A Dept Q crew member has died after being seriously injured at FirstStage Studios in Leith, Edinburgh, in an incident that has prompted inquiries from Police Scotland and the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). The man has not been named.

What we know about the incident

Emergency services were called to the studio at about 3pm on Thursday after a report of a seriously injured man. He was pronounced dead a short time later. The Independent and The Standard, citing police, say this happened at the scene. Police Scotland said the death is not being treated as suspicious, but that “inquiries are ongoing to establish the full circumstances.” Beyond that, the sources do not say how the man was hurt.

Left Bank Pictures, the production company behind the Netflix crime drama, confirmed that the man worked on the show. A spokesperson said the company was “deeply shocked and saddened by the tragic death of a member of our Dept Q crew.” The statement added that its thoughts were with his family, friends and colleagues, and that support was being offered to those affected. Netflix referred a request for comment to Left Bank.

Regulators are involved

The HSE told the BBC it was “aware” of the incident. In a statement reported by Deadline, which cited STV, the regulator said it was liaising with the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service and Police Scotland. In Scotland, the procurator fiscal investigates sudden or unexplained deaths. The involvement of both bodies suggests a formal examination of the circumstances, though no findings have been reported and nothing in the sources points to a cause or to anyone being at fault.

Reports differ slightly on the production’s status. The BBC and Deadline say filming on the latest series wrapped at the facility last month. A photo caption in The Independent describes the second season as currently filming. Deadline noted that film sets stay busy after cameras stop rolling, with work such as wrapping up and dismantling sets often continuing. None of the reports say what the man was doing when he was hurt.

A significant Scottish production hub

FirstStage was started by Jason Connery, son of Sean Connery. It took over an empty former warehouse in Leith in 2020. The BBC describes the “big blue shed” as having five sound stages plus production office space, and says Screen Scotland put £1m towards the initial set-up. The studio’s website lists work for Netflix and Amazon Prime, including the drama The Rig and the Bafta-nominated film The Outrun. Part of Marvel’s Avengers: Infinity War was also shot in the building before it became a dedicated studio.

Dept Q stars Matthew Goode as DCI Carl Morck, a difficult detective exiled to a police station basement to lead a cold case unit. Adapted from Jussi Adler-Olsen’s novels by Scott Frank, it has been one of Netflix’s biggest hits outside the US. The first season aired in May 2025, and a second was commissioned the following year.

For now, the picture is incomplete. The man’s identity, the cause of his injuries and the findings of the police and HSE inquiries have not been made public. Further details are expected to emerge as those inquiries progress, and the loss of a Dept Q crew member is being felt across a close-knit production community.

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KPop Demon Hunters tour tickets go on general sale at 10am local time on Friday, November 20, giving fans a week to prepare for one of the biggest arena runs ever built around an animated film. Netflix and AEG Presents announced the Golden World Tour on November 13, promising more than 150 performances in nearly 50 cities across 2027 and 2028.

When KPop Demon Hunters tour tickets go on sale

There are several ways in. Mastercard cardholders get first access, with a presale opening at 10am on Wednesday, November 18. A fan presale follows the next day, November 19, and fans must register on the tour website to take part. General sale then opens on November 20. Tickets in every presale window start at 10am local time.

The tour opens on June 5, 2027, at CFG Bank Arena in Baltimore. The first phase covers North America, the UK and Europe. Dates for Asia Pacific and Latin America have been promised but not yet released.

The North American and European route

The North American leg runs through June, July and August. Stops include Newark, Chicago, Atlanta, Dallas, Las Vegas, Oakland and Tacoma. Los Angeles gets the biggest allocation, with three shows at Crypto.com Arena on July 30 and 31, including a matinee. Many other cities get two-show stops, often with an afternoon performance.

Europe follows in September and October, with arenas in Zurich, Milan, Amsterdam, Vienna, Berlin, Hamburg, Copenhagen, Oslo, Cologne, Brussels, Paris and Dublin.

