The Beverly Hills Bar Association will honor Nina Shaw with its 2013 Entertainment Lawyer of the Year award next month. Shaw is to be given the award by the Entertainment Law Section of the BHBA at its annual Beverly Hills Hotel dinner on April 16. A founding partner at Del, Shaw, Moonves, Tanaka, Finkelstein & Lezcano, the lawyer has specialized in the areas of television, motion picture and live stage for almost 20 years. “The Beverly Hills Bar Association recognizes Nina Shaw for her groundbreaking work in the field of entertainment law and her strategic focus on ever-evolving technology in entertainment and its far-reaching impact on the industry, as well as for her dedication to her clients and commitment to fair play in a notoriously competitive field, said BHBA Entertainment Law Section Chair Adam Siegler in a statement.
Among Shaw’s various clients, the lawyer counts Oscar winner Jamie Foxx, James Earl Jones, newly-named Who Wants To Be a Millionaire host Cedric the Entertainer and America’s Got Talent host Nick Cannon. A graduate of Barnard College and Columbia Law School, Shaw began her career in the Entertainment Department of O’Melveny & Myers. Established in 1931, the Beverly Hills Bar Association is the fifth largest bar association in California with more than 5,500 members.
article by Dominic Patten via deadline.com
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South African photographer Zanele Muholi has spent the last 10 years determinedly creating a visual archive of black lesbian life in South Africa, often in the face of considerable opposition.
Her work was recognized with a major international freedom of expression prize at the Index on Censorship Awards, which, according to chairman Jonathan Dimbleby, celebrate the fundamental right to “Write, blog, tweet, speak out, protest and create art and literature and music.”
Other winners announced at the annual prizegiving evening in London included Pakistani schoolgirl Malala Yousafzai and Greek editor Kostas Vaxevanis.
Muholi said that South Africa was country of huge contrasts for gay people: on the one hand it has been enormously progressive and in 1996 became the first country in the world to constitutionally prohibit discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation; on the other, there is a culture of fear if you are gay and serious hate crime is a huge problem, including “corrective” rape to “straighten out” lesbians. In the last year, four women have been murdered because of their sexuality, including Phumeza Nkolonzi, 22, who was shot dead in front of her grandmother and niece, and Sihle Sikoji, aged 19 when she was stabbed to death.
Other winners announced at the annual prizegiving evening in London included Pakistani schoolgirl Malala Yousafzai and Greek editor Kostas Vaxevanis.
Muholi said that South Africa was country of huge contrasts for gay people: on the one hand it has been enormously progressive and in 1996 became the first country in the world to constitutionally prohibit discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation; on the other, there is a culture of fear if you are gay and serious hate crime is a huge problem, including “corrective” rape to “straighten out” lesbians. In the last year, four women have been murdered because of their sexuality, including Phumeza Nkolonzi, 22, who was shot dead in front of her grandmother and niece, and Sihle Sikoji, aged 19 when she was stabbed to death.
(Photo: Getty Images)
Nigeria is beating the drums of optimism regarding its satellite-based space program in the hopes that the data collected will help the country with securing steady agricultural production. The country currently has three satellites in orbit, and although Nigeria boasts one of Africa’s biggest space programs with some impressive accomplishments since its start in 2003, not everyone is sold on the plan. BBC reports:
The satellites are tracking crops and weather around the country in an effort to protect long-term food supply. There is also closer monitoring of the oil-rich Niger Delta, where there has been massive crude oil theft and environmental damage from oil spills.
Elijah Oyedeji is part of the team that worked on NigeriaSatX and found the initial task of building a satellite program from scratch quite daunting. “Eventually we were able to catch up,” he says. But not all Nigerians are convinced by these space ambitions. “These projects are always impressive to the ear,” says Akintunde Badiru, a Lagos-based banker, “that’s why they are commissioned in the first place.”
“Let’s see whether they are still functioning after four or five years, then we will see if this is worth it,” he says.
Read the full story here.
Elijah Oyedeji is part of the team that worked on NigeriaSatX and found the initial task of building a satellite program from scratch quite daunting. “Eventually we were able to catch up,” he says. But not all Nigerians are convinced by these space ambitions. “These projects are always impressive to the ear,” says Akintunde Badiru, a Lagos-based banker, “that’s why they are commissioned in the first place.”
“Let’s see whether they are still functioning after four or five years, then we will see if this is worth it,” he says.
