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    J. Cole Apologizes for Kendrick Lamar Diss Track

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    J. Cole also vowed to update the track, “7 Minute Drill,” or remove it from streaming services after it was featured on his new album, “Might Delete Later.”The rapper J. Cole apologized on Sunday for releasing a diss track about Kendrick Lamar, saying he felt “terrible” and vowing to update the song or remove it from streaming services.The apology followed an exchange of verses that began in October, when J. Cole and Drake ranked themselves, with Lamar, as the “big three” in hip-hop in the song “First Person Shooter.” In March, Lamar dismissed that comparison in a guest verse on the song “Like That” by Future and Metro Boomin, rapping that there was no big three, “it’s just big me.”In response, J. Cole on Friday released the diss track “7 Minute Drill” on his surprise new album, “Might Delete Later.” It includes the lines: “I got a phone call, they say that somebody dissing / You want some attention, it come with extensions / He still doing shows but fell off like ‘The Simpsons.’”Two days after the song was released, J. Cole apologized for it while onstage at his Dreamville Festival in Raleigh, N.C., according to videos posted on social media. During his headlining performance, he said that when he saw the response to the song after it came out, it didn’t “sit right with my spirit,” and that he was speaking about it at the concert to end the beef.He also called Lamar one of the “greatest” to ever use a microphone and said he hoped Lamar would forgive him.“The past two days felt terrible,” J. Cole said. “It let me know how good I’ve been sleeping for the past 10 years.”As of early afternoon on Monday, “7 Minute Drill” was still available on major streaming services.J. Cole released “Might Delete Later” on his Dreamville Records label, an imprint of Interscope Records, which is owned by Universal Music Group. Universal did not immediately respond to a request for comment.Lamar does not appear to have addressed the track or the apology publicly. Representatives for Lamar did not immediately respond to a request for comment.Drake seemed to respond to Lamar’s verse at a concert in Sunrise, Fla., in late March, according to Complex. He told the crowd that people had been asking him how he was feeling and that he had his “head up high,” and felt as if no one could mess with him.Lamar, Drake and J. Cole have worked together in the past and have individually received numerous awards for their music, including multiple Grammy Awards and nominations. In 2018, Lamar received the Pulitzer Prize in music for his album “DAMN.” More

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      Kanye West Apologizes for Antisemitic Comments With Post in Hebrew

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      “I deeply regret any pain I may have caused,” wrote the rapper formerly known as Kanye West, who is releasing an album next month.Ye, the rapper and producer formerly known as Kanye West, apologized to the Jewish community on Tuesday for a series of antisemitic comments he made last year.“It was not my intention to offend or demean, and I deeply regret any pain I may have caused,” Ye said in an Instagram post that was written in Hebrew. “I am committed to starting with myself and learning from this experience to ensure greater sensitivity and understanding in the future. Your forgiveness is important to me, and I am committed to making amends and promoting unity.”Ye became embroiled in controversy in October 2022 after wearing a shirt at Paris Fashion Week that said “White Lives Matter” and posting an antisemitic tweet in which he threatened to go “death con 3 On JEWISH PEOPLE.” In an Instagram post, he shared a screenshot of a text exchange with the producer and music mogul Sean Combs in which he suggested that Combs was controlled by Jewish people.Many organizations, including Adidas and Creative Artists Agency, eventually cut ties with the rapper.The Anti-Defamation League said on Tuesday that Ye’s apology was welcome, while noting that actions speak louder than words.“After causing untold damage by using his vast influence and platform to poison countless minds with vicious antisemitism and hate, an apology in Hebrew may be the first step on a long journey toward making amends to the Jewish community and all those who he has hurt,” a spokesman said in an email.Ye had previously apologized for the tweet but has continued to make antisemitic comments. In one interview with the right-wing commentator Alex Jones, he said, “I love Jewish people, but I also love Nazis” and “I do love Hitler.”The rapper’s next album, “Vultures,” is set to be released on Jan. 12 after a delay. On its title track, Ye raps that he cannot be antisemitic because he had sex with a Jewish woman. More

