Jodie Foster to receive Cannes honor
Jodie Foster will receive the Honorary Palme d’Or at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival in July. She will be the guest of honor at the opening ceremony, where she will receive the tribute.
Previous recipients include Jeanne Moreau, Bernardo Bertolucci, Jane Fonda and Alain Delon.
The festival praised Foster — an actor, director and producer — for her “brilliant artistic journey, a unique personality with a modest yet strong commitment to some of the major issues of our time.” As previously announced, Spike Lee will preside over the competition jury.
“Cannes is a festival to which I owe so much; it has completely changed my life,” said Foster, who first attended Cannes in 1976, at age 13, for the world premiere of Martin Scorsese’s “Taxi Driver,” which won the Palme d’Or.
“I am flattered that Cannes thought of me, and I am very honored to be able to share a few words of wisdom or tell an adventure or two with a new generation of filmmakers,” said Foster, who has had seven films, as actor or director, presented at the Cannes Film Festival.
Obamas, Barris team for Netflix series:
Barack and Michelle Obama, and Kenya Barris have executive produced a Netflix series combining music and animation. “We the People,” created by Chris Nee, consists of 10, three-minute episodes that feature music performed by H.E.R., Brandi Carlile and Andra Day, among others. The show premieres July 4.
“We the People” covers a range of basic U.S. civics lessons in not-so-basic ways, set to original songs performed by artists such as Janelle Monae, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Adam Lambert, Cordae, Bebe Rexha, Kyle and inaugural National Youth Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman, with a mix of animated styles. Other musicians featured in the series include Kristen Anderson-Lopez, Robert Lopez, Daveed Diggs and Brittany Howard.
BTS sets records with ‘Butter’:
K-pop band BTS hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart yet again with its second English recorded song “Butter.” BTS joins an exclusive club of just seven other artists —including The Beatles and Mariah Carey — to achieve their first four No. 1 songs on the Billboard Hot 100 in less than a year.
The premiere of the video for “Butter” was the largest audience for a music video in YouTube history, with 3.9 million fans tuning in to watch.
On Spotify, 11,042,335 users streamed the song within the first 24 hours of its debut, beating out the previous record holder, “I Don’t Care” by Justin Bieber and Ed Sheeran, according to USA Today.
Character actor Hogan dies:
Actor Robert Hogan, 87, died on May 27 due to complications from pneumonia, his family announced. Over his six-decade career, he had 150 credits on some of TV’s most famous shows, including “Murder, She Wrote,” “Law & Order” and “Gunsmoke.”
June 3 birthdays: Actor Irma P. Hall is 86. Singer Eddie Holman is 75. Actor Penelope Wilton is 75. Singer Deniece Williams is 71. Singer Dan Hill is 67. Actor Scott Valentine is 63. Guitarist Kerry King is 57. TV journalist Anderson Cooper is 54. Singer Lyfe Jennings is 43. Actor Josh Segarra is 35. Actor Anne Winters is 27.