Aurelia Butler

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    Diddy’s Lawyers Work to Establish Cassie’s Agency in Freak-Offs

    On the first day of cross-examination, a defense lawyer asked Casandra Ventura about messages she wrote to the music mogul ahead of their sex sessions.It was only about a half-hour into the cross-examination of Casandra Ventura that a lawyer for Sean Combs drew on messages the couple exchanged, in an attempt to establish one of the defense’s key arguments in the case: that Ms. Ventura was a willing participant in the sex marathons known as “freak-offs.”Anna Estevao, the defense lawyer questioning Ms. Ventura on Thursday, presented a message the singer wrote to Mr. Combs in 2009, that read, “I’m always ready to freak off lolol.”In another exchange from around that time, Ms. Ventura expressed her excitement in graphic terms, and he told her: “I can’t wait to watch you. I want you to get real hott.”She answered: “Me too. I just want it to be uncontrollable.”Conversations like those, which could involve both explicit flirtation and logistical planning about their meetings and preparations, were “somewhat typical” for the two, Ms. Ventura testified.Those messages showed a very different side of the relationship than what Ms. Ventura described in the first two days of her testimony, under questioning by prosecutors. Over hours of sometimes excruciating testimony, she said that Mr. Combs had forced her to take part in “hundreds” of these episodes over about 10 years, and used violence and threats of releasing explicit videos from the freak-offs as what she called “blackmail materials.”Mr. Combs, who is charged with sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy, has pleaded not guilty, and his lawyers have vehemently denied that any of his sexual encounters were not consensual.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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    Luigi Alva, Elegant Tenor With a Lighthearted Touch, Dies at 98

    A Peruvian-born international star, he made a specialty of roles in operas by Donizetti, Rossini and Mozart, becoming one of their pre-eminent interpreters.Luigi Alva, the Peruvian tenor who was a pre-eminent interpreter of Mozart and Rossini roles that highlighted his light-lyric voice, elegant phrasing and subtle acting during a three-decade career on the world’s opera stages, died on Thursday at his home in Barlassina, Italy, north of Milan. He was 98. His death was confirmed by the Peruvian tenor Ernesto Palacio, a close friend and the intendant of the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro, Italy.Mr. Alva did not have the booming, resonant voice needed for dramatic tenor performances in the biggest opera houses. But he triumphed in opera buffa roles — such as Count Almaviva in Rossini’s “The Barber of Seville” and the lovesick Ernesto in Donizetti’s “Don Pasquale” — which demanded fine comedic timing and an appreciation for absurd situations without resorting to slapstick or mugging.In more serious roles, such as Don Ottavio in Mozart’s “Don Giovanni,” Mr. Alva displayed a warm timbre and gracious line that gained him an enthusiastic following. Few tenors could match his ability to deliver long coloratura passages with a single breath, as Mr. Alva did time and again in “Il mio tesoro,” the famous aria from “Don Giovanni.”“The real trick is not merely to sing the passage, but to make it sound easy,” the critic Alan Rich of The New York Times wrote on the occasion of Mr. Alva’s New York recital debut at Judson Hall in 1961. “And this was the way he sang throughout the evening — beautifully, and with an assurance that was literally breathtaking.”In more serious roles, such as Don Ottavio in “Don Giovanni,” Mr. Alva displayed a warm timbre and gracious line that gained him an enthusiastic following. Here he performed the role in 1963 at La Scala.Erio Piccagliani/Teatro alla ScalaWe 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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    How Much Does It Cost to See Beyoncé? It Depends.

    Some fans who paid top dollar for the star’s Cowboy Carter Tour are feeling miffed as prices drop. Other procrastinators are reaping the benefits.Tanaka Paschal, 43, was thrilled to be taking her son to Beyoncé’s final Southern California show on her Cowboy Carter Tour this month. They had missed the Renaissance World Tour two summers ago; tickets had sold out so fast, some fans ventured overseas to catch a gig.“I thought I was not going to be able to see her, so I jumped on it,” she said.Paschal bought a pair of floor seats for about $900 total, but like many others, she soon had a bit of buyers’ remorse. In the weeks that followed, she saw the price for similar seats drop by hundreds of dollars, then increase, then drop again.“It’s frustrating,” she said. “The next time, I’m going to wait until the day of.”When tickets for big summer tours by acts like Lady Gaga, the Weeknd and Kendrick Lamar and SZA go on sale, the prevailing wisdom is you have to move fast during one of the presales offered by artists and credit card companies or you’ll be shut out.Most, if not all, tickets are usually snatched up immediately, with prime seats popping up on resale platforms like StubHub or Ticketmaster’s own secondary market at inflated prices. (Fans hoping to see Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour famously didn’t even get a shot at the general on-sale: All the tickets were long gone.)Kendrick Lamar is also on a stadium tour this year, supporting his recent album, “GNX” and a big year.Graham Dickie/The New York TimesBut things have been different for Beyoncé’s tour this time supporting her Grammy album of the year-winning “Cowboy Carter”; tickets moved during the presales, but a glance at the seat maps on Ticketmaster’s pages later revealed not only a lot of pink dots indicating resale tickets, but plenty of blue dots representing available seats that had gone unpurchased, too. And those prices were notably changing.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 to Expect From Cassie’s Cross-Examination at Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs’s Trial

