Aurelia Butler

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    At Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Trial, ‘Victim-4,’ His Ex-Employee, Set to Talk of Sex Abuse

    Prosecutors say the woman, who will testify under the pseudonym “Mia,” was forced into sex when she worked for Sean Combs.Jurors at Sean Combs’s sex-trafficking and racketeering trial have heard gripping testimony from Casandra Ventura, the singer known as Cassie, who described in lurid detail the violence and coerced sex that she suffered at the hand of the music mogul.On Wednesday, they are set to hear from a second woman, testifying under the pseudonym “Mia,” who prosecutors say had her own harrowing experience with Mr. Combs.For months before trial, little was disclosed about Mia — then identified only as “Victim-4” — other than that she is a former Combs employee who prosecutors say was coerced into sex with him. In one filing last month, the government redacted virtually an entire page-long passage about her.But in opening statements this month, lawyers for both sides fleshed out the woman’s profile somewhat. Emily A. Johnson, a prosecutor, described Mia as a former personal assistant whom Mr. Combs “worked to the bone for years.” At some point, she said, he then “forced himself on her sexually, putting his hand up her dress, unzipping his pants and forcing her to perform oral sex, and sneaking into her bed to penetrate her against her will.”“Mia will tell you how she could not talk about what happened to her until recently,” Ms. Johnson added, “how she wanted to take the secret of what the defendant did to her to her grave.”Mr. Combs, who has pleaded not guilty to all charges, has denied having anything but consensual sex with women, and his defense team has suggested it will pursue that approach in countering the testimony of Mia when she appears on Wednesday, likely in the afternoon.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    What It’s Like on the Ground at the Sean Combs Trial

    Subscribe to Popcast!Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTubeThe trial of Sean Combs, the rap mogul best known as Puff Daddy or Diddy, has entered its third week, as federal prosecutors attempt to prove charges of sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy in a Manhattan courtroom.Centering so far on the testimony of Casandra Ventura, a former girlfriend who performs as Cassie, the trial has also included time on the witness stand by Ms. Ventura’s family and friends; a former boyfriend, the rapper Kid Cudi; male escorts who were involved in her sexual relationship with Mr. Combs; and multiple employees of Mr. Combs, who witnessed his behavior over the years. (Mr. Combs has pleaded not guilty to all charges, with his lawyers arguing that any sex was consensual.)Yet while many headline-grabbing cases tend to be broadcast online these days, the rules at the Daniel Patrick Moynihan United States Courthouse prohibit video or audio recording, meaning only those present can experience the proceedings directly.Present each day for The New York Times has been a team of reporters, led by Julia Jacobs and Ben Sisario, who have covered the story since even before Mr. Combs was under criminal investigation. (Ms. Ventura filed a lawsuit against Mr. Combs in November 2023, which was settled a day later for $20 million; that account helped put into motion a series of events that led to Mr. Combs’s indictment last year.)This week on Popcast, the host Joe Coscarelli, who has also been covering the trial, was joined by Ms. Jacobs and Mr. Sisario to discuss the intricate charges against Mr. Combs; how the testimony so far has played in court versus how it is consumed online later; the effect of the trial on the reputations of Mr. Combs and Ms. Ventura; and what is still to come in the weeks that remain.Connect With Popcast. Become a part of the Popcast community: Join the show’s Facebook group and Discord channel. We want to hear from you! Tune in, and tell us what you think at popcast@nytimes.com. Follow our host, Jon Caramanica, on Twitter: @joncaramanica.Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. More

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    ‘The Sealed Soil’: Modesty and Its Discontents

    The Iranian director Marva Nabili’s first feature gets a weeklong run at Brooklyn Academy of Music.A hidden landmark from 1977, Marva Nabili’s first feature, “The Sealed Soil,” was made in secret in Iran under the Shah. It has never been shown there and although its qualities were immediately recognized in the United States, it has not been released here, until now.After a digital restoration by the Film and Television Archive of the University of California at Los Angeles and a flurry of recent festival screenings, Nabili’s deceptively modest feature gets a weeklong run at Brooklyn Academy of Music.An opening quotation from Albert Camus, predicating an individual’s maturity on even failed resistance to the status quo, heralds a leisurely shot of a young woman wrapping her chador. Eighteen-year-old Rooy-Bekheir (Flora Shabaviz) is engaged in a stubborn rebellion. Without explanation, she refuses her suitors. At the same time, she appears to silently oppose the construction of a modern town outside her village.The film’s understatement mirrors that of its protagonist. Shot on 16-millimeter film, “The Sealed Soil” is largely a series of straightforward middle-shots, many devoted to Rooy-Bekheir’s daily chores. Lamps are lit, grain sifted and chickens fed, mostly within the confines of a dusty communal courtyard. The camera rarely moves. The post-dubbed sound is largely ambient, save for strange music that the solitary Rooy-Bekheir seems to hear when she nears the modern town.The girl’s subjectivity is celebrated in the film’s most mysterious scene. Resting in the woods and given a rare close-up, she languidly extends her hand to catch the soft rain. As it continues to fall, she undoes her chador and strips off her top. Face hidden, bare back to the camera she allows herself to be ravished by the elements.The village, however, wants her wed. Her mother, it is pointed out, had four children by age 18. Told that a new suitor is coming, Rooy-Bekheir uses her best dress to attack the chickens in the courtyard and is deemed to be possessed. The movie turns ethnographic, documenting an exorcism. Highly ritualized yet weirdly perfunctory, it evidently works.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    What I Learned From the Great Singer Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau

    The baritone Benjamin Appl remembers his teacher at 100, as one of the 20th century’s greatest singers and a complicated, conflicted man.One September morning in 2009, I glanced at my watch over and over, nerves fluttering in my chest. I was sitting in the front row of a packed concert hall in Schwarzenberg, Austria, surrounded by other vocal students. At precisely 10:30 a.m., the baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau stepped onto the stage. It was the first day of his master class at the Schubertiade, and it was the moment I would meet the artist who had shaped my musical life.I was just 12, growing up in Bavaria, Germany, when I first heard Fischer-Dieskau. Leonard Bernstein had called him “the greatest singer of the 20th century,” and few would disagree. When my music teacher played us a recording of his interpretation of Schubert’s “Winterreise,” something stirred within me. This voice was different. Immediate. Truthful. Over the years, I listened to dozens of Fischer-Dieskau’s recordings, studied them, grew with them, and was continually astonished by them.Now I stood before him. The old video footage of that master class still shows how nervous I was: my vibrato wavering, my breath shallow, my stance unsure. What I did not realize at the time was how open and attentive he was with me. At the end of the course, he offered to work with me privately. For the next three years, I had the privilege of studying with him regularly at his homes in Berlin and Bavaria. Those hours remain among the greatest gifts of my life.In the months leading up to his centennial on Wednesday, I was granted access to his personal archive: letters, diaries, programs, photo albums. It was a journey to find out more about the man behind the name, affectionately known to his friends as FiDi. And it was an immersive experience that helped me to shape my new album “For Dieter: The Past and the Future.”This recording features songs that defined his artistic path; songs that shaped the singer who would became one of the most revered vocalists of his time, including works from his family circle; songs by Brahms, Schubert and Wolf; as well as compositions written especially for him by Britten and Barber. Through my access to his archive, I was also able to accompany the album with a book that offers a deeply personal portrait of a multifaceted, fascinating man.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    ‘Lilo & Stitch’ Cast Discuss What Lured Them to the Live-Action Remake

    Cast members from the original 2002 animated film and the live-action remake explain what lured them to — or back to — “Lilo & Stitch.”When Maia Kealoha learned that she was going to play Lilo in Disney’s live-action remake of “Lilo & Stitch,” she sobbed big, fat, happy tears.“That might be the first time I was quiet in my whole entire life,” she said of the video call with the film’s director, Dean Fleischer Camp, in 2023, when he asked her to be his Lilo.Kealoha, 8, is a big fan of the original animated film from 2002 about a destructive but adorable alien experiment named Stitch who crash-lands in Hawaii and befriends a young girl named Lilo.The film, which earned more than $273 million (or $484 million when adjusted for inflation) at the global box office, was one of the first Disney animated movies to be driven by a nonromantic story line. It also won praise for its strong female characters and nuanced depictions of Hawaii.“I’ve seen it 1,000 times,” Kealoha, who was born and raised on Hawaii’s Big Island, said in a recent video call. “It’s so good.”Stitch, unsurprisingly, is her favorite character. The rambunctious blue troublemaker also reminds her of someone she knows: Her 1-year-old brother, Micah Kealoha.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Rick Derringer, 77, Who Sang ‘Hang On Sloopy’ and ‘Rock and Roll, Hoochie Koo,’ Dies

    A Zelig-like rocker, the guitarist, singer and songwriter collaborated with the likes of Barbra Streisand and Peter Frampton and composed Hulk Hogan’s “Real American” theme.Rick Derringer, the ubiquitous rocker who sang the hit songs “Hang On Sloopy” and “Rock and Roll, Hoochie Koo” in a music career that spanned several decades and also included collaborations with Hulk Hogan and Weird Al Yankovic, died on Monday in Ormond Beach, Fla. He was 77.His longtime caretaker and friend, Tony Wilson, announced his death in statement on Tuesday. No cause was given.From his early garage rock success to his many contributions to albums or tours by music royalty — Barbra Streisand, Cyndi Lauper and Peter Frampton all enlisted him — Mr. Derringer introduced himself to audiences across several generations.One of his better-known and enduring collaborations was with the Edgar Winter Group, for which he produced the instrumental chart-topper “Frankenstein,” which the band released in 1972.Early on, Mr. Derringer was the shaggy-haired guitar impresario who was the frontman for the band the McCoys, who rose to the top of the Billboard singles chart in October 1965 with their catchy rendition of “Hang On Sloopy.”The song, about a girl known as Sloopy from a rough part of town, has become synonymous with Ohio State University, where the marching band first played it during a Buckeyes’ football game in 1965. In 1985, the Ohio Legislature adopted it as the official state rock song.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Stream These Movies and TV Shows Before They Leave Netflix in June

