Entertainment
Julie Powell, food writer of ‘Julie & Julia,’ dies at 49 – National | Globalnews.ca
Powell died of cardiac arrest Oct. 26 at her home in upstate New York, The New York Times reported. Her death was confirmed by Judy Clain, Powell’s email and editor in chief of Little, Brown.
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“She was a brilliant writer and a daring, original person and she will not be forgotten,” Clain said in a statement. “We are sending our deepest condolences to all who knew and loved Julie, whether personally or through the deep connections she forged with readers of her memoirs.”
Powell’s 2005 book Julie & Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen became the hit, Nora Ephron-directed film Julie & Julia, with the author portrayed in the movie by Amy Adams and Meryl Streep as Child.
Her sophomore and last effort — titled Cleaving: A Story of Marriage, Meat and Obsession — was a bit jarring in its honesty. Powell revealed she had an affair, the pain of loving two men at once, of her fondness for sadomasochism and even a bout of self-punishing sex with a stranger.
“People coming from the movie Julie & Julia and picking up Cleaving are going to be in for some emotional whiplash,” she told The Associated Press in 2009. “I don’t believe it’s going to be a Nora Ephron movie.”
Powell began her affair in 2004 as she was putting the finishing touches on her first book, a time she writes when she was “starry-eyed and vaguely discontented and had too much time on my hands.”
By 2006, she had landed an apprenticeship at a butcher shop two hours north of New York City, which offered an escape from her crumbling marriage and a place to explore her childhood curiosity with butchers.
“The way they held a knife in their hand was like an extension of themselves,” she said. “I’m a very clumsy person. I don’t play sports. That kind of physical skill is really foreign to me, and I’m really envious of that.”
The book explores the link between butchering and her own tortured romantic life. At one point, while cutting the connective tissue on a pig’s leg, she writes: “It’s sad, but a relief as well, to know that two things so closely bound together can separate with so little violence, leaving smooth surfaces instead of bloody shreds.”
Her book tapped into the growing interest in old school butchery and her experience slicing meat actually resulted in her eating less of it. She was an advocate for humanely raised and slaughtered animals.
“People want to get their hands dirty. People want to participate in the process. People want to know where their food is coming from,” Powell said. “People don’t want the mystery anymore.”
She is survived by her husband, Eric.
© 2022 The Canadian Press
Entertainment
Gwyneth Paltrow not liable in Utah ski collision, jury says – National | Globalnews.ca
A jury dismissed the complaint of a retired optometrist who sued Paltrow over injuries he sustained when the two crashed on a beginner run at Deer Valley ski resort, siding with Paltrow after eight days of live-streamed courtroom testimony that made the case a pop culture fixation.
Paltrow, an actor who in recent years has refashioned herself into a celebrity wellness entrepreneur, looked to her attorneys with a pursed lips smile when the judge read the eight-member jury’s verdict in the Park City courtroom. She sat intently through two weeks of testimony in what became the biggest celebrity court case since actors Johnny Depp and Amber Heard faced off last year.
The dismissal concludes two weeks of courtroom proceedings that hinged largely on reputation rather than the monetary damages at stake in the case. Paltrow’s attorneys described the complaint against her as “utter B.S.” and painted the Goop founder-CEO as uniquely vulnerable to unfair, frivolous lawsuits due to her celebrity.
Paltrow took the witness stand during the trial to insist the collision wasn’t her fault, and to describe how she was stunned when she felt “a body pressing against me and a very strange grunting noise.”
Throughout the trial, the word “uphill” became synonymous with “guilty, ” as attorneys focused on a largely unknown skiing code of conduct that stipulates that the skier who is downhill or ahead on the slope has the right of way.
Worldwide audiences followed the celebrity trial as if it were episodic television. Viewers scrutinized both Paltrow and Sanderson’s motives while attorneys directed questions to witnesses that often had less to do with the collision and more to do with their client’s reputations.
The trial took place in Park City, a resort town known for hosting the annual Sundance Film Festival, where early in her career Paltrow would appear for the premieres of her movies including 1998’s “Sliding Doors,” at a time when she was known primarily as an actor, not a lifestyle influencer. Paltrow is also known for her roles in “Shakespeare in Love,” which won her an Academy Award, and the “Iron Man” movies.
