Entertainment news in brief
Partners Hawn, Russell get Walk of Fame stars
LOS ANGELES — Longtime partners Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell have been honored with neighboring stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
In a Thursday ceremony, the
66-year-old Russell said there’s no one he’d rather be next to than Hawn. Russell and the
71-year-old Hawn have been together for more than 30 years.
Hawn said at the ceremony that she and Russell have never been celebrated in that way and jokingly asked Russell, “Did we just get married?”
The couple was joined by Hawn’s daughter, Kate Hudson.
Reese Witherspoon was on hand to help honor Hawn. Quentin Tarantino introduced Russell.
Historic Philly opera house to become live music venue
PHILADELPHIA — A glorious old opera house that takes up a full city block in Philadelphia will reopen as a live music venue.
The Philadelphia Inquirer reports that developer Eric Blumenfeld has entered an agreement with Live Nation to revive the Metropolitan Opera House for $45 million.
The theater on a major artery through the city was built in 1908 by impresario Oscar Hammerstein and served as an opera house and movie theater for its first three decades. Then a sports promoter bought it and held wrestling and boxing matches inside.
It sat vacant from 1988 to 1995, when a church bought the building.
Blumenfeld says the rehabbed 3,500-capacity music venue should open by the end of 2018.
Online club for Harry Potter fans to launch in June
NEW YORK — J.K. Rowling is launching a free online book club for fans and newcomers to her “Harry Potter” series.
The Wizarding World Book Club will launch in June in celebration of the 20th anniversary of “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone,” the first in what would become a seven-book series.
The online community “aims to surprise and delight those who have never read a Harry Potter book, as well as returning readers who want to join the conversation,” says Pottermore, Rowling’s digital publishing arm.
The club says its goal is to “create a global community of Harry Potter readers who are communicating with each other as they are reading the same book, at the same time.”