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      in Theater

      Lauren Boebert Apologizes for Vaping in a Denver Theater

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      The Colorado congresswoman previously denied vaping during the performance, but could be seen doing so on surveillance video.Representative Lauren Boebert of Colorado was kicked out of a performance of the musical “Beetlejuice” in Denver after causing a disturbance.Kenny Holston/The New York TimesRepresentative Lauren Boebert, a hard-right Republican rabble-rouser from Colorado, apologized on Friday night for her behavior at a recent performance of the family-friendly musical “Beetlejuice” in Denver, after surveillance video revealed her vaping and behaving disruptively in the theater.Ms. Boebert, 36, previously denied reports that she had been vaping. A pregnant woman seated behind her asked her to stop before she was ejected for “causing a disturbance” at the show, according to The Denver Post.“The past few days have been difficult and humbling, and I’m truly sorry for the unwanted attention my Sunday evening in Denver has brought to the community,” Ms. Boebert said in a statement Friday night. “While none of my actions or words as a private citizen that night were intended to be malicious or meant to cause harm, the reality is they did and I regret that.”Ms. Boebert, who can be seen on the video touching and carrying on with her date while sitting in the middle of a crowded theater, blamed what she called her “public and difficult divorce” for her behavior and said, “I simply fell short of my values on Sunday.”Ms. Boebert, a mother of four boys who likes to show off pictures of her new grandchild to colleagues in Congress, said she “genuinely did not recall vaping that evening” when she told her campaign to issue a statement denying she had done so. She said she would have to work hard to earn back trust from voters in her district.It may be a heavy lift for Ms. Boebert, who won re-election in 2022 by just 546 votes.If her too-close-for-comfort re-election campaign was a message that Colorado voters didn’t like her brand of disruptive politics, she hasn’t appeared to have received it. Since January, she has often acted in ways many Republicans view as detrimental to keeping control of the House in 2024 and to her keeping her seat.In June, Ms. Boebert tried to force a vote on articles of impeachment against President Biden, claiming his immigration policies constituted high crimes and misdemeanors. Some of her colleagues called the move “crazy,” and it was eventually shunted off to committees for further study.Ms. Boebert distinguished herself during the fraught speaker’s race in January as one of the most committed holdouts against Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, milking the moment for maximum Fox News exposure. In the House, she has cultivated an abrasive public persona, sometimes heckling her Democratic colleagues in the halls of the Capitol and largely ignoring reporters’ questions, except to loudly proclaim at times, “I love President Trump!”The behavior has also earned a cult following on the right. Ms. Boebert, who often wears five-inch Lucite heels and skintight dresses, has a national base of fans who enjoy her disruptive antics and extreme rhetoric.On the House floor, Ms. Boebert has railed against drag performances for children and claimed the left was “grooming” children by exposing them to “obscene content.” More

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      Florence Welch Says She Had Emergency Surgery

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      Florence Welch, the front woman of the band, apologized to fans for canceling her recent shows after undergoing what she said was lifesaving surgery.Florence Welch, the front woman of the English indie rock band Florence + the Machine, announced on Instagram that she had undergone emergency surgery, which is why she had canceled some of her recent shows.“I had to have emergency surgery for reasons I don’t really feel strong enough to go into yet, but it saved my life,” Welch wrote.“I’m so sorry that I had to cancel the last couple of shows,” she added.The singer said she plans to return to the stage for the Meo Kalorama festival in Lisbon, Portugal, where she is slated to perform on Sept. 1, and close out her Dance Fever tour in Malaga, Spain, on Sept. 2.The Dance Fever Tour was initially postponed in November, when an X-ray revealed that she had been dancing on a broken foot, Welch said on Instagram at the time.“It is not in my nature to postpone a show, and certainly not a U.K. tour, but I’m in pain and as dancers know, dancing on an injury is not a good idea,” she wrote in November.In her most recent Instagram post, she assured fans that her feet were fine but said that upon her return to the stage she might not be jumping around as much, adding, “you can do that for me.”“Suffice to say I wish the songs were less accurate in their predictions,” she wrote. “But creativity is a way of coping, mythology is a way of making sense. And the dark fairy tale of Dance Fever, with all its strange prophecies, will provide me with much-needed strength and catharsis right now.”The band is most known for its hit “Dog Days Are Over,” which peaked at 21 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 2010, and “Shake it Out,” which peaked at 72 in 2012. More

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      The Maestro John Eliot Gardiner, Accused of Hitting Singer, Apologies

