Roxane Gay is set to write a new Marvel comic book in the World of Wakanda, which delves into the lives of the women of the Black Panther comic book series universe. It will be released in November, the New York Times reports.
The Purdue College professor and “Bad Feminist” scribe will team up with writer Ta-Nehisi Coates who has written his Black Panther series set in the fictional African nation. Complex reports that the new series will involve several black women as writers and illustrators in addition to Gay. Alitha Martinez is the illustrator, and Yona Harvey and Afua Richardson will co-write and illustrate, respectively, a special “backup” story that will appear in the series’ debut issue.
Gay’s story will feature two members of Black Panther’s all-female security team—Ayo and Aneka—who fall in love. Harvey’s first story will revolve around Zenzi, a female revolutionary introduced in the first issue of Coates’ Black Panther series. “It’s the most bizarre thing I’ve ever done, and I mean that in the best possible way,” said Gay to the Times.
Coates recruited both writers because he thought it important to have a woman’s perspective. “The women in Black Panther’s life are very, very important,” he said.
Read more in the New York Times and Complex.
article by Lori Lakin Hutcherson (@lakinhutcherson)
According to Variety.com, the Emmy-nominated series “The Story of God with Morgan Freeman” will get a second season and another three episodes on the National Geographic Channel, premiering in early 2017. Topics like “Is there a Chosen One?” will be covered, as well as whether it’s possible to find proof of a singular deity.
“I had quite a journey last season, but not just in miles covered,” said Freeman, who serves as both host and executive producer. “I met incredible people who opened my eyes and my mind to new ideas and new ways of thinking about faith, the world and all of humanity. I barely scratched the surface of what we can learn, and I’m looking forward to continuing this search for the meaning of life and religion and everything in between.”
Originally billed as an “event series,” “The Story of God with Morgan Freeman” quickly became National Geographic Channel’s most-watched series over its six-episode first season. Watch a clip from the first season of the series below:
This year’s N.B.A. All-Star Game in Toronto. The league is set to announce a new site for next year’s game in the next few weeks. (Credit: Elsa/Getty Images)
The National Basketball Association on Thursday dealt a blow to the economy and prestige of North Carolina by pulling next February’s All-Star Game from Charlotte to protest a state law that eliminated anti-discrimination protections for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.
The move was among the most prominent consequences since the law, which bars transgender people from using bathrooms in public buildings that do not correspond with their birth gender, was passed in March.
The league, which has become increasingly involved in social issues, said that both it and the Hornets, the N.B.A. team based in Charlotte, had been talking to state officials about changing the law but that time had run out because of the long lead time needed to stage the game. The N.B.A. said it hoped the game could be played in Charlotte in 2019, with the clear inference that the law would have to be changed before then.
“While we recognize that the N.B.A. cannot choose the law in every city, state and country in which we do business, we do not believe we can successfully host our All-Star festivities in Charlotte in the climate created by the current law,” a statement by the league said.
Gov. Pat McCrory of North Carolina issued a blistering statement soon after the announcement by the N.B.A., in which he said “the sports and entertainment elite,” among others, had “misrepresented our laws and maligned the people of North Carolina simply because most people believe boys and girls should be able to use school bathrooms, locker rooms and showers without the opposite sex present.”
Mr. McCrory did not specifically refer to the N.B.A. in his statement, but he said that “American families should be on notice that the selective corporate elite are imposing their political will on communities in which they do business, thus bypassing the democratic and legal process.”
Others weighed in with support for the N.B.A.’s move, including two of its broadcast partners — Turner Sports and ESPN.
In taking the action it did, the N.B.A. is following the path already taken by others. A number of musicians, including Bruce Springsteen, Ringo Starr and Itzhak Perlman, canceled concerts in North Carolina to protest the law, and there have been calls for repeal of the legislation by a number of businesses, some of which have canceled plans to create new jobs in the state.
All-Star weekend is one of the most dazzling and lucrative events on the league’s annual schedule. In addition to the game, the league arranges three days full of activities for fans. There is a separate game for the league’s rising stars, a dunk contest and a 3-point contest.
Now all of that will be held elsewhere next February, with the N.B.A. to announce a new site for the game in the next few weeks.