The UK portion, in October 2027, adds up to seven performances:

• October 12: Glasgow, OVO Hydro
• October 16: Birmingham, Utilita Arena (matinee and evening)
• October 19: Manchester, AO Arena
• October 22: London, The O2
• October 23: London, The O2 (matinee and evening)

What fans will actually see

The organisers describe the show as an interactive concert rather than a standard gig. The animated trio HUNTR/X (Rumi, Mira and Zoey) are to be brought to life through what the announcement calls “cutting-edge performance innovations”. The Saja Boys and Derpy Tiger will also appear. Live-action performers, stunts and choreography are promised, along with songs from the film and what the organisers call “special performances”. Amy Tinkham, whose past credits include Cirque du Soleil’s Songblazers and a Disney Descendants/Zombies tour, is leading the creative direction.

The announcement does not say who will sing. The vocalists behind HUNTR/X are EJAE, Audrey Nuna and Rei Ami, and none has been confirmed for the tour. Nor does it say whether there will be new music or how much of the show will be animated. Fans have raised those questions online, and Polygon noted that the announcement leaves many of them open. Anyone wary of paying for KPop Demon Hunters tour tickets before those details emerge may be tempted to wait. Demand, though, could make waiting risky.

Why the demand looks so strong

Netflix points to the film’s numbers. Released in June 2025, KPop Demon Hunters became the streamer’s most-watched film ever, with more than 670 million views according to NME. Netflix’s chief marketing officer, Marian Lee, said it has spent 63 consecutive weeks in the Global Top 10. She also said “Golden” has passed 2 billion Spotify streams and that the soundtrack holds the record for the longest run at No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Soundtracks chart. “Golden” has won an Oscar, a Grammy and a Golden Globe.

The franchise is still growing. Netflix recently released 78 minutes of bonus content, and a sequel is in development. NME reports it is not expected before 2030 and will get a theatrical release alongside its streaming debut. For now, the tour is the main way to keep the fandom going. Fans planning to buy should check the registration details for the November 19 fan presale and decide which window to use before the November 20 general sale.

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Taylor Swift’s CMA Awards performance on November 18 will be her first at country music’s biggest night since 2013, the Country Music Association announced Friday. It brings the pop superstar back to the genre and the city that launched her career.

Swift is nominated for Single of the Year for “I Knew It, I Knew You,” a song from Toy Story 5. The nod is her 26th career CMA nomination. According to Deadline, the track is her first new song in more than a decade marketed as country to reach No. 1 on U.S. country radio.

Why this CMA Awards performance is a big deal

Swift’s relationship with the show goes back 20 years. She first attended in 2006 and won the Horizon Award, now called New Artist of the Year, in 2007. In 2009 she became the youngest artist ever named Entertainer of the Year, a record that still stands. Rolling Stone counts 11 more CMA wins since that first trophy.

Her last performance came in 2013, when she sang “Red” with Vince Gill and Alison Krauss and received the Pinnacle Award. She returned in 2016 as a presenter, handing Garth Brooks his Entertainer of the Year trophy. Rolling Stone noted that the 2013 “Red” set worked as an unofficial farewell to her country era, before she went fully pop with 1989 the following year.

She had telegraphed the return. After nominations were announced, she posted on Instagram Stories: “LOOKS LIKE I HAVEN’T YEE’D MY LAST HAW THANK YOU CMA!!!! See you there Nov. 18.”

A packed lineup in Nashville

The 60th annual ceremony, hosted by Lainey Wilson for a third straight year, airs live from Bridgestone Arena at 8 p.m. ET on ABC and Disney+, and streams on Hulu the next day. Ella Langley leads the nominations with nine and is among the performers, alongside:

• Miranda Lambert
• Kacey Musgraves
• Luke Combs
• Chris Stapleton
• Tim McGraw
• Megan Moroney
• Zach Top
• Mumford & Sons, who make their CMA debut

Brothers Osborne, Luke Bryan, Halestorm, Hardy and Marcus King will salute Brooks & Dunn, this year’s recipients of the Willie Nelson Lifetime Achievement Award. The show will also include a tribute to Dolly Parton, which Rolling Stone and The Standard describe as honoring the late singer. Rolling Stone says the performers for that segment haven’t been announced. It also says that, despite rumors Swift might appear in it, the outlet has confirmed she is not part of it.

