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    Val Kilmer in ‘Batman Forever’ Was a True 1990s Moment

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    The actor took only one turn in the famous batsuit. That film, “Batman Forever,” couldn’t be a more representative artifact of its era.In June 1995 a pop confection hit thousands of movie screens. It seemed to embody what both boosters and critics have identified as that decade’s end-of-history nonchalance. It was, of all things, a Batman movie. And holding it together, the sturdy straight man surrounded by abject goofiness, was Val Kilmer, the actor who died at the age of 65 on Tuesday.“Batman Forever” was the third movie in a franchise kicked off in 1989 by the director Tim Burton’s brooding “Batman.” Starring Michael Keaton in the title role and Jack Nicholson as the Joker, “Batman” was, by the standards of the time, dark for a comic-book flick.Burton’s and Keaton’s follow-up, “Batman Returns” (1992), failed to repeat the original’s box-office success. So a new director, Joel Schumacher, was brought in expressly to make what one journalist termed a “Batman Lite.” Schumacher was a fan of Kilmer’s portrayal of Doc Holliday in the 1993 western “Tombstone” and tapped him as his leading man.This was not Burton’s Batman. “There’s not much to contemplate here,” the critic Janet Maslin wrote in The New York Times, “beyond the spectacle of gimmicky props and the kitsch of good actors (all of whom have lately done better work elsewhere) dressed for a red-hot Halloween.”Schumacher favored showy camera angles and a garish color scheme. The villains — Jim Carrey played the Riddler, Tommy Lee Jones was Two-Face — were freely permitted to chew the scenery. Batman’s suit had nipples. The movie was weird.It was also a box-office smash. It broke an opening-weekend record and eventually brought in more than $336 million worldwide, besting its predecessor by tens of millions of dollars.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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      in Theater

      Angie Stone, Hip-Hop Pioneer Turned Neo-Soul Singer, Dies at 63

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      After having success as a member of the Sequence, an early female rap group, she re-emerged in the 1990s as a practitioner of sultry, laid-back R&B.Angie Stone, a hip-hop pioneer in the late 1970s with the Sequence, one of the first all-female rap groups, who later switched gears as a solo R&B star with hits like “No More Rain (In This Cloud)” and “Wish I Didn’t Miss You,” died on Saturday in Montgomery, Ala. She was 63.Her agent, Deborah Champagne, said she died in a hospital after being involved in a car crash following a performance.Alongside musicians like Erykah Badu, Macy Gray and Lauryn Hill, Ms. Stone was part of the neo-soul movement of the late 1990s and 2000s, which blended traditional soul with contemporary R&B, pop and jazz fusion. Her first album, “Black Diamond” (1999), was certified gold, as was her sophomore effort, “Mahogany Soul” (2001).A prolific songwriter with a sultry alto voice, Ms. Stone specialized in songs that combined laid-back tempos with layered instrumentation and vocals.“Angie Stone will stand proud alongside Lauryn Hill as a songwriter, producer and singer with all the props in place to become a grande dame of the R&B world in the next decade,” Billboard magazine wrote in 1999.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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      in Music

      Ananda Lewis, Former MTV V.J., Says She Has Stage 4 Breast Cancer

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      Lewis, the host of the 1990s MTV show “Hot Zone,” tried to fight her illness without undergoing a double mastectomy. She says she is responding well after resuming treatment.The former MTV V.J. Ananda Lewis said in a CNN round-table discussion that was posted online on Tuesday that her breast cancer, which she first learned she had in 2019, metastasized last year and had reached Stage 4.In a phone interview with The New York Times on Wednesday, Lewis, 51, said that she had since resumed treatment and was feeling much better. “I’ve turned it around really beautifully,” she said.Lewis first became recognizable in the 1990s as a host of “Teen Summit,” a long-running weekly live show on BET that aimed to speak to Black teenagers about current issues (Lewis interviewed Hillary Clinton, who was then the first lady, on the program in 1996). She went on to host “Hot Zone,” an MTV show in which she interviewed stars and gave style advice. The Times, in a 1999 profile, described her as one of MTV’s most popular stars and “the hip-hop generation’s reigning It Girl.”Stage 4 breast cancer means that the cancer cells have spread beyond the breast, often traveling to the bones, the lungs and the liver. It can be treated with tools like chemotherapy and hormone therapy, but it is considered incurable. Breast cancer is the second most common cancer among women in the United States and a leading cause of death from cancer among women globally.In the round-table — with the CNN correspondent Stephanie Elam, Lewis’s best friend since they met at Howard University in the 1990s, and the CNN anchor Sara Sidner, who had a double mastectomy this year after learning that she had Stage 3 breast cancer — Lewis said that she had decided not to get a double mastectomy despite her doctors’ recommendation in early 2019, when she first discovered the lump and learned she had Stage 3 breast cancer.She sought conventional care after receiving the initial diagnosis, speaking to “the right and best oncologists, the breast surgeons,” she said on Wednesday. As she told Elam, “I decided to keep my tumor and try to work it out of my body a different way.”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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      in Movies