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      John Eliot Gardiner expressed regret after he was accused of lashing out at a singer after a concert in France, and he withdrew from the rest of a planned tour.The renowned conductor John Eliot Gardiner, who drew widespread criticism this week after he was accused of hitting a singer after a performance in France, apologized on Thursday, saying that he had lost his temper and that “physical violence is never acceptable.”In a statement, Gardiner, 80, said that he had apologized to the singer, William Thomas, 28, and that he would withdraw from the remaining concerts on a European tour with two of his venerated ensembles, the Monteverdi Choir and the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique. The incident occurred Tuesday night after a concert performance of the first two acts of Berlioz’s opera “Les Troyens” at the Festival Berlioz in La Côte-Saint-André in southeastern France.“I deeply regret the incident which occurred at the Festival Berlioz at La Côte-Saint-André on Tuesday evening and apologize unreservedly for losing my temper immediately after the performance,” Gardiner said in the statement. “I make no excuses for my behavior and have apologized personally to Will Thomas, for whom I have the greatest respect. I do so again, and to the other artists, for the distress that this has caused.”“I know that physical violence is never acceptable and that musicians should always feel safe,” he added. “I ask for your patience and understanding as I take time to reflect on my actions.”Gardiner provoked an outcry when, on Tuesday evening, he struck Thomas backstage because he had headed the wrong way off the podium at the concert, according to a person who was granted anonymity to describe the incident because the person was not authorized to discuss it publicly.After the incident, Gardiner abruptly withdrew from the festival and returned to London to see his doctor, missing a performance on Wednesday night.Thomas, a rising bass from England who was performing the role of Priam, was not seriously injured and performed on Wednesday.On Thursday, Askonas Holt, the agency representing Thomas, confirmed in a statement that an incident had taken place and said that Thomas would continue to take part in the tour, which will next head to the Salzburg Festival in Austria, the Opéra Royal in Versailles, the Berliner Festspiele in Germany and the Proms, the BBC’s classical music festival, in England. The agency said Thomas would not comment on the incident.“All musicians deserve the right to practice their art in an environment free from abuse or physical harm,” the statement said.The Monteverdi Choir & Orchestras, a nonprofit that oversees Gardiner’s ensembles, said in a statement on Thursday that Dinis Sousa, an associate conductor with the organization, would replace Gardiner for the rest of the tour. Sousa had stepped in for Gardiner on Wednesday in France.“We continue to look into the events that occurred on Tuesday evening,” the group said. “Our values of respect and inclusivity are fundamental to us as a company and we take seriously the welfare of all our performers and employees.’’Gardiner — a crucial figure in the period-instrument movement and the founder of some of its most treasured ensembles, the Monteverdi Choir, the English Baroque Soloists and the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique — conducted at the coronation of King Charles III of Britain in May. He has made numerous recordings, many of which are considered classics, and wrote “Bach: Music in the Castle of Heaven” in 2013 about the life and music of Johann Sebastian Bach.In a 2010 interview with The Financial Times, Gardiner was asked about his famously demanding style.“Can I protest my innocence?” he said. “I can be impatient, I get stroppy, I haven’t always been compassionate. I made plenty of mistakes in my early years. But I don’t think I behaved anything like as heinously as you have heard. The way an orchestra is set up is undemocratic. Someone needs to be in charge.” More

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      Will Smith Resigns From Academy After Slapping Chris Rock at Oscars

