Entertainment

By Catherine E. Shoichet, CNN (CNN) — Notifications popped up on Barbie Koelker’s phone for days after a trailer for the “Barbie” movie first came out. Friends were eager to know what she thought. “They know that I’ve fought for people to just take Barbie seriously,” Koelker says. The 38-year-old marketing executive in Los Angeles

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — Former President Barack Obama is staying cool this summer with a summer playlist of 40-plus songs that showcase his eclectic tastes. “Like I do every year, here are some songs I’ve been listening to this summer,” Obama wrote on Twitter on Thursday, adding that his playlist is “a mix

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — It took over a decade for Josh Hartnett and director Christopher Nolan to finally have the opportunity to work together in “Oppenheimer,” but there was a time when Hartnett was almost cast as Nolan’s Batman. According to the director, Hartnett was an early contender to play the Caped Crusader

By Cheri Mossburg and Scott Glover, CNN (CNN) — Property records show that a house searched in connection with the investigation into Tupac Shakur’s killing belongs to the wife of a self-proclaimed witness to the rapper’s shooting. The search warrant, obtained by CNN, names Duane Keith Davis and shows police were looking for “items that

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — The time has come for the comic book-loving, cosplay-clad San Diego Comic-Con (SDCC) attendees to flock to sunny southern California for the 2023 convention – but this year is looking just a tad different. The con comes as Hollywood is at a standstill with the industry’s unionized actors and

By Marianne Garvey, CNN (CNN) — It’s official. Just days after Joe Manganiello and Sofía Vergara announced they were parting ways, the “Magic Mike” actor filed for divorce in Los Angeles County Superior Court. He cited “irreconcilable differences” as the cause and listed July 2, 2023 as the date of separation. The petition, obtained by

Review by Brian Lowry, CNN (CNN) — Wading through 85 years of comics history is a daunting task, and “Superpowered: The DC Story,” a Max docuseries tries doing it in just three parts. Yet this voyage into comics history, in print and on the screen, comes at a crossroads for DC, one that suggests all

By Caolán Magee, CNN (CNN) — When the highly anticipated movie “Oppenheimer” finally lands in theaters Friday, it will be one of the first blockbuster biopics to open since the end of the Covid-19 pandemic. Director Christopher Nolan’s latest creation concerns an earlier existential threat, telling the story of the atomic bomb through the lens

By Dan Heching, CNN (CNN) — Harry Styles is continuing to deliver his trademark charm with his latest music video, for the song “Daylight.” The former One Direction member appears in a series of eccentric costumes in the whimsical clip, which dropped on Wednesday, all inspired by the theme of an old-style traveling circus. Styles

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — Beyoncé gave one lucky audience member at a recent “Renaissance” tour concert in Nashville a pretty sweet wedding gift. The Grammy-winner was on stage singing “Crazy in Love” when she spotted a sign in the crowd asking her to help choose between her hits “XO” and “1+1” to be

By Marianne Garvey, CNN (CNN) — Sheryl Crow has shared her thoughts on Jason Aldean’s controversial song, “Try That in a Small Town.” Aldean’s single, which was released in May, stirred new controversy when the music video debuted on July 14. The lyrics and visual references in the video, critics say, are evocative of vigilantism

By Scottie Andrew, CNN (CNN) — This weekend, the movies belong to dolls and doom. It’s the cinematic event of the summer: Greta Gerwig’s splashy pink romp “Barbie” and Christopher Nolan’s “emotionally devastating” three-hour epic “Oppenheimer” rolled out in theaters this week. Aside from their prestige-y creative teams, the films have little in common, but

By Lisa Respers France and AJ Willingham, CNN (CNN) — There has been more fallout regarding Jason Aldean’s controversial single, “Try That in a Small Town.” CMT confirmed to CNN on Wednesday that the music video for the song has been pulled off the country network’s air. Billboard was the first to report the news.

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — Fran Drescher, actor and president of the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) – the union representing about 160,000 Hollywood actors who went on strike Friday – said on a livestream with Sen. Bernie Sanders on Tuesday that she believes it will one day be

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — Rachel Zegler is, yet again, addressing criticism related to casting decisions on Disney Studios’ upcoming live-action remake of its 1937 animated classic “Snow White,” in which she stars as the titular heroine. “Extremely appreciative of the love I feel from those defending me online, but please don’t tag me

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — Britney Spears has some new music dropping soon. The pop star is collaborating on a new single with producer and former Black Eyed Peas frontman Will.i.am, who teased a new song titled “Mind Your Business” on his Instagram on Monday. “Uh oh!!! This summer is about to be hot!!!”