A busy stretch for Swift

The Nashville homecoming follows an October ceremony in which Brad Paisley inducted her into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame. The Standard reports she is the youngest person ever inducted. In her speech, she credited the “fundamentals and the foundation” she learned in Nashville for her ability to “genre-hop.”

The Hollywood Reporter notes that the show falls two days after Grammy nominations are announced, where Swift is expected to be a major contender. It also says “I Knew It, I Knew You” is viewed as a top contender for an Oscar nomination for best original song. For a singer who has spent much of the past decade in pop, this CMA Awards performance is a notable return to the country stage.

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Barbara Broccoli, the producer who has steered James Bond for decades, has been named the first female film school president in the history of the UK’s National Film and Television School (NFTS). She takes over in February from Oscar-winning producer Lord David Puttnam, who becomes president emeritus.

The announcement, reported on 12 November by the BBC, Variety, Deadline and The Hollywood Reporter, ends more than five decades of Puttnam’s involvement at the top of the Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire institution. The NFTS was founded in 1971 by director Colin Young, who began with about 25 students. It was renamed the National Film and Television School in 1982 to reflect its widening curriculum.

A handover between two of British film’s best-known producers

Puttnam’s credits include Chariots of Fire, The Killing Fields and Midnight Express. He said he was “over the moon” to be handing over to a “hugely respected figure”. He described the presidency as a “lovely job” and said he had tried never to interfere. He also called Broccoli a close friend, and said the handover repaid “the last of the many debts” he owed his own predecessor, Richard Attenborough.

Broccoli called it “a tremendous honour” to follow Puttnam. She said she had been involved with the school for many years and had “seen first-hand the extraordinary talent it develops”. The school said her appointment builds on her longstanding relationship with the NFTS and her commitment to championing emerging talent. NFTS chair Sophie Turner Laing called it a “landmark moment” and thanked Puttnam for his “unwavering belief” in the school.

Timing tied to the Cubby Broccoli Building

The new film school president arrives just ahead of a major milestone for the campus. The Cubby Broccoli Building opens in January 2027, according to Variety and The Hollywood Reporter. It is named after her father, Albert R. “Cubby” Broccoli, who established the Bond franchise. Broccoli officially named it earlier this year.

According to the BBC, the expansion adds 25,000 sq ft of teaching space and will house new courses in costume design and hair and make-up. It will also widen apprenticeship opportunities and provide the school’s first purpose-built, fully accessible student accommodation. Broccoli linked the two events in her statement. “My father believed in the power of filmmaking and in giving talented people the opportunity to succeed,” she said.

A pivotal moment for Bond, too

The appointment comes as Broccoli’s role in the franchise is changing. She produced nine Bond films with her half-brother, Michael G. Wilson. The pair handed creative control to Amazon MGM Studios in a deal reported in February 2025. Deadline notes they received an Honorary Academy Award in 2024, and that the industry is awaiting Amazon’s announcement of who will succeed Daniel Craig as 007. Craig has previously praised Broccoli’s “passionate and protective determination”.

The sources do not say how Broccoli will divide her time between the school and her other work, and none outlines specific plans for her presidency. The school’s own statement stresses her industry knowledge and her “passion for developing new voices” as the NFTS seeks to strengthen its position in film, television and games training.

The school has also been reshaping its leadership. Deadline reports that producer Pippa Harris and YouTube UK boss Alison Lomax joined the board last month. For a school that began with a couple of dozen students, a new building and a new film school president arriving within weeks of each other mark a clear generational shift.

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The Ariana Grande red carpet appearance fans have been waiting on finally happened Wednesday night, when the singer and actor arrived at the New York premiere of Focker-in-Law with her boyfriend, dancer and photographer Ricky Álvarez, at her side. It was the first time the pair had posed together on a red carpet since rekindling their romance this year, and photographers captured them embracing, whispering to one another and sharing a kiss at the Beacon Theatre.