      Hundreds of Readers Told Us Their Favorite 1999 Movies. Which Came Out on Top?

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      In a memorable year for film, there were recommendations of blockbusters, tender dramas and coming-of-age-tales. But one title stood out from the rest.A quarter-century later, the residual energy of 1999 cinema lingers. The Class of 1999 series — our class project, so to say — took form as a retrospective, sifting through films and moments that inspired a generation at the dawn of a new millennium.It dissected the revolutionary power of “The Matrix” and “The Blair Witch Project,” which manipulated our minds into believing what we saw was real. It examined legacies, in conversation with Haley Joel Osment and the “risky stunts, not risky roles” ethos of Tom Cruise. In essence, the last year of the ’90s had earned itself the title of “the year of uncertainty,” at least according to Wesley Morris.As for myself, I’d define 1999 through the stylistic lens of “SLC Punk,” “American Movie” and “Girl, Interrupted.” (Passionate and a bit misdirected; gritty and a bit manic.) When our film staff writers and critics made their list of favorite films from 1999, we of course had to ask New York Times readers to weigh in on their favorite movie of the year — a question that spawned more than a thousand submissions (almost) overnight.“The Matrix” was mentioned nearly twice as often as any other film. “Fight Club,” “Office Space,” “American Beauty” and “Magnolia” followed suit, in that order. (“American Beauty,” directed by Sam Mendes, won the Oscar for best picture.)Many readers sent us lists, unable to choose just one film, while others gave an elaborate and detailed retelling of a first viewing. Here’s a sampling of what our readers picked, covering everything from teenage escapades to heart-racing thrills to gut-wrenching dramas.‘The Matrix’ Is EverywhereMike Ruddell of New York:By 2024, “The Matrix” is feeling more relevant (and plausible!) by the day, thanks in part to our obsession/tension with breeding ever more capable A.I., our cultural fixation on antihero hackers and leakers, our ongoing destruction of the planet, and our weirdly brat green digital culture. At this point only the phones feel dated.But that’s not what makes this a good movie. “The Matrix” is the best movie of 1999 because of the insanely inventive plot (or conceit?), the thesis-worthy philosophical themes, the kick-ass mishmash of Wing Chun, jujitsu, cyberpunk, shoot-em-up action, and C.G.I. “bullet time” (a term coined thanks to the film), the most “1999” film anyone could possibly think up. As Gen Z would say, “The Matrix” is a vibe.I still get an adrenaline rush from the closing scene when Neo, fresh off his obliteration of the Agents, puts on his shades, looks to the sky, and FLIES.Neeraj Gupta of London:Growing up in India, on a diet of Bollywood movies, “The Matrix” was the first English film that I had watched in a cinema. I distinctly remember being wowed by the plot and coming home to think if all of us are actually living in the Matrix. To this day, I can’t shake that feeling!It is a cult classic with scenes and props etched in my memory, from the long black leather coats to Morpheus’s frame less glasses, and of course Neo’s gravity defying bullet dodge. A movie that made a lasting impact on me.Dylan Feldpausch of Chicago:It epitomizes the alienation of modernity through a (literally and figuratively) subterranean queer lens. I remember watching it as a kid and being inexplicably drawn to its aesthetic, and only as an adult realizing how important it was to me as a nonbinary person — particularly the idea that you can imagine yourself into any identity no matter how inaccessible it may seem to you, and that your power in that identity comes from a strong commitment to your truest self.Paddy Free of Auckland, New Zealand:I was 10 in 1977, the perfect age for “Star Wars.” Walking out of “The Matrix,” I felt the feelings I’d hoped to feel walking into “The Phantom Menace.” 1999’s Great Disappointment and 1999’s Great Redeemer.Drama. Drama. Drama.Kevin Hengehold of Seal Beach, Calif., on “The Sixth Sense”:Not your typical ghost story, and I still watch it whenever I see it on. Fantastic in-depth acting led by Haley Joel Osment along with Toni Collette and Bruce Willis. “I see dead people” is a line that will live on long after I’m gone … and I’m not planning on coming back to watch my wedding video …Katie Robleski of Milwaukee on “Magnolia”:I’m glued to the screen in a dark theater as Aimee Mann’s “Save Me” swells. John C. Reilly quietly delivers his monologue until Melora Walters breaks the fourth wall (and her gut-wrenching pain) with that hopeful smile — cut to black (and to my tears rolling with the credits). Perhaps being 19 made all the difference, but everything about “Magnolia” — Tom Cruise, full cast breaking into song, raining frogs, and 3-hour runtime included — completely changed cinema for me. I miss that era.Zac Oldenburg of San Francisco on “Eyes Wide Shut”:My memories started on a 4:3 aspect ratio DVD, but the film became a revelation once I saw it in a theater. Kidman is alluring on every level, and Cruise gives himself over to Kubrick in a way he has never done again for a director. It’s just an incredible film that sends Kubrick out on a high note.Alex Arroyo of Littleton, Colo. on “Fight Club”:I remember I was in junior high, a group of friends and I going to watch it in theaters. We were so pumped afterward, we just wanted to start our own fight club … we never did though; we were kinda nerds. But the idea of someone being so over all of the daily, typical BS and willing to do something to change it all, gave me hope and kinda made me feel like a badass for watching it.Dana Jacoby of Cotati, Calif., on “American Beauty”: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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      in Music