By Lisa Respers France, CNN (CNN) — Charity Lawson is fully aware that “The Bachelorette” doesn’t have the best track record when it comes to participants find lasting love. “The Bachelor” franchise as a whole has seen most of its couples fail at creating a happily ever after, but Lawson isn’t focused on that. “I

Review by Brian Lowry, CNN (CNN) — Just seeing Timothy Olyphant locked and loaded again as Raylan Givens will probably be enough for fans of “Justified,” but the FX revival subtitled “City Primeval” more than justifies the encore. Featuring an older Givens with more to lose facing off against a truly nasty bad guy, the

By Lisa Respers France, CNN (CNN) — It’s up to you to debate whether this is a case of divine intervention. While Hollywood has ground to a halt due to parallel writers’ and actors’ strikes, there’s a US-based series that is being allowed to continue to production. “The Chosen,” a faith-based series about the life

By Thomas Page and David Daniel, CNN (CNN) — “The bomb, Dimitri. The hydrogen bomb,” an exasperated US president reminds his Soviet counterpart in Stanley Kubrick’s 1964 classic “Dr Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb.” As if the bomb could ever be forgotten. At the height of the Cold

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — Sofía Vergara and Joe Manganiello’s marriage of nearly eight years is officially ending. The couple shared the news in a statement to PageSix on Monday, saying, “We have made the difficult decision to divorce.” “As two people that love and care for one another very much, we politely ask

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — Miranda Lambert just wants to sing her songs, and she wants her concertgoers to put their phones down to listen. The opposite was the case during her performance in Las Vegas on Sunday, where video footage from the concert shows the country star stopping mid-song because some audience members

By Marianne Garvey, CNN (CNN) — “The Golden Bachelor” is looking for love. ABC’s first-ever senior citizen “Bachelor,” Gerry Turner, a 71-year-old grandpa from Indiana, will star in the spinoff series ABC calls a “whole new kind of love story, one for the golden years.” The description says it’s a chance for Turner to find

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — Tom Cruise has been on a mission to encourage fans to go to the movies to see not just his latest, “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One,” but all the movies coming out this summer. His efforts may have helped with the seventh installment of the “Mission Impossible”

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — Gwyneth Paltrow is enjoying her summer by spending time with her daughter, Apple Martin, and mom, Blythe Danner. The Goop founder hosted a dinner with Gucci at her home in the Hamptons on Saturday, posting a photo from the gathering on Instagram with Martin and Danner on Sunday. Paltrow

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — Country singer Jason Aldean says he is on the mend after suffering a heat-related medical incident during his concert at the XFinity Theater in Connecticut last night, forcing the show to end early. “I’ve had a lot of people checking in on me today after hearing about what happened

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — Dolly Parton has been a country music icon for more than 50 years and has no plans to stop anytime soon. “I would never retire,” Parton said last week during an interview with Ken Bruce on the UK’s “Greatest Hits Radio,” going on to joke she will “just hopefully

By Dan Heching, CNN (CNN) — Somehow, the original “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” premiered on Bravo two decades ago this month, presenting five gay men – each specializing in a specific lifestyle area – as they descended upon a (usually) heterosexual male subject in need of some support, whether it was with clothing

By Niamh Kennedy, Nicole Mowbray and Eve Brennan, CNN (CNN) — Jane Birkin, the British singer and actress who found fame in France, has died aged 76, CNN affiliate BFMTV reported Sunday, citing its sources. Birkin spent nearly six decades in the limelight in her adopted home, to which she moved at just 20 years

By Dan Heching, CNN (CNN) — HGTV star Ty Pennington had a bit of a health complication this week, just two days after attending the ritzy “Barbie” premiere. The television personality, 58, posted on his verified Instagram on Friday, including a carousel of photos and beginning his caption with, “From the red carpet, to the

By Faith Karimi, CNN (CNN) — In the fall of 2016, Jimmy Donaldson did not seem like a future celebrity multimillionaire. The shy 18-year-old had been posting videos on YouTube for five years from his mom’s North Carolina house without much traction. His mother urged him to go to college, but he dropped out of

By Brynn Gingras, CNN (CNN) — A woman has been arrested in connection with the death of Robert De Niro’s grandson, a law enforcement source with knowledge of the investigation told CNN Friday. Leandro De Niro Rodriguez died age 19, according to an announcement from his mother Drena on social media earlier this month. No

By Amy Woodyatt, CNN London (CNN) — As a host of Hollywood actors join film and TV writers in a strike against major studios and streaming services, filming and production of some popular shows – including “House of the Dragon” and “Industry” – could continue, due to UK strike laws. Though British acting union Equity

Review by Brian Lowry, CNN (CNN) — To anyone whose first thought hearing Wilt Chamberlain’s name is the number of women he claimed to have slept with, rest assured, “Goliath” has you covered. But the three-part Showtime documentary proves most notable for portraying the sensitive soul underneath the NBA great’s brash exterior, as well as

By Lisa Respers France, CNN (CNN) — Kelly Rowland has done plenty of interviews over the course of her career, but her friend Beyoncé factors into Rowland’s “worst moment ever.” During a recent conversation on the “Yeah, I F**ked That Up” podcast, Rowland was asked by host Billy Mann about the biggest mistake she’s ever

