Author: LATimes

HBO’s streaming platform Max is paying its respects to “Friends” star Matthew Perry, who died in his Los Angeles home Saturday. Perry, who gained popularity for his portrayal of wise-cracking Chandler Bing, has been memorialized at the beginning of each “Friends” season streaming on Max. When “Friends” viewers click on the first episode of any of the 10 available seasons, they will see a brief tribute that reads, “In Memory of Matthew Perry.”The notice also features the actor’s headshot and the years of his birth and death, 1969 and 2023. The Perry tribute also appears at the beginning of Max’s…

REDDING —  To the native Wintu people it was Bohem Puyuik, the “Big Rise,” and no wonder. Mt. Shasta towered above everything else, her loins delivering the natural springs and snowmelt that birthed a great river.The Sacramento River provided such an abundance of food that the Wintu and many neighboring tribes — the Pit River, Yana, Nomlaki and others — had little to fight over. They thrived in pre-colonial times, on waters that ran silver with salmon, forests thick with game and oaks heavy with acorns.But centuries of disease, virtual enslavement and murder wrought by European and American invaders scrambled the…

You can’t outrun M3GAN. Universal and Blumhouse’s “M3GAN” (which stands for Model 3 Generative Android) quickly became a cult classic as the killer AI doll twirled and kicked her way into our hearts after the film’s run earlier this year. Now, M3GAN appearances are resurging just in time for Halloween. At Universal Studios in Orlando, she roams the grounds, popping up for surprise performances of her murderous dance. People have flooded the comments of TikTok videos of her surprise appearance saying, “Sitting there for 1 hour paid off!!” and “They ate down.” The hashtag “M3gandance” has more than 637 million…

Taylor Swift is reportedly in her billionaire era. The “Bejeweled” singer’s net worth is now more than $1 billion, thanks to her blockbuster Eras tour, according to a Bloomberg News analysis published Friday. The report says Swift now joins an exclusive club of billionaire stars “to reach that status based on music and performing alone.”Swift now reportedly touts a net worth of $1.1 billion, more than six months after she launched her career-spanning Eras tour in March. According to Bloomberg, the Grammy winner’s concert circuit — which catered to generations of music lovers and launched beaded friendship bracelets back into…

Director Sofia Coppola says Apple executives axed her small-screen adaptation of an Edith Wharton novel because “the idea of an unlikable woman wasn’t their thing.”The “Priscilla” director was set in early 2020 to develop a series based on the incisive novelist’s 1913 book “The Custom of the Country” — a story that centers on the social ascent of protagonist Undine Spragg, a newly wealthy Midwesterner who tries to break into New York society. The social-climbing character, Coppola said when the project was first announced in May 2020, is her “favorite literary anti-heroine.”The “Lost in Translation” Oscar winner would write and…

A certain Kansas City football star just bought a multimillion-dollar mansion in Kansas allegedly over privacy concerns as he dates a really famous pop singer-turned-box-office-sensation. We speak of course of two-time Super Bowl champ Travis Kelce, whose recent purchase is being billed as “a desperate bid for more privacy surrounding his newfound romance with Taylor Swift,” according to Page Six.The Chiefs tight end, 34, closed the deal Tuesday, TMZ first reported, and is set to become the proud new owner of a nearly 17,000-square-foot home in a private gated community that boasts six bedrooms and eight bathrooms — because $6…

Prayag Mishra didn’t ask to be sassy. It’s just who he is.“I really don’t know how to feel about this whole sassy thing and I wanted to talk about it,” Mishra, a TikTok creator, said in a recent viral video. “First thing I want to say is guilty, guilty, guilty. I’ve been that.”Mishra’s videos have reached the For You page of over a million people (at least), winning them over with his charm and unapologetic attitude. He’s been dubbed a proponent of the “sassy man apocalypse,” part of an online trend showing men unafraid to say it how it is,…

Kendrick Lamar has Swifties in his corner — and in his Instagram comments. The Grammy-winning “Alright” rapper reteamed with Taylor Swift to bring new life to their punchy hit, “Bad Blood,” years after they first dropped the single. Swift revealed the reunion and rerecording Friday on Instagram, just hours after she dropped “1989 (Taylor’s Version).”“The reality that Kendrick would go back in and re-record Bad Blood so that I could reclaim and own this work I’m so proud of is surreal and bewildering to me,” she captioned a photo of her and Lamar sitting together.The new version of “Bad Blood”…

Actor Bridgette Wilson-Sampras was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in December, according to her husband, retired tennis legend Pete Sampras.Sampras disclosed his wife’s health status via an X post from the Assn. of Tennis Professionals.“This past year has been an exceptionally challenging time for my family,” the statement read. “Last December, my wife, Bridgette, was diagnosed with ovarian cancer. Since then, she has had major surgery, pushed through chemotherapy and continues with targeted maintenance therapy.”Sampras added, “It is hard to watch someone you love go through a challenge like this. However, seeing our boys step up and be such strong supporters…

It’s hard to say what’s cooler about the Japanese shōya house at the Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens — the centuries-old wood structure that was once the center of a small farming village in Marugame, Japan, or the backstory of how it got to its new home at the Huntington’s Japanese Garden. The shōya house’s original conical ceramic roof tiles had to be broken to move the structure. They were recreated by Japanese craftspeople, complete with a sprouting seed design. (Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times) The journey took nearly eight years of negotiations, bureaucratic wrangling and skilled…