Malone, Billie Eilish, Kendrick Lamar and Charlie XCX with seven each. Coming in at six nominations are Taylor Swift along with relative newcomers Sabrina Carpenter and Chappell Roan.

But, though folks love to pull for their preferred artist (the BeyHive will go nuclear on social media if Beyonce doesn’t win one of the big awards) for many casual viewers who may not have any specific artist allegiance, the reason to watch the 3 1/2 hour show is for the performances.

With parts of Greater Los Angeles still engulfed in wild flames, this year’s ceremony will be a bit different with a special “In Memoriam” tribute to the city of Los Angeles that will feature Brad Paisley, Brittany Howard, Chris Martin of Coldplay, Jacob Collier, John Legend, Sheryl Crow and St. Vincent.

The tribute will come a few days after the massive dual arena FireAid event on Thursday night that featured performances by an array of stars including Green Day, Peso Pluma, Katie Perry, Stevie Wonder. Several Angeleno natives also performed, including No Doubt and The Red Hot Chili Peppers, and there was a reunion of the surviving members of Nirvana – Dave Grohl, Krist Novocelic and Pat Smear fronted by Grammy nominees Kim Gordon, St. Vincent and Joan Jett.

Other announced Grammy telecast performers include Benson Boone, Eilish, Doechii, Raye, Sabrina Carpenter, Shakira and Teddy Swims. There also will be a tribute to legendary producer Quincy Jones featuring Cynthia Erivo, Herbie Hancock, Janelle Monae, Lainey Wilson and Stevie Wonder. Viewers can expect a more muted show with frequent reminders that many people in the wildfire’s path have lost everything and need help.

For all the proud Ohio homers, there are several folks to pull for including The Black Keys whose sprightly “Beautiful People (Stay High)” earned nominations for Best Rock Song and Best Rock Performance.

Other artists with O-H-I-O roots include Trent Reznor and composing buddy Atticus Ross, who are up for their fourth “Best Score Soundtrack For Visual Media Grammy for their score for the Zendaya vehicle “Challengers.”

RELATED READING: Cleveland and Northeast Ohio musical talent abounds in 2024 Grammy nominations

As has been the case for several years, Cleveland and Northeast Ohio classical artists and producers are sprinkled throughout the classical category, none of which will be aired on television. Nevertheless, proud homers can pull for record and festival producer and 14-time nominee Elaine Martone, who is competing with another local producer and sometime collaborator Erica Brenner for Producer of the Year.

Other local classical folks nominated include Cleveland-based Jeannette Sorrell & Apollo’s Fire and several alums and current folks from the Cleveland Institute of Music, including Alan Bise, head of the institute’s Recording Arts & Services, who is up for two of his vocal productions, and alums pianist Michelle Cann and Daniel Ching (also an Oberlin alum).

Trump administration slams Selena Gomez in new video after sobbing over deportations

On Friday (January 30) the White House posted on X (formerly Twitter) a video of the mothers of those who were allegedly killed by undocumented people. “Kayla Hamilton, Jocelyn Nungaray, and Rachel Morin were murdered by illegal aliens,” they captioned the post.

“Their courageous mothers had something to say to @SelenaGomez and those who oppose securing our borders.”

In the video, the mothers are watching the Rare Beauty founder’s clip from January 27 where she is crying and apologizing for not being able to help.

“Seeing that video, it’s hard to believe that it’s actually genuine and real because she’s an actress,” Alexis Nungaray said in the White House video. “My daughter was a child. There’s many other children whose lives were taken due to people who crossed here illegally.”

“You don’t know who you’re crying for,” Hamilton’s mother Tammy Nobles echoed a similar statement. “What about our children who were brutally murdered and raped and beat to death and left on the floor by these illegal immigrants?”

“I just feel like it’s a ruse to deceive people and to garner sympathy for lawlessness,” Patty Morin said about Gomez’s video.

Studies show that undocumented immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than U.S. -born Americans.

At the time of Gomez’s video, 956 people were arrested across major cities in the U.S. over just three days as a result of President Donald Trump’s new immigration policy.

