Tracy Morgan had a bout of food poisoning while in the front row at a New York Knicks game this week, the comedian revealed to fans on Instagram on Tuesday, assuaging concerns about his health after video of the incident went viral online.
“Thank you for all your concern! I’m doing ok now and doctors say it was food poisoning,’ Morgan wrote to his 915,000 fans on the platform. “Appreciate my MSG family for taking such good care of me and I need to shout out to the crew that had to clean that up. Thank you! More importantly, the Knicks are now 1-0 when I throw up on the court so maybe I’ll have to break it out again in the playoffs.”
A photo of Morgan giving a thumbs-up appears with his Instagram update. The 30 Rock Emmy winner has monitoring devices attached to his torso in the image, but he appears to be in good condition.
Morgan became ill during the third quarter of the game, People reported on Monday. The game was delayed for about 10 minutes while the actor was tended to by stadium staff.
Videos and photos posted online by those at the game at Madison Square Garden showed Morgan looking sick and vomiting before he was escorted out of the arena in a wheelchair while holding what appeared to be a white towel up to his face that was covered in red stains; he seemed to be bleeding, one commenter posted online.
This is not the first health scare for Morgan that’s taken place in public. In 2012, he collapsed outside a building in Park City while attending the Sundance Film Festival; he later wrote on Twitter that the high altitude in Utah “shook up this kid from Brooklyn.” His publicist, Lewis Kay, said at the time that the incident resulted from a combination of exhaustion and altitude. Morgan returned to work on 30 Rock just a couple of days later.
He also famously survived a near fatal car accident in 2014, when a Walmart truck slammed into the back of a limo-van carrying Morgan and two others. He was seriously injured but made a full recovery. But his friend comedian James “Jimmy Mack” McNair, died in the accident.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter
In SHADOW FORCE, Kyrah (Washington) and Isaac (Sy) were once the leaders of a multinational special forces group called Shadow Force. They broke the rules by falling in love, and in order to protect their son, they go underground. With a large bounty on their heads, and the vengeful Shadow Force hot on their trail, one family’s fight becomes all-out war.
Watch the new trailer above.
It’s been almost 30 years since we last saw Happy Gilmore, the long-driving hero who won the Tour Championship in 1996. Now we finally get to catch up with him in a new sequel that comes to Netflix July 25. Reunite with everybody’s favorite golfer in the brand-new teaser above.
That’s right, Adam Sandler is returning to the golf green as Happy Gilmore, and he’s bringing along a few familiar and fresh faces. Joining the film alongside Sandler are original Happy Gilmore stars Julie Bowen, Ben Stiller, and Christopher McDonald and brand-new co-star Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio (aka Bad Bunny), daughters Sadie and Sunny Sandler, and Blake Clark.
Some professional golfers have joined the roster, too, including John Daly, Paige Spiranac, Rory McIlroy, Scottie Scheffler, Bryson DeChambeau, Brooks Koepka, Justin Thomas, and Will Zalatoris.
Watch the trailer above.
Will Smith has announced the date that his latest album will be released as his imminent return to the world of hip-hop continues after a 20-year hiatus.
The actor-rapper-producer shared the news on Instagram on Sunday, writing in a post that his new album is scheduled for release in two weeks.
“It’s OFFICIAL!! My new album, Based on a True Story, drops on March 28. TWO WEEKS!! Hit that presave. Been working on this project for a minute and I’m itchin’ to get it out to y’all 🫶🏾,” Smith posted on the social media platform to his 69.5 million followers.
The 14-track album will reunite Smith with DJ Jazzy Jeff and feature collaborations with Teyana Taylor and Jac Ross. Smith released a single, “Beautiful Scars,” that features Big Sean and Obangain, in January.
The iconic comic and dramatic actor, and an Oscar winner for 2021’s King Richard, Smith has risen to the level of a multi-hyphenate pop culture phenomenon over his career, which began with rap music. He emerged from the fledgling hip-hop scene in the late 1980s as half of the duo DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince with instant classics like “Parents Just Don’t Understand” and “Girls Ain’t Nothing but Trouble,” both of which came with videos that enjoyed heavy MTV rotation.
Smith’s long-running hit NBC sitcom, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, featured his rapping, and as his Hollywood career took off, his music career flourished in tandem. At times, his franchise and Hollywood blockbuster movies, including Wild Wild West and Men in Black, featured a title track from Smith. His hip-hop career hit a peak with 1997’s Big Willie Style; he released three more records, Willennium (1999), Born to Reign (2002), and Lost and Found (2005), before putting down the mic to focus on his career in film as an actor and producer.