A Rekindled Romance, Ten Years On

Grande and Álvarez met around 2015, when he was a backup dancer on her Honeymoon Tour. They dated for roughly a year and split in 2016. Grande later name-checked him in her 2018 hit “thank u, next,” singing that she “wrote some songs about Ricky, now I listen and laugh.”

That line has since been revised. This summer the two were spotted together in Austin, Texas, after one of Grande’s Eternal Sunshine tour shows, and further sightings followed in Florida, New York and London. By August they were Instagram official, and Grande showed off a new tattoo reading “I do love you,” which Vogue noted seemed to echo an inscription on Álvarez’s collarbone.

Grande also used the song to hint at where things stood. At one show she sang, “We always find our way back.” By the tour’s final night in London, the lyric had become “I’m tryna make him my last.”

Why This Ariana Grande Red Carpet Moment Matters

The outing carries extra weight because of the timing. Grande’s representative said in August that she would step back from public life after the tour, citing “endless, ongoing public scrutiny.” She also withdrew from the planned London revival of Stephen Sondheim’s Sunday in the Park with George, in which she was to star opposite her Wicked co-star Jonathan Bailey.

Against that backdrop, this was her first major public return, and she chose to share it with her partner rather than appear alone. The film opens in theaters on November 25. It is the fourth entry in the Meet the Parents franchise and also stars Ben Stiller, Robert De Niro and Skyler Gisondo. Owen Wilson, Chris Redd, Eduardo Franco and Beanie Feldstein were among the cast at the premiere.

The Look: Vintage With a Backstory

The fashion drew almost as much attention as the couple. Styled by Law Roach, Grande wore a 1990s Badgley Mischka gown in pale silver-grey plaid, with spaghetti straps, a fitted bodice scattered with tiny floral embellishments and a full, ruffled skirt. Harper’s Bazaar reported that it came from Jellybean Vintage. She paired it with silver hoop earrings and wore her hair in a sleek updo tied with an ivory ribbon.

According to British Vogue, Roach said he bought the dress months ago because it evoked the era of the original Meet the Parents. That gave the Ariana Grande red carpet look a neat tie to the film itself. Álvarez kept things relaxed in a black blazer over an open-collared white shirt, rolled dark jeans, a belt and brown loafers.

Public Affection, Offline and On

Álvarez marked the night on Instagram with a selfie of the two, captioned “Fockers.” Vogue reported that they have also been seen cheering on runners at the New York City Marathon, and that Grande recruited him for a lip-product guessing game on Instagram for her R.E.M. Beauty line.

Grande has been careful about how much of her life she shares, so the couple’s first red-carpet appearance offers a rare look at a relationship she has largely let her lyrics and her tattoo describe.

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The Anthony Clark death, confirmed on Wednesday, marks the loss of a comic who rose from the Boston stand-up circuit to anchor one of network television’s most durable family sitcoms. Clark, best known as Greg Warner on CBS’s Yes, Dear, died Tuesday at 62.

News of his passing came from his longtime friend and former co-star Mike O’Malley, who posted a tribute online. Outlets differ on where: Rolling Stone and Variety cite X, while The Hollywood Reporter cites Instagram. Reports also differ on the cause. Rolling Stone, citing Deadline, said it is believed to be complications from pneumonia, while The Hollywood Reporter said a cause was not immediately available.

A tribute from a friend and fellow comic

O’Malley’s post was personal rather than promotional. He recalled watching Clark sell out shows in Boston in the mid-1990s, when O’Malley and his future wife were dating, and said he was “a fan before I was a friend.” He described Clark as “one of those comics who is laughing along with you at the absurdity of his stories and observations.” The two had spoken by phone about three weeks before Clark’s death, O’Malley wrote, and Clark “had us laughing loudly once again.”

Greg Garcia, co-creator of Yes, Dear and the creator of My Name Is Earl and Raising Hope, also paid tribute in a statement to Deadline. He said Clark had “the most insane sense of humor” of all the funny people he has known, adding that “the things that would come out of his mouth were so unexpected and hilarious.”