      10 Unforgettable Songs From 1999 Movies

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      Listen to tracks by the Chicks, Aimee Mann, Blink-182 and more linked to moments in a monumentally interesting — and busy — year of cinema.Julia Roberts offering a hint of what happens in “Runaway Bride.”Paramount PicturesDear listeners,For the past few weeks, my colleagues in The Times’s movies section have been running a highly entertaining series called “Class of 1999,” celebrating the 25th anniversary of a monumentally interesting — and busy — year of cinema.At the box office, the final year of the millennium truly had it all: era-defining horror (“The Sixth Sense,” “The Blair Witch Project”), boundary-pushing comedy (“Being John Malkovich,” “Election”), enduring art-house favorites (“Eyes Wide Shut,” “Magnolia”) and fodder for future dorm-room posters (“Fight Club,” “The Matrix”). It was, as Wesley Morris puts it in a delightful new essay summing up what some have called the “Best. Movie. Year. Ever.,” a time of “range, volume, abundance, deluge.” It was the year of both “The Phantom Menace” and “The Spy Who Shagged Me.” Of Americans “Pie” and “Beauty.” But, most importantly for our purposes, it had a killer soundtrack.Today’s playlist is a sonic tribute to the movies of 1999, culled entirely from soundtracks released that year. It’s got some names you’ll still recognize (Madonna, Blink-182, the Chicks) and some (Imperial Teen, Harvey Danger) that remain time-stamped in the late ’90s.I wanted to limit myself to songs released in 1999, which means that a few of the year’s most memorable musical moments (the Pixies song forever linked with the end of “Fight Club,” the Eurodance anthem that plays during the startling conclusion of Claire Denis’s masterpiece “Beau Travail”) must go unmentioned, except for the mentioning I just did there. I’ve also omitted a few of the most obvious and overplayed choices: I do not think I need to remind you of Sixpence None the Richer’s swoony “She’s All That” theme “Kiss Me,” or of that end-of-the-Willennium indulgence “Wild Wild West.”Still, I hope this playlist makes you feel like Austin Powers in reverse, aurally transported back to the brink of Y2K. Naturally, it’s oozing with nostalgia, but I think you may actually be surprised at how many of these tracks still hold up 25 years later.Also! Since we already determined last week what the song(s) of the summer are, I want to hear what your personal song of the summer was. Maybe it was an old song that you discovered (or rediscovered), or a newer song that provided the perfect soundtrack to your season. Here is a submission form where you can share your pick with me. We may use your response in an upcoming edition of The Amplifier.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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      in Television