U.S. National Team player Crystal Dunn (photo via huffingtonpost.com) article by Travis Waldron via huffingtonpost.com
A year ago this month, as the United States Women’s National Soccer Team demolished Japan to win their third Women’s World Cup title, Crystal Dunn watched the same way 25 million other Americans did: from home.Dunn, the diminutive 24-year-old star of the National Women’s Soccer League’s Washington Spirit, was by most accounts the 24th player on the 23-person World Cup roster ― manager Jill Ellis’ final cut before the team traveled to Canada.
It caught her by surprise.“I wasn’t really anticipating not being a part of the World Cup,” Dunn said after a training session with the Spirit in early July. “I was upset and pissed.”But when the Americans head to Rio de Janeiro in August to pursue an unprecedented fourth consecutive Olympic gold medal, the heartache that came with missing out on the World Cup can finally go away. After a year in which she broke out as the top goal-scorer in the NWSL, Dunn has also emerged as one of the USWNT’s most versatile, and potentially most important, young players.
She’s good enough to help you however she’s needed.”Former USWNT defender Kate Markgraf on Crystal Dunn“One thing that Crystal has proven is that she’s been a winner at every single level,” said former USWNT defender Kate Markgraf, now a broadcast analyst for ESPN. “I first saw her at the U-20 World Cup, and she was the MVP for me. You watch her in college and she’s dominating at forward. She’s a match winner, at every single level she’s played at.”“She’s good enough,” Markgraf added, “to help you however she’s needed.” To read full article, go to: Crystal Dunn Is Poised To Become The Next Star Of U.S. Women’s Soccer
(Image via musicalpassage.org) article via jbhe.com
Scholars at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, have debuted an interactive website that chronicles what is believed to be among the earliest examples of the music of the African diaspora. The website Musical Passage tells the story of an important, but little known record of early African diasporic music.
The project focuses on two pages of sheet music from Hans Sloane’s 1707 Voyage to the Islands of Madera, Barbados, Nieves, S. Christophers and Jamaica It is believed to be the first transcription of African music in the Caribbean, and possibly, in the Americas.
The project was created by Mary Caton Lingold, a doctoral candidate in English at Duke, Laurent Dubois, a professor of Romance studies and history at Duke, and David K. Garner, a composer with Ph.D. from Duke who has been hired as an assistant professor of music at the University of South Carolina.
Lingold says that “you’d be hard pressed to name a living genre of music that enslaved musicians didn’t help to create or transform. Jazz, country, rock, blues, reggae and the list goes on. Turn on the radio and you are hearing these musicians’ story. But we don’t know a lot about their early music because it was not preserved in conventional ways. And that is why a little artifact like this is so important, because it helps us to know more about what their performances may have sounded like.”
A teenage pilot from Compton arrived home in Southern California on Monday, capping a flight across the nation in preparation for what he hopes will be a record-setting around-the-world trip.
Isaiah Cooper, 16, touched down at Compton airport (to see video, click here) after a roughly two-week flight around the country, becoming the youngest African American pilot to complete the cross-country flight. A flight instructor accompanied him.
Cooper’s 8,000-mile flight was not without difficulty. Bad weather forced him to make a hard landing that heavily damaged his original plane in Wyoming. “He was able to execute the emergency procedures flawlessly, got it on the road, landed, didn’t damage the houses, the schools, the construction crew, nothing. I mean, he got out of that thing safely,” said flight instructor Robin Petgrave.
But Cooper has a much larger goal. He hopes next year to become the youngest black pilot to fly around the world solo. He will be 18 years old when he takes off on the planned flight.
On a GoFundMe page, Cooper wrote that he began attending the youth aviation program at Tomorrow’s Aeronautical Museum in Compton when he was 5, but he dropped out when he began spending time “with the wrong crowd” and doing “seriously self-destructive things.”
Paramount Pictures has acquired an untitled pitch based on the life of Reverend Jeffrey Brown from Chadwick Boseman and Logan Coles that will be developed as a potential starring vehicle for the “Black Panther” star.
Boseman and Coles will co-write the script as well as produce the pic along with Ivan Reitman and Ali Bell of Montecito Pictures. Bell, who worked with Boseman on “Draft Day,” brought the pitch to Boseman and Coles who then brought it to Paramount. Tom Pollock will executive produce.