From Lynchburg to Boston to CBS

Clark was born April 4, 1964, in Lynchburg, Virginia, and kept the accent that went with it. He studied mass communication at Emerson College in Boston, graduating in 1986, and won a top college comedian award from the American Collegiate Talent Showcase while he was there. Boston became his base. By the early 1990s he was part of a wave of emerging stand-ups that included Dave Chappelle, Louis C.K. and Dave Attell, all of whom appeared in a 1995 Young Comedians special.

Television followed quickly. After an early screen credit on American Playhouse in 1991, he landed his first lead role in 1996 on NBC’s Boston Common, playing a Virginian who moves to Boston and ends up working for a college student union. The show ran two seasons. Film and TV credits included Dogfight, The Thing Called Love, The Rock, Ellen and Soul Man.

The role that defined his career

His best-known part arrived in 2000 with Yes, Dear, which followed two young couples with sharply different approaches to parenting. Clark played the more buttoned-down Greg opposite O’Malley’s wilder brother-in-law. The cast also included Jean Louisa Kelly, Liza Snyder and Billy Gardell. Critics never embraced the show, but audiences did. It ran six seasons on CBS through 2006, totaling 122 episodes, and had a long afterlife in syndication. Variety once called it the “little-comedy-that-could” during a 2005 renewal push.

After the series ended, Clark hosted the sixth season of NBC’s Last Comic Standing in 2006, then largely stepped away from show business. Rolling Stone reported that he spent the past two decades in real estate, and O’Malley wrote that Clark “invested his money well and essentially retired” once the sitcom wrapped.

In a 2006 interview with The Comic’s Comic, Clark explained the pull of live comedy: “There’s no director. There’s no writer. No producer. There’s just you.” He added that he didn’t know why people found him funny, “but I’m glad they do.”

As details of the Anthony Clark death continue to emerge, the tributes from those who knew him point to the same quality: a comic whose own laughter made audiences laugh harder.

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Duran Duran drummer Roger Taylor is leaving the band and retiring from playing the drums altogether, following a worsening of his recently diagnosed tinnitus. The announcement came on Thursday, 12 November 2026, via the group’s social media, and ends a second run in the band that began with the 2001 reunion of the original line-up.

Taylor, who is 66 according to NME, framed the decision as a matter of health rather than a falling-out. “This is one of the hardest decisions I’ve ever had to make,” he said. “Playing drums in this band has been the joy of my life.” He added that his tinnitus “has been getting steadily worse” and that he had “reached the point where I must now listen to my body and my doctors.”

A Retirement Timed Around a Career High

Taylor stressed that he is leaving on his own terms and at a moment of success. “Figuring out the timing of all of this has not been easy, but I’m going out on a real high,” he said. He pointed to a “hugely successful” UK and European tour, which followed the band’s second headline show at BST Hyde Park, their Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction, and a return to the studio with Nile Rodgers, the Chic bandleader who has worked with them before.

The band’s own statement echoed the medical reasoning. Following “careful consideration and medical advice,” it said, Taylor decided that “protecting his hearing and long-term health must now come first.” The sources do not describe the severity of his condition beyond his own account of it worsening, and they give no detail on treatment.

What the Band Said About Their Duran Duran Drummer

The remaining members, Simon Le Bon, Nick Rhodes and John Taylor, called him their “brother.” Their joint statement said his drumming “helped define the sound of Duran Duran from the very beginning” and that having him back since 2001 “has been incredibly important to us all.” They said they “completely support his decision” and added that “he will always be part of this family, while we continue exploring new and exciting projects with the band.”

That last line suggests the group is carrying on, though none of the reports say who will play drums or what form future live shows might take.

Two Chapters, One Defining Sound

Taylor’s story with the band falls into two parts. He was among the earliest members, alongside Rhodes and John Taylor, and was later joined by Le Bon and guitarist Andy Taylor. The sources differ slightly on when he first came aboard: The Hollywood Reporter says 1978, NME says 1979. All agree he left in 1985. The Guardian notes he played on the first three albums, released between 1981 and 1983, which were transatlantic hits and helped popularise a glossy strain of new wave pop. He departed after the band’s Live Aid appearance, later explaining that he “needed to get to know myself” because being in a band that size meant “you can lose yourself.”