    A handful of great titles are leaving as early as the first weekend of the month. Catch them while you can.Oscar winners and tasteful trash get equal footing among the titles departing Netflix in the United States next month, alongside a compulsively watchable crime show, a pitch-perfect Jane Austen adaptation and a cult classic in the making. (Dates reflect the first day titles are unavailable and are subject to change.)‘Beginners’ (June 1)Stream it here.The writer and director Mike Mills crafts a lovely, lively combination of memory play and serio-comic romance, weaving together two tales of complicated romance. Oliver (Ewan McGregor) is a modern man, scruffy and sensitive, who falls for a French actress (Mélanie Laurent); his father, Hal (Christopher Plummer), a recent widower, has just come out as gay at the tender age of 75 and is rapturously in love with the much younger Andy (Goran Visnjic) when his health takes a turn. Mills’s sharp and sensitive screenplay gracefully sidesteps the clichés of both the coming-out movie and the disease-of-the-week movie, with a big assist from the talented cast. Plummer took home a well-deserved Oscar for his memorable supporting turn, Laurent and Visnjic are lovable but not overly idealized, and this is one of the best showcases to date for McGregor’s cozy charm.‘Burlesque’ (June 1)Stream it here.Critics were not exactly kind to this 2010 ode to the pleasures of contemporary burlesque from the writer-director Steven Antin — a world in which that old time hoochie-coo has been reclaimed as a rich text of performative femininity, peekaboo voyeurism and good old-fashioned camp. And it’s easy to see why; little in his screenplay is particularly original. But that familiarity is part of the movie’s appeal. Without winking at the audience or condescending to the material, he cheerfully borrows and deploys the standard narratives of such lower-rung showbiz tales. Christina Aguilera is charismatic as that old chestnut the naïve Midwestern girl with big dreams, while Cher plays the wise old veteran who shows her the ropes with offhand wit and seen-it-all wariness.‘Pride & Prejudice’ (June 1)Stream it here.The striking success of the recent 20th anniversary theatrical rerelease of this 2005 award winner is even more surprising when reflecting on its presence on Netflix — viewers could quite easily have stayed home to stream this adaptation of the Jane Austen classic, but its admirers love it so much that they plopped down their ticket money all over again. It’s not hard to understand why; Joe Wright’s direction is both sweeping and intimate, tender and evocative, while Deborah Moggach’s screenplay captures succinctly the wit and romantic longing of Austen’s text. Throw in a peerless cast (including Brenda Blethyn, Judi Dench, Tom Hollander, Keira Knightley, Jena Malone, Rosamund Pike, Donald Sutherland and a pre-“Succession” Matthew Macfadyen) and you’ve got one of the finest Austen adaptations to date.‘Two Weeks Notice’ (June 1)Stream it here.Once upon a time, the multiplexes were filled with affable little romantic comedies, in which great-looking stars bantered gamely and pretended not to be perfect for each other for 90 minutes before finally realizing what we all knew during the opening credits. Now, when those films are made at all, they often go straight to the streamers, rarely showcasing stars as bright as Sandra Bullock and Hugh Grant, who shared the screen in this 2002 rom-com from the writer and director Marc Lawrence (one of the writers of Bullock’s 2000 treat “Miss Congeniality”). The plot is negligible and the complications silly; all that matters is the chemistry, and Bullock and Grant have chemistry to spare.‘Trap’ (June 11)Stream it here.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Looking Back at Lollapalooza 1995

    Revisit a peak music festival with songs by Hole, Beck, Elastica and more.Michael Robinson Chavez/The Boston Globe via Getty ImagesDear listeners,Hi, I’m David Malitz, an editor on the Culture desk who has been writing or assigning music coverage for almost 20 years now. As summer festival season kicks into high gear, I’m thinking about the best music festival I ever attended: Lollapalooza 1995. Unlike today, when there’s seemingly a different mega-festival each weekend, 30 years ago there was really only one major player. Lollapalooza was both a mainstream touring behemoth and the embodiment of alternative culture that ruled the ’90s.When people (like me, often, I’m sorry) speak of the glory days of the ’90s, Lollapalooza 1995 was both the peak and the end of the road. We still had it plenty good for a while, but this tour did feel like a last gasp. Looking at the lineup now, it seems like a great college radio playlist, but not exactly a shed-filling financial success. The festival pivoted away from underground rock the following year and went on hiatus after its journey into electronica in 1997.To celebrate 30 years of this inspired collection of bands, here’s a playlist of songs from the acts that performed on the tour’s main stage, with a couple of bonus tracks from the not-to-be-missed second stage.Time takes its crazy toll,DavidListen along while you read.1. Sonic Youth: “The Diamond Sea”If it seems weird now that a famously iconoclastic band without even a single gold record to its name headlined a festival playing to upward of 25,000 people at each stop, it was weird then, too. Chalk it up to something of a lifetime achievement award for the New York legends who influenced acts down the rest of the bill.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More