“I just want to say that I’m so sorry. All my people are getting attacked,” the 32-year-old Mexican American singer cried in a now-deleted post on Instagram. “The children. I don’t understand. I’m so sorry I wish I could do something but I can’t.

“I don’t know what to do. I’ll try everything, I promise,” she concluded, captioning her video, “I’m sorry” with a Mexican flag emoji.

Gomez’s video was met with immediate backlash from Trump’s supporters, who accused her of performative online.

For example, right-wing political host Tomi Lahren called the actor a “certified moron” in a video shared on X. “This is why we don’t take our political advice from Disney child stars,” she wrote.

Sam Parker, a Republican candidate who sought election to the U.S. Senate in 2018, wrote simply: “Deport Selena Gomez.”

The Only Murders in the Building star subsequently deleted the video from her Instagram Story. She then went back online to hit back at the haters, writing: “Apparently it’s not OK to show empathy for people.”

The video came after Trump signed a deluge of executive orders related to immigration due to an “unconscionable risk” to public safety and national security, a White House official said.

Some of Trump’s orders were signed with the aim of expanding ICE’s ability to arrest and detain unlawful migrants in the U.S., including one that rescinded restrictions surrounding immigration raids in areas deemed “sensitive” — including schools.

Back in 2019, Gomez produced an entire documentary entitled Living Undocumented and wrote an essay for Time detailing her family’s history of illegally crossing the border from Mexico into the United States.

Both her Aunt and her paternal grandparents were undocumented for some time. However, according to Gomez’s essay, her family has since “worked hard to gain United States citizenship.”

The Emilia Pérez Controversies Just Keep Piling Up

The polarizing film should win an Oscar for biggest awards-season mess.

Emilia Pérez is this year’s most divisive Oscar nominee — for more reasons than one. Culture critics and film lovers have spent the past month debating the film’s merits (or, depending on who you ask, lack thereof). But things really started to reach a boiling point this week when some rather distasteful old comments from both the film’s star, Karla Sofía Gascón, and writer-director Jacques Audiard resurfaced in a span of just a couple of days. The many threads of controversy have been hard to follow, requiring an interested reader to wade through old tweets both vetted and unverified, multiple public apologies, and even suspicions about whether or not the academy’s social media regulations had been violated. But don’t worry, I trudged through Emilia Pérez’s muck so you don’t have to. Read on for a breakdown of the wild controversy surrounding one of this awards season’s strongest contenders.

OK, I’ve got my popcorn and I’m ready for the drama. How did everything start?

While this train of escalating drama has taken off faster than the speed of light, it seems like the tides began to turn when Spanish actress Karla Sofía Gascón — the lead actress of Emilia Pérez, who made history as the first openly transgender person to ever be nominated for an acting Oscar — made comments that some perceived as a slight toward fellow Best Actress nominee Fernanda Torres. Per a translation from Variety, in a Jan. 21 interview with a Brazilian news outlet, Gascón criticized the social media campaigns for films that “diminish” the work of other nominees in order to promote their own. Gascón then mentioned Torres, the Brazilian actress nominated for her work in the film I’m Still Here, and the I’m Still Here team, saying: “I have never, at any point, said anything bad about Fernanda Torres or her movie. However, there are people working with Fernanda Torres tearing me and Emilia Pérez down. That speaks more about their movie than mine.”

Some called into question whether Gascón’s comments violated the academy’s recently updated social media regulations by directly referencing Torres, who, it should be noted, has also been on both sides of public perception, getting praise for becoming the first Brazilian actress to win a Golden Globe for I’m Still Here (Torres’ mother was the first-ever Brazilian Golden Globe nominee), but also receiving flak for a recently resurfaced 17-year-old sketch — for which the actress has since apologized — showing Torres appearing in blackface. However, on Wednesday, in a statement given to Variety, Gascón explained that she wasn’t criticizing Torres or those “directly associated” with her — calling the actress a “wonderful ally” — but rather “toxicity and violent hate speech on social media” more generally. (For now, it seems Gascón’s original comments regarding Torres reportedly do not violate Oscar campaign rules.)

Given how much I’ve seen Gascón’s name in recent headlines, I’m assuming there’s more to this story?