      Sid Eudy, Wrestler Known as ‘Sid Vicious’ and ‘Sycho Sid,’ Dies at 63

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      The 6-foot-9 wrestling champion faced off against some of the industry’s biggest names, including Shawn Michaels and Hulk Hogan.Sid Eudy, a professional wrestler known as Sid Justice, Sid Vicious and Sycho Sid, who rose to fame in the 1990s and won multiple championships, died on Monday. He was 63.The cause was cancer, his son Gunnar Eudy wrote on Facebook.Mr. Eudy was one of his generation’s “most imposing and terrifying competitors,” the World Wrestling Entertainment said in a statement. Listed at 6-foot-9 and 317 pounds, he was one of the biggest of what are known in the industry as big men, who often play supporting roles because they don’t perform the high-flying moves that thrill fans.Mr. Eudy was a very big man who became a star in his own right. He headlined Wrestlemania twice and became champion of both the W.W.E., as it was then known, and its 1990s rival, the W.C.W., a rare trifecta.Mr. Eudy first entered the world of wrestling in 1989, when he signed with World Championship Wrestling, then an upstart circuit.Sid Eudy and Hulk Hogan at Madison Square Garden in 1992.Daily Mirror/Mirrorpix, via Getty ImagesIn 1991, Mr. Eudy debuted as Sid Justice in W.W.E., the organization said, as the special guest referee at SummerSlam 1991.Wrestlemania featured Mr. Eudy in its main event twice, in 1992 against Hulk Hogan, and again in 1997, against the Undertaker. Mr. Eudy was both a two-time W.W.F. champion and two-time W.C.W. champion. He was also a two-time U.S.W.A. champion.“One of the most brutal Superstars to ever terrorize W.W.E., the sadistic Sid brought an intensity that few could ever hope to contain,” the organization wrote. “Just ask the litany of ring legends who have incurred his wrath — a hit list that includes Shawn Michaels, Hulk Hogan, Bret ‘Hit Man’ Hart and many more.”Sidney Raymond Eudy was born in West Memphis, Ark., on Dec. 16, 1960. He is survived by his wife, Sabrina Estes Eudy, his sons Frank and Gunnar, as well as his grandchildren.In 2001, during a televised pay-per-view W.C.W. championship match, viewers watched Mr. Eudy injure his leg on live television after he jumped off the rope and accidentally landed badly, snapping his left leg at an unnatural angle.It effectively ended his career in major pro wrestling. Mr. Eudy himself acknowledged as much. “With my injury,” he said in a 2023 interview, “I feel I came up short with solidifying myself as one of the top 10, 15 money-drawers in the business.” More

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      in Television

      ‘Homicide: Life on the Street’ Will Finally Be Available to Stream

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      The celebrated 1990s police procedural is coming to Peacock in August.The critically acclaimed 1990s police procedural “Homicide: Life on the Street” will soon be available to stream in its entirety.All seven seasons of the crime drama, which ran on NBC from 1993 to 1999, as well as the 2000 film “Homicide: The Movie,” which served as the series finale, will arrive on Peacock on Aug. 19. The show has been syndicated over the years and has been released on DVD, but its absence from streaming services — thanks largely to the challenge of securing music rights, a frequent sticking point in streaming deals — has long been lamented by fans.“Homicide” was based on a book by David Simon — then a Baltimore Sun reporter who had spent a year shadowing the Baltimore Police Department’s Homicide Unit. The series — along with “NYPD Blue,” which also premiered in 1993 — infused the cop genre with more grit and moral ambiguity, setting the stage for hard-edge cable dramas like “The Shield” and Simon’s own “The Wire,” one of the most celebrated series of all time.“Homicide” was created by Paul Attanasio and executive produced by Barry Levinson, among others. (Simon was a producer.) Tom Fontana, who would go on to create the prison drama “Oz,” was the showrunner. “Homicide” had a devoted core following during its run but was never a ratings darling. It stayed on the air for seven seasons, winning four Emmy Awards out of 17 nominations and three Peabody Awards. It also boasted a memorable cast that included Andre Braugher, who won an Emmy for his role as Detective Frank Pembleton; Melissa Leo; Richard Belzer; and Giancarlo Esposito.As the streaming boom resurfaced beloved titles from throughout TV history, “Homicide” regularly appeared on lists of shows fans most wanted to see come to a service. Simon previewed its arrival in a June post on X.“Word is that NBC has managed to finally secure the music rights necessary to sell ‘Homicide: Life On The Streets’ to a streaming platform,” he wrote, adding later in a reply: “I did nothing. Tom Fontana, Barry Levinson and [the producer] Gail Mutrux undertook the lobbying effort.” More