    Lawyers for Sean Combs are expected to focus on moments of her agency in the relationship and on jealousy related to infidelities.Across two days on the witness stand, Casandra Ventura, a longtime girlfriend of Sean Combs, delivered hours of testimony about a relationship filled with harrowing physical abuse and meticulous control, and defined by the expectation that she would fulfill his sexual fantasies.Ms. Ventura, the government’s star witness, will now face questions from Mr. Combs’s lawyers. Some might even come directly from Mr. Combs, who has been passing notes to his legal team throughout the proceedings.The defense has acknowledged responsibility for domestic violence — including against Ms. Ventura — but has vehemently denied that his behavior warrants the charges against him of sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy.The lawyer expected to question Ms. Ventura is Anna Estevao, who has rarely been the lead voice for the team during court proceedings to this point. She faces the delicate task of challenging the testimony of a visibly pregnant woman who testified that years of physical violence and sexual coercion by Mr. Combs led her to such emotional distress that she considered suicide.Here are a few things we can expect from the cross-examination.The defense will try to highlight moments of agency.Mr. Combs is charged with sex-trafficking Ms. Ventura. To prove that, the government has to convince the jury that Mr. Combs forced or coerced her into sex parties with male prostitutes known as “freak-offs.”Ms. Ventura testified that during her relationship with Mr. Combs, she repeatedly followed his directions and felt powerless to do otherwise. But the defense is likely to try highlighting moments when she might have displayed agency.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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    ‘The Damned’ Review: Unfortunate Sons

    In Roberto Minervini’s intimate and impressionistic drama, a group of Civil War scouts faces the harsh realities of the uncharted Montana territory.The skies are overcast and the tone is contemplative in “The Damned,” as a small company of Union Army soldiers sets out in 1862 to explore the dangerously unmapped territories of the American West.What emerges, though, is more akin to a mood poem than a war movie. In keeping with the socially conscious sensibilities of its director, the Italian-born Roberto Minervini (whose previous work has sometimes probed the forgotten souls of rural Texas and urban Louisiana), “The Damned” is shaped as a wistful and laconic study of the minutiae of survival. Though billed as his first fiction film, it wobbles tantalizingly on a permeable line between narrative and documentary. Unscripted events and largely unnamed characters emerge organically from the director’s offscreen prompts and the men’s immersion in the life of the camp where much of the movie takes place.This means that, for long stretches, we’re watching the soldiers pitch tents, play cards, do laundry and complain about the deepening winter and declining rations. Embedded alongside the men, we eavesdrop on conversations that range from instructive to confessional, hopeful to cautiously philosophical. They have come from all over, with beliefs as varied as their reasons for enlisting. A golden-haired 16-year-old admits to having shot only rabbits and squirrels before following his father and older brother into the Army. When the three pray together, secure in their faith that the only happiness lies in the afterlife, his innocence is heartbreaking.If God is here at all, he’s in the details: the pot of coffee bubbling on a laboriously built fire; the dusting of snow on a pitch-black beard; the veins of gold in a lump of quartz.“This land has it all,” one man marvels, seeing beyond the conflict to the promise of the soil and the wildlife around them. At times, these moments are acutely lyrical, as when we watch a soldier lovingly clean his horse’s head (of mud or blood, we don’t know), then press his forehead against the animal in silent communion.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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    Christy Moore, Ireland’s Folk Music Legend, Is Still Writing History