Yes, and I will say that it gets decidedly worse from here. After the comments about Torres were put to bed on Wednesday, things ramped up the very next day when journalist Sarah Hagi alerted the world about Gascón’s history of uncouth tweets in a fairly lengthy X thread of screenshots. Many of the tweets — posted in Spanish, largely from 2020-2021 (though some are more recent) — are too disparaging and offensive to reprint here, but they include sentiments that run the gamut from Islamophobic, xenophobic, and racist to antisemitic. In addition to the incredibly xenophobic and Islamophobic tweets curated by Hagi, another tweet making the rounds shows the actress chiding the 2021 Oscars: “More and more the #Oscars are looking like a ceremony for independent and protest films, I didn’t know if I was watching an Afro-Korean festival, a Black Lives Matter demonstration or the 8M. Apart from that, an ugly, ugly gala.” Another, referenced in the same Variety report, shows Gascón disparaging George Floyd, referring to him as a “drug addict swindler.” And yet another, referenced in this piece from the New York Times, made racist comments about Chinese people in relation to COVID-19.

Oh god. Did Gascón respond to these resurfaced tweets? Were they taken down?

Later that day, Gascón apologized in a short statement issued by Netflix. In the statement, via NBC, Gascón expressed: “As someone in a marginalized community, I know this suffering all too well and I am deeply sorry to those I have caused pain.” However, shortly after, the actress deleted her entire X account. In a much lengthier exclusive statement later provided to the Hollywood Reporter, Gascón’s tone had shifted. Per THR, the actress wrote: “I’m sorry, but I can no longer allow this campaign of hate and misinformation to affect me and my family,” adding that she has “been threatened with death, insulted, abused and harassed to the point of exhaustion.” Gascón continues by stating that she has “defended each and every one of the minorities in this world and supported any event against racism, freedom of religion or homophobia,” calling her past opinions “erroneous,” and apologizing to anyone who has “ever felt offended” for them (or would), attributing them to her getting swept up in the toxicity of social media. (One of these days, we’ve got to have a mandatory, society-wide conversation about the right way to apologize.) Most perplexingly, Gascón’s statement ends by blaming some indiscriminate force for allegedly trying to tear her down or “sink” her, writing: “I cannot be responding to every single thing you bring up to try to sink me. But if you want, you can continue attacking me as if I were responsible for hunger and wars in the world.” Gascón asserts that “it is clear that there is something very dark behind it.” She finishes with the phrase “NAM MYOHO RENGE KYO,” which THR reports is a Japanese phrase related to Nichiren Buddhism.

… OK then! I hesitate to ask but: Is that all?

Nope! While Gascón’s torrid 24 or so hours ends there (so far), Jacques Audiard, the Oscar nominated writer-director behind Emilia Pérez, has also landed in the hot seat for some controversial comments he made about the Spanish language in recent months. During an August video interview with the French culture-focused media outlet Konbini, in which the French director was explaining why he wrote Emilia Pérez in Spanish as opposed to English or French, called the language — as roughly translated — one “of modest countries, developing countries, of poor people and migrants.” The resurfaced clip has inspired the ire of online commentators and of actor John Leguizamo, who lambasted Audiard on Threads.

How are people reacting to this onslaught of discoveries?

Despite the fact that this incredibly divisive movie was made and written by a white, cisgender French man, and filmed almost exclusively outside of Mexico, it has somehow become a major awards contender. It is an awards darling that won big at the Golden Globes and leads the pack of Oscar-nominated films with a total of 13 nominations. Naturally, people are finding these comments to be upsetting, enraging, and, if the movie were to rack up more trophies, even more disappointing. But there’s also a streak of irony in the PR disaster that has unfolded; as many have observed, it seems fitting that a film criticized as racist, transphobic (or, at the very least, heavily outdated), and/or just plain ol’ bad would then go on to have so many not-dissimilar issues haunting its awards campaign.

I know that Gascón, Audiard, and the movie are up for Best Actress, Director, and Picture (respectively) at this year’s upcoming Oscars. Does this controversy hurt the chances of them winning? What even were their chances in the first place?