The pitch is about the Reverend Jeffrey Brown who fought to decrease gang violence in Boston.
Boseman and Coles recently worked together on the upcoming thriller “Message From the King,” which starred Boseman and was co-produced by Coles (Simon and Stephen Cornwell, David Lancaster and Benedict Carver were point producers). Besides this pitch, the duo has also recently sold an untitled pitch to Universal with Marc Platt Productions that the two are writing. To read full article, go to: http://variety.com/2016/film/news/chadwick-boseman-paramount-rev-jeffrey-brown-1201816741/
When the third season of “Black-ish” arrives, the Johnson family will expand. Fresh from the Broadway smash “Hamilton,” Daveed Diggs will have a major Season 3 arc as Rainbow Johnson’s brother, Johan, Variety can exclusively reveal.
Bow (Tracee Ellis Ross) and Johan, whose mother is a very laid-back, hippie-ish soul, had very different childhoods than Dre, and that’s partly why Johan will be a frequent thorn in Dre’s side. Dre Johnson (Anthony Anderson) has always feared that his kids will grow up to be overly pampered, and it sounds like Johan is the personification of those fears.
“He’s sort of a hipster, entitled kid who gets on Dre’s nerves,” creator and showrunner Kenya Barris said. “He’s constantly on a search for the best conditioner for his hair. He’s probably gone to Penn or Wharton and could have gotten a great-paying job, but he’s trying to find himself. That attitude more than anything makes Dre want to strangle him.”
For Diggs, who won a Tony for playing Thomas Jefferson and the Marquis de Lafayette in “Hamilton,” there’s even a tiny link to French culture. Johan “has been to Paris twice and he’s like, ‘You Americans!’” Barris said. Johan, as it happens, doesn’t like his butter to be too cold and complains about Americans’ mania for refrigeration. “He’s like, ‘This butter’s making my croissant crumble,’” according to Barris. “Dre is constantly snatching food from him.”
The upside for Johan, who will have a “substantial” recurring arc in the third season, is that the Johnson kids think he’s extremely cool — except for Diane (Marsai Martin). “She’s not buying that sh*t,” Barris said.
COURTESY OF JIM BRITT/THE MICHAEL ORE COLLECTION/GETTY IMAGES article by Lori Lakin Hutcherson (follow @lakinhutcherson)
According to Variety.com, the life and art of legendary musician Marvin Gaye is being developed int a feature documentary by Noah Media Group and Greenlight called, “Marvin, What’s Going On?” The film will center on Gaye’s creation of his seminal 1971 album “What’s Going On” and marks the first time that his children — Nona Gaye, Marvin Gaye III and Frankie Gaye — along with his former wife, Janis Gaye, have supported and contributed to such a project.
The documentary is slated to go into production this year and is intended to be “the defining portrait of this visionary artist and his impeccable album,” according to a statement from the film’s producers.
The album, which was recorded at the zenith of Detroit’s Motown era, was heavily influenced by the troubling Vietnam War and the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. Gaye produced an album that “challenged America and the world to self-reflect, going on to inspire a generation of artists and music lovers,” the producers said. “The relevance of [his] masterpiece…is as strong as ever.”
The project will be filmed in Detroit, Los Angeles and Washington, and will feature exclusive interviews with several top Motown artists and never-before-seen archive footage unearthed by Gaye’s children and former wife. The film is set to be released in 2017.
In a joint statement, Gaye’s children commented: “We would like to express our excitement about the upcoming documentary feature film about our father and the creation of his amazing ‘What’s Going On’ album. We are proud that his relevance remains intact, and we look forward to being a part of this cinematic journey.
“Our father was complex, but we are confident that with Noah Media Group’s attention to detail and their dedication to the truth, the positive, inspirational and aspirational aspects of his life will be handled and shared with the world in a way never seen before.
“We look forward to participating and sharing what we can through friends, family, photos, footage and priceless stories that only those who knew our father up close and personal would know, as well as his contemporaries, purists and fans who have studied him and his art over decades.
“’What’s Going On?’…something many of us find ourselves asking today, 45 years later. Peace.”