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      The producer of the telecast said that Smith had been asked to leave after slapping Rock, and that he had urged officials not to “physically remove” him. LOS ANGELES — Will Smith, who slapped the comedian Chris Rock at the Oscars, said Friday that he was resigning from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, saying that he had “betrayed” its trust with conduct that was “shocking, painful, and inexcusable.”The sudden announcement came late Friday afternoon, days after the Academy had condemned Mr. Smith’s actions and opened an inquiry into the incident. “I have directly responded to the Academy’s disciplinary hearing notice, and I will fully accept any and all consequences for my conduct,” he said in a statement on Friday. “I deprived other nominees and winners of their opportunity to celebrate and be celebrated for their extraordinary work,” he said in the statement. “I am heartbroken.”He said that he would “accept any further consequences the board deems appropriate.”“Change takes time,” he concluded, “and I am committed to doing the work to ensure that I never again allow violence to overtake reason.”The academy said that it accepted his resignation. “We have received and accepted Mr. Will Smith’s immediate resignation from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences,” David Rubin, its president, said in a statement. “We will continue to move forward with our disciplinary proceedings against Mr. Smith for violations of the Academy’s Standards of Conduct, in advance of our next scheduled board meeting on April 18.”Now that he has resigned, Mr. Smith will no longer have access to academy screenings and events. He will also not be able to vote in the Academy Awards. However, he could still be nominated for an award, since being a member is not a requirement for eligibility. Mr. Smith’s resignation came roughly 12 hours after Will Packer, the lead producer of the Oscars telecast, spoke publicly about the episode for the first time. In an interview with Good Morning America” on ABC, the network which also broadcasts the Oscars, Mr. Packer said that after Mr. Smith had been asked to leave the ceremony, he urged the Academy leadership not to “physically remove” him from the theater in the middle of the live broadcast.Mr. Packer said he had learned from his co-producer, Shayla Cowan, that there were discussions of plans to “physically remove” Mr. Smith from the venue. So he said he immediately approached academy officials and told them that he believed Mr. Rock did not want to “make a bad situation worse.”The Altercation Between Will Smith and Chris RockThe Incident: The Oscars were derailed when Will Smith slapped Chris Rock, who made a joke about Mr. Smith’s wife, Jada Pinkett Smith.His Speech: Moments after the onstage altercation, Mr. Smith won the Oscar for best actor. Here’s what he said in his acceptance speech.The Aftermath: Mr. Smith, who the academy said refused to leave following the incident, apologized to Mr. Rock the next day after the academy denounced his actions.A Triumph Tempered: Mr. Smith owned Serena and Venus Williams’s story in “King Richard.” Then he stole their moment at the Oscars.What Is Alopecia?: Ms. Smith’s hair loss condition played a major role in the incident.“I was advocating what Rock wanted in that time, which was not to physically remove Will Smith at that time,” Mr. Packer said. “Because as it has now been explained to me, that was the only option at that point. It has been explained to me that there was a conversation that I was not a part of to ask him to voluntarily leave.”In the interview, Mr. Packer also said that Mr. Rock’s joke about Jada Pinkett Smith’s hair was unscripted “free-styling.”“He didn’t tell one of the planned jokes,” he said of Mr. Rock.Someone close to Mr. Rock who asked to speak anonymously because the Academy’s inquiry into the incident is ongoing said that Mr. Rock was never asked directly if he wanted Mr. Smith removed. Had he been asked, it was not clear how Mr. Rock would have responded, the person said. Mr. Rock was only asked if he wanted to press charges, and he said that he did not, the person said.Mr. Packer said that, like many viewers at home, he had originally thought the slap might be part of an unplanned comedic bit, and that he was not entirely sure until he spoke with Mr. Rock backstage that Mr. Smith had actually hit the comedian.