While one would think that this stir is likely to squander some of the favor Emilia Pérez has curried in the eyes of academy voters (who won’t vote for the final winners until mid-February), it is entirely unclear if it will deter a win. After all, in 2019, the similarly polarizing Green Book won Best Picture, even after the film’s screenwriter Nick Vallelonga came under fire for a resurfaced tweet from 2015 in which he disparaged Muslims in a response to Donald Trump.

But Gascón, at least, was already considered least-favored to win Best Actress (with Demi Moore being in the lead), according to the aggregator and awards-prediction site GoldDerby. For Best Director, Audiard trails in second place behind The Brutalist writer-director Brady Corbet, which is also true of the predicted standings for Best Picture. So, while some critics and Yahoo’s algorithm for predicting the Best Picture winner place Emilia Pérez as the favorite to win the big award of the night, others are equally as convinced that, even before the controversy, the award was going to go to The Brutalist anyway. (However, The Brutalist doesn’t come without its own controversy either, as the discovery that A.I. was used to perfect small portions of the actors’ Hungarian dialect ruffled the feathers of many cinephiles.)

In short, everything is still up in the air. Emilia Pérez’s chances could be slimmer because of all this, but it was hard to ascertain what the film’s chances of winning were to begin with. Then again, maybe it will become the next Green Book, which is just the most recent Crash, which is just another rehash of Shakespeare in Love winning over Saving Private Ryan. The academy voters may never learn, but I sincerely hope Gascón and Audiard do.

Nolan Re-Teams With Elliot Page: Here Are 5 Actors Who Have Been In Multiple Nolan Movies

We have more casting news for Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey. Joining an already elite group is Elliot Page, Samantha Morton, Himesh Patel, and Bill Irwin.

✕ Remove Ads

Fans of Nolan’s movies may recognize three of those names. Page had played Ariadne in Inception. Patel was Mahir in Tenet. And Bill Irwin voiced TARS in Interstellar.

Related

Inception the Game? Nolan is Working On It

Posts

Samantha Morton is a first-time Nolan collaborator. That list for Odyssey includes Charlize Theron, Tom Holland, Zendaya, Jon Bernthal, Lupita Nyong’o, and John Leguizamo. All of them will become eligible to join the club of actors who have worked with Nolan multiple times.

Let’s take a look at the five actors who have worked with Nolan the most, outside the Batman trilogy.

5 Anne Hathaway & Robert Pattinson

Co-Pilot, Time Traveler, To Be Determined

The Odyssey will be Hathaway’s second (non-Batman) film with Nolan, having previously played Dr. Amelia Brand in Interstellar. While Brand didn’t get to do all that much in the sci-fi epic, she is an important emotional foil to Matthew McConaughey’s character.

✕ Remove Ads

Robert Pattinson starred in Tenet, in a supporting role that finally won over many of the people who had continued to judge him for being the pretty, shiny vampire in the Twilight saga. Those in the know had long-recognized Pattinson’s talent and star power.

Both have joined The Odyssey, but in undisclosed roles. Screen Rant speculated that Hathaway could be Penelope, the wife of Odysseus. They pegged Pattinson as Antinous, an antagonist who pursues Penelope during Odysseus’s long absence.

4 Matt Damon

Loner, Enabler, To Be Determined

Matt Damon is also part of The Odyssey. He seems the obvious choice to play Odysseus, as Holland, Pattinson, and others would be too young for the role of the middle-aged hero.

✕ Remove Ads

Interstellar was Damon’s first collaboration with Nolan. The result was amazing, as Nolan used Damon’s penchant for playing audience-favorite protagonists to set up a shocking twist.

And then Damon played a major role in Oppenheimer, as U.S. Army Colonel Leslie Groves, the man in charge of the Manhattan Project, the one who brought Oppenheimer on to lead development of the atomic bomb.

3 Kenneth Branagh

Commander, Futurist, Scientist

Two of Branagh’s three Nolan films have been in understated roles. In Dunkirk, he plays Commander Bolton, a composite character inspired by Captain William Tennan. He has a few memorable moments, but isn’t the main character.