According to the Guardian, he briefly rejoined in 1994 before returning permanently in 2001. From then he played on six further albums, starting with 2004’s Astronaut and ending with 2023’s Danse Macabre. Hollywood Reporter dates the group’s Rock Hall induction to 2022.

What Comes Next for the Band

Duran Duran have stayed active. NME notes that this year they released the one-off single “Free To Love” with Rodgers and wrapped a UK and European arena run, during which The Strokes’ Nick Valensi joined them on stage in Paris. Attention had been turning to their summer 2027 plans, including their long-stated desire to play Glastonbury only in a main-stage slot.

For fans, the news is bittersweet. The Duran Duran drummer who helped shape the band’s early records and anchored its reunion is stepping away not because he wants to, but because, in his words, his body and his doctors are telling him to.

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Header image: AI-generated illustration by WordUp News.

Irma P Hall, the Texas schoolteacher who became one of American film’s most recognisable screen matriarchs, died on Tuesday, 10 November, in Dallas. She was 91. Her family announced her death and said she was surrounded by loved ones. No cause was given.

In a statement, the family called her “a beloved actress, author, poet, educator and public speaker whose contributions touched countless lives throughout her remarkable career,” adding that her “legacy of talent, dedication and compassion will continue to inspire generations to come.” Funeral and memorial details are to be announced later.

From the classroom to the screen

Hall’s path to Hollywood was an unusual one. Born Irma Dolores Player in Beaumont, Texas, on 3 June 1935, she was raised in Chicago. Her father was a saxophonist who played with big bands, and her mother was a housekeeper. She graduated from Texas College in Tyler and went on to teach English and foreign languages. Accounts differ on the details. One places her in classrooms in Houston and Dallas, another in Dallas public schools, and the length of her teaching career is given as roughly two to nearly three decades. All agree that teaching was her main job for most of her adult life.

Her acting career began almost by accident. While she was reciting a poem in Dallas, actor and director Raymond St. Jacques noticed her and cast her in his 1973 film Book of Numbers. She kept her day job for years afterwards. In 1978 she played the Ewing family’s housekeeper on the CBS series Dallas. She moved into acting full time only in the early-to-mid 1980s, when she was approaching 50.

She seemed to carry that late start lightly. “I always believed I could do whatever I wanted,” she said in a 2001 interview. “I never knew there [were things] I wasn’t supposed to be able to do because I was Black or a woman.” She also joked about her fame. “When I was doing something important like teaching school, nobody came to ask for my autograph,” she once said.

The roles that defined her

National attention came in the mid-1990s. She played the feisty Aunt T. in A Family Thing (1996), which starred Robert Duvall and James Earl Jones. Then came 1997, when she appeared as a root doctor in Clint Eastwood’s Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil and, more importantly, as the family matriarch in George Tillman Jr.’s Soul Food.

Her character in Soul Food was known as Big Mama or Mama Joe, depending on the account. She held her family together through Sunday dinners, and Hall won an NAACP Image Award for outstanding supporting actress in a motion picture. She reprised the role in the Showtime series that ran from 2000 to 2004. The character also inspired “A Song for Mama,” the Boyz II Men hit written and produced by Kenneth “Babyface” Edmonds. Hall said fans in Chicago still greeted her as Big Mama and asked for hugs.

Her screen credits include Backdraft, Beloved, Patch Adams, Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans and Tyler Perry’s Meet the Browns. In 2004 she played two very different parts. In the Coen brothers’ The Ladykillers, she was Marva Munson, the cantankerous, churchgoing widow who rents a room to a criminal played by Tom Hanks. The performance earned her a special jury prize at Cannes. The same year she played the formidable mother of Jamie Foxx’s character in Michael Mann’s Collateral. Later work included the Sundance TV series Hap and Leonard, where she played the pie-making neighbour Meemaw.

Her career was not without hardship. In January 2004, the Hollywood Reporter notes, she was in a serious car accident during a Chicago snowstorm and needed open-heart surgery to repair a punctured aorta. The following year she was inducted into the Texas Film Hall of Fame, introduced by Joel and Ethan Coen.