As an icon of entertainment for the last several decades, Smith is still, for many, rehabilitating his reputation after the shocking moment at the 2022 Academy Awards. This notorious Oscars moment saw the actor walk onstage and slap Chris Rock across the face following a joke the comedian made about Smith’s wife, Jada Pinkett-Smith. The fallout of that moment tarnished Smith’s reputation and led to him being banned from the Oscars for 10 years.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter
Erika Alexander (American Fiction, Living Single) has joined the cast of NBC‘s Untitled Tracy Morgan pilot from Tina Fey, Robert Carlock, and writer Sam Means.
Written by Carlock and Means, the new comedy stars Morgan as a disgraced former football player on a mission to rehabilitate his image.
Alexander will play Monica, Reggie’s (Morgan) childhood sweetheart from Brooklyn. She co-parents with him and still is his agent and business manager, even though they divorced years ago.
In addition to Alexander and Morgan, Daniel Radcliffe will star as Arthur Tobin, an award-winning filmmaker who moves into Reggie’s mansion to film an immersive documentary about the former star running back.
Carlock, Means and Morgan executive produce with Fey, Eric Gurian and David Miner. Rhys Thomas is the director and executive producer of the pilot. Universal Television, a division of Universal Studio Group, where Fey, Carlock and Means are under overall deals, produces with Little Stranger, Bevel Gears and 3 Arts.
SAG and Independent Spirit Award-nominated Alexander next co-stars in the newest season of Apple TV+’s Invasion. On film, she starred in Cord Jefferson’s award-season sweetheart American Fiction. In 2023, Alexander co-starred in the acclaimed film Earth Mama.
She is best known for her fan-favorite role of attorney Maxine Shaw in Yvette Lee Bowser’s beloved comedy series Living Single. Addition credits include Get Out, The Cosby Show, Black Lightning and Wu-Tang: An American Saga.
As co-founder of Color Farm Media and a board member of VoteRunLead, Alexander is on a mission to bring greater equity, inclusion and diverse representation to both media and electoral politics. Her company, Color Farm Media, self-described as the “Motown of film, TV and tech,” develops and produces scripted and unscripted content for film, television, streaming and podcast platforms.
She is repped by Greene Talent, Untitled Entertainment and Jackoway Austen Tyerman.
Source: Deadline
Steve Harvey – the Emmy-winning entertainer, author, and philanthropist known for series including “Judge Steve Harvey,” “Family Feud” and “The Steve Harvey Morning Show” – has signed on to use AI licensing and protection platform Vermillio to guard against deepfakes and other unauthorized use of his image.
“In today’s digital age, keeping up with the scammers using my likeness across all of the platforms is an impossible task,” Harvey said. “My primary concern is to make sure my fans don’t fall victim to these schemes. Partnering with Vermillio gives me the tools to both protect my personal brand and more importantly, my fans while embracing the future of AI the right way – with consent and control.”
Vermillio’s TraceID system monitors the internet and generative AI models for misuse of Harvey’s name, image, and likeness data. It’s also created to automatically remove unauthorized content and mitigate the impact of these scams.
Dan Neely, co-founder & CEO of Vermillio, noted that such misuse is “rampant,” with an estimated one million pieces of deepfake content created every minute. He related that Vermillio has opened a dialogue with SAG-AFTRA and other guilds, as well as talent agencies, management companies and talent.
Steve Harvey Global chief development officer Christel Sicé, facilitated the use of the Vermillio platform on behalf of SHG alongside CAA, with represents the entertainer.
“Steve Harvey’s partnership with Vermillio reflects a powerful vision for the future of talent and AI,” Neely said. “With TraceID, Steve is not only protecting his own legacy but also the wellbeing of his many fans. He’s leading the way in showing how the most beloved public figures can responsibly engage with AI.”
Source: Variety
The next Girls Trip may be moving, according to star Regina Hall. Screenwriter Tracy Oliver previously said she was writing Girls Trip 2 to send her quartet of women to Ghana, but Hall said recent revisions may relocate the sequel.
During a Zoom interview with UPI for her new movie O’Dessa, which will post next week, Hall gave a Girls Trip 2 update with more detail than she told Jennifer Hudson on her talk show last week.
“I heard that it may not be in Ghana actually,” Hall said. “They’ve since moved. I know Tracy and Kenya [Barris] are writing it.”
Oliver told UPI Afrochella inspired her to set the sequel in Ghana. Hall said the writers are still developing a girls trip to Africa, depending on which country is feasible for filming.
“But I do know it is in Africa which is a continent so that doesn’t narrow it down a lot,” Hall said. “I do know that it’s somewhere in Africa. It probably has a lot to do with where they’ll set the infrastructure up which makes me think South Africa. That’s my feeling.”
2017’s Girls Trip starred Hall, Tiffany Haddish, Jada Pinkett and Queen Latifah as four friends traveling to New Orleans. Their raunchy comic adventure challenges, but ultimately heals, their friendships.