It’s the same in Oppenheimer, as Branagh plays Niels Bohr. Bohr’s an important figure but not a meaningful part of the film.

In Tenet, however, he was Andrei Sator, arguably the biggest jerk (putting it mildly) in Nolan’s entire filmography and the scariest Branagh has ever been on-screen.

✕ Remove Ads

2 Cillian Murphy

Dreamer, Coward, Destroyer of Worlds

Cillian Murphy doesn’t seem to have a role in The Odyssey (maybe because he’s committed to the third film in the 28 Years Later trilogy?). But he’s one of the most memorable actors in Nolan’s filmography.

In Inception, he got to play Robert Fischer, the business titan with daddy-issues whose dreams the heroes invade. I’ll never forget that moment, at the end, after the inception, where Murphy has to nonchalantly convey he just had an emotional breakthrough that has changed his entire worldview. And he nails it!

But then, in Dunkirk, Murphy loses his nobility to play an emotionally broken soldier whose rising cowardice turns him into a villain.

✕ Remove Ads

Murphy and Nolan re-teamed for the high-point of their careers. Murphy played Oppenheimer and won the Academy Award for Best Actor, while Nolan took him Best Director, and the film won Best Picture.

1 Michael Caine

Engineer, Mentor, Poetry Reciter, Vocal Cameo, Sir Michael

Oh, Michael Caine. The legend himself. He has appeared in more Christopher Nolan movies than anyone else, whether you include the Batman movies or not.

First, he played the engineering assistant in The Prestige, and got to explain the three parts of a magic trick: the pledge, the turn, and the prestige. Nolan was quick to notice that letting Michael Caine narrate and give big speeches coincided with audiences loving the movie. It worked in The Prestige, they ran it back in Batman Begins, The Dark Knight, Inception, The Dark Knight Returns, Interstellar, and Dunkirk.

✕ Remove Ads

As much as I love all of Michael Caine’s appearances, my favorite is Tenet. Why? Because Caine’s character is literally called Sir Michael. Which opens up the possibility that Michael Caine was just playing himself. It’s a brief, Bond-like scene, where the spy gets important information from a sharp, witty character, and they banter back and forth. And nothing that’s said in any way goes against the theory that Michael Caine is playing Michael Caine and that Michael Caine, knighted as he is, plays a key role in British intelligence operations.

Sure, the character is officially named Sir Michael Crosby, but doesn’t the name being “Crosby” only strengthen the idea that it’s really “Caine”?

The Odyssey

Release Date July 17, 2026

Director Christopher Nolan

Cast

See All

Matt Damon

Tom Holland

Robert Pattinson

Anne Hathaway

Powered by ExpandCollapse

✕ Remove Ads

Grammy Awards 2025: It’s another Beyoncé vs Taylor showdown

The big question of the night is whether Beyoncé will finally win album of the year, after four previous losses in the category?

During last year’s ceremony, her husband Jay-Z addressed the oversight, telling the audience: “I don’t want to embarrass this young lady, but she has more Grammys than everyone and never won album of the year. So even by your own metrics, that doesn’t work.”

Beyoncé’s latest record, Cowboy Carter, is a wildly ambitious attempt to contextualise and commemorate the black roots of country music. It’s the sort of thing that delights Grammy voters, who traditionally prefer albums that elevate America’s musical history over contemporary, cutting-edge productions.

But the album’s excessive length – including a few weaker tracks in its latter half – could count against it.

Billie Eilish is currently the bookmakers’ favourite with her third album Hit Me Hard and Soft. Mixing passionate power ballads with violent electronic shifts and hip-hop swagger, it marks a new evolution in the star’s songwriting partnership with her brother, Finneas.

Charli XCX’s Brat is a career-defining pop record that became a cultural phenomenon. The best-reviewed album of 2024, it’s probably too abrasive for the Grammys’ more conservative voters, but that’s their loss.

And you’d have to be crazy to ignore Taylor Swift. Her 11th album, The Tortured Poets Department, was the biggest-seller of last year; a fact that will undoubtedly be taken into account, even if the record is one of her weaker efforts.

If she wins, Swift will collect her fifth album of the year trophy – more than any other artist in Grammy history.