The jury’s decision marks a painful court defeat for Terry Sanderson, the man who sued Paltrow for more than $300,000 over injuries he sustained when they crashed on a beginner run. Both parties blamed the other for the collision. Sanderson, 76, broke four ribs and sustained a concussion after the two tumbled down the slope, with Paltrow landing on top of him.
He filed an amended complaint after an earlier $3.1 million lawsuit was dismissed. Paltrow in response countersued for $1 and attorney fees, a symbolic action that mirrors Taylor Swift’s response to a radio host’s defamation lawsuit. Swift was awarded $1 in 2017.
Paltrow’s defense team tried to paint Sanderson as an angry, aging and unsympathetic man who had over the years become “obsessed” with his lawsuit against Paltrow. They argued that Paltrow wasn’t at fault in the crash and also said, regardless of blame, that Sanderson was overstating the extent of his injuries.
AP writer Anna Furman contributed from Los Angeles.
© 2023 The Canadian Press
Entertainment
Jennifer Aniston says ‘Friends’ offensive to ‘a whole generation of kids’ – National | Globalnews.ca
Aniston, who has been working in film and comedy for nearly three decades, told the French news agency AFP that it’s become “a little tricky” to produce comedies because you have to be “very careful.” She said this is especially troubling because “the beauty of comedy is that we make fun of ourselves, make fun of life.”
Aniston, 54, lamented the past when she said: “You could joke about a bigot and have a laugh — that was hysterical. And it was about educating people on how ridiculous people were.”
She used her role as Rachel Green in the 1990s sitcom Friends as an example of how audiences have evolved over the years.
“There’s a whole generation of people, kids, who are now going back to episodes of Friends and find them offensive,” she said.
Aniston blamed the offensiveness on a combination of “things that were never intentional” and elements of the program that just lacked thought.
Friends, a comedy about six young people in New York, has long since been criticized for a lack of diversity. All of the show’s main characters are white. While actors of colour appeared sparsely in short cameo roles, the most prominent, non-white actor on the show, Aisha Tyler (who played Charlie Wheeler), appeared in only nine episodes.
Some of the jokes in friends have also been labelled transphobic or homophobic.
Co-creator of the sitcom, Marta Kauffman, said last year she was “embarrassed” and felt “guilt” over the lack of diversity in Friends.
“It’s painful looking at yourself in the mirror. I’m embarrassed that I didn’t know better 25 years ago,” Kauffman told the Los Angeles Times.
Friends ran from 1994 to 2004. It is one of the most profitable sitcoms ever created, bringing in reportedly US$1.4 billion since its initial debut.
As a result of increased sensitivity, Aniston said less comedies are being made today than in decades prior. Not having comedies, she said, is a tragedy.
“Everybody needs funny! The world needs humour!” she said. “We can’t take ourselves too seriously. Especially in the United States. Everyone is far too divided.”
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Numerous popular comedians have already complained about producing comedy in the post-woke age. In particular, Dave Chappelle and Chris Rock have been especially outspoken about cancel culture and comedy.
Still, Aniston charges on. In her latest comedy, Murder Mystery 2, Aniston plays Audrey Spitz, a detective solving the case of a kidnapped billionaire alongside her partner Nick (played by Adam Sandler). Murder Mystery 2 is available to stream on Netflix on Friday.
© 2023 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
Entertainment
‘Ducks,’ Kate Beaton’s graphic memoir about Alberta’s oilsands, wins Canada Reads | Globalnews.ca
The graphic memoir published last year by Drawn & Quarterly traces Beaton’s two years working in Alberta’s oilsands.
Jeopardy! super-champion Mattea Roach defended the book during the four-day competition that aired live on CBC Radio.
“Ducks” won the competition Thursday, beating out Emily St. John Mandel’s novel “Station Eleven,” which was championed by actor-director Michael Greyeyes.
“Hotline” by Dimitri Nasrallah, championed by bhangra dancer Gurdeep Pandher, was voted off Wednesday; “Greenwood” by Michael Christie, championed by actress Keegan Connor Tracy, was eliminated Tuesday; and “Mexican Gothic” by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, championed by TikToker Tasnim Geedi, didn’t make it past the first day, Monday.
This year’s competition sought to find “one book to shift your perspective.”
© 2023 The Canadian Press
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