    Even though he just turned 80 and doesn’t leave the country, Moore finds himself at a surprising career peak, performing for generations of fans with an intense connection to his music.A sudden buzz crackled through the 2011 Oxegen Music Festival as one of pop’s starriest power couples — Beyoncé, who was performing on the final night, and Jay-Z — made their way backstage at the summer fete in the rolling countryside of County Kildare, Ireland. An older gentleman (bald, barrel-chested, in a black T-shirt) held open a door to the V.I.P. entrance for them. Sweeping past, Jay-Z pressed a $50 bill into the man’s hands, assuming he was a staff member or security — unaware he’d just tipped Ireland’s most beloved living musician, Christy Moore.Moore closed the festival that night, as the surprise guest of the headliners, Coldplay. Performing his soaring 1984 anthem “Ride On,” he heard 60,000 fans roar at his introduction (“One of our heroes since we were kids,” Chris Martin announced), sing along at full volume and chant his name.Born in nearby Newbridge, Moore had returned home after a long, celebrated career as a singer, songwriter, solo artist and leader of the groundbreaking folk band Planxty and the Celtic rock collective Moving Hearts. He’d become an icon, a national treasure — but a man still easily mistaken for the help.“Once, at Carnegie Hall,” Moore recalled gleefully during a recent interview, “a critic wrote, ‘When Moore came out, I presumed he was a stagehand coming to move the piano.’ I think that review was OK.”Moore, who turned 80 earlier this month, finds himself at a surprising professional peak. Last year, his 25th studio LP, “A Terrible Beauty,” debuted at No. 1 in Ireland, besting Sabrina Carpenter and Tyler, the Creator. Once a globe-trotting touring artist, these days Moore only plays his native island, performing solo — accompanying himself on guitar, bodhran drum or sometimes singing a cappella — while exploring a repertoire of songs that cut across several hundred years of history.Whether singing about the Blanket Protests (“Ninety Miles to Dublin Town”), detailing the Stardust nightclub tragedy (“They Never Came Home”) or pondering post-Troubles reconciliation (“North and South of the River,” his collaboration with U2), Moore has made a career charting his nation’s tragedies, triumphs and often difficult progress.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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    ‘Sister Midnight’ Review: The Feminine Mystique, but Make It Macabre

    A housewife’s domestic distresses take a horrifying turn in this dark comedy set in the slums of Mumbai.Malaise turns macabre in “Sister Midnight,” a shape-shifting tale of an arranged marriage gone awry. The film, written and directed with thrilling originality by Karan Kandhari, is set mostly in the slums of Mumbai and follows a sullen housewife named Uma (Radhika Apte), whose lack of fulfillment manifests as a dark, voracious hunger.Uma is distressed by almost every facet of her new domestic life, but her first agony arrives in the film’s opening minutes after her withdrawn husband, Gopal (Ashok Pathak), leaves her in their single-room home without cash for groceries. She’s lonely, hungry and bored, and the days that follow offer little to relieve the tedium. As time wears on, her misery gives way to flulike symptoms that send her to bed with fatigue, vomiting and chills.This is when the film takes a turn for the paranormal, with Uma’s affliction — and its nastier nighttime expressions — serving as a metaphor for her discontents. If the writer Betty Friedan once abstracted the horrors of being a housewife as “the problem that has no name,” “Sister Midnight” calls the horrors just that, and then gives them the genre hallmarks to match.In his first feature, Kandhari makes use of morbid humor and expressive imagery, including stop-motion effects. He rarely relies on dialogue and favors a fuzzier plot, which leaves the story with a shapeless and sometimes confusing midsection. Eventually, a repetitive pattern sets in that can feel stifling. But if it’s troubling to us, just imagine how Uma feels.Sister MidnightNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 47 minutes. In theaters. More

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    ‘The Kiss’ Review: A Romance Without Love?

    A young military man asks a woman to dance, but they’re in for a bumpy ride in this story adapted from a novel by Stefan Zweig.This movie begins as many conventional period romances set in Mitteleuropa do: at a formal event in the 1910s, as an ambitious young military man, Anton, asks a daughter of nobility, Edith, to dance. She is willing, but a complication becomes clear as she attempts to rise from her chair: She wears braces on her lower legs, which are paralyzed. She totters forward, and there is a fair amount of embarrassment to go around, but Anton, seeking through Edith a path to the favor of the nobility, is not deterred.“The Kiss,” the latest picture from the prolific Danish director Bille August, is adapted from “Beware of Pity,” the sole novel the Austrian writer Stefan Zweig published in his lifetime. Its narrative is persistently discomfiting, but August often tells it in a way that emphasizes the picturesque; if you weren’t paying attention to the postures of its characters, you could possibly mistake it for something genuinely romantic like “Elvira Madigan.”Anton is played by Esben Smed, who’s clearly trying to tamp down his character’s essential callowness, while Clara Rosager shows purposeful restraint in her work as the smitten and hopeful Edith. The picture moves at a stately pace that one supposes was considered period-appropriate but feels merely logy at times. August and his co-screenwriter, Greg Latter, juggle Zweig’s chronology a bit and try to compound his ironies. Then they take a whack at ameliorating those ironies in the movie’s coda, as if they themselves are taking pity on the viewer. As executed, it feels like waffling.This director’s filmography has long been bumpy — he came out of the gate with “Pelle the Conqueror,” which won the Palme d’Or at Cannes in 1988, took another Palme in 1992 with “The Best Intentions” (working from a script by Ingmar Bergman), and took a notable wrong turn with “Smilla’s Sense of Snow” (1997). And despite the best efforts of the cast and technical crew here, “The Kiss” winds up in the land of “meh.”The KissNot rated. In Danish with English subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 56 minutes. In theaters. More