“I just took a punch from Muhammad Ali,” Mr. Packer recalled Mr. Rock telling him.Mr. Packer said that Mr. Smith reached out and apologized to him the morning after the Oscars. And he praised Mr. Rock for having kept his cool. “Chris was keeping his head when everyone else was losing theirs,” he said.“I’ve never felt so immediately devastated,” Mr. Packer said of the incident.Asked if, after hearing Mr. Smith’s acceptance speech, he wished that the actor had left the ceremony, Mr. Packer said that he did, noting that Mr. Smith had not used his remarks to express real contrition and apologize to Mr. Rock.“If he wasn’t going to give that speech which made it truly better, then yes, yes,” Mr. Packer said when asked if he wished Mr. Smith had left the ceremony. “Because now you don’t have the optics of somebody who committed this act, didn’t nail it in terms of a conciliatory acceptance speech in that moment, who then continued to be in the room.”Mr. Smith did not apologize to Mr. Rock until Monday evening, after the Academy had condemned his actions and initiated disciplinary proceedings against him. Mr. Packer’s comments came after days of questions about why Mr. Smith had seemed to face no repercussions for striking a presenter on live television.The academy said in a statement earlier this week that Mr. Smith had been asked to leave the awards ceremony following the slap, but had remained. Then several publications questioned that account, citing anonymous sources, and reported that Mr. Packer had suggested he stay. Shortly after the ceremony ended Sunday, the Los Angeles Police Department issued a statement saying that the person who had been slapped had “declined to file a police report.”In the interview, Mr. Packer described his recollection of law enforcement’s involvement.“They were saying, this is battery, we will go get him,” Mr. Packer said in the interview. “We’re prepared to get him right now. You can press charges. We can arrest him.”“Chris was being very dismissive of those options,” Mr. Packer continued. “He was like, ‘No, I’m fine.’ He was like, ‘No, no, no.’”Both on Sunday night and in subsequent interviews this week, the Los Angeles police have maintained that Mr. Smith’s slap qualified as misdemeanor battery under California law — and that as a misdemeanor, officers cannot take action unless the victim in the case files charges, which Mr. Rock did not do.In an interview on Thursday, Deputy Chief Blake Chow, of the Los Angeles Police Department’s West Bureau, described the department’s role in less dramatic terms. At the Oscars, police officers are primarily responsible for patrolling outside the Dolby Theater and the Academy hires a security company to handle issues inside the building, he said.On Sunday, one police captain was stationed backstage as a liaison, the deputy chief said. The police captain inside did not observe the slap himself; but he quickly became aware of it, the deputy chief added. The police captain made contact with a representative for Mr. Rock shortly after the comedian had finished presenting an award and had returned backstage with his team, Deputy Chief Chow said.The representative communicated “Chris Rock’s wishes” that he did not want to press charges or file a police report, the deputy chief said. “He didn’t want to do anything.”The police department was not asked to escort Mr. Smith out of the venue, and even if the police had been asked to do that, such a request would not have fallen within the department’s purview, the deputy chief said.Detectives followed up on Monday with Mr. Rock’s representatives to ensure that he still did not want to take action. He reaffirmed that he did not, the deputy chief said.Mr. Rock made his first public comments about the incident on Wednesday at a comedy show in Boston. “I’m still kind of processing what happened,” Mr. Rock said, while promising to discuss the episode in greater depth later. “It’ll be serious, it’ll be funny, but I’d love to — I’m going to tell some jokes.”After nominating only white actors and actresses for its awards in 2015, drawing widespread criticism, the academy did it again the next year — overlooking performances like the one Mr. Smith gave in “Concussion.” At the time, Ms. Pinkett Smith was outspoken about what many people saw as an urgent need for the academy to become more inclusive. Smith was less pointed in his criticism, but joined her in a boycott of the ceremony, drawing attention to the #OscarsSoWhite movement.Nicole Sperling More