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      in Television

      Shannen Doherty, ‘Beverly Hills, 90210’ and ‘Charmed’ Star, Dies at 53

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      Shannen Doherty, the raven-haired actress known for playing headstrong characters in the 1990s television dramas “Beverly Hills, 90210” and “Charmed,” and who had tried in recent years to shed her rebellious reputation, died on Saturday at her home in Malibu, Calif. She was 53.The cause was cancer, her publicist, Leslie Sloane, said in an emailed statement.Ms. Doherty learned she had breast cancer in February 2015 and had been open about her struggle with it in the years since. In the summer of 2016, she shaved her head as a group of friends stood by, and in 2017, she announced that the cancer was in remission. It returned in 2020, and in June 2023 Ms. Doherty announced that the cancer had spread to her brain. In November, she said it had spread to her bones.But she continued to work and started a podcast that month.“I’m not done with living. I’m not done with loving. I’m not done with creating. I’m not done with hopefully changing things for the better,” she told People magazine. “I’m not done.”Doherty in 1996. “I have felt misunderstood my whole life,” she told People that year.Gary Null/NBCShannen Maria Doherty was born on April 12, 1971, in Memphis to John Doherty Jr., a mortgage consultant, and Rosa (Wright) Doherty, a beautician. By age 10, Shannen had established herself as a child actress, appearing as Jenny Wilder in 18 episodes of “Little House on the Prairie” and acting alongside Wilford Brimley and Deidre Hall in the NBC drama “Our House.”Those were quickly overshadowed by her performance as the acid-tongued, red-scrunchy-wearing Heather Duke in the 1988 movie “Heathers,” a campy comedy-thriller that starred Winona Ryder, Christian Slater and Ms. Doherty as students who fight for lunchroom domination as the body count begins to rise.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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      in Music

      Revisiting the Women Who Defined Lilith Fair’s Sound

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      Hear songs by Sarah McLachlan, Tracy Chapman, Meredith Brooks and more.Sarah McLachlan onstage at Lilith Fair.Susan Farley for The New York TimesDear listeners,Every once in a while, it’s good to be reminded that Sarah McLachlan is more than just the voice behind that depressing pet commercial that makes me look away from my TV. (You know the one, for the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. I’m getting a lump in my throat just thinking about it.) The writer Grayson Haver Currin provided just such a reminder, in an incisive profile of McLachlan published by The New York Times this week.McLachlan is also, among other things, the leader of a school that provides free musical education to children, an avid surfer (which I learned from the article!) and, of course, one of the founders of Lilith Fair, a highly successful if unjustly stereotyped late-90s concert tour that celebrated female artists.Lilith Fair came during a period of critical and commercial prosperity for female artists in a number of traditionally male-dominated genres like rock, folk and that wide-ranging radio format called “alternative.” But as often happens when women gain power and visibility in a certain space, it also provoked a backlash. Even as it was raking in millions, Lilith Fair was the butt of many a late-night TV joke. As the critic Rob Sheffield put it in a 2019 oral history of Lilith Fair for Vanity Fair, “Certainly nobody on late-night TV comedy in 1997 felt obligated or encouraged to make jokes about Ozzfest or the Horde tour.”Lilith Fair wasn’t perfect and is not beyond scrutiny. Most of the performers booked in its first year were white, though the bills in its second and third years became more diverse. And I’m not here to argue that every act who played Lilith Fair has stood the test of time.Still, many have: Fiona Apple, Tracy Chapman, Sheryl Crow, Indigo Girls, Emmylou Harris … I could go on and on. But instead, I made a playlist.For brevity’s sake, I limited myself to artists who played on Lilith Fair’s inaugural 1997 tour. That still gave me plenty of great songs to choose from, as you’ll hear. I’ve included some obvious choices (did you really think I would leave off a certain karaoke classic by Meredith Brooks?) and some deeper cuts you may have forgotten about (that Tracy Bonham song still rips). Although an attempt to revive the tour in 2010 didn’t quite work, I do hear the influence of Lilith Fair artists in this current generation of pop stars like Olivia Rodrigo, Billie Eilish, Haim and, yes, even Taylor Swift, which means it’s an especially interesting time to look back at the artists who defined the so-called Lilith Fair sound.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