The original film opened at No. 2 behind Dunkirk with $30.4 million on its way to grossing over $115 million in the United States and Canada.
Source: UPI
“And Just Like That” star Nicole Ari Parker has landed a recurring role in the HBO’s DC Studios drama series “Lanterns” as John Stewart’s mother Bernadette.
The series follows Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) and John Stewart (Aaron Pierre), two members of the Green Lantern Corps, an intergalactic team charged with defending a specific realm of the cosmos from evil through the use of rings that bestow an array of superhuman powers.
The official character description for Bernadette reads, “Formidable and tenacious, Bernadette refuses to give up, no matter how insurmountable the odds. At her core, she’s a fiercely protective mother who has worked her entire life to ensure that she and her family will not be passed over.”
HBO officially picked up “Lanterns,” the first live-action series created expressly for DC Studios under co-chairmen/co-CEOs James Gunn and Peter Safran, in June. The series was given an eight-episode, straight-to-series order by HBO, with Chris Mundy (“True Detective: Night Country,” “Ozark”) serving as showrunner and exec producer.
The cast also includes Kelly Macdonald, Garret Dillahunt, Poorna Jagannathan and Ulrich Thomsen as Green Lantern villain Sinestro.
HBO has yet to announce a premiere date for “Lanterns.”
Jordan was first portrayed by Ryan Reynolds in the 2011 “Green Lantern” movie; Stewart, a military veteran, is among DC’s first Black superheroes. Nathan Fillion will play a different Green Lantern member, Guy Gardner, in Gunn’s feature “Superman,” which is set to hit theaters in July.
Parker can next be seen in the third season of the Max series “And Just Like That,” which will debut later this year. She is represented by JME Management, The Lede Company and attorneys Matthew Johnson and Samantha Wainaina of Johnson Shapiro, Slewett & Kole.
Source: Variety
HBO has released the official trailer for season two of the original drama series THE LAST OF US during a panel at South by Southwest (SXSW(R)) featuring Pedro Pascal, Bella Ramsey, Kaitlyn Dever, Isabela Merced, Gabriel Luna, Young Mazino, Craig Mazin, and Neil Druckmann. The seven-episode second season debuts SUNDAY, APRIL 13 at 9:00 p.m. ET/PT on HBO and will be available to stream on Max. New episodes will debut subsequent Sundays.
· Season 2 logline: Five years after the events of the first season, Joel and Ellie are drawn into conflict with each other and a world even more dangerous and unpredictable than the one they left behind.
· Season 2 cast: Season two returning cast includes Pedro Pascal as Joel, Bella Ramsey as Ellie, Gabriel Luna as Tommy, and Rutina Wesley as Maria. Previously announced new cast includes Kaitlyn Dever as Abby, Isabela Merced as Dina, Young Mazino as Jesse, Ariela Barer as Mel, Tati Gabrielle as Nora, Spencer Lord as Owen, Danny Ramirez as Manny, and Jeffrey Wright as Isaac. Catherine O’Hara also guest stars.
· Season 2 credits: THE LAST OF US, based on the acclaimed video game franchise developed by Naughty Dog for the PlayStation(R) consoles, is written and executive produced by Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann. The series is a co-production with Sony Pictures Television and is also executive produced by Carolyn Strauss, Jacqueline Lesko, Cecil O’Connor, Asad Qizilbash, Carter Swan, and Evan Wells; with writer/co-executive producer Halley Gross. Production companies: PlayStation Productions, Word Games, Mighty Mint, and Naughty Dog.
CBS announced that its long-running hit comedy series THE NEIGHBORHOOD will return for an eighth and final season, to broadcast during the 2025-2026 television season on the Network, and available to stream on Paramount+.
“The brilliant cast and creative team at THE NEIGHBORHOOD led by the incomparable Cedric the Entertainer have brought levity, laughter and poignant storylines to Monday nights for seven incredible seasons,” said Amy Reisenbach, president of CBS Entertainment. “THE NEIGHBORHOOD is a strong ratings performer for CBS and one of the top comedies on TV. We believe the show’s loyal fans deserve a proper farewell season full of the trademark humor and heartfelt moments that are synonymous with the series.”
This season, THE NEIGHBORHOOD is delivering 6.4 million viewers with 35-day multiplatform viewing.
Cedric the Entertainer, Max Greenfield, Beth Behrs, Tichina Arnold, Sheaun McKinney, Marcel Spears and Skye Townsend star in THE NEIGHBORHOOD. Bill Martin, Mike Schiff, Aaron Kaplan, Wendi Trilling, Cedric the Entertainer and Eric Rhone serve as executive producers. THE NEIGHBORHOOD is produced by CBS Studios.