By Brian Lowry, CNN (CNN) — Like a lot of things in Hollywood, “The Blacklist” didn’t know when to quit, hanging on for two listless seasons beyond the exit of Megan Boone as Liz Keen in 2021. Yet the show at least knew to provide viewers with a pretty definitive ending, as it did with

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — Fran Drescher, the president of the SAG-AFTRA union, responded to criticism on Thursday for traveling to Italy to attend Dolce & Gabbana’s Alta Moda festivities this past weekend as her 160,000-member actors’ union faced a deadline to go on strike. At a press conference that day – during which

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — The cast of director Christopher Nolan’s hotly anticipated war-era drama “Oppenheimer” is standing united in the effort to support the SAG-AFTRA strike. Stars of the film appeared on the red carpet of the film’s UK premiere on Thursday before the strike was officially announced, but they ended up walking

Review by Brian Lowry, CNN (CNN) — Reuniting director Steven Soderbergh and Ed Solomon (the writer of “Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure” and “Men in Black”), “Full Circle” wages a battle between being twisty and feeling convoluted, finally coming out on the short end. An impressive cast makes this HBO limited series reasonably watchable, but

By Marianne Garvey, CNN (CNN) — Khloé Kardashian says don’t rule out her brother Rob Kardashian’s return to the family’s reality TV show. On Thursday’s episode of Hulu’s “The Kardashians,” she was asked if her younger brother would ever rejoin the series after shying away from the spotlight in recent years. “I do think Rob

By Lisa Respers France, CNN (CNN) — A decade after his death shocked “Glee” fans, Cory Monteith is still being mourned. The Canadian actor, who portrayed student athlete turned Glee club member Finn Hudson on the Fox series, was found dead from an overdose in a Vancouver, British Columbia, hotel room on July 13, 2013.

By Lisa Respers France, CNN (CNN) — Mick Fleetwood has paid tribute to his fellow band member Christine McVie in honor of what would have been her 80th birthday. Fleetwood, the drummer for the legendary band Fleetwood Mac, released an instrumental version of one of McVie’s most famous compositions, “Songbird” on Wednesday. She was the

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — Mandy Moore is calling out a porch pirate. The singer and actor posted a photo from her home security camera footage on her Instagram story on Wednesday, showing a person who she alleges stole a package from her front door. “People are the worst,” she wrote, going on to

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN (CNN) — Just one decade ago, Jenji Kohan brought us the very first episode of “Orange Is the New Black,” and many of the show’s stars commemorated the groundbreaking series’ anniversary on Tuesday by sharing throwback photos and messages of gratitude. “10 Years Ago—I really didn’t know what direction I was

By Lisa Respers France, CNN (CNN) — With award show nominations comes debate, particularly among people who feel passionate about their favorite television shows. This year, the Emmy Awards overlooked some major movie stars who brought their talents to the small screen. Neither Harrison Ford nor Helen Mirren scored nominations for their work as the

Review by Brian Lowry, CNN (CNN) — After his save-the-movie-business heroics with “Top Gun: Maverick,” saving the world seems like a relatively simple task for Tom Cruise in “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One.” Happily, he has some splendid help this time around, in that rare 2023 summer movie that has the scope and

By Marianne Garvey, CNN (CNN) — Rob McElhenney revealed he has been diagnosed with “neurodevelopmental disorders and learning disabilities.” The “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” star took to Twitter with the news, saying he will explain more about what he’s learned in an upcoming episode of “The Always Sunny” podcast with costars Glenn Howerton and

By Lisa Respers France, CNN (CNN) — The nominees for the 75th Emmy Awards – television’s top honor – were announced Wednesday morning. “Succession” led with 27 Emmy nominations, followed by “The Last of Us” with 24, “The White Lotus” with 23, and “Ted Lasso” with 21. This year the Television Academy leaned into the

By Lisa Respers France, CNN (CNN) — Zayn is opening up about his life and career. The singer and former One Direction member appeared on the video podcast “Call Her Daddy,” where he talked about everything from being a member of the hugely successful boy band to co-parenting with model Gigi Hadid. The interview –

By Dan Heching, CNN (CNN) — Padma Lakshmi is expressing pride for her successor as host of Bravo’s longstanding hit cooking competition show “Top Chef.” On Tuesday, the Twitter account for the program officially announced Season 10 champion Kristen Kish as the new host of the show, after Lakshmi stepped down from the post earlier

By Virginia Langmaid, CNN (CNN) — The jury hearing arguments surrounding the disposition of Aretha Franklin’s estate on Tuesday determined a 2014 version of her will should stand as the document of record. After deliberating for almost one hour, jurors found that a handwritten will, discovered under a sofa cushion by Franklin’s niece after the