Read the full story here.
article by Naeesa Aziz via bet.com
On Thursday (March 27), President Barack Obama met with the leaders of four sub-Saharan African countries in a bid to highlight the shared democratic sentiment shared between America and the nations. Present at the meeting were President Macky Sall of Senegal, President Ernest Bai Koroma of Sierra Leone, President Joyce Banda of Malawi, and Prime Minister José Maria Pereira Neves of Cape Verde.
Read more via Obama African Leaders: President Meets With African Leaders, Praises Continent’s Democratic Progress | Breaking News for Black America.
Leontyne Price as “Cleopatra” in the 1966 production of “Antony and Cleopatra” by the Metropolitan Opera at the Lincoln Center in New York.
According to Essence.com, rapper Eve is back with new music and teamed with Cobra Starship to uplift troubled teens with her song, “Make It Out This Town.” The inspirational video features students overcoming their problems and numerous incidences of bullying. It’s the follow-up single to her lead song, “She Bad Bad,” both from her forthcoming album, Lip Lock, out May 14.
article by Lori Lakin Hutcherson and Lesa Lakin
Bryant Gumbel on the set of “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel”
Robin Roberts’ ABC special about her bone marrow transplant and “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel” were among the 39 winners of this year’s Peabody Awards honoring the best in electronic media in 2012. The honorees were announced at a ceremony on the University of Georgia campus, but the awards won’t be handed out until a luncheon event in New York City on May 20.
Also awarded, Comedy Central’s “D.L. Hughley: The Endangered List,” an hourlong special on whether black men should be on the endangered species list; and the Smithsonian Channel’s “MLK: The Assassination Tapes,” which used rare footage collected at the University of Memphis in 1968, to relive the events leading up to the murder of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and its aftermath.
The long-gestating Richard Pryor biopic is starting over from scratch with Forest Whitaker now in charge.
Fresh from producing the Sundance Grand Jury Prize and Audience Award winner “Fruitvale,” Whitaker has taken over the nearly two-decade effort to bring the legendary comic’s life of the big screen, reports Deadline.com.
Whitaker is teaming with the late comic’s widow, Jennifer Pryor, to produce the film through his Significant Productions shingle. Whitaker will develop a new script with input from Jennifer Pryor, and Significant Productions’ Nina Yang-Bongiovi, will also produce.
The Pryor biopic has been attempted numerous times, and the most recent version had Bill Condon poised to direct Marlon Wayans in the starring role for Sony Pictures, where Adam Sandler’s Happy Madison had set the project. Condon was certainly passionate about Pryor, but everything took a back seat when he signed on to helm the final two “Twilight Saga” installments. The project languished.
The first Pryor project was a Martin Scorsese-directed drama to star Damon Wayans, this well before Pryor died in 2005. Later, there was a Showtime pic that was to star Eddie Griffin and another attempt at a feature that was to star Mike Epps with Kasi Lemmons directing.
Condon’s first flirtation had Eddie Murphy briefly interested, and then Chris Rock was briefly in the conversation.
The question now is, who will be Whitaker’s Richard Pryor? Deadline.com’s Mike Fleming Jr. thinks he should look no further than his “Fruitvale” star, Michael B. Jordan, “who by all accounts crushed it in that film.”
Fleming writes: “Jordan, who grew up playing roles in ‘The Wire’ and ‘Friday Night Lights’ before starring in ‘Chronicle,’ certainly has the charisma and should be established enough as the lead on a modestly budgeted film after The Weinstein Company releases ‘Fruitvale’ later this year.”
article via eurweb.com
On March 29, 1988, an album that propelled two kids from West Philadelphia into the stratosphere of international fame was released on Jive Records: DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince’s He’s the DJ, I’m the Rapper. Their debut LP, 1987’s Rock the House, included the mild hit single, “Girls Ain’t Nothing But Trouble,” but it was the duo’s sophomore effort, which eventually sold enough to be certified triple platinum, that ranks among the most successful hip-hop records ever—and certainly the most successful out of Philadelphia.
He’s the DJ, I’m the Rapper made Jeffrey Townes and Will Smith household names throughout their beloved hometown, while subsequently putting Philly on the map and the global stage in ways that still resonate a quarter-century later. Townes remains one of the most respected spinmasters in the world, and Smith has become one of Hollywood’s highest-grossing actors in Hollywood and part owner of the 76ers.
Read more at: DJ Jazzy Jeff on the 25th Anniversary of “He’s the DJ, I’m the Rapper” | Cover Story | Arts and Culture | Philadelphia Weekly.