A legacy beyond the camera

Outside film, Hall invested in the arts community that had launched her. She helped establish the Dallas Minority Repertory Theatre, and since 2015 the Irma P. Hall Black Theatre Awards, known as “The Irmas,” have honoured excellence in theatre across the Dallas-Fort Worth area. She was also church mother at Inspiring Body of Christ church in Dallas and stayed involved in its theatre ministry. “Our beloved Church Mother, Irma P Hall, has taken her final bow on the stage of life and stepped into eternity,” pastor Rickie G Rush said.

Her only daughter, Irma Hall Crayton, summed up her mother’s two careers. “She started as a teacher in the classroom but ended up being a teacher to the world,” she said. She recalled a line her mother often repeated: “To the world you may be one person, but to one person you may be the world.”

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Stacy Keach, the American actor who moved between Shakespeare, cult comedy and pulp detective television across a six-decade career, has died at the age of 85. He died on Tuesday at his family home in Magdalenka, Poland, after what his wife described as a long battle with a serious heart condition and heart failure.

In a statement given to The Hollywood Reporter, his wife, the Polish actor Malgosia Tomassi Keach, said he “fought for so long, with extraordinary courage, determination, and strength” and called him “a true warrior.” She also described him as “my beloved husband, my companion, and the heart of our family.” Keach had suffered a heart attack onstage in Chicago in 2017, when he collapsed during a one-man show about Ernest Hemingway and the run was cancelled.

Stacy Keach and the role that defined him

For many viewers, Keach was Mike Hammer, the fedora-wearing private eye created by crime novelist Mickey Spillane. The CBS series ran from 1984 to 1987, and Keach brought the character back in a 1989 TV movie and in a later series, Mike Hammer, Private Eye, in 1997 and 1998. He played Hammer as a kind of modern-day knight, a rumpled champion of the underdog, rather than as a straightforward tough guy.

The role brought him mass popularity, but he never seemed to want a career built on one part. Keach himself acknowledged that his appetite for variety may have cost him. “My choices have had a cost attached to it,” he told New York magazine in 2012. “But I’ve gotten to play Hamlet, and Richard III, and King Lear, and I would not give that up for anything.”

A career with few straight lines

Born in Savannah, Georgia, in 1941, Keach was the son of an acting family. His father was the character actor Stacy Keach Sr. He studied English and dramatic art at the University of California, Berkeley, then went to the Yale School of Drama and, as a Fulbright scholar, the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. Back in New York he built a stage reputation, earning a Tony nomination for playing Buffalo Bill in the 1969 Broadway production of Indians. He also appeared on Broadway opposite Lee J. Cobb in King Lear.

On screen, he worked twice with director John Huston, in Fat City and The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean. He played a stoner cop in the Cheech and Chong comedies Up in Smoke and Nice Dreams, and a deranged colonel in The Ninth Configuration. He won a Golden Globe for playing Hemingway in the 1988 miniseries, for which he put on 35 pounds. Later credits included American History X, The Bourne Legacy, Alexander Payne’s Nebraska and the series Prison Break. His final role was as George Clooney’s bitter father in Jay Kelly.

Theatre honours followed. He won Helen Hayes Awards in 1991 and 1996 for Richard III and Macbeth at the Shakespeare Theatre Company, was inducted into the American Theatre Hall of Fame in 2015 and received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2019. He also worked with his brother, the actor James Keach, who survives him. The two played the James brothers and co-produced the 1980 Western The Long Riders.

The Heathrow arrest and its aftermath

The darkest chapter of the story came in 1984, while Keach was starring in Mike Hammer. He was arrested at London’s Heathrow Airport after trying to bring about 1.3 ounces of cocaine into Britain, hidden in an aerosol shaving cream can and elsewhere in his luggage. He was sentenced to nine months and served six at Reading Prison. Reports say he was held in a medium-security facility because authorities worried a more relaxed jail would give reporters too much access.