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      Oscars Producer Did Not Want Will Smith Physically Removed After Slap

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      Will Packer, the producer of the telecast, said that Smith had been asked to leave after slapping Chris Rock, and then there were discussions of having him physically removed.Will Packer, the lead producer of the Oscars telecast that was thrown into upheaval after the actor Will Smith went onstage and slapped the comedian Chris Rock, said Friday that after Mr. Smith had been asked to leave the ceremony, he urged the Academy leadership not to “physically remove” him from the theater in the middle of the live broadcast.Mr. Packer said he had learned from his co-producer, Shayla Cowan, that there were discussions of plans to “physically remove” Mr. Smith from the venue. So he said he immediately approached academy officials and told them that he believed Mr. Rock did not want to “make a bad situation worse.”“I was advocating what Rock wanted in that time, which was not to physically remove Will Smith at that time,” Mr. Packer said. “Because as it has now been explained to me, that was the only option at that point. It has been explained to me that there was a conversation that I was not a part of to ask him to voluntarily leave.”EXCLUSIVE: #Oscars producer Will Packer tells Good Morning America about the frenetic aftermath of actor Will Smith slapping host Chris Rock live on stage on Hollywood’s biggest night. https://t.co/AeoYcGkM32 pic.twitter.com/8z35t8TPFw— Good Morning America (@GMA) April 1, 2022
      Mr. Packer gave his first interview since Sunday’s broadcast to “Good Morning America” on ABC, the network which also broadcasts the Oscars. In the interview, Mr. Packer said that Mr. Rock’s joke about Jada Pinkett Smith’s hair was unscripted “free-styling”“He didn’t tell one of the planned jokes,” he said of Mr. Rock.Mr. Packer said that, like many viewers at home, he had originally thought the slap might be part of an unplanned comedic bit, and that he was not entirely sure until he spoke with Mr. Rock back stage that Mr. Smith had actually hit the comedian.“I just took a punch from Muhammad Ali,” Mr. Packer recalled Mr. Rock telling him.Mr. Packer said that Mr. Smith reached out and apologized to him the morning after the Oscars. And he praised Mr. Rock for having kept his cool. “Chris was keeping his head when everyone else was losing theirs,” he said.The Altercation Between Will Smith and Chris RockThe Incident: The Oscars were derailed when Will Smith slapped Chris Rock, who made a joke about Mr. Smith’s wife, Jada Pinkett Smith.His Speech: Moments after the onstage altercation, Mr. Smith won the Oscar for best actor. Here’s what he said in his acceptance speech.The Aftermath: Mr. Smith, who the academy said refused to leave following the incident, apologized to Mr. Rock the next day after the academy denounced his actions.A Triumph Tempered: Mr. Smith owned Serena and Venus Williams’s story in “King Richard.” Then he stole their moment at the Oscars.What Is Alopecia?: Ms. Smith’s hair loss condition played a major role in the incident.“I’ve never felt so immediately devastated,” Mr. Packer said of the incident.Asked if, after hearing Mr. Smith’s acceptance speech, he wished that the actor had left the ceremony, Mr. Packer said that he did, noting that Mr. Smith had not used his remarks to express real contrition and apologize to Mr. Rock.“If he wasn’t going to give that speech which made it truly better, then yes, yes,” Mr. Packer said when asked if he wished Mr. Smith had left the ceremony. “Because now you don’t have the optics of somebody who committed this act, didn’t nail it in terms of a conciliatory acceptance speech in that moment, who then continued to be in the room.”Shortly after the ceremony ended Sunday, the Los Angeles Police Department issued a statement saying that the person who had been slapped had “declined to file a police report.”In the interview, Mr. Packer described his recollection of law enforcement’s involvement.“They were saying, you know, this is battery, was the word they use in that moment,” Mr. Packer said in the interview. “They said we will go get him; we are prepared. We’re prepared to get him right now. You can press charges. We can arrest him. They were laying out the options, and as they were talking, Chris was being very dismissive of those options. He was like, ‘No, I’m fine.’ He was like, ‘No, no, no.’”Both on Sunday night and in subsequent interviews this week, the Los Angeles police have maintained that Mr. Smith’s slap qualified as misdemeanor battery under California law — and that as a misdemeanor, officers cannot take action unless the victim in the case files charges, which Mr. Rock did not do.In an interview on Thursday, Deputy Chief Blake Chow, of the Los Angeles Police Department’s West Bureau, described the department’s role in less dramatic terms. At the Oscars, police officers are primarily responsible for patrolling outside the Dolby Theater and the Academy hires a security company to handle issues inside the building, he said.On Sunday, one police captain was stationed backstage as a liaison, the deputy chief said. The police captain inside did not observe the slap himself; but he quickly became aware of it, the deputy chief added. The police captain made contact with a representative for Mr. Rock shortly after the comedian had finished presenting an award and had returned backstage with his team, Deputy Chief Chow said.The representative communicated “Chris Rock’s wishes” that he did not want to press charges or file a police report, the deputy chief said. “He didn’t want to do anything.”The police department was not asked to escort Mr. Smith out of the venue, and even if the police had been asked to do that, such a request would not have fallen within the department’s purview, the deputy chief said.Detectives followed up on Monday with Mr. Rock’s representatives to ensure that he still did not want to take action. He reaffirmed that he did not, the deputy chief said.Mr. Rock made his first public comments about the incident on Wednesday at a comedy show in Boston. “I’m still kind of processing what happened,” Mr. Rock said, while promising to discuss the episode in greater depth later. “It’ll be serious, it’ll be funny, but I’d love to — I’m going to tell some jokes.”The academy said Wednesday that it had initiated disciplinary proceedings against Mr. Smith “for violations of the academy’s standards of conduct, including inappropriate physical contact, abusive or threatening behavior, and compromising the integrity of the academy.” It said that Mr. Smith would be given a chance to respond and that at its next board meeting, on April 18, it “may take any disciplinary action, which may include suspension, expulsion or other sanctions.” More

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      Jane Campion Apologizes for Comment About Venus and Serena Williams

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      In an acceptance speech at the Critics Choice Awards, the “Power of the Dog” filmmaker wrongly suggested that the tennis greats didn’t compete against men the way she had to.At the Critics Choice Awards on Sunday evening, Jane Campion won best director for her work on the revisionist western “The Power of the Dog.”Within minutes, she had committed a gaffe, one that she would apologize for the next day.“It’s absolutely stunning to be here tonight among so many incredible women,” Campion began as she accepted the prize. “Halle Berry, you have already done my speech — and really killed it, I loved it. You’re absolutely brilliant,” she said, referring to the winner of the #SeeHer Award.“And Venus and Serena, what an honor to be in the room with you,” Campion continued, referring to the tennis greats who were there in support of Will Smith and the rest of the cast of “King Richard,” a warm family drama about the Williams family. “I’ve taken up tennis. I truly have. And Will, if you want to come over and give me lessons, I would truly love it. I actually had to stop playing ’cause I got tennis elbow. I’d also just like to give my love out to my fellow — the guys. The nominees.“And you know, Serena and Venus, you are such marvels. However, you do not play against the guys — like I have to.”When the camera panned over to Venus Williams, her grimace launched a thousand memes.On social media, the angry reaction was clear. “‘No matter how far we come, we get reminded that it’s not enough’ — Serena Williams” read one of the top comments on YouTube, where video of the speech was posted.“The Williams sisters actually have competed against men in the mixed doubles team event,” another commenter noted. “For those not familiar with tennis, this is when 2 teams consisting of 1 man and 1 woman compete against each other. So not only is Jane’s comment ignorant, it’s inaccurate and incorrect.”On Monday, Campion apologized in a statement.“I made a thoughtless comment equating what I do in the film world with all that Serena Williams and Venus Williams have achieved,” she said. “I did not intend to devalue these two legendary Black women and world-class athletes.“The fact is the Williams sisters have, actually, squared off against men on the court (and off), and they have both raised the bar and opened doors for what is possible for women in this world. The last thing I would ever want to do is minimize remarkable women. I love Serena and Venus. Their accomplishments are titanic and inspiring. Serena and Venus, I apologize and completely celebrate you.” More

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      Joe Rogan Apologizes for ‘Shameful’ Past Use of Racial Slur

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      His apology came as listeners said that as many as 70 episodes of “The Joe Rogan Experience” podcast had been quietly taken off Spotify; the company has yet to comment on the reported removals.As pressure has intensified on Spotify and its star podcaster Joe Rogan, listeners reported that the company had quietly removed dozens of episodes of his show, while Rogan apologized early Saturday for his use of a racial slur in past episodes.In an Instagram video, Rogan — whose talk show, “The Joe Rogan Experience,” is Spotify’s most popular podcast, and has been available there exclusively for more than a year — addressed what he called “the most regretful and shameful thing that I’ve ever had to talk about publicly.” A compilation video showed Rogan using the slur numerous times in past episodes of his show; it had been shared by the singer India.Arie, who has removed her catalog from Spotify in protest of what she called Rogan’s “language around race.”Rogan said the compilation was drawn from “12 years of conversations” on his show, and that it looked “horrible, even to me.” The clips, he said, had been taken out of context, which he said included discussions about how it had been used by comedians like Richard Pryor and Redd Foxx, who were Black, and Lenny Bruce, who was white.When posting the clip compilation, Arie said that Rogan “shouldn’t even be uttering the word. Don’t say it, under any context.” In his video, Rogan said that he had come to agree with that view. “It’s not my word to use,” he said. “I’m well aware of that now.” He added that he had not spoken the slur “in years.”This week, Arie joined a small but influential boycott of Spotify led by the musicians Neil Young and Joni Mitchell, who cited complaints by health professionals that guests on Rogan’s show had spread misinformation about the coronavirus.In his latest video, Rogan also discussed a clip from another podcast episode, which he said he had deleted, in which he described seeing “Planet of the Apes” at a theater in a Black neighborhood in Philadelphia. “I was trying to make the story entertaining and I said it was like we got out and we were in Africa. It’s like we were in ‘Planet of the Apes,’” he said, adding that it was an “idiotic” thing to say that “looks terrible even in context.”Listeners noticed that as many as 70 episodes of “The Joe Rogan Experience” had been quietly removed in recent days by Spotify. Neither Rogan nor Spotify has given an explanation, and representatives of the company did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Saturday. Commenters on Reddit speculated that some of the missing episodes may have contained the slur, although that was unclear.Understand the Joe Rogan-Spotify ControversyCard 1 of 5A brash personality. More