In his 2013 memoir, All in All: An Actor’s Life On and Off the Stage, he wrote that hearing the sentence felt like being kicked “with lead cleats,” calling it “the lowest moment of my life.” He recalled the experience as lonely and depressing, though he also received supportive letters from stars including Gregory Peck, Burt Reynolds, Roger Moore and Al Pacino. After his release he spoke out against drug dependency, including testifying before the US Congress, and resumed his career, with Hammer returning to screens.

Keach never reached the kind of superstardom his talent might have suggested, and he seemed at peace with that. “If a script interests me, or a character intrigues me, or the cast features someone I’ve always wanted to work with, or the location is somewhere exotic, then sign me up,” he wrote in his memoir. “I’m not going to wait for a call that may or may not come.”

Keach, who was married four times, is survived by his wife, his son Shannon, his daughter Karolina, and his brother James.

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File photo: Stacy Keach “Murder Me, Murder You” (1983 Columbia Pictures Television press photo).jpg by Columbia Pictures Television, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

The Coachella 2027 lineup is out, and its top line carries a milestone: Dua Lipa will be the first solo British woman to headline the California festival. She is joined at the top of the bill by Tame Impala and SZA, with passes going on sale on 13 November at 12pm Pacific time.

Who headlines which night

According to Deadline, the festival’s two weekends, 9-11 April and 16-18 April at the Empire Polo Club in Indio, will follow the same pattern. Dua Lipa takes Fridays, Tame Impala has Saturdays and SZA closes out Sundays. Deadline also reports that Daddy Yankee gets a bonus headlining slot in the “In The Desert” area, as does Justice, who will debut “Blinded by the Lights” in the Bunker.

The three main headliners all know the site. Tame Impala, the project of Kevin Parker, topped the bill in 2019 as the festival’s first Australian headliner. SZA appeared as a surprise guest during Justin Bieber’s headline set this year. Dua Lipa made a guest cameo during Martin Garrix’s 2017 set. Lipa and SZA also share a recent history, having both headlined Glastonbury in 2024, where Lipa brought Parker on stage during her Pyramid stage show, according to the BBC.

Madonna, Daddy Yankee and a wide-ranging bill

Below the headliners, the Coachella 2027 lineup leans on nostalgia, global pop and dance music. Madonna returns roughly two decades after her first Coachella appearance. The Guardian describes her as headlining the dance tent, and she also surprised the crowd alongside Sabrina Carpenter this year. Her album Confessions II, a sequel to her 2005 dance record, reached number one in the US and UK, the Guardian reports. The BBC adds that she had been rumoured to be heading to Glastonbury 2027 before organisers ruled it out.

Daddy Yankee makes his Coachella debut. The Independent notes he is due to become the first Latin urbano artist named artist of the year at the Latin Grammys, and that he released the concept album La Postal last month. Also on the bill are Phoebe Bridgers, Weezer, Zara Larsson, Robyn, Kehlani, Don Toliver, Steve Lacy, Måneskin, Four Tet, Underworld and Giorgio Moroder. Diljit Dosanjh returns after his 2023 appearance, when the BBC says he became the first Punjabi-language singer to play the festival.

The international mix is broad, taking in K-pop and K-pop-adjacent names such as Jisoo, NCT and Babymonster, and Becky G and Adéla. British acts include Jorja Smith, EsDeeKid, Shygirl, Lambrini Girls and Chase & Status. The Guardian also points to newer names such as Underscores, Nettspend, After and Tiffany Day.

What the milestone means

The BBC links Lipa’s headline slot to last year’s debate around Charli XCX, who played the main stage before Green Day’s set in 2025 and was photographed in a “Miss Should Be Headliner” sash. Lipa’s booking answers that conversation, though the sources do not suggest the two are directly connected.

The BBC says more than 100,000 fans are expected each day. For those who can’t make it, YouTube returns as livestream partner for both weekends, the 15th year of the arrangement, according to the Guardian. With Lipa, SZA and Parker all reported to have connections to one another, the Coachella 2027 lineup looks like a deliberately familiar lineup, but one that still manages to include a first.

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File photo: Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival 2006 Coachella festival 2006 Coachella 2006 100 2682 (140038081) by Tammy Lo from New York, NY, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.